‘Joe Smith,’ he said, picking up an iron bar and prodding the wood in the brazier.
Fine by me, thought Dryden, who’d made up less believable names.
Smith held his one hand out over the fire and kindly shooed the kids away.
Dryden stepped into the circle of heat. ‘So what happened?’
Smith slipped a piece of chewing gum into his mouth. ‘Could’ve killed us. There’s a dozen kids on the site. No warning – nothing. Just set light to the stables.’
Dryden tried an expression of world-weary cynicism – a subtlety lost in the weaving heated air between them. ‘Police didn’t seem to think…’
‘They think we did it to get the insurance. Gonna print that, fella?’
‘Dryden. The name’s Dryden. So… who…?’
‘Never saw ‘em. They stuffed straw from the stables under the caravan as well – didn’t light it. Just a gesture. Nice people.’
‘But the dogs…?’
‘Inside. Cold. They’re pets. They lit the fires and drove off – we heard them reversing on the drove road, looked like a van, a Ford perhaps. We were too busy fighting the fire to follow’
‘All of you too busy?’
This observation was apparently a mistake. Smith came round the fire. Dryden estimated that a blow with the wrench would be fatal – or even a promise to deliver one. The potential weapon had now assumed the proportions of a small fork-lift truck.
‘You’ll want to see the animals.’ He walked off towards the stables and Dryden followed. Inside the straw was burnt and wet. Sprawled innocently in the debris were the charred bodies of two ponies. The smell was pure Salmonella Sid’s – overcooked greasy meat with a hint of burnt toast.
‘Oh shit,’ said Dryden and put his breakfast in the sawdust. When he finished retching and stood up Smith was standing ready with a metal canteen of water.
‘You found them like this?’
‘Nope. If we hadn’t got to them the whole block would have gone up – we’ve got nearly fifty animals. These two had gone down with the fumes. The half-doors had been bolted and a petrol bomb tossed in. Some of the fairground stuff is stored in there – we dragged that out but a lot of it’s trashed.’ Smith looked around and shook his head. ‘Don’t ask me why.’
Dryden couldn’t resist. ‘Why?’
Smith tried a grin. ‘If you want a list of our enemies we’d betta sit down.’
Perhaps the police were right – perhaps they were making it all up for the insurance money.
‘You the owner?’
‘Nope. We just look after it from the fall onwards. Feed the livestock, oil the machines, run ‘em now and again to keep it all moving. Do a bit of painting as well. Circus people come back in February from Ireland, pick her up and off on tour.’
‘So you’re not the insurance policy holder?’
‘Nah. But we’re all in cahoots. Gypsies are like that – ask anyone.’
‘You tour?’
‘Some of us go, work the stalls and the rest. Others stay here – keep an eye on things. Earn an honest dollar.’ He looked Dryden straight in the eyes. He said it again. ‘Honest dollar.’
Dryden started taking his pictures. Smith got two of the kids to pose with some of the charred circus rides – an old merry-go-round and some dodgem cars. Nice pic – very nice pic. A woman who might be the kids’ mother hovered by the caravans tending the fire. If you’d asked the average bigot what a gypsy woman looked like she was the opposite: neatly dressed in designer jeans and trendy sports windcheater. She had short blonde hair and bright cat’s eyes like Joe Smith – and shared his accent without the undercurrent of the Fens.
She inveigled the children into posing for the pictures and smartly slapped one who asked Dryden for a fifty-pence piece for his trouble.
Dryden took a set of pictures for the insurance company showing the extent of the damage. Smith insisted on a shot of the burnt-out stables. Dryden was relieved to get back out again into the fresh, cutting air.
His mobile chirrupped. It was Andy Stubbs. ‘Hi. You OK to talk right now?’
Smith had returned to the fire and was chatting with the children.
‘Yeah. Fire away.’
‘Chummy in the car boot – we’ve found the record that goes with his prints.’
Dryden waited. ‘There’s a link with the body on the roof. The prints were found at the Crossways garage – next to Tommy Shepherd’s on the shop counter. No ID of course, they never found the rest of the gang. But a link.’
Dryden’s imagination wheeled. The body on the cathedral roof was that of the prime suspect for the Crossways robbery. The victim in the boot of the car fished out of the Lark had been there too – but never identified. And the Lark victim died forty-eight hours before his one-time partner in crime Tommy Shepherd was discovered on the cathedral roof.