Backlash

by Nick Oldham

  Franklands had been right. They were definitely police. One of them, the thinner one, flashed his badge and warrant card. At first Higgins remained firm until the cop stood nose to nose with him and demanded to come in then he backed down.

  The cop looked tired, mean and irritable, itching to punch someone in the jaw. Though he was of a smaller build than Higgins, who was a towering shit-house of a bloke, he came over as being harder and tougher and, backed up by the beefier, more filled-out guy with a crew-cut, they made a formidable pair. People would only mess with them at their peril.

  They brushed cockily past Higgins, who eyed them dangerously, and entered the hotel through the glass doors.

  Franklands was on the verge of wetting himself.

  ‘I don’t know what this will achieve,’ Donaldson whispered to Henry as they approached the reception desk.

  ‘Nor do I, but it’ll be fun while it lasts.’

  ‘Female’ was not a completely apt description of the woman behind reception. She looked more like a man on a building site only with breasts and the irony was not lost on Henry. He knew right-wingers hated men who dressed up like women, but, almost by default, they had got one living among them.

  She was as big as Higgins, and not much better looking. Her blonde head was shaved (another irony, Henry thought, these people seemed to mirror the ones they despised) and each ear had a cluster of gold and silver studs fixed to its outer perimeter. She wore a low-cut T-shirt, tight fitting so her bulges were not disguised. Her tattoos were numerous, with the obligatory ‘CUT HERE’ on a blue dotted line across her throat (I wish, Henry thought), down to the ‘love’ and ‘hate’ across her knuckles. The best visible tattoo, though, was Adolf Hitler’s face on the downward slope of her huge left breast, and a woman’s face on the other. Henry assumed it was supposed to be Eva Braun but did not know enough about German history to recognise her.

  Trying to prevent himself from cracking into laughter, the first chuckle he would have had in a while, Henry dug out his badge and warrant card again, both housed in a natty leather wallet, and said, ‘DI Christie, Blackpool Central.’ He thumbed to his companion. ‘This is my colleague, Karl Donaldson.’

  ‘And to what do I owe the pleasure?’ she asked, voice as smooth as gravel being flung off a shovel.

  ‘Vince Bellamy, please.’

  ‘Dunno where he is.’ She shrugged her big shoulders unhelpfully and Hitler and his lover seemed to chat to each other with the wobble of her breasts, something Henry found to be vaguely obscene. ‘Like what you see, luvvie?’ she asked Henry, who for a moment had seemed transfixed by the sight.

  ‘It has merit,’ he grinned, ‘but I’d rather be looking at Vince Bellamy.’

  ‘As I said, sweetie, don’t know where he is, but I know a man who might –’ She pointed across the foyer to the double-doored entrance to the dining room where a man was sitting by the window, watching them.

  Franklands gave a silent scream as the two cops turned to look in the direction in which the receptionist’s finger was pointing. The silly, stupid bitch. She was telling them where he was.

  The smaller of the two detectives, smaller being six foot two as opposed to six foot four, thanked her with a nod. They started to walk towards the dining room.

  It was only the timely appearance of Adolf Hitler that gave Franklands the break he needed.

  Hitler strutted from the rear of the hotel into the foyer, surrounded by a team of four leather-jacketed bodyguards with jeans and laced-up Doc Martens, stopping Henry and Donaldson dead. He was a perfect replica, from the grey uniform, the swastikas on his arms, the belt and shoulder strap with the Luger pistol in a holster at his hip, hat tucked under his left arm, down to the shiny black jackboots, the shock of black hair down his forehead and the comical moustache under his nose. He went past them, raising his right arm in a lazy Nazi salute and a ‘Heil’. It was all they could do not to respond.

  He went through the front door of the hotel and appeared on the top step as though at the Munich Olympic games, flanked either side by the bouncers. He raised his right arm and extended it. A roar of approval emanated from the crowd.

  Henry and Donaldson, fascinated, moved to the door for a better view. Both were shocked and sickened to witness a sea of extended hands raised towards Hitler and a chant starting of ‘Heil Hitler.’

  It would have been a farcical spectacle had it not been so utterly abhorrent and nauseating.

  ‘I see he’s still got his pulling power,’ Donaldson commented.

  ‘I wonder if it’s Bellamy. Andrea said he did quite a good Hitler.’

  One of the bouncers handed the Hitler lookalike a loud hailer. He began to address his glorious followers.

  ‘Shit,’ said Henry despondently.

  ‘There’ll be tears at bedtime,’ Donaldson predicted.

  With overwhelming sadness, Henry turned away. ‘Let’s have a word with this guy anyway––’ He did not manage to complete the sentence because the man they had been directed to see was legging it down the corridor towards the rear of the hotel.

  Contrary to what most police officers would like to believe, running away from a cop is not an offence, unless the person already happens to have been arrested. But doing so, whether guilty, innocent or plain stupid, is like a red rag to a bull. Very few cops are able to resist the challenge of the chase because as soon as someone is on their toes, a police officer’s body gets an input of energy and the pursuit is on.

  It was a conditioned response in Henry. Almost before he knew what he was doing, or why he was doing it, he was after Franklands. American cops are no different: Karl Donaldson was with him all the way.

  Franklands hared down the corridor and burst through the double swing doors into the kitchen. A couple of female cooks and two young girls skivvying looked up from their tasks with disinterest as he ran past them, nippily side-stepping all objects in his way, heading for the exit door at the far end.

  ‘Oi,’ another woman cook yelled. ‘Fuckin’ watch it.’ She manoeuvred a huge pan of cabbage in water towards the gas stove.

  The doors crashed open again. Henry and Donaldson burst through as Franklands reached the exit.

  The cook – a big woman – with the cabbage pan in her hands immediately put two and two together. She knew Franklands was a hotel guest, but had never seen either of the two men who were chasing him. Without a second thought she heaved the pan up and hurled the contents at the chasers, then swung the pan at Donaldson’s head because he was the nearer of the two. He ducked the intended panning, but neither he nor Henry could avoid the dousing in water and uncooked cabbage.

  Henry ran on, undeterred. Donaldson took a quick moment to jam the palm of his hand into the woman’s large round face and send her sprawling backwards against a rack of pans. Then he was past her.

  The exit door led into a storeroom with an emergency fire door at the far end of it. Franklands threw himself at this door, slamming down the locking mechanism. He swung outside onto a metallic landing at the top of a set of fire stairs which dropped down into the back yard of the hotel. He flew down the steps, clattering into the yard which was full of junk.

  Henry and Donaldson hit the metallic landing as Franklands got to the yard door and spun into the alleyway.

  ‘Fuck, he’s fast,’ Henry panted, grabbing the fire-escape rail and sailing down about a dozen steps, touching down and then taking off again for the next ten, hitting the ground running. As he turned into the alley, Franklands, as ever it seemed, was about to go out of sight, running towards the promenade.

  Now that the two officers had a clear run, Donaldson, fitter and faster than Henry, powered into the lead, stretching out, totally confident of catching the man.

  Franklands, without looking and without any thought for his own safety, or any tactics for avoiding his pursuers, ran straight across the road onto the inner promenade. Miraculously, not a single car came close to whacking him. It was only when he realised where he had
run to did it dawn on him that he had made a bad tactical error. He was out in the open expanse of the promenade and it felt as big and wide and exposed as the Serengeti because it gave him nowhere to hide.

  When the two cops emerged from the alleyway on the opposite side of the road, Franklands knew he was beaten. There was a hundred metres between himself and them but it was no advantage out here. He was trapped in the open and he knew it.

  But there was a way out. It was trundling towards him at an aristocratic 10 mph from the north. Franklands headed towards the tram. This was his only means of escape and all his focus was on its approach.

  If the cops caught him he was as good as dead anyway. He did not have the experience or resolve to hold out under questioning, he would blab everything because he was weak and pathetic. And if he did, Bellamy would ensure that somewhere along the line, he died. He had that power. Geri Peters was a case in point. She had been in police custody, yet Bellamy had been able to get to her. Not personally, but her death had been his doing.

  The tram loomed larger. It was slow-moving but would provide a quick death, crushing his head with exceptional efficiency.

  Franklands judged how best to do it. It would have to be a last-second thing. Make certain the driver did not suspect it was about to happen. He looked at the front of the tram. It was only ten metres away. Franklands gritted his teeth and did not think of the pain. His focus was now intense, like looking down a telescope backwards. A pulsing, throbbing noise seemed to surround him. Five metres. The metallic sound of the tram on its tracks grew louder.

  Now! Throw yourself under, just behind the safety guard. Do it, you soft bastard, he yelled to himself.

  The tram, only inches away, passed in front of him.

  Franklands stood there, head bowed, crying.

  Donaldson grabbed him and yanked him away from the track and shook him. ‘You idiot, you could’a killed yourself.’

  ‘That was the idea.’ Franklands sobbed. He rubbed his eyes. The tram had gone. The sound surrounding him receded and became background noise. ‘I wish I’d had the courage.’

  ‘Jesus, you scared the hell outta me,’ Donaldson confessed.

  Franklands raised his chin. Henry came onto the scene, breathing heavily.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Franklands bleated, ‘I’m sorry, but I didn’t kill him. I was there when it happened, but I didn’t kill him.’

  Henry stood back an inch, not quite knowing what or who Franklands meant. However, he was canny enough not to ask which would have shown ignorance and given Franklands a get-out clause. ‘Who did kill him?’ Henry asked.

  ‘Higgins and Longton. Longton was the one who really kicked him, stomped on his head.’

  ‘Where exactly did it happen?’

  ‘There, down there.’ Franklands pointed along the promenade to beyond Central Pier. Now Henry knew. He gently placed a hand on Franklands’ drooping shoulders and said, ‘You’re under arrest on suspicion of murder.’ He cautioned him to the letter, then called up for some transport. While they waited for the van to come, they quickly searched Franklands – regular police procedure. While doing this, Henry said to Donaldson, ‘Wedge of thin end the – please arrange those words into a well-known phrase or saying.’

  Andrea Makin hung up the phone as Henry and Donaldson entered the CID office. Henry had booked Franklands into the custody system and done all the necessary evidence gathering, such as seizing clothing and taking fingerprints before slamming him into his en-suite accommodation, leaving a constable on suicide watch outside the cell as per force instructions for persons arrested on murder raps.

  Makin was red-eyed. She smiled sadly at the two men. ‘That was Jack’s wife – she lives in London. I’ve arranged transport for her to come up here as soon as possible to identify him, but with two kids to sort, and the time of day –’ she checked her watch: 5 p.m. – ‘she won’t be up here before morning.’

  ‘How did she take it?’ Donaldson asked.

  ‘With resignation, almost as though she was expecting it.’ Makin rubbed her eyes, took a deep breath. ‘Like all families of undercover cops. Anyway,’ she tried to brighten up, ‘how has your afternoon been, guys?’

  She noted their reaction to this question.

  Henry gave a modest shrug. ‘I think we’re well on the way to catching Jack’s killers.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yep.’ But now it was Henry’s turn to look depressed. ‘Having said that, I don’t know if we’re any closer to Jane Roscoe or Mark Evans.’

  He sat down heavily on a spare chair. Donaldson perched on the corner of the desk. At the far end of the room a phone rang, picked up by one of the detectives on duty.

  ‘Or my bomber,’ Donaldson said despondently. ‘The president will not be pleased.’

  ‘Henry? What extension is that?’ the detective across the room called. Henry peered at the phone on the desk and gave him the number. ‘It’s for you,’ the DC said, transferring it across.

  ‘Henry Christie.’

  ‘DI Harrison from Cheshire.’

  ‘Oh, hi,’ Henry said, expecting nothing.

  ‘Got to hand it to you, Henry, I think you got the bastard!’

  ‘Sounds like you are in deep pooh-pooh,’ PC Standring, the constable on suicide watch, said to Franklands conversationally. Standring, the officer who had dealt with Kit Nevison, had now been given the task of baby-sitting the alleged murderer and was actually getting a little brassed off with getting the shitty jobs. However, this was a fairly interesting one and he had been listening to Franklands’ stream of consciousness ramblings, trying to pick out any useful gems for the investigating officers to use in interview. Franklands had moved on to wittering about the murder on the promenade, making Standring prick up his ears. Theoretically there should be no conversation between them, but it was a difficult situation to be in and not say something.

  ‘You can say that again,’ Franklands came back, ‘and the rest.’

  ‘Why, what else have you done?’ Standring could not resist posing the question, but he did it almost with feigned disinterest.

  Franklands had been sitting on the edge of the cell bed. He stood up abruptly, knowing he had already said too much, but now that he had started to blab, he could not stop himself. It made him feel light headed, light chested and the feeling was just so fantastic.

  ‘What else?’ he said. ‘I planted that bomb.’

  Shit, thought Standring.

  ‘I think I want to talk to the detectives now – and I want a solicitor.’ His face cracked. He started to cry.

  It was all Henry Christie could do to stop himself leaping up and down, punching the air, planting kisses on everybody in sight.

  He had nailed the bastard. Christ, he had done it – or at least a partial fingerprint found at the scene of a murder which should not have been there had done it. And it belonged to one of the inhabitants of Blackpool. It was not enough to be used in a court of law, but it was enough to go and effect an arrest.

  David Brian Gill. Born 21/4/58 in Blackpool. The man had come to the attention of the police only once before at the beginning of the year when he had been arrested and cautioned for a minor public-order offence committed outside a pub in the resort. Despite the fact that there had been no prosecution because it was a first offence and not particularly serious, Gill’s fingerprints had been taken as a matter of course and then gone into the system, together with descriptive forms.

  That was how he had been caught, from the only set of fingerprints taken.

  Henry had a copy of the custody record in front of him relating to the time Gill had been locked up. There was a copy of the caution form with it. The descriptive forms which had been submitted to HQ were being searched for. With some pleasure Henry saw that the custody officer on the night in question was the inscrutable Dermot Byrne. PC John Taylor had been the arresting officer. Members of his new shift who had done a good job several months before, who had made sure everything was don
e and dusted for a minor offence, had played some part, subsequently, in the identification of a serial murderer. So simple. Yet it was the simple things that caught people.

  Henry ran a hand over his face.

  Outside on the streets Henry knew that the Hitler-led right-wing demonstration had come to nothing and everyone had dispersed. The conference had ended for the day, the PM having made his law and order speech to great acclaim and the home secretary his speech on immigration.

  Henry thought about David Gill. Where the hell did he fit into this picture? Had he abducted Jane Roscoe and Mark Evans? Henry struggled to get his head round it all. Had they stumbled onto him from evidence provided by this ‘military type’ and therefore been unprepared for an encounter with a seriously dangerous man?

  Gill’s address was not far away from Joey Costain’s. Roscoe and Evans could easily have walked to it, leaving their cars parked near to Costain’s flat.

  Henry was eager to get going, to pull the guy in, but he wanted to do it properly and if possible involve Byrne and Taylor. It would be a nice thank-you for having done a run-of-the-mill job so well and could go some way to reviving Taylor’s spirits following his horrendous night when he’d let Geri Peters get murdered and been there when Joey’s body had been found. Poor lamb. Henry decided to wait until they came on duty at six.

  Henry wanted to do it right. This included having a fingerprint expert on call as well as scientific teams on standby.

  There was also the other issue of Franklands. He was Henry’s prisoner and he had a responsibility to deal with him as expeditiously as possible. If Henry went out on what could be a completely unrelated matter while his murder suspect lounged in a cell, very serious questions would be asked when the case got to court. Henry had an idea how this could be addressed.