Dead at First Sight

128 Saturday 13 October

Roy Grace drove up to the barrier at the entrance to the Police HQ a few minutes before 9 a.m. As he waited for it to rise, he noticed Cassian Pewe’s classic black Jaguar XJS sports car, which was usually as spick and span as the ACC himself, parked outside the handsome Queen Anne mansion that housed the offices of the Sussex Police top brass, and the East Sussex Fire and Rescue chiefs.

Grace couldn’t help smiling as he noticed also that the Jaguar’s paintwork was splattered, like a patterned carpet, with messy white blobs. Clearly a passing flock of migrating birds held the same opinion of the man as he did.

Five minutes later he knocked on the door of Pewe’s office and was summoned in. Despite it being the weekend, Pewe was attired in his full dress uniform. Grace hadn’t bothered to make the same effort himself. He was unshaven and he was dressed in a leather bomber jacket over a quilted gilet, T-shirt, jeans and trainers. His casual appearance had the desired effect, clearly throwing Pewe off his guard.

‘Very kind of you to make space in your valuable downtime to meet me, Roy,’ he said, briefly frowning disapproval at his appearance as he stood up and shook the Detective Superintendent’s hand, his signet ring glinting in the morning sunlight. He had a cold, damp and limp grip that always felt, to Roy Grace, like shaking hands with a corpse.

‘I see you’ve been attracting birds with your car, sir,’ Grace quipped.

Pewe gave him a sickly look. Then, without replying, said, ‘I’m afraid my assistant and staff officer are both off today, but I could make you a coffee myself if you’d like one?’

‘I’m fine, thank you, sir.’ Grace sat in one of the two imposing chairs in front of his desk. To his surprise, Pewe was actually looking friendly, which put him even more on guard than usual.

‘So, Roy, quite a showdown yesterday, eh? Gunfight at the OK Corral!’

Grace replied, hesitantly. ‘I wouldn’t say that exactly.’

‘Well, it’s been quite a time, these past couple of weeks, Roy, for our supposed Head of Major Crime, hasn’t it? The murder of Mrs Susan Driver. The caretaker of the Marina Heights apartment complex. The murder of the Southern Water employee. And now the shooting of Mr Tooth. Not to mention the gunshot wounding of the — admittedly dubious character — Mr Jules de Copeland. And the brutal murder in custody of your prisoner, Mr Kofi Okonjo.’ Pewe was no longer smiling.

‘Meaning, sir?’

‘Meaning, Roy, that our Chief Constable and our Police and Crime Commissioner are not happy bunnies. Brighton got rid of its title of Murder Capital of Europe back in the 1930s. Under your watch it looks like it’s about to regain it.’

‘I hardly think so, sir, when you compare the number of murders in London this year, and you can hardly put all of these deaths at my door.’

‘You and I need to meet with Media Relations first thing Monday, Roy, and get a pretty reassuring press release out. What you have to think about is just how safe does all this mayhem make the citizens of our county feel?’

‘I’m not sure I can answer that. I have a job to do, which is to investigate crimes and to try to lock up the villains. I’m pretty satisfied, despite the tragic deaths of Mrs Driver and the caretaker of Marina Heights, that Operation Lisbon has succeeded. We’ve smashed a major internet romance network and we have its local ringleader and several of his minions in custody. A man we believe to be the major mastermind for a massive European internet romance fraud network is currently in custody in Jersey. On top of that we finally have the American hitman, Tooth, who has been responsible for at least two murders that we are aware of, as well as coming close to murdering DS Potting, no longer a threat.’

‘No longer a threat?’ Pewe’s lips formed an almost rictus smile. ‘But no thanks to you, Roy. And you are sure Tooth really is dead, are you?’

Grace again resisted the temptation to remind the ACC it was his insistence of removing Tooth’s hospital guard that had enabled the contract killer to evade justice earlier in the year. ‘I don’t think he’s going to be coming back from the dead anytime soon.’

‘Really? Are you sure about that?’

‘The world wasn’t big enough for Alexander the Great,’ Grace retorted. ‘But a coffin was.’

‘What?’

‘Juvenal.’

‘Who?’

‘A Roman poet of the first century AD. My wife’s doing a degree in philosophy at the Open University. Very apt for Tooth.’

‘What’s apt about that?’

‘Think about it, sir.’

Pewe shook his head. ‘Roy, I’m your line manager. You don’t tell me what I should and should not think about. Do you understand?’

‘Actually, Cassian,’ he said, clocking Pewe’s startled expression as he used the familiarity of his first name, ‘last night, after speaking with the Chief Constable, I accepted Alison Vosper’s offer. For the next six months I’m going to be heading up a new initiative to tackle knife crime in London, set up by the Prime Minister, the Mayor of London and the Commissioner of the Met — the National Knife Crimes Task Force. My title will be Commander, initially on a temporary basis, which means I will be of the same rank as you, and I trust you will respect that.’

There was a long silence. He saw Pewe’s face struggling to absorb this. Finally Pewe said, his tone very conciliatory, ‘Look, Roy, I... I know we’ve had our differences. But I would hate to lose you from Sussex Police. I mean — I... we... we can’t afford to lose you.’

‘Is that so? You’ve never given me that impression.’

‘Roy, let’s put our cards on the table. I don’t want to lose you. I may not like you, and I know you don’t like me, but I recognize that you are a bloody good police officer.’

Grace stared him back, levelly. ‘What you actually mean, Cassian — sorry... sir... is that I make you look good.’

Grace stood up and walked out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Slamming it on a chapter of his life.