OUTSIDE THE ‘DOG’, MARCUS SHIVERED IN THE COLD,
DAY THIRTY-EIGHT
By mutual unspoken agreement, the PCs, uniformed sergeants, and station admin staff drink in the public bar of the ‘Dog and Bacon’, while ranking officers and detectives drink in the lounge bar. Of course, there were occasions of crossover, especially after the closure of a serious case when the investigating officer bought drinks for all those involved in the case. On these occasions, everyone drank in the public bar.
For quieter, more confidential drinking, the ‘Dog’ had a private room, served by a small bar, but it was well understood that when senior officers were drinking in the private bar, they were not to be disturbed and that bar service only took place when called for by the bell on the counter.
At these times, the officers were left to themselves, quiet, secretive, confidential; nothing that might be said in the ‘private’ went beyond those four walls. Rank was suspended, and all were free to state whatever opinion they might hold without fear of later recrimination.
That evening, the private bar was wreathed in smoke as Trevor Bullock, Shuggie McDermott, Eddie Trueman, Christopher Yarrow, Harry Rawlings, and Marcus Harding, the officers most involved in the hunt for the killer of Emily Black, held an informal briefing and strategy review of the investigation.
Marcus had recently stopped smoking, although that had not helped his romance with Jennifer Beasley, who felt that he should be spending more of his time with her, rather than all his waking hours on the Emily murder case and had left him for a mechanic who worked for the Garside Council and had lots of spare time.
However, with everyone else smoking like the steelworks chimney, Marcus now felt like a Caster kipper, smoked to a turn. Bullock had his pipe fuming at full rate, heavy blue clouds swirling about like a London fog. Shuggie McDermott also had his pipe going, smoking something that smelled of old sporrans soaked in sheep dip, while Yarrow chain-smoked his Players Navy Cut. Eddie Trueman also smoked a pipe, but he had finished his first bowlful and had not yet re-filled it. Harry Rawlings smoked hand-rolled cigs; he had a packet of Virginia Flake tobacco and a packet of Rizla papers, dexterously rolling the paper between the fingers and thumbs of both hands around the loose golden tobacco before licking the gummed edge of the paper to seal the cigarette. He tamped the end down to tighten loose tobacco threads and then lit up, adding to the fug of smoke which wreathed around the private bar, adding to the greasy dark tobacco stains on the cream-painted ceiling of the private.
Marcus coughed a few times to try to make a point, but this only elicited a comment from Bullock who said, ‘Nasty cough you’ve got there, lad, should see a doctor about it,’ and blew another thick cloud of smoke into the polluted air which rasped at the back of Marcus’ throat like a coarse steel file.
Just to get away from the smoke, Marcus went up to the small service bar and rang the bell for service. Mary, the barmaid, came through; she was a tiny blonde, so petite and delicate Marcus always thought she could barely have enough strength in her stick-like arms to pull a pint, but she always did so with great skill. Five pints of Duckworth’s Best Bitter for Bullock, Yarrow, Trueman, Rawlings, and himself, a pint of stout, and a Bell’s scotch for Shuggie.
Having ordered, paid, and carried the drinks back to the table on a slop-soaked tray, he excused himself to go to the toilet and after he had finished went outside to breathe some clean fresh but very chilly and damp air into his smoke-choked lungs.
Outside the ‘Dog,’ Marcus shivered in the cold but relished the sharp tang of the fresh air, breathed in deeply and then with great reluctance made his way back inside.
He nodded in passing to Sgt Dave Armitage who was drinking in the public bar and raised his glass to Marcus with a secretive grin, which left him wondering what that was all about.
Earlier in the day, Armitage had heard through that mysterious ethereal news line that all good desk sergeants possess, that unspoken tacit brotherhood of sergeants whereby news within the force circulates quicker than seems humanly possible.
Dave Armitage knew, well before any official announcement, almost as soon as a decision had been made, that DCC Wilfred ‘Greasy’ Pole had not been given his long-sought-after promotion to Chief Constable, that the Police Committee had been less than impressed by his grandstanding publicity-seeking press campaign during the ongoing and very delicate Black investigation and so, therefore, a senior officer from the Northumberland Force had been appointed as Chief Constable to the West Riding Constabulary instead.
It was Albert Hinds, a sergeant from a Newcastle station who had given Dave Armitage the word. Hinds had heard that DCC Brian Hunter had got the coveted job, and Sgt Albert Hinds duly passed the news on down to Armitage. How Albert Hinds knew before any official announcement, Dave did not ask. Only asking, ‘What’s he like then, this Hunter?’
‘Why aye, he’s a hard bastard, nay doot about that, hard but fair like, do your job and he’ll give you the dues, fuck it up and he’ll have your balls nailed to the wall, but he’ll do it private like, he never bollocks you in public, he’ll back you in public, but in private, if you fuck up you’d best look out. Aye, like I say, hard bastard but fair with it.’
‘Can’t ask for more than that, any buggers got to be better than the shitheel Greasy Pole we got as was after the job, didn’t give a shit who he trampled on to get there, or who he had to brown-nose.’
‘He’s out, as I hear it, the committee thought he behaved like an arsehole over that murder of yours and he’ll be transferred, given a desk job where he can’t do no damage, put him out to grass, like.’
‘Sounds good to me, thanks, Albert, ‘preciate it,’ Armitage said, scratching at an itch at the back of his neck.
‘Any time, Dave, glad to be of service.’
Marcus made his way back into private and saw, to his relief, that Shuggie and Bullock had laid down their pipes, and Yarrow was stubbing out his cigarette into an already overflowing ashtray. Only Harry Rawlings still smoked, but he, in turn, soon finished his hand-roll and stubbed it out as well.
“Thought tha’d got lost, lad. Or else did you find your way into the ladies by mistake and get lucky?” Bullock said, trying to lighten the atmosphere, not just the physical, smoke-laden atmosphere, but the general mood of frustration and anger, frustration at their apparent failure to arrive at a coherent strategy for the further pursuit of Emily’s killer.
The police do not like unsolved murders on their patch, not because it looks bad on their arrest record but simply because, somewhere out there, there is a murdering bastard scumbag who raped and then battered to death a four-year-old girl—not one of the officers in that private bar gave the slightest thought as to whether an arrest and conviction might give a boost to their careers or were concerned that a failure to find the killer might have an opposite, adverse impact on their career prospects.
All they wanted was the killer found and hanged, and for Jenny Black to know that her daughter’s killer had paid for his crime.
Bullock got to his feet and walked over to the small fire that blazed on the far wall and knocked out the ash from his pipe, the tobacco dottle hissing on the grate. He put the pipe back in his mouth and blew heavily through to clear out the last residues, tapping it again against the side of the hearth. He stretched his back and grimaced as a muscle briefly knotted up before making his way back to the table, picked up his pint, took another long drink, and drained his glass.
He headed over to the bar and, not deigning to use the bell, simply shouted, “Come on, Mary, let’s ‘ave some service here, five more of the same and an extra scotch for me. The lad here’s paying,” he added. “Just joshing you, lad.” But even so, he did not offer any money to Mary, who wrote the tab down on her slate with a piece of chalk, the screech of the chalk on the slate setting Marcus’s teeth on edge.
Bullock sat down again, took another long drink, wiped the foam from his moustache, took a sip from his scotch, and then leaned forward in his chair. “We’re going nowhere, lads; we’re no nearer to getting this bastard than we were the day we first found poor wee Emily.”
Yarrow was about to protest, but Bullock held up his hand to forestall him. “I know what tha’s about to say, Chris. You were goin’ to say that your lads have worked their balls off, followed down every lead and back alley, done everything possible, and I’ll agree wi’ every word you say, but the truth of it is, we do not know who this scumbag raping, murdering weasel is.
Now, answer me straight, each and every one of you, have we given too much credence to the bastard being a local man? Have we blinded ourselves to this? Are we too sodding blinkered? Now I’ve bought into this idea as much as anyone else, and I’m not looking to lay owt at anyone’s doorstep over this; you all know the rules, whatever’s said in here stays in here. So, let’s hear it. Have we screwed ourselves by looking too local? Well, lad, what do you think?” he asked, looking directly at Marcus.
Marcus thought for a moment, taking a drink from his pint, a pint he did not really want but could not refuse, whilst collecting his thoughts. “Well, sir,”
“No sirs or rank in here, lad. You should know that by now.”
“Yessir, I mean… No rank…Right.” The interruption broke the chain of his thoughts, and he took another small drink whilst he collected the scattered links together again, herding the errant sheep of his thoughts back into their corral.
“Well…” about to say sir again, “well, we’ve all racked our brains over this. Been over it a dozen times, a hundred times, both in the formal briefings and informally amongst ourselves. I think about it in bed at night and in the morning again when I wake up.” He saw Yarrow nodding in agreement and, encouraged, carried on. “I don’t believe; do not believe that we have…made an error…in believing the perpetrator has local knowledge.
Bolehill Copse is not on any regular route in or around town; the killer knew exactly where to take Emily, he had planned it, and he knew the route, even how to get there in the night. He knows the area. I have no doubt about it. He is or has been a Garside resident. The real question is whether he is still a Garside resident. If he has moved out of the area and only came back for a visit that weekend…” He let that thought hang in mid-air.
Bullock picked up his empty pipe, put it in his mouth, chewed on the end before putting it down again. “Fair enough. Chris?”
“I concur with Marcus. Our man has local knowledge, and I am inclined to believe he is still a resident.”
“Aye? Why?”
Yarrow reached for the packet of cigarettes on the table, caught sight of the slight grimace on Harding’s face, and put them down again. Smoking too much, anyway. “The setup, Trevor, the setup. It was all too planned and laid out for a casual visitor to execute, even with local know-how. He scouted out that little glade in Bolehill Copse where he took her; he had the white coat, we believe a gag, he had a torch with him, this was not a casual passing thought by someone who was just visiting. He’s a local and still in town, of that I’m sure.”
“Putting your neck on the block, aren’t thee, but that’s not the first time and doubtless won’t be the last, Harry?”
Harry Rawlings nodded, his fingers twirling about a hand roll rather more vigorously than necessary, and after lighting up, more or less gave the same analysis as Marcus: he is a local, a casual visitor could not have known about Bolehill Copse, etc., and with the same caveat—Is he still in town?
At great and boring length, Eddie Trueman gave a detailed account of all that he had done, as if to exonerate himself before any opprobrium was even extended in his direction. He added nothing to the overall discussion before excusing himself, and picking up his pipe, donned his overcoat, and left without so much as a goodbye.
Bullock watched him leave; Eddie Trueman was a sound copper if told what to do, he could follow the book without deviation, but he had about as much imagination as a teaspoon, and original thought was not his strong point. “Miserable bugger,” Bullock said, “It were his round an’ all,” draining his pint again and putting it heavily down on the table to make his point. Yarrow took the hint and ordered another round. Bullock waited until he returned with the drinks.
“Shuggie?” he asked, “How do you see it?”
Shuggie McDermott, like Marcus, took another drink before speaking, leaning back in his chair as he did so, as if to distance himself from the conversation. ‘I’m not a local, and so cannot say for sure how much local knowledge the killer would need to locate the murder site, however, having said that, there’s no doubt that the spot was well chosen; it is not a casual site. And I do agree with Christopher in that the setup, the white coat, carrying the torch as he must have done, everything points to premeditation. Chummy knew what he was going to do, when he was going to do it, had his site in mind which, to my mind, indicates a local. Whether he is still in town, that remains the question as Marcus said. But on balance, it seems likely.’
‘Unless he’s got scared and made a run for it,’ Marcus pointed out. ‘He must feel the heat from all the fingerprinting and that.’
‘Aye, and I still think we’ll catch him through his prints on the glass,’ said Shuggie, before quickly summarising the status of the fingerprinting exercise. ‘If he’s here, and I feel, like Christopher and Marcus here, that on probability he is still in town, we just haven’t found him yet. But we will. We will.’ That thought hung in the air like the last residue of stale tobacco smoke.
‘Trevor, your thoughts?’ Yarrow asked after a minute or so as all five men stared into their drinks, assessing the various comments aired to date. ‘Do you think we’ve bought too heavily into the theory of a local? What’re your thoughts on it?’
“Aye, thoughts.” Bullock took a sip from his scotch, picked up his empty pipe, and suckled upon it, grimacing as he sucked in a drop of dottle and then holding the pipe by the bowl, he used it as a pointer to emphasise his line of reasoning. ‘My thoughts right now, are murderous. Right murderous. I want this bastard maggot on the end of a rope, I’ve said it afore and I’ll say it again. Nobody as does this to a four-year lass deserves aught else.’ Yarrow, Harding, Rawlings, and McDermott all nodded emphatically in agreement. ‘Is he a local? Aye, no doubt about that to my mind. He knows his way around the town, around the hospital. He is not a casual visitor to Garside.’
At this, he slammed his hand down on the table so violently that he snapped the stem of his briar. ‘Bugger, and that were me favourite an’ all. Still, ne’er mind that, as I were saying, this is not an opportunistic killing, which makes it all the worse, if such is possible. It was planned, despicably so. In my mind, the only thing worse than a copper killer is a kiddie killer, and this kiddie killer is beyond aught I have ever come across or heard in all my time on the job.’ He paused to take another drink for his pint, draining the glass again.
‘Shuggie, you’ve got the rights of it. We’ll get him with his fingerprints. You and thy team ‘as done a great job, fabulous job, God knows how many hundreds of prints tha’s taken to date.’
‘Not enough, since the wee bastard is still out there,’ McDermott interjected.
‘So, what else do we do to catch him? I want a strategy in place before the new Chief Constable comes down here and has all our knackers on a plate ‘cos we got no idea where to go next.’
Dave Armitage had passed the word on the new appointment to Bullock, who asked him to keep it to himself for the time being. The heads of Yarrow, McDermott, Harding, and Rawlings snapped up like the heads of puppets in the hands of an overenthusiastic but unskilled puppeteer. ‘The new CC, you don’t mean Pole got the job?’ Yarrow asked, appalled at the prospect. Bullock said nothing, enjoying his moment, savouring the secret pleasure of information that others do not have.
‘Nay, for once the committee got it right, Pole has been passed over, the new CC is Brian Hunter from the Northumberland force, up there in Geordieland, so perhaps we’ll have difficulty with the language, does anyone here speak Geordie, Shuggie, nearer your part of the world?’
‘Nay, the wrong side of that wall, that wall as was built to keep all you southerners out.’
‘I think Northumbria’s north of the wall, Hadrian’s Wall, isn’t it?’ Rawlings chimed in.
‘Whatever,’ said Bullock, ‘He’s the new CC; I think I maybe met him once at a conference in York, hard bastard so the word goes. So, like as not, he’s going to come in here with all guns blazing and looking for answers. He’s going to want to make his mark in a hurry. So, I reckon we’d best have some answers for him.’
‘Like I say, we’ll get the bastard through his prints,’ Shuggie McDermott said, like
Bullock, using his pipe to emphasise his point. ‘We know that nobody who had a legitimate reason to be in that ward left his prints on that glass apart from wee Emily herself and the tea lady. The set of prints we’ve got belong to the bastard; those prints are going to hang the bastard. We just need to widen the search, carry on fingerprinting, print anybody and everybody we can think of.’ Shuggie continued, the light of a zealot gleaming in his eyes, as if the prospect of printing several hundred or several thousand people were all that his life had been created for.
‘Sounds to me Shuggie, as though tha’ wants to print the whole of Garside,’ said Bullock with an amused smile, not really believing that that was what Shuggie McDermott meant.
‘Aye, that’s it exactly. Every male in Garside and within a fifteen-mile radius of the town. It’s the only way to get to the bastard!’
Yarrow said nothing as he considered the ramifications of the idea, the immense amount of work such a scheme - unprecedented in forensic crime history - to print an entire town and all the surrounding villages – whilst Marcus Harding and Harry Rawlings simply looked at each other in dumb amazement.
‘Bugger me. You can’t be serious?’ Bullock exploded.
‘Aye, I am deadly serious. We all want this wee murdering bastard; we all want it so bad we can taste it. The only clue we have is those prints. The only way to find the owner of the prints is to print everybody until we find him.’
‘We should put out a public appeal. Do it through the Mayor,’ said Yarrow, leaning forward, enthused by the idea, his burn scars seeming to glow with his passion, ‘let Ernest Heatherton make that chain of office work for once, get him to stand on the Town Hall steps and announce it to the whole town. Every male over sixteen is requested to come forward … come forward voluntarily - to be eliminated, to help to find Emily’s killer. Appeal to their better nature, appeal to the community. Make the town feel as though they are part of the investigation. Promise… I don’t know… promise that after the end of the investigation and we have a conviction that all the prints will be destroyed. We could even destroy them publicly’
‘Aye, a big bonfire on Markham Common,’ Marcus chimed in.
‘Don’t tell me you’re buying into this lunacy,’ Bullock expostulated, even redder in the face than usual with indignation. ‘Do you realise the manpower that would take?’
‘Get the new Chief Constable to buy into the idea; we know Greasy would never buy into it, penny-pinching bugger, but Hunter?’ Marcus said, caught up in Yarrow’s enthusiasm
‘Aye,’ echoed Shuggie.
‘Hunter, he might go for it, bound to be a big press deal about it, could be good publicity for him so soon into his tenure as CC,’ Marcus pressed on.
Bullock thought for a minute or so, slowly sipping at what was left of his scotch as he did so, then reached for his pipe before remembering that he had broken it. ‘Not so daft after all, are you, lad? Makes good sense does that. Aye. Good sense. I’ve got to pay a courtesy call on the new CC anyhow, and I’ll broach the idea with him then.’ He got to his feet, swaying slightly.
‘I’m off to take a piss and then we’ll kick this around a bit more once I get back, so I give him the full picture.’ He paused at the door. ‘Four gentlemen have bought their rounds, some bugger hasn’t,’ at which Rawlings hastily got to his feet to order yet another round.