Angels Passing

by Hurley, Graham

  ‘Single.’

  ‘And he’s been sharing a house with a vulnerable ten-year-old who’s run away from home? How appropriate is that, sir?’

  It was a direct challenge. The Paedophile Unit operated from the same suite of offices as the CPU at Netley. These guys were tuned into the slightest nuance as far as kids were concerned and the key word here was ‘vulnerable’.

  ‘This boy is a force of nature.’ Faraday felt his head beginning to thump again. ‘If anyone needs protecting, it’s probably the rest of us.’

  ‘They all say that, sir.’

  ‘Who’s “they”?’

  ‘People in these kinds of situations. Don’t get me wrong, sir. You’re telling me that the child has been kipping under the same roof as a virtual stranger. I’m just asking whether that’s the kind of situation we should have been tolerating.’

  ‘I think he’s ideal,’ Faraday grunted. ‘More than that, I think we’re lucky to have him.’

  ‘We? You mean the child, surely.’

  ‘No. I mean we.’

  Faraday glanced at his watch. The DS at Netley would be bringing a specialist PC up to Havant to handle the interview with Doodie. He wanted at least half an hour for a proper brief.

  ‘Better make that ten’o clock then,’ Faraday said.

  It took Winter several seconds to realise that no one had told Louise Abeka about Kenny Foster. They were back in the interview room at Central, Sullivan nursing a hangover after a piss-up following rugby training. Louise sat across the table, visibly anxious, her solicitor at her elbow. She must have spent her night banged up in the cells wondering how long she’d get for Perverting the Course of Justice, thought Winter. And here’s little me, Mr Sunshine, about to change her life. Again.

  He started the cassettes rolling and announced the time. He tallied the names around the table and then bent forward.

  ‘I’m going to have to ask you again,’ he began, ‘about last week.’

  Louise flinched, then shook her head. There was no way she was going to change her mind. Not now. Not ever.

  ‘There’s nothing we can say to you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’re sure about that?’

  She closed her eyes, swallowed hard, then nodded.

  ‘I am,’ she said. ‘I don’t care what happens, but I am.’

  ‘Then he must have done something terrible, mustn’t he, this Kenny Foster? Isn’t that a reasonable assumption?’

  Hartley Crewdson leaned forward to intervene. Winter reached out, putting a hand on his arm. He was still looking at Louise.

  ‘Suppose I was to tell you that Foster’s dead?’ he said softly. ‘Suppose someone came along last night and killed him?’

  Something happened in her eyes, a tiny spark. Winter could see it. Just the thought of Foster gone had lit a fire in Louise Abeka.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Her voice was so low he could barely hear it.

  Winter told her what had happened, nodding in confirmation when Crewdson raised an eyebrow. There was a long silence. Then Louise beckoned her solicitor closer and whispered in his ear. Crewdson nodded and got to his feet.

  ‘May I suggest we suspend the interview?’ He nodded down at the cassette decks. ‘My client would appreciate a word in private.’

  Doodie and the social worker were already at the Child Interview Suite when Faraday arrived. There was a waiting room downstairs with a couple of armchairs and a low table, and the social worker had sensibly planted herself between Doodie and the front door.

  Doodie had been found a change of clothes overnight. The jeans and sweatshirt were at least two sizes too big and made him look like a badly wrapped parcel. He sat sideways across the armchair, kicking his legs, and the moment he spotted Faraday he was up on his feet. An old friend. A familiar face.

  ‘Mister! What you doing here?’

  Faraday explained he was a policeman, a detective.

  ‘Why’s that, then?’

  In spite of the state of his head, Faraday couldn’t resist a smile. It was the sanest question he’d heard in weeks.

  Upstairs, he found the DS and the PC from the Child Protection Unit. The PC looked about eighteen – open unlined face, ready smile – and Faraday sensed at once that Doodie would eat him alive.

  ‘Right.’ Faraday unpacked his briefcase. ‘First things first.’

  He went through the events of the last week, adding to the CPU file. Every indication suggested that Doodie had been living rough for large parts of the last couple of years. He was tough and he was streetwise, but above all he seemed totally oblivious of the linkage between cause and effect, between his own impetuous charge at life and the trail of damage he left behind him. His file record could never do justice to what he’d really been up to. Undoubtedly there’d been dozens of other occasions when he’d broken the law but the only incident that really mattered just now was the death of the young girl, Helen Bassam. According to one witness, Doodie had been with her before she fell. A video camera had caught his departure from the flats. This morning’s task was to shed light on the half-hour or so in between.

  ‘You say she fell, sir.’ It was the PC. ‘Is there a suggestion the lad was involved?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘But you think it might be possible?’

  It was a good question and Faraday hesitated before answering it, remembering the little figure skipping along the parapet last night. Say the boy had tried to push past him and Faraday had lost his balance and fallen? Say he’d given him a playful push just for a joke? Did that qualify as murder? Or a kid’s game with some terrifying photographic evidence at the end of it?

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said at last. ‘I just want to establish the facts.’

  The DS leaned forward. DI Faraday ought to be aware that there were rules here, procedures that would constrain the interview. Everything would be videotaped for subsequent use in court. Leading questions were strictly off-limits. The child would be encouraged to explain exactly what had happened, and there was scope for clarification if it wasn’t clear what he really meant, but beyond that the interviewing PC’s hands were tied by the Rules of Evidence. In these matters, the judge would have ultimate discretion. Not the CPU. Not the DS. Not Faraday.

  Faraday nodded. It was the standard health warning. The interview itself would take place in the room in which they were sitting. There was a sofa against one wall and a couple of sturdy armchairs. A trio of teddy bears occupied one corner of the window sill and soft-focus pictures of country life hung in a line above the sofa. Looking at them, Faraday wondered what Doodie would make of this adult bid to put him at his ease. The two wall-mounted video cameras would be much more his style, he thought. Another chance to perform. Another opportunity to put his tiny hands around the world’s throat.

  ‘OK, then?’ He glanced at his watch. ‘We go for it?’

  Convinced by her solicitor that Winter hadn’t been lying about Kenny Foster, Louise Abeka at last opened up.

  Last week had begun badly. Stopped by the police, Bradley had given them Foster’s name and address.

  ‘Were you in the car?’

  ‘No. Bradley told me later when he came to the café. He said he’d done it as a joke. Foster’ – she shivered – ‘he went mad.’

  ‘Mad how?’

  ‘He kept phoning Bradley up, lots and lots, day and night, about what he was going to do to him.’

  ‘But Bradley didn’t have a phone. His mobile had been cut off.’

  ‘I’d given him mine. I didn’t want it any more because Foster had the number and kept phoning me.’

  Winter glanced at Sullivan and nodded down at his pad. All those calls to Louise’s mobile. Not for her at all but Bradley Finch.

  ‘What was he saying? Foster?’

  ‘He was telling Bradley he was in for trouble. There was stuff about a camera, too. Bradley had borrowed it from another friend.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘I don�
��t know his real name. He called him Tosh. He used to work with him sometimes but something bad had happened. Bradley hated him. He wanted to get back at him. I don’t know why.’

  ‘And when was this?’

  ‘Last week. Just before it happened.’

  Winter was thinking about the phone call he’d taken on his mobile, the tip that had sent them all scuttling round to Brennan’s. He’d known it had been Finch since he’d heard the boy’s voice on his nan’s answerphone but now he had a name for the guy who’d never turned up the night they’d staked out the Superstore. Tosh Harris. Had to be. Realising he’d been grassed up, he’d called the job off. Yet another reason for Bradley Finch to end up on Hilsea Lines.

  ‘What about this camera, then?’

  ‘Foster wanted it back. So did this Tosh man. Bradley wouldn’t let them have it.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ She paused, biting her lip. ‘Sometimes I think it was for me, to impress me, you know, that he didn’t care about Foster but that wasn’t true. He kept telling me it was all a joke but I knew he was frightened.’

  Friday came and Finch appeared at the café just after lunch.

  ‘He’d hurt himself,’ Louise said. ‘He’d hurt his foot. He had a really bad limp.’

  ‘How did that happen?’

  ‘He’d been in some cinema, a place that was all boarded up. He said it was dark in there and really spooky.’

  ‘What was he doing in there?’

  ‘He didn’t say but he’d trodden on a nail or something, a piece of wood with a nail maybe, and the nail had gone right into his foot.’

  ‘He was bleeding?’

  ‘Still a little bit, yes. He took the shoe off and showed me. There was blood on his sock, everywhere.’

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘I told him to go home to my place and wash it properly. Maybe go to the hospital for a jab. Those things can be dangerous.’

  ‘He went back to your place to sort out his foot? In the bathroom? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘That’s what he did.’

  Winter was grinning. Better and better, he thought. Of course the blood in Louise’s bathroom was Finch’s. Because he’d washed his injured foot in her sink and hadn’t bothered with the stains round the splashback. Hence the traces of blood for the Scenes of Crime boys.

  ‘So where are we time-wise?’ Winter queried. ‘Friday afternoon?’

  Louise nodded.

  ‘Bradley came back to the café afterwards and I made him some toast. Then he said there was something he had to do. He wanted to meet me when I’d finished work. He said he’d come and pick me up.’

  ‘And he did?’

  ‘About six o’clock.’ She nodded. ‘I’d almost given up but he did come. We went for a drink and I was really surprised.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He had so much money. He showed it to me. So much money.’

  ‘Where did he get it from?’

  ‘He wouldn’t say. It was just a job he’d done.’

  ‘Did he mention the camera at all?’

  ‘No.’ She hesitated. ‘You think …?’

  Winter nodded.

  ‘He sold it,’ he said. ‘To a bloke down Fawcett Road. That would have been the same camera Foster was on about. Not a clever thing to do.’

  Louise was studying her hands. Sullivan reached across to comfort her and it took a moment for Winter to realise that she was crying.

  ‘You want to stop this? Take a break?’ It was Sullivan. She looked up and shook her head. Her eyes were shiny with tears.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘You need to know the rest.’

  Faraday was monitoring the interview with Doodie from the tiny windowless control room at the back of the upper floor. Pictures from the two cameras appeared on monitor screens and the DS would cut them into a single sequence for presentation in court. On one screen, in a wide shot, Doodie sat in the armchair, his feet dangling above the carpet. On the other, a close-up jerked left and right as the DS struggled to keep his head in the frame. The kid never stopped moving. Not in real life. And certainly not here.

  The PC was doing his best to coax some kind of story from the chaos of Doodie’s memory. Yes, he remembered Helen Bassam. Yes, he’d knocked about with her and some of her mates. Yes, she’d been inside the cinema. And yes, that Thursday night they’d both gone up to the old lady’s flat in Chuzzlewit House.

  ‘Tell me what time that was.’

  ‘Dunno. Late.’

  ‘Very late?’

  ‘Dunno.’

  Faraday was watching the wide shot, fascinated by Doodie’s body language. Every question, every answer, produced a little kick. He wriggled too, the way Faraday remembered J-J wriggling as a baby: always looking for the comfiest spot, never content with what he found.

  ‘Tell me about Helen.’

  ‘What you want to know?’

  ‘Was she happy? Sad?’

  ‘Sad, yeah, sad.’

  ‘Why was that?’

  ‘I dunno. She was always sad except when she had the drink and stuff.’

  ‘What drink?’

  ‘Drink we’d nick off the old lady. All sorts. Vodka. Gin. That Martini stuff. All sorts.’

  ‘You went up there a lot?’

  ‘Yeah. I hid most of the time. The old lady was in bed.’

  ‘And you drank, too?’

  ‘Not much.’ He pulled a face. ‘Didn’t fancy it. She put sugar in for me once but it was still horrible.’

  ‘Who did?’

  ‘Helen.’

  There was a pause and Faraday wondered whether the PC was looking at his notes. Then he cleared his throat and began again, as patient as ever. He wanted to know about medicine. Had Doodie ever seen tablets in the old lady’s flat?

  ‘Them tablets, yeah.’ He was grinning again. ‘That night she had loads.’

  ‘Helen?’

  ‘Yeah. She was pissed too, know what I mean? I sees her take them. Then she said about the roof.’

  ‘She said what about the roof?’

  ‘She said she wanted me to take her up there. I’d told her, like. I used to go up there loads. She wanted to come with me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Dunno.’ He shrugged, arms wide, the picture of innocence. They’d left the flat and taken the stairs up to the roof. Doodie had the old lady’s key. It was terrible weather, raining, and they’d got really soaked.

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘She said she wanted to do what I did.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Get up, like. Up on the top of the wall thing.’

  ‘And you helped her?’

  Faraday felt the DS beginning to twitch. There was a very fine line between inviting an open account and leading a witness, and the PC was beginning to stray across it. Given the circumstances, Faraday didn’t blame him.

  Doodie was on his feet now, dancing around in front of the chair, mugging for the camera. When the PC asked him to sit down he just laughed.

  ‘She got up, like this and this, up the wall.’ He started to mime the girl’s climb. ‘It was really hard for her.’

  ‘Did you help her?’

  ‘I did at first. But then I couldn’t reach no more. She was just hanging on, like this.’ His little hands grabbed at an imaginary grille. ‘And then she started climbing up again.’

  ‘Was she saying anything?’

  ‘Dunno.’

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘She got to the top, yeah, down flat … like this.’ Doodie threw himself full length onto the back of the sofa. This time the PC didn’t try and coax him into the armchair. Far more important was where this story was leading.

  ‘And?’ he said.

  Doodie peered up at the camera, peekaboo, the same cartoon grin. Then, very slowly, he rolled off the back of the sofa and disappeared.

  Faraday watched him, knowing that this was the truth, sick
ened by the evidence in front of his eyes. He’d been wrong all the time – wrong to imagine the girl standing there in the windy darkness, wrong to put thoughts in her head, wrong to visualise her arms spread wide – trying to garnish those final moments with a little grace, a little dignity. No, the boy Doodie had seen it all and this was the way it had really been. Helen Bassam, pissed out of her head, numbed with morphine, sick of life, had simply rolled into oblivion. End of story.

  Faraday touched the DS lightly on the arm.

  ‘We need a break,’ he said softly.

  There was no need any longer to prompt Louise Abeka. She and Bradley had driven to the off-licence with Bradley’s money. He’d bought champagne and a bottle of something else for his nan. They’d dropped it off on the way back to Margate Road. And then they’d gone home to celebrate.

  ‘Yeah?’

  To Winter, this was like hearing someone describe a movie he’d seen. The thin figure in black limping across the road. And the missing minutes on the video coverage when he thought he’d lost them.

  ‘You drank all the champagne?’

  ‘Yes. Bradley had most of it.’

  ‘How long did all that take?’

  ‘I don’t know. We were in bed.’

  Winter paused. He had the billing from Foster’s phone on the pad at his elbow. Two calls, one at 21.20, another – briefer – at 22.12.

  ‘Did the phone go at all?’

  ‘Yes. Twice.’

  ‘Who was it?’

  ‘Foster. Bradley spoke to him. He was really silly, really rude. He called Foster all kinds of horrible names but he said it didn’t matter because Foster didn’t know where he was. The second time I took the phone away from him. Switched it off.’

  ‘And later?’

  ‘He was just standing there.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Foster. He was standing by the bed. I must have been asleep. We both were. It was …’ She shook her head, her eyes beginning to glisten.

  Crewdson produced a handkerchief and did his best to comfort her. Even Sullivan extended a sympathetic hand. At length Winter began again. He wanted to know how Foster had got in.

  Louise blew her nose.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she whispered. ‘It all went mad.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Foster just ripped off all the blankets, the sheets, everything.’