Dying Fall (11 page)

Beresford studied Big Bazza's reaction, and tried to get inside his mind. On the one hand, Bazza has his position as leader to consider, and Scuddie's dig at him would have to be dealt with. On the other, what Scuddie had said clearly amused the rest of the gang, and – for the moment at least – they were on his side.

Bazza had three choices, Beresford decided. He could smash Scuddie in the face and run the risk of also smashing the fragile structure of the gang. He could say he'd decided to stay after all, but that would be seen as a sign of weakness by the others. Or he could tell a lie.

Beresford was putting his money on the third course of action.

‘I'm not goin' home at all,' Bazza said. ‘I'm meetin' a bint.'

‘A bint!' Scuddie repeated. ‘What's her name?'

Bazza laughed unconvincingly. ‘I'm not goin' to tell you that,' he said.

‘Why not?'

‘Because I'm not just goin' to
meet
her – I'm goin' to shag the arse off her. An' I'll do the same tomorrow night, as well. An' the night after that. But if she finds out I've been talkin' about it, she won't let me get anywhere near her.'

It wasn't a particularly good lie, Beresford thought, but it was acceptable to a bunch of lads who, having no opportun­ities of their own, were more than willing to get their pleasures vicariously.

‘Good for you,' Scuddie said, with mild envy.

‘Give her one for me,' Little Bazza added.

Bazza, confident now that he was back on top, smirked. ‘I'll give her one for
all
of you,' he promised.

And then he swaggered off into the night.

For a moment, Beresford considered making his own excuses and following Bazza. Because though he did not believe the story about the girl, he was convinced that the lad was up to
something
.

Then he quickly dismissed the idea. Leaving now was too great a risk, he'd decided. He'd only got the barest toehold in the gang, and to push off immediately would open him up to a great many more jibes than Bazza, the established leader, had had to endure.

‘Tell us about this Paki you beat up?' Little Bazza suggested to him.

Beresford forced a grin to his face. ‘It was in this pub in Accrington that it happened,' he said.

‘I thought Pakis didn't drink,' Scuddie said suspiciously.

‘They don't,' Beresford agreed.

‘So what was he doin' there?'

‘Sippin' lemonade! In a pub! Well, if that isn't askin' to get the shit kicked out of you, I don't know what is.'

The gang nodded their agreement.

‘That'll learn him,' Scuddie said.

It was at two minutes past midnight that Tel Lowry, after pacing his living room for several minutes, picked up the phone and dialled Henry Marlowe's home number. It took some time for Marlowe to answer the phone, and when he did it was in a dopey voice which suggested that he'd been asleep.

Lazy bastard! Lowry thought. But aloud, he said, ‘Have you been giving any thought to our problem, Henry?'

At the other end of the line, Marlowe groaned. ‘It's not that easy, Tel. I've got the press to think about.'

‘And I've got my
re-election
to think about,' Lowry snapped.

‘You got in with quite a comfortable majority the last time,' Marlowe said weakly.

‘
Last time
, I wasn't standing against Ron Scranton, was I?' Lowry countered. ‘Look, I'm not concerned for myself …' He paused for a moment. ‘All right,
I am
concerned for myself,' he admitted. ‘I like being a councillor.'

‘Well, of course you do. That's only nat—'

‘But I'm
also
concerned about the people of this town – especially the newer arrivals. There's a lot of decent, hard-working Asian families that have moved to Whitebridge in the last few years.'

‘Are there?' asked Marlowe, as if it were news to him.

‘There are,' Lowry said firmly. ‘They want to build a new life for themselves, and I think they should be given that chance. Besides, the town in general will benefit from the influx of new blood.'

‘If you say so,' Marlowe replied, unconvinced.

‘I do say so,' Lowry insisted. ‘But things could go the other way as well, couldn't they? With me off the council, and Scranton still on it and stronger than ever, we could have a race war on our hands. And if that happens, everybody loses. Not just the Asians. Not just the whites. Everybody!'

‘I … er … rather think you might be overstating the case there, Tel,' Marlowe said.

‘Well, I don't! I could lose my seat, Henry, I really could. The riff-raff in my ward have already defected to Scranton, and if I can't deliver on my promise to cut spending, some of the more respectable voters will, too.'

‘When you put it like that, it certainly does seem to be something of a problem,' Marlowe said reluctantly.

‘And it's not just a problem for me,' Lowry pointed out. ‘The next chairman of the Police Authority might not regard your little failings quite as indulgently as I do, Henry. The next chairman might want you out!'

‘I'll do what I can,' Marlowe said.

‘And do it quickly,' Lowry advised. ‘Do it before there's a hole in my budget you could lose the
Titanic
in.'

The narrow alleyway ran between two industrial buildings, a tannery and a small abattoir. They were connected, on their first floors, by a covered bridge which had once been used to transport the skins of the slaughtered cattle from the one to the other. But it had been a long time since that bridge had been used – a long time since either of the businesses had been a going concern.

Crabtree and Warner walked down the alleyway at a leisurely pace, their torches lighting up the cobbled ground in front of them, their minds searching for something to break up the monotony of this patrol.

‘What's the time?' Warner asked.

Crabtree shone his torch on his watch. ‘It's just turned five past twelve,' he announced.

‘It's goin' to be a long, cold shift, without even a cup of tea to warm us up,' Warner said mournfully. ‘Don't you think it's about time that somebody opened one of them American all-night diners in Whitebridge?'

Crabtree chuckled. ‘Oh, absolutely,' he agreed. ‘And while they're at it, they might as well go the whole hog and start a film studio as well.' He looked around him at the blank, decaying walls, then said, in a bad American accent, ‘Welcome to Whitebridgewood – the new home of the movie!'

‘Aye, move over, John Wayne – and make way for John Wain
wright
,' Warner said, getting into the mood.

A dark silhouetted figure suddenly appeared from out of nowhere, and stood at the other end of the alley, watching them approach.

It was Warner who noticed him first.

‘Police!' he shouted, raising his torch. ‘Don't move!'

And then the beam landed on its target, and he saw just who the dark figure was.

‘Evenin', lads,' Woodend said. ‘Anythin' to report?'

‘Not a bloody thing, sir,' said Crabtree, and he was thinking, even as he spoke the words, that it was more than fortunate that he'd insisted he and his partner had followed the duty sergeant's instructions to the letter.

‘I couldn't sleep,' Woodend told the two constables, as if he felt that some explanation of his presence was necessary. ‘An' rather than lyin' there, tossin' and turnin', I thought I might as well come an' see how you lads were getting' on. Mind if I join you on patrol for a while?'

‘Of course not, sir,' said Crabtree.

Because what
else
was he going to say?

They turned the corner from the alleyway and walked around the front of the tannery. The main entrance had been boarded up when the business closed, but the boards – and the door which they had covered – had long ago been removed for firewood, and now there was just a wide gap in the wall.

‘Have you been in here before?' Woodend asked.

Crabtree nodded. ‘About an hour ago, sir.'

‘Did you find any tramps?'

‘Just the one. We asked him if he was all right, but we got no answer. The truth is that he was so drunk he wouldn't have noticed if I'd sung the “Hallelujah Chorus” in his lughole.'

‘Still, there's no harm in checkin' on him again, is there?' the chief inspector asked.

It could have been a suggestion or it could have been a question – but the two constables knew it was neither of those things.

‘No harm at all, sir,' Warner agreed.

The floor of the tannery's upper storey had long since collapsed, and there were holes in the roof which let in the moonlight, so while the place was dark, it was not quite as dark as it might have been.

In the immediate foreground, Woodend could clearly make out the shape of a huge stone vat which had once been used to soak the cattle skins, and as his eyes adjusted to the new conditions, he was able to see more vats stretching into the distance.

The chief inspector recalled the time when the tannery had been in full production. Back then, the smell of the curing hides had found its way out through the air vents and drenched the whole area around the building with an unpleasant stink. But what he was sniffing now was not tanned skins – or even the olfactory memory of tanned skins.

‘Can you smell what I think I'm smellin'?' he asked the two constables beside him.

‘It's petrol!' Crabtree said.

‘It's petrol,' Woodend agreed. He made a sweeping gesture with his hand. ‘Fan out. If we're lucky, we might just have the bastard.'

Warner went to the left, Crabtree to the right. Woodend himself made his way down the centre of the tannery.

‘You might as well give yourself up now, because there's no escape,' the chief inspector called out in a loud voice, as his beam, and those of the constables, swept across the room like small searchlights.

Their target was hiding behind one of the far vats, close to the tannery's office. Perhaps – for a while at least – he had been hoping that all he needed to do to escape detection was stay where he was, but the closer the three men got to him, the more he must have realized that that was no longer a possibility.

When he did make his move, it was with stunning speed. One second he had been crouched down, the next he had flung himself forward and disappeared into what had once been the toilets.

He moved so swiftly that none of the policemen actually
saw
him – but they heard the noise he made clearly enough.

‘I'll get him! You find the poor bloody tramp!' Woodend shouted, as he ran towards the direction of the sound.

He felt his torch jar in his hand, as he inadvertently struck it against one of the vats. The beam went out immediately, and he let the torch fall to the floor. He didn't need much light for what he had to do, he told himself. And when he caught up with the killer, it would be good to have both fists free.

His quarry had reached the toilets fifteen or twenty seconds before he did, and had used the time to pull himself up to a high window. But it was a
small
window as well, and now he was having to wriggle and squirm to get through it.

Woodend grabbed at his leg, in an effort to pull him back in, but he was just too late. The killer fell through the window, landing heavily in the alley on the other side, and all the chief inspector was left holding was his boot.

Dropping the boot, Woodend pulled himself up to the window, and looked out. He couldn't see anybody in the alley, but he heard the sound of the man running away. It was an odd sound – clump, pat, clump, pat, clump, pat – as first his boot hit the ground and then his bootless foot followed it. It was an awkward way to run – but it was fast enough, and though they would go through the motions of looking for him, they would never catch him now.

‘Shit!' Woodend said softly to himself.

He returned to the main tanning room. The two constables were leaning over a drunken tramp, who stank heavily of petrol. The jerry can which had been used to carry the petrol was lying a few feet away.

‘You, get on your car radio an' tell headquarters what's happened,' he said to Crabtree. ‘You, get him out of those clothes as quickly as you can,' he instructed Warner. ‘An' if the old bugger wakes up an' asks for a cigarette, for Christ's sake don't give him one.'

Crabtree stood up.

‘Do you need your torch, lad, or can you find your way without it?' Woodend asked.

‘I think I can find my way without it,' the constable told him.

‘Then give it to me.'

Crabtree handed over the torch, and Woodend took it back into the toilets. The boot he'd pulled off the killer was lying on the floor. From the feel of the thing earlier, he thought he already had a pretty good idea of what it would look like, and when he shone the torch on it, his suspicions were confirmed.

It was an industrial boot, with a steel toecap.

W
hen a new cleaner joined the staff at Whitebridge police headquarters, the old hands would take her into a quiet corner and tell her all about Chief Inspector Charlie Woodend's desk.

It might
look
like a disaster, they would explain, and, appearances – in this particular case – were not deceptive. Papers and notes were spread out all over it, and no one had any idea what lay on the lower levels. It would take an archaeologist to do the desk justice, the battle-scarred veterans would tell the novice, and a humble cleaning lady like herself would be best advised to ignore it altogether when cleaning the chief inspector's office.

In fact, the cleaners did Woodend an injustice. It was true that the desk, much like his mind, was strewn with seemingly random pieces of information, but the pieces made sense to him, and were set out in a pattern which, while he could not successfully explain it – even to himself – he knew how to manipulate in order to make the connections he
needed
to make.