The Death Collector (36 page)

‘I’m starting to think the same.’

Gina turned back towards him. ‘How well do you know Hugh? And I mean really know him.’

‘You know how I got the job. He did it before me and wanted to retire, and I had just left my old firm. I knew him from around the court and I used to enjoy his tales. War stories are fun sometimes.’

‘We had a different view of him in the Force.’

Joe frowned. ‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘I need to know everything. Kim gave me a taste, but I need more.’

‘This case is all about DCI Hunter,’ Gina said, leaning forward onto the desk, her hands clasped together. ‘I know what Hunter is like. I was in the same Force as him. He won’t have changed much, although the Force has, and is better for it. The legal system has probably gone the same way.’

‘You’re being too cryptic, Gina.’

‘Did you know that Hugh was once arrested?’

Joe was surprised. ‘No, I didn’t.’

‘It was about ten years ago. Before your time, I suppose. The top brass had become nervous about how close some of the defence lawyers were to the court clerks and judges. They thought it gave them an unfair advantage and looked into it.’

‘The clerks and judges are lawyers, just like me,’ Joe said. ‘There are bound to be friendships. Look at Kim and me, and I’ve even had a drink with judges away from the courtroom.’

‘But did you try to bribe them?’

‘Bribery?’

‘Yes, bribery, or so went the allegation. Undue influence and gifts. Football tickets for judges, court clerks being wined and dined at matches. It was corporate hospitality for those who were supposed to keep their distance.’

‘So what happened?’

‘Nothing, in the end. No one could prove that any case had been affected, but when they looked into Hugh, they found it went even further than court clerks. It went to the police too.’

‘The police?’

‘Yes,’ Gina said, nodding. ‘Does Hugh still have his apartment in Estepona?’

‘Spain? I don’t know.’

‘Ask him, and then ask him about his guests, and when they stayed there.’

‘No, why don’t you tell me? You seem to know a lot.’

‘Hunter has used it.’

‘Hang on. Are you saying that Hunter and Hugh are old friends?’ When Gina didn’t respond, he said, ‘How do you know?’

‘I know Hunter. He goes for every favour he can, and there were rumours about Hugh.’

‘Rumours? What are you talking about?’

Gina looked down and studied her hands for a while.

‘Gina?’

‘I’m breaching confidences here, and some of this is top secret, heavy stuff, secret squirrel information.’

‘It won’t go further than this room.’

‘Hugh was an informant,’ she said, and shrugged.

Joe was about to speak, but then he stopped himself, shocked, unsure as to what he could say.

‘An informant?’ he said eventually. ‘He was a defence lawyer.’

‘No, he was a businessman, and he found a way to keep the money coming in.’

Joe shook his head in disbelief. ‘That can’t be true.’

‘Do you think he’s a good lawyer?’

Joe hung his head. He remembered the conversation with Kim, and from what he remembered of Hugh’s advocacy, it was mostly endearing bumble. Like Kim said though, the magistrates sometimes liked that, and when you’ve been around for long enough, people listen to you.

‘He was never the sharpest,’ Joe said, ‘but I’ve known some very average lawyers get fierce loyalty from clients.’

‘But you’ve got to get them through the door first, and most of all, you’ve got to get the police to arrest them. So Hugh used to tip off against some of his clients, so that they would be arrested and he’d get the work.’

Joe shook his head in disbelief. ‘He would have been struck off if it had come out.’

Gina raised an eyebrow. ‘Do you think that would have been his biggest problem if it had?’

Joe understood what she meant. Criminal lawyers act for dangerous people but for the most part are not threatened by them. If his clients had found out that Hugh had been briefing the police against them, then nothing would have saved him.

‘That was where he went wrong,’ Gina said. ‘He couldn’t think beyond the next pay cheque, but do you think Hunter would care about that? I don’t know if it was just one bad year and he was under pressure to make more money, but once Hugh started selling out his clients, Hunter had him. Nothing explicit, but everyone knew about Hunter’s regular free holidays, and he wasn’t the only detective to enjoy them. And Hugh had to keep the tips coming, as well as more.’

‘More?’

‘Think about it,’ Gina said. ‘You’ve been involved in this case for a few days and you’ve started to pick it apart. Why couldn’t Hugh?’

‘I’ve been speaking to Martin Barlow, one of Aidan’s legal team. He said Hugh did a bad job.’

‘Hugh was smart. He did just enough to avoid an investigation from the Law Society, but I bet he could have done more. Hugh got his clients arrested, took the money, and the bargain with the police was that for their silence Hugh wouldn’t fight the cases too hard.’

‘He lost them on purpose?’

‘I’m just saying he didn’t fight very hard. Once it got round that Hugh was on a case, we used to think it was cut and dried. It didn’t always work out that way, but it often did.’

Joe paced as he thought about that. There was logic to it. Law firms depend on the police locking up their clients, and it goes in quiet patches sometimes. Joe could understand the temptation to generate extra income if a quiet patch went on too long.

‘So where do you think he is now?’ he said.

Gina dug into her pocket for her phone and tossed it over. Joe caught it, confused.

‘I haven’t forgotten how to follow people,’ she said.

Joe looked at the screen and his anger started to surge through him.

It was a picture of Hugh, and he was climbing into a car parked on one of the small cobbled streets near to Joe’s apartment. Joe recognised the driver.

‘Hunter,’ he said, looking up.

‘Straight after leaving your apartment,’ Gina said. ‘I waited for him after getting Kim’s call.’

Joe was angry. ‘So he offered to help just so he could keep Hunter up to date?’

‘He might be worrying about himself more. His panic will have started as soon as you called him, because he’ll know that if his world begins to unravel, so might Hunter’s, and Hunter will take everyone else down with him. It will only take a few words in the right ears to put Hugh’s life in danger, and he knows that.’

Joe leaned against the wall. ‘Why didn’t I spot what he was doing? I thought I could read people.’

‘Because you trusted him. We can all be blinded.’

Joe stared at Gina’s phone, finding it hard to believe the image. ‘So what do I do?’ he said eventually.

‘You use him like Hunter is using him, except you feed Hugh the false stuff.’

‘What like?’

‘I don’t know, but I’m sure you’ll think of something.’

‘So will you help me?’

‘I was all along. It’s just that you didn’t realise.’ When Joe held up his hands in apology, she said, ‘So what now?’

‘We’re looking for evidence of other murders or missing women. Something must have made David Jex act, and that can only be the realisation that they had got it wrong about Aidan. David had a bout of conscience and it cost him his life.’

‘But now the police have found his body, won’t they solve it all?’

‘They didn’t get it right with Rebecca Scarfield. I’d rather work this out for myself, just to make sure no one misses it.’ He pointed to the box of files taken from Carl’s house. ‘Take one each and we’ll go through them.’

He pulled out the first file. It was filled with the statements from Aidan’s case. He had read his own version and, as he flicked through, he saw that the statements were the same. No amendments or deletions. He put the file to one side. Then he went to the list of addresses that he had seen previously, the one with lines through, as if Carl had been checking them off. As Joe went through them again, he frowned. The list seemed shorter. Joe was sure there had been five pages, but now there seemed to be one less. And as he looked at the names in the folder, he saw that there was a gap in the alphabet, where the street names went straight from K to R. The third page was missing.

‘Have you been into these files for anything?’ he said.

Gina frowned. ‘Why would I?’

‘I don’t know. Curiosity?’

‘I’m not paid to be curious.’

‘There’s a page missing.’

As Gina looked over, she smiled. ‘That narrows it down, then. You might not have the address, but you know the range of the alphabet.’

Joe went through the other files but everything else seemed to be there. He was about to step away when he saw a blue cardboard wallet underneath the files. It was at the bottom of the box, half-folded into one of the flaps.

‘What’s this?’ he said quietly. He reached in for it, and when he opened it he saw that it was filled with newspaper clippings, either photocopies of the page or printed articles from the internet.

‘Have you seen these?’ Joe said.

Gina leaned in. ‘No. What are they?’

‘They are all reports of missing women.’ He flicked through them. ‘Some of these go back ten years.’

‘All local?’

‘They’re all from around Manchester, or just over the border, but not all are women. Some are missing teenagers, boys as well as girls.’

Joe looked through them quickly. Abductor and abusers go for similar types. It might just be age that selected them as victims, or even something more specific, like hair colour or dress sense, but not many mixed and matched. Someone who snatched children would not snatch an adult, and the reverse was true. It’s all about the sick preferences that drive them, not just about opportunity.

‘Sift them by geography,’ Gina said. When Joe glanced up, she added, ‘Familiarity is important, or else how could an abductor be sure that he wasn’t going to be seen? If David Jex had seen something that made him think that Rebecca Scarfield had been part of a series, then it had to be local.’

Joe went to his desk and made two piles of cuttings: one for the north of Manchester, where Rebecca lived, and the rest for elsewhere. Once he had sifted the pile by region, he discarded the ones of children. Rebecca had been a married woman. There was no point in looking for teenagers.

Joe was left with a pile of clippings involving seven women in total. Three were from Manchester. And there was one woman who made up most of the articles.

‘Most of the clippings are about her?’ he said, holding up the bundle.

‘Melissa Clarke,’ Gina said, reading the name. ‘Went missing just over a year ago.’

‘Thirty-two years old,’ Joe said, skim-reading. ‘No children. Had been married for three years. A pretty blonde. Just went out one evening and never returned. About the time David Jex starting obsessing about Aidan’s case.’

Joe went looking through the other files to see if he could find any other reference to Melissa Clarke. There was nothing.

He read the articles again. Then he spotted something. It was a printout of a website dedicated to finding Melissa, and there was a telephone number to ring if anyone had any news.

He raised an eyebrow at Gina. ‘Do we give it a call?’

‘We won’t find anything out if we don’t.’

Joe smiled and reached for his phone. ‘I knew you’d say that.’

As Joe and Gina were heading out of the office, on their way to see Melissa Clarke’s husband, Hugh was coming back in. He was out of breath, as if he had been rushing.

‘You two going out?’ he said, not quite meeting Joe’s gaze.

Joe and Gina exchanged brief glances and both smiled. ‘Errand all done, Hugh?’ Joe said.

‘Yes, thank you. Got to keep the family happy. Where are you two going?’

‘Going to see another witness. Fancy a ride along?’

‘Why not? That’s why I’m here, to help,’ Hugh said, relaxing slightly and falling in behind them.

The small group walked in silence to Gina’s car, Joe unable to think of a way to start a conversation, still too shocked from what Gina had told him. Her car was parked by a meter outside the office, and as Hugh climbed into the back Joe and Gina exchanged stern glances. They were watching him.

The journey to where Melissa Clarke had lived hit all the rush hours. She was from the same area of Manchester as Rebecca Scarfield, one of the small towns on the climb towards the Pennine hills, and they were stuck in the stop-start through the shopping streets and then every small town on the way, until eventually they were driving uphill and away from the grey flatland of the city.

Melissa’s address appeared to be a converted church, the high stone-gabled front boasting a metal plate with eight doorbells on it. It shouted young professionals, a couple who desired millstone living but without the means to buy the small cottage they really desired.

Joe reached the doorbells first and, once they were buzzed in, a short corridor at the top of a flight of new metal stairs led to an oak door that opened as they got closer.