Still Waters (Charlie Resnick #9)(11)

Lynn Kellogg, meanwhile, was due to interview three sets of neighbors whose houses backed onto one another between Balfour Road and Albert Grove and whose animosity—so far involving dead rodents, broken windows, all-night sound systems, and human excrement—came close to constituting a serious breach of the peace.

Carl Vincent, aside from the cases of benefit fraud and receiving stolen property that were weighing down his case file, was continuing to check through local antique shops and auction rooms, just in case whoever had taken the Dalzeil paintings had done so without either a ready outlet or any real sense of their worth.

Resnick’s regular early-morning meeting with the superintendent had been postponed; Jack Skelton was in Worcester, along with officers from forty-three other forces, attending a meeting to launch a joint investigation into the murders of some two hundred women, which, over the past ten years, had gone unsolved.

“This floater, Charlie,” Skelton had asked, glancing through the file. “Beeston Canal. Anything to add?”

Not a thing.

Now Resnick wandered out into the CID room, spoke briefly with both Millington and Naylor, glanced over Lynn’s shoulder at the report she was preparing, finally paused by Vincent’s desk and watched as the list of auction houses scrolled up the screen of the VDU.

“Any luck?”

“Nothing so far. More than half don’t seem to know who Dalzeil was. It’s like giving art history lectures by phone.” Vincent grinned. “Open University, strictly first level. But so far, no one’s owning up to being approached. Nothing that fits our bill, at least.”

Resnick nodded. “Okay. Stick with it for now. I’ll follow up a few things of my own.” He had a contact in the Arts and Antiques Squad at New Scotland Yard who might be able to help.

“Sir?” Lynn Kellogg swiveled round from where she was sitting. “I couldn’t have a word?”

“Sure. Ten minutes. Just let me make one call.”

Back in his office, Resnick was midway through dialing the Yard number when Millington burst through from the outer office, scarcely bothering to knock. Anxiety was clear in his eyes.

“Mark Divine, boss. Stupid bugger’s thrown a fit by t’sound of it. Gone off half cock in some nightclub. Glassed someone for starters. And there’s talk he had a knife. Right now he’s banged up in Derby nick.”

“Christ!” For a moment, Resnick closed his eyes. “All right, Graham. I’ll get over there myself. You hold the fort here.”

“Long as you’re sure.”

Resnick barely nodded, hurrying to the door.

“Sir …” Lynn was on her feet, watching her chance for pinning Resnick down about her transfer go storming past.

I was right, Resnick was thinking, hurrying down the stairs and out through the rear exit to the car park: the whole damn squad’s falling apart.

Divine sat slumped forward on the narrow bed, elbows on knees, head in hands. The interior of the cell had been painted a dull shade of industrial gray. The stink of urine seemed to seep through the walls.

“How’s he been?” Resnick asked.

“You mean since he sobered up?” The custody sergeant was singularly tall, taller than Resnick by several inches, and most of those extra inches in his neck. When he spoke, his Adam’s apple bobbed awkwardly above the collar of his uniform shirt.

“That’s what this is then, drunk and disorderly?”

“He should be so lucky.”

“But he was drunk?”

“Either that or popping Es. Regular one-man rave.”

Resnick stood back and the sergeant slotted the key into the lock, the inward movement of the door surprisingly smooth. Divine didn’t look up straight away and when he did the jolt of recognition twisted on his face and he punched the skimpy mattress with his fist.

“Mark …”

Divine blinked and looked away. Bruising hung purple from his mouth and around his eyes; a cut that angled deep across his cheek had been held in place by steristrips.

“He’s been to the hospital?”

“Doctor saw him here.”

“What about an X-ray?”

The custody sergeant shrugged.

“And the injuries, they were sustained where?”

“Over half the city center, looks like. Two or three skirmishes in pubs before the nightclub where things really got nasty.”

“Not here, then?”

“Eh?”

“I said, Sergeant, those injuries to the face, no way they could have been sustained when he was in custody?”

The sergeant held his gaze for fully ten seconds. “Didn’t exactly come quietly. Meek and mild. Might’ve taken a bit of time, getting him subdued.”

“Time?”

“And energy.”

“Force then?”

“Reasonable force, yes.”

Resnick’s turn to stare.

“Police and Criminal Evidence Act, 1984; section one hundred and …”

“I know the section, Sergeant.”

“I’m sure you do, sir.”

“And I’m sure whatever happened, whatever reasonable force was used in making the arrest, it’s all been logged.”

“Of course.”

“Thank you, Sergeant, you can leave us now.”