Youve lost more weight since I saw you last, he said.
And you were never exactly the biggest lass in Brum, were you?
No.
Fry looked around at the site hed chosen for their meeting. In the middle of the cemetery, they were standing at the top of a terrace of curved brick walls. Two of the walls had rows of small, sealed-up entrances built into them, like arched doorways.
What is this place? I thought it was a cemetery.
Yes, and these are the catacombs, said Kewley. Built into the side of an old sandpit. Dont you think theyre interesting? They always remind me of a sunken amphitheatre. You can imagine gladiators fighting to the death down there on the grass. The only difference is, the spectators are already dead.
Long since dead, said Fry. These places make my flesh creep.
Kewley laughed. Theyre harmless. Just our ancestors taking a bit of trouble over their final resting place.
Only those who could afford it, I suppose.
Theres another cemetery to the north of the station Key Hill. That one has catacombs too. Joseph Chamberlain is buried there.
Really?
Fry wasnt sure who Joseph Chamberlain was. There was a monument of him in Chamberlain Square, of course, and shed passed a clock tower named after him on the corner of Vyse Street, near the Rose Villa Tavern. She thought there was even a Metro tram with his name on its side. But he was just one more Victorian, wasnt he? Dead beyond living memory. She imagined him with a monocle and mutton-chop whiskers. Part of Birminghams vanished past.
I dont like Key Hill so much. It has a campaign group who are busy restoring it. The Friends of Key Hill Cemetery. There are fences and gates, and they lock it up at night to keep people out. Oh and there are too many trees. Kewley gestured around him. This one doesnt have any friends. Just the drunks. Just the dead and the desperate. And you can see whos coming fifty yards away.
Fry imagined him using this cemetery for years to meet his informants. But it wouldnt be wise to keep coming here after hed left the job. Too many people might remember. Too many of them might have a grievance to settle. Maybe it was just one of those eccentric fancies that overcame old coppers when they retired. Some had a mad hankering to run pubs, or to look for a quiet life in Northern Ireland. Others chose to hang around in Victorian graveyards.
They say unhealthy vapours from these catacombs led to the Birmingham Cemeteries Act, which required non-interred coffins to be sealed with lead.
The upper walkway looked down past two tiers of catacombs to the circle of grass in the centre. From the safety rail, it was quite a vertiginous drop. Lower down, part of the wall had collapsed, scattering gravestones. It was supported by steel props, awaiting some future repair. The cemetery had been well used. Victorian gravestones marched across the slopes, lurked in the hollows and hid beneath shrouds of ivy. Some memorials were large, horizontal stone slabs that she couldnt help walking over as she found the way down to the lower levels.
On the circle of grass stood two or three dozen memorials under the shade of the trees.
Andy Kewley had been a frontline detective, hardened by thirty years experience. According to his own story, he wasnt the kind of officer who was afraid of work, but hed started to want more routine, a bit of stability. The constant changes had unsettled him, made him wonder whether he was appreciated properly. Every officious memo he received had made him count the days to his retirement.
Sorry to be out of the job, or not?
I miss it, admitted Kewley.
You know theres still a lot of demand for more civilian staff. Prisoner handling, statement taking, file preparation. There are always cases under review. Any experienced officer can take his full pension and complete his Staff 1 at the same time. Unless youre planning on retiring to the Costa del Sol?
Ill bear it in mind.
His expression said otherwise. Hed probably heard it all before. His eyes suggested that he was a man whod heard everything before.
Cases under review. He laughed. You can say that again. I wouldnt be surprised if they re-opened the Nielson and Whittle enquiry, just to look as if theyre doing something.
Donald Nielson and Lesley Whittle? Theyre just relics of the 1970s, arent they? Most of the present West Midlands coppers werent even alive then. The Black Panther is as much ancient history to them as Jack the Ripper. Things move on, Andy. Times change.
You can say that again. Brum was a British city once.
Fry grimaced, but didnt answer.
I know, said Kewley, without even having to look at her face. Im not allowed to say things like that. If I was still in the force, youd report me to the DI and Id be suspended by tomorrow morning. Probably lose my job and my pension entitlement, too. Just for speaking the truth, eh?
Andy
Well, thank God Im not on the force any more. I got out at the right time, I reckon. Its you poor bloody sods who have to button your lips and take the shit.
No, its not like that, Andy. Not really.
Oh? What, whiter than white up in sainted Derbyshire, are you? I thought I heard you had some very active BNP areas.
Andy, what did you want to tell me?
I thought I might be able to help you.
How?
Did you know there was an arrest after your assault? I was responsible for that.
You produced a suspect?
Lets say I provided intelligence. It was good intelligence too, as it turned out. This wasnt one of the primary suspects, but he knew who was involved, all right, and he helped to cover up. A real piece of work. He was as guilty as anyone I ever met.
So what did you do?
Kewley shrugged. We needed information, and we didnt want to spend days dragging it out of him bit by bit, with a brief at his elbow telling him to do the no comment stuff. So we fast-tracked the interview.
Fast-tracked?
Kewley looked at her, gave her no more than a conspiratorial glance. But she understood.
I dont want to know any more, she said.
No, of course you dont. You wouldnt want to be contaminated.
But you got what you wanted to know?
Not entirely. We never got the names out of him. Kewley smiled. But if we hadwhat do you reckon, Diane? Would the ends have justified the means, or not?
What was he charged with?
Attempting to pervert, said Kewley. Pervert the course of justice, I mean. Obviously.
And what happened?
Miscarriage of justice. He got a get out of jail free card and a few quid in his pocket, and off he went.
Its hardly the first time, Andy.
No, theres a whole army of them out there.
Andy Kewleys career could best be described as chequered. In his early days in CID, before shed teamed up with him at Aston, Kewley had spent some time in the West Midlands Serious Crime Squad. The squad had been disbanded, more than two decades ago now, following accusations that its members had fabricated evidence, tortured suspects, and written false confessions.
For years, lawyers had been demanding fresh enquiries into the scale of corruption, claiming that dozens of innocent people had served time in jail. One had been quoted as saying that the Serious Crime Squad had operated as if they were in the Wild West. They were out of control.
You lost a crucial witness, right? said Kewley.
Youre well informed, Andy. How do you manage that?
He ignored the question. She pulled out of the case, decided she didnt want to testify after all. The old story, eh? Someone got to her, Diane.
One of the suspects?
Or maybe their friends. Kewley shrugged. Who knows?
She was supposed to be on witness protection, said Fry.
How would they have found her?
Information. Its easy to get hold of, if you know the right people.
Who?
Again Kewley seemed to ignore the question. Fry remembered this habit of his, recalled how it had often infuriated her. He always wanted to go round the houses before he responded. But later he would drop the answer in casually, as if hed never been asked.
Theres a real hot potato bothering the bosses around here at the moment, said Kewley. Some of the brass are shitting themselves trying to work out what to do for the best. If you ask me, theyre damned whatever they do.
What are you talking about?
He glanced over his shoulder in a ridiculously melodramatic gesture, as if anyone would be lurking behind the gravestones to listen into their conversation.
Well, you know theres been this recruitment policy in the West Midlands? Quotas for BME officers.
Black and minority ethnics.
What are you talking about?
He glanced over his shoulder in a ridiculously melodramatic gesture, as if anyone would be lurking behind the gravestones to listen into their conversation.
Well, you know theres been this recruitment policy in the West Midlands? Quotas for BME officers.
Black and minority ethnics.
Yeah. Trying to meet government targets. Kewley looked as though he might spit on the grass. Like they say, political correctness gone
Okay, I know.
Its turned into a real sensitive issue in Brum, and its not going away. A couple of years ago, there was a Channel Four documentary, Undercover Mosque. The chiefs got that wrong big time. They accused the production company of editing the words of imams to stir up race hatred. But they ended up having to apologize in the High Court.
Fry remembered it well. One Muslim cleric had been recorded claiming Allah created the woman deficient. But the police had claimed that the programme itself was Sufficient to undermine community cohesion and likely to undermine feelings of public reassurance and safety of those communities in the West Midlands for which the Chief Constable has a responsibility.
Now, there are allegations that some Asian officers have sympathies with the extremist elements, said Kewley. That they wont take action over honour killings, for example. You can see how the management are in a bind.
Fry nodded. She could see it all too well. Community cohesion. It was the latest buzz phrase in multicultural societies. You didnt hear it so much in the Peak District.
She looked at the graves of the Victorian dead all around her. According to their memorials, many of them hadnt actually died but had merely fallen asleep. If they woke up now, theyd get a shock. And over there was another one. Not lost, but gone before.