Angels Passing

by Hurley, Graham

  ‘What death?’

  Winter gestured towards the bed again. The girl didn’t move.

  ‘His name was Bradley Finch.’ He paused. ‘Bradley Finch?’ The girl nodded.

  ‘I know Bradley. Is that why you’re here?’

  ‘Yes. Did you know him …’ Winter offered her a smile ‘… well?’

  ‘Yes, quite well.’

  ‘Did you … have a relationship?’

  ‘We were friends, yes.’

  She looked between them for a moment, then from one to the other, then sank onto the bed. She said she couldn’t believe it. How come he was dead?

  ‘I’m afraid we don’t know. That’s what we’re trying to find out.’

  ‘But …’ she frowned ‘… was it violent? Was he in trouble?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  She shook her head and studied her hands, clearly wanting this conversation to end.

  Winter sat down beside her, making himself comfortable.

  ‘Why don’t you tell me about him?’ he suggested.

  There was a long silence. The girl looked up at Sullivan, trying to make a friend of the younger man, but Sullivan didn’t return her smile. Instead, he nodded at Winter.

  ‘He asked you a question. The quicker you answer it, the quicker we’re gone.’

  Louise looked down again, then began to talk. She’d first met Bradley Finch back last summer. He used to come into the café for breakfast.

  Sullivan cocked an eye.

  ‘What was he up to? Did he ever say?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you ever ask him?’

  ‘No.’

  After a while, he’d invited her out for a drink. She didn’t like alcohol or pubs, so in the end she’d settled for a walk on the seafront.

  They’d only gone out that once. Whole weeks went by and she’d never see him in the café. Then he turned up with a couple of tickets for a reggae band. He wanted to take her and she said yes.

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘In the autumn time. It was great. I loved it.’ She smiled at the memory and at last unzipped the jacket. She had a thick patterned sweater underneath, red cable stitch zigzags on white, and for one brief second Winter was convinced that Joannie must have run it up. Her kind of pattern. Her colours.

  ‘So when did you last see him?’ he asked. ‘Bradley?’

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t remember.’ She was looking at the window, evasive again. ‘Last week sometime?’

  ‘How was he?’

  ‘Just the same as usual. Hungry. Not much money.’

  ‘Did he seem nervous at all? Depressed?’

  She thought about the question for a while, picking at the hem of the nylon bedspread.

  ‘He was always nervous,’ she said at last. ‘He was always running around, always on the move. I think that’s why he was so … you know …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘So thin.’

  ‘Did he ever offer you drugs?’

  ‘No.’ She sounded shocked.

  ‘Did he ever talk about drugs?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘What did you talk about then?’

  ‘All kinds of things. I’d talk about Africa. My family. The places I’d been. What I want to do when I’ve finished my course here.’ She was studying English at the university. Once she’d got her degree, she planned to go back to Nigeria and teach.

  Winter took the conversation back to Bradley. How much did he tell her about his own life?

  ‘Not much. I don’t think he was very happy, not in himself, not inside. I don’t think he had many friends, not people he could trust.’

  ‘No one at all?’

  ‘No. Except his nan, his mother’s mum. He said he used to stay there sometimes. When he had nowhere else to go.’

  ‘So where was he living otherwise?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘You don’t know? And you never asked him?’

  ‘No, I did ask him. But he never told me.’

  ‘Never told you much, did he?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you still liked him.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Winter nodded. She was lying – he knew it – and he didn’t need anyone to tell him what charm and patience could do. Toerags like Bradley Finch could pull a real number on someone as tasty and naive as this girl appeared to be. Look soulful enough and in the end she’d insist you screwed her.

  ‘This nan of his where he used to stay. Where did she live?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Winter made a note to phone Mrs Naylor, then glanced at Sullivan and nodded towards the girl. Your turn.

  ‘Did you ever talk on the phone?’

  ‘Not really. Maybe once or twice.’

  ‘He had a mobile?’

  She nodded but when he asked for the number she said she couldn’t remember it.

  ‘Was it pay-as-you-go or was he on a plan of some kind?’

  She shrugged. Again, she didn’t know.

  ‘Where did you write it down?’

  ‘I can’t remember. Somewhere. I don’t know.’

  There was a long silence. Winter was leaning against the chest of drawers watching the exchange, the faintest smile of approval on his face. At length Sullivan nodded at the handbag at her feet.

  ‘Do you mind?’

  Without waiting for an answer, he picked it up. Her address book was in a zipped-up compartment inside. He thumbed through it. Bradley Finch was under ‘B’, three numbers, all of them crossed out. He transferred the numbers into his own pocketbook, taking his time while the girl sat on the bed looking down at her hands.

  ‘You’ve got a mobile too?’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head.

  ‘You haven’t? How did you phone him, then?’ Sullivan tapped the list of numbers. ‘Call boxes, was it?’

  Louise shut her eyes a moment, then swallowed hard.

  ‘I lost it,’ she said at last.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Yesterday.’

  ‘How convenient.’

  Sullivan held her gaze. When she heard the scrape of wood from the chest of drawers across the room, she flinched. Winter was peering down at the contents of the top drawer.

  ‘Are these yours?’

  He held up a handful of thongs, most of them red.

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  Dawn Ellis was in the CID office at Southsea nick when the tall, lost-looking young man wandered in. For a moment, she thought it must be someone off the street who’d somehow bluffed their way past the secured entries. Then it occurred to her that he might be in the job.

  He was standing by the door, looking round. He had a scary suit on, the kind her parents had once bought her kid brother for his first interview, and the tie had a definitely Caribbean feel to it, but he had a nice face under the mop of ginger curls and plainly needed help.

  Sundays, the big office was nearly deserted. There were only two duty DCs in, and the other guy had gone out for a paper.

  ‘Who are you after?’

  Ellis was sitting at the far end of the office. He strolled down towards her.

  ‘DC Winter’s desk?’ He gestured round.

  ‘Who wants to know?’

  He stopped and extended a hand. His name was Gary Sullivan. He was down from Petersfield on the Hilsea Lines job, working from the MIR. He was paired with Winter and he’d come down to pick up a contacts book. Second drawer down. Right-hand side.

  ‘Bloody nerve.’ Ellis was amused. ‘Are you doing his laundry, too?’

  Sullivan muttered something she didn’t catch. Then he explained that Winter was banged up with the management team, Willard and his deputy, over at the MIR. They’d scored this morning with a potential witness and Winter was determined to bottom the thing out. Hence the need for the contacts book.

  He paused, eyeing the rows of desks.

  ‘He does work here, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Yeah.’

&nbs
p; ‘How well do you know him?’

  ‘Paul? Pretty well.’

  She watched Sullivan as he perched himself on the edge of the adjoining desk, trying to work out how old he was. Twenty-one? Twenty-two? At that kind of age, he wouldn’t have a prayer with Winter. Especially if he’d taken all the stuff they’d told him at training school at face value.

  ‘How are you getting on, then?’

  ‘I just told you; we got a definite result.’

  ‘I meant with Paul.’

  ‘Ah, right …’ He nodded. ‘Yeah … interesting.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said hastily. ‘It’s just … he’s a bit different, that’s all.’

  ‘You mean difficult?’

  ‘Yeah, sometimes he can be difficult. Actually, it’s not that, it’s just the way …’ he frowned ‘… he goes about things. Know what I mean?’ He paused, looking at her, trying to weigh how truthful he could afford to be. ‘Tell you the truth, the man’s an embarrassment,’ he muttered at last.

  ‘Really?’ Ellis was enjoying this conversation. There were a million ways you could describe Paul Winter’s MO but this wasn’t one of them. Bent maybe, and certainly unorthodox, but never embarrassing.

  ‘Personally, you mean?’

  ‘No. More socially.’

  ‘Socially? Are you partying together? Does he take you to pubs a lot? I thought Major Crimes was all graft and car chases?’

  Sullivan coloured slightly, then began to describe the encounter with the dead lad’s parents, up in Leigh Park. The way Winter had handled them was out of order. It didn’t matter that the bloke had a load of stolen gear. Fact was the woman had just lost her son and deserved a bit of respect. He ought to have known that. He ought to have known what something like that must feel like.

  Dawn Ellis was gazing up at him, knowing exactly the way it must be between these two very different men. Not just a generation gap, not just a culture clash, but a cosmic black hole squillions of miles wide. Winter and Sullivan were on separate planets and she wondered what on earth might ever bring them together.

  Sullivan was still banging on about the Naylors. The problem with Winter was obvious: he had no sympathy. He just couldn’t imagine what it was like to be someone else.

  Ellis shook her head. ‘You’re wrong, Gary. That’s exactly where he’s brilliant. He gets inside their heads all the time. I’ve seen him do it. That’s his skill. And there’s something else, too, you ought to know.’

  ‘Yeah?’ Sullivan had visibly stiffened. ‘What’s that then?’

  ‘He lost his missus to cancer last year, just like that.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘So he probably knows a lot more about death than you might think.’

  Willard made Winter go through it in detail. They were sitting at the conference table in Willard’s office. Sammy Rollins, the Deputy SIO, and Dave Michaels were there too, each of them making occasional notes.

  ‘Number one, she’s obviously lying,’ Winter began. ‘She lied about the mobe numbers, and it’s odds-on she lied about the relationship. She’s obviously been tucked up with Finch for months.’

  ‘Can you evidence that?’

  ‘No, not yet I can’t, but you get billing on those numbers and I bet she was yakking to Finch most of the time. Plus the thongs we seized look like a match for the one he was wearing. Right down to the lacy bits.’

  ‘What about other witnesses? These people she shares the house with?’

  ‘Students,’ Winter grunted. ‘There are three of them but we’ve only seen one so far. He recognised Finch from the mugshot. Said the bloke was round a lot, all hours.’

  ‘Boyfriend? Relationship?’

  ‘Couldn’t say.’

  ‘What about the girl on Friday night? What was she up to?’

  ‘Friday?’ Winter glanced at his notes. ‘Friday night she says she was working late at the café. When I asked how late she said nine, ten o’clock, until the place closed, but then I mentioned chummy who owns the place and said we’d obviously be checking all this out and suddenly, bang, she changes the story completely. Made a mistake. Got the wrong night. Wasn’t working at the caff at all. No. Friday night, Plan B, she leaves at half five and goes for a walk. For three hours. In the pouring fucking rain.’

  He leaned back, his hands spread wide, his case made. Even Willard was trying to suppress a smile.

  ‘Did she see Finch at all on Friday night?’

  ‘She says not.’

  ‘And you think?’

  ‘I think she’s got another problem with that memory of hers.’

  ‘But why would she be lying?’

  I dunno, boss. For starters, she’s frightened. In fact she’s shit-scared. You can see it in her face.’

  Dave Michaels was sucking his pencil. ‘Maybe she’s got a visa problem. Maybe she’s not legit. Happens all the time.’

  Willard nodded, looking at Winter.

  ‘Yeah, maybe, but it’s more than that. When I invited her down the station, she came like a lamb. She was glad to be out of there, you could tell. Plus she’d just been to church, first time in ages.’

  ‘We can’t crime her for that.’ Dave Michaels again.

  Everyone laughed except Willard. He wanted to know how Winter could be so sure about this girl’s sudden decision to go to church.

  ‘Because I asked her, boss. Don’t get me wrong; she’s a nice girl. Deep down, I think she’s honest too. In fact she must be, to lie as badly as she does.’

  ‘So why isn’t she coming across?’

  ‘Good question.’

  Winter sat back in his chair while Willard brooded. Finding the woman who might well turn out to be Bradley Finch’s girlfriend was the first major break in the inquiry. There was still no joy with the Fiat, and last night’s trawl of the area around Hilsea Lines had netted nothing more than a handful of cottaging gays, none of whom had any light to shed on Friday night’s events. Intelligence was beginning to dribble in about Finch but none of it was very surprising: small-time thief, drug dealer and general waste of space. Laying hands on someone really close to him, someone who might have a handle on the last twenty-four hours of his life, would be a significant step forward.

  Willard was looking at the pad at his elbow. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Someone had been having a go at the front door lock. Nothing heavy but the damage looked new.’

  Willard nodded. Like everyone else around the table, he was thinking Friday night. Might Finch have been in the girl’s room? Might there have been some kind of confrontation? Him and the girl? Someone else with a grudge? He frowned, bending to his pad again, checking each of the trophies that Winter had brought back from Margate Road.

  Twenty years in the job had enabled Willard to turn scepticism into a fine art. He had little taste for wild theorising and absolutely no time for hunches. Nothing was real until he could stand it up in court. This painstaking determination to test every link in the evidential chain had served him well but younger men sometimes found his lack of visible enthusiasm deeply dispiriting. Not that they were ever silly enough to confuse wariness with indecision.

  ‘OK.’ He looked up. ‘Here’s what we do.’

  Faraday was back home in the kitchen, wondering what to sort out for lunch, when J-J finally appeared. He was wearing an old khaki sweater he must have picked up in an army surplus store and a pair of Asterix boxer shorts. His toes curled up on the cold tiles and he was hugging himself for warmth.

  ‘Hungry?’ Faraday signed.

  He shook his head and disappeared again. Half a minute later he was back with a bag of shag tobacco and a packet of Rizlas. Faraday watched while he rolled himself a cigarette. He’d obviously been doing this for some time.

  ‘You smoke a lot?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  Faraday nodded and turned away, determined not to be provoked into a row. J-J was doing this on purpose, he knew he was. He was staking out turf, testing his father’s lim
its. I’m my own person now, he was saying. And I’ll do what I bloody well like.

  The harsh, acrid tang of the roll-up pursued Faraday around the house. He prowled from room to room, trying to tell himself that the boy deserved a bit of space, a bit of freedom. It was his house as well as Faraday’s. That had been the deal from the very start, from the morning all those years ago when Faraday had opened the airmail letter from Seattle to find a cheque for $200,000 from Janna’s parents.

  Judy and Frank had come across for the funeral, staying long enough to realise that Faraday would never be able to cope alone with his infant son, not if he wanted to stay in the police. A probationer’s pay might stretch to a deposit on a mortgage but it sure as hell wouldn’t buy the kind of childcare he’d need if he was to hang onto the job. And so, with their money, Faraday had bought the house by the harbour, using the rest to secure a nanny for J-J, and in the regular correspondence he’d maintained with his in-laws ever since, he’d always made a point of joint ownership. Our house. Our view. Our good fortune.

  Now, though, for reasons Faraday didn’t fully understand, it felt very different. Between them, he and J-J had weathered a childhood that could have been disastrous. They’d built a relationship baggy enough to hold them both. They’d been friends, good buddies, as well as father and son. Faraday had never bothered to find himself another partner because – in the shape of J-J – he already had one. Then, as he should, J-J had moved away and led a life of his own. At the time it had left a big, big hole in Faraday’s life and for a while he hadn’t known quite what to do with himself. But then Ruth had come along, and now Marta, and Faraday had made the necessary adjustments. Indeed, in modest and quite surprising ways, he’d been extremely happy. Now this.

  Downstairs, J-J had switched on the television. He seemed to have hit the wrong button on the remote because the volume was way up, a fact that would be lost on him because he was deaf. Unless, of course, he’d done it on purpose. Faraday did his best to fight this suspicion. It was unworthy. It was needless. It was winding him up. Then his patience snapped and he went downstairs again. The big lounge, with its huge views of the harbour, already smelt like a prison cell. J-J was sprawled on the sofa, tapping ash into a mug. Of all the programmes he might have chosen, he’d settled for a game show.

  Faraday retrieved the remote and killed the sound. J-J didn’t move.