Dying to Sin

29

Cooper had no choice but to go to his DI with the results of his interview. Hitchens had just received the results of the postmortem on Tom Farnham, and he was ready to hear some good news.

‘Blunt-force trauma from a severe beating,’ he said. ‘Blows to the arms and legs produced contusions and haematomas, and the radius of the left arm was fractured. Further blows to the chest caused extensive bruising, and an injury to the abdomen had damaged the spleen. And that’s before we get on to the penetrating trauma from two bullet wounds, one of which was actually what killed him.’

‘They wanted to make a proper job of it,’ said Cooper.

‘More than that. They didn’t just kill him, Ben, they were sending a message.’

‘Yes, I see.’

‘And I bet everyone in Rakedale has received the message loud and clear. Not that they needed any encouragement to keep their mouths shut, by all accounts.’

‘No, sir,’ said Cooper. ‘Except …’

Hollowbrook Cottage was low lying enough to avoid the hill mist that was clinging to the plateau now that the rain had stopped. Palfreyman was raking dead leaves from his path, and heaping the damp, black mass into a compost bin. He dropped his rake when the car turned into his drive and came forward to meet them. He led them into the house with hardly a word.

‘Mr Palfreyman,’ said Hitchens, opening the conversation, ‘you’ve told my officers that you visited Pity Wood Farm on several occasions while the Sutton brothers lived there.’

‘In the line of duty, yes.’

Palfreyman already sounded on the defensive. Of course, he wasn’t stupid, and he had experience of the job. A third interview, and the presence of the DI himself, would suggest that someone didn’t believe what he’d been telling them, or thought he had information he was keeping back.

‘That’s right. But according to other witnesses we’ve talked to, you actually became quite friendly with the Suttons. You were often seen drinking with them at the Dog Inn.’

Palfreyman smiled. ‘Now, that would be off duty, of course.’

‘Was that a regular occurrence?’

‘A regular occurrence? What sort of language do they teach you these days?’ Palfreyman gave a small sigh. ‘I used to go to the Dog regularly for a pint or two in those days. I still do, though not so often. I can’t really afford it. But Raymond and Derek were regulars there, too. It’s the only pub you can get to without driving a few miles.’

‘So you met them in the pub often?’

‘Obviously.’

‘And they bought you drinks? Or did you buy them drinks?’

Palfreyman began to get annoyed. ‘Look, there’s something you probably don’t understand, Inspector. I can see you haven’t been in the job all that long yourself. In those days, the local bobby wasn’t just some bloke in a car who might, or might not, turn up when your house got burgled. He was part of the community. It was his job to know everyone, to be aware of what was going on around his patch.’

‘Yes, sir. I know that.’

‘Well, that was me — I was part of the community here, and folk liked to see me in the pub, or in the post office, when we had one. I was never exactly off duty, you see. They could talk to me about anything that was bothering them, whenever they saw me around the village. They could even come to my house, and I would try to help them. And, yes, if they felt the urge to buy me a drink occasionally, that was fine, too. That’s because they knew I was on their side, and they trusted me. They liked me. I don’t suppose you get that much, do you?’

He glanced at Cooper, as if seeking support. But, looking at the retired officer, Cooper couldn’t see what it was that people had liked so much.

Hitchens let a small silence follow the outburst, perhaps hoping to embarrass Palfreyman with the lack of response.

‘Mr Palfreyman, were you aware of any illegal activities taking place at Pity Wood Farm?’

‘Illegal activities? Blimey, there are so many laws now, there must be something to cover the way the Suttons lived. Let’s see. Breach of Health and Safety regulations? An EU directive on the standards of domestic hygiene? Control of Stinking Mud Act?’

‘I was thinking specifically of the manufacture of Class A drugs,’ said Hitchens.

Palfreyman was halted in mid-flow. ‘Drugs? At Pity Wood? Not on my watch.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘It’s ridiculous. I never saw any drugs on my patch, either supply or using. Oh, there might be one or two stuck-up folk who smoke a bit of cannabis in their own home, but nothing that troubles anyone else. Who are you suggesting was involved in manufacturing drugs?’

‘Possibly Tom Farnham.’

Palfreyman shook his head. ‘No, you’ve got that wrong.’

‘We suspect his involvement in the production of methamphetamine at Pity Wood Farm.’

It was then Cooper noticed the ex-PC’s huge hands. They were clenched tightly on the arms of his chair, their blue veins standing out like ropes. Those hands were almost the only sign of a tremendous tension that seemed to have gripped him. When Cooper became aware of it, he looked for other indications. After a moment, he saw that Palfreyman’s entire body was quivering, as if a great volcano of emotion was being suppressed, a hot vat of lava that might burst at any moment. Yet Palfreyman’s face remained impassive in response to the DI’s questions.

Hitchens must have thought he just hadn’t understood.

‘Methamphetamine. That’s a Class A substance known as crystal meth.’

‘Impossible,’ said Palfreyman bluntly. ‘I would have …’ He stopped, and gritted his teeth. ‘Well, I would have known.’

Then the DI gave Cooper a look, inviting him to have a go at the subject.

‘Mr Palfreyman, today I interviewed a Mr Jack Elder, from Rakedale. Do you know him?’

‘I know everyone,’ said Palfreyman, a trifle sullenly.

‘I’d like to ask you about an incident that Mr Elder says took place at Pity Wood Farm, between him and Derek Sutton.’

‘Incident?’

‘I’m sure you remember. You remember everything that happens in Rakedale, don’t you?’

Palfreyman gazed out of his window for a while. The grey mist hung in the woods half a mile away, but it hadn’t reached his property. Not yet.

‘Yes, I got the call to that,’ he said. ‘I had a young probationer with me, showing him the ropes. We responded to a 999, and we blue-lighted to the scene. Got there way ahead of the ambulance. We found Jack Elder bleeding all over the place, and you could see his jaw was broken. Derek had calmed down by then, but Raymond was in a right state. When we arrived, he was pacing up and down the yard, swearing violently. Honestly, he was like Ahab cursing Moby Dick. Sin and damnation, and I don’t know what else.’

‘What did you do?’ asked Cooper.

‘I did the right thing. I had a word with all three of them, then got on to the radio to Control and told them it was a farm accident. We loaded Jack into the ambulance when it came, and he got fixed up. It was the probationer who took the most sorting out, but he did what I told him.’

‘Did that really seem like the best way of dealing with it?’

‘Yes. The thing is, you don’t want a long enquiry and a court case hanging over you, when you’ve got other things to do. Think of all that blasted paperwork, the time you have to spend hanging around outside a courtroom. What’s the point? Is it any better now? No, I can see from your faces that it isn’t. Worse, maybe? I bet you know exactly what it’s like. Once your collar number is on a job, it’ll be round your neck for months, or years.’

‘Derek Sutton committed an assault. What about punishment for his crime? What about the concept of justice?’

‘That’s exactly what it was,’ said Palfreyman. ‘Jack Elder got the justice he deserved.’

‘Was it him who was responsible for the incident with Jo Brindley, too?’

‘Yes, of course. Nasty bugger, Jack. Derek Sutton did us all a favour.’

‘Are you sure Derek was responsible for the assault?’ asked Hitchens.

‘Yes, he admitted it.’

‘Did he have injuries? Scraped knuckles? Blood on his clothes?’

‘Why does it matter?’

‘I just like to get the details accurate, sir.’

‘Yes, we all have to deal with liars, don’t we?’

Hitchens looked up, surprised. ‘Sorry?’

‘You’re asking me all these details to try to catch me out in a lie. I know the technique. That female DS you sent the other day, she bragged about being trained these days. But don’t you find it difficult to have to go through life assuming that everyone is lying to you? Don’t you ever experience trust? Can’t you tell when someone knows what the right thing is to do?’

Neither Hitchens nor Cooper could answer the question. It was rhetorical, surely? Cooper couldn’t think how you would know that. Everyone’s ideas of ‘right’ were different, just as their concepts of justice varied.

Palfreyman sighed at their expressions.

‘God help us. Let me tell you something. There was an incident when I was a young bobby, only two years in, so I was just qualified. You know, nothing actually marked the passing of your two years’ service then. It was supposed to be such a milestone for a new copper, but all I got was a pep talk from the commander, and a quick handshake. The only celebration I can remember is having to buy cakes for the rest of the section. Then we got this misper report. You’ve been working through missing persons on this case, I dare say?’

‘Of course.’

‘Aye. Well, this was a small child that was missing. Three years old, she was, and the parents were screaming the place down. We were FOAs, me and my mate. While he talked to the parents, I made a floorboard check, like you’re supposed to do when you’re sent to a misper report. Especially as it was a child.’

‘In case a member of the family had killed her and hidden her body?’ said Cooper.

‘It happens,’ said Palfreyman. ‘A space under the floorboards, the bottom of a wardrobe, a cupboard below the stairs. Just somewhere to stash the body until the coppers have been and gone. It gives them time to decide how to dispose of her permanently.’

‘Did you find anything?’

‘No. The bosses turned up — and your lot, CID. They decided she was a genuine case of suspicious circumstances. They pulled out all the stops for a while.’

Cooper looked at him. ‘You didn’t agree with that assessment?’

‘It didn’t matter what I thought. I was just a young response bobby, wet behind the ears.’ Palfreyman shrugged. ‘I had no evidence anyway, just a bit of an odd feeling about the parents. The way they reacted seemed off, somehow. They were bothered about the wrong things — asking where we were going to look, when we’d be coming back to talk to them again, that sort of thing. Do you know what I mean?’

‘You had a gut instinct,’ said Cooper.

‘Right.’

‘And what happened to the child?’

‘Oh, they found her, six months later. She was unrecognizable by then, though. The father thought he’d suffocated her in her sleep, and they both panicked. So they waited until we’d gone, and they buried her under the garden shed. I always wondered if she might still have been alive when we first arrived.’

‘There’s no way you could tell that.’

Palfreyman watched his visitors for some reaction, and seemed disappointed. ‘A gut instinct doesn’t count for much these days, does it? Some of the old school might have listened to me back then, but not the SIO who was put on the case. He was too full of himself. Done all the courses, got all the certificates. If I’d said anything to him, I’d just have made a fool of myself. I still had hopes of promotion then, you see.’

‘I understand,’ said Cooper.

Palfreyman laughed. ‘Sad, isn’t it?’

‘No.’

‘Yes it is. Those are the decisions that come back to haunt you years later, you know. The ones where you chickened out, bottled it, or betrayed your own beliefs.’ He looked more closely at Cooper. ‘Has it happened to you yet, lad? Don’t let it, if it’s not too late already. Be true to yourself. Say what you think.’ He nodded at Hitchens. ‘Don’t play their game. You’ll regret it later, if you do.’

‘I’ll remember that,’ said Cooper.

But Palfreyman leaned across and gripped his arm. ‘It’s important. You know there are lots of coppers who feel like I do. They just daren’t say so.’

As they were leaving Hollowbrook Cottage, Palfreyman held Cooper back for a moment until he was out of earshot of his DI.

‘You know, back then, if you’d visited Rakedale, you could have depended on finding people with a bit of self-reliance — they were known across Derbyshire for a streak of independence. It was an independent spirit forged by hardship, all right. But that made them all the better as people, I reckon.’

‘I think I know what you mean,’ said Cooper.

‘Well, you’ve met some of the people who live in Rakedale now. Would you say that describes them?’

‘Perhaps not, sir.’

‘Don’t be so namby-pamby, lad. You can see perfectly well they’re not like that any more. They’re defeated. Their spirit has gone.’

Cooper wasn’t sure about Palfreyman’s verdict on the people of Rakedale. His contempt had sounded more like a judgement on himself.

There seemed to be building going on everywhere in Dublin — new offices, new housing estates, new roads. Fry saw signs claiming that some of the projects had been funded by the European Union. So that’s where her taxes had been going. She’d often wondered.

Detective Garda Tony Lenaghan had greeted her in the arrivals hall at the crowded airport. He was a cheerful-looking man in his thirties, relaxed and talkative. He gave Fry such a genuine smile of welcome that she almost hugged him on the spot. She hadn’t felt like doing that to anyone for years.

‘Sergeant Fry, welcome to An Garda Siochana.’

He loaded her bag into his car and asked where she was staying. It was only a short drive from the airport at Swords to Coolock, which turned out to be an area of north Dublin, lying somewhere between the M1 urban motorway and the northern arc of Dublin Bay.

‘Croke Park is just down the road here,’ said Lenaghan. ‘We were all on duty at Croke, back in February. The rugby, you know? England versus Ireland. Your boys had never been allowed to play at Croke before, for obvious reasons.’

Fry frowned, thinking she was missing some arcane fact about the game of rugby.

‘Obvious?’

‘Because of the Black and Tans.’

After a few seconds, Lenaghan rightly interpreted her silence.

‘You do know about the Black and Tans? The massacre in 1920?’

‘Sorry.’

Lenaghan stared at her in amazement. In fact, he stared for so long that Fry started to worry about his car drifting dangerously across the carriageway.

‘Thirteen spectators and one player were killed during the match between Dublin and Tipperary. Shot by the Black and Tans. It was the original Bloody Sunday massacre. Surely they teach you about that at school in England, Sergeant?’

‘No. These Black and Tans — were they English, then?’

Lenaghan shook his head in despair. ‘Eight hundred years of suppression, and you just forget.’

They’d booked her a room in a place called the Flyover B amp;B, a place with pine dressers and cast-iron fireplaces. Its name exactly described its location, right under Junction 1 of the motorway, where it met the Upper Drumcondra Road.

Fry made arrangements to meet up with Lenaghan in the morning, and she unpacked in her room. Then she switched on the TV, more for some background noise than because she wanted to watch anything.

Finally, she got out her phone. It had switched automatically to a local service provider in Ireland, but there were no messages that she’d missed. She put it on the table by the bed. But for the rest of the evening, her phone did not ring.

Cooper was sitting in his flat in Welbeck Street. He was watching the news on the telly, with his cat Randy purring on his knee and his mobile phone pressed to his ear.

‘So what do you want to do tonight?’ he asked.

‘I want to go shopping,’ said Liz. ‘I’ve still got some last-minute stuff to buy.’

‘Really? I thought you were more organized than that. I imagined you were the sort of person who had everything put away months ago. Drawers full of carefully wrapped and labelled presents for everybody you could think of.’

‘Presents, yes. But there are a few other things I need to take home with me for Christmas Day.’

‘And you want to do it tonight?’

‘Yes, Ben.’

Cooper exchanged glances with his cat, Randy. He’d never understood the appeal of shopping, but shopping on a Monday night seemed downright perverse.

‘OK, then. Where do you want to go?’

‘Meadowhall. We can be there in half an hour or so, and it’s open until nine o’clock tonight.’

‘Meadowhall? A week before Christmas? You’re kidding. Think of the crowds — it’ll be bedlam.’

‘It’s all right if you don’t want to come, Ben.’

Cooper sighed. ‘No. I’m sure it’ll be an experience.’

David Palfreyman opened the cupboard and took out the bottle of whisky. Glenfiddich, and it was still half full. He smiled for the first time that day.

‘There is a God, after all.’

It had been quite a day, and he deserved a drink. The police asking him more questions, a visit from Mel. It had been quite a week, actually, with the news from Pity Wood Farm that had gone round the village like wildfire, and the murder of Tom Farnham. But he’d resisted the bottle until now, hadn’t even peeped in the cupboard. But a large whisky was called for. A very large whisky, why not?

He poured a good-sized tumbler and held it up to the light, admiring the colour of the Glenfiddich. Peaty brown, with a hint of gold. Gorgeous. He could look at it for hours.

Palfreyman had done quite a lot of drinking when he was in the force. It was what had helped him relax when he came home at night, or in the early hours of the morning, whenever his shift ended. Sometimes he’d sat drinking on his own, when everyone else in the world was asleep, or just stumbling out of bed to get their breakfast, listening for the milkman whistling outside, turning on the radio to get the morning’s news. He’d drunk while the sun came up and the birds started singing. He’d drunk to ease the stress and dull the memories.

He’d only been eighteen months into the job when he was sent to a serious multiple fatal RTC. He’d been first on scene for that one. Over the years, he’d learned to handle the dead, but it had always been the living he’d had problems dealing with. He still had problems with them, even now. At that RTC, the poor woman whose husband had just died was so distressed that when he left her, he’d been close to bursting into tears himself. A big, strapping copper, left an emotional wreck. What a joke.

Later, he’d developed a sick sense of humour, pretty much like everyone else in those days. He’d viewed a fatal as a bonus. If the victim was dead, it meant one less statement to take. You had to be hard, didn’t you? You had to be thick skinned. You’d go mad if you weren’t.

He felt sorry for those in the job now. That detective sergeant — what was her name? Fry, of course. His memory wasn’t letting him down, not quite yet. And the other — her DC. Cooper, of course. No chance of forgetting that one.

These modern police officers had it worse than he did, no doubt about it. They couldn’t relieve the tension the same way he always had. No sick jokes — it wouldn’t be sensitive. Or, God help them, politically correct. And drinking was probably frowned on these days, too. Poor bastards.

Palfreyman took a sip of whisky, and found the glass was nearly empty. He wasn’t sure how that had happened. He mustn’t have been paying attention. He eased himself out of his chair and went back to the cupboard to top it up. There was plenty left in the bottle yet.

Some memories were very clear, even now. The first sudden death he went to. It had come over the radio just after he’d finished his supper. Chicken Korma, he could remember the taste of it. His stomach had knotted at the thought when they got the call. Most reports were false alarms, they’d told him. But he knew this one was going to be genuine. He knew it from the taste in his mouth. Chicken spiced with fear.

It had been a late winter’s evening, much like this one tonight. December, yes. A couple of weeks before Christmas. When they got to the house, there were no lights on and it was really cold. They’d shouted through the letter box, but got no reply. His partner had used a rammit on the door, and they’d gone in.

The occupant of the house was in the sitting room. He’d been a regular newspaper reader. They could judge how long he’d been there by the date on the newspaper he was holding. It had been about three weeks. Palfreyman remembered hearing the radio on in the background, some music playing, and the man lying on the sofa where he’d died holding his chest.

With a gesture of defiance, he finished the last of the whisky. It had been a few minutes before training kicked in on that occasion, but there was always duty to be done. Things to be sorted out.

Yes, even the dead demanded justice.