‘Outside the van?’
‘Clearly. The chisel’s shaft caught the ocular bone and fractured it, then sheared off into the soft tissue at the rear of the eye, then into the anterior lobe of the brain,’ she said, snapping off the forensic gloves. ‘I think he lost a lot of blood then – blood that is not at the scene. Then he was put in the driver’s seat, where he died.’ Shaw imagined the impact of the chisel blade, the internal crunch of the bone giving way, the painless thrust into the brain.
‘So,’ said Shaw. ‘To sum up. I’ve got a murder scene with no footprints and no blood.’
‘Least you’ve got a corpse,’ said Kazimierz.
Shaw parked the Land Rover in its usual slot beside the lifeboat station, triggering a security floodlight. The building was wooden, a throwback to the fifties, with Dutch gables. Beside it stood the new building, steel, with blue metal beams exposed. He unlocked the side door and slipped into the darkness.
The hovercraft sat on its deflated rubber skirt like a cat in a basket. His eyes constructed it out of the shadows and the ambient light seeping in through the high double‐glazed windows. She was perfect for working out on the sands, up the shallow creeks and over the mud flats of the Wash. Shaw sniffed the air: detergent, engine oil and polish. He reached out and flicked a single switch, bathing her in light, the paintwork polished to a deep orange patina, the two rear fans gleaming in silver and black. He felt a rush of excitement and a sense of being home. The adrenaline made him want to run, so he locked up quickly and set off along the beach in the half‐light of dawn.
The clouds out at sea delayed the moment when the sun would break free and start the day. The sands stretched ahead of him. In winter nothing moved here but the sand. A mile distant he could see home: a low wooden building with a long veranda, behind it a stone cottage, beyond that the old boathouse, beach stones strung over the felt roof to keep it down in the storms. Lena had
A busy year. Lena was organized, businesslike in pursuit of an ambition. The stone cottage was watertight now, the café stripped pine with an Italian coffee machine gleaming like a vintage motorbike, the boathouse converted to sell everything the sporty London beach crowd wanted: surfboards to wetsuits, hang gliders to sailboards. The exterior wooden panels of the café had been painted alternate yellow and blue. Shaw could see the flag hanging limply from the pole over the shop: a silver surfer on a blue sea. His seven‐year‐old daughter’s discarded summer swimsuit hung on a hook by the outside water tap, bleached by the rain.
He sat on the stoop, planning a dawn swim in the winter wetsuit, trying to focus only on the forthcoming rush of icy white water. But two things gatecrashed his mind: if Sarah Baker‐Sibley’s daughter was alone at home to whom had she passed the phone when her mother asked her to? And then there were the spark plugs in the pick‐up’s door pocket. Rusted. Spent. But Harvey Ellis’s cab had been otherwise neat. Unless the truck was rarely used – an unlikely scenario – then the plugs had not been in an engine for several months. He saw the tiny metal question mark of the spark plug’s contact points. Corroded, black, scarred by the constant electrical explosions of years bringing an engine to life. But if they hadn’t been recently taken out of an engine – which the lack of into an engine? And why would anyone plan to do that?
He squinted at the sun, then heard the thudding steps of his daughter running down the corridor which linked the cottage and the café. He smiled, turning, prepared for his other life.
George Valentine’s toast rack was almost empty, the charred crumbs scattered over the plastic tablecloth of the police canteen. He held his coffee with both hands, trying to disguise the tremble in his fingers. Toast, no butter. It was what George Valentine called ‘solids’, and it would have to keep him alive until he found a chip shop before going to his bed. He touched the half‐finished packet of cigarettes in his pocket, tired of finding proof that he was a weak man.
Peter Shaw stood by the canteen’s plate‐glass window, drinking bottled mineral water and looking across the tumbled rooftops of the old town towards the sea. He’d been on time, to the minute. At home he’d cleared ice from the gutters, snow off the veranda where it had blown in off the beach, then ferried coffee to Lena, who had been up early with Francesca because they wanted to collect driftwood on the beach to decorate the surf shop before school. He’d held a weathered plank up to the wooden door of the old boathouse as Lena hammered it into place.
She was five feet two, slim, compact. Her hair was cut short, angular, rising from her scalp like a surprise. At rest her face was melancholy, although the line of the lips always hinted, at least to him, of a smile. A slight cast in the right eye, the imperfection he had noticed first. Her
‘So, George Valentine?’ She’d smiled, watching her husband closely, but he didn’t answer. Shaw had told her about his new partner, the dishevelled, chain‐smoking toper. ‘I can see the funny side,’ she said, her smile widening.
‘You’ve never met him,’ said Shaw, looking out to sea.
‘You mean he wasn’t at the wedding?’
They both laughed at their oldest joke. No one had been at the wedding, least of all Shaw’s father or his onetime partner George Valentine. Lena’s family was troubled, dispersed, in an almost constant state of family warfare which ruled out any kind of concerted action. Shaw’s family just didn’t want to come. His father was already ill, already dying. Shaw hadn’t been surprised by his father’s prejudices, but he’d been saddened by his mother’s. Lena had tried to forgive them, pretended that she had, but she knew it was a day in her life she couldn’t have again, and they’d taken some of the joy out of it.
‘You should give him a chance, you know. It’s ten years, Peter – more.’ ‘Unforgiving’ – it was a trait she’d identified
‘He might surprise you,’ she said. ‘You surprised me.’ He picked up his tea and looked at her, knowing he didn’t have to ask.
‘I thought you were just a copper.’
‘I am just a copper,’ he said. He looked at his watch. ‘Nearly high tide – I’d better get moving.’
She stood back, admiring their work, refusing to let him go.
‘It’s a murder inquiry,’ he said. They both knew what that meant: the late nights, the calls, the pressure to be seen at St James’s. ‘It won’t last for ever,’ said Shaw. ‘But I can’t take her swimming tonight – sorry. I’ll text if things change.’
‘It’s OK. I’ll do it.’ Lena tried to hide her dis appointment that he would still apologize for his career, as if it hadn’t been his choice. ‘There’s an order today,’ she said. ‘The new wetsuits, kites, and a pair of sand yachts. I’ll be busy.’
‘You need help?’
She shook her head, annoyed, because he wasn’t in a position to give any help. She pointed out to sea where someone was already on a sailboard, a splash of twisting orange off the beach at Old Hunstanton. ‘I’m fine.’
She hadn’t taken her eyes off the sea. ‘Why would someone do that, Peter?’ He’d filled her in on the events of the night before: the stranded convoy, the body on the raft. ‘Bite into your own flesh? Why?’ She put down the hammer to take up her mug of coffee, watching their daughter on the high‐water mark collecting more wood.