The Dying Place (27 page)

‘Or this was always his plan …’

Rossi hummed under her breath.

A shadow fell across the body lying prone on the rack. Murphy turned to see DS Brannon standing in the doorway.

‘Jesus …’

Murphy looked back at the victim once more before walking towards DS Brannon. ‘Warrant in yet?’

DS Brannon continued to look past Murphy towards the rack. Wide-eyed, turning pale in the dim light. Then the smell hit him, making him shoot his hand to his mouth. Retching sounds followed, before Brannon started to shake and pull himself together.

‘Brannon? You with me?’

‘Yeah,’ DS Brannon said, switching his gaze towards Murphy, shaking his head. ‘Sorry … erm, it should be here soon.’

‘Good. The boss here yet?’

DS Brannon nodded, struggling to keep from looking over Murphy’s shoulder again.

Murphy shoved his way past him, walking back towards the main house. He didn’t stop to see if Rossi was following him. He wanted to speak to DCI Stephens alone. Murphy knew what was going to happen next and didn’t want to lose time.

He found her in what they’d decided was a living room, but was so sparsely decorated it could barely be described as such. A few wooden chairs and an open fireplace, unstocked with wood or any other kind of fuel. A few newspapers on the floor underneath the boarded-up window which faced out onto the driveway. Old and already yellowing. DCI Stephens was listening to a breathless DC Harris as he spoke ten to the dozen, bringing her up to date with what they’d discovered so far.

Murphy cleared his throat, causing DC Harris to excuse himself. Murphy and DCI Stephens stood opposite each other for a few seconds, just sharing a look between themselves. The quietness blanketed over them.

‘What the hell …’

‘I know,’ Murphy said, lifting a hand. ‘It’s not what we were expecting.’

‘You can say that again …’

‘We think we have a name for the guy who did it. Alan Bimpson.’

‘So your DC Harris says. Warrant is in. You can put his door through as soon as possible.’

‘Good.’

‘I’ve spoken to the Super. I think you know this calls for a major op. We’ll be getting all the resources we need. A statement will be made to the press shortly, not that many of them will be awake for it.’

‘Twenty-four-hour news these days …’

DCI Stephens waved a hand at him before sliding it through her shoulder-length hair. Tension was battling with tiredness in her face. Murphy expected the same look was being mirrored back at her.

‘I don’t think I’ve ever had one with this many before.’

‘Closest I’ve come is a house fire. That was four … but it wasn’t like this. This is something else. I’ve got officers out there who are not handling it.’

DCI Stephens nodded. ‘Then you need to get a handle on them, David. I won’t have anyone going off with depression or anything like that. I’ll be heading the operation but you’re still the one in charge. I’ll just be liaising with you a lot more. Any media goes through me. I want you to make sure that lot out there don’t leak a thing to the press.’

‘I can try …’

‘You’ll do more than try. I want this locked tight. Nothing gets out until we have Bimpson locked up. I don’t want panic spreading. Organise a team. Whoever and however many you need, you’ve got it.’

Murphy blew out a breath. ‘No problem.’

DCI Stephens started to leave, before Columbo-ing back. ‘One more thing. Not everyone can function without sleep. Make sure you put them in shifts. Same goes for you.’

Murphy kept his mouth tightly sealed, breathing deeply through his nostrils.

Whatever his boss said, he wasn’t going home.

23

People were already getting snappy with each other. Most of those who had been at the farm the previous night were still working away in the incident room. The sun was beaming through the windows; it was the warmest day of the year so far, bringing with it complaints about heat and comfort.

Murphy and Rossi were taking turns to get cold drinks from the vending machine. Too busy for arguments.

The operation had now taken over the main space, leaving Murphy without the comparative silence of his own small, shared office space as he and Rossi were forced to join the team out on the main floor. The dawn raids on the two properties in the name of Alan Bimpson had come to nothing. Items taken away to be processed, dozens of witness statements taken from neighbours and a lot of crime scene tape strung around the homes.

Excitement had quickly turned to worry as the first word had leaked out in the press. Every major media outlet was descending on Liverpool like locusts. A big story was brewing. Had already occurred. Seven bodies in one place.

It would be rolling news for a few hours at least.

‘Maybe we’ll get that stupid bint from
Sky News
doing those interviews on the street.’

‘Who’s that?’ Murphy said, turning to Rossi.

‘You know the one. Dark-haired, tight-faced. Always asking ridiculous questions and being dead insensitive.’

‘I don’t watch it,’ Murphy said, turning back to the murder board.

‘Mannaggia …
Why did you ask who I meant then? It wouldn’t matter if I gave you her name, you wouldn’t know her anyway.’

Murphy rubbed a hand over his face, scratching at a stray hair in his beard. Probably a grey one, he thought. He’d seen them creeping in more often. ‘I don’t know. Just leave it.’

‘Fine. What’s next then?’

Murphy sighed, thinking of his side of the bed at home. It hadn’t been slept on much the previous few nights.

‘We’ve got two cars registered to him from the DVLA. We’ll have a picture of him soon, hopefully, from what we’ve got from the house. We need to speak to George Stanley again.’

‘At least we know where he is …’

‘Yes. We do. And …’ Murphy was interrupted by a fast-approaching DS Brannon barrelling across towards them.

‘Shit. Shit. Shit,’ DS Brannon said as a greeting. ‘We may have a problem.’

Murphy shook his head, his brain seeming to rattle in his skull. ‘Go on …’

‘Kevin Thornhill has been reported missing by his wife.’

Murphy frowned. ‘The youth club guy?’

‘Yes, the youth club guy,’ DS Brannon almost sneered back. ‘I rang one of the volunteers, who says she turned up for work but couldn’t get in. Kevin usually opens up at nine …’

Murphy didn’t wait for him to finish his sentence. ‘We can’t really be dealing with that kind of thing right now, Brannon. If you haven’t noticed, we’ve got six people on the board.’

‘You don’t think it could be linked?’ DS Brannon said, looking towards Rossi as if for support.

Rossi looked away.

‘Look, if you want to have a quick run down to the youth club, be my guest. But at the moment, we’re concentrating on what we have here.’

DS Brannon looked as if he was about to argue, before thinking better of it and leaving without another word. Murphy stared after him, his eyes blurring as they gazed for too long.

‘It’s a bit of a coincidence, don’t you think?’ Rossi said, snapping Murphy’s attention back.

‘And probably nothing more,’ Murphy replied, turning back towards the board. ‘We can’t be wasting time on stuff like that.’

‘Still …’

‘Enough,’ Murphy snapped, causing a few heads at the surrounding desks to lift up in interest. ‘Concentrate on what we have here. It’s plenty to go on.’

‘Okay, okay. I was just saying …’

‘I know,’ Murphy said, cutting her off with a raise of his palm. ‘We’re all knackered, but let’s not start on each other. Now, where were we?’

Rossi looked at him for a second before speaking. ‘George Stanley.’

‘Ah. Yeah. We need to speak to him again.’

‘Maybe you should …
we
should, take a break first. Get a couple of hours’ kip or something?’

Murphy sighed, then looked towards DCI Stephens’s office. He could see her through the open blinds, talking on the phone. No doubt she was speaking to the Superintendent, trying to placate him.

‘You go first. We’ll take turns. Get back here between twelve and one though. I’ll take the afternoon shift.’ Rossi didn’t wait for him to change his mind, just turned on her heels, grabbed her coat and left.

He watched her leave. Jealous that she was about to get a few hours’ kip.

Murphy snapped to attention as the buzzer sounded. He pushed open the door to the ward at the hospital, the doors locked to keep out stragglers, but also coming in handy as an extra deterrent now that George Stanley’s story had turned out to be true.

Outside Stanley’s private recovery room sat two bored-looking constables in uniform. They gave him a nod as he arrived.

Murphy’s weathered and bearded face was all the ID he needed these days.

He entered the room to find DC Harris playing cards with George Stanley, who was sitting up in his bed, holding cards in one hand, having to place them down to pick up another one from the deck.

Harris stood as Murphy entered, but Stanley barely looked up at him as he crossed the small space.

‘Just passing the time, sir,’ Harris said, guilt fleeting across his face. Murphy shook his head to let him know he hadn’t been doing anything wrong.

‘Bet it’s getting boring being in here, isn’t it, Mr Stanley?’ Murphy said, taking Harris’s seat and letting the DC lean against the windowsill.

‘Yep,’ Stanley replied, still staring at the cards in his hand. The plastic bag on the drip running into a cannula on his hand was almost empty, the tape holding the tube in place turning up at the edges. ‘How long do you reckon I’ll be in here?’

Murphy shared a look with Harris. ‘I thought you might want to stay in here a bit longer. Given where we’ll be taking you when you’re recovered.’

Stanley stopped splaying his cards and dropped them to the bed. His face fell, his chest hitching up a little. ‘Oh, right. Yeah,’ Stanley said finally, voice catching in his throat. ‘How long do you reckon I’m looking at?’

Murphy blew out a whistle. ‘Could be a long time. Kidnapping, abduction, false imprisonment, assault, torture … that’s before we even get to the murder part.’

‘I didn’t have anything to do with that …’

‘Dean Hughes was murdered whilst you watched, George. Do you understand that? And then there’s the others. You were a part of the whole thing.’

Tears sprang up in George Stanley’s eyes. ‘It wasn’t supposed to happen …’

‘Yeah, well it did,’ Murphy replied, standing up from the seat. ‘And now you’ll have to face up to that. Before we get there though, you can start making amends.’

Stanley nodded slowly, rubbing his eyes free of tears with his good hand. ‘How?’

‘We need to find him.’

George Stanley began shaking his head, before Murphy cut in.

‘I don’t want to hear anything about you not knowing where he is or any of that bollocks.’

‘Okay,’ Stanley replied in a quiet voice. ‘What … where do I start?’

‘At the beginning. The first meeting you had with him. Who was there?’

‘I saw him a couple of times, with the old guy in the pub. He was just there, you know? One day. He spoke to the auld fella like he’d known him for a while. Soon, there were five of us. It was obvious really who was leading the whole thing, but we were just excited at first.’

‘Who was leading it?’

George Stanley breathed out, long and loud. ‘Alan Bimpson. We just went along with what he was saying.’

Murphy leant on the bed stand, not taking his eyes off George Stanley. ‘Tell me about the first.’

‘The auld fella was having problems with some teenagers hanging around his house. He’d come into the pub shaking most evenings. They were terrorising him. He’d been to your lot loads of times, but nothing had been done. At first I thought we were just going to knock a few heads together, but they wanted more.’

‘Who did?’

‘Alan and the auld fella.’

‘What was the auld fella’s name?’ DC Harris said, the sudden interruption causing Murphy’s head to snap towards him.

‘I don’t know. People used to call him Major, like that guy from
Fawlty Towers
. Remember that show?’

Murphy ignored the question. ‘So, the
Major
comes in telling his tale of woe. Some kids are messing up his garden or whatever …’

‘They were doing worse than that.’

‘Never mind,’ Murphy replied, dismissing Stanley. ‘You think you’re all going to beat up some kids …’

‘They were hardly kids …’

‘And instead you, what?’ Murphy said, ignoring George Stanley’s interruption. ‘You kidnap them and lock them up at a farm?’

‘Well … they already had one there.’

Murphy shook his head. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘We found out later that Bimpson and the auld fella had picked one up already. Some lad who they caught trying to break into a house or something. He was the boy we put outside the church. Dean Hughes. We came in for the big lad.’

Murphy thought about the victim tied to the rack. ‘Black guy? About six two?’

‘That’s the one.’

Murphy nodded. ‘So, he could take Dean Hughes alone, but needed help with the bigger lad. Sound about right?’

George Stanley nodded.

‘What happened next?’

‘It … we took a few more,’ Stanley said, his chin tucked into his chest. ‘I watched, mostly. We had cameras set up and that.’

‘Yeah, we found those.’

‘Just to see what effect we were having, nothing more than that. There was no paedo stuff going on or anything.’

‘Well done you,’ Murphy replied, holding back a round of mock applause. ‘What was the plan? Beat the shit out of them, until what … they gave in and became choirboys?’

‘Something like that.’

‘Did it work?’

Stanley lifted his head. ‘We thought it had, but Bimpson made fools of us. One of the first ones they brought in, he was a changed guy. Respectful, disciplined, willing. We were going to let him go.’

Murphy laughed once. ‘I don’t believe this …’

‘It’s true,’ Stanley replied, his voice raised. ‘They never saw our faces, barely heard our voices. It was done like clockwork. Bimpson was supposed to take him home. We’d keep an eye on him of course, but that was the plan.’