The Rock (8 page)

‘Going dancing Daddy!’ Daisy announced, a smile beaming across her face as she sat back on the bed.

‘Oh, good. Where?’

‘Disco. Going to get a boyfriend.’

‘Ah. I thought you had a boyfriend at school? Nicky, isn’t it?’

‘Nah. He’s not a good one. I want a disco boyfriend. I’m going to love him.’

Broderick sat on the bed next to his daughter and put his arm around her. ‘Well, that’s good. That’s good. But it is a Friday night, you know.’

‘Yeah. I know,’ Daisy replied.

‘I could put a DVD on in a minute if you like. Harry Potter maybe?’

Her face lit up. ‘Yeah, Harry!’

‘I thought I’d get some fish and chips from Roy’s as well.’

‘Fish and chips.’

‘And a bottle of cream soda.’ Broderick added, relishing his daughter’s delight.

‘Yeah!’

‘Fancy that, Daisy?’

‘Yeah! Fish and riding whips!’

‘Yeah,’ Broderick smiled and kissed Daisy on her forehead. ‘Fish and riding whips.’

*

Sullivan and Calbot were still tucked away in a corner table of the Marina Bar. They had spent over an hour in each other’s company. There was nothing unusual in this. They worked together side by side on a daily basis. What was unusual was that it was out of ‘office hours’ and to her great surprise Sullivan had found herself enjoying her colleague’s company. Calbot’s infuriating cockiness had given way to a natural charm and ease that was usually absent in his dealings with her. So it came as something of a surprise to discover that the time was later than she had expected. After she turned down Calbot’s offer of another drink, they both stood and moved to the door, passing a fellow off-duty officer at the far end of the bar. PC Ferra was nursing a large brandy and seemed to be lost in his thoughts. Calbot broke his colleague’s reverie as he placed a hand on the officer’s shoulder.

‘Ferra? I’m sorry about Bryant,’ Calbot said.

‘So am I. He was a good man.’

‘If you need anything...?’

Ferra nodded as Calbot and Sullivan forced a smile and moved towards the door and out onto the street.

‘Thanks for the initiation ceremony,’ Sullivan said as they got outside.

‘You’re very welcome. Share a taxi home?’ Calbot offered.

‘Nah, I’ll walk. And so should you.’

Calbot gave her a quizzical look.

‘Clear your head.’ Sullivan added.

‘Yeah. You know, it’s funny. Thought you’d be Irish, name like Sullivan.’

‘What makes you think I’m not? My dad was from Dublin.’

‘You’ve got a slight accent. Odd. Where’s it from?’

‘My mum’s from Chester, which is where I was brought up. So I’m a half Paddy.’

‘Wherever you’re from, you’re not what I thought you’d be.’

‘Meaning what, exactly?’ Sullivan challenged half heartedly.

‘Nothing....nothing really.’ Calbot attempted a change of topic. ‘I enjoyed that. You should be initiated more often.’

The awkward pause that followed was broken by Sullivan. ‘Right. Well. Good night, Detective Constable.’

‘Night, then.’

Calbot crossed the street towards the sports bars across the way. The night was obviously still young for him. Sullivan waited a moment. Had Calbot really given her the slight come on? Had she perhaps ever so slightly encouraged it? Had she not learnt by now how dangerous the after work drinks with fellow officers could prove? She shuddered a little inside and headed off in the other direction for home.

*

Ferra knew he shouldn’t drive – not after the amount he’d drunk – so it came as a relief to bump into some friends leaving the bar next door. They promptly offered him a lift. Ferra’s home – a boat - wasn’t far, but he needed sleep now and quickly. His mooring was half a mile away on the Kingsway Wharf. The ‘Ailsa’, a 1960’s built four berther, had been his home for three years now. It belonged to his great uncle, who had a long lease on the mooring at a ridiculously low – by Gib standards – annual rent. Ferra paid next to nothing for his lodgings in return for keeping the old man’s boat seaworthy.

Ferra’s pals dropped him off and as their car drove off, the policeman made his way carefully down the third avenue of pontoon moorings. It wasn’t late, but the place seemed deserted. The nearby boats were mostly owned by local Gibraltarians who would turn out during the day, but be off home come the dark. There were other fellow boat residents in the basin, but they had either turned in already or were elsewhere. Taking a deep breath, and being careful not to slip, Ferra stepped aboard the Ailsa’ and tried to find his keys, with no success. Distracted by the sudden sound of an object hitting the deck of the boat, he turned to see what it might be. As he did so, he felt a sudden blow to the back of his legs. Falling to his knees, he was stunned to feel a rope being slipped over his head. Managing to stagger upwards he flailed out at his assailant, but before any contact could be made his head was violently yanked upwards as the rope was tightened around his neck.

Turning and twisting in desperation, Ferra felt his feet lift from the ground as a forceful push propelled him over the side of the boat and into mid-air. The rope jolted sharply as the policeman’s neck snapped in an instant.

Seconds later her mobile phone started to ring in the next room, the shrill noise immediately grating on her nerves. She reached for a towel, wrapped it around her and rushed to answer it, her wet footprints leaving marks on the tiled floor. She reached her phone.

‘Sullivan.’

Calbot was on the line. There had been an incident. Sullivan had dropped her towel and was moving swiftly to her bedroom before Calbot had even finished with the details.

‘OK Calbot. I’ll be right there.’

*

Sullivan pushed her way through the crowds of onlookers milling along the wharf as she headed for the flashing lights of the ambulance and police cars. It was Broderick who spoke first when she got to the boat.

‘Can’t we get the poor bastard down from there?’

For the second time since her arrival on the colony, Sullivan saw the wretchedly distressing sight of a hanging corpse. Ferra’s eyes bulged from their sockets and his tongue lolled from his mouth. His dead body hung limply from the cross section of the mast and had obviously been pushed out and over the side so that his feet dangled helplessly just a few feet above the water.

‘Laytham’s been delayed, sir. With respect, I think we should wait.’ a uniformed officer replied.

Broderick nodded and turned to see the growing crowd of onlookers beginning to edge down the pontoon towards the macabre scene.

‘Well at least let’s clear the bloody audience away.’ Broderick barked. ‘Calbot, sort them out, will you?’

‘Yes, sir,’ Calbot replied, obediently.

Sullivan joined her superior and the pair stepped on board the boat.

‘I don’t believe it ,sir. Me and Calbot only saw him last night.’

‘Yes, Calbot told me. Do you know if Massetti has been informed yet?’

‘No idea, sir.’

‘Yeah, well our beloved Chief Super is just going to love this,’ Broderick said, tailing off as he examined the rope from which Ferra’s grey, lifeless body was swaying. ‘Doesn’t look like boating line. If you ask me, it’s pretty much identical to the one used on Bryant.’

‘Or the one that Bryant used, sir?’

‘As my sixteen year old daughter would say Sullivan...
whatever.
But let’s check it out, eh? Or is that beyond your brief?’

Before Sullivan had a chance to answer, Calbot’s voice called out from the end of the pontoon. ‘Sir? I think you should have a look at this.’

‘Christ’s sake, what now?’ Broderick snarled as he carefully left the boat and walked over to where Calbot was standing beside a severed wire running along the side of the wooden pontoon.

‘It’s the wire connecting the communal lights in the marina. It’s been cut.’

Broderick knelt to examine the wire.

‘Looks like someone’s just sliced it.’

‘Guy on the boat over there says the lights had been fine when he turned in at ten last night.’ Calbot nodded to an elderly gentleman who was speaking to a uniformed officer taking notes. From behind him, they noticed Professor Laytham jogging up the marina towards them. Broderick observed that the older man was clearly a lot fitter than he was. And he smoked a pipe. Was there no bloody justice?

‘Sorry for the delay. Went to the wrong marina...mooring...thingy,’ Laytham offered as he looked over towards Ferra’s body. ‘Oh dear, oh dear.’

‘Looks like this one managed the requisite drop, eh, Professor?’ Broderick observed.

‘Oh, absolutely. Much cleaner job this time. Quite impressive, poor sod.’

‘Do you think you could get on with it? We’d like to get him down as soon as possible.’ Broderick ordered. He was now both tetchy with the situation and the sudden flaring up of his irritable bowel syndrome.

‘Oh yes, by all means,’ Laytham replied. ‘You look a little pale yourself, if you don’t mind my saying so, Inspector?’

Broderick gave the pathologist a look that suggested further concern would not be appreciated.

‘I’ll get stuck in then,’ mumbled Laytham and moved swiftly towards the boat.

*

As Broderick and Sullivan watched Ferra’s body being carried to the ambulance, a uniformed police constable approached them.

‘Excuse me, sir?’

‘Yes?’ Broderick asked.

‘I was out with Ferra last night, sir. Well not actually out with him, just gave him a lift back here from the Marina Bar. Can’t believe it.’

‘Yes. Well, I’m sorry.’

‘I, uh... found these in my car this morning, sir. I think they’re his,’ the officer said, handing Broderick a set of keys.

‘Thank you, constable.’ When the officer had left, Broderick turned to Sullivan. ‘Get Calbot to organise a door to door, will you?’

‘Door to door, sir?’

‘Well, boat to boat, whatever. See if anyone saw anything out of the ordinary last night. Oh, and hurry the Glee Club along, will you?’

‘Are you treating this as a crime scene, sir?’ Sullivan asked.

‘Bloody well looks that way, doesn’t it?’

*

Thirty minutes later, Broderick and Sullivan came up on to the deck of the ‘Ailsa’. One of the keys the young policeman had handed his Chief Inspector had fit the lock of the boat’s cabin. Not that it had proved necessary, as the cabin door was already open. Down below, Broderick had been immediately struck by the immaculate nature of the boat’s interior. This came as no great surprise, as the limited confines of the living quarters dictated that order be maintained to avoid chaos. Broderick also noted that the late officer’s CD and DVD collection was meticulous in its alphabetic correctness and – more interestingly – the same faint smell of disinfectant he had noticed at Bryant’s apartment lingered in the shadowy interior of Ferra’s boat as well.

Back on deck, Broderick stifled a sharp pain in his abdomen and blinked in the sunlight. Sullivan noticed his discomfort.

‘Are you alright, sir?’ she questioned.

‘A damn sight better than Ferra, so I’m not complaining.’

Broderick took a deep lungful of the fresh sea air and turned to his detective sergeant.

‘So, what have we got so far? Ferra gets back from a night out, arrives here at his boat, climbs on board and hangs himself from the cross mast.’

‘So it would seem,’ Sullivan replied.

‘We know he’d dropped his keys in the car on his way home, so how did he open the cabin? How likely is it that he’d leave his boat unlocked all day?’

‘A spare key somewhere?’ Sullivan offered.

‘Anybody found one?’

‘No, sir.’

Broderick looked out to sea, his mind trying to compose logic.‘So, like Bryant, he makes a noose from some rope and decides to end it all.’

‘Well, yes, but ...’

‘And like Bryant, no note.’

‘Suicide isn’t always planned out in advance, sir. It is a fact that sometimes the act is just a rash and spontaneous action. And even if there is no note here at the scene. There could be one elsewhere. Also, it’s far from unprecedented for friends to follow the tragic actions of another. Bryant killed himself and Ferra was drawn to do the same perhaps?’

‘I’m not saying you’re wrong Sullivan. It’s just that I have this saying.
What you see is usually what you’ve got
. So why do I have this small insistent voice inside telling me that in this case...it’s not?’