The Reluctant Detective (Faith Morgan Mysteries)

by Ockley, Martha

  Alison had told her of her son’s illness when he was young. He’d caught something upcountry. She hadn’t said what had made her son so ill that they’d had to fly him home from Africa, had she? Faith frowned, trying to remember the conversation with Mrs Beech at the hospital the day Alistair Ingram died. She didn’t think she had mentioned polio, but that must have been it.

  Jessica. She had to talk to Jessica. Faith started the car up and drove off at speed, her heart pumping.

  CHAPTER

  20

  THE STREET WAS QUIET. Everyone seemed to be out on their Saturday errands. Jessica’s silver car was gone from her driveway. Faith listened to the doorbell chiming inside. There was no answer. She pressed her face against the front window, peering in. The living room was show-home neat. She went round the side of the house to the back door. Just on the off-chance, she tried the door knob. It wasn’t locked.

  That was worrying, given the recent breakin and Jessica’s declared determination to be more security conscious. Faith stood still, listening, every nerve on edge. Silence. Nothing. Except an odour.

  The house smelled of bleach. She checked around her. Just inside the door there was one of those plastic sacks charities pushed through the letter box soliciting for donations. Its top flopped open. It was filled with folded bedding, white with a narrow stripe of soft jade. A tall silver pedal bin stood by the fridge. Its lid was held ajar a few inches. In the gap she glimpsed flower stems. She crossed over and pressed the pedal with her foot. A bunch of irises, the blooms still fresh, had been crammed in. Among the leaves twinkled a silver chain. Faith lifted it out – the fish pendant swung between her fingers. She stared at it for a moment.

  A man in his thirties to forties, with short brown to fair hair. That was Di’s description – and it matched Don’s glass man.

  Her foot was still on the pedal holding the lid open. There was a torn section of postcard poking up between the stems. She fished it out and found another and another. A minute later she had retrieved seven fragments of card. She reassembled them on the countertop, moving them about to form a picture.

  It was a view of Lymington, separated into four quarters showing different aspects of the town. She turned the pieces over. The message on the back was stained and smudged but quite clear: I’m waiting for you by the sea.

  There was no signature or date or address. Just the Christian symbol of a stylized fish. The postmark was barely legible. It had been posted, first class, from Winchester the day before.

  The phone was on the wall by the fridge. Next to it was pinned a whitewashed wooden board and on it, a neatly typed list of telephone numbers. One was helpfully labelled “Diana”. Faith picked up the receiver and dialled.

  “Di – Faith Morgan. Hi! I’m glad I’ve caught you. I wonder, have you seen Jessica today? Only I’ve just come to call on her and the back door’s open but no sign of her.”

  “Bad girl! I swear she is so vague some times,” Di responded playfully. “She’s gone shopping, I think. I saw her drive out – maybe half an hour ago?”

  “Thanks.”

  She broke the connection and got out her mobile. She couldn’t remember; did she have it?

  Yes. There it was: “Jessica”. She waited as the phone rang. On the sixth ring it picked up.

  “The person you’ve called is unable to come to the phone,” intoned the irritating electronic lady. Faith waited impatiently for the beep.

  “Jessica, it’s Faith. Please call me when you have a moment. It’s important.”

  She stood by the phone, thinking. Now where had she seen them? Of course. She made a beeline for the study and found Jessica’s set of telephone directories neatly aligned on a blond wood bookcase.

  It was a long shot. Many bishops were ex-directory, especially their retirement homes, but it was worth a try. Bee…Beeby…Beech. There it was. Blossom Cottage, Lymington. She jotted down the address.

  Jessica’s laptop was on the desk. She flipped it open and turned it on. It looked as though she had wireless connection. The box was up on the bookcase by the window. She waited impatiently for the thing to load. A message flag popped at the bottom of the screen. Wireless Network Connection Connected. Good.

  She Googled the Royal Mail site and entered the address. Like magic the postcode came up. She noted it down beside the address. She never could trust her memory on such things; she always second-guessed herself.

  Back in the kitchen, she made a quick search of drawers and got lucky. A spare set of keys. She was glad to be able to lock the door behind her. Jessica had had too many uninvited visitors of late.

  She entered the postcode in the Sat Nav on the dashboard, and started up the engine.

  Turn right at… said a woman’s disembodied and slightly patronizing voice. This just might work.

  The route from Jessica’s to Lymington seemed to involve an awful lot of directions; turn here, look out for approaching junction there. It took all of Faith’s concentration to follow the instructions enunciated by the implacable digital voice. She had been driving for some time when it occurred to her that she hadn’t told anyone where she was going. She should ring Ben. The thought of last night’s incident made her shy away from the thought. She would take the coward’s way out and ring Peter.

  She spotted a lay-by and pulled over. The phone seemed to ring for ever, and then at last he picked up.

  “You have reached the message service for Sergeant Peter Gray…”

  “Peter, it’s Faith. I’m pretty sure it’s Simon Beech. I think he may have Jessica at the cottage in Lymington…” Her phone was dead.

  She stared at it disbelievingly. What was going on? Then she remembered the battery. The display bar was empty. She’d forgotten to charge it. How could she be such an idiot! She had meant to do it, but what with the car crash and Ben…

  It was all Ben’s fault. He had to barge in and distract her.

  Calm down. She looked about. She was in a country lane. There was no pub or shop in sight. She should find a phone but she was haunted by a sense of urgency. Jessica had more than half an hour’s start on her. If she was right, Jessica had gone to face a killer. She had to catch up with her.

  She put the car in gear and set off. She’d be bound to pass a phone box or pub soon, she reasoned to herself; she could ring from there. She wasn’t absolutely sure when the phone had cut out. She thought she’d recorded the key information before the battery died.

  She glimpsed the sea twinkling on the horizon. A cottage by the sea…

  “Turn right at the next junction by the golf course,” intoned the Sat Nav. Faith noted the golf course rolling out to her right. She thought of those stories about hapless humans driving into lakes, mesmerized by the authority of their Sat Navs. Was this really going to work?

  She almost missed it. There was a rustic oak sign set in a hedge with “Blossom Cottage” burned into it in hot poker work. She slammed on the brakes. A car hooted indignantly behind her, and accelerated past with a furious roar of its engine. She checked the road guiltily. It was clear. She found a safe spot and made a careful U-turn.

  Blossom Cottage was a late nineteenth-century brick cottage with a half-moon gravel drive. Roses spilled out from a wild-looking bush beside the narrow porch. An aphid problem. Jessica’s silver car was parked at an angle in front of the door. Its boot stood open.

  Faith glanced into the boot. The bright beach bag gleamed out of the shadows. It was hardly four days ago that I caught her with that, she thought. So much had happened so fast.

  There was something else in the boot. A long, flat green canvas case. Trevor Shoesmith’s missing shotgun. Faith leaned in and poked it. It was empty.

  She should have known. If Jessica was going to take the pesticide that morning to stop Trevor hurting himself, why wouldn’t she take the gun?

  She caught a glimpse of movement through the window. She went up to the front door. It was slightly ajar. She thought she heard a voice inside, its tone ins
istent. She pushed the cool wood cautiously. There was a narrow hall and an open doorway to the left. She saw a shadow move on the wall. She stepped into the doorway.

  “Hello. Where did you get that gun?” she heard herself ask conversationally.

  CHAPTER

  21

  JESSICA WAS STANDING IN THE FAR CORNER of the room away from the window. She was holding a shotgun at waist height. It was pointed at a man sitting in a leather-upholstered club chair; a man with cropped fairish-brown hair, tanned skin and his mother’s pale round eyes. Simon Beech.

  “It’s Trevor’s,” Jessica answered.

  “You took it?” asked Faith.

  Jessica glanced at her with a flicker of impatience.

  “I thought he might hurt himself with it. I put it in the boot of my car.”

  “You had it all this time?”

  “What’s she doing here?” Simon’s voice was querulous. Faith looked at him incredulously. He thought she was intruding?

  “Faith’s my friend.”

  Well, that’s a relief, thought Faith. And a start…What were the odds that the gun was loaded? What was the likelihood Jessica even knew how to load it? Faith didn’t recall seeing any cartridges in that boot. She cursed herself for not checking more closely.

  “He stalked me!” Jessica seemed to have her right hand in the correct position around the trigger guard. What was the likelihood of her being familiar with shotguns? “He broke into my house!”

  The shotgun bobbed alarmingly. Faith made a warning gesture, but Jessica was too incensed to notice. Simon leaned forward in his chair. As he moved, Faith noticed the built-up shoe on his right foot.

  “I had to let you know I’d come back for you,” he said earnestly. “I love you…”

  Jessica took a little step towards him, the barrel of the gun pointed at his face.

  “That’s not love!” her voice rasped. A different creature had sprung up inside the pretty, meek woman. It stretched the skin across the bones of her face and pointed her chin. “It’s perverted,” she spat.

  She glanced at Faith.

  “You know about him?”

  “The charity worker who gave you the irises.”

  Jessica nodded sharply.

  “The fake. How long have you known?”

  “I’ve only just put it together. I called at your house. I saw the kitchen.”

  “He broke in and got into my bed,” she said with revulsion.

  So that explains the bedding.

  “And he left the flowers?” Faith asked. “I wondered about that jug they were in; it didn’t look like your choice.” She worked hard to keep her tone conversational, but out of the corner of her eye Faith never lost sight of the gun.

  Jessica tossed her head and made a scornful sound. They were both standing watching Simon as they talked. He looked perplexed, his eyes shifting from one to the other.

  “Who is she?” he asked Jessica.

  “I’m Faith Morgan. Your father asked me to come and cover St James’s…” She trailed off, thinking of the many ways that sentence might hit a nerve. She glanced at Jessica. She seemed unperturbed.

  “She came to me, you know.” Simon’s manner changed. It was almost as if they were chatting at some weird social occasion. “It was out in Tanzania. She volunteered to help. She’s wonderful with finances.” His admiration had a sickly quality. There was something about the tone of his delivery that made Faith’s skin creep.

  “There was a crisis. I was about to lose the project. But she came, like an angel, and saved me.”

  “I didn’t save you…” Jessica hissed.

  “But you tried,” he shot back.

  “The finances were unsustainable.” Jessica addressed Faith as if he hadn’t spoken. “He was borrowing against expectations. He convinced me God would find a way, but I should have known. Once I’d gone through the books it was obvious – except I didn’t want to see it.”

  Simon’s eyes were locked in adoration on Jessica.

  “You don’t listen to me!” she cried sharply. “You never listened to me. You don’t know me. You just talk and talk and talk.”

  Simon looked vaguely smug. He’s enjoying the attention, thought Faith. Doesn’t he realize that gun could go off?

  “What are you?’ Jessica scoffed. “I thought you were a decent man.”

  “You know I am.” His voice was cajoling. “You couldn’t love me otherwise. And you do love me – you know you do. We’re each other’s salvation.”

  “Alistair was my salvation, not you! He knew me.” Her voice caught and she blinked back tears.

  “Alistair Ingram!” Simon exclaimed. His skin flushed under the tan. “The great man! Enough of him!”

  He wasn’t looking at them any more. He was talking in a world of his own.

  “Ingram can help you sort out your finances,” he said in a savage parody of someone. “Dear Bishop Daddy! He has no idea. He sends me out there and there’s never enough money…” He looked up at Jessica, pleading. “I saw you together. I saw you through the window. What kind of priest is that,” he demanded, glaring at Faith briefly, “seducing a vulnerable woman? After all I’ve done. He seduced you.”

  After all I’ve done, thought Faith. She felt cold.

  “I nearly despaired that night. I thought, what can I do? Then at dinner they were going on about her roses. Chemicals poison the land, he said; but sometimes nothing else will rid you of the pests, she said. They eat all the beauty away. So I put it in God’s hands.”

  “You poisoned him?” Faith asked quietly.

  His eyes flicked up to her face.

  “A sip of that wine wouldn’t have killed a good man,” he said dismissively. “It was God’s will. I saw signs.” He focused on the middle distance, chanting to himself. “She was pulling me down. Everything was collapsing. ‘Let it go,’ she said. She didn’t understand. He called me home, did you know that? It was in God’s hands; I left it in God’s hands.”

  Faith wasn’t sure why, but he seemed to feel the need to convince her. She wondered what response would be best calculated to calm him. She was worried about the effect his rising hysteria was having on Jessica. The more he appeared like a crazed monster, the more likely she would be to do something stupid. While at Hendon, Faith had been taught how to disarm a suspect at close range, but that was so long ago. And they’d known the guns weren’t loaded. The weapon in Jessica’s shaking hands seemed like a creature in its own right – something alive; deadly.

  “It was because of her, of course. She betrayed me. She wrote to Mother. So Daddy,” Simon spat the word out, loaded with fury, “decided I need to be taken in hand!”

  Dread caught Faith by the throat.

  “Who betrayed you?” she asked softly.

  Something flickered in the pale eyes. He clamped his mouth shut. He turned his attention back to Jessica.

  “I went to the church. I thought, if I can pray there God will tell me what to do. He would give me a sign. And he did. The door was locked, but that boy gave me the key. He showed me where it was kept. All doors were unlocked for me, you see. And there was the lamb – the lamb cut out of the wall and put on the ground for slaughter. I followed the signs. Simple faith. When I went in the next morning, no one saw me. No one stopped me. God blinded them.”

  “Shut up!” shouted Jessica.

  “Simple faith,” Simon repeated solemnly.

  Faith glanced at Jessica. Her face was blank, but her eyes never left the babbling man in the leather chair.

  “You know how hard I tried,” he whined, “but it was always the same. Bishop and Mrs Anthony – they’re such saints. The people, Simon; the people. Look at the purity of their faith,” he echoed in a savage sing-song.

  He stretched, flicking out his right leg in a nervous tic. The built-up shoe caught on the carpet and jarred.

  “And that’s what I got. Polio,” he said, indicating his foot, his eyes fixed on Faith. He tossed his head. “They had their mis
sion; I was just their boy.” He leant forward in his seat towards Jessica. “I came home to find you – just to be with you.” Faith thought he was pathetic.

  “You tricked me.” Jessica’s words were crystal clear. “You’re a wicked man; a false, slithering thing.”

  Her hands were shaking more. Faith tried to estimate how much pressure the trigger of a gun like that would take to pull. Was it even loaded? Did Jessica know how to fire it? Faith took a step closer. If she could push the barrel out of the way…But what then? What about Simon?

  “But I love you…”

  Don’t say that! The exclamation reverberated so loudly inside her own head that Faith wondered if she had spoken aloud.

  “You don’t love me!” The gun jumped in Jessica’s hands. “Alistair loved me, and you murdered him.” She aimed the gun at his head. Faith heard the click as Jessica cocked the hammer. Her chest fell as she expelled her breath. So she knows how to fire a gun.

  “Jessica.” Faith was amazed how calm her voice sounded; she wasn’t sure where the calmness came from. “Jessica – isn’t this what he wants?”

  Jessica frowned. “Alistair?”

  “No. Simon. Look at him.”

  “He’s destroyed everything.”

  “No. Not yet. He hasn’t destroyed you – not unless you pull that trigger.”

  “Don’t!” Jessica cut her off. “He’s damned me. He’s destroyed good men. I’m going to make him pay.”

  Faith glanced at the man Jessica regarded as evil sitting at the other end of the gun. He was so ordinary – except his eyes were sparkling and his cheeks were flushed. She felt a surge of revulsion. He’s getting off on this!

  “Jessica – Jessica!” She desperately wanted her to hear. She could almost feel the tide of misery sucking them out into a sea of wretchedness. “Don’t let him win. Can’t you see that’s what he wants?”

  Jessica’s head turned a fraction towards her, but her eyes were still pinned on Simon Beech. Faith took another step towards her. Another yard and she might be able to reach the gun, as long as she didn’t startle her and set it off by accident.