Snow Storm

13

Burke made his way to the West End. He buzzed the archaic door at the Phoenix Consultancy and entered. He was greeted by and aging receptionist who offered a cup of tea which he gratefully accepted with the proviso that she put three sugars in.

Fraser Douglas’s consultation room was more or less what he imagined a plastic surgeon’s office would look like. Two black leather couches flanked a marble fireplace with a heavy expensive looking vase as its centrepiece. Magazines related to the business of nipping and tucking adorned a coffee table and a series of splatted minimalist canvases their owner had no doubt paid through the nose for adorned the walls along with the standard centrepieces denoting qualifications awards and memberships.

The man himself was probably around forty five. It was hard to tell as he had clearly foregone the type of hair replacement he recommended and performed.

He bounded into the room like a cocker spaniel and they shook hands as Burke’s tea was delivered. Douglas sat on the arm of one of the couches and slurped on an espresso. He’d clearly had his teeth done as there wasn’t a coffee stain or natural shade of enamel on display in his mouth.

“So you spoke to one of my officers this morning?” Burke began.

“I did,” Douglas replied.

“And at the time you didn’t remember seeing anything?”

“No, well that’s not perhaps strictly true,” Douglas replied frowning.

Burke realised he’d had his eyebrows done.

“I hope we can keep this on the down low if you know what I mean.” Douglas gave Burke a look an actual spaniel might give someone with food; a kind of practised begging look, or at least he was sure that’s what he thought it would look like. The outside world rarely accurately reflected the inside of anyone’s brain and in reality it merely served to make him look like a cross between the ET and someone who was in the midst of a fright when the Botox properly kicked in. Forty five year old men really shouldn’t try to look cute in a begging way or in fact anyway Burke noted.

“I have been engaging in what you might call a bit of an assignation,” Douglas carried on. “Can I ask that we keep this between ourselves?”

“You can ask,” Burke replied “but I can’t really guarantee anything. That’s not strictly true. I can guarantee that you won’t be obstructing a police investigation should you see fit to fill us in on what you saw or didn’t see. I can also tell you that I will do my best to conceal your infidelity. But that’s as far as I can go.”

Douglas had obviously been trying to put a positive face on it. His shoulders slumped forward and his features collapsed. He raised his eyebrows, wrinkling his brow in recognition. “I value my marriage inspector. Are you married?”

“I am.”

“Well then presumably you know how much that means and that you just want to live up to your better half’s expectations but that also, sometimes that’s just not possible.”

“Sometimes, perhaps.”

“I’ve tried to fight it off,” he said staring intently at a spot somewhere on the wall. “But I’m a remarkably weak man when it comes down to it.”

Burke said nothing. He let Douglas continue knowing that this was a man looking to unburden himself.

“It started last summer. I’d been going round the doors on the street, looking for sponsorship for a cycle ride I’m doing to John O’Groats and back. It was through the local Rotary club, a few of us were doing it as much for an excuse to put in some extra training before the summer, if only to look good on the beach. Vanity’s a powerful motivator. I should know.” He paused clearly expecting this to elicit a small laugh at the very least. “So I get to Oleg’s house around nine only to find him in a bit of a drunken state.” He looked at Burke who nodded, “well he was having a bit of a get together and he invited me in. It was only at that point that I realised there were no other men there.”

“Really?” Burke replied. “In which case, who was there?”

Douglas’s shoulders slumped forward again and he let out a long lingering sigh.

“Professionals you might say.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Ladies of the night, escorts, call girls, hookers, call them what you will.”

“And presumably having being invited in, you were then invited to indulge?” Burke enquired, already knowing the answer. Why else would he look so decidedly pale right now?

“In my line of work there are of course ample opportunities for dalliances shall we say?”

“No doubt.”

“There is a bit of pressure involved. You take your chances to blow off steam while you can. I’ve already had more than one affair inspector, and my wife isn’t stupid. She caught me out twice and gave me an ultimatum as no doubt you’d expect. I suppose that’s what the cycling was about as much as anything. Escapism.”

“Hardly the same is it?” Burke heard himself say.

Douglas laughed a hysterical cackle, holding his head with both hands as though he might otherwise fall from his perch.

“No inspector, it isn’t. What is it they call us? Mamils? Middle aged men in lycra, an entire generation of men trying to recapture their youth by regressing to the age of twelve. At least some people have the balls to become born again bikers but no, that’s too dangerous. I learned that from my days in A&E. No, nowadays we all dress up like Lance Armstrong, and get our kicks peddling down hills like we did when we were pre-teens.” He laughed again. The hollow laugh of the slightly desperate man.

“I suppose if nothing else it’s healthy.”

“Didn’t work out so healthy for me though did it?” he almost shouted, before remembering himself, “caused me to spend the next few months in a blizzard of cocaine and whores.”

“So this became a regular thing?”

“It did, every Wednesday and Friday night. I told my wife these were training nights,” he scoffed to himself. “Gave me an excuse to come in wrecked and immediately take a shower. I kept it up, the training on Monday nights, just to keep my hand in, kept my story consistent if you see what I mean.”

“Must have been hard work.”

“Not really inspector. People rarely see what they don’t want to. It can be fairly easy to hide in plain sight.”

“You think your wife knew?”

“I assume she has more than an inkling. But knowing something deep down and being confronted with it are not the same thing, are they?”

“It must have been expensive.”

“Not at all.”

“Really? In my admittedly limited and strictly professional experience, coke and prostitutes tend to take a bit of a toll on the bank balance Mr Douglas.”

“Obviously, but I wasn’t exactly footing the bill.”

“Mr Karpov was funding your leisure activities in full?”

“He was.”

“And what did he want in return?”

Douglas looked thoughtful for a moment before shrugging.

“Not sure I know. I think he was lonely.”

“I see. Expensive way to get companionship isn’t it? Surely a Labrador, or at a push a Thai bride would actually work out cheaper in the long run.”

“I don’t know inspector. I’ve already told you that.”

“In any case, accepting all of what you say about your relationship with the now deceased Mr Karpov, what details can you actually give us regarding his murder?”

“None to speak of.”

“None?”

“No, save to say that he was involved with a dodgy crowd.”

“A dodgy crowd?”

“Well the man did have a ready supply of drugs and hookers didn’t he?”

“As did you sir.”

“I’m hardly Pablo Escobar Inspector.”

“But you suspected Mr Karpov of being some kind of kingpin?”

“Well possibly, what did I know? It’s not like I asked, but he was of Lithuanian extraction and I’m not being racist but..”

Oh here we go Burke thought to himself.

“Eastern Europeans perhaps have a different view of that kind of thing, culturally speaking.”

So it’s more a case of xenophobia then? Burke thought. “And yet you freely associated with him sir?”

“Well no,” Douglas replied, now looking a trifle confused.

“So he was coercing, perhaps blackmailing you in some way?”

“No Inspector. No I suppose I did freely associate with him as you put it. We didn’t discuss work.”

“Just took illegal drugs and had sex with prostitutes?”

“Look I’m trying to be helpful here,” Douglas said holding his arms out to the side in the age old way suggested he had nothing concealed. I have been totally honest with you here. “I haven’t involved my solicitor as I came to you in good faith.”

“So you know nothing else?” Burke summarised. He’d been here long enough. The air in the room was starting to taste bitter.

“No.”

“In which case that should be all for now.”

“Meaning?”

“We’ll be in touch.”

“Am I what would you say immune from prosecution. Does this goes any further?”

“We’ll be in touch.”

“Can we keep this away from my wife? Inspector, I have tried to be reasonable in all of this. I am doing my best to be helpful in catching the criminals who did this to a friend and neighbour.”

“It’s good of your sir.” And with that he was gone leaving Douglas to stew in his own juices. Funny how he seemed to think a medical degree gave him the right to flout laws as long as he did the big confession scene when it all went wrong. He must have been watching too much Oprah, much like his cycling hero.

Doctor Brown had offered him coffee from a kettle he kept -probably against health and safety- in the lab but he always refused, feeling somehow that the stench of death might make its way into the water by osmosis or something.

The ever downtrodden Brown was currently regaling him with a story about his recent golf holiday in the Algarve. Soon to be retired, he had squirreled away enough cold, hard cash over the years to set himself up a decent bolt hole out there and planned on living out the rest of his days in the relentless sunshine.

“Until the start of the inevitable decline,” he pointed out. “There comes a point when one has to rely on the kindness of the NHS or whatever is left of it by the time they have all gone private. Had my teeth done while I’ve still got the readies.”

He flashed a smile that was faultless and yet somehow just the right side of normal.

“An implant here and a crown there should see me right till I shuffle off this mortal coil, eh Jim?”

“My granny kept hers in a glass most of the time,” Burke volunteered before realising what he’d said.

“I’m not quite as old as your grandmother yet,” came the response, “that said I’m always in the market for an older woman.”

Brown flashed the teeth again as he nudged his young female assistant in the ribs causing her to roll her big blue eyes and shake her blonde head in protest.

“And I’ve met some great grannies.”

He was a walking HR issue. It was just as well he was close to retirement. Burke often wondered what the fabled Mrs Brown was like. The only description he’d heard from her husband consisted of the words battle-axe, harridan, harpy, fuhrer and managing director on the occasions he was inclined to be more charitable.

“So I suppose we should get down to brass tacks. Can’t stand around listening to Jennifer’s gossip all day can we?” He nudged the assistant again before leading the way through to the autopsy room, which he referred to variously as his office or in more jovial moments his studio. As they gathered round the stainless steel slab, part operating table part sink, Brown was poised to pull back the plastic sheet covering the vast body of the ex-Oleg Karpov. “Interesting things were immediately obvious on the removal of the deceased’s shall we say tasteful kimono.” He lifted the sheet “I warn you this isn’t one of the more aesthetically pleasing autopsies I’ve had the fortune to perform,” he said in a tone of sincerity he occasionally deployed. He pulled back the sheet as far as the shoulders, showing a largely misshapen head caked in blood. The face was unrecognisable as the bullets had ripped their way through the top lip, right cheek, bridge of the nose and the entire left eyebrow. “Of course when the bullet hit the eyebrow the upper part of the face caved in, giving him his distinctly Neanderthal appearance down one side.

“Do we know this is him for sure?” Burke asked fighting back the urge he had to heave.

He’d seen some gruesome things particularly over the last couple of days but there was something about the face, or the loss of its form that really hit home. It was, after all, how people gauged each other.

“Oh yes. Thankfully he didn’t have quite as good a dentist or perhaps wasn’t so fond as squandering good cash as I. He had a partial denture consisting of the upper four incisors and the left canine. Despite the bullet it was still in very good shape so we were able to run it past his dentist in good time thanks to the feminine wiles of my glamorous assistant.” Jennifer blushed slightly and Burke wondered if the old boy had a particular way of saying inappropriate things that got him off scot free.

“So unless he has company, we can assume he wasn’t sleeping.” Burke said almost to himself.

“Unless he was really vain,” Jennifer added.

“True,” Burke replied remembering a story about someone choking on false teeth.

“Had he had sex recently,” he added.

“Haven’t got quite that far yet Jim,” Brown replied, “but will have a look under the bonnet and let you know. Same goes for the tox screen and ballistics report. Obviously so far we’re quite chuffed we’ve managed to identify the bugger. Certainly no traces standing out under black light but you never know.”

“Shouldn’t that kind of thing stand? I mean bodily fluids; doesn’t that normally show up fairly easily?”

“Well there were a lot of bodily fluids but not in that particular area. He made have had a shower or something though. Are you worried he didn’t get any before he went?”

“Something like that,” Burke replied, leaving them to draw their own conclusions.

“And so to one of the more interesting pieces of the puzzle,” Brown declared, pulling back the covers to the corpse’s waist.

Between the bullet holes were various tattoos giving the man’s upper body the appearance of the world’s biggest embroidered pin cushion.

“Bit like join the dots,” Brown said as he stood back to give Burke some space to take it all in.

“Welcome to my world.” Burke looked on in awe at the network of drawings on Karpov’s body. The images were distorted by the bullet holes across the length of his abdomen, with pieces missing and others stretched by the cushy lifestyle Karpov had clearly led in recent years and the fatty toll it had taken on his body.

On his chest was what looked like a crucifix, this was the focal point about which all the other art work seemed to revolve.

His right shoulder bore what seemed to be an epaulette and on his left just at the base of the neck was a dagger from which countless drops of draining blood made their way downwards. A star adorned the opposite shoulder and a church with multiple spires, -Burke counted ten- dominated the left side of his chest, and a rose with thorns appeared to ooze out of a deep wound on the right.

The whole scene seemed at odds with the image of the respectable businessman Campbell had painted on his return from Karpov’s office.

“Russian prison tattoos,” Burke suggested knowing fairly well that this was likely to be the case.

“That would be my bet,” Brown agreed, “not for the health conscious anyway. They melt down a boot heel and mix the soot with urine then inject the nasty mix through the skin using a sharpened guitar string and a modified electric razor.”

“Hardly Miami Ink is it?”

“Not entirely sure what that is but I’ll take your word for it.”

Burke thought about explaining it was a reality TV show but decided against it. He made his way back to the cop shop via Greggs getting stuck into a much needed steak bake. He’d fancied a sausage roll but when it came down to it couldn’t face the idea of pork after the sight of Karpov’s gargantuan inked form.