One number stood out from the crowd - the direct line for the county council’s environmental disposal unit. Diane Patrick had called them on Thursday morning. The call had lasted for eight minutes. On impulse, Kevin promoted it to number one on his call list and dialled it. It led to an inevitable automatic menu. It took three levels of options before he got a human being. He introduced himself and said, ‘I’m interested in a call made to your unit on Thursday morning. It might involve evidence in a murder inquiry.’ He’d found over the years that the word ‘murder’ provoked remarkable brisk-ness among bureaucrats.
‘Murder?’ the woman on the other end of the phone exclaimed. ‘We wouldn’t know anything about murder.’
‘I’m sure you wouldn’t.’ Kevin adopted his most placatory manner. ‘I need you to consult your records. I believe a murder suspect called you on Thursday and arranged for something to be picked up from their home. I need to know if I’m right and if so, what it was.’
‘I don’t know if I’m allowed to do that,’ she said dubiously. ‘It’s the Data Protection Act, you see.’ Kevin almost groaned. The Data Protection Act had become the knee-jerk shield of every jobsworth in the country. ‘Besides,’ she continued, ‘how do I know you’re a policeman?’
‘Why don’t I give you the details and you can consult your supervisor and then you can call me back either way at Bradfield Police HQ? I really don’t want to have to waste time getting a warrant for this, but if your manager insists, I will. How does that sound to you?’
‘I suppose,’ she said reluctantly. Kevin gave her Diane Patrick’s details and the main switchboard number and repeated his name and rank. As he replaced the phone, he made a bet with himself that, since it was already almost half past four, he wouldn’t hear another word from the council till the morning. He might as well start on the private sector.
He was on his second call to a DPS client when Sam waved at him. ‘I’ve got someone from environmental disposal for you,’ he called. ‘Something about a freezer?’
Kevin ended his call and picked up the other line. ‘DS Matthews. Thanks for getting back to me.’
‘This is James Meldrum, head of section at environmental disposal,’ a precise voice told him. ‘You spoke to one of my staff earlier.’
‘That’s right. About a phone call from Diane Patrick or DPS.’
‘I’ve consulted my guidelines and I believe I can provide you with the information you requested.’ He paused, as if for applause.
‘Thank you. I appreciate that,’ Kevin said, belatedly realising something was expected of him.
‘A Diane Patrick asked us to collect a chest freezer from her premises. We did so yesterday morning.’
‘A chest freezer?’ Kevin felt a burst of excitement. ‘Was it empty?’
‘If it had not been, our operatives would not have uplifted it.’
‘Do you know where it is now?’
‘We have a dedicated area for pre-disposal storage of fridges and freezers. We are obliged to take special disposal precautions according to the law. So this item will have been taken there.’ Meldrum clearly took pleasure in the detail of his work. Not to mention his grammar.
‘And it will still be there? It won’t have been disposed of?’
‘Regrettably, we do have something of a backlog in terms of actual disposal. So yes, it will be there. Along with many others, it should be said.’
‘Can you identify which one came from Diane Patrick’s house?’ Kevin said, crossing his fingers.
‘Not me personally, you understand. But it may be that the operatives who removed it will be able to state with some certainty which appliance originated with Ms Patrick.’
‘Will they still be at work, these operatives?’
Meldrum tittered. There was, Kevin thought, no other word for it. ‘Good heavens, no. Not at this time of night. They begin work at seven in the morning. If you can be at our depot then, I’m sure they will be delighted to oblige you.’
Kevin wrote down the directions to the depot and the names of the ‘operatives’ he needed to speak to. He thanked Meldrum, then leaned back in his chair, a big grin on his freckled face.
‘You look like the cat that got the canary,’ Sam said.
‘When a murderer gets rid of a chest freezer in the middle of their killing spree, I think it’s safe to assume we’re going to find some interesting evidence inside, don’t you?’
Tony found Alvin Ambrose in the MIT squad room working his way down the client list DPS had posted on their website. ‘I’m trying to find anybody who had any kind of social relationship with Warren Davy,’ he explained when Tony asked what he was doing. ‘So far, nothing.’
‘I was wondering . . . Would you mind giving me a lift out to Davy’s cousin’s garage? What was his name again?’
Ambrose gave him an odd look. ‘All right, all right. I should have submitted the report to you lot too. Bill Carr. That’s his name.’ He gave a rueful smile. ‘Every unit has its little joke, right?’
Tony gave a weak smile. ‘If you say so. Can you take me over there?’
Ambrose hauled his bulk upright. ‘No problem. I don’t think he knows where Davy is, though. I already spoke to him this afternoon.’
‘I don’t imagine he does know,’ Tony said. ‘That’s not what I want to talk to him about, though. I’d go myself, but trust me, I’m the world’s worst navigator. I’d be driving around South Manchester from now through till Sunday if I went by myself.’
‘And you think I’ll do better? I’m from Worcester, remember? ‘
‘That still gives you a head start over me.’
As they drove, Tony got Ambrose talking about his life back in Worcester. What the West Mercia team was like. How he thought Worcester was a great little city, the perfect place to bring up kids. Small enough to know what was going on, big enough not to be claustrophobic. It passed the time, and he didn’t need to think about what he was going to talk to Bill Carr about. He already knew that.
Ambrose turned into the cul-de-sac and pointed out the garage. It looked as if they’d just made it in time; Bill Carr had his back to them, pulling down the heavy door shutter. ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, Alvin, but I’ll do this better on my own,’ Tony said, getting out of the car and trotting down to catch Carr before he left.
‘Bill?’ Tony called.
Carr turned round and shook his head. ‘Too late, mate. I’m done for the day.’
‘No, it’s OK, it’s not work.’ Tony stuck his hand out. ‘I’m Tony Hill. I’m with Bradfield Police. I wondered if we could have a little chat?’
‘Is this about that business with Warren’s car the other day? Only, I told the other guy. I’m just helping a cousin out. I don’t have nothing to do with their business or anything.’ His eyes were casting about, looking for an escape beyond Tony. He turned up the collar of his denim jacket and shrugged his hands into the pockets of his jeans. Defensive as a guilty child.
‘It’s all right, I just want to have a bit of a chat about Warren and Diane,’ Tony said, his voice warm and confiding. ‘Maybe I could buy you a pint?’
‘He’s in trouble, isn’t he? Our Warren?’ Carr looked apprehensive but not surprised.
‘I won’t lie to you. It’s looking that way.’
He puffed out his cheeks and expelled the air. ‘He’s been a different bloke lately. Like there was something bearing down on him. I just thought it was business, you know? There’s a lot of folk on the skids these days. But he wouldn’t have talked to me about it. We weren’t close.’
‘Come and have a pint anyway,’ Tony said gently. ‘Where’s good round here?’
The two men walked in silence to a corner pub that had once been a working men’s hostelry but had now been turned into a Guardian reader’s haven. Tony imagined it had been gutted by a brewery in the seventies then recently restored to a faux version of its original scrubbed pine floors and uncomfortable bentwood chairs. ‘Full of bloody students later, but it’s all right this time of day,’ Carr said as they leaned on the bar and sipped decent pints of some microbrewery bitter with a ridiculous name.