High-Wired

by Andrea Frazer

  ‘He was always going to cheat with his high sex drive and she was just convenient. I’m sure he didn’t think things would go this far, and now he’s stuck with her.’

  ‘You sound very certain.’

  ‘I am. And I’m not going to tell the children just yet. There’s no need for them to know anything until after Christmas. Time enough then to tell them they’ll be going back to the local church school. And as for Christmas, I’ve spoken to my parents, and they said that the children and I can go there for the celebrations.’

  ‘Won’t Kenneth object? Where do they live?’

  ‘Kenneth hasn’t a leg to stand on, and they live in the Cotswolds, so he’ll have to book into a hotel if he wants to see them and it’s going to cost him an arm and a leg,’ Lauren uttered, following it with a slightly inebriated giggle of black humour which she just couldn’t suppress. It was her turn to have the whip hand now!

  At 10.30, Ben came in and went to go straight up to his room, sighing with mock disapproval as he saw his mother opening another bottle of wine. ‘Remember that alcohol is an addictive drug,’ he reminded them with a hollow laugh, at which point his mother flicked at him with the tea towel which she was using to protect her hands from the cold surface of the bottle.

  ‘You do, and I’ll phone Childline,’ he quipped.

  ‘You do that, and they’ll hang up on you. You’re too old for that now,’ Olivia replied, smiling at how her son seemed to have bounced back, even though he still didn’t look particularly healthy. ‘Why don’t you get yourself a big glass of fruit juice – and there are bananas in the fruit bowl,’ she called to him, pleased when he headed for the kitchen before finally making it to the top of the stairs.

  ‘God, you must be so relieved to have him back,’ said Lauren, reaching for her newly filled glass.

  ‘I really thought we were going to lose him,’ replied Olivia, holding up her glass in a toasting gesture. Still, all’s well that ends well.’

  Hal arrived home just as they were listening to the evening’s recorded musical efforts, and giggling away like a couple of naughty schoolgirls. ‘Hal,’ called Olivia into the hall. ‘I’ve developed a sudden allergy to F sharps, and Lauren doesn’t seem to be able to play B flats. What do you think of that?’

  ‘I think,’ he replied, entering the room, ‘that that can’t be the same bottle of wine I opened for you before I went out.’

  ‘Spot on, squire,’ replied Lauren boldly.

  ‘My, we have relaxed, haven’t we,’ was his retort, as he headed for the kitchen to heat up the leftover roast potatoes and vegetables. He was starving, as he always was after playing for the evening.

  ‘I tried Hibbie’s mobile in my break,’ he informed them through a mouthful of semi-masticated food. ‘It was just in case she had the hump with you for some reason, but would be willing to speak to her dear old dad,’ he finished with a gargantuan swallow, immediately conveying another loaded forkful towards his mouth.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And she didn’t answer me, either. I’m beginning to wonder if there’s something wrong.’

  ‘I think the best thing to do would be to leave it to me to phone her at the office tomorrow,’ Olivia said. ‘At least she’d have to be polite if there are other people present.’

  ‘I wouldn’t put it past her to say “wrong number” and just hang up.’

  ‘Well, we’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?’ To Lauren, she said, ‘I reckon we ought to be going up now. All hell will have broken loose with Trussler’s name appearing in the local paper, and we need to pick up his three henchmen as swiftly as possible.’

  ‘And I need to check when I can move back to my own house. It’s very kind of you to put up with me here, but you would be the first to admit that it’s not the same thing at all as having your own space.’

  ‘Granted, but you know you’re always welcome.’

  ‘Confucius say that guests like fish: after three days they start to stink,’ stated Lauren, lifting her arms and comically sniffing her armpits.

  ‘Point taken,’ agreed Olivia.

  ‘And you’ve already had enough to worry about with Ben. Now it looks as if there might be a problem with Hibbie, it would be best if I left you to your own devices.’

  ‘It’s a good and very perceptive friend who knows the right time to leave,’ added Hal. ‘No offence meant.’

  ‘None taken.’

  Shortly after nine o’clock the next morning there was a call for Olivia from the landlord of The River View, with information that really made her ears prick up. As she ended the call, she called Lauren over and gave her the gist of what the man had said.

  ‘I was right about putting out that photograph with Genni Lacey made up to the nines and dressed in her trendy clobber. He recognised that all right: it’s the only way she’d ever have got into a pub, and it seems like she did get into The River View. The landlord remembers serving her and asking for her ID – she, of course, had one which, with the benefit of hindsight, was obviously forged.

  ‘He knows Trussler and his cronies by sight, and reputation and saw the man himself giving her the old chat-up line, then he saw them leaving together. He said he was concerned for the girl’s safety, but, knowing Trussler, he just wanted something to put on the grapevine so that it got to Mary Mackintosh’s ears.

  ‘All four of our suspects were in there. Apparently the other three gave him a two- or three-minute lead, then they left as well. What do you think of that?’

  ‘Would he be willing to identity them if we put together a line-up?’

  ‘No problem. He doesn’t want elements like that in his pub. It’s quite a well thought of place, and the likes of those four just lower the tone.’

  ‘Let’s get the troops out and pick them up, then, and we’ll see what we can do about getting other bodies to make up the lines.’

  Liam Shuttleworth was again dispatched, together with Lenny Franklin, a face they all recognised from their criminal pasts and treated with a modicum of respect. Lauren was getting better at expressing herself now, and gave it as her opinion that anyone who didn’t respect the considerable height and bulk of PC Shuttleworth must need their heads examined.

  ‘After what this lot has done, I think they need their bumps felt anyway. And they won’t want to raise young Liam’s inner monster, if I know them at all,’ replied the inspector with a wink.

  ‘He doesn’t turn green and break out of his clothes, does he?’ asked Lauren, returning the wink with a smile.

  ‘You wish,’ Olivia returned, and then watched Lauren’s face as it gradually turned red. ‘You’re such an easy target!’

  Their banter was interrupted by a call from the back of the room. ‘I’ve just been speaking to Forensics, and they’ve matched the identity of the man in the river with the national database.’

  ‘Can you get them to email it to me?’

  ‘Will do, guv.’

  ‘Groves?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Why do you call me “guv” sometimes?’

  ‘Because every time I call someone “ma’am”, it makes me think of the Queen. You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘Not at all. I was just curious, that’s all.’

  ‘Thanks, guv.’

  ‘Although ma’am is more correct.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  Hardy perused her most recent email to learn that the body in the river was a Daniel Fishburn. He had lived in one of the tiny flats created when the four-storey terraces of once-grand Georgian houses on the seafront had been divided up in the sixties and seventies. They’d just have to high-tail it round there to have a look at the place, she thought, and get in touch with the owner to see if he could enlighten them about the activities of Mr Fishburn.

  ‘Come on, Groves, time to pay a visit to the former home of our rather soggy Mr Fishburn,’ she called, picking up her jacket from the back of the chair. ‘Appropriate name, in the circumstances.’

&nb
sp; ‘Don’t joke about it. You’ll make me hurl,’ replied Groves, using a euphemism she hadn’t uttered since her boarding school days.

  Fishburn’s flat was as they’d expected. It was minuscule, furnished with obviously second-hand furniture, but fairly clean and tidy. In the wardrobe were some rather flashy suits and ties, and it seemed, from the amount of skin and hair care products they found in the tiny bathroom, that he was a bit of a dandy as well.

  ‘Fancied himself,’ muttered Lauren, knowing the signs from Kenneth’s toiletries and clothes.

  ‘The ladies would be very disappointed in him now,’ muttered back Olivia.

  They returned to the living areas of the property. ‘I’ve found a notebook in his bedside drawer,’ called Lauren in a somewhat louder voice. ‘It’s full of notes which seem to be about “getting in on the action” – whatever that means.’

  ‘Let me have a look. I think that could hold the key to why our Mr Fishburn ended up as fish food.’

  Olivia held out her hand, took the notebook and began to flick through the pages, eventually sighing as she lowered the source of information on to the bed top. ‘That explains a lot. I’m surprised they didn’t do this place over before we got here. It would appear that Fishburn was trying to muscle his way in to the local drugs scene. Someone took offence at that, and that’s why he had to be deleted. I expect he’d found out a bit too much, and they couldn’t leave him breathing, in case he breathed a word to the wrong person.’

  ‘That was a bit harsh, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Par for the course with these guys. If you know more than you need to, then you’re dangerous and have to be eliminated.’

  ‘But … why did someone make all those silent phone calls, then set my house alight?’ asked Lauren, completely changing the subject.

  ‘Dammit! I’d forgotten we had a mole. Whoever it is has obviously found out your address by illegally accessing personnel files, and passed it on. I suppose my place is never empty, and they must have learnt about Kenneth and Gerda.’

  ‘That sounds like someone’s been watching my house.’

  ‘Probably.’ Olivia’s reply was curt. ‘We’ll have to get a car to check on you every couple for hours. Can’t afford to lose a partner in flute-playing, not to mention a pretty amenable sergeant.’

  ‘Thanks … I think.’

  INTERLUDE

  In an anonymous semi-detached house, a man was packing a holdall with everything he would need to get by for the next few days. He had relatives in Wales to whom he could make an unscheduled visit. It would definitely be unhealthy to hang around here for any longer. He’d had enough of being questioned by the police, and he didn’t think he could survive another session. Although he considered himself a hard bastard, he was not unmoved by what he had taken part in, and was finding it difficult to live with himself.

  It would be OK if it had just been the three men, but what they had done to the girl was unforgivable. He needed somewhere far enough away to get his head together. If he didn’t crack, chances were that one of the others would. If necessary, he could disappear from his stopover in Wales and change his name: go somewhere else to start a new life.

  Once packed, he took a last look around the house that had been his home for so long. It had never looked much; hadn’t seen a coat of paint or new wallpaper for most of that time. The carpet had been the one already down when he and his ex-wife had moved in, and on which his children, when young, had spilled drinks and much worse. The pattern was now barely discernible through the patches of filth. The furniture was also not up to much, being outdated, cheap, and utilitarian.

  Everything had been such a struggle when his wife was there. When she left, the children had been old enough to go their own ways, and he had hardly noticed his surroundings. It was just somewhere he watched television and slept, and now he’d never see it again. It had not been much of a life but, as he looked round now, he felt he’d give everything to have had the chance to go on living here, anonymous and unnoticed. He might even have done a bit of decorating.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  It was gone one o’clock when they got back to the office, and Hardy immediately began to curse. ‘I was supposed to phone Hibbie’s work this morning, and they’ll be closed for lunch now.’

  ‘They must have an answerphone you could leave a message on. If you leave your rank on the message someone’s sure to get back to you.’

  ‘Good idea, Watson. I’ll do just that thing, and do it right now.’

  As she ended the call, the two PCs who had been sent to bring in the four suspects came into the office to say that one of them had done a runner – Mervyn Lord. Trussler had still not returned home, according to his partner, but they had the other two, and were awaiting their briefs who were, apparently, on their way to the station.

  ‘Get an all ports warning out about Trussler and Lord, and let me know as soon as our two potential canaries are ready to do some singing,’ she ordered them. ‘Oh, and get the landlord of The River View in here to look at some mugshots. We could arrange an identity parade with the two we’ve got, but you’ll need the electronic photo album for him to identify the other two. We’ll get these bastards if it’s the last thing I do. Bring him straight to me – or, rather, take me straight to him when he comes in.’

  Hardy’s attention was fully occupied until somebody brought her a very slim edition of the local paper put out as a special, this time with the headline Body of Man Found in Sack Identified. Without a thought for who heard her, she shouted out, ‘There’s a traitor in our midst!’ Not trusting herself to keep any further outbursts in, she clamped shut her mouth, and got Groves to follow her out into the corridor where it was more private.

  ‘We’ve got to find out who’s leaking all this information. We’ll have to think of a way of entrapping whoever it is,’ she said in hushed tones. ‘There are certain things that we need to conceal from the general public so that we don’t hinder our own investigations. If everyone knows the details, then we’ll have a lot of nutters confessing, but if only we know the facts, then only the real culprit can disclose this withheld information.

  ‘Come on, then, we’ve got to get on to those two men and re-question them, in the light of their disappearing cohorts.’

  First up was Teddy Edwards, a young man who had not quite outgrown his teenage arrogance, and still lived at home with his mother and several siblings. He sat at the bare table in the interview room idly chewing his finger nails, his brief beside him, looking very unhappy.

  After the formalities with the announcements for the benefit of the tape, Hardy began. ‘We think it’s about time you came clean with us, Mr Edwards. Two of your mates have done a runner, and it looks like they’re going to leave you and Mr Stoner to take the rap.’ She knew she was lapsing into cheap TV speak, but thought it might be easier for the man to understand. He wasn’t the sharpest knife in the box – more of a spoon, really.

  ‘My mates would never run out on me,’ he stated baldly.

  ‘Well, Dennis Trussler and Mervyn Lord have. That just leaves you and Steve Stoner to take the whole blame for four murders. You’ll never see the light of day again.’

  ‘I ain’t saying nuffink. I hardly know Trussler and Lord, and I’ve got loads of other mates.’

  ‘I’ll be needing you for an identity parade later on, and we’ll see what you have to say after that.’

  ‘An identity parade? What for?’

  ‘You’ll see, soon enough.’

  ‘I ain’t done nuffink. I just told yer!’

  ‘Only God can see the colour of your soul.’

  This was such an unexpected remark that Edwards looked down at his chest, as if he expected to see that invisible part of him on show for the world to see.

  The man’s solicitor put a reassuring hand on his arm at that point, as he seemed to be getting agitated. ‘Just relax, Mr Edwards, and stick to what we agreed.’ The witness sat back in his chair and seemed to slump into an
attitude almost of unconsciousness.

  ‘Did you know a Mr Daniel Fishburn?’ asked Groves, taking over the reins.

  ‘No comment,’ replied Edwards, a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth. They had rattled him, but he’d got himself back in control now. Bum! thought Groves.

  ‘Did you leave The River View public house on the night Genni Lacey was abducted, in the company of Dennis Trussler, Mervyn Lord, and Steve Stoner with a young girl in tow?’ Hardy continued.

  ‘No comment.’

  ‘Did you murder Daniel Fishburn in the boatshed on the east bank of the river, just up from the marina?’

  ‘No comment.’

  Hardy was deliberately dodging her questions from one part of the investigation to another, in the hope of catching him out, and she thought she’d seen a flicker in his eyes when she mentioned the boatshed. She really must chase up Forensics on that.

  After another forty-five minutes of the utterly predictable session, the duty sergeant put his head round the door and called her out.

  ‘What is it? It had better be good.’

  ‘We can’t get enough people of a similar build for the identity parades, but we think we can manage it for tomorrow,’ she was told.

  ‘If that don’t beat all. There are more shady-looking characters in this town than you could shake a stick at, but today, they all seem to have gone to ground. All right. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. Get me two lots of men for first thing tomorrow morning, and we’ll bring these two back in. This one’s brief was already going on about us not having enough to hold his client, so I’ll just have to request that he doesn’t leave the area, and we’ll pick him up again after he’s had a good night’s sleep.’

  As they were leaving the station, Olivia suddenly stamped her foot in frustration and exclaimed, ‘Bugger!’

  ‘What is it, guv?’

  ‘Hibbie’s employers never got back to me. It’s too late to go back in and ring them again. I’ll just have to leave it for now. By the way, when’s your house going to be habitable again?’

  ‘Not till tomorrow at the earliest, and I should be grateful for that. I emailed Kenneth and told him about it, and it looks like, as usual, he’s pulled a few strings to get things sorted out as quickly as possible.’