in.’
Not the best testimonial I’ve been given, he thought.
He was shown into the room where Emma Tasker sat in an armchair, wrapped in a blanket made of hand- knitted, coloured squares. ‘What caused that?’ she said, eyeing his crutch.
‘Fell over.’
‘Drunk?’
He shook his head. ‘Man drove at me on a motorbike.’
‘So it isn’t just a try for sympathy in case I lose my rag again and start throwing things at you?’
He chanced a quick smile and failed to get one in return.
‘What man? One of your own?’ Again, the remark sounded flip, the sort of bitter humour he was used to at work. But still her face showed not a flicker of amusement.
‘No, a suspect. He was hiding in the woods near Bradford on Avon.’
‘Did he get away?’
‘Up to now, yes.’
‘Is he Harry’s killer — Harry and the other two who were shot?’
‘It’s likely.’
‘Bastard. And you let him get away?’
‘Unfortunately, yes.’
‘He’ll shoot someone else now.’ She was unrelenting.
‘I hope not.’ The words sounded feeble as he spoke them and he tried for a stronger response and did no better. ‘We’ll not rest until he’s caught.’
‘He’s got nothing to lose,’ she said. ‘He’ll go on picking off good men while you lot fail to catch him.’
‘Believe me, ma’am, we’re doing everything in our power to stop him.’ Quickly, he changed tack. ‘And how are you coping?’
‘It’s no picnic.’
‘I’m sure.’
‘I haven’t had any sleep yet.’
‘Get your doctor to prescribe something.’
Her voice took on the hard edge of the previous day. ‘You’ve done this before, haven’t you? You’re the duty comforter, the guy they send to all the police widows. Couldn’t they rake up anyone better than you?’
‘If you’d prefer me to leave …’
She shook her head. ‘You’re all as bad as each other. I had to identify Harry this morning at the mortuary. They sent a car and two officers, male and female. They treated me as if I was ninety, calling me dear and trying to hold my arm. I didn’t take kindly to it and I told them.’
He had no difficulty picturing it.
She was able to talk openly about the experience. ‘The sight of him wasn’t as bad as I expected. His face was hardly damaged at all. Of course they were careful to cover the sides of his head where the bullet went through. He looked fairly normal.’
He gave a nod, rather than chancing any comment.
Her account moved on. ‘They told me they’re releasing the body later today. I don’t want one of those big police funerals with hundreds of bobbies who never knew him lining the street and all the top brass showing off their medals in the church. Harry’s send-off is going to be low key. Just a few family and friends.’
This time he had to respond. ‘Whatever you say. We’ll respect your wishes. Some of his close colleagues will want to be there, I’m sure, but it doesn’t have to be too formal. You won’t be able to keep the press away, unfortunately.’
‘I’ve got used to them already. It’s ghoulish, all this interest in photographing the widow.’
‘If you’d like some of our lads to keep them from troubling you, I can arrange it.’
‘No need.’
A pause in the outflow of words made him think this was the opportunity to leave. ‘I’ll pass on what you said about the funeral, just in case the high-ups were planning anything. Is that why asked me to come?’
‘No.’ She pointed across the room. ‘On the table there’s a small piece of paper, folded. Bring it over.’
The square dining table had various things on it: a heap of coins, some credit cards in a small leather case, keys on a ring and the paper, white, small and folded once. He handed it to her.
‘The contents of his pockets,’ she said. ‘They returned them to me at the mortuary. This was tucked in among the credit cards.’ She unfolded the paper and handed it to Diamond. ‘What do you make of that?’
13
The limp remained, but Diamond had progressed to a walking stick. In truth the soreness in the leg felt about the same. Knowing how appearances influence people’s opinion of you, he’d discarded the crutches for good and arranged for them to be returned to the Royal United Hospital.
The team noted a change in his looks when he stood to update them on the morning’s discoveries. The unhealthy pallor was gone, replaced by unhealthy ruddiness from high blood pressure.
The guv’nor restored.
The improvement was largely due to a rise in confidence. He’d floated the idea with John Leaman that the killings might not, after all, be random, as Jack Gull and everyone else assumed. The latest discovery appeared to support his thinking.
‘Some of you know Harry Tasker’s widow Emma asked to see me this morning,’ he said. ‘Between ourselves, I was surprised to hear from her. She’d already given me a hard time — and I don’t blame her in the least — when I first broke the news of Harry’s murder. You never know how anyone will react to a shock like that. She’s bitter that Harry was on beat duty the night he was shot and she blames us almost as much as his killer. I did a poor job of comforting her. So today I was expecting more aggravation. I won’t say it was all sweetness and light, but we discussed a few things. She wants Harry to have a low-key funeral.’
‘Is that possible?’ Halliwell asked.
‘No uniforms, no guard of honour. A simple service for close friends and family.’
‘No police?’
‘A few of his closest mates from uniform. If we want to honour him ourselves we’ll have to find some other way.’
‘She won’t stop the media being there.’
‘We make damn sure they behave.’ He turned to the main matter. ‘But the reason Mrs. Tasker wanted to see me was something I wasn’t expecting. Harry’s personal possessions — the contents of his pockets when he was shot — were returned to her this morning. Among them was this.’
He raised it for all to see, a strip of white now enclosed in a transparent evidence bag. ‘Found in the little case he kept his credit cards in. A scrap of paper with two words on it obviously produced on a computer printer.’ He passed the bag to the youngest member of the team. ‘Read them out, would you?’
‘Me?’ DC Paul Gilbert did as he was asked, but in a throwaway tone that meant nothing. ‘ “You’re next”.’
A moment of bemused silence followed.
‘
No one was willing to commit.
‘Come on. Liven up.’
Finally John Leaman said, ‘A note from the killer?’
‘That’s the obvious interpretation, and we can’t ignore it. However Harry came by the note, he must have thought it was worth keeping. Whether he took it as a death threat, we can’t say. He didn’t behave as if he was going in fear of his life.’
‘Some kind of practical joke,’ Keith Halliwell said. ‘That’s what I would think if it was sent to me.’
‘Joke?’ John Leaman said. ‘ “You’re next” — what kind of joke is that when some madman is targeting
