At that moment he realized he was being hailed from the far side of the street.
‘Mr Markby!’
It was Stebbings. He stood by the kerb in his grubby waxed jacket, waving his long arms in a wild semaphore. His hair and beard were even more unkempt. Passers-by gave him a wide berth. Seeing he had attracted the superintendent’s attention, Stebbings lurched across the road with his long arms still flailing as though he had lost all control of them. ‘I want a word!’
Markby wondered if the man was drunk. It was early in the evening, but that didn’t mean anything. He couldn’t smell any drink but he eyed Stebbings cautiously.
‘I want a word!’ said Stebbings again when he reached him.
‘Go ahead,’ invited Markby.
‘Where’s my boy?’ Stebbings demanded.
‘I don’t know,’ said Markby immediately. ‘Where should he be?’
‘At home, that’s where!’ Stebbings yelled in his face. People turned their heads.
‘Come along,’ Markby said soothingly, ‘we’ll walk on and you tell me about it.’
Having to walk alongside Markby put an effective brake on Stebbings’ belligerence. His manner remained truculent, however. ‘I’ve been looking all over town for him.’
‘It’s not yet seven,’ Markby pointed out.
‘He’s been gone since yesterday evening, dammit!’ roared Stebbings.
‘I see. Has he spent the night away from home before, without telling you?’
‘No!’ Stebbings stopped and forced Markby to stop also. They were outside a betting shop, which was a little unfortunate. ‘He doesn’t do that,’ said Stebbings in a quieter voice. ‘My wife, she’s going crazy. She’s reckons he’s had an accident.’
Markby’s brain was racing, throwing up a variety of scenarios. ‘It might be a girl,’ he said. ‘He’s that age.’
‘I’ve been to her house,’ said Stebbings. ‘Cherry Basset. She’s got no more sense than her mother. But she hasn’t seen him. She was at home last night, mother swears to it. So does the bloke who lives there with them.’
‘We’ll check the hospitals,’ said Markby. ‘Have you told the police?’
‘I told them, told the local chaps. Do you think they showed any interest? Not a bit. Like you, they said he’d be with a girl or a bunch of his mates.’ Stebbings snorted. ‘He doesn’t hang around with a crowd of others, Darren. He’s a loner, like me.’
‘Oh, I’m interested,’ said Markby. Anyone, even Darren Stebbings, who was connected with Overvale House was of interest. Darren’s absence might be easily explained, but the fact remained he had chosen a bad moment to go missing. Markby was getting that feeling of all not being well.
‘You go home,’ he said, ‘and reassure Mrs Stebbings. We’ll do everything we can to find him.’
Stebbings gave him a wild look and stabbed a grimy forefinger against Markby’s chest. ‘You find him soon.’ He lurched away, his long hair flying.
Markby stood in silent thought on the spot where Stebbings had left him. He was roused by a hiss at his elbow and looked down to find a small wrinkled face looking up at him.
‘Hello, Ferdy,’ he said resignedly.
Ferdy Lee, one of the small-time crooks (or, as the man himself described it, entrepreneurs of the neighbourhood), smiled delightedly at being recognized. He had broken nicotine-stained teeth. ‘I’ve got a good tip if you want a flutter,’ he said.
‘Tip? Flutter?’ Markby suddenly remembered that he was standing in front of the betting shop. ‘No, thanks all the same, Ferdy.’
‘I expect you don’t want to be seen going in, you being well known in the town,’ said Ferdy with kindly understanding. ‘I could put the bet on for you.’
Markby thanked him again and hurried away. Anxious to leave Ferdy behind, he had not consciously chosen a direction, but found himself walking down the road in which, if he remembered correctly, Jess Campbell had rented a flat. He dredged the number from his memory and rang her doorbell.
She was so surprised to see him that he was embarrassed and found himself apologizing profusely. ‘I just dropped by to tell you a piece of news which may or may not have a bearing on the Jenner case.’
She invited him in with a clear reluctance. He thought at first she might have company, or she might just object to being called on without warning when she was off duty. But as soon as he saw the interior of the flat, he understood her unwillingness. A television set flickered in one corner and, by a cruel irony, was showing one of those make-over programmes in which a rundown property was being transformed.
‘It’s not much,’ she said, seeing the expression on his face. ‘But it’s temporary.’ She followed his gaze to the television set and added wryly, ‘Yes, right …’ She went to switch it off.
‘I won’t stay long.’ His own embarrassment was growing and he felt she realized it. This was an awful place. Was it the best she’d been able to find? There was a glass of white wine on the stained coffee table.
‘Can I offer you a drink?’ She indicated the wine glass. ‘That’s all I’ve got, I’m afraid.’
‘That’s fine. Thanks.’
She retreated to the kitchen and returned with a second glass and the bottle. Markby seated himself in the rickety armchair and accepted the filled glass she held out.
‘We can surely find you somewhere better than this,’ he said.
She shook her head. ‘Don’t worry. It’s given me the necessary encouragement to buy. Meredith showed me over her house. I liked it very much. I’ve been wondering, if she hasn’t accepted any other offer, if I could make one.’
‘Oh?’ He tried not to look startled. ‘As far as I know, she hasn’t accepted any other offer. She’s rung to let me know she and Smythe come back from Cornwall tomorrow.’
‘Cornwall?’ Jess looked puzzled.
Markby’s embarrassment, which had been lessening with the arrival of the wine, returned. ‘Er, yes. She and Smythe went down there for a brief visit. You can ask her about the house tomorrow evening.’ He buried his nose in his glass and tried not to wince as the liquid struck his palate. It was the sort usually sold by supermarkets in large bottles. ‘I called by because I’ve just had a meeting with Harry Stebbings in town. Darren has gone missing.’
He explained the details, such as he knew them, and Jess looked serious.
‘It’s a dodgy time for him to go missing,’ she said.
‘It is. I took his digital camera off him the other day.’ Markby gave a rueful grin. ‘I confess I felt a little mean doing it, he was so distressed. But the little blighter was too good at snapping people unawares. And I’ve been thinking about that. Perhaps, in the present circumstances, Darren’s hobby was a dangerous one.’
‘We can get a search warrant,’ Jess said promptly. ‘Turn over that cottage where he lives with his parents. They won’t like it. But it might turn up some reason for his going missing. At the very least, we can take away all his photographic material and his computer.’
‘Computer?’ Markby set down his wine and blinked at her.
‘He might have stored some of the digital images he took on the computer,’ Jess explained. ‘He’s bound to have one.’
Chapter Twelve
It turned out to be a busy day. It began during the night when someone threw a brick through the glass door of a hairdresser’s salon in the centre of Bamford. Robbery didn’t appear to be a motive. A notice in the window informed passers-by that no money was kept on the premises overnight. The cash till was left open so that anyone still doubtful and peering through the window could see how empty it was. The owner, called to investigate, confirmed no one had helped himself to the hairdryers or cleared the shelves of bottles of spray and gel. It was probably, the local police decided, just some home-going merrymaker who was even now sleeping it off somewhere. When he woke up, his own actions would be lost in a fog and even if he were found and accused of breaking the door, he’d vehemently deny it with the confidence o
f one who simply couldn’t remember.
Constable Wallace was sitting in the police car outside the salon at seven thirty that morning. He was waiting for his colleague, still inside the premises with the owner, to join him. The salon was next door to a newsagent’s which was already open for business. The delivery boys had arrived to collect their satchel of papers and cycled away laden. A steady trickle of customers had been going in and out of the shop either to buy the morning news or to stock up with cigarettes for the day ahead. At the moment things were quiet; a girl came out of the shop and walked up to Wallace in the police car. She stooped down by the window indicating she wanted to speak. Wallace let down the window cautiously. He recognized her as the girl who worked in the shop. She had long, unkempt hair and small, truculent features like a terrier. Her name, he seemed to recall, was Cherry.
‘Oi!’ said Cherry Basset by way of greeting.
‘Yes?’ returned Wallace. ‘Something I can help you with?’
She stared at him as if he’d said something particularly silly. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I got some information for you.’
Wallace brightened. ‘About the breakage?’ He nodded towards the door.
Cherry turned her gaze to the salon’s damaged door and contemplated it for a moment as if assessing whether it was worth her attention. Apparently it wasn’t. She shrugged. ‘No.’
‘What then?’ asked Wallace tersely.
‘My boyfriend, Darren Stebbings. He’s missing. You lot are supposed to be looking for him.’ She didn’t appear to have much faith in their ability to do this.
‘Yeah,’ said Wallace. ‘We know about him. You seen him?’
‘No, of course I haven’t seen him,’ she snapped. ‘If I had, he wouldn’t be missing, would he? I’d know where he was! But I’ve been thinking.’
‘Oh yes?’ Now it was Wallace’s turn to sound doubtful about her abilities.
‘The last time I did see him, he said something to me about he knew where to get some money. He didn’t explain. It might have something to do with it.’
‘You didn’t ask where he was going to get this money?’ Wallace sounded sceptical.
‘No,’ said Cherry. ‘I didn’t know he was going to go missing, then, did I?’
‘All right,’ saidWallace wearily. ‘I’ll tell ’em back at the station.’ His colleague was emerging from the salon accompanied by the owner. ‘We’ve got to take care of this first,’ he added.
‘All right,’ said Cherry, tossing back her dishevelled locks. ‘Just don’t say I didn’t tell you.’
‘Caro?’ Michael Fossett called out his wife’s name from the yard behind the back door. If he wanted to go in the house, he’d have to take his boots off. Easier to stand outside and shout.
She appeared in the doorway. ‘What is it?’ She’d been at the computer working out the farm accounts and was annoyed at being called away. She held her glasses in one hand and a sheet of paper in the other. The sunlight fell on her face and made her blink at him.
The sight of her made him smile, not because he was amused, but because he felt happy whenever he saw her. She had been a very pretty girl and he thought she was still pretty. She’d put on some weight, of course, and her hair was just starting to grey, but she was the same in his mind. Over the last few years, when so much had gone wrong, as the farm turned slowly but inexorably into a loss-making concern and their future looked ever bleaker, this had been the one thing which had kept him going: his marriage and his family life. The thought that something might threaten it frightened him. That fear had been growing slowly in him since Fiona Jenner’s death.
Aloud he said, ‘I’ve been thinking about those sheep over on Jerry Jenner’s land. I’ll think I’ll move them down here. It’ll take me the best part of the morning.’ He and Caroline ran the farm between them with the sporadic help of an elderly farm worker, not here today. His back had ‘slipped out again’, something it tended to do after a late night drinking at the Feathers. ‘Do you want me for anything before I start?’
She shook her head. ‘No, but if you should see either Jeremy or Alison …’
‘I’ll be doing my best not to see them.’ That sounded cruel and he hadn’t intended to sound cruel or uncaring. But he had enough troubles of his own. He couldn’t take on board all the bad luck of others. It was terrible for Jenner to lose his daughter. The Fossetts had sent flowers and a note of condolence, Caroline had organized that, and Michael supposed they’d turn out for the funeral, when it was held. They couldn’t do any more. It was a private thing, a death in the family. Even a violent death at criminal hands as Fiona’s had been. The police had been to the Fossetts’ farmhouse asking if they’d noticed anything unusual during the days leading up to the death. Any strangers? Any strange vehicles parked suspiciously? No, he’d told them. If he’d seen a car parked on his land, he’d have investigated. A year ago they’d had a spot of trouble with some local youths using a remote area of his land for dog-fighting. Since then he’d kept an eye open, in case they came back. So he was sure he hadn’t seen anyone.
He shrugged now. ‘I’m really sorry for them, but what can I say? I’m hoping I don’t bump into either of them.’
She hesitated. ‘Take care.’
That was new. She would not have said that to him before the tragedy at Overvale. Farming was a lonely life and it didn’t do to be nervous or worried if you found yourself far from human habitation or company. But there was a new element out there these days in the familiar landscape. It was more of a threat than the dog-fighting or the occasional discovery of signs of badger-baiting. Both these activities were illegal and nasty but they went on all the time, all over the countryside. This new intrusion was different, more insidious, more personal. It had, as yet, no face. No one, to their knowledge, had seen it. But all of them felt its presence.
He whistled to his dog and set off. His wife watched him go and went back to her computer. But before she did, she locked the back door. That, too, was something new.
Fiona’s death had brought other concerns than their personal safety. Dorcas Stebbings was not the only one who was worried what the tragedy might mean in changed circumstances for all of them. Leasing the extra grazing land from Jenner, at what was frankly a trifling rent, was very useful to the Fossetts and Michael had plenty to think about as he strode across the fields. He’d been making use of Jenner’s land since the man had bought Overvale. Jenner had no use for it. He was happy for Michael to take care of it and over the years Michael had begun to look on it as an extension of his own land. But the Jenners might not want to stay, now that young Fiona was dead. A new owner of Overvale might not be willing to lease out the land – or might be willing, but at a vastly increased rent. Michael scowled to himself. A new financial problem wasn’t something they could easily deal with just now.
The dog was running ahead of him. She was a six-year-old black and white border collie and her name was Marge. She had been named after a television cartoon series character and the name had been chosen by the Fossetts’ own daughter, Bridget. Bridget was staying with her grandparents for the Easter school holiday. Holidays were unknown to Michael and his wife. They were too busy on the farm and there was no one to look after the stock even if they had had time. Bridget knew it and was happy to hang round the farm when she came home for the school holidays but on this occasion, with a murderer on the loose in the district, they had decided she’d be better off visiting Caroline’s parents in their North Wales retirement bungalow. Bridget was a good kid but her school fees ate a large hole in the farm’s revenues. Slowly but surely, the Fossetts were going broke. Caroline could jiggle the figures any way she liked on that computer, the facts remained the same.
Marge had suddenly scuttled off to the left. Michael called to her but, usually so obedient, she didn’t come. She was running round in a circle, head low to the ground, tail tucked in, her whole attitude one of distress.
Her unease was being caused by something lying o
n the ground. A dead sheep? Michael began to stride across the springy turf towards the spot. The dog looked up, barked once and then stood waiting, guarding whatever it was there.
Michael was near enough now to see what it was, and it wasn’t a sheep. He called again to the dog, more sharply. This time she came.
‘Wait here, Marge!’ he ordered and she dropped to the ground.
He walked on until he reached the thing on the ground. His first thought had been that it was just a bundle of old clothes. People had no compunction about dumping their rubbish in the countryside. Burnt-out cars, old bedsteads and fridges, plastic sacks of domestic refuse or garden clippings, he’d found the lot over the years. What did the fly-tippers think the farmer did with all that? He had to pay to get it cleared up, that’s what he did. It wasn’t as if there wasn’t a council dump not five miles down the road where people could take stuffy. They just couldn’t be bothered to drive so far. In the case of the burnt-out car, it had been stolen and used, the police guessed, in the commission of some crime.
Much as he detested all of this, he would have preferred any of it to what he found now. This was a body. He would have expected it to be some old tramp who had died out here from hypothermia or heart failure or some other natural cause. Death was common in the countryside, usually dead stock, but once before, some years ago, they’d found an old chap huddled in a crude shelter made from branches and rags. The tramp himself had been so emaciated and his skin so tanned and leathery with weather and a layer of ingrained grime that he’d looked like a mummified figure. But this wasn’t a tramp; and since Fiona’s Jenner’s murder, another, grimmer, possibility lurked and had now raised its unwelcome head.
Michael dropped on to his heels and balanced by the side of the body which was sprawled face uppermost, its arms flung out to either side. He recognized who it was, of course. It was that kid of Harry Stebbings. What was his name? David? No, Darren, that was it. He was dead, no two ways about that! And it wasn’t natural causes. There was blood on his T-shirt just below the breastbone.
Ann Granger Page 23
