Blood on the Tongue

22

Fry was waiting for Cooper outside his flat in Welbeck Street, her arms folded as she leaned on her car parked at the kerb. Mrs Shelley's curtain next door was twitching anxiously.

'Diane? Another visit?'

'Where have you been?' she said.

'It's my day off.'

'You haven't been answering my calls again,' she said. 'I need you.'

Cooper saw a blond head in the passenger seat of Fry's car.

'But you've got Gavin,' he said.

'Yes, I know I've got bloody Gavin. But I need you.' She hustled Cooper towards the car. 'Gavin, get in the back,' she said.

Murfin stumbled out, and a shower of plastic wrappers fell around his feet on to the snow. Cooper could have booked him for a litter offence. 'Hi, Ben. Charged any window cleaners recently?'

'Shut up,' said Fry. 'And get in the back.'

Cooper hesitated at the passenger door. 'There's some sort of sticky mess on the seat,' he said.

'You two,' said Fry, losing patience. 'You two are both going to be a sticky mess on the floor in a minute. Now, will you — '

'I know. Get in the car. What's so important? Have we got another body or something?'

For a trained response driver, Fry wasn't coping well in the snow today. She accelerated too hard and braked too suddenly. Now and then, Cooper could feel the wheels start to slide a little and braced himself for a collision with the kerb or a car coming in the opposite direction. But she always seemed to correct the steering just in time. At the top of the High Street, she turned left at the lights into Clappergate, away from the pedestrianized shopping area. They passed the front of the railway station and the spire of All Saints parish church, where someone had built a snowman in the churchyard. It had been made to look like the vicar, with a black T-shirt and a circle of white cardboard for a dog collar, and marbles to create glittering eyes.

'Where are we going?' said Cooper.

'Back to West Street first,' said Fry.

'We're going the wrong way.'

'I'm avoiding the hill.'

'Yes — if you drive like this on the straight, you'd never make it up the hill, would you?'

'There are three things you need to know,' said Fry, without smiling. 'One, we have an identification on the Snowman, who turns out to be an RAF investigator called Nick Easton.'

'Right.'

'Second, we've had a couple of goons from the Ministry of Defence Police at West Street this morning. It was the MDP who'd been trying to trace Easton at the air museum.'

Cooper thought that was quite enough to take in at once. But it sounded as though there was even more. 'And what's the third thing I need to know?' he said.

'The third thing you need to know,' said Fry, 'is that, if you don't like my driving, you can get out and walk.'

'Oh. Right.'

Fry turned up past the High Peak College campus. Though it was uphill here, it was a gentle, winding incline, unlike the precipitous approach to the West Street divisional headquarters.

'Your mate's still missing,' said Gavin Murfin from the back seat, as if trying to cheer Cooper up.

'What mate?'

'Eddie Kemp. I checked his record. He's got quite a bit of form, hasn't he?'

They reached the top of the hill and worked their way through the back roads towards West Street. At least Fry had learned to find her way around the town now. It was no longer foreign territory to her, as it had seemed to be for a long time after she transferred from the West Midlands. Some officers at West Street had called her 'the Bitch from the Black Country' in the early days. Cooper hadn't heard that title for a while. He hoped Fry herself had never heard it.

Sergeant Jane Caudwell and PC Steve Nash had driven up from the Ministry of Defence Police headquarters in Essex. Fry had taken an instant dislike to Caudwell. She couldn't explain what it was about her — whether it was the dimples in her cheeks when she smiled, or the muscles that bulged in her broad shoulders when she took off her coat. Her sidekick, Nash, Fry managed to forget within moments. He sat in the background, saying nothing, not even 'hello'. DCI Tailby had come in for the meeting as well as DI Hitchens.

'Nick Easton was an investigator with the RAF Police,' said Sergeant Caudwell. 'We're arranging for his wife to make a formal identification, but we don't think there's any doubt. He's very well known. They called him 'Magic Nick' Easton, because of his speciality.'

A photograph was passed round showing an RAF policeman in a blue uniform. It was clear to Fry that he and the Snowman were one and the same person. The attached personal details included a description of his tattoo.

'A speciality?' said Tailby, who looked even more unhappy today. But he always looked unhappy when his Sundays were disturbed.

'He was a children's entertainer in his spare time,' said Caudwell. 'His party tricks were very popular with the kiddies, I'm told. The top brass loved him — lots of opportunities for good PR, establishing friendly relations with the local community and all that.'

Paul Hitchens appeared to be on the verge of making a joke, but he looked at Caudwell and Nash and changed his mind.

'What case had Easton been working on?' asked Tailby.

'I'm afraid I can't tell you that at the moment,' said Caudwell.

Tailby stiffened and drew himself up to a greater height. He was several inches taller than Caudwell and two levels higher in seniority, but it didn't seem to make much difference.

'I think we're going to have to know, don't you?' he said.

'I'm sorry, sir. Not for the time being.'

'That's ridiculous, Sergeant. We have to be able to share information.'

Caudwell shook her head. The two stared at each other for a moment. Fry noticed that Caudwell hardly seemed to blink. Maybe she'd had her eyes stitched open to make her more frightening.

'I'll have to have a word with your chief,' said Tailby. 'This needs sorting out a higher level. We need access to information.'

'Well, we'll see,' said Caudwell. 'It may not be something we want to share. But that's not my decision. In any case, we don't know what Easton was doing in your area. We last heard of him in Nottinghamshire.'

'At the aircraft museum at Leadenhall,' said Fry.

Caudwell looked at her for the first time. She smiled, and her dimples made white holes in her cheeks. In the background, Nash was smiling, too. But he had no dimples, only a brutal haircut and eyes that strayed a little too close together.

'Ah,' said Caudwell. 'I see you know a little already.'

'I presume it was your people who'd been to Leadenhall before us.'

'Since Nick Easton failed to keep in contact, we've been trying to trace his movements.' Caudwell turned back to the senior officers. 'What progress have you made on the cause of death?' she said.

'A small, sharp knife or scalpel, something of that kind,' said Hitchens. 'And we don't know that he was actually killed in this area. We think he was already dead when he was left by the side of the road, and we don't yet know where his body had been brought from.'

'Forensics?'

'Apart from the fatal wound, there were no traces on the body that couldn't be accounted for at the scene. There were some dirt stains on his suit that contained engine oil, and that's our only hope of identifying the vehicle he was carried in. It seems likely that his body was wrapped in something that left no traces — a plastic sheet, something of that nature. We found a bag, but it had been emptied. The snowplough had obliterated any traces of tyre marks.'

'Presumably Easton had a car?' said Tailby.

'A black Ford Focus.' Caudwell gave the registration number.

'We'll have all the car parks and usual dumping spots checked. And we'll ask Nottinghamshire to do the same.'

'There is one other place we think he visited after Leadenhall,' said Fry. 'We have a possible witness here in Edendale who says a man answering Easton's description visited her house on Monday.'

Caudwell leaned forward with interest. 'Name?'

'Mrs Grace Lukasz.'

The MDP sergeant smiled so broadly that even the dimples disappeared into the creases under her eyes. 'You have no idea', she said, 'how much that helps.'

Caudwell produced a sheet of paper, which she handed to DCI Tailby. He glanced at it and passed it to Hitchens.

'You might like to check whether the other names on that list mean anything, too,' said Caudwell. 'Then perhaps we can have another meeting, and we'll talk about sharing information.'

Fry watched Caudwell and Nash leave to check themselves into a local hotel.

'Can I see the list, please, sir?' she said.

Hitchens gave it to her, and Fry looked through the names. The list felt like a direct challenge, and she had an overwhelming desire to find out as much information as she could about all the people on it before she met Caudwell again. She could see the MDP were a problem, without a doubt. Anyone who was allocated to work with them would be on difficult ground. It would be like throwing someone to the wolves.

Cooper had been trying to persuade Fry that Alison Morrissey's story was connected to the Snowman enquiry, and yet when the evidence was presented to him, it came as a surprise. Subconsciously, perhaps, he'd been convinced that the connections he was making were imaginary, that he'd been making them up because he wanted a reason to continue the McTeague investigation. But Fry had no reason for making these things up.

'So what do you say to that, Ben?' she asked.

'It was after Easton's visit that Zygmunt Lukasz started his journal.'

'Journal? What's this?'

'According to his son, Zygmunt is writing his account of the crash of Sugar Uncle Victor,' said Cooper.

'Oh, that.'

'Diane, don't you think it's time we conceded the possibility that the two things are connected?' he said.

Fry stared at him for a moment. 'What are you saying, Ben? Do you think Alison Morrissey might have been involved in the death of Nick Easton?'

'That wasn't what I meant. She wasn't even in the country at the time. She arrived after Easton was found.'

'Are you sure? Have you confirmed the time of her flight from Canada? Have you checked she was on the passenger list?'

'No.'

'Perhaps it's about time you did, then.'

Cooper stayed silent.

'It shouldn't be a problem,' said Fry. 'As long as you don't feel any personal involvement, that is. And I'm sure you don't feel that, do you, Ben? It wouldn't be like you at all. Not a competent and dedicated detective like yourself.'

Cooper felt himself flush. It was a habit he hated in himself, a ridiculous thing for someone approaching thirty years of age. Diane Fry had the uncanny knack of doing it to him. But, of course, it was usually because she was right.

'The connection is there,' he said. 'The link is the Lukasz family. Sergeant Caudwell knew the name — and I bet it's on the list she gave us.'

'Yes, it is.'

'I think Nick Easton was looking for Andrew Lukasz, though, not Zygmunt.'

'Why?'

'I don't know,' said Cooper. 'But it seems more than a coincidence that Andrew disappeared the day before Easton arrived. And something upset Zygmunt. His family have been worried about him. They say he's stopped speaking English. Personally, I think he's being damned awkward. But then, he hasn't got long left to live, they say.'

'Is his son very close to him?'

'They're all close. Yes, very close.'

'Peter Lukasz — what does he do for a living?'

'He's a doctor, works in the A amp;E department at the hospital.'

Fry opened a folder full of postmortem photographs of Nick Easton. Cooper still thought of him as the Snowman, since Easton had arrived in Derbyshire with the snow.

'According to Mrs Van Doon, the fatal wound on Easton was caused by a small, very sharp instrument. It could have been a scalpel.'

'OK, I can see what you're thinking. But Peter Lukasz is supposed to have been on duty at the hospital. We can easily check if he was where he ought to have been at the time Easton was killed.'

'Do it, then. What sort of car does Lukasz drive?'

'A blue BMW, three or four years old.'

'Good in snow?'

'I doubt it.'

'But there's a close little community there, you said.'

'It doesn't mean they'd conspire together to murder somebody. That would take a serious shared motive.'

'Yes.' Fry thought about it for a while, looked at the lists in front of her, and thought again.

'Ben, where else have you been?' she said.

'What do you mean?'

'On this business of Alison Morrissey's. Who else have you been to see? There was Zygmunt Lukasz, and the old RAF rescue man, Rowland. Who else is there? Tell me.'

'Well, there's George Malkin.'

Fry's face was grim. She looked as though she wanted to grab the lapels of his coat and shake him.

'Tell me who George Malkin is, Ben.'

'He was a farmworker, but he's been retired for years. The place he lives in at Harrop was his father's farm in those days, but there's only the old farmhouse left now. He was a child at the time of the Lancaster crash, but he went up to the site with his brother that night. Malkin is a lonely old man — solitary, going a bit strange, but he remembers the crash all right.' Cooper paused, thinking of Zygmunt Lukasz and Walter Rowland. 'Well, Malkin is not so old, really. Only in his sixties. It just happens that he remembers the crash very well.'

Fry continued to stare at him. 'It just happens?' she said. 'It just happens?'

'Well, yes.'

'This would be George Malkin, of Hollow Shaw Farm, Harrop?'

'Yes. What's all this about?'

Fry waved the file at him. 'Ben, George Malkin is another one of the names on Nick Easton's list. You've been wandering backwards and forwards across their enquiry, without knowing what the hell you were doing.'

Cooper felt a little surge of excitement, as if all his instincts had been justified.

'What are we going to do?'

'Have you got anything on for the rest of today?'

'Not a thing.'

'And have you got a phone number for the Lukasz family?'

'Yes.'

'Try them. We'll go and see them.'

Cooper rang. There was no reply. 'They're not in.'

'Malkin, then.'

He tried another number. George Malkin was in, but said he'd be busy.

'We'd really like to come today, Mr Malkin,' said Cooper.

'If you must. But be warned — you'll take me as you find me.'

Cooper nodded at Fry. 'He'll see us.'

'Let's go, then,' she said. 'I'll let DI Hitchens know the situation, and we'll see how your friend Malkin comes into this.'

But Cooper still wasn't sure where they stood. The arrival of the Ministry of Defence Police had confused him, and so did Fry's sudden interest.

'Diane, do you think I'm right, then — that there might be some connection with the Lancaster crash?'

'If it was just you, Ben, I'd say it was definitely your imagination,' said Fry.

'But it isn't just me?'

'No. When the MDP phoned this morning, one of the first things they asked for was to be shown the site of the wreck of Lancaster SU-V.'

Cooper had never had any contact with the Ministry of Defence Police before, except when he'd met some members of their surveillance unit on a training course. But he did have an old acquaintance in the RAF Police. Carol Parry was a local woman. Soon she would be finishing her time in the RAF, and she'd been talking about applying to Derbyshire Constabulary for a job. Derbyshire would welcome her with open arms — officers with experience would be vital to balance the number of new recruits who were filtering into the ranks.

While he waited for Diane Fry, Cooper gave Carol Parry a call.

'The MDP are an entirely different animal to us,' said Parry. 'They have a much wider remit, and they deal with civilians. All our customers are servicemen, and most of them end up with the provosts in the Military Correctional Training Centre at Colchester. If the Court Martial gives them more than eighteen months, they transfer to a Home Office prison. So we're not really concerned with punishing serious crimes.'

'Who is, these days?'

'Well, don't tell the MDP you've spoken to me. They won't like it.'

'Why not?'

'There's no love lost between the services. It's like we take the mickey out of the Royal Military Police, and the RMP call us "snowdrops". But the MDP, they don't like either of us. Their numbers are being hacked all the time, because we're finding other ways of doing the job. It's the way of the world.'

'But we work together with the RAF Police when it's needed. We co-operate.'

'Ah, but that's because we need you. The RAF Police have no powers of arrest. You have the constabulary powers. But so does Sergeant Caudwell. By the way, are Caudwell and her staff armed?'

'What? I have no idea.'

'Seventy-five per cent of MDP officers are permanently armed.'

'In Derbyshire we have to be specially trained before we're approved to carry firearms,' protested Cooper. 'We have to pass regular tests.'

'So do they,' said Parry. 'Every one of them is fully weapons trained. It makes you remember what they're really there for. Of course, the only time the general public is likely to notice them is when they're escorting nuclear convoys up the A1. It's a very British way — if you don't make a fuss about it, nobody notices.'

'That's been a help,' said Cooper. 'I suppose.'

'What's the weather like there, anyway, Ben?'

'Warming up a bit,' he said.