My guts coming back, “What do you think…”
“Can’t do bugger all without a body. Helps the family too, in long road.”
“So what will…”
“Check the bins, see who’s got themselves an early away day.” He was almost smiling, thinking about winking again.
I fought for my breath. “What about Jeanette Garland and Susan Ridyard?”
Detective Chief Superintendent George Oldman half opened his mouth, running a fat, wet, purple and yellow tongue along his thin lower lip.
I thought I was going to shit myself right there and then in the middle of his office.
George Oldman reeled in his tongue and closed his mouth, the tiny black eyes staring into my own.
There was a soft knock at the door and Julie brought in two cups of tea on a cheap floral tray.
George Oldman, eyes on me, smiled and said, “Thank you, Julie love.”
Julie closed the door on her way out.
Unsure I still had the power of speech, I began to mutter, “Jeanette Garland and Susan Ridyard both went…”
“I know what bloody happened, Mr Dunston.”
“Well, I was just wondering, thinking back -to Cannock Chase…”
“What the fuck do you know about Cannock Chase?”
“The similarity…”
Oldman brought his fist down on to the desk. “Raymond Morris has been under lock and fucking key since nineteen bloody sixty-eight.”
I was staring at the two small white cups on the desjc, watching them rattle. As calmly and as evenly as I could, I said, “I’m sorry. What I’m trying to say is that, in that case, three little girls were murdered and it turned out to be the work of one man.”
George Oldman leant forward, his arms on the desk, and sneered, “Those little lasses were raped and murdered, God help them. And their bodies were found.”
“But, you said…”
“I don’t have any bodies, Mr Dunfield.”
Again, I swallowed and said, “But Jeanette Garland and Susan Ridyard have been missing for over…”
“You think you’re the only cunt putting that together, you vain little twat,” said Oldman quietly, taking a mouthful of tea, eyes on me. “My senile bloody mother could.”
“I was only wondering what you thought…”
Detective Chief Superintendent Oldman slapped his thighs and sat back. “So what have we got, according to you?” he smiled. “Three missing girls. Same age, or near enough. No bodies. Castleford and…”
“Rochdale,” I whispered.
“Rochdale, and now Morley. About three years between each disappearance?” he said, raising a thin eyebrow my way.
I nodded.
Oldman picked up a typed sheet of paper from his desk. “Well, how about these?” he said and tossed the paper over the desk on to the floor by my feet, reciting by heart: “Helen Shore, Samantha Davis, Jackie Morris, Lisa Langley, Nichola Hale, Louise Walker, Karen Anderson.”
I picked up the list.
“Missing, the bloody lot of them. And that’s just since the start of ‘73,” said Oldman. “A little bit older, I’ll grant you. But they were all under fifteen when they went missing.”
“I’m sorry.” I mumbled, holding out the paper across the desk.
“Keep it. Write a bloody story about them.”
A telephone buzzed on the desk, a light flashed. Oldman sighed and pushed one of the white cups across the desk towards me. “Drink up ‘fore it gets cold.”
I did as I was told and picked up the cup, drinking it down in one cold mouthful.
“To be blunt son, I don’t like inexactitudes and I don’t like newspapers. You’ve got your job to do…”
Edward Dunford, North of England Crime Correspondent, off the ropes with a second wind. “I don’t think you’re going to find a body.”
Detective Chief Superintendent George Oldman smiled. I looked down into my empty teacup.
Oldman stood up, laughing, “See that in your bleeding tea-leaves do you?”
The telephone buzzed again.
Oldman walked over to the door and opened it. “You do your digging and I’ll do mine.”
I was standing up, legs and stomach weak. “Thank you for your time.”
He gripped my shoulder hard at the door. “You know, Bismarck said a journalist was a man who’d missed his calling. Maybe you should have been a copper, Dunston.”
“Thank you,” I said with all the courage I could muster, thinking, at least then one of us would be.
Oldman suddenly tightened his grip, reading my thoughts. “Have we met before son?”
“A long time ago,” I said, loose with a struggle.
The telephone on the desk buzzed and flashed again, long and hard.
“Not a word,” said Oldman, ushering me through the door. “Not a bloody word.”
“They’d hacked the wings off. Fucking swan was still alive an’ all,” smiled Gilman from the
“You’re fucking joking?” said Tom from Bradford, leaning over from the row behind.
“No. Took the wings clean off and left the poor bastard just lying there.”
“Fuck,” whistled Tom from Bradford.
I glanced round the Conference Room, boxing thoughts hitting me all over again, but this time no TV, no radio. The hot lights were off, allcomers welcome.
Only the Paper Lads here.
I felt a nudge to the ribs. It was Gilman again.
“How was yesterday?”
“Oh, you know…”
“Fuck, yeah.”
I looked at my father’s watch/thinking about Henry Cooper and my Aunty Anne’s husband Dave, who looked like Henry, and how Uncle Dave hadn’t been there yesterday, thinking about the great smell of Brut.
“You see that piece Barry did on that kid from Dewsbury?” It was Tom from Bradford, Scotch breath in my ear, hoping my own wasn’t as bad.
Me, all ears, “What kid?”
“Thalidomide Kid?” laughed Gilman.
“The one that got into bloody Oxford. Eight years old or something.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I laughed.
“Sounded a right little cow.”
“Barry said her father was worse.” Still laughing, everyone laughing with me.
“Father’s going down with her an’ all, isn’t he?” said Gilman.
A New Face behind us, next to Tom, laughing along, “Lucky bastard. All them student birds.”
“Don’t reckon so,” I whispered. “Barry said father had only got eyes for one little lady. His Ruthie.”
“If it’s young enough to bleed,” said two of us at once.
Everybody laughed.
“You’re bloody joking?” Tom from Bradford, not laughing very much. “He’s a dirty git, Barry.”
“Dirty Barry,” I laughed.
New Face said, “Barry who?”
“Backdoor Barry. Fucking puff,” spat Gilman.
“Barry Gannon. He’s at the
