Born in a Burial Gown (37 page)

Fenton pressed record on the digital interview camera and spoke into the table microphone. ‘DSI Alex Fenton interviewing DI Fluke on suspicion of misconduct in a public office. DI Fluke is not under arrest but this interview is being conducted under caution. You have waived your right to representation, is this correct?’

Fluke said nothing.

Fenton looked at him but couldn’t hold eye contact for very long. Eventually, Chambers saved him.

‘Let’s just get this over with, Avison, can we? I’m sure we all have real work to do.’

Fluke nodded.

‘For the record, DI Fluke has nodded,’ Fenton said.

‘We’re on video, you idiot!’ Fluke snapped.

Ignoring him, Fenton got out a file. He removed the letter Fluke had forged and put it on the table. ‘Have you seen this letter before, DI Fluke?’

As Chambers craned his neck to read it, Fluke said, ‘No comment.’

‘You must have seen it, Fluke. It was CC’d to your address.’

‘No comment.’

At that point, Chambers seemed to lose patience. ‘Look, Alex, I know you have a job to do but can we have some context here. This investigation has come from nowhere as far as I’m concerned, and if you’re going to interview one of my men, you’re going to have spell it out for me.’

‘Certainly, sir. Tuesday, someone from PSD happened to be at the Cumberland Infirmary visiting a relative and observed DI Fluke in the oncology ward. He appeared to be having a blood transfusion. He was about to make himself known to DI Fluke when Fluke’s mobile phone rang. I believe it was a call from you, sir, and was in relation to the body found in West Cumbria. My man clearly heard DI Fluke say that he was at home. On that basis, I opened a file on DI Fluke on suspicion of lying to a superior officer. I accessed his personnel record and found the letter from Doctor Leah Cooper stating that DI Fluke was fit to return to duty. This is a copy here, sir.’ He handed it over to Chambers who glanced at it.

‘Yeah, I’ve seen it. So what?’

‘I asked Occ Health for their copy, sir, and they sent it to me. It was exactly the same.’

‘I’m not following you, Alex,’ Chambers said.

Fluke grimaced. Wait for it, it’s coming. Fenton may not be a good detective but he had a sixth sense for officers in trouble.

‘The thing is, sir, this letter was unsolicited. Normally HR ask Occ Health to request medical reports. This one just turned up. I showed a letter to Doctor Cooper and in my opinion it was the first time she’d seen it.’

‘I see. Avison?’

Fluke breathed out slowly. Time to come clean. It was a shame as he was sure he could’ve closed the case given a few more days. It didn’t look like he was going to get the chance. He could try and bluff it but that wasn’t going to be a winning strategy and it also risked getting Leah into trouble. ‘Last year—’

He was interrupted by a loud and urgent knock on the interview room door. Towler walked in without being bidden. He bent down and whispered something into Chambers’ ear.

He looked up and then across at Fluke. ‘We’re going to have to stop this for a couple of minutes, Alex,’ Chambers said.

‘But, sir,’ Fenton protested. ‘Fluke was just about to admit everyth—’

‘I’m sorry, Alex. Please stop the tape.’ He left the room with Towler.

Nearly ten minutes passed. Ten minutes of Fenton pretending to read his notes, doing everything he could to avoid looking at Fluke.

When Chambers returned, he wasn’t alone.

There was a woman with him. She was carrying a brown leather satchel-type briefcase. She was also wearing a black leather jacket, black jeans and had a helmet tucked under her arm. When she turned to face Fluke, he stifled a gasp.

It was the woman Fluke had met at the dinner party. The woman who’d given him a lift home.

‘Hello, I’m Bridie Harper-Tarr, Mr Fluke’s solicitor,’ she said to a bewildered-looking Fenton.

Not half as bewildered as I am, mate,
Fluke thought.

‘DI Fluke’s waived his right to representation,’ Fenton said weakly.

‘Actually, Alex, he hasn’t,’ Chambers said.

Fenton protested. Fluke said nothing. He knew he had. He’d nodded and it was on video, as he’d pointed out to everyone earlier.

Chambers seemed to have been paying closer attention to chain of events than either Fluke or Fenton. ‘When DI Fluke nodded earlier it was in response to my question about us all having better things to do. He hasn’t actually answered your question yet,’ he said. ‘Is this correct, Avison?’

Lost, Fluke decided the best thing to do was agree. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘He can’t have a civilian solicitor without prior notice,’ Fenton said.

‘I’m allowing it, Alex. Miss Harper-Tarr has information that should clear all this up as it happens. Not only is she a solicitor, she’s also a friend of Doctor Cooper. Miss Harper-Tarr, over to you.’ Chambers said it with such assertiveness that everyone sat back down and waited.

Fluke consciously checked his mouth wasn’t hanging open. He had no idea what was happening. By the look of things, neither did Fenton. Fluke was also impressed with the new assertive Chambers. He was beginning to see what the Chief had been talking about.

Bridie Harper-Tarr cleared her throat and reached into her briefcase. As she did, her sleeve rode up and Fluke could see that the lower part of her arm was heavily tattooed.

She put a document on the table, turned it the right way round, and slid it to Fenton. ‘Doctor Cooper wanted you to have this, Mr Fenton. She was too busy to come herself and she said she’d rather not see you again in any case. She said you were quite aggressive when you came to her office.’

‘I wasn’t!’ Fenton blurted out.

‘Regardless. She may put in a complaint later on today. She may not. It depends what happens here, I suppose. What you have in front of you is a hospital printout of the letter Doctor Cooper sent to the police’s Occupational Health department. You have the original, of course. Is this the letter you asked for?’

Fenton said nothing as he read it. He put it down and got out the original, and put them side-by-side. For a full minute, he studied them.

‘Why didn’t she tell me she had it?’ he said. There was a whine creeping into his voice.

‘Doctor Cooper doesn’t work for you, Mr Fenton.’

‘But she’s legally obliged to assist the police in their investigations in a timely manner,’ Fenton said pompously, not ready to give up just yet.

Bridie Harper-Tarr smiled at him. It was the smile a shark gives a seal that’s found itself too far from the ice. ‘Mr Fenton, I worked at the UN for six years. I’ve represented countries. Do you really want to challenge me on the law? On medical ethics?’

By the looks of things, he didn’t.

Chambers clearly decided enough was enough. ‘Alex? Are we good here?’

Still Fenton said nothing as he desperately tried to find a discrepancy between the two documents. Fluke held his breath, mystified.

Chambers raised his voice. ‘Alex. I said, are we good here?’

Fenton conceded defeat. ‘It seems fine, sir.’

Fluke doubted he’d ever heard anyone sound so miserable.

‘Do you have any more questions for DI Fluke?’ Chambers asked.

Fenton looked at Fluke with genuine hatred in his eyes, and he knew he’d made an enemy for life. Fenton was renowned for holding grudges over the smallest things, and this one wasn’t small. He’d had Fluke dead in the water, a clear disciplinary offence, with in all likelihood, criminal charges to follow. Taking down a detective inspector would have been a massive feather in his cap and now he had nothing. Worse than nothing. He’d been made to look stupid. Stupid and impotent.

‘Not at this time, sir, although I reserve the right to re-interview him if the need arises.’

Everyone in the room knew it was a last effort at saving his dignity. Even the sergeant with him winced in embarrassment.

‘All right then, time for you to go and shuffle some paperwork, Alex. Let Avison here get on with his job. What do you say, Alex?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Fenton got up to leave. He was trying not to catch anyone’s eye. As he walked to the door, Chambers stopped him.

‘Oh, and Alex, can I have a written apology to DI Fluke on my desk within the hour, please?’

For a moment, Fluke thought Fenton was going to refuse. That Chambers had pushed him that one step too far. Eventually, he nodded, gave Fluke and Bridie one last spiteful look then left.

Chambers stood up as soon as the door shut. ‘That was rather fun, I thought,’ he said. He offered his hand to Fluke.

Fluke stood up and shook it.

‘I’m a ridiculous figure sometimes, Avison, I’m fully aware of that. But know this, I’ve always liked you a lot more than you think. Now, orders from the Chief. You’re on leave for the rest of the week,’ he said. ‘No arguments. Towler’s more than capable of coordinating what needs to happen now. Cross is out the country. Let someone else deal with him. You’ve come closer to catching him than at least three different intelligent agencies. You should be proud of what your team’s achieved.’

At a loss for something to say, he mumbled a weak ‘thank you’.

‘Miss Harper-Tarr, it’s been a genuine pleasure,’ Chambers said, and with that, he left.

Fluke was left alone with Bridie. She busied herself with putting various papers back in her briefcase. When it was clear she wasn’t going to say anything, he couldn’t contain himself. ‘What the fuck’s just happened?’

She looked up from what she was doing, smiled and said, ‘I think you owe me a drink, Mr Fluke.’

Fluke had a few things to tie up at Carleton Hall before he could get away. Once he’d composed himself, he went to see Chambers to apologise.

‘I can’t promise not to wind you up in the future, Avison,’ he’d said. ‘I want to be Chief one day and you don’t. Sometimes we’re going to see things differently.’

They were never going to be friends but it seemed there was at least the early form of a truce on the table.

He’d agreed to meet Bridie at a small pub they both knew in the small village of Threlkeld, just outside Keswick. She needed to go to her office first to drop off some files, and as they were travelling separately anyway, Fluke decided to just head off.

With the forged letter half resolved – he still had to see Leah – he felt as if he could relax for the first time in over a year. If it wasn’t for the looming threat of eviction, he might have actually smiled.

He left his phone on in case his team needed to get hold of him but the investigation was about to go global. FMIT’s part was effectively over. Towler would liaise with Interpol and make the arrangements. As soon as the intelligence community took an interest, a small rural force like Cumbria got pushed to the sidelines.

It was four o’clock when he arrived at the Fox and Pheasant, too late for lunch but he could do with a decent coffee. He walked in and found a quiet table in the lounge bar. A waitress peered out of the kitchen and saw Fluke. She walked over and he ordered an Americano, black.

While he waited for his drink, he ran through the brief conversation he’d had with Bridie back at Durranhill. He’d asked her how she had a copy of his letter when the only hard drive it was on was back in his log cabin. She’d told him to ask Towler.

He had.

Towler, it transpired, had been contacted by Leah Cooper who’d told him everything. She’d wanted to help. Towler had given Jiao-long Fluke’s spare key and asked him to hack into his desktop computer. That was what he’d been doing when Skelton was telling Fluke about how they got the warrants for the hospital. It had taken Jiao-long less than two minutes to find the right file and email it to Leah. With the right text, it was a simple case of printing off an identical copy of the letter.

He’d deal with Towler and Jiao-long when he came back from leave, although in truth, he wasn’t angry with them.

Fluke had asked Bridie about Michelle’s dinner party. It was obvious she hadn’t been there by accident.

Bridie had explained Leah had been doing some matchmaking for her oldest friend who was sick of going out with boring men, and decided Fluke could just be the right man. The mysterious detective who lived alone in a wood. She’d told Bridie that he was at the wrong end of a failing relationship and that she should engineer a way of meeting him to see what she thought. As luck would have it, a solicitor she knew from court, a lecherous man in his fifties, had been invited to the infamous dinner party. He couldn’t believe his luck when Bridie had asked to go with him. Although she’d driven them there, after the party ended, she’d told him to walk home. She wanted to give Fluke a lift. She’d enjoyed his brief company and decided she wanted to see him again. She had intended to wait until the investigation was over but Leah had called and told her Fluke was in trouble. They hadn’t had long to come up with a plan, and in the end, they’d called Towler for help with the letter, as she’d already explained.

Fluke had been lost for words. He couldn’t remember when so many people had put themselves out for him and he wasn’t sure he deserved it. Leah, Towler and Jiao-long were all risking their jobs. He didn’t know enough about the law to be sure, but Bridie had probably risked being disbarred. Personally, he didn’t think he was worth it.

The arrival of his coffee brought him back to the present. It was served in a huge cup, more of a bowl with a handle, with a tiny Italian biscuit. A group of farmers sitting at the bar with their pints of Jennings and bowls of soup turned to look at the decidedly un-Cumbrian drink. He grinned apologetically, pointed to his keys and mouthed he was driving. As one, they turned back to the bar and continued talking about whatever farmers talked about. Fluke picked his phone up and checked his emails. There was nothing that couldn’t wait.

With nothing to do but wait, Fluke idly picked up a brochure on the table. It had the rates for rooms and some of the special offers they were running.

When he had time to kill, Fluke would sometimes pass the time people-watching, trying to work out their stories from the context clues around him. The three men at the bar talking about Herdwick sheep were clearly fell farmers. No challenge there. The lounge bar allowed dogs and a Border Collie sat at the feet of the farmer on the left. As if the dog sensed it was being watched, it got up, stretched, and wandered over to the open log fire, before slumping back down.