Free Blood on the Tongue (Ben Cooper & Diane Fry) by Stephen Booth

was dark green, as if he were trying for a camouflage effect. It wasn't much use in the snow – he'd be a sitting duck for an angry gamekeeper with a twelve-bore shotgun. But somehow it made him look as if he belonged where he was, like a man who was at ease with himself and his own place in the world. And then there was the tweed cap. In the shadow of its peak, you could barely see his eyes.
    Fry shook herself. There was no one she could ask about Cooper. Perhaps her view of him was somehow distorted. Maybe her antennae were deadened by her preoccupations with her own problems. One thing was certain, Cooper was a man orbiting somewhere beyond the reach of her detection systems. But he wouldn't need to put a foot too far wrong before his orbit brought him right back into her sights. Maybe tomorrow.
     

5
     
    By the next day, the skies had cleared. Overnight frost had sprayed glitter on the snow that lay on the moors, and the air crackled like static electricity.
    Ben Cooper sighed as he stumbled around his room, determined not to miss breakfast today. First thing this morning he had to attend the Chief Superintendent's meeting with the Canadian woman. He hoped it was something that could be got out of the way as soon as possible. It was an irrelevance, and a waste of time. From what he'd read of the files produced by the Local Intelligence Officer, it was more than a cold case she was asking Derbyshire Constabulary to take up – it was no case at all.
    Cooper was sure it was just another fuss being kicked up by somebody with an obsession about the past and the history of their family. The Canadian would be sent packing by Chief Superintendent Jepson pretty quickly.
    She was unimportant, anyway. At the moment, until he was fully awake, Cooper couldn't even remember the woman's name.
    *    *    *    *
     
    Alison Morrissey had brought Frank Baine with her to West Street for support. Baine described himself as a freelance journalist who had researched local RAF history and the background to the aircraft wrecks that littered the Peak District. He hinted at a book yet to appear. He was also the man who'd liaised for weeks now on behalf of the Canadian, pestering for information and a confirmed date and time for the meeting. Though the Chief Superintendent had at no stage spoken to Baine himself, he'd already managed to become irritated by his persistence, communicated to him by his staff. That Canadian Consul must really be a valuable contact.
    The four of them met in the Chief Superintendent's office amid a flurry of cappuccino served by the Chief's secretary, and an offer of the Bakewell tarts that Jepson kept for the purpose of demonstrating his Derbyshire street cred to visitors. Cooper couldn't remember when he'd tasted real coffee at West Street before. He'd heard they actually served it to customers in reception at the new B Division headquarters, but he wouldn't believe it until he saw it for himself.
    The meeting opened with some half-hearted pleasantries about the health and welfare of Miss Morrissey's uncle, his family, his dog and his golf handicap. The Chief Superintendent eventually ran out of small talk and sat looking at his visitors in silence. It was an interrogation technique that he fell back on from force of habit, from his long-past days in the CID. It worked, though. Alison Morrissey began talking almost immediately.
    'As you know, gentlemen, I asked for this meeting because I'm attempting to clear the dishonour on the name of my grandfather, Daniel McTeague, who was an officer serving in the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was reported missing while on attachment to the RAF in January 1945.'
    'All of fifty-seven years ago,' said Chief Superintendent Jepson. He was smiling amicably, but he was putting down his marker from the start.
    'I happen to know that your neighbours the Greater Manchester Police re-opened a case last year that was exactly fifty-seven years old,' said Morrissey, looking him