by Tim Ellis
The call ended.
Chapter Three
Not only were Dixie and Hendrik working together, but they were also living and sleeping together. He didn’t care what they were getting up to, just so long as they were working on the mystery of the deceased Commander Anthony Baker of the Metropolitan Police Service, who had come back from the dead and was now calling himself Samuel Henchel, and appeared to be playing happy families with Dark’s wife and two daughters at 17 Underbarrow Road, Kendal in the Lake District.
He recalled Baker’s obituary from the Dartmouth Chronicle, that Dixie had shown him and the photograph, which definitely resembled Samuel Henchel:
Anthony Baker, 45
Anthony Michael Baker, 45, of Vicarage Hill, Dartmouth, Devon, passed away on March 15, 2013 following a short illness. The funeral service, which will be restricted to relatives only, will be held on March 30, 2013 at St Martin’s Church, followed by a private cremation. Anthony was a Commander with the Metropolitan Police Service. He was single, and leaves no surviving family or relatives.
He had no idea what the hell was going on, but with the help of Hendrik and Dixie he planned to find out.
When he entered the pub, he found Lake surrounded by a group of male admirers who had her backed up against a wall.
He shouldered his way into the circle. ‘What are you doing, Lake?’
‘I was asking these gentlemen . . .’
‘My advice is to keep your sex life separate from the job.’ He looked around the men. ‘Get lost.’
The men laughed and looked at each other.
A bulky man with ginger-hair and a plague of freckles pushed himself forward like a boxer and said, ‘There’s five of us and only one of you.’
The others nodded. ‘Yeah.’
He wasn’t worried. Stupidity loved company. Five would go down just as easily as one. He held out his Warrant Card as if it was the Cross of Jerusalem. ‘You heard me – get lost, before you end up fighting for your life in police custody.’
They glanced at each other and then shuffled away.
‘There was no need for that,’ Lake said. ‘I had it under control.’
‘You had nothing under control. It’s a good job I arrived when I did. Another five minutes and you’d have been standing there naked. So, how many people have you shown our victim’s picture to?’
‘I was just about to . . .’
‘This is what I’m talking about, Constable. Partners are rubbish. I give you one simple task and you can’t even do that right.’
‘And just when I was beginning to think that there might be another side to you.’
‘Wishful thinking on your part, Lake. The only side to me is the dark side. Now, I suggest you go and do what I sent you in here to do, and forget all about your sex life until we’ve solved the case.’
She barged her way past him and snaked her way through the crowds to the other end of the pub.
He walked up to the bar.
A young barman with a swatch of streaked brown-blond hair hanging down over his eyes approached. ‘What’ll it be?’
‘Tomato juice with Worcester sauce, please.’
The barman nodded.
Service was quick and slick.
‘Seen him before?’ he said, showing the man his Warrant Card and the picture of the victim on his phone.
‘This is the dead guy found in the canal earlier, is it?’
‘Well?’
The barman stared at the picture and slowly shook his head. ‘No, sorry.’
‘Can you ask the other staff to come and take a look?’
‘We’re a bit busy.’
‘You won’t be busy if I close the place down.’
He pulled a face, wandered up the bar and directed the other staff to come and take a look at the picture.
None of them recognised the man.
Dark finished his tomato juice, and shuffled from group to group, table to table showing the picture to the clientele, but no one recognised the victim.
Lake met him near the door. ‘No one knows him.’
‘Okay, let’s go.’
‘I thought we were having a drink?’
‘I’ve already had one.’
‘I haven’t.’
‘You should have thought about that while you were busy organising your sex life instead of focusing on what you were meant to be doing. Your apprenticeship hasn’t got off to much of a start, Lake.’ He stood back to let a couple enter, and then made his way out into the freezing night.
‘I’m wondering whether this apprenticeship is worth it,’ Lake said from behind him.
‘And me. But I’m not a quitter. We shook on the deal, so we both have responsibilities. You can quit if you want to, but then that will be down to you, not me. Are you ready to quit?’
Her jaw set hard. ‘No.’
‘Well, stop complaining about the working conditions then and do your job.’
They could hear the water from the River Goyt as they continued down the hill, over the bridge and into Town Street.
After showing the drawing of the victim to punters in the noisy Wellington pub that had live music blaring away, then the Maple Leaf Chinese restaurant, and not finding a single person who recognised the reconstructed face Dark said, ‘Let’s call it a night.’
‘Are you sure? There are more places open down there,’ she said, pointing along the street.
‘We’ll get to them tomorrow. First thing in the morning, I want you to organise pictures of the victim with the confidential contact number on them to be displayed in Marple and Marple Bridge. When we get here tomorrow, people will have had time to think about whether they recognise him or not.’
‘If he’s from around here.’
‘I think he is.’
‘It’s not looking that way so far.’
‘Maybe the drawing isn’t that accurate.’
After walking back up the hill to the lock, Dark was breathing heavily and his legs felt as though they belonged to someone twice his age.
‘You should get yourself one of those mobility scooters,’ Lake suggested.
He ignored her. ‘Go and tell Inspector Williams that we want his team to search the canal on both sides of the lock.’
‘Giving me all the dirty jobs?’
‘That’s another thing about partners, especially female partners, they moan all the time. Jobs are jobs. Someone has to do them. You’re the apprentice, so you get to do them. It would be a lot simpler and quicker doing the jobs myself, but then what would be the point of having an apprentice if I did that?’
She turned on her heel and stomped off again.
Bloody partners! He wished he’d simply ignored her when she’d turned up. He’d given her a chance, but she’d fallen at the first hurdle. Well, if she didn’t share his work ethic, then she was no good to him.
‘BURROWS?’
‘Here, Sir.’ She came hurrying towards him out of the darkness.
‘What’s going on?’
‘The body is on its way to the mortuary at Wythenshawe.’
‘Have you found anything?’
‘No, Sir.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Sorry, Sir.’
‘Okay. Lake is just informing Inspector Williams that I want the canal searched both sides of the lock. Do you know if the canal has a current?’
‘No, there’s no current. The canal is manmade. The only movement of water is as a result of the draining and re-filling of the locks, and the passage of the narrowboats.’
‘How do you know that, Burrows?’
‘I checked earlier.’
‘Well, the body could have been dumped in the canal further up and then been dragged into the lock by a narrowboat, couldn’t it?’
‘Anything is possible, I suppose.’
‘But not likely?’
‘It’s your call, Sir.’
‘Yes, it is.’
Lake returned. ‘You were right, they’re not happy.�
��
‘They’re not here to enjoy themselves. Right, I’m going home.’
‘Am I going home as well?’
‘Somebody has to stay here, Lake.’
‘Somebody being the apprentice?’
‘I’m impressed with the speed at which you’re learning. Call me if the situation changes. I’ll meet you at Bootle Street in the morning at eight o’clock.’
She checked her watch. ‘It’s nearly midnight now.’
‘Thanks for the time check.’
***
Thursday, January 16
It was twenty past midnight by the time he arrived at Flat 2A, 33 Woodhouse Lane in Gawsworth, Macclesfield and knocked on the door.
He saw an eye appear at the spy-hole, heard a key turning in the lock and then the door opened.
‘Hello, Mister Dark,’ Hendrik said, stepping to one side to let him in. He still had the Mohican hairstyle, but it wasn’t as pronounced as it had been when Dark had first met him on Christmas day last year. Maybe Dixie had told him to grow it out. He still had his piercings in though. There were three black spikes criss-crossed in the top of his left ear; black circular earrings in both of his earlobes; a silver ring through his left nostril; an arrow through his left eyebrow and a silver stud in his tongue.
‘Morning, Hendrik.’
‘Yeah, I suppose it is morning.’
The door closed behind him.
He shrugged out of his overcoat, hung it up with others on a hook on the wall and walked through into the living room. It was a bit tidier than the last time he’d been here, but not by much. The floor was oak wood laminate. An orange rug had appeared from somewhere. There was a large oak-framed mirror over the ornamental cast-iron fireplace. On the right, a patio door led out to a small balcony. The coffee table in front of the sofa was walnut, and the chest of drawers against the back wall was mahogany – neither matched the oak flooring. The two-seater sofa and armchairs were upholstered in a tired burgundy red. There was a large-screen television in the left-hand corner of the room that Hendrik had connected up to the rest of his computer equipment that was stacked on a six-foot table, and the sofa had been turned around to face the two walls that were being used as display boards.
‘It’s about time you got here,’ Dixie said.
‘I’m here when I said I’d be here - after midnight. You look like shit.’
‘Thanks.’
‘She won’t stop, Mister Dark,’ Hendrik said. ‘I keep telling her to stop, but she won’t.’
‘She suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder, Hendrik. She needs to see someone. You need to get her some help.’
Dixie paced up and down in front of the two walls. ‘Why don’t you two talk about me as if I’m not here.’
‘Half the time you’re not here, Dixie,’ he said. ‘You’re obsessing over whatever story you’re writing.’
She let out a strangled laugh. There were dark rings under her eyes, she was pale and her hands were trembling. ‘I’ll be all right. Once we’ve solved these mysteries I’ll be fine. It’s just . . .’
‘You said that when we were looking for the missing care home children, and yet here we are again in front of your walls talking about your life spiralling down the plughole.’
‘No, that’s not the way it is.’
‘That’s exactly the way it is, Dixie.’
Behind her, in the centre of the left-hand wall, was a map encompassing Buxton, Macclesfield, Knutsford and Congleton. Coloured map pins with matching string tied around them had been pushed into seven addresses in the map. The head of each map pin had a date written on it. At the other end of the string was another map pin pushed into the corner of an obituary.
There were also newspaper reports; photographs; telephone numbers; bank account details and passwords; a list of clues; colour-coded post-it notes; drawings; a mishmash of other photographs; statements . . . The whole wall was like an unfinished mosaic, a montage, a patchwork quilt.
She smoothed out an imaginary crease in a newspaper article, straightened a length of string and pushed down the corner of a post-it note that had begun to curl up. ‘No, no. I’ll be all right. I feel good. I’m eating, I’m sleeping, Hendrik and I are having lots of wild sex. I feel good.’
He looked at Hendrik who shook his head.
‘It’s getting worse, Mister Dark.’
Dixie snarled at him. ‘Call yourself a man? You’re a sheep in wolf’s clothing. I ought to throw you out into the street like a homeless person.’
Dark stared at her. She really was in a bad way. ‘I’m going to take it all away, Dixie.’
‘I have a gun.’
‘She hasn’t got a gun, Mister Dark.’
‘Hendrik is going to take you to the doctors today. If you don’t go, and you don’t follow the doctor’s instructions - I’ll strip your walls bare and you’ll never see what’s on them ever again.’
‘You wouldn’t?’
‘You know I would.’
She crumpled to her knees, covered her face with her hands and began sobbing.
Hendrik went and held her. ‘You know he’s right, Dixie. You can’t carry on like this. You’re ill. You need help. I’m worried about you. I’ll take you to the doctors in the morning and we’ll see what they have to say.’
‘All right. If I have to. You’ll come with me?’
‘Of course.’
‘You won’t leave me when they say I’m a crazy bitch, will you?’
‘They won’t say you’re crazy. You’re not crazy. You just need a little bit of help to put things in perspective. Everything in moderation, that’s what the experts say.’
‘We’re agreed then?’ Dark said.
Dixie nodded.
Hendrik kissed her on the forehead.
‘Do you want to tell me why I’ve travelled all this way then? And also, why there are two walls covered in crap instead of the usual one?’
Dixie stood up and hugged the left-hand wall. ‘This is my next story.’
‘Which is?’
‘You know that I found the obituary for Commander Anthony Baker in the Dartmouth Chronicle?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, when I was trying to find out about him, I stumbled on something totally unrelated that I thought might make an interesting story.’
‘Oh?’
‘A seventy-three-year-old woman called Olga Bloch – a Polish heiress – was found dead under the table in her kitchen at Fairfield in Buxton six months ago.’ She pointed to an obituary, which also had an accompanying photograph of a thin wrinkled old woman with silver hair. ‘At the time, her doctor decided that she’d died of natural causes, because she was undergoing treatment for a number of illnesses. However, a couple of weeks later, a mortician at the funeral directors where she was being embalmed, found a small circular wound at the back of her head that wasn’t meant to be there.’ She pointed to a labelled diagram of the back of a skull to illustrate the wounds’ location. ‘It was just below the occipital bone and hidden by the hair. The police were notified. A post-mortem was carried out, and the pathologist discovered that the wound was the point of entry for a thin metal spike similar to a barbecue skewer – she’d been murdered.’ She pointed to a side-on diagram of the skull, which had been overlaid with a barbecue skewer to illustrate the course and direction of the wound. ‘The killer pushed the spike upwards – at a forty-five degree angle – and into her brain to a depth of about five inches. She probably would have had no idea she was even dead. Anyway, the police investigated, and found that her bank account had been emptied the day before her death . . .’
‘How much was in her account?’
She checked the news article. ‘Seven hundred thousand pounds.’
‘A sum worth killing for, I suppose.’
‘Well, although the police know when, how and probably why she was murdered, they don’t know who her killer was.’
‘In my experience, it’s usually a family member.’
> ‘She had no family. The taxman was due to get all her money.’
‘Then follow the money.’
‘That’s what we plan to do.’
‘Okay, what about the other six obituaries that you’ve stuck on your wall?’
‘I looked through hundreds of recent deaths and found them. They all died of natural causes; they all had no family to leave anything to, and as a consequence they would all have been subject to the law of bona vacantia – vacant goods, or ownerless property, which means it all passes to the Crown. The Treasury Solicitor acts for the Crown to administer the estates of people who die intestate.’
‘And were they all murdered?’
‘We don’t know yet.’
‘And did they all have money taken from their accounts?’
‘We don’t know that either.’
‘So, you have one old lady who was murdered for her money, and from that you believe there’s a serial killer on the loose who’s preying on old people with no relatives and helping himself to their money?’
‘We’re just doing some research at the moment, aren’t we, Hendrik?’
‘That’s right, Mister Dark. You know that Dixie has a nose for a story.’
He nodded. ‘I’ll go along with that. So, how did you find out that Olga Bloch’s money had been stolen from her account before her death?’
Dixie tapped the newspaper article. ‘It says so here.’
‘And how do you propose to find out about the money belonging to the other deceased old people?’
‘You don’t want to know that, Mister Dark.’
‘I thought so. You’re going to hack into their bank accounts, aren’t you?’
‘On the advice of my solicitor I decline to comment,’ Hendrik said.
‘Yeah but,’ Dixie interrupted. ‘We’re just looking. It’s not as if we’re stealing anything, is it?’
‘It’s still against the law.’
‘So is murder. So is stealing people’s money.’
‘Okay, let me ask you this?’
‘What?’
‘If the person had taken the money from Olga Bloch’s account – why kill her? When he’s caught, he’ll be charged with murder instead of fraud.’
