Stop them dead, p.25
Stop Them Dead, page 25
Just one rear light on.
He accelerated, moving the BMW estate close to the lorry’s tail. It had a foreign registration, with a PL for Poland plate. Fresh off the Dieppe–Newhaven night ferry, he assumed. Stopping it would relieve the monotony. He flashed his headlights several times, then switched on his blues, overtook the lorry and tucked back in a safe distance ahead of it. Then he tapped the matrix board for the sign to display in the rear window: FOLLOW ME.
He slowed, and the lorry slowed. There was a safe lay-by a quarter of a mile ahead, and he pulled over into it, glad to see the lorry follow him and halt behind him.
He pulled his white cap on, picked up his torch, climbed out into the glare of the lorry’s headlights and walked up to the cab. A man in his thirties, thin-faced, with short hair, smiled nervously down at him, blinking in the glare of the torch.
‘Good morning, sir,’ Cornish-Sheasby said. ‘You speak English?’
‘A leetle,’ the man said pleasantly, in a heavy accent.
‘I’ve stopped you because you have a tail light out. Switch off your engine and I’ll take you round the back and show you.’
The driver complied and jumped down. He looked willing enough and no threat, Cornish-Sheasby assessed. Headlights loomed out of darkness, then a car, travelling way too fast, roared past then braked hard, clearly clocking the police car. As it disappeared, the officer heard a different sound. Like a cry. Coming from inside the rear of the lorry.
He frowned and asked, ‘What do you have on board?’
‘On board?’ The driver looked like he did not understand.
Cornish-Sheasby pointed at the cargo section of the lorry. ‘What is in there?’
The driver smiled. But nervously this time. ‘Hay. Farming. For farming.’
There was another cry, and the traffic officer clocked the anxious look on the driver’s face. ‘Hay? Just hay? Are you sure?’
He saw the driver shaking now. ‘Hay,’ he responded.
‘Hay from where?’
‘Poland.’
‘OK, what is your name?’
‘Mikolaj.’
‘Mikolaj what?’
‘Dragon. Mikolaj Dragon.’
‘OK, Mikolaj, do you have keys to open the rear of your lorry?’
‘Kees?’
Cornish-Sheasby mimed keys turning in a lock and pointed to the rear. The driver looked hesitant and for an instant the officer braced himself for an attack. But instead he nodded and climbed back into the cab. As he did so, the officer radioed the Control Room. ‘Got this lorry stopped, need backup. We might have a people-smuggling job here.’
He was told a unit would be with him in approximately ten minutes. He then led the driver around to the rear of the lorry and, again through sign language, indicated for him to unlock the tailgate. As the driver pushed the tailgate up, Cornish-Sheasby saw a wall of hay bales. Beyond were sounds, more distinct now. Whines, yip-yips. Then a weak bark.
He looked at the driver, who was standing beside him. ‘Dogs?’ he asked.
He got a maybe shrug in response.
Climbing up onto the tailgate and breathing in the sour, dry smell of the hay, he tugged at a bale, pulling it loose, and handed it to the driver, who took it with only slight reluctance. He indicated for the driver to put it down on the ground then removed another. After only a couple of minutes, he had a gap big enough to squeeze through. And as he did so, he stood still in astonishment, his torch beam lighting up row after row of cages, stacked five high, each one containing tiny, mostly sleeping puppies.
The driver stood behind him, wide-eyed, as if he too was surprised, although Cornish-Sheasby was pretty sure he wasn’t. ‘I’d like to see your documentation. Paperwork?’
The driver nodded and he followed him back round to the cab, but climbed in ahead of him and took possession of the ignition key. Then he glanced at the documentation. The bill of lading indicated the cargo was hay, bound for two farms in East Sussex. There was nothing about dogs that Cornish-Sheasby could see anywhere in the paperwork. Then he saw a glint of light in the rear-view mirror. White light, then blue light. Strobing blue light. The cavalry arriving.
He turned to the driver. ‘Mikolaj Dragon, I’m arresting you on suspicion of illegally importing dogs into the United Kingdom.’ Then, after reading out the caution, he explained he would be provided with a solicitor and a translator and asked him if he understood.
Dragon nodded, and Cornish-Sheasby had the feeling he understood it all a lot more than he was giving away.
75
Tuesday 30 March
‘Mummy?’ Bluebell murmured deliriously. ‘Mummy?’ She was cannulated and taped with electrodes on her chest, arms and head.
‘Mummy’s here, darling,’ Chris said. ‘We’re both here with you.’
Chris and Katy glanced at each other, exchanging thin smiles of even thinner comfort, as they kept their vigil beside her screened-off bed in the Children’s Intensive Care Unit. It was coming up to 7.30 a.m. but it felt like twilight in here, Chris thought.
Twilight on some other planet, an alien world of constant beeps with a landscape that was a forest of wires and drips and digital numbers and zigzagging graphs on display screens. Occasionally there was the sound of an alarm somewhere else on the ward, and a rush of footsteps, reminding him there were other desperately sick children in here, each fighting their own battle for life. And no doubt other equally worried parents.
His eyes roamed the graphs and the readouts in a constant sequence. He was gripped by them. Mesmerized by each of their new readings. And scared as hell for Bluebell. Good she was being so thoroughly monitored, but at the same time he felt completely alienated.
They had both ignored the advice of Dr Shah and the staff sister last night to go home and get some rest, that there was nothing they could do, that it would be better if they and Bluebell were able to get a night’s sleep. They’d insisted on remaining at the hospital, wanting to be there to comfort her, to reassure her and wanting to believe that just knowing they were near her might speed up her recovery. Despite their exhaustion, neither was able to get much sleep. Their neighbours, Helen and Vivek, had called to ask how Bluebell was. They said they were enjoying looking after Moose at the Fairfaxes’ and she was adorable. She’d been making them laugh while watching the rugby with them, looking behind the TV for the rugby ball.
During the seemingly eternal night, Chris and Katy alternated visits to Bluebell’s screened-off bedside. Each time a nurse or doctor – most often Dr Shah – came in through the curtains to take a reading or adjust the meds, when Chris was there, he would trail them back out. When safely out of earshot of the bed, like a child in the back of a car repeatedly demanding, Are we nearly there yet? he would nervously ask if there were any indications of improvement in Bluebell’s heart rate, ECG, blood pressure, blood-oxygen level and all the other vital signs in which he’d become a self-taught expert during these past hours. Each time he was given the platitude that she was stable – when she patently wasn’t. He could see the changes, small admittedly, but none of them in the right direction.
At some point during the night, Bluebell, increasingly clammy, had begun complaining that she couldn’t feel her legs and he could see Dr Shah was very concerned about this development although he kept telling both of them not to worry. Dr Shah, looking more and more drained, had been the one constant throughout the long night.
‘You’ll be coming home in a day or so, darling,’ Katy said. ‘Moose can’t wait to see you!’
‘I want to go home!’ she yelled, suddenly, so loudly it startled them.
‘Darling,’ Katy said, quietly and more calmly than she felt. ‘We’ll take you home just as soon as you feel better.’
‘I’m not ill,’ Bluebell said, grumpily and suddenly very lucid. ‘I want to go home now.’
‘Are you really feeling better, Bluebell?’ Chris asked hopefully.
‘I’m thirsty.’
Katy picked up the paper cup of water on the bedside table and held it out to her. But as the cup neared her mouth, Bluebell suddenly and terrifyingly screamed, ‘NO, NO, NO!’ She flung out her arms, sending the cup flying onto the floor, the remaining water spilling out onto the tiles. Then she screamed again, ‘NO WATER NO WATER NO WATER.’
Chris and Katy looked at each other, bewildered.
‘Darling,’ Katy said. ‘What—’
At that moment Dr Shah came in, followed by the nurse who had been assigned to Bluebell throughout the night. He went straight to the little girl and looked down at her tenderly. ‘Do you want water, Bluebell?’
She screamed, ‘NO NO NO!’
He turned and spoke quietly to the nurse.
‘I’m just going to give your daughter some sedation to help her sleep,’ she told Chris and Katy. Then she hooked another drip up and switched lines to it.
The effect was almost instant, calming Bluebell right down. In less than a minute, it seemed, she was asleep.
Shah beckoned Chris and Katy to follow him. They went out of the unit and into the small, bare Relatives Room next door. ‘Please sit down, you must be exhausted.’
‘And you,’ Chris said. ‘You’ve been up all night too.’
He gave a wan smile as the three of them squeezed past the camp beds and sat on the hard plastic chairs. ‘It’s OK, I’m used to it, goes with the territory,’ Shah said, and frowned. ‘This reaction to water – has Bluebell done this before?’
‘No,’ Chris replied. He looked at a Covid hygiene poster above Shah’s head.
‘Never, I mean – she didn’t want a wet flannel on her, but this is crazy,’ Katy added. ‘It – it was – when I offered her a cup of water – it was like there was some demon inside her.’ She dropped her face into her hands, crying. ‘Oh Jesus, what’s happened to our darling?’
Chris, feeling useless, draped an arm around her shoulder, but immediately felt her pull away. He looked at the registrar. ‘Bluebell’s not improving, is she?’
Shah looked directly back at him for some moments, then at Katy. He wrung his hands together. ‘As I told your husband yesterday, Mrs Fairfax, your daughter is displaying early signs of the disease rabies. Most medics in this hospital – indeed, in this country – would be unaware of these signs, because no one has caught the disease here for over a hundred years. But I worked as an intern in Pakistan before I came here, and I saw too many cases there.’
‘Right,’ Katy said forlornly.
Chris looked at him, both terrified for their child and bewildered. ‘I’m sorry to ask – but how are you so sure that it’s not something like sepsis?’
Remaining very calm, Shah said, ‘Bluebell was bitten on the nose by a puppy, drawing blood, and soon after became seriously ill. She is not responding to antibiotics and all other medications we would expect to clear up an infection from a wound in a healthy young person.’ He paused and looked at them both, gently and with caring eyes. ‘We’ve taken bloods and, as you know, a lumbar puncture, to try to eliminate any underlying problems, and we’ve sent samples to the London Hospital for Tropical Diseases for their analysis. It is possible that an unvaccinated puppy from somewhere in Europe could have given Bluebell some other form of infection we are not familiar with.’ Then he hesitated.
‘And?’ Chris prompted.
‘I had deep concerns yesterday that Bluebell was possibly displaying symptoms of a rabies victim. Her rejection and seeming fear of ingesting water – hydrophobia – is further evidence of that. I won’t know for sure either way until we get the results back from London. But I think you need to prepare yourselves for the worst.’
‘The worst?’ Katy’s voice sounded like a high-pitched tremble.
Calmly, his eyes moving from one of them to the other, he said, ‘I don’t want to deceive you. Her condition has been steadily worsening during the night. If she does indeed have rabies, the prognosis is not good.’
‘What – what does that mean?’ Chris asked. ‘Is there a different vaccination or antidote that can be given at this stage?’
It seemed an eternity before the registrar replied. ‘There is a two-stage vaccination that a human bitten or scratched by a rabid animal can be given. But the first vaccination needs to be given within twenty-four hours of the wound occurring. It is not just ineffective after that, it is counter-productive and will aggravate the symptoms.’
‘I know, yes,’ Katy said a little impatiently. ‘That’s what you said to my husband before. But the doctor saw her on Saturday as soon as she was feeling unwell – why didn’t she see this then?’ Katy demanded.
‘Because,’ Shah said calmly, ‘this is just not a condition most medics in this country know about. Only around twenty people in the world have ever survived the disease without a vaccination. There is very little chance of a cure.’
‘Oh God,’ Katy said sadly.
‘Darling,’ Chris said and pressed his arm around her, but she pulled away.
‘If you are right, Dr Shah,’ Chris asked, ‘and Bluebell does have rabies, and you don’t think the vaccine is going to work, what – what then – what do we do? I mean, like what are our options? Where do we take Bluebell to get treated?’
The registrar raised his hands. ‘Let’s deal with this one step at a time.’
Katy shook her head in terror. ‘Oh God, I just want her cured.’
There was a long silence, during which the air in the little room felt heavy, oppressive, hostile.
76
Tuesday 30 March
Roy Grace liked to be at his desk even earlier than normal in the crucial first days and weeks of a major crime investigation, getting a jump on the world. He would check for important emails, reading the online report of all incidents and criminal activity in the county, before the day became hectic with meetings, calls and even more emails poured in.
And there was one that particularly interested him. A Polish lorry driver, arrested at 4 a.m. today, after arriving on the Dieppe–Newhaven ferry, with twenty-seven puppies concealed in the rear of his lorry. The arresting officer had been from the Roads Policing Unit, but Tom Cartwright, from the Rural Crimes Unit, was being brought in, along with the RSPCA, to organize temporary homes for the dogs. He made a note to find out where the lorry’s journey had originated from, its destination, and who was the UK contact. Then he looked at his watch.
It was 7.15 a.m. He checked his calendar on his screen: 9 a.m. briefing on Operation Brush, followed by a 10.30 a.m. meeting with the ACC to update her. And a raft of further meetings on Operation Brush throughout the day, including a 3 p.m. with the Chief Constable, Lesley Manning, who wanted not only an update on the current operation but to discuss the wider issue of the dog crime epidemic both in the county and also nationwide.
But most of all at this moment, he was anxious to get an update on how Polly Sweeney had got on with the informant she had been due to meet last night. She had told him yesterday evening when he last spoke to her that the girl had not yet shown up. He was about to call her when there was a rap on his door.
‘Come in!’ he called.
To his surprise, it was the officer herself. She came in, dressed elegantly, as always, in a smart black blouson top, black and white checked trousers and black shoes, her fair hair pinned up, but her normal smiling face was crinkled into a frown.
‘I was about to call you,’ he said. ‘To see if your contact did turn up?’ He indicated a chair in front of his desk, and she sat with a smile that was possibly incubating another frown.
‘I’m afraid she didn’t.’
‘Chickened out?’ he asked, disappointed.
‘She sounded very nervous on the phone, but equally very determined.’
‘Shame – it sounded like she might have been helpful.’
‘I thought so too – and I’m very surprised. I was due to meet her in Eastbourne at 5.45 p.m. I waited until 8 p.m.’
‘She didn’t call or text or anything?’
‘Not after the call I mentioned to you last night where she sounded anxious at around 5.15 p.m. and suggested a place to meet – a sheltered bench on the promenade in Eastbourne. It was a filthy night, so I imagine she thought there wouldn’t be anyone around.’
‘So we know nothing about her? Other than she’s working at a kennels where she suspects the dogs stolen from the Ruddles might have landed, and the name of her absent co-worker, Rosalind Esche? No phone number?’
‘It was withheld, boss, we’re following it up, but she did give me a description of herself for when we met – it’s not much but it might be helpful.’
‘Tell me?’
‘She said she was twenty-one, with brown hair in a ponytail and that she’d be wearing a purple puffer and jeans.’
Grace felt a sudden, wintry chill. ‘You’ve no idea where exactly she worked, Polly?’
‘No.’
‘Bear with me.’ He called up the overnight serials again on his screen and scrolled through to one he’d noticed on his scan through them earlier, but it hadn’t stuck out. Now it did, like a red flag.
He found it. A fatal road traffic accident on the B2014, at approximately 5.30 p.m. yesterday. A single vehicle colliding with a tree. He followed the update trail. The driver was identified as a twenty-one-year-old female. He memorized the names of the two traffic officers who had arrived on the scene. PCs Richard Trundle and Pip Edwards.
They would have remained at the scene for many hours, while the Collision Investigation Unit carried out their laser measurements and other investigations, and were now probably home and sound asleep. He knew both officers and that they were diligent, and he had PC Trundle’s number on his address book. He dialled it, expecting it to go straight to voicemail. But it was answered after four rings by a predictably sleepy voice.
‘Hello?’
‘Richard? It’s Roy Grace.’
‘Sir, sorry, Detective Superintendent, sir.’
