‘You know, the English people used to drink in the street,’ she said. ‘And they urinated in doorways. The English people used to gather in groups in the alleys too. Now they blame us because they can’t do it without getting moved on by the police or arrested. We stand out more because we’re Polish. It’s easy to point the finger at us.’
Fry nodded at Callaghan, and she got up to leave. Michal and Anna accompanied them politely to the door.
‘My uncle Tomasz runs a shop here in Shirebrook,’ said Anna, as she looked outside at the street. ‘He works night shifts at the distribution centre, goes home to kiss his wife and son, then opens up his shop.’
‘So he’s a hard worker,’ said Fry.
‘Yes, he is. So are we.’ Anna Wolakova gestured at the houses around her. ‘The people of Shirebrook are getting older, or they’re sick. None of them are working. So who would be paying tax if we Polish weren’t here? A few bad people give us all a bad name. People drinking in the street? There were ten of them, maybe. And now suddenly “all Poles drink in the street”.’ It’s not true. Most of us are normal people. We have jobs and families. We live our lives like everyone else does.’
At the scene in the alley where Krystian Zalewski had been attacked, Diane Fry noticed that the crime scene examiners were already starting to dismantle their forensics tent and pick up the evidence markers. Everything had been carefully photographed and videoed in situ. It would be unrealistic to try to keep the scene contained any longer than absolutely necessary.
DCI Mackenzie looked unhappy and dissatisfied.
‘How is the community cohesion going, sir?’ asked Fry.
Mackenzie snorted.
‘I keep being asked over and over, “Is this a hate crime?” Do we have any evidence of that, Diane?’
‘None at all so far,’ said Fry.
He nodded. ‘It would be better if it isn’t.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? Just think of all the attention we’d get. All the national media — tabloid newspapers, TV crews. The Police and Crime Commissioner would be here. There’d be questions asked in Parliament. It doesn’t bear thinking about.’
‘We’re getting some of that already. There’s been a bunch of reporters around Shirebrook asking questions, getting knee-jerk responses from the public. I think they’re probably looking for a pub now.’
‘Yes, we had photographers taking pictures of the tent and the scene guard too.’
‘But that tells them nothing.’
‘No. And that’s what we should carry on doing,’ said Mackenzie. ‘Telling them nothing.’
‘Of course.’
‘How did you manage with Mr Pollitt?’ he asked.
‘There’s something going on in the shop — if you can call it a shop. From what I’ve just been told by a witness, there may be suspect individuals meeting there.’
‘What do you mean?’
Fry repeated what Michal and Anna Wolak had told her about the men outside the shop with the heavy metal posters in the window.
‘We ought to get a look in the storerooms at the back of the shop,’ she said.
‘We don’t have any justification,’ said Mackenzie. ‘Not on that basis.’
Fry sighed. ‘I suppose not.’
Mackenzie checked his phone for messages. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to go,’ he said.
‘I’ll make sure everything is being done here, sir.’
Mackenzie looked up from his phone.
‘As you know, Diane, I’ve been asking for the appointment of a new DI.’
‘It’s long overdue,’ she said.
‘We were expecting to get a DI seconded from Nottinghamshire, but they say they can’t spare anyone. Apparently they have a shortage of experienced officers at that rank.’
‘Hasn’t everyone? But there must be someone in Derbyshire, or perhaps a DI might want to transfer from Eastern Command. It’s hardly a million miles from Lincoln to Nottingham.’
Mackenzie put his phone away and fastened his coat.
‘We’ll carry on hoping. I just wanted to keep you up to date.’
‘I appreciate it, sir.’
When Mackenzie had gone, Fry stood for a while and looked at the alley. With the crime scene examiners’ lights dismantled she realised now how gloomy this alley was. As DI Mackenzie had pointed out, there was no lighting for its entire length.
And Krystian Zalewski had hated the darkness. Perhaps that explained it. Explained why he’d staggered away from the scene of the attack, growing weaker and weaker as he gushed blood from a fatal knife wound.
He’d made his way back to his little one-bedroom flat, with the damp in the walls and the mouse droppings on the floor, just so that he wouldn’t die in the dark.
10
A hospital mortuary was always located near the boiler house and laundry, well out of the way of living patients as they came and went to their appointments. When you arrived for the first time, you looked for the chimney.
‘So you found me a body after all,’ said Dr Chloe Young. ‘You didn’t have to do that.’
‘I’m sorry. Was it a nasty one?’
‘Young people,’ she said. ‘They’re always difficult. They have all their lives ahead of them. Or they ought to. They shouldn’t be lying on my examination table.’
Cooper nodded. ‘I feel the same, you know.’
‘Of course you do, Ben. I know.’
Against his own better instincts, Cooper had spent his time on the way here picturing Shane Curtis in a hospital shroud, with a tag on his wrist and a tag on his ankle, and the grey, drained face of the dead. He’d seen the funeral directors collect the body at the scene of the fire and transfer it feet first to their vehicle, the way funeral directors always did.
Of course, he could have left this one to Dev Sharma. In fact, Sharma had assumed he would be coming. He knew his DI had good reasons to avoid post-mortems on this kind of victim. But something had encouraged Cooper to make time for the call at the mortuary today.
‘His name was Shane Curtis,’ he said. ‘Eighteen years old.’
Dr Young didn’t need to look at her notes for the details.
‘He wasn’t very well-nourished for a young man of that age,’ she said. ‘I imagine he had a substandard diet. So many people I see in here do. He also had substantial amounts of alcohol in his blood. Cannabis too. They’re familiar lifestyle signs. But he died of smoke inhalation from the fire. He has thermal damage to the respiratory system, burns around the mouth and nostrils, pulmonary swelling caused by carbon monoxide and various toxic gases. That couldn’t be called a lifestyle choice.’
To Cooper, the physical details sounded all too familiar. For a moment, he couldn’t say anything. The words wouldn’t come out of his mouth, because the images in his mind were too clear.
Young looked up, immediately sensing his discomfort.
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘A fire death victim. You should have sent someone else. Why didn’t you?’
Cooper shook his head. ‘I can’t avoid these things. They’re part of the job.’
‘Yes, but the memories must still be very painful. You were there at the scene when she was killed, weren’t you?’
‘Actually,’ said Cooper, ‘that’s not the problem. It’s the good memories that are the most painful.’
Young put a hand on his arm. He found her touch reassuring. Cooper took a deep breath, filling his lungs with the antiseptic smell of the mortuary.
‘There were no traces of accelerant on the swabs from the victim’s hands,’ he said. ‘We’re working on the assumption that someone else set the fire.’
Immediately Young became professional again.
‘So your job is to find out whether it was an unfortunate accident, or if young Shane’s death was deliberate,’ she said.