Death at Hazel House

by Betty Rowlands

  The Superintendent grunted. ‘So what did he do – go back to the house?’

  ‘Not straightaway… or so he says. He claims he just sat there, brooding, waiting for something to happen. He heard a vehicle go past – he was out of sight of the lane so he never actually saw it – and thought it went only a short distance, so he decided to investigate. He got out of the car and walked along the boundary hedge at the back of his house. Apparently there’s a gap where some cattle once broke through.’

  ‘Something else to be verified. Never take a voluntary confession at its face value, Castle,’ interrupted the Superintendent, who was known to enjoy playing the role of devil’s advocate.

  ‘Quite so, sir.’

  ‘Well, go on.’

  ‘He slips through the hedge and makes his way up the garden towards the house, keeping under cover as far as possible.’ Without realising it, Castle continued his narrative in the present tense, seeing the events unfolding in his mind’s eye like action on a screen. ‘Then he hears a vehicle start up and drive away in a hurry, but he can’t see it from where he is so he forgets about not wanting to be seen and goes tearing round to the front of the house. There’s no sign of the car, but the next moment his wife comes staggering out of the front door with a bruise on her face, screaming obscenities. When she sees her husband she goes into hysterics and retreats indoors with him after her. I think you can probably guess the rest, sir – it’s all on the tape if you want to hear it for yourself.’

  The Superintendent declined the offer with a movement of one of his well-kept hands. ‘I’ll hear it later. It seems pretty obvious. She thought she was going to elope with Bayliss, taking all the jewels and her husband’s secret nest-egg, and Bayliss had planned to grab the lot and ditch her. I suppose the so-called break-in was a cover-up – they must have planned that together.’

  ‘So Chant alleges, but unfortunately there’s no way we can confirm it.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because Bayliss is dead as well. Cooked himself in his own sauna, apparently.’ Briefly, Castle outlined the circumstances. ‘Of course, if we’d known beforehand about the affair, Bayliss would have been the obvious suspect. That’s what Chant was hoping for. He says the realisation that Terry Holland was under suspicion has been preying on his mind.’

  ‘And to let on that he knew his wife had been having it off with Bayliss would have made him an obvious suspect?’ The Superintendent rubbed his hands together, then sat back in his chair and locked them behind his large, balding head. ‘Well, I know there was no evidence against him, but if you’d taken my warnings on board a little earlier, maybe you’d have found some… and saved quite a lot of police time.’

  ‘Point taken, sir.’

  With evident relish, the Superintendent resumed his own summary of events. ‘So when Chant got his hands on his wife, he grabbed her by the throat to shake the story out of her and ended up throttling her… without intending to, of course… horrified when he realised what he’d done and soon?’

  ‘That’s about the size of it, sir. One can feel a certain sympathy for the man from that point of view, but the way he set about tidying things up, making coffee and putting his empty cup beside his wife’s in the kitchen, re-locking the safes to make it appear they’d never been touched, denying that any money had been stolen to cover up the fact that he’d been withholding all that cash from the Revenue – all that confirms what I felt all along. I admit I found nothing to suggest he’d killed his wife, but I was convinced he was putting his business and financial interests above everything else from the word go.’

  ‘Hmm.’ The Superintendent began a re-examination of his fingernails. ‘Well, his confession in order to absolve Holland shows he’s not a complete bastard,’ he commented. ‘Of course, none of this explains how some of his money got into Holland’s possession.’

  ‘Radcliffe and Hill are questioning Holland now on that very point,’ said Castle. ‘In my mind, there’s a strong possibility that he and Bayliss were in the robbery together.’

  ‘How d’you figure that out?’

  ‘Another interesting detail that we’ve stumbled across is that Bayliss may in fact be one of his old partners in crime called Charlie Foss. At his trial, Holland claimed Foss was the third man in the bank robbery he and another man were sent down for.’ Without mentioning Sukey’s part in the discovery, Castle explained how Barbie Bayliss had slipped up and referred to her husband as ‘Charlie’.

  ‘You reckon Holland and Bayliss – or Foss – were in the robbery together?’ The Superintendent expressed his doubts with pursed lips and a ponderous shake of the head. ‘Who’d be daft enough to team up with a man who’s already ratted on him?’

  ‘Maybe Holland saw it as a way of recouping earlier losses. He’s not over-bright, but he’s smart enough to know Foss wouldn’t want his image of a squeaky-clean businessman tarnished by any suggestion of a murky past which might attract media attention. Mrs Holland’s convinced he’s been in touch with Foss recently. She hates the man’s guts.’

  ‘If that’s the case, Bayliss – Foss, that is – was running true to form when he ditched the Chant woman and made off with her old man’s money. He took a gamble, though… supposing Chant had called us in?’

  ‘Not so much of a gamble really sir, if—’ Just in time, Castle checked himself from saying ‘if you think about it’. It was not the kind of remark that would have endeared him to the Superintendent. ‘Both Chant and his wife would have suffered public humiliation, but worse than that, he would have had to explain where all that money came from in the first place.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose you have a point there,’ the Superintendent allowed graciously.

  ‘What I propose to do now is find out how Radcliffe and Hill are getting on with interviewing Holland. Then I’ll go back to Marsdean with one of the SOCOs to see what evidence we can find to support Chant’s story.’

  ‘Do that… and keep me posted.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘Since you haven’t referred to the search of Holland’s house, I assume nothing was found.’

  ‘Er… no, sir,’ Castle admitted. ‘It’s possible the money he paid into his building society represented his share of the job.’

  ‘We can’t hold him on mere possibilities, Castle. If you’ve no hard evidence against him and he’s made no significant admissions, you’ll have to let him go for now.’

  ‘Let him go! But, sir—’

  ‘Can’t risk having him sue us for wrongful detention, can we? You can always bring him in again if the circumstances justify it.’ The Superintendent indicated that the discussion was at an end by reaching for a file and picking up his telephone. Inwardly seething, Castle withdrew.

  He reached the interview room where Holland was being questioned just as Radcliffe and Hill were emerging. Behind them the prisoner, sullen-faced, was being escorted to his cell. Back in his own office, Castle asked, ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Like a charm at first,’ Radcliffe told him. ‘Once he realised we knew that Hugo Bayliss was really his old mate Charlie Foss, he admitted going to see him. Just to renew an old acquaintance, of course. He said Foss’s wife was wearing the necklace and that he must have left his prints on it when he admired it on her.’

  ‘So why didn’t he say that before?’

  ‘He muttered something about not wanting his wife to know. I suppose it was the best he could think up on the spur of the moment.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘And then… nothing. He still refuses to say where the money came from.’

  ‘Hoping to go back for more,’ Castle surmised. ‘It’s what he sees as his cut from the robbery, of course, so he’s obviously trying to keep his options open.’

  ‘You mean the bank robbery, Guv?’

  ‘Not necessarily. I’ll explain in a minute,’ Castle added, seeing their puzzled expressions. ‘I take it he now knows Foss is dead?’

  ‘Of course. It appea
red to shake him when we sprang that on him, but whether it was genuine shock or distress at seeing a nice little extortion racket going down the tube is anyone’s guess. When we let on we knew the real nature of his earlier relationship with Foss he clammed up altogether. Won’t say another word before he’s talked to his brief again.’

  ‘I see. Well, we have to let him go for now – orders from the Super. Things have moved on in the last hour or so,’ Castle went on as the two officers stared at him in dismay. He unlocked his filing cabinet, took out the tape of his interview with Arthur Chant and put it on the desk. ‘This’ll keep you entertained while you’re noshing your sandwiches. I’m off to Marsdean now – see you later.’

  Sukey was on the point of leaving for work when her telephone rang. To her surprise, Mrs Bayliss was on the line.

  ‘Oh, Mrs Reynolds,’ she began. ‘I just want to thank you again for bringing the pictures – it was so kind of you.’

  ‘Not at all. My pleasure.’

  ‘I wonder… I really would like more copies… to send to friends, you know …’

  ‘No problem. They’re all numbered on the back. Just tell me which ones you want and I’ll get them done for you.’

  ‘I don’t want to put you to all that trouble. If I could have the negatives, I could see to it myself.’

  ‘That’s not the way I work,’ Sukey said. One or two of the shots had been so successful that she was thinking of entering them in a competition and was not keen on the idea of letting any of the negatives out of her possession. She reached for a pencil and notepad. ‘Just give me the numbers – unless you’d like the whole set.’

  There appeared to be some kind of discussion going on at the other end of the line. Sukey heard the words, ‘Tell ’er you’ll pay!’ in what was unmistakably Auntie Gwen’s tobacco-roughened voice, followed by ‘Yes, all right,’ in a whispered aside. Then Mrs Bayliss cleared her throat and said, with a trace of self-consciousness mingled with anxiety, ‘Of course, we’re not asking you to give us the negatives, we’re prepared to pay for them. Would fifty pounds be enough?’

  It was tempting. Had she been dealing with Mrs Bayliss alone Sukey might have agreed, but the knowledge that she was being pressured by that repulsive old woman made her dig her toes in. ‘It’s not a question of money,’ she said. ‘I’ve been paid for the job and the negatives are my property.’

  ‘Yes, I understand that but… a hundred pounds then.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  There was the sound of an altercation in the background. Then Auntie Gwen came on the line. ‘Now look ’ere, those pictures are of my niece’s ’ouse and you ain’t got no right to keep them!’ she said aggressively. ‘We don’t ’ave to pay but we’re offering good money, so don’t be so bloody awkward!’

  Who could resist such a charmingly worded request? Sukey thought to herself. Aloud, she said, ‘I haven’t time to discuss this any further. I’m off to work now and I’m going to be late as it is. The negatives are not for sale.’ She put down the receiver, grabbed her jacket and camera bag and made for the front door, almost tripping over Fergus’s cricket gear which he had left ready to pick up for that afternoon’s practice.

  Twenty-Four

  Terry Holland, shoulders hunched and eyes fixed blankly on the floor of his cell, sat on the edge of the bed and cursed his luck. Everything, it seemed, was conspiring against him. It had started with those bleeding rubber bands. If they hadn’t been such a pansy colour, no one would have noticed them. Then there was the necklace. How was he to know it was hot? You couldn’t trust anyone nowadays. Even Rita had let him down by blurting out Charlie Foss’s name in front of the filth. And what had he done? Nothing they knew about. Nothing they’d been able to charge him with. He’d gone to the house to stake a claim to what was rightfully his and it hadn’t taken much persuasion to make Charlie see his point of view. You could hardly call that an assault – it was only a ducking after all. It wasn’t as though he’d injured the rat, although no one deserved it better. In any case, nothing had been said about it and Charlie had left it a bit late to lodge a complaint, hadn’t he?

  That was another thing that got up Terry’s nose. Charlie had really done the dirty on him by dying with the debt only partly settled. There must be more where the first lot came from. His brief had suggested it was money Charlie had nicked with the bands already on them. Maybe that was it, maybe he’d deliberately left them on the five grand in the hope that they could be traced and he’d be suspected. It was just the sort of snidey trick that would appeal to someone with Charlie’s warped sense of humour.

  Another odd thing was that although the coppers obviously believed the money had been taken from Chant’s safe, they still hadn’t charged him with nicking it. That, his brief told him, meant that Chant had never reported it stolen. He’d gone into some long-winded explanation about why anyone would let five grand go just like that, but it hadn’t meant much to Terry. All he knew was that they could keep him banged up here for the rest of the day, maybe longer. And who could say what other nasty little surprises Charlie had cooked up for him? Not that the bastard would be there to see the results, not now he’d gone and cooked himself in his own sauna. Terry’s depression lifted at that particular bit of rough justice, but only for a moment. Then his mind switched back to his own predicament. He thought of Billy and wondered what Rita had told him. He thought of Rita and wondered why she hadn’t come to see him. He cursed his luck again.

  All in all, it looked like being another lousy day. It therefore came as a pleasant surprise when they told him he could go. They wouldn’t tell him anything of course, just gave him back his possessions and told him to piss off before they changed their minds.

  ‘What about a ride home, then?’ he grumbled.

  The custody sergeant grinned and said, ‘The walk’ll do you good after sitting on your backside all morning.’

  When Sukey reached the morgue she found Inspector Mahony talking to Doctor Yates, the pathologist, in the glassed-off partition that served him as an office. She hoped the conversation wouldn’t go on for too long; she was not looking forward to the task ahead and wanted to be done with it and get out of the place as quickly as possible. She hated the cold bleakness, the bright lights, the echoing walls and above all the combination of disinfectant and blood overlaid with an indefinable something that ‘all the perfumes of Arabia’ could never quite disguise or eradicate – the all-pervading smell of death.

  Mahony spotted her through the glass and with a word to the pathologist beckoned her inside. ‘Inspector Castle passed on your message about that elastic band and put me in the picture,’ he told her. ‘I’ve sent a team round to The Laurels with a warrant to give the place a going over and I’m about to join them to see how they’re getting on. Well spotted, Mrs Reynolds.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Mahony.’ It occurred to Sukey that if anything significant were to break as a result of her one and only excursion into moonlighting, it might perhaps count in her favour.

  ‘You’ll do what you can to hurry along the result of the blood test?’ Mahony added, turning back to Doctor Yates.

  ‘I know the lab is pretty choked with work at the moment, but I’ll do my best,’ the pathologist promised.

  ‘Fine. Let me know the minute you hear anything.’ Mahony was halfway to the main door when he swung round and came back. ‘I believe you told me you took some pictures of the Bayliss house and garden?’ he said.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Would there be any shots of the sauna?’

  ‘Yes, at least a couple.’

  ‘I’d like to see them. Can you let me have them as soon as possible?’

  ‘I only have the negatives, but I can easily get more prints done.’

  ‘Please do that and get them over to me as soon as you can.’

  ‘Of course, Mr Mahony. No problem.’

  ‘You’re here to take Bayliss’s fingerprints, I believe,’ said Doctor Yates when the inspector
had finally left.

  ‘That’s right. Do I understand there’s still some doubt about his death?’

  ‘Ay, frankly, I’m a wee bit puzzled,’ the doctor replied. He had a deep, rumbling voice and despite a good quarter of a century in the south of England he still retained traces of his Scottish burr. ‘There’s no doubt he was subjected to a much higher than normal temperature while he was in the sauna, but I’m told it has been examined and shows no sign of malfunction. I’ve sent blood samples away for testing… maybe they’ll tell us something.’

  ‘I suppose that’s why Inspector Mahony wants to see my pictures.’

  ‘I canna see what the outside will tell him, but you never know. Here, get into these before you start work.’

  Sukey put on the protective clothing that he handed her and waited while a trolley on which lay a corpse covered by a sheet was wheeled out of its cabinet. Yates checked the label attached to one of the big toes and said, ‘Ay, that’s your laddie. Darren will look after you.’ He jerked his head at the gowned and masked attendant before wandering over to a work surface covered in pale grey laminate to examine something unpleasant-looking that lay in the dish of a weighing machine.

  Sukey swallowed and turned away. She took her fingerprint kit from her case and waited while Darren extracted Hugo Bayliss’s forearms from under the sheet and laid them across his chest like a grotesque caricature of a figure on a tombstone. Taking steady, regular breaths in an attempt to settle the queasiness in her stomach, she set about her task, fighting the revulsion she invariably experienced at contact, even through surgical gloves, with cold lifeless flesh. She finished with one hand, cleaned the ink off the dead man’s fingers and reached for the other, then paused as something caught her eye.

  ‘Excuse me, Doctor Yates, could I have a word with you?’ she called.

  ‘Sure.’ He came over immediately. She was too excited by what she had noticed to be affected by the sight of the blood on his gloves and apron. ‘What is it?’ he asked, peering at the hand she held up for his inspection.