and the snakes, I walked through it all.
Everything gone, everything wrong, only lies.
The office was dead.
I went down the hall and into records.
Into 1974.
I spun the microfilm through the reels, over the lights. Into Friday 20 December 1974. Front Page:
WE SALUTE YOU.
A photograph -
Three big smiles:
I pressed print and watched those three big smiles, those outstanding police officers come out.
Watched that by-line:
BY JACK WHITEHEAD, CRIME REPORTER OF THE YEAR
I knocked on Hadden’s door and went in.
Still sat behind the desk, his back still to Leeds.
I sat down.
‘Jack,’ he said.
‘Bill,’ I smiled.
‘Well?’
‘Fraser’s done a runner.’
‘You know where he is?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Maybe?’
‘I have to check.’
He sniffed up and tidied up some pens on his desk.
I asked, ‘You got anything new?’
‘Jack,’ he said, not looking up. ‘You said something about Paula Garland, the last time you were in.’
‘Yeah.’
He looked up, ‘Well?’
‘Well what?’
‘You said something about a connection, a link?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Bloody hell, Jack. What have you found out?’
‘Like I said, Clare Strachan…’
‘The Preston Ripper job?’
‘Yeah. She went by the name Morrison and under that name she’d made a statement as a witness in the Paula Garland murder.’
‘And that’s it?’
‘Yeah. Fraser said Rudkin and maybe some other officers knew this, but it’s never been officially recorded in the Preston inquiry. Or anywhere else.’
‘And there’s nothing else?’
‘No.’
‘Nothing you’re not telling me?’
‘No. Course not.’
‘And you found this out from Sergeant Fraser?’
‘Yeah. Why?’
‘Just getting it straight in my mind, Jack. Just getting it straight.’
‘You got it straight then?’
‘Yeah,’ he said, eyes on mine.
I stood up.
‘Sit down a minute, Jack,’ he said.
I sat down.
Hadden opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a large manila envelope.
‘This came this morning,’ he said, tossing it across his desk. ‘Take a look.’
I pulled out a magazine.
A nack mag, pornography.
Cheap pornography.
Amateurs:
The corner of one page folded down.
‘Page 7,’ said Bill Hadden.
I turned to the marked page and there she was:
Bleached white hair and flaccid pink flesh, wet red holes and dry blue eyes, legs spread, flicking her clit:
Clare Strachan.
I was hard again.
‘This morning?’ I asked, throat hoarse.
‘Yeah, postmarked Preston.’
I turned the envelope over, nodding.
‘Anything else?’
‘No, just that.’
‘Just the one issue?’
‘Yeah, just that.’
I looked up, the mag in my hands.
Hadden said, ‘You didn’t know she was doing this kind of stuff?’
‘No.’
‘You any idea who might have sent it?’
‘No.’
‘You don’t think your Sergeant Fraser’s gone west do you?’
‘No.’
‘I see,’ said Hadden, nodding to himself. I said, ‘What we going to do with it?’
‘I want you to make some calls, find out what the fuck’s going on out there.’
I stood up.
He was picking up a phone as he said, ‘And Jack?’
‘Yeah,’ I said, one hand on the doorknob.
‘Be careful, yeah?’
‘I always am,’ I said. ‘I always am.’
I dialled her flat.
No answer.
I hung up and dialled again.
No answer.
I hung up and dialled again.
No answer.
I hung up and dialled again.
No answer.
