Dead Man''s Time (Ds Roy Grace 9)

  ‘Want me to go and check it out, boss? Could do with a weekend in the sun.’

  Grace smiled. ‘Not at this stage.’ Then he turned to the analyst Annalise Vineer. ‘Have you found any similar MOs anywhere else?’

  ‘There’s one in Newcastle, sir, and one in Glasgow. I’m looking into them.’

  Grace looked around at his team hopefully. ‘Anything else, anyone?’

  There wasn’t.

  ‘I’m making this evening’s briefing at 5 p.m. If there’s nothing significant then, I’m giving you all the evening off, so you’re fresh in the morning. Okay?’

  No one objected.

  53

  His day began at 5 a.m. It was nice, if a tad ironic, Gavin Daly thought, that the older he became, the less sleep he needed. There’d be plenty of sleep soon enough, he thought. Oh yes. The great bard understood.

  To sleep: perchance to dream . . .

  For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

  When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

  Must give us pause.

  He had pause, all right. Three nights a week for the past ninety years he had dreamed of that night his mother was shot dead and his dad was taken. In that dream, the same dream every time, he saw the blood pulsing from her; then the Statue of Liberty fading into the mist beyond the Verrazano Narrows. And then his promise.

  One day, Pop, I’m going to come back and find you. I’m going to rescue you from wherever you are.

  The words of Hamlet returned.

  The undiscovered country,

  From whose bourne no traveller returns.

  He could not die without having found his father. It was still not too late. So long as he was alive, it was never going to be too late.

  54

  ‘Still feeling in the mood for fish?’ Roy Grace asked.

  ‘Very definitely!’ Cleo said. ‘And I have a craving for oysters. Followed by a great big Dover sole!’

  ‘I thought you were only meant to have cravings when you were pregnant?’ Roy Grace looked apologetically at Marlon, swimming around his bowl. ‘Don’t take it personally, old chap,’ he said.

  ‘Unfortunately I’m not meant to eat shellfish while I’m breastfeeding. So you’ll have to eat some and I’ll just stare at them and enjoy them vicariously!’ She grinned wickedly. ‘Apparently they make men horny as hell.’

  ‘I don’t need oysters,’ he said. ‘Just being with you makes me horny as hell, all the time!’

  ‘Cravings aren’t restricted to pregnancy. I’ve got new cravings now.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Some rather interesting stuff I didn’t know about that I’ve just learned.’

  ‘From that book you’ve been reading?’

  ‘I’m on the third one now. I went shopping this afternoon and bought a few things we could try out when I’m up to it again.’ She gave him a sideways look.

  ‘You took Noah into a sex shop?’

  ‘He loved it! He looked around quite excitedly – I think he liked the red and pink colours in Ann Summers.’

  ‘He’s two months old and you’re getting him into bad ways!’ Grace grinned.

  She said nothing for a moment, then she frowned. ‘You do still fancy me, don’t you? Even though I’m fat and I’ve got varicose veins? I read that some men get put off sex after their wives have given birth.’

  He took her in his arms and kissed her. ‘You look stunning.’ She did look really stunning, he thought. She was wearing a loose cream linen summer dress, suede ankle boots with killer heels, her hair, the colour of winter wheat, shining and smelling freshly washed. ‘I fancy you like crazy. I fancy you more than ever.’ He kissed her again.

  The doorbell rang.

  Cleo took a reluctant step back. ‘That’ll be the Aged Ps!’

  Grace glanced at his watch. It was 6.45 p.m. Cleo’s parents, who he really liked, always arrived at least fifteen minutes early for anything. They were babysitting their grandson tonight, giving Roy and Cleo their first evening out since Noah’s birth.

  *

  Although many people considered summer officially over at the end of August, in Roy Grace’s experience September was often the most glorious month of all. Normally he did not like to take any time out during a murder enquiry, and he had felt torn between spending the night working on the Aileen McWhirter case and taking Cleo out.

  It was Cleo starting to sound a little tetchy last night that had been a reality check for him. It reminded him so much of Sandy. Sandy had never accepted how dead people could be more important than she was. How his work took priority over their life together. He had tried to explain, back then, the words instilled in him when he had been at the police training college, learning to be a detective. An instructor had read out the FBI moral code on murder investigation, written by its first director, J. Edgar Hoover: No greater honour will ever be bestowed on an officer, nor a more profound duty imposed on him, than when he or she is entrusted with the investigation of the death of a human being.

  He would never stop fighting his corner for his murder victims. He would work night and day to catch and lock up the perpetrators. And mostly, so far in his career, he had succeeded.

  But he was a father now, too. And soon to be a husband again. And that gnawed at him; the realization that there was someone in this world now who needed him even more than a murder victim. His son. And his wife-to-be.

  He was glad he had made that decision as he walked hand in hand along Gardner Street with this beautiful woman he was so proud of. They passed Luigi’s clothes shop, where some months ago Glenn Branson, as his self-appointed style guru, had coerced him into spending over two thousand pounds to transform his wardrobe. He was wearing some of the gear now: a lightweight bomber jacket over a white T-shirt buttoned at the front, tapered blue chinos and brown suede loafers. Men turned and looked at Cleo as they passed. Roy Grace liked that, and wondered, with a private smile, if they would still ogle her if they knew what she did for a living, and might one day, if they were unlucky enough, be preparing them for a post-mortem.

  They walked the narrow Lanes he loved so much, passing packed restaurants and bars, and came into the square, Brighton Place, dominated by the flint façade of one of Brighton’s landmarks, the Sussex pub. English’s restaurant was directly across, with a long row of outside tables roped off, Mediterranean style.

  ‘Inside or outside?’ the restaurant manager asked.

  ‘I booked outside,’ Cleo said decisively, and glanced at Roy Grace for approval. He nodded enthusiastically.

  They were led down the line to the one table that was free. From long experience, Cleo indicated for Roy to take the chair with its back to the wall. ‘You take the policeman’s chair, darling.’

  He squeezed her hand. After a few years in the force, most police officers only felt comfortable in restaurants and bars if they had their backs to the wall and a clear view of the room and the entry points. It had become second nature to him.

  They took their seats. Behind Cleo, an endless stream of people walked along the alley from Brighton’s trendy East Street into the Lanes. He picked up the leather-bound wine list and opened it. Just as he began casting his eye up and down, looking for the dry white wines he knew Cleo liked, and which he liked best, too, he suddenly saw two people he recognized.

  ‘Bloody hell!’ He pulled the wine list up, covering his face, wanting to spare them the embarrassment of being spotted. Although the Machiavellian streak in him almost wanted them to see him.

  ‘What is it?’ Cleo asked.

  He waited some moments, then lowered the list, and pointed at a couple, arm in arm, strolling away from them. ‘I thought they were coming in here!’

  She stared at the couple. The man had a large bald patch, and was wearing a brown jacket and grey trousers. The woman had brown hair cut in a chic style, and wore a pretty pink dress. ‘Who are they?’

  ‘You’ve met them both, individually, at the mortuary over the years.
DS Norman Potting and DS Bella Moy!’

  ‘They look rather a mismatched couple, from here anyway.’

  ‘They’re even more mismatched close up, believe me!’

  ‘She’s the one on your team who doesn’t have a life, right? She cares for her elderly mother?’

  He nodded.

  ‘And he’s been married – what – four times?’

  ‘Yup.’

  Their waiter appeared. Grace ordered two glasses of champagne and some olives.

  ‘That’s terrible.’

  ‘He is pretty terrible. But hey, good on Norman pulling Bella!’

  ‘Good on Norman pulling Bella?’ she quizzed. ‘What is it with you men? Why do men treat pulling women like a sport? What about, Poor Bella, lumbering herself, in desperation, with a serially unfaithful old lech?’

  He laughed. ‘You’re right.’

  ‘So why do they, Roy?’

  ‘Because, I suppose, for most people, life’s a compromise. That writer – philosopher – you like, whose work you introduced me to a few months ago. What was his great line? Something about so many people living lives of quiet desperation?’

  ‘Yes. Don’t let us ever get like that, Roy.’

  He stared back into her clear, green eyes. ‘We never will,’ he said.

  ‘Is that a promise?’

  ‘It’s a promise.’

  Their champagne arrived. He raised his glass and clinked it against hers. ‘No desperation,’ he said. ‘Ever.’

  ‘None!’

  A short while later he ordered six oysters. Then, when he saw the mischievous look in Cleo’s eyes, he upped it to a dozen.

  55

  At 11 a.m. on Monday, Gavin Daly sat at his desk, thumbing through his ancient Rolodex looking for a name from the past, ignoring the grinding blatter of the old ride-on mower as his gardener went up and down the lawn, cutting immaculate stripes.

  He had heard the news, an hour earlier, that the Coroner had released his sister’s body, and her funeral could go ahead tomorrow, as he had planned.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a perfunctory knock, followed by the sound of his door opening, and he turned to see his housekeeper, Betty, enter with a tray containing a wine glass, an opened bottle of Corton-Charlemagne white Burgundy, a Robaina cigar, perfectly cut, and a dish of green olives.

  The first of his two glasses of white wine a day, which would be followed by his evening two fingers of whiskey. Everything in moderation was his recipe. All the people he knew of or had read about who’d made it to his kind of old age had their own particular secret. For some, it had been total abstinence from alcohol. For others, it had been a life of celibacy. Poor, miserable sods – they might have lived a long time, but strewth, it must have seemed so much longer! What they all ignored was England’s oldest ever man, Henry Allingham, who had died only a few years ago at 113, and had attributed his longevity, in a radio interview he’d heard on the great man’s 112th birthday, to ‘Cigarettes, whisky and wild, wild women.’

  Every morning, as Betty filled that first glass for him, he raised it in a silent toast to Henry Allingham, before lighting his cigar.

  In front of him lay the front page of the Daily News from February 1922, in its protective plastic. He thanked Betty, drank some wine, and waited until he heard the door shut behind him. Then he continued his search through the ancient, battered Rolodex index cards, until he found the name and telephone number he was looking for. A genealogist called Martin Diplock, whose service, years back, he had used regularly to check the background history of high-end antiques.

  He dialled it, and as he half-expected, heard a number discontinued tone. But just in case the man was still alive, he googled his name. To his surprise he found a simple website giving an email address and what looked like an overseas phone number. He dialled and it rang. Three times. Four. Five.

  Then he heard a click, followed by Diplock’s very distinguished, cultured voice.

  ‘You’re still alive?’ Daly said.

  There was a moment’s pause. ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘Gavin Daly!’

  ‘Well, well, well! It sounds like you’re still alive too!’

  ‘Just.’

  ‘It must be twenty years.’

  ‘All of that.’

  ‘So, to what do I owe this pleasure?’

  ‘I need some family history checked out. Are you still working?’

  ‘I live in Tenerife – retired here over fifteen years ago. But I keep my hand in – thanks to the Internet, it’s easy to keep up with old acquaintances and developments. Why?’

  ‘This is probably a long shot, I don’t know. I guess I’m long enough in the tooth to have learned not to dismiss coincidence.’

  ‘You know what Einstein said about coincidence?’

  ‘Something about God’s calling cards?’

  ‘Kind of. He said it was God’s way of remaining anonymous.’

  Daly smiled and drank some more wine. ‘It’s good to speak to you, Martin. How’s Jane?’

  ‘She’s well. She’s in rude health. Sunshine is good for people.’

  ‘It’s bad for antiques.’

  ‘So, what information do you have for me?’

  ‘There’s a man named Eamonn Pollock,’ Daly said. ‘His current main residence is on a yacht based in Marbella called Contented. As I said, it’s a long shot. But I’m happy to pay whatever you charge these days to find out if he is related, in any way, to a man in New York back in the 1920s called Mick Pollock. I think he would have been Irish, and a member of the White Hand Gang.’

  ‘Do you have any more details than that, Gavin?’

  ‘Back then, Mick had only one leg – I gather he got gangrene in it after being shot in a gang fight. He had the nickname of Pegleg.’

  ‘Pegleg Pollock. Anything else?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid not. Could you try to prepare as detailed a family tree as you can?’

  ‘I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t promise anything.’

  ‘Give me an address to wire some money to.’

  ‘There’s no charge. Tell you the truth, I’m bored. Be good to have a challenge. Is there any urgency?’

  ‘Everything’s urgent at our age, Martin.’

  56

  Like most police officers he knew, Roy Grace always felt uncomfortable entering a prison. In part it was the knowledge that prisoners had a pathological hatred of the police, and in part it was the loss of control. As a police officer you were normally in control of any environment you found yourself in. But from the moment the first of the prison’s doors was locked behind you, you were in the hands of the Prison Governor and his or her officers.

  Convicted policemen, given custodial sentences, were treated by other prisoners on a par with paedophiles.

  Sussex had two prisons: Ford, an open, Category D prison, filled mostly with relatively minor and low-risk offenders, as well as some lifers approaching the end of their custodial terms, gradually getting accustomed to the world they were soon to re-enter. The other, Lewes, a Category B, was a grim, forbidding place. Roy Grace had passed it many times, as a child with his parents, and back then it had always both fascinated and scared him.

  Built like a fortress, it had high, flint walls and tiny barred windows. When as a small boy his dad once told him that the bad people were locked up in there, Roy Grace used to imagine bad people as monsters who would rip people’s heads off, if given the chance. Now, with his years of experience in the force behind him, he knew a little different. But he was only too aware that if anything were to kick off when a police officer was inside a prison, for any reason, he – or she – would be damned lucky to get out unharmed.

  Which was why, to Roy Grace’s relief, having checked in at the registration office where he had to leave his private and police phones in a locker, he was greeted by Alan Setterington, the duty Governor, who told him he had an interview room reserved for him in the main office section.

  Setteri
ngton, a lean, fit-looking man with a fine physique from being a weekend racing cyclist, was dressed in a smart suit and a bright tie with his white Prison Service shirt. As with every prison Grace had ever been inside, all the doors were unlocked then locked again behind them as they made their way further through into the gloomy, windowless interior with its cold stone floors, drab walls decorated with the occasional Health and Safety poster, fire buckets and large, strong doors.

  Alan Setterington made him a coffee, then went off to fetch the informant who was prepared to talk to Grace. For favours, of course.

  Donny Loncrane came into the room in his green prison work tunic. Aged fifty-five, he looked as most long-term prisoners did: a decade older than his years, from the lifestyle and badly cut drugs. Roy Grace was shocked at his appearance. Last time he had encountered the serial car thief – and police informant – had been a good ten years ago. Setterington tactfully left them to it, closing the door behind him.

  Loncrane, tall, with bad posture, his short, grey hair brushed forward over his forehead, gave him a sheepish grin, shook Grace’s hand with his own damp one, as if he had just washed it in deference, and sat down opposite him. ‘Hello, sir,’ he said. He exuded a sharp, earthy smell of clothes that were in need of a wash.

  Grace shook his head. ‘What are you doing still inside? You told me you were going straight last time I saw you.’

  Loncrane shrugged. ‘Yeah, well, I was. Problem is, you see, I love motors.’

  ‘You always did.’

  ‘The thing is, they’re harder to nick these days. The high-end jobs, right? The Audis, Beemers, Mercs, Ferraris, Bentleys? I used to be able to hotwire one in thirty seconds. You know how long it takes now?’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘Well, with all their security systems it takes about four hours. So the only way is either to get one on the road, taser the driver, pull him or her out – or else break into the owner’s house and nick the keys.’