Alex Howard - Time to Die

The fat man on his own carried on eating his spatzeli. The two young lovers were still holding hands and looking at each other over the tablecloth. A tired-looking, quite drunk, English businessman in a crumpled suit was reading a book propped up on the salt and pepper in front of him. All was as before, except in her head, where everything had exploded into Edvard Munch-like despair. I must get home, she thought.

Images of Peter flashed through her head in bewildering succession. Terrible thoughts of what might be happening to him, mixed with random memories of his face. The police would meet her flight, Annette had said. She had felt Annette’s guilt and pain through the iPhone in her hand, but she had no desire to say anything comforting. She felt like throwing up. She was stunned. I must go, she thought, and stood up, then immediately sat down. She was too unsteady on her feet. Her legs were like jelly. I must tell Max I’m going, she thought. But I can’t say why, I can’t face talking.

When Max rejoined her at the table, he thought to himself as he saw her across the restaurant that she looked ethereally beautiful. Before, she’d been funny, sexy, warm. Now, she was like a woman transformed. She was staring expressionlessly into space. Momentarily he wondered if he had done something, or said something, terrible to offend her. They had been speaking German, Kathy’s was so good Max had to keep reminding himself how unusual this was from a British person. Now she switched to English. Her beautiful eyes held his and she spoke as if she were reading a script, her voice flat and uninflected.

‘Max. I need to leave now. Something’s happened. No, I’m not going to talk about it now, I’m sorry. There’s a taxi rank on the corner.’ He opened his mouth to speak and she touched him gently as a feather on the lips. ‘Please don’t say anything. I can’t talk right now.’

She stood up and left. He watched her back retreat through the restaurant. Kathy always had excellent posture, she didn’t stoop like some tall people, but now she was walking drawn up to her full height in an almost exaggerated way. She didn’t look back or left or right. ‘Entschuldigung. Zahlen, bitte,’ he said to a waiter, asking for the bill.

He realized she had left without taking her small suitcase. He would look after it for her until he saw her again. He guessed it had to be serious. Most of us can recognize when someone has just had bad news, but Max couldn’t even begin to guess how bad it could be.

Enver watched from his position outside the flat as the SOCO officers came and started their work, while various other uniforms sealed off the premises and started searching the roof and alley. These were the parameters that he had defined as the primary and secondary search sites. He had already started a crime-scene log, which he’d handed over to the SIO. He had also taken a witness statement from Mr Colin Hargreaves, the formerly abusive, but now extremely cooperative, pensioner. Hargreaves seemed pathetically eager to help. He kept smiling nervously at Enver, his false teeth slipping around wetly in his slack mouth. He reminded Enver of a chastised dog, keen to make amends.

What he told Enver was this: two men in council workclothes had arrived, had been admitted to the Yilmaz flat, there’d been some shouting, a general commotion which the old man had put down to objections to doing what they were told, then silence. The men had emerged carrying the large refuse sacks of the kind that were reinforced and strong enough to contain builders’ waste and rubble. Hargreaves said he assumed the bags contained rubbish. No description of the men beyond the fact that they were white and burly, both with hats, one a baseball cap, one a blue beanie. Hargreaves had no idea of the vehicle the men had arrived in. He said he’d heard doors slam after they disappeared down the staircase, so he assumed it was a van.

The officer who had been put in charge, the SIO, was DCI Murray, someone Enver knew fairly well. Murray was regarded as reliable and thorough, but Enver thought he was actually a lazy sod who liked to spin things out for overtime purposes. He was known as ‘Never Hurry’ Murray. As if to confirm this nickname, as soon as he’d cordoned off the service road and checked the initial plan of action with Enver, Murray had put Enver in charge of the crime scene and disappeared to ‘sort things out, logistics wise. We need an incident room.’ In Murray speak, that meant finding an office and drinking a lot of tea. Enver resigned himself mentally to a very late finish.

He sent officers to check the shops below for CCTV footage and to get witness statements. He arranged to have door-to-door enquiries down the street and he also sent an officer to try to track down the gang of youths who’d been hanging around when he and Hanlon had first arrived. If anyone had seen anything, they would have, although the chances of them helping the police with their enquiries would be practically nil.

He had been so preoccupied with the various tasks in hand, determined not to let Hanlon down, that strangely, the first he heard of the Whiteside shooting was when the outsize bulk of Corrigan, all six foot five of the assistant commissioner, loomed up the metal steps that led to the roof where the flat was. Like Enver, he was finding the metal stairs hard going and he appeared in Enver’s sight inch by impressive inch as he grimly hauled his way up, knees protesting. The top of his head came first, followed by the rest of him in slow motion. It was like the visitation of a deity. Everyone stopped what they were doing and stared. He climbed on to the flat roof, followed by two of his own men, hard-faced police that Enver had never seen before, one in uniform, one not. They fell in behind Corrigan, one on either side, like attendant priests.

In the absence of Murray, Enver had been busy contacting the council for traffic and other CCTV sources to see if anything could be made of the van. If they had the number plate they could use the ANPR system. He wasn’t optimistic. They’d probably have fake plates, but it was worth a try. He told the council employee he’d be back in touch later and, like everyone else, he stopped what he was doing and stared at the assistant commissioner. Although Corrigan was wearing civilian clothes, chinos, a baggy shirt and deck shoes, Enver recognized him immediately and saluted. Like everyone else, he wondered, what had brought the assistant commissioner up here. To his horror, Corrigan bore down on him.

‘Are you Sergeant Demirel?’ Corrigan asked.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Enver uncomfortably. He wondered feverishly what all this could possibly be about. The AC’s acolytes stared at him silently. It was very unnerving.

‘Come with me, Sergeant.’ The assistant commissioner indicated the hatchet-faced plainclothes policeman to his left. ‘DI Ralphs will take over from you.’

‘Yes, sir. Do you want me to fill the DI in on what I’ve done already?’ asked Enver.

Corrigan looked at him as if he were insane. ‘No. No, I don’t,’ he said, as if speaking to a child. ‘I want you to stop what you’re doing and come with me. Ralphs is perfectly capable of following procedure, which I take it you have been doing?’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Enver.

‘Good,’ said Corrigan. ‘Where’s the SIO here?’

‘Back at the station, sir.’

‘Is that so?’ said Corrigan.

‘Yes, sir. I’m acting SIO, in his absence.’

‘Well, Ralphs is now,’ said Corrigan. He looked unimpressed by Murray’s absence. Someone’s in for a bollocking, thought Enver. The AC ordered, ‘You, Sergeant, come with me.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Enver and fell in beside the AC. Corrigan swung his bulk over the roof’s edge and descended the stairs. Enver followed him. The sergeant came up to the other man’s shoulders; he hadn’t felt this small in years. He wondered what on earth Corrigan might want.