Howard Linskey - The Dead

‘Why don’t you make me, you fat bastard? Look at you,’ and Kevin curled his lip at Maggot, ‘you’re like a sleazy little pork scratching on legs.’

‘Both of you shut up,’ I ordered, ‘this isn’t a playground. It’s a shrine,’ I indicated the pictures on the walls, ‘now show some respect. What have you got for me Kevin?’

Kevin Kinane looked uneasy.

‘It’s alright, he’s family.’ Maggot was many things but he wasn’t a grass and none of this was too sensitive. We were looking into the case at the request of the police anyhow, but Maggot gulped down his pint as quick as he could, burped and said.

‘I’ve got to be off anyhow. You’ll have a word with Sticky for us?’

I nodded and Maggot slunk away. Once he was gone Kevin gave us an update.

‘Okay, I caught up with some of Golden Boots’ lads,’ he said, ‘they’re practically a fixture at Cachet, so we know them all. They all remember Gemma and they saw her at the party on the Friday night. She walked in on Golden Boots’ arm. A bit later he took her to the bedroom. A very short while later he came out and he pretty much ignored her after that. You know what he’s like.’

Kevin took a sip of his pint and continued, ‘She hung around for a bit. Eventually he gets one of his lads to drive her and her friend Louise home and we know she got there safely. Here’s the interesting bit, I spoke to all of his friends and some of them say she wasn’t at the party on the Saturday night but a couple of them reckon she was. She tried to see old Golden Boots again but he was busy.’

‘Meaning he was shagging another lass?’

‘Yep.’

‘How did she take that?’

‘Not well, apparently. She got pissed and started saying stuff about him.’

‘What sort of stuff?’

‘Tiny cock, shit in bed, that kind of thing.’

‘So what happened?’

‘Eventually she fucked off, but nobody knows when she went or who with. I’ve asked everyone. Most of them don’t remember her at all. You know what his parties are like? Stacks of people, everyone high or pissed, dozens of strangers mixed in together in that big house of his, people coming and going all night. All we’ve got is a couple of folk who remember a brunette with the hump at Golden Boots. One minute she’s there and the next she’s gone.’

‘What about his entourage? Anyone give her a lift home this time?’

‘They all say no,’ and he cut me off before I could question him, ‘and I didn’t ask them nicely. They’d have told me. Someone could have driven her though. He’s got nine cars and the keys are just lying around, plus there will have been a dozen other cars on the driveway or in the grounds and taxis coming and going all evening. Who’s going to remember one young girl?’

‘Alright, thanks Kevin. Let’s hand that over to Sharp and he can take it from there.’ Kevin nodded, then he went off to the Gents. I was pleased with his efforts. This was just what I needed; a plausible explanation behind the death of the young lass that didn’t involve me. She’d attended a party, she’d got the hump, maybe there’d been a row, she was drunk and vulnerable. Perhaps she tried to walk home on her own and was offered a lift by some predatory bloke, who drove her out of there while no one was looking. It was enough to take the heat off me and get the police looking in a different direction. They could untangle the rest.

‘So poor little Gemma Carlton liked to do a bit of blow and shag footballers,’ I said when he had gone, ‘not quite the innocent little copper’s daughter we thought, eh?’ but Palmer didn’t seem to be listening.

‘A pork scratching on legs,’ he said quietly, ‘that’s priceless, that is.’

‘Finish your pint,’ I told him, ‘we’ve got work to do.’

I had never seen the man before, but we picked him up on CCTV easy enough. It was Palmer’s army-jacket guy. My blokes stopped him before he got too close to the main door of the Cauldron. Vince took their call, listened for a moment, then lowered the phone so he could speak to me.

‘There’s a fella downstairs says he wants to see you. The boys told him to fuck off but he said he knew you were here and he wouldn’t leave till you heard what he had to say. They threatened to kick the shit out of him and he just laughed, said he didn’t care what they did to him.’

‘Bloody hell,’ commented Kinane, ‘he’s either nails or he’s as mad as a badger.’

‘Who is he?’ I asked.

‘He says his name is Bell, Matt Bell,’ answered Vince.

‘Do you know who he is?’ asked Kinane.

‘Yes,’ I said, finally understanding, ‘he’s the father of Leanne Bell, the little girl Baxter killed.’

‘Jesus,’ said Kinane.

‘What do you want me to do?’ asked Vince.

I didn’t want to turn the poor bastard away, but I was pretty sure I wouldn’t want to hear what he had to say to me. In the end I said, ‘They’d better bring him up.’

Two of our guys escorted Matt Bell into the room. I noticed that they stayed close to him but I had two guys from the door, plus Palmer, Kinane and Vince with me, so I didn’t feel in any danger. The man before me must have been in his late forties, but you could see in his eyes that he’d been through something resembling a hell on earth. Our guys were all big, hard blokes, but he didn’t seem remotely intimidated by them. I watched as he glanced at Kinane, Palmer and Vince, then finally his eyes fell on me.

‘David Blake?’ I nodded. ‘My name is Matt Bell,’ he told me, ‘do you know who I am? Why I have come here to see you today?’

‘I think so, yes.’ He dipped his head slightly, as if to acknowledge that I hadn’t bothered to lie to him. ‘Take a seat,’ I told him.

‘I’m fine standing thanks,’ he replied then, without preamble, he began. ‘There’s a man being held on remand in Durham jail called Henry Baxter. I understand you know him?’

I couldn’t see any point in lying about that, ‘I do. He has worked for me for a while.’

‘Then you know what he has done to get himself in Durham nick?’

‘I know what the police are telling me he’s done, yes.’

‘Baxter murdered my daughter, Mr Blake.’ He said it with a conviction that was absolute, then his voice cracked, ‘My little girl’. He cleared his throat, then he continued, ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘I promised myself I would say my piece and get out of here without making a bigger fool of myself than necessary, but it’s hard. It was ten years ago, but I think about it every day, so it doesn’t feel like ten years to me,’ then he balled a fist and planted it firmly against his chest to indicate his heart, ‘my grief is still fresh.’

‘I understand.’

‘Do you?’ His tone made it clear that he seriously doubted that. ‘I assume the police are telling us both the same thing, that there’s no doubt Henry Baxter is the man who murdered Leanne. Baxter raped and strangled a thirteen-year-old girl, then he drove her out into the country. He dug a ditch at the edge of a field and he dumped her in it, so we couldn’t find her. Two months, Mr Blake. That’s how long it took for the police to discover my little girl’s body. For eight weeks my wife and I clung to the slim belief that she might still be alive, somehow, that maybe she’d just run away, even though that hope was chipped away with every freezing night that passed until they found her.’ My crew stayed silent while he said his piece, everyone afforded him that respect. ‘All those days spent knowing our baby was most likely gone forever but, until we knew for sure, we would allow ourselves to hope that she could be alive somewhere and we might get her back one day.’