Mark Billingham - Buried

‘Why didn’t anyone call me when he was brought in?’ Hoolihan asked. ‘Just as a common courtesy.’

Brigstocke and Hignett looked at one another, each trying to formulate a nice, polite answer.

It had all kicked off towards the end of the morning’s briefing, which had naturally concentrated on the discovery of the body in Shepherd’s Bush. As ever, the first twenty-four hours were the most crucial, so all efforts would now be channelled into investigating the murder of Kathleen Bristow. Though this was clearly the best chance they had of making progress on the main case, too, the kidnap itself had barely been talked about.

It had not escaped Thorne’s attention that Luke Mullen’s name was being mentioned less and less as the days went by. Spoken more quietly, when it was. There were the murders to work on now, he understood that; other angles that might prove more productive. But Thorne knew that wasn’t the only reason.

As the briefing had broken up, Graham Hoolihan had appeared, and a heated discussion had rapidly reached boiling point, until a sergeant from another squad had ushered them all towards Brigstocke’s office, like an irate landlord escorting drunks from the premises.

‘You should know that I’ve got written authority to take Freestone back with me to Lewisham.’

Lewisham, Sutton, Earlsfield. The three places Homicide South were based on the other side of the river.

Hoolihan reached down for a briefcase, then swung it on to Brigstocke’s desk. ‘My guvnor got it signed by Commander Walker first thing this morning.’

From where Thorne was standing, it looked as though Hignett and Brigstocke couldn’t quite decide whether to bristle or shudder. Clive Walker was head of Homicide Command, London-wide. He was one of the few men who could make Trevor Jesmond seem like one of the lads.

‘So let’s not waste any more time,’ Hoolihan said. ‘Do you still have every reason to believe Freestone can assist with your enquiries?’

There seemed little point pretending there was any reason whatsoever. Freestone had been questioned earlier that morning, and had claimed to have been tucked up in bed at his sister’s flat when Kathleen Bristow was having a pillow put across her face. Predictably, Jane Freestone had confirmed her brother’s story, and, though she was hardly the world’s most reliable witness, the alibi would be tough to dispute.

Not that Thorne could see any reason to even bother trying. He knew that Freestone had no more murdered Kathleen Bristow than he had Amanda Tickell or Conrad Allen; any more than he was behind the kidnapping of Luke Mullen. He thought back to when he and Porter had nicked Freestone in the park the morning before. He hadn’t looked happy, of course, why would he? But he certainly hadn’t looked like a man being arrested for a murder he’d committed only a few hours earlier.

The hesitation that followed his question seemed to give Hoolihan the answer he desired. ‘Right, well, let’s get a move on, then.’ He tapped the lid of his briefcase. ‘We’ll have plenty of paperwork to push at each other.’

Thorne felt himself stepping forward, then heard himself speaking. ‘For someone who obviously sets so much store by courtesy, I was thinking that maybe a “thank you” might be in order.’ Brigstocke threw him a look, but Thorne ploughed on, making a mental note to adjust his definition of ‘chipping in’. ‘OK, we may not have handled things exactly as you’d have liked them, but the fact remains we did you a bloody big favour.’

Hoolihan pulled his briefcase to his chest, folded his arms around it and waited for Thorne to continue.

‘You’d taken your eye off the ball as far as Grant Freestone was concerned, or given it up as not being worth the effort. Somebody rubber-stamped the review paperwork once a year, but you weren’t doing much of anything, as far as I can make out. The fact that you’re going to get a nice, fat feather in your cap is down to us. We may not have been as courteous as we should have been, but I still think you should be fucking grateful.’

It was the F-word that did it; that caused the colour to rise to Hoolihan’s face. Though he pointedly refused to respond to what had been said, it was clear that Thorne would no longer be getting any favours from anyone at Homicide South.

After losing what was only a half-arsed staring contest, Hoolihan turned back to Brigstocke and Hignett. ‘It’s not like I’ll be taking Freestone very far,’ he said. ‘We’ll get him up in front of a magistrate within a day or two, so he’ll be on remand somewhere, if you need to speak to him after that.’

There was some shouting once Hoolihan had left, but not too much. Hignett once again showed restraint in his decision not to gloat or say, ‘I told you so.’

There were more important things to be discussed.

‘We got a preliminary PM report from Phil Hendricks,’ Brigstocke said. He picked up a piece of paper from his desk, and read: ‘Asphyxia due to suffocation, obviously… three broken ribs… a broken nose. That’s from where he’s put his weight on the pillow, Phil reckons…’

A second or two of looking at feet, and walls, and a sky that couldn’t make its mind up.

‘You still think he was after something?’ Hignett asked.

‘It’s a possibility,’ Thorne said. ‘Porter’s going to have a good look through those filing cabinets later. I think she’ll be at the mortuary for a while yet.’

‘Whatever it was, he obviously wanted it badly.’ Brigstocke took a last look at the PM report. ‘Or else he’s just rattled.’

‘Not too rattled, I hope,’ Hignett said.

Thorne knew what Hignett was saying, the dreadful possibility it would be stupid to ignore. He noted that, yet again, the point had been made without any mention of the boy’s name.

The Major Incident Room seemed just a little busier than it had the day before. Conversations were less likely to go round the houses. People moved from desk to desk, from phone to fax machine, with greater urgency. It was not even twelve hours since Kathleen Bristow’s body had been discovered, but Thorne knew that unless those doing the chasing were quick enough, murder cases could be away and out of sight long before that. He exchanged quick words with Andy Stone and a couple of the Kidnap boys, then spent a few unwelcome, but necessary, minutes talking admin with DS Samir Karim, who was also office manager. Thorne liked Karim, an overweight, gregarious Asian with a shock of prematurely greying hair and a thick London accent. But the smile that was normally hard to shift was not much in evidence this morning.

‘Everything’s fucked up,’ he said.

Thorne nodded, without really needing to know exactly what Karim was talking about.

Dave Holland seemed as focused as anyone, but up close his eyes betrayed a man who hadn’t slept the night before.

‘Pissholes in the snow,’ he said, ‘I know, but still slightly bigger pissholes than yours.’

Thorne looked down at Holland’s computer screen: a page from the Borough of Bromley website displaying various contact telephone numbers and email addresses.

‘There’s an out-of-hours contact service,’ Holland said, ‘which is fine if a water main bursts or you see someone fly-tipping, but not much use for anything else. I’ve spoken to a couple of people at home, but I’m not getting anywhere. As far as any records Kathleen Bristow might have kept, I think we’ll have to wait until tomorrow morning, talk to someone at social services who’s got access to the files. Even then, I’m not sure it’ll be a five-minute job.’

‘Get hold of the other people who were on the panel with her,’ Thorne said. ‘Roper and the rest of them…’