Deadlight (26 page)

Back in his office, with Willard drawing up the wagons around his precious Major Crime team, Faraday had time to track down Scottie. A call to his mobile found the naval regulator stuck in a monster traffic jam on the M275.

‘Builder’s Transit lost a wheel,’ he said cheerfully. ‘The body count’s in double figures.’

‘You’re serious?’

‘No.’

Faraday explained they needed to get together. There was a new lead they ought to discuss, three blokes in town on the night of the murder, all of them allegedly ex-navy, none of them big fans of Sean Coughlin. It was early days but Faraday could use some advice.

‘I’m not surprised.’ Scottie was laughing. ‘I told you we ought to have that pint.’

Just now, he was en route to sort out his mother-in-law’s leaking overflow. After lunch, he’d pop over.

‘No sooner?’

‘Sorry. More than my life’s worth.’

Faraday looked up to find Willard at the door. He got a promise of two o’clock from Scottie and then hung up. Willard was looking for scalps. In certain moods he could be truly intimidating, and this was one of them.

‘Where’s Corbett?’

Faraday’s heart sank. He hadn’t thought about Andy Corbett for at least twenty-four hours. Now this.

‘I’ve no idea, sir. You transferred him to the Somerstown job the day before yesterday.’

‘I know I did. And the job’s called
Hexham
, by the way. Corbett’s been back up to Streatham. Did you know that?’

‘No, sir.’

‘I’ve got an e-mail from FIB. They’ve talked to SO11 and the intelligence checks out.’

‘Meaning what?’ Faraday was beginning to get irritated. ‘Sir?’

‘Meaning Davidson may be at it again with his old mates. Securicor job. Just like Corbett told us.’

‘And the inference is?’

‘We ought to be working a fuck’s sake harder on Davidson. Pull him in. Have another chat. The last thing we need is some little scrote like him giving us the runaround.’

‘And Corbett?’

‘According to the bloke at SO11, he was due a meet with one of the Streatham intelligence DCs last night. I’ve left a message on his mobile. He’s still on the
Hexham
squad. And if he doesn’t show at the squad briefing, I’m going to kick his arse so hard he won’t be sitting down for months.’ He paused. ‘I’ve nicked half a dozen more of your blokes, by the way. Just so you know.’

He offered Faraday a thin smile and then he was gone.

Bev Yates began to wonder whether Pritchard was ever going to make it downstairs. He’d phoned ahead to the Alhambra, and had a brief conversation with Pritchard’s sister. Jackie confirmed that Pritchard was awake and promised to have him on his feet by the time Yates turned up. Nearly an hour later, though, Yates was still waiting in the poky little room at the back that served as a restaurant. He’d turned down Jackie’s offer of a full breakfast on the house but was now beginning to regret it.

At length, Pritchard appeared at the door with a mug of tea. He was wearing a shirt with stains down the front and a pair of black trousers that were too big round the waist. He tottered across to the table and collapsed in the other chair. Half the night seeing off the remains of the Johnnie Walker had made him look gaunter than ever.

‘I’m not sure I can do this.’ He put the tea down and his hands shook as he tried to light a cigarette.

‘Kevin, mate, you have to. Without a statement we’re fucked. In fact without a statement, we needn’t have gone to bloody Gibraltar at all.’

‘I meant the body. Sean.’

‘Ah …’

Coughlin’s corpse had been returned from the post-mortem in Southampton and was now in a fridge in the local mortuary. The senior technician at the mortuary was a soccer fanatic called Jake. He turned out every Saturday afternoon for a decent Pompey League side but Yates had assured him that they could have Coughlin sorted by midday at the latest. Now, Yates glanced at his watch. 10.14. Say an hour for the statement, and they’d still be through by twelve.

‘First things first, Kev.’ Yates stationed an ashtray under the cigarette. ‘Let’s start with Monday evening. You do the talking and I’ll write it all down.’

Yates bent to his briefcase and produced a statement form. Pritchard lurched to the door and pleaded for more tea. Back at the table, he put his head in his hands.

‘Monday night?’ he began.

The statement turned into one long ramble. If anything, he seemed to have forgotten most of the facts he’d been so certain about less than a day ago. Monday night had lost all shape, all meaning, just a string of random impressions. A couple of guest meals early on. Some crisis with the wrong tin of soup. The empty bar and the prospect of a quiet night with the football highlights. The three guys crashing in from nowhere – fucking
nowhere
, you understand that? – and turning on poor Sean. The way they’d looked at him. The stuff they must have been saying. The fat one standing there in the window, giving Sean the finger as he shot off into the night. What did these guys have on Sean? What had he ever done to
them
? If only he’d answered the phone when he’d rung. If only he’d had a chance to say goodbye. If only. If only.

‘Fat one?’ Yates had his pen poised.

‘Big bastard.’ Pritchard nodded. ‘See the weight on him.’

‘Face? Hair?’

‘Skinhead. Baldilocks.’

Yates put the pen down.

‘Clothes?’

‘Jacket. Tie. Blue tie. Blue tie with a crest on it.’ This was turning into a quiz show, Yates thought. Or a séance. Did Pritchard expect voices? Sean Coughlin swaying in with a fresh pot of tea and a kiss? He picked up the pen again and started writing while Pritchard had a fresh think about Monday night, the fog slowly lifting.

Half an hour later, to Yates’s relief, most of it was there, right facts, right order. Far more often than he should, he’d had to prompt and suggest, playing the driver at the wheel of Pritchard’s clapped-out memory, using his own recall of the Gibraltar interview to provide
a map, but in the end – everything considered – it made a good solid five pages, the last one initialled in Pritchard’s wavering hand.

‘Now then.’ Yates got to his feet and consulted his watch. ‘We up for it, Kevin?’

It was the first name again. The eyes began to swim with tears.

‘How important is this?’

‘Very, mate. What you’re going to do is grace Sean Coughlin’s death with a little dignity. That make any sense?’

Yates had once heard Faraday use exactly this phrase. He watched Pritchard clambering slowly back over the sentence, sorting out the words, cocking his huge head, trying to understand exactly what difference a visit to the mortuary might make. Grace? Dignity?

At length, he took a deep breath and nodded.

‘Let’s do it,’ he said.

The mortuary was at the back of St Mary’s hospital, a big Victorian institution with an outer keep of modern, post-war blocks. Recognising Jake’s boy-racer Escort, Yates pulled in behind it. Jake was waiting for them in the sunshine. He kept a special suit for occasions like these, a dark two-piece from Austin Reed with narrow lapels and a sombre cut. On other occasions, Yates had seen him mistaken for an undertaker.

‘This way, gentlemen.’

He led them into a waiting room. It was immediately colder, a perceptible chill, and it was obvious that Jake had been busy with the air freshener. Not that Pritchard appeared to notice. His face was quite blank, a mask. Clasped together in front of his body, the knuckles of his hands were white with tension.

Jake had a quiet word. Sean Coughlin was next door in the chapel. There were chairs by the body and absolutely no pressure on time. Pritchard could go in there alone, or
with Yates, or with both of them. It was his decision, his call. All the occasion demanded in terms of formalities was a confirmation that this was, indeed, Sean Arthur Coughlin.

Pritchard was having trouble with his eyes. He rubbed them a couple of times with the back of his hand, then sniffed. Jake appeared at his elbow with a box of tissues. They were pink.

Pritchard shook his head. He wanted Yates to go in there with him. He needed support, a hand, anything.

‘Help me,’ he said quietly. ‘Please.’

Yates took his arm and steered him gently towards the door. The chapel was even darker, pricked with light from two candles. Coughlin lay on a trolley. The trolley was draped with a sheet, and the long hump of his body was softened with a funeral pall. Coughlin’s head lay on a pillow. There were still signs of bruising around his cheek and jaw, shades of yellow and purple, but the swelling had gone down and he looked – to Yates – remarkably peaceful. He had a big face, like Pritchard, and there was barely any trace of grey in the thick, black hair.

‘He never wore it like that. Never.’ The hair was combed low on the forehead. Pritchard seemed outraged. ‘Who did that?’

Yates muttered something about post-mortem procedures but Pritchard wasn’t listening. He knelt by the body, his face inches from Coughlin’s. He wanted to kiss his lover. He wanted to say goodbye. Yates stepped backwards and turned away, giving him a little privacy, then came a tiny gasp, almost animal, a strangled noise deep in Pritchard’s throat. Yates looked round. Pritchard had tried to backcomb Coughlin’s hair with his fingers, but pushing away the funeral pall had revealed a crude line of stitches across Coughlin’s scalp. They were big stitches and they puckered the flesh, a terrible reminder that this lover of his wasn’t, after all, asleep.

Yates stepped quickly forward, taking Pritchard’s arm again. He could feel his whole body trembling.

‘Sorry, Kev …’ he murmured. ‘But is this Coughlin?’

Pritchard was staring down at Coughlin’s face. He wanted to say no. He wanted to rub those hideous stitches out. He wanted to put the time machine into reverse, go back to Monday night, leave the three guys in the lounge bar, and be there for the moment when this man of his needed him most.

Instead, he turned away, sobbing.

‘You see why I loved him?’ he said.

Winter did his best to hurry the SOC boys along. Once they’d finished with Dawn Ellis’s lounge, they moved out into the front garden. Neighbours, intrigued by the sight of two men in baggy white suits crawling all over Dawn’s front lawn, lurked behind curtains and made a series of unnecessary trips to the pillar box at the end of the road, curious to know what lay behind this dramatic little flurry of activity. Dawn, who’d always kept her job to herself, gave them a tired smile. The SOC van at the kerbside was unmarked. Challenged for an explanation, she’d decided to blame an infestation of killer bugs.

Winter loved this thought. After a sleepless night in the tiny spare bedroom, he’d been up since six. He’d got Willard’s weekend off to a flying start with a brisk phone call, checked the fridge for milk for the SOC team, and then decided to treat Dawn Ellis to a proper breakfast. Cooking one-handed was a new challenge, but he’d made a fair job of eggs on toast, loading the tray with a huge mug of tea and spilling barely a drop as he juggled his way up the narrow stairs. After last night, the least the girl deserved was a little TLC.

Dawn was still asleep when he knocked at the bedroom door and though her face told him the last thing she wanted was food, she was touched by the gesture and told him so. Perched on the edge of her bed, Winter had
cheerfully demolished the eggs, enquiring whether she had any preference when it came to glaziers. There were umpteen firms in the city who’d charge the earth for an insurance job but he knew a bloke in Fratton who’d do it cash for thirty pounds and he’d be happy to give him a ring. Dawn, bewildered by Winter’s matter-of-factness, told him she was past caring. The SOC van had arrived shortly afterwards, both blokes gagging for tea.

Now, Winter wanted to know when they’d be through. The glazier went to his allotment Saturday afternoons and was getting tired of waiting for the phone call. Hang on much longer, and Winter would be back with the cowboys from the city.

The older of the two SOCOs told Winter thirty minutes. Apart from the print they’d lifted from the remains of the bottle they’d drawn a blank, but Proctor had made it absolutely plain that Willard would be going over every line of their report and Proctor didn’t make that kind of stuff up. Winter, back inside the house, heard the cheep of a mobile. Moments later, one of the white suits came tramping down the hall. He’d had a bit of news. The NAAFIS guys at Netley had scored a hit on the print.

Winter, still trying to remember where he’d put the glazier’s number, shot an enquiring look at the SOCO.

‘Bloke called Darren Geech?’ The SOCO was looking at the teapot again. ‘That mean anything to you?’

After Bev Yates had left the office, Faraday remembered the photo album. It had formed part of the forensic seizure from the Alhambra Hotel, the morning Jerry Proctor’s boys had gone through Pritchard’s flat, and Faraday had hung on to it in case he needed to evidence the relationship between Pritchard and Coughlin. Now, deep in thought, he went down the corridor to the exhibits cupboard and retrieved it for a second look.

A lot of the photos went back years – a younger,
happier Pritchard mugging for the camera with a series of men – and some of them featured excursions on a new-looking mountain bike. To Faraday, these snaps came as a surprise. He’d never associated Pritchard with physical exercise but he’d certainly invested a bob or two in the right gear – cycle helmet, Lycra shorts – and the wooded slopes that filled the background of shot after shot suggested some serious terrain.

It was this same landscape that reappeared in many of the more recent shots. By now, Pritchard had met Coughlin. The bike had disappeared and the pair of them were clad in walking gear – Berghaus anoraks, proper boots. Most of the photos featured either one or the other, a clear indication that they’d been alone on these outings, and Faraday lingered on a particular shot of Pritchard. He was lying on his side, a blanket spread beneath him. The remains of a picnic lay scattered beside an open Ordnance Survey map. It was obviously hot, because Pritchard had his shirt off. Peering up at the camera, he’d propped his sunglasses on the very end of his nose, camping it up for Coughlin’s benefit, but there was something about the expression on his face, something in the eyes maybe, that spoke of a total dependence. Love would be too gentle a word. Enslavement was much closer.