Smoke Alarm

by Priscilla Masters

  ‘Well, I’m glad of it,’ she said. ‘You’re a good pathologist, Mark; it would have been such a waste.’

  He stood up then. ‘Thanks,’ he said, grinning at her, and left.

  FIVE

  Tuesday, 1 March, 7.30 a.m.

  Martha opened her eyes and remembered why today felt special. It was the first of March, not only in her mind the first day of spring but also St David’s Day, patron saint of Wales. She made a mental note to ring her dad this evening and wish him happy St David’s Day, knowing he would be noisily celebrating at the pub, wearing either a leek or a daffodil, (the emblems of Wales), and watching the St David’s day concert broadcast live on the large-screen TV from Cardiff’s Millennium Centre. The weather was bright and cold and she was still smiling as she drove round the ring road towards her office in Bayston Hill. Today the weather displayed the best of early spring, the time when a young man’s thoughts turn to love. Martha pulled in outside her office, switched the engine off and sat still for a minute, contemplating. And a woman fast approaching middle-age? What do her thoughts turn to in the early spring? She pushed the thought aside and opened the door. Jericho was waiting for her. ‘Any news about the fire?’ She tried to make the question sound casual but Jericho wasn’t fooled for a minute.

  He shook his head solemnly. ‘Not so far as I’ve heard,’ he said. ‘In the Shropshire Star last night it said that they was looking for an arsonist.’ His Shropshire burr was always more pronounced when he got overexcited. He paused, his eyes as round as saucers. ‘I can’t think how anyone would do such a terrible thing.’

  ‘No word from Detective Inspector Randall, then?’

  ‘Not this morning, Mrs Gunn.’ Jericho Palfreyman spoke firmly, eyeing her with bright-eyed curiosity. It was time to drop the subject. She moved towards her office door. ‘Coffee’s already waitin’ on your desk, Mrs Gunn,’ he called after her.

  That was another thing about Jericho. He had to have the last word.

  She walked into her office and closed the door behind her. Quite apart from the scent of fresh coffee that steamed from the mug on her desk, she simply loved the room. High-ceilinged, unmistakably Victorian but with oak-panelled walls, it had an air of substance, dignity and a reassuring permanence. It was a good place to interview grieving and sometimes angry relatives. It lent gravitas to the situation. But the best feature of the room, in her opinion, was the bay window, floor to ceiling, which gave her a bird’s-eye view of the town. Bayston Hill was, as its name suggested, on an elevation to the south of Shrewsbury. Shrewsbury town itself was on a small hill in an oxbow of the River Severn. This had protected the English town, wealthy from the proceeds of Welsh wool, from the attentions of the hostile and sometimes aggressive Welsh. The geography of Shrewsbury was also the reason why it used to be cut off when the rains washed down heavily from the Welsh mountains, raising the level of the river and making the town, in effect, a fortified island. Shrewsbury (or Scrobbes-byrig, which was its Anglo Saxon name – the Fortress of Scrob) had been susceptible to floods for hundreds of years – right up until the council had installed flood defences. These now protected the town and sent the unwelcome waters shooting downstream. Elsewhere.

  The window gave her a fine view of the town, familiar landmarks fixing its points: the spire of St Mary’s (tragic witness to the first hang gliding fatality), the English Bridge with its elegant Georgian buildings, and the cross at the top of the domed church of St Chad’s with its distinctive round shape. Martha warmed her hands around her coffee mug and still smiled. How many times had she played a trick on friends and relatives? Taken them into the quiet graveyard of St Chad’s and watched them read the tombstone of Ebenezer Scrooge? They always fell for it. ‘He’s a real person, then?’ they’d ask until, laughing, she had to tell them that the town of Shrewsbury had been the setting for the 1984 film of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol and that this stone was merely part of a film set which had not been removed when the shooting was over, left to become yet another tourist attraction.

  She looked over the town, feeling a certain pride and affection for it then, reluctantly, turned back to her work. She was not paid to dream around spires but to try and make some sense, truth, logic and justice out of death. She was haunted by the image of Christie Barton fumbling with a locked door, trying to escape the bedroom, her lungs gradually filling with smoke, finally suffocating while the fire raged. And Adelaide Barton, cowering underneath her bedclothes. They were truly awful images. She was not smiling now but frowning. And the old man, she wondered. What part had he played in the drama? Perpetrator? Muddled interferer? Who could know? Would they ever know the full truth?

  Once she had settled down to work the images receded and she quickly lost track of time. She was absorbed in reading reports, checking statistics and taking phone calls, one or two from hospital doctors. Periodically Jericho came in with coffee, sometimes biscuits, and at lunchtime a sandwich nicely set out on a plate with a glass of fruit juice.

  But the back of her mind was still tracking around the fire, considering it from a different angle now. She was thinking about the living, wondering how Jude was and how his father was responding to the tragedy. What was his view on the events of Friday night? she wondered. How was he reacting? Once or twice she glanced at her phone, tempted to ring Alex Randall and ask him how the enquiry was progressing but she resisted the temptation – with difficulty. It was a relief when Jericho buzzed her at four o’clock to say that Detective Inspector Alex Randall was on the phone and had asked to speak to her.

  Randall was brisk. He sounded as though he was having a very busy day. ‘Sorry to interrupt your work, Martha.’ He spoke quickly. ‘I thought you might like to be kept up to date with the investigation into the Melverley fire.’

  ‘That’s very thoughtful of you, Alex. Thank you. I was wondering if you’d found anything out.’

  ‘Well, not a lot so far,’ he confessed. ‘That’s why I didn’t ring earlier. I’ve been at the hospital.’

  ‘How is Jude?’

  ‘Physically the doctors say he’ll be OK,’ he began.

  Martha picked up on the implication. ‘But mentally?’

  ‘He’s devastated. Got real survivor complex, feeling guilty he didn’t wake and raise the alarm – that he saved himself, but left them in the burning house and failed to rescue them.’

  ‘Poor boy.’

  Alex continued: ‘I don’t think we’d quite realized how traumatic his descent on the ladder was. He was terrified the rope would burn and he’d fall. It must have been dreadful.’

  ‘Yes,’ she agreed.

  ‘And that’s on top of the burns to his hands. The doctors have told me he may need skin grafts but they haven’t told him yet. His father knows.’

  ‘Has Mr Barton been able to throw any light on the arson?’

  ‘He’s given us one or two leads but they seemed pretty feeble – business associates, a boy that Adelaide was involved with who came from a fairly unsavoury family, stuff like that. Nothing that really grabbed me.’

  ‘Did you run the idea past Nigel that his father might have started the fire? Did you tell him you’d found a lighter in William’s dressing-gown pocket?’

  ‘No, I didn’t tell him about the lighter. I thought he had more than enough to take in. I did mention the previous fire to him. He insists it was just an accident. And he definitely doesn’t see his father as some sort of avenging arsonist.’

  ‘And how did he respond when you told him that his wife and daughter had been locked into their rooms?’

  ‘He absolutely insisted it must have been an accident.’ Randall paused. ‘He couldn’t believe anyone would do such a thing deliberately, let alone his father. He said his father could be quite confused. He ventured the explanation that when his father woke to the fire he might have been trying to help the women out of their rooms and accidentally locked them in instead.’

  ‘I could maybe swallow that one if only one door had
been locked. But not both.’

  ‘Well, he describes him as nicely muddled.’

  ‘Two locked doors,’ Martha said. ‘That’s not muddled coincidence. It’s deliberate.’

  ‘Mmm.’ Randall’s response was non-committal.

  ‘And how did Mr Barton respond to his son descending by a rope ladder?’

  ‘He couldn’t keep the admiration out of his voice. He’s very proud of Jude – and the fact that he tried to save the rest of the family. He thinks the boy’s a hero.’

  ‘Which I suppose he is,’ Martha said slowly. Then she added, ‘What was your impression of the dynamics of the family?’

  Alex didn’t answer straight away. It took him a minute or two to come up with a response so the line was quiet. ‘It’s hard to say, Martha, with such a tragedy. I mean, I’ve never met Barton senior, Christie or Adelaide. But there’s no doubt of the affection between father and son.’ He paused, frowning before finishing. ‘Perhaps by spending time with Jude and his father I might learn a bit more about the rest of the family.’

  ‘What’s your instinct, Alex?’ She couldn’t resist pressing him.

  On the other end of the line, Alex laughed. ‘I had the feeling you were going to spring something like that on me. I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I really don’t know. It’s early days yet. So far I’m a bit flummoxed. Initially I believed it was a random arson attack. For no particular reason Melverley Grange was picked on, maybe because it is such a grand and beautiful old house. But if it was a random attack it doesn’t explain why the women were locked in their rooms. I’ve wondered about the old man. He started a fire before but no one has described him as demonic or crazy.’

  ‘Alzheimer’s isn’t that sort of crazy, Alex. It isn’t clever and it isn’t calculating. As his son has said, William was nicely muddled, occasionally unhappily confused but not calculatingly deliberate or cunning. Where would he have got the petrol from? I take it he doesn’t drive?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, that’d take some planning. And if he had started the fire why didn’t he escape when he could have?’

  ‘Overcome by smoke?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Martha continued: ‘Believe me, Alex, this just isn’t the sort of thing people with Alzheimer’s do – lock people in their rooms, set fire to a house then climb the stairs and perish with the rest. Did you consider that? If he was the one who started the fire downstairs he must have climbed the stairs afterwards. That doesn’t make any sense.’

  ‘Unless he was trying to save his granddaughter and daughter-in-law.’

  ‘I wonder.’

  ‘But,’ Alex pointed out, ‘remember, he was found with a lighter in his pocket.’

  ‘I still don’t care,’ she said stubbornly. ‘William Barton was a victim too. As much a victim as his daughter-in-law and granddaughter and very nearly his grandson as well if Jude hadn’t been quite so resourceful and forward thinking. Worse than that, Alex, if Barton senior is wrongly blamed for the fire he is the fall guy. The scapegoat, which would mean that the real villain goes free. Someone wanted us to believe that this old man committed this horrible and deliberately cruel act. An elderly man whom his son fondly describes as nicely muddled. How do we know he was crazy, anyway?’

  ‘Mark Sullivan told us there were clear signs of Alzheimer’s on a scan done a year ago of Mr Barton’s head.’

  ‘Well, maybe you should just check up on that. See if he’s had a proper psychiatric assessment.’ She waited a while before putting another thought into his head. ‘Well, you’ve told me you have possible leads through Nigel Barton.’ Martha pressed on. ‘And one via Adelaide. Is there no one else in the frame?’

  ‘No one, just the three business leads Nigel Barton gave us and Adelaide’s boyfriend. We will check them out, of course, but I’m not hopeful that it’ll be that easy or that obvious.’

  ‘Have there been other similar arson attacks?’

  ‘Not in Shropshire.’

  ‘Elsewhere?’

  ‘Not unsolved.’

  ‘So are we looking at an inside job? Something personal?’

  She knew by his silence that Alex Randall was uncomfortable. His tightly uttered, ‘It would appear so,’ was practically forced out of him.

  ‘What about Jude? Does he have any enemies?’

  ‘A fourteen-year-old boy?’

  ‘Yes, a fourteen-year-old boy.’

  ‘We’ve yet to question him along those lines.’

  ‘And Mrs Christie Barton. What about her? Is she Caesar’s wife, above suspicion?’

  ‘I do wonder if she had –’ Randall sounded angry with himself. ‘Oh, it’s such a cliché. I wonder if she did have a secret life.’

  Martha responded with an arch, ‘Don’t we all?’

  But Randall’s silence on the other end of the line told her that he was confused by her riposte. Then it must have dawned on him that she was teasing. He chuckled but she noticed he did not pursue the comment. Instead he said slowly, ‘Martha, do you suspect everyone in this case?’

  She answered calmly but with conviction. ‘Yes, I do, Alex. Looking at it plainly, this was a case of arson which resulted in three deaths. Nearly four. This was no serial gang of silly boys playing up and down the street with a box of matches to disastrous results. This was a house deliberately chosen. Selected, if you like. Someone deliberately entered that house, locked Christie and Adelaide in their bedrooms, then set fire to the house. I think William Barton was trying to effect some sort of rescue. Maybe I’m wrong but I believe it was deliberate murder, not an accident. No one else in the entire village was targeted, were they?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have there been other cases of arson in Melverley in, say, the last five years?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And did anyone see strangers wandering around the village that night?’

  ‘Not that we’ve picked up on so far.’

  ‘I take it there’s no CCTV in the village?’

  His silence affirmed her assumption.

  ‘OK, so all I have is a great long list of questions that need answering. Why did this happen? What was the intent? To murder two women, or was the old man the target? Was it Jude they were really after – and failed? Why did he have a rope ladder installed? It seems an odd thing to me. Or was Nigel Barton the real target and our arsonist was unaware that he was not at home that night? Is there some vengeful woman behind this? Did Nigel Barton have a mistress who might wish his family harm? Why lock Adelaide and Christie in their rooms? Also, isn’t it unusual for an arsonist to actually enter the property to splash the petrol around? It wasn’t even ridiculously late. The family could have still been awake. Have your forensic people found any sign of him – or her?’

  ‘Whoa, there.’ Randall chuckled. ‘Slow down. I can’t keep up.’ Then he added, ‘I’ve said this before: you’re wasted being a coroner.’

  ‘Am I?’ The question was not asked to provoke flattery or invite compliments but as a genuine query. And DI Randall responded in kind.

  ‘Well, no. Not really. You aren’t wasted as a coroner.’ He cleared his throat in embarrassment. ‘What I mean is you’d have made a bloody good cop.’

  She laughed. ‘Thank you very much, Inspector. Praise indeed.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’

  They both sensed that the conversation was over, said their goodbyes and hung up.

  And somehow the exchange with DI Randall had made St David’s Day doubly special. The awkwardness was over, the intrusion forgotten or at least forgiven.

  Both a leek and a daffodil.

  SIX

  Tuesday, 1 March, 6 p.m.

  Alex conducted the briefing, his eyes roaming around the room speculatively. They’d taken over the church hall in Melverley as their operations headquarters. The place had a gentle feel in spite of the whiteboards, graphic photographs and rows of chairs holding police personnel. As an environment it wasn’t hugely conducive to crime solving but it served its
purpose and at least it was near the burnt-out house.

  As Randall wrote on the board he was well aware that the lines of enquiry he was outlining coincided with Martha’s ideas.

  At the top he wrote a list of these potential lines, underlining the categories heavily. Business associates of Nigel Barton.

  Next he wrote the name, William Barton, underneath detailing questions:

  What exactly was his mental state?

  Is he a serious suspect?

  Is it possible he deliberately started the fire and locked the women in their rooms?

  What was he doing on the landing?

  Why did he have a lighter in his pocket?

  Randall stood for a moment, staring out over the faces of his force. The two people best placed to answer these questions were the old man’s son and grandson. Could he rely on them to be honest in their responses? One had to hope so.

  Next he wrote: Did William Barton smoke?

  A minor question, surely easy enough to obtain a truthful answer? A simple yes or no. Randall would soon learn that this case would not be simple from any angle. There would be no simple yeses or nos.

  Next he wrote Jude followed by a question mark – nothing else.

  Then the ‘unsavoury man’ – probably a boy who had had some sort of relationship with Adelaide.

  And lastly he wrote Nigel Barton.

  Underneath:

  Money concerns?

  Another relationship?

  Business associates?

  It was a simple matter of checking out the man’s alibi, surely. If he had been miles away at the time of the fire – whatever his personal life – he couldn’t have had anything to do with it. But Randall was a realist. Nigel Barton couldn’t have had anything to do with it unless, he added mentally, someone had done the dirty work for him.

  But at the back of Randall’s mind was the fear that none of these lines of enquiry would lead them to their arsonist, that this was not a personal, planned attack but a random selection. In which case, as they had no local leads, they were in trouble. It threw the entire investigation wide open. It could have been anyone who poured the petrol, anyone who locked the doors, anyone who threw the fatal match. He didn’t want to explore this particular avenue even in his mind.