'I'm fine,' Grace said, unsure what kind of hygiene went on in the kitchen.
This level of interview would have been delegated to someone junior by most SIOs, but Grace had always been a firm believer in getting out in the field himself. It was his style of operating - and it was one of the aspects of police work that he found most interesting and rewarding if sometimes, like now, challenging.
After a couple of minutes, Phil Wheeler lumbered back into the room, swept a pile of magazines and some more record sleeves off
the settee and eased himself down, then pulled a tobacco tin out of his pocket. He prised open the tin with his thumbnail, removed a packet of cigarette papers, then proceeded, one-handed, to roll himself a cigarette. Grace couldn't help watching; it had always fascinated him how people could do this.
'Mr Wheeler, I understand your son told you he had some conversations on a walkie-talkie radio with a missing person, Michael Harrison.'
Phil Wheeler ran his tongue along the paper and sealed the cigarette. 'I can't understand why anyone would want to hurt my boy. He was the friendliest person you could meet.' Holding his unlit cigarette, he bicycled his hand in the air. 'Poor kid had - you know water on the brain, encephalitis. He was slow, but everyone liked him.'
Grace smiled in sympathy. 'He had a lot of friends in the traffic police.'
'He was a good lad.'
'So I understand.'
'He was my life.'
Grace waited. Wheeler lit the cigarette from a box of Swan Vesta matches and moments later the sweet smoke wafted across to Grace. He breathed in deeply, enjoying the smell, but not enjoying this task. Talking to the newly bereaved had always been, in his view, the single worst aspect of police work.
'Can you tell me a bit about the conversations he had? About this walkietalkie?'
The man inhaled, smoke spurting from his mouth and nostrils as he spoke. 'I got pretty angry with him on -1 don't know - Friday or Saturday. 'I didn't know he had the damned thing. He finally told me he'd found it near that terrible wreck on Tuesday night with the four lads.'
Grace nodded.
'He kept talking about his new friend. To be honest I didn't take much notice. Davey lived in - how do you put it - his own little world most of the time - always off having conversations with people inside his head.' He put the cigarette down in a tin ashtray, then blotted his eyes with a scrunched up handkerchief and sniffed. 'He was
always chatting. I sometimes had to switch off, otherwise he could drive me nuts.'
'Can you remember what he said about Michael Harrison?'
'He was very excited - I think it was Friday - he'd been told he could be a hero. You see, he loved American cop shows on the telly he always wanted to be a hero. He was going on about knowing where someone was, and that he was the only person in the world who knew, you see, and this was his chance to be a hero. But I didn't take much notice; had a busy day with two wrecks we had to bring in -1 didn't make the connection.'
'Do you have the radio?'
He shook his head. 'Davey must have taken it with him.'
'Did Davey drive?'
He shook his head. 'No. He liked to steer the truck sometimes, I let him do that on a quiet road - you know - like one hand on the wheel? But no, he could never drive, didn't have the ability. He had a mountain bike, that was all.'
'He was found about six miles away from here - do you think he went off to find Michael Harrison? To try to be a hero?'
'I had to pick up a car on Saturday afternoon. He didn't want to come with me, told me he had important business.'
'Important business?'
Philip Wheeler gave a sad shrug. 'He liked to believe he mattered.' Grace smiled, thinking privately, we all do. Then he asked, 'Did you glean anything from Davey about where Michael Harrison might be?'
'No, it didn't occur to me to make any connection - so I didn't take much notice of what he said.'
'Would it be possible to see your son's room, Mr Wheeler?'
Phil Wheeler jabbed a finger, pointing past Grace. 'In the Portakabin. Davey liked it there. You can go across - please don't mind if I don't -1--' He pulled his handkerchief out.
'That's fine, I understand.'
'It's not locked.'
Grace crossed the yard and walked up to the Portakabin. The dog which he had still not yet seen, which he thought had to be on the
far side of the bungalow, began barking again, even more aggressively. Fixed to the wall beside the front door was a warning sign to Intruders reading 'armed response!'
He tested the door handle, then pulled the door open and stepped inside onto carpet tiles, several of which were curling at the edges, but most of which were covered in either socks, underpants, T-shirts, sweet wrappers, a Macdonalds burger container lying open, the lid smeared with congealed ketchup, car instruments, hub caps, old American licence plates and several baseball caps. The room was even more untidy than the bungalow, and had a rank odour of cheesy feet, which reminded him of a school locker room.
