176249.fb2 The Coffin Trail - читать онлайн бесплатно полную версию книги . Страница 4

The Coffin Trail - читать онлайн бесплатно полную версию книги . Страница 4

Chapter Three

‘Think of it as an opportunity, a new start.’ The Assistant Chief Constable had spent six months on a management training programme in the United States and she’d come back with the tooth-whitened smile and relentless self-confidence of a seasoned television evangelist. ‘A fresh challenge.’

Hannah Scarlett said through gritted teeth, ‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘You’re not happy, Hannah,’ the ACC said gently.

Not a question, but a statement with a sub-text: the difficulty lay with Hannah and not with the job she’d been offered. Lauren Self liked to think of herself as adept at psychology. Her rapid rise to high office was proof, so far as the dinosaurs in the Cumbria Constabulary were concerned, that in the modern police force, people management skills mattered more than mere detective work — what mattered was whether you could talk a good game.

‘Not really, ma’am.’

The ACC topped up their tumblers of sparkling water. ‘Shall we chat about it?’

They were both sitting on the same low, semi-circular leather sofa. The faintest tang of citrus hung in the air. Abstract oil paintings, splashes of blue and gold, decorated the walls. It was so cosy not even the most sceptical diehard in the Police Federation could complain about a confrontational management style. The ACC simply didn’t do confrontation, it wasn’t in her vocabulary. She was a passionate believer in talking through problems, in seeking consensus. Faced with a complaint, she preferred to kill it with kindness. If the worst came to the worst, she might resort to mediation.

Hannah took a breath. ‘It just doesn’t seem right.’

‘Hannah, I do understand.’

The ACC spoke as though soothing a juvenile martyr to period pains. She had three children and their bright-eyed pictures stood on top of a bookcase crammed with tomes covering every aspect of staff relations and the measurement of key performance indicators in the modern police service. Raising children was, Hannah thought, ideal training for a woman who had to deal with rebellious or intransigent police officers. Hannah didn’t have any kids herself, although occasionally she wondered if she’d spent the last seven years sleeping with one.

She took a sip of water. ‘This is all about the collapse of the Patel trial, isn’t it?’

‘I wouldn’t say that, Hannah.’

You might not say it, Hannah thought. But it’s true. When a murder prosecution falls apart in such spectacular fashion, someone has to take the blame. Where there’s a PR disaster, there must be a scapegoat. This time, it’s me.

‘I know you had reservations, ma’am.’ Somehow she managed to resist the urge to say: you sat on the fence, waiting to see if we’d drop lucky. ‘But the case was sound enough to take to court.’

‘Mmmmm.’ The ACC could pack a wealth of meaning into the simplest sound. A mere clearing of the throat could express a gamut of emotions and a reproving cough sufficed where others would rant and swear.

‘Sudhakar Rao was murdered ten years ago. It’s a long time. Sometimes it just isn’t possible to find corroboration.’

‘Well…’ The ACC looked disappointed that Hannah couldn’t come up with a better excuse.

‘Of course there was risk.’ Hannah hated herself for sounding defensive, but the ACC had that effect upon people; it was another of the qualities that had secured her high office. ‘There’s always risk when you rely on a criminal’s word. But Golac was adamant that Patel hired him. The cuckolded husband, wanting his wife’s lover dead. Golac’s story fitted the facts. We couldn’t find a single hole in his statement.’

‘Or a single piece of evidence to support it.’

‘Ivan Golac is an old man, his heart’s weak. He faces spending the rest of his life in prison. He’d kept his mouth shut for long enough. Like he said to me, now he has nothing to lose by telling the truth. And nothing to gain by lying.’

‘Fifteen minutes of fame,’ the ACC suggested. ‘He liked being the centre of attention, it gave him something to fill his days. Being seen as hard. He’s spent all his life as a second-rate villain. He’d be walking the streets now if the security guard he clubbed had a thicker skull. But — a hitman? That’s very different. Dangerous, someone that nobody in their right mind messes with. A Premier League killer.’

The ACC liked to throw the occasional soccer metaphor into her conversations, just to show that she was really one of the lads. It made no difference if she were speaking to a female subordinate like Hannah who didn’t have a clue what she meant.

Hannah said, ‘You think it was just a robbery gone wrong? That Golac simply panicked and Sudhakar Rao was in the wrong corner shop at the wrong time?’

The ACC frowned. ‘I really can’t say, Hannah. The judge may have been caustic, but I rather go along with his old-fashioned idea that before a man’s convicted of murder, it helps for the court to see his guilt proved beyond reasonable doubt.’

She had to be taking the piss — surely? Hannah counted to ten, then to fifteen just to be on the safe side, before saying, ‘You’ve seen Golac’s witness statement. It had the ring of truth.’

‘You heard the judge,’ the ACC said. ‘Once Golac refused to testify, the statement couldn’t be read in place of sworn evidence. Sandeep Patel walked away without a stain on his character. The way he’s talking to the Press, he’s another victim.’

Hannah leaned forward. ‘I still think he’s a murderer.’

The ACC pursed her lips, adopting the more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger expression that she’d perfected. ‘Well, anyway. No one’s ever going to prove it now. We need to look forward. And that’s why I wanted to share this new project with you.’

‘It’s a backwater. We both know that.’

‘Not at all.’ The ACC winced at such blasphemy. ‘The Cumbria Constabulary Cold Case Review Team will be a flagship unit, a sign of our commitment to making sure that no serious crime in the county goes unsolved.’

‘And the murder of Sudhakar Rao?’

‘Already detected,’ the ACC said, folding her arms to preclude argument. ‘Golac had a fair trial and was properly convicted. He’s served nine years and he’ll be dead before the year’s out. Most people would say that justice has been served.’

‘Not if they’d listened to Golac describing how Patel hired him, the conversations that they had, all the…’

‘I really think you should leave it, Hannah. The team will have enough on its plate to keep it occupied from the word go, I’m quite sure.’

Digging her teeth into her tongue, Hannah muttered, ‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Now, let me give you an outline of what we have in mind. Tonight you can see what your husband says. I’ve absolutely no doubt that once you’ve thought it over and had a chat with Marc, you’ll be excited by the whole idea. This is a once in a lifetime chance for any ambitious police officer, Hannah. Trust me.’

‘She might just be telling you the truth,’ Marc said as they lounged on their living room sofa, after washing down a microwaved Bird’s Eye dinner with a bottle of supermarket Chardonnay whose high alcohol content compensated for any lack of subtlety. ‘It could be a great opportunity.’

Lauren Self had remembered Marc’s name correctly, that was one of her skills, but she had made one small mistake. Marc wasn’t Hannah’s husband. Marriage was, she’d understood from day one, a commitment too deep for him. He maintained that if a relationship was strong enough, who needed a piece of paper to document it? If the bond wasn’t strong enough without the official seal of approval, then there wasn’t much hope for it anyway.

‘The ACC’s a politician, and who trusts politicians?’

‘You always swore you wouldn’t let the job turn you into a cynic.’

‘Right now I feel more like I’m in a maze, and I’ve turned into a dead end. Word’s got out already. Albie Kelsen couldn’t wipe that smug smile off his face when he asked if the rumours were true, that I was stepping back from front-line detective work. God, I could have slapped him.’

Marc cast a glance at the television screen. An elderly contestant on a quiz show was agonising over the answer to a question that might win him a villa in the South of France. In the studio audience, his wife covered her face with a knobbly, age-spotted hand.

‘You worry too much.’

He spoke absently and she didn’t know whether he was offering a considered analysis of her reaction to the new job, or merely chanting a mantra that had become over-familiar. He reckoned that she cared too much about the job. She’d worked so hard to earn her stripes. It had paid off; she’d reached the rank of Chief Inspector at an absurdly young age, thanks to the accelerated promotion scheme. Not so long ago, gossips reckoned she was marked down for stardom. But then Ivan Golac had failed to show up in court to give the testimony that would have convicted Sandeep Patel.

‘Reviewing cold cases is a job for old men. Lauren is even going to dig some superannuated detective superintendent out of retirement to contribute his wisdom. And harp on about how much better police work was in the good old days.’

‘So you’ll be reporting to him?’

She shifted on the sofa. They’d bought it a couple of years ago from a Scandinavian store that offered designer living on a budget. It was blue and elegant and looked wonderful in the catalogue. It was also astonishingly uncomfortable. ‘No, retired officers don’t have full police powers. Nominally, I’ll be in charge.’

‘What’s the problem, then?’ he murmured. ‘Sounds fascinating to me. Go for it. It could be just the change you need.’

Could it? Hannah had feared that she’d been lucky in her career. What if her luck had run out? Was the collapse of the Patel trial her fault? Of course, witnesses fail to turn up every day of the week. Talk to any officer who has worked in Merseyside or the Met, they’ll say it’s an occupational hazard. In any city, intimidation of people due to give evidence is a way of life.

But this was a high-profile murder and she’d been sure that Golac would see it through. Of course, she should have sat on the fence with the ACC. If the investigation had been allowed to die quietly once further enquiries drew a blank, no one would have complained. No one mourned Sudhakar Rao. His widow had remarried and his two daughters had been so young at the time of his death that they could barely remember him. Would it really have mattered if Sandeep Patel had been allowed to escape prosecution? Hannah thought it would. Even after ten years in the police, she still wasn’t cynical enough to abandon all belief in doing the right thing simply because it was the right thing. But, clearly naive. Her efforts had come to nothing and Patel had been allowed to put two fingers up to justice.

‘Even if this new team isn’t just a rest home for detectives who have screwed up,’ she said, ‘it isn’t…’

‘Oh, don’t you know anything, for God’s sake? It’s Gerard Manley Hopkins! Any fool should know that.’

Hannah blinked and then realised that Marc was shouting at the hapless quiz show contestant. The man on the small screen had developed a nervous tic. The questionmaster’s trademark sarcasm wasn’t helping.

‘Tennyson?’ the man enquired, with a mixture of hope and panic.

‘Doh!’ Marc flicked the remote so that the crushed features of the ignoramus vanished. ‘Imagine Tennyson writing The Windhover. I mean…’

‘Sorry, was I distracting you?’

‘All right. Don’t start.’ Marc put his hands up in mock surrender. ‘You’ve had a bad day, a miserable experience, and it’s a shame. Just don’t take it out on me, okay?’

‘I wasn’t…’

‘Look,’ he said, stretching a bony arm around her, ‘I was listening to you, honest. Just remember, you’re not the only one who has bad days. The bank manager was telling me this afternoon to carry less stock. The accounts aren’t looking too clever at the moment. All the same, I try not to bring these things home, right? Trouble is, you let that woman get to you. Has it crossed your mind she could be right?’

‘There’s a first time for everything,’ Hannah said bitchily. ‘I just have this sneaking feeling that I’m being set up to fail. Or not to succeed, which is just as bad.’

‘Listen, cold cases are sexy at the moment.’ His hand strayed to her breast. ‘Journalists love them. Maybe she thinks she’s doing you a kindness.’

‘Moving me out of the firing line? Perhaps. But she’s also taking away my best chance of redeeming myself after Sandeep Patel. Outcomes, that’s the name of the game. The police authority loves to see them. Budgets are fixed, reputations won and lost, all because of outcomes. Any progress I’ve made so far has been because I’ve delivered the right outcomes. And then came the Patel trial, and a shedload of negative publicity.’

He began to nibble at her ear. ‘You’ll get over it.’

‘Sure,’ she said, wriggling away, ‘but if I’m shuffled into reviewing cold cases, it won’t only be Kelsen who sees it as a sort of demotion. And far worse, I won’t be able to do much to claw back my credibility. Let’s face it, there’s often a very good reason why cases go cold. It’s because they’re bloody difficult to solve.’

‘But running a small team, you can be hands-on, conduct key interviews yourself if you want to.’

‘I suppose.’

With infinite care and patience, he undid a couple of buttons on her blouse. ‘So what are you going to do at make-your-mind-up time? Resist — or submit?’

He put on such a comically lascivious expression as he unbuckled his jeans that she couldn’t help laughing. ‘Submit, of course.’ She leaned back against the sofa. The TV remote was digging into her thigh and she threw it on to the floor. As he eased himself on top of her, she whispered, ‘You never know, miracles happen. I may find I enjoy it.’

In bed that night, she rolled over and turned to face him. They had switched off the light, but the moon was shining in through a gap in the curtains. The fair hair was flopping over his face, the way she’d always loved, and she couldn’t resist giving his cheek a kiss. His skin was smooth and warm and smelled of lemon soap. He was a fastidiously clean man; that was something she’d liked about him early on, though now it counted for less. His eyelids were drooping and she almost let him slip out of consciousness, but there was something she wanted to get out in the open before it created a barrier between them.

‘Marc, I’ve been thinking. Suppose I accept this job…’

‘You should,’ he said sleepily. ‘It’ll be fine.’

She took a breath and summoned up her courage. ‘Okay, when I say yes, I’ll be asking the ACC if I can have Nick Lowther on the team.’

Marc lifted himself up and pushed the hair out of his eyes. He leaned on his elbows, staring at her. When he spoke, his voice was tight. ‘Why do you need him?’

‘He knows me, I know him. We can trust each other. That’s important, in a unit like this. God knows what the retired guru will be like. I don’t just want any old sergeant. I need someone who’s on my side.’

Marc grunted. ‘Just as long as…’

‘What?’

‘Oh, nothing.’

He turned away. She put her hand on his bony shoulder. His whole body was taut with suppressed anger.

‘Marc, listen, you’ve got the wrong idea about Nick Lowther. We’re friends, that’s all. It’s never been any more than that.’

No answer.

She felt as though a rope had been pulled tight around her midriff, squeezing the breath out of her. She didn’t want to be trussed up, she had to break free.

‘Marc,’ she said, ‘Talk to me. I know you’re awake.’

‘Friends?’ he muttered. ‘He’d like to be more than that.’

‘He’s a married man.’

‘Ah, but is he a happily married man?’

‘Oh God, Marc. I can’t imagine why you’re so…so…’

He turned over again. ‘Jealous?’

The rope slackened a bit, now that the word was out in the open. Usually it lingered unspoken, somewhere in the air between them.

‘Protective.’ She was willing to compromise, but it took two.

‘He’d love to get into your knickers.’

‘You’re imagining it.’

Marc put his arm around her, started to caress her rump. ‘I’m sorry, darling. It’s not that I don’t trust you…’

Even as she closed her eyes, her thoughts were racing.

But that’s not true, you’ve never trusted me. Not altogether, not with Nick, not with any other man I admit a liking for. After all these years, why can’t you?

‘You’ve made the right decision, Hannah.’ The ACC beamed, magnanimous in triumph. Another tricky people problem resolved, another box about to be ticked. ‘I’m absolutely sure you won’t regret it.’

On a wet and windy morning, the breakfast TV weathergirl had warned of ridges of low pressure sweeping in from the west. The ACC’s room offered a temperate, climate-controlled refuge. Through the colour-coordinated blinds Hannah could see the rain slanting down on to the overflowing bins in the yard at the back of the headquarters building. This room was an oasis of calm, far removed from the incoherence of the world outside. A world where — yes, even in Cumbria, so proud of its modest rate of criminal activity — old people were mugged for the price of a shot of heroin, where men in anoraks hid in bushes beside lonely paths, waiting for young women to walk by in the twilight.

‘So where do we go from here, ma’am?’

Her tone was all brisk efficiency. When giving in, no point in doing so with a bad grace.

The ACC straightened the papers in her folder. She hated anything to be out of place. ‘We’ve already agreed a start date and that you can have Lowther as your sergeant.’

Hannah had briefly contemplated making a sacrifice for Marc’s sake. Why not forget about recruiting Nick for the Cold Case Review Team? But that would be absurd. Nick was perfect for the job; she couldn’t overlook him simply to please her partner. Marc would have to grow up. She wouldn’t cave in.

‘I’ve already sounded him out, ma’am, and I’m sure he’d be interested.’ Hannah paused, groping for suitable Lauren-speak. ‘Motivated by the opportunity.’

‘Marvellous. You’ll have four constables, working in a couple of teams so that you make best use of resources. Obviously you won’t want a group of idle uniform-carriers.’

‘So can I choose who I want?’

‘Provided they are available and happy to sign up. And then there’s your consultant. We’ve trawled through NROD.’

The National Retired Officers Database listed men (they usually were men) who had opted to leave the police and pick up their pension, only to weary of the prospect of watching daytime television until they dropped dead of boredom. Hannah supposed that they hankered after the camaraderie of the job, to say nothing of the chance of a bit more cash.

‘And?’

‘I’ve offered a contract to Les Bryant. Until a couple of years ago he was a Detective Superintendent with North Yorkshire Police. He’s headed several high profile murder inquiries over the years. The Whitby caravan shootings, yes? I’m sure we’ll benefit greatly from his experience.’

So he’s to keep an eye on me, Hannah thought, to make sure I don’t mess up like I did with Sandeep Patel.

‘I’m sure he will, ma’am.’

‘Very good.’ The ACC took a sheaf of correspondence from her in-tray to indicate that the meeting was at an end. ‘One more point, Hannah. With this kind of project, public profile is all-important.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Hannah wondered what was coming. A warning not to screw up again, on pain of being transferred to traffic control and enduring career gridlock?

‘The press office will be issuing a news release and we’re planning a media conference.’ The ACC put on a smile, as if rehearsing for the cameras. ‘I’m hoping for extensive press, radio and regional TV coverage. It may stir a few memories about cases of the past, and, just as important, we could do with all the positive publicity we can get after…recent events. So please, whatever you do, don’t walk out on the assembled media the way you did when the questioning over Patel got rather sharp. Everyone’s allowed one mistake, but two PR disasters in quick succession are simply unaffordable. Do we understand each other? Lovely. That will be all, Hannah. And please accept my congratulations on your appointment.’

‘Dream Policing,’ Nick Lowther murmured the next morning, over coffee in Hannah’s office. ‘Isn’t that what the ACPOs call it when they blend a team of serving officers with someone from NROD? Taking advantage of expertise that would otherwise be lost forever. Tapping into the investigative skills of senior officers who retired while still at their peak. Combining the talents of…’

Hannah grinned. ‘Or, to put it another way…’

Nick Lowther accepted the feed-line gleefully. ‘Alternatively, we’re being lumbered with some wrinkly has-been whose old lady is sick of him getting under her feet and who thinks that fingerprinting and grainy photo-fits are the last word in forensic detection.’

‘I don’t know much about Bryant. Except that he’s a Yorkshireman.’

‘So we can look forward to an open-minded, forward-thinking colleague who’s always first to buy a round at the bar and the last to venture a controversial statement, for fear of giving offence to those who might disagree. And is that a pig I see flying past the window?’

Hannah laughed. ‘And you reckon Yorkshiremen are bigoted! Be fair. We ought to give him a chance before we write him off.’

‘When did being fair ever have anything to do with police work? Did they teach you nothing at police college?’

Nick gave her a mischievous grin. He had untidy black hair and easy charm. Whenever people described him, the adjective of choice was laid-back. Only the absent-minded way he gnawed at his fingernails made Hannah wonder if he was really as relaxed as everyone thought.

‘On second thoughts, you’re right.’ She leaned back in her chair and stretched her arms out wide. ‘Anyway, you’ve taken the ACC’s shilling now. You’re spoken for. There’s no going back.’

‘Fine by me.’ He yawned and said, ‘Better this than a transfer to Millom. And to tell you the truth, I was ready for a change.’

‘Me too.’ She’d never thought so until that moment, but as soon as Nick said it, she knew he was right. ‘Patel was such a sickener. But the first time I spoke to you about reviewing cold cases, you gave me the impression it was taking a step down.’

‘That was before I heard that the ACC had arranged for us to tell the world how good we are before we actually do a lick of work.’

She giggled. ‘Kelsen’s sure I’ve been shown a yellow card. One more mistake and I’ll be out of his life forever.’

Nick made a gesture that gave a graphic indication of his opinion of Detective Inspector Albie Kelsen. ‘Yeah, he’s as happy as a dog with two dicks. It’s what he wants to believe, that your career’s gone off the rails. None of it’s about you, it would be the same with any younger woman who climbed the ladder faster than him. Don’t take any notice.’

‘Honestly, I try not to. But can you remember, as a kid, trying to ignore chicken pox? You know what you shouldn’t do, but the irritation’s so great that you simply can’t resist…’

Of course Nick was right. Generous, too. Both of them knew that he was just as good a detective as she was. Yet, smart as he was, he’d never had much luck with promotion boards and exams. Perhaps he didn’t want it enough, perhaps he preferred to be one of life’s sidekicks. The two of them had worked together for a couple of years and not once had he ever given her a moment’s trouble. Marc maintained it was because he wanted to sleep with her, but she refused to believe that. Nick never flirted and she never caught him giving her a sidelong glance. She told herself that she was almost entitled to feel peeved by his lack of interest. All that grief from Marc and not a thing to show for it.