Elizabeth George - In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner

“What?” she said. “Tell me, Andy. What happened?”

Andy smoothed the scroll against the secretaire drawer's unfolded writing surface. He weighed down the top end with a Bible. The bottom end he held in place with his left arm.

“Andy?” Nan said again. “Tell me. Say something.”

He reached for a rubber. It was stubby and marked with the blackened remains of hundreds of erasures. He bent to work. And when he moved, Julian was able to see the contents of the scroll.

It was a family tree. At the top were printed the names Maiden and Llewelyn and the date 1722. At the bottom were the names Andrew, Josephine, Mark, and Philip. With them were the names of their spouses and below that their issue. There was only a single name beneath those of Andrew and Nancy Maiden, although space for Nicola's spouse had been provided and three small lines branching beneath Nicola's name indicated Andy's hopes for the future of his immediate family.

Andy cleared his throat. He appeared to be regarding the genealogy in front of him. Or perhaps he was only garnering courage. For in the next moment he erased those oversanguine marks reserved for a future generation. And once he'd done that, he picked up a calligraphy pen, dipped it into a bottle of ink, and began to write beneath his daughters name. He formed two neat parentheses. Inside them, he penned the letter d. He followed that with the year.

Nan began to weep.

Julian found that he couldn't breathe.

“A fractured skull” was all that Andy said.

Detective Inspector Peter Hanken was less than chuffed when his CC at the Buxton nick informed him that New Scotland Yard was sending up a team to assist in the investigation into the Calder Moor deaths. A native of the Peak District, he possessed an inherent distrust of anyone who hailed from south of the Pennines or north of Deer Hill Reservoir. The oldest son of a Wirksworth quarryman, he also possessed an inherent dislike of anyone whom their class-weighted society told him he was supposed to consider his social better. The two officers of the Scotland Yard team thus garnered his double animosity. One was a DI called Lynley, a bloke tanned and fit and with hair so gold that it had to be courtesy of the nearest bleach bottle. He had an oarsman's shoulders and a posh public school voice. He wore Savile

Row, Jermyn Street, and the scent of old money like a second skin. What the hell was he doing in the police force? Hanken wondered.

The other was a black, a detective constable called Winston Nkata. He was as tall as his superior officer, but with a tensile rather than a muscular strength. He had a long facial scar that put Hanken in mind of the manhood ceremonies undertaken by African youths. In fact, aside from his voice, which sounded like a curious mixture of African, Caribbean, and South-Bank-of-the-Thames, he reminded Hanken of a tribal warrior. His air of confidence suggested he'd been through trials by fire and had not been found wanting.

Aside from his own feelings in the matter, Hanken didn't particularly like the message it sent to the rest of his team, having New Scotland Yard involved on their patch. If there was a question about his competence or the competence of his officers, then he would have vastly preferred to be told so to his face. And no matter that having two more officers in on the action meant he could end up with time to put together Bella's surprise swing set in advance of her fourth birthday next week. He hadn't asked his CC for help, and he was more than just a little annoyed to have help thrust upon him.

DI Lynley appeared to take the measure of Hanken's irritation within thirty seconds of meeting him, which somewhat elevated Hanken's opinion of the man despite his upper-ten voice. He said, “Andy Maiden's asked for our help. That's why we're here, Inspector Hanken. Your CC told you the dead girls father retired from the Met, didn't he?”

The chief constable had done, but what anyone's working for the Met in his salad days had to do with Hanken's ability to get to the bottom of a crime without assistance was an issue that hadn't yet been clarified. He said, “I know. Smoke?” And he offered his packet of Marlboros to the other two. Both demurred. The black looked as if he'd been offered strychnine. “My blokes aren't going to like it much, having London breathing and peeing for them.”

“I expect they'll adjust,” Lynley said.

“Not bloody likely.” Hanken lit his fag. He took a deep drag and observed the other two officers over the cigarette.

“They'll follow your lead.”

“Yeah. Like I said.”

Lynley and the black exchanged a look. It said kid-glove treatment was called for. What they didn't know was that kid gloves, silk gloves, or chain mail gauntlets wouldn't make a difference to their reception in Hanken's office.

Lynley said, “Andy Maiden was an SO 10 officer. Did your CC tell you that?”

This was news. And the mild animosity Hanken had felt towards the London officers was immediately redirected towards his superiors, who'd apparently and deliberately kept the information from him.

“You didn't know, did you?” Lynley said. He dryly directed his next comment to Nkata. “Politics as usual, I expect.”

The DC nodded-his expression disgusted-and crossed his arms. Although Hanken had offered both men chairs when they'd entered his office, the black officer had chosen to stand. He was lounging at the window from which he had a bleak view of the football grounds across Silverlands Street. It was a stadium structure topped by barbed wire. It couldn't have offered a less pleasing prospect.

Lynley said to Hanken, “Sorry. I can't explain why they hold back information from the officer in charge. I expect it's some sort of power game. I've had it played on me once too often to like it.” He went on to fill in the missing information. Andy Maiden had worked undercover. He'd been highly respected and exemplarily successful during a thirty-year career. “So the Yard feels an obligation to one of its own,” Lynley finished. “We're here to fulfill that obligation. We'd like to work as part of a team with you, but Winston and I will stay out of your way as much as possible if that's how you prefer it. It's your case and your patch. We're well aware that we're the interlopers here.”

Each of the statements was graciously made, and Hanken felt a slight de-icing of his attitude towards the other DI. He didn't particularly want to like him, but two deaths and one unidentified body were unusual in this part of the world, and Hanken knew that only a fool would object to having two more minds sorting through the facts in the investigation, especially if both minds in question were absolutely clear about who was giving the orders and making the assignments in the case. Besides, the SO 10 detail was an intriguing one that Hanken was grateful to have passed his way. He needed to ponder it when he had a moment.

He twisted his cigarette down into a spotless ashtray, which he then emptied and cleaned thoroughly with a tissue, as was his custom. He said, “Come with me, then,” and took the ondoners to the incident room, where two of his uniformed WPCs were at computer terminals-apparently doing nothing save chatting to each other-and a third male constable was making an entry on the china board where Hanken had neatly penned assignments earlier in the day. This last constable nodded and left the room as Hanken walked the Scotland Yard officers over to the china board. Next to it, a large diagram of the murder site was hanging alongside two pictures of the Maiden girl-in life and in death-as well as several pictures of the second-and hitherto unidentified-body, and a line of photos of the murder scene.

Lynley put on a pair of reading spectacles to have a look at these as Hanken introduced him and Nkata to the others in the room. Hanken said to one of the WPCs, “The computer still down?”