Death Wore White

Friday, 13 February

Andrew John Lufkin was arrested at 6.15 a.m. in his bedsit above Josie’s International Hair Salon – a lock‐up on the Greyfriars Estate. The backstairs entrance reeked of singed hair and cheap scent. DS Valentine stood back as they took out the door with a shoulder ram, the splinters flying as they pushed through into the bedroom. Lufkin was naked, on top of the sheets, the room heavy with the smell of a paraffin heater and the salty tang of sex.

Shaw couldn’t help thinking he looked a lot cleaner than he’d expected. His skin was slightly pink, shiny, and tussling with the fumes from the heater was something else: pine, perhaps? Lufkin asked to see the warrant, not bothering to pull the sheet across his genitals. The girl was in the bathroom. She came out wrapped in a towel, a cigarette unlit between red glossed lips.

‘Suzi,’ said Valentine, recognizing one of the women who worked the docks, based in a sauna off the quayside. That was the smell, cedar wood, splashed with scented water. ‘I’d get your stuff; this one’s done.’

‘He’s paid up ’til lunchtime,’ she said, genuinely affronted on behalf of her client’s rights.

They ran her back into town in a squad car while Lufkin dressed.

All the clothes in the flat above the shop were new – brand new, newer. Boxer shorts, socks and T‐shirts still held the creases from the shop packaging which filled the kitchen bin. M&S receipts, also in the bin, put the date of purchase as the previous Tuesday. Three pairs of jeans – identical – and a waterproof jacket hung in the wardrobe. They may have been worn once. But Lufkin’s watch had a green army‐style corded strap, a dark stain by the buckle. A single CSI officer had accompanied them on the raid. The watch strap was bagged and dispatched to the Ark with him.

‘What’s this about?’ said Lufkin, pulling a T‐shirt over his head. But it wasn’t a question, just part of a ritual.

‘Let’s save the questions for the station, Mr Lufkin,’ said Shaw. Tom Hadden’s early morning report from the Skolt was encouraging. The mark on her port side was an exact match for the gash on the Hydra’s starboard side. The paint samples matched, too. And there were plenty of fingerprints on the trawler. Shaw had little doubt he’d be able to put Andy Lufkin on board the Skolt the night James Baker‐Sibley died.

Lufkin brushed back the blond curly hair, then covered it with the hood of his duffle coat.

DC Twine was trawling through the drawers in a bedside table; a model of concentration, methodically sliding his gloved hand around each drawer, then slipping it out to check underneath.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Valentine. He picked up a cardboard box on a windowsill and from it pulled out the plastic wrapping around a new mobile phone. ‘Your phone?’

Lufkin laughed. ‘It’s not just a phone, Grandad.’ He licked his lips. ‘TV, radio, video messaging. It’s the dog’s bollocks.’

Valentine looked around the flat and tapped his foot against the cheap electric fire sitting in the hearth. ‘You can tell me some more about it down at the nick. Like how you paid for it.’

Lufkin took a packet of gum from the bathroom and chewed loudly as they completed the search. He gave them the key for a drawer in a cheap desk set under the window, inside of which they found a passport, an HGV licence and a certificate of registration with the Trawler Association.

‘Where were you Monday night?’ asked Shaw.

‘Poker. Regular thing – with the Serbs. They can play all right, but I still won. I always win – but they come back for more. Stupid fuckers.’

‘Excellent,’ said Shaw. ‘Perhaps it’s your lucky week. But then again, perhaps it isn’t.’

‘There’s something here, sir,’ said Twine. He was flat on his back, searching under the bed. He rolled clear, a metal canister in either hand.

Each was the shape of a pencil box but the wrong size: larger, almost a shoe‐box, in brushed aluminium, with several bands of metal added for strength. Shaw had never seen objects like them.

Twine knelt, put the canisters on the bed, withdrawing his hand quickly. They were all imagining what might be inside.

‘Right,’ said Shaw, his good eye scanning the room. ‘Mr Lufkin – enlighten us.’

Lufkin chewed gum. ‘Never seen them before.’

‘Get him out,’ said Shaw.

Two of the DCs searching the kitchen came in as a uniformed PC took Lufkin down to the squad car. They all stood in a circle as if round a death bed.

‘That one’s heavy,’ said Twine, smearing his hand on his trousers, then pointing.

‘OK – we need to open them,’ said Shaw.

‘Count me out,’ said Valentine.

‘You were never in,’ said Shaw. He picked up the heavier canister quickly and slid the top back a millimetre, then right back, quickly, tipping it over. A gun lay on the soiled sheet.

‘Makarov,’ said Twine. ‘Russian‐made pistol – loads come in, mainly from Serbia.’

‘OK,’ said Shaw. ‘That explains a lot.’ He’d wondered how Lufkin and Fibich had found it so easy to take Jillie away from her father when they’d boarded the Hydra. Now he knew.

He picked up the other canister, then applied an even pressure to the lid until the contents were revealed, placing it on the bed.

What was inside began to expand, like a time‐lapse

Shaw picked one out and held it against the light. A £50 note. He tipped the canister over and prised the bundles out, and they each began to unfurl on the soiled bed; blossoming, like exotic flowers.