A Crushing Blow (Anna McColl Mystery Book 3)

by Penny Kline

  A Crushing Blow

  Penny Kline

  © Penny Kline 1995

  Penny Kline has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1995 by MacMillan London.

  This edition published in 2016 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter One

  You’re tuned to Radio Bristol, coming up to news on the hour, but first a reminder of this afternoon’s phone-in when … Inside the car the air is stifling. Leigh Woods, a stone’s throw away, looks cool, inviting. Sunlight filters through the lime trees, rare butterflies with white-streaked wings flutter above the wood anemones. The Princess Royal on a visit to British Aerospace. The newsreader’s voice, keeping it light, keeping it bright. A new production opening at the Old Vic on Tuesday … Then a sudden shift of tone. News just in. The body of a man … bludgeoned to death in the woods. Leigh Woods. Police withholding details of the victim’s identity … until the next of kin … The traffic slows to a halt, near the track through the woods that leads down to the Avon Gorge. And now over for a check on the weather … Clear skies with occasional cloudy spells. Cooler winds from the west later this evening: … Somewhere in the woods a heavy bloodstained corpse is lifted on to a polythene sheet, slowly, carefully so no damage can confuse the post-mortem. Lines of police scour the grass, searching for a weapon, the print of a shoe. Plans for a new multi-storey car park … A woman who lives in St Paul’s has won the National Lottery … The lights turn green and the traffic moves on.

  Chapter Two

  It was one of those notices you know by heart but read over again each time you pass. The Samaritans Care. Talk to us in confidence any time — day or night. Then a Bristol phone number and a reminder of the telephone box at each end of the bridge.

  The day had been burning hot but now, high above the city, the air felt cooler, less humid, free of the fumes from the traffic in Cumberland Basin. Halfway across the bridge a tall, thin girl stood staring down at the mud two hundred and fifty feet below. Her black jeans and sleeveless T-shirt contrasted dramatically with hair that was almost white, cropped short, apart from the long trailing strands at the back of her neck. A yellow and purple knapsack hung over her left shoulder. I guessed she was about seventeen.

  She was very still, leaning forward a little, with one foot on the ground and the other resting on the toe of her boot, but as I watched she stepped back a couple of paces and stood with her arms hanging loosely away from her body, like a swimmer preparing to jump into an icy pool.

  ‘Don’t!’ I ran towards her, ignoring the traffic that was only a few inches from the pavement. ‘Wait!’

  When I reached her side she stared at me, her pale face expressionless. ‘I’m not going to jump, if that’s what you’re hoping.’

  Jerking at Aaron’s choke-chain I forced him to stay still and the girl bent down, rubbing her knees, then holding out her fingers for the dog to sniff. ‘Retriever, ain’t he? If I had a dog I’d have one like that.’

  ‘He’s not my dog,’ I said, wanting to keep the conversation going, wanting to see the colour return to her face.

  ‘You mean like you’ve nicked him.’

  ‘No, of course not. A friend of mine, a neighbour, he’s sprained his ankle so I’m taking Aaron for a walk in Leigh Woods.’

  The corners of her mouth moved a little. ‘Not scared, then?’

  ‘Scared? Oh, you mean the murder. That was nearly a month ago.’

  ‘Haven’t got him yet, though, have they?’ She took the dog’s lead from my hand. ‘Old bloke it was, the one that got done in. I reckon he had it coming.’

  ‘Why d’you say that?’ But I knew what she was going to say next.

  ‘I saw a flasher once. Running between the trees he was, hoping I’d see his whatsit and scream blue murder. If they catch ’em nothing happens. I reckon like they should lock them up and throw away the key.’

  ‘Most of them are harmless,’ I said, ‘just sad, isolated people who’ve no one they feel close to.’

  She snorted. ‘Always talk that garbage, do you? If you want my opinion men should be castrated, then there wouldn’t be all those wars and that.’

  She glared at me, waiting for the obvious rejoinder. When it didn’t come she muttered something about who wanted kids anyway then walked on ahead of me with Aaron trotting by her side.

  I had wanted to distract her, make sure she left the bridge, but I had overreacted — because of the Suspension Bridge’s reputation. Now it was proving difficult to get rid of her. When we turned up North Road she asked if Aaron could go off the lead.

  ‘Not till we reach the woods.’

  ‘Does what you tell him, does he?’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘I had a cat once,’ she said, ‘when I was a kid, but it died. Sat up all night, I did, but it wouldn’t stop coughing. Reckon it’d swallowed its fur or something.’

  ‘What was its name?’

  ‘Eh?’ She slowed down till we were walking side by side. ‘Nobody asked me that before. Martin — that’s what I called it, don’t remember why.’

  ‘I work with a man called Martin.’

  ‘You’ve got a job, then. Mine’s only part-time but if I play my cards right I reckon I can make it last most of the week.’

  We were passing the Botanical Gardens. I made a mental note of the name of a side road that looked as though it might lead to the one where Sandy Haran lived.

  ‘What are you looking at?’ The girl was studying my face minutely.

  ‘On my way back I have to call in on a friend, only I’m not sure where his house is.’

  ‘Funny kind of friend.’

  I took a scrap of paper from my pocket and she slowed down a little to read the address.

  ‘Over there.’ She pointed across the road, then stopped, leaning against the stile that led into the woods, short of breath but not nearly so pale. ‘What’s he called, your friend?’

  ‘Sandy.’

  She had a strand of hair wound round her finger. She gave it a twist, screwing up her face as though she was in agony. ‘You an accountant?’

  ‘Is that what I look like?’

  She shrugged. ‘Everyone’s an accountant or a solicitor. What are you, then?’

  ‘A psychologist.’

  ‘Let him off now, shall I?’ Without waiting for an answer she dragged the choke-chain over Aaron’s head and he leapt the stile and bounded away into the undergrowth. ‘Don’t worry, still got his collar with his name and that. Dogs have to run free, it’s cruel to keep them on a lead.’

  It was pleasant under the trees, a relief to be out of the sun although now it was after six the temperature had started to drop. The girl walked on ahead, kicking a stone with the side of her boot, trying to keep it on the path, muttering under her breath as it bounced into the long grass. I thought about the last time I had walked in Leigh Woods. Strolling, with my friend Chris and her three youn
g kids, passing the precise spot where only forty-eight hours later a middle-aged man called Walter Bury had been discovered with his skull smashed in.

  Checking the time, I realized I was regretting my decision to call in at Sandy Haran’s house, even though Aaron provided me with a ready-made reason for not staying too long. Why had Sandy invited me round? Presumably it was because he wanted me to see where he lived, a fairly impressive place if the address was anything to go by. I would say hello to his wife, exchange a few pleasantries, drink a quick cup of coffee, then leave.

  I had known Sandy only five or six weeks. He was attending a counselling course where I had recently completed a series of lectures on Working with Groups. The first time I saw him he had been sitting in the second row — a rather unlikely looking candidate for such a course, with his dark suit and small, neat moustache — but when it was time for questions I had been impressed by his shrewdness, his understanding of how counselling could all too easily become a self-gratifying power game. The third week he introduced himself — in the car park where I was trying to repair my windscreen wipers sufficiently to drive the two miles back to my flat — and when I discovered he was ‘good with cars’ it was such a relief that I remember telling him he was my friend for life. Later, I wondered if he had taken this meaningless remark literally. Waiting for me at the end of each lecture became a habit. Sometimes he had a particular question, other times he just chatted about this and that. There was something about him that intrigued. Some of the others, fascinated by the subject because they had so many problems of their own, appeared quite unsuited to the course. Sandy was sensible, down-to-earth, enthusiastic but realistic. He spoke in a straightforward, unpretentious way, explaining how he had made a fair amount of money as a property developer then become disillusioned with the business world and decided he wanted to do something entirely different. The counselling course was his first step towards a new way of life.

  During the next few weeks his physical appearance had begun to change. The suit was replaced with the kind of leisure wear that features in the pages of the up-market Sunday papers, and his short, thinning hair was allowed to grow longer, bushier above the ears. At the end of my final lecture he had come up to me in the car park and invited me to dinner. I hesitated, unwilling to become too involved, seeing him almost like a client rather than a student on the course. It was ridiculous. In an effort to maintain so-called professional boundaries I was in danger of cutting myself off from all but a handful of close friends and my colleagues at work. As a compromise I suggested that since I had to exercise my neighbour’s dog perhaps I could drop by some time on my way home from Leigh Woods.

  ‘When?’ He wanted a date and time.

  ‘Thursday? About seven, or is that too late?’

  ‘Seven’s fine, just right.’

  ‘I won’t be able to stay long, not with the dog and everything.’

  He laughed. ‘Using a dog as protection, eh? I’ll leave that up to you, Anna, stay just as long as you want.’ It was the first time he had used my name. He seemed pleased, out of all proportion, as though my visit meant a great deal to him, as though by agreeing to call round I had taken a great weight off his shoulders …

  The girl was standing on one leg, leaning against a tree, watching me. ‘Two kids found the body,’ she said, her eyes bright with excitement. ‘Up the other end where you can look down at the Gorge. Cordoned it off, they did, so you couldn’t get close but I got to know this policeman bloke. Only a kid he was really, told me all kinds of stuff. Like he was guarding the area.’

  ‘From people like you,’ I said, smiling, but she didn’t smile back. ‘You live near here, do you?’

  She shook her head, screwing up her face in disgust. ‘Do me a favour, think I’m made of money? Dressed in white overalls they was, with hoods over their heads and special shoes. Like they wear them so they won’t leave their hairs and that muddled up with clues from the murderer.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot about it.’

  She nodded. ‘Dogs they had too. German shepherds. I’d like to be a dog handler but I don’t s’pose they have women doing it. Bloody typical.’

  I pictured the pathologist crouching beside the dead man, a photographer making a video of the position of the body and the surrounding areas, taking stills with close-ups of the injuries. How long had the man been lying there? Two days, a week? The girl could probably tell me although I was sure she knew far less than she wanted me to believe.

  ‘He come from Abbots Leigh,’ she said, ‘it was on the telly but only the local news. I s’pose there’s murders every day so like it wasn’t important enough for the other.’ She stumbled over a rotten branch that had fallen half across the path. ‘They’ll never catch him now, it’s too late, the scent’ll have gone cold.’

  ‘Oh, I doubt it. For all we know there’s plenty of forensic evidence.’

  ‘What kind of evidence? Oh, you mean blood and semen and that. Bits of skin under the fingernails, fibres in the wound.’

  I laughed. ‘You’ve been watching too many crime programmes.’

  ‘No, I haven’t. Anyway, the knife’ll be in the river by now, or sunk in the mud.’

  ‘I thought he was bludgeoned to death.’

  She swivelled round on one foot. ‘There you are, caught you out, tricked you into admitting you’re as interested as I am. People love murders, what’s the point in pretending to feel bad about someone you’ve never even met?’

  There was no sign of Aaron. At the part of the woods we had reached the trees grew closer together, cutting out most of the light, making it impossible to see much beyond the path. I could try an ear-splitting whistle but more than likely it would come out as a thin breathy puff which the girl would find highly amusing. She ran on ahead and I saw her bending over the sagging fence that protected a small murky-looking pond.

  ‘Can you see the dog?’ I shouted.

  ‘What?’ She had a length of slimy green weed in her hand and was swinging it round, threatening to let go so it hit me in the face.

  A moment later Aaron bounded up and started pawing the sagging wooden struts that surrounded the pond. The girl held up the choke-chain triumphantly. ‘Think I’m daft or something?’ She returned the weed to the water. ‘If it hadn’t been for me he’d have jumped in, got his coat all mucky.’

  ‘Well done.’

  ‘Well done,’ she mimicked. ‘It was down there they found the stiff.’ She pointed at where the path split. ‘If we go that way I could show you.’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘Why not? Squeamish, are you? I reckon it was someone who lives close by, the one who done it. I reckon I know who it was.’

  ‘Better tell the police, then.’

  ‘Think it’s funny, do you?’ She spat out the words. ‘Think I’m joking? He’d only been there a few hours, not buried, just covered in branches and that. First you go stiff as a board, then it wears off and the maggots get started. Where d’you live?’

  ‘Cliftonwood.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Just up from Hotwell Road.’

  ‘Lived in Bristol all your life?’

  ‘No, only a few years. You’re not from round here either, are you?’

  She pulled a face. ‘South London, as if you didn’t know. People like you, people who speak like the newsreader on the telly, no one knows where they’re from so they can’t be fitted into nice neat little slots.’

  ‘Everyone fits into some slot or other.’

  ‘Oh, very profound.’ She stared into the distance as though she was thinking about another time. When I told her I was turning back she seemed not to have heard.

  ‘I have to go now.’

  ‘So you said.’ She handed me the lead. ‘Thought like you was visiting a friend.’

  ‘Yes, I am.’ I looked away, unnerved by her angry, staring eyes. ‘Well, see you around I expect.’

  ‘Maybe.’ She took a tissue from the pocket of her shorts and
blew her nose hard, contorting her face as if she was in pain.

  It was crazy, we had only just met, but she was making me feel I was letting her down. Or perhaps it was all in my imagination. It was Aaron she liked, not me, she made a habit of attaching herself to people with golden retrievers.

  ‘Where d’you live?’ I asked.

  ‘Southville.’

  ‘Look, when you were on the bridge … ’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘There are people who can help, people you can talk to.’

  ‘What for? What’s the point?’

  ‘Sometimes telling someone else makes it seem less terrible, helps you to sort things out in your — ’

  ‘Not if you’d done something really bad?’ The defiant expression had disappeared. She looked wretched, despairing. ‘Something you regretted but it was too late.

  What good would it be just talking about it?’

  She started walking away, then stopped, holding up her hand to shade her eyes from the sun. ‘Talking’s a waste of bloody time. Doesn’t alter the past.’ Then she turned, pausing for a moment as though she was listening for sounds in the woods, shook herself, like a dog, and began running down the track — back to the scene of the crime.

  Chapter Three

  The front door was answered by a woman in her late sixties with short thick grey hair, very pale blue eyes, and a round soft-skinned face. She was holding a baby on one hip.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘I was looking for Sandy Haran.’

  The woman hoisted the baby against her shoulder then, when it wriggled and let out a disgruntled squawk, turned it to face me, licking her finger to wipe something sticky off its mouth. ‘Round the back,’ she said. ‘There’s a door with one of those microphone things.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’ She seemed glad of the diversion. People who stay at home looking after babies probably are.

  ‘Lovely baby,’ I said, assuming she was the proud grandmother, ‘is it a boy or a girl?’