Unusual Remains

by Oliver Davies

  “Ms Renner, sir. She’s no longer at the hotel.”

  Temper lost. My hand curled into a fist, and I pinched the bridge of my nose with my other.

  “Where the bloody hell,” I grit through my teeth, “has she gone?”

  “According to the hotel landlord, she left in a very sleek car about an hour or so ago. He took down the number plate for us,” she said, “in case we needed it.”

  “Clever man. Run the numbers,” I ordered, making to push past her back upstairs.

  “I have.” She pulled out a sheet of paper. “It’s why I almost charged into you earlier. The car is registered to Mrs Sophia Johnson.”

  “Mr Johnson’s wife?”

  “That’s the one, sir. Here’s their address.” She handed me the paper, gave a curt nod and retreated back from the smell of chemicals and the mildly deranged look of Dr Crowe, who did, rather look like she’d been electrocuted today. The weather, I suspected. And the way she was clutching her coffee, not unlike Gollum. God help whoever tried to pry that from her hands.

  “Sir?” Mills called my attention back to him.

  “Get the car going, Mills. I’ll be with you in two.”

  He nodded, marching out to the car. I thanked Lena and took off back upstairs. Jeannie was still in the office, spinning my chair.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to get it back to how it was,” she grumbled.

  “We’re going out, stay here.”

  “Yes, boss. Oh! Thatch,” she waved me still, and I paused, impatient, “look,” she pointed to Mills’s desk, to the stacks of documents she’d been working through.

  “What is that?”

  “License from the reservation association. Proof,” she said bluntly, “that he was building allotments.”

  I snatched it, stuffed it in my pocket and grabbed her face. “You are brilliant,” I told her, kissing her quickly and took off outside, running down to the car, idly waiting. I slid into the car, slamming the door, and Mills took off.

  “Jeannie found a document from the allotment company confirming Hughes’s intentions,” I told him. “We have proof on that count.”

  “Finally. How do you want to take this sir?”

  “We’ll head to the house. Hopefully, they’ll both be there.”

  “Of not?”

  “No bother yet. I want to speak to Mrs Sophia Johnson.”

  Mills glanced at me in the mirror. “About what?”

  “About her husband. What else?”

  The Johnsons unsurprisingly lived in a very nice house. On the outskirts of the city, surrounded by tall hedges and trees, the old brick house stood handsomely against the grey sky. Neatly kept gardens and a weed-free driveway.

  We got out of the car, Mills following me to the front door. I pulled on the bell and looked at him over my shoulder.

  “Got your notepad?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Take notes.”

  “On what?”

  “All of it.”

  The door opened, Sophia Johnson looking out at us. Her brown hair was swept up in a ponytail, her clothes simple, but expensive.

  “Detective Thatcher, was it?”

  “Yes. Hello, Mrs Johnson, forgive our intrusion. This is Detective Sergeant Mills. I was wondering if we could come in?”

  “My husband isn’t home.”

  “It was you, actually, I was hoping to talk to.”

  She blinked, but stood aside and let us in. Mills let out an impressed sigh as we were led through the gleaming white foyer, the floor tiled and the ceiling tall into the kitchen. It had all the look of a country house, a large Aga, a long wooden table, but none of the feel. It was too new, too clean and crisp. She waved to the table, and we sat as she cleared a few things away, hovering slightly.

  “Tea?”

  “No, thank you.”

  Sophia Johnson nodded and sat opposite us, her eyes drifting over Mills to me.

  “What can I help you with?”

  “We understand that Ms Cynthia Renner is no longer a resident at her previous hotel.”

  “No. Not the sort of place you would want to stay for too long, and they were losing business letting her stay there.”

  “Your car was identified as the one that picked her up from the hotel.”

  “My car?”

  “Was it you who went to pick her up?”

  She paused, absentmindedly toying with the gold band around her ring finger,

  “No. My car’s better suited for going out into the countryside, but my husband borrowed it.”

  “Is she staying here?”

  “For a little while. He, we,” she corrected herself quickly, “thought it would be a welcome change from the hotel.”

  “Perfectly understandable. Very good-natured of you.”

  She smiled, a small, unfeeling smile and dropped her hands.

  “Is she currently here?”

  “No.”

  “Do you know where she is?”

  “She went into the office with my husband.”

  “They’re both there now?”

  “As far as I’m aware.”

  “Does your husband often borrow your car, Mrs Johnson?”

  “Not usually,” she said slowly, “but quite regularly, these past weeks.”

  “Do you know where he goes?”

  “He goes to look at properties.”

  “Mrs Johnson,” I leant on the table, pleading with her, “on the night of the fifth, you said that your husband was home with you all evening. I’d like to know if that was also the case two days ago.”

  “Two days ago?”

  “Yes.”

  “All night?”

  “All night, Mrs Johnson.”

  She sat back in her chair and sighed heavily, closing her eyes briefly.

  “Business hasn’t been going all that well for him,” she said quietly, “for a few years now, he’s been struggling to keep his head up. It’s me that pays for most of this,” she waved around the kitchen, “but for a few months now he’s been hopeful. Keeps saying that business is going to go right again, that he has insider knowledge, whatever that means, about other people. Other businessmen.”

  “Businessmen like Samuel Hughes?”

  She nodded.

  “Information, that he might have been receiving from someone close to Mr Hughes, close to his business.”

  “I think so.”

  “Someone like Ms Renner?”

  She nodded again, “his concern for her wellbeing, it’s not usual for him to care that much about a stranger. I thought,” she shook her head, “I thought maybe there was something going on there, but no.”

  “Romantically, you mean?”

  “I’m sure everyone worries about that from time to time.”

  “But you don’t think it is romantic?”

  “No. I think it’s business.”

  “She was feeding information from Mr Hughes?”

  “That’s a terrible thing to say about your husband, isn’t it?”

  “Saying it, is not a bad thing, Sophia. Doing it, that’s what bad.”

  She looked up and met my eyes and something in her face resolved itself. “He was late home, on the night of the fifth.”

  Mills sat up straight.

  “He’s usually never late home, and he always calls first. I was doing steak, and that usually gets him home early, if anything.”

  “But this time, he was late?”

  “Yes.”

  “And he didn’t call?”

  “No. Until he was in the car, said he’d be home in ten minutes.”

  “And what time would this have been, Sophia?”

  “Around half seven, quarter to eight maybe.”

  “Did he tell you what kept him?”

  “Said something came up in the office. Business.”

  “Why didn’t you mention this before?”

  “Because if I admitted that he was home several hours late, I’
d have to admit why.”

  “You thought he was having an affair?” I asked gently.

  She nodded and squared her shoulders. “I wanted to deal with that myself, before letting anyone else in.”

  “It’s your private life. That’s again, very understandable. But you don’t think that anymore?”

  “No. I don’t.”

  “And two nights ago?”

  “He was out all night. Said he was going to play poker with some of the lads. Goes about once a month. They have few drinks, and he stays over, most of them do. Sometimes they have it here.”

  “I see.”

  “I thought nothing of it until you asked.” Her voice was shaky. “Has he done something wrong?”

  “That’s what we’re trying to understand, Mrs Johnson.”

  She got up, pacing over to the window with her arms wrapped around herself,

  “He was annoyed that Hughes got the land,” she told us without turning around, “I think he was counting on it. Counting on it helping his business.”

  “What will happen without it?”

  She laughed humorlessly and turned around,

  “Bugger if I know, Detective. I suppose it’s for sale again now though, isn’t it?”

  “Mrs Babbage isn’t planning on selling. She has other options in play.”

  “Good for her,” she sniffed. “A woman should be in charge of her own household, her own land.”

  “Your own garden is very nice,” Mills piped up.

  She smiled at him. “Thank you. My mother taught me to garden. Kerry has no time for it. He’s been harping on about putting a pool in, tiling the whole thing over.” She shuddered lightly. “I need my garden, though.”

  “Good for the soul,” I stood up from the table, Mills following, “or so I’m told. Your husband and Ms Renner are currently at his offices?”

  “They are,” she confirmed sadly.

  “You read the Post?” Mills asked abruptly, picking up the paper she had moved when we entered.

  “Yes. Read that one about Hughes, very interesting.”

  “Did your husband read it?”

  “No. Reads the economic times, he does. Not so much interest in local papers. Annoyed him, it did. She’s a good writer,” she commented, “I think so anyway.”

  The inference was there. Kerry Johnson wasn’t a fan of Jeannie Gray.

  “Thank you, Sophia,” I said earnestly, “for all of your help.”

  She wrapped her arms around herself again, clutching her elbows.

  “What will happen now?”

  “We’ll be taking the two of them into the station. We’ll go from there.” She nodded and looked around,

  “I’ll need a good lawyer, I imagine.”

  “I’d imagine so. Though I’m sure that your husband has good contacts in the industry.”

  Her head snapped back to us,

  “Oh no, detective. Not for him, for me.”

  I smiled,

  “I don’t think it would be too hard a case to win.”

  “Nor do I. Is that all? I need to get on.”

  “That’s all. Thank you.”

  “I’ll show you out.” She brushed past, leading us to the front door. We said nothing until we got in the car. I drove us away from the house and pulled over on a side road.

  “Call Sharp,” I told Mills. “We’re bringing them in on suspicion of murder.”

  Twenty-Eight

  Thatcher

  They sat in separate rooms, staring blankly at the dim walls, uniformed officers loitering by the doorways.

  Mills and I hung about in the hall, waiting for the familiar clicks of Sharp’s heels coming along the floor. She didn’t take long, appearing around the corner, stern-faced.

  “How did they come?”

  “Easily. Not a lot of trouble.”

  “Any requests for a lawyer?”

  “Not yet, Ma’am.”

  Sharp nodded, her lips pursed and looked between the two doors. “Who do you want to start with?”

  I nodded to the door behind which sat Ms Cynthia Renner.

  “Do you have what you need?”

  Mills held up the files we’d hastily piled together: forensic evidence, Hughes’s reports, some of Jeannie’s notes, and Sharp nodded once more, heading into the other room to watch.

  I sighed, scratched the back of my neck, and pushed the door open, taking a seat on the cold plastic chairs. Mills sat beside me, ensuring that the recording device was ready, the information correct. I waited for him to finish, keeping my gaze on Ms Renner.

  We’d found them both at his office, as his wife had claimed, bypassed the young girl in reception and headed straight up. They’d been sitting at the desk, pouring through files, holding a stack of memory sticks with a very familiar blue box beside them. We had that with us too.

  I held out my hand for the files and Mills passed them over without a word. I laid them out: Hughes’s research, the allotments plans, the photo of the contract with his notes, the forensic findings and then sat back in my chair, crossing one leg over the other.

  “So, Ms Renner. Where shall we start? With the stolen items from the office of Jeannie Gray? Or your fingerprints, found on the rocks used to help hide the victim’s laptop at the bottom of the river?” She said nothing, staring at the table, wringing her hands together. “Perhaps, with the fact that you were about to lose a great deal of money on this deal that Samuel Hughes was changing last minute, money that is of great importance to you.”

  “We know what Hughes had planned for the land he wanted to buy,” Mills added, “we know he wanted to go ahead with that. We also know that you would have been made aware of this.”

  “You said so yourself,” I took over, “that you did whatever was necessary to keep that business going strong. Now it’s one thing, to leak information to a business rival, to be honest, I don’t care all that much about that, but to kill a man,”

  “Kill him?” She spoke at last. “I didn’t kill him.”

  “Someone did, Ms Renner. Someone with a lot to gain from his death and a lot to lose without it.”

  “Could have been anyone,” she said snippily, leaning away from us.

  “Why did you hide the laptop? Why did you break into Jeannie Gray’s office?”

  She said nothing.

  I sighed again, “Ms Renner. We can charge you for tampering with evidence, for breaking and entering, and we very much plan on doing so.”

  “So why am I here?”

  “On suspect of murder, Ms Renner, you were made aware of this when we brought you in.”

  “We know that you support your brother,” Mills tried softly. “We know that it can’t be easy.”

  “What do you know?” she spat. “I put everything I have into looking after him. Twelve years!” She slammed a hand down on the table. “Twelve years of being an overlooked little assistant and then I finally get to do some real work, invest and profit and he just goes and throws it all down the sodding drain!”

  “You were counting on that project being a success?”

  “Of course, I was.”

  “It must have been a blow, to lose that. Especially when a man like Kerry Johnson could have profited both himself, and you, better from it.”

  “A man like Kerry Johnson doesn’t change his entire business ethos over some girl.”

  I’m sure his wife would agree with such a sentiment.

  “But he hadn’t made that official, had he? Not until you came up here, not until he went to see Mrs Babbage?”

  She shook her head, shoulders sagging, “no. I only to keep it one more day; we’d have signed the contracts, and everything would have been fine. And then he changed his mind, without consulting me,” she added, “and that my money too, you know.”

  “Did he give any explanation?”

  “Said it would be easier in the long run,” she sighed, “that it would give us a good image, make more people likely to sell.”

  “Not a
terrible idea.”

  “Not if you’re like him and have money in the bank for a rainy day. Not all of us do.”

  “No, we certainly don’t. So, after he went to see Mrs Babbage, he made his way back to the hotel, to discuss the changes with you. Only he never made it to the hotel.”

  I leant forward again, bracing my arms against the table,

  “He took a detour through the woods, got off the path and heard someone behind him. Someone he knew well enough to let them get that close. Someone he wouldn’t have thought of as a threat, someone who would never kill him.”

  Her eyes darted around the room, from the sheets before her to the blinking red light, to the ceiling and back, over and over again like she was following a fly.

  “Why then? Why bonfire night? Coincidence? That was the day he made the changes. But you knew these changes were in the works for some time, that note on the contract was just, forgive the expression, the nail in the coffin. Wasn’t it?”

  “He was supposed to burn,” she muttered, caving in on herself. Mills straightened up beside me, glancing to the mirror.

  “But he didn’t, did he? So, you had to make sure that his laptop was gone, that any research done on him or into the business was gone. That the weapon would be found somewhere else, somewhere to throw us of course.”

  “And that Detective Inspector Thatcher wouldn’t find the laptop that night at the river,” Mills added bitterly. Her head shot up,

  “That wasn’t me!”

  “We know you didn’t do this all alone, Ms Renner.”

  She looked away again.

  “Why don’t you tell us? The whole story, from the start.”

  Another sigh, a great deep one and she raised her hands up to her hair, grasping at the strands. “He wanted to do a project like this for some time,” she muttered eventually. “I managed to play him and Johnson off each other, figured if he invested a lot of money into it, he’d have to play ball properly. Not waste it all on some fanciful garden dream. But he kept talking about it, all the time, and Johnson said that if I could get him to stop the deal, then he would give me a share, out of gratitude. I said we would wait, see what he does. And if it comes to it, we’ll deal with it properly, no need for lawyers or anything. We’ll do things the old-fashioned way.”