Dancing With the Virgins (13 page)

*

Todd Weenink looked up towards the road at the sound
of a car approaching the cycle hire centre. Ben Cooper
saw his partner stiffen, and heard him start to curse, low but vehemently. Spurts of Weenink's breath were
hitting the air, swirling ominously. Cooper could almost
see the curses forming into dark, solid lumps in the mist.

‘
Don't look now, Ben, but the weather just got a few
degrees colder round here,' said Weenink
.

The car that splashed through the puddles and pulled
up in front of the hire centre was a black Peugeot. When
it stopped, the headlights were turned down to sidelights, but its doors remained closed and no one got out. It sat there with traces of steam rising from its
bonnet and mingling with the mist. And with each tick
of its cooling engine, Cooper felt his heart chill a little
more
.

9

It was only an hour or so after the morning news that
the first visitors started to arrive on Ringham Moor. They parked up on all the roadside verges, filling the lay-bys and blocking the field gates. Within a few
minutes, the first of them began to wander up the tracks
that led on to the moor. They came in ones and twos
mostly, but some had brought their children for a day
out.

‘
Look at them,' said the uniformed sergeant in charge
of containing the crime scene. 'Can't you hear the con
versations over the cornflakes? "Nothing much on the
telly today — why don't we all go and see where the lady got herself murdered?"
‘

These people had come wrapped up well, in their
sweaters and anoraks and boots and hats. They brought
their cameras, too, and their binoculars. They took photos of any policemen they saw, and of the crime scene tape rattling in the wind; they were excited by
the sight of the small tent that the SOCOs had erected
in the middle of the Nine Virgins, over the spot where
Jenny Weston had lain
.

Officers had been posted to block the main paths. But
they were too easily visible across the moor, and soon they found that people were simply cutting across the vast expanses of heather to avoid them. They shouted
themselves hoarse and got the bottoms of their trouser
legs soaking wet trying to intercept the stragglers. The sergeant called in for reinforcements, but found there
were no more officers available. As always, the division
was short of resources.

‘
"Just do the best you can,
^{" '}
he reported. 'That's what they always say. "Just do the best you can."
‘

One young PC found himself being followed around
by two old ladies who bombarded him with questions.
They pulled at his sleeve and patted his arm and demanded to know whether there was a lot of blood, and how big the murderer's knife had been, and
whether the body was still inside the tent. The constable
appealed to his sergeant to help him. But the sergeant
was busy threatening to arrest a small, fat man in a
fluorescent green bubble jacket who refused to move as
he stared at the tent with feverish eyes and asked one
question over and over again: 'She was naked, wasn't
she? It said on the news she was naked.
’

Finally, the officers were forced to retreat, reducing
the size of the area they were trying to protect. They
clustered round the clearing, abandoning the heather
and birches to the intruders, like a garrison under siege.

‘
Haven't they got anything else to do?' complained
the PC to the sergeant for the tenth time. 'Can't they
go and pester the ducks in Bakewell or something?'

‘
There'll be more of them yet, Wragg. It's still early,'
said the sergeant, watching the green jacket constantly
circling the clearing like a bird of prey.

‘
Early for what?'

‘
Early for the real loonies.'

‘
What do you call this lot, then?
’

The sergeant shrugged as PC Wragg shook off the
grasping fingers of the old ladies. 'These are just your
normal, everyday members of the public. Wait till the
pubs open. Then you'll
see
a real circus.'

‘
Christ, why don't they leave us alone?'

‘
It's a bit of excitement for them, you see. Some of them probably think it's a film set. They think we're
filming an episode of
Peak Practice
or something. In fact,
I reckon those old dears have mistaken you for what's
his name, the heart-throb doctor.'

‘
Let's hope the forensics lot are finished soon over at
the quarry.'

‘
Shush. Don't let on. The gongoozlers'll be over that
way too, if they hear you.'

‘
I think it's too late, Sarge.
’

The old ladies had spotted a police Range Rover and
the Scientific Support Unit's Maverick parking on the roadway above the abandoned quarry. The pair set off
at a brisk pace, adjusting their hats and twirling their
walking sticks. A family with three children and a Jack
Russell terrier had settled down on the grass under the
birch trees and had begun to unpack sandwiches and flasks. One of the children got out a kite and unfurled
the line. Another threw a stick for the dog to chase
.

The sergeant looked around for the little man in the
green jacket, and saw him crouched in the heather, his
hands compulsively pulling up clumps of whinberry.
He looked like a wild dog, eager and alert, sniffing the
air for carrion.

‘
I'm sure I know that one,' said the sergeant. 'I've seen him somewhere before.'

‘
He looks as though he shouldn't be out on his own,' said PC Wragg. 'I reckon there ought to be at least two
male nurses with him, carrying a strait jacket and a bucket of tranquillizers.'

‘
Don't you believe it,' said the sergeant. 'I've a feeling
he's a respectable member of society. A teacher or a
lawyer, something like that. I can't quite place him, but
it'll come.
’

Wragg held up his hand like a traffic policeman as he saw more walkers approaching. 'I'm sorry, ladies.
This is a crime scene. I'll have to ask you to walk another
way, please.'

‘
Oh, but we always come this way.
’

There were four women, all in early middle age, with
their hair tied back and their faces flushed and healthy.
They were in bright cagoules and striped leggings, like
a gaggle of multi-coloured sheep. They had probably
left their husbands at home washing their cars or play
ing golf.

‘
Not today, I'm afraid, ladies,' said Wragg firmly. 'Please take another route.'

‘
He's very polite,' said one woman.

‘
Have you the right to stop us walking along here?'
asked another in a different tone. 'It's a public right of
way, after all.'

‘
That's right — it's marked on the Ordnance Survey
map.' The third one produced the map as evidence and
pointed at it triumphantly.

‘
All the same . . .' said Wragg
.

The women began to turn away. But the second one
paused and glowered at Wragg.

‘
You'd be better off making it safe for people to go about their business rather than stopping us using public rights of way. Get the man who's attacking women, that's the best thing you can do.
’

PC Wragg watched them go. 'It's not my fault,' he said to their retreating backs.

‘
You'll have to get used to that,' said his sergeant.
'As far as the public are concerned, it's
all
your fault.'
The man in the green bubble jacket was still manoeuvring for a closer approach, watching the officers
until they were distracted by something else, then creep
ing a few inches nearer.

‘
So help me, I'm going to thump him if he gets in
reach,' said PC Wragg. 'Just the sight of him makes my
skin crawl.
’

*

Of course, Ben Cooper realized that the black Peugeot was familiar. It was just that he hadn't expected to see
it here. Maybe it was destined to follow him around for
ever, like a kind of ghostly hearse, with a phantom undertaker at the wheel.

‘
It's Diane Fry,' he said
.

Todd Weenink cursed some more. 'Oh great. First the
Wicked Witch of West Street, DI Armstrong. Now the Frozen Bitch from the Black Country. God, we could do without this. Stand by for a laugh a minute.'

‘
I thought she was already gone,' said Cooper.
'Fry? I wish.
’

They watched Fry get out of the Peugeot and look
around the car park. To Cooper, she still seemed thin, despite a heavy woollen jacket with a hood against the
cold. She had never looked healthy — too much in need
of a few good meals, and with a strength that was all
sinew and technique, rather than muscle. For a moment,
he wondered how she spent her time now. No one else
in Edendale had taken the trouble to befriend her since
his own efforts had failed. Diane Fry carried something
dark and immovable on her shoulder, something that
had accompanied her from West Midlands when she
transferred. Cooper felt a
frisson
of unease at the thought
of what might happen to her eventually, if she was left
entirely on her own
.

*

Finally, Fry saw them and walked directly towards
Weenink. She took him aside and spoke to him quietly
for a minute. Cooper could see that Todd looked unhappy. But then he walked to their car and drove away without a glance, his face set into a scowl
.

Cooper stood quite still, like a child reluctant to draw
attention to himself. He wanted to shove his hands in
his pockets to keep them warm, but was worried about
how it might be interpreted
.

He found the officer safety techniques from the train
ing manuals running through his mind — extracts from
the sections on employing empathy. Don't excite the
suspect by sudden movements, they said. Show a will
ingness to resolve the situation by co-operation. That
was fine. But there was one problem here. The manuals
always recommended maintaining a verbal exchange
with the suspect for as long as possible, if you were going to maintain empathy
.

Cooper watched her as she took her time reading the notices in the window of the cycle hire centre, as
if she were totally fascinated by the weather forecast or
the penalties for returning a bike after the deadline.

‘
What's going on?' he asked. 'What's wrong?'

‘
Wrong?' Fry's stare was capable of raising the temperature of his skin until he felt his face was glowing
like a red traffic light. 'DC Weenink is required back at
Division, that's all.'

‘
Why?' said Cooper. 'What's so important that they
pull him off the job just like that?'

‘
Sorry,' she said. 'I can't tell you that.'

‘
Can't? Does that mean you do know why? Or haven't
they told you either?'

‘
It's nothing to do with you, OK?
’

Cooper opened his mouth, then realized it would be
a waste of time trying to explain that Todd Weenink was his partner.

‘
Right. OK. So now what?'

‘
Well, we're following Jenny Weston's route, aren't we?'

‘
We?'

‘
Since I've deprived you of your friend, you'll have to put up with me. Sorry. Is it this way?
’

She turned away from him towards the trail. Cooper
felt as though she had reduced him to insignificance
with a mere twitch of her narrow shoulder. He followed
her, a step behind, staring at the back of her head, trying
to figure out what exactly was going on in her mind
.

He knew their relationship had got off on the wrong
foot. He had tried to be friends with her when she was
the new girl in E Division and no one else had bothered.
It had gone wrong, of course. But there was something
in Fry's manner, something about the way she held her body when she spoke to him, that told him it was more
complicated than that. Things always were more com
plicated than they seemed
.