Peter Robinson - Many Rivers to Cross

‘I don’t understand.’

‘It’s a matter of timing. Do you have a car, Jason?’

‘No.’

‘That’s right. Mr Bowen told us. But Chris Myers does, doesn’t he? Your best mate. He gives you a lift to school and back.’

‘So what? And why have you been talking to Bowen about me? What’s he got to say?’

‘We’ll get to that later,’ said Banks. ‘In the meantime, we think Samir’s body was dumped on the East Side Estate. Most likely by car.’

‘Now, wait a minute,’ said Gus Bartlett. ‘You’re not accusing our Jason of this murder, are you?’

Banks glanced from one to the other. ‘I’m not quite sure yet,’ he said. ‘We’re still waiting on the lab results of traces we found in the park. At the scene. I have a suspicion it might be one or the other of the boys, though. Unless you also smoke marijuana.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ said Gus Bartlett.

‘Not at all. Obviously, the killer wanted us to think Samir had been killed on the East Side Estate, that it was just the kind of place where a boy like him might have lived and died. The thing is, nobody’s ever seen him there. Nobody knew him.’ He turned to Jason again. ‘He was thirteen,’ he said. ‘He left his family in Syria because they could only afford to pay the smugglers for one passage. The idea was that when he got here, he would find an aunt and uncle, get work and send money home. But it didn’t happen like that. God only knows what privations he suffered on the journey — kids like him go through everything, from rape to robbery — but he made it, having walked over a good part of the continent. It took him months. He found a group of smugglers who got him into this country, but by then he’d lost his relatives’ address, and he had no money left. They kept him a virtual prisoner in Birmingham, in slavery, working off his debt. He got away and fell in with a bad crowd in Leeds, got involved in selling drugs. He was no angel. But he was only thirteen and a long way from home. He was still saving money to get his family over. And guess what? His family were all dead. Killed in a bomb attack not long after Samir left. And the irony was that he never knew. He never knew he was selling drugs for nothing.’

‘That’s a very sad tale,’ said Gus Bartlett, ‘but I don’t see what it has to do with us.’

Banks looked directly at Jason. ‘Does that really make Samir “no better than an animal”, Jason?’ he asked.

Jason reddened and turned away. Everyone else seemed nonplussed by the question. Clearly, Jason had not apprised his parents of his racist views.

Banks stood up. ‘Ask your son,’ he said to Gus Bartlett. ‘He knows what I’m talking about.’

He noticed that Lisa was crying.

‘It is a sad story, isn’t it, Lisa?’ he said. ‘Anyway, I must be off. We’ve had a lot of developments down at the park today. I don’t know if you’ve seen our forensic officers at work, but pretty soon we’ll have a DNA profile of the killer, then all we have to do is match it up with one of our suspects.’ He looked at Jason again, but the boy’s eyes were still averted.

‘Well, I wish you luck, Superintendent,’ said Gus Bartlett, ‘but I assure you it’s got nothing to do with us.’

‘I do hope not,’ said Banks. ‘And thank you. We’ll need all the luck we can get. Bye, then. Bye, Lisa. Mrs Bartlett. Bye, Jason.’

But Jason didn’t look up or mumble a goodbye in return. He seemed lost in his own world.

When Banks got back to Newhope Cottage after talking to the Bartletts that evening, he found a note from the courier company to the effect that there was a package too large for his letterbox waiting for him round the back. Curious, he walked around to the wooden chest he had been having packages left in for years and found that whatever was in it was so big it wouldn’t shut properly.

He carried the large, well-wrapped box into the front room and started to remove the wrapping. It seemed to take for ever, and he had to fetch a box-cutter from the kitchen drawer, but he knew what it was before he managed to cut off the last strip of cardboard and saw the envelope taped to the case. He opened it up and pulled out the card, which read:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AND

HAPPY STRUMMING, DAD!

LOVE,

A guitar . But not just any guitar. When he opened up the case, he saw it was a Martin D-28, just about the best acoustic guitar on the market. He took it out and held it in his hands. Then he strummed it and found, naturally, that it was out of tune. That would be the first job.

There was a care package of extras with it, and Banks found spare strings, plectrums, a cleaning cloth and an electronic gizmo you attached to the neck, which told you the note of each string as you tuned it. He found something else, too: a copy of Bert Weedon’s Play in a Day , the legendary manual used by Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Pete Townshend and John Lennon, among others. Not that Banks imagined he would ever be able to play as well as any of them, but at least he would get the same start.

He had tears in his eyes as he stroked the smooth wood and rested it on his knee. He had been quite resigned to buying his own guitar — and it certainly wouldn’t have been a Martin — but this was a wonderful gesture from his son, and it almost overwhelmed him. It wasn’t even his birthday for another two weeks, but that didn’t matter. No doubt Brian wanted to get it to him before he bought an inferior model for himself.

The guitar put the Hollyfield case quite out of his mind as he tried to work out how to use the gizmo to tune it. He remembered that strings were supposed to be EADGBE, which was a good start, and soon found that if he tightened or loosened each string in turn, the electronic tuner showed him what note he was playing.

He had managed to tune the first three strings when his phone rang. He cursed, but when he saw it was Gerry, he put the guitar aside. He had been expecting her to ring. ‘Yes, Gerry? How did it go?’ he asked.

‘Just as you expected, guv.’

‘Excellent.’

‘You were right. It wasn’t long after you left that Jason Bartlett came out of the house, made a quick call on his mobile and then met up with Chris Myers at the end of his street.’

‘So it’s the kids, not the parents. Well, well. Where did they go? The park’s still taped off and under guard, isn’t it?’

‘Yes. They went to The Oak, sat in the beer garden, had quite a long natter.’

‘Any sign of Lisa or the parents? Granville Myers?’

‘None. Just Chris and Jason. I couldn’t hear what was going on — I didn’t dare get too close for fear they’d notice me — but they seemed to be arguing on the way down there. It looked as if Jason was panicking and Chris was trying to calm him down. There was a bit of arm-waving, and at one point they stopped while Chris held Jason by the shoulders, gave him a good shake and seemed to be trying to make a point. But I couldn’t get any closer, guv. They know who I am. They’d have spotted me.’

‘That’s OK. I think we’d better make our move first thing in the morning, though, don’t you?’ said Banks. ‘Give them both a chance to spend a sleepless night with their consciences, if they have any, then bring them both in. With any luck, we should have some lab results from Jazz by then. Even if we don’t, I can’t risk either of them making a run for it. Or give them time to clean up the car any more than they probably have done already. Let’s put an officer on watching the Myers garage, just in case. We’ll want their computers and mobiles, too. There should at least be evidence of Jason’s racist activities in his Internet browser usage. I think we’ve got enough to get the boys talking if we employ a bit of creativity here and there, push them to the edge. One of them is bound to crack. We’ll need to arrange for duty solicitors to be available if we don’t want any delays, too. OK?’