The Rotting Spot (A Bruce and Bennett Mystery)

by Valerie Laws

  She walked on rubbery legs to the kitchen. Empty.

  ‘Seymour, darling, make us a nice cup of coffee, while I unpack.’ Her own voice sounded hollow and fake to her, but Seymour heard nothing amiss.

  ‘Righto, Liz old girl, it’s all under control!’ He loved fiddling with the cappuccino machine, bless him. That would keep him busy while she found Lucy. Glancing in the empty downstairs rooms, she carried the bags upstairs.

  ‘Lucy!’ she called softly. Nothing. Lucy’s old room was empty and chill. Liz hurried down the stairs. She could feel something different in the house, her house. She knew the feel of it so well. As she passed the cellar door, she noticed it wasn’t properly shut. She pushed. The light was on! She felt a pain in her heart. Lucy had gone down to the old hidey- hole chest, where she used to keep some things of Molly’s that Peg had passed on to her. Lucky I got rid of all Molly’s stuff, thought Liz … Molly … dear god, what was Lucy thinking? What did she know?

  Through a blur of tears, Liz carefully descended the narrow steps, and held out her arms to a slight figure stooping over the open chest built into the fabric of the building. ‘Lucy!’

  Erica had just registered that the chest was empty when the sharp voice behind her went through her like a spear. She nearly passed out with the shock, adrenalin already surging round her body. She swung round in sick dread. Liz Seaton! For a moment Erica saw the same shock in the other woman’s eyes, before fury took over.

  ‘Breaking and entering? Invading my home?’

  Erica shrank back, trapped in the cellar. Caught like a burglar … her old, stupid fear of Liz Seaton gripped her anew. ‘It’s not what it looks like, Liz. Honestly, I was just…’

  her voice tailed off.

  ‘I told you five years ago to leave Lucy alone – and now you come here, a thief … I thought you were my daughter come home…’

  Erica saw pain in Liz’s eyes. She summoned up her own anger.

  ‘But she’s not your daughter is she? Molly was pregnant when she disappeared! And Peg couldn’t have had another child without an operation – admit it, Molly was Lucy’s mother, and your precious husband got her pregnant! He’s the abuser in Stonehead, not poor Mickey!’

  ‘What rubbish! You’re hysterical! I suppose you’ve told this irrational fable to the police?’

  ‘They wouldn’t listen. But a DNA test will prove it. Did Seymour kill Molly, did you help him cover it up, take her baby?’

  ‘Seymour would never, never … look,’ Liz leaned against the wall, as if feeling faint. ‘All right, yes, Molly did … seduce my husband,’

  ‘Seduce!’

  ‘I gave her money, took the baby, she didn’t want it … she went off … neither of us did Molly any harm, I swear it … it must have been Mickey Spence, he wasn’t normal … nothing can tie me or Seymour to Molly’s death, but wait, before you start insisting on DNA tests, stop and think! If you care about Lucy, think what this will do to her; I can persuade Peg to agree she gave birth to Lucy, I’ll tell Peg it was some village tart, she’ll go along with it to protect Lucy, and Lucy won’t check further. Think how she’d feel, to know her mother was her cousin, made pregnant by an uncle, misguided as he was … it’ll destroy her Erica, surely you don’t want that on your conscience!’

  Erica hesitated.

  Liz pressed her advantage home. ‘Molly is long dead. Lucy is alive, she has her whole life ahead of her.’

  ‘She deserves the truth! And so does your sister!’

  ‘Leave my sister out of this! She’s ill!’

  ‘Yeah, you left her out of it all right. I bet she didn’t know what happened to Molly…’

  ‘I was protecting her, can’t you see that? I’ve always protected her. Molly being pregnant would have destroyed her…’

  ‘Total fucking bollocks!’ The words bounced off the walls as Erica spat them out. ‘Peg never knew what happened to Molly, and lost her granddaughter as well. And that’s better than an illegitimate baby? I don’t think so! Oh you’ve been so kind, letting poor dumb old Peg be a second mother to Lucy … it’s yourself you’ve been protecting all along, you and your scuzzbag of a husband. That’s what you didn’t want to come out!

  ‘Well it’s all coming out, all of it! Everybody’s going to know what you and Seymour did, and what you are, you, a doctor, faking a pregnancy, Seymour, an incestuous abuser, Lucy’ll never want to see either of you again…’ Erica couldn’t stop herself yelling at the woman so still in front of her. It was the only way to stop her own fear taking over.

  ‘And who but you two had a motive for killing Molly? There was always the chance she’d tell, demand the baby back, I bet you killed her and buried her head in the rotting spot and told Mickey it was there and he went to get it and you killed him, after plying him with vodka first…’

  Liz rallied. Her voice shook but she still controlled it. ‘Molly was nothing but trouble, Seymour tried to help her but he couldn’t resist her, then she wanted money … blackmailed us!…’

  ‘Are you saying you did kill her?’ Erica almost didn’t want to know.

  ‘I’m saying nothing of the kind! I wanted to protect Peg from learning what sort of a daughter she had…’

  ‘Or what sort of brother in law!’

  ‘That baby should have been mine!’ Liz stood erect, almost wailing. ‘Mine and Seymour’s! All our lives, I was the clever one, the pretty one, the successful one, Peg was always jealous of me, but Peg had the baby, and I had none! How could she do something so simple, so common, and I couldn’t? Don’t you see, Lucy is the baby I should have had – the baby I was entitled to! All I’ve ever wanted is the best for her … a great education, a great start, would she really have been happier in a council bedsit with a teenage mother? Erica, you claim to be Lucy’s friend, think of her now!’

  ‘I am. You know, warning me off Lucy five years ago was a big mistake? If you’d been less of a control freak, if you’d been less desperate to prove to yourself and everyone else that Lucy’s your daughter, you’d have allowed her to become an actress. But no, it had to be a doctor didn’t it, nothing else would do … well you can congratulate yourself Liz, Lucy became a medic, and knows about DNA and the genetic implications of colour blindness – it’s because of you she finally realised you are not her mother!’

  She stopped, shocked at her own violence. Liz Seaton’s face went blank with shock. Then she gave a kind of moan and toppled forward. Erica caught her in her arms, instinctively holding her up, as Liz leaned on her for support. A bitter revulsion filled Erica. Her victory over the old enemy was far from triumphant – this destroyed woman, hanging round her tormentor’s shoulders, her wiry, strong fingers on Erica’s neck, pinching, pinching … terror flared, as her vision swam, her pulse boomed in her ears, her legs gave way, she was falling … couldn’t see, or move … blackness, hard cold on her back … nothingness …

  Sounds … Liz’s voice echoing in her head like the sea in a shell. ‘It shouldn’t take long, Erica, you’ll soon asphyxiate, and later you’ll be found, another victim of the sea, maybe a suicide, unable to cope with the truth about Mickey, the murderous skull-hunter, the killer.’ The last word rang in Erica’s head as Liz slammed the lid of the chest and in utter darkness she heard the bolts shoot home, as full consciousness cruelly returned.

  Liz, breathing heavily, straightened up. Useful to know where to apply pressure on the arteries of the neck … and now Erica was gone. Tidied away. Liz pushed back her hair, wiped her face and went up the cellar stairs, more shaky than she would have expected. She hadn’t felt this shaken that night she’d visited Mickey Spence with a bottle of vodka, to show him where his promised human skull was. So excited, like a child, he’d had eyes for nothing but the skull in his own rotting spot, appearing like magic, he’d not seen the blow coming, the rock swung at just the right place on his own skull.

  It was a risk, a gamble, just as twenty-five years ago she’d gambled, and the stakes had been high enough to make it wor
th while. Now, the game was almost up, but while there was the slimmest of chances, she would keep fighting.

  She stumbled through the cellar door, to hear Seymour calling her. He came out of the kitchen, and his face, his dear face, lit up to see her.

  ‘There you are Lizzie! Coffee’s ready! You look ready for a cup I must say! Might have a snifter in mine.’

  ‘Thank you darling. Lead me to it.’ The hidey-hole chest was barely big enough for a person, and the lid was airtight. Not.much air in there. Especially ·when someone was screaming, screaming alone in darkness, gulping in air to scream scream with no-one listening.

  29

  Blackness – cold – sheer primitive terror swept over Erica and she screamed, her voice hit back at her by the lid barely inches above her face. She couldn’t raise her arms, the chest was painfully small, but she kicked and punched at the lid, barely feeling the bruising pain. She was alone. Shut in. Buried alive.

  She took a slow breath and forced her limbs to stop struggling. Hideous thoughts whirled through her head. She was young, strong, she wanted to live … could this really be the end? Could she really be meant to die, here, unknown … images of her mouldering skeleton … Liz had done this to her, Liz wanted her to die, would she’d come back, no, she wouldn’t change her mind now, and now Erica felt she was not alone, that Molly lay somehow with her in the chest, Molly long dead … Molly, whose skull she had looked at, now she’d be a skull … she’d joked about giving Mickey her head … Erica took another shuddering breath, and fought down the urge to scream with all the self-control she had. There was very little air. She could do nothing to get out. She’d known the chest years ago, the bolts were heavy and secure, the seal airtight.

  To scream and breathe deep, hastening the end? Or to keep hoping, prolonging it? It wouldn’t be long, either way. Forcing down the denial, the hope, the instinct to cry out for help that kept welling up, Erica struggled to resign herself to an ignominious death, alone, perhaps never discovered. The desolation of that was almost worse than dying. Liz would have to get her out, get rid of her body, but how could she live long enough for that, supposing she could overpower her? Mum, mummy, she whimpered, and helpless tears ran down her temples into her hair, as the years of growing up fell away from her, and the years of education, evolution, leaving a trapped, sweating, unthinking piece of flesh and blood and bone. As time passed, all thought slowly left Erica’s head, and her breast rose and fell ever more slightly in the darkness.

  When the doorbell rang, over an hour later, Liz again thought ‘Lucy!’ She’d remembered that Lucy had left her keys in her car when she disappeared. She rushed to the door, flung it open, and Will Bennett was standing there, towering over her, with his two colleagues behind. For a second, she almost fainted, for real this time.

  Sally Banner leapt forward and steadied her. ‘It’s alright, Mrs Seaton, we’ve not come with bad news or anything. We’ve still not heard from Lucy, but I’m sure she’ll soon be home.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Liz recovered as best she could. ‘Come in.’

  They followed her, seeming to take up a lot of room in the graceful hall, into the kitchen.

  Seymour walked in. Liz pressed his hand and he subsided into a kitchen chair. Liz began to make tea.

  Hassan began, ‘Has Erica Bruce been here?’

  Liz froze, in the act of filling the kettle, so it overflowed into the sink. Seymour stepped in, surprised.

  ‘Erica? No – we’ve only just got home ourselves. Why’d’you ask, officer?’

  ‘We had a report that a woman fitting her description was seen entering this house … was there any sign of a break-in when you arrived?’

  ‘No, certainly not,’ Seymour was clearly bewildered.

  ‘We’ve seen nothing suspicious, or we’d have rung you – wouldn’t we darling?’

  ‘Of course.’ Liz clattered cups. Fine bone china, unlike the country cottage earthenware.

  ‘And she hasn’t been here?’ Will was relieved and a bit disappointed.

  ‘Absolutely not, Inspector. We’ve both been here together, we’ve not seen her or anyone else at all. Someone must be mistaken.’ Seymour was transparently telling the truth.

  ‘Obviously a misunderstanding, or a prank call,’ Liz managed.

  Beneath their feet, Erica was dying, right now … Liz felt fear, but also exaltation. If she was to fail, at least Erica wouldn’t be there to gloat. The police didn’t like Erica. They didn’t believe her. She was a quack, a con merchant with her potions. There was still a chance.

  Will sipped tea and put down his cup gingerly. ‘While we’re here, we’d like to speak to your sister Peg.’

  ‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible Inspector.’ Liz spoke calmly.

  The three officers exchanged resigned looks.

  ‘Mrs Seaton, this is a murder enquiry. We need to talk to her; we will be very careful, we’re fully aware of her state of mind. You yourself are not a specialist in psychiatry, I believe.’ Will was firm.

  Hassan smoothed things over. ‘We understand you feel the need to protect your sister but surely you want to help the police establish the truth about what happened to your niece …’

  ‘My sister has suffered a complete mental breakdown, and is now in the private clinic of Dr Gould, who is a specialist in psychiatric medicine. He says she is not fit to be questioned. Her eventual recovery depends on total rest and seclusion. You can ask him yourselves.’

  It was the hint of triumph in her voice that convinced Will, in a surge of angry instinct, that Liz had something serious to answer for.

  ‘Well since we’re here, and it was you who told us the account of how Mr Seaton here came to father Lucy on your sister Peg acting as a surrogate, we’d like to question you further. It seems Mrs Westfield had an emergency Caesarean when she gave birth to Molly. This calls your account into question, Mrs Seaton.’

  Both Liz and Seymour were still, except for their eyes, which sought each other’s – his in appeal, hers in warning.

  ‘Not at all,’ she returned coldly. ‘And I object to having my word questioned, as if I were some sort of criminal. I am a consultant obstetrician, I’ve performed many, many Caesareans. Even twenty-five years ago I was experienced enough to perform one on my sister without undue risk. I had the help of an experienced anaesthetist, who owed me a favour. I can supply his name, though I’m afraid he sadly died some time ago.’

  I just bet he did. ‘You expect us to believe your sister agreed to go through that, for you? And that you asked it of her?’

  ‘My sister has total faith in me, and it is not for you to judge how desperate a childless woman may be.’

  Christ this woman has balls, thought Will.

  ‘We can establish the facts through a DNA test,’ began Hassan.

  ‘You’ll be lucky to get any DNA from the skull assumed to be Molly’s, after all those years. It remains to be seen whether you will be able to obtain any from my sister. She is not in a state to give permission at present. Possibly not for a long time. For now, I decline to give any further information without consulting a solicitor. And so does my husband.’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Seymour agreed.

  ‘Erica seemed to think that Molly was pregnant just before she disappeared,’ Will stated, determined to get through to this couple somehow. ‘Someone remembered.’

  Erica is unconscious or dead by now, bathed in her own excrement; the thought gave Liz strength. This was one victory she could cling to, even if all else was taken from her.

  ‘Odd they never mentioned it before.’ Liz looked at Will with a challenge in her eyes. ‘You have little or no evidence but gossip as far as I can see. And you had no right to my sister’s medical records. I shall certainly take this further.’

  Sally Banner audibly gasped. She couldn’t believe this woman’s nerve. ‘Your niece was murdered!’ she burst out. Will shot her a glare and she subsided before blundering any further in. But then Will himself surprised her
by following up.

  ‘If it turned out that Molly was in fact Lucy’s mother, and Mr Seaton here her father, it would be damaging indeed to you all – and it would give a double motive for the murder of your niece to you both. To keep the baby, and to hide what your husband did.’

  Liz stood up, pale, dark circles round her eyes, but regal still. ‘If it turned out that way, it would ruin Lucy’s life and our reputation, but there’s no evidence to link anyone but Spence to Molly’s death. Now I’d like you to leave. I can’t take much more of this. I’m becoming ill myself with the stress and trauma … please go…’

  Will rose, and the others followed suit. ‘This isn’t the end of it, Mrs Seaton, Mr Seaton.’

  No answer. They walked out of the house into the warm summer air and the salty breeze, while the Seatons remained in the kitchen unmoving.

  ‘Fucking hell! I hate to admit it, but Erica was right. I’m sure of it. That family, some or all of them, probably masterminded by Liz, used Molly as a baby machine, probably killed her … all these years they’ve got away with it…!’

  ‘Yes, Guv,’ Hassan pointed out. ‘And if they did kill Molly, that means that they probably killed Mickey Spence as well, that they buried the skull in the rotting spot, as an insurance policy … Erica might have been right about that too.’

  ‘Where d’you think the rest of Molly is, Guv, in the sea? She’ll never turn up now.’

  ‘That’s what’s really pissing me off!’ Will and the others had walked forwards to the fence above the harbour, and were looking down at the dark water where Mickey’s rat- gnawed body had been found. ‘They’ve got money, they can go abroad … they’re both retired, or practically so, a scandal now’s not the end of the world. If they’re clever, and Liz certainly is, they can keep blaming each other in circles, if they really end up with their backs to the wall, but it’ll not get that far, oh no, we might never be able to link them to Molly’s death, only the pregnancy … or Spence’s death either. And anything Peg says will be questioned as the word of a basket case. The Super’ll love this…’