An Accidental Death

by Peter Grainger

  There was a haze over the sea, beyond the lines of cranes at the docks; the weather was holding but only just. It mattered because if DI Reeve read the file in the same way that he did, then she would not be able to ignore what it contained – she would ask him what he proposed to do and he would say that they needed to make some effort to find the canoeist. As there was no evidence that he had ever come back down the river, he might still be up there. It was unlikely, very unlikely, but, logically, they had to go and have a look. Wandering up and down towpaths would be a lot less pleasant in the rain.

  Smith looked around. She was still reading intently and quickly, fingers ready to turn the page before her eyes had finished with it. Alison Reeve was probably the best female detective that had served under him, and now she was an effective DI. Another couple of years avoiding calamities and spending cuts, and she would make DCI, too.

  She closed the file and Smith went back to his seat.

  ‘Bloody hell, DC.’

  ‘Yes, it’s one of those.’

  She opened it at the beginning again.

  ‘First thing. Procedurally, how was it handled at the start? Is it OK? For God’s sake tell me it’s OK. You know why.’

  ‘Not going out on the Saturday evening was reasonable, I suppose, in view of the ages of those concerned. Teenagers are congenitally irresponsible, and wander off. If it had been a girl… Anyway, Charlie Hills did everything right on the Sunday morning as duty officer. He called CID the moment they found the boy.’

  ‘Wilson?’

  Smith nodded and saw the tiny shake of the head as Reeve looked down at the file again.

  ‘You know what I’m going to say next, don’t you, DC?’

  ‘That Wilson should have gone himself. He sent O’Leary instead. It matters because it gives a message if you send the most junior detective to a body, it’s like saying, yes, routine accidental drowning, we’re just going through the motions. It affects how everyone views it after that.’

  ‘But it’s just a judgement-call, that. Nothing disciplinary in it.’

  ‘No. Ma’am.’

  She looked up again, half annoyed with him because that was his way of saying to her, you have your management hat on when you say things like that. Smith shrugged a half-apology, his point made. Reeve went back to the file, turning pages quickly, skimming and giving herself time to think.

  ‘We can release the body?’

  ‘Yes. Wayne cannot tell us anything else, sadly.’

  She picked up a pencil and tapped the point quietly on the desk several times.

  ‘What do you want to do?’

  ‘We’d better go and have a look for the mystery man. If he’s paddling back to wherever he came from, he’s come to a dead end by now, or lugging the canoe overland. Too many days have gone by but it’s a box we need to tick. He’s not going to give himself up, is he?’

  ‘You mean because of the CPR?’

  ‘Yes – he knew what he’d done, assuming that’s what happened.’

  ‘And what do you need?’

  ‘A couple of bodies to speed things up. Four of us can get it done in a day.’

  ‘How about Wilson and O’Leary?’

  ‘How about Murray and Henderson?’

  She nodded and gave him her sweetest smile as she said, ‘And DC?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t find anything.’

  Chapter Eight

  The following morning they took two cars to Upham and parked by the riverside, where the town did its best to create the waterfront lifestyle and attract the passing boat traffic. It was a Friday, market day, and Maggie Henderson said that was good – while John got on with the search, she could get the weekend’s shopping done early. There was a fancy cheese stall, too.

  Upham was the only significant town on the river above where the body had been found. Smith explained that John and Maggie needed to walk along both banks, talking to anyone who might have seen anything relevant last weekend, particularly tradespeople, café and shop owners and dog walkers, who tended to have a regular routine and often noticed anything out of the ordinary. And keep an eye open for an abandoned canoe that might just happen to float past… It was all for Waters’ benefit, obviously, as Murray and Henderson were experienced and as professional as anyone at the station. Smith made a mental note – when he got a team going again, they had to be a part of it.

  Four miles above Upham was the village of Littleford – not so much to do here but it was a popular fishing area, and fishermen tend to notice boats going by. Also, the map showed a couple of riverside farms, a riding stables and some expensive-looking houses; all ideal for Waters to play with. When they had planned it yesterday afternoon, Smith had found the right OS map; after a few minutes, Waters had gone off to a screen as if he had lost interest but then he called DC over and showed him Googlemaps. He’d heard of it, obviously, but never used it himself – with it, Waters had mapped out his exact route before he ever saw the places. Clever stuff. Smith parked his car at the green and left Waters to do the village.

  Smith would take the last section above Littleford, which should consist of a pleasant stroll along the river, visiting a few even more executive-style properties, a rather nice pub called the Swan and Duck and a large private estate that he hadn’t realized existed – Manley Park it was called on the OS map. After that, the river seemed to disappear pretty rapidly into a tiny blue squiggle in which you probably couldn’t even turn a canoe around. They couldn’t search every inch of it in a morning. The plan was to meet back in Upham at about one o’clock, get a sandwich and see what had occurred.

  Not a thing from the posh houses; even though they all had their little landing stage, none of the people he spoke to seemed to keep an eye on the river. At the Swan and Duck the landlord half-remembered him from the days when he and Sheila used to go out to eat on a Saturday evening – they had had some decent meals there. The landlord offered him a drink, a soft one or something a bit stronger if he wasn’t too on duty; the half pint of lemonade was very welcome as they stood outside on the terrace that overlooked the water. No – last Saturday had been very busy, boats going in all directions and they had been short-staffed; it would be impossible to remember one canoe in all that unless it had somehow drawn attention to itself.

  Smith asked about his final destination before he left.

  ‘Manley Hall, you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ll be lucky to just walk in there. I reckon you’ll need a warrant just to press the button on the gate.’

  ‘Why’s that, then?’

  ‘High security, electronic gates, the lot.’

  ‘Oh. Valuable artworks, I expect.’

  ‘I don’t know about that. My nephew went for a job in the kitchen a couple of years ago, and they vetted him before letting him in for the interview! He didn’t get it…’

  ‘Dear me – this land is yours and mine, eh? Still, I’ll give it a go.’

  ‘You can get there along the river. That’s still a public footpath, though they tried to divert it when the place was sold about five or six years ago.’

  ‘OK, thanks. You might just have a word with your staff - if anyone remembers anything, here’s my card. Oh, run out – I’ll scribble it down here on this beermat.’

  After a glance at his watch, Smith picked up the pace – it was further than it looked on the maps. Sheila walked quickly when they first went up to the Lakes; it had surprised him but she came from an outdoorsy family, he later discovered. More than once she had laughed and left him behind as she climbed to some gill or crag, in shorts and wooly socks with those proper little walking boots.

  The fence was seven feet tall and topped with barbed wire, and the warning signs grudgingly directed the public to follow the maintained footpath by the river. Smith did as he was told, and wondered idly why anyone felt the need to disfigure the landscape with such a sense of their own insecurity. And it must have cost a small fortune.

>   The river was on his left, narrower, weedier and wilder now. Old willows hung over it, and thick beds of rushes and irises kept walkers away from the water, but here and there people had found a way through and small beaches of gritty sand had formed. The inevitable empty cans and food wrappers told him that at weekends a few intrepid picnickers came up here for some peace and quiet – or more likely for somewhat less salubrious reasons. He didn’t investigate the litter too closely. Further on, as the footpath became a tunnel through the trees, he was surprised to find a couple of breaches in the security fence – just holes where the wire had been bent aside some time ago and not repaired.

  Nothing. A hopeless task really, considering how overgrown it was. Smith stopped and listened, allowing his frustration to dissipate slowly into the soft green shade beneath the trees. Somewhere a single bird sang quietly at the water’s edge. Go back, as agreed, and see what the others have found. But before that, step off this path - one of those little beach places through here. Really shouldn’t have drunk that lemonade on top of two cups of coffee.

  He stood, relaxed now, smiling at the relief, and then noticed the heap of ashes on the grit beside him. Kids probably, making camps and starting fires. A big fire, though, quite a heap of wood ash… He crouched down next to it. Not just sticks but larger, more solid pieces of timber, not all burned into a heap, some of the ashes still retaining the curved shape of whatever burned here. One shower of rain, even a strong gust of wind and it would all collapse into unrecognisability – but it wasn’t unrecognisable yet. Smith stood up and reached for his phone. A couple of snaps showed a smudge of whitish grey on the sand, nothing more. Different angle, same result. And where was he exactly? If he had one of those phones with the GPS thingy, he could do something clever with it, record his position. Back to the old-fashioned way then, searching through his jacket pockets and finding eventually the single evidence bag that they contained.

  Then he took out the notebook and wrote a detailed description, paced around the ashes and recorded the distances. The canoe had not been burned whole, as a single thing; it had been broken up and the pieces piled onto each other first. That had taken strength, effort and determination. As to why, he would worry about that later – first and foremost, gather the evidence.

  At the other side of the tiny beach he found a plastic bottle, been there ages, not involved. He stepped out onto the footpath and looked along it in both directions but there was no-one in sight. Stepping across to the fence, he pushed the neck of the bottle firmly into the wire and hoped that no litter-conscious pensioner would come by and remove it.

  He meant to go back, straight back and report the find, but after just a few yards he came to one of those holes in the fence and stopped. Beyond the hole there seemed to be a sort of path. He stared at it, the hole in the fence, and it stared back at him. He thought, of all places, that canoe ended its final journey here, just a few yards away from this fence – which has a hole in it. What had the landlord said? ‘High security, electronic gates, the lot.’ Coincidence?

  The ‘path’ petered out after a few yards. At first the thick undergrowth almost gave him second thoughts – there were nettles and briars and those annoying round things with little hooks that stick to every item of clothing not made of 100% nylon – but once under the taller trees, the way ahead was clearer. It was mixed woodland, ash and some sort of conifer that gave quite dense shade. It wasn’t extensive though, just a strip planted around the edge of the estate, and no more than fifty yards away through the trees the sunlight was clearly visible again. Smith made his way towards it.

  Marcus Davies would have brought the Doberman if it hadn’t been so hot and she hadn’t been getting on a bit. Now he was wishing that he hadn’t been so soft because there was someone in the wood, coming towards him. First he had glimpsed a movement and then a couple of twigs had snapped – he was pretty certain that it wasn’t a deer this time. He could have released the dog and sent her into the wood; after the trouble last weekend, no-one would have blamed him.

  He waited on the single-track road, sweating a little, and telling himself that it was most likely just kids anyway and that sending in Helga, who was trained to bite first and never ask questions, might have been unwise. Nevertheless, he unbuttoned the security jacket and felt inside for a little reassurance – better safe than sorry. Another snap of a twig and then nothing but a long wait. He stepped backwards off the road, closer to the bushes, and kept watching.

  Smith had seen the figure on the road when he was about ten yards from the edge of the wood – a man standing still, waiting for something and it was fairly obvious for what. As Smith considered his options, he saw the man unbutton his jacket and reach inside but then the hand came out empty. Odd, and then he noticed that the jacket itself was part of a security guard’s uniform, which changed things somewhat. Then the man had stepped off the road so that he would be less obvious to whoever was coming out of the wood.

  It would be worse if the guard came into the wood looking for him, and so Smith moved forward again until he was out of the trees. He put up a hand as an acknowledgement that he had seen the other man and began walking in his direction. When five yards separated them and Smith was about to speak, the guard put up a hand of his own.

  ‘Stop there! Do not come any closer!’

  Smith did as he was told.

  ‘This is private property. You have broken in through the security fence.’

  The guard’s hand was halfway to his jacket again, and the other, his left, was no longer making the stop sign; it had come back to the left side of the guard’s face as if he was about to take hold of his left ear. He’s a little too nervous for his own good or mine, thought Smith, and he made no move of his own.

  ‘No, I have not. The fence was already broken. In several places.’

  Seconds passed. Finally, the guard turned his head slightly to the left, still keeping one eye on the intruder, and spoke quietly, but not quietly enough, into his sleeve.

  ‘Main gate, come in.’

  He must be wearing an ear speaker; the response was faint, just a high-pitched buzz.

  ‘We’ve got another one.’

  And another mosquito-like whine in answer.

  ‘South end, on the track.’

  This time, a pause. The two of them looked at each other, Smith’s face quizzical but calm, and Marcus Davies no longer making any attempt to conceal what he was doing. Another short buzz and a final response – ‘Will do. Over and out.’

  Smith said, ‘What happens now?’

  ‘Someone will escort you off the property.’

  ‘My goodness. It all sounds very official.’

  In the silence that followed, a wood pigeon began calling from the trees behind Smith, soon answered by another in the trees behind the security guard. The sun was warm on Smith’s back and he would have taken off his jacket if he didn’t suspect that the movement would provoke an unwelcome response from the guard.

  ‘Still, it’s a nice day for it…’

  Nothing.

  He looked more closely at the face in front of him. At the top of the left cheek, where the bone is closest to the skin, was some discoloration, leaking up and into the flesh around the corner of the eye. A bruise? And then, as if in answer, Smith saw that the lower lip had been recently split, was still a little swollen, giving the mouth a slightly petulant cast. Technically, he should probably declare himself at this point but he was intrigued to see how they intended to treat him as an ordinary member of the public, if that’s how they viewed him. And technically, he had not yet been asked what he was doing there, either. ‘We’ve got another one’ the guard had said. Another what?

  Smith took up his stand-easy position, glanced around and then back at the guard. More pigeons had joined in – it was a veritable lunchtime chorus. In the distance, and a little way up the hill, was the faint sound of an engine, approaching rapidly, confirming the impression in Smith’s mind that he represented
some sort of an emergency, some sort of threat. To what? To whom?

  The jeep rounded the corner and bore down on them rapidly. It was driven by another uniform but this one was younger, more heavily muscled, tattooed on the hands. He swung the jeep around, off the track and then back onto it, turning the vehicle to face uphill in a single manoeuvre.

  ‘Get in.’

  The first guard climbed into the back seats and motioned Smith to follow. They set off, again at a speed that seemed quite out of proportion to any offence intended or committed so far. The driver, just one hand on the wheel, turned to look at Smith. The eyes travelled down from the face to the feet and then back again, openly measuring him against some as yet unperceived standard. More professional and certainly more dangerous. Conclusion made, the driver spoke for the first time – Scottish, quite broad, possibly Glaswegian.

  ‘You ought to know better, granddad.’

  ‘Yes, I know. I blame the home. They leave the doors open and I just wander off… It happens all the time.’

  The driver looked back at the road as they approached the first bend and slowed a little. Once past it, he turned again, looking slightly less certain about the direction they were taking.

  ‘Eh? You serious?’

  ‘Search me. I’m easily confused. Where are you taking me?’

  ‘Look, we’re just taking you to the gates, mate, we’re not taking you home. There’s a phone… I suppose we could call someone. If you know the number!’

  The driver looked back at the other guard and grinned.

  ‘Actually, I’d rather you didn’t take me to the exit just yet.’

  The driver’s eyes were back on the road. Ahead of them was another strip of trees and, in a gap, security gates and a small, single-storey building.

  ‘Oh. Like a tour round, would you?’

  ‘No. I’d like you to take me to your leader. If that’s not too much trouble.’

  The driver turned again, still laughing, but the amusement gradually disappeared as he read the warrant card that was being held up towards him.