Final Account

1

It was foolish, Susan knew, but she couldn’t help feeling butterflies in her stomach as she turned the corner where Courtney Terrace intersected Bridgeport Road at number thirty-five. It was mid-afternoon; there was no one about. She felt completely alone, and the click of her heels, which seemed to echo from every building, was the only sound breaking the blanket of silence. Her instructions were simple: find out what you can about Arthur Jameson and his whereabouts.

In her blue jacket and matching skirt, carrying a briefcase and clipboard, she looked like a market researcher. A light breeze ruffled her tight blonde curls and a sudden burst of sun through the clouds dazzled her. She could smell rain in the air.

We know he’s not at home, she repeated to herself. He has cancelled his papers for three weeks and gone on a long holiday on the proceeds earned from killing Keith Rothwell. He doesn’t answer his telephone, and the two men observing the house over the past hour or so have seen no signs of occupation. So there’s nothing to worry about.

But still she worried. She remembered Keith Rothwell kneeling there on the garage floor in his suit, his head blown to a pulp. She remembered the tattered pieces of the girlie magazine, ripped images of women’s bodies, as if the killer had intended some kind of sick joke.

And she remembered what Ken Blackstone had told her about Jameson at the makeshift briefing in The Victoria. He had been kicked out of the army for rushing half-cocked, against orders, into an ambush that had killed two innocent teenage girls as well as one suspected IRA triggerman. After that, he had drifted around Africa and South America as a mercenary. Then, back home, he had beaten an Irishman senseless in a pub because the man’s Belfast accent hit a raw nerve. Since the GBH, he hadn’t done much except work on building sites and, perhaps, the occasional hit, though there was no evidence of this. He had four A-levels and an incomplete degree in Engineering from the University of Birmingham.

Susan looked around her as she walked. Bridgeport Road was a drab street of dirty terrace houses with no front gardens. From each house, two small steps led right onto the worn pavement, and the tarmac road surface was in poor repair. At the back, she knew, each house had a small bricked-in backyard, complete with privy, full of weeds, and each row faced an identical row across an alley. A peculiar smell hung in the air, a mix of raw sewage and brewery malt, Susan thought, wrinkling her nose.

Outside one or two houses, lines of washing propped up by high poles hung out to dry right across the street. A woman came out of her house with a bucket and knelt on the pavement to scour her front steps. She glanced at Susan without much interest, then started scrubbing. If Jameson really is our man, Susan thought, he’ll probably be looking for somewhere a bit more upmarket to live after he has laid low for a while.

There was nobody at home in the first two houses; the timid woman at number thirty-nine said she knew nothing about anyone else in the street; the man at number forty-one didn’t speak English; the West Indian couple at number forty-three had just moved into the area and didn’t know anyone. Number forty-five was out. Susan felt her heart beat faster as she lifted the brass lion’s head knocker of number forty-seven, Jameson’s house. She was sure the whole street could hear her heart and the knocker thumping in concert, echoing from the walls.

She had it all rehearsed. If the man with the puppy-dog eyes answered the door, she was going to lift up her clipboard and tell him she was doing market research on neighborhood shopping habits: how often did he use the local supermarket, that kind of thing. Under no circumstances, Banks had said, was she to enter the house. As if she would. As her mother used to say, she wasn’t as green as she was cabbage-looking.

But the heavy knocks just echoed in the silence. She listened. Nothing stirred inside. All her instincts told her the house was empty. She relaxed and moved on to number forty-nine.

“Yes?” An old lady with dry, wrinkled skin opened the door, but kept it on the chain.

Susan kept her voice down, even though she was sure Jameson wasn’t home. She showed her card. “DC Susan Gay, North Yorkshire Police. I’d like to talk to you about your neighbor Mr. Jameson, if I may.”

“He’s not at home.”

“I know. Do you know where he is?”

The face looked at Susan for some time. She couldn’t help but be reminded of reptile skin with slit lizard eyes peeping out of the dry folds.

The door shut, the chain rattled, and the door opened again. “Come in,” the woman said.

Susan walked straight into the small living room, which smelled of mothballs and peppermint tea. Everything was in shades of dark brown: the wallpaper, the wood around the fireplace, the three-piece suite. And in the fireplace stood an electric fire with fake coals lit by red bulbs. All three elements blazed away. There might be a chilly breeze outside, but the temperature was still in the mid-teens. The room was stifling, worse than Pratt’s office. As the door closed, Susan suddenly felt claustrophobic panic, though she had never suffered from claustrophobia in her life. A heavy brown curtain hung from a brass rail at the top of the door; it swept along the floor with a long hissing sound as the door closed.

“What’s Arthur been up to now?” the woman asked.

“Will you tell me your name first?”

“Gardiner. Martha Gardiner. What’s he been up to? Here, sit down. Can I get you a cup of tea?”

Susan remained by the door. “No, thank you,” she said. “I can’t stop. It’s very important we find out where Mr. Jameson is.”

“He’s gone on his holidays, that’s where. Has he done anything wrong?”

“Why do you keep asking me that, Mrs. Gardiner? Would it surprise you?”

She chuckled. “Surprise me? Nowt much surprises me these days, lass. That one especially. But he’s a good enough neighbor. When my lumbago plays me up he’ll go to the shops for me. He keeps an eye on me, too, just in case I drop dead one of these days. It happens with us old folk, you know.” She grabbed Susan’s arm with a scrawny talon and hissed in her ear. “But I know he’s been in jail. And I saw him with a gun once.”

“A gun?”

“Oh, aye. A shotgun.” She let go. “I know a shotgun when I see one, young lady. My Eric used to have one when we lived in the country, bless his soul. Young Arthur doesn’t think I know about it, but I saw him cleaning it through the back window once. Still, he’s always polite to me. Gives me the odd pint of milk and never asks for owt. Who am I to judge? If he likes to go off shooting God’s innocent creatures, then he’s no worse than many a gentleman, is he? Ducks, grouse, whatever. Even though he says he’s one of that green lot.”

“How long ago did you see him with the shotgun?”

“Couldn’t say for certain. Time has a funny way of moving when you’re my age. Couple of months, perhaps. Are you going to arrest him? What are you going to arrest him for? Who’ll do my shopping?”

“Mrs. Gardiner, first we’ve got to find him. Have you any idea where he went?”

“How would I know? On his holidays, that’s what he said.”

“Abroad?”

She snorted. “Shouldn’t think so. Doesn’t like foreigners, doesn’t Arthur. You should hear him go on about the way this country’s gone downhill since the war, all because of foreigners taking our jobs, imposing their ways. No, he’s been abroad, he said, and had enough of foreigners to last him a lifetime. Hates ’em all. ‘Foreigners begin at Calais, Mrs. Gardiner, just you remember that.’ That’s what he says. As if I needed reminding. My Eric was in the war. In Burma. Never the same, after. England for the English, that’s what Mr. Jameson always says, and I can’t say I disagree.”

Susan gritted her teeth. “And all he told you was that he was going on holiday?”

“Aye, that’s what he told me. Likes to drive around the English countryside. At least that’s what he’s done before. Sent me a postcard from the Lake District once. He wished me well and asked me to keep an eye on his place. You know, in case somebody broke in. There’s a lot of that these days.” She snorted. “Foreigners again, if you ask me.”

“I don’t suppose he left you a key, did he?”

She shook her head. “Just asked me to keep an eye out. You know, check the windows, try the door every now and then, make sure it’s still locked.”

“When did he leave?”

“Late Thursday afternoon.”

“When did you last see him?”

“Just before he went. About four o’clock.”

“Was he driving?”

“Of course he was.”

“What kind of car does he drive?”

“A gray one.”

“Did he take his shotgun with him?”

“I didn’t see it, but he might have. I don’t know. I imagine he’d want to shoot a few animals if he’s on holiday, wouldn’t he?”

Susan could feel the sweat itching behind her ears and under her arms. Her breathing was becoming shallow. She couldn’t take much more of Mrs. Gardiner’s hothouse atmosphere. But there were other things she needed to know.

“What make was the car?”

“A Ford Granada. I know because he told me when he bought it.”

“I don’t suppose you know the number?”

“No. It’s new, though. He only got it last year.”

That would make it an “M” registration, Susan noted. “How was he dressed?” she asked.

“Dressed. Just casual. Jeans. A short-sleeved shirt. Green, I think it was. Or blue. I’ve always been a bit color blind. One of those anoraks – red or orange, I think it was.”

“And he drove off at about four o’clock on Thursday.”

“Yes, I told you.”

“Was he alone?”

“Aye.”

“Do you have any idea where he was heading first?”

“He didn’t say.”

Susan needed to know about any friends Jameson might have entertained, but she knew if she stayed in the house a moment longer she would faint. She opened the door. The welcome draft of fresh air almost made her dizzy. Banks would want to question Mrs. Gardiner further, anyway. They would need an official statement. Any other questions could wait. They had enough.

“Thank you, Mrs. Gardiner,” she said, edging out of the door. “Thank you very much. Someone else will be along to see you soon to take a statement.”

And she hurried off down the street, heels clicking in the silence, to where Banks and the rest waited in their cars in the Tesco car park off the main road.

2

It took the locksmith all of forty-five seconds to open Arthur Jameson’s door for Banks and Blackstone to get in. As it wasn’t often that four detectives and two patrol cars appeared in Bridgeport Road, and as it was still a nice enough day, despite the occasional clouds, everyone who happened to be home at the time stood out watching, gathered on doorsteps, swapping explanations. The consensus of opinion very quickly became that Mr. Jameson was a child molester, and it just went to show you should never trust anyone with eyes like a dog. And, some added, this kind of thing wouldn’t happen if the authorities kept them locked up where they belonged, or fed them bromide with their cornflakes, or, better still, castrated them.

Like Mrs. Gardiner’s, Jameson’s front door opened directly into the living room. But unlike the gloomy number forty-nine, this room had cream wallpaper patterned with poppies and cornflowers twined around a trellis. Banks opened the curtains and the daylight gave the place a cheery enough aspect. It smelled a little musty, but that was to be expected of a house that had been empty for almost six days.

Jameson’s mug shot and a description of his car had already gone out to police all over the country. They had got the Granada ’s number quickly enough from the central Driver and Vehicle Licensing Centre in Swansea. Local police were warned not to approach him under any circumstances, simply to observe and report.

Hatchley and Susan Gay were taking a statement from the woman next door, whom they had managed to persuade, at Susan’s insistence, to accompany them to the local station. Mrs. Gardiner had, in fact, been quite thrilled to be asked to “come down to the station,” just like on television, and had managed a regal wave to all the neighbors, who had whistled and whooped their encouragement as she got in the car. Things were on the move.

In the living room, Banks and Blackstone examined a small bookcase filled with books on nature, the English heritage and the environment: rain forests, ozone layers, whaling, oil spills, seal-clubbing, the whole green spectrum. Jameson had a healthy selection on birds, flowers and wildlife in general, including Gilbert White’s Natural History of Selborne and Kilvert’s diaries. There were also a few large picture books on stately homes and listed buildings.

Blackstone whistled. “Probably a member of Greenpeace and the National Trust, as well,” he said. “There’ll be trouble if we arrest this one, Alan. Loves Britain ’s heritage, likes furry little animals and wants to save the seals. They’ll be calling him the Green Killer, just you wait and see.”

Banks laughed. “It’s not every murderer you meet has a social conscience, is it?” he said. “I suppose we should take it as an encouraging sign. Loves animals and plants but has no regard for human life.” He pulled a girlie magazine from down the side of a battered armchair. “Yes, it looks like we’ve got a real nature boy here.”

After the living room, they went into the kitchen. Everything was clean, neat and tidy: dishes washed, dried and put away, surfaces scrubbed clean of grease. The only sign of neglect was a piece of cheddar, well past its sell-by date, going green in the fridge. The six cans of Tetleys Bitter on the shelf above it would last for a long time yet.

As he looked in the oven, Banks remembered a story he had heard from Superintendent Gristhorpe’s nephew in Toronto about a Texan who hid his loaded handgun in the oven when he went to Canada to visit his daughter and son-in-law, Canadian gun laws being much stricter than those in the USA. He forgot about it when he got back, until his wife started to heat up the oven for dinner the first night. After that, he always kept it in the fridge. Jameson didn’t keep his shotgun in the oven or the fridge.

The first bedroom was practically empty except for a few cardboard boxes of small household appliances: an electric kettle, a Teasmade, a clock radio. They looked too old and well used to be stolen property. More likely things that had broken, things he hadn’t got around to fixing or tossing out. There were also an ironing board and a yellow plastic laundry basket.

The other bedroom, clearly the one Jameson slept in, was untidy but basically clean. The sheets lay twisted on the bed, and a pile of clothes lay on the floor under the window. A small television stood on top of the dresser-drawers opposite the bed. All the cupboard held was clothes and shoes. Perhaps the soil expert might be able to find something on the shoes linking Jameson to Arkbeck Farm and its immediate area. After all, he had succeeded with the car. The only reading material on his bedside table was a British National Party pamphlet.

There was a small attic, reached through a hatch in the landing ceiling. Banks stood on a chair and looked around. He saw nothing but rafters and beams; it hadn’t been converted for use at all.

Next, they opened the cistern and managed to get the side of the bath off, but Jameson had avoided those common hiding places.

Which left the cellar.

Banks never had liked cellars very much, or any underground places, for that matter. He always expected to find something gruesome in them, and he often had when he worked in London. At their very best, they were dark, dank, dirty and smelly places, and this one was no exception. The chill air gripped them as soon as they got down the winding steps and Banks smelled mold and damp coal dust. It must have been there for years, he thought, because the area was a smoke-free zone now, like most of the country. Thank the Lord there was an electric light.

The first thing they saw was a bicycle lying in parts on the floor next to a workbench and a number of planks of wood leaning against the wall. Next to them hung a World War II gas mask and helmet.

Dark, stained brick walls enclosed a number of smaller storage areas, like the ones used for coal in the old days. Now they were empty. The only thing of interest was Jameson’s workbench, complete with vise and expensive toolbox. On the bench lay a box of loose shot and a ripped and crumpled page from a magazine. When Banks rubbed his latex-covered index finger over the rough surface wood, he could feel grains of powder. He lifted up the finger and sniffed. Gunpowder.

There was a drawer under the bench and Banks pulled it open. Inside, among a random collection of screws, nails, electrical tape, fuse wire and used sandpaper, he found a half-empty box of ammunition for a 9mm handgun.

“Right, Ken,” he said. “I think we’ve got the bastard, National Trust or not. Time to call in the SOCOs.”

3

Banks cadged a lift with Blackstone back to Millgarth, where Susan and Hatchley were just about to take Mrs. Gardiner home before returning to Eastvale. They had found out nothing more from her, Hatchley said as they stood at the doors ready to leave. It seemed that Jameson was a bit of a loner. He had had no frequent visitors, male or female, and she had seen no one answering the vague description of his partner. Neither had the other neighbors, according to the results of the house-to-house.

Banks asked about Pamela Jeffreys’s condition and was told there had been some improvement but that she was still in intensive care.

Christ, Banks thought, as he sat opposite Blackstone, it had been a long day. He felt shagged out, especially given his previous night’s folly, which seemed light years ago now. He looked at his watch: ten to six. He wanted to go home, but knew he might not be able to make it tonight, depending on the developments of the next few hours. At least he could go back to the hotel and have a long bath, phone Sandra, listen to Classic FM and read the army and probation officer’s reports on Jameson while he waited around. If nothing happened by, say, eight o’clock, then he would perhaps go back to Eastvale for the night.

He slipped the reports into his briefcase and again decided to walk back to the hotel. It was that twilight hour between the evening rush-hour and going-out-on-the-town time. The city center was practically deserted; the shops had closed, workers had gone home, and only a few people lingered in the few cafés and restaurants still open in the arcades and pedestrian precincts off Vicar Lane and Briggate. The sun had at last won its day-long battle with cloud; it lay in proud gold pools on the dusty streets and pavements, where last night’s rain was a dim memory; it cast black shadows that crept slowly up the sides of buildings; it reflected harshly in shop windows and glittered on the specks of quartz embedded in stone surfaces.

Back at the hotel, he picked up his jacket, which he had handed over to be mended before leaving for The Vic. There was one message for him: “Please come to Room 408 as soon as you get back, where you will find out some useful information.” It wasn’t signed.

That was odd. Informers didn’t usually operate this way. They certainly didn’t book rooms in hotels to pass along their information.

“Who’s staying in room 408?” Banks asked, slipping his jacket on. After the obligatory refusal to give out such information on the part of the clerk, and the showing of a warrant card on the part of Banks, he discovered that the occupant of said room was a Mr. Wilson. Very odd indeed. It was a common enough name, but Banks couldn’t remember, offhand, and Mr. Wilson.

He was tempted to ignore the message and carry on with what he planned, but curiosity got the better of him, as it always did.

When the lift stopped at the fourth floor, he poked his head through the doors first to see if there was anyone in the corridor. It was empty. He followed the arrow to room 408, took a deep breath and knocked. He debated whether to stand aside, but decided it was only in American films that people shot holes through hotel doors. Still, he found himself edging away a little, so he couldn’t be seen through the peep-hole.

The door opened abruptly. Banks tensed, then let out his breath. Before him stood Dirty Dick Burgess.

“You again? What the hell?” Banks gasped. But before he could even enter the room Burgess had put on a leather jacket and taken him by the elbow.

“About bloody time, Banks,” he said. “I’m sick of being cooped up in here. There’s been developments. Come on, let’s go get a drink.”