by Bill James
4. Veronica Susan Cleaver, aged thirty-two, of 9 Larch Lane, IT consultant.
I had parked my car in a multi-storey and was walking towards the shops in Scourton Road on Wednesday, 3rd June at about 9 a.m. This was not a part of the town where I normally shopped, but a colleague had said there were bargains to be had here. I became aware of a man running towards me. Two police officers in uniform were chasing him and shouting at him to stop. He was carrying a pistol in his right hand. The policemen also had guns. I was so startled and afraid that I think I froze for a minute. I hoped he and the police officers would run past me. I have not been well lately and find it difficult to cope with stress episodes.
The man with the gun, who, I have since learned, was called Sparks, did not pass me, however, but when he was very close shouted to me to get into the charity shop. I obviously did not want to go in there if he meant to come in there also. I stood still. He grabbed me, by the shoulder at first, and stood behind me with the gun against the back of my neck and he screamed at the two officers chasing him to stop or he would shoot me. They did stop. They were yelling at him to let me go, but he didn’t.
The two policemen got down and lay on the road, their guns pointing towards him, but they did not fire. I think they must have withdrawn to the cordon later. Sparks moved his hand from my shoulder. Instead, he took hold of me around the neck, so breathing became difficult. He kicked the door of the charity shop open and pulled me inside after him, then he kicked the door shut.
Her statement described the events in the shop, without much difference from the other three statements. She hadn’t taken part in the fight with Sparks because she felt so weak and numbed by his attack on her. She concluded:
I had recognized my partner, Gary James Dodd, making his way from the police caravan towards the shop and then brought down by the man I have learned since was Assistant Chief Constable Iles. I realized Gary must have heard of the siege somehow and come to find me, if he could. As soon as Sparks fell, seeming unconscious or possibly dead from a gunshot wound, I left the shop and hurried to where Gary still lay. He seemed to be coming round and was able to speak my name. I was hugely relieved. Just then a stretcher party came and I went with them and Gary to an ambulance and the hospital.
Chapter Thirty
2009
Not very long after the wedding* and honeymoon, Manse set off to London to see Joan Fenton again and check over the most recent amendments to his will and sign it. The divorce settlement with Sybil had been done OK, he thought – on the generous side, as Manse had always wanted. He hated meanness, even towards someone like Syb, who hadn’t behaved at all proper, in his opinion. Anyway, now his new wife, Naomi, had to be properly looked after in some vital changed clauses.
Hubert drove him in one of the firm’s Audis. Manse had wanted to leave him behind to do the school run with Matilda and Laurent, but Naomi insisted real hard that this had to be her duty. Although it worried him, he agreed. He could understand her thinking. She was their stepmother now and very keen to make this obvious. It was official, yes, but she also required people to recognize it, see it as normal, accept it. This seemed to Manse very lovable and strong.
He left the Jaguar for her so that up at the school they would know this was undoubtedly the new Mrs Shale, who absolutely had a right to drive this car and to be in charge of the children. Never would Manse have allowed Carmel or Patricia or Lowri to of ferried Matilda and
* See Hotbed
Laurent in the Jag. It would not of been correct. Their role was not to drive the children to school. He had an idea Carmel, Patricia and Lowri would of recognized this theirselves. For Naomi, another thing about driving the children was it showed she was settling down much more here. She seemed to of almost given up going to London. Maybe the consultancy didn’t matter so much to her now. Shale wondered, too, whether the ‘facilitating’ had never really happened – just made up by that sod Lionel-Garth to bring trouble and nerviness. To Manse in these days and weeks and months, Naomi, Matilda, Laurent and himself seemed a true family, a happy household.
Naomi certainly deserved to be big in his will, even though she’d automatically get a good sackful if he went because a wife had certain entitlements via quite a law or two. The rotten idea that he could get snuffed at any time still hung about. It was even worse lately. Them two, Egremont Lake and Lionel-Garth Field, had been quiet since he saw them at the rectory or up near Bracken Collegiate, but that might not mean much. Why had one or other of them done that tracking and tracing? Perhaps Joan Fenton had been right when she said he ought to have a bodyguard always. It was definitely sensible to get the will tied up and neat.
He’d had Ralphy Ember as his best man for the wedding, but that might not mean much either. Always there was this pressure to get monopoly. Manse felt it often. And he guessed Ralph did, too. It could be dangerous. One reason he’d asked Ralph to be best man was that he’d have to stand close to Shale in church for some of the service. If Ember had been thinking the ceremony would put Manse nice and exposed and easy to blast by gunmen smuggled into the congregation, he’d have to ditch that plan because he might get hit hisself.
Manse and Hubert left early and would of been in London with at least an hour to spare, if they hadn’t turned back. The appointment with Fenton was at noon. Manse asked Quentin Noss to keep in touch by mobile and let him know any developments on the patch. The call came at just after ten thirty. Noss said: ‘Manse, something bad, very bad.’
In the evening at the rectory Manse had three visitors and a phone call. Ralph Ember arrived first. ‘I didn’t know whether to come or not – whether it would be intrusive, Manse. But Margaret said I should.’
Hi, Ralph. Matilda told me Laurent thought you sent the hired fucking murderer of my wife and child. He believed you wanted all the trade for yourself and your firm. However, I don’t consider you stupid enough to pick the sort of bungler who kills two lovely people by mistake. But Manse did not say this. ‘Hi, Ralph. I’m glad you did come. Thank you, and thank Margaret.’
‘And your daughter?’ Ember said.
‘They’ve given her a sedative. She’s with her aunty.’ If Matilda saw you she’d probably gob in your fucking face. But he didn’t say this last bit either.
‘Terrible for her.’
‘Yes.’ They went into the den room. Shale poured claret.
‘Half a family wiped out,’ Ember said.
‘Yes.’
‘And for what?’
‘A mystery,’ Shale said.
‘Have you thought about the Lake family?’
‘The Lake family? Why?’
‘That death of Denzil.’
‘His suicide?’
‘Well, yes, his suicide,’ Ember said. ‘We all know that’s what it was, of course, but does the family accept this?’
‘But why shouldn’t they, Ralph?’
‘Well, yes, but you know what some people are like. He came from a rough dynasty, I heard. Hackney?’
‘That way, yes.’
‘Might they want to settle things?’ Ember said.
‘Settle? Which things?’
‘It’s been a long while since the death, but what’s that saying about revenge? A dish best eaten cold. Have you had any dealings with those folk? Could they be secretly determined to get you?’
‘They must know I was as distressed as any of them by what happened to Denz. We was very close, you know.’
‘Certainly,’ Ember said. ‘That, too – his death – must have been an appalling shock for you.’
‘Appalling,’ Manse said. ‘A true shock.’
‘Yes.’
Iles and Harpur called while Ember was still there. Shale poured more wine. Iles said: ‘You’re brave, Manse. It would break me, a wonderful woman, a wonderful child.’
‘You’ll probably know we got an identification pretty quickly,’ Harpur said. ‘Lance Stanley Sparks.’
‘No, I’ve never heard the name,’ Shale said
.
‘Ralph?’ Iles said.
‘No, how would I?’ Ember said.
‘Sparks – an up-and-coming general duties villain operating in mainly Manchester,’ Harpur said. ‘Sometimes Liverpool and Nottingham. We put out a picture of him and had a more or less instant response from West Midlands police. They’d had a tip he might be offering himself as a freelance executioner at ten grand a pop and were working on it. Obviously, he hadn’t properly learned the trade yet. And so the terrible mistakes, Manse. He saw what he’d been conditioned to see – the Jaguar.’
‘Not that we’d have wanted him to get it right, and wipe you out, as commissioned, Manse, of course,’ Iles said. ‘A few of these youngsters try to come on too fast. He’d convinced someone he could do it. But you’ve definitely no knowledge of him, Ralph? You keep in touch, don’t you?’
‘In touch with what?’ Ember said.
‘That’s one of your strengths,’ Iles replied, ‘keeping in touch with many.’
‘We wondered about the Lakes,’ Harpur said.
‘What about them?’ Manse said.
‘A revenge situation?’ Iles said. ‘But mucked up by some novice shooter. He’s been told a Jag and the likely time so just blazes away, thinking it’s you.’
‘Revenge for what?’ Ember asked. ‘Do you mean the death of Denzil? Surely everyone knows he took his own life. If I were Mansel I’d feel very hurt at that kind of questioning. Very hurt and resentful.’
‘You’re known to be sensitive, Ralph,’ Iles said.
‘Disgraceful innuendo against Mansel,’ Ember replied.
‘Naomi – the London connections, Manse,’ Harpur said.
‘Might she have run into dangerous folk up there? Excuse us for all the questions so soon after the tragedy, but we need to see which way inquiries should go. Is it possible she was the target after all, not you? The boy killed simply because he was there.’
‘She worked as consultant on a celebrity paper,’ Shale said.
‘Yes, we know that. It’s the kind of job where people can run into all sorts of other people,’ Iles said.
‘Which sorts of other people?’ Shale said.
‘Yes, all sorts of people,’ Iles replied.
‘Smear and then extra smear,’ Ember said. ‘That’s always your method.’
When they’d gone, Ember said: ‘Maybe Naomi did have some troublesome links through the job, Manse.’
‘What sort of troublesome links?’ Shale said.
‘I do understand your touchiness on this, Manse. She was such a lovely woman. It’s difficult to imagine any darker side to her life.’
‘Well fucking don’t.’
Ember stood. ‘You’ll want to rest, Manse. Please call at any time if you feel the need of company. This house will seem very large and lonely now, although you have Matilda.’
Not long after Ember had left, the phone rang and a man said, ‘Excuse me, this is something of an exploratory call. I’ve just seen on television news about the terrible shooting of a lady called Naomi Shale and her stepson. I am hoping, trusting, it is not the Naomi we used to have dealings with in London. We knew her then as Naomi Gage, a charming, very helpful person. She has not been among us recently, and I’d heard she went away to get married in your part of the world. So, you see my concern and why I make this rather, well, rather wide inquiry. I do hope I’m wrong.’
‘What dealings?’
‘Yes, dealings, you know. There are some very ruthless individuals connected to this kind of dealing. I won’t spell it out. One needs to be very judicious on the phone. Perhaps you know something about this trade, indeed. Possibly that is what brought you together.’
‘The Pre-Raphaelites. How did you get this number?’
‘Please do tell me I’m wrong, and this Naomi Shale is not our Naomi Gage.’
‘What dealings? Facilitating?’
‘So, I’m not wrong. Oh, God. Such a loss. I grieve with you.’
Afterwards, Manse dialled 1471. ‘You were called at 2132. The caller withheld their number.’ Only the other day when Laurent had used 1471, after he answered a ring on the phone and got silence from the other end, he’d told Manse that this announcement by British Telecom was not good grammar. ‘It shouldn’t be “withheld their number” but his or her number.’ In this case, his. Yes, only the other day.
