The Take Read online

  The Take

  Graham Hurley

  © Graham Hurley 2012

  In memory of Norman Shaw

  1940–2000

  Acknowledgements

  My thanks to the following for their time and patience: John Ashworth, Katie Brown, Deborah Owen-Ellis Clark, Roly Dumont, Tony Johnson, Bob Lamburne, Colin Michie, Phil Parkinson, John Roberts, Pam and Ian Rose, Pete Shand, Matthew Smith, Steve Watts, Sandra White and Dave Young. Thanks, as well, to my agent Antony Harwood and my editor Simon Spanton for their encouragement and advice. My wife, Lin, supplied the coffees, the warmth and the laughter – all of them beyond price.

  Contents

  Copyright

  Prelude

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Epilogue

  Prelude

  Friday, 16 June 2000

  Another grey summer’s day, spitting with rain.

  Faraday was one of the last into the crematorium car park, abandoning his Mondeo, buttoning his coat and ducking along the path towards the front of the building. The larger of the two chapels was already full. It smelled of furniture polish and the kind of flowery scent you squirt from an aerosol. Faraday slipped into a pew at the back, acknowledging a nod here and there, aware of the bareness of the place, burying himself in a random page of the English Hymnal.

  There is a blessed home, beyond this land of woe

  Where trials never come, nor tears of sorrow flow.

  Fat chance, Faraday thought, closing the hymn book with a soft but perceptible thud.

  The cortège appeared ten minutes later, delayed by a tanker spill on the motorway. The coffin was bigger than he’d expected and he wondered about its weight. Vanessa had been the slightest of women but, in a darkening world, the brightest of candles. She’d brought energy and commitment and an infectious good humour to a job that was never less than daunting. She applied to herself and to others the highest of standards. On bad days, and there were many of those, she’d made going to work a pleasure.

  Faraday was still gazing at the coffin, still wondering about the burden these men had shouldered. Could you measure loss in pounds or kilos? Had the undertaker’s men with the bowed heads and the clasped hands seen her wrecked body before screwing down the lid?

  Vanessa’s mum was supported on both sides by relatives, her small white face shadowed by an enormous hat. She peered around her, plainly bewildered. Lately, Vanessa had been talking of early Alzheimer’s, trying her best to minimise the harm her mother might do to herself. Hence the weekly supply of pre-cooked meals. And hence, perhaps, the state of the Fiesta’s brakes.

  The service lasted no more than twenty minutes. Friends, relatives and, it seemed, half of Southsea police station did their best with the hymns. A vicar who seemed never to have laid eyes on Vanessa talked of her passion for hill-walking. Then came the moment when the canned music swelled and the vicar ducked his head in silent prayer.

  Watching the curtains close on Vanessa’s coffin, Faraday thought of the last time they’d shared a proper conversation. It would have been a couple of days ago. She’d had a problem with next month’s duty roster and she wanted to know whether there was a likelihood of any more abstractions. After seven brief months as a management assistant, she knew as well as Faraday that the question was impossible to answer. A stranger rape in Fordingbridge or a drive-by killing in Southampton could rob them of yet more pairs of hands, sending another little administrative tremor through the rapidly emptying divisional CID room.

  He and Vanessa had discussed the roster for the best part of half an hour. She was as tireless and quietly efficient as ever, but short of prophecy there was no real way he could help her. In the end, with the sweetest of smiles, she’d nicked the last of his jammie dodgers and scrawled NBC across a yellow sticky, fixing it to the top right-hand corner of the paperwork. NBC was her own contribution to the ever crazier world of performance indicators and management acronyms. In Vanessa-speak, it stood for No Bloody Chance.

  The curtains were fully closed now and feet were beginning to shuffle in anticipation of the end of the service. Across the aisle, Willard was exchanging a word or two with his DCI and Faraday caught the lift of an arm as the DS checked his watch. Willard, he knew, was due at headquarters for a conference which started at eleven. If the M27 was open again, he might just make it to Winchester in time.

  Faraday returned his prayer book to the back of the pew and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to rid himself of the images that had haunted him ever since he’d asked to see the traffic file. The guys in Photographic spiral-bound the colour prints between blue covers. The shots that really hurt showed the interior of the Fiesta. The shell of the car had deformed beyond all recognition. The engine had come back through the dashboard and the driver’s seat had slipped forward, crushing Vanessa against the steering wheel. The contents of her handbag – money, make-up, two ticket stubs from a recent visit to the UCI – were strewn across the remains of the passenger seat and there were three library books among the wreckage in the footwell. One of them, a Catherine Cookson novel, was webbed with something glistening and scarlet and it had taken Faraday several seconds to realise that he was looking at blood. Vanessa had bled to death. In the dry prose of the post-mortem report, her left femoral artery had ruptured, shock and blood loss killing her before help was at hand.

  Faraday opened his eyes again. Heads were bowed. The vicar was intoning a final prayer. Then, from nowhere, a butterfly appeared. It fluttered up the aisle, darting left and right, before coming to a halt, as if making some kind of decision. Faraday stared at it, transfixed, and as he did so it came back down the aisle at head height, zig-zagging towards the door.

  Butterflies, like birds, were one of Faraday’s passions, a solace, an escape. He knew about them, knew where to look for their newly hatched eggs, knew the colour of their larvae after the first and second moults. He could map their migration routes, and their habitats, and their distribution. Above all he knew their names, not simply in English but in Latin as well.

  The butterfly gone, he gazed numbly towards the curtained altar, letting the dull colours slowly blur. The Red Admiral butterfly, he thought. Vanessa atalanta.

  Outside, the promise of rain had given way to a thin drizzle. Ignoring an invitation to inspect the floral tributes, Faraday made his way back to the car park. The overwhelming temptation was to look for the butterfly. Was it down by the road, feasting on buddleia and lavender? Or had it flown north, bound for the row of evergreen shrubs that edged the long curve of the drive? He didn’t know, and he realised that he didn’t care. It had come and gone like a ghost. Simply to have glimpsed it was enough. Vanessa Parry would never see her thirty-fourth birthday. End of story.

  The car park was beginning to fill with mourners for the next funeral. Unlocking his Mondeo, Faraday suddenly became aware of a white Vectra Estate. It was parked three spaces along from his own car. The driver was wearing a green anorak and his head was turned away. Faraday withdrew his ke
y and walked across. The lettering along the side of the Vectra read WESSEX CONFECTIONERY – TRADE AND RETAIL. Must be a replacement motor, he thought. No question about it.

  Faraday bent to the window and tapped on the glass. The driver ignored him. He tapped again, looking at the huge bouquet with its cellophane wrap laid so carefully on the big cardboard boxes of crisps in the back. The handwriting on the card might have belonged to a child. ‘Sorry’, it said. There was no name.

  At last the driver looked round. He had a chubby young face, with a couple of days’ growth of beard. His hair looked freshly gelled and he wore a tiny diamond stud in his right ear. He gazed up at Faraday, vacant, stupid. Faraday hesitated a moment, then wrenched open the door. He knew the traffic file by heart. Matthew Prentice. DOB 21.10.74. Four previous convictions, all for speeding. Just about right, Faraday thought. You were on the mobile that morning. Or making notes on your little clipboard. Or doing any bloody thing except driving properly. Bastard.

  The driver was trying to get out of the car. Faraday blocked him with his body.

  ‘You killed her,’ he said softly. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

  Two days later, Sunday night, a woman set out to take her boxer puppy for a walk. She lived in Milton, an area of narrow-fronted terraced houses which lapped the edges of Southsea and Fratton. She had the dog on a lead and she carried a torch.

  The woman’s route took her out onto the path which skirted the edge of Langstone Harbour. Five minutes’ walk and she’d be among the ponds and bushes that covered Milton Common, the featureless scrubland between the busy Eastern Road and the water’s edge. It wasn’t countryside, not real countryside, but in one of the most densely packed cities in the country, it offered a rare chance to get away from the hassle and the traffic. The dog loved the place almost as much as she did.

  Tonight, for the first time, she was going to let the puppy off the leash. She’d discussed it with her kids and they’d both agreed it wouldn’t be a problem. Tyson was as good as gold. No way would he dream of straying.

  She bent to slip the chain around his neck. The dog looked up at her for a moment, as if she’d made some kind of mistake, then bounded off towards the nearest of the ponds. Within seconds, she could hear the rustle of wildlife among the reeds at the water’s edge. Just like Tyson to look for new friends.

  Lighting a cigarette, she began to wander towards the pond, taking her time, enjoying the breeze off the harbour. Weatherwise, it had been a crap day – more bloody rain – but the sun had come out late afternoon and the bloke on the telly was promising something half-decent for the next couple of days. If it lasted through to the weekend, she’d maybe take Jordan and Kelly for a treat. Get over to the Isle of Wight for a day on a real beach. The thought of the kids chasing Tyson through the shallows brought a smile to her face.

  The cigarette gone, she called the dog’s name. She thought she heard an answering yelp and the usual pell-mell tumble, but she wasn’t sure. She called his name again. This time, for definite, nothing. By now, it was nearly dark. Out across the water, she could see the lights of Hayling Island. Half a mile behind her, the orange glow of the Eastern Road.

  Switching on the torch, she followed the path towards the pond. The more noise she made, the better.

  ‘Tyson!’ she yelled. ‘Tyson!’

  Still nothing. For the first time, she felt a prickle of apprehension. What if the bloody animal had got lost? What if it had gone after some duck or other and didn’t know how to swim? She reached the edge of the pond. Her eyes followed the beam of the torch as it swept across the water. A splash as something small and black swam quickly away. But no Tyson.

  Then, suddenly, there came a stir in the bushes directly behind her. Flooded with relief, she swung round. She had the torch in one hand, the lead ready in the other. Daft bugger.

  ‘Tyson …’ she began.

  A man was standing in front of her, no more than a metre or two away. He was wearing a tracksuit of some kind and she could see gloves on his hands. She brought the torch up, then screamed. A Donald Duck mask covered his face, and the moment she took an involuntary step back he began to make quacking noises, really loud, like he was laughing. The gloves fumbled at the waistband of the tracksuit bottoms, pulling them down, exposing his erection. She stared at it, then up at the mask again, feeling the chill of the water around her ankles, not knowing what to do. This isn’t happening to me. No way.

  The man took a step towards her, the quackings turning into a deep, throaty laugh. Instinct told her to run. The moment she moved, he blocked her path. She could smell him now, the sour reek of cheap tobacco. More quacks. And another step towards her.

  For a moment, she just stared at him. Then, from her right, came the sound of splashing and a familiar bark. Distracted, the man in the mask looked away. Seeing the puppy, he began to turn, and as soon as he moved she took her chance. Lashing out wildly with the lead, she caught him around the head. She did it again as he lunged towards her, the tracksuit bottoms still around his knees. Tyson, by now, was yelping fit to bust. Play time.

  Later, giving her statement, she couldn’t remember how long they’d struggled. It might have been seconds. It felt like for ever. She’d tried to knee him in the groin, tried to fight him off, but what had brought the nightmare to an end was the moment he’d caught her hand, forcing back her fingers until she was screaming with pain. It was the screams that drove him off. One minute he was all over her. The next, he’d gone. Making her way back towards the lights of the Eastern Road, she’d wept like a baby. That bad, it was. That fucking horrible.

  One

  Monday, 19 June, early morning

  Unable to sleep, Faraday was up by half-past five, nursing his second cup of tea. It had been light for over an hour, a pale grey wash spilling over the mud flats of Langstone Harbour. At half-tide, from the upstairs study, he could see turnstones strutting across the pebbled flats, pausing from time to time to poke around in the pools of standing water. Several of them seemed to follow the mooring lines that snaked out to dinghies and larger craft marooned by the sluicing tide, and he watched a group of three as they squabbled over a yellow smudge of mussel. Aggressive behaviour was rare among turnstones, but over the last few months he’d noticed a number of episodes like these. Must go with the territory, he thought. Inner-city turnstones. Bred to be stroppy.

  He turned back from the view, eyeing the mountain of paperwork on his desk. All the years he’d been living with J-J, he’d made it a rule never to bring work home. That, of course, was impossible. It was a rare evening when the phone didn’t ring at least a couple of times. But paper was different. That belonged in his other world, and with the challenge of bringing up a deaf child to meet, he’d made bloody sure it stayed there.

  But Joe-Junior had been gone for the best part of a year now, a gangly, loose-limbed twenty-two-year-old who’d blissfully surrendered himself to a sharp-faced French social worker from Caen, and the months of living alone had nagged away at Faraday’s resolve until it was rare not to return with his battered briefcase bulging with stuff he never seemed to have time to sort out at the office. Minutes of meetings he could barely remember. Agendas for meetings he’d do his best not to attend. Amendments to Force Standing Orders. Thick briefs on upcoming European legislation. Incomprehensible strategy papers from the Social Services policy group on child abuse and the At Risk register. Home Office updates on service performance indicators. Risk assessments on more or less everything. Hundreds of thousands of words that were somehow expected to make him a better detective.

  Faraday emptied his mug and picked up the yellow pad he normally kept by the telephone. The duty DC had answered the call from the control room about last night’s Donald Duck incident. By the time he’d got to the woman, she was up in Accident and Emergency at the Queen Alexandra hospital getting her injuries sorted out. She’d evidently gone straight home after the incident because she’d left her kids by themselves, and by the time a u
niformed patrol had made it to her house, she’d changed into a dressing gown, dumping all her clothes in the washing machine. She’d felt dirty, she’d said. This pervert had touched her. Pawed her. Pressed himself up against her. All of which, in the DC’s dry phrase, was a bit of a shame. Because, even with the washing machine’s filter for examination, nothing makes forensic evidence more difficult to recover than a cupful of BioSurf and the hot-spin cycle.

  At the hospital, X-rays had confirmed two broken fingers and a fractured wrist and the DC had piled insult on injury by arranging for a police surgeon to take scrapings from under her fingernails, plus a couple of hairs from her head, for later matching if they were lucky enough to pull in a worthwhile suspect. After discharge from the hospital, he’d driven the woman back to the ponds by the harbour where three uniforms were waiting to identify the scene of crime. The woman had done her best to try and work out exactly where she’d been jumped, but in the dark she’d got hopelessly confused and in the end they’d taped off the whole area, waiting for daylight before beginning a proper search.

  This was the third time this year that someone in a Donald Duck mask had exposed himself to local women, but so far there’d never been any suggestion of rape. The DC, on the phone, was still unclear in his own mind whether the guy had simply been trying to defend himself from the flailing dog lead or had had something more substantial in mind, but either way, it didn’t really matter. The woman’s injuries turned a potential nuisance into grievous bodily harm. Crown Court, for sure.

  Faraday made his way downstairs, musing on the irony of the case. The incident had taken place barely a hundred yards from his house, here beside Langstone Harbour. Had he been in on Sunday night, he’d probably have heard the woman yelling. A piece of luck like that could have saved him the chore of organising a proper inquiry, getting bodies out there, knocking on doors, asking questions, taking statements, raising actions, looking for leads. They’d have the bloke locked up by now, tidied away, not too much paperwork, minimal fuss. Luck like that might even have stirred a modest herogram from headquarters. Exemplary vigilance. In the best traditions of the force.