Urban Noir

We can only imagine what Feyderbrand thought of the machine’s new selection. But in the case of this guy we can, and should, go right inside his head.

 

Hull: Crime City, the metropolitan borough of burglary. “If we can lift it, we’ll shift it”. That should be Hull’s motto nicely dressed up in Latin-speak under the posh swag (three crowns) on the coat of arms.

Stuff in this city goes missing a lot; stuff around here is only temporarily in your possession. It’s like you’re keeping an eye on the stuff on its journey from the shop to the thief. Then he takes it to one of those shops that unblock phones and the whole cycle begins again. Burglars don’t do over shops with their shutters and CCTV and proper alarms linked to cop shops. They leave shops to shoplifters in their roomy all-the-year-round coats. No, burglars do people’s homes. They’re much easier than shops. Lots of them have tenfoots offering easy access to back yards and gardens. You can drive a van up to the back gate and load right up. There’s no fear of getting caught. There are hardly any coppers dedicated to catching burglars any more. There are too many more serious crimes to deal with and too many police service cutbacks.

Look, I was born here. I love the place. Crime City suits me very nicely as I’m in the security game myself. A few years back a rich uncle in the U.S. helped me with some start-up capital. Nice of him. I didn’t even know I had an uncle in America. My father never mentioned him and I’ve never met him and still haven’t but I couldn’t have set up this business without him. Now I have a secretary, a dozen men on the payroll, this office, a yard and four patrol cars with Protectotech written on the side. That’s my firm’s name. It hints at all-seeing electronic surveillance but in point of fact we’re a bit short of ‘tech’.

The company isn’t doing as well as I’d hoped. We’ve never really got into the lucrative stuff like factories, warehouses and offices; we mostly get the derelict buildings to look after. I wish I had a piece of what Siemens must pay out to protect their huge plant at Alexandra Dock. The perimeter fence alone must be four kilometres long. They’ll need cameras, men, dogs, gatekeepers and, anyway, who is going to steal any of their precious turbine blades? No one could lift one to shift one. They even left one lying around in the city centre and no one nicked it.

There’s money in door management. With a new bar opening every month in Crime City there’s a demand for big men, smartly dressed but handy with their fists, to vet the clientele. Two agencies have the duopoly in this town. I can’t seem to break into the market. They’re telling me I can’t get in.

I’ve got some CCTV work but the derelict sites we mostly get to look after don’t usually have cameras. They shouldn’t be of any interest to anyone but they are. I’m having trouble from skinheads. Skinheads in this day and age! They daub their ridiculous graffiti on buildings under my protection and then tag it: Hull Skins. They don’t give a monkey’s. They are making Protectotech look bad. The security that never sleeps looks like it’s been dosing in an armchair surrounded by juvenile delinquents vandalising our buildings with impunity.

My boys nearly got them once. Some civilian had seen them capering about on the roof of an old bottling plant. Five men were dispatched and these kids gave them the runaround. Kids! And they got clean away. That was after they’d painted a huge grinning face up there. It can be seen for miles around and it’s laughing at me.

Some of the buildings with our Protectotech signs on them aren’t as empty as they appear. If the skinheads are really targeting our buildings then sooner or later they’ll break into one and find themselves facing a bunch of Vietnamese cannabis farmers waving machetes and then they’ll wish they’d stayed at home putting dubbin on their boots.

A few months back I’d lost some money in a poker game. More money than I could afford and I’d lost it to one of those guys you especially don’t want to owe money to. (One of those guys you shouldn’t play cards with but I’d been feeling lucky.) As he fingered my I.O.U. he told me there was something I could do for him which would give me more time for repayment.

That’s how me and my boys ended up keeping an eye on these hydroponic cannabis farms hidden all over Hull in disused-looking buildings. Our protection just covers the outside, we are strictly forbidden from going inside. Each farm is run by a dragon-mama. They are in charge of the workforce (all Vietnamese), internal security and all aspects of the horticulture.

Mr. Dees (that’s his name) has some legit businesses and we’re looking after these too. I’m terrified my protection of any of his premises fails. He’ll up my debt or feed me to one of his dragon-mamas.

In the meantime I’m not making enough to significantly reduce the debt. I’m only just breaking even. Would-be clients might take me more seriously if I had a proper office instead of this Portakabin.

But there I was in my shoe-box on a Wednesday morning, back at work after a mini-break. It was a steaming hot day in mid June. All the windows were open at their fullest extent. I was on my third coffee and second Get Lucky of the day. I’ve got a bit of a head on me after an injudicious late night sesh. In front of me was a brief report from one of my men. Those damned skinheads had been busy again. Over the weekend they’d broken into another of my buildings and done a big piece of multi-coloured graffiti on the roof. They were getting more ambitious. This wasn’t so much graffiti as a full-scale mural. They’d got in through a poorly maintained door, found the stairs and gone all Michelangelo on a blank wall. They’d signed it with their ‘Skins’ tag and this time no one had seen them at work. My men hadn’t been called out and patrol cars had driven on by. It was only discovered on Saturday morning when anyone in that part of town looked up. They’d seen a big ugly mug with its tongue sticking out.

My thoughts were interrupted by the roar of a motorbike, very loud. A big black motorcycle had come into the yard at what sounded like full throttle. It came to a rest right under my window after a dramatic skid and spray of gravel. The rider, all in black, dismounted. The visored helmet was removed releasing a cascade of black hair. She lowered the zip of her leather jacket and slung the helmet carelessly on the seat. With another toss of her hair she marched into the tiny cubby hole set aside for my secretary. I heard words through the partition wall and tried to compose my features to suggest serious, sensible, alert, efficient, cool. I probably failed. The door was thrust open and the motorcyclist was in my office. My secretary leant in to close the door mouthing ‘sorry.’

The woman before me was tall, striking (very striking, not from around here) and incredibly self-possessed. She didn’t look like a client. I doubted she would need the help of Protectotech to protect anything.

What she did was put her gloved hand inside her jacket and pull out a thick wad of twenties. She tossed it onto the desk in front of me.

“The pound keeps taking a beating but you can still buy something with this around here, right?”

She was American. That explained her crack about sterling but there’s no excuse for busting into my office and bad-mouthing my currency. Still, there looked like a lot of money there.

“What’s this about?” I said, reaching into my jacket pocket and pulling out my pack of Get Luckys and a lighter. I offered her one but she shook her head and took out her own pack which was odd as she smoked the same brand as me. She did allow me to light it for her. There were chairs in my room but she perched on a corner of my desk.

“You got a rich uncle stateside, helped set you up in this security racket, yes?”

“Yes, my…”

“Well now he wants you to do something for him.”

“Okay, what can…?”

“Not here. You haven’t even got proper walls. These bills okay with you? They told me no one has ever seen a fifty around here.”

“Fine,” I said, pocketing the wad. “They told you right.”

“I’m staying at the Marina Plaza. Their bar, six-thirty tonight. Look sharp.” She pulled out a smaller wad and threw that onto the desk. “In fact get yourself a new suit. You look like a schmuck.”

“Thanks, “ I said trying on a smile and realising too late it was the kind of weak ingratiating smile favoured by schmucks. “What, what’s your name?”

“Angel,” she said with a straight face. And left. When she rode out of my yard she didn’t pause to look left or right and just roared off without a care. I trousered the second wad, told my secretary I was going to be out of the office for the rest of the day and went to buy a suit.

 

I was absolutely punctual but she was already sitting on a bar stool when I arrived. A glass of whisky was in front of her but so was the (almost) full bottle of twelve year old Yamazaki. If this wasn’t impressive enough, she was smoking. The barman wasn’t even looking the other way. I could see why. She was all in black again but looked red-carpet-ready in an expensive-looking backless sheath. Her long black hair was worn loose. The other patrons were pretending to look unconcerned like this happened all the time, like they lived and breathed this kind of glamour, like the smoking ban had never happened.

I had to pretend this was my natural milieu but it so wasn’t. I took off my new white raincoat, folded it and placed it on a stool. Carefully I placed my new hat on top of it and sat next to her. She gestured to the ever attentive barman for another glass. It seems I would be joining her on the whisky trail, not my usual tipple. She stubbed out her cigarette in the ashtray she had (somehow) obtained. Lipstick smeared the filter. She looked me up and down, taking in the new black suit, new white shirt, new black tie and new sunglasses.

“Better,” was all she said.

I poured myself a generous slug. Let’s face it, I was nervous. I was sure I was visibly sweating. It was swelteringly hot in here despite the earlier rain. I took a sip. The burning liquid slipped down my throat. The booze did not allay my worries. I said nothing. She could do the talking. She didn’t. A few sips later and my tongue was loosened.

“Angel,” I said. “That’s a nice name.” She just looked at me. I tried again: “What do you think of the City of Culture?”

She sighed and with one hand she swept up the bottle. She leaned slightly over the counter to speak to the barman: “We’re going to my room.” He nodded and palmed her something.

“You’ll need this to disarm the smoke alarm.”

“Thanks, Andrzej.”

I realised she could get men to do whatever she wanted and wondered (again) what she had in store for me. The barman’s face was impassive as I gathered up my things. Maybe he wondered that too.

Standing next to her in the lift in my hat and shades with my mac over one arm and clutching two ridiculously heavy whisky tumblers, I asked her: “Do you always get what you want?” and was met by another blank stare.

I was getting a little tired of the silent treatment but things changed once inside her suite. We sat in big comfy arm chairs to drink, smoke and talk business.

“Your uncle, my employer,” she said, “wants something found. Something he lost over three years ago. He was sure you’d like to help.”

“Certainly, if it wasn’t for my uncle’s generosity…”

“Yeah, naturally. That’s what he thought. So the thing is.”

The thing was that my uncle had been duped by a fly-by-night operation calling itself the Institut Baudrillard. These Parisian hucksters had taken my uncle for a lot of dough. Then they’d done a midnight flit and skipped town. This august, highly respected research body had vanished into thin air. My uncle, apparently, wasn’t the sort of man to take this lying down. He had gone to some trouble and expense to track them down. He’d traced them to Hull where they’d re-established themselves behind another front organisation. But he didn’t know which one and that’s where I came in. He remembered his dear nephew, luckily also based in Hull. I was to find out what they were now calling themselves and where, exactly, they were to be found.

“But I’m not a detective.”

“Good. Your uncle likes to keep things in the family. He doesn’t like strangers knowing his business. If anyone knew he’d been a patsy he’d lose respect. Private detectives don’t know when to stop nosing around. You know this city, its streets, its hidden places and its underworld. You will be his nose, his eyes and ears. You will find these people and you will report to me.”

“Okay,” I said, “but you aren’t, er, family are you?”

“Your uncle took me in as a child and raised me as his own.”

What a nice guy my uncle is. He’d helped this girl and he’d helped me. I had to prove myself and locate the callous con men who had fleeced him. I pictured the dear sweet old man sitting in his rocking chair on the porch of his house in the Hamptons staring out to sea willing on his transatlantic nephew to hunt down the tricksy Frenchies.

“I’m indebted to my uncle and I would love to help him out. The vast resources of Protectotech are at your disposal.”

Without acknowledging my self-deprecating humour she topped up my whisky. “Excellent, we knew we could count on you.” We touched tumblers and drank deeply.

“Whereabouts in America do you and my uncle live?”

“Florida.”

“Oh, nice. That explains the tan.”

“I’m half Native American.”

“Wow, cool.”

“Before you go…” (Had I said something wrong?) “…I’ve got something for you.” She went over to the desk, put on gloves and came back with a gun.

“Ah,” I said and the sweet old man in a rocking chair suddenly metamorphosised into an over-blinged Mafiosi with Bolognaise sauce on his tie. The gloves were particularly unsettling.

“You won’t need it but your uncle wanted you to have some extra help in case your enquiries touch a nerve.”

“Well, quite.”

“This is a semi-automatic pistol as I’m sure you can see. It’s light, easily concealed and easy to use. It’s very reliable. The magazine is full, ten rounds in all. The clip is, of course, in the grip. There’s a hammer and a de-cocker instead of a safety catch.” She proceeded to demonstrate how to arm it, fire and make it safe. She clearly knew her way around this gun. “Once you’ve made it safe it can’t go off even if you drop it on the hammer. You can stick it in the waistband of your pants and it won’t blow your pecker off. It’s fully loaded. I’m not giving you another clip so you can’t take it down to the woods to practise by shooting up tin cans. But you’re in security. You won’t need to, right?”

“Right, and the bullets come out of this hole here?”

For the first time I got a smile off her.

“Yeah, and then they fly through the air and make a hole in the bad man.”

“I don’t have to go just yet.”

“Okay.”

I put the gun in the pocket of my raincoat and she peeled off her gloves. This time she topped up both tumblers. The seduction, begun in my cardboard office only this morning moved on apace. I went home late, very late. A punk stopped me on the street.

He said: “Have you got a light, mac?”

I said: “That joke only works if I’m not actually wearing one at the time.”

 

Despite a top ten hangover, which was still racing up the hit parade, the following morning I was straight on the case.

I summoned the day shift to Protectotech H.Q. for a briefing. We all stood about in the yard, smoking.

“You look smart, boss.”

“Never mind that.”

“Nice hat.”

“Right, lads,” I said even though the day shift were all considerably older than me. “In your travels around the city in the last two years or so have any of you come across a new outfit in town? Mostly French with quite a large staff and some heavy plant?”

“Siemens?”

“No, not Siemens.” They were all looking blank and there were a few head shakings, not something I dared try in my condition.

“That new waste-to-energy place they’re building? That’s got European money.”

“Too big and still unfinished.” I realised I was being far too vague but I couldn’t give them any more to go on because I didn’t know myself.

Angel (my Angel) had told me the Gallic grifters had some machine, a piece of kit too big for a domestic house. She couldn’t be more forthcoming about its description or function. Why my uncle knew so little when he’d invested in it Angel didn’t know. I suspected the classic pig in a poke sting operation. There were technicians to run the thing, a sizeable staff mostly, but not exclusively, French. My uncle’s previous investigations had ascertained it was somewhere here in Crime City but he couldn’t narrow it down any further. That was our job.

“Okay, lads, fair enough but put your feelers out and ask around. There’s a bonus for the man who finds the Frenchmen.”

“Yes, boss,” and they returned to their cars and their patrols.

I shouldn’t have driven but I did anyway. My shades helped protect me from the worst of the sun as I headed out west. In my head the twelve year old Malt was still throwing a schoolyard tantrum for my cowering brain cells. Somehow I knew Angel would be feeling no ill effects whatsoever and would be sitting long over her light Marina Plaza breakfast. My mouth could only taste itself. That would never do and I sparked up another Get Lucky.

My Sat Nav told me I was nearing the Swanland mansion of Dougie “Dirty” Dees. No one called him Dougie to his face and the sobriquet “Dirty” hadn’t been used since his Everthorpe days and that unfortunate fatality in the woodwork room.

There were nice big houses around here with gates and drives. Protectotech had no business around here. We hadn’t even got the unpaid contract for Mr Dees’ private residence. I was glad of it. Pity anyone who messed up on that job.

I had to get out of the car to use the intercom to open the gate to drive up the drive, a nice little humiliating ritual for any guest. It continued as I climbed the steps to the big front door, rang the bell to be granted entry by a flunkey who insisted on taking my hat but held it at arm’s length. Then I had to wait in the sitting room for the arrival of my gracious host.

“You look like shit. What do you want?” Mr Dees was wearing a dressing gown over trousers, shirt and tie. He had a cup of coffee but wasn’t about to offer me one.

“I’ve come to pay you some money, Mr Dees,” I said as breezily as I could.

“How much?”

I told him, pulling out the portion of Angel’s wad I had set aside for debt reduction.

“Good boy. Found some mugs that’re worse at cards than you?”

“There’s lots of them out there Mr Dees.”

“Not so many, son, not so many.” He took the money and then did that gag whereby he riffled the notes past his ear and then nodded as if he could count money by his sense of hearing alone. Actually he knew no one would try and cheat him. I smiled to show my appreciation even though I’d seen it before. He put the money in a dressing gown pocket and said: “I will readjust your I.O.U.”

“Thanks, Mr Dees.” I could actually trust him to do that. “One quick question: know anything about a medium-sized operation, run by Frenchmen, turned up here in the last two years or so?”

“I never had you down as one of those hard-line fundamentalist Brexiteers.”

“I’m not, Mr Dees, I…”

“We’re done here.”

 

“Dirty” Dees didn’t give anything away for free and neither did my men. The first to try and claim the bonus was one of the Nozedar brothers when he came off the day shift.

“I popped into Reeds for fish and chips. I asked, real casual, like, about our pals from over the channel.”

“Yes?”

“Until recently they’ve had a regular order, every Friday, for thirty-four fish and chips. Not delivery, they always pick them up and it’s nearly always by someone with a French accent.”

This was promising.

“Where’s Reeds?”

My informant went behind my desk to the street map fixed to the wall showing our protected premises with coloured pins.

“Here,” he said jabbing at the map with his finger. “Leads Road.”

That made it near both Stoneferry and Sutton Fields Industrial Estate. The whole district was rich in possibilities but it would need narrowing down further. I thanked him and promised I would see him right.

I briefed the night shift. They knew nothing and I didn’t expect them to discover anything. I went home to catch up on some zeds. Angel was “busy”.

 

Friday morning and I’m facing the day shift boys again. Putting other duties on hold for the day I sent half of them north of Reeds and the rest south. They were to check shops and caffs for above average numbers of French customers.

The southern team were successful, getting positive responses from Snak Shak and Kim’s Place, both on Cleveland Street near Wilmington roundabout and the new waste ‘conversion’ facility. I pulled the boys from Sutton Fields and sent them south. A bald bloke, universally called Curly (thanks to the strict laws of banter), rang me to say he’d stumbled upon this café where the menu boards were in two languages. It was the Wilmington Café on Foster Street. I found it on the map and told Curly I’d be there in ten and lunch was going to be on me. I found the café on a corner of this very industrial street and parked right outside next to Curly’s Protectotech van. I went inside to join him.

The café was a converted railway booking office with photos of the old station and nearby Railway Bridge. There were six tables and at one end was the kitchen with a counter in front of it. At the other end a log fire was burning. Curly and I were the only customers. My gun would be staying in my pocket. Despite the surrounding industry and the lorries trundling by this wasn’t a typical workman’s ‘greasy spoon’. It was scrupulously clean and cheerful with flowers on the tables.

The menu was chalked up on a series of blackboards. Besides the usual full English breakfasts and burgers there was an unusual selection of ‘specials’. Curly and I made our selections and approached the counter together.

“What’ll it be gents?”

“I’ll have the Poulet à la Comtoise,” I said.

“Pasta, rice or new potatoes with that?”

“Rice, please.”

“And for you, sir?”

“Is the Bouillabaisse…?”

“Traditional? It certainly is. Vincens wouldn’t let us get away with anything less.”

“Then count me in, sweetheart,” said Curly.

While our dishes were being prepared (with an authentic rattle of pots and pans) Curly and I made inroads into a very agreeable Côtes-du-Jura Blanc. As the only customers we engaged the woman in small talk whenever she came out from behind the counter.

Eventually, and as casually as possible, I asked her about the menu.

“We get a lot of French customers,” she said and noticed me looking around. “Until about a month ago.”

“Where did they come from apart from France?”

She pointed out of the window.

Just round the corner was a big gate. On the fence next to it was a sign identifying the premises as supplies of aggregates and other building materials. I was sure I knew better.

“Ah, right,” I said trying not to display too much interest or excitement. That wasn’t long before our meals arrived. The Bouillabaisse got a thumbs up from Curly and I was delighted with my choice. Sated and a bit tipsy we emerged into the hot summer afternoon.

Running next to the aggregates place was the old railway line which was now a footpath and cycle track. Curly and I took a stroll as far as the river and the old swing bridge. I realised that the entrance we had seen led to a building I had known all my life in Hull: the British Extracting Co. silo. It’s a landmark and certainly big enough to hold a machine and its attendant staff. The biggest part of it had no windows making it the perfect front for whatever was going on inside.

Curly and I drove slowly and carefully back to the office. I called Angel as soon as I was alone and told her I was sure I’d found what she was looking for. I drove her to Foster Street, showed her the building and explained my reasoning. She took another huge wad from what was fast becoming my favourite jacket and passed it to me.

“Your uncle will be extremely grateful. As am I. Tonight you and I are going to have a big-time celebration. I’ll take care of the consumables. All you have to do is find us the hottest party in town, okay?”

“Okay.”

 

 

So, from nine that night we hit every hot spot on Witham.

First we primed ourselves with a selection of shots in the Vault. When we started to attract too much attention we crossed the road to the Windmill. Angel was the tallest and (I have to say) slimmest woman in there. The disco was loud, packed and sweaty but Angel managed to clear some space by her judicious use of sweeping arm movements and obviously insincere apologies.

By the time we got to Hee-B-G-Bees we were feeling distinctly jittery what with all the hi-octane booze, additives and Get Luckys. We blended right in.

I’m afraid to report an incident in the Plimsoll Ship. We managed to reach the bar through the throng and were rocking backwards and forwards like everybody else, when someone pinched Angel’s bottom. This could have seriously curtailed our evening’s entertainment if we hadn’t got out before the cops and paramedics arrived.

We got to Jack Rabbit Slim’s rather breathless and took our Double Vodkas, Red Bull out the back and up onto the balcony it shares with the night club next door. We lit up. She said:

“Tomorrow I’ve got to fly back to the States.”

“What,” I said, “and miss all this?” My sweeping arm gesture took in the view of the neighbouring gym’s car park. Uncharacteristically she began to laugh but stopped immediately when I took out the gun. I rested it on the railing.

“You’d better have this back.”

“It’s not that easy to conceal,” and she indicated her form-fitting dress and tiny clutch bag. “Keep it. It’s untraceable and some day it might come in handy.”

“Okay,” I said and replaced the shooter in my jacket pocket. I knocked back my Double Vodka, Red Bull. My teeth felt coated in sugar. I played it cool: “Are you ready for some Bongo Bongo, baby?”

“I am always ready for some Bongo Bongo.”

And so on to Bongo Bongo.

We had to take a slight detour via Coelus Street to avoid passing the Plimsoll Ship but soon arrived at the night club. Angel effortlessly got us past the door management team in spite of my fit of the giggles.

Hard drinking, cigarettes and stimulants helped us dance the night away.

I woke up in Angel’s room at the Marina Plaza. There was no sign of Angel. My watch told me it was afternoon. All her things were missing from the wardrobe. I showered and dressed. My clothes smelt so bad I didn’t want to put them back on but needs must. I took the lift down to the lobby where my walk of shame was exacerbated by a sarcastic bye-bye wave from Andrzej. In the taxi home I tried to piece together the events of the previous night with little success.

In the evening when my hands had stopped shaking and my hangover was within tolerance I phoned “Dirty” Dees so I could offload more of my debt. He wouldn’t meet me at his house but would be at one of his known-only-to-a-few hydroponic farms at midnight.

One of his workers let me in and showed me through a metal door into a big room. There were rows and rows of cannabis plants under big lamps. The smell of the Skunk added to the after-effects of my night with Angel made my head spin. There didn’t seem to be anyone about but all of a sudden one of Dees’ fearsome dragon-mamas was in the aisle ahead of me.

“Oh, hello,” I said. “I’m here to see Mr Dees to give him some of my hard-earned cash.” I smiled. She didn’t. In fact she spat on the nearest plant.

“No good,” she said. “Not tender. Funny money.”

“Counterfeit,” said a voice behind me. I spun round to see three more dragon-mamas cutting off any retreat.

“Can’t be,” I said. “My uncle…” they were all advancing. I pulled out the gun and waved it threateningly. The women continued to advance, unperturbed. I armed the gun as Angel had showed me and fired. Click.

“Replica,” said the woman in front of me at whom I’d aimed. “No good.”

“Toy,” said a woman behind me. “As we were informed.”

Disbelieving, I desperately thumbed the hammer, checked it was cocked and pulled the trigger back as far as it would go. Click. Nothing.

The dragon-mamas came at me in a silky whirl of high kicking feet and hard chopping hands while my very reliable gun went click, click, click.

Click.

Police Procedural

The crime scene was already swarming with personnel by the time the Chief Investigating Officer arrived. One Hi-Vis constable was on the approach road and saluted as he drove up. Another was standing by the perimeter established by his sergeant and marked by fluttering tapes. Forensic assistants in their white protective suits were examining the grass within the cordon. Right in the middle, like the holy of holies, like a tabernacle of sorts, was the tent, hastily erected to protect the corpse from the rain, windborne contamination and prying eyes.

The C.I.O. pulled on his own over-suit, mask and gloves before entering the tent. Three figures, similarly suited, were positioned around a forth. His sergeant had his tablet out, evidence bags lay on the grass before him. The photographer was recording the corpse from different angles. The pathologist was bending over the body. She straightened to let him have a good look.

“Oh dear, oh dear,” he said through his paper mask. “I take it he wasn’t black to start with?”

“No, nor blue. That’s some bruising.”

The body was dressed in a black suit and white raincoat but the monochrome effect was ruined by the face.

“Okay,” said the photographer and he helped the pathologist flip the corpse.

“Pockets? I.D.?”

“No I.D., sir. His raincoat pockets were full of counterfeit twenties.” He held out one of the evidence bags. “And his jacket pocket yielded this,” and he passed his boss the other bag. Inside was a gun.

“Ah, ha,” said the C.I.O. holding the bag up in front of his face.

“It’s a replica, sir, a good one as far as I can tell. It’s identical to a SIG 229 semi automatic.” The sergeant showed his boss a picture on his tablet.

“Quick work, sergeant. Anything else?” The sergeant picked up a third bag from the grass.

“Some small change and a cheap lighter and a pack of Get Luckys. That’s all: no wallet, cards or genuine paper currency.”

“Look at this,” the pathologist broke in. “The grass under the body is dry and there’s no blood. Early days, but I think death occurred elsewhere and the body was brought here; before the rain started.”

“What time was that?”

His sergeant consulted his tablet. “Approximately 4 a.m., sir.”

“Time of death, yes, yes, guestimate only?”

“It’s now ten. The body has been outdoors for some time. I would say, from the usual signs, that he’s been dead 8 to 12 hours. That’s between 10 last night and 2 this morning.”

“Thanks, doctor. Beaten to death?”

“Looks that way.”

“It certainly does. What with?”

“I’ll be able to tell you more when I’ve got him on the table.”

“We’ll leave you to it.” The C.I.O. gestured for the sergeant to follow him out of the tent. He looked around. They were in the middle of a football pitch. This being a Sunday morning there would soon be hordes of kids and their parents arriving to use these pitches. To his right was the Springhead pumping station, a large Victorian edifice now disused but surrounded by fences with notices claiming CCTV coverage and visiting Protectotech patrols. To his left was a modern industrial unit.

“So, sergeant, why here? Why bring the body to this sports field where it would be found within hours? Why not dispose of it more comprehensively?”

“It’s got to be a warning. Maybe to do with the dodgy twenties?”

“But who to and who is he? Get the tech boys to do something with a photo of his face so we can show it around. His own mother would literally not recognise him. And check the CCTV on that old building next door.”

“Yes, sir.” By this time they’d both removed their over-suits.

“How good was the counterfeit money?”

“It’ll need to go to an expert, sir, but it looked like a good professional job.”

“Who found the body?”

“Those two over there,” the sergeant indicated two shifty-looking teenagers talking to a constable outside the perimeter. Two bikes were lying on the grass.

“When?”

“Just after eight.”

“A bit early for those two, wouldn’t you say?

“And they’re from the Fountain Road Estate, sir.”

“So what are they doing right out here so early on a Sunday morning? We’d better talk to them.”

They introduced themselves to the two teenagers and flashed their warrant cards. The constable stepped back respectfully. The boy and girl were dressed almost identically and sported skinhead haircuts. They looked nervous. The C.I.O. began his questioning.

“Okay, sonny, first off, what were you doing here at 8 this a.m.?”

“An early morning bike ride.”

“In the rain?”

“We didn’t think it would last.” He indicated his damp Harrington jacket as some sort of sartorial collaboration.

“Why here?”

The boy glanced over at the girl. “Well, officer, it’s this City of Culture thing. They keep going on about looking afresh at the city…”

“If you think you know Hull, think again,” the girl interrupted with one of the slogans. She sounded like a Londoner. The boy took over again:

“So we’re going on bike rides round the city and this place looked interesting.”

“We’ve never been here before; we’re like, exploring.”

“But not urban exploring, you know, just exploring,” the boy clarified.

The distinction was lost on the policemen.

“So, take me through what happened this morning.”

“We cycled up the grass track from Spring Bank West and came to these playing fields. We were going to have a skeg at the pumping station but then saw this white bundle on the pitch. We rode over to see what it was…” The boy stopped. The C.I.O. was sympathetic and turned to the girl.

“Did you touch anything? Check for a pulse?”

“No,” she said. “His eyes were open; he was being rained on, his face…”

“Quite, now I know it’s not easy to tell, but have either of you seen the man before?”

They shook their heads.

“Okay, the constable here will take your details and then you can go. Thanks for your help.” The policemen walked away.

“They were hiding something.”

“Yeah, but not about the murder, I think.”

 

After talking to the constable who wrote things down in her notebook, Sasha and Joe cycled off. Back on the grass track and out of sight of the crime scene they dismounted and walked with their bikes. For a while neither of them said anything. By the time they met up with the others later in the day they’d have worked the discovery up into an impressive story but not yet, not yet.

Finding a body had been unsettling for them both. Neither had seen a dead body before. They hadn’t wanted to touch it. They’d reassured each other that they’d be no pulse (no way) and that evidence mustn’t be interfered with but there was something so very disturbing about those unseeing eyes.

Joe put on a brave face for Sasha (and the sympathetic p.c.) but he felt angry and disappointed. The corpse was a direct challenge to the notion of Hull as a good-natured town, especially in that state.

What struck him forcibly was that finding a body wasn’t like it was on the telly. Neither he nor Sasha had screamed (fist in mouth, wide, mad eyes) and of course they hadn’t got a tea-tray to drop; but it had been horrible approaching the bundle on the pitch (what is that?) as it slowly revealed its true nature. Nor were they like those dog-walkers on TV who find a body and take the discovery completely in their stride as if they were always finding them, littering the riverbanks and tow-paths of their canine ambulations.

Sasha had felt sorry for the man. He’d put on a smart raincoat to protect himself from the drizzle but it was now totally redundant.

She also felt she understood the old adage that everyone has something to hide. She and Joe had come out here to check out the old pumping station for urbexing/street art potential and there was no way the cops could learn that. She spoke: “I thought you’d given the game away…”

“When I said ‘we’re exploring not urban exploring,’” Joe smiled. “I know. My first go at lying to the police and I make a schoolboy error.”

“Never mind, they didn’t notice and we got away with it.”

“It was no good anyway; the building was too well protected with fences and cameras.”

“And it looked like it had been recently cleaned. Maybe somebody cares about it.” They felt better talking so matter-of-factly but it didn’t last.

“I wonder who he was?”

 

Late on the following afternoon and the C.I.O. was no closer to answering that question but he did have two reports in his inbox. The first was the results of the preliminary P.M. Conclusion: the man had been beaten to death by three or more people using their bare hands and feet. The rain of blows had continued post-mortem. The bruising beneath his clothes was as virulent as on his face.

The second was the toxicology. In the last 24 hours of his life the man had consumed an alarming cocktail of alcohol and drugs; suggesting the deceased was a party animal of insatiable appetites. If it wasn’t for the gun and dodgy money he’d have put this down to a wild party that had got completely out of control but as it was – could this be a gangland hit?

 

At the same time, on the other side of the Atlantic, the Chief was facing a bank of screens in an underground chamber. With him was one of his top agents. The biggest screen was the live satellite feed showing the Hull home of the Institut Baudrillard.

The Chief couldn’t take his eye off the prize. He said:

“That’s another of our agency’s long term sleeper agents you’ve activated only to be almost instantly deactivated. At this rate they’ll soon be all used up.”

The woman who had called herself Angel laughed. “You didn’t want any loose ends did you? The poor sap told me about his debts when he was drunk. He was nearly always drunk and if he wasn’t drunk he was hungover. I just gave the two-bit hood he owed some gun-related intel. There always has to be a fall guy.”

The Chief nodded but his mind was back on the building on the screen.

“Whatever they’ve got in there, I want it.”