Western Approaches (Jimmy Suttle) Page 7

  ‘Flux?’ Suttle was lost.

  ‘Yeah. Wonderful word. Perfect. Flux.’ Symons grinned. ‘Partly this is about geography. Here, let me show you. This is Tash again. Her idea. Her trope.’

  Symons unfolded his long frame from the chair and rummaged around behind the desk. Seconds later Suttle found himself looking at a framed map of the Exe estuary. Symons knelt beside him, visibly excited at this sudden interest in his life.

  ‘OK, so what I’m wanting is a narrative, a story that does justice to the river, that captures its essence, its soul. The framing device is the affair. But the affair, this relationship, has to be shaped by the river itself. And here’s what Tash came up with.’ One bony finger settled on the river upstream of Exmouth. Then the finger tracked slowly south until it paused at the mouth of the estuary.

  ‘Look at that. Look at the river just there. What does it remind you of?’

  There was a hint of impatience in his voice. This, he seemed to be saying, is obvious. Suttle was trying to make sense of the shape of the river. The way the harbour nosed into the tidal stream. The long curl of a feature on the bank opposite. The narrowness of the gap between them.

  Suttle asked about the bank opposite. What was he looking at?

  ‘It’s called Dawlish Warren. It’s a protected bird site. Magic place.’

  Suttle nodded. He was still no closer to an answer.

  ‘You can’t see it?’ Symons couldn’t keep the disappointment out of his voice.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Truly?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s a fanny. A woman’s vagina. That was her insight, Tash’s, a stroke of total brilliance. Just here, where the river gets tight, is where the barge is moored. That’s where the action takes place. Within touching distance of the Warren. Just here. Just across the water where the sweet spot is. And here’s another thing. Touching distance. Tash again. The perfect title. Why? Because we’re talking every kind of distance. Geographical distance. Historical distance. The distance between two people. And the way that passion, or the tide, or the history, can bridge that distance, even abolish it.’

  Way back in the eighteenth century, he said, a group of Dutch seamen got themselves shipwrecked on the Warren. There was a big south-easterly blow and their ship ended up on the beach. The locals came over from Exmouth and slaughtered every last man.

  ‘That’ll be in the movie too. My idea this time, not Tash’s.’

  His finger had found the sweet spot again. Suttle was looking hard at the map. This time he got it.

  ‘That’s Regatta Court. That’s where Kinsey lived.’

  ‘Exactly. He thought it was really funny. We needed a development budget and Tash thought he might like the idea. He knew nothing about flux but he understood the rest of it.’

  ‘You’re telling me he gave you money?’

  ‘Not me. Tash. She did the negotiations, got him sold on the idea. First off he wanted to see the kind of stuff I’d done already. I’ve got some work from way back but Tash said we could go one better and shoot a couple of scenes from the script and show him those.’

  Suttle’s eyes had gone back to the PC. He was beginning to understand.

  ‘So that’s what you did?’

  ‘Yeah. Kinsey bought us a decent camera and gave Tash a couple of grand to make it happen and we did the rest.’

  ‘You’re talking about the stuff I just watched?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘So who chose the sequences?’

  ‘Tash did. She chooses everything.’

  ‘And Kinsey?’

  ‘He only saw a rough cut. I gave him a DVD and he watched it on his laptop.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He loved it. Totally knocked out.’

  ‘He told you personally?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Last night, in the pub. He’d told Tash already but last night he made a big thing of it. He said the rest of the budget wouldn’t be a problem. Not after watching what we’d done.’

  ‘How much are we talking?’

  ‘Forty-five grand. Quite a lot of that is for the hire of the barge.’

  ‘Right.’ Suttle nodded. ‘Right.’

  There was a long silence. Would someone about to field a cheque for forty-five thousand pounds toss their benefactor into oblivion? Suttle thought not.

  ‘How well did you know Kinsey?’ he asked. ‘Be honest.’

  ‘Not well. Not really. If you want the truth I got into his crew because of Tash.’

  ‘I’m not with you.’

  ‘Kinsey fancied her. He’d do anything for her. And that turned out to be a bit of a blessing.’

  ‘For you?’

  ‘For both of us.’

  ‘Because of the movie?’

  ‘Of course. And the rowing too. Yesterday was magic. That guy Andy Poole’s taught me loads.’

  ‘He thinks you’re good.’

  ‘Does he?’ The grin was unfeigned. ‘Did he say that?’

  ‘Yeah. Not to me. Not directly. But yeah. So tell me – what did you make of Kinsey?’

  Symons thought about the question. Finally he sat down again, leaning forward, his voice lowered, almost conspiratorial. A kid. Definitely.

  ‘This is just between us two, right?’ Suttle didn’t answer. Symons went on regardless. ‘I think he was lonely.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just got the feeling. He didn’t seem to have any friends, any mates. Mates matter.’

  ‘No girlfriends? No one special?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Was there a wife once?’

  ‘Dunno. I suppose there may have been.’

  ‘Right.’ Suttle nodded. ‘So you’re telling me the guy was pretty much alone?’

  ‘A loner, sure.’

  ‘And Tash?’

  ‘Tash?’

  Suttle recognised the flicker of alarm in Symons’ eyes.

  ‘She got close to him?’

  ‘He fancied her. I told you.’

  ‘That’s not what I’m asking.’

  ‘Listen, man. The woman’s my partner. She’s beautiful. Everyone fancies her. So what are you suggesting?’

  ‘I’m suggesting nothing.’ Suttle had noted the sudden flash of anger. ‘I’m asking you whether she might know more about Kinsey than you do.’

  ‘And not tell me, you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Symons considered the proposition before rejecting it with a vigorous shake of his head.

  ‘No way,’ he said. ‘No fucking way.’

  Suttle held his gaze. At length he asked how Symons made his living.

  ‘I do stuff for my dad.’

  ‘What sort of stuff?’

  ‘You’ve seen the van out there? I collect and deliver bits and pieces of furniture. He’s got a couple of antique shops. He bids in the auctions and I pick the stuff up.’

  ‘And that gives you enough to live on?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Suttle nodded and scribbled himself a note. The earlier warmth had gone out of this conversation. Symons was visibly upset now. Suttle asked him where Tash would be tomorrow morning.

  ‘Here,’ Symons shrugged, ‘I guess.’

  Suttle took her mobile number and then got to his feet.

  ‘There’s a guy called Pendrick,’ he said. ‘He rows in Kinsey’s crew. You’ll know him.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Any idea where he might be?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘He didn’t mention anything last night? Plans he might have had for today?’

  ‘No.’ The smile had returned. ‘But then he wouldn’t.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘The guy’s another loner. Just like Jake.’

  Suttle was back at Exmouth police station in time for the first of the Constantine squad meets. Nandy had returned from a busy afternoon in Torbay, and the house-to-house teams filled the rest of the offic
e. As a courtesy, Houghton had also asked the duty uniformed Inspector to attend.

  She kicked off with a brisk summary of progress to date. House-to-house teams had knocked on every door in Regatta Court. They’d scored a response from maybe two thirds of the apartments but failed to gather anything of evidential use. Only one resident had laid eyes on Kinsey’s partying crew. She’d seen them streaming out of Regatta House around midnight. Hand on heart she couldn’t be sure but she thought four or five people, one of whom was definitely a woman.

  Detectives had also covered every property with line of sight on Kinsey’s balcony. Again, nothing.

  ‘What’s the lighting like?’ This from Nandy. One of the D/Cs fielded the question.

  ‘Crap, sir. We’re talking lights at knee level on the walkway by the dock. No way would they reach the fifth floor.’

  ‘So no witnesses?’ Nandy was looking at Houghton.

  ‘None, I’m afraid.’

  ‘And definitely no CCTV?’

  ‘No.’

  Houghton went on to describe the kind of ripples Kinsey had been making. No one seemed to like him. His reputation for arrogance had spread beyond Exmouth Quays. There was even a question mark about the crew he’d put together.

  ‘Who says?’ Nandy again.

  ‘Me, sir.’ Suttle told him about Lenahan and Symons. In his view Kinsey had bought their loyalty. These were guys who got on among themselves, and after yesterday’s win they might still carry on rowing with someone else in the bow seat, but neither Lenahan nor Symons seemed over-distressed by Kinsey’s passing.

  ‘So what are you telling me?’

  ‘Nothing, sir. Except no one seems surprised that the guy’s dead.’

  ‘You think someone killed him?’

  ‘I think he may have had it coming.’

  ‘And we can prove that?’

  ‘Of course not. Not yet.’

  ‘But you think we might?’

  ‘I think it’s possible, sir, yes.’

  Suttle was getting uncomfortable. The last thing he wanted was a public pissing match with Nandy.

  Houghton stepped in. The post-mortem, she reminded everyone, was scheduled for tomorrow morning. After that, things might be a great deal clearer. In the meantime, D/S Suttle would be pulling together the background intel.

  Suttle nodded, glad of the reprieve. There was a pile of Kinsey’s files on his desk, material seized from the apartment, and he’d be spending most of tomorrow trying to build a picture of the man’s life.

  Houghton wanted to know what they’d missed. She was still looking at Suttle.

  ‘Pendrick,’ he said. ‘We still haven’t nailed the guy.’

  Houghton nodded. Detectives had returned to his flat throughout the day but failed to raise him. Messages left on his mobile had gone unanswered. She’d tasked two D/Cs to sit on his address throughout the evening. If necessary, they’d be relieved by another shift at midnight. SOC had already retrieved some shots of last night’s celebration from Kinsey’s camera, and a process of elimination had ID’d Pendrick. If the guy hadn’t turned up by first thing tomorrow morning, she’d be circulating the mugshot and other details force-wide.

  Houghton had printed a couple of photos. Suttle, reaching for one of them, found himself looking at a big guy in his mid-thirties. A brutal grade one darkened his shaved skull and there was something about the cast of his face that seemed vaguely familiar. He had a deep scar that tracked diagonally down his right cheek and he was wearing jeans and a blue sweat top that had seen better days. Unlike the rest of the crew, he wasn’t punching the air. On the contrary, he seemed preoccupied, almost detached. A loner, he thought, remembering Symons’ parting shot.

  The meeting broke up. Nandy told Suttle to stay put. Already Suttle sensed what was to come. It was this man’s job to match ever-thinning resources against the incessant demands on the Major Crime machine. MCIT inquiries were horribly expensive, as the headbangers at HQ were only too eager to point out. In any enquiry the only currency that mattered was evidence.

  ‘We’ve got Kinsey’s crew alibied. Am I right?’

  ‘Yes, sir. With the exception of Pendrick.’

  ‘And Scenes of Crime have found nothing material in the apartment?’

  ‘Not so far.’

  ‘We’ve no witnesses to what happened?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And not much prospect of finding any?’

  This was a question Suttle wasn’t prepared to answer. He didn’t go as far back as Nandy, nowhere near, but his years on the Major Crime Team in Pompey had taught him never to discount a surprise. Solid effort, meticulous investigation and a helping of luck could sometimes transform a faltering enquiry and something told him that Constantine was far from over.

  Nandy rarely left a suspicion unvoiced.

  ‘You don’t think this man had an accident, do you?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘And you don’t think he topped himself?’

  ‘I think it’s unlikely.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he doesn’t seem that kind of guy.’

  ‘Who says?’

  ‘Pretty much everyone.’

  ‘I see.’ Nandy nodded and turned away.

  There was a long silence. Suttle thought the conversation was over. He asked whether the Det-Supt would be down in Exmouth tomorrow. Nandy ignored the question. He hadn’t finished with Kinsey.

  ‘You think these people knew him, this man? Really knew him? You think anyone knows anyone? You really think there aren’t parts of us we keep hidden? You? Me? Every other poor sod?’

  Suttle blinked. This was suddenly personal. He seemed to have touched a nerve in Nandy, stirred feelings much deeper than irritation at defending his precious budget.

  Nandy hadn’t finished. He said he’d lost count of the sus deaths he’d tried to stand up as murder. As a younger copper he’d taken far too much notice of people telling him that so-and-so would have been incapable of suicide. They were probably sincere, they probably meant it at the time, but the truth was that deep down we were all in the dark, all strangers to each other.

  ‘You don’t believe that?’ There was something almost plaintive in his voice. ‘You don’t think that’s the way we really are?’

  Suttle left the nick shortly afterwards. He’d phoned ahead, checking in with Lizzie, but had raised no answer. The road back to Colaton Raleigh took him down into the town centre. On an impulse he headed for the seafront. The rowing club lay at the far end of the long curve of yellow sand. He found a parking space on the promenade and got out.

  The days were lengthening now and the sun was still high in the west. The tide had turned a couple of hours ago and water was pouring back into the mouth of the river. After a morning of low cloud and drizzly rain Suttle could scarcely credit the transformation. A sturdy little trawler was wallowing in through the deep-water channel, a cloud of seagulls in pursuit. More gulls wheeled and dived over the distant smudge of Dawlish Warren while a pair of cormorants arrowed seawards, barely feet above the churning tide.

  Watching the cormorants, Suttle thought suddenly of Joe Faraday. His ex-boss had been a manic birder. On a number of occasions down by the water in Old Portsmouth he’d abandon a review of this job or that to bring some passing blur to Suttle’s attention. Suttle, who knew absolutely nothing about birds, had always been touched by this passion for the natural order of things. Faraday, to his certain knowledge, had despaired of the chaos that passed for daily life, and from the world of birds he appeared to derive both comfort and solace. Nature, he’d once confided, represented sanity. You could rely on a mother to feed her chicks. You could set your watch by the arrival of birds of passage. Spot a skein of Brent geese lifting off for the long flight north, you knew it had to be April.

  Suttle paused on the front, enjoying the sun on his face. Nandy, somewhat to his surprise, seemed to share a little of Faraday’s view of the world. In Faraday’s case, deep pessimism had ha
rdened into despair – and it was that despair, in the end, that had taken him to his death. Nandy, on the evidence of six busy months, appeared to be far more robust, but after their last exchange, just minutes ago, Suttle was beginning to wonder. Was there something that came with higher command, some subtle alteration to your DNA, that took you to a very bad place? Had Nandy been serious about the stranger at the heart of every friend?

  In truth, he didn’t know, and just for a moment, standing in this puddle of sunshine, the wind in his hair, he knew he didn’t much care. He liked this new job of his. There wasn’t much of a social life as far as work was concerned because most of the guys lived a fair distance away, scattered across the hugeness of Devon. Some lived up near the north coast, an area they referred to as the Tundra. A commute like that didn’t leave much room for a pint or two after work, and in any case most of his new colleagues had young families to think about, a gravitational tug about which Suttle knew a great deal.

  He grinned to himself. Despite the grief he was occasionally getting from Lizzie, he loved going back to Chantry Cottage. He wasn’t the least bit daunted by the ever-lengthening list of jobs he had to sort and rather liked the way they’d managed to turn camping into a way of life. Nocturnal scufflings from the mice, he told himself, brought you closer to nature. That had to be good for Grace, and good for all of them in the end, and if Lizzie occasionally lost her sense of humour then so be it. Faraday, he thought, would have definitely approved.

  On the point of returning to the car, his eye was caught by wheel marks tracking down to the water’s edge. Then he spotted a boat trailer, tucked up beyond the tideline. The trailer was tiny, way too small for the big sea boats he’d seen earlier in the club compound, and he peered out at the water, shading his eyes against the glare of the sun, not quite sure what he might find.

  For a long moment he could see nothing but the dance of the incoming tide. Then he caught a movement, a black speck, away to the east.

  The speck was moving fast, buoyed by the tide. Within seconds he could make out the shape of a single rower. He was big, powerful. He was wearing a red singlet. Each stroke seemed to flow effortlessly into the next one, his long arms reaching forward, his legs driving hard, his hands tucking the oars into his body until the cycle started all over again and he leaned forward over his knees, his hands feeling for the grain of the water, driving the tiny scull closer and closer.