who knew anything about a supply of cyanide capsules, possibly wartime, should contact police at Lynn. Any such information would be treated in confidence and could assist police in ongoing enquiries.
‘Good work,’ said Shaw. He took a deep breath: ‘I’ve just been with Tom — mass screening results are through.’ He caught Valentine’s eyes — dark, but catching the light. ‘No matches. Not one.’
‘What?’ It was closest Valentine would get to a shout. ‘You’re kidding.’ Sweat prickled his skin, making him shiver.
‘No, I’m not.’ Shaw looked away, allowing a flare of anger to subside. ‘He’ll kick the tyres on the results, but I think we may have run out of luck.’
Valentine looked into the mid-distance, letting the sea air seep out of his lungs. They’d considered the possibility of failure, but only in an academic sense, as the last possible option. He’d spotted the ‘we’ in Shaw’s sentence, although he seriously doubted that the DI’s career would take as big a tumble as his. He was eight years from retirement, and he’d failed to get past a promotion panel three times in the last eighteen months. This wasn’t a bad result for DS George Valentine: it was a disastrous one.
‘Roundhay?’ he asked, a flicker of hope making him pause, a match struck, a fresh Silk Cut in his lips.
‘First up. No match. Not close. Our next best shot has to be Joe Osbourne. He fits the bill: jealous boyfriend. Then an unhappy marriage. Tussle with a hooker.’
‘It was a bit of push and shove. And why’d he kill White?’
‘Maybe Marianne was one of White’s many conquests. Maybe she was being blackmailed and he did the noble thing — turned up to put the frighteners on White.
‘Back to square one,’ said Valentine. ‘That’s where we’ve got.’ He didn’t want to sound bitter, or accusatory, but he failed on both counts. They’d already talked to Joe Osbourne. What did Shaw think they’d get at the second attempt — a confession?
Shaw walked down a slope to the sand and looked at his boots. ‘If he is our East Hills killer then he has to be a swimmer, there and back again. So we need to check that out. It’s all very well posing on the beach. Could Osbourne swim the distance? We always knew that was a loophole. That’s my fault. I got seduced by the numbers. Seventy-five out, seventy-four back.’
Valentine looked out to sea over the marshes. At high tide East Hills was a sliver of sand. The pine trees that marked its spine seemed to be set on the horizon itself — impossibly distant. He’d no more try to swim to it as walk to it. He couldn’t resist pointing out the obvious: ‘He’s an asthmatic. When we told him his wife was dead he passed out. You serious about this?’
Shaw didn’t answer.
Valentine rubbed his hand over his jaw, the sound of skin rubbing on the five o’clock shadow like sandpaper. He still found it hard to believe they’d struck out on the DNA tests. ‘There’s no chance we fucked up the mass screening?’ It wasn’t a question, more a lament.
‘We’ll think it through later but Tom reckons there’s only one possible way out. Maybe there’s a mistake in the DNA profiles of the five men we took off East Hills who are dead. One of the samples could be duff — maybe someone thought they’d keep a family secret. Or there’s a family secret that’s a secret even to the family. But it’s got to be a long shot.’
‘Any longer than Joe Osbourne turning into Mark Spitz?’ asked Valentine.
A sudden wave broke on the edge of the sand and looking up they saw one of the small fishing boats motoring out along The Cut. ‘Anyway, all that can wait for tomorrow,’ said Shaw. ‘Osbourne’s at home and Paul’s keeping tabs. Meanwhile, let’s do what we should have done eighteen years ago and interview the ferryman.’
Valentine handed Shaw a file, inside of which was a one-page statement. Shaw looked at the close-lettered type and the heat of the day seemed to suck any vitality he had left out through his feet and into the sand. He didn’t really have the energy to read it.
‘Summary?’
‘His name’s Philip Coyle. Known as ‘Tug’. I think I met him once — someone nicked some gear out of his boat and I must have interviewed him. He’s got a small inshore fishing business here at Wells — mainly shellfish, flogging scallops and stuff to the posh pubs for the tourists to eat. He’s on the RNLI crew. Grandfather before him. I checked with the coxswain for personal details: he lives alone in Lynn. Married about fifteen years ago, divorced since. One child, a boy, lives with the mother.’
Valentine cracked the single page of A4 so that it was rigid. ‘Back in ’ninety-four he took the boat out to East Hills, dropped off the seventy-five ticket holders, carried on to Morston where he picked up twenty-eight to go out to Blakeney and see the seals. He ran them back, then came back to East Hills. He gave a statement here at Wells — we didn’t take him back to St James’ with the rest. And we didn’t call him on Saturday for a review. A loophole. So we haven’t got his DNA sample either.’
They’d just opened the main doors of the boathouse and the first group of visitors was up on the observation platform, looking down into the cockpit of the
‘Tug’ Coyle was in the small tractor at the prow, used to tow the lifeboat down the ramp for launches, checking oil levels in the engine. He jumped down, more nimble than his thirty-six years should have allowed, but heavy nonetheless, carrying muscle and big bones, with most of his power in his shoulders, short neck and arms. Shaw was immediately reminded of a crab.
He smiled at them both, shook hands with fleshy fingers, and nodded twice at Shaw, the green eyes intelligent and searching. ‘
‘Toy compared to this,’ said Shaw. The prow of the
‘How can I help?’ asked Coyle, stooping easily to close the metal butterfly wings of a toolbox.
Valentine’s eye had been caught by one of the photographic portraits framed on the wall. This image was in pride of place, in a heavy wooden frame with gilt carving and behind a thick layer of glass. The citation under the picture read:
He tapped the edge of the picture.
‘Sure,’ said Coyle, nodding. ‘Grandfather. Not that he had much to do with us — Dad was the black sheep of the family and Tug was a funny old bugger. But I got the name, and the boat, so I shouldn’t complain.’
Shaw knew of Tug Coyle, a legend on the coast but many years before his time. One of those iconic lifeboat men who always, in retrospect, seem too good to be true. He noted that the grandson hadn’t just got the nickname and the boat — he noted the genetic inheritance too, the ‘lifelong look’, the one facet of the face that would hold the family likeness. In this case it was the bone structure of the skull, the way the eye sockets were set firmly apart, the bridge of the nose notably wide.
‘This about East Hills?’ Tug said.
‘You were running the
‘Yeah,’ said Coyle, glancing back to the lifeboat. ‘Look, I thought it might help — we could go out, to the island?’ He smiled again, hands together, and Shaw thought he’d planned it like this so that they’d be out in his elements, the sea and air, not here, landlocked. ‘Shift’s done and I need to check the pots. Couple of the Burnham restaurants are screaming for fresh stuff. Crab, scallop. That OK? And I could do with catching the tide.’ Coyle’s manner was charming, smooth, and Shaw imagined he’d honed those skills flogging his shellfish to the Chelsea-on- Sea fishmongers and pubs along the coast. But the gentrification of the coast hadn’t all been good news, because while it provided Coyle with a living, he clearly couldn’t afford to live locally anymore. Having to drive back into the seedy suburbs of Lynn to a flat at the end of a long shift would make a bitter man of anyone. He wondered how
