Chill Factor (10 page)

The internal phone rang. “Priest,” I said into it.

“Just letting you know that the Deputy Chief Constable has arrived, Charlie,” the desk sergeant informed me in a stage whisper.

“Thanks,” I said. “In that case, I’m off.”

I went down the back stairs and into the main office. Every major crime has an appointed exhibits officer and a connected property store, which in this case was a drawer in a filing cabinet. It’s essential that a log is kept of every piece of evidence, accounting for all its movements and recording the names of everyone who has had access to it. There’s no point in telling the court that a knife had fingerprints on it if the defence can suggest – just suggest – that the defendant may have handled it after he was arrested. I didn’t want the knife, just the keys to Silkstone’s house. I said a silent
apology
to Gilbert for leaving him in the clutches of the DCC and drove back to Mountain Meadows.

The panda cars and the blue tape had gone and the street had resumed its air of respectability. The Yellow Pages
delivery
man had done his rounds and the latest edition was
sitting
on the front step of several houses, neatly defining who was at home and who wasn’t. I’d had Silkstone’s Audi taken from Latham’s house to our garage for forensic examination, so there was plenty of room for me to park on the drive alongside the Suzuki. I picked up the directory and let myself in.

First job was a coffee. They drank Kenco instant, although there was a selection of beans from Columbia and Kenya. I watched the kettle as it boiled and carried my drink – weak, black and unsweetened – through into the lounge. I sat on the chesterfield and imagined I was at home.

It was a difficult exercise. This was the most
uncomfortable
room I’d ever been in, outside the legal system. The
furnishings
were good quality, expensive, but everything was hard-edged and solid. No cushions or fabrics to soften things. Focal point of the room was a Sony widescreen
television
set big enough to depict some of TV’s smaller
performers
almost life-size. I shuddered at the thought. After about ten minutes the wallpaper started dancing and
weaving
before my eyes, like a Bridget Riley painting. I stood up and went exploring.

There was a toilet downstairs, a bathroom upstairs with a bath shower and rowing machine, and one
en suite
with the room where we’d found Mrs Silkstone. A room under the stairs with a sloping ceiling was their office, where a Viglen computer and seventeen-inch monitor stood on an L-shaped desk. I sat in the leather executive chair and opened the first drawer.

An hour later I was in the kitchen again. I examined all the messages on the pin board and made a note of several phone numbers. The cupboard under the sink was a surprise: there was still some room in it. I spread a newspaper – the
Express
– on the floor, emptied their swing bin on to it and poked around in the tea bags and muesli shrapnel like I’d seen TV cops do. Then I went outside, dragged the dustbin into the garage and did it again, big time.

I washed my hands and had another coffee, sitting in the captain’s chair at the head of their dining room table. It was all mahogany in there, with more striped wallpaper. The only picture on the walls was a limited edition signed print of Damon Hill winning the British Grand Prix. Number
fifty-six
of eight million. His room again, I thought.

I had a pee in the downstairs loo. It was the standard type, like the one in my 1960s house. I pulled the lever and watched the water splash about and subside. I’d have thought that a house as modern as this one would have had those low-level ones, where you watch everything swirling around, convinced it will never all go down that little hole. Personal preference, I supposed. I might even have chosen the same ones myself. I went upstairs into the master
bedroom
and, lo and behold, the
en suite
bog was the modern type, in coral pink. I did a comparison flush and decided that maybe these were better after all, but it wasn’t a convincing victory. Just for the record I looked in the main bathroom. Old type, in stark white. Flushed first time, like the others. I didn’t write any of this in my notebook.

I sat in one of the hard leather chairs for half an hour,
thinking about things. I enjoy being alone with my thoughts, and the seat was more comfortable than I
expected
. You had to sit well back and upright, but it wasn’t too bad. Probably good for the posture, I thought. Next time I saw Silkstone I’d check his posture. A brandy and a cigar would have gone down well, or perhaps a decent port.

Jim Lockwood and Martin Stiles were coming out of the front door as I arrived back at the nick. Jim was wearing a suit and tie, Martin a short-sleeved shirt and jeans. They looked worried men.

“How’d it go?” I asked.

“He’s sacked us,” Martin blurted out.

“We’re suspended,” Jim explained.

“He can’t sack you,” I replied.

“He wants us sacked,” Martin declared.

I looked at Jim. “Yeah,” he confirmed. “He made that clear. Mr Wood tried to stand up for us, but the DCC went ’airless. Said we’d made a mock’ry of the force, and all that. It was on TV again this morning, apparently.”

“Well he can’t sack you,” I repeated. “You know that. And next time you’re in for an interview make sure you have the Federation rep with you. Don’t let them two-one you.”

“Right, Mr Priest,” Martin replied.

“Meanwhile,” I flapped a hand at the sky, “make the best of the decent weather. Paint the outside of the house, or something. It’ll be a nine-day wonder, you’ll see.”

“Thanks, Boss,” Jim said, and they skulked away like two schoolboys caught peeing off the bike shed roof.

I made a pot of tea – all that coffee makes you thirsty – and ate the M & S cheese and pickle sandwich I’d bought on the way back. The lab at Wetherton confirmed that I’d have the DNA results tomorrow, but otherwise they had nothing to tell me. I rang the CPS and agreed to a meeting with them on Monday afternoon.

The hooligans down in the briefing room had a recording of the Dick Lane Massacre and were delighted to show it to
me. It was worse than I expected. Some local chancer had recorded the whole thing on his camcorder and networked it. He took up the story as Jim and Martin were trying to extricate themselves from the jammed car. Unable to climb into the back, they eventually reclined their seats and crawled out of the rear doors on hands and knees. It wasn’t a picture of noble policemen fighting crime against
impossible
odds with courage and dignity. It was a fourteen-year-old twocker making two fully-grown cops look complete
pillocks
. The only good thing was that Jamie wasn’t named. That would have made a folk-hero of him. Jim and Martin’s so-called colleagues jeered and catcalled throughout the showing, relieved they weren’t the subjects of such ridicule.

“If the car had caught fire and they’d been burnt to
cinders
, we’d be saying they were heroes,” I said. I stomped back upstairs, wondering if that was the reason why I hated Jamie Walker.

The troops filtered back, empty handed. Dave called into my office and asked if I’d had a report on the DNA.

“Tomorrow,” I replied. “You know they said tomorrow.”

“Just thought you might have rung them and asked.”

“I did. They still said tomorrow. What about you? Find anything?”

“Nah. Waste of time. His mates think he might be in Manchester, but the little toe-rag’s screwing a bird from the Sylvan Fields, so they say he won’t stay away long.”

“Video games and sex,” I said. “Kids today have it all.”

“What did we have?” Dave asked. “Train spotting and snowball fights. Makes yer fink, do’n it?”

“Do’n it just.”

“I called at this house in the Sylvan Fields estate,” he said, “and there was this great big Alsatian in the garden, barking an’ slavering. A woman was leaning out of an upstairs
window
and she shouted: ‘It won’t hurt you, love. Just kick its balls for it.’ So I went in and kicked it in the balls and it ran away yelping and the woman shouted down: ‘No, not them!
Its rubber balls that it plays with.’”

I laughed, against my wishes, and said: “You’d think they’d learn, wouldn’t you?”

Annette knocked and came in, just as Dave said: “Well, I’d better report to Jeff. Hi, Annette.”

“Hello Dave,” she replied, holding the door for him. “Find anything?”

“Mmm. Ronald Biggs did the Great Train Robbery. Nothing on Jamie, though.”

“Perhaps he’s hiding in Brazil,” she said.

“Could be. See you.”

Dave went and I waved towards the spare chair. She sat in it and crossed her ankles. Her jacket was tweed, what might have been called a sports coat or hacking jacket a few years ago, and her blouse spilled from the sleeves and unbuttoned front in splashes of colour. She looked carelessly dishy, with extra mayonnaise.

“Hard day?” I asked.

“Waste of time,” she replied. “Running about after a will o’ the wisp. Word is that he’s gone to Manchester. When he was in care his best pal was a youth from there called Bernie, so all we have to do is track down all the Bernards who were in care at the same time as our Jamie. Methinks he’ll
resurface
long before then.”

“Methinks you’re right,” I agreed. She was wearing a ring on the third finger of her right hand. A delicate gold one with a tiny diamond. Wrong hand, I thought.

“So,” Annette began, “I was just wondering if anything had come through from Wetherton about the samples?”

“No, they said tomorrow,” I told her.

“Oh. I thought you might not be able to resist giving them a ring and asking if they’d found anything.”

“I couldn’t,” I admitted, “but they haven’t. We should have the full report at about ten in the morning.”

“Right.”

She uncrossed her ankles, as if to stand up and leave. I
said: “Thanks for coming with me last night, Annette. It was nice to have some company for a change.”

“I enjoyed it,” she replied. “Thanks for inviting me.” She smiled one of her little ones, barely a movement of the
corners
of her mouth, but her cheeks flushed slightly.

“As a matter of fact,” I went on, “tomorrow night I’m going to the Steakhouse with Dave and his family. It’s a bit of a celebration. If you’re not doing anything I’d love for you to come along.”

“Saturday?” she asked.

“Mmm.”

“No, I’m sorry, I can’t make it.”

“Oh, never mind. His daughter has just finished her
A-levels
, and she’s been accepted for Cambridge if she gets the grades, so we’re taking her out. They do good steaks there. That’s the Steakhouse, not Cambridge. I think she needs two As and a B. Sophie’s my goddaughter. And other stuff, if you’re not a steak eater.” I waffled away. See if I care.

“Sophie?” Annette asked. “Dave’s daughter Sophie?”

“Yes. Have you met her?”

“Of course I have. She used to come on the walks.”

“That’s right, she did. You’d just joined us. I used to
wonder
what you kept in that great big rucksack you carried.”

“Did you?”

“Yes.”

She stood up, saying: “Remember me to Sophie, please, Boss, and give her my congratulations.”

I pulled a pained face and said: “Annette. Could you please call me Charlie once in a while? Everybody else does. I shan’t read anything into it, honestly. It just helps maintain the team spirit. That’s all.”

She sat down again, and this time the smile was fulsome. “Sorry,” she said. “Charlie.”

“That’s better. I hope you have a good weekend. If you ring me I’ll tell you the results of the tests.”

“Oh, I’ll come here first, in the morning,” she asserted.

“You’ve no need to, if you’re going away. Anywhere special?”

“Um, York, to a friend’s, that’s all. I’ll come here first, for the results.”

“If you say so.”

She went off to report to Jeff about Jamie’s movements, leaving a faint, tantalising reminder of her presence in my office. Annabelle came on some of the walks we’d organised, and the two of them had surely met. Annabelle – Annette, I thought, Annette – Annabelle. A man would have to be careful with two names like that, in a passionate situation. Not that one was ever likely to arise. I wondered about the mystery friend in York and growled at the next person to come into the office.

The forecast for the weekend was good so I told the troops that we’d have a meeting about the murders on Monday. Most of them said they’d pop in Saturday morning, for the results. I still do a few paintings, when the mood takes me or someone commissions one. I only charge for materials. Mr Ho at the Bamboo Curtain had asked for one, for on his staircase, so I decided to make a start on it. It was going to be six feet by four feet six inches, abstract but with a Chinese theme. On the way home I called in the library and borrowed a book on Chinese art.

I had a trout for tea, with microwave oven chips and peas. Not bad. Chinese art is big on impossible cliffs and bonsai trees. I hinted at a few terracotta warriors and coolie hats, for the human touch, and a couple of tanks to show where the power lay. By midnight I’d done the underpainting and it was looking good. What a way to spend Friday night, but better than cleaning the oven. The next part, laying on the colour straight out of the tubes, was the best bit. Therapeutic. I had a shower and went to bed.

I couldn’t sleep. Maybe it was the trout, maybe it was the enquiry. If the DNA results were as expected we’d have that
sewn up tomorrow, so no problem there. Maybe I was
thinking
about the sad life I was drifting into. Maybe I was
thinking
about a woman. Maybe I should set it to music.

I listened to the World Service for a while, then switched to the local station. There’d been a bad accident on the Heckley bypass, something about a jack-knifed lorry, and traffic disruption was expected to last into the morning. Six o’clock I went downstairs and made some tea.