A Killing Resurrected

by Frank Smith

  ‘Did you see anyone else come in? See anyone talk to Corbett?’

  ‘No. Like I said, we were busy, so they could have done.’

  ‘So he was here for half to three quarters of an hour?’

  ‘Give or take, yeah, something like that.’

  ‘You say he’s a regular in here. Does he ever have anyone with him?’

  ‘There’s this woman, although she doesn’t come in very often. Orange juice, that’s all she ever drinks.’

  ‘Are you talking about his wife?’

  The man shook his head. ‘Don’t think so,’ he said, ‘at least she doesn’t wear a ring, and he does.’

  ‘Can you describe her?’

  ‘Good looking woman,’ the man said with more animation than he’d previously displayed. ‘Looks like she’s Chinese or Japanese or something like that, except she has red hair. He told me once she’s an actress.’

  ‘Thank you very much, Mrs Draper,’ said Molly Forsythe. ‘You’ve been very helpful, and I appreciate your cooperation. I don’t think I will need to trouble you again.’ She put the phone down and sat back in her chair to think about what she’d been told by Rachel Draper – or Rachel Kiechle as she had been thirteen years ago, when she and Sharon Grady had chummed around together.

  Based on what Sharon had told her about Rachel and her parents, it hadn’t taken Molly long to discover that there used to be a mission called The Only Way down by the river in an area known as the Flats. It was run by a Reverend Peter Kiechle and his wife, and they had a daughter named Rachel.

  Where the Kiechles were now, Molly hadn’t been able to find out, but she was able to track Rachel down. Married now, she had two children, and she and her husband ran a bed and breakfast in Brighton.

  Rachel had been reluctant to talk about her past at first. ‘It’s not a period of my life I’m proud of,’ she said, ‘and I’ve tried hard to put it behind me. As for Sharon, I haven’t been in touch with her since I left Broadminster, so I don’t know how I can help you.’

  It had taken Molly some time to talk Rachel round; to convince her that her only interest was in the names and background of the young men she and Sharon had dated, and not in anything the two girls had done themselves.

  Rachel responded cautiously at first, but once she started talking the floodgates opened, and Molly found herself listening to aspects of Rachel’s life that she’d kept bottled up for years.

  ‘It’s funny,’ Rachel said at last, ‘but I don’t think Sharon and I hung out together for more than six or maybe eight weeks at the most, and yet it seems much longer than that when I look back.’

  Rachel told Molly that she’d been brought up to believe that almost anything even remotely enjoyable was sinful, and any deviation from the ‘right path’ would lead inevitably to hell and eternal damnation. She said rebellion had been bubbling up inside her throughout her teenage years, but she’d been too afraid of her father to do anything about it. But when her parents left for East Africa, she felt as if she’d been set free, and she was determined to do absolutely everything her parents were against. But she didn’t know how to set about it until, by chance, she met Sharon Grady.

  ‘Sharon was going through a rebellious stage herself,’ she said. ‘Her mother had died suddenly the year before; she’d never been close to her father; and she was mad at the world.’ A long sigh drifted over the line, and Rachel sounded incredibly sad when she spoke again. ‘We tried everything,’ she said. ‘We went to parties; we drank ourselves silly; we experimented with drugs; and we had sex with the boys.’

  ‘Who were the boys you went with?’ Molly asked. ‘Sharon tells me that she had a feeling that one of the men in the robbery I mentioned to you was someone she’d met before. She implied that it could have been someone she’d slept with, so when exactly, did all this partying take place?’

  ‘Let’s see, now. You say the pub was robbed at New Year? Then it would have been the July or August before that, because the boys we went with were all from university, and they went back in September, and that’s when I moved to Tenborough.’

  ‘They were all university students? Do you remember which university?’

  ‘Leeds, most of them, I think, although some could have been from somewhere else.’

  ‘So what about their names?’

  ‘Ah, yes, the names. Sorry. Didn’t mean to run on like that; I must have been boring you to tears with—’ She stopped abruptly. ‘Oh, God!’ she breathed. ‘You haven’t been recording this, have you?’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ Molly told her – which was true in the narrowest sense, but she had been taking shorthand notes. ‘The names, Mrs Draper?’ she prompted again.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Rachel said. ‘Funny, though, Sharon not remembering, because she used to keep a notebook – her scorecard, she called it – and she used to rate each boy according to how good the sex was, with notes on what she thought of him. I remember that well enough, because she always made a point of telling me all about it in lurid detail afterwards. Which reminds me, what’s Sharon doing now? Not that I want to get in touch with her or anything like that. I just wondered, you know.’

  ‘She’s married now. Her married name is Jessop.’

  ‘Jessop?’ Rachel repeated. She sounded surprised. ‘Not Al Jessop? She didn’t marry Albert Jessop, did she?’

  ‘Albert Jessop. Yes, that’s his name.’

  ‘Oh, dear. Al Jessop. Poor Sharon. Whatever made her do that, I wonder? He was a nutter back when I was there. I hope he’s improved . . .?’

  It was an implied question, but Molly refused to be drawn. ‘The names, if you don’t mind, Mrs Draper?’

  ‘Right. Got a pencil?’

  Molly sat looking at the shorthand notes in her notebook. There were eleven names in total – Rachel had a good memory – and four of them were on the list of those who had attended the Taylors’ house-warming party.

  Molly had just finished relaying the information to Ormside, when Tregalles entered the room, followed almost immediately by Paget.

  ‘Good, you’re all here,’ the DCI said briskly. ‘I’ve just heard from Starkie, and it is his opinion that Corbett’s death was no accident. There are bruises on the back and sides of Corbett’s neck, and some of his hair was pulled out, which suggests that someone held him face down and forced his head under water until he drowned. Corbett’s blood-alcohol reading was off the scale, but he must have been conscious and struggling, because some of his fingernails are all but torn away from clawing at the side of the pond. And there are bruises and cuts on the back of one of his hands that suggest it was hammered to make him let go. I’ve passed that information on to Charlie, so we’ll see if his people can find any evidence at the pool to support Starkie’s theory. He’s promised to have his report on my desk first thing Monday morning.’

  Paget glanced at the time. ‘Now, Tregalles, how far did you get in tracking Corbett’s movements after he left the office on Tuesday?’

  Tregalles gave a brief account of his talk with Corbett’s old boss and Joanie, the secretary, and his subsequent visit to the Unicorn. ‘It sounds to me as if Corbett started to panic after you left him,’ he said, ‘because he started making phone calls as soon as you were out of his office, and he went on making them after he got to the pub, and the barman thinks he was waiting for someone as well. So the next thing I have to do is find out who Corbett was calling and who he was waiting for.’

  Tregalles turned to Ormside. ‘Can you check that list of things found in Corbett’s pockets to see if his mobile phone is on it?’ he asked. ‘Don’t know if we can get anything from it after being under water, but it might save us a bit of time if we can.’

  Ormside pulled the folder and opened it. He flipped through the pages until he came to the one he wanted. ‘No phone,’ he said. ‘It could be at the bottom of the pond, assuming he had it with him when he went in.’

  Tregalles grimaced. ‘Might as well forget it if it’s still down ther
e, then,’ he said. ‘I’ll put in a request for his phone records.’

  Paget looked thoughtful after hearing Molly’s report. ‘Do we have anything on Short?’ he asked Ormside.

  ‘Not yet,’ the Sergeant told him, ‘but I’ll check with Tenborough and see if they have anything. That’s where he lives.’

  ‘Right,’ said Paget. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘I had Graham Williams in,’ Ormside said. ‘He’s an accountant. Lives alone and works from his house. He was at school with Barry, but says he used to be painfully shy, so he stayed out of Barry’s way. And he went to Durham university, when Barry went to Leeds. As for Williams being part of a gang, I think you can safely scrub him off the list.’

  ‘Well, that’s something, at least,’ Paget observed as he turned his attention to Molly. ‘What about Irene Sinclair?’ he asked. ‘Have you had a chance to talk to her about her relationship with Roger Corbett and his wife?’

  ‘No, sir, not yet,’ she said, and went on to explain that Irene Sinclair was taking part in a pageant in Chester over the weekend, and wouldn’t be back until Monday. ‘But I would like to have another chat with Sharon Jessop. I managed to track down the girl Sharon used to knock around with the summer before the pub was robbed, and her memory is much better than Sharon’s. She gave me a list of names of the boys they went with back then, and I’d like to hear what Sharon has to say about them, because I think she’s been holding out on me. I thought I might do that tomorrow if . . .’

  But Paget was shaking his head. ‘No need for that,’ he told her. ‘You’ve all worked too many weekends and unpaid overtime as it is. It’s not that often we see fine weather on a weekend, so enjoy this one while you can. Leave Jessop and Irene Sinclair till Monday.’

  ‘I had thought about doing salmon on the barbecue this evening,’ Grace said, ‘but we would probably have to fight the wasps for it, so I picked up a barbecued chicken instead. I’ll do a salad to go with it, and have fruit and ice cream afterwards. I could do a jacket potato as well if you like? If you’ll set up the toaster oven on the bench in the garage, we can keep it cool in here.’

  ‘Good idea,’ said Paget. ‘I didn’t have much time for lunch today.’ He picked up the toaster oven and left the kitchen.

  Grace was busy at the sink, scrubbing a couple of potatoes when he returned.

  ‘So, how was your day?’ he asked.

  ‘Quite pleasant, considering the reason we were there,’ Grace said. ‘I spent a good part of it messing about in the Corbett’s fish pond. There was a nice bit of shade, and it was almost cool under the trees, so it was quite enjoyable. And I found Mr Corbett’s glasses.’

  ‘You were actually in the pond?’

  Grace shook her head. ‘We were using the submersible probe light and the recovery tools, so we sat on the side with our feet in the pool to do it. It took a long time because we had to be careful not to stir up the mud on the bottom. We shooed the fish out of there and put in a temporary dam first, of course.’

  ‘What did Mrs Corbett have to say about that?’

  ‘She was very helpful, as a matter of fact. She told me that the pond had been her husband’s preserve, but she seems to know quite a lot about the feeding and general care of the fish and their habits herself.’ Grace dried the potatoes off with a paper towel, then stuck a steel skewer through each one. ‘There, they just need a touch of oil on them and they’re ready to go once the oven heats up,’ she said.

  ‘Find anything else in the pond?’ asked Paget. ‘Starkie believes that Corbett was held under by someone.’

  ‘So Charlie said. And we did find what appears to be blood and tiny bits of skin on the stonework, which could have been left by Corbett trying to drag himself out of the pond, but we’ll have to wait for Forensic to confirm that – or not. But that could have happened just as easily if he had fallen in accidentally. Apparently the man was very drunk, so he could have simply toppled in, and was too drunk to claw his way out.’

  ‘But it wouldn’t account for the bruises on either side of his neck, or the fact that someone or something had hammered the back of his right hand.’

  ‘Ah! Charlie didn’t mention that bit. So, it does look like murder, then?’

  Paget nodded. ‘I was pretty sure that Corbett was nervous about something when I spoke to him on Tuesday,’ he said. ‘Like almost everyone else, he denied knowing anything about Barry Grant, but it didn’t ring true to me. I suspect that he knew a lot more about Grant and the robberies and killings than he let on. I have trouble seeing him as a participant, but I think he knew who was, and that’s who he was trying to call. You didn’t happen to find his mobile, did you?’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Too bad,’ he said, ‘but if I’m right, chances are that the person or persons who killed Corbett are the same ones who killed George Taylor and Emily Bergman. And speaking of Emily Bergman, love, how would you like to go away for the weekend? This could be the last weekend of sunshine for a while if the forecasters are right about the weather breaking next week.’

  Grace eyed him suspiciously. ‘Before I answer that,’ she said, ‘I’d like to know why the name of Emily Bergman triggered the idea of going away for the weekend. Where, exactly, are you suggesting we go?’

  ‘Cambridge.’

  ‘Cambridge . . .?’ Grace raised an eyebrow, silently inviting an explanation.

  ‘Tell you in a minute,’ he said. ‘I’d better get these potatoes started; time’s getting on, and you must be hungry.’

  Grace chuckled. ‘Which is your ever so subtle way of letting me know that you’re hungry, I suppose,’ she said. ‘Let’s have the potatoes, then, and I’ll give them a shot in the microwave first. That will cut the cooking time in half, and the oven should be ready by now. Anyway, why Cambridge?’

  He handed the potatoes to Grace. ‘Because that’s where the Bergmans live now,’ he said, ‘and after the call I received this afternoon, I’d like to talk to them.’

  He moved out of Grace’s way to prop himself up in the doorway before going on. ‘The phone call was from a Mr Urquhart,’ he said. ‘He’s a vice-president of the company with whom the Bergmans were insured. It seems that Len Ormside rang the local office a couple of days ago to ask for some information regarding the settlement of Bergman’s claim for his losses in the robbery. It was a routine enquiry. The amount claimed was in the information we had on file, but as it wasn’t settled for several months, the final settlement figure never did get back to us.

  ‘The local man didn’t have the information, so he went back to head office for the file, and that’s when Mr Urquhart got into the act and phoned me. He wanted to make it very clear that they believe Sam Bergman falsified the records in order to claim far more than he’d actually lost in the robbery. The trouble was, there was such a mixture of cash, jewellery, gold leaf, gold wire and wafers and so on, that it was almost impossible to make a true evaluation. In addition, they said he should have put the alarm on as soon as he and his wife arrived at the shop. In short, they were refusing to settle for the amount he was claiming

  ‘But Sam stood firm, and said if they didn’t pay up, he’d take them to court. They were all set to fight it, but their legal people got cold feet at the last minute. They felt they might do the company more harm than good, “relationship wise”, as Urquhart put it, by fighting the man in open court so soon after he’d lost his wife in such tragic circumstances. So they held their noses and settled the claim.’

  Grace, who had been listening while she stripped the lettuce and washed the leaves, paused to cast Paget a puzzled glance. ‘So what did this Mr Urquhart expect you to do about it?’ she asked.

  Paget shrugged. ‘Nothing, directly. The main purpose of the call was to ask if we had considered the possibility that the robbery was a scam, engineered by Bergman, to defraud the insurance company. At first, he said, they thought that was all it was, and Emily had been killed when something went wrong, but when they learned that Sam and
his assistant were married within six months of Emily’s death, they wondered if that, too, had been part of the deal. Urquhart said it made a lot of sense, considering that Emily had been insured for £300,000.’

  Grace frowned. ‘Same company?’ she asked. ‘And they paid up?’

  ‘Different section, but the same company,’ Paget told her, ‘and since there was no doubt about the way she died, less questions were asked about that claim than were asked about Sam’s other claims, so they settled within weeks.’

  ‘That oven should be ready now,’ Grace said, ‘so pop the potatoes out there for me, will you, love?’

  She dried her hands and set the timer for half an hour. ‘I wonder where they were married?’ she said when Paget re-appeared. ‘Sam and his assistant, I mean. What was her name?’

  ‘Loretta Thompson. And they were married in Hereford, at least that’s what Urquhart told me today. A quiet, civil marriage, he said. Why?’

  ‘Because that means the insurance company must have had their suspicions about both claims if they were keeping that close an eye on them.’

  ‘Good point,’ said Paget, ‘which means Urquhart may be on to something. And that is why I would like to go to Cambridge tomorrow to have a chat with Sam and his wife.’ He picked up a handful of cherry tomatoes. ‘These been washed?’ he asked.

  ‘No, but if you’re offering, go right ahead,’ Grace said. ‘There’s a cucumber in the crisper if you would like to do that as well. But Cambridge in the middle of July? I’m not so sure about that,’ she said doubtfully. ‘It would take us the best part of the day to get there and even longer to come back; you know what the roads are like on a weekend in midsummer.’

  ‘Three-and-a-half hours,’ he countered. ‘I checked it on the RAC route planner. If we leave about six thirty in the morning, we can beat the traffic and be there by the time the shops open. And if we stick to the minor roads on the way back, we can do it in four. What do you say, Grace? It would do us both good to get away for a couple of days.’

  ‘Might be hard to get a room at such short notice,’ she said, ‘or have you checked that out as well, DCI Paget?’