The Coldest Blood

They set out again as she produced a stylish woollen ski hat which she pulled down low over her hair. ‘The sea keeps the temperature up, actually,’ she said, answering a question that hadn’t been asked. ‘Although the wind doesn’t help. The chalet’s got storage heaters – and some hot air blowers if it needs a boost. They’re double-glazed, very snug,’ she said, wriggling her neck down into the thermal collar.

Dryden held his overcoat lapels to his chin. The north wind was still freezing, and the danger of an ice storm still hung over the Fens and its coast. Emergency services and the power companies were on constant alert, and councils had stockpiled grit and salt to keep the roads open. Looking along the coast westwards Dryden could see the diminishing line of massive electricity pylons linking the national grid to the outlying communities of The Wash. Each one glinted silver-white in the sunshine, the connecting cables hung with decorative ice.

An elderly woman in running shorts jogged past, her legs a livid red, the flesh juddering with each blow of foot against gravel.

They walked down towards the beach between lines of chalets, brick now rather than clapboard, with modern plastic windows and doors, and set within neatly trimmed lawns scorched by frost. White picket fences separated each plot from its neighbour, potted fir trees and brass carriage lamps adding a further suburban touch. Each had a tarmac parking space and several cars were on the site – mostly expensive 4x4s or people carriers. Through one window Dryden could see a couple on a wicker sofa, both fast asleep, a flat-screen TV showing indoor bowls.

Down by the beach there was evidence that the Dolphin’s traditional attractions had not been entirely abandoned. The summer fairground was mothballed: a helter-skelter swaddled in stiff tarpaulins. A blackthorn hedge still enclosed the outdoor swimming pool, an Olympian stretch of 1930s artdeco concrete, now empty except for a kidney-shaped slick of ice on the base and a beached pedalo full of accumulated hailstones.

The eastern perimeter of the camp was marked by Morton’s Leam, a tidal channel which ran inland through high sandbanks, a single fishing boat keeled over in the sluggish water of low tide. A footbridge crossed the water where the coastal path met the creek: a graceful curve of timber with double handrails, which took the path east. But Ruth Connor led them west to a line of chalets built on wooden stilts in the sand dunes. Dryden pushed Laura up a ramp and over the specially widened threshold. Connor gave him a brief professional tour of the facilities, then left. He positioned Laura’s chair by the window, carefully wiring up the portable COMPASS they had purchased for the trip so that Laura could speak. Then he used the hoist to transfer his wife to a lounger, put a talking book on the tape deck provided, and went out to the verandah with his binoculars. He swept the glasses east and found Humph’s Capri easily, parked up beyond the footbridge beside a clump of wind-torn pine trees, with a clear view of the chalet.

A glint of cold reflected light came from the driver’s side of the cab. He guessed that they were swapping telescopic images and he raised his hand in greeting. Two miniature fountains of water leapt out like whiskers from either side of the Capri’s bonnet and the windscreen wipers swished once in reply.

25

Fear: it was still the emotion which haunted him despite the seven days which had passed since the fire on board PK 129. If Humph hadn’t tried a social call at midnight with a bottle of malt whisky he’d be a charred corpse on a mortuary slab; dead along with Joe Petulengo and Declan McIlroy. Dryden, recalling the ‘accident’ which had killed Petulengo, and the ‘suicide’ which had ended Declan’s life, didn’t believe in coincidences – and certainly not when they came in threes.

The police had no time for Dryden’s conspiracy theory. The inquest into Petulengo’s death had recorded a verdict of accidental death, dismissing any concern that he might have taken his own life. The victim had died of hypothermia, although his fall into the ice had resulted in particularly severe injuries to his left leg. The detective who had taken a statement after the fire on board PK 129 was dutiful but unconvinced, clearly sensing paranoia and professional opportunism in the reporter’s lurid version of events. The fire brigade examined the scene and a full report would be made: but it looked like an accident due to a poorly maintained generator, with the occupant drunk in his bunk.