An Unfinished Murder

by An Unfinished Murder (retail) (epub)

  ‘I couldn’t see Fred when I got there and I thought, at first, he’d been nervous and cleared off. But I could still smell cigarette smoke, pretty strong, so I reckoned he was nearby. I called out, quiet, and he heard me. He came out of the trees, pale as a ghost and shaking. Some kids had come to the spinney and they’d found the body. That gave me a shock, because I thought for sure the kids would have run off to tell someone. But Fred said, perhaps not. He knew those children, brother and sister. They lived up in Brocket’s Row. The Social had put them with Nina Pengelly. They – well, the girl mostly – had caused a lot of trouble in the school, fighting. Fred reckoned there was a good chance they wouldn’t tell anyone about the body – or, if they did, no one would believe them.

  ‘So, we decided to get on with it and bury her. It had started to drizzle with rain by then, too. That would discourage visitors. We made a decent job of it, put the poor lass in the ground neatly. Luckily, we’d laid her out straight when we took her off my pickup, or we’d have had a job laying her out, because rigor had really got to her now. As it was, when we picked her up, it was like lifting a board. I tried to close her mouth and eyes, but it was too late for that, and we couldn’t. We buried her as deep as we could, then put a lot of leaves and branches and stuff on the top, together with a bag of rubbish someone had dumped down there and we emptied out. Then we made off. The next day it rained heavy, I remember. We were a bit worried the earth might be washed away and she’d be seen, or foxes might go digging. But neither of those things happened. The kids either hadn’t said anything or no one had believed them, because no one went down to the spinney looking about. We reckoned we’d got away with it.’

  He frowned. ‘Funny thing, Fred said he saw one of the kids, the girl, later on that evening, after we’d buried her. She was picking flowers up by the houses. It reassured him, because she was acting like nothing had happened. Yet now we know it had, because she’d nicked the bracelet.’

  Wallace looked at the two police officers and said conversationally, ‘You wouldn’t believe a little girl like that would go robbing a body, would you? But she’d taken a bracelet off the corpse, it said in the paper. Honestly, kids!’

  Carter leaned forward and asked, ‘Mickey, think hard. Could you take us – take me – back to the road with the big houses in it? Where you stopped for your pint and lunch?’

  Wallace looked unhappy. ‘I couldn’t, to tell you the truth. Not to be sure. I’d just as likely take you to the wrong place! You gotta understand. It wasn’t our neck of the woods. It was all strange territory to us. We’d been just driving around looking for a place to eat…’ He paused. ‘I can tell you the name of the pub, though. I’ve a good memory for a decent pub. It was called the Feathers.’

  Carter leaned back and let out a sigh. ‘Yes,’ he said softly, with real satisfaction. ‘Yes!’

  All the others in the room looked at him then, even the solicitor, a spark of interest showing in his weary eyes.

  Carter turned to Trevor Barker. ‘I’d like to leave this interview. I need to contact my base. You don’t need me any more, I think.’

  ‘Superintendent Carter leaves the room. Interview is suspended,’ said Barker, glancing up at the clock on the wall. He added the time.

  ‘We’ll resume without you,’ Barker said, in the corridor outside the interview room. ‘I’ll continue, with Sergeant Johnson sitting in. This has to do with something Wallace said, doesn’t it? Was it the name of the pub?’

  ‘Yes,’ Carter said. ‘Now I know where Rebecca died.’

  Chapter 19

  Nick Ellsworth had left Gloucester a little later than he’d expected. He’d spent longer with the solicitor than planned. Then, perhaps because he wasn’t looking forward to visiting his cousin, he’d stopped for a black coffee, and to mull over what he should report to her. The solicitor had been very doubtful about involving the police complaints department. If Mrs Malone was set on it, it would be wise to consult further before taking things to the next step. He, the solicitor, felt there wasn’t enough to make a case. He hadn’t handled anything like it before. He’d like to take more experienced advice.

  That made a lot of sense to Nick. But it wasn’t what Caroline wanted to hear. Hear it she would have to, and from him.

  ‘I’ll be writing to Mrs Malone, of course,’ the solicitor had continued. ‘But perhaps it might be a good thing if you had a word with her first. She’s in a highly nervous state, isn’t she? That’s how it seemed to me when we spoke. You’re a family member. It would be better coming from you.’

  Oh, great! Good thing for whom? Not for me! Nick had wanted to say to the man. You’re the legal eagle. You’re getting paid for advice, not to pass the buck! As it was, he’d mumbled and promised to have a word with Caroline.

  By the time he’d reached the road where she lived, he was sweating as if he’d run a mile. He wanted a drink. A whisky would help. There was the pub, the Feathers, but he couldn’t go in there. He was breathing with difficulty and wondered if he was going to have a heart attack. He almost wouldn’t mind being taken ill – not seriously, of course – if it would mean he’d get out of this visit.

  The opening into the drive of the Malone home was coming up and the security gates stood open. That puzzled him briefly. But he had too much on his mind to worry about that. The dreaded moment was at hand and couldn’t be avoided. He had no idea what state he’d find Caroline in. She was a strong personality. But Pete’s death – particularly the manner of it, and the suddenness – had inevitably taken a dreadful toll.

  He wondered if Cassie’s suggestion that Caroline take some time to go down to Cornwall to the cottage might not have been a good one. He’d dismissed it when Cassie spoke of it, but after all, for Caroline to stay alone in her own house for the next week or two would place a definite strain on her already shattered morale. Yes, he’d suggest the cottage at St Ives. Fresh air, sea breezes, the beach, the Tate St Ives gallery, the Barbara Hepworth museum… Caroline had studied art. She’d like to visit the Tate St Ives gallery now it had been refurbished. He began to feel more optimistic as he drew up before the house. He mopped his brow, sat for a moment to settle his mind, and got out of the car.

  The house looked deserted. Was she in town somewhere? He should have phoned first. He hadn’t, because that would have meant telling her over the phone what the solicitor had said. He would still have had to face her later. Better get it over and done with. But if she was out, the visit could decently be put off. Yes, he could only try, and if she wasn’t here… let the ruddy solicitor phone up or write one of his expensive letters and give her the discouraging news.

  After a moment’s hesitation he walked round to the back of the building. There was no one in the garden, and for a moment he stood looking at the lawns and bushes. This garden had memories for him and they weren’t good ones. The earlier nausea was creeping over him again. Then, as his gaze roamed around, it caught a movement behind the kitchen window. Nick went to the kitchen door, knocked and called out.

  ‘Caro? It’s Nick! Can I come in?’

  He didn’t hear a reply but she must have heard him call out. Tentatively, he tried the door handle. It turned beneath his touch and the door swung open, revealing the large, well-planned kitchen with its flagged floor and expensive fitted units. Caroline was there, leaning back against a worktop, sipping from a bone china mug of what he guessed must be one of her herbal brews. She looked up as he came in, but didn’t speak. Her long hair wasn’t twisted into a knot as usual, but hung long and loose like a damsel in a Pre-Raphaelite illustration for some courtly romance. She was dressed head to toe in mourning black, and that slightly shocked him. People didn’t go into such deep mourning these days, did they? There was no reason why she shouldn’t, of course. But somehow, with her long dark-blonde hair, pale complexion and slender build, the unrelieved sombre attire seemed more consciously dramatic than sorrowful. Her face was a mask, expressing nothing.

  ‘Caro?’ he
asked. He knew his voice sounded nervous. ‘Caro? How are you?’

  She moved the mug away from her lips, turned her head slightly to set the tea down on the worktop and then turned back to face him. She gripped her upper left arm with her right hand, as if to steady it or prevent some involuntary movement.

  ‘The gates were open,’ he said. He had to say something. If only she’d speak!

  But she only nodded and made a slight gesture in his direction.

  ‘You expected me?’ he interpreted. ‘You’ve been expecting me to come and tell you how I got on with the solicitor? Say something, Caro. I understand how you must be feeling. But, please, say something.’

  She made a single, slow downward movement of her head. Another nod? Then she spoke at last.

  ‘Tell me, Nick,’ she invited, and her voice was low and husky, as if she had a sore throat. ‘Tell me how I ought to feel. You, you of all people, ought to have some idea. Tell me how it feels when someone dies.’

  He’d known this visit was going to be difficult but it had started even worse than he’d feared. Had Caroline gone a bit loopy, too? Like poor Pete? Aloud he said, as soothingly as he could, ‘Cassie and I are really very sorry about Pete. Cassie is very worried – we both are – about you being here, in the house, all alone. You know the cottage at St Ives is at your disposal, if you feel a need to get away.’

  Caroline didn’t reply to this. Nick, feeling he was sinking into mud, floundered on. ‘You can come and stay over at Weston with us, but the children are a bit noisy. We want you to know that we’re here to support you in any way you think we can. Don’t blame yourself, you couldn’t know …’ There was a dangerous spark in his cousin’s eyes. Desperately, Nick concluded, ‘You shouldn’t feel – I mean, none of us could have guessed that he’d… he’d do what he did.’

  ‘You don’t know why he did it? Walked into the canal?’ Caroline’s voice was dangerously calm, and it worried Nick a lot. He wondered if she’d been taking something, some sort of medication. She was keen on those weird herbal brews, but normally she didn’t take pills. Now wasn’t a normal time, however.

  ‘You don’t know why he wanted to drown himself? Yes, you do, Nick. You know very well why he did it.’ She sounded gently reproachful. ‘Don’t lie to me, Nick.’

  ‘You can’t blame the police, Caro!’ Nick began again, unhappily. ‘I’ve, er, just come from the solicitor. He thinks, if you want to go through the police complaints procedure, we should take further advice first.’

  ‘What do I complain about?’ asked Caroline in that husky, almost dreamy voice that frightened Nick far more than shouting or crying would have done. ‘That my husband was driven to kill himself? Or that he did it because my own cousin, and Pete’s old friend, couldn’t keep his mouth shut?’

  Nick felt the blood drain from his face. He desperately wanted to sit down but he was mesmerised by that slender black-clad figure, now swaying slightly to and fro. It was like being faced with a cobra, head raised, ready to strike, and deadly. Bloody hell! he thought. She’s flipped! She’s lost her marbles. And she thinks I spilled the beans!

  ‘Caro,’ he said gently, ‘you’re under a lot of stress. Why don’t you go into the lounge and sit down and I’ll call a doctor.’

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘Oh, call a doctor? You wanted to do that once before, didn’t you? When that wretched girl collapsed out there.’ Caroline made a slight gesture of her head towards the garden behind them. ‘But you didn’t, Nick, did you?’

  A wave of anger suddenly surged through Ellsworth. ‘No, I didn’t, and you didn’t, and we should have done, Caro! You know we should have done!’

  ‘She was dead,’ Caroline said, simply. ‘No point, was there?’

  Nick felt a bead of sweat trickle down his forehead and knew that she could see it. He wanted to put up his hand and wipe it away, but he couldn’t. He stammered, ‘It-it was your fault, Caro, you—’

  ‘My fault!’ After speaking so quietly, her voice suddenly split the air in a cross between a squeal and a shout. ‘And was it my fault that my husband went into the canal? No, Nick, yours! You just couldn’t keep quiet, could you? The moment you saw in some tabloid rag that her body had been found, you went to pieces! You had to tell Pete! And Pete couldn’t cope—’ She broke off, choking on further words.

  Nick stared at her in horror. ‘I didn’t tell Pete! I swear it, Caro! I never said a word to him about what happened that day!’

  ‘Don’t lie to me! Why else would he take his own life! You told him!’

  Suddenly, Nick felt a strange calm, some defence mechanism of the mind kicking in, he supposed. ‘No, Caroline,’ he said. ‘I didn’t tell him. I didn’t need to tell him. He worked it out for himself. Perhaps he didn’t know exactly what you did, but he knew that you killed Rebecca!’

  ‘He didn’t know!’ she screeched. Turning, she snatched up the tea mug from the worktop and flung it at him.

  Nick managed to swerve so that the mug missed him and shattered on the floor, but the tea sprayed his face and neck. Taking advantage of his momentary confusion, Caroline grabbed a kitchen knife from a wooden rack. She flew across the floor and, under the force of her body colliding with his, he staggered and slipped on the wet flags, crashing down full length, momentarily winded. A nearby stool fell as well, just missing his head and adding to the racket. Then she was on him. Her face was only an inch from his, white, wild-eyed, her mouth working and a stream of obscenities and accusations pouring forth. She stabbed down at him with the knife. Her strength was doubled by her fury but he managed to grasp her wrist and push her arm to the side. He saw the blade flash past his face, only just missing him, and heard it scrape on the flagged floor.

  Then she raised it again.

  He found himself thinking, She really is going to kill me. I’m going to die.

  * * *

  Jess Campbell put down the phone, sat for a few minutes in thought, and then went in search of Sergeant Phil Morton.

  ‘Phil? The superintendent’s been on the line from Bamford. There’s been a development.’ Briefly, she summarised the information Carter had given her: the outline of Wallace’s confession, including the body that he and Stokes claimed must have been put in the back of his pickup while parked in the road near the Feathers pub.

  Morton listened, gave a low whistle, and asked, ‘What does he want us to do?’

  ‘I’m not sure. But I think perhaps we should drive out to the Malone house and get the widow talking.’

  Morton looked unhappy. ‘That’s a bit tricky, isn’t it? She – Mrs Malone, I mean – is already kicking up the devil of a fuss about police harassment and her husband being driven to suicide. Sit and talk is the last thing she’ll want to do.’

  ‘The more fuss a witness makes, generally the more likely it is he or she has something to hide!’ retorted Jess. ‘You know that, Phil.’

  ‘Oh, sure, once witnesses start squawking about their rights and wanting their high-flying lawyers, there’s a chance they know they’ll need them. But in this case, Malone has only just died. It’s a bit insensitive, isn’t it?’

  ‘If she’s got nothing to hide, Phil, I agree. It’s hellishly insensitive. But the superintendent thinks she has got a lot she can tell us. I’ve only met her twice and I judge her to be pretty tough beneath the willowy, fashion-plate appearance. Frankly, I think this might be the very time to tackle her. She may be more talkative now, when her guard is down, than she was the first time the superintendent and I went to see them both. Then she left the talking to her husband and she’d planned the meeting all out, complete with the suggestion of guests about to arrive. This is the ideal time.’

  Morton raised an eyebrow but made no reply.

  ‘Well, anyway,’ Jess conceded, ‘I agree we’ll have to be very tactful when mentioning Peter Malone. But Mr Carter has left this in my hands, so I say we go straight out there, OK, Phil?’

  ‘If you say so,’ said Morton, unhappily.

&
nbsp; ‘Then off we go!’

  * * *

  ‘Upmarket sort of area, this,’ commented Morton, who hadn’t visited the locality before. He slowed down, peering through the windscreen at the neighbourhood around them. ‘Nice houses. Worth a bob or two.’

  ‘There’s the pub!’ Jess exclaimed. The Feathers pub was coming up on the left-hand side. ‘Slow down, Phil. If that man Wallace is telling the truth, he parked his pickup around here, on the verge. And that opening in the hedge over there…’ She pointed across the road. ‘That’s the entry to Malone’s house.’

  ‘Looks like Mrs M may already have a visitor. There’s a Mini parked up there under the hedge.’

  ‘That might not be someone calling on her. A visitor would be more likely to turn into the drive. We’ll go in, Phil.’

  Morton obligingly turned into the drive and pulled up before the front door where a black Mercedes two-seater was already parked.

  ‘Now that’s definitely a visitor,’ said Jess. ‘What’s more, I know who it is. I’ve seen the car before. It belongs to Nick Ellsworth, Mrs Malone’s cousin. It was parked outside his house in Weston St Ambrose when we called on him. Come on, let’s join the party.’

  They climbed out and, as Morton closed the driver’s door, they suddenly heard an extraordinary noise – a high, piercing screech – followed by a crash as of falling furniture, and then more screaming.

  ‘Round the back!’ exclaimed Jess. ‘Come on, Phil!’

  * * *

  Nick felt oddly resigned. Perhaps this was how Pete felt when he walked into the canal. Death was inevitable. It had to come at some time and he was meeting it now. If anything, his strongest emotion was one of sadness. He wouldn’t see Cassie and the children again. He was so sure of his fate he had even closed his eyes, shutting out the crazed face glaring down at him. He opened them again when Caroline gave an unexpected gurgle. Through the haze of sweat and panic, he saw that a strange arm had come out from somewhere and snaked itself around his cousin’s neck. As he stared up disbelievingly, Caroline’s pressure on his chest was lessened. She raised her free hand to claw at the intruding arm, and then jerked backwards, dropping the knife. Suddenly, there were two bodies wrestling on the floor. One was Caroline and one was—