“And did you? Did you meet him?”
“Sort of…” Tayte shone the Maglite into the dinghy to the body that lay awkwardly across the centre seat board.
Hayne’s eyes widened as he went for his radio.
Within thirty minutes Hayne knew everything that had transpired on the ferry boat that afternoon between Tayte and Simon Phillips, and the pair were now lit up on Durgan beach like actors on centre stage. The light-source came from the Aquastar police launch that had diverted to Durgan after Hayne had placed his call. Tayte walked towards the light - which seemed to hover several metres above the river - squinting through the white glare as he watched a powered inflatable come ashore. Seconds later DCI Bastion stepped out, accompanied by a marine officer who dragged the craft further in.
Bastion strode up from the shoreline with fitting authority. “I’m beginning to wish I’d had you deported after the first murder!” he called to Tayte who was still trying to shield his eyes from the glare. “Death seems to follow you around like the plague.” He passed Tayte, heading straight for Hayne who was still beside the dinghy at the top of the beach. “And Mr Laity might well be joining them before the night’s out.”
“You found Tom Laity?” Tayte said, following after him. “I thought he was already dead.”
“A returning fishing boat reeled him in off Porthkerris Point about an hour ago.”
“What was he doing there?”
Bastion shrugged. “No idea. The man was senseless by all accounts. Had a nasty gash to his head.”
“Where is he now?”
“Hospital, Mr Tayte. Intensive care at Truro. He was rambling when they picked him up. Something about mackerel fishing for heaven’s sake. Obviously delirious. He’s been out cold ever since.”
Bastion turned his attention to the fresh body in the dinghy. “What’ve we got now then, Sergeant?” He leant in over Simon’s body, clicked on his torch and began to study the scene. “Anyone touch anything?”
“I don’t think so, sir.”
“No,” Tayte said.
“Good. I don’t suppose you can help us with a motive this time can you, Mr Tayte?”
Tayte could barely pull his thoughts away from Amy long enough to try. “I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head, not really thinking. “Simon obviously knew plenty about the probate record you found at his flat. He had enough there to piss a few people off.”
“People like Sir Richard Fairborne?” Bastion said.
Tayte nodded. “I guess. Did Laity say anything else?”
“Nothing intelligible. The man was barely breathing.”
Tayte thought back to his earlier conversation with Simon, when the kid had boasted about killing Laity. “Laity might have found Amy,” Tayte thought aloud.
Bastion turned away from the dinghy. “Mr Tayte,” he said impatiently. “I have another murder to investigate here.”
Tayte sensed that Bastion was close to throwing him off the beach, but what had he to lose? “And if we don’t find Amy before high tide,” he cut in, “you’ll definitely have a third.”
Hayne offered a few words in Tayte’s favour. “Mr Tayte had a bit of a struggle with our late Mr Phillips here this afternoon, sir.”
Bastion sighed. “And why doesn’t that surprise me?”
“I couldn’t take any chances,” Tayte said. “But when I left him I was assured that Amy would drown unless he got back to her by high tide.” Tayte checked his watch again. “That’s about thirty minutes from now and all I know is that she’s someplace where the tide can drown her. That’s gotta be along the coast somewhere, right?”
“Or the river,” Hayne corrected. “The Helford’s tidal.”
Tayte squeezed his temples, thinking the search area was too big given the time they had left. Then he realised that if Laity had found Amy…
“She must be somewhere close to where Laity was picked up,” he said.
Bastion sighed. “Mr Tayte. A body can drift for miles along this coastline in a very short time.”
“I’m sure it can,” Tayte said. “But we don’t know how long Laity was out there. It’s gotta be Amy’s best shot.”
Hayne interjected. “I could take the boat out and have a look, sir. The sea’s calm tonight. He might not have drifted far.”
“If we do nothing,” Tayte said, “she’s dead for sure.”
The beach fell silent. Bastion seemed to ponder his options. Then at last he gave Hayne the nod. “The rest of the team should be along soon. I’m sure I can manage without you a while longer.”
“Right, sir.”
As they ran for the inflatable at the shoreline, Tayte heard encouraging words from DCI Bastion in the background. He was talking to the marine officer who’d come ashore with him.
“Get onto the coastguard,” he said. “Let’s see if we can get a few more boats out to join in the search for Mrs Fallon.
Porthkerris Point lies approximately one kilometre south-east from the coastal village of Porthallow on the Lizard Peninsula, three kilometres south of the Helford River. Tayte and Hayne were aboard the Aquastar police launch being powered towards Porthkerris under a dark sky and the capable command of the marine unit sergeant.
From the single seat on the exposed upper deck, Hayne stabbed a finger through the cool night air towards the headland where Tom Laity had been picked up. “There it is!” he shouted over the rush of the twin 400hp diesel engines. He swung the spotlight beam away from the land on their right, across Porthallow and along the coastline to Porthkerris Point.
With him on the upper deck, above the main cabin that housed most of the controls, Tayte looked out portside. His eyes followed the light, but as far as he could see, the only clue that they were heading for land at all was that the headland appeared subtly darker than the sky above it. Then gradually he became aware of the stars that framed the land mass which appeared to him now as a dark void.
They arrived in a hurry and slowed to a sudden crawl, pitching the craft and forcing Tayte to grab onto the rails. As they came in towards the rocks, as close as they dared, Hayne lit up the cliff face and the Aquastar patrolled alongside, searching. Tayte was pessimistic about their chances. He knew as soon as they arrived that the police launch was too big a vessel to be effective. Bright as the spotlight was, the Aquastar couldn’t get close enough. He considered that Simon would have been careful with his choice of hiding place for Amy. He supposed she would be somewhere that no boat this far out could easily see.
He looked back towards the Helford River and Falmouth Bay and it suddenly struck him just how dark it was out there. It was too dark, and they were too far out. The tide was almost in now, and try as he did to fight his rising inner voice of despair, Tayte’s hopes for Amy began to sink. Time was running out.
“I’m taking the inflatable,” he said. He pulled Hayne’s Maglite from his pocket, gripped it between his teeth and part slid, part fell off the upper deck, down the steel ladder, heading for the dinghy that was raised off the Aquastar’s stern.
“Bastion’ll have my badge!” Hayne called.
Tayte took no notice, and Hayne made no effort to stop him. Instead, he reached into a locker beneath his seat. “Here, take this,” he said as he threw Tayte a halogen dive lamp.
Tayte flicked it on and sent a piercing column of light ripping into the night. He climbed into the inflatable and lowered himself behind the launch until he was hovering inches above the water. Then he let the rope go and splashed down. Seconds later, the outboard motor buzzed into life and he was away, one hand on the dive lamp, the other on the throttle arm which also served as the tiller. With the tide almost in, Tayte knew he could get the inflatable right in among the rocks. It lifted his spirits. He felt like Amy had a chance now as he began to search for what he figured must be a cave entrance of some sort; somewhere out of sight of the open water.
He ventured back towards Porthallow first, cutting in close to its grey stony beach before crossing between dark
hills, catching the odd breaking wave as he went. The sea was no longer as hospitable this close to the rocks; the swell began to shove the inflatable around, reminding Tayte who was boss.
He ran the inflatable back towards the Helford River, thinking the Aquastar had passed that section of coastline far too quickly to have been effective. Always in the back of his mind he knew that things must be desperate for Amy by now. Maybe it was already too late. He pushed on and very quickly one rock formation came to look like the last. He was soon past Nare Cove, then off Nare Head. Too close to the river, he thought as he spun the inflatable around and headed back for another sweep.
Tayte conceded that Bastion might well have been right. Laity could have drifted a long way before he was picked up by that fishing boat. And he could have drifted in either direction. To Tayte’s frustration, he didn’t know enough about sea currents or the area he was in to know which way or how far Laity had been carried before he wound up off Porthkerris Point.
He was back at Nare Cove now. The inflatable had drifted a little with his thoughts and he was suddenly aware that he was too far out. He turned the tiller in and blipped the throttle to get back amongst the rocks and the cliff face. Then as the revs rose there was a whir and a slap from the water behind the motor and it fell instantly silent.
The engine had stalled.
Tayte pulled at the starter cord to revive it but the motor felt like it was jammed solid. He tilted the outboard motor up on its hinges, shone the lamp over it and immediately saw the cause. The prop blade was a tangled mess - like a bird’s nest from fishing reel hell.
Chapter Sixty
The low hum of a mobile generator was busy in the background on Durgan Beach, powering a series of floodlights on tall stands around the crime scene. The entire beach was alight, though nowhere was brighter than at the Scenes of Crime Officers’ interest epicentre: the body of Simon Phillips and the dinghy where Tayte had found him.
The cameras had finally stopped flashing; the scene sketches made. The people in white paper suits were now busy collecting evidence and dusting for prints - and the smooth tarpaulin cover on the larger of the two boats was proving a rich source of forensic information. One of the white suits - the SOCO Supervisor - finished with the last of Phillips’s personal effects and bagged it; another cellphone to complement the others they had found on him. She left the dinghy and brought a collection of clear plastic bags with her beyond the perimeter of lights to where Bastion waited at the shoreline, gazing across the Helford River. Deliberating.
As she arrived beside him, the SOCO supervisor pulled the hood back off her tidy red-brown hair and lifted the bags up for Bastion to see. “Here you go, Chief,” she said. “All done.”
Bastion wheeled around in the shingle and smiled. “Thank you -” He paused. She was familiar, but he couldn’t place her.
“Gillian McDowd, sir.”
“Yes, of course. McDowd.” Bastion flashed her another smile, more out of embarrassment than sincerity. He turned his attention to the bags McDowd was holding. The outline of a sheath knife flashed a violent image of Peter Schofield through his mind.
“It was velcro’d into his jeans pocket,” McDowd said.
Bastion’s fringe twitched. “Concealed, yet convenient,” he said. He led McDowd back into the floodlit arena, towards the stone wall at the top of the beach where a folding table waited.
“I’m sure you’ve been thorough?” Bastion said as they crunched their way towards the table.
McDowd’s smile looked forced. She spread the bags across the table and produced a fresh pair of latex gloves. “Better put these on if you insist on touching anything before the lab’s done with them.”
Bastion snapped the gloves on without taking his eyes off the contents: the knife, a few fat roll ups, three mobile phones, a silver crucifix and an old leather-bound notebook. He removed one of the phones and switched it on, navigated to the ‘last call’ list and redialled the number Simon Phillips had called that morning at an indicated ten minutes past ten. The call went straight to Jefferson Tayte’s voice mail.
Bastion cleared the call, thinking it would have been the last call Simon Phillips made to Tayte before he’d tried to blow him up. He switched the phone off and slipped it back into the protective bag. Then he moved on to the next phone and repeated. The last call from this phone was later, obviously not to Tayte since Tayte’s phone was out of action by then. The displayed time read, ‘13:39’. Bastion redialled the number, another cellphone. This time the call rang and after several seconds it was answered.
“Richard Fairborne,” the voice announced.
Bastion was speechless. His head buzzed with the implications. He had not expected this. Thanks to Tayte, he already knew Sir Richard Fairborne had motive enough to want Simon Phillips dead. Now it transpired that Phillips and Sir Richard Fairborne had spoken together that very afternoon.
Bastion could still hear Sir Richard’s voice in the earpiece. “Hello… Who is this?” Bastion ended the call. “I wonder if he’s got an alibi,” he said. Then to McDowd he added, “I’m bringing someone in for questioning. I need as much of this processed tonight as possible.” He reached for his radio, about to make a call that would end the celebrations at Rosemullion Hall. “If we can place Sir Richard Fairborne at the scene, maybe we can keep him in on suspicion.” He scoffed. “Might even get a charge out, the way things are stacking up.”
Floating adrift in the swell at Nare Cove, by the light of the dive lamp DS Hayne had thrown him when they parted company, Jefferson Tayte was on his knees, bent over the back end of the police inflatable he’d semi-appropriated from the Aquastar. He was staring in disbelief at a prop blade that looked like it would never turn again.
The timing sucked.
He reached a hand out to the prop and tugged hopelessly at the thick orange fishing line that had snagged it. He wished he had a knife. He looked back towards Porthkerris Point for the Aquastar’s search light, but there was nothing. The sea and sky merged as one dark eternity. The coastline too was barely discernible in the void, and Jefferson Tayte was stuck somewhere in between. He figured Hayne must have gone further south, beyond the headland. He silently wished him better luck.
Some good I’ve been…
Tayte eyed the back-up oars clipped to the inner walls of the inflatable. Maybe he could row along the coastline - anything would be better then just sitting there. But he realised the oars were useless. Without a spare hand to hold the dive lamp he wouldn’t be able to see a thing. He turned back to the motor and tried to rotate the prop blade by hand to see if there was any play in it, hoping to work it loose enough to be able to turn it over more forcefully with the starter cord. It wouldn’t budge. Without something sharp to cut the tangled line away, Tayte knew he’d be there until the Aquastar came in.
Out of frustration he snatched at several strands of line with both hands and began to vent his anger on them, pulling back and forth with all his weight until the pain across his fingers felt like he was close to losing them. As he let go and went to cool his hands in the salt water he saw a single strand of orange line stretching away.
His first thought was that he might be able to push the loose end back through the tangle and in doing so, gradually unravel it. It would take time, but he saw no obvious alternative. He grabbed at the stray line and pulled it clear of the water, but instead of finding a loose end, the line went taut and twanged out from the sea. It ran all the way to the cliff face.
Tayte knew his luck had just changed. He couldn’t stop smiling as he unclipped an oar and began to row the inflatable awkwardly towards the cliff, following the orange fishing line with the dive lamp between his knees.
Is this what Laity was trying to say?
He recalled Bastion telling him that Laity had said something about mackerel fishing when they picked him up. Maybe this was the line he used.
Closer in, the swell shoved the inflatable around harder than Tayte liked, and more
than once he felt the scrape of a rock beneath the inflatable’s soft underbelly. The fishing line led him to a sheer wall of rock that at first he thought was literally the end of the line. Then he saw a towering split in the cliff face that he hadn’t noticed before. He passed uneasily beyond it, through a tight gap that barely accommodated the craft until he vanished from the eyes of the world, hidden now behind a curtain of rock. Around him in that tight space, the sea began to break over every inch of exposed surface it touched. Salt-spray soaked him, and Tayte instinctively knew that this was not a good place to linger.
The fishing line ended abruptly in the middle of a hidden pool where it sank below the water. Tayte could still feel resistance as he tugged it. It was attached to something, but he could no longer see it. He shone the dive lamp down through the water and his eyes followed the line until it dropped too deep to see. He realised then that to follow the line further he’d need the services of a diver with scuba gear.
Or some guts.
Tayte already had the dive lamp. His lungs would have to provide the oxygen. He shook his head at the idea, knowing what he had to do, yet barely able to believe he could. It was like someone else was inside his head with him, suddenly calling the shots. Only that other guy was plain crazy.
Tayte was over the side before his sensible self had a chance to argue. He drew a sharp breath against the cold water as it filled his clothes and pricked his skin. He took another, deeper breath, and then followed the dive lamp beneath the surface.
Chapter Sixty-One
Beneath the sea, without a dive-mask or goggles to put an air space between his eyes and the water, Jefferson Tayte’s vision was blurred. In the halogen light, he could see a white sand bed rising as it came in towards the cliff. He blinked and followed the incline to a dark slit in the rock. The orange fishing line, which seemed to glow now as he shone the dive lamp along its length, vanished again into that narrow space. He felt a twist of nervous excitement as he realised he was looking into a cave and that Amy might be on the other side. The opening looked tight. He bobbed his head up for a last breath of air before going on. Then he sank below again, following the line.
JT01 - In The Blood Page 30
