On the Loose (22 page)

‘This is an area of historical importance,’ said Xander Toth, the leader of the Battlebridge action committee, ‘but ADAPT has no respect for the capital’s heritage. Time and time again it has attempted to bypass planning restrictions.’

‘The residents were consulted at every stage of the planning process, and their rights are being carefully observed,’ the company’s Senior Public Relations Officer, Chris Lowry, told us. ‘Many of these protesters are former offenders and ex-employees with grudges who have nothing better to do with their time.’

The construction area is now being guarded twenty-four hours a day to prevent acts of vandalism. Work to the west of the York Way area is not expected to be completed for another three years.

Arthur Bryant and Janice Longbright met with Terry Delaney’s girlfriend, a hard-faced blonde who stood on the street furtively smoking until it was time to be interviewed. Her name was Casey, and Longbright thought she looked like a younger, more feral version of Delaney’s wife. She had been informed that Delaney was dead, and was handling the news without emotion.

‘I don’t know why I was with him,’ she told the detectives. ‘All he ever did was talk about his ex. I said to him, “There’s three of us in this relationship. Someone’s got to go,” but he never got around to making a choice.’

‘Did he have any financial worries?’ asked Longbright. ‘Was he broke?’

‘Terry didn’t like talking about money. I got the impression he was behind on his child support, but that’s nothing unusual, is it? I mean, with men.’

‘What about the evenings when you didn’t see him? Where did he go?’

‘Down the pub with his mates, the usual stuff.’

‘Any problems?’ asked Bryant. ‘Drink, drugs, gambling? Anything that would get him into debt?’

‘Not that I know of. We’d both been through some hard times, but he’s a good man.’ That phrase again, suggestive of strong morals and respectability but conveying nothing of use.

‘What sticks most in your mind when you try to describe him?’

‘He’s dependable,’ said Casey, her face softening. ‘He’s one of those people who picks up everyone else’s rubbish in the street. He’d tell off a kid for putting his feet on a bus seat. He was always trying to help people he hardly knew. Like, there was this woman he was trying to trace.’

Bryant’s ears pricked up. ‘What kind of woman?’

‘Terry had something of hers and wanted to return it, but I have no idea what it was. I suppose I should have asked.’

‘Do you know who she was?’

‘No idea. But he was very anxious to get it sorted out quickly.’

‘Do you know if he succeeded?’ To Bryant this was a point of significance.

‘I don’t know. As I told you, the last time I saw him was on the Sunday night, when I stayed over. He’d already left for work by the time I got up.’

‘Can you think of a reason why anyone would want to hurt him?’ Longbright asked.

‘Not at all,’ Casey replied, at a loss. ‘As I said, everyone liked him. Terry was the sort of man you would go to if you were in trouble. A good man.’

‘You don’t murder someone because of their goodness,’ said Bryant, disappointed.

Colin Bimsley’s doctor said that his lack of spatial awareness had been exacerbated by the misalignment of his spine and the differing optical fields in his left and right eyes. None of which was any consolation when the detective constable fell over the edge of the fire escape at the rear of the Paradise Chip Shop.

‘Are you all right?’ called Banbury, who heard the crash.

‘I’m fine; I landed on my head. The railing was rotten. Give me a hand up, will you?’ Scrambling to his feet amidst bags of builders’ rubble and shards of shredded timber, Bimsley tried to find a way to climb back out of the stairwell.

He was rubbing his sore, stubbled pate when Banbury came out onto the fire escape. ‘I can’t lift you, you’re too big,’ he called down to the DC. Banbury was trying to work out a method of levering Bimsley up when his nostrils detected a familiar but highly unpleasant smell. He was instantly reminded of the odour that lingered on the lab coat of the PCU’s late medical examiner, Oswald Finch.

The dark space between the buildings housed the ventilation shaft of the takeaway, but had been used by builders as a dumping ground for the shop’s old interior.

‘Can you smell something?’ Banbury sniffed and followed his nose, sifting out the musky odours of mildew, moss and London dirt.

‘Rotten food,’ replied Bimsley.

‘Have a poke around down there, would you?’ Banbury indicated a wet, dark corner filled with plastic sacks.

‘I’ve got my good shoes on, Dan. I’m going out tonight.’

‘Just do it, would you?’

Pulling aside half a dozen bags stuffed with mortar and plaster, Bimsley dug down into the waste, listening to the scuttle of fleeing rodents.

In a cement bag, he came to the source of the smell. Gingerly opening the top of the sack, he shone his pencil torch inside.

A single blue eye glittered back at him.

Bimsley yelped in alarm, but was drawn back to the thing in the sack. The skull had been so badly battered that only the eye was left intact. ‘Oh, man.’ He covered his nose and instinctively released the bag.

‘What is it?’

‘I think we’ve located the missing part of the first Mr Delaney.’ He took another look. The head was surrounded by pale mounds of spaghetti, giving it the appearance of the Medusa. He realised that he was looking at the remaining piece of the body from the freezer, buried here where only someone with an acute sense of smell and a predilection for digging in trash would ever think of looking for it. ‘Maybe now we’ll find out who he really is. And how many of him there are.’

28
THE LAND DECIDES

R
aymond Land shifted about in his chair and rearranged the few items on his desk, then looked for something useful to do. Everyone else was busy, and he had no-one to talk to. He wasn’t needed here at the office, and he certainly wasn’t needed at home. The only person who had come to see him this morning was Crippen, and that was because the cat wanted to be fed.

Life wasn’t fair. At least retirement would have allowed him regular games of golf. He had a little money saved, and might have taken a holiday somewhere far away, South America perhaps. Leanne could have put her rhumba lessons to use. Heaven knows she’d taken enough of them. Instead, he was stuck in this crumbling warehouse, where chill winds crept in through the cracks in the walls, wondering if he would ever get warm again and how on earth he could be of help to anyone other than the cat.

Outside it was just starting to rain again. May in London, a month when nobody talked about anything but the weather. He sharpened a pencil. The bulb on his desk light flickered and went out. His chair had a wobbly leg. Folding a beer mat into quarters he bent down to use it as a makeshift prop, and found himself looking at a painted white line, about an inch wide. The
line came to a point under his foot, then set off again beneath his desk.

Puzzled, Land rose and pushed back his chair.

Another point, further to the left, went under the ancient, moth-eaten Persian rug Bryant had thrown down on the floor. Land lifted a corner with his shoe to see where the line went next. It disappeared under the desk, so he moved the desk and rolled the rug back.

‘Mr Bryant—’ His voice rose and broke. He cleared his throat and tried again. ‘Arthur, may I have a word with you?’

After what seemed like an age, Bryant stuck his head around the door. ‘What is it? I’m very busy, you know.’

‘There’s a pentacle under my desk.’

Bryant came into the room and made an elaborate fuss about getting out his spectacles. Fitting the wires firmly behind his ears, he peered at the floor. ‘So there is.’

Land was outraged. ‘Have there been Satanists up here?’

‘I really have no idea.’

‘I’m sure you do. You always have an idea. You pretend you’re dotty, but you know a hawk from a handsaw. You’ve probably got a dossier on this place tucked among those weird books you keep.’

‘Is this all you wanted?’ asked Bryant irritably. ‘You do know we’ve got a murder investigation on our hands? Perhaps I can be allowed to return to my—’

‘No, it’s not all,’ said Land plaintively. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing anymore. I don’t have a purpose. You always know what to do. What should I do?’

‘Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Nobody takes any notice of you because you don’t do anything. You sit there worrying. People do peculiar things and you can’t understand why. Life is short and filled with pain, and just when you start to finally get
the hang of it, you drop dead. So pull yourself together and give me a hand. Do something and make a difference. I have over a hundred blurry photocopies of land-purchase agreements to go through, and could really use some help.’

Land should have been annoyed. There was a murderer on the loose, time was running out, and he had no idea what Bryant was doing with property contracts, but as he followed Bryant’s instructions he felt strangely elated.

‘I was told I’d find Xander Toth here,’ said John May. He had come to the Camley Street Natural Park, an urban nature reserve run by the London Wildlife Trust, to talk to the leader of the Battlebridge Action Group. The small sanctuary consisted of woods and wetlands backing onto the canal, and had been reclaimed from the former red-light district. The site had originally been a coal drop for the railway, but after the discovery of wild orchids growing by the water it had been reborn as a wildlife park. Toth worked here as one of the volunteer gardeners.

‘He’s planting, over there on the bank,’ answered the girl who was refilling the bird-feeders at the entrance. May followed her directions and picked his way across a muddy meadow filled with reedmace, wondering if he was about to meet the abductor who stalked the lonely road leading from the Keys nightclub. He decided to take a soft approach to the subject and let his suspect speak out.

‘Xander Toth?’ he called.

‘You’re the other one, aren’t you?’ Toth set aside his spade and pulled off his gardening gloves, leaning over to shake May’s hand. He was standing in a dell filled with evening primrose, hollyhocks and oxeye daisies.

‘Detective John May. You know me?’

‘I saw you talking to Marianne Waters the other day. You think I’m a troublemaker.’

‘I didn’t say that. I know you want to build a pagan temple on the site of St Pancras Old Church, but that’s about it.’

Toth grinned. ‘See, that’s the kind of quote that’s taken out of context.’

‘Maybe you should have thought more carefully before you gave it.’

‘People will think I’m crazy whatever I say.’

‘Are you? It’s the kind of thing that can really damage a good cause.’

‘No, I’m not crazy. I’m committed.’

‘And you don’t believe in compromise.’

‘Tell me, Mr May, how would that work? ADAPT gives back a little corner of land so that we can erect a maypole or something, donates a little money toward the restoration of the graveyard in return for sticking up some sponsor plaques? And we agree to back off so they can build London’s largest shopping mall on public property?’

‘That’s a very cynical outlook, Mr Toth. The world moves on; you can’t go back in time.’

‘I don’t want to go back. I want people to have what’s rightfully theirs. ADAPT has spent years perfecting the art of turning people out on the street and making them feel grateful for it.’

‘Tell me something I don’t understand. You have fewer than thirty registered members on your side. That’s according to your own Web site. If all these people you say you represent can’t even be bothered to stand up for their own land, why should you care?’

Toth looked down at the freshly turned earth and shook his head. ‘You know how quickly areas can change? ADAPT
demolished all the buildings on the land they bought, and ploughed up the ground. Since then, wildlife has started returning to the region. Geese, herons, foxes, rare flowers, migrating wild birds not seen here for decades. Do you believe that the landscape in which you grow up has the power to shape you?’

‘Of course. Inner-city kids are very different from ones who—’

‘I’m not talking about demographics. The land on which we build our houses decides who we are. If you thought your environment had become harmful, how would you feel about raising a child in it? I’m about to become a father.’

‘How much do you know about the history of this area?’

‘Pretty much everything there is to know. It’s my specialist subject. I talk to the local people and try to educate them about it.’

May thought back to what his partner had told him about the myths born in the ancient woodlands of Battlebridge. ‘Then you know how strongly it’s associated with the image of a man in horns. You have the knowledge, Mr Toth. You have the motive. Who else is it more likely to be?’

‘You’re accusing me, Detective. What are you going to do—apply for a warrant to search my home?’

‘You were supposed to provide my partner with times and dates of your whereabouts. We’re still waiting for that list. Several of your members have criminal records for drug offences. Your flat is listed as the registered address of the Battlebridge Action Group. If there are reasonable grounds for me to suspect that there are drugs on your premises, I don’t have to apply for a warrant. If I find anything that connects you with the stag-man, I’m going to arrest you.’

‘Oh, really?’ Toth studied him with interest. ‘What are you going to charge me with?’

May was suddenly struck by the absurdity of the idea. If Toth was responsible, what had he actually
done?
A few workers had walked out, and one man had broken his ankle in an accident that had arguably been caused by a hallucinated sighting of Veles, a Romanian childhood legend. What about the girl the stag-man had supposedly abducted? She had apparently vanished into the night sky, no name, no identity, no loved ones to even report her missing. May had nothing. He was chasing an invisible man.