The Twice Hanged Man: A Richard Clever Mystery

by Tessa Dale

  He simply could not abide the everyday, crushingly boring, door to door actions that constituted most of the daily activities of an investigation. It drove him wild with anger that a dozen officers had to knock on a thousand doors, and ask the same, dull questions, over and over again. Now and then, however, the ‘luck’ that the DCI poured so much scorn on, worked in his squad’s favour.

  “Is she absolutely sure?” Clever asked, when his sergeant reported his findings.

  “She described him to a fault,” Dan Jones replied. “Even to him having acquired a bandage on his forehead when he came in this morning. The landlady says he’s been staying with her for six days, and claimed his name was Catesby … Peter Catesby. He is from Coventry, and says he is on a fell walking holiday.”

  “Which is probably why he was on Solomon’s Tor,” Clever said. “That part of the Fells has belonged to the Vancleur family since they were endowed with the title of Earldom in 1746. The first Earl of Castleburgh was known as the Lord of the High Fells, and was elevated to that position after commanding one of the redcoat regiments at the battle of Culloden.”

  “Our man seemed obsessed with anything to do with Peter Fornell and the Earldom,” Jones replied.

  “A dangerous obsession, I think,” said his DCI. “Where is the fellow now?”

  “He turned up about one and a half hours ago, packed his rucksack with a flask of tea and some sandwiches, and set off on a walk. The old girl saw which way he went, and thinks he has gone back to Solomon’s Tor.”

  “The scene of the crime,” the DCI muttered. “Whistle up DC Stanton and have him bring a car. How close can we get to this infamous Tor, Sergeant Jones?”

  “The Carlisle road passes within a hundred yards of the base of the Tor, but we’ll have to climb a steep incline, if you want to get to the top.” The sergeant glanced at his watch. “Why would he want to return to the accident sight, Guv?”

  “To carry on from where he left off,” Clever explained. “It’s only a theory at the moment, but I’m sure we’ll find enough facts to support what I think.”

  “Which is what, Guv?”

  “Peter Catesby if, indeed, that is his real name, came to Castleburgh to investigate the Fornell murder case. He might be a reporter, or even a policeman from another force. I think he found out something that gave him food for thought.”

  “After twenty three years?” Jones said, incredulously. Any physical evidence would have vanished long ago, he thought, but the circumstantial had been conclusive enough to see Peter Fornell pay with his life.

  “Why not?” Richard Clever persisted. “He comes across the case, and thinks it might make a good story. Then he starts to pick at the evidence, and finds a dropped stitch. Either it is to do with the Tor, or something close by. At any rate, he was asking questions all around Castleburgh, and it seems to have upset someone.”

  “You believe his story then?”

  “About being pushed off Solomon’s Tor?” Clever re-set his glasses on the bridge of his nose. “Yes, I do. Imagine the scenario, if you will, Sergeant Jones. His head is completely full of the Peter Fornell case, when he is called to meet someone - someone with information about the murder back in Nineteen Twelve.”

  “I see,” Jones agreed. “He makes his way up to the top of the Tor, where he is attacked. The fall should have killed him, but his descent was broken by shrubs, or some such, and he landed quite unhurt, apart from a very nasty crack on the head.”

  “A head full of Peter Fornell,” Clever finished. “Is it any wonder he woke up confused. For a few hours, the concussion must have scrambled his memory. To all intents and purposes, he was Peter Fornell.”

  “We need to find him, and fast,” Jones said. “He’s still confused. What if he remembers who might have attacked him, and wants to sort them out all by himself. What if he’s so intent on finding out the truth about Fornell, that his judgement is affected?”

  Half an hour later found the three investigating officers standing on top of the impressive, and majestic Solomon’s Tor. The DCI, more used to contemplation than physical exertion, was completely out of breath, and Dan Jones was little better.

  DC Stanton, in comparison, had virtually skipped up the steep incline. He was hardly breathing hard, and was scanning the view eagerly. The swift car ride, followed by the rapid climb up the Tor’s shallower eastern approach had quite excited him. He was disappointed therefore, to find them to be the only three people in reasonable proximity.

  “He’s not here,” Stanton said, stating the obvious to his labouring colleagues. Richard Clever was too out of breath to snap at his detective constable, and satisfied himself with drawing in great lungs full of air, in an attempt to regain control of his unfit body.

  “That is some climb,” Dan Jones said. “Where the hell could he have gotten to, Guv?”

  Clever shrugged, still unable to regain the power of speech, and gestured for them to begin the descent down the steeper side. There was always the possibility that Peter Catesby had not made good time, and they might yet happen upon him.

  The young DC, familiar with the Tor, picked out the easier, zigzag path for them to follow. After a couple of minutes, his DCI gained his second wind, and was able to communicate once more.

  “Peter Catesby was due to meet someone here the other day, and I believe that person either attacked him, or revealed something that made someone else try to kill him. They, by a sheer fluke, failed in their intent.”

  “Which means that Catesby is still at large, and free to snoop even further,” Dan Jones replied.

  Stanton paused and took another look around. The Tor was still deserted, and the few farm buildings in the near distance seemed unattended. He had spent the formative years of his life visiting with his Uncle Brian and Aunt Mavis on their well managed small holding. Every holiday meant a stay in the country where, according to his father, there was no bad air to get on his son’s chest.

  “Something is wrong,” he said, softly.

  “Too bloody true,” Dan Jones replied, harshly. “I hate the countryside!”

  “What is it, Stanton?” Clever asked. The young man’s eyes had narrowed, and he seemed to be concentrating on a couple of stone walled fields in the middle distance. “What’s concerning you?”

  “You’ll think I’m being stupid, Guv,” Stanton replied, pointing into the distance. “It’s that barn off to the left. It’s enclosed within a stone wall, and there are a dozen sheep clustered at one end, away from the building.”

  “Which signifies what?” Jones asked.

  “Sheep are the stupidest animals alive,” Stanton told them both. “They wander away, stray onto roads, and try to graze on dangerous cliff tops. Those sheep are clustered, away from the barn, and the barn door is open. The only reason those sheep aren’t nosing around the barn, or even going inside, is because they are scared.”

  “You mean that there is something in the barn that has spooked them?” Clever asked. “Are you sure?”

  “No, I’m not, Guv,” Stanton told him, “but they don’t want anything to do with that barn, despite it probably being full of tasty forage. Shall I run down and take a look?”

  “No, we’ll go together,” Clever said. “If Catesby, or his attacker are there, we need to be mob handed. Come on.”

  The DCI seemed to have gained a new lease of life, and the three policemen covered the intervening distance in less than five minutes. The sheep set up a cacophony of bleating as they arrived, and moved, en masse to another corner of the enclosure. Dan Jones took hold of the open door, and pushed it wide open, so as to admit as much light as possible into the gloomy interior.

  Peter Catesby’s attacker was not inside the barn, but Catesby was. His dead body was swaying gently at the end of a stout hemp rope. The young man’s once handsome features were now swollen, and suffused with blood.

  “Wait!” Richard Clever shouted, as Stanton made as if to take the man’s weight. “We are too late, Constable St
anton. Don’t interfere with the scene of crime in any way. Not until I’ve had a damned good look first.”

  “If we’d have come here first,” Stanton groaned.

  “Stop that,” Dan Jones ordered. “Look at him, he’s been dead since first thing. Get to the nearest habitation, and call out the cavalry. We’ll need a good photographer, a fingerprint man, and the duty police surgeon. Have them send a few uniformed men along too. We’ll need to rope off the area and keep the usual ghouls out of here. Okay?”

  “Yes Sarge, sorry,” Stanton replied. “It’s my first hanging. I thought if I could cut him down…”

  “I know,” Dan Jones said. “I’ve attended a few of these things before. You always think you should have been able to do something. Best let the Guv’nor do what he does best, eh?”

  Detective Constable Stanton went off, as instructed, and Dan Jones stood sentry at the barn door whilst Richard Clever circled the hanged man. Had it only been the day before that the deceased had claimed to be Peter Fornell. Then the incongruousness of the situation hit him. Peter Catesby’s belief that he was Fornell had become a truly self fulfilling prophesy. Peter Fornell, in one form or another, had become a twice hanged man.

  “I can’t cut him down until the forensic boys give me permission,” Clever told Jones, “but I can tell you one thing, for sure. Peter, didn’t kill himself. He didn’t throw himself off the Tor, and he didn’t put the rope around his own neck. Do you agree, with me, Dan?”

  Jones glanced around the barn. At first sight, the casual observer would shudder, and regret the act of suicide, but the sergeant was anything but casual in his approach. He, like Clever, circled the hanged man and allowed his mind to take mental snap shots of the scene. The DCIs memory would be more retentive, but Jones knew he had seen enough to back up his Guv’nor’s conclusion.

  “The rope is tied off at that post, and cast over the overhead cross beam,” Jones expounded. “Then Peter stood on that milking stool, put the rope around his neck, and did the deed. That is how it is supposed to look, Guv. The stool is a giveaway. It’s too low for a start. Peter Catesby would have had to balance on tiptoe to get his head in the noose.”

  “Very good, Dan,” Clever said, smiling at the confirmation of his own observations. “Anything else, without touching the body?”

  “Yes, there is, Guv.” Jones reached out and tugged his bosses tie without warning. Clever reacted by snatching at his own collar, to loosen the sudden tightness.

  “Thank you, Dan,” Clever said, loosening his tie. “You graphically illustrated the most telling fact of all. When a man hangs himself, even if he wants to die, he can’t help but reach up, and scrabble his fingers at the rope. It doesn’t save him, but it leaves the finger tips grazed, and the finger nails broken.”

  “That’s right, Guv,” Jones agreed. “This man’s fingers are undamaged. I have to agree with you, completely.”

  “Quite so,” the DCI said. “Peter Catesby was either unconscious, or already dead when he was hanged. Once the body is cut down, I think we’ll find out that he was strangled, or drugged, before being strung up. We have two murders to investigate, Dan.”

  “Two, Guv?”

  “Of course. Someone murdered Peter Catesby, because of what he knew about Peter Fornell. That means we have to re-investigate the Earl of Castleburgh’s death, in order to uncover the truth. Once we have that, we will know who needed to silence Peter Catesby all these years later.”

  “The Chief Constable will stop us looking at the old case,” Dan Jones told his commanding officer. “He might even reprimand us for trying to stir things up.”

  “Really?” Despite the affectionate nickname of Clever Dick, the DCI had no time for internal politics, and could not understand why Chief Constable Alan Herbert would be so unhelpful. “What about our motto… ‘Iustitia per diligentam’.”

  “Justice through Diligence,” Jones translated. “I think you are spot on, Guv, but the Chief Constable has another motto that he lives by. He has it on a little wooden plaque on his big, posh desk. It says: ‘Sit honoris et dignitatis retineretur’, and he means his honour and his dignity, to be preserved, no matter what the cost. If he can, he’ll stop us looking, either by invoking budget restraints, or simply pulling rank on you.”

  “I still don’t understand,” Richard Clever replied. “How does the Fornell investigation affect him?”

  “Twenty three years ago, Alan Herbert was a detective inspector with Castleburgh CID. He ran the entire case, from start to finish. It was the then DI Herbert who arrested Peter Fornell, and it was he who found enough physical evidence to obtain a guilty verdict.”

  “I see.” DCI Clever fiddled with the one of the arms of his glasses, before putting them back on. “That might embarrass him a little, but how would it reflect on him now, almost a quarter of a century later?”

  “There is always gossip around the station, Guv. The word is, he’s been put forward for a gong in the next honours list,” Dan Jones explained. “What if we uncover a terrible miscarriage of justice? The knighthood would fade away, and he might even have to collect his gold watch early, and retire to his villa in France.”

  “Would that be such a bad thing?”

  “The Chief Constable cherishes his position, Guv,” Jones told his Guv’nor, wondering how much to tell him. “He has two sons. Both of them are inspectors with affiliated constabularies. His nephew is the head of uniformed in Westmoreland, and he has a son in law who is a DCI in the Cumberland division. That means he has real power, from the Scottish border, and right down to the Lancashire constabulary‘s patch.”

  “Goodness me, it sounds like the golden days of the Roman Empire,” DCI Clever said, smiling ruefully. “We will tread very carefully, Dan… but we will tread.”

  “That’s what I thought, Guv,” said Jones, looking up at the husk of what had been, only hours before, an inquisitive and driven young man. “I know we will have to sort out the Fornell business, but I sat by this man’s hospital bed. I could have done something, even if it was only to place a guard on him until he was fit again.”

  “It never crossed my mind either,” his DCI told him, “and I’m supposed to be Clever Dick. No, don’t look so damnably innocent, Dan. I know it is not meant unkindly. I actually joined CID because I am clever, so I better start earning my pay.”

  “What can I do, Guv?”

  “We have a name to work on now,” the DCI replied. “We need to know who Peter Catesby was. I want to know why he came to be interested in the Fornell case. Then I want to start an investigation into the death Charles Vancleur, Earl of Castleburgh, and Lord of the High Fells. Was it about the titles, or simply greed?”

  “We’ll have plenty of help offered, once we establish that this really is a case of murder,” Jones confirmed, “but we’ll have to keep the Peter Fornell investigation close to our chests. If the Chief Constable gets wind of it, he’ll have us all doing traffic duty until we retire.”

  “Then we keep it between the three of us, Dan” Richard Clever decided. “Someone has reached out of the past and, with cold calculation, caused Peter Catesby’s death. I don’t give a damn for the Chief Constable’s reputation, but I know, if he found out, he would be able to damage our investigation.”

  “Ah, here’s Stanton,” said Jones. “We’ll be able to get things rolling now.”

  Clever almost replied, until he realised that his sergeant was looking up, directing his words to the dead man. Yes, the DCI thought, this case is a special one, if only because they had both met the victim. Justice through diligence would be the watchwords.

  Chapter Seven

  One of the four duty police surgeons, Dr. Blake, arrived and, because it was demanded, by law, examined Peter Catesby and declared him to be dead. That single action allowed the body to be gently lowered to the ground, where the CIDs recently installed forensic scientist was able to carry out a preliminary examination.

  Professor Neil McFarland was a gradua
te of the excellent Edinburgh School of Medicine, and was, at the age of thirty four one of the youngest medical examiners in the country. He had jumped at the opportunity of working for a large police force, and had moved from Edinburgh to Castleburgh without a qualm.

  It was only after his successful interview for the post that he learned what had transpired. A CID Chief Inspector having studied Scotland Yard forensic techniques, suggested employing their own man, rather than having to call in the Yard. During the following months, McFarland had worked on several cases with the forward looking DCI, and had grown to admire his technique, if not his brusque manner.

  “What can you tell me, Professor?” DCI Clever asked.

  “The police surgeon was right,” McFarland said, stifling a grin. “your man is dead. At first glance, I’d say he hanged himself.”

  “And at second glance?”

  “I suspect you saw the stool, and deduced the same as I did,” McFarland replied. “The lack of scuffing to the fingertips, or the throat where the rope was, says the man was either very calm and controlled… or he was already dead.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Clever said. “Anything else?”

  “Yes, look here, Richard.” The professor had tried to break down the DCIs shield for weeks, finally resorting to using his first name. The DCI accepted the professor’s use of his given name, but continued to be as straight laced as a Victorian mill owner. “Let me just loosen the noose a little. There, do you see what I mean?”

  There were two, quite distinctive rope marks. Both Clever and Jones studied the victim’s throat for a few moments. It was Jones who spoke first.

  “Two rope marks, sir,” he offered. “The wider one has marked the neck, where it meets the jaw, but the second rope was thinner, and has cut the flesh as it was drawn tight.”