Psycho Alley by Nick Oldham Page A

any dealings with him before?’ Henry nodded, bit into his sarnie. ‘How did he know to run you down?’
    â€˜I’ve been thinking about that one … maybe I’ve had dealings with the guy in the passenger seat.’ Henry wrapped his hand around his chin, his palm covering his mouth, munching food thoughtfully.
    â€˜At least it’s a bloody good start to the job. You know who the prime suspect is, which is always a starter for ten.’
    â€˜Yeah, I just need to corner the bastard now.’ He finished the sandwich, folding it without manners into his mouth, smiling at Debbie as he did so. She, on the other hand, bit delicately into the one slice of wheat-germ toast she’d bought for herself.
    They grinned at each other.
    Henry very quickly established an intelligence cell, a grand phrase for a lone detective constable heaved from the local Intel department, to start rooting into Uren’s background, to go through everything they could find on him from all agencies, and to start to piece together a crazy pathway that might lead to his door. At nine thirty a.m. he had managed to recall all the detectives who had been working with him the night before, scouring Fleetwood’s pubs, and had already briefed them to follow up some lines of enquiry as regards Uren’s burnt-out car.
    Things had started to tick over, but Henry did not want to lose any momentum. He had a briefing booked for eleven a.m. for the murder team and uniformed officers and had arranged the post mortem for two p.m. Via the press office, he had already issued a holding statement to the media.
    The scientific people were at the scene and some local uniforms had been commandeered to begin some house-to-house legwork near the docks just to get the ball rolling. They were knocking on warehouse and factory doors, as well as boarding some yachts in the marina. Possibly clutching at straws, but Henry knew there was rarely a crime committed that went unwitnessed.
    By midday, a small team of investigators had been given the scent and unleashed. A Home Office Large and Major Enquiry (HOLMES) team and appropriate admin supported them.
    A murder enquiry was well and truly under way. Henry’s rudely-christened operation had got a new dimension. He wondered how much time he’d be given to solve it. Several weeks ago he’d been warned he only had a month to get a result and he’d failed. Now a murder had come in which may or may not be connected … one thing he knew for sure was that Dave Anger was hovering for the kill.

Three
    H enry Christie regarded his reflection in the mirror of the gents’ toilet of the public mortuary in the grounds of Lancaster Royal Infirmary. His injuries – the combination of the whack on his eye and the painful glancing blow he’d taken on the thigh from Uren’s car, together with the long day he’d just had, made him look grey and not a little frail. He splashed some water on his face, though it didn’t do much to revive him, and wiped himself dry with a paper towel.
    His thumped eye had gone a vivid shade of purple, though the swelling had subsided and he could more or less see through it now. His ‘gammy’ leg, as he now called it, was sore and aching; he was actually wondering whether he should start using a walking stick, which could maybe become a pretentious trademark. After all, all great detectives had something quirky which defined them.
    â€˜Great detective my arse,’ he mumbled at his reflection and necked a couple of the strong painkillers the hospital had doled out to him.
    Behind him, the door to the gents’ opened and the Home Office pathologist entered, still in a bloodied-up apron from having just completed a gruelling three-hour post mortem examination on the body found in the back of the burned-out car. He was called Baines, a stick of a man with ears like a trophy. Henry had known him for longer than he cared to