“Mark,” Resnick greeted him, concerned but genuinely pleased. “Glad you could make it. How’ve you been? All right?”
“Yeah, yeah. Never worry.”
“Well, take it a bit easy, okay?”
“Right.”
Divine tugged at the knot of his tie and headed for the bar. Moments later, lager in hand, he collided with Sharon Garnett, carrying a tray of drinks toward a corner table. The crash momentarily stopped most conversation, Sharon squatting down among the broken glass, the front of her dress dark and wet.
“Here, let me,” Divine said, lowering himself shakily onto one knee.
“Tell you what,” Sharon said. “Why don’t you fuck off instead?”
“Black bitch,” Divine said, the words out of his mouth without hindrance or thought.
The back of Sharon’s hand caught him full across the face, the edge of her ring opening a cut alongside his left eye. For a moment, he was stunned and then he lashed out, one of his feet kicking her hard in the thigh, a fist whistling close by her head.
“Hey, Mark! Enough.” Naylor had been the first to react, pulling Divine back, Resnick quick to seize hold of his other arm, the pair of them hustling him over toward the door and through onto the stairs.
“Are you all right?” Lynn asked, shepherding Sharon toward a seat.
“Stupid bastard,” Sharon said. And then to Lynn, dredging up a smile. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“I thought,” Khan said, “things were a little on the quiet side.”
Vincent looked at his watch. “Early days.”
Out on the street, Resnick propped Divine up against a wall, while Naylor called for a cab.
“I’ll go with him,” Naylor said, “make sure he gets indoors okay. Tell Debbie I’ll not be long; I’ll get the driver to wait.”
“You’re sure?”
“No problem.”
“Good lad, thanks.”
Resnick was scarcely back in the room before he saw Helen Siddons headed straight toward him. “Just got a call. There’s a body, Charlie. In the canal. Not far from here. I thought maybe you’d want to come along.”
After a quick word with Hannah, Resnick followed the new DCI from the room.
Someone had moved fast. Already the section of Wilford Road that ran into Castle Boulevard had been closed to traffic and the footpath along Tinker’s Leen had been roped off as far as the entrance to the new Inland Revenue buildings. Officers from the Technical Support team were rigging up lights. Jack Skelton talked to the uniformed inspector directing operations from above the lock, while Resnick followed Helen Siddons down the steps toward the water. She was wearing a stone-colored topcoat, loosely belted over her dress, and somehow she had found the opportunity to change into flat shoes. Two young PCs stood guarding the body, neither one looking as if they should legitimately have left school. They stood back and murmured “Ma’am” as the DCI approached.
Just as Resnick had done not so many months before, she lowered herself down and lifted back the plastic sheet. In the glare of artificial light, the face shone white, opaque as ivory. Borrowing gloves, Helen Siddons gently turned the head aside; a deep gash ran from behind the left eye to the inner edge of jaw, tissue and bone laid bare. She had not been in the water long, hours at most. Skelton was walking along the towpath toward them, the police surgeon in his wake. Siddons lowered the sheeting back into place and stood.
“You haven’t got a cigarette, have you, Charlie?”
Resnick shook his head.
“Poor cow.”
“Yes.”
“How many’s that now? No clothing, no ID. If anyone steps forward to claim the body, I’ll be surprised.”
But Resnick knew that wouldn’t be the case: he had recognized Jane Peterson the instant Helen Siddons had exposed her face.
Thirty
Hannah wept.
It was not that she and Jane had been so close, not close like sisters, but she had known her as we often do those we work with, socialize with occasionally, as though through a prism, so much else unknown, hidden. Hannah had seen Jane angry, exhausted, hurt, excited: alive. Now she had to think of her as dead.
Resnick made fresh coffee, toast. Sounds of life filtered in from the houses on either side. By now the official identification would have been made, the preliminary medical examination over and done, a post-mortem arranged; an official murder inquiry set up, with Helen Siddons as senior investigating officer in charge. By midmorning, a new database would be in place, linked through the national HOLMES computer to other similar investigations, importing and exporting information. Files, begun in the wake of the newly formed nationwide operation and examining the unsolved violent deaths of women, would automatically be accessed. Those instances where the bodies had been discovered in or near canals and waterways would be prioritized. In addition to the normal CID personnel, there would be a researcher, a receiver, an indexer and reader, an action allocator. Helen Siddons would supervise all of this activity, set parameters, and after consultation with the detective superintendent overseeing all three squads in the authority, decide policy. Murder was a Serious Crime.
When Hannah came down, she was red-eyed but alert. “Charlie, I can’t believe you’re not going to be handling this. It just doesn’t make any sense. You were the one that knew her, after all.”
“I already had a quick word last night. I’ll speak to Serious Crimes again today.”
“And that’s all?”
“Hannah, it’s all I can do. It’s not my case.”
With a sign of impatience, she moved away.
“It’ll be all right, you’ll see,” Resnick said. “It’ll get sorted.”
She turned slowly, the room not so dark he couldn’t see her eyes. “Really, Charlie? Like all those others? That girl out at Beeston, like you sorted her?”
“Maybe I should go,” Resnick said.
“Maybe you should.”
Neither moved.
Resnick rang the Serious Crime Squad from his office at eight fifteen, eight fifty, nine, nine thirty, a quarter to ten, a quarter past. DCI Siddons was in a meeting, at a press conference, due to see Chief Superintendent Malachy, talking to BBC Midlands TV, plain busy.
Finally, he was able to speak to Anil Khan. Khan was wary, very much his nature, Resnick suspected, wary but not unfriendly. The medical report suggested that the cause of death was a blow or blows to the head, and that Jane Peterson had already been dead for some hours when her body was introduced into the water, although the water itself rendered establishing an exact time of death difficult, if not impossible. Preliminary estimates suggested she had been in the water for between six and twelve hours, possibly less. There was some evidence of recent bruising low on the right side, almost certainly dating from some time before the fatal injury. So far, none of her clothing or personal effects had been found. No witnesses had come forward, other than the dog walker who found the body; there was no information yet that filled in any of the time between the last known sighting of her on the previous Saturday and her death. No suspects.
“You’ve talked to the husband?” Resnick asked.
“I think we’re talking to him again now.”
“But not as a suspect?”
A pause. “Not as far as I know.”
“And the bruising?”
“Waiting on more information, the post-mortem. I’m not sure.”
Resnick didn’t want to place him in an awkward position, push him too hard; he thanked him and broke the connection. Almost immediately, the phone rang again. “Look,” Hannah said, “I think I’m going to drive over and see my mother. Spend a little time with her. I’ll probably come back late Sunday night.”
“Okay, it sounds like a good idea.”
Resnick searched about in the kitchen until he found an aging scrubbing brush, some J-cloths, and a plastic bottle of Jif whose cap had broken off. After half an hour in the bathroom, he went down to the local newsagents and had a card put in the window: Cleaning person wanted, hours by arrangement, must be good with cats.