The Truth About Murder Read online

  It was important to keep a sense of perspective. After Denny had given me the background, I don’t know what I’d expected when I got to the hospital, but it was a relief to see a relatively ordinary guy lying there. I mean, he hadn’t got two heads or anything like that. He was just another crime victim, and I would just address him in the same way as I would any other member of the public.

  When I was absolutely certain that the breathing had settled again, I looked up. Pale, with blond hair cropped short and looking like a cornfield after a storm, where the nurses had not completely succeeded in washing out the blood. After three days the stubble on his chin was poking through, and my Sonia would probably say he was not bad looking underneath all the bruises. He took up the length of the hospital bed, which must make him a slim six feet, and apart from the tics and twitches, you couldn’t tell really that there was anything wrong with him. Poor bastard. I went back to my book.

  ‘Anything?’ The nurse who’d shown me down here appeared in the doorway.

  I shook my head. ‘When he does come around . . . is there anything I should know . . . I mean, how to . . . ?’ I tailed off, not really knowing what I was asking, but somehow she worked it out.

  She came over to the bed and started tucking in an imaginary loose corner. ‘I’ve been told he’s a bright guy and not to underestimate or patronise him. Apparently, he hates it.’

  No pressure, then.

  * * *

  I seemed to drift in and out of the world for a couple of days, making fleeting contact, until finally I re-entered civilisation for good on Tuesday afternoon. Scoping the room, my eyes fell again on the shaven ginger nut. He must’ve heard me this time because he looked up, hazel eyes in a chubby pink face, a half-smile full of uncertainty. Welcome to my world.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, putting to one side the paperback he’d been reading. I didn’t catch the title, but it was substantial. The dark clothes made sense now: a bulky stab vest with all the hardware, over a white shirt. St Peter was a cop. He cleared his throat, casting about for a distraction. Nerves. Someone must have told him about me. He said something, but so fast and with such an impenetrable Scots accent that I didn’t catch it. I’d have laughed at the irony if I hadn’t hurt so much.

  Seeing the blank look, he tried it again, this time more slowly, clearly, loudly. ‘I’m Police Constable Mick Fraser,’ he said, like the outfit didn’t speak for itself. He leaned back on the chair next to the bed, relieved to put some distance between us, and rifled through his pockets for something, finally holding out a warrant card for my perusal, his eye contact fleeting and evasive. ‘Can I get you anything? Some water perhaps?’ He mimed drinking, evidently now thinking I was deaf, too.

  But I was glad he could read minds, because while I was asleep, in addition to everything else, someone seemed to have plugged my mouth with superglue. When I nodded, PC Mick Fraser stood up, picking up the jug from the bedside table, but regarding its murky contents said, ‘Yeah, this has been standing here a while, I’ll go and get you some fresh.’

  While he was gone, I tried to drag myself up on the pillows to a kind of sitting position. Aagh! The slightest movement set off a chain reaction, starting in my neck, spreading across my shoulders, down my spine and round to my ribs, and ending up in my balls. He came back in and clocked the grimace.

  ‘Painful, eh?’ He glanced towards the door, as if hoping that one of the nurses would appear, but no one did, so gingerly (as it were) he reached out and tugged at the pillows, in a vague attempt to help. ‘Here, let me . . .’ Without having to actually touch me, he managed to wedge a pillow behind my back and then, recognising it as the only possible course of action, held the glass of water awkwardly to my lips. It was going pretty well until my tongue and throat got out of sync, then I coughed, spraying it everywhere. His colour rose. ‘Sorry, I’m crap at this. Not cut out for nursing. Is that enough for now?’

  I nodded, and lay back again, exhausted by the manoeuvre.

  ‘Are you comfortable? Anything else before we start?’ Fraser asked.

  I had, in the last couple of minutes, become aware of a nagging urgency in my bladder. I hadn’t been catheterised, but I was pretty sure that getting up to go to the bathroom wasn’t a realistic option right now either. Scanning the room, my eyes alighted on a side-lying wide-necked plastic bottle, clearly left there for the purpose. Fraser, following my gaze, saw the same thing. Oh crap passed across his eyes like a banner across the sky. Not part of his job description, nor my idea of fun either. Fortunately, we were both saved the embarrassment of that particular intimacy by the timely reappearance of Freckle-face.

  The operation over, Fraser settled back into his seat, which he’d left to go and lurk discreetly in a corner of the room. ‘Right, Stefan,’ he said. ‘I need to ask you some questions about your attack. That OK?’

  I nodded again. This was going to be fun. ‘Thanks,’ I said. It came out as ‘hang’.

  Surprise crossed his features. ‘What for?’

  ‘For getting — my — name — right.’ It took forever to say it, shaping my mouth around the words as clearly as I could, with no guarantee that he’d get it, but miraculously, he did.

  ‘No problem,’ he replied, with enviable ease. ‘It’s a pretty fundamental starting point.’

  Not for your colleague, I wanted to say, but it wasn’t worth the effort.

  ‘Now, are you OK talking about it?’ he asked, producing from his pockets a notebook and pen, something else to focus on.

  How are your listening skills? I wanted to ask, but it would have wasted too much time. ‘I — don’t — remember much,’ I told him instead.

  ‘Sorry?’

  Oh, here we go. ‘I — don’t — remember much.’ I strained to enunciate the words.

  ‘Ach, don’t worry, that’s not uncommon in these situations. We’ll start with what you can recall and build on it as things come back to you. And as soon as you start to get tired, we’ll stop.’

  But I already was.

  Chapter Six

  ‘So, in your own time,’ he said. ‘What do you remember about the attack, maybe starting from when you left your flat?’

  I recounted what I could of my walk to the corner shop, which took an eternity, even though my memory of it was sparse. To his credit, Fraser seemed to keep up, though I noticed that after the first couple of utterances he’d abandoned the notebook, concentrating instead on my contorting mouth, which he had to study for additional clues. I wish I’d had the chance to clean my teeth. I described my walk to Davey’s and the reception committee waiting outside.

  ‘They saw you go into the supermarket?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How many were there?’

  ‘Two, maybe three.’

  ‘Could you describe any of them? Height, skin colour, hair colour, clothing?’

  ‘I didn’t look at them. Didn’t want to draw attention to myself.’

  ‘Not sure that it worked,’ he said, drily. ‘There’s nothing you can tell me about them?’

  But I hadn’t singled any of them out for special attention, so could give only the vaguest of descriptions: jeans, hoodies, shaven heads. Talk about stereotyping.

  ‘What about age?’

  ‘I don’t know. Late teens, early twenties?’

  ‘Did you feel threatened by them?’

  ‘One of them spat at me but . . . ’ I tailed off.

  He seemed taken aback, sceptical even. ‘Spat at you?’ He wanted to make sure he’d heard me correctly. ‘Why?’

  ‘You haven’t seen the way I walk.’

  ‘You make it sound like this has happened before.’

  I said nothing.

  ‘Jesus.’

  His naivety would have made me laugh, but the pain in my ribs put a stop to that. ‘I’m fair game,’ I slurred. ‘What’m I gonna do, fight back? Give them a verbal lashing?’ The words came out painfully slowly, proving my point.

  Maybe Fraser didn’t catch all
of that, but he got the gist. ‘That’s bad.’ I liked the way he said it, not in that pitying ‘oh, poor you’ kind of way, but as statement of fact.

  ‘It’s the way it is.’

  He gave a wry smile, rubbing a hand over his scalp. ‘Yeah.’ That he understood. ‘But it doesn’t make it right.’

  I shrugged. Who said it did?

  ‘Could it be the same group of youths who followed you?’

  ‘S’possible. They were outside, but they might have seen me use the cashpoint.’

  ‘Were you aware of being followed?’

  ‘Not at all.’ In reality, I had little memory of anything prior to the attack.

  ‘Davey might be able to help,’ Fraser said. ‘If they were hanging around his shop, he might know them. Do you remember seeing any of them before?’

  I shook my head again. I was getting tired now.

  ‘From what you say it sounds like an opportunistic attack. I think it’s likely these guys outside the shop saw you withdrawing the money and pounced.’

  ‘They got my wallet?’ His nod confirmed it. They must have waited till I passed out, as I had a sudden memory of hugging my jacket around me.

  ‘Were you carrying anything else of value?’ Fraser asked.

  ‘Phone,’ I said. ‘And my watch.’ Suddenly I noticed its absence on my wrist. It was a gift from a friend, and an expensive one at that.

  ‘We didn’t find those on you, so I think we can assume that this was a particularly brutal mugging. Don’t worry, we’ll take it very seriously. Spitting is one thing, aggravated assault is something else.’

  I couldn’t argue with that. No, really, I couldn’t argue.

  ‘This appears to give us a pretty clear motive, but for the record, can you think of anyone who’d want to hurt you?’

  ‘Me? I’m not important enough . . .’ I started to say, but as I did, an image of Ashley Curzon floated into my head. Would he? No, he’d have more important things to occupy himself with. And he’d certainly have no interest in my pathetic belongings. ‘Who found me?’ I asked, the thought suddenly occurring.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Who—?’

  ‘Oh, found you? A woman called it in.’ He flicked back through the notebook. ‘Keeley Moynihan. You know her?’

  I nodded. Of course, she’d have wondered where I’d got to. Fraser didn’t ask about our relationship and for some reason, I felt reluctant to offer him that information. In any case, who should appear in the doorway at that moment but the woman herself. Today she was casual, skinny jeans tucked into high boots, with a man’s shirt belted over the top. She still looked as if she’d just stepped off the catwalk, and suddenly I realised I’d ceased to be the object of Fraser’s attention. He jumped up from his seat, almost tipping it over in his eagerness, but Keeley was homing in on me like a surface-to-air missile.

  ‘Hi, you. How are you doing?’ She came over to the other side of the bed and kissed me long and slow, and with enough heat to make it clear to Fraser that we were already acquainted. It had exactly the effect she was aiming for.

  When I came up for air, Fraser was struggling to wipe the look of near astonishment off his face. He closed his notebook. ‘I guess that’s enough for today,’ he said, obviously completely distracted. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’

  ‘I’ve been helping him with his enquiries,’ I told Keeley. It was predictable as lines go, but they were both polite and patient enough to wait for me to say it.

  ‘I’ll be in touch,’ said Fraser. ‘And will let you know when there are any developments.’

  Later that evening, after Keeley had gone, Freckle-face returned to dig me in for the night. She tucked the sheets in so tight, I could feel my lungs expand every time I breathed.

  ‘You’re a popular guy,’ she said. ‘Someone called Laura came to see you too — oh, and a guy called Jake, with his daughter. She’s a piece of work, isn’t she?’

  His daughter? Jake would be thrilled to hear Plum called that. But I sensed that Freckle-face was testing me out. She wanted me to tell her that Plum wasn’t Jake’s daughter, and that Jake was single. I decided not to disabuse her. It was for her own protection.

  Chapter Seven

  On the drive back to the station I was relieved, almost to the point of euphoria. OK, I hadn’t caught everything he’d said, but enough to not make it awkward and I’d got some decent notes to be going on with. And as we’d talked, I’d relaxed. He was just a guy. I tried to imagine coping with his situation all the time.

  It was no surprise to find when I got back that Denny was in a meeting with Chief Superintendent Bowers — Bowers clearly doing what I wanted to do and picking Denny’s brains. They seemed to have developed quite a friendship, now that Denny was cruising towards his exit. Well, no matter. I went straight to my desk and, logging on to the system, scrolled the Intranet to pull up the file on Stefan Greaves’ mugging and add in the first interview notes. I did a search of Greaves’ name to begin with, but no results came up. I went to last Friday night’s incident log page and found a couple of burglaries, and sure enough the assault was listed, along with the crime number. The 999 call was logged at 10.24 p.m., but when I searched using that, again no file appeared. I worked through the list of newly created incident files, scrolling up and down several times, before accepting that there was nothing there. There was no getting away from it — details of the attack hadn’t yet been recorded. There was bound to be an explanation for it, so I just had to bide my time and wait for Denny to reappear. Meanwhile, I put a call through to one of my favourite people. She wouldn’t like me nagging her, but Natalie from the private forensic service would know if they’d had anything.

  She picked up immediately.

  ‘The gorgeous Natalie,’ I said. ‘Hi, how are you? It’s Fraser from OCU2.’ I can’t remember who started it, but although we’d hardly spoken and never met, somehow our established habit was to indulge in a bit of gentle flirting on the phone.

  ‘I’m good.’ She was smiling. I could hear it. ‘How are you, handsome Fraser from OCU2?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m OK. I wanted to check on the processing time for clothes belonging to an assault victim, Stefan Greaves.’ I gave her the crime number. ‘They will have been submitted sometime since Friday evening.’

  There was a pause while Natalie looked it up on the system, taking enough time for me to have drawn a little stick man hanging from a noose. Whatever had brought that on?

  ‘Can you give me that number again?’ Natalie asked. I repeated it for her. Another pause, producing the executioner in a hood, carrying, for some reason, a scythe. ‘I’m sorry,’ she came back. ‘I haven’t got any record of that name or number. Are you sure they came here?’

  ‘You’re our favourite people. We send everything to you,’ I said, reminding her of the station details.

  She sighed. ‘Well we don’t seem to have anything relating to that incident. We are pretty swamped at the moment though, and what with the weekend, there’s a backlog and it might be that they just haven’t been checked in yet.’

  ‘OK, thanks.’ She was right. Everyone’s resources were overstretched, including ours. It could easily mean a simple delay in admin. Denny might even have held on to the clothing for now. But a check with the property store log turned up big fat nothing, nor did there seem to be anything on or around Denny’s desk, which was puzzling.

  When Denny finally appeared, late in the afternoon, he was preoccupied and I had to wait while he made a couple of phone calls before he even acknowledged me. Five foot nine and heavily built, from the belt on his trousers holding up his middle-aged paunch to his weatherworn face, he looked every one of his fifty-seven years.

  ‘All right?’ I asked, when he eventually got off the phone.

  ‘Eh, oh, yeah.’ Now that he’d noticed me, his grey eyes were shrewd and watchful beneath untamed brows. He could see that I was waiting for more. ‘The chief wanted a bit of local knowledge, something he’s got coming up.
’ Chief Superintendent Bowers, like me, was a relative new boy in the area. Typical of current police management, he was a fast track ex-public school copper with a double first in criminology and psychology who, if station gossip was to be believed, preferred his police work to be conducted from behind a desk.

  ‘Oh yes, what’s that then?’

  ‘Oh, just a thing.’ He couldn’t have been more vague if he’d tried, but I let it go. I couldn’t be arsed playing games.

  ‘I’ve not long got back from interviewing Stefan Greaves,’ I said instead.

  ‘I know that name.’ Denny frowned.

  Seriously? ‘The guy who was assaulted on Friday night,’ I reminded him, trying to keep a lid on my impatience.

  ‘Oh yeah, right, how did it go then?’ He was trying to sound interested. I could hear the effort going in.

  ‘Very well, actually.’ I tried not to sound smug. ‘The woman who found him came to visit.’ I thought back to that kiss. Jesus, what a kiss. ‘I think she must be his girlfriend.’

  ‘Get away.’ Denny looked up. Now I’d got his attention.

  ‘Why shouldn’t she be?’ I didn’t like to admit that I’d been surprised too.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Denny defensively. ‘Still, he’s a lawyer, isn’t he? Must be worth a bit.’

  I decided to ignore the crass assumption. ‘Anyway, he doesn’t remember too much yet, so I’ll need to go back. Meanwhile we may have another witness. Davey, proprietor of the supermarket on Dog Lane. There was a gang of youths hanging around outside when Greaves went in to use the cashpoint. It’s possible they might have followed him from there, or been lying in wait. I’ll go and talk to him.’

  ‘All right. If you think it’ll do any good.’ Talk about passive-aggressive. Maybe he was miffed that I hadn’t completely cocked up. He’d hardly sat down and now, before five, he was reaching for his coat. ‘I’m off,’ he said, as if I hadn’t noticed. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’