Who Saw Him Die?

by Sheila Radley

  Hilary smoothed out the paper. On it was written, in shaky capitals, DAVE WHEELER.

  ‘I see. He’s your mother’s brother, is he, Sharon?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so …’ Eyes lowered, the girl swung her sturdy shoulders in embarrassment. ‘Me and Trace called him uncle when we were little. He used to work with Dad, up at the factory. He was ever so nice …’ Her voice trailed wistfully away.

  ‘And what about him? What is it that Tracey wants us to know about Uncle Dave?’ prompted Hilary gently.

  ‘I don’t know …’ The girl looked up for a moment, her blue eyes bewildered; then she returned to her study of the unoccupied toes of her man-sized wellington boots. ‘He used to bring us presents, sometimes,’ she said, wistful again.

  ‘Ah –’ Hilary thought for a few seconds, then returned to the car. Quantrill had his window down, listening to their conversation. ‘This may be a profitable use for that large bar of fruit and nut chocolate you keep in your door pocket,’ she said. ‘The one you think I don’t know about …’

  ‘That’s my iron rations!’ he protested. ‘Emergencies only. Besides, I doubt you’ll get anything out of her.’

  ‘It’s worth a try. Oh, come on Douglas, hand it over. I’ll buy you a replacement.’

  Chuffed that she’d called him by his first name, he did as Hilary asked. Sharon received the chocolate with evident pleasure. But as he’d suspected, she refused – or was unable – to say where Dave Wheeler lived, or anything else about him. Shyly smiling her thanks, she turned and lumbered towards the bungalow.

  Hilary, looking back as they drove away, saw a front window curtain twitch. But whether they were being watched by Tracey, or by Doreen Goodrum, or both; and whether the lead was genuine or they were being craftily misled, she had no means of knowing.

  The Chief Inspector, who had been putting his mind to the quickest method of finding out who Dave Wheeler was and where he lived, came up almost immediately with the answer.

  ‘No sense in wasting time trying to get hold of the personnel records of J.R.Goodrum Limited. We’ll go straight to the best source of information in any firm – she’s bound to live somewhere local.’

  ‘Who is?’

  ‘The tea lady.’

  An enquiry at a shop in the village half a mile away sent them to another bungalow, far less lavishly equipped than the Goodrums’ but clean and budgerigar-neat. Its occupant, Mrs Alice Fulcher, a widow who greatly missed the companionship she had had at Goodrum’s, was delighted to receive her visitors. She had just had an early dinner, she said – there was an emptied mug and a slightly used small plate on the kitchen table, together with two opened packets, one of individual servings of instant soup powder, the other of cream crackers – and she assured them that it would be a pleasure to have someone to drink a cup of coffee with.

  Yes, she’d read about Jack Goodrum’s death. A shocking business. Mind you, she wasn’t entirely surprised, the way Jack had treated everybody, his own poor wife and girls as well – a slave driver if ever there was one. But there was no call for anyone to go and shoot him. Two wrongs would never make a right.

  Yes, she’d known Jack most of his life. Knew him when he was a little terror of a boy, knew him when he was a young tearaway, knew him when he first started his poultry processing business and hadn’t got a penny to pay his bills with. Let the b .… . . s wait, he used to say. Didn’t care for anybody except himself.

  And yes, she certainly knew Dave Wheeler. Poor Dave – the last she’d heard of him he was unemployed, his wife had left him, and he was living with his mother in a village the other side of Ipswich. Clayford, that’s where he went back to live. He and Jack Goodrum had been mates for years – Dave used to have a small poultry farm in the village here, and they’d often gone out shooting together.

  Dave supplied Jack with poultry in the early days, but he was always kept waiting for his money. When Jack eventually persuaded him to give up the smallholding and join him as a partner, Dave thought he was on to a good thing at last. He didn’t realise that it was just Jack’s way of wiping out one of his debts.

  ‘How long were they in partnership?’ said Quantrill.

  ‘Hah!’ said Mrs Fulcher with bright-eyed relish. ‘They never were – not properly, that is. I didn’t realise it, and neither did Dave, until they had a big row when the news leaked out that Jack was selling the business. It seems there never was any written partnership agreement – Dave was fool enough to trust Jack to see him right! He’d been working for rock-bottom wages, same as everybody else, because Jack wouldn’t allow any trade unions in his factory. And when Jack sold out, Dave discovered that all he was entitled to was his redundancy money.’

  Having talked herself almost hoarse, Mrs Fulcher suddenly paused and gave the detectives a worried look over the rim of her coffee cup. ‘Here –’ she said, ‘I’m not talking out of turn, am I? I couldn’t help knowing what went on in the offices – I used to go in and out with my trolley, and they’d carry on with what they were saying regardless. They seemed to think I was just an automatic hot-drinks machine. But don’t you go getting the idea that Dave might have shot Jack Goodrum! I’m sure he wouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t in his nature to be violent.’

  ‘But did he threaten Goodrum, in that big row they had?’ asked Quantrill.

  ‘Well … He said he’d get even with him, one day … But what you’ve got to understand is that just about everybody who worked for Jack hated him. They didn’t say so to his face, naturally. He’d have sacked them on the spot. But you should’ve heard what the production workers reckoned they’d do to him, if ever they got the chance! And I don’t mind telling you that some of them were a rough lot … Oh, if it’s suspects you’re looking for, there’s plenty to choose from without picking on Dave Wheeler.’

  Sergeant Lloyd could put off the job no longer. She took out her notebook and started making the long list of former employees, ex-employees and associates who might, with good reason, be suspected of complicity in Jack Goodrum’s murder.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Disregarding Mrs Fulcher’s opinion, the detectives left her bungalow to go looking, first, for Dave Wheeler.

  They found his mother’s house, in a red brick terrace built in the late Victorian Station-Road style, in the railway village of Clayford. Their knock at her front door went unanswered. Walking through an entry to the rear of the terrace, they opened the gate of rough, creosoted planks that led into her small back yard, and tried their luck at the kitchen door.

  Mrs Wheeler senior was at home. A good twenty years older than Mrs Fulcher, with wispy hair and trembling lips, and so unsteady on her pins that she needed to lean on a walking stick, she was still full of fight. She seemed to have a shrewd idea why the detectives were there, and all she was prepared to give them was sufficient space in her kitchen to allow her to shut the door against potentially eavesdropping neighbours.

  Her son was out. He’d gone off that morning after a job – somewhere in Colchester, she thought. Or perhaps Chelmsford. He’d had a telephone call, somewhere about midday, and then he’d left to catch the twelve-forty train. He’d said he might be away for a day or two.

  Yes, he knew Jack Goodrum had been murdered. She’d seen it in the newspaper and read it out to Dave at breakfast. But that had nothing at all to do with his going away.

  She knew it was wicked to say so, but she was glad Jack Goodrum was dead. He’d treated her son shamefully. But they needn’t think Dave knew anything about what had happened to Jack, because he didn’t. He’d been at home with her when the murder was committed. Whenever the murder was committed.

  Yes, and he’d been at home all day the previous Saturday as well. And why they were asking she couldn’t imagine, but if they must know he took size seven and a half in shoes.

  ‘Does your son own a shotgun, Mrs Wheeler?’ asked Hilary.

  ‘Not that I know of,’ said the old lady. Her sunken eyes were weak and wate
ry but she stared at the sergeant without a blink.

  ‘He knows how to use one, though,’ said Quantrill.

  ‘That he doesn’t!’

  ‘Oh come now, Mrs Wheeler – you know that’s not true. Your son had a gun licence when he lived at his previous address, and we’ve heard that he used to go shooting with Jack Goodrum. I think it’s likely that he still has his shotgun.’

  Physically, the old lady was sagging. She needed to rest both hands on the handle of her walking stick to stay upright. But she stood defiant, barring the way beyond her kitchen doormat: ‘Not in this house, he hasn’t.’

  ‘What a pity,’ said Hilary pleasantly. ‘You see, we’ve heard that a lot of people had reason to hate Jack Goodrum, and we’re anxious to eliminate those who know nothing about his murder. If only we could borrow your son’s shotgun, we could send it to the forensic lab for a test firing. Then the experts would compare the spent cartridge with the one that was found at the scene of the crime, and that would confirm your son’s innocence.’

  Five minutes later, the detectives were on their way back to Breckham Market with a well-kept shotgun that his mother had fetched from David Anthony Wheeler’s bedroom.

  ‘I don’t enjoy conning suspects’elderly relatives,’ said the sergeant. ‘And it seems a particularly mean thing to do when the murder victim was such a bastard to so many people.’

  ‘You’ve changed your tune, Hilary! I thought you had a high opinion of Jack Goodrum’s honesty and kindness.’

  ‘So I did. But that Jack was the one I met at The Mount: Felicity’s husband. It’s difficult to believe he was the same pig of a man Doreen was married to – he must have changed completely. But I suppose that’s the civilising influence of love.‘

  Quantrill thought it was more likely to be the civilising influence of early retirement and a lot of money, but he didn’t say so. He didn’t want to provoke her into a lengthy argument. They had at most a twenty-five minute drive ahead of them, on the minor road he had chosen, and he was determined not to waste it. He felt that this was going to be his final chance to establish a more intimate relationship with her.

  ‘Hilary –’

  ‘The sugar beet campaign’s still going strong, I see,’ she said, taking an unusually keen interest in the agricultural scene. ‘Piles of beet by the roadside, dirty great container lorries ferrying loads of it to the sugar factories, and mud everywhere … Well, at least it’s stopped raining. That learner-rider must be glad.’

  They were about to overtake a lad riding an L-plated moped. He must have been at least sixteen to hold a provisional licence, but he seemed very small. He was dressed in jeans and a thin combat jacket, with a spaceman crash helmet that made his head look far too heavy for his body. As they passed him – giving him a wide berth – they saw him wobble. He managed to control his machine and prevent it from going into a slide, but he gave the impression of hanging on to it for dear life.

  ‘Bloody bikes,’ scowled Quantrill, remembering his encounter with Peter that morning. ‘D’you wonder I won’t let my boy ride one? It’s terrifyingly dangerous. A rider can come off so easily, and he has no body protection at all.’

  ‘Yes, I realise that,’ said Hilary. ‘It must be very worrying for the parents. But – since you’ve asked me – don’t you think you’re being a bit inflexible with Peter? It did seem to me this morning that he’s going to be a very frustrated young man if he can’t ever hope to join his mates.’

  ‘Well at least he won’t be joining the casualty statistics,’ Quantrill retorted. ‘The number of Suffolk sixteen to twenty-three-year-olds who’ve killed themselves on bikes this year alone is absolutely horrifying. No responsible father ought to allow his son to have one. When Austin Napier – QC, for heaven’s sake – told us he’d bought a bike the other week for young Matthew, I thought it was a good demonstration of his complete lack of judgement.’

  ‘Oh well, Austin Napier …’ said Hilary. ‘Considering that he refuses to recognise his wife’s divorce, and that we can’t rule him out as her second husband’s murderer, what can you expect? But he probably had his own reason for buying the machine. Matthew was taking a bike-riding course at school – his mother told us she was worried about his safety, if you remember – so I suppose his father wanted to try to buy his way into the boy’s favour.’

  ‘Hmph,’ said Quantrill. The hurt he had sustained during his major row with Peter had begun to ease, until this morning’s incident had aggravated the sore. ‘I’m damned if I’d ever do that.’

  He glanced at his watch. Although he was driving more slowly than usual, the journey was going too quickly. ‘Hilary –’ he said.

  ‘Is Peter leaving school next summer?’

  ‘Not if I can help it. I want him to stay another year and get some qualifications. Grow up a bit, at least.’

  ‘And what then?’

  ‘God knows … Hilary –’

  ‘But what’s he interested in?’

  ‘Motor bikes. Oh, and the CND; he seems to think that unless we disarm, we’ll be overwhelmed by what he calls the nuclear winter.’

  ‘Well, it’s arguable, isn’t it? That sounds very thoughful and responsible of him – even if you don’t agree with it.’

  ‘Pah! He doesn’t believe what he said, he’s only using it as an excuse to spend every penny he’s got on a bike.’

  Quantrill slowed the car even more. They were within four miles of Breckham Market, and he knew that this was his last opportunity. The narrow road was enclosed by leafless hedges and the occasional bare, black-tipped ash tree, but he recalled that there was a lay-by just ahead. He pulled in, unclipped his seat belt, and turned to her. Although the words she had used last night on the train had been deliberately discouraging, she had quite definitely responded, if only for a moment, to his touch. She’d met his eyes, and what he had seen there – if only for a moment – encouraged him to persist.

  ‘Look, you know how I –’

  ‘Are you sure you’re not underestimating Peter?’ she said. ‘He sounds to me –’

  Quantrill exploded. ‘For God’s sake shut up about the wretched boy! And don’t start on any other subject, either. You know perfectly well what I want to talk to you about.’

  ‘When we’re in the middle of a murder investigation?’

  ‘That’ll keep for ten minutes. Whoever killed Jack Goodrum had a personal grudge against him – it isn’t as though we’re expecting any more deaths.’

  They were both silent for a few moments, Quantrill because he needed to steady himself after his outburst. That had been a fine way to begin propositioning her …

  This wasn’t much of a setting for it, either. The wet November countryside looked dismal, and the passing traffic consisted chiefly of mud-splattered tractors and trailers carting sugar beet from the fields to a nearby collection point. The minor road was greasy, scattered with yellowed beet leaves that had fallen from the trailers. The edges of the road were puddled with dirty rainwater.

  Inside the car, Quantrill felt that the atmosphere had begun to thicken. Having at last seized her attention, he was almost too stifled to speak. And now, embarrassingly, the windows had begun to mist up. He started to say something – anything – but she interrupted him once more.

  ‘I think I’d better tell you’, she said, briskly winding down a window and letting in a blast of chill air, ‘that I’m planning to ask for a transfer from Breckham Market.’

  ‘But you can’t leave!’ he protested. ‘I mean – we work so well together. What shall I do without you?’

  ‘I’m quite sure you’ll do just as well as you did before I came,’ she said.

  ‘But why do you want to leave?’

  ‘You know perfectly well why. I like working with you, and I’d hoped to go on doing so – but our working relationship is too close to allow for any personal entanglement. Frankly, it would get in the way of the job.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ he argued. ‘We’d probably
be able to concentrate better if we admitted the attraction and did something about it, instead of trying to pretend that it doesn’t exist.’

  ‘All right, I admit it. But we’re not in love with each other, and you’re married – and as far as I’m concerned, that’s that. I’m not exactly flattered, you know, to be regarded as a married man’s potential bit on the side.’

  ‘But it wouldn’t have to be like that! There is such a thing as divorce –’

  He’d thought of it often enough. Not of the process of being divorced, but of the end product: of having his freedom. He hadn’t anticipated mentioning it to Hilary, and now that the thought had emerged, unrehearsed, he found that it alarmed as much as it excited him. But because she had admitted that she found him attractive, he was recklessly prepared to offer her any inducement. ‘I could get a divorce,’ he repeated, hoping that his voice didn’t sound as unnatural to her as it did to him.

  ‘But not on my account,’ she said lightly. She took a duster from the door pocket and cleared the last of the mist from the inside of the windscreen. ‘Oh, come on, Douglas, let’s get back on the job. I really am anxious to nail whoever killed Jack Goodrum. A man who loved and was loved by someone as nice as Felicity can’t have been all bad.’

  Quantrill made no move. The rain had started to drizzle down again, and he gazed at it disconsolately. ‘So where does that leave us?’ he asked. ‘Are you really going to put in for a transfer?’

  ‘That’s up to you – you’re the boss. You may prefer it if we split up, after this. If you want me to stay, I will. But only on the understanding that we’ll never be any closer than we are now.’

  ‘All very well for you,’ he grumbled. ‘You can’t expect me to turn off my feelings, just like that.’

  ‘You can direct them somewhere else, though,’ she said. ‘Why not pay a bit more attention to your marriage?’

  ‘There’s precious little of it left, except the appearance …’

  ‘Have you tried the kiss of life?’ She gave him a wholeheartedly friendly smile. ‘It really can work wonders, so I’m told.’