by Robert Innes
“The abused partner is statistically -” Gardiner began.
“Yeah, I know that.” Blake nodded. “Circumstantially, at the very least, it should all fit together. But this isn’t a normal murder case. This happened in a locked shed for God’s sake. We’re not just trying to work out who, but how. And from what we’ve seen Harrison, surely, couldn’t have done it?”
“There doesn’t seem,” put in Royale from the office door. “Any way in which anyone could possibly have done it.”
“Which means,” Gardiner said triumphantly, “that it could still have been Harrison.”
Blake sighed, then nodded. “Alright. Fine. So let me ask you this – ignoring any potential suspects for the moment. How? How could he have been shot? How did Daniel Donaldson die in that shed?”
There was a pause.
“Did we discuss the possibility of a remote control device?” Patil ventured. “Something that could have been set off after he’d been locked in there?”
“Well,” Blake said, leaning against the desk with his arms folded and looking at the board, remembering Jacqueline suggesting exactly the same thing. “Nothing was found in the shed afterwards that would suggest that that was the case. There was nothing in there except farming and gardening equipment.”
“Could they have hidden something in one of the tools?” Mattison shrugged. “I dunno, like one of the hoses or something?”
“Well.” considered Blake. “It might be worth having another look round it now forensics have finished in there, but, I don’t know. It just doesn’t seem likely.”
There was another pause whilst Blake considered any other solutions to the puzzle, but none came.
“Alright.” He said at last. “Let’s move on. Now, when we arrived, we heard that one gun shot. Obviously, Donaldson’s body had three separate bullet wounds in it. So what do we think that’s about?”
“A distraction from what was actually happening?” Patil suggested.
“What would it be distracting us from though?” Asked Mattison. “It was a gunshot, which is what killed Donaldson.”
“Yes, but.” Blake stood up and stared at the white board for inspiration. “We know that the gunshot we heard was from Seth Baxter’s gun that had previously been kept inside the shed. It had nothing to do with what killed Donaldson.”
“So, we haven’t even got a murder weapon then?” Asked Royale.
“No, Sir.” Replied Blake. “But, I’d be willing to bet that when we find it, we’ll be able to work out how Donaldson was killed. Alright,” He turned back to the room. “Let’s talk about Seth Baxter.”
“The man you think did it.” Snorted Gardiner.
“I haven’t said who I think did or didn’t do it,” Blake retorted, knowing full well that Gardiner was speaking the truth. “But we’ve got to go through everyone connected to the case, we will discuss Harrison further, I promise. Ok, Seth Baxter. Harrison’s father.”
He pulled out his marker pen and scribbled on the board. “Now, he was the one who put Donaldson in the shed in the first place. As we’ve seen on the CCTV footage, he actually frogmarches him in and locks the door. OK, so first question, for me anyway, is why did he put him in this shed?”
“He walks into his kitchen and finds his son being attacked by Donaldson.” Patil read from her notes. “He drags Donaldson outside, locks him in the shed so that he can’t go anywhere whilst he phones the police.”
“Does that not seem a bit extreme to anyone else?” Blake offered. “Why not just keep him in the house? Lock the kitchen door or something to stop Donaldson from going anywhere? Why does he go to the trouble to lock him inside a shed? Matti, what did you find out about his army life?”
“Erm, well…” Mattison flicked through his notepad. “I would have told you this sooner, but I’ve not seen you, Sir. For most of his time there, he was a Sergeant in the Grenadier Guards, he was there for twenty years or so.”
“An excellent division.” Gardiner said approvingly.
“Thank you, Mainwaring.” Replied Blake wryly. “Go on, Matti.”
“But, before that,” Mattison continued. “He did a two year placement in the Royal Artillery.”
Blake raised his eyebrows. “Oh did he now?”
“So he’d know his way around a gun and how to handle one discreetly.” Patil added.
“Could Seth have shot him on his way to the shed?” Mattison asked, a moment of inspiration appearing in his eyes. He excitedly stood up and walked across the room to Blake and put his hand on his shoulder. “Do you mind being a shooting victim for a moment, Sir?”
“There’s easier ways to get a promotion Matti, but go on.” Grinned Blake to a ripple of chuckles around the room.
“So Seth is shoving Donaldson across the yard,” Mattison began, gently pushing Blake into walking across the office. “He then, secretly, pulls out a gun from his pocket….” He slowly and deliberately put his free hand into his pocket and then out again, his fingers now in the shape of a gun. “…Shoots him, then shoves him inside and locks the door?”
There was a pause. Mattison looked at Blake and then the rest of the room for some sort of clarification that he had solved the mystery.
“Yeah, but he’d got three separate wounds on him.” Patil said, standing up and tapping the picture on the whiteboard. She then walked across the room and took Mattison’s place, her hand now on Blake’s shoulder. “The only way he could manage that -Sorry Sir.”
“No, go on Mini.” Replied Blake. He was delighted that he’d got them thinking of practical solutions. This was the level of involvement he tried to establish in meetings like this.
“The only way he’d manage all three would be really quick handiwork.” She marched Blake across the room in the opposite direction, poked him gently in different places to signify him being shot and then pushed him inside Royale’s office.
“Even then,” Blake said. “If, and I do mean if,” He added at Gardiner who gave him a resigned shrug of the shoulders. “If we’re saying that Harrison didn’t do it, then he would have seen Seth do that.”
“Unless,” Royale pondered. “They were both in it together. Harrison then keeps quiet on the whole thing and his father does the deed?”
Blake sighed, his head beginning to ache. “So, what? Harrison agrees to wait till his boyfriend starts giving him a beating and then they can go ahead with their plan? It just doesn’t fit, does it?” He sucked on his teeth, thinking hard. He then smiled at Mattison. “It was a good thought and right now we need as many of them as we can get. I think you’re on the right lines Matti, I really do, but we’re missing something.” He stared at the white board in silence again for a few moments.
“So, who fired the gun that we heard?” Gardiner asked.
“Now that, Michael,” Blake said, clicking his fingers and pointing at Gardiner, “Is an excellent bloody question. Let’s recap. We’re in the yard of Halfmile Farm, Harrison and Seth are standing in front of us, so it couldn’t have been them.”
“Sandra Baxter claims she was feeding the animals at the time of death.” Patil read from her notes.
“Sandra Baxter.” Blake muttered, scribbling her name on the white board. He stared at it for a few moments before being struck by a thought.
“What animals have they even got on that farm?”
Gardiner shrugged. “Few hens, couple of sheep I think. The usual farm stock.”
“What did we see when we arrived that morning? Chickens that were just scattered all around the farm, a few geese, likewise, that bloody goat and…” His brain whirred. Something wasn’t connecting. “There were a few sheep in the distance, near the other end of the field. Have they got anything else? Cows? Horses? Alpaca?” He added dryly.
There were a few shakings of heads and shrugs around the room. “Not that I know of.” Replied Mattison.
“Their farm was hit pretty hard by the various flus and epidemics over the past decade.” Royale said thoughtfully. “I r
emember Seth telling me a few months back. Mad Cow’s disease, Bird Flu, Swine Flu; they just had really bad luck with it. Doubt they’ve been able to afford to buy more. They’ve had very little to sell.”
“So, if all of Halfmile Farm’s livestock were either in plain sight of us or dead,” Blake asked flatly, “Then what the hell was Sandra Baxter busy feeding?”
There was a long silence. Blake’s heart fluttered. Had they finally landed on something solid?
“Excuse me, Sir.” Blake turned to see Mandy Darnwood standing in the doorway. “Pathology report has come back on Daniel Donaldson.”
“Oh, finally.” Blake took the report off her and then keenly opened it, his eyes devouring the details.
The sound of a phone ringing from the front desk echoed around the corridor. “Oh for God’s sake.” Sighed Darnwood. “I tell you, I’ve been nonstop in that office today!” She marched wearily out of the meeting room.
“Yeah, the crosswords are longer at the back of her puzzle books.” Gardiner muttered, loud enough for everyone to hear and chuckle.
Blake was hardly listening. His mouth was dry, his heart was thumping. He had to reread the same paragraph three times before he assured himself that he had read it right. Ignoring the idle chatter that was going on around him, Blake rewound the tape and watched Seth throw Donaldson inside the shed again. If what the report was saying was right he had just worked out who had killed Daniel Donaldson and how.
“Guys!” Darnwood poked her head round the door again. “Just had a call from Robin at The Dog’s Tail, reporting a disturbance. It’s Helen Donaldson.”
“Daniel’s mum.” Patil said. “Do you want me to go? I’ve been her liaison officer throughout this case.”
“Yes, good idea Mini.” Royale nodded.
“I’m coming with you.” Blake called to her as she started to leave. He slammed the folder shut and passed it to Royale. “Have a good read through that, Sir. Matti, Michael. Give me an hour, then I’m going to be back here and we’re going back to Halfmile Farm.”
“Give it another going over, Sir?” Mattison sighed.
“Nope. Michael, you’re going to get your wish.”
“And why’s that?” Gardiner asked, his eyes narrowing.
Blake pulled his coat off the chair and flung it over his shoulders. As he strode out of the room, he called over his shoulder, “Because I want you to arrest Harrison Baxter for the murder of Daniel Donaldson.”
Blake didn’t say much as he travelled with Patil towards The Dog’s Tail. His brain was whirring with what he had landed on and he was performing a mental checklist in his head to make sure all the facts tallied with what he had realised was probably the only logical explanation of what had happened. There were only a few things he wasn’t sure of but he was hoping to be able to iron those out during interviews.
As Patil pulled up at the end of the road, she exhaled through her nose deeply. “She can be a bit of a handful when she’s in this state.”
“Oh, she’s not a spitter is she?” groaned Blake.
Patil merely grimaced and got out of the car. Blake tutted and shook his head as he followed her. It was the only thing that pushed him immediately to the limit and at risk of losing any sense of professionalism. Spitting at someone was just the lowest way to behave as far as he was concerned.
They could hear raised voices as they approached the entrance to the pub, one particularly shrill and abusive female voice by far outperforming the rest. Patil had just put her hand on the door handle when there was a sudden smashing of glass and a bar stool suddenly crashed through the window near where Blake was standing. It landed on the floor with a clatter on the pavement.
“Right Helen, that’s it!” Roared Robin from inside the pub. “Sod the police, I’ll deal with you myself!”
Patil glanced back at Blake who nodded back to let her know he was ready. She then pushed the door open and they found Robin the barman struggling to hold a small, gaunt faced woman in an arm lock. She had streaks of blonde in her extremely messy hair with large areas of black roots showing from beneath and a lit cigarette in her hand.
The pub was a mess. There was broken glass all over the carpet, presumably from glasses that she had thrown across the bar. There was a mirror behind the bar now sporting a large smashed centre and barstools were overturned.
“You seeing this?” Helen shouted at Patil. “You gonna let him do this to me?”
“Robin, let go.” Blake said calmly.
“Are you joking?” Snapped Robin, struggling against the force of Helen attempting to get free from his grip. “Have you seen what she’s done to this place?!”
“Yes, well we’re here now.” Blake replied.
Helen kicked her foot back with a huge amount of force against Robin’s leg. He howled in pain and let go of her. She immediately made a break for freedom towards the door, but Blake grabbed her as she pushed past Patil.
“That’s enough, come on.”
She turned round to him and circled her mouth, preparing to spit. In a flash, he put his hand over her mouth. “I promise you that if one single drop of anything leaves your mouth and lands on me then I will personally make sure that you are locked away for any charge I can get you on, and if there aren’t any then I will make some up, are we clear?”
She glared resiliently back at him for a few moments and then nodded.
“I mean it.” He said slowly and firmly.
His tone seemed to resonate with her and she opened her eyes wider and nodded furiously.
He removed his hand and turned her round to handcuff her.
“What about all this damage?” Robin said sharply. “I hope you don’t think I’m paying for all this!”
“We’ll sort it out Robin, don’t fret.” Patil replied.
“Do you want to get statements from in here whilst I put her in the car?” Blake asked her, turning Helen towards the door. She slumped slightly and he pulled her up straight again.
Patil nodded and Blake frogmarched Helen out of the pub.
She glanced at the barstool on the ground and burst out laughing. “I didn’t even mean to do that!” She cackled drunkenly. “I meant it to land against the table but it went flying through the window.”
“Yeah and nearly took our heads off at the same time.” Blake replied, unlocking the car. “Mind your head.” He manoeuvred her into the back of the car and closed the door behind her, before walking round and sitting back in the passenger seat.
“Right then Helen.” He began as he slammed the car door. “As you’ve probably gathered, we’re here because you’ve been reported as being drunk and disorderly, as well as abusive and for damaging public property and general vandalism.”
“Like I care.” Helen slurred.
Blake nodded. He did feel a twinge of sympathy for the woman behind the grill. She had lost both her children, one murdered and the other behind bars. Getting drunk was a pretty easy solution to try and numb the pain. “Do you want to tell me how it all kicked off in there?”
“He wouldn’t serve me.” Shrugged Helen. “I wanted a drink and he wouldn’t serve me.”
“So you lost your temper?”
“They were all judging me in there.” She snapped. “All of them with their beady eyes watching me, the failed mother. Well they don’t know anything about my life or my kids. All I wanted was a vodka and he starts going “’Think about what Daniel would have wanted, would he want to see his mum in this state?’ Piss off!”
She kicked the seat in front of her in anger.
“Oi.” Blake interjected. “Less of that.”
She glared at him, then slumped into the back of the car again.
“This is all that bitch’s fault.” She growled.
“Which bitch?”
“The bitch,” Helen replied slowly. “That took my Brian away from me. Daniel would still be here if it weren’t for her.”
Blake frowned. “Brian? You mean your husband? Daniel’s dad? Why
?”
Helen shook her head. “I dunno why you’re wasting your time with me, trying to sort me out. There’s nothing you can do for me, alright? I’m finished mate. I’m a mess. You should be out there, arresting her, asking her questions about my son’s death!”
“Why would whoever your husband was having an affair with know anything about Daniel’s death?”
Helen looked up at him disdainfully, an expression on her face that suggested she thought he was being incredibly stupid. “Well, it happened at her farm, didn’t it?”
Blake stared at her, his mouth falling open. “Sandra Baxter?”
Helen seemed to physically recoil at the name. “Yeah. Her. He was on his way to meet her at some hotel or summit. Then he crashed his car.” Furious tears began to appear in her eyes through the smeared mascara. “I didn’t even get a chance to tell the bastard how much I loved him.”
Blake’s brain whirred furiously. “So, just so we’re clear. Brian was seeing Sandra Baxter, how long for?”
Helen shrugged, her head leaning drunkenly to one side. “About a year or so I think. Brian told me the night he died. Said I wasn’t to start anything. That he was going to end it.” She scoffed bitterly. “Like he was going to end it with her. She’s a devious cow. She’d have worked on him somehow, got him to keep coming to see her. God, let me tell you. When I smacked her in the face the other day, it felt good. I’d have done it again and again and again, but I only got one in before Daniel pulled me off her.”
Blake’s mouth went dry. “Daniel knew? About the affair?”
Helen nodded. “Yeah. He knew. Not for very long though. I would have told him after his Dad died but me and him, we argued. Shouted, screaming. I was drinking and...” She shrugged, looking slightly like a child who was being scolded for something. “He didn’t want to be around me. Can’t blame him I s’pose. He wanted to spend more time with that lad, Harrison. I could hardly take that away from him. Telling him that his boyfriend’s mum was the reason things were so bad at home.”
