Nick Oldham - Fighting for the Dead

‘Boss?’ he said quickly.

‘What?’

‘Dog man down by the river — his dog has found something.’

Henry waited for the revelation, encouraging the sergeant with his body language.

‘A Wellington boot… and there’s something in it.’

‘What?’

‘A camera-phone.’

Henry had been on the point of rushing off to deal with the custody office emergency in Blackpool, but he knew five minutes wouldn’t change anything. ‘Let’s go see.’

He traipsed after the sergeant across the wide lawn of Sunderland’s garden, onto a path winding through some rhododendron bushes which then sloped down to the river which was running high and fast. Henry could imagine someone falling in and instantly being swept away to the coast and drowned.

The dog man, a support unit constable and the German shepherd dog, full name LanConBertie, were clustered by a bunch of low-growing bushes, chattering.

‘What’ve you got?’ the sergeant asked them.

‘It’s behind there,’ the dog man said and led Henry and the sergeant around the bush where, seemingly tucked out of sight, was a lone pink-and-grey polka-dotted cut-off Wellington boot, for the left foot.

Henry had one of his wonderful, arse-twitching moments, completely the opposite of what he’d just felt on hearing the news from Blackpool. He recognized the boot instantly: the match to the one that Jennifer Sunderland had been wearing when Flynn pulled her out of the river. He swallowed drily.

‘It was actually under some leaves,’ the dog man said, ‘so we moved it a bit and stood it upright.’

Henry nodded. Fair enough.

‘And I also looked into it,’ he went on. ‘There’s a mobile phone in there, but I haven’t touched it.’

‘Brilliant,’ Henry enthused. He squatted down by the boot and peered into it, saw a mobile phone of some description inside, laid flat. Temptation nearly overcame him. He wanted to grab it, see if it worked, see what was on it that was so bloody urgent. Clearly this is what the fuss was about, the item that Mrs Sunderland was believed to have had in her possession, and which resulted in the violent incident in the mortuary and the failed attempt to kill Steve Flynn on the canal boat.

‘Right,’ he said, addressing the sergeant. ‘Turn out a CSI now — on my say-so — get photos of it in situ, then I want the boot and the phone bagged separately and securely. I want both items to be put into the safe at Lancaster nick. No one must mess about with the phone — understand?’ The sergeant nodded. Both men knew that the curiosity of cops could be the downfall of a case. Hell, even Henry wanted to have a go at switching it on here and now. ‘If I find out that anyone has had a go at doing this, I’ll have ’em, and I mean it. So — bagged, sealed, tagged and in the safe with specific instructions to the duty inspector that only I am allowed to handle it.’

‘Got it, boss.’

‘I need to get to Blackpool and head some bastards off at the pass.’ He turned to the dog man. ‘Well done.’ Then he looked at Bertie, who had actually done the finding, and reached out to pat him on the head, but a warning growl made him snap his hand away. Being savaged by a police dog would just be the icing on the cake.

He knew that time was of the essence, so he turned and started to walk briskly back to the pool car.

Fully dressed, Flynn heaved, pushed and re-stacked and rearranged the stock boxes so they were against three of the four walls of the stock room, leaving the fourth wall free, the one against which he had laid the air beds (now deflated), and found the tooth wedged under the skirting. By doing this he also exposed as much of the floor space as possible, which wasn’t much. Perhaps seven feet by four of bare floorboards.

It had been a long time since he had been a detective and though obviously rusty and not up to date, some fundamental things never leave. He still had the instinct. Not that he needed much at this juncture. Nor imagination, nor skills, as most people of sound mind and intellect could probably hazard a guess and identify blood stains.

Flynn therefore knew exactly what he was looking at: a crime scene.

‘Boss! Boss!’ the support unit sergeant called to Henry at the moment he yanked up the car door handle.

Henry turned with irritation as the sergeant almost skidded into him. He tried not to let it show because this man and his team were doing a bloody good job and Henry appreciated it. He forced a smile, well, more a grimace.

‘Sorry, I know you’re in a rush, but I think we’ve found something else. In the house and the guys really want you to have a quick look.’

Henry took a deep breath. ‘Quick one,’ he said.

He trotted behind the sergeant up to Sunderland’s lovely house and followed him inside into a huge entrance hallway, then up a wide staircase to the first floor. He was led along the landing, through a door that opened on to another set of stairs which were much tighter and steeper than the main set.

‘Up to the converted loft,’ the sergeant explained. ‘There’s a couple of extra bedrooms up here, a shower room and a large sort of lounge, all built under the eaves.’

‘Uh-huh,’ Henry said.

They emerged on to a long landing corridor, a door either side, one a little further on and a door at the far end.

The sergeant pointed at the end door. ‘That one goes into the lounge, these doors are to the bedrooms, and that one is to the shower room, toilet.’

‘OK,’ Henry said, taking in the geography. He might have been a detective, but he wasn’t keen on mini-mysteries and was aching for the sergeant to get on with it and tell him why he had been dragged up here. It had better be good, something to match the Wellington boot and mobile phone. He hoped his face hid how he was feeling. He suspected it did. Being battered and bruised and swollen hid most things, except pain.

The sergeant opened a door.

Inside was a pair of constables going through items in a chest of drawers. They stopped their work.

Henry glanced quickly around a fairly small, sparsely furnished bedroom, with a three-quarter-sized bed that took up a lot of the floor space, the chest of drawers, a narrow wardrobe and one bedside cabinet. The bed was unmade and several items were strewn on it, including men’s clothing.

The sergeant said to one of the PCs, ‘John, what have you got?’

John nodded eagerly. He crossed to the bed saying, ‘Various things, but these in particular.’ He lifted a grubby shirt, underneath which were four passports, which he picked up and came to Henry’s side. The PC was wearing latex gloves, so he kept hold of the passports and opened the first one of them for Henry to see, so he didn’t have to touch it. It was Russian and on seeing the holder’s photograph, Henry went icy cold. He looked at Henry for a reaction.

‘Next one,’ Henry said.

The PC did the same for that one and the next two. There was another Russian passport, an EU one from Malta and a Turkish one. The photographs were all of the same person, all slightly different, and the names were all completely different.

They belonged to the man who had forced Henry and Flynn off the road and then tried to murder them by spraying them with bullets — but had met his own violent end at the hands of Steve Flynn.

Henry’s lips parted with a pop: ‘Vladimir Kaminsky.’

‘There are two guns underneath the bed with ammunition.’

Henry said, ‘The room opposite?’

‘Three passports from three different countries, all belonging to the same man — but not this one.’

‘Let me see.’

Henry crossed the corridor into the opposite bedroom and inspected the find.

Three passports, two more guns. Each passport with a different name, but all belonging to the man who had killed Joe Speakman, wife and dog, and who had almost blasted Henry to pieces, had it not been for Steve Flynn. Yuri Gregorov.