‘No, there’s a whole army of them out there.’
Andy Kewley’s career could best be described as chequered. In his early days in CID, before she’d teamed up with him at Aston, Kewley had spent some time in the West Midlands Serious Crime Squad. The squad had been disbanded, more than two decades ago now, following accusations that its members had fabricated evidence, tortured suspects, and written false confessions.
For years, lawyers had been demanding fresh enquiries into the scale of corruption, claiming that dozens of innocent people had served time in jail. One had been quoted as saying that the Serious Crime Squad had operated as if they were in the Wild West. ‘They were out of control.’
‘You lost a crucial witness, right?’ said Kewley.
‘You’re well informed, Andy. How do you manage that?’
He ignored the question. ‘She pulled out of the case, decided she didn’t want to testify after all. The old story, eh? Someone got to her, Diane.’
‘One of the suspects?’
‘Or maybe their friends.’ Kewley shrugged. ‘Who knows?’
‘She was supposed to be on witness protection,’ said Fry.
‘How would they have found her?’
‘Information. It’s easy to get hold of, if you know the right people.’
‘Who?’
Again Kewley seemed to ignore the question. Fry remembered this habit of his, recalled how it had often infuriated her. He always wanted to go round the houses before he responded. But later he would drop the answer in casually, as if he’d never been asked.
‘There’s a real hot potato bothering the bosses around here at the moment,’ said Kewley. ‘Some of the brass are shitting themselves trying to work out what to do for the best. If you ask me, they’re damned whatever they do.’
‘What are you talking about?’
He glanced over his shoulder in a ridiculously melodramatic gesture, as if anyone would be lurking behind the gravestones to listen into their conversation.
‘Well, you know there’s been this recruitment policy in the West Midlands? Quotas for BME officers.’
‘Black and minority ethnics.’
‘Yeah. Trying to meet government targets.’ Kewley looked as though he might spit on the grass. ‘Like they say, political correctness gone — ’
‘Okay, I know.’
‘It’s turned into a real sensitive issue in Brum, and it’s not going away. A couple of years ago, there was a Channel Four documentary, Undercover Mosque. The chiefs got that wrong big time. They accused the production company of editing the words of imams to stir up race hatred. But they ended up having to apologize in the High Court.’
Fry remembered it well. One Muslim cleric had been recorded claiming ‘Allah created the woman deficient’. But the police had claimed that the programme itself was Sufficient to undermine community cohesion and likely to undermine feelings of public reassurance and safety of those communities in the West Midlands for which the Chief Constable has a responsibility.
‘Now, there are allegations that some Asian officers have sympathies with the extremist elements,’ said Kewley. ‘That they won’t take action over honour killings, for example. You can see how the management are in a bind.’
Fry nodded. She could see it all too well. Community cohesion. It was the latest buzz phrase in multicultural societies. You didn’t hear it so much in the Peak District.
She looked at the graves of the Victorian dead all around her. According to their memorials, many of them hadn’t actually died but had merely ‘fallen asleep’. If they woke up now, they’d get a shock. And over there was another one. Not lost, but gone before.
‘Euphemisms,’ said Fry. ‘Don’t you hate them?’
Kewley looked as though he didn’t agree.
‘Have you heard the name William Leeson?’ he said.
Fry’s ears pricked up. This was the way it worked with Kewley. He distracted you with something irrelevant. Then the important information was dropped into the conversation like an afterthought. You had to be paying attention, or you missed it.
‘Leeson? No. Who is he?’
‘A dodgy lawyer from Smethwick, who used to practise here in the city. I thought you might have come across him.’
‘I could have done,’ said Fry. ‘But hundreds of defence briefs come and go through interview rooms. I don’t remember all their names.’
‘You might want to remember this one,’ said Kewley.
‘Why?’
Kewley didn’t answer directly. He seemed to be getting more nervous now, and jumped when a motorcycle with an unsilenced exhaust roared by on the Middleway.
‘William Leeson first came on to the scene in a big way during all that bother with the Serious Crime Squad,’ he said.
‘He loved getting the attention, calling for public enquiries and Appeal Court hearings. “Miscarriage of justice” was practically tattoo’d on his forehead, he said it so often.’
‘Was he the one who said you were operating like the Wild West?’ asked Fry.
‘No. But he would have said it, if he’d thought of it. He was always small-scale, though — and he got pushed out by the smarter, more expensive briefs who elbowed their way in when they saw a lucrative bandwagon rolling. Leeson got really pissed off about it. That was why he turned.’
‘Turned?’
‘He started to give us information.’
‘What kind of information?’
Kewley pulled his cap lower over his eyes, and wiped the palms of his hands on his jacket.
‘I shouldn’t be telling you any of this.’
‘Who says? You’re retired, out of the force. You’re a civilian now, Andy — as free as a bird. Get used to it.’
‘I could still get myself into deep shit. You don’t understand.’
The bottom end of the cemetery seemed to back on to the middle ring road. Around it, she could see the commercial buildings of the Jewellery Quarter, the Mint in Icknield Street, a factory chimney, all the places that these affluent Victorians would have made their money.
Fry noticed that the memorials nearest to her had names like John Eachus and Walter Peyton Chance. Strange how names like that seemed to have died, along with the Victorians themselves. She saw defaced angels, tombs blackened with soot. A wire mesh bin was filled with empty bottles of Olde English cider and Frosty Jack, the booze of choice for street drinkers. Nearby, a statue lay broken and beheaded, an empty vodka bottle on the ground at its feet. Many of the memorials had fallen, or had been pushed over. The ground in this part of the cemetery was covered in broken lumps of moss.
And there was that sickly smell again. She would have to get away soon. It was starting to smell like the scent of death.
‘I’m just telling you, Diane. There are things you need to know. You could ask someone else, but whether you’ll get the truth or not…’
‘Okay, okay.’
‘I just want you to know, there are political considerations at play right now. Much bigger issues than a successful conviction in any cold case — and I mean any case, no matter who the victim is. You understand me?’
‘I’m not sure I do, Andy.’
‘Damn it, I can’t make it any clearer,’ he said irritably ‘Look — anybody can get tossed aside, if it suits them. Justice is a slippery concept these days. You need to watch your back, that’s what I’m saying. I gave my statement,
