by James Raven
She picked her handbag up off the floor and took from it a sheet of folded A4 paper.
‘I’ve kept it all these years,’ she said. ‘I’m sure it’s the reason Kent police didn’t put much effort into finding her.’
She handed the sheet to Temple. It was a print-out of the email from her mother.
Dear Ruth
I want you to know that Ethan has left me and I feel terribly depressed. There’s no one here to help me through it so I’ve decided to start my life all over again. I’m selling the house and all my jewellery, so I’ll have enough cash to go anywhere in the world. I won’t tell you where I’m going because I need to be completely by myself for a while. Perhaps if you were here for me things would be bearable, but you’re not and I wouldn’t dream of dragging you away from your perfect life in Australia. So don’t worry about me. I’ll get back in touch in the not too distant future to let you know how and where I am.
Your loving mother xx
‘It’s a strange note,’ Temple said, handing the sheet to Vaughan.
‘It came from my mother’s email account but I can’t be a hundred per cent sure that she wrote it.’
‘So do you think she went off with Kane and that’s why she doesn’t want anyone to know?’
‘I think it’s quite likely,’ she said. ‘My mother’s never been one for grand gestures and she doesn’t like taking risks. In fact, she hates change, which partly accounts for why she was so upset when I moved away.’
‘What about her friends? Couldn’t they have shed light on what happened?’
‘She didn’t have any friends in Kent. She suffered from severe bouts of depression, so she didn’t work and hardly ever went out. And the house was in the country and quite remote so she had no close neighbours. It was after I left that she decided to try to meet someone through the dating sites.’
‘So what did you do after receiving this email?’
‘I tried to contact her but she didn’t respond to phone calls or emails. After a week or so, I asked a friend of mine in Kent to go to the house and that’s when I heard back that it had been sold. I came back to England a week later and went to the police. It was then I discovered that they were looking for Kane because he hadn’t reported to his probation officer. But they insisted there was no evidence to suggest that my mother had run away with him.’
‘So what happened next?’
She heaved her shoulders. ‘Before I went back to Australia I made my own enquiries. I talked to her bank and the estate agent who sold her house. The estate agent only met her once but he said she seemed fine and she told him she was going abroad to live. She lowered the price substantially to secure a quick sale.’
‘What about the bank?’
‘Well, all they could tell me was that my mother withdrew all her savings in cash – about £١٠,٠٠٠ – in the weeks leading up to when she sold the house. Then when the money from the sale came through, she used it almost immediately to buy gold from a dealer in London. Days later she disappeared and got a house clearing firm to take away all the furniture.’
‘Did the bank not think it odd that your mother was withdrawing so much cash?’
‘Not until I raised it with them. Then they looked back at all the withdrawals to make sure they were in order. And they were.’
‘What about her credit cards?’
‘She only had one and she used it right up to the day she disappeared. According to Kent police, she paid off the entire balance and closed the account.’
Temple pondered for a few moments what he’d been told. He could see why Ruth Kogan was worried about her mother, but at the same time he wasn’t convinced that finding her would lead them to Kane.
It was obviously the same conclusion that Kent police had come to. But to them Kane would have been a low-priority perp, and they would have been reluctant to commit too many man-hours and resources to finding him.
But now things were different. Kane was a suspect in a series of kidnappings and murders, and it was necessary to explore every lead – no matter how tenuous – in the hope of tracking him down.
‘What you’ve told us is really useful, Mrs Kogan,’ he said. ‘I agree that it’s possible your mother went off somewhere with Ethan Kane, and I hope that when we find him it will solve that mystery for you, one way or the other.’
‘I hope so too, Inspector. I just want to know that she’s all right.’
‘Of course you do. And I promise to contact you if we come up with anything. You’re living in Aldershot now, I take it.’
‘Yes, we are. We left Australia nine months ago after my husband was offered a job in London. We’re renting at the moment because we can’t decide whether or not to stay permanently.’
Temple asked her if she had contact information for the bank and estate agent her mother had dealt with. She said she did and pulled out her mobile phone.
Temple then turned to Vaughan and asked him to get in touch with them.
‘It’s a long shot, I know,’ he said. ‘But there might be something that was missed at the time by Kent police. And check to see if Miss Bellamy used a firm of solicitors to sell the house. She may well have given them some indication where she was going.’
After providing the details, Ruth Kogan asked Temple if he wanted to see a photo of her mother.
‘Of course,’ he said.
She held up her phone and he saw an attractive, middle-aged woman with an oval face framed by long, dark hair.
‘I can’t help feeling responsible,’ she said, choking back tears. ‘If I hadn’t gone away, then she would probably never have met Ethan Kane and would still be at home.’
‘You weren’t to know what would happen,’ Temple said.
‘But I do know one thing,’ she said. ‘I know my mother wouldn’t just go away and not stay in contact. So either someone is stopping her from getting in touch or else she’s dead.’
42
They found the fourth grave at 11 a.m. that morning. The search team had been at it for five hours when an object showed up on the radar equipment three feet below ground.
The news spread like wildfire. TV reporters did their live links directly from the scene and Temple and his detectives watched it on the screens in the incident room.
The location was a forest glade north of the village of Minstead. There were two names against the spot on Mason’s map – Joseph Pearson and Heidi Frobisher. They were an engaged couple in their twenties who had disappeared fifteen months ago. It was believed they had gone out for a drive one Thursday afternoon when they both had a day off work. Their abandoned car was found near their home in Poole, just west of the New Forest.
Temple felt compelled to go and check it out on the way to Tom Fowler’s house, where he planned to join in the execution of the search warrant.
He told the duty solicitor that he wouldn’t be interviewing Fowler formally until the afternoon. By then, they would hopefully have finished the search of the house and decided whether he should remain in the frame.
He told the rest of the team to focus their efforts on finding Ethan Kane, which meant chasing down all his relatives and known acquaintances.
‘He’s the prime suspect,’ he said. ‘From the sound of it he’s as crazy and sadistic as Mason was. They would have made a formidable pairing. He hasn’t been seen for almost three years since he walked out on his girlfriend and jumped probation. The dates on Mason’s map go back about two years so we have to consider the possibility that Kane came down here to live near his former cellmate and together they embarked on a killing spree.’
Temple drove to the forest on autopilot as his brain struggled to assimilate the thoughts that were crashing through it. He found it difficult to focus because there were too many distractions. Helicopters flew overhead, police cars were everywhere and army trucks thundered along the country roads.
It was dry outside and the sky was a steely grey. Yet for a Sunday, the forest was not at all busy. There
were few cyclists and hikers and the parking areas were virtually empty
It made Temple feel distinctly uneasy. To him, the forest had always been a place of natural beauty and tranquillity, where locals and visitors alike felt safe and secure.
But from now on many people would probably find it hostile and threatening. The landscape had been blighted by the blood of Mason’s victims.
And it would be hard for them not to wonder just how many other gruesome secrets were buried beneath the woods and heathlands.
The grave near Minstead contained the remains of two more people.
Temple felt his heart give a single heavy thump as he stared down at the dirt-smothered skeletons. There was no doubt in his mind that he was looking at Joseph Pearson and Heidi Frobisher.
He couldn’t remember what they had looked like even though he’d seen their photographs along with all the other missing persons. And that made him feel bad.
Around him the scene was one of semi-organized chaos. There was the usual band of white-suited SOCOs, plus officers in uniform and a group of soldiers armed with shovels instead of weapons.
It was almost surreal.
Once again, the grave was close to a visitor car park that was now packed with vehicles and hordes of reporters. Temple reflected on how strange it was that the scene was being repeated at six other locations throughout the forest. So many graves and so many bodies, the cruel legacy of two sadistic killers who had used the area as their own personal hunting ground.
Temple made a visual assessment of the scene and spoke to those in charge. He was introduced to a forensic anthropologist, who’d been called in to examine the bones and who confirmed that the remains were those of a man and a woman.
As Temple walked back to the car park, a dozen reporters closed in around him, microphones out.
He pushed past them without answering any of their questions and was relieved when he got to his car. Once behind the wheel, he closed his eyes and felt his body grow rigid. A coldness gnawed at his gut and his breath came out in shudders.
He knew that it was a reaction to what he’d seen over the past couple of days. He had witnessed the exhumation of no less than six corpses. And it was all the more distressing because he’d seen most of them on video being abused and tortured before they’d been put to death.
Temple headed south from Minstead towards East Boldre, a distance of about five miles.
On the way, he passed the scene of another search operation, this one near a beauty spot called Honey Hill. There was police presence on the road and off to the left, he saw soldiers gathered in the car park. But he didn’t stop because he assumed they hadn’t yet come across a grave.
As he drove, the events of the past few days ran through his head on fast-forward. It had started out as a straightforward missing person case and was now something that would be talked about and analyzed by criminologists for years to come.
But despite all the resources they had been throwing at the investigation, Bob and Rosemary Hamilton were still unaccounted for.
It was hard for Temple not to fear the worst, but harder still for him to accept defeat. He was clinging to the hope that if they found Mason’s accomplice, then they would find the Hamiltons.
43
The sun was threatening to break through the clouds as Temple arrived at Fowler’s house. Two police vehicles and a SOC van were parked on the road out front.
Temple pulled onto the grass verge opposite the driveway entrance. He got out and held back from crossing the road to let a car approaching from the right drive by.
But the car slowed down and pulled onto the verge behind his car. He frowned when he realized that it was the blue Vauxhall Corsa he’d seen on Amanda Cross’s driveway. Her brother Noah was sitting behind the wheel.
Temple stepped up to the car on the driver’s side and Cross lowered his window.
‘Hello, Inspector,’ he said. ‘I didn’t expect to see you here.’
‘I could say the same about you, Mr Cross.’
‘I tried phoning Tom this morning to find out what happened to him last night. When he didn’t answer or return my calls, I thought I’d drive over and see if he was in.’ He pointed his chin at the house. ‘So what’s going on? Is Tom inside?’
‘Mr Fowler is still in custody,’ Temple replied. ‘We’ve obtained a warrant to search his house and that’s now in progress.’
‘Why are you doing that? All he did was throw a tantrum in a pub.’
‘I’m afraid I can’t say anymore, Mr Cross. So I suggest you get on with your business and I’m sure you’ll learn in due course what’s going on.’
Temple moved away before Cross could ask another question. He hurried across the road and up Fowler’s driveway. He entered the house after he was kitted out with a forensic suit complete with hood and boot covers.
Inside, the SOCOs and detectives were painstakingly searching every room. The senior crime scene officer was a DC named Rory MacBride. Clean-shaven, fair-haired, bad complexion. He responded to Temple’s questions in a rich, West Highland accent.
‘The loft is hardly big enough to swing a cat in,’ he said. ‘And there doesn’t appear to be a basement. So I think it’s safe to say that this isn’t where the victims were held while they were being tortured and abused.’
‘Are you sure about the basement?’ Temple said. ‘I’ve been in a few houses where the entrance to the basement was concealed.’
MacBride shrugged. ‘Well, if there is a door we haven’t found it yet and we’ve looked bloody hard enough.’
‘What about the garden and the woods in the immediate area?’
‘It doesn’t look as though any of the earth in the back garden has been disturbed recently. We haven’t yet checked out the woods and fields around the house.’
Temple went from room to room and was struck by how bland the place was. The walls throughout were the same dull shade of grey and there were very few pictures to brighten them up. There were no carpets upstairs, just untreated floorboards that creaked when anyone walked on them.
Temple was surprised that a man who made his living as an estate agent hadn’t put more effort into making his own home more comfortable.
One of the bedrooms was being used as an office with an old teak desk and a couple of Ikea filing cabinets against the wall. On the desk sat two laptop computers and a SOCO was checking both of them.
‘Why has he got two of those?’ Temple said.
The SOCO looked up and shrugged.
‘That’s what I’m about to find out, sir. One’s a Mac and quite new. The other’s a top-of-the-range Dell, so he might like to switch between the two. Are we sure that Tom Fowler lived here alone?’
‘As far as we know he did.’
‘Well the Mac definitely belongs to him,’ the SOCO said as he tapped at the keyboard. ‘His name’s on documents and email accounts.’
The SOCO turned his attention to the Dell which had also been fired up.
Temple decided to leave him to it and stepped towards the door. But just as he was leaving the room, the SOCO said, ‘Holy shit.’
Temple stopped in the doorway and snapped to attention.
‘What is it?’ he said.
The SOCO swivelled in his chair to face Temple and gestured towards the laptop.
‘This one doesn’t belong to Fowler.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because it’s crowded with documents created by Grant Mason, including book manuscripts and correspondence between him and his publisher. I reckon this could have been stolen from Mason’s house the night you were attacked there.’
Temple felt the blood stop pumping through his veins. But before he could react, he heard MacBride yelling for him to come downstairs.
He hurried down and was summoned outside where a group of SOCOs were gathered around a wheelie bin. On the ground next to the bin were spread the contents of a black plastic bag.
‘The bin had been left at the
bottom of the driveway so the rubbish could be collected,’ MacBride said. ‘When we checked it, we found those blood-soaked clothes.’
There was a small pile of clothes amongst the rubbish. Temple’s eyes were drawn to a purple sweater with black stripes on it.
He was pretty sure it was the one Rosemary Hamilton had been wearing on the day she disappeared.
44
Temple placed two transparent evidence bags on the table in the interview room. One contained the blood-soaked sweater from the wheelie bin on Fowler’s driveway. The other contained Grant Mason’s laptop.
‘We found these during the search of your property, Mr Fowler,’ Temple said. ‘Can you explain how they got there?’
Fowler stared at the bags for a few seconds through narrowed eyes. Then he switched his gaze fearfully between Temple and Vaughan.
‘What the fuck is this?’ he said.
His lawyer, who was sitting next to him, put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. His name was Ralph Lister. He was bald, with sharp features and a sharp mind.
‘It’s best if you just answer the question,’ he told his client.
Fowler’s eyes shifted back to the table. He leaned forwards, his squint becoming more pronounced.
‘The laptop isn’t mine,’ he said. ‘I’m not even sure what that other thing is.’
‘It’s a woman’s sweater,’ Temple said. ‘And it has quite a lot of blood on it.’
Fowler raised his eyes and shook his head. ‘I’ve never seen it before. In fact, I’ve never seen either of them. They couldn’t have been in my house.’
Fowler’s hangover had worn off but if anything he looked even worse than he had that morning. His clothes had been taken away for forensic examination and he was wearing an ill-fitting jumpsuit.
He and his lawyer had been told that he was now being questioned in connection with the murders of at least four people, plus the abduction of Bob and Rosemary Hamilton. The lawyer had been given time to brief his client before the interview started, but they hadn’t been told until now what the search had turned up.
