A Bombing Enigma

by Angelika Lansdale

  Cynara sat there thinking about everything she had read. She was not sure whether it had been fortunate to unearth the diary or not. It gave a perspective into Jimmy’s life and his mindset. However, it also revealed some very painful secrets, like George Stewart’s adultery. Finally, Cynara stood up and decided to go to bed. Charles was not back yet. She would show him her find in the morning.

  Charles was still asleep by the time Cynara finished getting ready for work. She decided not to wake him. It was his vacation after all. She debated about the diary. Ideally, she would have liked to show it to Charles before returning it. However, it did not feel right to hold onto it. She decided to return it to the manor immediately. Cynara hoped Elizabeth would give it to the agents without looking at any of the entries. It would be wonderful if she were spared the humiliation of knowing about her husband’s unfaithfulness.

  The diary certainly confirmed Jimmy’s association with Abaan and the fact that they had still been in contact with each other. It also mentioned a plan and Abaan’s probable presence in England. Thus, the bombing at the races could have been entirely orchestrated by Abaan. The investigators had not been able to find a link between Jimmy and any known terrorist groups. This diary now proved that connection, between Jimmy the terrorist and Abaan Khalid Fakhri’s Islamist group.

  Cynara walked into the manor and found all the servants standing in the hallway looking petrified. “What is wrong?” she asked with a sinking heart.

  Mrs. Simpson looked at her as if in a stupor and said, “Sharon is dead.”

  Chapter 19

  “Dead? Sharon? Who is Sharon?” Cynara asked unable to comprehend.

  “She is Cynthia’s daughter, senior Mrs. Stewart’s housekeeper,” Mr. Drake said.

  “How did she die?” Cynara asked falteringly, scared to hear the answer.

  “She was shot in the head. Cynthia found her body this morning in the cottage she shared with her,” Mr. Drake explained.

  “Shot! My God, what is going on?” Cynara asked.

  “Yes miss, shot. She was only twenty-one,” Mrs. Keene said. “Poor Cynthia.”

  “She was just here yesterday evening delivering a cake Cynthia had baked for Mrs. Stewart,” Mr. Drake said.

  “Yes all pretty and happy and healthy. Who could have known that it was the last time we were going to see her alive,” Mrs. Keene said.

  “It is so preposterous. Do they know what happened? Did Cynthia see anyone?” Cynara asked.

  “No. Last night Cynthia slept inside the manor, she has a set of rooms there. This morning, she returned to the cottage and found her daughter sprawled in the kitchen dead,” Mr. Drake said.

  “How horrifying to find your daughter like that. Does anybody else live there with them?” Cynara asked.

  “No miss. She is a widow. Her older daughter is married and lives in Leeds. Sharon was still living in the cottage,” Mrs. Simpson said.

  “Where is Elizabeth?” Cynara asked.

  “She is upstairs getting ready to leave. Mr. Drake and I are also accompanying her to help. It must be chaotic there,” Mrs. Simpson said.

  “Yes. Poor Cynthia,” Cynara said. She went to the study and quickly put the diary back on the shelf where she had found it. Now was not the time for it. She felt shaken and was unable to focus on her work. Elizabeth did not seek her out before they left. Cynara could well imagine the turmoil in her employer’s mind at this time. She called Charles on his cell and found him awake and eating breakfast. He was equally nonplussed to hear about Sharon.

  Jane called after a few hours. She had just returned from the Stewarts’ house. “It is unbelievable. Sharon was so young and very much alive at the inquest last week. She was there sitting next to Cynthia,” Jane said.

  Cynara vaguely remembered a girl seated beside Cynthia. She had not really paid much attention to her. “Any idea as to who killed her or why?” Cynara asked.

  The police are not saying anything yet. They are still combing the estate looking for clues. There are no signs of a robbery. Nothing has been stolen. Sharon was shot in the head from behind, probably did not even realize. Poor girl!” Jane said.

  “Everyone must be so devastated,” Cynara said.

  “Yes, inconsolable. It is terrible,” Jane replied. “Mr. Watson and Mr. Daniels are also at the scene. Elizabeth thinks it might be related to Mr. Qureshi’s death, as the anti-terrorist unit is there. Also, the method used for killing seems to be identical in both the deaths.”

  “It is all very strange. How is Cynthia?” Cynara asked.

  “She is unable to accept it. Her older daughter came right away, but even she is pretty shattered,” Jane said.

  “Yes must be so difficult,” Cynara agreed.

  “I will keep you informed. Right now we can only wait and see what the investigators uncover,” Jane said before disconnecting the call.

  Cynara could not see the connection between the two murders. However, they had to be connected. That seemed to be the only logical conclusion. Otherwise, this second murder was too mystifying. What was the link? How could Sharon have been involved with Mr. Qureshi? Had she been friendly with Jimmy?

  Cynara forced herself to not think about the situation the rest of the day. Elizabeth had not returned by the time she left the manor and went to her cottage. Charles was waiting for her anxiously. She repeated her conversation with Jane. No one in the manor had heard anything more after that. Even Mrs. Simpson and Mr. Drake had neither returned nor called. Charles insisted they go out for a jog. The physical activity did help a little in lessening Cynara’s stress.

  After dinner, Cynara told Charles about the diary. He was as amazed as she had been when she spotted it. She confessed to bringing the diary home and reading the entire contents. Surprisingly, Charles did not criticize her actions. Instead, he wanted to know what secrets it had revealed. Cynara recounted in detail everything she had read. Charles was not surprised about George’s infidelity.

  “I can imagine he must have been a playboy. He was too rich and too arrogant,” Charles commented.

  “Yes but they seemed to have an ideal marriage,” Cynara said sadly.

  “It is unfortunate. Where is the diary now?” Charles asked.

  “I took it back to the manor this morning. I was going to show it to Elizabeth but was unable to due to Sharon’s murder. So I returned it to the shelf where I had found it,” Cynara replied.

  “You did the right thing. Show it to Elizabeth the next time you see her,” Charles said.

  “Yes I will,” Cynara agreed.

  Elizabeth called Saturday morning and informed Cynara the agents were on their way. She enquired whether Cynara was available to join her. She did not want to face the agents by herself. Cynara asked if she could bring Charles as well. They quickly dressed and walked over. Mr. Drake let them in. He had returned the previous evening. Mrs. Simpson was still at the other manor and would probably stay the weekend. They went into the study and found Elizabeth seated at the desk looking very solemn.

  “I am sorry to disturb you on the weekend especially during your holidays,” Elizabeth apologized to Charles.

  “It is fine,” Charles assured.

  “How is Cynthia and how are Mr. and Mrs. Stewart?” Cynara asked. “This must be such a shock for them.”

  “Yes terrible, just terrible. Sharon was so young. Her life had hardly begun. Cynthia has taken it very badly. Thank God her other daughter is here to look after her,” Elizabeth said sadly.

  “Have the investigators shared anything with the family regarding the motive for this murder?” Charles asked.

  “No, nothing yet,” Elizabeth replied.

  Cynara stood up to show Elizabeth the diary. Before she could pull it out, Mr. Daniels and Mr. Watson arrived. Elizabeth introduced them to Charles and requested them to speak freely in front of Cynara and her brother.

  Mr. Daniels looked at Charles doubtfully and then shrugged dismissively. After briefly clearing his throat, he said, �
��We have uncovered some rather troubling facts.”

  Cynara felt tensed at hearing these words and started fidgeting with her fingers. Charles reached over and pressed her hands consolingly.

  “You are all aware of what has occurred. Cynthia’s daughter, Sharon, was shot in the head Thursday night, sometime between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. She seems to have let the killer in as the front door of the cottage was unlocked and there were no indications of a break-in,” Mr. Daniels paused. “We are still waiting on a full ballistic report, but it is fairly likely that the bullet was shot from the same revolver that was used to kill Qureshi.”

  Chapter 20

  “What!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “How is that possible? You mean to say that both Qureshi and Sharon were killed with the same gun?”

  Mr. Daniels nodded his head, “Yes that is correct.”

  “Seems rather incredible,” Charles interjected.

  “Yes it does but unfortunately the probability is very high. We will know for sure as soon as we get the report back from the test lab,” Mr. Watson added.

  “Has the gun been found?” Cynara asked.

  “No we are still searching for it,” Mr. Watson replied.

  “We need to ask you about Sharon. How well did you know her?” Mr. Daniels questioned looking at Elizabeth.

  “Not too well. Cynthia has been with my in-laws for a very long time. I always saw Sharon around their house, especially during her younger school years, but never really chatted with her,” Elizabeth replied.

  “Was she Jimmy’s confidante?’ Mr. Watson asked.

  “I do not really know. We frequently dropped by my in-laws and Jimmy usually drove us. During the visit, he used to go the kitchen to help. They could have been friendly with each other,” Elizabeth replied.

  “Did you ever see them talking?” Mr. Daniels asked.

  “Yes, a few times. I never thought anything of it. Their conversations always seemed casual and brief,” Elizabeth said musingly.

  “So it is possible that they were close?” Mr. Daniels persisted.

  “I cannot say with certainty,” Elizabeth replied. “You need to ask Cynthia. She will know exactly what terms they were on.”

  “We did question her,” Mr. Daniels said. “Unfortunately, she is not in any shape to say much right now. She does claim they barely ever spoke to each other. It was more of just acknowledging each other’s presence with a civil greeting.”

  “I see. Yes that is perhaps all that it was,” Elizabeth agreed.

  Charles signaled to Cynara about the diary. She quickly went to the bookshelf and pulled it out. “I need to show you something I found while I was looking for a book to read.”

  “What is it?” Mr. Daniels asked.

  “It is Jimmy’s diary that he wrote over the course of twelve years,” Cynara replied as she handed it over to Mr. Daniels.

  “What?” Elizabeth’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Jimmy’s diary? But how did it get here?” she asked.

  Mr. Daniels quickly flipped through it and said, “Yes seems to be his. Did you have any knowledge of this?” he asked Elizabeth.

  “No, not at all. I have never seen it,” Elizabeth replied.

  “How did you find it?” he asked Cynara.

  “I have been borrowing these classics to read and I pulled out the next two. This was one of them,” Cynara explained.

  “Are there any others?” Mr. Watson asked.

  “I do not think so,” Cynara replied.

  They all walked over to the bookshelves and looked at each book carefully. No other diaries were found.

  “We can assume it found its way here the same as the pen drive. Jimmy forgot it in the car and someone placed it on these shelves,” Mr. Watson said thoughtfully.

  “Yes it is possible. George could have found it and placed it on the book shelf, thinking it was one of my books,” Elizabeth reflected.

  “The last entry is dated 25th March, 2013. Hopefully this will provide us with some vital information,” Mr. Daniels said excitedly. He looked at Cynara but did not ask the question, whether she had read the diary or not. She felt very relieved and just stood there quietly.

  Mr. Watson then questioned Elizabeth’s staff about Sharon’s relationship with Jimmy. None of them knew of any real intimacy between them. They had only seen them being cordial to each other at family events, and nothing more. Mr. Daniels also showed them the diary and asked if any of them remembered seeing it and putting it on the bookshelf. None of them had ever noticed it before. The agents took the diary and left. Cynara hoped they would never reveal Mr. George Stewart’s infidelity to Elizabeth.

  “The turmoil in our lives seems to be unending. First George’s death. Then Ruth’s suicide. Now murder at my in-laws! When will it end?” Elizabeth asked bleakly.

  “Soon. This diary might be the key they need to solve Qureshi’s and Sharon’s murders,” Charles consoled softly.

  “Did you get a chance to look it at all?” Elizabeth asked Cynara.

  “Yes I took it to the cottage and sat down to read, thinking it was a novel. When I turned to the first page, I realized it was Jimmy’s diary. I then flipped through the entries. Maybe I shouldn’t have but I could not resist,” Cynara admitted truthfully.

  “I would have done the same. Did it reveal anything relevant?” Elizabeth asked.

  Cynara repeated what she had already told Charles, minus the entries regarding Mr. Stewart. “Why did he stop writing in March?” she questioned.

  “Maybe March is when he misplaced it,” Charles speculated.

  “That explains why the entries ended so abruptly. Jimmy no longer had the diary in his possession,” Cynara agreed.

  “Yes probably. But we will never know for sure,” Elizabeth said.

  “Let us hope that it helps the authorities,” Charles said optimistically.

  “I pray for that. It is time for all of us in the family to heal and move on, especially Uncle Michael and Aunt Fiona. They have to get past Ruth’s death,” Elizabeth said.

  Elizabeth’s prayers were not answered. Mr. Daniels and Mr. Watson suddenly appeared late Monday afternoon. Ballistics report had come and confirmed the same gun was used in both Qureshi’s and Sharon’s murders.

  “How are they linked? Where does Sharon fit into all this?” Elizabeth asked.

  “We cannot provide any definitive answers yet. Please allow us more time,” Mr. Watson said briefly.

  “You can help us with something,” Mr. Daniels said.

  “Help? What do you need?” Elizabeth looked at him quizzically.

  “Did Sharon come here anytime during the day before her death? On Thursday?” Mr. Daniels asked.

  “Yes she brought over a cake that Cynthia and my mother-in-law had baked for me,” Elizabeth replied.

  “This is the last place she visited on the day of her murder,” Mr. Daniels informed them soberly. “Did she use your computer?”

  “My computer?” Elizabeth asked looking confused. Then her face cleared, “Yes she did actually. I met her in the kitchen and walked her out. Just as we reached the front door, she asked if she could quickly access her email. There seemed to be some network issue with her machine at home. I agreed and took her to the study and left her there. She must have checked and gone home, I presume. Why? How does it matter?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Sharon had a laptop, I think an old machine given by Mr. George Stewart. We took it to our lab, as we wanted to check through her emails. However, all her emails had been deleted, even from the Trash folder. We tried to retrieve them from her hard drive but that too had been cleaned. In fact, a software called Eraser was used to remove all the data from the hard drive,” Mr. Daniels said.

  “What is Eraser?” Cynara asked.

  “It’s a software for deleting securely. It overwrites all the files multiple times so that nothing can be recovered,” Mr. Watson explained.

  “We tried to obtain the messages directly from her email provider but they had been deleted
there as well. However, we were able to track that the last time she accessed her email was from your computer here in the study on Thursday. The IP address was for this machine,” Mr. Daniels said.

  “With your permission we would like to search your hard drive to see if we can retrieve any emails she either received or sent while using your computer,” Mr. Watson added.

  “Yes sure you can,” Elizabeth’s eyes darted nervously between them.

  “We will need to take your computer to our crime lab,” Mr. Watson said.