Watching the Dark

Chapter 5

Banks got to the office early enough on Monday morning to listen to Today for a while as he went through his in tray. Before long, sick to death of hearing how bad the economy was and how violent things were in the Middle East, he switched over to catch the end of Breakfast on Radio 3, where a stately Haydn symphony was playing.

As expected, nothing much had happened on Sunday. Banks had called in at the station briefly, and he found Haig and Lombard working away at the escort agency websites. Doug Wilson and Gerry Masterson were out conducting interviews. He guessed that Joanna Passero would be at home, as would most of the CSIs and lab technicians they so needed to start producing results. Winsome had arranged for the Garskill Farm victim’s photo to be on the evening news that night, and it would be shown again the following morning and evening. She had spent most of Sunday asking more questions in Ingleby. There hadn’t been many calls made from the telephone box there, and the ones of interest to Banks, made around the time Mrs Boscombe had seen the man resembling the victim, had all been to mobiles. One was to Bill Quinn, another was a pay-as-you-go, impossible to trace, and the third was an Estonian number they were trying to track down.

Early on Monday morning, the upper floors of the police station were still mostly empty, and Banks enjoyed a little quiet time gazing down on the market square, the gold hands against the blue face of the church clock telling him it was a quarter past eight. He made some notes, answered a couple of emails and binned most of the official memos and circulars that had piled up. As Banks worked, he heard people arriving, footsteps on the stairs, office doors opening and closing along the corridor, good mornings, brief comments on the weekend’s football and television. A normal Monday morning.

By nine o’clock he was ready for a gathering of the troops, but before he could round them up, there was a knock at his door and Stefan Nowak, Crime Scene Manager, walked in. The two had known one another for years. Stefan was unusual among CSIs for being a detective sergeant rather than a civilian. He was working towards his inspector’s boards, and he already had a BSc and a number of forensics courses under his belt. He wasn’t a specialist, but something of a jack of all trades, and his management skills made him perfect for the job. He still spoke with a slight Polish accent, though Banks understood that he had been in England for years. He never talked much about his past or his private life, so Banks was not certain what his story was. He sensed that Stefan liked to cultivate an aura of mystery. Perhaps he thought it made him more attractive to the opposite sex. He had a reputation for being a bit of a ladies’ man, and dressed as stylishly as Ken Blackstone, though in a more casual, youthful way. He was a lot better-looking, too, with a full head of healthy, well-tended hair.‘I hope you’ve got something for me, Stefan,’ Banks said. ‘We could do with a break right now.’

Nowak sat down, pulling at his creases the way Ken Blackstone did. ‘I don’t think you’ll be disappointed,’ he said. ‘I paid a visit to Garskill Farm yesterday and had a chat with the Crime Scene Manager Mr Smedley. I must say, he’s a bit tense and prickly, isn’t he?’

‘That’s one way of describing him.’

‘Anyway, I wanted to compare some fibres and tyre tracks as soon as possible, and it seemed the best way.’

‘And were you able to?’

‘Not until just now,’ said Nowak. ‘The team worked very hard and late up at that dreadful place. The report was in my tray when I got in a little over an hour ago. Someone must have dropped it off late last night.’ Nowak spent most of his time in Scientific Support, next door, which had been taken over as an annexe when Eastvale was the headquarters of the Western Area. It would probably remain as it was, because it was damn useful, and it saved money in the long run. Like most county forces, Eastvale sent most of the evidence collected at crime scenes out to an accredited forensic laboratory for analysis, but there were one or two things they could handle in their own labs here, such as fingerprint and basic fibre analysis, photographic services and documents. Not DNA or blood, though. In the end, most trace evidence went to the official Forensic Science Service Laboratory at Wetherby, or to one of the specialist labs dealing with such matters as entomology or forensic archaeology. But having some services in-house saved time as well as money.

‘Anything useful?’

‘Depends what you mean. The book that someone left behind there was in Polish, by the way. A translation of The Da Vinci Code.’

‘That’s a promising start. Fancy a coffee?’

‘Sure.’

Banks rang down for a pot of coffee. He still needed about three cups to kick-start him in a morning, and so far he had had only one at home to wash down the slice of toast and marmalade that passed for breakfast.

Nowak shuffled the files in front of him, picking out photographs of hairs and tyre tracks that didn’t mean much to Banks. ‘The long and the short of it is that we can place the same car at both scenes,’ Nowak announced. ‘The tracks at Garskill Farm were poor because of the rain, of course, but the ground was very hard to start with, and Smedley’s lads managed to get some impressions. There’s some very distinctive cross-hatching on one of the tyres.’ He showed Banks two photographs; even he could see that the little scratches on both were the same.

‘So hang on a minute,’ said Banks. ‘These are photographs from two different scenes, right? You’re saying that the tracks from the farm lane near St Peter’s match tracks found in the old driveway at Garskill Farm?’

‘Yes.’

‘Excellent,’ said Banks. It was the forensic link he had been hoping for. It wouldn’t offer an easy solution to the case, and perhaps it wouldn’t stand up in court, but it would help them focus, give them a sense of direction and a fruitful line of inquiry. ‘I don’t suppose you can tell the make, year and colour? Licence plate, too, perhaps?’

Nowak laughed. ‘Not the year. Not yet. It’s not a rugged terrain vehicle, though, I can tell you that much. We’ve got the wheelbase measurement and identified the brand of the tyres, ContiSportContact 2. So now we have to see how many car manufacturers use them, but we should be able to come up with a bit more information soon. Going by the size and wheelbase dimensions, I’d say we’re looking at something along the lines of a Ford Focus. All this is still preliminary, of course. Guesswork. We’re working from photographs, and we won’t be able to state with any more certainty until we get the Dentstone KD impressions done.’

Banks scribbled on his notepad. ‘But you think that what you’ve told me is accurate so far?’

‘Ninety per cent.’

‘That’s good enough for me right now.’

‘Oh, I forgot to mention. It’s dark green.’

‘What is?’

‘The car. It’s dark green.’

‘You’re having me on.’

‘Not at all. It brushed against a fencepost and got a little scratch. We’re having the paint analysed as well as the tyre tracks. We can probably get you the make, model and year from the paint reference databases, wheelbase and tyre type, when we’ve got it all itemised, but I’m afraid even that won’t be able to tell us the licence number. Still, taken in combination, it should all help us be a lot more accurate.’

‘I’m impressed,’ said Banks.

‘You should be.’

The coffee arrived. They both took it black, so Banks poured from the metal pot into a couple of mugs and passed one to Nowak. ‘There’s more,’ said Nowak, after he had taken his first sip. ‘I’ve just been having a look through the comparison microscope at fibres from both crime scenes. We found quite a few strands of synthetic fibre, most likely from a cheap, mass-produced overcoat of some kind, stuck to the tree from which we think the killer fired his crossbow. Smedley’s team found similar fibres at Garskill Farm, in the building where the body was found. Doorpost, chair.’

‘So the same person was in both places?’

‘So it would seem. Or the same overcoat. We still have a fair way to go to be certain — spectrographic analysis, dye comparisons and so on — but from what I can see at first glance, the fibres match. I wouldn’t read too much into that as a scientist without all the other things I’ve mentioned. After all, it’s pretty common. These overcoats are mass-produced, as I said, and anyone could buy one from Marks and Spencers or wherever. When we’ve got a better sense of the make-up of the fibre and the dyes used, we’ll start searching the databases and talking to manufacturers and retailers. But all that will take time, and it’s still very unlikely to give us a name. I thought you might want a few preliminary signposts as soon as possible. There are footprints, too. Rather too many to be especially valuable, but their expert thinks some of them match the ones you took from the woods at St Peter’s. Same size and distinctive cut on the sole. He was there, in both places.’

‘You’re a wonder, Stefan.’

‘None of this will stand up in court. I hope you don’t—’

‘Nothing’s going to court. Not for a while. But it sheds a little more light on the cases if we can think of them as definitely connected in this way. Thanks. I’ll need to do a bit of thinking about what all this means.’

‘Smedley’s team also found traces of another vehicle on the driveway at Garskill Farm. Seems it has a slight oil leak, so we’ve got a sample. We’ve also got tyre tracks. This is a larger vehicle altogether, bigger wheelbase and tyres. A good size transit van.’

‘People mover? Big enough for twenty?’

‘Maybe. It’d be a bit of a crush, but when you’ve seen where they were living, I doubt they’d have minded much.’

‘I don’t think they would have had much choice. Will Smedley’s team be able to tell us much more about this other vehicle?’

‘Sure. They’ll do the measurements, the impressions and analysis. I just thought you might like to know that there was someone else there.’

‘Now all we have to do is find him.’

‘Give us time,’ said Nowak, getting to his feet. ‘Give us time. By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask you. Who is that good-looking blonde with the delightful figure I’ve seen about the place the past couple of days? Is she new? Visiting? Permanent? Why don’t I know about her?’

Banks smiled. ‘She’s Professional Standards, Stefan. I’d stay well clear of her if I were you.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with my standards,’ Nowak said. ‘Professional or otherwise. Professional Standards, eh? Interesting. She’s a foxy one.’

‘She’s married.’

‘But is she happy, Alan? Is she happy?’ He glanced at the coffee mug in his hand. ‘Anyway, I must get back to work. Can I take this?’

‘Of course,’ said Banks. ‘Be my guest.’

He shook his head slowly at Nowak’s departing back.

Though Winsome, Banks and the rest of the team gave Annie a heroine’s welcome when she arrived in the boardroom for the morning meeting, she nonetheless felt disassociated from the investigation, from the processes of police work as a whole. As she listened to Banks and Winsome, who did most of the talking, and watched them stick photographs and write names on the glass board, it all seemed very remote and distant from what her life had become, and she found herself drifting away, missing bits and pieces, unsure of the connections. Sometimes the voices sounded muffled, and she couldn’t make out what they were saying; other times she would notice that two or three minutes had passed by and she hadn’t heard a thing. She didn’t even know what she’d been thinking. It was only to be expected, she told herself. She had been away a long time.

Area Commander Gervaise dropped in at the end of the meeting to welcome her, and to remind her to take things easy for the first few weeks, not go running around the county. If Annie felt tired, Gervaise told her, she only had to say so, and she would be allowed to go home. The most important thing was that she make a full recovery. Bollocks, thought Annie, making a rude sign at Gervaise’s departing rear. The main thing was that she got back on the tracks again before it was too late, and she lost all her skills, not only her powers of listening and concentration. She didn’t want to be treated like an invalid, like one of those wounded soldiers back from the war who nobody wants to know, or even acknowledge.

She had spent a pleasant weekend reacquainting herself with her tiny cottage in Harkside after over a month at the sprawling artists’ colony near St Ives. The cottage in the heart of the maze, or so Banks had described it when he had first visited her there, years ago. She remembered those days well, the late mornings in bed, the warmth and humour, the lovemaking. Whatever their relationship, however it had ended, at the beginning it had felt like falling in love, full of promise, with that joyous sense of abandon, of falling without a net: feelings that she very much doubted she would let herself experience again, should she be fortunate enough to have the chance. None of those things was a part of her life now, and she had an idea that they weren’t a part of Banks’s life, either. Maybe she was romanticising their time together. Perhaps it hadn’t been that way at all. Memory plays strange tricks on us, she thought. We often remember things the way we would have liked them to be. Besides, it’s foolish to try to rekindle what has gone. She had ended her last day of sick leave with a long hot bath and a stack of gossip magazines.

In the large open-plan squad room she shared with the rest of the team, there were flowers on her desk from Banks, along with a box of chocolates from Winsome. The rest of the squad had had a whip round and bought her a fancy teapot, a little gizmo that made it easy to use loose leaves instead of tea bags, and a nice selection of exotic teas, from green to lapsang souchong. It was a nice gesture, and by half past eleven, as she sipped her late elevenses of Darjeeling, sampled a chocolate and looked at the flowers — roses, of course, what else would a man think to buy? — she thought things might not work out too badly after all.

Her main job on her first day was catching up on the Bill Quinn case. Banks had told her a fair bit on Friday night, and at the morning meeting she had learned about the other murder, at Garskill Farm, and its connection with Bill Quinn’s murder. Now she had to fill in the gaps, read the witness statements, study the forensic and post-mortem reports.

Over in the corner at the spare desk sat two detectives she didn’t know. They were on loan from County HQ, Winsome had said. Haig and Lombard. From what Annie could see, they were watching porn on their computers, and the most unattractive of the two, wispy-haired, shiny suit, skinny as a rake, with bad skin and a Uriah Heep look about him, kept giving her the eye. She couldn’t remember from the briefing whether he was Haig or Lombard. All she knew was that they were supposed to be checking Internet sites for the girl in the photo with Quinn. They seemed to be enjoying themselves.

Annie returned to the growing pile of statements, reports and photographs. As she flipped through them, something caught her attention, a blow-up from one of the photos found in Quinn’s room, and she went back to it. If anyone had mentioned it at the meeting, she had been drifting at the time. She put the end of her pencil to her lower lip and frowned as she thought through the implications.

Closing the folder, she stood up and walked over to Haig and Lombard. The one who had been ogling her averted his gaze like a guilty schoolboy caught smoking or masturbating in the toilets. They appeared furtive, pretending to concentrate on their respective screens. As they both showed images of big-breasted women in lingerie with knowing expressions on their faces, that didn’t help the two detectives to appear any more innocent.

‘Enjoying yourselves?’ Annie asked, arms folded.

‘We’re working,’ said the wispy-haired one.

‘Who are you?’

‘DC Lombard, ma’am.’ Generally, Annie didn’t like being called ma’am, but these two young pups needed a lesson. She would put up with it.

‘Getting anywhere?’

‘No, ma’am.’

‘Where are you looking?’

‘Lyon,’ said Haig. ‘It’s the only place we know DI Quinn has visited in France.’

‘What makes you think the photos were taken in France?’

‘Huh?’

‘Huh, ma’am.’

‘Right. Huh, ma’am?’

‘I asked why France? I suggested to DCI Banks that it had probably happened in a foreign country, but it didn’t have to be France.’

‘It’s the beer mat, ma’am,’ explained Lombard, as if he were talking to a particularly backward child. ‘You must have seen it. It says “A. Le Coq”.’ He pronounced the last word with the requisite manly gusto and bravado, a smirk on his face. ‘That sounds French to me.’

Annie could see it took them all they had to stop bursting out sniggering. She held her ground. ‘Did you look it up?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The beer, the brewery. A. Le Coq. To find out where it is.’

‘No need to, was there?’ said Lombard. ‘I mean, it’s French, isn’t it? Stands to reason. Or maybe Belgian.’

‘But DI Quinn never went to Belgium, did he?’ Haig said.

‘I thought so,’ sighed Annie. ‘You pair of bloody idiots. You can stop that right now. You’re miles off.’

‘What are you talking about? Ma’am.’

Annie leaned over the nearest computer and typed the words ‘A. Le Coq’ into the Google search engine, then she brought up the first site on the list, moved back so the two DCs could both see the screen. ‘That’s what I mean,’ she said. ‘See how simple it is? Ever heard of Google? And you couldn’t be bloody bothered to check. That’s sloppy police work.’

Annie walked away, leaving the two open-mouthed. Time to talk to Banks. She picked up the phone.

Banks found a parking spot on North Parkway and walked to the Black Bull. The road, not far from the big Ring Road roundabout, had a central grass strip dotted with trees, and two lanes of traffic on either side. The houses, set back behind pleasant gardens and walls or high privet hedges, were brick or prefab semis, with a smattering of bungalows and the occasional detached corner house. There weren’t many small shops, but he passed a mini Sainsbury’s and a Job Centre Plus, and saw a small church with a square tower across the street. The area had a pleasant open feel to it, with plenty of green in evidence. There was a council estate behind the opposite side, and two tower blocks poked their ugly upper stories into the quickly clouding sky like fingers raised in an insult.

Banks was feeling pleased with himself for getting rid of Joanna Passero for the day. Naturally, she had wanted to accompany him to Leeds, but Dr Glendenning was performing the post-mortem on the Garskill Farm victim, and seeing as she liked post-mortems so much, Banks had suggested she should go along with Winsome. The rest of the time she could do what she wanted; there was plenty to keep her occupied. She didn’t like it, but in the end she reluctantly agreed. With her along, Banks knew he would have an even tougher time with Warren Corrigan, and he probably wouldn’t get anything out of Nick Gwillam at all, even though he wasn’t actually a copper himself, not with Miss Professional Standards sitting next to him. Still, it remained to be seen whether he got anything useful on his own.

Before Banks got to the Black Bull, his mobile rang. At first he thought he would just ignore it, but when he checked, he saw the call was from Annie, and he felt he owed her all the encouragement he could give her. He stopped and leaned against a bus shelter. ‘Annie?’

‘I’ve just been having a word with those two young lads from County HQ,’ Annie said. ‘Where on earth do they find them these days?’

‘Needs must,’ Banks said. ‘Why? Surely they can’t be doing any harm on a soft-porn search?’

‘No harm, no, but they’re wasting time.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The beer mat.’

‘What beer mat?’

‘“A. Le Coq”. A blow-up from one of Quinn’s photos. It came in after you left. I don’t think they bothered to check on the brewery’s location. They’re checking escort agencies in the Lyon area.’

‘I don’t follow. Look, Annie, I’ve got rather a lot on my plate and—’

‘A. Le Coq is not a French brewery.’

‘It’s not? Sounds like it to me. Belgian, then?’

‘Not Belgian, either.’

‘OK, you’ve got my attention. I have no idea where it is. Never heard of it. Enlighten me.’ A woman, not much more than a girl really, passed by with a two-tier pram in which her twins lay sleeping. She puffed on her cigarette and smiled shyly at Banks, who smiled back.

‘If either of them had taken the trouble to find out,’ Annie went on, ‘they’d have discovered that A. Le Coq is an old established Estonian brewery.’

Banks paused to digest this, work out how it changed things. ‘But...’

‘As I mentioned the other night, I’ve been to Tallinn,’ Annie went on. ‘I’ve even tasted the stuff. It’s not bad, actually. You do know what this means, don’t you?’

‘That the photos were most likely taken when Bill Quinn was in Tallinn six years ago on the Rachel Hewitt case.’

‘Exactly. I’ll start researching the case immediately. Where are you now?’

Banks explained.

‘Will you keep me informed?’ Annie said.

‘I will. And you me. Thanks a lot, Annie.’

‘No problem.’

‘One more thing. Don’t forget that one of the calls we think the Garskill Farm victim made from the telephone box in Ingleby was to an Estonian number. You might check if anyone’s run it down yet. Or do it yourself. It shouldn’t be too difficult.’

‘Will do.’

Banks put his phone back in his jacket pocket and made his way towards the pub, which rather resembled a rambling old house, with a red pantile roof, a whitewashed facade and a small area of picnic benches in a stone-flagged yard out front, separated from the pavement by a strip of grass and a low wall. Banks made his way past the empty tables to the door and entered the cavern-like space. The ceiling was high, and the room seemed to swallow up the little groups of tables, even the bar itself, though it was long, and the tiers of bottles reflected in the mirror gave the illusion of depth. The place had clearly seen better days, but there was a certain warm welcome in the shabby velveteen, brass fixtures and framed watercolours of old Leeds scenes on the walls. It smelled of domestic cleaning fluid, but all the Domestos in the world couldn’t get rid of the years of stale smoke. A few slot machines flashed and beeped here and there by a nicotine-stained pillar, but no one was playing them. Peter and Gordon were singing ‘A World Without Love’ on the jukebox. It was lunchtime, and there were a few family groups picking away at baskets of chicken and chips or bowls of lasagna, and the usual ensemble of regulars stood at the far end of the bar chatting up a buxom blonde barmaid. She looked like a retired stripper, Banks thought. Or perhaps not even retired yet. He walked over to the barman, who was studiously polishing a glass.

‘What can I do for you, sir?’ the barman asked.

‘I’d like to see Mr Corrigan.’

The man’s expression changed abruptly from welcoming to hostile. ‘And who may I say is asking for him?’

Banks showed his warrant card.

‘Just a moment, sir.’

The barman disappeared. The blonde pulling pints at the far end of the bar glanced over and cocked her hip. A few moments later, the barman reappeared, and a giant materialised beside Banks.

‘Curly here will take you to him,’ said the barman, then he turned away. Curly was as bald as one of the balls on the snooker table at the far end of the room, and about as unsmiling. Banks followed him through a maze of small lounges, past another bar, through doors and down corridors by the Gents and Ladies toilets towards the back of the pub, until they came to a small private function room, perfect for the office lunch. Curly gestured for Banks to enter, and he did. The decor was much the same as the rest of the pub, with plenty of brass and velvet in plush dark shades, with heavy varnished tables, ornate iron legs. Banks had expected an entourage, but one man sat alone at a table, a few papers spread in front of him. He gathered them up and put them in a folder, then smiled and stood up when Banks came in. Banks was surprised at how slight and skinny he was. He had a sort of ferret face, thinning ginger hair, no eyebrows and a high forehead. Banks put his age at about forty. He was casually dressed, wearing a navy sports jacket over his shirt. No tie. He extended his hand in greeting. Banks thought it churlish to refuse, so he shook.

‘I know Kelly at the bar checked your ID, but you don’t mind if I have a butcher’s, myself, do you? One can’t be too careful.’

‘Not at all,’ said Banks, showing his warrant card.

Corrigan examined it. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Banks,’ he read slowly. ‘Impressive. It’s a pleasure to meet you at last, Mr Banks. I’ve heard so much about you. Sit down, sit down. You’re a long way from home. What brings you to these parts? But please excuse my manners. Can I offer you a drink?’

‘I wouldn’t mind a coffee,’ said Banks.

‘Coffee, it is.’ He called Curly in. ‘Get Mr Banks a coffee, Curly. How do you take it?’

‘Black, no sugar,’ said Banks.

‘You might think this set-up a bit odd,’ said Corrigan, gesturing around the room when Curly had gone for the coffee, ‘but I find it far more congenial than some soulless office in a building full of soulless offices. This place has history, atmosphere. And I’m comfortable here. Don’t you think it’s comfortable?’

‘Very,’ said Banks.

‘Of course, I travel quite a lot, too, but when I’m in town, I find it most pleasant to work here. It’s also useful for entertaining, too, of course. The chef can put together a decent menu when the occasion demands it, and there’s never any shortage of drink. Plus, I find it’s a good way to stay in touch with the neighbourhood. It’s a part of the community.’

‘You’ve sold me on it,’ said Banks. ‘I’ll ask my boss if I can relocate to the Queen’s Arms as soon as I get back to Eastvale.’

Corrigan laughed, showing rather long, yellowish teeth. The coffee arrived. Corrigan didn’t have anything except the bottle of sparkling water already in front of him. ‘It’s a lovely part of the country you come from, the Yorkshire Dales,’ he said. ‘You should be proud of its heritage. I’d live there like a shot if I was in a position to retire. Do you know Gratly?’

‘I do.’

‘One of my favourite spots. The view from the bridge, the old sawmill. Picnic by the falls on Gratly Beck on a warm summer’s day. I like nothing better than to take the wife and kids there for a day out when I can manage it.’ He paused. ‘Still, I don’t suppose you’ve come here to talk about the beauties of the Yorkshire Dales, have you?’

‘Not exactly,’ said Banks. He knew that Corrigan was trying to rile him, or scare him off, by showing that he knew where Banks lived, which he had no doubt checked up on after Bill Quinn’s murder, but he was damned if he was going to rise to the bait. ‘It’s about DI Quinn. Bill Quinn.’

‘Ah, yes.’ Corrigan scratched the side of his nose. ‘Poor Bill. Tragic. Tragic. I understand it happened in your neck of the woods. I should imagine that’s why you’re investigating the case and not the locals here?’

‘Got it in one,’ said Banks. ‘But I shouldn’t worry too much. DI Quinn might be dead, but he’ll be replaced so quickly you won’t even notice it’s happened. I understand he was causing you a few problems?’

‘Problems? Bill? Not at all. I enjoyed our conversations, though I must say he was a rather dour man. It was hard to get a laugh out of him. Still, an intelligent man. Well informed. Well rounded, too. I like a man who has an interest in outdoor pursuits like fishing and gardening, don’t you, Mr Banks? I think it adds character, dimension.’

‘Frankly,’ said Banks, ‘I couldn’t give a toss. What I’d like to know is where you were last Wednesday evening between about eleven and one in the morning.’

‘Me? I’m assuming this is to do with Bill’s death, but I’m surprised you’re asking where I was. Surely if I had anything to do with what happened — and I assure you, I did not — then I’d hardly do it myself, would I? Do I look like an assassin?’

‘Assassins come in all shapes and sizes,’ said Banks. ‘And it’s murder. Not just death. Bill Quinn was murdered. I think we’d be best calling a spade a spade.’

‘As you will. Plain speaking. I’m all for that.’

‘What kind of car do you drive?’

‘A Beemer. Some think it’s a bit flash for these parts, but I like the way it handles.’

‘So where were you?’

‘At home, I should think. Certainly nowhere near St Peter’s.’

‘But you knew where Bill Quinn was?’

‘Everyone knew where Bill Quinn was.’

‘Did you tell anyone?’

‘Why would I do that?’

‘You tell me.’

‘No.’

Banks suspected he was lying. ‘Where’s home?’ he went on.

‘Selby.’

‘Any witnesses?’

‘My wife, Nancy. Lily and Benjamin, the kids, ten and twelve respectively. Quite a handful.’

‘Anyone else?’

‘Isn’t that enough?’

‘How about Curly out there?’

‘We don’t live together.’

‘Where was he?’

‘Curly!’ Corrigan called.

Curly stuck his shiny head around the doorway. ‘Boss?’

‘Mr Banks here wants to know where you were last Wednesday night.’ He glanced over at Banks, an amused expression on his thin pale face.

‘At the infirmary,’ Curly said.

‘What happened?’

‘Bumped into a lamppost. They kept me in overnight for observation.’

‘We can check, you know.’

‘Then check.’ He lowered his head. ‘You can still see the bump.’

Banks saw it. ‘Ouch,’ he said. ‘Nasty one. Dissatisfied client?’

Curly grunted and walked away.

‘So, as you can see, Mr Banks,’ said Corrigan, showing his palms in a gesture of frankness, ‘we have nothing to hide. Our consciences are clean.’

‘I can’t see how that could be,’ said Banks, ‘when you prey on the most vulnerable members of the community. You’re nothing more than the school bully demanding cash with threats in the playground.’

‘Unfortunately, there will always be the weak, and there will always be the strong,’ said Corrigan, ‘just as there will always be the poor and the rich. The poor are always with us. Didn’t Jesus say that, or something very much like it? I know which I’d rather be in both cases. Do you, Mr Banks?’

‘Misquoting the scriptures doesn’t help your case,’ said Banks. ‘Besides, I think it’s more a matter of the decent and the morally bankrupt, and I know which I’d like to be. But that’s just me.’

‘Oh, we have an outraged moralist here, do we? Yes, I remember I’d heard that about you. One of those religious coppers, are you? I provide a service. Do you think these poor vulnerable people, as you choose to see them, are any more decent than the rest of the rabble? Well, let me tell you, they are not. They think this country is the land of milk and honey. For a start, they’re greedy. They have no money, no jobs, they’re already in debt up to their eyeballs, but they want that new flat-screen television, they want the new car, their wives want to shop somewhere other than Primark for their clothes and their children’s clothes. They are also lazy, but they still want to be able to go out to fancy restaurants for dinner, and the younger ones want to go clubbing. All that takes money, and I supply it. I’m doing them a service.’

‘You make it sound very generous, Mr Corrigan, if it weren’t for your rates of interest.’

‘High risk, high interest. A businessman has to make a living.’

‘And the occasional broken leg? What happens when they can’t pay, and you come around asking for the money?’

‘Now, what good would my clients be to me if they weren’t healthy enough to work, should an opportunity and inclination present itself? Ask yourself that, Mr Banks. Yes, we have had to administer a gentle reminder on occasion, as an example, let’s say, but is that so different from any other line of work? Examples must be made. The message soon gets around.’

Banks had dealt with criminals like Corrigan before. They don’t really see themselves as criminals, or else they are so cynical about society and human nature that it doesn’t matter to them what they are, as long as they have the power and the money. On the surface, everything is all very cosy and upper-middle class, ponies and piano lessons for the kiddies, cashmere sweaters, Hugo Boss suits, Beemers and Range Rovers, golf club membership, perhaps even a friend or two on the local council. Underneath, it’s another matter. A trail of misery and woe, broken bodies and trampled souls going back as far as the eye can see. Someone has to pay for the Corrigans of this world to live in luxury, after all, whether they be junkies, gamblers or just poor sods who have fallen for the whole consumer society deal hook, line and sinker. But there was no point in saying it; there was no point arguing.

‘Tell me what you know about migrant labour camps,’ said Banks.

‘Only what I read in the papers. People come over here seeking for jobs, unskilled workers, asylum seekers, illegals, and they don’t always find one. Then they start whining about how badly done to they are. Well, that’s a big bloody surprise isn’t it, given that half our own people can’t find a job either?’

‘You mean that sometimes they start out in debt to someone like you, are made to work at jobs no one else wants to do, forced to live in squalid dormitories for exorbitant rents?’

‘You’ve been reading the Guardian, haven’t you? No wonder your heart’s bleeding all over your sleeve. I told you, I know nothing about them except what’s on the news, and I can’t say I pay I much attention to that. If they come over here stealing our jobs, they get what they bloody deserve.’

‘What about the people who bring them here? The agents? The gangmasters? The staffing companies? You must have some contacts with them?’

‘Don’t know what you mean.’

Banks sensed that he was lying again but moved on quickly, anyway. ‘Ever heard of a place called Garskill Farm?’ he asked.

‘No,’ said Corrigan. ‘It sounds a bit Dales-ish, though. Is it somewhere near you?’

‘Close,’ said Banks. ‘We just found a body there.’ He slipped a picture of the victim out of his briefcase and put it on the table. ‘Recognise this man?’

Corrigan examined it. ‘No. Not looking very healthy, though, is he?’

Banks followed it with a blow-up of the girl Quinn was with in Tallinn. ‘How about her?’

‘Nope. Wish I did, though. She looks good enough to eat.’ He ran his pink pointed tongue across his upper lip.

There was no evidence that Corrigan trafficked in young girls or acted as pimp, so Banks couldn’t really push him on any of this. It had been a long shot, anyway. All of it. Corrigan was a villain, no doubt, legally and morally, and Quinn had been on to him. But had Corrigan murdered Quinn, or had him killed? Had Quinn been in Corrigan’s power and tried to escape? And the man at Garskill Farm? What part had he played? There were still too many unanswered questions.

Leaving the rest of his coffee, Banks stood up. As soon as Curly heard the chair scraping against the stone floor he was in the doorway again. Corrigan gave him an almost imperceptible signal, and he stood aside.

‘It’s been a pleasure, Mr Banks,’ said Corrigan. ‘Next time you come, let’s make an occasion of it. Have a real drink. They’ve got a very nice selection of single malts in the main bar. You should enjoy the ten-year-old cask strength Laphroaig especially.’

Banks smiled. ‘Your information’s a bit out of date, Corrigan,’ he said. ‘I’m more of a red wine man, these days.’ Then he left.

Annie had experienced an extraordinary amount of satisfaction after bollocking Lombard and Haig for doing a half-arsed job on A. Le Coq, but now she was feeling guilty. It had been like shooting goldfish in a bowl. After all, they were just probationers, still wet around the ears, transferred in from elsewhere to help out. And they had done a lot of the shit work. For all the jokes made at their expense, it can’t have been a lot of fun spending day after day trawling through sleazy Internet sites searching for a face.

On the other hand, if they didn’t have what it took to carry out a simple Internet search, a no-brainer, then it was best they should find out now, rather than later, when they had more responsibility and could do more damage. They would get over it and move on. They might even make decent detectives one day. At least now they were checking the Estonian escort sites.

Though Annie had been to Tallinn for a dirty weekend with a DI from Newcastle four years ago, she knew very little about the place. They had done some sightseeing, but not much, sat at tables outside bars in an old part of the city drinking beer — A. Le Coq, as it happened — and eating pasta. The rest of the time they had spent in the hotel room having sweaty sex.

To Annie, that whole part of the world was tainted with the old Soviet curse, and she assumed that the Baltic states were an extension of Russia when it came to crime and Russian Mafia activity. Drugs, people-trafficking and illegal labour scams would be right up there. Perhaps Quinn got involved in something like that, and the Russians were behind it? Weren’t they behind almost everything illegal these days? The girl herself could be Russian. There was no way of telling from the photographs, but she did have that certain sad and tragic aspect to her beauty that Annie had associated with Russian women ever since she saw Doctor Zhivago on late-night television. It was one of Banks’s favourite movies, she knew, but that was because of Julie Christie.

Anyway, there was no point in speculating further. Whatever his motive, and whoever he was, Quinn’s killer had been in the woods at St Peter’s four days ago. They had a few solid leads to him now — the forensics on the tyre tracks and fibres, Quinn’s involvement in the Rachel Hewitt case, and now the blown-up part of one of the blackmail photos showing an A. Le Coq beer mat. She had Haig and Lombard checking if it was sold in other Baltic countries, too, or anywhere else in such quantities as to justify handing out free beer mats to bars — she wasn’t going to make the mistake of assuming too much at this point — but given that Rachel Hewitt had disappeared in Tallinn, and that Quinn had spent a week there working on the case there with the locals, she felt pretty certain about it.

There was very little about the Rachel Hewitt case in DC Gerry Masterston’s research so far, or in Quinn’s old files, which had arrived in the early afternoon. It was hardly surprising, really, Annie thought, as he had been only marginally connected with it. The real stuff would be in Tallinn. In Estonian. Whether it would be possible to get hold of those files if she needed to, she had no idea. In the meantime, she could at least start digging a bit into the background of what happened on that night six years ago.

Rachel Hewitt was to be maid of honour to her best friend Pauline Boyars at her wedding at St Paul’s Church in Drighlington on 5 August 2006. Before that, from 21 to 24 July they were going to Tallinn with four other close female friends for a hen weekend. The girls, all about nineteen years of age, were excited about the trip. They booked their cheap EasyJet flight early, and made sure they all got rooms at the Meriton Old Town Hotel, which someone told them was very comfortable and very close to lots of bars and clubs. To save money, the girls asked for twin beds and doubled up; Rachel shared with Pauline.

On the Friday they arrived, the girls met up in the hotel bar for a drink at six o’clock, then walked into town to find somewhere to eat. It was a hot evening, but they were early enough to get a table outside and enjoy some ‘authentic’ Estonian cuisine of pork in beer, and elk sausage. The idea was to have a relatively civilised and sedate Friday night out, which is exactly what they did, returning to the hotel around 11 p.m.

Saturday was for sightseeing and shopping, then came Saturday night, the big night itself, party time. They all got dolled up in their micro-skirts, spangly tops and fishnets, put on a bit of war paint and headed for the bars and clubs. At least they weren’t wearing bunny ears and tails, or little whiskers painted on their cheeks, as far as Annie could gather from the reports. They started with a few drinks in the hotel bar, then hit the town. After stopping at a few other bars, they ate steak and frites and drank wine outside at a restaurant, and after that things started to get a bit hazy.

Annie realised that she would have to go through the individual statements made by each of the girls before she could build up a clear picture of the order of events, but according to the newspaper and Internet reports, the girls went on to a couple of dance clubs, getting rowdier as the evening wore on. They were seen talking and dancing with various groups of boys over the course of the evening. Pauline was sick in the street, but soon recovered enough to go on with her friends to another bar on the main square.

Naturally, the boys flocked around them, their predatory instincts sensing the lack of inhibitions that comes with drunkenness, expecting easy pickings. According to all the accounts, though, there was no trouble. At least all the girls agreed on that. They moved on to yet another bar with a group of German youngsters they had befriended earlier at a nightclub, and it was maybe twenty minutes or so after that when Pauline began to wonder where Rachel had got to.

They checked all the rooms and toilets of the bar they had just arrived at, but she was nowhere to be seen. One of the others thought she might have been in the toilet when they left the previous bar, and may have missed their leaving, but she was equally sure that they’d told her where they were going. Pauline argued that they can’t have done, as they didn’t decide where they were going until they got outside, and it was the Germans’ idea, anyway.

Somehow, Rachel had become detached from her group.

Pauline asked one of the German boys to accompany her back to the previous bar, but in the winding streets of the Old Town they couldn’t remember exactly where it was, so they eventually gave up. They tried Rachel’s mobile, but all they got was her answering service. The police discovered later that Rachel had forgotten her mobile, left it in her hotel room.

At this point, Pauline said she assumed that Rachel would find her way back to the hotel, or get a taxi to take her there. They didn’t know the city well, having been there only a day, but although it was winding and confusing, the Old Town wasn’t very big, and Pauline thought that anyone wandering around for long enough was bound to return to the place they started from eventually. Besides, Rachel marched to the beat of her own drummer, and whatever she was up to, she would come back when she was ready.

Even so, Rachel’s defection put a bit of a damper on the night, so they all returned to the hotel, disappointing the German boys. They expected to find Rachel slumped in the bar, or passed out in her room, but when Pauline went back to her room to lie down, she wasn’t there. She said the room started spinning, and she was sick again. Then she fell asleep, or passed out, and when she awoke it was daylight. There was still no sign of Rachel. She felt awful; her head ached; her stomach churned, but despite the ravages of the hangover, concern for her friend gnawed away at her. It wasn’t like her to stay away all night. Pauline started to think that Rachel must have got lost somewhere and maybe ended up at another hotel, or maybe got caught up in a group and gone to a party. At worst, she worried that her friend had hurt herself, got hit by a car or something, and was in hospital. She went down to the hotel reception and asked to speak to the manager. The young assistant manager who came out to talk to her was concerned enough to bring in the police, and thus the whole nightmare began. Of course, the girls had drunk so much and visited so many bars and clubs that it took the police close to two days to get any sense of where they had been and what they had done, and by then, anyone who might have been there on the night in question was long gone.

Rachel Hewitt was never seen again, and no clues to her whereabouts were ever discovered.

Annie put aside the clippings and rested her head in her hands. Christ, she thought, what do you do? As a policewoman, she had seen the worst in human nature, and she thought that if something like that had happened to a friend of hers, she would have been down to the cop shop like a shot screaming for some action. But would she?

There had been no real reason to assume that anything bad had happened to Rachel. She sounded like a bit of a character to start with, up for adventure. Annie remembered when her best mate from school, Ellen Innes, had disappeared on a night out in Newquay. It wasn’t exactly a foreign country or anything, but there were some wild pubs, and things could get pretty crazy there on a Friday and Saturday night. Annie and her other two friends searched, but they couldn’t find Ellen in any of their usual haunts, so they went home, assuming she would come back when she was ready. Annie went to bed without calling anyone.

In the morning, after a few frantic phone calls between the girls’ parents, it transpired that Ellen had simply felt tired and decided to go to sleep on a quiet bench by the harbour. She was none the worse for wear, except for a bad hangover and a stiff back. Her parents gave her a strict curfew, and that was the end of the matter. But Annie thought of the things that could have happened, things that probably had happened to Rachel Hewitt. Of course, she realised that she had the benefit of hindsight and the experiences of twenty years as a police officer.

She didn’t blame Rachel’s friends. Anyone in their position, and their state of mind, would have done the same as they did. And the odds were that if Pauline had insisted on calling the police when she got back to the hotel that night, they would hardly have combed the city for the missing girl. At most, they might have done a sweep of some of the most popular bars, checked the hospitals for accident victims and scoured a few patches of open ground in case she’d nodded off somewhere, but they were hardly going to pull out all the stops for a nineteen-year-old foreign tourist missing a couple of hours at most. They would most likely have assumed that she went off with some boy and was happily screwing her brains out somewhere. In the morning she would be back. Police thinking could be very basic, Annie knew. Especially male police thinking.

Whether she was pregnant when she came back, had been infected with some STD or HIV, or whether she had tried to say no but had been too drunk to resist, was not their problem. Annie understood that much. The police couldn’t be the moral touchstones or guardians of the world, and to be honest, nobody would want or expect them to be. It was pointless trying to assign blame, except to whoever it was who had taken and hurt Rachel, for Annie was sure that was what must have happened. As sure as she was that Rachel Hewitt was dead. She could only hope it had been quick and painless. Annie sighed. Time to check and see if there was any progress on the Estonian mobile number called from Ingleby.

She turned to see Joanna Passero standing behind her, all blonde hair and elegant curves. Why did her appearance always make Annie feel so dowdy and tomboyish?

‘Is everything all right?’ Joanna asked.

‘Just fine and dandy.’

‘Are you in pain? Ca—’

‘I’m fine. Is there something you want to tell me?’

Joanna seemed taken aback. Annie was aware of the harshness of her tone, and blamed it mostly on the dark place her mind had been wandering in when she noticed her standing there. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I was just... the Rachel Hewitt case.’

Joanna glanced at the computer screen, which showed a photograph of a smiling Rachel under the heading ‘West Yorkshire Girl Disappears in Estonian Hen Weekend Tragedy’.

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Did you once know someone who disappeared like that?’

‘We’ve all worked on cases,’ said Annie. ‘It’s nothing personal. Just empathy. Anyway, I’m sorry I was rude just now. Did you have something to tell me?’

Joanna pulled up a chair and sat down. ‘I’ve just got back from the post-mortem with DS Jackman,’ she said. ‘It was pretty straightforward, really. The man was definitely drowned, and Dr Glendenning is pretty certain he was drowned in the trough of water at the scene. They have to do various tests on the samples to be absolutely certain, of course.’

‘Was drowned, rather than just drowned?’

‘That’s how it appears. There were bruises on the back of his neck, on his upper arms, and on his shoulders. There were also marks on his wrists, where they had been bound with some sort of cord. The lab’s working on the fibres. Somebody held him under the water deliberately. He struggled. And Dr Burns was right, he was definitely waterboarded first.’

‘Jesus Christ, the poor sod,’ said Annie.

Before meeting Nick Gwillam, Banks ate lunch by himself at the Pizza Express behind the Corn Exchange and allowed himself a small glass of Sangiovese to wash down his Sloppy Giuseppe. He had considered giving Ken Blackstone a call to see if he was free for lunch, but decided that after his session with Corrigan he preferred his own company for a while. Talking to Corrigan, he thought, had probably been a waste of time, but as with so many similar conversations, he could only know that in retrospect. Just another in the long line of sad, tired, cocky, depressing villains that seemed to be Banks’s daily round.

Corrigan was small-time, though there was a chance he had connections with some big players in the people-trafficking world, whose victims provided him with his victims, and whom he helped keep in bondage. Essentially, he was a parasite on the bigger organism, but many animals willingly went through life with millions of parasites living on their skin or inside their bodies. It became something of a symbiotic relationship. There was always room for a bit of give and take in the world of crime. Especially take.

But that didn’t mean Corrigan had anything to do with Quinn’s death. Curly’s alibi would be easy to check out, so easy it had to be true, and Corrigan’s would be impossible to break, even if it were a lie. No doubt he had other minions capable of doing the job for him, and they should be easy enough to round up, but so far his little gang had no history of crossbow use, or of murder. He certainly intimidated people who owed him money, resorted to threats and even to violence on occasion, but he had never, as far as they knew, killed anyone yet. A dead debtor might well be a lesson to the rest, as Corrigan had pointed out, but he was also a loss of income. Why start the killing with a cop and bring down the heat? He was surely under enough pressure already, with the citywide investigation into his operation, and the suicides that could possibly be linked to it. If Corrigan had had Bill Quinn in his pocket, was somehow tied in to the photos and the blackmail, then it now appeared that there was a definite Estonian connection, too. Curiouser and curiouser.

After Banks had finished his lunch, he wandered up to Call Lane, then down Kirkgate. Hands in pockets, walking slowly and taking in the colours, sounds and smells, he cut through the indoor market with its white-coated barkers and stalls piled with scaly fish, marbled red meat and bright shiny fruit and vegetables. No matter how fresh everything was, there was always a faint smell of decay underneath it all.

He came out by the back of the bus station to Millgarth, at the bottom of Eastgate. Though the day had clouded over, it was still warm, and was quickly getting more humid. There’d be more rain before nightfall, Banks was sure.

When he presented himself at Millgarth, Nick Gwillam came down to meet him and, not surprisingly, suggested that he’d like to get out of the office for a while, so why didn’t they go for a coffee? Banks had had enough coffee for the day, but he was quite happy to enjoy an afternoon cup of tea. They ended up sitting outside the Pret A Manger on the corner of Lands Lane and Albion Place, opposite WHSmith.

‘So, you want to talk to me about Bill?’ said Gwillam, with a large latte and an egg salad sandwich in front of him.

‘You worked with him closely, I understand?’

‘Recently, yes. I suppose you know I’m only temporary up here? A civilian, really. Trading Standards.’

‘Yes. But you worked on the Corrigan case with DI Quinn?’

‘For my sins.’

‘I just had a word with him, and he seemed to know a fair bit about me. Where I live. What I drink. I wonder how he could have found out all that?’

Gwillam leaned back in his metal chair and regarded Banks through narrowed eyes. He was tall and lean, with cropped dark hair already thinning and turning grey around the edges, like Banks’s own. He wore a pinstripe suit, white shirt and an old club or university tie. Finally, he let out a chuckle. ‘Oh, he played that little trick on you, did he?’

‘What trick?’

‘See, it’s a thing of his. A little trick he likes to play. He rattles off bits and pieces he knows about you. Tries to shock you. I assume he knew you were on the case, Bill’s murder, so he’d find out a bit about you.’

‘Yes, but it’s where he gets his information that interests me. He also knew that Bill Quinn was at St Peter’s.’

‘There was no secret about that. Everybody knew where Bill was. Everybody who had any sort of connection with him, at any rate. He probably told Corrigan himself.’

‘Why would he do that?’

‘No specific reason. Just in conversation.’

‘Do you think he also happened to mention where I live and the name of my favourite tipple?’

‘Everyone knows you’re a single malt man.’

‘I must say you’re very nonchalant about this. But the questions remain. Where does Corrigan get his information, and what else does he do with it other than show it off to impress visiting coppers?’

‘Are you suggesting that Corrigan gave away Bill’s whereabouts to someone who wanted him dead?’

‘It’s possible, isn’t it? He has to be connected to some pretty violent people in his line of work. If DI Quinn had found out too much, or crossed someone...? But it’s just another theory. One of many, unfortunately.’

Gwillam sipped his latte. It left a faint white moustache on the top of his lip. ‘Corrigan talks to a lot of people, mixes a lot,’ he went on. ‘People talk to him. Tell him things. He listens. He’s a like a jackdaw going after silver paper, and he remembers, he absorbs information like a sponge. Sorry about the mixed metaphor, but I think you know what I mean.’

‘Anyone could have told him?’

‘Yes. Even Bill himself.’

‘And Corrigan could then have passed on the information to anyone, himself?’

‘Yes. For any reason, or none at all. If he did pass on Bill’s whereabouts, it might not have necessarily seemed significant to him at the time. He might simply have done it in passing.’

‘OK,’ said Banks. That meant there were two strong contenders for telling the killer where Quinn was staying: the Garskill Farm victim, under torture, and Warren Corrigan, for any, or no, reason at all. Banks also realised with a shock that he had been as guilty as anyone else of giving Corrigan information. At the end of their conversation, he had intimated that he didn’t drink Laphroaig any more, which was only partly true, but that he was more of a red wine drinker, which was wholly true. He had intended it as a put down of Corrigan’s out-of-date source in information, but he realised that through his own showing off, through his need to get one up on Corrigan, he had actually fallen into the trap and told him something he didn’t know: that Banks was a red wine drinker. It didn’t matter, had no real significance, at least none that he could see, but it shed some light on the way Corrigan worked, and some of the snippets he picked up were clearly very useful indeed.

‘What more can you tell me about Corrigan and his business?’

‘My interest is mostly in the loan sharking, of course, but we also think he’s in a bit deeper with the whole people-trafficking and migrant labour business. It’s quite a wide-reaching racket. Has to be. There are agents and runners all over the place. Even Customs and Excise and Immigration officers have to be paid off to turn a blind eye. There are fake visas, passports, too. But it’s a connection that’s hard to prove. He’s nothing if not cautious.’

‘Drugs?’

‘Not yet, at any rate.’

‘Prostitution?’

‘He’s clearly got contacts among the pimps, but we don’t think he’s one, himself. Probably thinks it’s beneath him.’

‘And gouging the poorest of the poor isn’t?’

‘What can I say? Blokes like Corrigan have a skewed version of morality.’

‘You’re telling me. So how deep is he in it? How high up?’

‘That’s what we’re not sure of. We’ve seen him once or twice with a bloke called Roderick Flinders. Flinders runs a staff agency. Rod’s Staff Ltd. Get it?’

‘“My rod and my staff”? Cute. What do they do?’

‘They provide cheap labour to whoever wants it, no questions asked. They deal mostly in asylum seekers, illegals of various kinds, unskilled migrant workers. Place them in shit jobs for shit pay.’

This was the kind of thing Penny Cartwright had told Banks about on Saturday night, the factories where no questions were asked. ‘Illegal work?’

‘Sometimes. You could certainly argue that it’s slave labour. Below minimum wage.’

‘The same people Corrigan preys on himself?’

‘The very same. It would be to his advantage, wouldn’t it, to be sure of the supply, know what’s heading his way? It makes sense. Helps him expand his markets. You scratch my back, I scratch yours. We suspect that Flinders also helps fix forged temporary work permits for asylum seekers. In some cases he’s even got hold of faked passports, which is a bit more difficult, but not so much as you think. He’s part of a chain that starts with the agents in the various countries involved and continues through drivers, gangmasters, employers, people who rent out the accommodation, and the rest of the hangers-on. Everyone takes a slice except the poor sod doing the work. It’s a pretty big operation. That’s why Trading Standards is involved.’

‘Why hasn’t this Flinders been arrested?’

‘He’s slippery. Got a smooth front, clever lawyers, and nobody’s been able to come up with any hard evidence on the other stuff. Besides, the ones watching him are still excited about where he might lead them. Sometimes I wish we could just seize his phone records and bank accounts, but even I know these buggers are too clever. We’ve got no cause, for a start. And they use encryptions and untraceable mobiles and numbered bank accounts in countries that don’t care where the money comes from.’

‘He and Corrigan are mates?’

‘That’s right. Dinner. Drinks. Holidays in the sun.’

‘And Bill?’

‘Me and Bill were just keeping an eye on Corrigan, having the occasional chat, hoping to hook something a bit bigger.’

‘How long has this been going on?’

‘With Corrigan? About eight months.’

Banks mulled over what he had been hearing. If Corrigan had these links to organised crime, there was clearly a chance that he was, indirectly or otherwise, behind Quinn’s killing, or at least that he knew more about it than he was willing to admit. Quinn could have been bent, as Joanna Passero seemed to think, and suddenly become a liability. But where did the Rachel Hewitt case fit in? What was the connection? And the girl in the photo? Or was all that simply a red herring? Surely it couldn’t be? There was definitely a forensic link between Quinn’s murder and the murder at Garskill Farm, and there was a link between the two victims; they had spoken twice on the telephone. There was also a possible connection between the Garskill Farm murder and Estonia.

‘Just out of interest,’ Banks asked, ‘does Corrigan have any connections with Estonia?’

‘Estonia? Not that I know of,’ said Gwillam.

‘Maybe through the migrant labour scam? Through Flinders?’

‘I suppose it’s possible, but I’ve never seen or heard anything.’

‘I was just thinking about the Rachel Hewitt case. Bill Quinn worked on that. He even went to Tallinn in the early stages.’

‘You think there’s a connection?’

‘I don’t know. Right now, we’re just looking more closely at the Hewitt case for various reasons, but as far as I know she was simply an innocent English girl who disappeared abroad. No body has ever been found. But that was six years ago. Where was Corrigan then?’

‘No idea, but I don’t think he was on anyone’s radar that long ago. Maybe mugging old ladies and robbing sweet shops.’

‘It might be worth checking.’

‘Bit of a long shot.’

‘I know.’ Banks sighed. ‘That’s the way everything seems in this case. I’m just hoping one of them will hit the mark. Even if Corrigan wasn’t involved, he might be doing business with people who were. Did Bill ever talk about Rachel?’

‘Not much. It was long before my time, and way out of my areas of interest. It came up once or twice in conversation, but you soon got the sense that it wasn’t a good idea to mention it. Bill didn’t like to talk about it. He’d get all broody.’

‘Why do you think that was?’

‘He felt he’d failed the girl.’

‘But he never really got a chance to succeed.’

‘Doesn’t matter. He was just that kind of copper. Took it personal, like.’

‘But why?’ Banks paused to collect his thoughts. ‘This is something that puzzles me. Everybody I talk to tells me Bill Quinn was haunted by the Rachel Hewitt case, that he felt he failed, but in reality he didn’t have very much to do with it. Why did Bill Quinn care so much? He spent a few days in Tallinn, that’s all, surely more of a public relations exercise than anything else, by the sound of it, and when he comes back it’s as if his life has been blighted by the whole thing. Why?’ He wasn’t going to tell Gwillam about the added complication of the mystery girl and the photos, clearly taken in Tallinn, too, which might go some way towards explaining Quinn’s obsession.

‘Like I said, he was that kind of copper,’ said Gwillam, through tight lips. He pushed his cup aside. ‘And I’ve worked with all types. Bill took everything seriously. And he happens to have a daughter about the same age as Rachel. He doted on Jessica. Now, if you don’t mind...’

‘Work to do?’

‘Something like that.’

Gwillam got up and walked down Lands Lane, turning left on Bond Street, out of sight among the crowds of shoppers. Banks swirled the remains of his tea and mulled over what he had just heard. He’d been searching for connections and finding too many, each of which seemed to cancel out or contradict the other. He remembered Annie telling him what she had heard at St Peter’s about Quinn’s overriding sense of guilt. He had been out on surveillance when his wife died, and that kind of thing could eat away at you. Every copper had missed something important in his family life because of the job — an anniversary party, kid’s graduation, a birth, a wedding, even a funeral. Most learned to live with it, but it dragged some of the best men and women down.

Banks glanced at his watch. Time to head back to Eastvale so he could check on developments there before the end of the day.