Cross and Burn (34 page)

B
radfield Moor Secure Hospital perched on the side of a hill on the north-western side of the city at the point where cultivated greenery gave way to the untamed hodgepodge of moorland vegetation. The buildings were angled so they faced down the hill at trees and roofs and lawns and shrubberies and flowerbeds rather than the weatherbeaten grasses and stunted shrubs of the peat bogs above. Tony had once described it to Carol as a Victorian metaphor directed at the patients within. ‘They’re supposed to turn their backs on the jungle of madness and become part of the ordered consensus below,’ he’d said. Typical Tony, she thought, then felt irritated with herself for enjoying the richness of his take on the world. Now he was the one implicitly accused of madness and she was the one with the task of restoring him to the mainstream.

The hospital had extensive grounds and once she had cleared the security gates and parked well away from the buildings, Carol clipped the leash on Flash and let her out of the Land Rover. The sky was grey and heavy with the promise of rain, but it was still only a promise. She walked down the driveway in the teeth of a stiff breeze and when she was sure there was nobody around, she let the dog run free. As she’d done the night before, Flash ranged across the terrain but kept returning to her mistress without being summoned, before taking off on another zigzag run. Carol let the dog run for quarter of an hour, then put her back in the Landie with a bowl of water and a handful of treats.

By the time she reached the main entrance, she could feel a few drops of rain. ‘Not a moment too soon,’ she muttered, pushing the door open. The reception area was the usual institutional beige and grey, but someone had taken a little effort and imagination to make it more appealing. There were attractive photographs of tranquil mountain scenery around the walls and a pair of large blue glazed pots containing an assortment of house plants. Too heavy to be lifted and thrown, of course, Carol recognised. Off to one side was a doorway without a door leading to a seating area where visitors could wait before being processed and allowed in to see inmates. Behind the glassed-in reception desk, one woman was on the phone, another at a computer.

Carol stood patiently waiting for one of them to pause in their vital tasks to deal with her. It took a couple of minutes, but the woman on the phone eventually finished her conversation and slid open a panel in the glass. ‘Visiting hours don’t begin till noon,’ she said, not unkindly. ‘They should have told you that at the main gate.’

‘I’m not a visitor.’ Carol produced the old warrant card that had got her on to the premises and flashed it at the women. ‘I’d like to see Maggie Spence.’

‘Have you got an appointment?’

‘No.’

‘Can you tell me what it’s in connection with?’

‘It’s confidential.’

The woman at the computer glanced up at the word, like a dog picking up a scent. She frowned momentarily, then her face cleared. ‘I’ve seen you with Dr Hill,’ she said, smiling. ‘Molly, this lady works with Dr Hill when he’s doing his profiling.’

Molly squeezed a smile out. ‘I’ll see if Mrs Spence is available.’ She slid the panel shut and returned to the phone. A brief conversation, glancing at Carol a couple of times, then she replaced the phone and reopened the panel. ‘She’s coming through.’ She produced a clipboard and handed Carol a pen. ‘If you wouldn’t mind signing in?’

Carol completed the formalities and was pinning a visitor pass to her jacket when a heavy door to one side of the desk clicked open and a woman emerged. Somewhere in her mid to late fifties, Maggie Spence looked like a woman for whom comfort was the headline priority. She wore loose khaki chinos topped by a baggy blue T-shirt and a hand-knitted multicoloured cardigan. A pair of scarlet-rimmed glasses perched on the end of a nose that wouldn’t have looked out of place on Santa Claus. Her plump face was lined with the tell-tale tracks of smiles rather than frowns. Seeing Carol, she gave an automatic grin. ‘Hi, I’m Maggie Spence. I gather you wanted to talk to me?’ She extended a hand and Carol found her fingers enveloped in a warm grip.

‘I’m Carol Jordan,’ she said. ‘Thanks for seeing me. Is there somewhere we can talk?’

Maggie glanced at the visitors’ waiting area. ‘Molly said it was confidential, right?’ Carol nodded. ‘This is too public, then. Come with me and we’ll use my office.’

Carol followed as Maggie used a swipe card to lead her through a series of locked doors and short hallways to a neat little room with a view across the grounds to the distant moors. Apparently the staff were allowed to enjoy the wild grandeur of nature. Maggie’s office was crammed with books, files and paper, but unlike Tony’s, everything was organised in neat piles. The only wall space not fitted with shelves was covered by a colourful patchwork hanging that appeared to be an impressionistic image of a mountain landscape. Maggie waved Carol to a chair and settled herself behind the tidy desk. ‘So, what’s all this about?’

Carol took Tony’s letter out of her bag. ‘I’m here under false colours, I’m afraid. I’m not a police officer any longer. I’m working with Bronwen Scott, who is a criminal defence lawyer.’

Maggie leaned forward and opened her mouth to speak. But Carol held up a hand. ‘Please. Hear me out?’ Maggie subsided, but the smile was gone.

Carol cut to the chase. ‘Tony Hill was arrested last night on suspicion of committing two murders. You know Tony. You know how absurd that is. But there is some circumstantial evidence and a cop who has decided this is how she’s going to make her name. I’m working with his lawyer to establish his innocence.’ She pushed the letter across to Maggie. ‘He’s asking for your help.’

Maggie looked stunned. ‘Tony? Arrested? Are you sure?’

‘I’ve just come from Skenfrith Street police station. I know it’s hard to believe —’

‘Hard to believe? It’s surreal. I’ve never met a man with more compassion. The idea that he could intentionally kill anyone is ridiculous.’

‘Unfortunately, not everyone knows him like we do. And he doesn’t come across like most blokes.’

Maggie gave a little snort of laughter. ‘No kidding. All the same. Working in here, you think you’ve heard everything. And then you walk in and tell me Tony Hill’s suspected of murder. Incredible. Poor Tony.’ She picked up the letter and pushed her glasses up her nose. She read it carefully then put it down on the desk. ‘All right. We have some data protection issues here. I can’t let you have access to our incident log because of our duty of confidentiality to staff and patients. But because I have Tony’s permission, I believe I can give you copies of entries in that log that relate to him, provided that I redact the names of the patients involved. Will that give you what you need?’

Carol nodded. ‘I don’t need much in the way of detail. All I’m interested in are the dates and the nature of the incidents.’

Maggie nodded. She pulled her keyboard towards her and started hammering the keys with the energy of someone who had learned her skills on an old manual typewriter. Every now and again she paused and massaged her forehead with her fingertips. ‘Luckily everything’s online these days,’ she muttered. ‘And searchable.’

After a few minutes, she said, ‘I’m going to cut and paste all the incidents involving Tony into a separate document then I can redact any identifying features relating to patients and I can print it out for you. That fine?’

Carol nodded. ‘Perfect.’

The tip of Maggie’s tongue slipped out between her lips as she concentrated on what she was doing. Finally, she looked across at Carol and smiled. ‘That’s it. Four incidents. I expect you already knew about the knee?’

A swirl of recalled emotion caught Carol unawares. She had a vivid recollection of the axe attack that had left Tony lying in a hospital bed and its aftermath. No need for redaction there. Lloyd Allen’s name was carved on her memory. ‘I was around at the time,’ she said calmly, hiding what was going on beneath the surface.

Just then the door swung open behind her. Carol turned in time to catch the arrival of Aidan Hart, Clinical Director of Bradfield Moor. It had been at least a year since she’d seen him last and time was definitely not on his side. He didn’t look as if he’d gained weight, but somehow, his face had grown pasty and jowly. Although he’d barely turned forty, there were deep lines between his eyebrows, and the whites of his eyes looked liverish. She’d never considered him attractive – particularly given what she knew about him – but now he was becoming positively repulsive. ‘What the hell is going on here?’ he demanded. For a psychologist, his interrogatory techniques seemed somewhat lacking.

Maggie was clearly inured to his belligerence. ‘I’m just sorting out something Dr Hill asked for,’ she said calmly.

‘On whose authority?’ Hart moved further into the room, using his height and bulk to dominate the women.

Maggie was undominated. She picked up Tony’s letter and waved it at him. ‘On Dr Hill’s authority. He has the right to access his own records.’

Hart looked around him theatrically. ‘I don’t see Dr Hill here.’

‘His letter authorises Ms Jordan here to access the information on his behalf.’

‘He can’t do that. It’s a data protection issue.’

Maggie shook her head. ‘I’ve redacted everything that could identify patients or other staff.’

‘I’m not prepared to release any of our records to a third party, however redacted they are. She’s not a police officer any more, you know. She’s here under false pretences.’

‘No, she’s not, she told me that.’

Hart’s crocodile smile crept across his face. ‘She didn’t tell the gatehouse staff or reception. She used police ID to bypass our security.’

Carol shrugged. ‘I needed photo ID. That was all I had. I never said I was a serving police officer.’

Two stripes of scarlet appeared on his cheeks, as if a child had drawn on his face with lipstick. ‘Don’t split hairs with me, Miss Jordan. I’d like you to leave now.’ He was wholly focused on her, but beyond him, Carol could see Maggie’s fingers move stealthily on the keyboard.

‘Not without what I came for. It’s completely uncontroversial. We could easily get a court order.’ Carol wasn’t going to give up without a fight.

‘Get one, then.’ He threw the door open. ‘Maggie, show Miss Jordan out, would you?’

‘No point in making a fuss,’ Maggie said, taking Carol’s elbow and steering her to the door. Hart watched them leave, then, as Maggie opened the first locked door, he turned and marched off in the opposite direction. Maggie looked after him and smirked. ‘I figured something as menial as seeing you off the premises would be beneath him. He is the absolute antithesis of a class act. I don’t know how Tony puts up with him. I don’t know how
I
do, come to that.’

As she talked, she led the way towards reception. But just before they emerged into the foyer, she turned abruptly into another office. A young man in a nurse’s tunic sat at a desk, working on a spreadsheet. He looked up when they walked in and grinned. ‘You owe me a drink.’ He leaned across the desk and picked up a few sheets of paper from the printer tray.

‘Thanks, Stephen.’ Maggie accepted the papers and handed them to Carol. ‘There you are. Tuck them away so the snitches on reception can’t see them. Now it really is time to go, Carol.’

‘Thanks. Nice move,’ Carol said as she followed Maggie into the corridor. ‘I have the impression you’ve done that before.’

‘We look after each other here,’ Maggie said. ‘Aidan only looks after number one. Tell Tony, chin up.’

On her way out, Carol made a point of glaring at the receptionists. Anything else would have looked suspicious. She didn’t so much as glance at the papers until she was out of sight of the security guards on the front gate. Then she pulled in to the first woodland track she came to for a read. It wasn’t easy to make sense of the redacted reports, but when she compared them with the dates Nadia Wilkowa had been in Bradfield Moor, one thing rapidly became clear.

Tony had been treated for a nosebleed following an incident with a patient on a day when Nadia Wilkowa had been there. ‘You fucking beauty,’ Carol said, kissing the sheet of paper. The first piece of evidence against Tony had been perfectly undermined.

T
he absence of their bosses didn’t let the workers at Tellit Communications off the hook. They knew their computers recorded every detail of their working lives. Their keystrokes were counted, their phone calls timed, their absences from either form of communication logged and monitored. The workers were so wrapped up in what they were paid to do that they barely looked around them. So Rob Morrison had been in his office for a good twenty minutes before Gareth Taylor appeared in his doorway.

‘Marie Mather’s husband phoned earlier,’ he said. ‘I was the only one in, so I picked up the call. Apparently she’s been taken to hospital with a suspected burst appendix.’

Rob winced. ‘That sounds painful. Did he say how long she’d be off?’

Gareth shook his head. ‘He said he’d phone again when he had a better idea of the prognosis, but not to expect her in for the rest of the week. He sounded fucking terrified,’ he added with a sneer.

‘That’s not a great start to a new job,’ Rob said.

‘I don’t suppose she planned it.’ Gareth pushed off from the door jamb and turned back to the busy room. Unobserved, Rob gave a sly smile. Marie Mather’s big ideas had definitely been put on ice and he wasn’t in the least sorry about that.

Paula had felt her phone vibrate against her thigh while they’d been conducting their miserable ‘no comment’ interview with Tony Hill but she’d known better than to take it out in front of Fielding. The DCI was obviously right on the edge of losing her temper and Paula definitely didn’t want to be her target.

The interview had run into the sand when Fielding had started repeating questions. Bronwen Scott had leaned back in her chair and smiled with the weary charm of one who has seen it all before. ‘Charge my client or release him,’ she’d said.

Fielding had thrown her pen on the table. ‘We’re continuing our inquiries. We have search warrants for Dr Hill’s home and his office, and officers are conducting those searches right now. So we won’t be releasing your client just yet.’ She’d pushed her chair back and stabbed a finger at the recording equipment. ‘This interview terminated at 11.17 a.m.’ Then she’d stalked out of the room, leaving Paula to make an apologetic face and follow. She took the chance to glance at her phone and see a message from Carol Jordan. ‘Think the metal case might be portable anaesthetic unit? Check any missing? Check paramedics?’

Chiding herself for not having thought of that, Paula hurried to catch Fielding. ‘Bloody woman,’ Fielding snarled, climbing the stairs with the energy of fury. ‘And bloody Carol Jordan.’ She stopped in her tracks and turned on Paula and lowered her voice to a growl. ‘Don’t even think about leaking to Jordan.’

‘I’m not stupid,’ Paula said. ‘But I did have a thought while you were asking Dr Hill about hospitals. That metal case the killer is carrying in the CCTV footage? What if it’s portable anaesthetic apparatus? When he tips them into the car boots, he puts the box in and leans over them. We can’t see what he’s doing. What if he’s putting them under so they can’t escape or give the alarm?’

Fielding’s face lit up. ‘That’s a bloody great idea, McIntyre.’ She clapped her on the shoulder. ‘Hill could easily have figured out how to get his hands on one of them. Head upstairs to the incident room and get that actioned right away. I want a check on hospitals that Nadia Wilkowa visited, see if they’ve had any portable anaesthesia units stolen. Paying particular attention to Bradfield Moor and Bradfield Cross. Although Tony Hill’s credentials could get him in anywhere.’ She looked almost gleeful. ‘Bloody brilliant! Well done, McIntyre.’ She bounded off up the stairs leaving Paula in her wake, feeling stricken. The suggestion was meant to shake Fielding’s certainties. Instead, it seemed merely to have reinforced them.

‘Bloody hell,’ Paula muttered, heading up to the incident room. If they uncovered any stolen anaesthetic sets, that would give fresh life to the investigation. At least she could set the guys on to checking out paramedics rather than solely focusing on Tony. She wondered whether the search teams were suitably baffled by Tony’s life – psychology textbooks, computer games, superhero comic books, case notes and cryptic memos to himself. She couldn’t imagine they’d find anything to link him to the victims or the crimes. Wasting police time, that’s what this was.

Somehow, she didn’t think anybody would be charging Fielding.