even bigger than Paul remembered and towered above him. Added to the creaking of his leathers was the thud of his studded boots as they headed down the corridor.
‘Do you want a coffee?’ Paul asked.
‘No thanks, but a bottle of water would be good.’
He unwound a white neckerchief that he had used to draw over his mouth and sat with his legs apart undoing his fringed jacket. He had a cotton navy-blue scarf with skeleton heads tied round his head in gypsy fashion. His pigtail was tucked into the jacket.
‘Will this take long,’ he asked, ‘only I’m planning to go to the Isle of Man for a drag race.’
Anna arrived and introduced herself and Silas rose to his feet, head and shoulders above her, putting out his hand to shake hers.
‘Thank you for coming in,’ she said, sitting down opposite him.
‘The bloke who phoned me asked me to draw up a list of the best surfing beaches. He could have got them off the internet, but what I’ve done is sort of earmark the top slots for experienced surfers and middle-of-the-road types.’
Sal Douglas dug into a pocket and took out a printed sheet of paper.
‘Now the top surfers would usually hit the north beaches, as tides are stronger there. Amateurs go for the more sheltered ones. Top of the list has to be Newquay Bay. It’s got three big sandy beaches – bit overcrowded in the summer, of course – but it’s the most famous beach in the UK for surfers. All the competitions are held there. Then there’s Crantock Bay and Holywell where the surf’s best at low tide.’
Douglas concluded his descriptions of the surfing beaches by looking at Anna, and saying with a grin, ‘This guy that’s missing – he could be anywhere between Land’s End or East Devon if he’s serious.’
‘Did you make a customised board for him?’
‘It’s hard to say. I’ve been doing this for years, so Christ knows how many boards I’ve sold. I’ve got a small stake in a shop in Newquay Esplanade and I supply them as well. I also sell direct on the beaches from the back of a van.’
Anna placed down the photograph taken of the boards found in Alan Rawlins’s parents’ home.
‘Take a look at this . . . it might jog your memory.’
Silas picked it up in his huge hands.
‘Well, right off I can tell you that this is not what I’d call top of the range. This is more an intermediate’s board. I was shown another photo and that was one of my old hire boards.’
Anna placed down the photograph of Alan Rawlins carrying a board. ‘This?’
‘Yeah, that’s the one, but as I said before, I couldn’t tell you anything about the bloke holding it. I don’t ever recall making a customised board for him. He could have bought a second-hand one off me, but I’m not the only board-dealer out there making money. Kids who buy my intermediate or beginners’ boards eventually sell them on, plus the hire ones get nicked if people don’t keep an eye on them when they’re off the water. The surfers come from all over the world to Cornwall.’
‘He drove a silver sports car, drophead . . .’
Silas puffed out his cheeks. ‘Again, these guys all have sports cars. You know, it’s a big seasonal thing, guys in their hundreds pulling the chicks, driving around in their flash motors. It’s part-surfing, part-sexual conquests.’ He laughed.
‘This man is homosexual.’
Silas shrugged. ‘We get all sorts and true, there is a clique of the gay dudes. They tend to stick together, but I personally don’t have any time for them. To me, it’s a God-given shame. Great bodies and the women drooling, and they bat for the other side.’
‘What can you tell me about the Smugglers cafe.’
‘Not much more than I already have. It comes and goes in popularity. One season it’s not the place to be seen at, next it’s thriving. It’s cheap. They do hamburgers and chips and it jumps a bit at night, but the cops have been coming down on them for building fires on the beaches. Can’t hear yourself talk in there; the music is throbbing out, which also gets complaints.’
‘You knew Sammy Marsh?’
‘The photographer, yeah everybody knows him. He took that picture I gave Detective Simms and the lady officer.’
‘You told them that he did a moonlight flit to Florida. Do you know why?’
‘Not really no, but I’ll be straight with you, Sammy was a bit of a ducker and diver, regular Mr Tambourine man, moving from beach to beach knocking out good weed. He’d sort of cornered the market as everyone does a joint down there, kind of goes with the sport and I used to buy off him as well.’
Sal smiled and shrugged his massive shoulders.
‘He used to have this big Rasta looking out for him. Sometimes it could get a bit hairy and Sammy didn’t like competition, I know that.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, I don’t know all the facts, but some kids were all sharing a farmhouse, a good way out from Newquay, and they were growing their own cannabis plants. Had several greenhouses – lights – the lot. They were underselling Sammy and he didn’t like it. He got unpleasant, warned them off, and in the end I think they started working for him. I dunno . . .’
‘Was he violent?’
‘Sammy?’
‘Yes.’
Silas gestured with his hand to about his shoulder level sitting down. ‘He was only this big. Like I said, this Jamaican dude, Errol, was his heavy arm, but he also had a few other bodyguards.’
Paul produced Errol Dante’s mugshot. ‘Was one of them this man?’
Silas looked and nodded. ‘Yeah that’s Errol, but I haven’t seen him for a while and nor have I seen Sammy since he went to Florida. I’m only there come the summer months.’
There appeared to be little else that Silas could help them with and so he was thanked for coming in and left the station.
Anna watched from her office window as Silas, ‘call me Sal’, replaced his helmet, having drawn up the white scarf to cover his mouth. He fired up his Harley and almost collided with Langton, driving his beat-up old Rover. She was glad she had seen him as it gave her a few moments to gather her thoughts on how she would approach the fact that he’d been ‘busy’ the night before. She expected him to come in to see her straight away, but when he didn’t she eased up the blinds of the window looking into the incident room. He was standing beside Paul, who was writing up on the board the information from Silas Douglas. Quickly flicking the blind closed as Langton turned towards her, she hurried to sit at her desk.
He did sort of knock, but it was only a tap and the door opened as he strode in.
‘You free for an early dinner tonight?’
Taken by surprise, she blinked and then nodded.
‘Good. There’s a small Italian round the corner, we can walk to it. Say in ten minutes?’
‘Fine. Do I see you there or . . .?’
‘No, we’ll walk over there together. I just want to catch up on a couple of things.’
‘I would have thought you caught up enough last night.’
He hesitated, swinging the door open. No matter how long she had known him, he could still make her hairs stand up on end when he gave her that cold, arrogant look.
‘Just doing my job, sweetheart. Ten minutes.’
He closed the door and she could have kicked herself for bringing it up. She had always hated it when he called her ‘sweetheart’ – now even more so. She also reckoned that the promise of a dinner between them wasn’t what he intended by this evening’s date. Instinct told her he was going to use it for another reason.
As Anna made her way to the ladies cloakroom to comb her hair and freshen up, Langton was in deep conversation with Brian Stanley in the incident room. Exactly ten minutes later, he was waiting for Anna in the corridor.
‘Let’s go,’ he said briskly.
‘Do you mind if I just tell the team I’m off?’
