Just the Job, Lad Page 9

  ‘But that’s in blinking Cleveland,’ I said.

  Walt shook his head. ‘Didn’t used to be. Used to be part of us, till them blooming politicians decided to change t’map thirty forty years ago.’

  ‘Oh, right. Like they got rid of Hull and so on.’

  Walt sniffed. ‘I dare say we can manage without Hull,’ he said.

  ‘Right, well, looks like breakfast’s ready. Time to put the bad memories behind you and look ahead to brighter times, eh?’

  Walt cleared his plate, set off for the coast, and left me and Ann to complete our preparations for the tidal wave that was about to hit us. I mean Soapy and whoever he’d persuaded to help him out. By the time Tuesday morning came we’d got all our fragile and valuable assets out of the way, and everything else covered in old sheets. I went into work ready for a break – and keen to find out what our crime analyst had come up with.

  I didn’t actually see Amanda first thing. There was a note on her door saying she’d be back soon. So I sat down with Fordy and logged on to the police intelligence crime file. As a starting point we keyed in Baker’s name – and up it came, right away. ‘Well,’ I said. ‘There’s our man. Cautioned for “burglary other than a dwelling”. Looks as though he was a bit of a tearaway as a kid, breaking into someone’s outbuildings. Now then, what’s this?’ There was a second record, dating from only a year previously. It seemed our man had got into trouble after some kind of domestic incident involving a girlfriend. ‘Not a very nice man,’ Fordy said, as we read through the details. ‘Harassment? Threatening phone calls?’

  ‘Yeah, and see who dealt with it?’

  ‘Thommo!’

  ‘Say what you like about him, Fordy, he’s thorough. Got it all logged. Good lad. Look at this: visited him at his address in Pickering and – yes! Mobile phone number.’

  ‘What you thinking of doing with that?’ Fordy asked, as I jotted it down on my pad.

  ‘Just an idea,’ I said. ‘Sommat I picked up in the Met.’

  An hour or so later I picked up the phone, dialled 141 to withhold my number, and called our man.

  ‘Jed Baker?’

  ‘Yeah, can I ’elp you?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m a mate of . . .’ I gave the name of someone we knew as a user of drugs.

  ‘And?’

  ‘He told me if I wanted some gear, you were the man, like.’

  ‘Wass your name?’

  I hesitated a moment. ‘Nah, I don’ wanna give it.’

  ‘Right, well, I dunno what you’re talking about, so f*** off and don’t ring me again.’

  I grinned at Fordy. He looked perplexed. ‘Don’t you get it?’ I said. ‘Number one, we now know we’ve got his name right, and number two, we’ve got his number. It’s still live. C’mon, let’s go and see Amanda.’

  Amanda greeted us like long-lost friends. ‘Don’t get a lot of visitors up here,’ she said, shifting a pile of papers off a spare seat for me. ‘Especially not PCs. Unless you’re stuck, that is.’

  ‘Well, we do take note,’ I said. ‘Trust me, we read all those intelligence reports and crime trends you bang out for our briefings with Chris. Anyway, I reckon we need your expert help with this one.’ I filled her in on what we had so far. She said she would take it on board, search for any links between Baker and other known criminals or suspects, and see whether he fitted into the bigger picture. Amanda had access to what was going on all over the region, as well as being up to speed with national crime trends. Her work was invaluable in our fight against crime, both local and cross border. Day after day, all over the country, crime analysts painstakingly go through all the reports and make note of the methods the various suspects use when committing crimes. Amanda knew all the trademarks of our most proactive criminals; sometimes she would name you a suspect just by looking at how someone had gained entry to a house. She would also analyse the intelligence reports submitted on a daily basis by officers on patrol. She had an overview of what was going on, where it was happening and who had been seen out and about. Put this all together with her local knowledge, and she could quite often put you on to the person you needed to take a look at.

  ‘Well,’ I said, after I’d briefed her, ‘what do you reckon?’

  ‘It sounds interesting, Mike. And I tell you what, it’ll make a change to get my teeth into a proper job again. I’ve spent the last few weeks providing statistical information for the senior management team for these new league tables.’ She pulled a face.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I think I get the picture.’

  ‘Anyway, the first thing I’ll do is interrogate this phone number.’ I could tell by her brisk manner that she was confident she could get something out of it. I knew that she’d use the phone number to find out who our friend had been calling, but it was a long and tedious process, and required permission from on high.

  ‘Right,’ I said as we left her little office, ‘we’ll leave it with you.’

  Later that morning Fordy and I passed on the same information to Des, the CID man. And then we waited. If past experience was anything to go on, it would be a week or two before we heard anything.

  Chapter 5

  Occupational Hazards

  ‘The thing with foxes,’ Rich said, ‘and let’s be right about it: that’s what lies at the centre of all this hunting ban malarkey – the thing about foxes is, aye, they’re killers all right, but there’s a sight worse killers out there. Plenty of ’em.’

  We were sitting by the fire. It may have been early August, but it was a cool, breezy day with spits and spots of rain falling, and there wasn’t much brightness penetrating the low-ceilinged house. I’d finished my pie and peas and had the empty plate on my lap and a cup of tea in my hand, with Rich’s cocker spaniel Bracken slumped across my feet, snoring. Penny, Rich’s wife, was in the kitchen cutting a slice of blackcurrant tart for my pudding. Lovely grub, I was thinking, but at the same time I was feeling sort of inhibited, because I’m the kind of person who talks a lot better if he can move around and wave his arms about. It helps me express myself. Not that I had much chance to say anything in this instance – which some people would tell you is a good thing – because Rich was on his favourite hobby-horse.

  ‘Worse than a fox? Oh, cheers Penny.’ I balanced the tea on the narrow wooden arm of the rocking chair as she took my empty plate and handed me the tart. ‘How’s that then?’

  ‘Think on, lad, think on. A cat, for example . . .’ Rich took a last drag on his cigarette and threw it into the fire. ‘A cat is far worse. I mean, a fox is a menace, certain times of the year, don’t get me wrong. But a cat – it’ll kill anything it finds. Any place, any time. Don’t kid yourself, Mike: foxes get blamed for a lot of things they aren’t guilty of. And when it comes to pests, what about rabbits? When you’re harvesting three tonnes of grain per acre and the buggers eat four, five acres – which they will do, if you don’t keep ’em in check – that can be your profit for the year.’

  ‘What d’you do with all the rabbits you kill?’ I was thinking about the pie I’d just eaten. It sort of tasted like chicken, but I wasn’t sure. Not that I mind rabbit. Or hare. Or anything, really. Like a lot of country people, I was raised to eat what was on the table. I just prefer to know what it is.

  ‘We eat a few, but most of them’ – he pointed at Bracken, still fast asleep and twitching, dreaming, no doubt, of chasing something to ground – ‘most of them we freeze and feed to t’dogs.’

  ‘Not that this one deserves it,’ Penny said. ‘She won’t go out hunting. Never would. First time she heard a gun she started howling and ran back to the house. Proper little lapdog.’

  ‘Don’t you take any to market?’ I asked. I was thinking about all the gamebirds and rabbits that hang outside the butcher’s shop in Malton marketplace.

  Penny pulled a face. ‘Not worth the diesel,’ she said. Then she glanced at Rich. ‘Or the time. Is it?’

  ‘Thirty, forty years ago,’ he said, settling back into his easy
chair and kicking his slippers off, ‘we could get as much as a pound apiece for rabbits, which was worth having. ’Cos we were only lads then, looking to make a bit of pocket money. You know what you’d get now?’ He sat there with his eyebrows arched, waiting for me to answer. I hadn’t a clue. ‘Fifty pence.’ He nodded towards Penny. ‘Like she says, not worth the effort. But it has to be done. Along with rats, magpies . . .’ He sighed and stretched his arms out, working his shoulders. ‘You never stop, mate.’

  ‘I don’t think most people realise you kill magpies,’ I said.

  ‘They wouldn’t. ’Cos they’re beautiful birds. But they’re another of your corvids, and all corvids are classified as vermin. Rooks, crows, magpies, jays . . . We trap a lot of them, but mostly it’s crows and magpies. They’re the biggest nuisance. They’ll take birds’ eggs – and if they can get amongst t’young uns they’ll have them too.’

  I looked at my watch. It was nearly time I was on my way. I’d called on Rich for one simple reason, which was that I hadn’t called on him in several months. I hadn’t actually known him all that long, but the more I saw of him the better I liked him – and his wife, who couldn’t half cook. He wasn’t a local. Neither was she. They came from Barnsley. Well, that’s not quite correct. They actually hailed from a South Yorkshire village called Fitzwilliam, the same place as Geoffrey Boycott. Rich started working on the Wentworth estate as an apprentice gamekeeper straight from school, and stayed ten years before going to work on the Nickerson estate at Rothwell, out on the Lincolnshire Wolds. The pair of them had moved to Hovingham quite a few years ago. It’s a 3000-acre estate, combining arable land with mixed woodlands, and adjoins the land attached to Castle Howard.

  Rich’s job was, by his own reckoning, seven days a week. ‘We never stop,’ he said. ‘That’s why we always reckon to get abroad for us holidays – where they can’t get hold of you. Job like this, you’re always on call. Think you’ve spotted a poacher? They’re on the phone. Injured animal? Call Rich – he’ll know what to do. Why, one time some poor old lad went and hanged himself from a tree, and guess who had to guide t’rescue team in?

  ‘But’ – he paused to light another cigarette, and I caught a twinkle in his eye – ‘who else can they call on, eh? We’re a dying breed, Mike. A dying breed.’

  ‘How can you say that?’ I asked him. ‘They’ll always need gamekeepers. Why, old Nick over by Rillington, he’s training his lad up to step into his shoes.’

  ‘Aye, they’ll be called gamekeepers all right, but they won’t be the real McCoy. They’ll never know all what we know. Same as I’ll never know what the old lads who taught me knew, things what’ve been handed down, generation to generation. Take me. I was taught by fellows who ought to have retired. Seventy years and older, some of them, and they told me things nobody would know now. They had’ – he thought for a moment, as if grasping for the right word – ‘they had infinite knowledge. They got it from a lifetime studying the wildlife in one little estate.’

  He glanced at the clock, then said, ‘I’ll tell you an example, before you go – ’cos it’ll soon be time for me to go back to work too. I was only a youngster, learning me trade, like. This was back in me time on the Wentworth estate. One day I caught a weasel. We’d had no end of trouble around the chicken run, so I was quite pleased wi’ meself. Well, I made sure it were dead, and put it on top of t’trap, like. I’d come back for it later, to dispose of it sort of thing. And when I did, it were gone. Thought it were a bit odd, like, until I caught another one next day, put that on top – and same bloody thing. Well, I’m scratching me head now. Where are the buggers going? I told my head keeper it must be a tawny owl. He laughed. Said nowt. They were like that, them old timers. Left you to puzzle it out for yourself – which is one way of learning, I suppose. So I thought, he’s taking the mickey. He’s snaffled it away, like, just to confuse me. But no, when I challenged him he took me back to where t’trap had been and showed me. It was right there in the undergrowth a few yards away, buried under a pile of leaves and grass. “There, lad,” he says, “now you know. Stoats – aye, and weasels too – they’ll bury their dead”.’

  Rich flicked his ciggy into the grate and wagged his finger at me. ‘Y’see, they knew which way was up, did them lads.’ Then he laughed. ‘By hell, they led me a dance – not that I didn’t fight back. I remember how they used to wait while it were siling down, then send me out to fetch a load of kindling. And of course they’d complain ’cos it was wet. Or it’d be morning break time and they’d say, go fetch some eggs. Well, we had chickens running wild, just about, and every day I’d bring the head lad a load for t’pan and he’d say, “Is that all?” Right, you old bugger, I thought. I’ll show you. So, next time he sends me – in the pissing rain, of course – I foraged. Under hedges, behind trees, in the long grass. Got meself soaked right through, I did, but what a pile of eggs! Must’ve been dozens, all covered with muck and bits of straw. Anyway, I hands him this basket, piled high. He looks at it and grunts – which was the nearest you ever got to a thank you. He’s got all his bread sliced and buttered and stacked up, and he gets the old frying pan heated up, pops the dripping in, and starts cracking ’em. Well! Out they come. Old ones, addled ones, ones with half-grown chicks in ’em, dead chicks, the bloody lot.’ Rich laughed and got out of his chair. ‘He never asked me again. Right,’ he said, putting his cap on. ‘Work to do.’ He picked up his jacket off the back of his chair and paused with it half on. ‘Aye, and there’s a thing. I’d never have been allowed to sit here in me shirt-sleeves. You wore a collar and tie to work, them days, and if you wanted to take your jacket off – even at your mealtime – you’d to ask permission of t’head man.’ He clicked his tongue. ‘Young lads today – why, they don’t know they’re born.’

  I was thinking about young people as I drove back to town to meet up with Fordy – the kind of young people who buy drugs off older people who, if you want my opinion, are exploiting them. And I was thinking about this man Baker, wondering whether Amanda the crime analyst and Des the CID man had made any progress. It had been a full fortnight since we’d given them our bits and pieces of information. Surely they’d have come up with something by now.

  ‘We have,’ Amanda said half an hour later as we made ourselves comfortable in her cramped little office. Des had joined us, so there wasn’t a lot of room. ‘Firstly,’ she continued, ‘we identified this man Baker’s phone as active, which was good news. We then had to jump through the usual hoops to get all the reams of paperwork completed and signed off by the superintendent. Then we had to wait for the phone company to turn it all around.’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Ah well, you know what that’s like – but, I can tell you, it was worth it.’

  Des pulled out a sheaf of papers stapled together. ‘It certainly was. We’ve got a list of all his calls, in and out, going back several months. Haven’t started working on the names yet. But soon as I looked at it I recognised a few players, so . . . very interesting.’

  ‘That’s one thing,’ Amanda said. ‘Then there’s this. His vehicle has been sighted in the northeast. More than once. And there are addresses attached to the report, as well as street locations.’

  ‘That’s promising,’ Fordy said.

  ‘Oh, it’s promising all right. It may not lead to anything – yet – but it helps build the picture.’ She rearranged her papers and pulled out a single printed sheet. ‘Now we come to something much more illuminating. Jeremy James Baker. He owns two premises in Pickering. One of them is the house he lives in, which is modest enough. As is the other one. Here.’ She showed us a photograph of a terraced house with a small forecourt garden. ‘Two bedrooms. For which he paid £90,000 . . .’ She paused. ‘Paid up in full, no mortgage involved.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ I said. ‘Where’d you get this from?’

  ‘The estate agent. If a deal strikes them as extraordinary they’ll let us know.’

  I nodded. I’d come across this sort of thing a few tim
es before. I was thinking about where Baker got his money. I was reminding myself that we shouldn’t be jumping to conclusions, that it could just be a case of a fellow having rich parents – not that that would necessarily explain him buying a house for cash. I opened my mouth to speak, but Amanda held her hand up. ‘Now, before you say anything, we had a similar call from a travel agent last week – and this is backed up by CCTV images of the transaction.’

  ‘What transaction?’ Fordy asked.

  ‘He walked into the travel agents and booked a top-of-the-range holiday in a luxury Spanish resort, for two people. All-inclusive premier resort. Four thousand three hundred pounds – and he paid cash – used notes. The travel agent let us know because they thought it was unusual.’

  I sat back in my chair and let out a long sigh. ‘And do we know what he does for a living?’

  ‘No,’ said Des. ‘But you won’t be surprised to learn he doesn’t appear to have a job. He’s not paying tax and he’s not signing on. That’s not to say he isn’t working, but . . .’