The Detective's Secret

by Thomson, Lesley

  Jack gave a long-drawn-out yawn and his eyes watered. He looked again at the details on the database entry. No tattoos. For an organization seeking to identify corpses, the more marks or scars on a body the better. Tattoos, a moderately contentious form of expression in life, were a welcome clue in death. He had a scar on his thumb – so deep it must have scored the bone, Lucie said.

  Jack looked to see if Stella had replied to his email, knowing she would not have. Although she frequently worked late, this was so late it was early. A thought occurred. She hadn’t invited him over because she was with her Brand-new Brother. He would be making himself at home in his father’s old house. Stella’s house. He would be sizing up its worth.

  His email to her was still in the Outbox. Jack was sure he had pressed ‘Send’. He did so now. He received an email about money-saving tips, but the email to Stella remained unsent.

  He confirmed there was a blue light on the router before remembering he had had incoming mail. There were five bars at the bottom of the screen depicting an ‘excellent’ signal.

  His laptop wasn’t connected to his router. It had jumped on to the one called CBruno that he had been offered when he first connected to the internet. The owner – C. Bruno presumably – was clearly not savvy about security. While he was using this connection, Jack’s own account was not secure. He clicked to the dropdown list of routers – his and C. Bruno’s – and as he did so, noticed the CBruno router script. WPA2-PSK. The code indicated a secure router, which meant he shouldn’t have been able to access it without a password. Yet he had. Given this, why hadn’t his email to Stella gone? He sent it now.

  Jack heard a sound. If he hadn’t worked it out from the silence, Lucie’s information about the Glove Man told him that in the conversion the tower had been soundproofed. He could hear a buzzing, intermittent and insistent.

  It was his phone. His imagining the Glove Man dying in panic and distress centimetres from his bed had upset him, his nerves were on edge. A blue subterranean light from his phone sent an insidious glow across the curving walls. He saw the room as the concrete tank it had been that night.

  Open the door.

  Jack dropped the phone before he had seen whom the message was from. He heard a distant boom: someone was banging on the flat door. He caught himself in the wardrobe mirror, a poster boy for a horror film, mouth and eyes wide open, hands clasping the sides of his face.

  Far off, through the thick cladding, he heard his name being called. Without pausing to consider if it was safe, he flung the door open.

  Stella was on the spiral staircase with Stanley in her arms. Never had Jack felt so warmly towards the dog, although from the fathomless brown eyes, it was unclear if the feeling was mutual.

  ‘Lulu Carr is his wife!’ Stella marched past him into the flat.

  40

  Saturday, 26 October 2013

  ‘Stella I need to tell you—’ Jack started as he shut the door.

  ‘We’ve made a breakthrough!’ Stella had intended to confront Jack about coming to her flat, but, reassured by his email saying that he wanted to ‘take stock’ – they were a team – she let it go. Jack would have had his reasons; best not to probe.

  She dropped on to the chair by his desk and swivelled to face the room. Stanley sat at her feet, eyes on Jack. She didn’t trust his mood and fished a liver treat from her anorak, popping it in his mouth. Jackie said Stanley got jealous of her giving Jack attention. Stella had disagreed. She and Jack were ships in the night – or day; she saw more of the dog so no problem. Besides, he was just a dog.

  Jack went to the window, arms folded, his hands under his armpits. ‘I wanted to explain why I was—’

  ‘I’m cleaning Rick Frost’s house. Lulu Carr is his widow!’

  ‘We already know his wife is called Tallulah Frost.’ Jack pushed off the window sill. Stanley got up, tail whirling.

  ‘She’s using her maiden name and a diminutive of her real name. Lulu is short for Tallulah. Tallulah Frost says she wants a fresh start, like we offer at Clean Slate,’ Stella ploughed on.

  ‘Is this your client whose husband left her?’

  ‘He didn’t leave. He’s dead.’

  ‘She lives in Perrers Road?’

  ‘Yes!’ It was late; Stella forgave Jack being slow to grasp the immensity of her discovery.

  ‘So you were cleaning there already?’ Jack asked. ‘Before we got this case?’

  ‘Yes! I’ve spent hours listening to Lulu – or Tallulah. I know more than I might if we’d interviewed her, except now I don’t know what’s true and what’s made up. I told her we were working for her brother-in-law. She said he should mind his own business. He was right, no love lost there.’

  ‘Stella, you are the best of Wonderhorses!’ Jack spread his arms.

  Stanley gave a shrill bark. Stella decided that Jackie was right about him getting possessive.

  ‘It’s a sign! Amongst the fabrication will be a kernel of truth. Her husband may have been having an affair. Strip away the narrative and we’ve got betrayal at the core of this case.’

  Stella didn’t quite see how Jack had arrived at this conclusion.

  ‘Dying is like leaving. Suppose he was having an affair with this Nicola and then he died. Tallulah Frost or Lulu would feel rejected. OK, so now we have a suspect with a motive.’ He put his phone and a plastic box of dental floss on the bedspread in front of him, presumably to represent suspect and motive. ‘Lulu/Tallulah Frost finds out and chases him off the platform. She can’t accept she’s killed him so reframes it as being jilted which, as I said, is also true. I guess she’s more comfortable being the victim than the persecutor.’

  ‘She told her brother about the affair.’ Stella felt exhausted. There were too many facts that might be fiction. Now she understood why Lulu’s husband had left so much stuff. Where Lulu’s husband had gone, he couldn’t use an iPad.

  ‘Speaking of Rick Frost, I had a word with—’ Jack began.

  ‘But she told me and Dale she saw him in the street the other day. Which obviously she couldn’t have.’ Stella felt a tightening under her ribs. She had been lied to. Lying was betrayal. She had been fooled.

  ‘Probably believes she did. You often see a person you’re grieving for out and about, on buses or waiting on the platform for a train. That sense that they’ve just left the room.’ Jack was rolling a ball of rose quartz between his palms as if kneading dough. A birthday present from Jackie, it apparently signified love. Jack held store by lucky stones. Stella couldn’t see how a lump of mineral signified anything. She had given Jack aftershave and had yet to smell it on him.

  ‘So Dale was spot on!’ Stella exclaimed.

  ‘How come?’

  ‘He said she was lying about something. He said she was “inauthentic”. He got it straight away.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘Yes, well, it’s easy to see stuff if you’re not involved.’

  ‘Lulu’s not a murderer.’ Stella didn’t know why she had said that.

  ‘Because?’

  ‘She’s not organized; her place was a mess. You’ve described this as a perfect murder. If Lulu planned to push her husband off a platform, we’d know exactly what happened.’

  ‘It is possible to achieve perfection by accident. Like the beauty of light falling on the river because clouds part while you are standing there.’

  Jack spoke to the rose quartz as if it were a crystal ball. Stella scanned the room for the aftershave. She had given him Armani Code Ice, not for the smell but the word ‘code’. Maybe he kept it in the bathroom. She zipped up her anorak; right now Code Ice fitted the temperature of the tower.

  ‘Let’s do an audit of the suspects.’ She brought Jack back to the matter in hand.

  ‘William Frost.’ Jack was prompt; he manoeuvred the dental floss to the centre of the bed. ‘As we said, him having brought us the case doesn’t absolve him of guilt. If he’s so keen to solve this, why choose a cleaning company and not an established
private detective? Or go back to the police.’

  ‘He did go to the police and Martin Cashman wouldn’t touch it. We came recommended by Jackie.’ Stella would accept cleaning from a detective agency if Jackie vouched for them, but decided not to say this. She wanted Jack on point.

  ‘Do we know the police aren’t interested?’ Jack narrowed his eyes. ‘We only have his word he spoke to them.’

  ‘You were at the inquest and you saw Rick Frost die. The verdict was suicide.’

  ‘Nevertheless, it might be worth giving your mate Martin a call. Check out his thoughts, they might not tally with the official view.’

  Stella was reluctant to waste Cashman’s time. As her dad’s old friend and colleague, he would give her plenty of it, but he would be humouring her. However, after her lunch with William she did wonder if he had been straight with her. He had definitely seemed nervous and wasn’t happy when she made it clear she was going to investigate the case her way. Putting aside her growing guilt that she had used his app – with his permission and without – she didn’t like that he had used it to find her. What else did he use it for?

  ‘Lulu-Tallulah Carr-Frost is an obvious suspect and now we have a motive. She has the most to gain, as we’ve already said. Her lying to you puts her up at the top. I asked Lucille May about Rick Frost.’ Jack slipped that in, knowing she wouldn’t like it. ‘She had already gone into his business. It seems that Frost only had one client, an engineering company. She couldn’t remember the name: she’s getting back to me. She thinks we’re wasting our time and Frost’s money.’

  ‘Nice of her to worry.’ Stella bridled, although she was beginning to think so too. She was peeved that Jack had gone to Lucille May without agreeing it with her. Some team. She hadn’t meant to see William without him. She announced blithely, ‘There’s the mistress.’

  ‘A mistress!’ Jack had the right response this time.

  ‘Lucille May didn’t mention Nicola Barwick?’ She felt bad for the smooth surprise. ‘Well, according to Lulu, she was a wicked fairy and cast a bad spell at their wedding.’

  ‘Did she?’ Jack’s natural belief in curses and bad fairies was greater than his capacity to be hurt. Stella was chagrined at her effort to put him on the back foot.

  ‘Lulu was all for going to see her tonight. I had to stop her.’

  ‘Why now?’

  ‘As opposed to when?’

  ‘Frost died six weeks ago – why is she tackling her now? What’s changed?’

  ‘She said she saw her in the street with her husband this week.’

  ‘Which can’t be true since he’s dead.’

  ‘Not if she’s grieving.’ Stella reminded Jack of his earlier point.

  ‘That’s different. Actually thinking you saw a dead person and acting on it by trying to see them is delusional.’

  ‘So she’s lying about that too?’ Stella was losing patience with the woman who had called herself Lulu Carr.

  ‘Maybe. Maybe not.’ Jack tipped the rose quartz from one palm to the other. ‘Something’s nagging at me,’ he said after a moment.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s gone – probably means it’s important. Go with her to see Nicola Barwick. Whether she’s a mistress or not, she’ll give us insight into Rick Frost’s character.’

  ‘It could be messy. What if Lulu attacks her?’

  ‘Do you think she will?’ Jack raised his eyebrows. ‘You don’t think Lulu capable of murder.’

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘Mess is what we need. Detectives stir the rubbish around and up comes an oyster!’

  ‘Pearl.’ Stella knew about searching through the rubbish: Suzie had gone through a phase of losing things in the pedal bin.

  ‘What about the inspector?’ Stella had the self-conscious impression she was playing at being a detective, deliberately calling innocent passers-by suspects to make it feel like a real case. She was no better than Lulu Carr. The man had been waiting for a train, he had been nice to her and to her dog, then he’d got on the Richmond train and gone on with his life. Were they twisting facts calling him a suspect?

  ‘Describe him again?’

  ‘It was dark. He was my height, so tall. I think he had brown hair, but there was no light so it might have been black. He was wearing a coat, I think. I didn’t see his face.’ Stella saw the hopelessness of the situation. They had no means of finding the inspector. He might as well have been one of Jack’s ghosts.

  Jack grinned. ‘Sounds like me.’

  ‘Not at all!’ As soon as he said it, Stella realized that the reason why the man had seemed familiar was because he had reminded her of the side of Jack she preferred not to dwell on.

  ‘Could it have been William Frost putting on a different voice?’

  Stella was about to say no, but realized she couldn’t. The man was tall, and so was Frost; his hair was dark, as was Frost’s. Frost had a deep voice, but it would be easy to lighten it and the man at the station had said little.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said finally.

  ‘William Frost, Lulu Carr, Nicola Barwick and the station inspector who may be Frost. Unless they all have alibis, that’s three if not four suspects! Lovely!’

  ‘How is that lovely?’ It complicated an already complicated problem.’

  ‘The more suspects we have, the greater the chance we’ll keep an open mind and ward off prejudices and preconceptions. Lulu and William will have alibis – the police no doubt checked them out, although, unless they’re watertight, it doesn’t rule them out. The other two are problematic. Pass me my phone – it’s on the desk. I’ll take minutes on the notebook app.’

  Stella stopped herself rolling her eyes. Jack never took notes and certainly not minutes. Swivelling the chair around, she rootled amongst a sheaf of papers by Jack’s laptop. Wistfully she recalled the wealth of material they had gathered for the Blue Folder case.

  Dead Man in Tower, Screams Unheard.

  ‘What is this?’ She waved a photocopied sheet at Jack.

  ‘Ah-hmm.’ Jack cleared his throat. ‘I was going to mention that.’

  If Jack had been nervous about Stanley, it was nothing to how he looked now. His usual pallor was sheet-white.

  ‘What dead man?’ She read the byline: Lucille May. The journalist would be behind why Jack had moved to a desolate tower reachable only by a dangerous girder-type thing hardly wider than a pipe. She counted to five before she trusted herself to speak.

  ‘A man died after being trapped in a tower during the 1987 storm. It was in this tower, over there!’ Stella pointed to the floor by the door and uttered in a whisper. ‘He literally died of fright all alone—’

  ‘What is he doing?’Jack followed her finger.

  Neither Jack nor Stella had noticed that Stanley had woken up. He was crawling very slowly along the floor, his stomach sliding over the boards, sniffing at the skirting by Jack’s bed.

  ‘That’s why I went to see Lucie,’ Jack whispered. ‘The dog is never wrong, you told me that. He’s sensed the ghost.’

  ‘I meant about biscuits under the sofa, not a dead man in the living room!’ She looked closer. ‘What’s he got in his mouth?’

  Jack moved down the bed.

  ‘Careful, he gets fierce when he’s stolen something.’

  ‘I can see fingers!’ Jack breathed.

  ‘Damn, it’s Lulu’s glove.’

  It was the one that Stanley had been guarding on the seat in the van after leaving Lulu Carr. Preoccupied with the wet bedding and the driving licence, Stella had forgotten about it.

  ‘Ignore him and he’ll drop it. What ghost?’ She heaved a sigh. This case and everything to do with it was out of control.

  ‘Little happens in this part of London that Lucie hasn’t delved into. She was working on a story about this tower until—’ Jack stopped.

  ‘Until what?’

  ‘Until she stopped.’ Jack kneaded the rose quartz between his palms.

  ‘Why did sh
e stop?’ As she had with Lulu Carr, Stella knew what Jack was going to say.

  ‘Terry died,’ Jack finished.

  ‘It was Dad’s case? But this tower isn’t in Hammersmith.’

  ‘Terry wasn’t working for Hammersmith. She said he was doing a stint in Chiswick.’

  ‘How did he think the man died?’ Terry would have got the measure of Lucille May; he would know that any attention she paid him was for the sake of a story.

  ‘He suspected murder, but had no evidence. He worked on it with Lucie in his spare time. The set of prints on the champagne bottle was most likely the dead man’s, but being a skeleton they couldn’t prove it. Terry’s theory was that the murderer removed everything incriminating.’

  ‘So you moved here to solve it?’ Jack hadn’t asked for her help.

  ‘No. I’ve always wanted to live in a tower. I rang Lucie when Stanley alerted me to the ghost, and there’ve been noises.’ He twirled a lock of his fringe around. Stella thought he was on edge.

  ‘How did you know about it?’ Stanley was back, his head resting on her foot.

  ‘I got a leaflet through the door.’

  ‘Who put it through?’

  ‘A man. I didn’t see his face. The consortium – my landlords – did a leaflet-drop.’

  ‘What is this consortium?’ Suzie had used the word when she suggested she buy Dale Heffernan’s restaurant business. It was a posh term for too many cooks – or chefs.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Jack shrugged. ‘Not a consortium. I might be muddling it with the previous owners of the tower.’

  Stella was exasperated. How could Jack rent a property without looking into who owned it? Anything could happen. Anything had happened.

  The dog had dropped the glove. She got up and retrieved it from the floor by Jack’s cupboard and returned to the desk. It was damp from Stanley’s mauling, but undamaged. She turned it part inside out.

  ‘It’s got what looks like an “R” inside.’ She laid the glove on the desk. ‘Perhaps it’s not Lulu’s after all. Certainly not Rick Frost’s, unless he had small hands.’

  ‘He didn’t. I saw them,’ Jack replied.