The Serpent Pool

by Martin Edwards

  Daniel recalled Louise talking about her lover on their way here from the airport.

  ‘When Stuart is in the mood, he can be so much fun. But his boredom threshold is even lower than yours. He’s a mass of contradictions. A party animal who is happiest when he’s walking the fells on his own. That’s why he never moved from the Lakes. He has the luxury of being able to head into the hills at a moment’s notice. If his partners or his clients don’t like it, tough. Because he’s so good at what he does, they put up with his maverick ways.’

  This could explain it. After Louise had fled, Wagg must have set off for the fells. All the forecasters’ warnings about bad weather wouldn’t faze a man in a temper who needed solitude. He returned to the warmth of the kitchen and dialled Tarn Cottage. Louise snatched up the receiver on the second ring.

  ‘Daniel?’

  ‘The house is unlocked, and the power is off, but I can’t find him anywhere.’

  ‘Where are you now?’

  ‘Unfreezing my hands on the kitchen radiator.’

  ‘There’s no trace of blood?’

  ‘Why would there be? You only gave him a tiny scratch, remember?’

  She ignored the jibe. ‘It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Might he have stomped off and forgotten to lock up?’

  ‘Not Stuart. He’s fanatical about security. The thought that anyone might nick his beloved books…’

  ‘Maybe he was so furious that he wasn’t acting rationally. Might have headed for the Langdale Pikes.’ He hesitated. ‘Or A&E.’

  ‘Why don’t you believe me?’ She was shouting into the phone, and he moved it away from his ear. ‘I barely grazed him.’

  ‘Whatever. The fact is, he isn’t at home, and anyone could walk into Crag Gill like I just did and loot the place from top to bottom.’

  He heard her swearing to herself and waited.

  ‘There’s a spare set of keys hanging up on the inside of the door of the cupboard over the microwave. I left them there this morning. No more use for them. You’d better lock up.’

  ‘OK. I’ll call his office and see if they’ve heard from him. Can you give me the number?’

  He found the keys and redialled. The receptionist put him through to Wagg’s PA. She couldn’t tell him anything other than that her boss didn’t like to be disturbed on holiday, unless for a real emergency. When Daniel pressed, she gave in and transferred him to another partner.

  ‘Raj Doshi speaking.’ Smooth and reassuring as music from pan pipes, a calm bedside manner conveyed in three little words. Louise had mentioned Doshi a couple of times. He specialised in divorce work. It was Doshi who had taken Wanda Saffell home after the contretemps on New Year’s Eve. ‘How can I help you, Mr Kind?’

  ‘I need to speak to Stuart Wagg.’

  ‘Your sister doesn’t have a problem, I hope?’

  Doshi must know Wagg’s reputation with women. Did the way he used them impact on the business, or his colleagues? Or was he so important to the firm that he was untouchable, that whatever he did, they were happy to turn a blind eye?

  ‘Stuart and I need to talk. Soon, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mr Kind, but I cannot help. Stuart isn’t due back until next week, and if he’s not answering his home phone or his mobile…’

  ‘Does he often blip off the radar screen like this?’

  ‘You have met Stuart, Mr Kind?’

  ‘Twice.’

  ‘Then you will realise he is his own man.’

  ‘Look, my sister and I are worried. I’m at Crag Gill right now. The power lines seem to be down and he appears to have left his house unlocked.’

  A discreet cough. Possibly the closest Doshi ever came to expressing shock-horror.

  ‘Unlocked, you say?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I…um…I tried the front door.’

  Best not to admit to a solicitor that he’d spent the past hour trespassing.

  ‘I used my sister’s keys to lock the door and secure the house.’

  Or at least he would do, the minute he walked out of this empty place.

  ‘That’s good of you.’

  ‘It doesn’t explain what has happened to Stuart Wagg.’

  ‘He loves walking, Mr Kind, he’s probably on his way home even as we speak.’

  ‘And the fact he left his house open to any Tom, Dick or Harry in the middle of a power cut?’

  ‘I don’t always lock my own front door, Mr Kind.’

  ‘So, you think there’s no cause for concern?’

  ‘I am sure there is a straightforward explanation. Thank you, though, for letting us know. Good afternoon.’

  The phone was put down. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Doshi wasn’t a lawyer for nothing. Not knowing what to do for the best, Daniel decided to trust to instinct.

  Time to call Hannah Scarlett.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Was it significant, Wanda Saffell’s name cropping up in the Bethany Friend inquiry? In conversation with Maggie, Hannah played it down. The young DC’s enthusiasm was one of her virtues, but no sense in jumping to conclusions. Cumbria was a small world, albeit so diverse that anyone could be forgiven for forgetting. The local population was tiny, once you stripped out seasonal workers and tourists who came from all four corners of the globe. For the wife of a suspected murder victim to be interviewed in relation to the unexplained death, six years ago, of a work colleague barely registered on the Richter scale of coincidence.

  But you never knew. Wanda intrigued Hannah. The sight of Arlo Denstone, drenched with red wine at the New Year party, remained as vivid in her memory as the stain on his white jacket. Wanda had a temper, and she lacked restraint. She’d had too much to drink that night, and seemed at the end of her tether. But it didn’t mean she had anything to do with Bethany’s death. The brutal shock of having a husband roasted alive was enough to drive anyone to distraction.

  ‘I’ll pay her a visit.’

  ‘She has this little business in Ambleside, can’t be more than a mile away from your new house.’ Maggie thrust a scribbled note into her hand. ‘Here’s the address.’

  ‘Thanks. I’m having breakfast with Fern Larter tomorrow. She can brief me on Wanda.’

  ‘I don’t like the sound of her.’ Maggie folded her arms as she pronounced judgement. She was a sturdy young woman, from a family who had farmed in the Lakes for five generations, and were the sort of people who believed that there was no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing. She didn’t have much time for shades of grey. Or for posh women who printed obscure volumes of poetry. For all her diligence, she’d need a more flexible mindset if she wanted to shin up the greasy pole. ‘Her witness statement is only a page long, but she comes over as heartless. And she must be in the frame for her husband’s murder.’

  ‘Assuming he was murdered. Let’s not run ahead of ourselves before the coroner has had his say. Let alone the CPS. Wanda is a grieving widow, we’d better not forget that.’

  Maggie’s jaw was set firm. Like most of the foot soldiers in the force, she suspected the Crown Prosecution Service of devoting its time and energy to thinking up reasons not to prosecute.

  ‘A black widow, maybe.’

  ‘We’ll see.’ Hannah slapped Maggie on the shoulder, a gesture of encouragement to counterbalance her caution. ‘In the meantime, well done.’

  * * *

  Hannah asked the admin assistant to set up a meeting with Wanda while she attended a New Year sermon from Lauren. The ACC’s theme was that the CID had to change with the times and she went on and on like an automated phone system. Press one for inclusive policing. Press two for a critique of gender stereotyping. Her latest big idea was a weekend conference for senior detectives at ‘a top secret location’ which would turn out to be some dreary hotel in the Yorkshire Dales. The ACC droned on ad nauseam about the force’s ever-increasing number of ‘partnerships’ with assorted authorities,
units, agencies and projects before introducing a shiny young woman called India Sturridge, the latest recruit to Cumbria Constabulary’s team of spin doctors. India looked barely old enough to be out of university, but she was bound to be paid more than the likes of Maggie Eyre, although she’d never be asked to put her life on the line. Having taken the precaution of wearing a very low-cut blouse, she was assured of the attention of a predominantly male audience. Hannah sensed Greg Wharf shifting in his chair as he composed his next chat-up line.

  ‘We wanted to make a statement,’ Lauren announced, though India’s tanned flesh was the only statement Greg and most of the others were interested in. ‘This appointment is a tangible sign of our commitment to effective and targeted communication with local communities.’

  ‘My aim is simple,’ India trilled. ‘To support the fantastic job my new colleagues do in making the Lake District an area that is not only safer, but feels safer. Our business is not just to cut crime, but to manage the public’s perception of crime.’

  So that was all right, then.

  ‘CID?’ Les Bryant demanded when they repaired to the bar at the end of the shift for a quick drink and communal moan. ‘Criminal Investigation in Decline, if you ask me. In my day, you’d fill a page of a notebook writing up a sudden death. Now you have to produce War and bloody Peace. That’s why the likes of Nick Lowther are fucking off to places like Canada and Australia. I can remember the time when detectives dreaded the thought of demotion. Now they punish you by keeping you in the CID. Loading up your unpaid overtime, taking away your plain clothes allowance.’

  ‘Why do you think they didn’t send me back to uniform?’ Greg Wharf asked, wiping the froth from his pint from his mouth. ‘That’s where you get a decent work/life balance.’

  ‘You’d never have dreamt—’ Les began, before breaking into a violent sneeze.

  ‘No wonder the CID is advertising so many vacancies.’

  The pair had already formed a double act, Hannah thought, as she sipped her lemonade. The Disgruntled Detectives. But she guessed Ben Kind would have agreed. Fewer cops aspired to be a chief inspector these days, simply because of the long hours. Rest days routinely cancelled, duty rotas and shifts changed at short notice. Performance targets were poisoning police work. The government had created three thousand new offences in the past decade, to prove they were dealing with crime. So stupid kids had to be ‘sanctioned’ for offences such as being in possession of an egg with intent to throw it. Detective work was skewed towards statistics, and away from time-consuming stuff like burglary and rape. Officers were nailed to their desks, filling out forms to satisfy the demands of an army of lawyers and social workers.

  ‘You don’t calm down a domestic nowadays.’ Greg leant back in his chair, lamenting the Good Old Days. ‘You provoke someone to lash out, then arrest them. Crime, detection, clear-up, all in a couple of minutes. Easy-peasy.’

  ‘We do need to reach out more—’ Hannah decided it was time to give the ACC a bit of support, but was at once drowned out by a chorus of protests.

  ‘You wait. There are forces out there wearing sponsored baseball caps instead of helmets. They’ve privatised forensics, and the computer geeks will be next. How long before we’re—?’

  The moanfest was interrupted by the chirruping of her mobile. She glanced at the number on the screen, and recognised it at once.

  Daniel Kind.

  The jolt of excitement travelled through her like an electric shock. Was this how addicts felt, when after months of cold turkey, the drug entered their veins? She muttered an excuse, vague and inarticulate, and hurried away from their table. Must make sure she was out of earshot.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hannah? This is Daniel, Daniel Kind.’

  He didn’t need to introduce himself. There was only one Daniel.

  ‘Sorry.’ He sounded unaccountably nervous, as though he’d taken her silence as frostiness. ‘Is it inconvenient, am I interrupting something?’

  ‘Only a rant from my sidekicks about the downsides of modern policing.’

  ‘I’ll keep it brief.’

  ‘No need to apologise.’ She hesitated. ‘Fact is, I could do with being distracted. Preferably until they both drink up and bugger off home.’

  ‘You sound fed up.’

  ‘Shouldn’t be, should I? Not long back after the holiday and already I feel as though I’m on an endless treadmill, as per usual. How are things? I saw Louise—’

  ‘I know.’ Still that note of anxiety. What was wrong? ‘It’s because of Louise that I’m ringing. I’d like a word with you, off the record.’

  ‘Your sister isn’t in trouble?’

  ‘Well…’

  He was floundering.

  ‘Then, what?’

  ‘She’s split up with Stuart Wagg, and now he’s…’

  The superarticulate Daniel Kind, lost for words? Amazing. But – admit it, Hannah – it was impossible not to feel a frisson of excitement. Quite a turn-on that: when he needed help, he’d called her.

  Striving for her best chief inspector tone, she said, ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  ‘Don’t worry. She’s well rid of him…sorry, he’s a friend of yours, he invited you over for New Year’s Eve.’

  ‘Police officers don’t make friends with lawyers. No, he’s a customer of Marc’s, a rare-book collector. You were saying, about him?’

  ‘Look, it’s difficult to talk about over the phone. I wondered if you could spare me half an hour?’

  She almost succumbed to the impulse to clench her fist and shout, ‘Yes!’ Sod the New Year’s resolution and all that crap about clean breaks and fresh starts. It would be fantastic to see him again.

  ‘When were you thinking of?’

  ‘As soon as?’

  Keen, or what? This wasn’t like Daniel.

  ‘You mean this evening?’

  ‘If it’s too much to ask…’

  ‘How about we meet in an hour’s time?’

  ‘Terrific! It’s really good of…’

  Her skin prickled, and she spotted Greg Wharf watching her with undisguised curiosity. She imagined him speculating about the call that she didn’t want overheard.

  ‘How about The Tickled Trout?’

  ‘Perfect. And Hannah…’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Walking through the front door of The Tickled Trout, Hannah glanced to right and left, to see if she recognised anyone. Or, more to the point, if anyone was likely to recognise her. It was second nature for a police officer to check out any room he or she entered. But no one at the tables or gathered at the slate-topped bar took a blind bit of notice of her. If anybody felt a pinprick of conscience, it was her. This wasn’t a secret get-together with a CHIS (no informants in modern policing, only covert human intelligence sources). More like a tryst, though she was still in her work clothes – there’d been no question of nipping back home to change. Fobbing Marc off with the news that he’d have to make his own meal was the easy bit; she’d given him the same message a hundred times before.

  A text popped up on her mobile.

  Running late. Traffic. Daniel.

  So she needn’t have arrived twenty minutes early, but never mind. Turning up early for meetings away from home ground was a habit learnt from Daniel’s father. Ben said it gave you a chance to scope out the meeting place, and to keep an eye on the door. You never knew when you might need to get out in a hurry.

  Painted on a beam above the counter was a quote from Twelfth Night. ‘Here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling.’ Hannah had a hazy recollection that this was something to do with Malvolio but she hadn’t paid much attention to Shakespeare since she was sixteen. On a pillar facing the bar a notice explained that, by rubbing a trout’s underbelly with your fingertips, you could send it into a trance, so it’s ready to be thrown onto the nearest scrap of dry ground. It dated back to the days of the ancient Greeks, apparently, but although Hannah th
ought it might be rather nice to be stroked into a trance, in twenty-first century England, tickling trout was illegal. Not that Hannah had ever collared anyone for it. Before long, the Home Office was sure to embark on a media blitz, celebrating the low incidence of offences as evidence of their success in being tough on crime.

  The Tickled Trout was one of the most renowned gourmet pubs in the county and had escaped the malaise affecting other rural hostelries. Two hundred years back, the place had been a coaching inn. Now run by two generations – father, mother, two daughters and their husbands – it had evolved over the years in response to the changing demands of Lakeland visitors, combining the pub with a micro-brewery and gourmet restaurant. Marc had once brought her here for a meal as a birthday treat, but the prices were pitched at American and Japanese tourists, or wealthy professionals with weekend cottages in the posher parts of the Lakes, not at second-hand book dealers.

  She resisted the temptation to warm her hands in front of the open fire, or linger near the restaurant door and savour the aroma of roast venison and guinea fowl. There were a couple of secluded booths at the corner of the room, suitable for guests who didn’t want to be disturbed. Debussy piano music tinkled in the background as she positioned herself in a seat behind a pillar. From here she could spot people walking in, without easily being seen herself. In the Lakes, rumours spread faster than ripples on a tarn. She’d traded on hearsay often enough to know its potency. For all that Lauren waxed so lyrical about modern, technological, intelligence-led policing, what detectives really relied on was good, old-fashioned, gossipled policing.

  Daniel arrived barely five minutes late. As his gaze swivelled round the bar, she raised a hand. He moved towards her with brisk, athletic strides. Her stomach knotted as he approached. She’d thought she was anaesthetised to this. Thought that she’d rid herself of that ludicrous desire for him, the desire she’d refused to acknowledge, even to herself. But the anaesthetic had worn off. She simply couldn’t help it.