Bright Spark (45 page)

       He
found his way to the bathroom, filled the basin with cold water and plunged his
head into it. As the blood surged, he realised he’d begun to see the present
more clearly and to contemplate the future without once thinking about work. He
needed to make some strong coffee and flush away the tranquilisers while he
still recognised himself. Hunger clutched at his stomach; when had he last
eaten anything other than toast? He should eat something hearty.

Hearty
and healthy, he reflected, eyeing the love handles bulging pertly above the
waistband of his boxer shorts like plumped-up pillows. Yes, it was decided, his
innermost will had spoken; he would eat a nutritious lunch, then go for a run,
or better still, use that gym membership he’d been paying for since his last
visit in the first week of January last year. No, he would run; that would
allow him to better acquaint himself with a neighbourhood he might be spending
a lot of time in. Then he would eat a healthy evening meal at a sensible time
and wash it down with nothing stronger than coffee. Words, he conceded, were
easy; but remaining a flabby flake was harder by far.

       “Mens sana in corpore sano,” he proclaimed to his reflection, dredging up his grammar school
Latin as he went eye to eye with himself and poked himself in the finger. “That
means you, you fat mentalist. Lose your lard and knock that chip off your
shoulder.”

       He
spent ten ill-tempered minutes foraging through the half dozen bags that
comprised his entire estate before he found a t-shirt that didn’t cling to his
belly, shorts that weren’t too short to be legal, socks that almost matched and
a pair of running shoes that smelled more alive than he felt. Only as he
limbered up in the kitchen with a cup of coffee close at hand, discovering with
alarm that he could no longer touch his toes, did he remember that his mobile
had woken him. Should he ignore the wretched thing? The police had taken far
more than their pound of flesh lately; if only they’d taken it from his
midriff. Yet leave was leave, and while the message might be important, so was
his mental and physical health.

       He
knew he could slip the leash of mobile communications at any time he chose. So,
he told himself, it was curiosity rather than compulsion that led him back
upstairs to fish the mobile from the tangled duvet and access his voicemail
service. As he listened to the halting words from a headquarters fingerprint
clerk who couldn’t have grasped their import, his heart-rate leapt to levels
he’d never have achieved on the open road. Within minutes, he’d stripped off
his running gear and hurriedly donned his best work suit, allowing the leash to
be slipped over his head again.

       “Epidermal
ridges are all about sensation. All these raised lines exponentially increase
the surface area of the skin available for conveying sensation to the nerves.”

       “Ronnie,
that’s lovely.” Harkness cast a glance over his shoulder to ensure that they
were alone in the quiet annex of the headquarters building that housed the
fingerprint technicians. He might need to keep a lid on this if his worst fears
were confirmed; at least until he could limit the damage to people he’d allowed
himself to care about. Dread and excitement jostled for his attention.

       “It
is. Absolutely fascinating,” continued the clerk, almost bursting with
excitement. “So, first of all, this lovely set tells me that whoever left these
marks couldn’t have been in the least bit forensically aware.  It also tells me
that they pressed their hands firmly and clearly onto the glass. I’ve seen worse
samples from a Livescan machine.”

       “Ronnie,
stop. Which window were these prints taken from?”

       “’13
Marne Close, first-floor, rear bedroom, both left and right-hand panes,” said
the clerk, reading from his screen.

       “Inside
or outside?”

       “Well,
that’s the odd thing. These prints were on the outside of a locked window on
the first-floor. How wild is that? And guess what else? On the inside, almost
in mirror-image….….”

       “You
found the prints of Suzanne Murphy smeared in her own blood, confirmed by
post-mortem fingerprint and DNA samples.”

       “Top
marks, detective.”

       “I
should remember that. I found them. Go on then, put me out of my misery.”

       “Ok.
Well, more or less in mirror image with the victim’s prints, there’s a full
left-hand impression on the left-hand pane if you’re looking from the outside.
Despite the sooty residue, you’ll easily get the sixteen points of agreement
we’ll need in evidence.”

       Harkness
nodded, acknowledging the fact that, to be considered good evidence against a
suspect, the whorls, arches and ridges of a given fingerprint sample had to be
shown to have sixteen sequential points of agreement with the sample originally
taken from that suspect.

“Things
are less clear-cut on the right-hand pane,” Ronnie continued. “The prints are
smeared in one direction; the right thumb from twelve o’clock anti-clockwise
through to about nine o’clock, and the right index and ring finger from three
o’clock to twelve o’clock, again anti-clockwise.”

       “Corresponding
to the window handle’s direction of rotation, if it had been unlocked.”

       “It
looks that way,” said Ronnie. “But there is no handle on the outside of that
window.”

       “No,”
said Harkness. “Somebody was miming, urging Suzanne Murphy to open the window,
failing to understand why they couldn’t or wouldn’t.”

       “God.
That’s awful,” said Ronnie, brightening as he returned to his work. “As I was
saying, the smeared prints will get you no more than eight points of agreement,
but there’s no doubt it belongs to the same set as the clear left-hand print.”

       “Come
on, Ronnie, just tell me. Who do we need to talk to?”

       “Please
bear in mind, Sergeant, that this person may well have just been trying to
help…..”

       “I can
see that. A name.”

       “Here
we go,” said Ronnie, turning back to his screen and scrolling down to find the
jumble of personal identifiers that always seemed so much less eloquent that
arches, whorls and DNA sequences. “You’re looking for one Jeremy Jennings, born
12
^th
May 1980, white male, no previous convictions, not the subject
of any intelligence reports. Wow. You’ve gone pale. Should I get you a glass of
something?”

       “No,
thanks.”

Harkness
had dared to guess in drowsy moments that the truth of these killings would lie
close to home, for the Murphys and now for him. He didn’t doubt that Jeremy had
been trying to help Suzanne escape the death that claimed her, but the Jennings’ silence on that matter disturbed him and had to be explored.  He’d seen the
loose thread running through the resolution he’d stitched together and now this
grinning clerk had given it a sharp tug and unravelled everything.

       “Why
has this only just come to light, Ronnie? How did it take this long?”

       “We
had the window impression weeks ago, but we’ve only just had the Jennings samples through from the enquiry team and they weren’t marked as a high priority.
They’re just elimination samples, after all.”

       “Who
else knows?”

       “Just
the two of us, so far.”

       “And
why did you ring me directly?”

       “That’s
what DC Slowey told us to do when he submitted the job.”

       “Look,
this is straight from the chief,” said Harkness gravely. Ronnie didn’t need to
know which particular chief he was lying about. “There’s a media blackout on
this until we’ve spoken to this Jennings character. No sense in starting a
witch-hunt if he turns out to be a good Samaritan. So don’t process this
through the usual channels. We want to minimise leakage. For now, tell no-one
else.” 

       “This
is most unexpected.” Sharon greeted Harkness in the corridor outside her
office, almost regretting her brusqueness. She’d told the receptionist to send
him straight up rather than engaging in an awkward, indirect interrogation.

       On her
return from Marne Close, Rory had been unusually solicitous of her welfare but
had still managed to flatter and flirt. She had dismissed him with only the
requisite niceties; that must have piqued his curiosity, as would Harkness’s
incongruous presence on familiar terms.

       “I’m
sorry, Sharon,” said Harkness, face downcast. “I should have called ahead. But
it’s important.”

       “Who’s
died?” she joked, immediately regretting it.

His
presence had thrown her off-balance. Nobody other than her neighbours, Slowey
and possibly Harkness’s ex-girlfriend knew of their affair and she couldn’t
allow news of it to reach her colleagues. Unpopular as he was in his own right
within these walls, being romantically linked to Harkness might raise questions
about her handling of the now defunct Firth claim.  

       “It’s
not that drastic,” he lied, taking a seat. “But I have asked Slowey to meet us
here. If that’s ok.”

       “I
don’t know if it is ok.” She remained standing, arms folded, unsure of her
ground. “Why don’t you help me decide?”

       Harkness
nodded thoughtfully then unzipped a document folder, drew out a sheaf of papers
marked ‘FINGERPRINT SAMPLE ANALYSIS – RESTRICTED MATERIAL’ and placed it on her
blotter. When Harkness offered no commentary, she perched on her chair, scanned
the document and gasped. Drawing a breath and composing herself, she read the
document again, looking for vagueness and inconsistencies and finding only
awful clarity.

       “What
does this mean?” she asked, wanting Harkness to contradict her own worst
suspicions.

       “I
don’t want to leap to the worst possible conclusion, Sharon.”

The
bullishness she’d seen in him when he’d entered her office must have sprung
from an urge to offload bad news quickly. He seemed distracted, wringing his
hands while he stared at his shoes. His hair, while never well-groomed, had
arranged itself into wayward tufts and clumps and the knot of his tie hung
askew below a missing shirt button. She couldn’t quite believe she’d kissed
this sleeping head goodbye a few hours earlier.

       “Rob,”
she said, standing and firmly closing the door to her office, after first
checking that nobody lurked in the corridor. “Forget ‘us’, whatever we have. It
doesn’t matter now. I don’t mean….I have no regrets…it’s just………..well, damn
it.”

       “I
understand, Sharon, it…”

       “It
can’t matter now. Even if I wanted it to. Just tell me what this means. I’ve
read through this technical gibberish but I need it in English.”

       “It
means that before or during the fire at 13 Marne Close, your brother stood on
the roof of the conservatory and placed one hand firmly on a first floor window
pane while he moved his other hand through ninety degrees in a motion that
roughly mimicked the action of the interior window catch.

“We
can’t say for sure that he did this while Suzanne Murphy stood on the opposite
side of that locked window trying and failing to open it, but the presence of
her blood and fingerprints almost exactly mirroring Jeremy’s makes it seem
likely. Incidentally, she couldn’t open it because Dale Murphy kept all the
doors and windows locked and carried the keys on him.”

       “Jesus.”
The world shrivelled into distance, traffic noise and nagging telephones just
faint memories of the cleaner and simpler world she’d just left behind.

       “This
doesn’t mean Jeremy did anything wrong. Frankly, until we….someone speaks to
him, we don’t exactly know what this means.”

       “Rob,
make it go away.” Colour suffused her pale face and her eyes swam back into
focus. “I couldn’t do this to my dad, not now.”

       “Calm
down…”

       “Justice
has been done, hasn’t it? I mean we know who really did it and it certainly
wasn’t Jeremy and he just wouldn’t understand the process and it would be
cruel, so cruel, oh Christ, listen to me, floundering and flapping. Just tell
me something good, Rob, anything. Can it disappear? Can it?”

She
took her seat again and stared into his eyes, daring him to decide what she was
to him, to throw in with her or disown her.  

       “I
couldn’t do that, Sharon, even if I wanted to. My force has logged the
information and so has the lab. I only managed to take charge of it by dumb
luck and lies. I can’t control it forever and if I dropped it, someone else
would pick it up. But we have got a period of grace. I can control it, for
now.”

       “So
control it. Write it off.” She dropped her head into her hands and rubbed her
temples. “I know how these things work. You CID types can make anything go
away. Get creative.”

       Harkness
allowed a silence to settle like frost.

       “So,
you expect me to stand aside while you exploit my brother and incriminate my
family based on the flimsiest of circumstantial evidence. Is that it, Rob? Is
that how you help? Am I another line of enquiry as well as a great cook and an
obliging shag?”

       “Do
you really believe that?”

“Maybe
that’s the way it has to be from now on.”

“You
think I would choose this, Sharon? Really? This could be professional suicide
for both of us if we don’t handle this correctly.”

“Correctly?
We’re way past correct or appropriate, Rob.”

“Sharon, just stop and think. Forget about whatever we had.”

“Past
tense, Rob?”

“We
have to know why your brother climbed onto that roof at that time. I have to
interview him pronto or somebody else will. Hate me if you want, but please
believe that this will come to light, one way or another, and I want to help.”

“Do
you care about me?”

“We
can’t do this now.”

“You’re
right. But there may never be another time.”

“Let’s
make a plan, Sharon. Write nothing, record nothing. Let’s at least manage the
risk. If we ever do have to go on the record about this conversation, then I’ve
just been trying to establish your brother’s whereabouts with a view to
interviewing him in the most sensitive and conducive way possible.”

“Then
I won’t have to lie, will I, Rob? You’re all about the job.” Sharon picked up
the ringing telephone. “Yes, I’m expecting him, send him up. Oh, and Kim, I
need you to hold my calls and postpone all of my appointments for the rest of
the day. What reason? Just say it’s personal.”

“Slowey?”
Harkness asked

Sharon
nodded and swivelled her seat towards
the window, dismissing him, imposing a silence and thinking hard about her
options. Seconds later, Harkness heard Slowey’s polite but solid rap at the
door. Leaving Sharon to mull for a few seconds longer, Harkness opened the door
and beckoned Slowey into the office with a finger raised to his lips.

Slowey
shrugged and entered. In Harkness’s absence, Slowey seemed to have regained
something of his former self. The charcoal of the ingrained bruises beneath his
eyes had faded and his complexion had recovered from anaemic white to its usual
charcoal grey. His suit had been dry-cleaned and his shoes polished so that he
looked thrifty rather than shabby. He even seemed to have shaved a few degrees
off his habitual stoop as if only most of all the world’s woes pressed down on
him.

Today,
his kids had foisted on him a tie bearing dozens of images of ‘Tweety Pie’ Even
if he’d known what kind of day to expect, he’d still have honoured his girls’
wardrobe choices. Harkness fought back an urge to bear-hug the man, not even
knowing if a handshake would be reciprocated.

“Let’s
see it then,” Slowey said softly, taking the proffered print-out and dropping
into a spare chair next to the coat-rack. As Sharon and Slowey quietly
contemplated the case, Harkness began to feel like a giddy child in the
presence of tolerant but disapproving adults. 

“Right
then,” Sharon said at last, swivelling to face them and slapping her palms down
on her desk. “What happens next, officers?”

“Do
you know where Jeremy is?” asked Harkness.

“Yes.”

“Will
you take us to him?”

“Yes.”

“Will
you stick around to help us talk to him?”

“Yes.
I don’t have a choice. I need to protect him. This is the best way. But I have
conditions.”

“Are
you acting as his sister or as his solicitor?” asked Slowey from his position
on the back wall.

“His
sister, of course,” Sharon replied, peering over Harkness’s shoulder. “I
couldn’t represent him in person without sinking up to my teeth in ethical
quicksand. But I should be his appropriate adult.”

“He
won’t need a solicitor, Sharon,” said Harkness.

“You
can’t promise that,” said Slowey, stern now.

“No,
you can’t,” Sharon added. “Don’t soft-soap me, Rob. I mean, Sergeant….. Oh,
screw it. You do know, don’t you, about our …relationship?”

“I
do, ma’am, yes,” said Slowey, a blush lending his face an almost healthy
colour.

“Ok,
good. Now we can all be grown-ups. If my brother needs a lawyer, believe me,
I’ll make sure he gets one. I know a few.”

“You
mentioned conditions,” said Slowey.

“Today,
my father took himself off to a hospice so that he can get on with his dying.
He’s been dying for most of my adult life, first with emphysema and now with
stage-four lung cancer which has metastasised into other organs. I’m not going
to play the weeping victim; I’ve been living with this threat too long for
that. But you have to know that my dad may never get to understand why I’m
about to help you. I can promise you that my mum will never forgive me either.

“You
can’t change that, but you have to give me a chance to control the damage. In a
few minutes, we’ll go straight to his care centre. You’ll let me bring him out
– the staff will never see you. We’ll drive him directly to one of those
interview suites that doesn’t feature screaming shoplifters and piss-soaked
cells  – you know, the kind you use for abused children, with peace and quiet
and soft furnishings and toys that Jeremy can tidy up for you.

 
“We’ll complete the interview in record time without reducing him to a
screaming, twitching wreck. If…when my brother gives you a wholly innocent
account for his presence on that roof, we’ll deliver him back to his carers in
record time and before he’s due to be taken home. I’ll swear him to secrecy
about it, tell him it’s a game, and hope for the best.”

“Good,”
said Harkness. “We can certainly….”

“You
should know, Sharon,” said Slowey, leaning, his face creasing with concern.
“This could be more complicated. I think Jeremy might reveal something we’d all
rather not hear. I desperately hope it’s simple. I just want you to be ready
for the shocks if they come.”

“You
visited the house, didn’t you….Ken?”

“Yes.
I did visit. Took samples.”

“And
spooked my mum. Why?”

“She
lied to me,” said Slowey, biting his lip. “I don’t quite know why, but she lies
consistently and well about that night. Jeremy kept trying to reveal something
but she won’t allow it. I wanted an interview but fingerprints weren’t a bad
second prize.”

“You
presume a lot, don’t you?” she said.

“Yes,
Sharon, I do; but that doesn’t mean I’m wrong. You’re not outraged by my
suggestion. You’re not even surprised. I think that’s because you agree with
me. If you didn’t, and your brother was a client, you’d have stonewalled. Instead,
you’re helping us. You know something’s wrong and you need to put it right,
perhaps even more than we do.”

“I’ve
said I’ll help.” Sharon stood, brushed past Harkness and reached for her
jacket. “You should get me into your car before I remember who I am.”

       Jeremy
endured this imperfectly formed and plodding world with an impatience that
could barely be contained. His mind had wound itself too tightly and its
fantastic confusion of wheels, levers and cogs could not be tinkered with lest
they be wholly un-sprung. Fizzing and ticking, kinetic energy drove his
flittering mind, his twitching hands, the anxious clamping of his teeth and his
stamping and shuffling feet. His intelligence loomed vast yet disorderly, and
marshalling it into external order consumed him.

       They’d
collected Jeremy from the specialist care centre he periodically visited in a
leafy village a few miles north of the ring road. Sharon had chivvied him into
their car with repeated assurances that not only had his mother planned this trip
out for him, but she had also written it into her diary ever so neatly; if he
didn’t go, it would have to be erased or scribbled out and then the whole diary
would no longer be all neat and tidy.