MURDER IN THE GARDEN a gripping crime mystery full of twists Page 10

  Before even getting into his disguised van to set out for police HQ on the day Mel Mallow died, for instance, he’d planted tiny bugs on the vehicles of all those closest to the trio of animals who’d raped his daughter. Including the best friend of his daughter’s rapist, John Dix. Knowing a man who could kit him out with all the latest gear was another huge help, and along with practising his marksmanship, he’d also been updating himself with everything that modern technology had to offer.

  What else did he have to spend his money on? With his wife dead, and his daughter confined to a psychiatric institution, he hardly needed the money for anything else.

  And so, when the motorbike of one of Gary Firth’s closest pals suddenly took off for the wilds of Wales, not only did Clive Myers know about it, he was able to track it accurately, due to the wonders of the Global Positioning System. Of course, it could just mean that John Dix had gone to Wales. But he’d been monitoring the bike’s movements for some time, and the lad barely left the confines of Oxford. So this sudden long journey into the wilds of Wales had piqued his interest. Instinct told him that Dix had no business so far from home, so the odds had to be fair that he’d either lent the bike to the animal who’d raped his daughter, or had been asked by Firth to take him so far from his home patch. In which case, he couldn’t afford not to check it out.

  Now, keeping to the back roads, his eyes glued to the electronic map and the steadily bleeping green dot that told him where his quarry was holed up, Clive Myers drove calmly and placidly into Wales.

  Beside him, under the passenger seat of his van, was a carefully concealed sniper rifle.

  And if he was right, and found Gary Firth at journey’s end, then it would be time to put phase two of his plan into operation.

  * * *

  Whilst Clive Myers contemplated killing the rapist of his fifteen-year-old daughter, Keith Barrington fairly skipped up the stairs of police HQ back in Kidlington.

  ‘Guv. I’ve found someone who says they overheard Eddie Philpott and Tom Cleaves quarrelling in Eddie’s garden the day before he was killed.’

  Hillary, still feeling guilty over what she’d done to Janine Mallow, looked at him bleakly.

  ‘OK.’

  Barrington blinked, somewhat taken aback by her lack of enthusiasm. ‘So do we go and see Tom Cleaves?’ he asked uncertainly.

  Hillary sighed. ‘What time did this argument take place, according to your witness?’

  ‘Early Sunday morning, guv.’

  ‘OK. Let’s go back to The Knott. I want to see first if Rachel Warner or either of her kids heard the rumpus. If not, Tom Cleaves can flatly deny it, and we won’t be able to prove otherwise.’

  Barrington saw the logic of that, and, his faith in his boss restored, he followed her out into the car park.

  * * *

  Rachel Warner opened the door to their knock, rubbing her face with one hand.

  ‘I’m sorry. Were you sleeping?’ Hillary asked, her level of guilt, which was already high, abruptly sky-rocketing.

  ‘No, that’s all right. I needed to get up anyway.’ The woman turned her wrist to look at her watch, then made an annoyed tch sound. ‘Damn watch — it needs a new battery. I’ve been meaning to replace it for days. I never know what time it is.’

  Hillary glanced obligingly at her own watch. ‘It’s just gone three.’

  ‘I’ll have to pick Mark up from school soon,’ said Rachel, standing reluctantly to one side to show them in.

  ‘That’s OK, we won’t keep you,’ Hillary said quickly, taking the decision not to go inside. ‘I just need to ask a few quick questions. Can you remember if you heard your father arguing with someone in his garden on Sunday morning? That would be the day before he died.’

  Rachel yawned hugely, apologized, then nodded. ‘Sorry. It’s the pills I’m on. Er, yes, I did hear Dad talking to someone. It sounded a bit heated, too. I was still in bed, though, but I had the top window open a notch. I find fresh air helps.’

  ‘Did you recognise the man he was speaking to?’

  Rachel shook her head. ‘No. Sorry.’

  ‘Could you tell what the argument was about?’

  Rachel smiled wanly. ‘Yes. That’s why I stayed in bed and didn’t bother to get up and have a look. They were arguing about tomatoes. That’s why I wasn’t worried. I expect it was that man Dad was always ruffling up the wrong way.’

  Hillary smiled. ‘You took no notice of them?’

  ‘Oh no. They’ve been feuding for years. I think they both enjoy it.’ Then her face seemed to collapse in on itself. ‘Or rather, did enjoy it. Once.’ Her mouth began to do that wobbling thing that mouths do when tears are imminent, and Hillary hastily thanked her and backed away, leaving her alone with her grief.

  Beside her, Barrington looked as miserable as she felt.

  ‘Now we go and interview Cleaves?’ he asked eagerly.

  But as they climbed into the car, Hillary sighed and shook her head. ‘Not right now. He’ll keep.’ She had the depressing feeling that talking to Tom Cleaves wouldn’t get them an inch further in their case.

  And she’d had just about enough gloom for one day.

  Back at HQ, Ross’s desk was still empty, which was not a huge surprise.

  * * *

  In Wales, Clive Myers pulled off a narrow and deserted country lane, and took to open grassland, parking his well-sprung van in a small spinney.

  He got out his camping equipment, and set about making himself comfortable. Later, he’d check out the lie of the land and use his binoculars to pinpoint the nearest farms. But with luck, when it came time to scout out Gary Firth’s hidey-hole, he would find it in a nice, quiet little spot, well away from prying eyes and human ears.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The next morning, Hillary got in early and finally put paid to the backlog of papers in her in-tray. Another largely sleepless night had left her feeling lethargic and yet another vague headache loomed on the horizon.

  With the arrival of Barrington and Gemma, she reached for her third cup of coffee of the morning, and told them both to update the Murder Book and refamiliarize themselves with it. The Murder Book was a file they kept up to date with reports, witness statements and personal thoughts, so that any one member of the team could look at it and get a comprehensive view of the case.

  The post-mortem report had only just reached her, the delay due to a multi-car pile-up on the M40 two days ago. The sudden blitz of bodies arriving at the morgue had postponed Edward Philpott’s autopsy for more than thirty-two hours, but as she read the report through, carefully translating the pathologist’s medicalese as she went, she realised that it told them precisely nothing they didn’t already know. Cause of death, predictably, had been severe blunt force trauma to the back of the head. Apart from that, Edward Philpott had been a fit and healthy man for his age, with only the onset of a slight touch of rheumatism that might have caused him problems, had he lived.

  She sighed and tossed the report to one side. Catching Gemma Fordham’s eye, she shook her head. ‘Nothing useful.’

  Just then she became aware of a slight stirring in the office, and her heart fell, her first thought being that Janine Mallow was back. But when she looked up it was to see DS Frank Ross weaving his way through the room — and the weaving was not due entirely to his having to negotiate his way through the archipelago of desks.

  Paul Danvers had also spotted him, and came out of his cubicle fast, on an intercept path. Hillary felt her shoulder muscles tense, for her soon to be ex-sergeant had his nasty eyes fixed on her face, and he didn’t look in any fit state to be prudent.

  ‘Well, bitch, here they are,’ he all but shouted, bringing the entire office to a standstill. Telephone conversations were cut off in mid-sentence and keypads were ignored as everyone looked their way to watch the upcoming entertainment. The building was already buzzing, of course, with news of Ross’s long-anticipated ejection, and nobody wanted to miss the fun.

  ‘
I take it that is your application for retirement, Sergeant.’ Paul Danvers’s icy voice cut across the room. Frank reeled around and glared at the sartorially elegant, blond-haired man reaching out with an imperious hand. ‘I’ll take those.’

  ‘Screw you,’ Frank Ross sneered.

  ‘You’re drunk,’ Danvers said blandly.

  ‘What a loss you are to the detective ranks, sir,’ Frank slurred, with a drunken smile. He threw the papers towards Danvers who, surprisingly, managed to catch them before they had a chance to disperse and scatter.

  ‘Go home and sober up,’ Danvers said. ‘You’re a bloody disgrace and no damned good to anyone in this state.’

  Somebody somewhere in the room muttered sotto voce, ‘He never was in any state,’ and a few people sniggered. Frank Ross flushed, then gave an elaborate shrug followed by an over-dramatic V sign to Hillary, which made him stagger, then turned and weaved his way back to the door.

  ‘Class all the way,’ Hillary said quietly. Keith Barrington sniggered, then turned it into a cough and hid it behind his hand.

  Gemma watched Ross’s departure with narrowed eyes. So he was definitely going, she mused with satisfaction. There was no possible way back from that. Which meant that Hillary had been sincere in what she’d said about the shake-up to her team. It made Gemma feel better about herself and her decision to stay on. For the time being, anyway.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Hillary said quietly to Danvers, who looked at her with a searching gaze, then smiled briefly, nodded, and returned to his desk. Once there, he gave Ross’s papers the quick once-over, just to make sure the stupid sod hadn’t deliberately sabotaged them with a false signature or incorrect data — something of which he was thoroughly capable.

  But the papers were all in order, and DCI Paul Danvers tossed them into his out-tray with a sense of relief. Well, that was one problem solved. Then he glanced through the Plexiglas cubicle towards Hillary and her team, and sighed heavily.

  She was looking desperately tired, and was still steadily losing weight. But she’d hold it together. The thought of her doing anything else was unthinkable.

  * * *

  Martha Hepton crossed her ankles nervously under her solicitor’s admiring glance, and licked her lips unhappily.

  ‘So there’s nothing you can do?’ she appealed.

  ‘Not really, Miss Hepton. The death of your landlord doesn’t really change anything from a legal point of view. His estate will be probated, and his executors will deal with all the issues arising from his last will and testament. Unfortunately, Mr Philpott had already made the matter concerning your lease formal by writing to his own solicitor. Who will, of course, be sure to pass Mr Philpott’s expressed wishes on to the executors of the estate.’

  Martha Hepton swallowed hard. ‘But he was going to change his mind. I know he was. He told me so only a few days before he died,’ she lied.

  ‘Did he say this in front of a witness?’ the solicitor asked hopefully. He was a lean, grey-haired man, who was trying hard to be sympathetic to his newest client but finding it difficult.

  ‘No. We were alone,’ Martha said vaguely.

  ‘Did he ever write a letter to you, a dated letter, stating his intention of changing his mind in the matter of Honeysuckle Cottage?’

  Martha shook her head miserably. Of course he hadn’t. Eddie had been determined not to renew her lease of the cottage. He’d told her weeks ago that, come the end of November, he needed the cottage empty, so that he could sell it.

  When he’d first told her about it, she’d thought he’d been joking. After so many years, she’d come to think of the small stone cottage as her own, and it had come as a complete shock to her to realise that comfortable old Eddie would even consider making her homeless. Let alone do so.

  At first, she’d pleaded and cajoled and tried every womanly wile she could think of to get him to change his mind.

  After that came vague, veiled threats.

  Then open tears and recriminations.

  Then the withholding of sex.

  Nothing had changed his mind, and by the time he died, they were barely on speaking terms. And Eddie hadn’t been to her cottage for their usual twice-weekly get-togethers for more than a month. Something she had not been going to tell that nosy female copper, or her smirking git of a sidekick. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what they’d have made of it all.

  They’d have had her in cuffs and down the station before she could draw breath.

  ‘But surely I’ll have a bit more time now, won’t I? I mean, doesn’t probate take time?’ Martha asked plaintively.

  The solicitor shrugged helplessly. ‘It depends on how straightforward things are. The clarity of the last will and testament, and the attitude of the heirs, for instance, can make a great deal of difference.’

  ‘But he was murdered,’ Martha pointed out. ‘Doesn’t all that slow things down?’

  The solicitor cleared his throat. The potential for complications in this case was slowly becoming clear to him. ‘Well, much of that would depend on how quickly the police conclude their investigations, and, of course, the identity of Mr Philpott’s killer. For instance, for it to affect probate at all, it would have to be proved that one or more of the people mentioned in Mr Philpott’s will had been culpable in his homicide. As you may know, it is against the law for somebody to profit financially from an unlawful killing.’

  Martha sighed heavily. That was hardly helpful.

  ‘Do you know who the main heirs are in Mr Philpott’s will?’ he asked curiously. Martha shrugged.

  ‘Well, he only has the one child, a daughter. She’s been living with him for a long while now, so I expect she’ll get the bulk of it. Or he might have left it in trust for his grandchildren. I’m not sure.’

  ‘In that case, I suggest it might prove prudent to try and have a confidential talk with Mr Philpott’s daughter. She might well be amenable to you staying on at Honeysuckle Cottage. If the property does revert to her, she might prefer to have the steady income of a rent coming in, rather than the one-off large payment that would result from a sale.’

  Martha’s heart plummeted. She hadn’t told this dry old stick that she’d never paid a penny in rent all the years she’d lived in Honeysuckle Cottage — or why. And again, it didn’t take a genius to realise that Rachel Warner would hardly be likely to let such an arrangement stand. After all, Martha could hardly provide the same sort of service for her that she had for Rachel’s father, could she?

  ‘Well, thank you, Mr Mainwaring, for your advice.’

  The solicitor stood and shook hands, and watched her go with a slight sigh.

  Outside on the pavement, Martha Hepton saw the busy street in front of her shimmer and waver, and realised she was on the verge of very public tears. Taking a big gulp of air, she set off across a pedestrian crossing towards a large church, and the quiet graveyard that surrounded it. If she was going to make a spectacle of herself, better that only the dead would see it.

  But as she stumbled through the gravestones and all but fell down on to a wooden bench overlooking a gloomy marble rectangle dedicated to the memory of one Elijah Cranwarry, Martha felt the first glimmerings of real despair.

  What was she going to do?

  She was hardly likely to get a council home, was she? Not at her age, not with her being single and not with the waiting lists like they were. And she didn’t even know anybody who’d be willing to rent her a room. Most of her friends were married, had moved away, and had families or problems of their own.

  She might end up in a caravan park somewhere. The spectre of homelessness loomed. She’d be forced to get a real job, find a poky hole somewhere, and skimp and save.

  Damn Edward Philpott. She was glad the old bastard was dead.

  * * *

  Clive Myers paused in his digging and glanced around. Despite it being a damp and just slightly chilly day up in the Welsh hills, he was stripped to the waist and sweating.

 
It was the tree roots that were the problem. The deep hole he was digging in the small spinney was chock-a-bloc with stubborn, iron-like roots that resisted the spade. But he was determined to get down to at least five feet. He knew that bodies were found mostly because the lazy sods who were disposing of them were too panic-stricken, too physically unfit, or too stupid to dig down far enough. Foxes and dogs had good noses, and liked to dig for buried treasure. Their scavenging instincts were always on the alert.

  He took a swig of water from a supermarket-brand bottle and flexed his tired arms and shoulders. A few more hours should do it. In his mid-fifties, he was no longer in his prime, but he’d always kept himself trim. His wife had always teased him about that, although he knew she’d been secretly pleased by his lack of a beer belly. It had allowed her to show him off to her friends.

  Friends who’d come to her funeral and spoke meaningless words at him, all the while looking at him speculatively, and gossiping at the first opportunity.

  Clive Myers thrust such thoughts aside, and began digging with renewed energy and grim determination. He’d never been a man to contemplate things too thoroughly. A plain and simple man, he preferred plain and simple deeds.

  * * *

  Janine Mallow felt the desk sergeant’s eyes on her as she walked across the foyer and to the lift. A few weeks ago she’d have taken the stairs, but just recently her back had been playing her up, and her legs felt heavy. It was almost as if she could feel the growing baby inside her sucking her dry of all stamina and energy.

  As she got in the lift she saw him reach for his telephone, and knew he’d be calling Hillary to give her the heads-up. For some reason she’d never quite been able to fathom, Hillary Greene had always, and seemingly effortlessly, commanded the respect of the rank and file. Young people in uniforms, old geezers like the desk sergeants, the retired legends, the up-and-comers. It seemed to make no difference. Hillary seemed to know them all.

  But for once, Janine had got it wrong. The desk sergeant wasn’t calling Hillary Greene, but only because he’d seen her leave the building about an hour before. Instead, he was calling a retired mate from Traffic to tell him the news about Frank Ross. By now, the tale of Ross’s drunken stunt upstairs was taking on the aura of legend. So much so, that by the time Janine had got halfway across the large open-plan office towards her old hunting grounds, she’d been told the news by no fewer than five people.