Deadly Thyme

by R. L. Nolen

  “I’m calling DCI Trewe, Mrs. Butler, if you will take a seat.” Jon punched in some numbers. Trewe must have answered immediately. “Yes. Mrs. Butler is here at the B & B. No, she came by herself.”

  Ruth heard him sigh.

  He quickly repeated what she had told him, then said, “She is here. I … yes, sir.”

  “What happens next?”

  “They will get the description of the car and where it was seen last.”

  Ruth heard herself scream inside her skull. That isn’t enough! Her hand was beginning to throb. She searched to come up with a reasonable way to get him to talk to her about her daughter. “My daughter wasn’t a drug addict.”

  He jerked back as if she’d slapped him. “Mrs. Butler, we don’t believe your daughter was a drug addict. The drugs were probably injected by the killer.”

  “I overheard DCI Trewe say that the still photo was from a video. Mr. Graham … You gave it to me didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “You saw a video of her? What was she doing?”

  “It looked like she was talking to herself. She sees something—or someone—and she walks toward the shadows. That was all there was.”

  She noticed his face went very pale as he spoke of her daughter. She asked, “What do you think she saw?”

  “I don’t know.” He stood up and fidgeted, rearranging books, checking his mobile. “I wish I had something more to give you than flimsy platitudes. You’re worth more than that.”

  “And the handwritten notes I couldn’t read?”

  “Tavy. Apparently it was his way of communicating when he was emotional.”

  “And no one told me that.”

  “That was a mistake. I’m sorry. When we discovered him missing, the notes were momentarily forgotten. There is no excuse for not communicating with you.”

  “What did you mean ‘you’re worth more than that’?”

  He cleared his throat. “You’ve been through a lot. You deserve better.”

  “Why?”

  “I … you just do.”

  She waited for more but he would not look up from his mobile. So she turned and left.

  11:52 p.m.

  He couldn’t take as much blood as he needed. The child couldn’t handle the draining without dying, and even on days when he did have enough, his stomach wouldn’t bear more than a cup at a time. He knew that once the blood passed the stomach it did him nothing but good, but he hadn’t figured out a way to get it in without drinking it—and blood goes bad too quickly.

  Charles bent over the gardening bench in his shed. His roses were doing wonderfully with the leftover blood. He used some for his nightly disguise, and the rest he poured into the drying trays with screening to keep the flies from feasting. Then he would mix the dried blood into top soil to lay out on the beds.

  Even The Wife had commented on how youthful he was looking. His efforts were working. He was readjusting his physical being for the turning back of time.

  He fixed his goggles to his face, careful not to let any of the plant material touch his bare skin. This particular poison could be deadly if absorbed through any mucus membrane. He hummed a tune under his breath. The concoction he was making was odorless. The white powder was not tasteless, though. He knew he would have to invent a way around that.

  36

  Friday

  Day thirteen

  It was early evening by the time Jon was ready to meet with Trewe with what he thought were good arguments for reactivating a search for Annie Butler. Jon went to the Perrin’s Point Police Station, but Trewe was not there. Strange, because he said he would be. He overheard Perstow remark that Trewe was out for blood today.

  He entered Perstow’s cramped office through the break room where there was another package of chocolate digestives. “Who are you talking to?” he asked Perstow. There was a square-shaped uniformed woman in Perstow’s office. Jon read her name tag. “Ah, Mrs. Trethaway, we meet at last.”

  Perstow stood. “I don’t wish to be here when DCI Trewe comes along. I was asked to wait until you arrived and now you’re here.” The jolly man waved and rushed away.

  Police Community Support Officer Sue Trethaway had mouse-brown hair and three pairs of glasses draped or perched on her person. Introductions over, she began with a well-told story about her son and his car. Seems the old rattle-trap was in long need of mechanical help and in short need of petrol all of the time. Her son had a good job in medical sales but spent a fair portion of his salary on the needs of his car, so he still lived at home. That story ended when the phone alerted her to other business.

  An hour passed with no word from Trewe. Jon reviewed notes on his smartphone, set up some to-do lists, and reread a few reports. He had eaten some of the chocolate digestives, washed down with some tea. He would not sit here waiting all day. He stood and brushed crumbs from his trousers. Trewe burst through the door carrying a sheaf of papers. “I’m having the DNA of the spittle analyzed.”

  Jon sat back down, a little taken aback with Trewe’s abrupt entrance.

  Mrs. Trethaway nodded and smiled at him from the doorway. She said, “I’ll just make sure you’re not disturbed.” She shut the door behind Trewe.

  Jon realized what Trewe had said. “Brilliant. There will be something with the other murders.”

  “New developments. Fingerprints found in Tavy’s kitchen were sent to the Police National Computer.” He let the papers fall on Perstow’s desk.

  “The PNC matched them?”

  “Beggars belief, it did! Name of Charles Darrin.”

  “He signed some of his notes and emails as Charles. But I didn’t see there were fingerprints with the other cases. How was there a match?”

  Trewe shifted files. “Found at another murder scene.”

  “Really? Which one?”

  “One that you don’t have in your nice, neat little stack, Mr. Graham. His mother, when he was twenty. He had a job in Wales. Supposedly came home that weekend and found her dead.” Trewe frowned. “Here’s a grainy photo of the mother.”

  Jon took the photo. His breath caught.

  “What is it?” Trewe asked.

  “This looks like Ruth Butler.”

  Trewe studied the photo again. “There is a likeness.”

  “This could be a motive.”

  “Seems a stretch to say that. Why hasn’t something happened to her before? No one has recently moved to the village.” Trewe pulled his readers from a pocket and fit them across the bridge of his nose. He studied the photo. “What do we do about this?”

  “We need to assign someone to guard her.”

  Trewe huffed, “We have all available manpower on this as it is.”

  Jon sat back, rubbed his temples. “I’ll make it a point to watch out for her then. What else do we have?”

  Trewe gave him a look. “And I’ll make it a point to watch you.”

  “I’m only saying that if the killer, this Charles, killed his mother, and Ruth Butler looks like his mother … Well, she isn’t safe.”

  Trewe pursed his lips as if he was about to argue, but then said, “We’ll add some officers to keep an eye on her house. The profiler believes the killer is presently employed in a job where he can control his own hours. The situation may be complicated by multiple personalities. The killer may believe he is invincible and so will take risks. He may act perfectly natural most of the time.”

  “Anything in there about a stunted social background?”

  Trewe looked at Jon over the glasses. “How did you know that?”

  Jon shrugged.

  Trewe continued reading. “He might have had a speech impediment, some physical deformity, or something less obvious. May have been obese as a child—one underlying cause of social inadequacy. Childhood obesity was not such an epidemic thirty or forty years ago. The problem led to self-image issues. He would have had either an authoritarian father or an overbearing mother—but not both—one who would use the other against the wor
ld or their child.”

  “In other words,” Jon said, “if he had a bad father, the father would use the mother against the child, or the mother would use the father against the child, in order to weaken their resistance, to frighten them to death. ‘Just wait until your father gets home!’ that sort of thing. And we can link the Mother Goose nursery rhymes to childhood. What else do we know about him?”

  Trewe glanced down at his notes. “Age at present: late fifties. He’d have to be in pretty good shape, too. He was fingerprinted at twenty, after his mother turned up dead. Not enough evidence to pin it on him. The bloody fingerprint was explained away apparently—tried to revive her or some such nonsense—but too many others died around him. Always an alibi at hand, had our Charles. His father only recently turned up—as an old skeleton. The age of the skeleton put Charles at about eight or nine years old, meaning that he probably wouldn’t have been the one to put a bullet in his skull and drive him into the pond. Just an odd coincidence, is all. The headmaster of his school was ruled a suicide, but guess who was the first on the scene.”

  “Charles Darrin.”

  “Got it in one. Imagine a fourteen-year-old kid pushing his old headmaster from the school’s roof.”

  “You could say he is quite experienced,” Jon murmured.

  “I don’t know what sort of job he has, but he has a good knowledge of chemicals. Managed to drug the dog with a drug prescribed for stomach problems.”

  “Ulcer?”

  “Irritable Bowel Syndrome. The drug contains Secobarbital. He had to drug the dog and wait until the dog showed signs of drowsiness to have a go at the old man.” Jon busied himself stacking the files that were scattered across the floor beneath Perstow’s desk so they wouldn’t tumble to the floor if shifted. “Have you had the local chemist checked out?”

  “Yes, he’s been cleared.”

  “Has anything come up about the car that Mrs. Butler saw?”

  “No. I expect he has a hiding place for it. Something well concealed.”

  “I like the theory of hiding in plain sight. How many people around here have a dark, old-model car?”

  “I for one. Perstow does. A lot of people, I imagine. It isn’t exactly an uncommon color for old-model cars.”

  Jon shook his head. All this Sturm und Drang and nothing was resolved. “At least we have a name.”

  “Yes.” Trewe stood. “But, that’s all I’ve got. I’ll not hold you back from your busy schedule, Mr. Graham.”

  “I’m not so busy that I’d turn down a pint.” He wanted to discuss things a bit more. A pint was always good for easy talk.

  “Not even in your mission to keep an eye on Mrs. Butler?”

  “She’s got plenty of eyes in the daytime, Chief Inspector.” Jon followed Trewe outside, where they turned to walk toward the beach and the Spider’s Web. Jon paused to look out over the tiered houses. A sliver of sea gleamed under the cold, gray sky. The sun seemed to be taking a vacation this week, only making an occasional appearance for appearance’s sake. “It won’t be easy to find him, will it?”

  “Not unless he keeps shutting up witnesses. He’ll make a mistake. They all do.”

  In search of an honest man, he could try walking through the streets in daylight carrying a lighted lamp like Diogenes. He doubted he would discover many truly honest people. No life was completely open. Everyone had secrets and ulterior motives. No one was without guile. Motive wasn’t evil.

  In practical terms, each human undertaking could be boiled down to a few fundamental objectives: power, money or sex. So why was Charles Darrin killing? From what he could surmise from reading and rereading the files, it seemed the answer was power. It was likely that his true reasoning was unreasonable. The man was mad.

  The pub was crowded and loud, but warm. There was a party going on in the public bar—a wake, of sorts, for Tavy. Through the pervading smell of food and beer, cigarette smoke moved in waves of intensity about the main room. The no-smoking rule must have been taken lightly here. But he wasn’t one to disrupt the proceedings. He and Trewe found an empty table in the quieter snug where a few oldsters had settled in with their pints and their thoughts.

  “What can I get you, Peter?”

  “Milk.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t drink much. Stomach.” Trewe patted the flat area above his belt.

  Jon had been impressed since first meeting Trewe at the shape in which he kept himself. He must be close to retirement age. For an old guy, he looked good. He made his way to the bar to place his order. Their glasses clinked as he set them on the table.

  “Cheers,” Trewe said.

  They finished their drinks in a silence broken by Trewe when he said, “I’m starved.”

  “I’m for one of those Cornish pasties. I’ll buy this time around. Milk again?”

  “Water. I’ll have a ploughman’s. Next round of drinks is on me.”

  “I won’t let you forget. Back in a tic.”

  Jon returned with their drinks. “The manipulation of the bodies shows order and intelligence. With the other bodies being buried in the manner they were, over the last thirty years, we could say he was rational and orderly. No one could have predicted Annie Butler would meet him that day. What made him act impulsively?”

  Trewe shook his head.

  Jon sat back. “I think it has to do with the mother and Ruth Butler.”

  “Perhaps you’re right. I will assign someone to patrol.”

  The bell rang to announce their meal was ready, and Jon brought the two plates to their table from the bar. They set about making short work of their meals. The Cornish pasty was everything it was supposed to be, a thick, steaming meat-and-vegetable concoction enclosed in flaky pastry.

  Trewe said around a mouthful, “This morning a motorist came forward. He saw two men walking along the road on that Friday evening. One had a white beard and brown felt hat. Sounded like Tavy. The other, a younger man, wore a hat much like Tavy’s.”

  “Sounds like the nephew.” He picked a matchbook with the pub’s name on it from a bowl at the center of the table. Even though the non-smoking rule had been implemented, there were still scofflaws and the pub’s owner apparently looked the other way. He had a lot of matchbooks. It was an unofficial record of where he’d been.

  “It was.”

  “You checked him out?”

  “Very thoroughly. Only living relative. Inherits the house. Not much else. The day Tavy died, the nephew had already returned to his girlfriend’s flat in London. Plenty of witnesses. Everything he says checks out, down to the hats. They purchased them together.”

  “The hats?”

  Trewe nodded. “The nephew and he found them in a little shop in Port Isaac.”

  “My money’s on the postmistress,” Jon whispered. A group entered the snug and were noisily engaged nearby. He leaned closer and lowered his voice. He didn’t want anyone listening in. “Knows a lot about the locals. Has a reputation. Nosey. Good ingredients for a killer.”

  “Good ingredients for a victim, too. Charles Darrin is a male.”

  “There’s that.”

  “We examined Tavy’s computer.”

  Jon had to raise his voice a bit to be heard over the swelling crowd. “What’d you find?”

  “All the emails and poetry on it were written after Tavy’s death. So the killer was spending a lot of time in Tavy’s cottage.”

  “Likely why you were able to find a print.”

  Neither of the police officers noticed the older man sitting near the crowded table next to them pull a hat on, excuse himself and leave the pub.

  37

  Jon and Trewe had been so engrossed in conversation, the Friday night crowd and the noise of the pub could just as well have been down south in Port Isaac.

  Trewe’s mobile beeped. Trewe looked at it before answering. “Yes, Perstow?”

  He stood abruptly, nodded a dismissal to Jon and left.

  Puzzled, Jon followed o
n his heels, but by the time he’d exited there was no sign of Trewe. His mobile sounded. It was Ruth Butler.

  “Mr. Graham, there’s someone in my garden.”

  He swung around full circle, searching for Trewe. He started off at a run to Ruth Butler’s cottage. “Do you recognize him?”

  “No.”

  “On my way. Call 999.” He took off through the car park and over the footbridge spanning the River Perrin. The pathway ended at the alley behind Ruth Butler’s back garden. He craned his neck to see what he could over her garden wall, but could make out nothing in the dark.

  The shadow of a cat slunk between dark patches. A dog barked. Jon raced through the alley to the narrow walk between cottages and to Ruth’s front door. The cottage was dark. Jon approached the front door and knocked. “Are you all right in there?” No answer. Had something happened to her?

  Two uniformed policemen arrived, breathing hard as if they’d run uphill, which they probably had. “Check the doors and windows,” Jon ordered.

  Flashing lights raked across windows along the length of the street. Tires squealed as car after car arrived in front of Ruth’s home. Just then, Jon heard several locks click undone. The door opened. The smell of fried fish wafted out. Mrs. Butler clutched her dressing gown around her thin form. From the darkened doorway her scared face looked pale green in the flashing lights. “You came so quickly,” she whispered. “He got away.”

  Shorter than Mrs. Butler, her mother peeked out from behind her.

  “He didn’t go by way of the alley. I would have seen him. Might I have a peek from your vantage point?”

  Mrs. Butler stepped aside and pulled the switch on a floor lamp just inside her front door. She was standing so close to Jon he could have reached out and touched her. He wanted more than anything to be able to take her in his arms, tell her he would protect her from any harm, and promise he would always be there. All these thoughts went through his head, but at the same time he thought, What am I thinking? He said, “Show me where you saw him. Tell me what happened.”