Dead Dream Girl (8 page)

‘What sort of day have you had?’ Crane asked her, as they waited for Anderson over the drinks.

‘The sort of day I always have. I’m a checkout, remember?’

‘But you must be in line for some kind of promotion after all this time.’

She coloured in that way she had. ‘Oh, I don’t want a promotion. I’m happy with the girls. If I took a step up I’d be over them and it wouldn’t be the same.’

Crane thought, poor kid, she had so little confidence, seemed so defenceless against peer pressure, not just among the sort of women who lived on the Willows, but among her mates on the tills.

‘Funny you should mention it though, because my supervisor said did I want to think about moving up a peg.’

That would have been when she’d ditched the tousled hair and the layers of make-up, Crane guessed. ‘Why not go for it, Patsy?’

‘The other girls, they’d think … they can be a bit catty.’

‘You’d learn to live with it. And you’d get on, make more money. You always felt Donna had all the attention and you lost out. Well, now’s the time to make up for it.’

‘Oh, I don’t know, Frank.’

‘Just
go
for it. If they’re wanting to promote you they must think you’re the right type.’

Patsy had never known her confidence to be given such a boost. But then, she’d never known anyone like Frank. He never seemed to be flannelling, he just seemed to say exactly what he thought. And he must think there was
something
about her …

Crane felt it was the least he could do, help her find herself after the years of living in her sister’s shadow, of unsuitable men, mundane work. A quid pro quo for the help she’d already given him and that she would
hopefully
continue to give him. It would help to ease the slight persistent guilt a little.

Anderson came rushing in, holding a collapsible stand that already had a flipchart screwed to it.

Crane said, ‘What’s all this?’

‘If we’re brainstorming we might as well do this as methodically as possible.’

‘What’s wrong with using our memories, for Christ’s sake?’

‘If we write everything down here nothing gets
overlooked
. And Patsy’s memory won’t have had the training ours have had.’

‘You can say that again, Geoff,’ she said, but she was very pleased to be involved like this with two men who were so different from the sorts of men she was used to.

As usual, it went against all Crane’s instincts, which were to work alone and keep his cards close. Yet he’d done exactly this type of thing in the police force, when information was coming in by the shed load, the felt tips on the white boards, noting everything that seemed
crucial. But then, they’d all been police together, working to a common goal. Anderson had his own agenda, and if everything went on the flipchart he’d almost certainly feel more in control, no detail lost for the big feature he’d set his ambitions on, with Crane unable to get too far ahead of him. Crane wondered what it mattered if it got them anywhere? Except that his professional pride was coming into it now and he
wanted
to get there ahead of Anderson.

‘Do you guys want a drink?’

They both nodded and Anderson said, ‘I like your new hairstyle, Patsy, by the way. You’ve changed it haven’t you since I used to visit your folks?’

‘Glad you like it,’ she said, going quickly off to the kitchen.

‘She’s different,’ he said. ‘Just used to sit there when I was talking to Connie and Malc. Hair a dog, make-up laid on with a trowel, tended to be sullen.’

‘She did a good job for me with Greenwood and I told her so. I’m also encouraging her to go for promotion. She’s not a bad kid, just lost her confidence with the spotlight always being on Donna.’

‘Donna was a taker and she had a lot to answer for.’ He turned back to the flip chart and wrote the word DONNA at the top of the first page in felt tip and underlined it. ‘Right,’ he said briskly. ‘Let;s jot down on this page everyone we know to have been in contact with her.’

‘Maybe we should start with the kid who found her.’

He shrugged. ‘If you like, but that’s all he did, find the body. I tried to get a little story out of him but he was having nightmares and it was his father who gave me the outline and then told me to sod off, they’d all had more
than enough with the police.’ (But he wrote down LIAM PATTERSON.

‘Thanks, Patsy,’ he said, taking his drink from the offered tray. ‘Donna knew Clive Fletcher before Joe Hellewell, right?’

‘She was barely out of school before Fletcher got his beady eye on her. God knows how he does it.’ She gave a shudder. ‘
Cre-epy
.’

‘He trawls the clubs,’ he told her. ‘I’ve seen him around.’

‘The photographer,’ Crane said, ‘who may or may not have talked her into nude photography? You gave him a clean bill of health in your reports.’

‘I had to watch my step. The readers know him as a weddings and babies man. It was only the insiders who knew the truth and they didn’t talk.’ His grin was faintly conspiratorial. There was plenty a skilled journalist could imply about a man like Fletcher, but Crane guessed it was to be the big story again, with Donna cast as the innocent she’d looked. Anderson said, ‘I suggest we see the bloke as soon as we can.’ He wrote down CLIVE FLETCHER on the chart and below that he wrote JOE HELLEWELL.

‘
He
was a bit creepy too,’ Patsy said. ‘He was good looking and seemed all right, so I don’t really know why. Only met him the once.’

‘Agreed. Another arsehole and I couldn’t get a fix on him either. Attractive wife. Gave an impression she was making do. We’ll see him as well. Pity about the rock hard alibi.’

Crane knew this was going to be the problem. The case had been picked over in such detail he wondered if there could possibly be any area left he could shine his own
little torch into that hadn’t already been floodlit. He picked up the felt tip and scribbled MARVIN JACKSON and EFFIE.

‘What’s all this?’ Anderson said. ‘Patsy’s
brother
?’

‘Donna was definitely putting the squeeze on Marvin for some hold she had over him,’ Crane said. He wasn’t going to spell it out, not in front of Patsy.

‘How do you know this?’

‘Patsy tipped me off and I went to see him.’

‘Now come on, you bugger, I thought we’d agreed to act together.’ He spoke lightly and with his usual disarming grin, but Crane could sense the underlying irritation. He was beginning to realize just how much of a control freak Anderson really was and how driven to try and take over. And this was the second time Crane had come up with an extra angle on a case he’d lived and breathed. The reporter gave Patsy a slight look of reproach. It was clear he felt it was him she should have tipped off.

She reddened. ‘I told no one at the time, Geoff. It wasn’t just because he was my brother, it was because I had a bloody good idea …’

She broke off, embarrassed. Crane said, ‘What Patsy’s saying is that Marvin probably had the best alibi of all. We think the police believe he was involved in an unrelated matter that night.’

Anderson didn’t like that either, even if you could barely tell, but Crane didn’t want him rushing into print about anything to do with antique guns until Benson was good and ready.

‘All right, you cagey sod,’ Anderson said, in the amused tone he’d perfected, ‘but I’ve got my own snouts at the station.’

‘Fair enough,’ Crane said. ‘Anyway Marvin’s live-in’s another matter. Effie. She detested Donna. Whether she detested her enough to kill her and had the nous is highly unlikely but not impossible. Let’s regard her as a long shot.’

Anderson turned back to the flip chart and began to write each name listed on the front sheet on to a separate sheet of its own. His edgy movements told Crane that behind the collected exterior he was still very annoyed. ‘Now,’ he said, can we think of anyone else she knew who might have a possible motive? Anyone at all. Patsy?’

‘That was the trouble, she knew so many people, mainly blokes. And she was so secretive. She got off on it. She’d only ever hint at things. “I’m going for a Chinese with this guy who has a look of Brad Pitt. If Bobby comes round tell him I’m at Auntie Linda’s.” All that stuff.’

‘OK. Now, on these separate sheets let’s think about motivation. Take Fletcher. Maybe Donna got to know too much about his operation but refused to get involved herself?’ He jotted down KNEW TOO MUCH?

Crane said, ‘Blackmail?’ Anderson wrote that down too.

‘He might have lost it with her because she’d not have sex with him,’ Patsy said. ‘She led blokes on, even when there was no way she was going to sleep with them.’

He scribbled down CRIME OF PASSION?

They did the same for the others, working through possible motives. Crane had to grudgingly admit that it did help focus their minds, especially Patsy’s, and time passed quickly.

‘Well, that makes a start, you guys,’ Anderson said, flicking his thick mop of wavy hair back and finishing his drink. ‘Every time we get back here we jot down
everything 
we’ve turned up. Oh, is it OK to use your pad, Patsy?’

She nodded quickly, touchingly eager to be of use.

‘I’ll be off then. But you will keep me on message, Frank?’

‘The problem’s solved, isn’t it,’ Crane said, with an ironic smile of his own, ‘now you’ve got the flip chart up and running?’

‘I’m a reporter and we do like to be where it’s at when anything’s actually happening.’

It was a fair point, Crane supposed, but it emphasized again the separate directions they were coming from, the newspaperman anxious for all the publicity and headlines he could grab, and the PI, keen to keep his work and himself as low profile as possible. He’d always sensed that taking the chance of working with him was going to be a two-edged sword.

The atmosphere seemed flat when Anderson had gone as when he was around you could almost feel the energy he seemed to throw off like blown air.

‘Another drink, Frank?’

‘A very small one,’ he said, telling himself to bring a little stock of booze with him next time, the kid had little enough spare cash. He flicked through the sheets of the flip chart. Could it be one of them, he wondered, or one of those secret punters who might never now be traced, however hard they brainstormed? He sighed.

‘Thanks.’ He took the fresh drink she handed him. She seemed to be mutating before his eyes. It wasn’t just the hair and the make-up she was looking to, but also her clothes. She wore a crisp white square-neck top, lilac, narrow leg trousers and newish black mules. He sat with
her on the sofa. It was obvious she’d loved working with them this evening.

‘Patsy, when the police searched Donna’s room after she’d gone missing they’d have been hoping to find letters, a diary. Especially a diary.’

She nodded. ‘That’s what Mr Benson said. We were there while they went through her things. They found nothing like that and they looked everywhere, even under the mattress. Her bed has drawers in the base, they took every single thing out.’

‘Did they look under the carpet?’

She shook her head. ‘It’s fitted. You can’t move it.’

‘There could just be a little part that’s loose. My granny used to keep a few tenners in an envelope in a place like that.’

‘I could take another look.’

‘Might be worth a try. Has anything been done with the place since?’

She shook her head, gave a slight grimace. ‘They’ve kept it exactly as it was. Like a … what’s the word?’

‘Shrine?’

She nodded. ‘I’ll have a scout round next time I’m there.’

‘Good girl.’

He got ready to go. He patted her arm, gave her a warm smile. She was searching for her own self-worth as hard as he was searching for Donna’s killer. And it seemed that Donna had had to die for the complex chain reaction to be triggered which could lead to Patsy being given a chance to live.

Later, Patsy couldn’t sleep for thinking about him. Three times he’d been here and would be here more, with
Geoff, the men
listening
to what she had to say, so keen to use what little she knew. She’d never known anything like it. She wondered, could Crane be, could he possibly be, interested in her? She knew she wasn’t much of a looker, but neither was he, but what a bloke! He really seemed to like coming here, having a drink with her, and she didn’t think he was living with anyone, at least that was the feeling she had. Life had never seemed like it was now, and it was just since she’d met Frank.

C
rane blended in with the women and scattering of men who waited to pick on up their children. As Liam Patterson only lived a couple of roads away, and it was summer, Crane hoped he took himself home. The boy came drifting across the playground with two others. ‘Liam? Liam Patterson? Could I have a word with you?’

He eyed Crane suspiciously. He was small but chunky, with spiky brown hair, a pink, downy face and a snub nose. ‘You think I’m getting in that car, pal, you’re out of your tree,’ he said in a piping voice. ‘We don’t go nowhere with strangers.’

Crane put on a friendly smile. ‘I’m not asking you to, Liam. I’m helping the police. About the lady in the reservoir.’

‘Not
that
again. Haven’t they nobbled anyone? The fuzz are rubbish.’

‘Couldn’t catch a fish in a bucket!’

‘Couldn’t catch a burglar with a wooden leg!’

‘Couldn’t catch a torcher with his pants on fire!’ The list of police inadequacy went on for some time. Crane waited patiently. At least the three seemed in no hurry to move on.

‘When you used to swim in the reservoir, how late would you stay?’

‘Listen, we need to split, mister—’

‘Ninety-nines all round if you answer a couple of
questions
.’ Glancing cautiously about him, Crane showed them the edge of a fiver.

‘You don’t want no change?’

‘It’s yours.’

‘You couldn’t make it a tenner?’

‘No.’

‘OK, man, a couple of questions.’

‘Swimming in the reservoir, how late would you stay?’

‘Till it started getting dusky. Till the funny men started hanging about, up on the other reservoir.’

‘Funny men?’

‘Queers,’ he said.

‘Poofters,’ said another.

‘Arse bandits,’ said the third.

They began to giggle.

‘Did any of these men talk to you boys?’

‘Only Ollie.’

‘Ollie?’

‘Ollie Stringer. He’s always around. He’d watch us swimming. Didn’t try nothing on though. Daren’t. We’d have had the Bill on him, no bother.’

‘The police have
some
uses then?’ But the blank stares reminded Crane that youngsters didn’t usually do irony. ‘What does he look like, this Ollie?’

‘Fat. Has glasses with no edges. Always wears a straw hat.’

‘Look … Liam, you went home when the light started going, but did you ever see the lady called Donna at Tanglewood with anyone when she was still alive?’

‘You said two questions, mister. This is about ten.’

‘That’s the last one,’ Crane said, giving the knowing urchin another warm smile. ‘Can you remember someone as pretty as the lady was with a bloke around there?’

‘Nah, she was just dead meat to me, buddy.’

Crane wondered which forbidden shocker he’d been watching,
Goodfellas
or
Reservoir Dogs?
But then the boy’s downy face became impassive in the afternoon sun and he wondered how many frightful, recurrent dreams he’d had about trawling the bottom of a murky sheet of water and getting hold of a handful of pale dead flesh.

‘Frank Crane.’

‘It’s Terry Jones, Frank. How are you doing?’

‘Nice to hear from you, Terry.’ It was too, DI Terry Jones had once been Crane’s boss when he’d been in the force.

‘Marvin Jackson. Ted tells me it’s time for some
collar-feeling
.’

‘I’m certain he’ll admit to the fancy guns. Otherwise he knows he’ll be a suspect for Donna’s death. She was
definitely
into him for money.’

He gave Jones the details of what had happened between Jones and his sister. ‘He’s scared shitless about any of that coming out. He knows he’s just got the one option.’

‘Bloody good effort, Frank. I’ve been in touch with Leicester, that’s where the guns were sold in a district auction. A go-between put them in the sale, then the gang bought them back themselves, cash down. It only cost them a small commission and then they’ve got a bona fide bill of sale to show private buyers they’re the legal owners.’

‘Clever stuff.’

‘No one can fix these things like Dougie. The police still haven’t nabbed the gear but they know damn fine who’s involved. If your friend Marvin coughs we’ll be able to establish a link between Dougie and the gang, and we should be in business.’

‘Glad I could help, Terry.’

‘Tell me, are you still working on the Jackson case?’

‘The Jacksons rehired me. I told them your people would be making a fresh start, but they’d not take no for an answer. I’ll not get under your feet.’

‘You never do. And as far as I’m concerned, the more brains involved in that particular can of worms the better. You must come for a bite of supper one night, Frank …’

Jones put down his phone. Christ, he wished Crane were back. There’d been big trouble. Crane had fixed some evidence against one of the most evil types the city had ever known. Top class lawyers had picked up on it, Crane was out. Jones sighed, turned back to the file on the antique guns. It hadn’t been just down to Crane, but also to Ted Benson, he was sure of it. He was sure too that Crane had taken the burn for the lot, as he was single and Benson had kids and a sick wife. That was the sort of bloke Crane was, apart from being the sharpest Jones had ever had on his team.

It had been a clear day and the setting sun was now a bright sliver through the dense trees of the low hills that surrounded the two sheets of water. Mallard, moorhens and Canada Geese clucked softly at the water’s edge, their night quarters beneath overhanging foliage. Crane climbed the curving flight of wide stone steps that led
from the lower to the upper reservoir. He spotted the straw hat almost instantly, on the head of a plump man in rimless glasses, who sat on a bench at the side of the perimeter track, gazing out over still water.

Crane sat on the same bench, about a yard from him. His faded blue eyes darted to Crane’s through strong lenses. He had soft, pink, blobby features that gave an impression his face had no real bone structure. He wore a neatly ironed blue shirt and chinos. ‘Looking for company, dear?’ he said hopefully, in a high, slightly wheezing tone.

‘Are you Ollie?’

He gave a little smile. ‘Perhaps I should say, “Who’s asking?” like they do on the telly.’

‘Frank Crane.’

‘It’s a nice name and you’ve a nice friendly smile, but I don’t believe I’ve seen it before, so it makes me just a tad wary.’

‘Remember a young woman called Donna Jackson, Ollie?’

‘Dear boy, if you’re a bobby, despite that disarming cotton shirt and those form-fitting linen trousers, I shan’t even admit to being called Ollie. I’m Bill Brown to the police, Frank Crane, always was.’

‘I’m just a private investigator, working for Donna’s parents.’

‘Don’t believe I like PI much either, dear, it’s like saying you’re not a crab but a lobster. They can both give you a very nasty nip.’

A twenty-pound note rustled between Crane’s fingers.

‘Oh!’ Ollie gave a little coquettish scream. ‘
Specie
. I’m quite overwhelmed. It’s usually the other way about, duckie, when you get to my age.’

‘Look, Ollie, I know you don’t talk to the police, you and your friends up here. I’m not wanting to intrude. I’m just an ordinary bloke working for two very distressed people whose daughter was strangled and dumped in the lower reservoir. Now it’s not easy to get to Tanglewood without wheels unless you live nearby. I daresay you all have a fix on one another’s motors, was there one you couldn’t place roundabout the time she went missing?’

‘You’re dead wrong there, dear.
I
can’t afford wheels on my bit of pension. Out through the door at fifty. “We’re having to downsize, Ollie, I’m afraid,” he says. “Oh,” I say, “is it just gays you’re downsizing, Mr Havercroft because you only look to be downsizing by one?” Didn’t know where to look, love, didn’t know where to
put
himself. Terrified I’d go to the Tribunal. But I still got bleeding downsized.’

‘But you know everyone, Ollie, don’t you? I bet you’re their first port of call for a good gossip.’

He liked that, almost simpered. ‘Well, yes, they do like chewing the fat with their Auntie Ollie. That’s what they call me. So very Gallic.’ He took the note from Crane’s fingers almost absently. ‘Well, you have a trustworthy face. Now this is absolutely on the qui vive. We did see rather a lot of a young chap called Adrian along here, and the whisper was that he’d been seen getting out of a motor with your Donna and going off round the bottom
reservoir
.’

‘The night she—’

‘Oh, no.’ He broke Crane off. ‘It was a month or two before that.’

Crane was puzzled. ‘But … if he was one of your little group …?’

‘The word was he was a fiver each way, love.’

‘Bisexual?’

‘Never could get that carry-on together myself, but there you are.’

‘And he’s not been seen around any more? After that night?’

‘Oh, yes, he was around a good while after the upset. But he just drifted off in the end, like they very often do. Probably got work outside the area. Couldn’t say just when, I lose track of time at my age.’

‘But it was definitely him, getting out of the car with Donna?’

‘We’re almost certain, love. But it was dusky and he was wearing a cap and wasn’t in his usual car. That’s why it’s just a whisper, think on.’

‘What did he look like? How old?’

‘Fair, tallish, kept himself in nice shape. About forty.’

‘And you’re sure he was a fiver each way?’

‘Well, sometimes he’d be around and sometimes not, and when he wasn’t the word was he fancied the other side of the bed. And then there’d be those distasteful jokes flying around about the girlfriend being so confused she’d not know which way to turn.’ He pursed his lips in
disapproval
.

‘It’s worth another twenty, Ollie, if you can find out where this Adrian went, and what his surname and
occupation
were, and what make of car he mostly used. Someone here must have the inside track.’

The idea seemed to excite him, maybe gave a little zest to what must have been an empty existence since Mr Havercroft had been forced to let him go. ‘I’d not want my name coming into anything.’

‘You have my word. I always protect my sources.’

He liked that too. He adjusted his Panama hat so the brim came a little lower over his eyes. ‘All right, young man, I’ll see what I can do. I must say you’ve got a very persuasive manner with you.’

‘Good. I’ll be back here, same time, same bench, the evening after next, yes?’

Ollie touched his arm. ‘Are you quite sure you’re straight, dear?’

Crane grinned again. ‘Straight as a stick, Ollie. Awfully sorry I can’t oblige.’

The three of them stood in Patsy’s living room again. Crane had written OLLIE STRINGER on the chart and ADRIAN with a question mark, while telling them what Ollie had told him. Anderson listened with the crooked grin Crane was getting to know only too well. He’d studied a lot of body language in his time and he could tell that the reporter’s was beginning to tense.

‘I could have gone along too, Frank. I could have made time last night.’

‘I had to work on him to get him to speak to
me
. If I’d gone round there with a crime reporter he’d have been a write-off.’ Crane spoke more tersely than he’d intended. He was beginning to hate it, having to explain the way he worked, to write it all down, to know that Anderson was intent on controlling everything.

But Anderson began slowly nodding. ‘It’s a valid point.’ Then he put on one of his practised smiles in the old engaging way. ‘Well done, pal. I can see I’ve got a lot to learn from an expert like you.’

‘Just experience, that’s all. In this game you often find
yourself going over well-trodden ground and so you have to learn to look closer.’

There was a great deal more to it than that, but Crane knew they were exerting themselves to meet each other halfway, as they each had so much the other needed: Anderson’s knowledge of the case and Crane’s ability in the field. Even so, Crane was anxious to reach an answer to Donna’s killing before the reporter, if it were possible for anyone to. His pride was now very much involved in what Anderson clearly regarded as a competition.

Anderson said, ‘This Adrian guy makes my nose twitch.’

‘And mine.’

‘But would Donna have gone out with an AC/DC?’ he said, pulling a face. ‘What do you think, Patsy? HIV-wise, it might have been dodgy.’

‘There wasn’t much she didn’t know about safe sex,’ she said. ‘And anyway she might not have twigged what he was.’

Crane felt it could quite easily become near impossible for Anderson to attempt to profile Donna as the sweet innocent she’d looked if he ever did get to write that final story. He said, ‘Why might a bisexual have reason to kill her?’

‘Blackmail again?’ Anderson scribbled on the sheet now devoted to Adrian. ‘Maybe he’s married and his wife doesn’t know he’s AC/DC, and might have given him the welly if she’d found out.’

‘Bias at work if it came to light? It still happens.’

‘Perhaps another gay,’ Patsy said. ‘Jealous of Adrian going out with a woman.’

‘Nice one, Patsy,’ Crane said. Pleased, she began to redden.

‘But gays tend not to do violence,’ Anderson said.

‘Joe Orton wouldn’t have thought so.’

‘When do you aim to see Ollie again?’ The reporter spoke tentatively.

Crane also forced tact. ‘Tomorrow evening. We could both go, now he trusts me. You can be a colleague. He’ll take to a bloke with your looks.’

‘Bugger! I’m tied up. Can’t get out of it either. It’s an Asian girl being forced into a marriage against her will. She’s on the run and she’s made very complex
arrangements
to see me and talk about it. You couldn’t make it the evening after?’

‘Sorry. I’ve promised Ollie and it’s too hot a lead. I’ll make sure it all goes on your flip chart.’

That wasn’t the point, but Anderson smiled in cheerful resignation. ‘I’ve got to go now, but keep up the good work, Frank, and
do
keep me in touch, said he with a mirthless grin.’