Cath Staincliffe: Hit and Run

Janine returned to her car and was just drawing away from the kerb when she saw a blue Mercedes coming, far too fast, down the centre of the road. Near the gaggle of late arrivals waiting to cross, the car braked fiercely with a squealing sound. Janine saw the child flung to one side, the small body flying limp like a puppet, then landing hard. The car shrieked to a halt a few yards ahead. Janine grabbed her phone, her heart thumping hard in her chest. A knot of people gathered round the injured girl. With a sickening feeling, Janine recognised her as a classmate of Tom’s – Ann-Marie Chinley.

Her mother was screaming, kneeling beside the unresponsive child. ‘Ann-Marie! Ann-Marie! Oh, my God, somebody help me!’

A powerful sense of shock was palpable in the atmosphere; Janine could almost taste it, acidic like metal, harsh and electric, galvanising them all.

Janine pressed 999, speaking as soon as the operator answered. Ambulance. Little girl’s been knocked down. Outside Oak Lane Primary, Didsbury.’

One of the women wore a nurse’s uniform, most likely working at one of the nearby hospitals, St Mary’s or Manchester Royal Infirmary; she began checking the girl. ‘It’s all right, love. Try and make you comfy, eh? Can you hear me Ann-Marie?’

Janine heard an engine rev, watched stunned as the Mercedes set off again at speed. She pulled out after it, sounding her horn and mounting the pavement to pass the onlookers.

Her mind had the bright clarity that comes with stress; she concentrated on the number plate, V384 ZNB, memorising it before the car turned out of her view. Using the police radio she got through immediately: ‘Attention all units, Detective Chief Inspector Lewis reporting RTA Oak Lane Primary, Didsbury. Driver failed to stop. Pedestrian injured. Blue Mercedes, registration Victor 384, Zulu, November, Bravo. Heading west on School Lane.’

She spotted the Mercedes again, turning right into Wilmslow Road. She activated the emergency sirens and flashers on her own vehicle and increased her speed. The traffic was still heavy; cars and vans and several buses chugging towards the city centre. They responded to the siren, pulling in so she could overtake. At the next junction she followed the Mercedes as it took a sharp right turn and roared away. She kept up with it along Fog Lane, fighting to keep control on the bends and where the road narrowed. The suburban street was a blur of privet hedges, red brick walls and stone gateposts that fronted the family houses. Despite her best efforts she couldn’t get a clear view of the car’s occupants; the windows were tinted glass.

Traffic lights ahead remained on green as the Mercedes took another right. Round in circles, she thought. She increased her speed again and edged closer. ‘Vehicle now on Parrswood Road heading south from Fog Lane.’ They rode through the Parrswood council estate with its distinctive cream rendered houses, built in rows of four.

In dismay she watched as the car approached the School Lane lights. It didn’t slow even though they were on red. Janine kept close. The Mercedes crossed the junction directly into the path of an oncoming van. The getaway car swerved violently and Janine, on its tail, screamed and rammed her foot on the brake, feeling the slam of the seatbelt as the car bucked and stopped inches from the shocked van driver. The Mercedes disappeared over the hill ahead. Frustrated, Janine hit the steering wheel. Damn, damn, damn.

Her radio crackled with news. ‘Victor 384, Zulu, November, Bravo. Mercedes reported stolen 22 hundred hours Monday 17 November.’ Stolen the previous evening. She groaned. The culprits would be even harder to find.

Returning to the school, she found the ambulance just leaving; the little girl was alive but unconscious. She rang Richard and filled him in. The group of witnesses remained; one woman was crying, wiping at her eyes repeatedly, automatically rocking the tall coach-built pram she’d been pushing. Others were talking about the accident, their voices hushed but edging now and again into hysteria. When traffic officers arrived shortly afterwards Janine spoke to the man in charge, giving a résumé of what had happened. Finally she got back in her car and set off for Northenden, feeling shaky and hollow and cold.

The car park at the side of the weir, next to the camping suppliers, was already awash with police vehicles. As Janine parked she saw the first news crew arrive, piling out of their van with cameras, flight cases and cables.

A scenic spot. It would make for good visuals – unlike the rows of terraced houses, dull semi-detached frontages or bleak alleyways that were usually the staple setting for local murder stories.

The river, olive brown and swiftly flowing, curved between steep grassy banks. The sweep of the motorway flyover above cast part of it in shadow, making the water there almost black. On the far bank were concrete buttresses that were part of the water management for the area. The land was low here and the Mersey often flooded, submerging the nearby golf course and playing fields along the valley.

The stretch of water behind the weir was pitted with eddies and ripples and patterned with fractured blue reflections from the sky above. Below the weir, the river seethed, a gushing torrent of white and silver, before regaining its equilibrium.

Fifty yards away, towards the large riverside pub and parallel with the weir, Janine could see the white incident tent that was shielding the corpse. Scene of crime officers, clad in white, were going about their business. She dressed in her own protective suit and locked the car.

At the edge of the car park, she gave her name to the officer keeping a log of entry to the site. She could see Richard near the tent, dark-haired and a head taller than many of the others. Slim in his long, black, winter coat. Attractive looking, if you liked that type, and she did. She’d almost slept with Richard years ago, but her engagement to Pete held her back. There was still a pull between them, apparent in the flirting and teasing they enjoyed. But now, in the aftermath of Pete’s departure and Charlotte’s arrival, she knew she wasn’t ready for a relationship with anyone. Not yet. Never mind the risks of getting emotionally entangled with someone at work.

He nodded as she reached him, his head tilted in concern. ‘You OK?’

She sighed. ‘No, not really.’ She paused, took a breath. ‘She’s only seven, the little girl.’

‘How is she?’

She looked away across the water. It was easier than meeting his gaze. Stopped her from getting tearful. ‘They’ve taken her to hospital. She’s in Tom’s class,’ she added.

‘Close to home.’

Janine bobbed her head, sniffed hard, swallowed. ‘So,’ she gestured towards the tent, ‘what’s the story?’

‘Female. The Rivers Authority guy reckons the body will have gone in upstream. Flows east to west.’

Which way was east? Janine tried to get her bearings, pointed in one direction, thinking if that way was south…

Richard set her straight. ‘That’s east – Stockport.’

The river marked the boundary between the city of Manchester and the adjoining town. ‘We got a time frame?’

‘Not yet. But she’s reasonably intact. Day or two.’

The pair of them covered the few yards to the plastic tent. As she stepped inside Janine caught the rank smell of river water and the sweet reek of death. She opened her mouth; breathing that way would cut out the stench that made her gag. She focused on the body. The face was shrouded by long, wet, dark hair, tangled with bits of straw, flotsam from the river. Tattered bin-liners covered the torso. Janine glimpsed raw flesh on the face, in between the banks of hair, and on one exposed thigh. She noticed straps at the ankles and colourful plastic dumb bells.