Watching the Dark (Inspector Banks Mystery)

by Robinson, Peter

  Banks glanced at his watch. Time to head back to Eastvale so he could check on developments there before the end of the day.

  Chapter 6

  On Tuesday morning, Banks was in his office early again, and this time the first to knock on his door was an excited Gerry Masterson brandishing a sheaf of papers, her wavy red hair cascading over her shoulders in all its pre-Raphaelite glory.

  ‘It’s not that there haven’t been a few crimes involving the use of crossbows,’ she began before even sitting down, ‘but nearly all of them are domestic, or they involve some nutter going on a spree and either getting caught or killed.’

  ‘And the ones that aren’t?’

  ‘That’s what’s interesting. I looked for a pattern.’

  ‘And did you find one?’

  ‘I found three unsolved murders overseas involving the use of a crossbow – same make of bolt used as in the Quinn killing, too, by the way – all in one way or another connected with the world of people-trafficking and illegal immigration.’

  ‘Now that’s interesting,’ said Banks, taking another sip of coffee. Masterson had brought her own mug with her.

  ‘I thought so. There was one in Vilnius, that’s in Lithuania, one in Amsterdam, and one in Marseilles.’

  ‘How hard is it to get a crossbow across European borders?’

  ‘Not very,’ said Masterson. ‘You probably wouldn’t want to carry one on a plane, but you could take it apart and put it in with your checked luggage. Or why not just buy a new one in each country, if you’re paranoid about getting searched? It’s not as if you need a permit or anything. However you look at it, it’s a lot less trouble than a gun.’

  ‘True enough,’ said Banks. ‘The victims?’

  ‘Not known to us, sir, but with definite Interpol profiles. In all cases the conclusion was that the victims were either skimming the profits or about to blow the whistle on a lucrative people-trafficking route, usually connected with Eastern Europe.’

  ‘I don’t suppose any suspects’ names cropped up, did they?’

  ‘Afraid not, sir.’

  ‘Pity. You said overseas. What about in this country?’

  ‘I was just getting to that, sir. We’ve had two over the past three years: a gangmaster in South Shields, and a hoodie on a housing estate in Stockton-on-Tees. Both unsolved. The gangmaster was connected with illegals, and local intelligence suggests that the hoodie was attempting to break into the loan-sharking business on his own.’

  ‘Interesting,’ said Banks. ‘So we’ve got some sort of enforcer for the people-trafficking and loan-sharking business?’

  ‘It seems that way, sir.’

  ‘Any links to Corrigan?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘OK. Do we have any idea who this bowman works for?’

  ‘No, sir. I suppose it could be just one person, some sort of crime kingpin who employs him when he’s needed. Or he might be for hire. A freelance.’

  ‘Hmm. Anything more on the car?’

  ‘I checked with the local rental agencies. There was a Ford Focus with similar cross-hatching on the front left tyre, the same shade of green paint as the scraping we found, rented from Hertz in Leeds last Wednesday and returned on Friday.’

  ‘Details?’

  ‘Arnold Briggs, address in South London. UK driving licence. But it’s all fake, sir. I checked. There’s no such address.’

  ‘I suppose if these people can forge passports and work visas, they can forge driving licences, too. So whoever Arnold Briggs is, he’s long gone?’

  ‘Afraid so, sir.’ Her expression brightened. ‘But the car hasn’t been rented out again. It’s been cleaned, of course, but forensics might still find something, mightn’t they?’

  ‘Indeed they might,’ said Banks. ‘It’s worth a try, at any rate. Get on to them and—’

  ‘I’ve already talked to DS Nowak, sir.’ DC Masterson flushed slightly as she spoke Nowak’s name. ‘I took the liberty. I hope you don’t mind. He says he’s on it. This does get us forward a little bit, doesn’t it?’

  Banks admired her enthusiasm, and he didn’t want to dampen it. ‘Yes, it certainly does,’ he said. ‘That’s good work, Gerry. You showed initiative. Let’s go through what we know, or suspect, point by point.’ He counted off on his fingers. ‘One: the same car was at both crime scenes. The methods of killing were different, so maybe there are two killers. Two: Quinn and the victim at the farm had spoken twice on the telephone shortly before their murders. Three: we think the victim at the farm was also a victim of some sort of migrant labour scam. Four: Quinn had in his possession a number of photographs of himself in a compromising position with a young woman, most likely taken six years ago in Tallinn. Five: Quinn was briefly involved in investigating the disappearance of Rachel Hewitt, also in Tallinn, at that time. Six: Warren Corrigan, on the surface a petty loan shark, is connected with Roderick Flinders, owner of Rod’s Staff Ltd, a front for migrant and illegal labour scams. Seven: Bill Quinn was involved in the investigation of said Corrigan. Have I missed anything? I’m running out of fingers. Yes. Eight: There were rumours of a bent copper, possibly Quinn, and possibly through blackmail. It’s all giving me a headache.’

  ‘Arnold Briggs was the fake name of the person who rented the car,’ said Masterson. ‘It’s not that easy to kill. I think it would be a bit unbelievable, not to mention too much of a coincidence, if there were two different killers, sir.’

  ‘Good point. Now, what could Bill Quinn possibly have in common with the Garskill Farm victim, a migrant worker?’

  ‘Unless he wasn’t a migrant worker, sir,’ said Masterson. ‘You said yourself he didn’t have the hands of a manual labourer. What if he was an informant, or even an undercover police officer?’

  ‘Possible,’ said Banks. ‘But I’m certain Ken Blackstone or Nick Gwillam would have brought it up, if he was Quinn’s informant. But it’s an interesting thought. Perhaps our man was at the farm under false pretences. Either that or he got all the soft jobs.’

  ‘Maybe West Yorkshire didn’t know, sir? Not if he was an undercover officer from Poland or Estonia or somewhere.’

  ‘Maybe you’re right, at that,’ Banks agreed. ‘One of the numbers called from the telephone box in Ingleby was an Estonian mobile. Again, though, it’s bloody untraceable. Annie’s tried ringing it, but there’s no answer.’

  ‘Just the sort of phone an undercover officer might have, or his controller,’ said DC Masterson. ‘A throw-away?’

  As Banks thought over what Masterson had just told him, there came another knock at his door. When Annie and Joanna Passero walked in, the office started to feel crowded.

  ‘What is it?’ Banks asked.

  ‘I just got a call from a woman who says she knows the Garskill Farm victim,’ said Annie. ‘She recognised his photo in the paper this morning.’

  ‘Why didn’t she call before?’ Banks said. ‘It’s been all over the papers and TV for the past two days.’

  ‘Says she’s been away on some sort of retreat.’

  ‘Religious?’

  ‘Dunno.’

  ‘You think she’s genuine?’

  Annie rolled her eyes. ‘We’ve had a few cranks. I think I can tell the difference. Yes, I think she’s genuine.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Anyway,’ Annie went on, ‘she’s in Manchester, but she says she’s willing to drive over now and identify the body, tell us all she knows. She was upset, naturally, and I offered to arrange a car for her, but she said she could manage it by herself.’

  ‘What’s her name?’

  ‘Merike. Merike Noormets. And according to her, the victim’s name was Mihkel Lepikson. She said he was her boyfriend.’

  ‘Dutch? German? Scandinavian?’

  Annie grinned. ‘Wrong, sir. Estonian. Both of them.’

  ‘My, my,’ said Banks, rubbing his hands together. ‘This is starting to get interesting, isn’t it?’

  Before Merike Noormets arrived,
Banks and Annie agreed that they would interview her together, preferably in a more congenial environment outside the police station, after she had identified Mihkel Lepikson’s body down at the mortuary. But they hadn’t reckoned with Joanna Passero, who claimed that she couldn’t be excluded from this interview because it impacted directly on the Quinn case. She actually said ‘impacted’. Banks cringed, but there was nothing he could do except let her come along under sufferance. She would only go crying to Superintendent Gervaise if he didn’t. Having three people present, four including Merike Noormets herself, would be a bit of an overload, but Banks trusted that Annie knew when to keep quiet and take notes, and he stressed to Joanna that she was present only to observe. He would do most of the talking. She didn’t like it, clearly didn’t like any of it, but she grudgingly agreed. Annie seemed rather more sympathetic to Joanna’s predicament than Banks, but then she had worked for Professional Standards herself.

  Merike Noormets was an attractive woman in her early thirties, with hennaed hair and a couple of minor piercings, wearing jeans, and a light yellow cotton jacket over an embroidered Indian-style top of some kind. She also carried a stitched leather shoulder bag. She looked a bit hippy-ish to Banks. She had clearly been crying when Annie and Joanna brought her up from the basement of Eastvale General Infirmary.

  Banks had waited for them outside in his car, feeling that he had no need to see the man’s body again. The rain that had threatened yesterday afternoon had started during the night and was still falling. With it, a cold front had moved in, and the temperature had dropped considerably.

  The identification was positive, Annie told him, and now they could get in touch with the parents back home in Tallinn and arrange for them to come over. As soon as the three women had piled into the Porsche, Banks headed out of town. It was a Tuesday lunchtime in late April, so a lot of country pubs and restaurants would probably be closed, but he knew he could depend on the Blue Lion in East Witton.

  It was very much a silent journey from the Eastvale mortuary. Banks concentrated on his driving and listened to the lovely strains of ‘The Lark Ascending’ and ‘Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis’. He thought the music might help sooth Merike Noormets and relax her enough to make her open up.

  All the parking spots in front of the pub were taken, so Banks parked opposite the long village green, and they walked back over the road to the rambling old building. Merike smoked a cigarette on the way and got through about a third of it before they went inside and found a table in the bar. The menu was chalked on a blackboard over the enormous fireplace. Rain dotted the windows. A few logs burned in the hearth and threw out more than enough heat to compensate for the weather outside. The starters were written on another blackboard over the bar, and to read all that was on offer would have taken all day. Merike said she would like a glass of white wine, and Banks was unable to resist a pint of Black Sheep, but the other two stuck to diet bitter lemon. Annie because of her medication, Banks supposed, and Joanna Passero just to show him up. He bet she was making a note, too: ‘DCI Banks drinking on duty, during interview of important witness.’ Well, screw her. Banks knew how to interview an important witness, and it wasn’t in a dingy interview room smelling of stale sweat and fear with a styrofoam cup of canteen coffee in front of you. Especially a witness who had just come from identifying her boyfriend’s body.

  Merike pushed her hair out of her eyes, pale green flecked with amber, Banks noticed. For some reason he thought of the Jimi Hendrix song ‘Gypsy Eyes’, though she was hardly a Gypsy, and they were hardly gypsy eyes. There had to be some connection somewhere in his mind, but, as so often these days, he couldn’t grasp it. Maybe there was a hint of wildness about her that chimed with the music, he thought; perhaps she had a gypsy soul, whatever that was.

  When the landlord came around to take their orders, Merike said she wasn’t hungry. The other three ordered. Banks went for his favourite, smoked haddock with a poached egg, leeks, mushrooms and Gruyère cheese.

  ‘I suppose you want me to tell you everything I know?’ said Merike, with a hint of irony. Her husky voice was only slightly accented. If she was in her early thirties, Banks calculated, she would have been in her teens when Estonia won its independence from the Soviet Bloc. Old enough to remember life under the old regime. He found himself wondering what her childhood had been like.

  ‘Not everything,’ he said. ‘Just what you can. First, I’d like to thank you for coming forward and getting in touch.’

  Merike seemed surprised. ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

  ‘Not everyone does. That’s all. Sometimes people just don’t want to get involved.’

  Merike shrugged. ‘It was such a shock, seeing Mihkel’s photograph in the newspaper like that.’

  ‘What was your relationship with him?’

  ‘I suppose he was my boyfriend. My partner. My lover. I don’t know. With Mihkel it was always difficult.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He is the kind of person who comes and goes in your life. Sometimes he disappears for weeks, or months. At first, it used to drive me crazy, because he would tell me nothing, but now he tells – he told me – a little more, and we talk on the telephone.’

  ‘When did you last talk?’

  ‘On Tuesday. Tuesday evening, at about nine o’clock.’

  Banks searched for a sheet of paper in his brief case and showed it to Merike, pointing to a number. ‘Is this yours?’

  ‘Yes, it’s my mobile number. It’s a pay-as-you-go I use when I’m over here. Cheap phone, occasional top-ups.’

  ‘Did you and Mihkel live together?’

  ‘No. I travel also, for my job, and we are never in the same place together for long enough. It would be too complicated.’

  ‘How long have you been seeing each other?’

  ‘Three years now.’

  ‘What are you doing in Manchester?’

  ‘I work as a translator. I’m on a two-week course at the university there. Almost finished.’ She glanced at Annie. ‘I just returned from a weekend retreat in the Lakes, and I haven’t seen any newspapers or television from Friday until this morning. Part of the course. It was beautiful. Much more grand than our Estonian lakes. But it rained a lot.’

  ‘It always does in the Lake District,’ said Banks. ‘Your English is excellent, by the way.’

  ‘Thank you. I lived in London for many years, in my twenties.’

  ‘Do you speak any other languages?’

  ‘German,’ Merike said, ‘Finnish, Russian, French and a little Spanish. I’m learning Italian. When you grow up in a small country like Estonia, you soon realise that nobody from anywhere else is going to understand you unless you speak their language. Who learns Estonian except Estonians?’

  Who, indeed? Banks thought. He hadn’t even known Estonia had a language of its own. He had assumed they spoke Russian there, or perhaps some version of Polish. But languages were not Banks’s strong point. ‘Was Mihkel a translator, too?’

  ‘Mihkel? Oh, no. His English was very good, but he was no linguist. It seems so strange to be talking about him in the past tense. I must get used to it.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Banks.

  ‘Mihkel knew the risks.’

  ‘What risks? What was he doing at Garskill Farm?’

  ‘Is that where he was when it happened? I don’t know it. I had no idea where he was, except that he was somewhere in England. It seemed so strange to be in the same country and not be able to meet. I couldn’t even telephone him. I had to wait for him to ring me.’

  ‘Mihkel phoned you from a public telephone box in Ingleby,’ said Banks. ‘It’s the nearest village to where he was found. It was about two miles away from where he was staying.’

  Merike smiled sadly. ‘Mihkel walked four miles just to talk to me? I would never have thought it of him.’

  Annie gave Banks a sharp sideways glance. He knew that she was hoping he wouldn’t spoil Merike’s illusion by telling her that she w
asn’t the only reason Mihkel had walked all that way to the telephone. ‘Do you know what he was doing there?’ he asked.

  ‘He was on an assignment. Mihkel was a journalist. He specialised in investigative reporting. He was freelance, but he worked mostly for a weekly newspaper called Eesti Telegraaf. They specialise in the sort of articles he liked to write.’

  ‘What were they?’

  ‘In depth, usually about crime. He also contributed sometimes to a weekly column called “Pimeduse varjus”. In English it means “in the shadow of darkness”. Very sinister. The idea is looking into the darkness. Watching. It’s also about crime.’

  ‘Watching the dark,’ said Banks.

  Merike flashed him a brief smile. ‘Ah, so you like Richard Thompson?’

  ‘Yes, I do. Very much.’

  ‘I like that,’ she said. ‘A policeman who admires Richard Thompson.’

  ‘His father was a Scotland Yard detective,’ Banks said. ‘And a lot of his songs are about murders.’

  ‘I didn’t know that. About his father, I mean.’

  ‘My own son’s a musician,’ Banks went on, unable to stop himself, now he felt he was bringing her out of herself a bit, and enjoying the way the gypsy eyes were seeing him in a new light, not just as some faceless authority figure. ‘He’s in a group called The Blue Lamps.’

  ‘But I know them!’ said Merike. ‘Their new CD is wonderful. The best they have ever done.’

  ‘Brian will be pleased to hear that.’ Banks felt proud, but he could tell from the waves of impatience emanating from Joanna Passero that she wanted him to get the interview back on track. It was one reason he hadn’t wanted her around. She didn’t understand how important it was to find some common ground with the interviewee, to forge a bond. She was used to interviewing dirty cops, where there was never any possibility of her creating a link because it was an adverse situation from the outset. Annie had been more impatient and aggressive in her interview techniques at first, when she had come from Professional Standards, despite the courses she had taken, but she had learned over the years since then. She knew how Banks operated.