The Enemy Within (3 page)

‘I need someone to guard the body overnight. Make sure the scene isn’t disturbed. Scare off journalists and other rubberneckers; you know the drill.’

‘But what’s it to do with us?’ Dom repeated.

‘Yeah,’ Carlyle chipped in. ‘I thought we were here for the strike. Not to deal with little old ladies getting killed. Surely that’s not our problem?’

Holding up a hand, the sergeant looked at each man in turn. ‘I know, I know, it’s not our responsibility, but the local sheep-shaggers have asked us for some help on this one. What with everything going on around here, there just aren’t enough bodies to go round.’ Realizing what he’d said, he glanced beyond the tape and gave a rueful smile. ‘No pun intended, love.’ He turned back to face the two young officers. ‘To top it all, a couple of scabs down the road had their houses petrol-bombed last night. They only just got out alive by all accounts.’ He chuckled to himself. ‘One of them had their pet cat barbecued – everyone’s going crazy about that.’

‘It figures,’ Dom mused. ‘People care more about animals than they do about people.’

Ross nodded. ‘A Siamese cat called Dennis. Quite expensive, apparently. He went to shows all over the country.’

‘So we’re here because of a bloody cat?’ Carlyle grumped.

‘No,’ said Charlie firmly. ‘You’re here because the forensics team for the whole bloody county has been stuck there all day. They’re still going through the smouldering remains, searching for the vital clues that will lead the forces of law and order to the cat killer. Doubtless, it will turn out to be some NUM-supporting little scrote who believes domestic pets are some kind of fascist conspiracy created by the ruling elite in order to keep the working classes under the heel of their filthy jackboots.’

‘He may have a point,’ Dom grinned.

‘Either way,’ Ross mused, ‘you boys are here tonight.’

‘Great,’ Carlyle pouted, folding his arms.

‘The local constabulary can’t cope,’ Ross continued. ‘Their idea of a crime wave is if a group of ten-year-olds go on a shop-lifting spree down the newsagents on the high street. Their world has been turned upside down by all of this. They’ve had twenty years’ worth of criminal activity here in the last month.’

Like I give a fuck, Carlyle thought sourly. A gust of wind blew through the trees, causing him to shiver.

‘Your job is simply to preserve the crime scene for the next few hours,’ Ross explained. ‘Forensics won’t be able to get here until morning, so try and keep everything nice and fresh for them. Stay this side of the tape.’

Frowning, Dom looked up at the inky heavens. ‘What happens if it rains?’

Charlie shrugged. ‘That will count as an Act of God. Nothing you can do about that, son. If any evidence gets degraded overnight, that will be forensics’ problem.’ Turning, he headed back towards the path down which they had arrived a few minutes earlier.

‘Are you not staying then?’ Dom asked.

‘Don’t be fucking stupid, son,’ Charlie laughed as he continued on his way. ‘Good luck. I’ll see you both in the morning.’

His dreams of watching pretty girls walking down the King’s Road were interrupted by the sound of the wind in the trees, followed by the crowing of birds.

‘Wakey, wakey!’

With the greatest reluctance, Carlyle opened his eyes and found himself staring at the scuffed end of Dom’s boot. ‘Did you just kick me?’

‘Just a gentle prod,’ Dom grinned. ‘You don’t really want Charlie Ross to bowl up and find you in the land of nod, do you?’

Shivering in the grey dawn, Carlyle yawned. ‘What time is it?’

‘Just after six.’

‘Fuck.’ Struggling to his feet, Carlyle stretched before trying to shake the stiffness from his body. Dom patted the breast pocket of his jacket. ‘Fancy some breakfast?’

‘What have you got?’ Carlyle asked groggily, wiping the leaves from his overcoat.

‘Just some whizz.’

‘Urgh, no thanks.’ It was one thing taking advantage of Dom’s amphetamine supply to get through the last stretch of a double shift, quite another to find yourself snorting speed at this hour of the morning. ‘I’d rather have a coffee and a Danish pastry.’

‘Not on the menu, I’m afraid.’

‘Then I’ll pass.’

‘Suit yourself.’ Dom’s jerky manner suggested he had already partaken.

‘I need a slash,’ Carlyle grunted. He glanced at the grey plastic sheet behind the police tape. At least it hadn’t rained. Everything seemed as it was the night before. Turning away, he stepped up to the nearest tree and unzipped his fly.

‘Ahhh . . . fuck . . .’

Still in full flow, he looked up to see a young woman walking towards him.

‘Fuck!’ Blushing violently, he took a step backwards, struggling not to piss all over his trousers.

‘Good morning!’ the woman said cheerily, eyeing his groin with more amusement than seemed strictly necessary.

Turning away, Carlyle finished his business, gave himself a shake and zipped himself up.

‘Good morning,’ said Dom cheerily. He nodded at Carlyle, who was struggling to regain his composure. ‘Sorry about the floor show.’

‘Don’t worry about that,’ said the woman, looking Dom in the eye. ‘In my experience, once you’ve seen one knob, you’ve seen them all.’

Now it was Dom’s turn to blush. ‘I wouldn’t know,’ he mumbled.

The woman stepped forward. ‘I’m Fran Mullin. From the
Gazette.’

They looked at her blankly.

‘The local paper,’ Mullin explained.

‘So you’re a journalist, then?’ Carlyle asked.

‘Well spotted.’ Her grin grew wider. ‘Looks like your brain is as big as your other organ.’

‘Ha!’ Dom laughed.

Carlyle frowned. Not only a journalist, but a piss-taking journalist. Just what he needed: a great start to what would doubtless be a great day. He looked the woman up and down. She was dressed in jeans and a parka with fur on the collar and a pair of sturdy-looking walking boots. On one shoulder was a small black rucksack. Carlyle suddenly had a flashback to his school days, memories of his fifth-form geography teacher, a cheery, outdoorsy type who was the subject of much sixth-form speculation and banter. There was dismay among the boys of 6C when she ran off with the deputy headmaster, much to the annoyance of the latter’s wife.

‘I work for the local paper,’ Mullin explained, ‘and do a bit of radio too, sometimes even TV, when there’s a big story.’ Dropping her bag on the ground, she gestured towards the police tape. ‘Like this one.’

Carlyle watched the cheeky hack pull a notepad and pen from the bag. Has she got a tape recorder in there as well? he wondered. Charlie Ross had given clear instructions about keeping journalists well away from the crime scene. But that was easier said than done now that one had actually turned up. What were they going to do?

He looked at Dom, who gave him a hopeless shrug.

‘You shouldn’t be here,’ Carlyle said feebly.

Taking the cap off her biro, the Mullin woman gave the young constable a patronizing smile. ‘I’m here on a public right of way, love,’ she said, tapping the muddy path with the sole of her boot, ‘as is my legal right.’

‘Yes, but—’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Am I interfering with your duties, in any way?’

‘No, but—’

‘So, I’m not infringing the legal process.’ A smile played across her lips. ‘Plus, I’ve had to contend with you waving your willy at me.’

Carlyle felt a sense of desperation creeping over him. ‘But—’

‘Lucky for you I’m not the kind of girl who is going to run off screaming about a pervert in the woods.’

‘I didn’t—’

Cutting short Carlyle’s protests with a wave of her hand, she flipped open her notebook in a way that made his heart sink. ‘Now that we’ve got the preliminaries out of the way, what can you tell me about the murder of Beatrice Slater?’

‘She’s dead,’ Dom sniffed.

‘Yes, I am aware of that. What can you tell me about the circumstances surrounding her death? Give me some background. Who found her? When?’

‘Look, love,’ Carlyle said, trying to sound both knowing and world-weary at the same time, ‘we’re just here guarding the crime scene, waiting for forensics to turn up. The investigation proper hasn’t even started yet. We don’t know anything.’

Nodding furiously, the woman began scribbling on her pad. ‘Can I quote you on that?’

‘No, you bloody well can’t,’ Carlyle wailed. ‘Fuck off!’

A gleam appeared in Dom’s eye. ‘You can quote what he’s said, as long as you attribute it to a Sergeant Charlie Ross.’

Mullin shook her head, pointing at their uniforms with her pen. ‘Neither of you are sergeants. What’re your names?’

‘Fuck off,’ Carlyle repeated.

The journalist gestured with her chin towards the body. ‘Don’t you know who she is?’

The two young policemen said nothing.

‘Beatrice Slater is – was – something of a local celebrity round here. She was a champion rose grower who campaigned on a range of issues like the environment, nuclear disarmament and animal rights.’

A lentil-eating,
Guardian
-reading leftie then, Carlyle mused.

‘She claimed that she’d been under surveillance by Special Branch and MI5 ever since she wrote to Mrs Thatcher in Downing Street to protest about the Falklands War.’

Dom laughed. ‘A bit doolally, then, was she?’

Mullin shook her head. ‘Not at all. Beatrice was a very interesting and engaging person. She was a teacher for almost thirty years. She was also a vocal supporter of the striking miners.’

Oh, oh. The faintest of alarm bells started ringing in Carlyle’s head. ‘How do you know all this?’

‘I interviewed her for the
Gazette
not so long ago. Someone put a brick through her front window after she organized a coffee morning and cake sale in support of the local branch of the NUM. The story made page four of the paper. There had been threats . . .’

‘What threats?’ Carlyle asked.

‘Now, now, Fran,’ said a deep voice, ‘what are you doing to these young lads after they’ve been up all night?’

Carlyle turned to see a tall, middle-aged man in a green quilted jacket and brown cords appear through the trees, with Charlie Ross following obediently in his wake. Bringing up the rear was a third man, a young bloke about the same age as the two constables. Plump, with blonde curls spilling over his face, the youngster was incongruously dressed in a tweed suit with a Prince of Wales check. His pale brown brogues were covered in mud and he looked distinctly uncomfortable out in the open air.

‘Ha!’ Mullin laughed. ‘And what are you doing using a couple of guys up from London to cover this for you?’

Who said we were up from London? Carlyle wondered.

‘Put that bloody notebook away,’ said the man.

Glaring at him, Mullin reluctantly did as she was told.

‘Shouldn’t you be on the Dennis the cat story, anyway?’

‘Chris Boon is covering that,’ she pouted. ‘You know I don’t do fluff.’

‘Ha, ha,’ the man deadpanned, ‘very good. We could all do with a bit of comedy at the moment.’

Mullin gestured towards the body. ‘This is no laughing matter.’

‘No,’ the man agreed, ‘it isn’t. It is very serious. Very serious indeed. All the more reason why you shouldn’t rush into print with some hasty and ill-considered ramblings.’

‘I don’t—’

‘Now is not the time or the place,’ he cut her off. ‘We can sort out what you’re going to write later.’

Ross glared at his two young charges. ‘I told you buggers to keep journalists away,’ he growled.

‘Don’t worry, Charlie,’ the man smirked, ‘I can handle Fran here.’ Striding across the clearing, he extended a hand to Dom and then to Carlyle. ‘I’m Inspector Rob Holt from the local station up the road.’ He paused, to allow the duo to introduce themselves.

‘PC Silver,’ Dom said cheerily.

‘Carlyle.’

Holt smiled at the sergeant. ‘Looks like you’ve got some good lads under your command at the moment, Charlie.’

Ross grunted non-committally.

‘Anyway, thanks for helping us out, boys. It was very good of you to step into the breach at such short notice.’

As if we had much choice, Carlyle thought glumly. He glanced at the cherub in tweed but got no response. Stepping over to the police tape, the man showed no intention of introducing himself.

‘I’m sure Charlie . . . Sergeant Ross explained how stretched things are here at the moment.’

‘Yes,’ the two constables replied in unison.

‘So, like I said, we are very grateful for the help.’

‘Our pleasure,’ Ross beamed. Slipping a knapsack off his shoulder, he pulled out a Thermos and tossed it towards Dom. ‘Hot coffee; you deserve it.’

Catching the flask, Dom started unscrewing the lid. ‘Thanks.’

Sticking his hand back in the bag, Ross pulled out a brown paper bag soaked with grease. ‘And a couple of bacon rolls.’

‘Result!’ said Dom, stepping forward and grabbing the bag.

‘We’ll have someone here to replace you in an hour or so,’ Holt explained. ‘The forensics guys might turn up first. I hear that the remains of Dennis have been recovered – such as they are – and returned to the grieving owner . . .’ turning to Mullin, he flashed a cheesy smile, ‘who I’m sure will make page one of the
Gazette.’

Mullin made a face. ‘We’ll see about that. It’ll be an editorial decision.’

‘Yes, yes, of course.’ Holt turned back to the two young constables. ‘Anyway, my forensics guys are very good. They know what they’re doing, so let them get on with it.’

‘Just don’t get in their way,’ said Charlie Ross firmly.

Carlyle started to complain then thought better of it.

The cherub caught the inspector’s eye and gave him a slight nod. Turning away from the body, he started back down the path.

‘Right,’ said Holt, stepping over and slipping an arm round Mullin’s shoulder, ‘we’ll be on our way. Thanks again.’

As they watched the trio depart, the sergeant gave his underlings a nasty smile. ‘When you get back to camp, be sure to get some rest. You’ll be back on duty this afternoon. We’re expecting things to kick off properly later on.’

‘Jolly good.’ Dom took a bite from his bacon roll and washed it down with some coffee before handing the cup to Carlyle. ‘By the way, who was the guy in the suit?’