The Burning (33 page)

‘How did things end between you?’

Jenny tried to hold her focus through a confusion of emotions. ‘He wanted to move in with me, but I found out he’d been cheating while he was abroad. I wouldn’t forgive him. He
spoke to Alison, my officer,
ex
-officer, and she told him – ’ She paused, frightened she might cry. ‘She told him she thought I was pregnant.’

Ryan looked at her sympathetically. ‘And are you? . . . I mean, does he know one way or the other?’

Jenny nodded. ‘He called me last night. He wants to be forgiven. He was pleading with me.’

‘Your life really isn’t simple, is it?’

Jenny laughed, but it came out halfway to a sob. Tears trickled down her cheeks. Just what she didn’t want to happen. She pressed a napkin to her face, willing herself to be strong.

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Ryan said.

She felt his hand on her arm. He squeezed her lightly. A welcome gesture of comfort.

‘I still don’t see why he would,’ Jenny said.

‘A man will do all sorts of things if he’s desperate enough. Look at Ed. My guess is he thought you’d pick up the phone and beg him to come and protect you.’ Still
holding her arm, Ryan added, ‘He knows about your case, right? About Ed’s connection with Fairmeadows Farm?’

‘I think I mentioned it.’

‘Then it starts to make sense. Call it a romantic gesture. Well, a passionate one, at least.’

Jenny tried to imagine Michael dumping a pig’s head at the end of her garden. It didn’t compute.

‘I’ll be honest with you – the neighbour knew who it was. I checked him out. He flew fighter jets in combat – Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan.’

Jenny nodded.

‘So when you’ve blown that many people up, what he did doesn’t seem quite so bad, does it? At least from his point of view.’

She pictured Michael at the roadblock the previous week. His malevolent silence as the policeman had walked towards the car. Then remembered waking that same night to find him standing naked at
the foot at the bed, freezing cold as if he’d been there for hours. It must have been the therapy she had pushed him into: drawing the poison to the surface. She couldn’t help blaming
herself.

Taking his hand from her arm, Ryan looked at her sincerely. ‘Anything more I can do, I’m all yours.’

‘Thank you,’ Jenny said. And wished he’d stayed touching her a little longer.

J
ENNY ENTERED THROUGH A DOOR
in the wood panelling and stepped onto a raised dais to take her seat in the judge’s chair. The courtroom was small,
windowless and overheated, giving it a stuffy, claustrophobic feel, but she didn’t plan on being here long. In an inquest without a significant conflict of evidence, there was no need for a
jury. If she kept up the pace she could expect to hear all the witnesses before the end of the morning and to deliver a verdict that afternoon. She was already virtually certain what that verdict
would be.

She had been provided with an usher, an elderly part-timer called Dennis, who was already comfortably seated at the side of the court reading his newspaper. She had no doubt that in a few
minutes he would be fast asleep.

Besides the three witnesses and a quietly dignified man in a plain suit and tie, who Jenny assumed to be the dead man’s brother, Anthony Burden, the only other persons present were Louis
Falco and, seated along from him on the advocates’ bench, a young female lawyer whose name didn’t appear on Jenny’s note of legal representatives.

Falco rose to make introductions. Large gold cufflinks glinted at the end of his suit sleeves and his glossy hair shone with oil, but in a nod to the sobriety of the occasion he wore a black
silk tie. He could have been a drug dealer at a funeral.

‘Good morning, ma’am. I represent Anthony Burden, the brother and next of kin of the deceased, Daniel Burden, and my friend, Miss Clara Lawson, is, I understand, keeping a watching
brief on behalf of the deceased’s employers, the Home Office.’

‘Only a watching brief, Miss Lawson? You have no wish to examine any witnesses?’

The young woman stood up nervously. She was slight, with mousy hair and cheap, dark-rimmed glasses. Jenny suspected she was an in-house lawyer at the Passport Service, sent to keep an eye for no
reason other than that one of their employees was giving evidence. ‘No, ma’am. Just a watching brief.’

‘Very well,’ Jenny said. ‘Shall we proceed?’

‘There is one matter,’ Falco said. ‘A witness I should like to call later this morning.’

‘If the evidence is relevant, I’ve no objection, Mr Falco. What is the witness’s name and connection with the deceased?’

Falco cast a sideways glance at DI Ballantyne, who was seated in the row behind him. The detective looked as sour and hung-over as the last time Jenny had seen him, at Burden’s flat.
‘Perhaps we could call him Mr Smith – at least for the time being.’ Jenny became aware that she could easily grow impatient with Falco. ‘He’s a man with certain, shall
we say, “underworld” connections. If he’s able to be heard – and I think you would find him very useful, ma’am – I would request that the gallery be cleared and
that he be allowed to give evidence without his true identity being made public.’

Jenny looked at Anthony Burden and saw that he was as bemused by Falco’s request as she was.

‘Have you spoken to your client about this potential witness, Mr Falco? I get the impression you may have surprised him.’

‘Events have moved rather quickly, ma’am. I don’t yet have Mr Smith’s full statement, but I will, of course, keep my client fully informed.’

DI Ballantyne scowled moodily at Falco’s neck, viewing him, no doubt, as indivisible from the criminals from whom he made his living.

Jenny tried to be patient. It was too early in the day to lose her temper, and experience had taught her that once lost it would be hard to regain.

‘All right, Mr Falco, here’s what we’ll do. As and when your witness is ready to testify, you can tell me in chambers why I should grant the conditions you request, and
we’ll take it from there.’

‘I’m obliged, ma’am,’ Falco answered with exaggerated politeness, and, ignoring the look he was receiving from Anthony Burden, sat down.

Jenny formally opened the inquest and reminded those assembled that Daniel Robert Burden was thirty-five years old and had been born Diana Burden, before starting the process of gender
reassignment in his late twenties. He was unmarried, lived alone, and worked as a civil servant for the Home Office’s Passport Service at their offices in Newport, South Wales. He had lost
both his parents and had only one sibling. Described so succinctly, Daniel Burden’s sounded a miserably lonely and unfulfilled life.

DI Ballantyne gave evidence on behalf of the Bristol and Avon police and was in a hurry to get it over with. Some police officers appearing at inquests took the trouble to consider the feelings
of any relatives present; Ballantyne wasn’t among their number. He described with brutal bluntness how he had been called to the first-floor flat in Henleaze when neighbours had been alerted
by a foul smell. Burden’s body was hanging from the pull-up bars of a mini-gym by a length of nylon tow rope. There was no note, and nothing to indicate his state of mind other than a
pornographic video which was open on the browser of his laptop computer. His personal affairs were in good order and he had a little over £50,000 in a Barclays deposit account. His monthly
salary after tax was £1,952.

‘Inspector, was there any sign of forced entry to the property?’ Jenny asked.

‘None.’

‘Any evidence of drugs or excessive alcohol use?’

‘No.’

‘Was there any indication or sexual activity proximate to the time of death?’

‘Apart from what was on the computer, none,’ Ballantyne said, tucking his notebook back into his jacket. His eyes flicked impatiently to the clock on the side wall.

‘The £50,000 in his bank account – are you able to say where that came from?’

‘No.’

‘“No” it’s impossible to say, or “no” you haven’t inquired?’ Jenny asked patiently.

‘The money has accumulated over the last two years, all cash deposits in the region of £1,000 to £2,000.’

‘Was there any evidence in the flat of how he might have come by extra money?’

‘No, ma’am. Your guess is as good as mine.’

‘All right, Inspector. I sense Mr Falco may have a question for you.’

Falco stood and gave Ballantyne a smile that suggested an eventful history between them. As he did so, the door at the rear of the court creaked open. Jenny glanced up to see Alison enter.
Alison proffered a smile that contained no hint of bitterness, took a seat in the back row and produced a notebook and pen.

‘Are you familiar with a businessman by the name of Jacob Rozek, Inspector?’ Falco asked.

‘I’ve heard the name. Though I’m not sure that the Rozek I’m thinking of was exactly legitimate.’

‘Success does tend to breed suspicion,’ Falco said, ‘and envy too, of course. But I digress. Are you aware that he disappeared on December the 19th of last year?’

‘I fail to see the relevance,’ Ballantyne grunted, appealing to Jenny.

‘Get to your point quickly, Mr Falco,’ Jenny interjected. ‘Answer the question, please, Inspector.’

Ballantyne gave a bad-tempered sigh. ‘Yes, I know Rozek disappeared, and yes, I’m aware that my colleagues are investigating the possibility that he was murdered. What of
it?’

‘Did you find any mobile phones in Mr Burden’s flat?’

‘Not as I recall.’

‘Doesn’t that strike you as odd?’

‘Unusual, but not exactly “odd”. Not in the sense I imagine you’re implying.’

Falco consulted some papers on his desk. ‘There’s no sign of him making a monthly payment, I’ll grant you, but he did have a mobile number that his brother was aware of. I have
it written down here. It turns out to have been a pay as you go registered in the name of a Miss Diana Francis. You may know that Daniel Burden was born Diana Francis Burden. So far, so good, but
my client has searched his brother’s flat, and his car, and he can’t find it. Now, in my book, when you add all that up, it becomes odd.’

‘I think we read from different books.’

‘We have a missing phone, Inspector. So either Mr Burden disposed of it before he died, or you or your officers took it and won’t admit the fact.’

‘Why would we do that?’ Ballantyne growled.

‘Let me give you a possibility – when Rozek disappeared, your colleagues naturally went through his phone records. One of the numbers he had dialled was registered to a Miss Diana
Francis. Rozek called that number only once – on December the 11th, eight days before his disappearance. Am I getting warmer?’

‘There’s no jury to impress,’ Jenny reminded Falco. ‘All that interests me are the facts.’

‘Inspector, Mr Burden worked at the passport office, approving applications. Mr Rozek was a businessman from Poland who had begun to attract the attention of some of your colleagues
– actually, some of your
undercover
colleagues – who I’m reliably informed have been passing themselves off as criminals in the human-trafficking and prostitution
business.’

‘I thought that was Mr Rozek’s line of country,’ Ballantyne said, his temper hanging by a thread.

Believing that he had Ballantyne cornered, Falco goaded him with a tolerant smile. ‘Inspector, for reasons irrelevant to this inquest, Mr Rozek may well have felt the need to acquire an
alternate identity. Mr Burden approved passports for a living and was making regular cash deposits at the bank. The connection is obvious. Now, what I’d like to know from you is whether you
took Mr Burden’s phone because he was someone already of interest to you, or merely because you checked his number and found that it connected him with Mr Rozek.’

Ballantyne responded with a hard stare. ‘I told you, we didn’t find a phone.’

Falco met Ballantyne’s gaze. The humour that had played about his eyes during their previous exchange had vanished. ‘Was Mr Burden working as an informer to the police, Inspector?
Was he what you would nowadays call a “covert human-intelligence source”?’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ Ballantyne said.

‘Did Mr Burden tip you off that Mr Rozek was seeking a passport under an assumed name?’

‘Ditto.’

‘These are proper questions, Inspector,’ Jenny said, beginning to feel unsettled by Falco’s suggestions. ‘Please treat them seriously.’

DI Ballantyne looked at Falco in the way he might look at a suspect across an interview-room table. ‘No. Daniel Burden did not inform CID that Mr Rozek was seeking a false
identity.’

‘I’m nearly finished, Inspector,’ Falco said. ‘Are you aware that, in the course of the last twelve months, no fewer than five Polish men, all with substantial assets,
have disappeared from this city without trace?’

‘Their pictures are on the wall in the station: two pimps, two drug dealers and Jacob Rozek, who, I believe, had numerous interests, not just confined to drugs and prostitution.’

Ignoring the slur, Falco pressed on. ‘Would you concede that five missing men suggests something distinctly odd?’

‘Criminals kill each other all the time, Mr Falco. You of all people should know that.’

Falco didn’t flinch. ‘Mindful of the oath you have sworn, to tell the
whole
truth, Inspector Ballantyne, is there anything further about Daniel Burden that you haven’t
yet shared with the court?’

‘Not a thing,’ Ballantyne shot back.

‘If you were aware, for example, that Daniel Burden’s role as a police informer had somehow leaked and that his life had thereby been placed at risk, you would disclose the
fact?’

Ballantyne answered through gritted teeth. ‘I am fully aware of my obligations to the court.’

Falco gave a hint of a smile. ‘I’m sure the court will note your reply.’ He gave an exaggerated nod to the bench and sat.

‘Thank you, Inspector,’ Jenny said. ‘You may stand down.’

Ballantyne left the witness box and headed for the exit, but as he neared the door he seemed to undergo a change of heart and found a place in the back row, across the aisle from Alison.