Peter Helton - Falling More Slowly

Austin let out a long breath through puffed-up cheeks. ‘Tumbleweed alert. The close that time forgot.’

As the sky darkened a light came on behind the small net-curtained window of number three.

‘We’ll try this one, have a chat, find out if anyone’s seen him today.’

‘I bet people round here know everything about everybody.’

‘You’d have thought so. Yet obviously not everything.’

‘Got a point there.’ Austin pressed the tiny electric bell button in the centre of number three’s front door.

A woman in her late fifties opened it as far as the chain allowed. McLusky showed his ID. ‘I’m Detective Inspector McLusky from CID. With me is Detective Sergeant Austin. Could we have a word? Won’t keep you long.’

‘What is it now?’ The door closed to allow for the removal of the chain, then opened wider.

‘May we come in?’

‘Make sure you wipe your feet. What is it you wanted?’ The woman stood in the tiny carpeted hall, allowing them just enough space to come in out of the rain.

‘Oh, it’s nothing to worry about. May I ask your name?’

‘I’m Mrs Woodley. Joan Woodley.’

‘Mrs Woodley, we would like to ask you about Mr Cooke. He lives in number thirty-five, I believe. Do you know him at all?’

‘Yes, poor Mr Cooke, well, of course we know of him.’

‘He lost his wife.’

She shook her head at his ignorance. ‘And his daughter. Both dead within two years. He lost everything really. His house, business, family.’

‘His daughter too? I didn’t know that. And his business? How …?’

‘Yes, well, he used to have that electrical repair shop in the old town, I remember Frank getting our radio repaired there once, years and years ago now. But people don’t have things repaired any more, do they? They just buy new things now, and then perhaps Mr Cooke didn’t know how to repair all the new technology and that anyway. The business folded and then he lost the house too, they lived over the shop and he had remortgaged it to prop up the business.’

‘His daughter, how did she die?’

‘Jenny? She was run over. Well, squashed by a reversing lorry against a house. That’s what sent Barbara, Mrs Cooke, over the edge, I’m sure of it. They’d just lost the house and all and had moved here.’

The hall was so narrow Austin had to speak over McLusky’s shoulder. ‘Mrs Woodley, does Mr Cooke have an electric bicycle?’

‘That’s exactly what the other policeman asked. Yes, he does all his shopping on it. What’s so important about it? Did he break the speed — ’

McLusky interrupted. ‘Other policeman, Mrs Woodley? When was that?’

‘Today, earlier. Can’t be more than an hour ago. Actually he looked too young to be a policeman, but you know what they say about policemen looking younger.’

McLusky fleshed out the picture for her. ‘Thin hair, bad skin, terrible suit?’

She rewarded him with a broad smile. ‘You describe him very well.’

Austin was already outside. McLusky thanked Mrs Woodley and urgently followed. ‘Right, Jane, let’s go check it out. That could only be Dearlove, what the hell does he think he’s doing?’ They walked fast towards the other end of the close. The further they came the more boarded-up prefabs they saw.

‘Deedee’s not the shiniest tool in the box.’

‘He’ll be the dullest bobby on the beat if he’s spooked Cooke. Right.’ He counted off the house numbers. ‘There’s his house, let’s walk along the hedge out of sight.’

McLusky stalked along the fence among heaps of builder’s rubble, some of which looked like dumped asbestos — he was glad it was still raining. Number thirty-five was entirely surrounded by uninhabited and partly derelict houses. It was a dark and desolate corner of the close, richly overgrown.

Austin nudged his boss. ‘Look in there.’

McLusky followed the direction Austin indicated, into the wilderness of number thirty-four’s garden. A car had been parked in here, then covered with bits of tarpaulin and partially surrounded with corrugated iron and chipboard.

‘That’s Deedee’s little Ford.’

‘You sure?’

Austin pulled more of the camouflage away and nodded. ‘It’s his.’

‘Shit. Okay, we’ll go in now.’

‘Aren’t we waiting for the firearms unit?’

‘He didn’t park it like that himself. If he’s no longer in control of his car then he’s in trouble. Sod the firearms unit, they’re twenty minutes away.’ He keyed his airwave radio. ‘Alpha Nine to Control request immediate back-up my position Nelson Close number thirty-five one officer down ambulance required immediate officers McLusky and Austin attending over.’ As soon as Control acknowledged he put the radio down and took his mobile out. ‘Switch your mobile to vibrate.’

Austin did so, squinting into the thin drizzle. ‘It’s very quiet at this end away from the road.’

‘Not for long. He’s got net curtains on every window and the glass in the door. Probably the same at the back. He’ll see us coming if he’s in there. There’s no time for subtlety. You take the back door, I’ll take the front. Go, and move fast. If you hear me smashing through do the same at the back, otherwise wait.’

There was no possibility of approaching by stealth. They moved in quick strides past the front of the derelict house neighbouring Cooke’s, then split up, Austin putting on a spurt to get to the back door. If Cooke was in there he must have noticed the movement. McLusky didn’t hesitate: he turned the door handle, ready to break the half-glazed door down if it was locked. It wasn’t. He opened it and moved quietly inside, listening. A narrow hall, identical in proportions to the first one they had visited. Cabbagey cooking smells mixed with the lemon scent of furniture polish. A half-open door to the left led into a small, sparsely furnished sitting room; two-seater sofa, half of it taken up with piles of newsprint. A closed door to the right; he threw it open. A double bedroom, neatly made bed. Quickly on to the next closed door — a tiny bedroom, green carpet, empty apart from a silver electric bicycle leaning against the wall, connected to a charger on the floor. McLusky stepped through the final half-open door into the small kitchen. Behind the net-curtained half-glazed back door stood Austin, waiting patiently for a sign from his boss. McLusky stepped towards the door to open it for him, reaching out towards the handle. Below it a black round metal container, fixed to the door by an iron bracket, looked out of place. He withdrew his hand sharply and opened the tiny window above the sink instead. ‘Step away from the door, Jane, it’s booby-trapped. He’s not in here.’

They met up by the front door. ‘Was the booby trap meant for us?’

‘Hard to say. Perhaps it’s a burglar trap. No sign of Deedee or of a struggle. The door was unlocked and his electric bike is in there. He’s in his workshop in one of these derelict houses.’

‘Yes, but there’s scores of them. Which one is it?’

McLusky pointed. ‘It’s that one.’ Cooke had appeared from around the back of the last bungalow, whose garden backed on to the towpath. As he saw them he stopped in his tracks, then turned quickly back around the corner.

‘Stop, police!’ McLusky was running already. Austin sprinted around the front in case Cooke tried to escape that way. They met up by the back door, having seen nothing. Windows and door were boarded up and, to the casual observer, secure. Yet on closer inspection the chipboard over the back entrance was in fact a hinged door. A bolt lying on the ground beside it would secure the door from the outside. McLusky picked it up and flung it far into the long grass. There was no sign of Daws’ break-in. It had either been repaired or he had come in a different way.