Fighting for the Dead (7 page)

‘Jennifer Sunderland . . . she went missing a few days ago. It was in the local paper and on the radio . . . it was thought she might have slipped into the river.'

‘Did you know her?'

‘Phh . . . sort of vaguely. Colin knew her husband. He did a bit of driving for him when he retired from the police, and we bought this place from him. But I wouldn't say I knew her – or him, really.'

‘Oh,' Flynn said absently. When he glanced into the tea jar he found it empty, neither was there any coffee or milk. And the kettle had just boiled.

‘Sorry – a bit scatterbrained at the moment,' Diane said.

‘I'll get some supplies from the shop across the way.'

‘OK – then I'll try and show you how the shop works – even though you've already found your way around the clothing department.'

Operating with one good eye, Henry cautiously drove his Mercedes from the mortuary car park to the police garage at Lancaster nick and parked in the already overcrowded premises. He didn't want to leave his car unattended in the hospital grounds, which had a poor record for car crime. He was also a touch reluctant to leave it in the police garage, where the cars were jammed tightly together and there was every chance a police motorbike would topple over and cause extensive damage. It was the lesser of two evils.

Ralph Barlow waited impatiently for him in the CID Astra. Henry dropped in alongside him, already regretting his decision to go AWOL from the hospital without getting his face X-rayed. It had swollen up even more and was bruising nicely purple now, throbbing like a pump, sending out pulses of agony. Definitely a cheekbone broken.

Now he was suffering. The adrenaline that had flooded his system at the time of the incident had dissipated and all he wanted to do was place his head on a soft pillow. But no. He'd been too keen, didn't want to miss anything even though he knew he could easily have let the DI deal with Harry Sunderland, which he was more than capable of doing.

But Henry had an insatiable desire to witness people's reactions to bad news first hand. He believed it was an intrinsic part of being a detective to judge how people dealt with things and the only way to do that properly was to deliver the news personally, watch, read, assess and feel. Especially in this case, as there was clearly not something right with the situation.

From what he'd skim-read on the MFH file, Jennifer Sunderland had gone out for a walk, as she often did, apparently, down to the bottom of her garden and along the banks of the River Lune. It had been a bad night weather-wise, so the theory went that she must have slipped and gone into the fast-flowing, deep water . . . with something in her possession that two armed men wanted.

Henry was therefore looking forward to seeing Harry Sunderland's reaction to the news of her death confirmed. That was purely from a professional point of view. Not because he enjoyed delivering death messages. In fact that was an aspect of the job he had never been comfortable with. He had done it many times during his police service, but more frequently as an SIO, since it usually fell to the senior investigator to deliver the message because, sometimes, it would be to the actual murderer.

He touched his face gingerly.

‘You OK, boss?' Barlow asked. ‘It looks really bad. Let me take you back to X-ray.'

‘No, it's fine,' Henry shook his head. ‘I need to see Harry Sunderland's reaction . . . then you can take me back and I'll throw myself on the mercy of the nurses.'

‘They don't like people disappearing on them.'

‘I know.'

Barlow pulled away from the police station and eased the CID car into the traffic gridlock that was Lancaster's one-way system.

‘Where are we going?'

Barlow said, ‘To Sunderland's haulage depot out at Slyne. He's most likely to be there. If not we'll go to his house . . . you sure you don't want me to ring ahead, Henry? Tell him we're coming?'

‘No. I want to see his unprepared reaction.'

‘You think it's more than a simple drowning accident?'

‘I'm making no assumptions – but you know the score: always think murder, then you don't make a tit of yourself.'

‘Yeah, yeah.'

‘I like to see the whites of their eyes.'

Barlow skipped from lane to lane to make progress through the city. Soon they were heading across Greyhound Bridge, which spanned the River Lune, taking westbound traffic out of Lancaster towards Morecambe. Henry's one eye got a good view of the river as he looked across to St George's Quay and south down the river itself, under Carlisle Bridge, which was just a footbridge. At that moment the river was fairly low, but ebbing quickly, and he thought of the terrifying vortex of a journey Jennifer Sunderland must have had in the river. If she had fallen in at the Crook o' Lune, where her house was – maybe a mile and a half north of Greyhound Bridge – she had been dragged and dumped five miles away at Glasson on the estuary.

‘I wonder at what point she gave up struggling and accepted her fate,' Henry mused out loud. She could have gone a long way, gasping and fighting, hoping to get snagged on an overhanging branch or washed up on the bank. Henry was reasonably familiar with the general geography of this area – as he was for most of Lancashire – and knew she had passed under seven bridges, including an aqueduct, and over a weir. She had been on a hell of a journey. ‘Unless she was unconscious before she went in,' he added. ‘Or maybe she didn't struggle at all. Maybe she just jumped in and killed herself intentionally.'

Barlow filtered across more lanes of traffic and picked up the A6 to head north out of Lancaster. He did not reply to Henry's first stabs at forming a hypothesis.

Flynn trailed Diane around the shop, both of them with a mug of tea in hand. She showed him the ropes, literally and metaphorically, of how the chandlery operated. From how to use the till and credit/debit-card machine, to how items were priced, how stock was recorded and even how to bag up goods for customers, how to smile, make small talk, make them feel important, all that customer focus stuff.

He was amazed at how much stock there was and the value of it, running to tens of thousands of pounds. Upstairs there was a large storage room that was once a bedroom, jam-packed with boxes and crates, plus an upstairs toilet and shower, but they didn't go up there.

He let her chatter on and could tell she was enjoying being distracted from the main issue in her life, which would very soon return to the forefront when she went back to the hospital.

After this introduction and the opportunity to deal with a couple of customers, they sat at the back of the shop with new brews.

‘I never asked how you are,' Diane said. ‘I mean, pulling a body out of the river, for goodness' sake.'

Flynn blew out his cheeks. ‘Not really bothered,' he said. ‘Done it before a few times – y'know, back in the day, as they say,' he spoke wistfully. ‘I've even hooked my fair share of bodies out of the Atlantic . . . boat people from Africa, you know. Thousands come ashore in the Canaries . . . and hundreds don't make it.'

‘That must be awful.'

Their conversation ran on for a while, going around the houses, studiously avoiding the important issue. Flynn could sense what was going on, so he said, ‘Do you need to go back to the hospital now? You can leave the place with me . . . I'll muddle through. You do what you need to, Diane.'

She stared at her tea, then raised her eyes. ‘Will you come with me?'

The glaze of her tears did it for Flynn. He always considered himself to be a hard man, and in most instances he was. But Diane got to him and he had to swallow back his own tears.

‘Course I will.'

Slyne village lay a couple of miles north of Lancaster, straddling the A6. Henry knew it a little, that it consisted mainly of dwellings and rural businesses because this part of Lancashire was predominantly countryside. Years ago he'd been to the two pubs on either side of the A6, but hadn't visited the place recently.

Barlow turned off the main road, left the houses behind and drove into the rolling hills, then swung a tight right into Sunderland's haulage depot. It was a huge operation with at least four massive warehouses, surrounded by smaller units, and a long line of HGVs parked in a regimented row, all bearing the Sunderland Transport crest. Henry counted twelve, plus two pulled up at the doors of warehouses being filled with goods. He guessed there were a hundred more out on the roads. There were also possibly over fifty container units stacked high.

The place had once been a farm. Some of the buildings were converted barns and the main office block had once been a large farmhouse.

Barlow drew into a visitor's parking bay and got out.

To their right were some designated parking spaces, one taken up by a sleek silver-grey Aston Martin with a personalized number plate. It didn't take a super-sleuth to make the connection between the registration plate and the owner of the company, Harry Sunderland.

Henry climbed slowly out of the CID car. He and Barlow walked to the office entrance and through the revolving doors. There was a small foyer with a large desk where a female receptionist sat tapping away at a computer keyboard. It was a nice modern set-up inside an old house.

As they entered, the receptionist glanced up from her work and her eyes instantly clocked Henry's battered face. Her jaw dropped slackly and her lipstick-covered lips popped open.

Henry rooted out his warrant card and flipped it for her to see.

‘Apologies for the appearance,' he said as he introduced himself. ‘We'd like to speak to Mr Sunderland, please.' Henry saw that her name badge said Miranda, so he added, ‘Miranda.' The personal touch.

‘I'm afraid he's busy at the moment.'

‘I'm sure he'll want to see us,' Henry said firmly.

‘Could I enquire what it's about?' Miranda's hand hovered over the telephone.

‘Very personal and urgent,' Henry said.

Miranda got the message. She picked up the phone.

At that moment a door behind her opened and a man spun out from the office beyond with a mobile phone clamped to his ear.

‘Look, I said no, OK?' he insisted down the phone. ‘The consignment will be delivered as soon as practicable . . . Can't be done any sooner . . . You have my word . . . Yep, yep . . .' His face was angled down as he spoke, his head bobbing, his free hand gesticulating with annoyance.

Harry Sunderland, Henry guessed . . . and not quite what he was expecting.

He was dressed in a cheap white shirt, no tie, sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms, and dark grey trousers that reminded Henry of a school uniform. His shoes – black and scuffed and unpolished – looked like lads' shoes as well. His hair was blond, unkempt.

Henry had been expecting more of an executive look, but seeing Sunderland and linking him to the type of business he ran, he immediately nailed him as a man who had made his money through hard graft and getting his hands dirty – literally – and didn't give a stuff about how he looked. He was in an industry where appearances probably didn't matter. Haulage wasn't exactly banking.

Sunderland was, however, a good-looking man in a charming, boyish way. Mid-forties, a bit stocky, the blond hair accentuated by a tan.

He finished his call and slid the phone shut with the words, ‘Fuckin' basic.'

Only then did he look up and take in the two detectives standing at reception. He came up behind Miranda, who had swivelled on her chair to look at him, then positioned herself so she could point at Henry and Barlow.

‘Mr Sunderland,' she began hesitantly.

Sunderland's eye darted from one man to the other, trying to weigh them up. Henry spotted a flicker of recognition when he looked at Barlow that went as soon as it came. Sunderland's brow knitted, then his face crumpled in horror.

‘You're cops, aren't you?' Before either could answer, he uttered, ‘It's about Jennifer, isn't it?'

T
hey retired to Sunderland's office behind reception. Henry sympathetically outlined the finding of a woman's body in the river and that all indications – from clothing, other property and photographic comparison – were that this was his wife, Jennifer. It just needed a formal identification – and Henry was, of course, deeply sorry for his loss.

Sunderland seemed stunned and his features became granite-like as the news permeated. Henry studied him carefully, but tried not to draw any hasty conclusions from the way the man took the news.

There was no set of rules as to how people should respond. Henry had seen everything, from hysteria to cold-blooded anger and shouting; others were detached and practical. Most veered between extremes.

Henry had much experience in delivering awful news both to the innocent nearest and dearest and to those who knew exactly what was coming – the killers of the deceased. The way these people took it was often over the top. Much weeping, wailing and gnashing of dentures, vowing revenge – reacting in a way they thought people should behave on hearing the devastating news. Often, they were very convincing and it was only subsequent good coppering that unearthed the truth.

So what was Harry Sunderland going to do?

If he'd pushed his wife into the river, then he would be mentally ready and would probably have rehearsed his reaction.

If he hadn't and still harboured hopes of her turning up alive, or even if he feared the worst, he would have given no thought to how he would take the news and it would be spontaneous, whereas if he was her killer it would appear to be spontaneous. There was a subtle and not very obvious difference and Henry had to try to work out which was which. Prepared or unprepared? Guilty or not? He watched Sunderland's mouth, his eyes, any facial tics, the general body language . . . but he had to admit he couldn't reach any firm conclusion. He was not Sherlock Holmes, after all.