Deadlight (39 page)

‘That’s difficult.’ Beattie began to toy with the remains of his apple pie. ‘There wasn’t a bloke on that ship who wouldn’t have sent Coughlin home by the next post. But that’s not the same as murder.’

The two men studied each other. Then Faraday mentioned Matthew Warren. The boy had gone overboard. No one seemed to know how or why. Faraday had evidence from other sources that he’d been involved somehow or other with Coughlin, same mess, same galley. Was it stretching credulity to speculate about some kind of link between this relationship and Warren’s abrupt disappearance?

Beattie took a while to frame an answer. Then he balled his serviette and tossed it into a nearby bin.

‘I’m due a meet at half two.’ He got to his feet. ‘You’re welcome to come along.’

They drove back to the cottage, Beattie working his mobile, calling clients, ordering fertiliser and building materials, putting a call through to his son. He had a big job on just now, the biggest he’d ever tackled, and if he got it right then there’d be more of the same kind of work. Ideally, he’d bin the little jobs, leaving himself a raft of two or three contracts to carry him through the year. That way, he could at last make time for the book he was trying to complete.

‘Book?’ Faraday was astonished.

‘Yeah.’

‘About what?’

‘This.’ They were close to the river again, plunging down yet another narrow track, the water shimmering through the blur of trees. ‘The valley. The past. The stuff I mentioned this morning. The guys who fed the lime kilns. The women who broke the ore. The miners who worked the really deep pits. The bargees. What those people must have gone through.’

‘And you think there’s a market for a book like that?’

‘Fuck knows.’ He flashed Faraday a sudden grin. ‘Who cares?’

At the cottage, Beattie collected a bundle of files from the office. Once a month he took all his receipts and invoices to a lady in the village who’d do his books for him. He slipped the files into a plastic bag, called for the dog, locked the door of the cottage, and then set off along a path that skirted the back of the property before disappearing into the woods. It was suddenly colder here, and Faraday could smell the peaty, slightly sour breath of rotting leaf mould. Beattie moved fast, the dog bounding ahead, following the track as it wound upwards, climbing away from the river. From time to time the dog would raise a covey of birds – pigeons, the odd pheasant – and Faraday wondered what else might be tucked away in this chilly gloom. Was this where the buzzards nested?

‘There.’ Beattie had stopped.

Faraday followed his pointing finger. Amongst the thickets of bramble and stands of nettles, he could just make out the remains of a square of wooden posts. The wire strung between them had long gone and it wasn’t clear what lay in the middle.

‘Mine shaft,’ Beattie explained. ‘Here. Look.’

They scrambled down the hillside, trying to avoid the brambles. Kicking aside the nearest fence post, Beattie rummaged amongst the lattice of fallen branches until he uncovered the opening to a shaft. Faraday gazed into the darkness. If you were small enough, access would be easy.

‘How deep?’

‘Two thousand feet? Three? These hills are full of holes like this.’

Faraday eased back, still squatting on his heels. He had a number of questions he wanted answering, none of them to do with mine shafts.

‘The boy Warren,’ he said. ‘There was an investigation afterwards?’

Beattie was still gazing at the open throat of the shaft. At length, he took a tiny step back.

‘Of course. Had to be.’

‘And what did you establish?’

‘For definite? Very little. The kid went AWOL early in the morning. He was 06.00 for the wardroom lay-up. Never appeared.’

‘Who reported him missing?’

‘Coughlin.’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah. That’s no surprise, though. Coughlin would have been the first to realise he wasn’t up and about. So off he goes to the Officer of the Watch. From that point on, there’s a set procedure.’

Faraday nodded. Wallace had been through the order
of events, each one inching closer to the inevitable conclusion: Warren was no longer aboard.

‘You’re telling me it was an accident?’

‘I’m telling you what happened. We don’t know whether it was an accident. That’s the whole point.’

‘But you’d have had a thought or two, a suspicion. Isn’t that what the job was about?’

‘Of course.’

‘And?’

‘And nothing.’ Beattie checked his watch, and then whistled for the dog. The scramble back up the hill sucked the breath from Faraday’s lungs. It was a full minute before he caught up with Beattie again.

‘You had an oppo. Man called Flaherty.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Wallace. Flaherty was killed when the ship went down. He was in the same mess as Coughlin and Warren. His job was to keep his ear to the ground. You’re telling me he didn’t suss some kind of relationship between the two?’

‘Sure.’

‘There
was
a relationship between them?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You mean you can’t prove it? Evidence it?’

‘Exactly.’

‘But that doesn’t rule it out, does it?’

‘Of course not.’

They strode on in silence. The sun had gone in now, and a rising wind was beginning to stir the trees. Faraday was watching the dog.

‘Just say Coughlin and Warren were screwing. Not the boy’s choice, Coughlin’s. Where would they go? Where would they do it?’

Beattie, if anything, quickened his pace.

‘That’s tough,’ he said. ‘There was a store up forward where we kept the hawser reels. That was private enough. There were a couple of battery stores and a chain
locker midships. They might have been a possibility. Then there was the tiller flat.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Aft. Above the rudders. There’s an emergency steering rig in there, in case the bridge takes a hit.’

‘And someone like Coughlin could have gained access?’

‘Anyone could. There’s access through the main dining room. Or you could climb down through a hatch on the quarterdeck. The place was checked pretty regularly, but it was empty most of the time.’

‘So Coughlin and Warren … ?’

‘Sure. If that’s what they fancied.’

‘Not they.’ Faraday was fighting for breath now. ‘It would have been down to Coughlin. The boy had no choice. He was so terrified of the man he just went along with it. Doesn’t that sound plausible to you?’

Beattie’s steps faltered for a moment, then he stopped altogether. The expression on his face suggested he might have come to some kind of decision.

‘We all have nicknames in the navy,’ he said at last. ‘Warren’s was Bunny. Everyone called him that, his mates, everyone. It goes with the surname. Bunny Warren. Coughlin thought it was hilarious. I remember him pissed one night, down in Two Delta mess. Bunny Warren. Fucks like a good ’un. Some of the guys had a ruck about it. That just made Coughlin worse. After that, he called Warren “Fluff”.’ He paused, bending for a stick and sending it into the trees for the dog. ‘The night before he went missing, Warren went to Flaherty, my killick Reg. He wanted to tell him something, fix a time for a private chat. Flaherty said he was very upset.’

‘Why?’

‘We never found out. Flaherty was really pushed that night, said he’d see him in the morning. By then, Warren had gone.’

‘And you’ve no idea … ?’

‘None. First thing I did was search the kid’s locker. Cases like that, that’s what we always do. There might have been a diary in there, some scribblings, maybe a letter.’

‘And?’

‘Nothing. Nothing I could evidence. Nothing I could put in the report.’

‘The report’s gone missing.’

‘That’s strange. There’s fuck all in it, just the bare facts. I interviewed Coughlin, of course I did, but he was Mr Plausible when the chips were down. Just said how sorry he was, kid like that, barely eighteen.’ He shook his head and eyed the path ahead. ‘Bastard.’

Minutes later, they were out in the fresh air again. Across a field lay a country road. Half a mile’s brisk walk took them past a tiny railway station, semi-abandoned, and then into a road flanked by a row of forlorn-looking bungalows. The one at the end was called ‘Wensleydale’. Beattie knocked at the front door, stepping back into the sunshine. At length the door opened and a woman appeared. She was in her sixties at least, small and plump with a ready smile.

‘This is Dorothy.’ Beattie lifted the plastic bag. ‘She keeps me legal.’

Dorothy peered at Faraday. She had a Yorkshire accent.

‘And you are?’

Faraday returned the smile.

‘Joe. Nice to meet you.’

She led the way down the narrow hall and into the kitchen. She had a couple of queries to sort out over Beattie’s last set of accounts. She fetched a ledger from the top of the fridge and handed it to Beattie. Moments later, she was asking Faraday whether he preferred tea or coffee.

Faraday consulted his watch. Half two. If he wanted to be back at a sensible hour, he ought to think about
getting on the road. He thanked her for the offer, then turned to Beattie.

‘There’s just one other question. I ought to have asked you earlier.’

‘What’s that?’ Beattie was already leafing through the ledger.

‘Monday night at the Home Club. We’re trying to trace anyone who might have gone on to a hotel for a late drink. Place in Granada Road.’

‘What’s it called?’

‘The Alhambra.’

Beattie frowned a moment, his finger on a line of figures. Then he looked up.

‘That’d be me,’ he said.

MONDAY
, 10
JUNE
, 2002,
15.15

It took Faraday less than a minute to get through to Willard on his mobile. What had begun as a promising expedition westwards, a chance to tap into Beattie’s memories of his months aboard HMS
Accolade
, had abruptly become something very different.

‘Joe?’ Willard sounded less than pleased to have been hauled out of conference. ‘What’s the problem?’

‘Beattie, sir. Turns out he was one of the blokes at the hotel.’

‘Monday night?’

‘That’s right. Him and two others. All of them pissed. Just the way Pritchard told us.’

‘You’ve got names?’

‘Yep. One of them is a mate of Beattie’s from Plymouth. Used to be an electrical engineer in
Accolade
. The other is a bloke called Gault. Lives in Milton. Bev Yates has him down for interview this evening. For the time being, I’ve told him to hold off.’

‘And Beattie’s account of Monday night?’

‘Says they walked to the Alhambra from the Home Club. None of them had been there before but someone else at the dinner thought they’d get late drinks. He was right.’

‘And Coughlin made an appearance?’

‘Just the way Pritchard described. Called in late, went to the bar, ordered whatever, then saw who else was in and had second thoughts.’

‘Did they talk to him at all?’

‘Beattie says no. Coughlin was out the door before anyone got the chance.’

There was a longish silence. Faraday could picture Willard in his office, hunched over his desk, the conference abandoned, swivelling slowly left and right in the chair while he decided what to do. In situations like these, he exercised an almost pathological caution, determined to exhaust every conceivable line of enquiry. Absolutely nothing, he always insisted, should be left to chance.

‘So what’s your feeling about Beattie?’ he said at last.

Faraday had been expecting this question. The fact that he quietly admired Beattie – the life he’d made for himself, his strange sense of self-possession – was neither here nor there. The nicest people frequently did the strangest things.

‘He’s a policeman,’ he said simply. ‘He’s one of us. He knows the way we go at it. He’s not one to scare easily.’

‘You think he’s telling the truth?’

‘Some of it, yes.’

‘You think there’s more?’

‘Undoubtedly.’

‘Where is he now?’

‘Sitting in a bungalow up from his cottage. The place belongs to the woman who does his books. I’ve told him we’ll need a formal interview under caution but he’s not keen. Told me he’s got a big job on, can’t spare the time.’

‘And?’

‘I arrested him.’

‘So where are you?’

‘In the woman’s back garden. Beattie’s sitting in her lounge reading the paper. There’s nowhere else I can keep an eye on him until Devon and Cornwall arrive.’

‘You’ve talked to them?’

‘Couple of minutes ago. They’re sending a car.’

‘Then what?’

‘You tell me, sir. Either way, we’ll obviously need a proper go at him.’

For a moment, Faraday thought Willard was going to lose it.
Hexham
, he said, was on its knees. Geech may have reappeared but they were no closer to binding him hand and foot to the Rooke murder. Geech’s mother was still swearing blind that the baseball bat and the jeans had been left by another youth which meant that only witness statements to the beating itself offered the guarantee of a result in court. Now this.

‘We’ve got a choice,’ Willard said at length. ‘Your end or here.’

‘There are two of them,’ Faraday reminded him. ‘Beattie’s oppo is a bloke called Phillips.’

‘And you say he’s also down there?’

‘That’s right, sir. Plymstock address.’

‘That’s two sets of premises, then. Two searches.’

‘Yes, sir. Beattie’s place I’ve seen already but—’

‘You’ve been
in
there?’

Faraday had been dreading the question. In evidential terms, he knew he was crazy to have accepted Beattie’s invitation to make himself at home in the cottage but at that point the ex-Master-at-Arms had been nothing more than a promising source of information. He’d policed the ship. He’d have known about Coughlin and the boy Warren. The last thing Faraday had expected was his own hand in any final settlement of accounts.

‘Well?’ It was Willard again.

‘His place was where we talked earlier,’ Faraday said carefully. ‘But it’s secure at the moment and we’ll obviously need to turn it over.’

Willard grunted his agreement and then broke off to take another call while Faraday eyed Beattie through the tall French windows. Arrest and caution hadn’t appeared to have troubled him at all, and in his heart Faraday knew that there was little prospect of a Scenes of Crime search finding anything incriminating at the cottage. The
man was far too canny to have left evidence lying around. Indeed, inviting Faraday to help himself to the cottage had been the clearest possible proof that Beattie had nothing to hide. Had that been deliberate? Faraday wondered. Had Beattie been expecting a visit like this? Had he stuffed a bundle of bloodied clothing down a mine shaft and then decided to send a signal or two in advance?