Текст книги "The Corpse Bridge"

Автор книги: Stephen Booth

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 39 страниц)

‘Not wandering around exactly, Sergeant. All the groups were accompanied by a guide.’

‘Even so…’

‘I’m afraid it’s not exactly difficult to get into the abbey grounds at night, if you’re determined to do so,’ said Burns. ‘Of course, we have security. And alarms.’

‘But if all you want to do is creep up to the chapel and daub some graffiti on the wall, while the public are trooping in and out of the abbey for some Halloween event…’

‘Yes. Anybody could have managed it.’

‘“Explore Knowle Abbey’s dark and spooky interior”,’ quoted Fry. ‘I take it that means…’

‘Of course. We had all the lights turned off. For atmosphere, you know.’

‘Is the earl himself at home at the moment?’ asked Cooper.

‘Yes, he and the countess are in residence, along with their younger son and their daughter, Lady Imogen.’

‘And do you happen to have a photograph of Lord Manby that we could use?’ asked Cooper.

Burns looked surprised. ‘Why on earth would I have one of those? He’s hardly some kind of rock star handing out signed photographs to his fans.’

‘No, I just thought—’

‘In fact, Walter is a very private man,’ said Burns stiffly. ‘He prefers not to be recognised, even when he’s here around the abbey. And he doesn’t do much in public, if he can avoid it. To be honest, I think he would rather find some other way of paying for the upkeep of the abbey, instead of letting all these visitors in. It’s his home, after all.’

‘I understand.’

When they left the estate office, Cooper and Fry followed the arrows pointing towards the main entrance. But Cooper paused in a passage lined with peeling doors. While Fry fidgeted impatiently, he opened a door marked ‘Nursery’. Even if he hadn’t been told by Meredith Burns, it would have been obvious that the army had been billeted in this part of the house. There were maps and flags scattered among the toys. The wallpaper was filthy, and the doors and skirting boards looked as though they had been kicked repeatedly by heavy boots.

In the Great Hall the walls were lined with enormous Manby family portraits. The present earl was there – Walter, 9th Earl Manby of Knowle Abbey. In previous generations his ancestors seemed to have been christened with wonderful aristocratic names like Algernon, Peregrine and Clotworthy.

The collection of earls and their relatives gazed down with apparent astonishment at the crowds of strangers who must come through this hall every weekend to gawp at the abbey. Walter’s Victorian grandfather, the seventh Lord Manby, looked particularly outraged at the prospect.

When they got back to the car Fry sat and stared at the façade of Knowle Abbey for a while. From her expression she didn’t seem to be impressed by the quality of the architecture. Maybe the pillars and porticos weren’t quite symmetrical enough for her taste.

Or perhaps something else was causing the sour look on her face.

‘What are you thinking, Diane?’ asked Cooper curiously.

‘Have a guess.’

‘You’re wondering whether they used this as a location for filming Downton Abbey?’

‘Idiot.’

‘Thanks. So, what, then?’

Fry was silent for a moment, so Cooper waited. Finally, she started the car and let the engine turn over slowly before putting it into gear.

‘I’ll tell you what I’m thinking,’ she said. ‘I’m asking myself why ordinary people should be expected to cough up millions of pounds to maintain a privately owned pile like this, when there’s no money available for proper policing.’

Cooper nodded. ‘Fair point. But she did say it’s a national treasure. And the earl can’t afford to maintain it himself.’

‘Personally,’ said Fry, ‘I don’t care if his chapel leaks and his statues erode.’

17

In the CID room at West Street, Cooper found a message waiting for him that Detective Superintendent Branagh wanted to see him ASAP. And that meant before the morning briefing took place on the Sandra Blair inquiry.

All of his team had come in for the briefing, except Luke Irvine. Cooper had a couple of jobs he needed doing. First of all he asked Becky Hurst to hunt out a photograph of Walter, 9th Earl Manby.

‘There should be something on the internet,’ he said.

‘Everything is on the internet, Ben.’

‘So I hear.’

‘The ninth Earl,’ said Hurst.

‘Yes, the living one. Walter. If you find something and I’m not back before the briefing, pass it to DI Walker.’

‘Okay.’

Cooper turned to Carol Villiers and asked her to produce a list of residents in Bowden.

‘All of them?’ she said.

‘If possible. The adults anyway.’

‘Okay, Ben.’

Cooper straightened his tie. ‘I won’t be long. I hope.’

Down the corridor the door of the superintendent’s office was standing partly open, but Cooper knocked anyway. Detective Superintendent Hazel Branagh got up from her desk and waved him to a chair.

‘Come in, DS Cooper,’ she said. ‘It’s nothing to worry about. I just want to catch up. Tell me how things are going generally.’

Cooper sat down, not entirely reassured. Rumours around the station said that Branagh had been on a diet recently, though she would never have admitted it. She seemed to have lost weight around her face, though, and the combination of broad shoulders and lean cheekbones made her even more intimidating. Cooper was actually glad when she sat down again.

‘Fine, ma’am,’ he said. ‘I’m very happy with my team in CID. They’re doing nicely.’

‘Ah, yes.’ Branagh consulted a note on her desk. ‘You have DC Villiers – I’ve heard very good reports of her since she joined us.’

‘She’s a valuable asset,’ said Cooper, conscious that he was immediately falling into management speak, but unable to prevent himself.

‘And DCs Hurst and Irvine. Very promising, would you say?’

‘Absolutely, ma’am.’

She paused, placing a finger on the list in front of her. ‘And I see you still have DC Gavin Murfin at the moment.’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, we’ll be giving him a good send-off soon,’ said Branagh. ‘There’s no point in going over his faults now, is there?’

‘I’ve found Gavin’s experience useful,’ said Cooper.

Branagh glanced up at him. ‘Very loyal, DS Cooper. Of course, we’ll look at the possibility of finding you a replacement for Murfin when he goes. But I’m sure you understand, in the present circumstances … The budget cuts…’

‘With respect, ma’am, there should be five detective constables in my team, according to the official establishment. I’m already one down.’

‘I know. But I’m afraid we have to get used to these reductions across the board. It’s the same for all of us.’

Cooper said nothing. He’d heard a lot of officers express the opinion that Derbyshire Constabulary was a victim of its own success. The crime rate in the county had been reduced by about 15 per cent in the past year. And this was despite the fact that all the neighbouring forces had higher rates of crime and larger urban centres of population, with the result that Derbyshire was often a target for travelling criminals from Greater Manchester, Nottinghamshire or South Yorkshire. If your crime rate was falling, even in those circumstances, then clearly you didn’t need so many police officers. It seemed counter-intuitive and very short-term thinking.

But Superintendent Branagh had probably heard that view plenty of times. There was no point in Cooper repeating it now.

Branagh pushed her list to one side. ‘But what about you, DS Cooper? How are you doing yourself?’

That was a question he couldn’t hesitate in answering. Not for even a second.

‘I’m absolutely fine, ma’am,’ said Cooper firmly.

‘Good. Excellent. That’s what I like to hear. But could I suggest, perhaps…’

‘Yes?’

‘That you need to push yourself forward a bit more. You’re in danger of getting overlooked.’

‘Overlooked?’

‘For promotion.’

‘Oh.’

Cooper hadn’t really thought about further promotion yet. There didn’t seem much point. There was already a log-jam in human resources since promotions were frozen by budget cuts.

‘You’ve talked up all the DCs in your team,’ said Branagh. ‘Even DC Murfin, who we all know about. But you don’t talk yourself up at all.’

‘I suppose that’s true,’ admitted Cooper.

Since he’d been promoted to Detective Sergeant, Cooper had concentrated on taking the trouble to bring his DCs on. He wanted to let them take responsibility and get some credit for their work. Not everybody did that. But it was true what Branagh said. The police service had become a competitive business. Like lots of people working in private sector businesses, you had to be able to justify your job these days.

‘You can be too self-effacing, you know,’ emphasised Branagh. ‘In this profession you have to get yourself noticed if you want to get on. Otherwise they’ll just bring somebody in over your head. People who lie down get walked over.’

‘Yes, I do know that,’ said Cooper.

Branagh watched him carefully, then nodded. Her shoulders relaxed slightly.

‘Well, if it does happen, Ben,’ she said, ‘let’s hope it’s a police officer at least, and not someone brought in from managing a supermarket.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ said Cooper.

He realised the interview was over and got up to leave. Branagh was exaggerating, of course. But only a bit. The government’s new scheme would soon bring in twenty direct-entry police superintendents from other businesses and professions, along with eighty fast-tracked inspectors, graduates on a three-year scheme taking them straight from constable rank to the first rung of the management ladder. Many were already on training courses at the College of Policing.

There were very few police officers who didn’t believe that experience working on the frontline was essential for anyone holding a senior management position on the operational side. How could you expect someone to make high-pressure decisions in an emergency situation when they’d never had to respond to an emergency themselves? Surely they needed first-hand knowledge.

But it was too late to fight the changes. The new scheme would allow outsiders to leap over thousands of officers who’d spent years building experience, working in a variety of roles across the force. One day a chief constable would be appointed who had never made an arrest.

Those new inspectors had to be graduates with good degrees, but would at least have spent a short time as constables and sergeants. But neither of those was a requirement for a direct-entry superintendent, though that was two ranks above inspector. The new batch of supers might be from the armed forces or the intelligence services. They could be prison governors or existing members of civilian staff. But the guidelines said they could equally be ‘people with experience of running private sector operations’.

So Branagh’s half-joking reference wasn’t quite accurate. A newly appointed inspector couldn’t come straight from being a supermarket manager. But a new superintendent could.

It’s time to get out.

Cooper had heard those words said more and more often over the past few months. And it wasn’t just from Gavin Murfin either.

‘By the way,’ said Branagh as Cooper left her office.

‘Yes, ma’am?’

‘Detective Sergeant Fry is with us for the briefing. Representing the Major Crime Unit, of course.’

‘Yes.’

Cooper waited, sensing that Branagh had something else to say. If it was in connection with Diane Fry, it might be something he didn’t want to hear.

‘It would be good,’ said Branagh, ‘if we could manage without the assistance of the MCU on this occasion.’

He nodded, not sure what she expected him to say in response to that.

‘I feel it would be good for the division,’ she said. ‘And especially … Ben, it would be especially good for you. It would be wonderful if we could fill a vacancy at inspector level before those direct entrants start to arrive.’

Cooper swallowed at the enormity of the challenge he was being presented with. Was he ready for this? But Branagh was waiting for an acknowledgement of some kind.

‘Ben, remember what I said, won’t you?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said.

18

The briefing room wasn’t as full as it ought to have been. Cooper remembered it being packed out in the past, with standing room only for those at the back. Superintendent Branagh led the briefing herself, with Detective Inspector Dean Walker alongside her. Walker was relatively inexperienced, but Branagh had many years as a senior investigating officer.

Currently, the Sandra Blair inquiry was treated as a suspicious death. Results of the post-mortem examination were expected later today and would surely raise the classification to a murder case when the cause of death was established.

The details known about the victim were already familiar to Cooper. He and Luke Irvine had obtained most of them over the weekend. But forensic examination of the scene at the bridge had been continuing for the past forty-eight hours. So had the search of the woods on either side of the river, the search area gradually expanding to cover most of the hillside and the tracks leading down to the bridge. Witness statements had been taken from the young man who discovered the body, Rob Beresford, as well as from Geoff and Sally Naden, and Jason Shaw.

Now there would be an assessment of what lines of inquiry could be followed up and which would be most urgent.

‘According to the forensic medical examiner, the victim died somewhere between 6 p.m. and midnight on Friday,’ said Branagh. ‘That’s an estimate based on body temperature and the extent of rigor mortis and lividity. As usual we can’t get a more specific timeframe. No witnesses have come forward who had contact with the victim between those times. The body was found at around 1 a.m. by a young man called Robson Beresford, whose statement we have. The other witness statements are vague, but I think we can take them as indicating the presence of at least two people in the woods near the scene earlier that night. One of them may have been our victim. But we can’t be sure of that.’

Becky Hurst raised a hand to get attention.

‘Yes, DC Hurst?’

‘These statements suggest that someone was being chased,’ said Hurst. ‘Were there any signs on the victim that she’d been running?’

‘Such as?’

‘Scratches on her hands and face from the undergrowth, mud splashes on her clothing. She might have been sweating from the exertion.’

‘There was certainly mud on her shoes and some of her clothes. But that could simply have resulted from being on the riverbank. We’ll get an analysis of the spread of the mud splashes if we can. But bear in mind that the victim was lying in the river. Much of the mud will have dispersed.’

Cooper nodded across at Hurst. ‘It’s an important point, ma’am,’ he said. ‘If the victim had been running, that sort of physical exertion makes a difference to the rate of onset of rigor mortis.’

‘Yes, it would speed up the onset of rigor, particularly in the legs,’ agreed Branagh. ‘On the other hand, the weather was cold and she was partially submerged in water, both of which would slow the process down. So it’s a case of swings and roundabouts, I suppose. Rigor was certainly fairly well advanced by the time we attended the scene.’

She was right, of course. Cooper recalled the rigidity of the victim’s limbs as she was removed from the river. When her muscles relaxed at the moment of death, she’d fallen into an awkward, tangled position, then rigor mortis had begun to set in, first in the small muscles of the face and neck before spreading to the rest of the body. Even Rob Beresford had remarked on the flat, staring eyes that had so frightened him. The eyes were among the first parts of the body to be affected by rigor.

Branagh consulted her briefing notes. ‘As far as the victim’s movements are concerned, all we know is that she left her place of work between one and one-thirty on Thursday afternoon. That’s the Hartdale tea rooms in Hartington. She seems to have returned to her home in Crowdecote at some time during the afternoon, but went out again later on. Since her car was still parked outside her house when it was visited by DS Cooper and DC Irvine on Friday, we have to conclude that she either went with someone else or took a taxi, or possibly set out on foot.’

The superintendent paused and looked round the room, but no one commented. Perhaps she expected someone to cast doubt on the idea that Sandra Blair would have walked from Crowdecote to the bridge. It was the best part of two miles, even using the footpaths that skirted the hillsides in the Dove valley, and a good bit further by road. Diane Fry might have been the person to scoff at that possibility, but even she said nothing. Cooper glanced across at her and saw that she was holding herself tense and restrained, her lips pursed shut, as if making a determined effort not to interrupt.

Cooper waited for Branagh to continue. Personally, he had no doubt that the victim might have set off to walk from her home. He thought the idea of her calling for a taxi was by far the least likely.

‘So over the next few days,’ said Branagh, ‘we’ll be deploying all of our additional manpower…’

She paused again, but only very briefly to ride the automatic laughter from the officers present.

‘… in both Hartington and Crowdecote to conduct house-to-house enquiries. Here are the priorities for the house-to-house teams. We need to know if anyone saw the victim after she left the tea rooms and before she left home again that evening. Did she call at one of the shops in Hartington? Did anyone see Sandra Blair in her car between there and her home? And obviously, we’d very much like to hear from anyone who saw her, and a possible second person, between her home and Hollins Bridge that afternoon or evening. Somebody will have to check local taxi firms.’

Cooper restrained himself from shaking his head. Taxis were a waste of someone’s time, but the options had to be covered. As for her drive home, Sandra Blair was a local. He bet she wouldn’t even have thought of going via the main A515 up to Sparklow, but would have taken the back road from Hartington, which wound its way across the hill above the hamlet of Pilsbury. It was a much quieter route. He could think of only three or four farms set back from the road until you reached the junction at High Needham. Not much chance of anyone noticing a small red Ford Ka passing. Their best hope would be that someone saw Sandra later, after she’d left her house. Yes, that would definitely constitute an early break.

Branagh handed over to DI Walker, who had been at the scene. He was a young detective inspector, who’d risen quickly through the ranks, but who might yet be overtaken in his career by those fast-tracked graduates just starting their three-year programmes. Slim and blond-haired, Walker looked more like an actor auditioning for the role of a fictional aristocratic detective than a real police officer. It was said that he had public school and university education too – though surely that didn’t make any difference in today’s police service?

‘Our search of the scene is still ongoing,’ said Walker. ‘Given the statements from witnesses, we’ve extended the search area quite considerably.’

He indicated a large-scale map on the wall of the briefing room. Around the area of Hollins Bridge, the map was shaded in sectors to show the designated areas. As Walker said, the search teams were working their way steadily further from the bridge itself.

‘We’ve almost completed the area on our side of the river,’ the DI was saying. ‘We’re waiting for our colleagues in Staffordshire to do the same. They have some difficult terrain on their side, where it’s a bit steeper, so it’s taking longer. I’ll be liaising with them later today on that. Meanwhile, these are the items we’ve found so far.’

Photos were pinned up on a board next to the map, with indicators to show where each item had been found. The noose was there and so was the witch ball with its screwed-up bits of paper and the clay eagle’s head. Most distinctive of them was the effigy discovered lying on the coffin stone, which caused a lot of murmuring through the room.

‘It’s just a guy, isn’t it?’ said someone.

‘Yep, someone had it ready for Bonfire Night and lost it,’ added a second officer.

But a third shook his head. ‘I’ve never seen one like that. It’s too well made. Why would you go to all that trouble, just to burn it?’

DI Walker agreed. ‘That’s what we think, too. It may have been designed deliberately to look like someone. I think it would be fair to say that it isn’t our victim, anyway.’

There was a ripple of laughter again and Walker looked pleased. In that moment he seemed even more like a performer, gratified to get a reaction from his audience.

‘However, we have one suggestion put forward for the identity of the effigy,’ said Walker cheerfully. ‘DS Cooper has a theory.’

All eyes turned to Cooper and he stood up. Briefly, he explained his reasoning, from the eagle’s head to the emblem of the Manbys, then the situation at Knowle Abbey, with the anonymous letter, the mysterious intruder and the vandalism of the chapel.

‘So it’s possible this is part of a campaign by someone with a grudge against the Manby family,’ concluded Cooper.

‘And who’s the effigy of?’ asked a voice from behind him in the room. ‘Is it the earl? I have no idea what he looks like.’

Walker pinned a photograph on to the board next to the picture of the effigy. It was a blown-up detail from a formal occasion that had been featured in Derbyshire Life. The Right Honourable Walter, Earl Manby, was pictured in white tie and tails, beaming at the camera with his best air of bonhomie. He was clean shaven, with iron-grey hair neatly clipped and slicked down. His cheeks were full and his skin shone with a slightly florid glow, which might just have been a sign that he’d been enjoying a convivial evening. Apart from that, Cooper had to admit the photograph bore no similarity to the effigy at all.

‘The photo is a year or two old,’ said Becky Hurst, against a deafeningly dubious silence. ‘But it was all we could lay our hands on.’

‘Well, be that as it may,’ said DI Walker, ‘it’s something to bear in mind that there may be a connection with Knowle Abbey. The presence of the rope noose within a few yards of the effigy is worrying. It starts to look like a serious threat.’

Another murmur ran round the room. Walker waited for it to subside.

‘Although it also seems a possibility from the evidence at Sandra Blair’s house that the victim may have made the effigy herself,’ he said. ‘We’re waiting for confirmation of that.’

‘Why would she do that?’ asked someone.

‘We don’t know. In fact, a better question might be “Who did she make it for?”’

It was a good point, of course. Cooper had to admit that. He decided to sit back and listen to the rest of the briefing in dignified silence.

‘We’re still working our way through the diary and address book belonging to the victim, but the good news is that we’ve located Mrs Blair’s sister. Her name is Maureen Mackinnon and she’ll be arriving from Scotland in the morning.’

Cooper frowned. Why hadn’t he been able to locate a Dundee phone number in Sandra’s address book?

DI Walker might have seen his expression. He hesitated, looked down at his notes and said, ‘Mrs Mackinnon lives in Dunfermline, I believe.’

Oh, well. Dundee, Dunfermline. It was probably too easy to confuse them. It must have taken Luke Irvine a while to sort that one out.

‘There was the note in the diary about meeting “Grandfather”,’ said Cooper, forgetting his resolution to keep quiet.

‘According to Mrs Mackinnon, the victim doesn’t have a grandfather,’ said Walker with an air of finality. ‘Not a living one she could have been meeting.’

And Cooper wasn’t surprised to hear that.

‘Okay, thank you,’ said Superintendent Branagh. ‘Let me say at this point that we won’t be releasing any details to the public of what we found at the scene. Specifically, there will be no mention of the effigy or the noose. Understood? All right. What about forensics?’

The crime-scene manager, Wayne Abbott, took over the floor. He was a marked contrast to the DI, heavily built and shaven-headed like a football hooligan but totally on the ball when it came to the details of a crime scene.

‘Our scene is pretty messy,’ said Abbott. ‘Muddy, badly churned up, rained on and trampled. It couldn’t have been worse really. There’s no viable DNA to work with, for a start, and trace evidence is fragmentary. We’ve recovered some shoe marks close to where the body was found. They’ll be difficult to identify with any certainty, but we’re working on it.’

‘Fingerprints?’

‘We’ve retrieved a few partials from the victim’s clothing and from the effigy,’ said Abbott. ‘Many of them are the victim’s own, of course. The others we haven’t been able to identify. There’s no match from the database.’

‘That’s privatisation for you,’ said someone.

Cooper turned round to look, but couldn’t see who had spoken. It could have been Gavin Murfin, but he looked too innocent and his mouth was full anyway.

Creeping privatisation was a standing grievance among some officers. And fingerprint records had already been privatised during the past twelve months. There was no storage room left at the Regional Identification Bureau in Nottingham. So, like other East Midlands forces, Derbyshire had decided to digitise their records and move to an entirely electronic process. Half a million paper records were being destroyed after they were scanned and stored on a secure server.

‘That’s nothing to do with it,’ said Superintendent Branagh sharply. And no one seemed ready to argue with her.

Abbott looked across at where Cooper sat and met his eye.

‘The one thing we have established,’ he said, ‘is that the material used in making the effigy matches samples of fabric found in the victim’s home. There’s also a sketch that resembles the final design. So it seems we can confirm that the victim created the effigy herself.’

Cooper breathed a sigh of relief. At least he’d been right about something. He looked across the room and gasped in surprise. If he wasn’t mistaken, he’d almost caught Diane Fry smiling.