True Witness (4 page)

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Authors: Jo Bannister

BOOK: True Witness
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“Whatever else he is,” said Brodie, “Jack Deacon's a pro.
When he's finished shouting, he'll think about what you told him. If only as insurance, he'll look into it.”
Daniel was chewing the inside of his cheek. “This Mrs Berry. Do you know where she lives?”
Immediately Brodie's expression turned wary. “Why?”
“I'd like to go and see her. To – I don't know – apologise.” His gaze came up and she saw the pain in his eyes. “I was her son's best chance and I failed him. I'd like to tell her I'm sorry. That I'd have helped if I could.”
Brodie shook her head. “I don't know, Daniel, I'm not sure it's the right time. Deacon will have told her what happened, so she knows there was someone there who cared enough to try and save Chris. The fact remains that she lost him, and I don't know if she could cope with meeting you just now. Give her a little time. Later she'll be glad of the chance to thank you, but right now it's just asking too much.”
He thought she was right. He nodded slowly and flicked her a fragile smile. “I don't know what to do for the best.”
“Daniel, you've already done it. There's nothing more you can do. It's up to other people now.”
As soon as he had his search warrant Detective Inspector Deacon returned to Manor Farm. Now he regretted his earlier visit: it hadn't advanced his inquiries, only served to warn Cochrane that he was under suspicion. Any evidence that Chris Berry had been here would be harder to find now. The constables left on surveillance had seen Cochrane rise at six and tend to his beasts. They could not say if he had also been busy with a bucket of soapy water and a scrubbing brush.
It takes a lot of people a lot of hours to search a building thoroughly. Deacon had brought a lot of people, and they had nothing more important to do with their time, but he still wasn't confident of success. They did all this ten years ago and found nothing; and Cochrane wasn't worried enough.
The Land Rover was probably their best chance of finding some forensics. Cochrane hadn't been near it: whatever was in or on it at four o'clock this morning would be there still. As soon as Cochrane had seen the warrant the Inspector waved up a low-loader to take it away. He wasn't going to do this on his hands and knees with a torch. It was going to the police garage for a thorough workout.
“How long's that going to take, then?” asked Cochrane dourly. He'd pulled on a waxed jacket so old it was impossible to judge its original colour, wellingtons with as much tread on them as tractor tyres, and a tweed cap. He was a farmer, had no wish to be mistaken for a gentleman. When he had trouble with vermin he solved it with a double-barrelled shotgun, not a horse and a bunch of dogs.
“A couple of days,” said Deacon. “Look on the bright side. When you get it back – if you get it back – it'll be spotless. Think of it as a free valet.”
“In the meantime, how'm I supposed to feed my sheep?”
Deacon's gaze travelled round the farmyard, lit on a wheelbarrow propped against a wall. “Plan B.”
Leaving Manor Farm, he headed back into Dimmock with Frick Down on his left and Menner and Chain Downs stretching away to his right. The Three Downs. Dimmock hadn't many claims to fame, but the fell race was one. Runners all over Britain knew of it, counted its plain silver cup as one of their glittering prizes. For three years this had been Chris Berry's kingdom; till he met a rampant old goat and made the mistake of running the one way his speed could do him no good.
When Deacon got back to the police station Sergeant Voss was waiting. “Mrs Berry's here.”
“Has she done the formal identification?”
“We're just back from the hospital. Her husband was there too but he couldn't hack it. I had Jill Meadows take him home.”
“Is she all right?”
Charlie Voss looked askance at his boss. “Well, she didn't faint and she didn't get hysterical, if that's what you mean. Now she wants to see you.”
Deacon had wanted to talk to her again too. He'd broken the news to the family himself at six o'clock this morning, but he hadn't stayed long. It was too soon to tell them anything that made it easier, and his time could be better spent than on meaningless condolences. When he'd caught their son's killer he'd sit down with them and talk.
Except that Mrs Berry wanted to talk now. Deacon threw his coat at the rack and missed; Voss picked it up. It was a ritual they performed a couple of times a day. “Where is she?”
“In your office. I didn't want to put her in an interview room. Meadows is with her.”
Mrs Berry didn't look like an athlete's mother. She was rather small and dumpy, and wore a grey cloth coat over a purple sweater and grey tweed skirt. She'd only known for four hours, but already she was observing the proprieties.
She also remembered his name, which was an achievement in the circumstances. Perhaps that ability to focus through the pain was what Chris inherited from her. She'd just been to view the body of her murdered child. Someone who'd seen less of grief than Jack Deacon might have found her dry eyes and steely self-control unnatural if not unnerving. But Deacon knew that people cope with disaster in a wide variety of ways, and any which leave them sane are valid. Mrs Berry was getting involved. She couldn't help her son but she could follow the hunt for his killer. “I wondered if there'd been any developments, Inspector Deacon.”
He wasn't sure what to tell her. She desperately needed some good news but he wouldn't raise her hopes only to dash them. If he'd been able to get more sense out of Daniel Hood … But he hadn't.
“We're following a line of inquiry, Mrs Berry,” he said, dropping into his chair. “I've interviewed a man, and we're searching a house and a vehicle. I can't tell you yet that we have your son's killer. But I'm doing everything I can in the hope of making an early arrest.”
“When you came to the house,” she said, “you told us what had happened. I'm sorry but I didn't take it all in. Did you say there was a witness?”
Deacon nodded. “A man who lives near the pier. He happened to be outside and heard shouting.”
“He saw …?” She couldn't quite bring herself to say it.
“He saw something.” The policeman shrugged awkwardly. “It was the middle of the night. But yes, he saw the struggle. Then Chris went into the water and the other man ran. The witness got a glimpse of his face. I'm hoping it'll be enough.”
“And then – did I get this right? – he pulled Chris out of the sea?”
Deacon nodded. “He thought he might still be alive. He found him and started artificial respiration. But it was too late.”
“He could have died. Trying to save my son.”
“Yes,” nodded Deacon. He looked surprised. “Yes, he could.”
“Would you thank him for me?”
“Yes, Mrs Berry, I will.” It had taken the mother of the murdered youth to think of it. Deacon didn't remember saying a single appreciative word to Daniel Hood when he stood, shocked and exhausted, in front of him. For a moment he regretted that. But he knew the feeling would pass before he saw Daniel again.
While he had her there Deacon took the opportunity to ask a few questions of his own. “You told me Chris went out training yesterday evening. Do you know where he'd have gone or who he'd have been with?”
“He'd have been with Nathan. They did all their training together. They did
everything
together.” She smiled wanly. “We used to say they'd have to marry Siamese twins.”
“Nathan?”
“Nathan Sparkes.” She gave him an address on the Wood-green estate. “They're – were – best friends since they started school. The year Chris didn't win the Three Downs, Nathan did.”
“So they were running yesterday evening.”
“They might have gone running,” said Mrs Berry, “they might have gone to the gym. They might have decided to skip a night and go to the pub. They weren't just athletes, Inspector, they were young men. They enjoyed their lives. It's the one consolation in all of this, you know? Chris may not have had a very long life but it was a full one. He'd done as much, achieved as much, as men twice his age.”
“It ought to make it better,” Deacon agreed softly. “Somehow it makes it worse. I'm going to get this man, Mrs Berry. Count on it.”
He saw her out. When he got back to his office there was a message waiting. “A Mr Ennis to see you. He says he knows you.”
Deacon's eyes widened. “George Ennis? Of course. Send him up.”
If the girl on the desk had been doing this job for longer she'd have known who George Ennis was too. Ten years ago he was Detective Chief Inspector Ennis, leading the hunt for the man who murdered three Dimmock youths over the course of thirteen months. Deacon knew that his failure to make anyone amenable – more specifically, to bring charges when the whole of CID knew who committed the crimes – influenced his decision to take an early retirement a couple of years later. He hadn't been much older than Deacon was now.
He headed for the stairs to meet Ennis on the way up. There was also a lift, and most men in their fifties would have taken it, but Ennis had always been a fitness fanatic. He'd got salad put on the canteen menu at a time when self-respecting policemen ate steak and chips. When he retired he opened some kind of a health club. Deacon hadn't seen him for years, but he still knew better than to wait for the lift.
They met at the top of the stairs and shook hands, Deacon uncharacteristically warm in his welcome. Of course, this was the man who'd taught him nearly everything he knew. “Good of you to come round, George. I was going to call you, let you know he's back in business.” It wasn't true but it might have been.
But he'd misunderstood the reason for Ennis's visit. He wasn't for the moment concerned with Neil Cochrane. “Jack, they're saying it was Chris Berry. Is that right?”
“Yes,” said Deacon.
“There's no mistake? You're quite sure?”
“I'm afraid so.” He steered Ennis into his office as if it hadn't been
his
office until eight years ago. “Did you know him, then?”
“Of course I know him!” George Ennis was an inch taller than Deacon and a lot of inches narrower, and if anything he looked younger than the day he retired. But he also looked
desperately troubled, his angular face creased with anxiety, his eyes stunned. “Knew him. I trained him, Jack. From when he was a scrawny little kid about thirteen years old. His mum sent him to me to keep him off the street, and the first time I saw him run I knew I had a champion. And now he's dead.” He dropped into the chair recently vacated by Mrs Berry. “You're sure? You are sure?”
“George, the boy's mother ID'd the body. There's no doubt.” The pieces were snapping together with a click. “She said something about him going to the gym. Your place?”
Ennis nodded. Now the last hope was gone he slumped in his chair and sighed. “Yes. One of my star pupils, and as nice a kid as you could hope to meet. It's an absolute tragedy.” He shook his head, still struggling to believe. “Can you tell me what happened?”
Deacon told him everything he knew. He stopped short of telling him everything he suspected; but Ennis had no need to be cautious any more.
“You know who did this, don't you?”
Deacon bit his lip. “I have a good idea. But George – that's not your business any more.”
“I know.” Ennis straightened, pulling himself together by sheer force of will. “And I know it's in safe hands. But – oh dear God, Jack, if I'd got him ten years ago Chris would be alive now!”
“Damn it, George,” growled Deacon, “you can't think like that. It isn't fair on either of us. We did our best. We found the man responsible. It wasn't our fault that the evidence didn't satisfy the Crown Prosecution Service.”
He let out a long, slow breath and leaned back in his chair. “And actually, that isn't fair either. We couldn't give them enough. If there'd only been some DNA. But whatever else Cochrane is, he's not stupid. He was never overtaken by an irresistible urge. He planned carefully, meticulously. Well, maybe this time will be different. This time he didn't have things all his own way.”
Ennis was looking at him, the question he was reluctant to voice stinging in his eyes. “Did he … rape … Chris too?”
Deacon shrugged, not unkindly. “I don't know. The post mortem's going on about now. Maybe not – he still had his clothes, maybe he got away before Cochrane could overpower him.”
“In that case there won't be any forensic.”
That was Deacon's fear too. “George, we simply don't know yet. He may have been in the Land Rover; he may even have been in the house. If he was there'll be some evidence somewhere; and however little it is, we'll find it.”
But he was talking to someone who knew the pitfalls as well as he did. “We're going to lose him again, aren't we, Jack?” whispered Ennis. Behind rubbed lids his eyes were bitter. “We couldn't get him ten years ago, and we're not going to get him now. He's too clever for us.”
Deacon stumbled to his feet as if someone had kicked the chair from under him. “Don't give me that!
Nobody
is that clever. Nobody is fireproof. Ten years ago we were unlucky. We did our damnedest, but we were unlucky. We scared him, though. We put him off trying again for ten years. How many boys have grown up safely in that time because of how close we got to him?
“This time it's going to be different. We know exactly when the crime occurred, we got to the pier while the scene was still fresh, we had Cochrane and his house and Land Rover under surveillance within a couple of hours. We were never in that position before. Forensic techniques have improved in ten years. And this time we have a witness.”
Ennis was staring at him, a coal in the grief-muddied blue of his eyes. “Somebody saw?”
“The whole thing. I have the time, the place and a damned good description. I'll get him, George. I promise you.”

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