Echoes of the Dead (6 page)

Woodend carefully laid the delicate cup on the fragile table, and – even more carefully – stood up.

‘I have to go,' he said. ‘My sergeant will probably be expectin' me back at the hotel.'

‘Well, we'd better not detain you any longer, had we?' his father said, and smiled to show that he was well aware he was using the same words as his wife had used to get rid of Auntie May and Uncle George.

Woodend kissed his mother and shook hands with his father – had the old man
always
been so small? – then walked across to the door which led out directly on to the street.

‘Remember, Charlie, we're all relyin' on you,' he heard his mother say behind him.

Woodend stepped out on to the pavement and closed the front door behind him. He looked first up the street of narrow terraced houses and then down it. It somehow didn't feel real any more, he thought. It was as if it were a place he had only read about, and which now – examining it for the first time – seemed to be nothing like he had pictured it in his mind.

He lit up a cigarette, and set off towards the ‘better' part of town, where the Royal Victoria was located.

His mam expected a great deal from him, he thought, as he walked down the cobbled street.

And it wasn't just his mam who expected it – it was the whole bloody town of Whitebridge.

Because he was not so much the local hero returning home to his justly earned acclaim as he was one of their own who they had allowed to get on in life – and who they now expected to fix things for them.

And that was a lot of pressure to put on a newly-promoted chief inspector, he told himself.

Five

T
he Drum and Monkey public house was just fifteen minutes' walk from the Royal Victoria Hotel, and had a historical importance in the life and development of Charlie Woodend.

It was here, as a youth inexpertly puffing on a Park Drive cigarette, that Charlie had first tried to pass himself off as old enough to drink. He had been nervous when he entered the public bar, but he need not have been. Even at sixteen, he was half a head taller than most of the other customers, and the landlord had pulled him a frothy pint of best bitter without a second thought.

Looking around him as he drank, he had savoured the moment. This was the adult world, he'd told himself – this was the world of
men
– and a lifelong love affair between Charlie Woodend and old-fashioned pubs had begun to blossom.

Now, approaching the pub for the first time in perhaps a dozen years, Woodend felt butterflies in his stomach, just as he had done that first time.

Well, not quite like the first time, he admitted.
This
time, there was no danger at all that the landlord would refuse to serve him because of his age.

But perhaps other things would be different, too.

Perhaps this shrine to his coming-of-age would have changed beyond all recognition – the oak counter replaced by something modern and plastic, the brass foot-rail removed, the wall between the public bar and the snug knocked down in order to create one vast soulless room . . . the possibilities were horrifically endless.

He opened the door, and breathed a sigh of relief. It was, he saw, exactly how he remembered it – exactly how it
should
be.

‘What do you want to drink?' he asked Sergeant Bannerman, as they strode over to the bar.

He was half-expecting that the sergeant would ask for something exotic – something that not only did the pub not stock, but had never even heard of.

But what Bannerman actually said was, ‘Is the best bitter any good in here, sir?'

‘It's champion,' Woodend replied with enthusiasm. ‘But you'll have to treat it with caution, because after that thin London ale you're used to, it'll probably knock your socks off.'

Bannerman gave him a smile – the first sign of genuine amusement Woodend had seen from his new sergeant – and said, ‘I'll risk it.'

They took the pints to the nearest table.

‘Well, you certainly made your disdain for the chief constable evident enough,' Woodend said.

‘The man's an idiot,' Bannerman replied simply. ‘He's a third-rate polo player and a fourth-rate policeman.'

‘I agree with you – on the second part, at least,' Woodend said. ‘But he is
still
the chief constable, an' he could seriously damage your career if you're not careful.'

Bannerman smiled sardonically. ‘As I see it, there are two main skills to getting on in life,' he said. ‘The first is to achieve the results you're expected to achieve, and the second is to know
who
you can step on and
who
you can't.'

‘An' you think you can step on Sanderson, do you?' Woodend asked, interestedly.

‘Definitely,' Bannerman said. ‘If we manage to get a result on this case, then the people who matter back at the Yard won't give a damn about what Sanderson thinks of me. And if we
don't
get a result, well,' he waved his hands carelessly through the air, ‘I can at least point out, in my own defence, that when I told the chief constable we needed more resources, he ignored me.'

An' you can also point out that I said we
didn't
need them, Woodend thought.

‘I've got two questions for you,' he said. ‘Firstly, do you see solvin' the case as anythin' more than a step up the promotions ladder for you?'

‘Of course I do,' Bannerman replied. ‘Life is about justice and order, and I wish to see justice prevailing and order maintained. That's why I joined the police.'

Woodend did no more than nod non-committally.

‘What's the second question, sir?' Bannerman asked, when some time had elapsed.

‘Oh aye,' Woodend said, as if he'd completely forgotten there
was
a second question. ‘What sort of feller am I?'

‘I'm sorry, sir?

‘Am I the sort you can step on – or the sort you can't?'

‘Definitely the latter,' Bannerman said, just a little too quickly. ‘You're my boss, and I intend to learn all I can from you.'

An' then kick me up the arse when you've learned it, Woodend thought.

He opened the file that the Whitebridge Police had given to him, and spread it out on the table.

‘Accordin' to this report,' he said, ‘Lilly Dawson left the covered market at one o'clock. Now it's a twenty-five minute walk from the market to the Dawson's home . . .'

‘How do you know that?' Bannerman interrupted.

‘Because I've clogged it,' Woodend told him.

‘I beg your pardon, sir.'

‘While you were settlin' yourself in at the hotel, I went to see me mam an' dad.'

‘I know that, sir.'

‘An'
after
I'd seen them, I walked from the market to Lilly's house. Now, I can't say I did it at exactly the same speed the little lass would have done, but I tried my best, an' I don't think I can have been more than five minutes out, one way or the other.'

‘I'd never have thought of that,' Bannerman said, with what just might have been a hint of admiration.

‘It's what's called “old-fashioned police work”,' Woodend replied. ‘You can learn a fair bit from reports – especially if they've been written by a bobby who really knows his job – but there's no substitute, to my mind, for cloggin' it around the scene of the crime.'

‘I'll remember that,' Bannerman said.

‘Anyway, things are quiet at that time of a Saturday,' Woodend continued. ‘By one o'clock, most people are either busy still shuttin' up shop or sittin' down to their dinner, so it's hardly surprisin' that the last reported sightin' of Lilly was at ten past one. Now it's possible that she went wanderin' off on her own somewhere, but what's most likely is that she was snatched off the street by her killer some time between ten past one and twenty-five past, which was when she should have arrived home. So what we're lookin' for, Sergeant, is somebody who can't account for his movements between those two times.'

‘But we could be talking about
hundreds
of people!' Bannerman said.

‘Do you think so, Sergeant?' Woodend asked.

‘Yes, sir. Don't you?'

‘No, I think it's more like
thousands
– but at least it's a start.'

Bannerman pondered on the enormity of the task for a moment, then said, ‘So what do we do next?'

‘Next, though I'm not lookin' forward to it at all, we go an' see Lilly's mother,' Woodend replied heavily.

He took a last look around the bar before they departed. He was glad it hadn't changed since the last time he'd been there, but he accepted, fatalistically, that the
next
time he was in Whitebridge and visited it again, it would probably be a completely different pub entirely.

He had no way of knowing, back then, that when he had his
last
drink in the Drum and Monkey – twenty-two years later, on the very day of his retirement – he would be sitting in exactly the same chair as he was sitting in at that moment.

Like Rome, Whitebridge was built on hills, but there the comparison with the eternal city ended.

The terraced houses which made up most of the housing stock in the town had been hastily constructed, a hundred years earlier, to accommodate the workers in the booming textile industry. They were two-up two-down dwellings, with no front garden and a back yard (containing the wash-house and the outside lavatory) which opened on to a narrow alley and a view of
someone else's
backyard. The houses clung precariously to the hills, each one with a front door at an angle to the pavement, each with a roof which was a little lower than the neighbour's on the right, and a little higher than the neighbour's on the left.

‘Must be a bit of a change to what you're used to,' Woodend said to Bannerman, as they laboured up the steep slope.

‘Oh, I wouldn't exactly say that,' Bannerman replied. ‘There are slums in the south, as well, you know, sir.'

‘Aye, maybe there are,' Woodend agreed. ‘But, you see, lad, the people round here don't regard
these
houses as slums – to them, they're little palaces.'

They came to a halt in front of a door which had been inexpertly painted in royal blue, and Woodend lifted the knocker and tapped it against the door.

The woman who answered his knock was in her middle thirties. Her hair was lank, her eyes were red, and there could be no doubt that she was Lilly Dawson's mother.

‘We're from Scotland Yard, Mrs Dawson,' Woodend said softly.

‘I know who you are,' the woman replied, in a flat, dead voice. ‘Would you like to come in?'

‘If you wouldn't mind.'

She stepped back to admit them, then gestured towards the front room.

‘If it's all the same to you, love, we'd prefer to go into the kitchen,' Woodend said.

Bannerman gave him a questioning look, as well he might.

What the sergeant didn't understand, Woodend thought, was that if they wanted Mrs Dawson to relax – or, at least, be as relaxed as she
could be
, under the circumstances – then the kitchen, her natural environment, was where the interview should be conducted.

Mrs Dawson nodded, and led them through.

‘It's a bit of a mess,' she said apologetically. ‘I've not had time to tidy up, what with . . .' She waved her hands helplessly.

What with your daughter havin' been murdered, Woodend supplied mentally. What with havin' to live through every parent's worst nightmare.

‘It's fine, love,' he assured her.

‘Well, sit yourselves down,' Mrs Dawson said, doing her best to sound the brisk and efficient housewife that she probably normally was.

They sat at a solid old table which would serve as both the surface on which the food was prepared and the place at which it was eaten.

‘Cup of tea?' Mrs Dawson asked.

Bannerman looked at Woodend for guidance, and Woodend said, ‘That would be most welcome. After walkin' up that hill, I feel as if I'm spittin' feathers.'

Mrs Dawson rewarded him with a thin laugh. ‘You get used to the climb,' she said, then added sadly. ‘You can get used to everythin' in time.'

I doubt that, Woodend thought. The ache may dull over the years, but it isn't goin' to go away, love.

Mrs Dawson brewed the tea in a dark-brown teapot which, in Bannerman's ‘social circles' would have been considered almost an antique, but in hers was just an old teapot.

‘Lilly's dad died when she was nine,' Mrs Dawson said, when she joined them at the table.

‘That must have been difficult for her,' Woodend said, sympathetically. ‘For you, as well,' he added.

‘If he'd got hit by a bus, it wouldn't have been so bad,' Mrs Dawson continued. A look of horror came to her face. ‘I . . . I didn't mean that the way it sounded. Ted's death would have been terrible, however it had happened, but if it had have been quick, it might at least have been easier to take.'

‘I understand,' Woodend said.

He took a sip from his cup. The taste of tannin filled his mouth. This was how he liked his tea – strong enough to build bricks out of.

‘It was cancer that Lilly's dad had,' Mrs Dawson said – and her voice dipped when she used the dreaded word, as it did with all women in Whitebridge when they referred to the killer disease.

‘It's a terrible way to go,' Woodend said.

‘Yes, it is,' Mrs Dawson agreed. ‘A terrible way. It took him over a year to die, an' he was here at home for most of it. Our Lilly was marvellous with him. When she wasn't at school or asleep, she hardly ever left his bedside. She was just a little kid, but he couldn't have asked for a better nurse.' A tear came to the woman's eye. ‘She really loved her dad. She never got over losin' him.' Mrs Dawson gulped. ‘An' now she never will.'