Scream Blue Murder

by Linda Coles

  “Bad back. I’m better on a hard surface,” he lied. He glanced at the mug and the pale brown liquid within. Something white and lumpy floated on its surface and Jack hoped it wasn’t sour milk. He took a sip. It tasted like dishwater and he put it down on the old glass table that separated the two men. He’d done his bit, taken a sip, and now it didn't matter if he didn't drink any more.

  It was Howard’s turn to speak. “What's this all to do with? You mentioned an old case?”

  Jack was pleased to be getting down to business, he didn't fancy lingering in the man’s home for too long. He imagined fleas jumping up and biting his ankles, making their home in his socks. “It's about a case that you worked on with Maxine Keppel some years ago. Michael Hardesty and Chesney McAllister.”

  King nodded his recognition. He reminded Jack of one of those bobbing dogs that you saw at the back of people's rear windscreens.

  “You remember it, then?” enquired Jack.

  “I certainly do. Unfortunately,” said Howard. “It’s one of those cases that I guess I'll always remember.”

  “Oh? And why is that?”

  “We should have won that one, but we didn't. Hardesty should never have gone down for murder, but it all seemed to get out of hand very quickly. One minute he was driving along, minding his own business, then a car accident and a man is dead. And it wasn't from the actual car accident.”

  “So why did that stick with you?” asked Jack.

  “Because whatever we did, we seemed to hit a brick wall at every turn. Pardon the pun.”

  “So, what do you think actually happened that night?” Jack asked.

  “It was a simple altercation and nothing more. But those boys had a history together. Their families had a history together and not a good one. And somehow McAllister won. Maxine did her best, but like I said, every turn we seemed to hit a brick wall. I suspected something was going on at the time, but I could never get to the bottom of it, never prove it.”

  “Like what, exactly? You think somebody was buying somebody else off?”

  “No, not so simple as that. Though I daresay somebody would have tried it.” Howard was quiet for a moment, looking out through the smeared window. Not that there was much to see through the grime.

  Jack waited.

  After a few moments, without looking at Jack again and still looking towards the window, Howard said, “I'd been out for a drink one night. I’d had a bit of a skin-full. Actually, truth be told, it was a stressful trial, and the whiskey bottle and I were good friends for a good proportion of that time. Only in the evenings, you understand, not during the day. I do like a drink; I'm not embarrassed about telling you. I still do, but that aside, nothing to do with it.

  “So, I was on my way home one night and I was desperate for a piss, so I pulled over up a side road and snuck behind a bush. There were a few houses along there, and a pub a bit further down, so the bush came in handy. Once I'd done my business and was zipping myself up, I heard voices. They were raised, like they were having an argument. I listened, and I recognised one of them. It was one of the McAllister brothers—Mac, the big guy. I wouldn't want to meet him in a dark alley. I couldn't tell what he was saying, but it was heated, sounded threatening. I stayed where I was to listen, keep out of his way. Since it was almost dark, I peered my head round to see what I could see.” King went quiet again, either reliving what he’d experienced that night, or wondering how much to tell Jack.

  “Go on,” Jack urged impatiently.

  “I can't be sure, exactly, but when I looked out, I could see the back of McAllister and he had somebody pushed up against the wall. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but I guess he was reminding him of who the boss was.”

  “And did you get a good look at who he had up against the wall?”

  “Well, I couldn't be one hundred percent sure. Like I say, it was almost dark. But I thought I knew who it was, although I wasn’t totally sure. I couldn't follow the guy, but it’s stuck with me all this time.”

  Jack tried again. “Who was it? Who did you think you saw?”

  “The foreman from the trial. I only caught a fleeting glimpse of him, but it would all fit, looking back. If McAllister had bought the foreman off, that guilty verdict would have worked well in his favour.”

  “And you didn't have enough evidence to go to the judge.” Jack was beginning to understand King’s predicament.

  “Correct. What could I do? Tell him I thought I saw something, but it was dark and I couldn't be sure? He was hardly going to call a mistrial or sack the foreman because someone may or may not have seen something, no matter who the person was.

  “So, when the verdict came back guilty, that was it, the end. Hardesty got sent down, and he should never have. Not for murder, anyway. Accidents happen, and even if he had a hand in that man's death, he didn't murder him. He didn't set out to do that. That was all fabricated after the fact.”

  “What about Maxine Keppel? Did you tell her?”

  “Of course I told her, and she said the same as what I've just said: we couldn’t really go to the judge without any evidence and with just a maybe. It was pointless. We had to just do our best from then on and hope we got Hardesty off.”

  “Are you still in touch with Maxine?”

  “No, our paths don't cross anymore now. I'm retired, spend all my time in here, though she still practices. She’s still a barrister.” Howard looked at Jack's mug. “You've not finished your tea,” he said. “You want a splash of malt in it?”

  Even though it would make it more palatable, Jack never drank during the day, not on duty. “Sorry, I guess I've had enough tea for one day, thanks,” he said, standing. “You’ve been really helpful. Thanks, Howard.” Howard nodded from his chair. “I'll see myself out,” Jack said, and headed back down the dreary passageway to the front door. He opened it and stood briefly on the step. The world smelled a whole lot sweeter than the air inside Howard King’s house. It was as if the man had imprisoned himself, the way he lived. In fact, the prison where Hardesty was residing smelled a good deal sweeter than King’s lounge, with that odd rustling in the log basket. He shuddered and pulled the door closed behind him, then wandered back to his car, deep in thought.

  “Poor sod,” Jack said out loud to himself.

  He was talking about Hardesty.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  When Dr Faye Mitchell was satisfied that the skeleton was laid out correctly on the gurney, the photographer stepped in and readied his camera. The remains of the body from the hole at the Simpsons’ old place, unlike many other skeletons they found, were complete. All the pieces had been retrieved; there was nothing missing. That was a plus, because one hand missing or the head missing or even a leg missing usually meant that the killer had tried to prevent identification. Even now, identification would be difficult unless there were any other distinguishing marks on the bones, and that was where a forensic anthropologist was required. Had the body been found earlier with flesh still intact, they might well have been able to find distinguishing features such as scars or tattoos, but in this particular case, they’d been far, far too late.

  On the gurney next to the bones lay the other items that had come from the makeshift grave—the remains of a pair of jeans, what looked like a short-sleeved cotton shirt, and workmen’s boots. There were no personal effects—no wallet, no watch, no telephone, nothing of any personal significance except a cufflink that had been recovered from the soil on top of the body. It had an eagle engraved on it.

  “Let's start, then, shall we, Quentin?” she said to the photographer. All the bones had been catalogued and measured; all the data written down in the report. The individual was male and five feet, nine inches tall. The skull was missing its second molar on the upper left side, and that fitted with the dental records of one Mr Desmond Taylor—the missing landscaper. At last, they could give him a name.

  “Can you get closeups of this please, Quentin?” she said, pointing to a visible fract
ure on the right temple. The photographer snapped away from various angles, taking pictures of the crack alongside a small tape measure to make it easy to see the length of it. There were some flaky parts around the crack that indicated something sharp-edged had hit Des Taylor's right temple.

  “There are no signs of callus formation or remodelling, so this injury was peri-mortem, around the time of his death. It hasn’t started to heal at all. Fractured skull by blunt force trauma, by some sort of instrument at the temple, is what killed Mr Taylor,” she said to Quentin. “It’s a linear fracture and, looking at the angle and damage around it, I’d say it was sustained from behind.” Quentin snapped away as Faye looked closer. “It’s not a typical depressed fracture. It’s not from a baseball bat or something similar. The marks are all wrong. And it’s not sharp force trauma, either, like you’d see in a machete injury. But I would say it was consistent with something in between, like the edge of a spade, possibly.”

  Satisfied that the skull could tell them no more, she carried on down through the vertebrae, the ribs, the pelvis and the rest of the bones of Des Taylor's body, examining each one for tiny nicks or prior breakages or anything else that could say what had happened to him. Apart from a broken ankle that had healed some years before, the only mark on Des Taylor's skeleton was the fracture at the temple—the cause of his death.

  When she was satisfied that the remains could tell her no more, she instructed Quentin to photograph each of the items of clothing so they could be used for further identification. Everything had to be logged, even though the dental records were a perfect match.

  It was coming up to lunchtime when they finished. Knowing that Jack and Amanda were anxiously awaiting her results, she went back to her desk and made the call before finalising her report. She dialled Amanda's number first, and she answered almost immediately.

  “Hello, Faye. What have you got for me?”

  “I'm good, thank you, Amanda. How are you?” She was being sarcastic. “No time for pleasantries today, then?” Faye asked.

  “Sorry. How are you, Faye? Are you well?”

  “I am, thanks, and yes, I have some news for you. It is Des Taylor. We confirmed it from his dental records, and everything else agrees with that. So that was a good guess; it made my job rather easy, for a change. And as you would expect, he didn’t die of natural causes but from blunt force trauma to the head. He had a fracture on his right temple from an object that was likely sharp on the edge. So, something like a spade.”

  “Right,” said Amanda, breathing out. She sounded a bit despondent even to her own ears. What had she been expecting? What had anyone been expecting? “That gives me something to work with. Thank you, Faye. Now I’ve just got to find out who killed Des Thomas. And who put him in the ground.”

  “One last thing. We found a single gold cufflink, with an eagle on it. Not actually in the grave with him, a little higher up in the soil. Maybe whoever was digging the hole, lost it after the initial coverage? Apart from the remains of his clothes, that was it.”

  “Interesting, thanks.”

  “I'll leave that with you, then,” said Faye struggling out of her lab coat while she held the phone with one hand. “It’s time for lunch.”

  “I don't know how you can eat lunch in your job,” said Amanda.

  “I've still got to eat, you know, and the skeletal remains of a dead body are a lot easier to eat lunch after than someone that's jumped off London Bridge. They make a bit of a mess of themselves. Not the prettiest way to go.”

  “Spare me the details,” said Amanda, “but I get your point. And thanks again,” she said, before hanging up.

  Amanda sat back in her swivel chair and nibbled on the index finger of her right hand, not something she did normally.

  “So, he was murdered, hit by a spade or something like it,” she said to herself out loud. “Now who could have done that? And why?”

  “I have no idea,” said Raj, coming up behind her. Amanda turned and looked at his handsome face. “Any idea where Jack is?” she asked.

  “Haven’t seen him all morning,” said Raj. “So that man who was dug up was murdered, possibly by a shovel?” He balanced himself on the edge of her desk, legs crossed, hands clasped and resting on his thighs. She spied his well-manicured fingernails; Raj always looked after himself. His appearance was obviously important to him, though she wouldn't call him vain. Perhaps his colleagues could take a lesson from him.

  “The timeline fits. Des Taylor was there digging a pond when the Simpsons were in residence, so I guess now we have to revisit and ask more questions. With Mrs Simpson dead, that only leaves Mr Simpson, and I've seen Jack's interview. There really wasn't anything there. I really do believe the man had no clue about this.”

  “So, what's next then?”

  “I'll tell you as soon as I know,” said Amanda.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Jack was almost back at the station when his phone rang. It was Amanda.

  “I'm nearly there now. Two minutes away,” he said, pre-empting her question of ‘Where are you?’ He was aware he had been incommunicado all morning. That wouldn't sit well with his boss. He hoped Japp hadn’t noticed too.

  “Right, thanks. I've got some news from Faye. It is Des Taylor in the morgue. She's confirmed it with his dental records, as well as his height and age. That's a positive ID.”

  “Great. That gives us something to work with. Anyway,” said Jack, “I'm not surprised, really. You always thought something had happened to the guy. I just figured he’d gone off and left his debts and his sister behind. I guess you were right all along.”

  “Question is, though, who killed him? Apparently, he’s got a hole in the side of his head by his right eye, so he was hit with something heavy and with a sharp edge.”

  “Did Faye say what she thought he could have been hit with?” He was casting his mind back to what he just seen at the Simpsons’ old place: a few odd tools lying about, though no workmen. Obviously, Des Taylor had been there originally, digging a hole, and would have had all his tools with him.

  “Well, she did mention a spade. What are you getting at, Jack?”

  “I don't know. I'm just thinking. I’ve just come back from the Simpsons’ old place. I'm thinking what tools you would use to dig a hole. What would be lying around for an opportunist?”

  “Well, he had a digger, but if you were whacked on the head by the side of a digger there probably wouldn't be much of your skull left.”

  “Exactly,” said Jack. “I wonder if a shovel or a garden fork would have done the trick, as Faye suggested?”

  “But surely Des would have seen that coming and defended himself? If you've got somebody stood in front of you with a shovel and they pick it up and swing it at your skull, unless your hands are tied behind your back, you’d lash out, probably put your hands out and stop it.” She paused. “Hang on a minute,” she said. “He was hit on his right temple, so that means two possibilities. One, that the person that hit him was left-handed.”

  Jack could see where she was going with this and interrupted her. “Or he was hit from behind, which would fit with your question of whether he would have seen it coming and stopped it. He didn't see it coming: he got whacked from behind by someone right-handed.”

  “Let's go over the timeline again,” she said. “Because if Des Taylor went missing on the day that he turned up for work, that's got to be the day he was killed. Stands to reason. I doubt somebody would keep him tied up in the shed and risk him getting out or calling attention to himself. But Madeline Simpson had said that he’d gone off in his car and never came back.”

  “Do you think she could have done it?” asked Jack, incredulous.

  “You know as well as I do it takes all sorts to do all types of things, so I'm not surprised at anything anymore in this job. Question is, if it was her, why? What was her motive?”

  “Whoever it was, whether it was Madeline or Gordon, how did they then bury the body? That digger wa
s there for ages, long after the funeral.”

  “I know. That's perplexing me too, because when we questioned her, that hole was still empty. We looked at it. So where was she, or whoever did it, storing him in the meantime?”

  “Was there anything else in the in the grave with him? His wallet or any other personal belongings?”

  “Faye mentioned a cufflink with an eagle engraved on it, but it wasn’t directly with the body apparently. It was in the dirt above him. She wondered if whoever was burying him, had lost it then.”

  “Odd. Well, I'm not far away now. Let's do as you say and look back at the timeline and who else could have been involved. Then maybe we can figure out where the hell the body was kept before they buried him.”

  “Maybe we need to look at Gordon's movements over those couple of days as well as Madeline’s. There’s one thing that is puzzling me,” said Amanda.

  “And what's that?” inquired Jack.

  “When Madeline had died, that digger was still sat there and that hole was still empty, and yet Des had been missing a few days by that stage. If Madeline had done something on her own, say, and stored the body in the garden shed, for example, surely somebody, Gordon perhaps, would have found it at a later date and wondered why it was there. Wouldn’t he?”

  “You would think so,” said Jack. “Unless the person who found the body was also in on it. They'd have had plenty of opportunity to use the digger and bury the body.”

  “Well, that poses another problem, then, because after the funeral, when they took that digger away, the driver himself filled the hole in, and there was no body in it then.”