Taking Pity (9 page)

“Stuff?”

“Underwear,” says Audrey shyly. “Off the line. These were the days when you didn’t even like to hang your bra on the line in case somebody thought you were a hussy. But there were days when the wind was blowing hard, you could get your laundry done in an hour and you’d take the risk. That’s when they’d vanish.”

“And people thought it was Peter?”

“There weren’t many other suspects. And when they searched his room they found plenty, didn’t they?”

McAvoy rubs one hand over the other, thinking.

“Did you have any reason to believe he had any problems with the Winn family?”

Audrey cocks her head to the left and makes a face, as though struggling with an uncertain thought.

“You know the oldest girl was a looker, don’t you?” says Audrey. “Anastasia. Pretty as a picture, and very clever. She didn’t go to school around here at first. Was off at some boarding school. Had lovely manners and real poise. I think the other girls were pretty jealous. Heck, I was jealous myself and she was half my age. She wasn’t flash with it, though. Just a nice, sweet girl. And I think Peter didn’t quite know how to deal with the fact he liked her in a certain way.”

McAvoy nods. He would rather form his own conclusions, but can’t help asking the question. Can’t help finding out what the local line is on a tragedy that shook the whole community.

“What do you think happened, Audrey?”

She raises her arms, palms up. “Peter used to like going up to the church to read the gravestones and play with his gun. He’d been told off for it before, of course. Nowadays the police wouldn’t let him anywhere near a gun. But this was a rural community and he was a farmhand, and the local blokes didn’t see any reason to object to him having a shotgun, provided he kept it under lock and key. Seems crazy now, looking back. But he was a hard worker for Mr. Winn. Wasn’t exactly one of the more popular blokes, but people tolerated him, and at least he was working. A shotgun kind of came with the territory. He would just have these episodes where he’d do something silly, like taking potshots at passing airplanes.”

“And you think he was doing that when Mr. Winn interrupted him?”

Audrey digs her toe into the carpet again. “Could be. Mr. Winn liked to walk in those woods. Sometimes the family would go with him. It was a nice night before the snow started. Maybe they were walking off dinner. Maybe Peter panicked. Maybe he shot one of them by accident and killed the others so nobody would tell. That’s the kind of thought I can imagine him having. It’s just so horrible. Even now, thinking about it, I get goose pimples.”

Audrey pushes up the sleeve of her cardigan and holds the limb out for inspection. The gray hairs upon her flesh have risen like sails.

“I know it’s hard, Audrey, but do you think you can remember anything else from that night that may help?”

She looks out the window at the damp green fields and the carpet of dead leaves.

“You’d do well to speak to Vaughn,” she says. “Oldest boy. Done well for himself, despite everything. Took a long time for his money to come in from the sale of the farm, of course. His solicitor’s still alive, though he’s about a thousand years old. Lives up the road there. Did a top job for Vaughn. Wasn’t easy to sell. Nobody wanted to buy the place for years. Took its toll on this little community, Sergeant. I’ll never forget when Peter’s gran came back from his first hearing at York Crown Court. She’d aged about twenty years. Was hard for her after that. She’d been quite close with Mrs. Winn. She was the one who persuaded Mr. Winn to give Peter a job on the farm. She felt like she’d made it all happen.”

“She accepted Peter’s guilt?”

Audrey cocks her head again. “That’s a harder one to answer. These days you’d say he was probably ill and give him pills to make him better. In those days she was just the grandma of a weirdo. And when he got sent to the funny farm she was left all alone. We assumed there would be a trial at some point, but after a few years we all kind of put it in the past. Mrs. Coles moved away. I think she got a new lease on life after a few years and started putting the past behind her, too.”

McAvoy keeps his mouth closed. Mrs. Coles did find some renewed zest for life, but it took the form of harassing her local MP and demanding answers over her grandson’s continued incarceration.

For a spell there is silence in the room. McAvoy settles back in the sofa and looks up at the ceiling, where a crack runs from the chimney breast to just above the door. Audrey follows his eyes.

“Subsidence,” she says, tutting and rolling her eyes. “If I ever sell this place it will get me about one pound fifty. Needs a lot of work-doing. It’s what some of the houses are built on, you see. Funny old place, is Holderness. You know the saying about building on shifting sands, don’t you? Could have been written for this bit of coastline. I’m a Holderness girl and even I feel like a stranger here sometimes. It comes with nobody knowing you’re here. Unless you’re from nearby, you think the coast stops at Hull. We’re this little bit that’s stuck on afterward. Miles and miles of not a lot. Gives you a bit of a chip on your shoulder. Puts a bit of wildness in the eyes.”

McAvoy watches, amused, as Audrey does an impression of having psychotic eyes.

“Anton said it was a hard place to get used to. He wasn’t wrong. Loved it in the end, though. We had his ashes scattered in the front garden. Didn’t know where to put him that meant more to him than here, with me.”

“Did you go to the funeral?” he asks. “The Winn family, I mean.”

“It was a quiet affair,” she says, still looking out at the garden. “Would have been held at Saint Germain’s but that would have been too horrible. Was held at Saint Patrick’s in Patrington. The Queen of Holderness.”

“The Queen?”

“It’s true. That’s what it’s known as. The ‘King’ is Saint Augustine’s in Hedon. Saint Patrick’s is the ‘Queen.’ Stunning building. Was on a list in the Sunday newspapers as one of the most beautiful in England. The spire’s nearly two hundred feet tall. Looks a bit out of place in a little town like Patrington, but this used to be a big important place, centuries ago. Everybody knew the Queen. Quite a thrill to say you were married there.”

“You and Anton?”

She smiles warmly. “Beautiful day. ’Twas 1962, it was. I think that was the last time it was sunny.”

McAvoy lets his eyes travel back to the crack in the ceiling. He finds himself beginning to worry that one slam of the door will bring the roof in on Audrey George. She seems to read his mind.

“I’m no spring chicken, Sergeant. Whatever will be will be.”

“I could have a look at it, before I go,” he says, rising. “Might just need the gable end repointed . . .”

Audrey puts out a hand to stop him. “If you did everything today, you’d have no reason to come back, would you. And I hope you do.”

McAvoy stays where he is, half risen. He feels like he is trapped midway into a curtsy. He straightens his back and readjusts his clothes; trying not to tower over the seated Mrs. George.

“If you did ever need to give evidence in a trial . . .”

She gives another shrug. “It would be something to do with my day,” she says. “I can tell them all I’ve just told you. I told it all to half a dozen different policemen back when this all happened. Nothing ever came of it. Peter never really got dealt with properly. The ashes of the two Winn children are still blowing across this land, aren’t they? Their parents are still rotting in the ground. You seem like a nice policeman, but I do think this was done a bit shabbily. It made life difficult for John Glass afterward. He got the mick taken out of him a lot after that. For panicking. For not having his cuffs. And the detectives were not the nicest of people. He was supposed to be our community policeman, and there were people who thought he rolled over and let the men in suits say and do whatever they wanted. I always thought that was unfair. Anton did, too. He and John were never exactly close, but I got a lovely letter from John when Anton died. Not everybody was so thoughtful. Vaughn Winn was, though. I’d only ever spoken to him a handful of times, but when he sent money for the new roof at Saint Germain’s, I sent him a letter of thanks, and he must have remembered me.”

McAvoy takes his eyes from the crack in the ceiling. “Vaughn Winn? You’re still in contact?”

“Well, not exactly contact, no, but there are people in Patrington who have a lot to thank him for. He’s sent money for a few goodwill projects. Good of him, really, considering what this place cost him emotionally.”

McAvoy purses his lips and breathes hard, like a racehorse at the end of a gallop.

“Do you have his contact details?”

Audrey grins. “If I give you them, do you promise to come back?”

McAvoy eyes the remaining flapjack on the plate.

“Promise.”

C
OLIN
R
AY
’
S
FACE
has taken on the same characteristics as the sky. He’s gray, damp, and there’s a good chance of thunder.

He sniffs, almost from his toes. Something lumpy rattles its way from his lungs to the back of his throat and he turns and hawks it against the wall of Hull City Hall. It clings like a limpet.

“About fucking time,” he says, wiping the rain from his face with a grimy hand. “Freezing me bollocks off.”

Inspector Phil Batty pouts as he reaches across and opens the door of the patrol car. Ray pushes off from the wall of the building and ducks into the warm vehicle without a hello.

“Another lovely day in the city of sunshine—eh, Col?”

“Fuck off.”

Batty’s grin threatens to touch his ears. He eases the vehicle forward a few yards until he finds a suitable parking space. They come to a halt outside a clothes store selling the kind of jeans that makes teenagers walk as though they have just soiled themselves. It’s all Day-Glo and thumping techno beats and Ray struggles to imagine he will ever be a customer.

“Used to be a record store, that place,” says Batty, taking his seat belt off and turning to face his passenger. “Local institution. Bloody shame.”

Ray shrugs. He moved to Hull for work. He has little affection for the place and can’t abide the accent. His own roots are vaguely West Midlands but he has little in the way of a dialect. His words are all bile and sneer.

“Coffee shops and travel agents, that’s all we’ve got left,” says Batty, waving a hand at the empty shopping street framed by the rain-spotted windscreen. “Was always heaving with people when I was a kid. Couldn’t move for shoppers . . .”

“Shite,” says Ray, unable to let it go. “I’ve seen pictures, Phil. Place has always been a shithole.”

“No, seriously, Col,” says Phil earnestly. “Hull used to be a great place . . .”

“Shite,” Ray says again, picking at a crumb on the leg of his trousers. “It’s a hole in the ground. You can’t build a city on fish without it starting to stink somewhere down the line.”

Phil seems about to offer a riposte but gives in to a smile. He’s spent his whole career with Humberside Police and has a nice uniformed job that rarely takes him away from the station. He’s a good ten years younger than Ray, but his sedentary life means he looks a little flabby and unfit. He’s well liked by his team and largely ignored by the brass, which for a good chunk of the area’s coppers is the ultimate dream. He’s also a man who remembers a favor.

They sit without talking. Watch the rain and the mist on the windscreen, and the steam rising from Colin’s wet clothes.

“They’re missing you,” says Batty at last. “The lads. It’s shit you have to stay away.”

Ray is gratified by that. He coaches the force’s football team and is missing his interaction with the boys far more than any other aspect of his day job.

“You’re taking care of them? I heard we let in a real soft one against those wankers from the tile warehouse.”

“They just need to concentrate. Keep their eyes open and not drift off. We’ll do fine. Finish midtable, I reckon.”

Ray grunts and nods. He’d be happy with that sort of finish. He wants Batty to do well in his absence but would hate for him to be seen to do a better job.

Above them, the streetlights suddenly flare back to life. There was only an hour or two, around midday, when they were switched off. It’s not yet four p.m. but already evening is settling on the city center; falling as ash from a sky of woodsmoke and rain.

“Shaz keeping you informed of developments?” asks Batty, resting his head against the window on the driver’s side. “Plenty going on. You’ll know what happened to the Scotsman’s house, eh? Gypsy bitch. I never even knew he was married. You can’t imagine it, can you? Bet she’s the sort to stop taking the pill and not tell you about it. Probably trapped him with a nipper.”

Ray swills his spit around his mouth, tasting cigarettes and pastry. He looks at Batty.

“You know that’s shite, Phil. Was fuck all to do with his wife. That lad Downey was a villain. He wanted to show he was hard man. Picked on the first copper he could. Cost the jock his house. She’s left him, last I heard. Took the baby, too. He’s having a miserable time of it. Came out of hospital to find his life ruined. His missus had never even met the fucker who did it.”

Batty shrugs. He doesn’t really mind which story is true, but the one about McAvoy’s pretty wife having affairs on the side is the one that’s more fun to talk about over a pint with the lads.

“Shaz was the one who told me,” says Batty, a touch petulantly. “Gave me plenty of details, too.”

“Shaz doesn’t know a fucking thing,” spits Ray. “Silly cow’s all loved up, isn’t she? Fallen for some slick prick from London.”

“Aye, she was looking like something from a Disney movie when I saw her the other day. All bluebirds and bunny rabbits and twirling her skirts. You know him?”

Ray shakes his head. “I haven’t had the pleasure. Smelled him on her, though. Shaz and me had a drink a month or so back. Could smell his aftershave on her when she kissed me. Must bathe in the stuff. Must be an estate agent or something.”

“He’s not a copper, then?”

“I didn’t ask. Just know he’s got money and he smells like a poof. And Shaz is so cockblind that she’s forgotten who got her where she is.”

He says the last with venom, turning away so Batty doesn’t see the hurt in his eyes when he talks about his protégé. For ten years, he and Shaz Archer have been inseparable. Every job he has taken has been on the proviso she comes as his number two. He had been expecting to run the Serious and Organized Unit alongside her before the job went to Trish Fucking Pharaoh. He’s pissed off that she has abandoned him when he needs somebody to buy him drinks and tell him none of this shit is his fault.

“Pharaoh’s got her hands full,” says Batty. “This shit with the new villains has gone national. She’s up and down to London every five minutes. Hard to tell if she’s making progress. Hard to see whether she needs to, to be honest. Ninety percent of the people these bastards hurt are bastards themselves. Let them get on with it, I say.”

Ray shrugs again, not really caring what inroads Pharaoh has made. He reckons he’s doing better than she is, whatever she’s got.

“You going to give me something useful, Phil?” he asks, turning back to his friend. “Tell me you’ve got a pretty picture for me.”

Batty’s face falls a little. The news is not going to be good.

“I’ve had two uniforms and one civilian checking every camera within three square miles,” he says, sounding put-upon. “You know how many lies I had to tell to requisition them? They played a blinder, though. Even called in some favors from the traffic lads.”

“And?”

“At that exact time, we saw eighteen separate individuals talking into mobile phones within the network of streets you asked for. Of those, ten were female. That leaves you with eight . . .”

“I can do the fucking math, Phil.”

“Of those, two were teenagers, which leaves you with six.”

“Piss off.”

“And here are the six.”

Phil pulls an A4 page from his inside pocket, folded into quarters. He hands it to Ray, who looks at six blurry images. Men, phones held to their ears. A bloke in a tracksuit. An old boy outside a bookie’s. A security guard, outside the coroner’s court. A bloke leaning against the wall outside of Courts Bar on Land of Green Ginger, swigging from a bottle of milk. The
Hull Daily Mail
salesman in his booth at the bottom of Whitefriargate, a finger wedged in his ear. And the owner of the Manchester Arms on High Street, in animated conversation on a mobile while the delivery driver who brought the wrong wine sits on a beer barrel.

“Any takers?” asks Batty.

Ray sighs, crumpling his face. He can taste something vile at the back of his throat. Suddenly needs a cigarette and a pint.

“Nobody fits.”

“Shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, Col.”

“Yes you should. These are just blokes, mate. I’m looking for somebody with swagger. Somebody who would piss me off and not worry about it.”

Batty gives a little shrug. “I did my best, mate. I’m sorry if you were expecting more.”

Ray turns away wordlessly. Watches a group of raindrops dribble together and trickle down the glass. He hadn’t known what to expect, but he had known what to hope for. He wanted a photo of a man in expensive clothes and sunglasses, smoking a cigar and smirking into a state-of-the-art mobile phone—preferably with his name and address embossed on a designer leather jacket.

“Maybe for the best,” says Batty, making conversation. “You’re suspended, remember. Maybe best not to rock the boat. I’m sure you’ll be back at your desk in no time anyway. I mean, the lad’s dead. What can he do? You’re best just taking it easy. Kick your heels a bit. That’s what the tall lassie’s doing, I’d say. Brave girl, that one. Deserves a rest . . .”

Ray coughs and swallows down the results. He’d forgotten about Detective Constable Helen Tremberg. Good lass. Quick brain. Hard worker. Nowt to do . . .

“She match fit?” asks Ray. “I know she took a bad knock . . .”

“She’s home, I know that much. Wasn’t in hospital as long as the jock. Malingerer, that one. How long’s he been on the sick now? Shouldn’t even be in the job after what he did to Roper. Give me five minutes in a room with him, that’s all. Christ, it was a scalpel he was stabbed with, not a samurai sword . . .”

Ray isn’t listening. He waves a hand at Batty: his gesture of thanks. Then he lets himself out of the vehicle and steps back into the drizzle and the cold, gray air. He stamps away, heading for the Punch Bowl, passing the impressive Victorian frontage of the city hall. Posters for comedians he hasn’t heard of and operas he will never see are trapped behind the glass display posters nailed to the big gray walls. The only paving slabs in the city not to be turned mud-brown by the rain are those beneath the big balcony jutting out above the columns and double doors.

Somebody has spat on the front wall.

Ray pulls his old mobile from the recesses of his coat and scrolls through until he finds the number he is looking for. It doesn’t occur to him that she will say no. Doesn’t occur to him she may be traumatized and ill and too broken to start looking for the bastards who did this to her. She’s a copper, after all.

She answers on the fourth ring; whispering and wary.

“Helen,” he says, pushing his way into the warm embrace of the pub. “Got a little job for you . . .”

•   •   •

4:12
P
.
M
. F
LAMBOROUGH
H
EAD
.

Mahon’s feet sink into mud and sodden grass as he walks quickly along the cliff top. He’s leaving footprints and is quite enjoying it. The rain will come again soon and remove all trace he was here. He is free to make an impression. Free to enjoy the salt and spray of the ocean. Free to accept the screams of the whirling seagulls and the lash of a gale which cuts to the bone.

Mahon is making for the lighthouse. Hasn’t seen the place in years. Has pleasant enough memories of the last time he and the old man took a little time for themselves and popped down to this untamed and ragged stretch of coastline. Mahon had needed to have a word in the ear of a couple of likely lads who had held up the local boozer after hours. They hadn’t known that the landlord had friends. Hadn’t known just what was coming after them. That must have been ten years ago, at least. Mr. Nock was still pretty nimble. Still had it all upstairs. Had even managed to squat down to help clean up the mess without needing help to stand back up again.

Mahon pauses and admires the view. Squints through the driving rain at the distant exclamation mark of the lighthouse and wonders whether he should carry on to his destination or turn around now. He’s left Mr. Nock on his own. Has to think of his own physical limitations. He’s going to need his strength in the coming days. Has to eat and sleep and save what he’s got left. He’s feeling his age. Feeling a pressure on his chest and noticing the odd bit of blood in his piss. His good eye aches after too much close reading, and sometimes when he coughs he finds himself vomiting something ghastly and brown. He can’t take unnecessary risks with himself. Mr. Nock likes to tell him he’s invincible and laughs whenever Mahon tells him his fingers are aching or his back is playing up. As far as Mr. Nock is concerned, Mahon remains the scariest and most brutal bastard he has ever met. And he has met them all.

Mahon turns to the ocean. The sea, beyond the cliffs and the shingly, oil-streaked strip of beach, seems to have been drawn in muddy gray, then striped with the frothy white chaos of rolling waves. Nobody would take a picture of this scene and put it on a postcard, but there is a kind of rugged, wild beauty to it that Mahon enjoys. He looks through the amber filter of his ruined eye and surveys the ocean. Stares down at the jagged limestone and quartz-seamed boulders of the cliff. Remembers. Pictures his first meeting with the man who would become his benefactor and his friend, his keeper and confidant. Looks inside himself at the memory of a young man. Twenty-something and formidable. Polished and dangerous.

Mahon sees . . .

The cell door opening and a young man standing in the green light of the hall, a pocket of dark inside the frame of the door. A half smile on his face, as though he’s the best-dressed guest at a cocktail party. Dark hair slicked back, and clean-shaven. Prison overalls somehow cut to look like a designer suit. Slipping the screw a few notes, as if he’s a bellhop at a posh hotel. Peeking in, at the creature on the lower bunk. Thinking. Nodding. Extending a hand, rigid as steel, smooth as silk. Clasping Mahon’s shovel of a fist in his.

“Nock,” he’d said. “Francis Nock.”

And so it had begun. More than fifty years later, Mahon remains loyal and irreplaceable. He remains the reason that Francis Nock lives and that he hasn’t seen the inside of a prison cell in decades. Together, they have ruled the North East from the shadows. They have stayed in business while partners and rivals have gotten caught and died. Nock is in his eighties now but has managed to get old without losing any of the drive or ambition that first won him his empire. He’s not an imposing physical specimen anymore, and there are times when his mind seems to wander, but Mr. Nock looks like nobody’s sweet old granddad. He took care of Lloyd personally. Pulled the trigger with a liver-spotted hand and didn’t blink as the blood sprayed on his face. Sat there with a cup of tea while Mahon bled the body and cut it up. Took himself to bed and slept eight hours; got up to a breakfast of toast and marmalade, then let his pretty, black-skinned nurse run him a bath and tug him off. He’s still the boss. Still the man who holds Mahon’s collar. They have been friends for more than half a century but Mahon is still a little afraid of his employer. Still can’t look him in the eye without experiencing a chill. It’s just the
certainty
of Mr. Nock that unnerves him. All his life Mr. Nock has believed himself to be right. Believed himself
entitled
. Believed himself within his rights to take what he wants and end lives with a nod. Mahon cannot fathom what made Lloyd embrace disloyalty. He would have liked to have asked him. Would have liked to have hurt him until he knew every last detail. But Mr. Nock had been too busy shooting Lloyd in the face to ask questions.