Silent as the Grave

by Paul Gitsham

  But now that problem was solved.

  “Entrepreneurial Investments International—EII, they even have their own logo.” Rubens produced a piece of letter-headed notepaper with a flourish. The logo looked like it had been done by a child learning to using Microsoft Paint and EII sounded like a scream from a Bruce Lee film, but Delmarno didn’t care.

  “They are a shell company registered in the British Virgin Islands, all legitimate as far as their tax and regulatory authorities are concerned.” Rubens grinned. “Not a very high bar to meet it has to be said. According to their website—” he switched windows to a rather crude webpage adorned with the even cruder logo “—they are an international investment firm looking for new opportunities in Europe. Somehow they stumbled across your modest little empire and have decided to infuse some much-needed capital to allow you to realise your full potential. Get Jocelyn to sign here as soon as the two of you are remarried.”

  The CEO of EII had signed the contract, with a blank space above Jocelyn’s name. It grated with Delmarno intensely that until he and Jocelyn became husband and wife again, he had no legal control over the companies he had founded. That would be fixed soon.

  Delmarno looked at the signature of EII’s CEO. “Who’s this Pieter Van Dirke?”

  “Dunno, I picked it out of the local telephone directory.”

  “So whose signature is this?”

  “Mine. I used my left hand.”

  Chapter 22

  The call came as Warren was making his lunch for the day ahead. He glanced at his watch and sighed in irritation. His head was fuzzy after the late night and the consumption of rather more vodka and Coke than was sensible on a weeknight. With Susan on holiday, he’d somehow forgotten to set the alarm and he was going to be pushing it to make it in time for the morning briefing.

  “We’ve reports of an unexplained death in Carlton Way,” the despatcher informed him.

  “What do we know?” Warren asked, cradling the phone between his shoulder and ear as he sliced his cheese sandwich down the middle with a bread knife. Wrapping it in cling film, he tossed it into a carrier bag that already held several pieces of fruit and a fat-free yoghurt.

  “Few details yet, sir. Victim is a white male, found at the bottom of a flight of stairs. Nothing else. Paramedics are in attendance and the scene is being sealed off by uniform.”

  “I’m on my way. I’ll be about fifteen minutes,” Warren promised, looking at his watch. After hanging up he gulped one last mouthful of coffee, wincing as he burnt his tongue. After a moment of indecision he grabbed a bag of cashew nuts and a chocolate bar from the snacks cupboard. To hell with the diet, he decided. He had a feeling it was going to be a long, tiring day.

  * * *

  Carlton Way was just a few miles down the road and the morning rush hour had yet to hit its stride. A rather shabby street, most of the houses had been converted into low-cost rental units, inhabited primarily by students from the University of Middle England. Warren arrived in about twelve minutes, feeling rather pleased with himself. He’d worked hard since the summer to learn the layout of his adopted town and had calculated a successful shortcut without the aid of his satnav. Flashing his badge at the middle-aged constable manning the entrance to the road, he parked and stepped into the early morning sunshine.

  The front door to number fifty-three was slightly ajar, but the large, well-built sergeant guarding it would easily block the view of any rubberneckers. Although at this early hour, none of the neighbours were in evidence.

  “The body’s just inside the hallway, at the bottom of the stairs, sir. Paramedics confirmed he was dead then left the scene to us.”

  “Who found the body?” asked Warren as he pulled on a pair of rubber gloves and knee-length plastic booties. Until he was sure that it wasn’t a crime scene, he had no intention of leaving any contaminating evidence. Chances were it was an accident and Warren had only been phoned as he was on rota as the senior police officer on call for any unexplained or suspicious deaths, but he wasn’t going to make SOCO’s job any harder, should he decide to call them in.

  “His girlfriend, we think. She’s in the back of the ambulance in hysterics. She looked through the letter box and saw him.”

  “Do we have a name yet?”

  “Not that I’ve heard. The paramedics are trying to calm her down.”

  “Seems a bit strange that his girlfriend would be calling around at this hour,” mused Warren as he took his notepad out and prepared to step over the threshold.

  “I reckon she was picking him up for work,” opined the uniformed police officer. “She’s dressed in a smart blouse with a name badge—she could be a waitress.”

  Warren nodded. It was possible he supposed. They’d find out soon enough. After pushing the door open with a gloved fingertip, he stepped in.

  The body was that of a dark-haired white male, wearing nothing but a pair of grey boxer shorts and white sports socks. A sprinkling of acne across the pasty, white skin of his shoulders hinted at relative youth. He lay sprawled face first on the tiled floor, his feet still resting on the second and third steps. It was immediately obvious from the angle of the man’s head that his neck was broken. Stepping closer, Warren could smell the strong, acrid smell of super-strength lager, the sort favoured by people with serious alcohol problems.

  A binge drinker making a wrong turn in the middle of the night and falling head first down the stairs? It was a familiar and tragic tale.

  Don’t jump to conclusions, the rational voice at the back of his mind cautioned. He looked up at the staircase. Uncarpeted, it was made of hard, polished wood, the steps angular and sharp-edged. There was no bannister on either side. Warren winced. A header down those steps would be nasty even if you didn’t break your neck.

  Squatting on his haunches, Warren angled his head down to get a look at the victim’s face. He was reluctant to turn the body over, lest he mess up any potential evidence. At the very least, they’d want a photograph of him in situ.

  His breath caught in his throat. Seconds before, he’d been expecting to dismiss the scene as a tragic accident, but Warren didn’t believe in coincidences. Staring sightlessly back at him were the glazed eyes of Zachary Eddleston, the young waiter he’d interviewed less than twenty-four hours earlier.

  Wednesday 4 April

  Chapter 23

  Early morning and the main briefing room was full to bursting, with most of Middlesbury CID’s serious crime team in attendance. DS Kent was connecting a laptop to the overhead projector.

  Warren took his place in front of a pair of wheeled whiteboards. Immediately the chatter amongst the assembled detectives died down.

  “As you all know, yesterday officers were called to an unexplained death in a student property in Carlton Way.” A picture of the dead young man lying at the bottom of the stairs was projected onto the white-painted wall that doubled as a screen. “After an investigation by SOCO, the death has been categorised as unexplained. However, because of circumstances surrounding the young man’s death we will be giving this the full treatment.” Warren paused and looked around the room. “Given potential sensitivities in this case we will not be releasing any details to the press at this time and will be referring to it as ‘unexplained, pending further investigation’. Is everybody clear on that point?”

  Murmurs and nods of assent rippled around the room, even if nobody knew the reason for the sensitivity.

  The display changed to that of a headshot of a young man in his early twenties. Pale, with jet-black hair and dark eyes, he was smiling and laughing at something off camera.

  “Zachary Eddleston, aged twenty-three. A catering student at Middlesbury College and part-time hospitality worker, he shared the flat with two other students, both studying at the university. Both of those students are away over the Easter holiday and weren’t present at the time of the deceased’s death.

  “He was found at approximately six-thirty a.m. on Tuesday 3 April by his girlfri
end, Donna Carter, who called to pick him up for the breakfast shift at the local Travelodge. He failed to answer the doorbell, and when he didn’t pick up his mobile phone she looked through the letter box and saw his body at the bottom of the stairs. She called the police and paramedics, who forced the front door.

  “I was the attending senior officer and at first glance, it seemed that Mr Eddleston had fallen, face first, down this flight of stairs, breaking his neck. He smelled strongly of alcohol.”

  The projection changed to one of the stairs. Several winces went around the room at the sight of the unforgiving, wooden steps.

  Warren paused, the guilt he had been feeling for the past twenty-four hours roiled in his gut. The young waiter had been nervous and scared when confronted at the golf club. Had they taken enough precautions to ensure the young man’s safety? A glance at Tony Sutton’s face showed that the older man shared his doubts.

  “The apparent narrative is that the deceased had been drinking heavily Monday night, alone in the living area. We found the remains of four cans of Tennent’s Super lager with his fingerprints on the coffee table, alongside an empty takeaway pizza box.”

  A photograph showed the scene.

  “He then apparently went to bed. At about three a.m., he fell down the stairs, face first, breaking his neck. As you can see, he was wearing what we presume is his nightwear.”

  Nods went around the room; the story seemed plausible.

  “However, there are too many inconsistencies to ignore.” The scene switched to a top-down line drawing of the upper floor of the house.

  “The deceased’s room was here.” Warren used a laser pointer to circle the front room of the house. “The stairs are here, next to the entrance to the bathroom. To get to the stairs from his room, you would pass his housemate’s bedroom, then the bathroom door, turning back on yourself.”

  “Could he have taken a wrong turning on the way to the bathroom?” asked DS Hutchinson. “After four cans of Tennent’s Super he could easily have gotten confused in the dark.”

  “That’s what we assumed at first; however, it’s almost a straight line from his room to the bathroom. He’d have had to double back on himself to fall face first down the stairs.”

  “What about when he left the bathroom?” persisted Hutchinson. “He’d have been facing the right way—a step to the right, rather than the left and he’d have been at the top of the stairs, rather than safely on the landing?”

  “We don’t believe he went to the toilet before he died. Preliminary results reveal that he had a half-full bladder when he died. It should have been empty when he exited the bathroom—and let’s face it, after that much booze once he’d started peeing there was no way he could stop halfway.” There were a few slight smiles at the gallows humour.

  “Maybe he got up for a glass of water? He probably had a thick head from the lager,” suggested Mags Richardson.

  “There was a three-quarter full glass of water on the bedside table, so why would he have gone to get another?”

  There was a pause whilst the team digested the information. Warren could see that they weren’t convinced yet and he was pleased, he wanted his best officers to pick apart his theory, to show up any holes that needed patching.

  “There are more inconsistencies. First of all, the choice of lager. His girlfriend and his housemates are adamant that Zachary didn’t have a drink problem. He was a purely social drinker. His tipple of choice was either red wine with a meal or cheap, regular-strength lagers like Carling or Foster’s. He’d even been heard to describe super-strength lagers as ‘tramp juice’. They couldn’t imagine him drinking it himself.

  “We found a single can of Carling in the recycle bin and a receipt showing that he had bought a four pack a week earlier with his weekly shop. The recycle bins were emptied on the Friday. Having a can of lager with a pizza in front of the TV would be consistent with his normal behaviour on a Monday evening. He knew that he had to get up for work the following morning. He probably drank the other three cans over the weekend. We have been unable to find a receipt for the four pack of Tennent’s. We’re questioning local shops nearby but we’ve not found out where they were bought. Furthermore, he was pretty diligent about recycling. Why were the cans left on the coffee table, when he threw away the Carling?”

  “Could he have drunk the Tennent’s later? Then after getting pissed he didn’t bother tidying up, he just left the cans on the table and went to bed?”

  “It’s possible, but there’s more. SOCO have combed the bedroom and found what they believe to be traces of lager on the pillow and the headboard of his bed, consistent with that from a slightly shaken can being opened. They believe that at least some of the beer was consumed in the bedroom.”

  Warren waited a few seconds for the evidence to sink in.

  DS Hutchinson was first. “So they are suggesting that the beer was drunk in the bedroom, then he went downstairs with the empty cans—but instead of throwing them in the recycling bin he neatly placed them on the coffee table?”

  “And he’d have had to pretty much pass the recycling bin to get to the living room. From what we can tell he was a pretty tidy guy; it seems implausible.” Warren concluded.

  The circumstances were bizarre and the timing suspicious. It wasn’t enough for court, yet, but he could tell by the excited mutterings from the team that he was right not to take it at face value. Now they were just awaiting the rest of results from the autopsy and the toxicology reports and maybe then they could find out what really happened that evening.

  Chapter 24

  Warren’s hope for some quick answers about the Allingham Golf Club and Hotel, which seemed to play such an important role in these latest deaths, were soon dashed.

  “I called that helpful hotel manager, Mr Molinie, yesterday only to find out that he has gone away for a few days and can’t be contacted.” Tony Sutton looked frustrated. The two men were meeting in Warren’s office, away from the rest of the team. Eddleston’s death was still unexplained, but Warren had deliberately not declared it suspicious yet, reluctant to draw the attention of senior officers until he had a clearer idea of the bigger picture.

  “The relief manager finally returned my calls but refused to answer any of my questions without a warrant.”

  “So we have no idea who is on the club’s member list?”

  “That’s right. I did a web search, but aside from the names of a couple of past tournament winners, the club keeps a pretty low internet profile.”

  “Do we know who the owner is?”

  “No.” Sutton shook his head. “Mr Molinie is listed as the licensee for the bar but I’m sure he’s not the owner.”

  “What about Companies House?”

  “It’s not listed as a limited company, so they don’t need to disclose the names of the directors and before you ask the tax office needs a RIPA request before they’ll hand over any information.”

  Warren huffed a breath out in frustration. Applying for a warrant or requesting information under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act would leave a prominent paper trail and risk just the sort of interest he was trying to avoid. “OK, let’s come back to that at a later date. What have Zachary Eddleston’s friends and family said?”

  “Nothing much that we didn’t already have. His girlfriend confirms that he had done a couple of shifts previously at the golf club, but they only started dating a couple of months ago and he never mentioned anything strange.”

  “What about his flatmates?”

  “Nothing from them either. Apparently they don’t really know each other very well and Zachary worked a lot of odd shifts on top of his college work, so they didn’t socialise very much.”

  “Parents?”

  “Both pretty distraught as you’d expect and I sensed a bit of tension.”

  “Oh?”

  “Nothing significant. I just got the impression that his parents thought that he could do a bit better for himself than catering colle
ge—they were a bit snobby if you ask me. Suffice to say, they didn’t know very much about his work life.”

  “OK, what else have we got?”

  “The doorknockers have finished their rounds. None of the neighbours saw or heard anything suspicious. A lot of the other properties in the street are also student rentals, so the neighbours don’t really know each other.”

  “No curtain twitchers?”

  “’Fraid not.”

  “What about the serving staff from that list we had?”

  “I’ve spoken again to the young lady who gave us Eddleston’s name in the first place, but she had nothing else. She reckons that the only managers they ever deal with are Mr Molinie and the deputy, and she has no idea who owns the hotel. She also couldn’t recall anyone fitting the rather vague description Eddleston gave us. I’ll keep on plugging away at the list, but it’ll take me some time. I’m assuming you don’t want me to call in anyone else to split the load?”

  “Sorry, Tony, I’d rather you didn’t for the time being. But keep the questioning short and quick. Call me in if anyone has anything interesting.”

  Sutton sighed. “Why do I feel that we’re going nowhere fast?”

  Warren summoned up a tight smile, determined to at least sound upbeat. “You know what these things are like, Tony. Nothing for ages whilst the clues trickle in, then ‘bang’ it all comes together.”

  Sutton tried a smile of his own. “If you say so, sir.”

  * * *

  “I wouldn’t want to speculate above my pay grade, but I don’t think the death was an accident,” started Andy Harrison, the Senior Crime Scene Manager in charge of the Zachary Eddleston unexplained death investigation.