Fall Down Dead

37 Saturday

A meeting at West Street had just finished. Three murder cases concluded and the files finalised for the CPS. DCI Alistair Mackenzie from the Major Crime Unit made a quick exit with the excuse that he had another meeting to get to back at EMSOU.

But Ben Cooper noticed that Diane Fry seemed in no rush to leave.

‘Do you want to get a coffee?’ he asked. ‘We can drink it in my office.’

‘Oh, your office,’ said Fry. ‘One of the privileges of being an inspector.’

‘Pretty much the only one.’

Fry sat hunched in a chair on the other side of his desk, clutching a plastic cup as if she needed its warmth to thaw out her frozen hands.

‘Diane, have you heard the news?’ said Cooper.

‘I don’t watch the news,’ she said. ‘What’s happened? Another politician kicked out on his arse?’

‘No, I mean the news from Birmingham.’

Fry looked up at him suddenly.

‘What?’ she demanded.

‘It’s William Leeson,’ said Cooper. ‘He’s dead.’

‘How did you hear that?’

‘Angie told me. She sent me a text. I checked, though. He’s definitely dead, Diane.’

She seemed to slip into a trance as she gazed into the distance. Cooper wondered what was going through her head. Memories from her childhood? If so, he knew from her face that none of the memories were good ones.

‘Well, I’m glad,’ she said.

‘Was he ill?’ asked Cooper.

‘I think he had cancer. Is that what he died from?’

‘Angie didn’t know. Apparently, he was found collapsed at home. There will have to be a post-mortem, I suppose.’

‘Yes, I suppose.’

‘You don’t seem too bothered.’

‘I’m not. In fact, I don’t even want to think about him. Talk to me about something else.’

‘Right.’

Cooper wondered what it was she wanted him to say. Should he mention the weather, the latest office gossip? Fry had never enjoyed small talk. She despised it, in fact. But there was that one question he’d been burning to ask all week.

‘So what about the promotion?’ he said. ‘There’s a vacancy for a DI at EMSOU, isn’t there?’

Fry shook her head. ‘Not for me. It was never going to be my job.’

‘Really? I’m sorry.’

‘It’s not a problem. I didn’t expect it. They already had someone lined up.’

‘Anyone I know?’

‘Actually, yes,’ she said. ‘But I don’t suppose I should tell you. You’ll be officially informed in due course.’

There was no need for her to say any more. Cooper didn’t know why it should come as a surprise to him. He had had the feeling it would happen for a long time, almost as soon as Dev Sharma came to Edendale as his sergeant.

‘Will you be working with him?’ he asked, deliberately not mentioning a name.

‘I have no idea. Who knows what will happen in the future? There hardly seems any point in planning anything.’

‘I know what you mean.’

A silence settled between them as they drank their coffee. Cooper looked at his phone, expecting it to ring and break the silence. But, for once, it didn’t. He raised his head and met Fry’s eyes. She blinked, apparently embarrassed.

‘I owe you, by the way,’ she said, looking away. ‘For the favour you did me.’

‘That’s OK. I’m glad it helped.’

‘I’m sure it did.’

‘I owe you quite a lot too, in a sense,’ said Cooper.

‘Oh?’

She didn’t ask for an explanation, and Cooper was glad of it. He wasn’t sure he could have explained it himself.

‘That’s funny,’ she said.

It was odd how so much could be left unspoken between them. He’d only ever experienced that with his brother. As far as Fry was concerned, the silence had always seemed more like a lack of communication rather than any level of understanding. What had changed? Could it possibly be Diane herself?

‘I’m not sure I did much for you anyway,’ said Cooper.

‘No, really. You helped a lot,’ she said.

‘Me and your biological father, apparently. The man you hate most in the world.’

‘No, not him,’ she said bitterly. ‘He did nothing.’

‘Actually, he did,’ said Cooper. ‘He sent the information to me, and I gave it to Professional Standards.’

‘Sent it to you how?’

Cooper shrugged. ‘It was delivered anonymously to my house.’

‘When did you get it?’

‘Wednesday night.’

‘That was while I was talking to him in Solihull. He must already have given it to someone.’

‘Yes, he must have.’

Fry stared at him. ‘That doesn’t make any sense. Why would Leeson do it that way? Why wouldn’t he send it directly to me, when I’d taken the trouble to go there and ask him?’

Cooper thought he knew the explanation for that. He wasn’t sure whether Fry would want to hear it, though. But what else could he tell her? He certainly couldn’t mention the message that Leeson had included with the package, because he’d been asked not to. He couldn’t say that it was her own sister who’d delivered it. People were on her side, taking risks and working on her behalf. But it hurt him not to be able to tell her. He had to give her something.

‘If you ask me,’ he said, ‘he didn’t want you to feel indebted to him. He wasn’t going to put that onto you right at the end of his life. After your visit, he decided to do what he could, but not to shake your antipathy. He knew how much you hated him, Diane. He didn’t want you to feel guilt or obligation as well.’

‘What? You’re saying he was thinking of me?’

‘In the last few months and weeks before he died, yes. The approach of death makes people think about everything differently.’

Fry took a moment to digest this, her mouth twisting in disgust as if she was tasting something particularly bitter.

‘So why did you tell me?’ she said. ‘Why have you stuck your oar into my life again, Ben?’

‘I just had to tell you the truth.’

‘Truth?’ said Fry. ‘Truth is vastly overrated.’

‘Well, they wouldn’t have got anywhere with a disciplinary hearing,’ said Cooper. ‘They didn’t have a proper case. They were just fishing, you know. You weren’t guilty of anything, so you could tell the truth. That’s always the best thing.’

Fry didn’t reply. Cooper studied her face.

‘You weren’t guilty of anything,’ he repeated. ‘Were you, Diane?’

‘The truth?’ she said.

He hesitated, but only for a moment.

‘Yes, please.’

‘You say that’s always for the best?’

‘If you want people to trust you.’

Fry was silent for much longer.

‘I don’t agree,’ she said. ‘The truth can destroy everything.’

She drained her cup and dropped it into his waste-paper bin. She nodded to him as she walked to the door. Cooper watched her go, a sour taste bubbling in the back of his throat. So that was the way it ended here too. With no more than a whimper.

Fry had been right when she said to him, years ago, The people who you think are on your side always turn round and betray you.

And that was the real truth.

That afternoon, Chloe Young accompanied Ben Cooper on his visit to check on Bridge End Farm.

‘How long are Matt and Kate away for?’ she asked as he unlocked the front door and turned off the alarm.

‘Just a week. Matt would never last longer than that. In fact, I imagine he’ll be getting withdrawal symptoms by now.’

‘Withdrawal symptoms?’

‘From the farm. This place is Matt’s drug. He’s totally dependent on Bridge End. And it’s dependent on him too, of course.’

They stepped into the hallway, a place filled with memories for Ben.

‘The Coopers seem to be a close family,’ said Chloe.

‘I suppose we are. Matt and Kate particularly.’

‘Twenty years, eh? It’s quite a wedding anniversary.’

Cooper looked at her. What did that mean? Was the tone of her voice admiring, envious even? Or did she sound faintly horrified? Was Chloe Young yearning for that sort of lasting relationship, one that would still be secure in twenty years’ time? Or was she appalled at the prospect of being tied to the same person for so long? Some people said it was a life sentence. Murderers got out of prison in less time than that.

He checked the back door and examined the porch for leaks, though there had been very little rain. Then he went into the kitchen and opened a tin of dog food for Jess.

‘You’re really at home here, aren’t you?’ said Chloe.

‘It was my home for over twenty-five years.’

‘No, I mean really at home, not just in a place where you used to live.’

‘It does mean something special,’ admitted Cooper. ‘So many memories, I suppose.’

‘Good and bad?’

‘You can’t separate them, can you?’ he said. ‘Well, I can’t anyway.’

Even as he said it, the memories came crowding round him, reminding him of all those years he’d spent growing up here. His father was there in the sitting room, occupying his favourite armchair, still in his uniform shirt and trousers, his sleeves rolled up on muscular arms, and his tunic hanging on a hook in the hall, where his sergeant’s stripes always seemed to gleam as they caught the light. His mother was in the kitchen, humming to herself in a cloud of steam and there was the aroma of roast beef, which always seemed to ooze through the door when he came home from school. He saw his grandfather there too, out in the yard at the back in his flat cap and tweed jacket, whistling for his dog, while Matt followed behind him, trying to copy the way Granddad walked, splashing through a cowpat in his wellies, so that he’d come in smelling of manure again and get shouted at by Dad.

Cooper felt dizzy for a moment under the barrage of memories, until Chloe put a hand gently on his arm.

‘So,’ she said, ‘there’s something that’s been puzzling me. You avoided giving me an answer.’

‘An answer to what?’

‘It’s probably not important.’

‘No, go on.’

‘Well, you never finished telling me about the cat. You didn’t say what name she originally had at the rescue centre when you collected her.’

‘Oh, that. You’re right — it’s not important.’

She laughed. ‘Now I really want to know.’

Cooper hesitated. But he knew she wouldn’t give up on the subject now.

‘The cat was called Diane,’ he said.

‘Diane? Are you kidding?’

‘No, it’s true.’

Chloe let her head fall back. ‘Yes, I see. There’s no way you could have lived with a cat called Diane. Imagine you going outside and shouting for Diane to come home. She would never have done what you told her.’

‘She doesn’t now,’ said Cooper. ‘She just carries on doing exactly what she wants and gets herself into all kinds of trouble.’

Chloe glanced at him, still smiling. ‘Now I’m not sure which one you’re talking about.’

‘Me neither,’ he said. ‘I’ll just check upstairs.’

‘I’ll come with you.’

He turned on the bottom step. ‘There’s no need.’

She held his eye and smiled again. Cooper suddenly realised what she meant.

‘I’ll come with you,’ she repeated.

He took her hand and they walked upstairs together. Cooper pushed open the door of the spare bedroom, the room he’d once slept in as a teenager. Sunlight streamed in through the window. In the distance, the Peak District hills shone like precious stones.

Well, that was one way to dispel old ghosts. The best way to wipe out old memories, and to replace them with entirely new ones.