Psycho Alley

Eleven

Janet Christie, eighty-six years old, lived alone on a warden-controlled old people’s complex on the outskirts of Poulton-le-Fylde. She had a comfortable one-bedroom bungalow with all the mod cons for an easy life. Frank, her husband, Henry’s father, had died ten years earlier, having left her with serious money from property and pensions and she did not want for anything, except better health, better memory and a son who visited her more regularly.

Henry had watched her slow deterioration since his dad had died. It had been her decision to go into sheltered housing, having sold the mortgage-free marital home, because she did not want to be a burden. At first the decision had been ludicrous to Henry, but as the years passed, he’d seen the sense. She had anticipated the future, but he had not. Now she needed a cane for support and it was a struggle for her to even make her own meals. She had not reached her dotage, but it was on the horizon, yet she remained fiercely independent and fought the prospect of the next big move in her life … to an old people’s home.

The journey to her house was not without risk for Henry. He arrived five minutes earlier than promised.

A car was parked outside and Henry found a local DC inside talking loudly to his mother. Henry knew the detective well, having worked with her over the years. She looked at the DCI and gave him a worried smile.

‘Henry!’ his mother said, obvious relief flooding through her

‘Hiya, Mum, what’s been going on?’ He scooped down and pecked her cheek.

‘Been bloody robbed … uuhh!’ she shivered. It was at that exact moment Henry saw how shaken and vulnerable she was. Her old, watery eyes turned up to him, edged with cataracts, and a tear rolled down her cheek. ‘Need a hug,’ she blubbed.

Henry gasped quietly, swooped down and wrapped his arms around her, feeling guilty he had allowed this to happen. He even began to fill up himself and get a wobbly chin. ‘It’s all right, mum,’ he said brightly, ‘I’m here … it’s OK.’ He twisted his head to the detective and said, ‘Can you give us a minute?’

They were in the tiny but well-appointed kitchen, each with a cup of tea and a biscuit, leaning against cabinets. Henry’s mother was in the living room, chatting happily now to her friend who had called round; a friend who was a mere slip of a thing at eighty and who did quite a lot for her. This gave Henry and the local detective time to speak.

‘I idealistically thought that a warden-managed complex would make this sort of crime more difficult,’ Henry said. He had to admit that he was pretty much out of touch with this level of criminality, and it had come as quite a shock to him that his own mum could be the victim of such a callous individual.

The detective was called Sheena Waters and had been posted to this area for a good number of years. ‘It’s an epidemic, distraction burglary,’ she said. ‘I’m investigating four others on this complex and about ten others in the area. They’re all much the same MO, same offender, I think: targeting old people, mainly women, using a variety of scams to gain entry and steal.’

‘What happened here?’

‘Electricity board checking pipes.’

‘She fell for that?’

‘It all happens quite quickly, and for an eighty-odd-year-old it’s pretty unstoppable. They don’t really know what’s happening until it’s too late. Preying on vulnerable people is easy.’

Henry’s mouth twisted with revulsion.

‘I think I’m dealing with someone who makes a living from this type of crime, someone who’s chosen the location very carefully; there’s lots of older people round here, the main road in and out is easily accessible …’ Sheena stopped, seeing her words weren’t really penetrating. ‘Henry, it’s not your fault,’ she said kind-heartedly. The expression on his face informed her he was feeling differently.

He sipped his tea — Yorkshire tea, the kind his mother swore on, even though she’d been born in Rochdale — and pulled himself together.

‘It’s not the first time, though,’ Sheena said tentatively.

Henry closed his eyes in despair. ‘What?’

‘She’s been burgled before, same MO, but didn’t report it.’

‘What?’ His incredulity was tangible.

‘It often happens. Embarrassment, plus the offender threatened her.’

‘Threatened her?’

Sheena nodded. ‘She only told me just before you came, by the way.’

Henry felt queasy. ‘What’s the description of the offender?’

‘Male, white, twenty-five to forty years, black hair, five foot six inches tall, slim build, local accent.’

Henry rubbed his face. ‘What did he take?’

‘The two thousand pounds under her mattress.’

‘What?’ he said, horror-struck. ‘Money under the bloody mattress? She keeps money under the bloody mattress? The stupid bloody woman.’

‘DC Waters receiving?’ Sheena’s PR blared out.

‘Go ahead.’

‘ANPR hit you might be interested in.’

‘Go ahead.’

Henry mee-mawed he was going back into the living room, leaving Sheena in the kitchen. He found his mother and friend devouring cake — Yorkshire Brack — to accompany their cups of tea. She seemed more relaxed now, but gave Henry a weak smile. Before he could speak, Sheena swung through the door behind him.

‘Henry,’ she hissed and beckoned him back to the kitchen, out of earshot of two people who couldn’t hardly hear a rock concert between them. ‘Traffic have an ANPR site set up on the 583 into Blackpool,’ she said quickly. ANPR stood for Automatic Number Plate Recognition, and was a superb computerized system of recording and checking vehicle registration numbers by the thousand. It was linked to PNC, the DVLA and other intelligence systems and was a tool often used for crime or traffic operations with great success. ‘They’ve had a hit which resulted in a motor being pulled and someone being locked up on suspicion of this job.’ Sheena pointed to the floor, meaning the burglary which had been committed at his mother’s. ‘He’s presently in custody at Blackpool.’

As ever, the custody office was heaving. Henry had never known it to be anything other. In excess of twelve thousand prisoners were processed through its doors each year, a phenomenal amount of human flesh being put through the sausage machine and spat out at the other side into the monster that was the criminal justice system.

Henry and Sheena eased their way through the horde, up to the custody desk, Henry’s eyes roving over the whiteboard on which the names of all detainees were posted for ease of reference. One name stood out, marked up as arrested on suspicion of burglary. Troy Costain. On their journey into Blackpool, he and Sheena hadn’t been told the name of the person who’d been arrested, and Henry hoped this wasn’t the person who had burgled his mother.

Sheena spoke to the world-weary-seen-it-all-don’t-give-a-flying-fuck custody sergeant. ‘Someone just been lodged on suspicion of burglary as the result of an ANPR check?’

The sergeant looked up from his thick binder of custody records. Eighteen people were presently in the cells, and he thought he was having a quiet day. He lifted his pince-nez and squinted at Sheena and Henry. He knew both well. ‘Doctor’s room, just being stripped for forensic.’

‘Who is it?’ Henry asked.

‘One of the Costain clan from Shoreside.’ It was the one Henry had seen on the whiteboard.

Henry swallowed. He edged up to the sergeant. ‘Put me down for supervising the forensic stuff.’

The sergeant eyed him, slightly puzzled. ‘Why?’

‘He burgled my mum’s house — whilst she was in.’

The sergeant nodded. ‘Don’t drop me in it, Henry.’

‘I won’t.’

Henry twisted away from the desk and, Sheena trailing behind him and giving the custody officer one of those ‘What the hell’s happening?’ looks, they made their way down the corridor to the doctor’s room, a place reserved for the police surgeon to assess any prisoner requesting treatment. It was also the room in which the breathalyzer machine was located.

Inside, the prisoner was stepping into a paper suit. His clothing had been bagged up appropriately. Two uniformed traffic cops were supervising.

‘There’s no effin’ way you can put me in a cell. I’m claustrophobic, and I promise you, I’ll kick off big-style.’

The constables blinked with disinterest. Then the prisoner turned and saw Henry. For the second time that day, someone breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of him coming through a door. The prisoner opened his mouth, about to say something, but Henry gave a minute signal with his index finger to silence him.

‘You guys finished bagging up?’ Henry asked.

‘Yeah, boss.’ They picked up the parcels containing the prisoner’s seized clothing.

‘You’ve done a good job.’ Henry stood back, indicating they should leave, which they did. He closed the door behind them, softly and firmly, leaving himself, Sheena and the detainee in the room.

‘Thank fuck you’ve turned up,’ the prisoner whined. ‘They were gonna put me in a cell. I’d go ape, you know that.’

Henry eyed the felon up and down, unable to hide his look of utter disgust.

Troy Costain, hard man from Shoreside estate on the outskirts of Blackpool. One of the ever-multiplying Costain clan, which ruled the estate through violence, burglary, intimidation and drugs, as well as populating houses with an array of illegitimate kids, rather like cuckoos. The Costains claimed to be descended from Romany gypsies, that they had blood running through their veins which could be traced back proudly through generations and that their behaviour — believing in the righteousness of theft and the fist — was part of their wild and legitimate legacy.

Troy was the eldest son. He pretty much ruled the roost, as old man Costain now spent most of his time in Spain. What no one knew was, though, was that he had been one of Henry’s top informants for many years, and, because of that, Henry had turned a blind eye to his nefarious activities. Recently, however, Troy had been trying Henry’s patience to the nth degree.

He had become Henry’s grass when Henry had arrested him years earlier and discovered that the hard man Troy purported to be became a weak, pathetic little shit when introduced to the inside of a cell. Confined spaces sent him batty. A chink in his armour which Henry had ruthlessly shoved a metaphorical knife through during the intervening years.

As Henry looked at him today, though, he knew that their ‘special relationship’ was at an end.

‘What’ve you been up to, Troy?’ Henry asked calmly.

‘Nowt, really. Just a bit of a scam.’ He glanced worriedly at Sheena, then back at Henry. ‘Can we get rid of the totty,’ he said conspiratorially, edging up to Henry.

Troy did not see it coming. Henry was hardly aware of it, either. It was just a reaction.

He punched Troy in the lower stomach with a fist bunched hard as iron. Then, he slapped him across the face, open-handed and sent him spiralling across the room, falling across the doctor’s examination table, with Henry right with him. He grabbed Costain by the throat and smashed him against a steel cabinet, making an awful din, but one which Henry knew could not be heard outside the room.

Troy slumped down, clutching his gut, gasping for breath. ‘What the fuck was that for?’

Henry towered over him, shaking with rage.

‘Tell me again what you’ve been up to, Troy.’

‘Henry, man, what is this? Jesus Christ, I’ve only been rippin’ off old biddies, everybody’s doin’ it,’ he wailed.

Sheena laid a hand on Henry’s shoulder. She had witnessed the assault from behind and could see Henry trembling with fury. Her touch stopped Henry from launching a full-scale battering, which was what he desperately wanted to do. Beat the evil bastard to a pulp. The last time Henry had completely lost his rag in the cells it had cost a young man a testicle and caused Henry endless grief. He stepped back, removing the red visor that had clicked down over his eyes. He was astonished at how entirely furious he was, how his anger was driven by the thought of someone violating the home and property of his mother.

He caught his breath, then knelt down next to Costain, who was looking at him with the surprise of a beaten puppy. ‘I want you to admit all the offences you’ve committed, Troy, do you understand?’ Costain nodded, wanting to please Henry there and then, discretion being the better part of valour and all that. ‘Stand up and let me take you to the cells. You need to be punished for what you’ve done.’

‘Henry, you know what the cells’ll do to me.’

‘Yes.’ A beat. ‘I do.’

‘No fucking way, you bastard.’ And Costain did exactly what Henry wanted him to do as the prospect of being locked up blinded him to everything else. He went for Henry, using his legs like a sprinter, driving himself into Henry’s chest, arms flailing, punches landing on Henry’s upper body.

Henry stumbled backwards awkwardly, riding the blows with a bleak smile, before easily brushing off the attack, grabbing Costain by the throat and waltzing him across the room like a farmer strangling a chicken and slammed him across the breathalyzer machine, holding him down, the grip tightening on his neck. Both their eyes bulged.

Henry was enjoying the sensation, but after a few moments he let go, spun Costain round, put an arm around Costain’s neck and bent him double.

‘OK, I’m going to walk you nice and easy out of here down to the cells, Troy, and if you so much as tremble wrong, I’ll make you do the funky chicken, OK?’

‘OK,’ he wheezed.

‘Open the door,’ Henry growled at Sheena, who was shocked and speechless by Henry’s display, having seen a side of him she did not know existed. She did as instructed, meek obedience, awe and fear in her face. Henry gave her a wink as he marched Costain out of the door, but it did not reassure her.

‘Which cell?’ he asked the custody sergeant.

‘Trap four.’

Henry led him down the cell corridor, turned into cell four and pushed him in, sending him stumbling against the bench. Costain rubbed his throat and turned to Henry. ‘Fuck’s this about, Henry, fuck’s this about?’

‘I’ll tell you what it’s about, Troy, mate,’ Henry said through clenched teeth. ‘It’s about you trespassing, you preying on people who can’t defend themselves. You being much, much worse than I ever thought you could be.’ With that, Henry slammed the heavy metal cell door shut with a reverberating crash.

Immediately Costain started to scream and pound and kick on the door from the inside. Henry listened to it for a moment, then turned away and stalked down the corridor.

Tea and a piece of cake, just like his mother was having; just the things Henry needed at that time of day to calm him down. At first, as he drank the tea, his hand dithered. After a few sips and some coffee walnut cake, he began to mellow out, to feel a certain serenity. At last he exhaled the last breath of tension, and the veins stopped pounding in his head.

He and Sheena were in the canteen on the eighth floor of the police station. She had said little, but had herded him up in the lift, sat him down and made him chill out.

‘I thought you were going to kill him.’

‘As Clint once said, “Killing’s too good for him”.’ He smiled again to try and reassure her, but his boyish grin wasn’t working on her. She was clearly upset and unsettled by Henry’s attack on a prisoner. ‘It’s probably a good job you put a hand on my shoulder when you did, though,’ he conceded. ‘He’s a bit too smackable.’

‘Mm,’ she said doubtfully.

‘Reckon he’s a possible for your other jobs?’

‘Fits the description well enough.’

‘He’ll have done them.’

‘I take it you know him of old … I sensed a certain history there?’

‘We go back a long way,’ was all Henry would say. That Costain was an informant was not known for sure by anyone else, nor was Costain even in the new informant handling system. Henry was handling him the old, unethical way, totally against modern procedure. Not that he would be doing that any more. He’d protected him for too long and now Troy had overstepped the mark. Time to jettison him.

‘I’d better get down and start interviewing him,’ Sheena said, standing up. She vacillated. ‘Look, Henry, if he makes a complaint or this gets asked about, I don’t think I’ll be able to cover for you,’ she said anxiously, unable to look Henry in the eye. ‘I’ve got my job to think about, y’know.’

‘I know, don’t worry. I wouldn’t expect you to do anything but do the right thing. It’s fine. But he won’t rock the boat. Thanks for looking after my mother.’

‘Pleasure.’

Henry watched her walk out of the canteen, then sat back and finished his tea and cake alone, two blissful flavours combining to de-stress him.

‘Time to get back to a murder enquiry,’ he announced to himself.