Blue Murder (18 page)

*****

Even at school they were talking about it. Maria going on about how her mam knew the man that had been murdered. Then Megan saying that everyone who went to church knew him because he was there every week. He sat near the back with the Hennesseys. Jade couldn’t remember him but she didn’t go every week. Only when Mam felt up to it. And someone said the police had started a manhunt.

Jade wondered if the manhunt had horses or maybe they just used the helicopter because they could see where you were from that even if you were hiding. It was on the telly and they showed these men in some bushes and they were hot and the helicopter could see them with a special thing. They could even see you in a wheelie bin. Jade nearly told them what she’d seen. That would show them. They’d all want to sit with Jade at school dinners.

Then in assembly they had to say a special prayer for Mr Tulley and Mrs Tulley. He was a teacher at St Columbus. That’s where you went to big school. They had the same colour uniform. At break, Anthony said Mr Tulley had his head chopped off but he was just making it up ‘cos when Liam asked him how he knew he said he just did and he went red. Liam kicked him and said liar, liar, pants on fire and Liam said Mr Tulley had been shot with an aykay forty-seven. He pointed his finger at Jade and shot her ‘pyew, pyew’.

‘You are so sad,’ Jade told him and she went to sit by the wall. She wondered if Mr Tulley would be in heaven already or if he had to go to purgatory for a bit. You only went straight to heaven if you’d no sins. So if you’d done something wrong and you died before your next confession then you went to purgatory and you suffered until your sins were cleaned up. Then you could go up.

If you had loads of sins, if your soul was all black with sins then you’d go straight to hell. Everlasting torment. If they were mortal sins. It was really hard, thought Jade, to be good all the time. Mainly remembering all the time was hard. Just one little thing and you’d committed a sin.

Even babies weren’t pure. They were all born with the sins of the world. They didn’t get sent to purgatory though, just limbo. They didn’t suffer, just floated about like astronauts. But they stayed there. That was tight really, ‘cos if you were a baby and you died and went to limbo and then your mam died and went to heaven then you’d never see her again. For all eternity. But a baby was all right if it got baptised. That took away all the sins and then they were saved. Jade knew how to save a baby. You could baptise it yourself. You needed holy water though. You put some on your thumb and you made a sign of the cross on the baby’s forehead and you said, ‘I baptise you in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen.’ Then it was safe. Jade had baptised all her dolls. It was good practise. Anyway, if Mr Tulley went to mass every week he’d probably be okay.

*****

Janine surveyed the tatty mobile home that Ferdie Gibson’s mate Colin hid in. The place was near Northenden, tucked in between the motorway flyover and the steep banks of the murky brown river. A dismal place, she thought, the roar of the traffic night and day, the shadow of the concrete bridge and a dispirited ram shackle air to the whole site.

Janine wondered what sort of upbringing the lad had had to end up here, on his own. Colin blinked repeatedly and licked his lips as she and Richard stepped in through the narrow doorway and perched on the sagging mattress couch at the dining end of the space.

‘Ferdie Gibson’s down the station now, Colin. Helping us with our enquiries. We thought you could help, too,’ Janine said.

‘I told the other guy everything,’ Colin meant DS Butchers.

‘Tell us again,’ Richard folded his arms.

‘Ferdie came round about one. We went down the pub.’

‘One o’clock?’ Richard made it sound like the wrong answer.

Unnerved, Colin reached for a cigarette and lit it. ‘Yeah, ‘bout then.’

‘You didn’t see Ferdie earlier on Saturday morning?’ Janine asked.

‘No, I told you, I was in bed.’

‘Really?’ She didn’t believe him. ‘See, we know he’d attacked Mr Tulley once already. Probably talked about having another go. You’ve heard him saying he’d get Tulley, haven’t you?’

‘That was just talk. Everyone says stuff like that,’ Colin puffed quickly on his fag.

‘Ferdie follows through, though,’ she said. ‘We’ve a witness who’s got someone like Ferdie near the scene of the crime. We’re not looking at taking without owner’s consent now, Colin. Murder.’ She paused. The lad’s face was tight with tension. His eyes darting all over the place. ‘If Ferdie is charged and you withheld information then you could be done for obstruction or attempting to pervert the course of justice.’

Colin’s hand shook violently.

‘Be better for you if you’re straight with us,’ she said quietly. ‘Much better. Well?’

In the pause before he spoke she heard the blare of a horn from the overhead traffic and the squeal of brakes. Come on, Colin, she willed, give it up, whatever you’re hiding.

‘I was here. I didn’t see Ferdie till one. All like I said.’ He spoke in a rush, pulled hard on the cigarette.

Damn! Any chance she’d had of persuading him had passed. She flicked her eyes to Richard. No score. Time to go.

*****

Eddie Vincent took two extra tablets to help with the pain. He didn’t want to be doubled up when he had his go at picking out the lad he’d seen. They had promised to send a car for him. He was ready, coat and hat on.

He didn’t ever feel properly warm these days. Like the cancer was draining the heat from him as well as the life. His mother had lived to a ripe old age but Eddie’s father died young. He’d been killed at work. An accident on the docks at Old Trafford. Six dead, several injured. Unloading cotton that had come all the way from India across the oceans and up the Manchester Ship Canal.

There was no compensation. His mother went before the Poor Board to try and get help with the rent. His sisters went into the mill as girls and he followed them. Till the war came long.

Knocking at the door. Eddie got slowly to his feet and went to answer it.

At the police station it was just like the television. A row of men sat behind the glass. They couldn’t see him. They were dressed in similar casual clothing and wore baseball caps turned backwards. He took his time looking at each in turn. They were very alike. He’d expected it to be easy. That the face of the one he had seen would jump out at him, clear as day. But it hadn’t and the more he studied them the more similar they appeared. Although one on the far end, a bit taller, looked most like he remembered, skinny too.

‘Take your time,’ said the policeman. ‘Would you like them to turn to the side?’

‘No, I saw him from the front.’ He could hardly ask them to look desperate, haunted. ‘But can you get them to look right and left, like they’re watching out for something?’

The parade were instructed to do so. The movements were stilted and made Eddie more uncertain. He felt foolish for agreeing to come. When they had all finished he turned to the policeman. ‘It’s no good, the nearest is number one but I couldn’t say he was the chap I saw. Couldn’t swear to it in a court of law.’ He had to be honest.

*****

Butchers was adding to the boards again. All the bits of information they could verify and that might have a bearing were going up. He pinned the memo about the Tulley parents up above the picture of the dead man. DS Shap sidled over. Butchers waited for some smart arse comment. He didn’t have long to wait.

‘Dead loss, your old codger, Mr Vincent,’ Shap said. ‘Picked Andy from traffic.’

Butchers sighed and stabbed a drawing pin into the display and the whole thing clattered down, scattering papers and pins and the board landing with one edge on his left foot, the tender spot where he’d damaged a toe joint in a school rugby game. A sarcastic cheer rang through the room from the handful of staff working there.

‘Piss off,’ shouted Butchers, righting himself and looking at the holes in the wall. Some idiot had fixed it up with nails, instead of using screws and rawlplugs. If a job’s worth doing … thought Butchers. Be the bloody handyman cum caretaker. Had some fancy title: Building Resources Manager. Hah! Couldn’t manage fuzzy-felt. Butchers sighed and began gathering up the bits of paper.

*****

Janine pulled up outside the address where Matthew Tulley’s parents lived. Nice bungalow, low-maintenance garden at the front, conservatory at the side.

‘Lot chillier, today,’ Richard looked at her. Not smiling. ‘Not just the weather. Have I missed something?’

She tensed up. ‘Can we just concentrate on the job?’

Her phone went. It was Shap.

‘The line-up,’ she told Richard, ‘no joy.’ She hit the steering wheel in frustration. It was disheartening, too many leads going nowhere. The Lemon was right, they did need to narrow it down but nothing concrete was coming out yet. She couldn’t disregard Ferdie simply because the ID parade had failed. Eyewitnesses were notoriously inaccurate. Just because the old guy hadn’t picked him out didn’t mean Ferdie was in the clear. He still had the history with Tulley and she knew Colin had been lying about the morning.

Jack Tulley came out to greet them and took them in to meet his wife, Connie. They sat in the lounge. A room awash with floral patterns.

The couple looked shell-shocked, expressions slack with the impact of the news they had had, clothes flung on with little care, hair tousled.

‘When we spoke on the phone you said you hadn’t seen your son recently?’ Janine began.

‘Not for years,’ Connie explained, her frame shaking. ‘We didn’t even know Matthew had got married again. He’s got nephews and nieces he’s never even seen. He just didn’t want to know. And now –’ her voice trembled.

‘Matthew had been married before?’

‘Awful business,’ Jack patted his wife’s hand, his voice husky. ‘They were divorced before they’d even given it a go. They were far too young, still at college.’

‘When was this?’ Richard asked. ‘Nineteen seventy-nine.’

‘What was her name?’

‘Laura, Laura Belling.’

‘Do you know where she’s living,’ Janine said.

‘No’ said Jack. ‘He told this Lesley we were dead, didn’t he?’

Janine gave a small nod.

Connie made a mewling sound. Her husband shuddered.

Oh, God, thought Janine, aware of their pain and the awful humiliation. She took in the framed photographs on the wall. The sister they’d mentioned, young family, smiling parents.

‘Julia and her crew – four grandchildren,’ Jack told her, sniffing hard.

‘And you’ve no idea who did it?’ Connie’s eyes shone with tears.

Janine shook her head.

‘Or why? They said there was no idea why he’d been killed.’

‘Not yet,’ said Janine, ‘but we’re doing everything we can.’

The journey back from Lymm was turning out to be a nightmare. A lorry had shed its load of tinned goods just outside Manchester and traffic was backed up for four miles. The air was still and thick with the stench of exhaust fumes.

‘So what does that tell us about Matthew Tulley?’ she said to Richard.

‘That he was a liar.’

‘Why pretend they’re dead? Why deny the existence of family?’

‘Couldn’t stand them?’

‘But not a dickey bird in … what … nearly twenty

years, eighteen years?’

‘They cramp his style?’ Richard suggested.

‘Hardly Steptoe and Son though, were they?’

‘Perhaps he was being economical with the truth in other ways; didn’t want them blowing the gaff?’

‘Like the first marriage? That was news. See if we can find her, see what she has to say about Tulley.’

‘Yep.’ Richard cracked open a can of Lilt. ‘We’re moving,’ he gestured at the cars in front. His mobile sounded and he took the call. Relayed the details to Janine. ‘Next lot of forensics in.’

‘The bonfire?’ she said eagerly.

‘As if! The trainer: Hi-Tec, Walklite, tens.’

‘Get Shap to check out Ferdie Gibson’s shoes. We know how unreliable IL parades are – doesn’t mean he’s off the hook. Anything from Lesley?’

‘Hair and skin traces on his body and clothing,’ Richard shrugged. ‘Gets us nowhere: they shared a bed. Also the lab reckons the killer would have been awash with blood, and so would the knife – if they were carrying it.’

Janine tried to imagine the scene. The killer leaving the body, blood everywhere. ‘Send Butchers back to Mr Vincent, take him through it, bit by bit. In minute detail. Oh, damn.’

They came to another standstill because of road works. Janine groaned. She was dying to pee, another symptom of her pregnancy. She put on the handbrake and shifted in her seat to ease the pressure on her bladder. She helped herself to a chocolate bar.

‘One thing came up when I talked to the school,’ Richard had visited St Columbus after seeing Bobby Mac, ‘according to an old classmate, Gibson had been making personal comments about Tulley’s wife. That’s when Tulley went ballistic.’

‘Jealous?’

‘There’s a chance.’

‘We need to dig around some more. Did Ferdie Gibson know Mrs Tulley? I want to press her on the car park business, the times don’t tally and cutting herself up – perhaps everything in the garden wasn’t quite so rosy?’

Janine’s phone went then. Her mum again. She was expecting more about the VCR but her mum’s voice was full of panic.

‘Janine, it’s Tom, he’s had an asthma attack. They’ve taken him to hospital.’

Tom! Her guts twisted in fear and she felt the blood jump in her veins. ‘Oh, my god. Which hospital?’

‘Wythenshawe.’

‘Oh, Jesus, I’m on my way.’ She turned to Richard, her face white with panic. ‘It’s Tom. He’s had an asthma attack at school. They had to get an ambulance.’

Richard leant forward and opened the compartment, retrieved the magnetic blue light and siren from the glove compartment and wound down his window.

Janine looked at him, shocked. It was against all the rules to do that. Only ever police business, only ever a genuine emergency.

She frowned. Richard placed it on the car roof. Nodded at her. ‘Go for it, Janine.’