Deadlight (3 page)

‘OK?’

Faraday didn’t bother to hide his smile. HOLMES was the major inquiry cross-referencing system, a powerful piece of computer software with a huge appetite for data. It swallowed every shred of emerging evidence, filing it away for the moment when a pattern began to emerge. It was fed by the inputting indexers, civilian operators shackled to their keyboards, and migraine had become one of their milder occupational hazards. PDFs, along with House Occupants Forms and the House-to-House Enquiry Questionnaire, ran to five dense pages of hand-scribbled information. No wonder the indexers were tempted to stay in bed in the morning.

‘You want me to go round with an aspirin?’

Willard, scenting a joke, changed the subject. Staffing on this one was going to be tricky. The force had two other Major Crime teams and both were working flat out. The Receiver, Statement Reader and Action Allocator – key HOLMES players – were local decisions that made themselves. Ditto the officers who would handle Exhibits and Disclosure. But Willard never settled for less than the pick of the force-wide talent and he didn’t want some knobber turning up as FLO. The Family Liaison Officer mopped up the puddles of grief that every murder left in its wake. A good FLO, winning the trust of immediate family and friends, could also be a priceless intelligence source.

Willard mentioned a couple of names. No way would he give either of them house room. He also wanted a squad briefing, six p.m.

‘OK?’

Faraday nodded. Conversations with Willard seldom made allowances for small talk but this morning’s exchange was especially blunt. Reviewing his mental checklist – miracles to be worked over the next hour or so – Faraday began to wonder what lay behind this opening barrage.

‘You’re SIO?’

‘Of course.’

‘And me?’

‘Deputy.’ Willard had produced his car keys. ‘I’m off on a course tomorrow. Wyboston Lakes. Kidnap and extortion.’ Bending to the car door, he glanced back at Faraday. ‘Be OK on your own, will you?’

The question was a joke, and Faraday knew it. Wyboston Lakes was up in Bedfordshire, a Centrex training facility specialising in senior command courses, but no way would Willard let a hundred miles come between himself and a job as high profile as this one. Senior Investigating Officers sat on top of every inquiry, responsible for keeping the investigation on track, and having Willard across the corridor at Kingston Crescent was pressure enough. Reporting to him on the phone ten times a day would be a nightmare.

‘How long are you away, sir?’

‘Five days.’ For the first time, a ghost of a smile. ‘Unless you fuck it up.’

Willard gone, Faraday stood on the pavement for a moment, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his face. He’d been on Major Crimes for four brief months but already he’d realised how each successive job banged you up in a world of your own.

The need for focus and concentration was intense. Dedicated inquiry teams and six-figure budgets were a luxury beyond the reach of journeyman DIs on division, but the sheer weight of responsibility on Major Crimes was immense. Real life – shopping, cooking, even a
snatched half day out on the marshes looking at his precious birds – became a memory. Enquire about the day of the week, and you wouldn’t have a clue. But ask about alibi parameters, or forensic submissions, or arrest strategies, or the current state of the overtime budget, and you’d be word perfect, the undisputed king of a virtual world of the murderer’s making.

With luck, and ceaseless attention to detail, you’d get a result. And even if you didn’t, there still remained a kind of awe at the sheer reach and power of the system. On good days, it did your bidding. On bad days, it could crucify you.

‘Sir?’

It was the photographer from Netley. He’d emerged from the house with a bagful of gear.

‘You’re through?’

‘Yep.’ He pulled back the hood on his one-piece suit and mopped his forehead with the back of his hand. ‘Christ knows what the bloke had to eat last night. It stinks in there.’

Faraday was looking down at the bag. As Deputy SIO it was his right to inspect the room where Coughlin had died, but no detective in his right mind would hazard precious forensic evidence until the CSM declared his work done. More and more often, court convictions turned on a tiny particle of DNA recovered from the scene of crime.

‘What kind of state was he in?’

‘I’ve seen worse. He certainly got a kicking. Here and here especially.’ The photographer touched his upper body and groin. ‘But you’re not talking loads of blood.’

‘Face?’

‘Couple of bruises. Swelling. Nothing more.’

‘Weapon?’

‘Nothing obvious. As far as the body’s concerned, I’d wait until the PM. Maybe the bloke choked to death. There’s a bucketful of spew on the carpet.’

‘No question about the injuries, though?’

‘None. The room’s a mess, too. Here.’ The photographer bent to the bag and pulled out the video camera. Rewinding the tape, he shielded the tiny screen with his hand until he found the spot he wanted. Then he handed the camera to Faraday.

‘Hit play.’

Faraday did his best to make sense of the image but the bright sunlight washed away the detail. Crouched in the back of the photographer’s Fiesta van, he tried again.

‘Starts with the body. Are you seeing the body? Big bloke?’

‘Got him.’

Coughlin was lying on his side on the carpet, his knees drawn up towards his chest, his hands knotted protectively across his groin. He was a big, flabby man, a couple of stones overweight, and there were curls of black body hair across the spread of his belly. The bruising to his rib cage purpled the white flesh and there were more bruises around his thighs and buttocks. A day’s growth of beard darkened his lower face and a thin dribble of vomit had caked across his swollen chin. His eyes were open, gazing sightlessly across the soiled carpet. Even in life, he wouldn’t have been a handsome man.

The camera offered a couple of extra angles on the body, revealing a serpent tattoo on his left arm. Then came a slow pan around the living room. Faraday wedged himself more tightly against the wheel arch. The photographer was right. The room had been wrecked: chairs overturned, pictures smashed, a bookcase emptied, the tiny hearth full of debris from the mantelpiece above. The shot finally settled on half a dozen magazines, spread in a semi-circle around Coughlin’s feet. The images were explicit, stuff you wouldn’t buy in W. H. Smith’s.

The photographer was squatting beside Faraday.

‘Porn,’ he said. ‘Stuff’s everywhere. He had the computer on, too. One of those premium sites. All-night wrist shandy.’

‘And it’s still on?’

The photographer nodded and Faraday made a mental note to talk to the CSM. The specialist Computer Crime guys at Netley would have to come out and make the disconnection. No way should Scenes of Crime touch the machine.

‘Was there more of this stuff?’ Faraday had paused the camera on the porn mags.

‘Yeah. Whole pile down by the desk the computer’s on. Bloke must have wanked for England.’

‘And these’ … Faraday pointed at the spread of magazines on the screen … ‘you think someone did that little arrangement?’

‘Must have.’

Faraday tried to imagine the sequence of events that might have led to this carefully mounted little scene.

‘We’re talking a flat here? Self-contained?’

‘Yep. Two bedrooms. Kitchen. Bathroom. Usual shit conversion.’

‘Any damage?’

‘None the guys could see.’

‘What about upstairs? Who lives there?’

‘Dunno.’

‘Shared front door?’

‘So I’m told.’

‘What about entry? Any sign of damage?’

‘Not that anyone mentioned. I’d have photographed it otherwise.’

Faraday nodded, releasing the pause button and watching the tiny screen again. The shot began on a magazine cover. Then the sight of two women licking a huge erection receded as Coughlin’s body wobbled into view. The camera steadied on the sprawl of dead, white flesh, and for the second time that morning Faraday
realised the power of a single image, a moment frozen in time, a man’s last gasp celebrated in this sordid tableau.

In the closeness of the tiny van, the photographer began to chuckle.

‘Those premium sites charge one pound fifty a minute.’ He indicated the body on the screen. ‘Bloke’s better off dead. Would have cost him a fortune otherwise.’

An hour later, at Kingston Crescent police station, Faraday took the stairs to Hartigan’s third-floor office. Recently promoted to Chief Superintendent, Hartigan was now in overall charge of the Portsmouth BCU. Basic Command Units came in all shapes and sizes, but Pompey was one of the biggest building blocks in the force-wide command structure. Heading the forces of law and order was, as Hartigan so often reminded visitors, the dream job. Not just top uniform in the county’s most challenging city, but a real chance to make a difference.

‘Joe …’

Without getting to his feet, Hartigan waved Faraday into a chair. Physically, Hartigan was small and obsessively neat, as precise and fussy in his dress sense as he was on paper. Once, in an unguarded moment in the bar, his management assistant let slip that Mrs Hartigan even ironed the great man’s socks.

‘Prison officer? Am I right?’

‘Yes, sir. Name of Coughlin.’

‘Niton Road?’

‘Yes.’

‘7a?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Next of kin?’

‘We’re still checking.’

Faraday did his best to rein back his rising irritation. He’d watched Hartigan play this game for longer than he cared to remember. It had to do with knowledge and
power, and it sent a message that precious little escaped the Chief Superintendent.

‘So … this Impact Assessment …’ Hartigan was frowning. ‘The beatman tells me it’s normally pretty quiet around Niton Road. Unfortunate really, under the circumstances. No?’

Faraday added what little he could. The first of the seconded DCs, half a dozen guys from the local divisional CID strength, had already joined the investigation and four of them were working the house-to-house enquiries, toting their clipboards the length of Niton Road. So far, according to the DS in charge of Outside Enquiries, they’d turned nothing up, no surprise at this time of day.

‘Most people are out at work,’ Faraday pointed out. ‘Won’t be back until this evening.’

‘Women as well? Mums?’

‘Yes, by and large.’

‘Typical. Time was when mums stayed at home for their kids.’

‘But their kids are at school.’

‘Not the toddlers, Joe. That’s the age that counts.’

Faraday settled back. Soon enough, they’d come to the meat of the Impact Assessment – the precautionary exploration of ways in which they might keep the inquiry as low profile and non-intrusive as possible. Few householders fancied living in a street blackened by murder. Even fewer relished the prospect of a round-the-clock, high-profile CID operation. Hartigan would doubtless have his views on this, plus a list of neatly pencilled must-action priorities, but for now he was off on another tack.

‘Volume crime can be a challenge,’ he mused. ‘I’m not suggesting you’re missing it for one second, not in this new job of yours, but it’s true, you know.’

‘What’s true, sir?’

‘The minor key. The small print. That’s where we win or lose the battle in this city. Murder? Rape?’ He fluttered
a dismissive hand. ‘That’s where the resources go, and maybe that’s the way it should be. But tell me this. We have a bunch of kids in Somerstown, tearing around from corner shop to corner shop. They operate mob-handed. They’re completely upfront. They go through a shop like a bunch of locusts and nick anything they can get their hands on: money, goods, alcohol, even shop fittings. They’re out beyond the law, out beyond society, and they couldn’t care a monkey’s. Terrifying, eh Joe? So what are Major Crimes proposing to do about that?’

‘Nothing. Unless they kill someone.’

‘But occasionally they do, Joe, they do. As well you know.’

Faraday ducked his head, trying to work out whether Hartigan had just paid him a compliment. A year back, still on division as DI at Highland Road, Faraday had cracked a case that ended up making national headlines. A fourteen-year-old who’d thrown herself off a Somerstown tower block. And an even younger kid – ten, for God’s sake – happy to burn a house down and kill a man to revenge a separate death. The day after the boy had been found guilty, the
Guardian
had caught the mood with its page three feature analysis. ‘Fallen’, the headline had read.

‘About Niton Road …’ Faraday began. Hartigan ignored him.

‘The kids should be at school, Joe. They should be motivated, keen. They should be committed. Instead of which we’re chasing them around Somerstown at God knows what expense. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t resent the resource implications. That’s what we’re here for. But where does it lead? Where is it taking us as a society? Any ideas, Joe?’

For a moment, Faraday was tempted to believe that this was a prelude to a serious debate, that Hartigan really was keen to follow through on the events of last year, but then the little figure behind the desk gave
himself away, mentioning a speech he was due to make to the Government Office for the South-East up in Guildford, and at once Faraday realised that this little outburst of civic concern was simply a rehearsal. Real life goes on, Hartigan was saying. While you guys hog the money.

Ten minutes later, after agreeing that Major Crimes should tread as carefully as possible in Niton Road, Hartigan brought the conversation to an end. Only at the door did Faraday voice his misgivings.

‘You’re sure that’s enough?’ he queried. ‘Assessment-wise?’

Hartigan, back behind the desk, glanced sharply up.

‘It’s all about absent mothers, Joe.’ He shook his head. ‘Kids go off the rails. I’m surprised you can’t see that.’

TUESDAY
, 4
JUNE
, 2002,
17.30

When the bent figure in the stained polyester dress tottered back with yet more refreshments, even DC Paul Winter couldn’t manage it. He and DC Dawn Ellis had been sitting in Doris Ackerman’s tiny bay window since lunchtime. A fourth pot of Shopper’s Choice teabags, and his kidneys would explode.