Blood Substitute (7 page)

‘There won't be. The day I look like anything emanating from a police department when I'm on a job I shall deserve to be chucked out.' He smiled placatingly. ‘No, it's fairly simple to give every impression of belonging to an aggrieved local godfather's outfit.'

‘All these people could be operating under stolen identities,' Reece went on after a short pause. ‘And, picking up the thread of what we were talking about just now, we did subsequently check on the address that Morley had been given. There was no house of that name in the road mentioned.'

‘All the more reason to do a little investigating on those snouts,' Patrick said. ‘Would you like me to do that first? I mean, you're not going to trust them sufficiently to use either of them again, are you?'

‘Do re-phrase that, Patrick,' I urged. ‘Or Superintendent Reece will think you're going to make them disappear for good.'

‘Unfortunate use of words,' he agreed. ‘I should have said “otherwise you're not going to trust them sufficiently to use them again.”'

‘They would have been brought in for interview already,' Reece told him. ‘But the pair of them have gone right off the map. Needless to say, we're looking, but by all means act independently.'

I said, ‘One of the worst aspects of this is that Morley was tortured before being killed. I understand that the initials RK were carved on his chest. Have you any idea who that might be, or is it possible that the marks made with a knife only resemble those letters?'

‘No, it's fairly clear it's someone signing their handiwork,' Reece answered. He reached for a file on his desk. ‘To spare the family we've omitted to mention that he was mutilated as well. There are photographs in there, taken of the body as it was found, if you both care to look at them. But I warn you, they're not pleasant.'

‘I'd rather you didn't distress yourself,' Patrick said to me, leaning over to take the file before I could touch it. ‘Remember what happened on the arson job.'

There had been no arson job. But as we have our own codes that involve the deliberate telling of lies I went along with this knowing that he would explain his reasons later. He opened the file and I could tell from his face that the photographs were ghastly – I could see only that they were in colour – and on looking at one of them this ex-soldier of mine got to his feet and walked over to the window to try to prevent us from seeing him retching.

‘God,' he whispered. He stared at Reece hard. ‘Did he have the kind of information that would be of real use to serious criminals?'

‘Well, the names of all his colleagues and those in charge, of course, but that's about it. He certainly wasn't in possession of the kind of stuff that's mostly inside my head. And we're not that high-flown a department, merely CID with a few knobs on.'

‘That begs the question of who they might have
thought
he was. Are these people, one wonders, into the kind of activities that would attract the attention of the Anti-Terrorism Branch or those sectors that were merged to create SOCA? Or I suppose it's possible inflicting such torment wasn't in an attempt to learn anything but just to make some sadist feel all nice and warm inside.' These last words had been uttered, as he handed back the folder, in a voice choking with disgust. ‘Perhaps you'd be good enough, Superintendent, to let me have a copy of the case notes contained in this. And the pictures of those characters that you sent to the Met.'

‘Certainly,' Reece said. ‘You can have them right now. Will you visit the scene where Morley's body was found?'

Patrick nodded. ‘Yes, probably straight after we leave here. Not that I would presume to discover anything that your people have missed. We find it helps, that's all.'

‘There's a map marked with the exact location in the file. I'll get that copied for you as well.'

‘You're not very good at hiding your feelings,' Patrick explained when we were on our own. ‘That's why I didn't want you to see anything that might possibly be the work of James's father. He'd know, just by looking at you, that you were upset and an abomination had taken place.' He added, ‘But I'm glad you didn't see them for your own sake, too. I almost threw up.'

‘But you must have seen all kinds of ghastly sights when you were a serving officer,' I said, actually quite shocked at how it had affected him.

‘I did, but in time of enemy action your real concerns are tactics, your responsibility for the living, and you learn to concentrate on all that. The worst things were the bomb disposal people who got it wrong when I was in Northern Ireland.'

The media descriptions of the finding of the body in ‘woodland near Bristol' appeared to be inaccurate and after wending our way along country lanes we found ourselves bouncing over rough ground and scrubland on the edge of a rubbish tip near Bradley Stoke, the second time the place had featured that morning. Patrick was doing the navigating – we were at the correct grid reference but at the follow-your-nose stage – and we duly topped a slight rise and headed down towards what was indeed a small wood. Incident tape was stretched between some of the trees, creating a restricted area. There was no sign of any police presence now but the ground was churned up from the recent movements of vehicles.

As we went downhill, now on a track of sorts, the ground became wetter. I could see that it was very dark within the wood, water glinting in a couple of places where light penetrated the leaf canopy and, when the engine was turned off, the sound of a trickling stream could be heard. But this was not an attractive place, the air sour with the smell of rotting rubbish on the nearby tip, the thin grass yellow and sickly-looking. The stream, looking more like a polluted run-off, was a strange grey, almost metallic colour and in the small pools that had formed revolved large blobs of revolting yellow scum.

Neither of us spoke as we left the car and walked down to the edge of the trees. Over to our right seagulls circled in the dusty air above the tip and excavators growled somewhere out of sight in the distance. Huge piles of topsoil had been dumped right up to the trees and I could see a day, soon, when this little wood would be buried for ever.

We ducked under the tape and entered, pausing to allow our eyes to accustom to the gloom. The spot where Morley's body had been found was quickly obvious; the vegetation, such as it was, in a shallow ditch flattened and bruised with a kind of greasy sheen to it, footprints everywhere. I knew that when investigations had ceased all traces of murder would be removed and wondered why no one was here to prevent incursions by the curious or ghoulish. Then I saw that there was indeed a police presence; a patrol car just visible through the trees over to the left. It appeared that we might have arrived by the ‘scenic' route. Surely they had heard us.

‘Say nowt,' Patrick whispered. ‘It would be polite to go over and say hello but …' His voice trailed away as he crouched down on the edge of the ditch from which arose the smell of putrefaction.

I felt sick. Looking around, it was obvious that the trees were dying, leaning on one another, the trunks at ground level black and slimy, the bark, in places, falling off. Branches had also fallen and lay, one on another, rotting into the wet ground. The pools of water had an iridescent gleam as though oil lay on the surface. It probably did. Dark, Sherlockian and bog-ridden? I had been very naîve: I now knew what those words really meant.

I turned and went away.

After a few minutes Patrick joined me in the Range Rover.

‘You've been crying,' he observed softly.

‘This is an evil and disgusting place,' I whispered.

I could not write the book now.

As Bristol CID had undertaken a search of the whole area, even raking through the pools, without finding any clues, there was no point in us lingering. Patrick did have second thoughts about making ourselves known to the crew of the area car and went back to speak to them. It turned out they had been expecting us, having been given our vehicle's registration. Then we left.

‘Will you be offended if I ask you to go home for a few days while I endeavour to chase down these missing informers?' Patrick said as we were driving away.

‘Because I'm getting all emotional?' I queried, hearing the resentment in my voice.

‘No, because I can't see the point in dragging you around neck-end Bristol pubs, which is no doubt where they usually hang out. I was wondering if you'd undertake a little discreet surveillance at Sheepwash Farm – I don't think we're finished with the place yet.'

‘I might,' I said grumpily.

‘But please don't go inside any of the buildings. Someone might have returned and rigged up another nasty surprise.'

‘But surely the local police will have sealed them all off.'

‘They may well have done. But don't take any chances.'

I should, after all this time, have got used to Patrick just walking away, taking one of the small bags containing a few necessities that we always keep in the car and going from my sight, either into the countryside, or as now, a busy city centre. I have not: I have a horror that, one day, it will be the last time and I will never see him again. He did not want the car, it was of no use to him, even a hindrance on this kind of job.

My only comfort was that, before he joined the army, Patrick went off by himself and learned all kinds of things; his survival package, he calls it. He has not burdened me with full details – most wives probably would not want to know any more – but it meant that when he started training for Special Services he could show the instructors a thing or two. It is actually a side to him that I prefer not to dwell on too much as I have witnessed what he can do. But it keeps him alive in the most dangerous and nightmarish situations.

I
had a nightmare that night; of a tall, shambling scarecrow figure climbing the creepers on the cottage wall outside my bedroom window, all the while making strange hissing sounds. The mouth and eyes were just black holes in a strange sacking mask it was wearing but within, in the malevolent darkness, there seemed to exist a being. When it got into the room and I was trying to fight it off I discovered that although immensely strong it was, after all, just made of straw. Then I woke up, drenched in sweat.

Despite what he had said, I was sure now that Patrick had felt the need to remove me, temporarily, from the forefront of the investigation into the case of the horribly murdered policeman. This occurred to me when I was sitting in the kitchen sipping a mug of tea after my dream. An over-active imagination is the penalty you pay when you write books, I was all too aware, a fact that was not lost on the man in my life either. It was a little before six, the morning already light, the sound of birdsong entering through the window I had just opened.

I heard movement and Matthew, another early bird, came in. He closely resembles his uncle at that age, especially now with this grave expression on his young face.

‘Are you all right, Auntie?' he asked, not used to seeing me at this hour. Both he and Katie call me that for their mother is still alive. She is an alcoholic and since illicitly trying to gain possession of valuable jewellery their father left them in his will has no legal access to them.

‘I had a bad dream, that's all,' I answered.

Normally, and as previously mentioned, Patrick and I live in the converted barn across the courtyard. My return home had meant that I could give Carrie, the nanny, time off, and she had gone into Plymouth to see friends and spend the night with her mother. I had slept in the spare bed in her room.

‘What was it about?' Matthew wanted to know when I had given him some tea.

‘A horrible scarecrow.'

He gave me a reassuring smile. ‘You were remembering the ones in
Doctor Who
. They were
terrific
! Just men inside though, actors.'

Just a man inside, I pondered. Just a man, acting, a common-or-garden crook.

So he was.

As we had arranged, Patrick kept in touch. We did not speak; he merely rang the landline or my mobile number for the next couple of evenings, allowing it to ring three times and then hanging up. It saved any conversations being overheard by the wrong people and, with the criminal fraternity becoming ever more sophisticated as far as electronic gadgets are concerned, prevented calls being traced. All I could gather from this, of course, was that he was still in one piece and on the job.

I could picture the scene: the scruffy, unshaven individual leaning on the bar or playing darts with the locals, succeeding in looking the worse for wear after drinking hardly anything at all, blending in, keeping his eyes open. He might decide to start a fight at closing time and even get himself arrested. There is a side to him that enjoys making trouble and blacking a few of the eyes of the ungodly if he thinks he can learn something useful from it. He would have made a first-class criminal.

I thought the business of my keeping discreet surveillance on Sheepwash Farm rather a ploy on Patrick's part to make me feel as though I was still being useful. But, as usual, I did as requested on the third day at home, setting off mid-morning, the first two being devoted to the children and things like paying bills and organizing the farrier for George and Fudge.

The weather was absolutely appalling, a real Dartmoor downpour, so by the time I had fought my way over the flooded tracks I had reached the mental state of ‘bugger everything', decided to drop the ‘discreet' and drove all the way to the farm. I was damned if I was going to get soaked to the skin and not for one moment expected anyone to be around.

But there were plenty of people around; mostly police by the look of it.

I
found somewhere to park on the rough hillside, put boots on and sploshed my way towards the entrance to the yard, the steep stony path a fast-flowing stream such was the force of the rain that somehow turned sharp right and disappeared into the byre when everything indicated that it should carry on straight though the front door of the house. I suddenly remembered the name of the senior officer who had arrived when we had found the booby-trapped suitcase.