Blood On the Wall (4 page)

D
ebby Seward and Kirsty Taggart had compiled a list of the people that Tamara Armstrong had been out with on the night she was murdered. There were three: Donna Evans, Suzie Starr and Rena Matlock, all girls of about the same age, all former schoolfriends of the victim. They were talking to Rena Matlock now, in the living room of her parents’ home in Cavendish Terrace, less than two miles from where Tamara’s body had been found.

The house was large, double-fronted, early 1930s, in one of the most exclusive roads in Carlisle, and both Seward and Taggart were aware they were dealing with money. It was in the way that Rena stood by the window while Seward and Taggart sat, as if Rena owned the world and everything in it. Surly, thought Seward. Superior. To her, we’re her servants. It’s the way she’s been brought up.

Their questions had been gentle, probing without appearing to. Georgiou had taught them that: ‘Our job isn’t to talk, our job is to listen. Let them talk. If they’re guilty, they’ll say something that will trip them up. If they’re innocent but they’ve got information that can help us, they’ll
reveal it. But only if
they
talk.’

Rena Matlock was talking now.

‘We were in Razza’s bar. It’s a new one opened in town, at the top end of the town, not far from the Lanes. Do you know it?’

Seward and Taggart nodded.

‘We were supposed to be having a girls’ night out, just the four of us, but Donna picked up a guy and went off with him at half past ten. She is such a slut! That left me, Suzie and Tamara. We stayed there till just after midnight when Razza’s closes. We decided to walk home because our houses are so near, and I don’t trust some of the taxi drivers who work late. Some of them are such low-lifes.’

‘Have you or any of the other girls had trouble with taxi drivers before, late at night?’ asked Taggart.

‘Well … yes and no,’ said Rena. ‘They don’t actually say anything, it’s just the way they look at you. They leer. You know they’re trying to hit on you.’

Perhaps if you wore more clothes when you went out at night they mightn’t leer so much, thought Seward. She’d seen the way so many of these young girls walked about at night, even in the coldest weather, with skirts that hardly covered their behinds and off-the-shoulder tops that barely hung below their nipples.

‘So you walked home,’ prompted Taggart.

‘Right.’ Rena nodded. ‘We walked over the bridge, then Suzie went off first because she lives just along Brampton Road. Me and Tamara walked up to Cavendish Terrace and I turned off and walked home. Tamara headed up Scotland Street. She lives … lived … at Knowefield.’

Suddenly Rena moved away from the window, her fists clenched.

‘It could have been me!’ she stormed angrily. ‘Do you know that! It could have been me!’

Seward and Taggart exchanged looks. Beneath their bland, concerned looks, both knew what the other was thinking: Rena was a spoilt brat who was more worried about what had almost happened to
her
rather than what had happened to someone she claimed to be her best friend.

‘I’ve got to go to the loo,’ snapped Rena, and abruptly left the room.

Seward and Taggart said nothing, just waited. They’d been caught before by people who claimed to be going to the loo, and then hung around outside the door eavesdropping for a second or two, trying to pick up information to help them with their alibi. That’s if Rena was a suspect, of course, not just a witness. But then, Seward and Taggart had learnt that everyone was a potential suspect. And the closer they were to the victim, the more of a suspect they became. Lots of relationships had their dark side, something that could trigger sudden violence.

As the two women waited for Rena to come back, Seward looked at her partner and wondered what Taggart really thought of her. She was friendly enough in a casual way, but there was a gulf between them. Not that it was entirely Taggart’s fault; Seward knew she didn’t let people get to her. She also knew that some of the male officers called her a lesbian behind her back, and wondered if it coloured Taggart’s attitude towards her. Did Taggart expect Seward to make a move on her while they were out in the car
together? If so, she’d be relieved to know that women weren’t her thing. Or maybe she’d be disappointed. Who knows which way people swung. OK, Taggart was married, but in her experience that didn’t mean much.

The truth was that Seward had a secret: Andreas Georgiou. She’d fallen hook, line and sinker for him soon after she joined his team, a year before. His wife had been alive then. Then his wife had died, and Seward had let Georgiou know that if he wanted to talk, she was there for him. But she hadn’t overdone it, just kept it casual, businesslike. Possibly she’d been too businesslike, too casual. He’d just nodded, said ‘Thanks’, and that was it. He didn’t know how she felt, how she’d always feel. She’d thought about coming out and telling him, maybe when they’d all had a bit too much to drink, blame it on the alcohol, but it hadn’t happened.

They heard footsteps outside, and then Rena swept into the room. She still looked angry.

‘Going back to what you said: you think this was just random?’ asked Taggart. ‘You don’t think Tamara was the deliberate target?’

‘Why should she be?’ demanded Rena. ‘She doesn’t mix with the sort of lunatics who’d do this mad thing!’ Then she stopped as if a thought had struck her.

‘Yes?’ Taggart prompted her.

Rena shook her head.

‘Even that lot wouldn’t do something like this.’

‘Which lot?’ asked Seward.

‘Those creepy geeks she hangs around with from the uni.’

‘The Brampton Road campus?’ asked Seward.

Rena nodded. ‘They make films. Tamara hung around them now and then. I think she wanted to get into films. Be an actress.’

Seward and Taggart exchanged glances. This was an interesting aspect.

‘Do you know who in particular she was involved with at the uni?’ asked Seward.

Rena shook her head.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I never got involved with them. They’re a bunch of fakes. Posers. I warned her against getting involved with them.’ Then she frowned. ‘Wait, she sometimes talked about someone called Drake.’

‘Was Drake his first name or his last name?’ asked Seward.

Rena shrugged.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘All I know is that Tamara thought he was a genius.’ She scowled. ‘All these arty types think they’re geniuses. I can’t stand them.’

‘And did she see these people … and this Drake … a lot?’

Rena shook her head.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I didn’t want to know about them.’

‘How did she get involved with them?’ asked Taggart.

‘She just saw them doing some filming in the centre of Carlisle one day and got talking to them. They were making some kind of documentary by the cross in front of the tourist office.’ Rena gave a sour little laugh. ‘If Tamara saw anyone with a movie camera she’d start talking to them. She was a complete geek like that. Starstruck. I told her, most of these people are sleazy and undesirable and to be avoided.’

‘How closely did she get involved?’

‘I don’t know.’ Rena shrugged. ‘She didn’t talk about them to me because she knew what I thought about them.’

‘Except for this person called Drake,’ probed Seward gently.

Rena nodded.

‘And she only mentioned him to me once. She shut up when I told her what I thought about these so-called artist geniuses. They all die in poverty. What’s the point of that?’

The crime scene was a mess. Tyre tracks and footprints on the grass around the tree where Tamara Armstrong had been found hanging. The grass beneath the tree was still stained, the red of Tamara’s blood now turning brown. The ground felt spongy beneath Georgiou’s feet.

Bunches of flowers had been laid at the base of the tree, bearing cards with messages like ‘You were an angel’.

‘Check the cards on the flowers,’ said Georgiou. ‘See if we can trace who left them. Maybe chummy left one, just to be funny.’

Tennyson nodded.

‘There’s not much here, guv,’ he said. ‘Tyre tracks from the vehicles that came to take the body away, footprints from uniform.’

‘Did you see it before it was messed up?’

‘Yes and no,’ said Tennyson. ‘Uniform were on to it first, then I gather there were a load of ghouls turned up to look. Uniform kept them away and put up screens, but that meant them walking all over the place.’

Georgiou looked at the tree where Tamara Armstrong
had hung upside-down while her killer cut her head off, and at the patch of dried blood beneath. This was the big difference with the murder of Michelle Nixon. Michelle had been murdered and her head cut off indoors, in a railway shed, out of sight of prying eyes. Tamara Armstrong had been killed and her head cut off here in the open, even though it had been in the darkness of the early hours of the morning. Anyone could have come by. What had caused the change in the MO? Maybe the killer needed more of a thrill? The chance of being caught? Like people who got an extra kick out of having sex in public places, doing it without being caught. Maybe it was a challenge, a gauntlet thrown down to the police. See, I kill right out in the open and you can’t catch me.

Oh yes I will, Georgiou promised himself grimly.

S
eward took a swig from the small plastic bottle of water and then put it back in the glove compartment of the car. God, it was hot! The water had been cold when she bought it an hour ago, now it was already lukewarm. She wondered if she ought to invest in one of those iced water bottles she’d seen advertised in the papers, a padded bottle holder with an ice cube in the bottom. No, she decided, she’d only forget to put it in the freezer every night.

Beside her, in the parked car, Taggart was listening on her mobile, nodding and saying ‘Got it’ every now and then. Finally she said, ‘I owe you one, Nick.’ Then she hung up.

Seward looked at her inquisitively.

‘A pal of mine,’ said Kirsty. ‘He teaches creative writing at the uni. A good guy.’

‘Does he know Drake?’

‘Not well,’ said Kirsty. ‘A different department. Enough to know his first name though. Eric Drake. Nick says he’s a bit of a poser.’

‘An opinion shared by Rena Matlock,’ commented Seward.

‘No, Rena said that everyone at the uni’s a poser,’ Taggart
corrected her. ‘Not true. Take Nick, for example. Like I say, a good guy. Genuine.’

When she saw Seward looking at her with a curious expression, Taggart laughed out loud.

‘Nothing like that! I’m a married woman!’

Seward shrugged. ‘I didn’t say anything,’ she said.

‘Anyway, if we can’t get hold of Drake, Nick suggests we talk to someone called Paul Morrison. He’s an occasional lecturer in film at the place. Nick says he’s the guy who has most to do with Drake. Today is one of the days when Morrison is in, lecturing.’ Kirsty grinned. ‘Nick also says Morrison is a pretentious wanker.’

DC Conway looked at the pile of papers in front of him and shook his head. Social Services reports. Charge sheets. Medical reports. He groaned.

Little looked up from his own paperwork and shot a glance at him.

‘What’s up?’ he asked.

‘Michelle bloody Nixon,’ groaned Conway. ‘A complete nightmare. Thank God I didn’t live next door to her. Punters. Drugs. Violent and abusive when drunk, which was most of the time. Apart from her being a woman, there is absolutely nothing here which links her in any way to Tamara Armstrong.’

‘The names?’ murmured Little.

Conway looked at Little and frowned. ‘Michelle and Tamara?’

Little shook his head. Then, almost as if he was embarrassed by it, he said: ‘Nixon and Armstrong.’

Conway frowned. ‘What about them?’ he asked.

‘They’re Reiver names,’ he explained.

‘So what?’ said Conway, shrugging. ‘Half the people in the Carlisle phone book have got Reiver names. Graham. Armstrong. Nixon.’

‘And Little,’ added Little. ‘That’s what made me think of it.’

Conway shook his head.

‘This case is hard enough without bringing the bloody Border Reivers into it.’

Conway remembered being taught about the Border Reivers at school in ‘local history’. The Border Reivers were the families who lived in what was known as the Debateable Lands, on the border between England and Scotland between the 1200s and the sixteenth century. It had been a time when there was no law and order in the border region between England and Scotland, and the Reiver families had taken advantage of it. For hundreds of years they lived by robbing on both sides of the border. English or Scottish, it didn’t matter. The most notorious were the Armstrongs, the Nixons, the Grahams, the Littles and the Bells. They plundered, murdered and raped, and no one could touch them. Not until James VI of Scotland became James I of England, and he took a hard line with them. He had them rounded up and hanged without trial. It had been known as Jeddart Justice. Those who weren’t killed on the spot were given a choice: execution or exile. A lot of them chose exile.

‘I don’t see it,’ said Conway. ‘The Reivers died out.’

‘Their families didn’t,’ pointed out Little. ‘You said it yourself, just look in the local phone book and see how many
people have Reiver names. Thousands.’

‘So you’re saying this is a family feud from six hundred years ago? That after all this time someone’s decided to take revenge and start cutting some heads off? Or maybe it’s a ghost coming back and cutting heads off. Like in that film,
Highlander.’

Little looked at the disbelief on Conway’s face, heard the sarcasm in his voice, and sighed ruefully.

‘OK,’ he said. ‘But it’s the only thing I can see that connects the two women in any way at all.’

‘Maybe that’s the point,’ said Conway. ‘Maybe chummy chose them because they
were
completely different.’ He looked at the papers in front of him and let out a long and agonized sigh. ‘In which case, us doing this is a complete and utter waste of time.’

Seward and Taggart parked outside the large 1960s building in Brampton Road that housed the University of Cumbria and walked into reception, making their way through a crowd of students who were either soaking up the summer sun or taking a chance to smoke a cigarette. As the uni buildings were strictly non-smoking, and as many of the students looked like they’d be at home in a vampire movie, with their death-white skin and black clothes, Seward guessed it was the latter.

At the reception desk, they asked to speak to Eric Drake.

‘I’m sorry,’ said the receptionist apologetically. ‘I don’t think he’s in today.’ She frowned, and then added: ‘In fact I don’t think he’s been in for the past few days.’

‘You know him, then?’ asked Seward.

‘Oh yes,’ replied the receptionist, smiling. ‘Everyone knows Drake.’

‘In what way?’ asked Taggart.

The receptionist seemed to suddenly realize that these two women were officials of sorts, and she suddenly clammed up.

‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘I just meant that he’s well known.’

‘He must be,’ said Seward, ‘if you can remember him out of the hundreds of students here and know that he isn’t in.’

The receptionist looked momentarily flustered.

‘In that case, can we speak to Paul Morrison?’ asked Taggart.

The receptionist studied them carefully, aware now that something was up.

‘Who shall I say wants him?’ she asked.

‘Just tell him it’s the police,’ said Taggart.

The receptionist picked up the phone, tapped out an extension, and then said, ‘Is Paul Morrison there? It’s reception.’ She waited a moment while someone obviously went to call the lecturer to the phone, then she said, ‘Mr Morrison? There are two police officers here to see you.’ A pause, then she added, ‘No, they didn’t say what it was about.’

She nodded, then hung up and told them, ‘He’s on his way down.’ Then she added with a sigh: ‘It makes a change being able to get hold of him. Usually with these lecturers they’re either teaching, or out.’

‘Then it’s a good omen,’ said Taggart, smiling.

They moved aside from the reception desk to wait, and a few moments later a man appeared, out of breath and
looking worried. He went to the reception desk, and the woman behind the desk indicated Seward and Taggart.

‘Paul Morrison,’ he introduced himself, his tone whining as well as slightly aggressive. ‘Look, if it’s about my car tax, I’ve already told your office this is a matter of civil liberties—’

Paul Morrison was a short, balding man in his forties, with three earrings in his left ear and two in his right. What little hair he had was pulled back into a ponytail. He was wearing a striped suit and sunglasses. Seward wasn’t sure if Morrison was going for the Hip Film Guy look or the Second-Rate Gangster. Whichever it was, at first sight she agreed with Taggart’s friend’s description of him: a pretentious wanker.

‘No,’ said Seward abruptly, cutting him off, ‘this is about one of your students. Eric Drake.’

‘What about him?’ asked Morrison suspiciously. ‘Who are you?’

Both Seward and Taggart showed him their IDs and introduced themselves.

‘Perhaps if we can go somewhere more private to talk?’ suggested Taggart. She had already picked up Seward’s tone and had immediately switched to ‘nice cop’ to Seward’s ‘hard cop’. ‘Your room?’

‘I don’t have a room,’ snapped Morrison angrily. ‘I’m only a part-time lecturer and so I suffer accordingly. Absolute victimization. This is a truly dreadful place as far as trying to get one’s own space. You wouldn’t believe it! We’re even forced to share lecture rooms.’ He looked towards the refectory. ‘We could always go in there and talk. Have a cup
of coffee while we’re doing it.’

Seward looked through the glass doors of the refectory. It was filled with students.

‘We’d prefer to go somewhere where we can’t be overheard,’ she said.

‘In that case, the only place is outside,’ said Morrison. ‘Fortunately today is sunny.’ As he led the way outside, he was still complaining. ‘It’s an outrageous way to treat professional people, not giving them their own space.’

Seward thought about their own cramped and shared offices at police HQ and was going to add a soured comment of her own, but decided against it. She wanted Morrison to be the one who talked.

They found a spot in the grounds away from the groups of students, and Taggart said: ‘We’d like to get in touch with Eric Drake.’

‘Yes, you said,’ said Morrison, nodding. ‘Why?’

‘It’s to do with an ongoing investigation,’ said Taggart.

‘What investigation?’ persisted Morrison.

‘I’m afraid we’re not at liberty to divulge that at this moment, sir,’ Taggart told him. ‘However, we understand that Eric Drake isn’t in today. Is that right?’

‘This isn’t a school, Sergeant. It’s a university,’ snapped Morrison. ‘We encourage mature individual creativity, and sometimes the creative mind doesn’t conform to the office hours mentality.’

‘So any of your students can not turn up and no one bothers?’ asked Seward.

‘They turn up for lectures, tutorials, that sort of thing, but much of their work is carried out on their own at their
own speed.’

‘So Eric Drake hasn’t had any lectures or tutorials scheduled for the last few days?’

Morrison looked uncomfortable.

‘Well, he
has,’
he said, a defensive tone creeping into his voice. Then he looked at Seward defiantly. ‘But I’m sure that when he presents the piece he’s working on, it will justify the time he has spent working on it outside the campus.’

‘And what piece of work is he involved with at the moment?’ asked Taggart, trying to put a friendly tone in her voice to counter Seward’s aggressiveness. Nice cop, nasty cop.

‘Many different pieces of work,’ said Morrison vaguely. ‘This is not a restrictive course. The students have to complete a wide range of assignments.’

‘But what particular piece of work were you referring to when you said that when he presents it, it will justify the time he’s spent working on it?’ persisted Seward.

‘It’s a film,’ said Morrison. ‘A short film.’

‘What sort of film?’ asked Seward. ‘Documentary? Drama?’

‘Drama,’ said Morrison.

‘Any particular genre?’ Seward pressed. ‘Fantasy? Horror? Film noir?’

Taggart looked at Seward in momentary surprise; then recovered herself. She’d been taken aback to hear Seward talking like one of these art critics on the telly. Morrison also looked at Seward with a new wariness. He checked Seward’s expression for any sign of sarcasm, but saw none. The truth was that Debby Seward loved films. She had
spent her childhood being taken to the cinema by her father, a complete movie nut, and had come to share his love of films. Laurel and Hardy silents. Musicals. Westerns. She particularly liked old black and white thrillers. Film noir, the film buffs called them. She loved them for the stories, for the intrigue. But most of all for the flawed heroes: the Robert Mitchum types, doing their best to be heroic against a tide of sleaze and corruption.

And, as deeply as she loved film, she had contempt for those who lived off it without giving anything back. Film critics who felt themselves so clever by writing a few witty lines, words which in some cases had destroyed the career of a writer or director or actor. The fakes who couldn’t make it as creative people in their own right, so they got their rocks off attacking those who could. People like Paul Morrison.

‘I believe Drake’s work touches on all known genres,’ said Morrison. ‘He is a very talented and driven young man. He has a fierce imagination, and a wonderful eye. Do you know the work of Orson Welles?’

The patronizing way that Morrison emphasized the name ‘Orson Welles’, as if talking to an idiot, prompted Seward to ask ‘Do you mean
Citizen Kane
or his television adverts for sherry?’ just to annoy him, but instead she just nodded, watching him.

‘Drake has the same kind of intensity and individuality about his film-making that Welles had, before the studio system destroyed him,’ said Morrison. ‘If he can cope with the system, he has a real future in front of him. I believe he has the potential to be another Scorsese.’

‘Or maybe even another Curtiz,’ said Seward quietly.

Morrison stared at Seward, stunned.

‘What?’ he said.

‘Michael Curtiz,’ said Seward. ‘The man who directed
Casablanca, Angels with Dirty Faces, The Adventures of Robin Hood—’

Morrison snapped out of his state of shock.

‘I know who Michael Curtiz is, Sergeant!’ he said, almost angrily. ‘I lecture on film.’

Seward nodded.

‘Of course you do,’ she said. ‘Well, thank you for your time, Mr Morrison. You have been most helpful.’

As the two detectives walked away from Morrison, heading for the car park, Taggart asked: ‘What was all that about this Curtiz character?’

‘Hungarian-born film director,’ said Seward. ‘Worked with all the greats: Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, John Wayne. He directed the only good film Elvis Presley ever made:
King Creole.
’

Taggart gaped at Seward, open-mouthed.

‘I like films,’ explained Seward. ‘When I see anything good, I want to know who made it so I can watch out for their stuff again.’ She shrugged. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything to him.’

‘Yes, you should,’ said Taggart. ‘He was being a pompous prick. You put him down nicely.’