Night Fall

by Frank Smith

  He lay there for a moment, eyes still closed, listening for the sound of rain in the pipe outside the bedroom window, and hoping he’d made a mistake and it was Sunday and he didn’t have to get up. No sound, so that was good. But it was Thursday, and that meant he’d better get moving if he was to get to work on time.

  He slid out of bed, picked up his clothes from the chair by the door and took them into the bathroom. Twenty minutes later, washed and dressed and shaved, he emerged. Michael, their ten year old, must be lying on his back again, because Moreland could hear the boy snoring as he passed his door. He paused to peep into Laura’s room, then went in. All the bedclothes were on the floor, and she was curled up in a ball in the middle of the bed. Laura was eight, and a restless sleeper. He picked up the clothes and laid them gently over her, but he knew they’d probably end up on the floor again.

  It was ten minutes to six when he left the house. He never stopped for breakfast – that would mean getting up fifteen minutes earlier – so he usually waited for the fresh buns to come out of the bakery at eight, then had one with a slice of Gouda and a coffee from the deli. He stood for a moment, breathing in the morning air. His hand and sleeve came away wet as he brushed past the car in the driveway. So there had been some rain in the night, and there was a nip in the air, a reminder that summer was definitely behind them. And he was sure it was darker than it had been at the beginning of the week, and only yesterday, Joan had been talking about having a look round the market on the weekend for a bit of jewellery for her sister in Australia for Christmas.

  Dennis Moreland hunched into his coat, thrust his hands in his pockets and set off.

  There was a van in the street halfway down the hill. The rear doors were open and there were several tins of paint and a plastic bucket sitting on the pavement beside the van. A man, wearing paint-smeared overalls and a cap, was leaning inside the van. He straightened up and flexed his hands as Moreland approached. ‘Bloody ladder,’ he grumbled loudly. ‘Here, would you mind giving me a hand, mate? Just to get it out of the van. It’s an awkward thing. Heavy. Only take a minute.’

  ‘Starting work early, aren’t you?’ Moreland said as he stepped into the road.

  ‘Got another lot to fetch as well,’ the man explained, ‘so I thought I’d get an early start. If you’d just lean in there and pull, I’ll get in and push from the other end. All right? Mind your head.’

  ‘Right.’ Dennis Moreland bent forward to lean into the van and grasp the ladder . . .

  Joan Moreland came awake to the sound of the telephone ringing. She raised herself on one elbow and squinted at the clock next to the phone on the far side of the bed. Twenty to seven. Who on earth . . .?

  Not fully awake, her mind ran through the possibilities as she clambered across the bed and reached for the phone. Probably a wrong number, she told herself, but a call at this time of the morning was a bit worrying all the same.

  ‘Hello . . .?’

  ‘Joanie . . .? It’s Norm. Is Dennis there?’

  Norman Beasley, Dennis’s boss. She frowned into the phone. ‘What do you mean, is he here? Isn’t he there?’

  ‘If he was I wouldn’t be ringing you, now would I, Joanie? Is he ill or just skiving off? Only we’ve got a lot on today and we need him here.’

  She wished he wouldn’t call her Joanie. She’d told him often enough but he still did it. It made her feel as if she were six years old. She ran her fingers through her hair, trying to bring herself fully awake. ‘He’s gone,’ she said. ‘He . . . I mean I think he has. Hang on a minute, Norman. I’ll go and look.’ She put the phone down and struggled into her dressing gown as she left the room.

  Not in the bathroom. She took a quick look in each of the kids’ rooms before going downstairs. ‘Dennis?’ she called at the foot of the stairs. Silence. Worried now, she went through the rooms. She opened the back door and peered out. Silly, of course he wouldn’t be there. Then the front door. The car was still there. She padded out to the street and looked both ways. A man on a bicycle sped past, and a boy was delivering papers across the street, but there was no sign of Dennis. She went back to the kitchen and picked up the phone on the counter.

  ‘You wouldn’t be having me on, would you, Norman?’ she asked tartly. ‘I mean he went off to work same time as usual; he has to be there.’

  ‘Well he’s not, love, so when you find out what he’s playing at, tell him to get himself down here. OK?’

  Frowning, Joan Moreland hung up the phone, then made her way upstairs to replace the extension as well. What could Dennis be up to? Where could he have gone? It wasn’t like him to go wandering off. She got dressed, then sat down on the bed to try to think what to do. He couldn’t have had an accident or she’d have heard, and it was no distance at all from the house to where he worked at the SuperFair market. A two-minute walk, that was all. Dennis must be at work. Probably doing something in the back, and Norm hadn’t bothered to check. Either that or it was some sort of wind-up by Norman Beasley. It was the sort of thing he might do and think it funny, and if that were the case, there was no point in worrying about it. She looked at the clock. Soon be time to get the kids up anyway, so she might as well start getting breakfast ready. She’d wait a while, then ring the market and ask for Dennis. Just to be sure.

  Paget sat back in his chair and said, ‘I’m sorry, Amanda, but it’s just not possible. We’re short-staffed as it is. There have been no replacements for almost a year now. On the one hand we’re being criticized for our clear-up rate and the time it takes to complete an investigation, and for the amount of overtime, and now you’re suggesting we cut staff by five per cent. It’s a simple equation, so if this is your idea of a way to impress Mr Brock, then I suggest you find another way.’

  Amanda had objected to Paget calling her ‘Ma’am’. ‘I don’t like the term,’ she told him flatly. ‘Superintendent in public, but in private, when we’re working one on one, I would prefer to use first names, if you have no objection?’

  His instinctive reaction had been to balk at that himself. It suggested a not so subtle attempt on Amanda’s part to break down the barrier that so clearly existed between them. But even as that was going through his mind, he knew it would sound petty, even spiteful to refuse. They could hardly go on addressing each other as ‘Superintendent’ and ‘Chief Inspector’ as they sat together day after day in her office, so he’d agreed.

  Amanda, who had been searching for something on the screen on her desk, turned to him. ‘I know you don’t think much of me,’ she said quietly, ‘but I think even you will concede that I’m not stupid. I know as well as you do the consequences of such cuts, but I have no choice. Mr Brock made it very clear that it’s not negotiable. Believe me, Neil, I’ve given the chief superintendent my opinion regarding where these cuts will lead, but I might as well have saved my breath, so let’s stop wasting time on a fight we can’t win.’

  The uniformed constable facing her when Joan Moreland opened the door looked almost too young to be a policeman. ‘Mrs Moreland?’ he enquired. ‘Constable Lowry. You reported your husband missing?’

  The man appeared little more than a teenager. Joan Moreland looked past him, hoping to see someone more senior, but the man was alone and there was no one else in the police car at the kerb. She hesitated, then sighed and said, ‘You’d better come in.

  ‘I sent the kids off to school. I didn’t want to worry them,’ she explained when they sat facing each other in the living room. ‘I wasn’t too worried at first, when his boss phoned to ask where Dennis was, but after I’d phoned round and nobody had seen him, I rang the hospital, the ambulance people, then you. The car’s still here, and I’ve been up and down the road to ask if anybody saw him this morning – that was after I rang you – but nobody had.’

  ‘And he’s how old, Mrs Moreland?’

  ‘Thirty-two. Well, he’ll be thirty-three at the end of the month.’

  ‘Has he been worried about anything recently? Has he said
or done anything unusual? Is he taking any medication?’

  Joan shook her head to each question. ‘No,’ she said impatiently, ‘and they asked me all that when I rang to report him missing.’

  ‘If you’ll just bear with me, Mrs Moreland. I know this must be worrying for you, but the more information we have, the better. You mentioned his boss. Where does Mr Moreland work?’

  ‘He works for SuperFair down the bottom of the road. He’s a butcher. I mean, what could have happened to him between here and there?’ Joan Moreland’s eyes were suddenly moist.

  ‘I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation and your husband will turn up,’ Lowry said soothingly. He continued doggedly through the standard list of questions. Names and addresses of friends and relatives. The name of Dennis’s boss. Places he might be. Had there been any trouble at work? And, as delicately as he could, the probing questions about the state of their marriage.

  ‘We’re a very happy family,’ Joan said tartly, ‘and I resent the implication that we’re not. Dennis is a good husband and father, so if you’re suggesting—’

  ‘But I’m not,’ a now red-faced Lowry broke in hastily. ‘I have to ask those questions, Mrs Moreland. It’s routine. Honestly.’ He rose to his feet. ‘And we will do everything we can to find your husband. But before I go, I’d like to take a look around the house, if you don’t mind?’

  Joan Moreland bristled. ‘What for?’ she demanded. ‘Do you think Dennis is hiding somewhere? I told you, he left the house to go to work.’

  ‘It’s standard procedure,’ he said weakly. ‘It’s—’

  ‘I know,’ she broke in wearily as she got to her feet, ‘it’s routine. So what do we do now?’

  ‘Perhaps we could start upstairs,’ Lowry suggested. ‘And do you have a greenhouse or a garden shed?’

  Paget stayed late that evening to catch up on his own work. Not only was Amanda Pierce new to the job, she was in a completely new environment, so there was a lot to learn in a short space of time. To be fair, she grasped things quickly, and reluctant as Paget was to give her credit for anything, he had to admit that she was working very hard. But he knew it must be frustrating for her to have to rely so heavily on him, knowing how he felt about her.

  He looked at the clock. Ten minutes to nine. Time to pack it in. Time, too, he told himself as he gathered up the files on his desk and locked them away for the night, to forget about Amanda Pierce, at least until tomorrow. But that was easier said than done.

  In spite of everything he knew about her, Paget couldn’t help but feel a grudging respect for the way Amanda was tackling her new job, but, as he kept reminding himself, that could never excuse what she had done to Matthew, and to Jill, when she disappeared without a word to anyone.

  Amanda had known Matthew as long as she and Jill had known each other, but because of the difference in their ages, it wasn’t until shortly before Jill and Paget were married that Amanda and Matthew started to take notice of each other. Suddenly, Matthew was no longer just Jill’s young brother, and sitting there now in the quiet of his office, Paget remembered how thrilled Jill had been when Matthew and Amanda announced their engagement.

  ‘He needs the steadying hand of someone like Amanda,’ she’d said. ‘I’m so pleased.’

  Paget pushed his chair back and stood up. So what had gone wrong, he wondered. How long had their relationship been in trouble before either he or Jill had become aware of it? How could this woman, Jill’s best and closest friend for years, so callously and so deliberately walk away without a word of explanation, and leave Matthew in such despair that he’d committed suicide?

  Would he ever know the truth, he wondered as he stepped out into the night. A few leaves scurried before a fitful wind to find refuge in a corner behind the steps, and another leaf fluttered past his face as he made his way to his car. Change was in the air, he thought . . . and not only with the weather.

  Friday, 14 October

  The investigation into the killing of Billy Travis had all but ground to a halt due to lack of both evidence and apparent motive. The suspicion that he had been the victim of mistaken identity was beginning to take hold, so while every facet of Billy’s life was still being examined under a microscope, and background checks were being done on virtually everyone he had ever known, the case was at a standstill.

  While a comprehensive search on the police national computer for crimes of a similar nature produced a number of cases involving the use of duct tape, beatings and/or killings, none included plastic cable ties or dropping the victim from a bridge or high place of any kind, nor was there any mention of a letter of the alphabet carved on the victim’s forehead.

  ‘Unless someone comes forward with new evidence, I’m dropping back to normal weekend staff levels,’ Paget told Amanda that afternoon. ‘I wish there was more that we could be doing, but at least it’ll keep the overtime down, so that should please Mr Brock.’

  But Chief Superintendent Morgan Brock was not pleased. Sitting in his New Street office, surrounded by his beloved charts and graphs, he did not relish trying to explain the lack of progress to the chief constable.

  He read the brief report from Detective Superintendent Pierce again, half hoping he would find something he’d missed, but the message was plain and simple: without a motive, without physical evidence, and without a single witness, the investigation was at a standstill. In fact there was even some doubt that Billy Travis was the intended victim.

  Brock tossed the report onto his desk. Blunt words and not an auspicious start for Superintendent Pierce, he thought dourly, but then he’d had his doubts about her suitability for the job from the very beginning. But political correctness was what it was all about these days, and when your chief constable tells you, in confidence, that he’s ‘rather in favour of the idea’, it pays to take that into consideration when casting one’s vote.

  The woman did have an excellent record, but under normal circumstances Paget would have been the clear choice: he had the background and he knew the job. On the other hand he could be a bit headstrong and hard to manage, and he couldn’t always be persuaded to see the big picture and the need for compromise, so perhaps the appointment of Amanda Pierce had some merit after all. Only time would tell.

  SEVEN

  Saturday, 15 October

  Ron Jackson shrugged into his coat as he came out of the house and looked up at the sky. ‘Looks like a good one,’ he said to his son, Jimmy. ‘Ready to go, are you? Got your hammer and your goggles?’

  ‘Here, Dad.’ The boy held up a satchel. ‘And Mum did me a sandwich and some water.’

  ‘Good lad. Give your mum a kiss, then.’ Ron turned and gave his wife a peck on the cheek.

  ‘And you be careful,’ Alice Jackson warned her son for at least the umpteenth time in the last ten minutes. ‘And make sure you put those goggles on.’ She looked across the boy’s head at her husband. ‘And mind what you’re doing with that sledgehammer,’ she said. ‘Chips fly in all directions, so make sure Jimmy’s well away from you when you’re breaking those stones up.’

  ‘Don’t worry, love, I’ll bring him home safe and sound.’ He and the boy made their way to the pickup truck in the driveway and got in.

  ‘Got your phone?’ his wife called as he backed into the street. He nodded and waved.

  Alice watched until the pickup turned the corner and disappeared. ‘And do be careful,’ she whispered as she went back into the house.

  It was a short drive, three miles up the valley before taking the side road that wound its way through trees to the top of Clapperton Hill, where the paved road ended at a lookout point. But Jackson carried on, following a well-worn track across the moorland for close to a quarter of a mile before coming to a halt before a wire fence and gate. Half buried in the scrubby grass beside the gate was a rusted sign that had at one time warned all and sundry to Keep Out.

  Jimmy jumped out and ran to open the gate, then waited for his father to drive through before cl
osing the gate and getting back into the pickup. Jackson drove slowly along the strip of turf between the wire fence and the edge of the quarry, then began the spiral descent to the relatively flat surface of the quarry floor. Once parked, Jimmy, with goggles already in place, pulled his small hammer from the satchel and got out.

  ‘That’s where I got the good ones last time, Dad,’ he said, pointing to a pile of smaller stones at the base of the cliff. ‘The red ones, remember, Dad? Can I get some more?’

  Ron got out and set the seven-pound sledge down beside him while he slipped his own goggles over his head to hang around his neck as he looked around. He didn’t need the small stuff, but it would keep Jimmy busy for a while. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘But stay right there. Remember what I’ve told you about climbing?’

  The boy nodded and said, ‘Yes, Dad,’ as he scampered off, hammer in hand.

  Ron picked up the sledgehammer and walked over to a pile of larger stones. He’d done well here last week. Most of the stones had split without shattering; just what he needed for the rock wall he was building at home. He glanced up at the cliff face towering above him. It looked safe enough, but he was a cautious man, so he’d made it a practice to pick out the stones that looked promising, then carry them away from the base of the cliff before attacking them with the sledge.

  He clambered onto one of the larger slabs to take a better look . . . and froze. He glanced back at the boy. Jimmy was hammering away quite happily. Ron Jackson picked his way carefully over the jumble of rocks until he came to the body. He looked up. The man had to be dead after a fall like that. Even so . . . He bent to take a closer look, then drew back.

  The man’s hands were bound together behind his back, his mouth was covered with duct tape, and his hair was matted with blood . . . Ron Jackson sucked in his breath and took out his phone.