Luca Veste - The Dying Place

DCI Stephens was already standing in the doorway as he reached her office, down the corridor from his own. Her office was around the same size of his, but with the benefit of being for her alone.

‘Was just coming to let you know the latest,’ Murphy said, realising he was still holding his jacket. He began putting it on.

‘I know, I heard. Didn’t want to interrupt. Looks like you’ve got the basics covered. ID yet?’

‘Almost sure of it. Some teenager from Norris Green …’

‘Not a frigging gang thing, is it?’ DCI Stephens said, running a perfectly manicured hand through her loose hair. ‘That’s the last thing we want.’

‘Not sure yet. There’s a few things not adding up at the moment. I’d stay open-minded for the time being.’

‘Okay. Well, the Chief Super has taken an interest already.’

‘Really?’ Murphy replied, surprised to hear notice had been taken.

‘Body found in church grounds? He’s already imagining all kinds. Don’t worry about him, I’ll keep him quiet for now. You concentrate on finding out who the vic is, and how he ended up dead outside a church.’

Murphy mocked a salute. ‘Got it, boss.’ Received a roll of DCI Stephens’s eyes in response. He walked away before she could say anything more, finding Rossi in exactly the same position as he’d left her. ‘Ready?’

‘Of course.’

Murphy fiddled with the lever underneath the passenger seat, attempting to find the right motion which would move the seat backwards, removing his knees from underneath his chin. Sliding the chair back with a sudden bang, he ignored the stare from Rossi and went back to reading the criminal record of Dean Hughes.

It could have been his own from that age, had he not been much savvier. Every time Murphy had been in trouble as a teenager, he’d managed to get away with a warning here, a run away there. Not so much as an official caution, which was handy, given that he ended up joining the dark side himself.

Not that he saw it that way. The police service had given him purpose, a grounding. He could have been another lost statistic from the Speke estate. No drive to do anything other than get pissed with his mates and cause a bit of trouble. Boxing had helped, given him a sense of discipline, but when it became clear that he wasn’t going to make it above domestic level, he jacked it in. Waste of time.

Murphy remembered his dad talking to him once, dragging him out of bed at around ten in the morning, which had annoyed Murphy no end, given he hadn’t got home until four. His dad then had one of those conversations with him where he asked the questions Murphy had no answer for. What was he doing with his life … was this all he wanted … and where’s your keep, you little shit?

Just about to turn nineteen and he had no clue. Working every few days or so, cash in hand, and then blowing it on cider.

He couldn’t remember who’d suggested joining the police. It had just happened one day. He wandered into Canning Place near Albert Dock, having passed the initial application, and sat down to do a Maths and English test. Then it was the physical, which he’d passed with ease, still retaining the fitness from the boxing. Then two years on probation.

Fifteen years later and here he was, a detective inspector a good few years ahead of schedule, and at the forefront yet again.

‘What was the address again?’ Rossi said, disturbing Murphy’s trip down memory lane.

‘Clanfield Road,’ Murphy replied, checking the notes on the top of the file. ‘Head for Dwerryhouse Lane and I’ll direct you from there.’

‘Good, ’cause I get lost in all the back roads around there.’

Murphy sniggered, knowing what she meant. Norris Green was a larger place than most people expected. A council estate with one of the worst reputations in Liverpool at that moment – mainly for gang violence. Since the murder of a young boy outside a pub in nearby Croxteth, the result of a longstanding feud between rival gangs in Croxteth and Norris Green, with the eleven-year-old boy, an innocent bystander, shot in the back, the area had begun to change. Gangs had been shown on TV in exploitative documentaries – and subsequently shunned for revealing supposed secrets of ‘street-life’ – and the DIY show from the BBC had made over the local youth club, giving some kids a place to go which wasn’t in danger of falling down around them.

It was still a tough place to grow up though. Not much upward mobility in those kind of estates. And not many people trying to change that.

‘Take the next left,’ Murphy said, as they approached the end of Muirhead Avenue – Croxteth Park off to their right, still hidden by houses – the church where Dean Hughes’s body had been found that morning close by, only a few minutes further away.

‘Right here,’ Murphy said, looking at the derelict patch of field which lay to their left. An upturned Iceland shopping trolley was the main attraction, along with empty carrier bags, various bottles and rubbish. ‘You’d think they’d do something with that.’

‘With what?’ Rossi replied, indicating to turn.

‘That big patch of green. Just going to waste. It just looks like an eyesore, ’cause no one’s looking after it.’

‘You know why. They’re not willing to spend money around here. Reckon it’d just get wrecked, so they won’t bother.’

‘I suppose.’

Rossi slowed the car, looking for the right house number. ‘It’s bollocks though. That argument, I mean.’

‘You think?’

‘Course I do. If you put people in places like this, where everything is left to go to shit, what do you expect them to do? Everything’s grey, dark. That’s how your life is going to feel like. It’s the Broken Windows theory.’

‘The what?’

‘The theory that if the area you live in looks like shite, then the people who live there will act like shite as well.’

Murphy smirked. ‘And that’s how it’s put in the books, I imagine.’

Rossi snorted. ‘More or less.’

Murphy thought she had a point, but didn’t have chance to say so as she slowed the car and parked up.

‘I really wish we could have phoned ahead,’ Rossi said, unbuckling her seatbelt. ‘I hate just turning up with no warning. Makes it worse.’

‘Home number we had for them was out of use. Everyone has mobiles these days.’

The house they’d stopped outside of didn’t scream ‘house of a tearaway’. A sort of mid-terrace, with light brown stone brickwork. An archway separated the house from next door, but it was still connected on the top level. There were three wheelie bins on the small driveway, a few crisp packets lifting slightly in the breeze before settling back down against the fence. It was May, but Murphy shook his head as he noticed the house next door still had Christmas decorations hanging from the guttering – the clear icicles he’d noticed on market stalls in town, the previous December.

‘You ready?’ Murphy said as he pushed open the metal gate, the screeching sound as it slid across the ground making his hairs stand on end. It needed lifting, fixing or replacing.

‘Are you?’ Rossi replied, walking ahead of him and knocking on the door. Four short raps – the rent man’s knock, as his mum used to say.

They stood waiting for a few seconds before Rossi knocked again, pulling back as they heard the barking.

‘ Porca vacca ,’ Rossi said under her breath.

‘You don’t like dogs, Laura?’ Murphy said from behind a smile.

‘Not ones that bark.’

A few more seconds passed before they heard shuffling from behind the door. A mortice lock turning on the old-style door, the house not being adorned with one of the newer double-glazed models. It opened inwards a few inches, a face appearing in the gap.