Endangering Innocents (9 page)

She replaced the figure in the cabinet and locked it, feeling terribly uneasy as her eye was caught through the glass, by the tall, pointed head of the wronged hound. Staffordshire figures are not renowned for their realism. They are crude, their faces blunt-featured. And yet she seemed to read both accusation and a plea in the dog’s painted eye.

Then two things happened at once. She heard Matthew’s key in the door and the telephone rang. “I’ll get it, Jo,” he
called and moments later handed it to her, his face a mixture of resignation, frustration and frank irritation.

“Ma’am.”

She didn’t recognise the voice.

“It’s Pugh, Sir. Ma’am. I’m a Special. They asked me to phone you. We’re at Haig Road, Ma’am. There’s trouble.”

She had no time to speak to Matthew. And the vision of the innocent dog, sword in his side, flashed warningly through her mind as she took the unlit moorland road back into Leek.

Baldwin might be innocent.

Baldwin might be guilty.

She did not know. Her mind swayed between the two possibilities all the way back into town.

Dramatic street scenes all look the same. A dark night, orange street lighting, houses with every light blazing. Flashing blue strobes reflect in broken glass. They sound the same too. They are noisy. There is loud shouting, overlaid by screaming and plenty of people. Arms wave. There are police cars, often a fire engine. An ambulance. An ugly, ugly mob. And behind all this drama someone is very, very frightened. Maybe hurt. Possibly even dead.

A stretcher was being wheeled out. The blanket did not quite cover his face but Baldwin looked dead. “No…” It was an involuntary shout which had escaped her own lips. Blood was seeping through the grey woollen material that covered his body. His face was a mess, nostrils bleeding, eyes puffy and closed. His skin the colour of wax. He must have had quite a beating. There was some movement. She thought he was trying to open those swollen lids. But it might simply have been a
reflex. “Baldwin,” she hissed in his ear. There was a guttural sound far down in his throat. She backed away. She’d failed him. Failed to protect him. Failed to protect Madeline. Failed to
find
Madeline.

A WPC followed Baldwin into the bright interior of the ambulance.

The crowd was trying to melt away. The police were taking names.

She homed in on Robert Cumberbatch. An honest, stolid, unimaginative, local lad. Not given to exaggeration or histrionics.

“You’d better tell me what happened.”

Behind him a couple of Specials were threading police tape around the crime scene.

“As far as we can tell they dropped a petrol bomb inside the letter box. There’s quite a bit of fire damage inside. When he came out they were waiting for him.”

“Who’s they?” She already knew the answer. It always was the obvious one, the usual suspect. Look no farther than Mr Huke. Across the road she could see four men being bundled into a Black Maria.

“They were wearing … “

“Balaclavas,” she said wearily. “How many? Any witnesses? And don’t leave Baldwin alone in the hospital for a moment. Understand? He is to be watched 24/7. If he’s guilty I want him brought to court. In one piece preferably. If he’s innocent I don’t want a hair of his head touched again. And why wasn’t he being watched tonight?”

“We were short,” Cumberbatch said. “He was being watched but they got taken off because there was a domestic two streets away.”

“I’ll have details of that too.”

“Ma’am?”

“It’s Joanna,” she said. “And one day, PC Cumberbatch, you might have to learn to put two and two together and make a little more than four.” Then she smiled at him. The Constable looked distressed enough without her cheap sarcasm.

Baldwin’s flat was a mess. The Molotov had done its work. The front door was badly charred. As was the wallpaper in the narrow hallway. They used flashtorches to shine the way ahead. She put overshoes on and stepped inside. Fire scenes were inevitably like this, ankle deep in water.

The atmosphere stank of sordid crime. Joanna turned abruptly on her heel. “Seal it up,” she said abruptly. “Get the SOCOs round here first thing in the morning. And I want the shoes of everyone found near the scene of crime. And you can bring the bloody lot of them in.”

A fireman loomed passed her, yellow hat ablaze like a miner’s lamp. He was dragging a hose behind him. “OK now. Gas and electric’s off.”

He looked straight at Joanna. “He won’t be able to come back here for a while.”

“I wouldn’t let him anyway - even if he was fool enough to want to. It’s not safe. And the upstairs flat?”

“Bad too - but luckily she was out. It was her gave the alarm. Coming back from the pub.”

“Good.”

She sat in her car for a while, thinking. And trying to control her anger. They might have known something like this would happen. This was bad. Not just because it smacked of anarchy and mob rule but because it was a distraction. Finding Madeline was the real issue of the day. A five-year-old girl who had been spirited away. She did not want to be wasting precious police resources
on taking statements and interviewing people about Baldwin being beaten up.

The two incidents were connected. It would take a fool to doubt that but she wanted to concentrate on finding the child. She pressed her fist to her forehead. This was typical of Huke. To make a blunt, thuggish attack on someone who was a suspect in the abduction of his partner’s daughter without having the brains to realise it would only cloud the issue.

Can’t find me, can you? Told you. I am invisible. Magicked.

She leaned forward to start the car. Better see what Cumberbatch had down at the station.

The custody suite was pandemonium. People arguing, pushing, shoving. The arresting officer trying to take charge like a teacher with a class of unruly pupils and a telephone kiosk to deal with them all. The room was too small for crowd disturbances.

“I want the ringleaders locked up for the night.”

“Ma’am.”

She answered in a low voice. “Baldwin’s injuries looked pretty bad to me. If he dies it will be a murder hunt. At the very least we could make GBH stick.”

“Yeah but…” There was a group of officers behind the counter.

“Get it into your thick skulls,” she was oppressed by the image she had of the slain dog, “that Baldwin could be an innocent man. We’ve got nothing against him.”

“He was lurking outside the school.”

“Yeah.” She answered Alan King herself. “Lurking. Which even in the Middle Ages was not a hanging offence.”

“Loitering with intent.”

“We don’t know about the intent.”

“Then why was he there?”

She had no answer. In a tired voice she answered. “It’s something we must find out.”

She interviewed the chief suspect herself, Huke, looking beefy and defiant. Sweating and red with alcohol - and the workout he’d been having, knuckles bruised and bleeding.

For the first few minutes after she had put their names on the tape, she said nothing but studied him. Huke stared back. But as she continued studying him she sensed a melting of his resolve.

Then she leaned forward and smiled. “Well, Mr Huke. Perhaps you’d like to tell me why you think you’re here?”

“Up to you to tell me that, ain’t it.”

She flashed him a smile. “I’d much rather you did.”

“I was just going for a walk. Some of your guys dragged me off the street, innocent like.”

She nodded. “I thought you might say something like that. So you haven’t been playing with petrol?”

He shook his head, some of his confidence leaking away. Not much.

“Good.” She put her hand out to Cumberbatch. He put a cigarette and a lighter into her palm. She clicked the lighter on. “Want a fag?”

“Gerroff …” Huke snatched his hand away, cursing. Joanna rose to her feet. At this point she didn’t see any point in asking Huke questions she knew he would not answer. She merely wanted him to know she knew. It was enough. That and his clothes, underwear, shoes all piled into a forensic bag. And a simple test on the palm of his hand.

And Huke, lucky man, had three good buddies, the
sort of guys who, if you asked them, would join you on a jungle foray. And they too, had been “out for a walk”.

Joanna left them to be detained with a sense of waste.

They’d have been better off using their overtime to search for the missing child.

It was three when she finally arrived back at Waterfall Cottage. Achingly tired, expecting Matthew to be asleep. But he wasn’t. He was sitting quietly, in an armchair, a glass of whisky in his hand. She felt terribly glad to see him. She sat on the floor, her head in his lap, and talked about her fear for the innocents. Matthew listened without comment. And when she looked up his eyes were closed.

Easter Sunday.

She awoke still suffused with anger, wishing she could have done nothing but lain in bed and watched the light creep up the sloping ceiling, not have to face the day ahead with all its difficulties. But she had the feeling that if she stayed here even five more precious minutes the phone would ring. And Matthew would be disturbed.

Already she was aware the pressure was on.

She rose, showered, dressed and went downstairs. Matthew hadn’t even moved.

It was seven o’clock.

She rang the hospital first and got a bulletin on Baldwin. Comfortable. She’d done enough hospital liaison to know what the word meant. “Uncomfortable” but he’d live. “Smoke inhalation,” a tired doctor said, “plus a head injury and a few cracked ribs.”

“Is he conscious?” she asked.

“Not enough to help with your questioning.” She picked up on the disapproval in his tone.

She could have done with Matthew to translate, put Baldwin’s injuries into perspective. But not for the world would she have woken him to this.

Next she rang the station and assured them she’d be in within twenty minutes.

It was more than thirty hours since Madeline had last been seen. And they needed to go back in time to that point when she had vanished from view.

She drove across the moorlands thoughtfully. It was a bright, cold day. The grass was a damp spring green and
the verges bright with clumps of wild daffodils. But the fields were empty. Not even farmers clear of foot and mouth were brave enough to expose their herds to the risk of the virus blowing across the fields, like an invisible foe.

Mike was already at the station, waiting for her.

Briskly she filled him in on the facts. “So now we’ve got two crimes to investigate. A missing child, with not a single sighting for a day and a half, and a violent attack on our chief suspect. “

From the hardening in his dark eyes and the set of his jawbone she knew he would not be wasting any sympathy on Baldwin. And she was right.

“You can hardly bracket the two together, Jo.” It was a predictable response.

“They’re both serious crimes, Korpanski,” she said disapprovingly. “And both will be brought to court in due time. Now let’s go and visit the custody suite.”

Huke and his merry band of outlaws looked no prettier for their night in the cells. Stubble and sweat plus beery breath was not a tempting dish before eight o’clock on a Sunday morning - particularly when you’d got to bed after three. And their outfits of cotton trousers and t-shirts provided by Her Majesty’s Police Force in lieu of their own clothes - which had been bagged up ready for forensics - didn’t improve their appearances.

Joanna sat opposite him in the interview room. “Well, Mr Huke. Thanks to this incident we’ve had to take men off the hunt for Madeline and use them to get statements from you and your crew.”

“What exactly are you saying?”

“Your clothes have been subjected to preliminary forensic scrutiny. I suggest you and your pals find yourselves a
solicitor. And by the way - Mr Baldwin is poorly. He’s been kept in hospital.”

Huke’s eyes flickered with the first frisson of fear. Now he’d calmed down and the alcohol had left his system he was not so brave. He knew he would have to face the consequences of his actions - as would his friends. Only they would not have his crutch of “extenuating circumstances.”

There was one bright event in an otherwise dire morning. Bridget Anderton knocked on the door a little after nine. “Results,” she said. “I’ve made contact with Denise.”

She flopped down in the chair opposite Joanna. “She’s his daughter.”

“What? How did you …?”

“I simply emailed her back.” Her brown eyes were sparkling. “Sometimes the simplest methods are the best. I told her that “Josh” was busy and how did she know him. I got this answer this morning.”

Hello, Bridget. Are you my daddy’s girlfriend
?

“The email address is registered to someone in the States. I got a phone number and rang. His wife and daughter are with an American guy she met while on holiday. Denise is ten years old and hasn’t seen her daddy since she was five. But they keep in touch. And one day they’ll be together again.”

“Touching,” Korpanski muttered from the corner. Both women looked at him then at each other and smiled. Korpanski was notorious for pinning his hopes on one suspect and being slow to move on.

She and Mike drove back to Horton School for the morning briefing which, despite the high drama of the previous night, was a low key affair as she detailed the officers
on their order of the day. Then she drove down to the hospital. Alone.

She was shocked at the sight of Baldwin. They’d made a mess of him. His face was so swollen he could not speak. His nose had been broken. Around both eyes were black swellings. Tubes and machines seemed to come from everywhere. Periodically alarming, constantly bleeping. She found a doctor and flashed her ID card at him. “Detective Inspector Joanna Piercy,” she said, “Leek police. We’d been questioning Mr Baldwin about a missing child.”

“You won’t be questioning him about anything today,” the doctor said. “You’ll be lucky if he remembers his name.”

The doctor was young. Younger than her. Looked just as tired. “Are you sure?”

“No -o - .” The first sign of hesitation. “We can never be sure about damage done. Particularly at this stage. Nature is unpredictable. We won’t have much idea until the swelling has gone down. Particularly the swelling on his brain. His arm is broken, his nose, some of the facial bones. A few ribs but it’s his head injury that worries us. That and the smoke inhalation. He’s also sustained superficial burns to both hands.” The doctor made a face. “What on earth happened out there?”

“We can’t be sure.”

“No need to be so guarded, Inspector. We’re on the same side, you know.”

“Are we?”

The faintest touch of a smile. “I sincerely hope so.”

She smiled back. “Yes. So do I. We questioned Mr Baldwin over a five-year-old who went missing from Horton School on Friday,” she said slowly. “It’s possible that some people took this as an indication of guilt.
When we let him go on Saturday they decided as it appeared the police weren’t achieving results to take the law into their own hands.”

“And is he guilty?”

“We don’t know. It seems unlikely as we took him into custody so soon after the little girl vanished. We haven’t found her yet.” She paused. “We’ve been questioning the mother’s partner amongst others over the assault on Mr Baldwin.”

“I see.” The doctor stared at her for a moment. “Excuse me asking,” he said, “but you must have known Mr Baldwin was in a vulnerable position. Why didn’t you protect him after you’d released him?”

“We did.” She could read between the lines. This doctor believed she had failed her suspect. Guilt or innocence was not the issue here. But vulnerability. And her police force had failed to protect someone they had known was vulnerable even though via his own actions. “We were protecting him,” she insisted. “Up to a point. But the officers watching Mr Baldwin were called away. We don’t have enough manpower to keep a twenty-four hour watch on a suspect. Particularly during a major investigation when our priority is to find a missing five-year-old. Resources are tight in the police force too, you know.”

The doctor gave an exclamation of resignation combined with a hand gesture of disgust, turned around and headed off up the corridor. Walking fast. Joanna watched him go, knowing their jobs were similar. Both sometimes futile … frequently terribly overworked.

Yet without them …

Two pm

Time to face the cameras.

She used the standard format, giving a factual description of the little girl, photographs, details of what she was wearing. Everything. Then she exposed them to the grieving parents. Carly looking even more in shock than on Friday. Bloodlessly pale, a lock of thin hair winding around her finger as though she would pull it out. By her side, recently released from custody, Huke had grown an air of smugness which he wore around him like a comfortable grey wool blanket. He knew what he’d done. Whether the police got him or not, whether Baldwin was innocent or not, he’d got to him. Joanna watched as he put his meaty arm around Carly and wished she could charge him with more than assault. Instinctively she hated him. And in her position she was aware that this was a potentially dangerous situation.

It would take a couple of days for anything real to trickle through from the media exposure. Joanna had learned this through previous TV appeals. First you got the excited public - the over-excited public. They’d seen all sorts of things and were prepared to shop their neighbour if it meant they might a) get the reward money and b) be on the telly. Sometimes Joanna despaired of a population which cared only about these two things.

Second you got the more considering population urged on by spouses, girlfriends, partners, lovers. That was when you started uncovering seemingly minor irrelevancies which sometimes turned out to be major facts.

Third only trickled in but these were most often the folk with real information, the people who used diaries, who infrequently watched the TV or read the papers.
Theses were the people who were too busy living their lives, working, going on holidays to pay much attention to another news story about a missing child. But sometimes it was this third group which held the vital key.

Joanna watched Carly and Huke sob out their pleas and wondered whether this time anything would result from the appearance. At the same time she acknowledged that at least Huke was supporting Madeline’s mother. Madeline’s father, Paul Wiltshaw, had limited his contact to a couple of brief telephone calls and an insulted denial that he knew anything about his daughter’s whereabouts. The local force had interviewed him and described his involvement as “minimal”.

Which probably meant he just about stayed on the right side of the CSA.

She came out of the conference prepared to wait for her results and rang Matthew while the others stood around and discussed their performances. “What are you doing,” she asked. “Now?”

“I’m off to inspect the cricket ground,” he said. “Thought I might have lunch with Alan and Becky. They’ve asked me and somehow I’m not in the mood to be alone. Or to cook. And I don’t suppose you’re offering.” There wasn’t even hope in his voice.

“I’ll be back this evening.”

“Jo,” Matthew said. “Don’t promise things you can’t deliver. You’re in the middle of a major investigation. Your time is not your own. I understand that. If you’re home, great. If you’re not. Well…”

She flicked the end call button and rejoined the group.

“Well done, Jo.” Korpanski grinned at her. “Nice little performance.”

“And Huke’s performance?”

“Not so convincing.”

“Let’s watch a rerun then.”

The cameraman obliged and they ran through the video tape freeze-framing Huke’s actions and words. She watched carefully his faint hint of a smile as he pinched Madeline’s mother’s arm.

“Stop the tape,” she said, “just for a minute.”

The cameraman obliged and Joanna stared at the numerous marks on the bony arm where Huke’s fingers had pinched before. And frozen on the TV screen was Carly Wiltshaw’s wince of pain and swift glance at her partner. Yet all she had been doing was appealing for information from the public to help find her daughter.

Joanna watched in silence until the end of the cassette.

“We need to go back to the school again.”

He looked puzzled.

“We need to interview the teacher and the classroom assistant again.”

Gloria Parsons lived in a nice house in a nice road. All detached, 1940s, neat gardens, rows of daffodils, crocuses, tidy lawns, clean windows. Clean cars parked in the drives. There was a pleasing orderliness about the entire street. This was civilised England.

“I think I’ll get more out of Gloria if I talk to her alone, Mike.”

Korpanski’s mouth tightened. “OK. Whatever you think. You’re the boss.”

She touched his shoulder briefly in a gesture of friendship. “Thanks for being so understanding.”

If he caught the hint of sarcasm in her tone he wisely ignored it. Korpanski had moved on.

Rick Parsons answered the door, in old painting trousers and a shirt. He recognised Joanna at once and
shook her hand with warmth and vigour. “Hello again,” he said.

“This isn’t a social call, Rick.”

Immediately his face shuttered. “I guessed as much,” he said, some of the warmth emptying out of his voice. “It’s my wife you want to see, I expect. We saw your appeal on the telly - just now. It’s about the little girl, isn’t it? Gloria’s been really upset by it.”

Joanna nodded.

Gloria was peeling potatoes at the sink, wearing jeans that made her look lumpy and a sloppy sweater that should have covered her bottom. But the apron tied around her waist had caused it to ride up. She looked ungainly. Joanna leaned back against the units. “I want to make it clear that this interview is off the record, Mrs Parsons,” she began.

Gloria turned, the potato peeler still in her hand. “Is anything ever off the record with you?” Her eyelids were wrinkled and tired looking, the eyes themselves dulled with worry.

“I understand. But I’m sure you want Madeline found as much as we do. She’s been missing for almost two days now. Her mother’s frantic.”

Gloria nodded, a hesitant, dubious nod. Still not without suspicion.

“Tell me a bit about her. What kind of a child was she?”

There was an alert expression in Gloria’s eyes, as though she had woken to a thought. “What do you mean?”

“Just tell me about her.”

Gloria put the potato peeler down on the draining board. It seemed a very deliberate, significant action. It meant she was going to co-operate.

“She was a strange child,” she said. “A loner. A little girl who was very …” She chose the word carefully. “Contained. Sometimes I’d see her lips move as though she was talking to herself. And sometimes she’d give a little secret smile. She shut people out of her life. If I put my arms around her I could feel her stiffen, move away, close up. She seemed to dislike human contact.”