Cooper and Fry Crime Fiction Series Books 1-3: Black Dog, Dancing With the Virgins, Blood on the Tongue

‘Harry Dickinson is seventy-eight years old,’ he said.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Cooper. ‘But we’re not assuming that his age rules him out. Are we, sir?’

‘Of course not,’ said Tailby. ‘We assume nothing.’

There was a general shuffling of feet and scraping of chair legs. Fry watched a female detective turn round to ask Ben Cooper if he was all right. She looked concerned, but he only nodded, keeping his eyes on the chief inspector. Fry noticed that there was a scuff mark on Cooper’s leather jacket and his tie needed straightening. He was really untidy, and it made him look disorganized. No way was he as perfect as everyone said he was.

‘One more thing I want to emphasize before you go,’ said Tailby, raising his voice over the noise. ‘Again, this is in your files, but keep it to the forefront of your minds, all of you. DC Cooper has mentioned the trainer found by Mr Dickinson and his dog, the find which led us to the body a short distance away. But there is one fact which could be vital to the enquiry. One thing which could lead to an early conclusion, if we are thorough with our routines – and if we get a little bit of luck. I want you to remember, all of you, that Laura Vernon’s second trainer is missing.’

‘All right. DC Fry, here, please.’

Fry stepped briskly towards Hitchens, where he leaned casually against the wall, dangling a leg over the edge of a desk. He had a stack of action forms in his hand, and Fry knew she was about to be allocated to an enquiry team.

‘You’re the new girl around here, Diane. So we’re going to team you up with Ben Cooper for a while. He knows the area like the back of his hand.’

‘So I’ve heard.’

‘Well, we don’t want you going and getting lost on the moors, do we, Fry? We’d have to send the dogs out again.’

Fry tried a smile and hoped it was convincing. ‘I’m sure we’ll work well together.’

Hitchens studied her. ‘You’ll get on all right,’ he said.

‘It’s OK.’

‘Right. DC Cooper! Where’s Ben Cooper gone?’

‘He had to take an urgent phone call, sir,’ said another detective. ‘In the CID room.’

‘OK. Well, you two are in charge of house-to-house in Moorhay,’ said Hitchens. ‘There will be uniformed teams out there to assist you. These are the allocated areas. Make sure you don’t miss anybody.’

He held out a photocopied street map divided into three sections with blue, red and yellow highlighter pens.

‘I’ll go and introduce myself to DC Cooper,’ said Fry. ‘If I can find the CID room.’

Ben Cooper was hunched over a desk, staring at a sea of papers that seemed to have accumulated during his holiday. He wasn’t reading the papers; in fact, he didn’t appear to see them at all. His face was completely blank as he listened to the voice at the other end of the phone.

‘I suppose so, if that’s what they think,’ he said. ‘But how long for? Yes, I know Kate needs a break, but Matt –’

He saw the new DC coming from the far end of the CID room. She moved with a cool deliberateness, not meeting his eye, but glancing from side to side as she walked past the desks and filing cabinets, as if searching for evidence of misdemeanours among her absent colleagues. Cooper half expected to see her stoop to check for footprints in the carpets, or turn over an envelope to examine the address. She had a lean face and short fair hair, and she was very slim – slimmer than he had grown up to expect women to be. His mother would have said she was sickening for something. But she had a certain wiry look that suggested she was no weakling. No wilting violet, this one.

He had worked out who she was, of course. She was the one PC Garnett had told him about, the new DC who had come from the West Midlands with a reputation. Garnett had been almost right in his description. The only surprise was that she was actually quite attractive – though a smile, he thought, would help to relax her face and do something about the dark shadows in her eyes.

‘Yes, Matt. Yes, you’re right, I know. Two days, then. And we can talk about it properly on Thursday, OK? It just seems a long time to wait.’

The new DC had reached Cooper’s desk. She stood looking at the mess of papers, idly tapping the Moorhay file against her thigh. He turned away, shielding the phone. He knew it was obvious that the call was nothing to do with work. She would recognize a personal call when she heard one. She probably thought he was discussing a girlfriend.

He watched in amazement as she calmly took a seat and booted up his computer terminal, still without looking at him.

‘Hold on a minute, Matt.’

He saw her start to smile as the computer came to life and she logged into the database. It allowed her into the first two screens, but then threw up a dialogue box when she tried to extract some data.

‘You need a password,’ said Cooper.

‘What’s that?’ said Matt in his ear.

‘Nothing.’

‘What is it then?’ she asked.

‘I can’t just give it out. You need authority.’

‘Yeah? I’ll find a way past it then.’

She started tapping keys to get into the terminal settings, looking for the security program and the password function. A silver stud glinted in her ear where it was exposed by a recent trim.

‘You’ll never get anywhere without knowing the proper password.’

‘Ben, if you’re busy –’

‘Yes, look, Matt, I’ll have to go,’ said Cooper. ‘I’ll speak to you tonight.’

He replaced the phone, and didn’t look up for a moment, as if he was adjusting himself to something, preparing to face a whole new challenge.

‘Damn!’

A ‘fatal error’ message was frozen on the computer screen. The terminal had objected to the unauthorized tinkering and had crashed.

‘I did tell you you’d get nowhere without the password,’ he snapped.

‘You’re my new partner,’ said Fry. ‘When you’re available, that is.’

Cooper took a deep breath. ‘OK. Hi, I’m Ben Cooper. You must be DC Fry.’

He waited for her to say something else. He didn’t know her first name yet.

‘My friends call me Diane.’

He nodded cautiously, noting the ambiguity of the message. ‘What are we up for?’

‘House-to-house with some woodentops.’

‘Don’t let them hear you call them that.’

Fry shrugged. ‘We could get going, if you’re ready. I’m only the new girl, but I understand murder enquiries are usually considered quite important.’

‘All right, I’m ready.’