The Dead Place. Stephen Booth

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СКАЧАТЬ the black limousines. No one would think to question who he was or why he was there, as he entered the phone box and made his call. Meanwhile, mourners would have been gathering in the church behind him, and the funeral service would be about to get under way.

      ‘The recording,’ said Fry. ‘Have Forensics been asked to analyse the background noise?’

      ‘We’ll make sure they do that,’ said Hitchens. ‘But why do you ask?’

      ‘I wondered what music was playing. “Abide With Me”, perhaps. Or “The Lord’s My Shepherd”. We might be able to tell what stage the funeral service had reached, whether he was already in the phone box as the mourners were going in, or waited until the service had started to make the call. Maybe there were some late arrivals who noticed him. We’ll have to check all that. If we can narrow it down, we might be able to trace the people who were most likely to have seen him.’

      ‘That’s good.’

      ‘And another thing –’

      ‘Yes?’

      ‘I wonder if he just drove away again as soon as he’d finished the call.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Well, that would make him stand out, wouldn’t it? Someone might have wondered why he left without attending the service. If he was really so clever, I’m guessing he’ll have stayed on.’

      ‘Stayed on?’

      ‘Joined the congregation. Stood at the back of the church and sung the hymns. He might have hung around the graveside to see the first spadeful of dirt fall on the coffin. He probably smiled at the bereaved family and admired the floral tributes. He’d be one of the crowd then.’

      ‘Just another anonymous mourner. Yes, I can see that.’

      ‘One of the crowd,’ repeated Fry, struck by her own idea. ‘And all thinking about the same thing.’

      ‘What do you mean, Diane?’

      ‘Well, we know nothing about him yet, but I bet he’s the sort of person who’d love that idea. All those people around him thinking about death while he made his call.’

      She paused and looked at Hitchens. He turned on his chair and met her eye, his face clouded by worry. Fry saw that she’d reached him, communicated her own deep uneasiness. The caller’s words in the transcript were bad enough. Now she found herself anticipating the sound of his voice with a mixture of excitement and dread.

      ‘Except that his death,’ said Hitchens, ‘the one he was talking about in his call, was nothing to do with the deceased councillor who was being buried in Wardlow churchyard. It was a different death altogether.’

      ‘Of course it was,’ said Fry. ‘But we have no idea whose.’

      The DI looked at his watch. It was time to call it a day. Unlike some of his officers, he had good reasons for wanting to get home on time – an attractive nurse he’d been living with for the past two years, and a nice house they’d bought together in Dronfield. But it’d be marriage and kids before long, and then he might not be so keen.

      ‘It’s the Ellis case in the morning, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘What time are you on, Diane?’

      ‘Ten thirty.’

      ‘Is everything put together?’

      ‘DC Murfin is doing a final checklist for me.’

      ‘Good. Well, the undertaker who conducted the funeral at Wardlow is based right here in town,’ said Hitchens. ‘You’ll have time to drive round and speak to him in the morning before you’re due in court.’

      Fry wasn’t looking forward to her court appearance next morning. But at least she’d done everything she could to make it as straightforward as possible and give the CPS a solid case. With a bit of luck, there’d be another long-term resident occupying a bunk in Derby Prison by the end of the week.

      Many of the details of the Micky Ellis case were depressingly predictable. Whenever officers of E Division got a call-out to a body on Edendale’s Devonshire Estate, they expected it to be another domestic. A killing in the family, a Grade C murder.

      ‘You know, it never ceases to amaze me how often the offender calls in the incident himself in a case like this,’ said Fry, checking through the files Gavin Murfin had gathered for her. ‘They can’t think what else to do when they see the body on the floor, except dial 999.’

      ‘Well, I think it’s very considerate of them to worry about our clear-up rate at a time like that,’ said Murfin.

      ‘Is everything there, Gavin?’

      ‘All tied up with a neat bow. Fingers crossed for a short hearing, then,’ said Murfin as she closed the top file. ‘I hear Micky is pleading guilty, so it should all be over by Christmas. Not that he had much choice in the matter.’

      ‘It was just a walkthrough,’ said Fry.

      ‘The best kind. I hate the whodunits, don’t you? All those computers thinking they can tell me what to do, and every bugger in the building complaining about my paperwork.’

      ‘I presume you’re referring to the HOLMES system.’

      ‘HOLMES – who thought up that name? Some Mycroft down in Whitehall, I suppose. One day they’ll sack all the dicks and let the computers out on the streets.’

      ‘When is your tenure up, Gavin?’

      Murfin said nothing. He worked in silence for a while. Out of the corner of her eye, Fry could see his mouth still moving, but no words came out.

      ‘Only a few months left now, aren’t there?’ she said.

      ‘Could be.’

      ‘Back to core policing for a while, is it?’

      ‘Unless I get promoted,’ said Murfin bitterly.

      ‘Let’s hope for the best, then.’

      Fry was aware of the look that Murfin gave her. Of course, they might have different ideas as to what the best might be.

      Ben Cooper was still smiling as he cleared the outskirts of Sheffield and dropped a gear to start the climb towards Houndkirk Moor. At the top of this road was the Fox House Inn, where he crossed back into Derbyshire and entered the national park. As soon as he passed the boundary marker at the side of the road, Sheffield seemed to fall away behind him quite suddenly. And when he saw the moors opening out ahead of him, burning with purple heather, it always filled his heart with the pleasure of coming home.

      Cooper looked again at the file on the passenger seat. In all likelihood, the area he was entering had been home for Jane Raven Lee, too. Somewhere in the valleys and small towns of the White Peak would be the place she’d lived, a house full of her possessions, perhaps a family who still missed her and wondered what had become of her. But a family who loved and missed someone reported them missing, didn’t they?

      The previous weekend, Cooper had spent a couple of days СКАЧАТЬ