‘Hello again, sir,’ the agent said awkwardly approaching Deans. ‘Miranda will be with you very shortly.’
The agent backed away with a low bow.
Deans smiled. They obviously did not get many visits from the cops.
Not long after, a woman walked into the room from the rear part of the building.
‘Hello,’ she said. Her voice was flat, like Deans was interrupting her from important business. ‘My name is Miranda Small. I am the manager.’
Deans placed his designer cup and saucer onto the small glass table, stood from the comfort of the sofa and shook her hand.
‘Would you care to come with me, please?’ she said and walked back the way she had come.
‘How can I help?’ she asked, leading Deans up a narrow flight of winding stairs to a pristinely tidy first floor office.
Even though the window was open, Deans could smell the remnants of a recently smoked cigarette.
‘I’m interested in one of your properties from a recent sale,’ Deans said, following her pointed arm to a chair opposite her desk, which he took with a smile and a nod.
She shook her head and placed both hands flat onto the desk. ‘I’m sorry, why should the police be interested in that?’
‘I’m merely following a line of enquiry,’ Deans said. ‘Please be assured there is nothing you or the company need be concerned with.’
Her mouth twitched and nearly broke into a smile… nearly. It was obvious she was hoping for more information. She wasn’t going to get it.
‘Well… alright,’ she said eventually, taking her own seat. ‘Where exactly are we talking?’
‘The Willows, Bathwick,’ Deans said and noticed her eyes flicker and narrow a little at the corners.
Ms Small leaned back in her seat.
‘You know the house?’ Deans asked. He already had that answer loud and clear.
The manager looked away and shuffled her bottom in the chair. ‘Yes…’ she said moving her hands behind the desk and into her lap. ‘I know The Willows.’
‘What can you tell me?’ Deans asked.
She twitched and blinked rapidly. ‘It was a straightforward sale,’ she replied down to her desk. ‘No hiccups and certainly no issues that we were made aware of by any party involved in the transaction.’
Deans smiled and waited a beat before speaking. ‘I’m interested in the sale: who the vendors were, where they are now, and how I can get hold of them?’
‘Um, I’m not sure I can—’
‘No one is in trouble,’ Deans interrupted. ‘But I must trace them and this appears to be the only way.’
The manager frowned. ‘Well, have you not considered asking the new occupiers?’
Deans matched her concerned features. ‘I would have,’ he said, ‘had they still been alive.’ He gave her an uncompromising stare.
After a few seconds she stood up from the chair. ‘I’ll find the portfolio,’ she said and left the room.
‘Okay, how can I help?’ she asked returning only seconds later. She was clutching a beige folio file pressed tightly into her body.
‘Firstly, when did the exchange take place?’ Deans said, his day-book open and his pen at the ready.
The manager got herself comfortable in her chair and opened the cover. She cleared her throat as she turned the pages.
‘September the fifteenth. Friday,’ she said peering at Deans over the top of the folder.
‘Sold by?’ Deans asked.
‘The executor was Samantha Fenwick,’ the manager replied with a flat tone and without looking at the information contained within the folder.
Deans squinted. ‘Executor… she didn’t live there?’
‘Actually, I believe she did,’ the manager said. She was acting on behalf of her father, who as I understand now lives in a care home.’
Deans looked down at his day-book. He had picked up on a tinge of attitude in the manager’s tone.
‘Can you let me have the contact details of the vendor, please?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ she replied.
‘Thanks,’ Deans said looking at her directly in the eye. Something though, was clearly amiss. ‘Anything else about the sale – how much did it go for?’
The manager shifted uncomfortably in her seat and looked away.
Here we go. He lowered his pen and smiled.
He watched her fiddle with the pages of the folder. He could tell she was not reading any of the content.
‘Well… this property was unusual for us to take.’ She looked up at Deans.
He signalled for her to continue.
‘Not the bricks and mortar,’ she said. ‘In fact to have a complete house of this kind, in its original form and in that locality is our specialty.’ She brushed invisible lint from her jacket lapel, straightened herself in the seat and wiped the front of her jacket again. ‘But not at that price.’
‘Go on,’ Deans prompted.
She turned away briefly and then looked back. ‘We put the property on for four hundred and ninety-five thousand pounds.’
‘And what did it fetch?’ Deans asked.
‘Four hundred and ninety-five thousand pounds.’
Her neck stiffened, and she looked along her nose at Deans. ‘On the first day.’
Deans shrugged. ‘And?’
The manager drew a controlled breath. ‘That was a nine hundred and fifty thousand pound property.’
Deans nodded. ‘I guessed it was pricey from my visit there. Why so cheap?’ he asked.
‘The vendor… the vendor was adamant in her mind that the property should sell with immediacy. I must say, against our best attempts to dissuade her,’ the manager said.
‘Why do you suppose that was?’ Deans asked quietly, leaning in closer to the desk. A little body language technique – they were now sharing a secret.
The manager’s eyes were free from explanation. ‘I really don’t know,’ she said.
‘How did the buyer pay?’ Deans asked.
‘Cash – outright,’ the manager said without looking at the file.
‘Lucky them,’ Deans jibed. ‘How much mortgage did the vendor owe?’
The manager shook her head. ‘Um—’
‘I’m not recording this information anywhere,’ Deans said. ‘Just for my benefit it would be useful to know?’
The manager covered her mouth with her long slender fingers. ‘None, to the best of my knowledge.’
Deans sucked in through his teeth. Now, he had two dead bodies, an expensive house sold for half the market value and an increasingly unsettled feeling about the investigation.
Was he ready for this?
Chapter 5
‘Hello.’ The phone was answered in a dozy and slurred response.
‘Good evening,’ Deans said. ‘Is this Samantha Fenwick?’
‘Um… yeah.’
‘My name is Andy Deans. I’m a detective with Falcon Road Criminal Investigation Department. I’m sorry to trouble you, there is nothing to worry about. I just need to ask you a few questions about your time at The Willows in Bathwick, if I may?’
A faint groan filled the earpiece, followed by a short pause.
‘Why, what’s this about?’ she mumbled.
‘I’d rather see you in person,’ Deans said.
‘See me?’ She sounded confused.
‘Yes. Are you free for me to come by this evening?’ Deans asked.
‘Not really.’
‘This is important, Mrs Fenwick.’
‘Well, you tell me what it’s about and I will see if I am available.’ Her words were barely coherent.
Deans slapped his pen onto his day-book. ‘Look, I need to speak with you regarding your time at The Willows, that’s all.’
There was no reply.
‘Hello,’ Deans said impatiently.
‘Well, how long will it take?’
‘I can’t say, Mrs Fenwick, but probably only a few minutes.’
‘Miss.’
&nb
sp; ‘Sorry?’
‘You keep calling me Mrs. I’m a Miss. Miss Fenwick.’
‘My apologies, Miss Fenwick. So, can I say I will see you this evening?’
‘I suppose so. Are you coming to me?’
‘Yes, that would be no problem at all. Where do you live?’
‘Travis Street flats.’
Deans recoiled. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘And the number?’
‘Thirty-seven,’ she replied – though it sounded more like thirzeven.
‘Shall we say at six p.m. tonight, then?’
Deans waited eagerly for her reply.
‘Okay,’ she finally said.
Deans ended the call and, confused, stared at her address in his day-book.
All the local cops knew Travis Street Flats. Some spent more time there than in their own homes. For a time in the early nineties, it had been a no go zone, especially if you were solo crewed. Two police cars and four officers was a minimum: two officers to deal with whatever was happening, and the other unit to prevent the unoccupied police car from being trashed. These days the council housed the unfortunates within its walls – the smack and piss-heads and incumbent bone-idle. It was certainly not the address of someone that up until recently had resided in the relative opulence of The Willows. Such a change in circumstances seemed inconceivable.
Deans interrogated the police intelligence systems. It was clear as he read the data that Miss Fenwick was one of the few Travis residents that had not received a visit from the police in recent times – a remarkable achievement in itself. Maybe that accounted for her reluctance to see him; her head was buried so deep in the sand, the crazy world she co-inhabited simply span around her arse.
But a big question stuck in Deans’ mind: what happened to the four hundred and ninety-five grand?
Deans arrived ten minutes early. From the outside, the flats appeared relatively modern, faced in the familiar, buttery Bath sandstone. The building sprawled over three storeys, with a maze of stairwells, a number of different entrances and no clear order to the room numbering.
Deans went to the recognised ‘main entrance’, buzzed 37 on the wall-mounted intercom, and waited with an ear tuned to the small perforated stainless steel box.
‘Alright, officer?’ a voice came from behind him.
Deans turned to see a young man with the generic appearance of one of the residents, sporting a smart-arsed grin on his face as if he had just exposed a secret agent in the midst of a clandestine operation.
Deans wasn’t wearing a uniform, but cops stood out in a place like this.
‘Alright, mate,’ Deans replied, as the youth scuttled off, digging a hand into the pocket of his grubby light-grey tracksuit bottoms – held up around his upper thighs by a magic force of nature.
No doubts, this shit-bag was the drumbeater; the filth are about.
‘Hello?’ a weary voice sounded through the intercom speaker.
‘Miss Fenwick, it’s Andy Deans from the CID. We spoke earlier.’
He heard a buzz and a click and tugged at the door to let him inside the building.
If the flats looked tidy from the outside, they looked a dreadful mess from within its walls. The floors were scuffed and dirty. The walls were peeling beneath the mosaic of colourful stains. The general odour was the same as any other doss-house, or public toilet frequented by the ne’er-do-wells of society – a subtle blend of months’ old body sweat, cannabis, urine, vomit, alcohol and excrement. If Dior bottled it, Wretch or Heave would make a suitable branding.
Deans made his way up to the next level, carefully avoiding any wet patches on the floor.
He went along two false corridors before finally coming to number thirty-seven. At least this one still had an intact number on the door.
He knocked loudly on the door and waited.
After thirty more seconds, he tapped again, and this time lifted the letterbox and called out. ‘Miss Fenwick, it’s Andy Deans.’
He waited some more and then heard the sound of a key being turned, followed by another, and then a sliding bolt.
The door started to open inward, but then stopped abruptly to the twang of a security chain at full tension.
A pair of sluggish eyes appeared in the opening and looked out, but not directly at him.
Deans held his warrant badge in front of his chin and angled himself to be within her line of sight.
‘Hello, Miss Fenwick. I am Andy Deans. Can I come in, please?’
She blinked with painful slowness, and after a tortuous ten seconds raised her brows in recognition of who he was.
The door closed. The security chain rattled, and the door opened to its fullest extent.
‘May I come in?’ Deans asked after a moment, hovering at the threshold to the door.
Miss Fenwick laboured a wave, inviting Deans inside, and replaced each security measure in an excruciating and uncoordinated display of why not to touch heroin.
She slouched through the narrow hallway without a spoken word and moved into an area that could just about be described as a living room.
Deans followed silently behind her.
The windows were blacked out with thick drapes and two small table lamps dimly lit the room with rouge coloured shading.
Miss Fenwick placed herself down in an armchair in front of a battered pine coffee table, upon which, numerous bottles of cheap cider, Rizla papers, cigarette tabs and general crap was randomly spread.
The room was a disaster zone, but Deans had seen worse. One bonus though: at least she did not appear to have pets. Less poo for him to step in.
This is going to be hard work.
‘Miss Fenwick,’ he said. ‘Thank you for seeing me.’
She did not react.
‘The reason I have asked to see you, is to chat to you about your time living at The Willows.’
She turned lethargically towards him and squinted through watery, black eyes. Her wiry, grey hair took on a witch-like rose hue from the lamp light behind her.
‘The Willows,’ she gargled, and her face attempted a smile.
‘How long did you live there?’ Deans asked. He had not bothered to open his day-book, and his pen was still deep inside his suit jacket pocket.
‘All my life,’ she said eventually.
‘Do you mind if I ask your age?’
‘Fifty-one.’
Fuck me, another good reason not to use heroin. She did not look a day over seventy.
‘And how long have you lived here?’ Deans asked looking around the room.
She raised a clawed hand towards her forehead and held it there for a moment.
‘Since we sold The Willows,’ she slurred.
‘We?’ Deans repeated. ‘You just said, “We sold”. Who did you live there with?’
‘Dad,’ her throat crackled.
‘And is he still around, may I ask?’
She did not answer.
Deans noticed her head gradually drooping as if she was falling asleep.
‘Miss Fenwick. Is your father still alive?’
‘Um…Yeah,’ she mumbled down to her chest.
‘Where does he live now?’ Deans asked. He could see her lids becoming heavy. He checked his watch. ‘Miss Fenwick, where is he now?’
‘Care home,’ she garbled.
‘Care home? How long has he been living in a care home?’
One of her dirty talons scratched the corner of her forehead.
‘Two…’ she slurred.
‘Two what… months?’
She started to cackle and her head dropped back as if it was only prevented from rolling off her shoulders by the connecting skin between her chest and her ears.
‘Who looks after the proceeds from the estate?’ Deans asked loudly. His lips were tightening.
She rocked her head back and forth and momentum brought it upright again. Her beady eyes sought out a cider bottle on the table and she dragged it towards her. ‘I do,’ she said.
Christ!
/> He watched her struggle with the ballast in the bottom of the plastic bottle, as it got closer to her lips.
‘Is your mother still around?’ he asked.
‘Dead,’ she replied quickly.
‘Brothers, sisters?’
She waited until she finished her mouthful of cider before answering.
‘Nope.’
Deans rubbed his face. ‘Your mother – was she buried, cremated?’
Miss Fenwick groaned and chuckled quietly. ‘Buried,’ she eventually replied.
‘Where is she buried?’ Deans asked.
Miss Fenwick forced her head up to peer at Deans. ‘It’s not Mum,’ she spluttered.
Deans shook his head. ‘What’s not Mum?’
‘The reason you are here.’ Miss Fenwick kept staring at Deans. ‘It’s not Mum,’ she repeated.
‘Why am I here?’ Deans asked, narrowing his gaze.
She leaned forward with a groan and directed more cider towards her lips.
‘Charlie,’ she said between gulps.
‘Charlie,’ Deans mirrored.
‘Char-lie,’ she repeated as if Deans had not understood her the first time.
Deans scrunched up his face. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about?’
Miss Fenwick hugged the bottle of cider to her bosom and formed a self-satisfied half-smile.
‘The ghost,’ she said after a few more seconds.
Deans felt his scalp creep. He did not move. Did not speak, and he realised he was holding his breath.
‘What ghost?’
‘Char-lie,’ she repeated.
Yeah, I get that, you skanky old crow.
‘Who is Charlie? And please, don’t say “the ghost”.’
‘He won’t like you being there,’ she said, partaking in more alcohol.
‘Who, your dad?’
Miss Fenwick spluttered and chuckled with barely the energy to force air beyond her lips.
Deans huffed and checked his watch again.
‘What am I doing here?’ he mumbled beneath his breath and peered at the pathetic individual sharing his air.
‘I will have to speak with your dad,’ he said.
She shrugged, or at least that was how the small movement in her shoulder appeared to Deans.
‘Which care home did you say he was in?’ Deans asked.
The Detective Deans Mystery Collection Page 30
