The Trebelzue Gate

by Anna Fitzwilliam

  Beyond the gateway a jeep was travelling slowly inside the high wire boundary fence. It moved for a few yards and stopped, and then started up again. The two occupants, young men in United States Marine Corps fatigues, were observing the gathering at the gateway.

  Flight Sergeant Stallwood said ‘It’s the routine guard patrol, M’am. The Americans – their Marines - they do it twenty-four hours a day.’

  ‘Why?’

  He smiled and shrugged and looked to Peter Goodchild to reply.

  ‘The United States Navy has an installation here at RAF St Mawgan. It’s a little – how shall I say – sensitive. The United States Marines are here to guard that installation.’

  Sergeant Bee returned as the jeep drew level with the gateway. Beneath the peaks of their khaki forage caps, the young men stared at him with a blank and intransigent insolence. He was reminded of the expression replicated in scores of custody photographs. He saw too that the faces of the Marines had an unhealthy prison pallor.

  ‘That’s all very well,’ said Monica, ‘but I have a crime scene here which is also rather sensitive.’ She stepped closer to the gate ‘Can I help you?’ she asked in a clear loud voice. Behind her the waiting men shuffled their feet and exchanged smiles and Peter Goodchild murmured ‘Joyce Grenfell to the life.’

  The occupants of the jeep stared back unblinking. The driver reached for a radio receiver and spoke into it in his cupped hand. A reply crackled back. He looked at the group and spoke again and then he revved the engine loudly and the jeep’s tyres rasped at the asphalt as it drove away.

  Monica said ‘Right, well we’ll have a word with these Americans later, if they’re up and down here around the clock.’

  Flight Sergeant Stallwood looked at Peter Goodchild and raised his eyebrows. Monica, intercepting their expressions, asked

  ‘Well? What’s wrong with that?’

  ‘Nothing at all, in principle,’ said Peter Goodchild, ‘Just that it might be easier said than done, that’s all, they like their privacy, our American cousins do.’

  ‘That young woman over there might have liked her privacy too, but death tends to do away with such niceties.’

  She had retorted sharply, before the men could respond the corporal said warningly,

  ‘CO approaching sir.’

  ‘Oh, and so he is, here we go,’ said Peter Goodchild.

  The stance of all the men straightened automatically as an Austin Maxi saloon car with gleaming air force blue paintwork pulled up beyond the gate. On the car’s bonnet a roundel pennant played out in the breeze. The station commander was a broad-shouldered stocky man, he wore his uniform cap slightly up tilted at the front and linked his hands behind his back as he approached. The men saluted and Peter Goodchild made the introductions

  ‘Group Captain Leonard Grimond, Chief Inspector Guard and Detective Sergeant Bee, sir’.

  ‘And we have a corpse on our hands, do we?’ asked the group captain, ‘Is she one of ours?’ There was impatience and the vestige of a Northern accent in his voice.

  ‘No sir, but it is one of the Shute family,’ said Peter Goodchild.

  ‘Marilyn Shute’s family? Christ Almighty, does she know yet?’

  ‘Not yet, Group Captain, my sergeant and I will be informing next of kin shortly. We have asked for complete discretion until then.’

  He turned to look at Monica, his cheeks had patches of purple red, high blood pressure perhaps.

  ‘Of course. What happened, was she hit by a car?’

  ‘No, she was not hit by a car.’

  ‘I see. So, what are we saying then?

  ‘At the moment we are saying that it is a suspicious death.’

  ‘Right. Then this is going to get bloody complicated.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Monica asked. One of the patrol car officers was setting up a screen around the girl’s body.

  ‘What I mean, Chief Inspector, is that the body, strictly speaking, is lying on Ministry of Defence land. We have a TACEVAL imminent, and as soon as it starts the entire station will be in lock down,’

  ‘We are going to need to set up an incident room here, Group Captain,’ she said.

  He edged his watch out from under his shirt cuff to check the time.

  ‘I don’t know about that. Look, you’ll have to excuse me, I have a briefing starting three minutes ago.’

  ‘We will need an incident room,’ she said.

  He had begun to walk away but turned back with frowning annoyance. Each of the men watched as she calmly returned his gaze.

  ‘That could be somewhat difficult, Chief Inspector’.

  ‘Yes well, in my experience, Group Captain, suspicious deaths are invariably somewhat difficult.’

  Still frowning, he turned to Peter Goodchild.

  ‘Look, get something sorted out, will you Peter – talk to OC Admin, get him to make the arrangements, pronto.’

  ‘Sir.’

  The men saluted and they watched as the station commander returned to the Maxi and drove away along the runway perimeter.

  ‘And what is a TACEVAL exactly?’ asked Monica.

  ‘It’s a staged exercise – a tactical evaluation. We have them every so often, and, as the CO said, the whole station goes into lock down.’

  ‘And if it’s not too ingenuous a question, what is it that’s being evaluated?’

  Peter Goodchild smiled, ‘I tell you what, I’ll get back and talk to Bill Gentleman - he’s our OC Admin - and see what we can arrange for an incident room – that SECO hut over there is only used by Supply Flight for storage at present. Perhaps you could call up to SHQ – station headquarters – later on this morning? I’ll send a chitty to the Guardroom at the main gate, to make sure they let you in.’

  ‘Thank you, we’ll do that. Right, Sergeant, I fear we have a family to inform. Where on earth is that medic?’

  ‘Just this minute arrived M’am,’

  ‘Morning all, sorry for the delay, I got stuck behind a blasted milk tanker,’

  Dr David Skerrett’s greeting was brisk and jaunty. He was a lean, tanned, energetic man in late middle age with receding grey brown hair. As he approached them he swung the weight of his medical case from one hand to the other, a jersey was loosely knotted around his shoulders.

  ‘Right, young Bee my boy, show me the corpse.’

  As the doctor stooped to kneel beside the girl’s body his tone and manner were transformed.

  ‘You poor kid,’ he quietly said and gently he lifted a strand of her long blonde hair. On her neck, the ribbon mark left by a ligature was turning to the colour of blackberries which are soon to ripen. As he carried out his inspection, Dr Skerrett spoke continuously but softly, as though she might be a deep sleeper who should not be disturbed. He spoke too quietly for the others to tell whether he was talking to himself or to the dead girl or to record on the Dictaphone he had taken from his case. When he stood up again Monica saw that the summer grass had marked green patches on the knees of his corduroy trousers.

  ‘Any idea of time?’ she asked.

  ‘At a guess I’d say six to eight hours. As soon as Forensics give the okay, I’ll have her moved into town, I can do the PM at Newquay Hospital.’

  ‘Good, we can bring the next of kin there. Now, sergeant, seeing as our victim is apparently so easily identifiable, we’d better get to the family before someone else tells them. We’ll take my car, but would you mind driving – you know the coast road better than me I’m sure.’

  To their right as they drove, the beaches were almost deserted, the sand the colour of Madeira cake. Here and there the unending blue of the sea was scuffed white with wave movements.

  ‘What was your last one, sergeant?’ Monica asked.

  ‘Last murder? It was a farmer, up Liskeard way, found in his car in a lay by.’

  ‘Was it a straightforward case?’

  ‘Not really, but then when is it ever …’

  ‘Indeed. Now, am I right in thinking that there’s been
an incident involving a young woman on the air station before, an attack?’

  ‘There was something, but it was before your time, a couple of years back … and we made precious little headway on it …’

  ‘I gathered as much. Since I arrived I’ve been going over the serious crime case files from the last five years. Make sure the reports are pulled for us when we get back to the station, can you?’

  The road descended towards a beach edged by grey concrete breeze blocks. Sand had been shuffled and blown into drifts at the base of the wall. In the drifts there were discarded paper wrappers and cigarette ends and a single green rubber flip flop. As the road rose again he said

  ‘That’s the Mermaid Hotel up ahead, halfway up the hill.’

  Monica saw a square granite building standing sideways on to the road. It was Georgian, she thought, or early Victorian, outside major cities the style of architecture is often several decades behind. It must once have been a substantial private home, built perhaps by a man who had made his fortune from the sea and ships and wished to keep an eye on the horizon. Sergeant Bee swung the Clubman into the large car park behind the hotel.

  ‘It’s a sizeable place,’ she observed.

  ‘It’s a sizeable business. They’ve got the bars, and the letting rooms and restaurant and then all this carry on outside in the summer’.

  Above the car park there was a terraced garden with picnic tables and children’s swings and a slide formed as a tree trunk with a grotesque face. A round wooden building was clad in bamboo with a sign reading The Shack Bar.

  ‘And it all belongs to our victim’s family?’

  ‘The mother, yes, she carried it on after the husband died. She’s in partnership with another couple, they’re foreign, Dutch, I think. They’ve got this place, and the Old Parsonage in St Columb Major – that’s a kind of country club – and there’s the caravan park out Trenant Woods way. They’re big employers locally. We’ll go in the side entrance, the front door won’t be unlocked till opening time.’

  The sergeant pushed open the half-glazed door. On the glass there were stickers with tourist guide recommendations and star ratings. The hall carpet had a large red and gold pattern. There was a wide staircase with a heavy oak balustrade and a smell of bacon on the air. A small woman in a pale green nylon overall emerged from the kitchen carrying plates of fried breakfast. She paused to look at them with busy black brown eyes.

  ‘No vacancies,’ she said, ‘Full up,’

  ‘Actually, we’re here to see Mrs Shute,’ Monica replied.

  ‘You’ll need to ask at Reception then.’

  They followed the direction of her nod along the hall. On the walls there were racks of brightly coloured leaflets about local attractions and framed photographs of pilot gig races and aircraft in display formation. An image of the Red Arrows was scrawled over with the autographs of the pilots.

  Behind the reception desk sat a young woman with short blonde hair and black framed glasses. She was talking on the telephone and writing in a bookings diary. While she was speaking she looked them over, unsmiling.

  ‘That’s all arranged then, Mr Taylor, twin room for the weekend of the 21st. We’ll look forward to seeing you and Mrs Taylor then.’

  To Mr Taylor on the other end of the line she must have sounded youthful and bright and engaged, but they saw that her complexion was tired and dull against the white of her polo neck sweater and that the set of her mouth was dissatisfied. When she had replaced the receiver, she pushed the glasses up onto her head and they were both startled to see her sudden and marked resemblance to the dead girl.

  ‘We’ve no vacancies I’m afraid,’ she said.

  ‘We’re here to see Mrs Shute. I’m Chief Inspector Guard and this is Detective Sergeant Bee,’

  ‘I’m Mrs Shute’s daughter, can I help you?’

  ‘Is Mrs Shute here? We do need to speak to her rather urgently.’

  She looked at them for a moment longer then stood up and pushed open the door to an office behind her.

  ‘There’s the police here to see you,’

  She leant against the door for them to enter and then stepped back. The sergeant said

  ‘Actually, Miss, it might be better if you stayed,’

  At the office desk a carefully groomed woman in her fifties was using an adding machine. Her hair, the colour of set honey, was backcombed and lacquered, a navy-blue cardigan was draped around the shoulders of her crisp shirtwaister dress. She looked up questioningly and did not entirely conceal her impatience at being disturbed.

  ‘We are here about your daughter, Mrs Shute,’ said Monica.

  ‘Which one? I have three.’

  ‘And may I ask the names of your daughters?’

  ‘Their names? Alexa, Roxanna and Amanda, this is Roxanna. What is this about, Inspector?’

  ‘We’re here to see you about Amanda,’

  Roxanna said, ‘Oh for God’s sake, what’s she done now?’

  ‘When did you last see Amanda, Mrs Shute?’

  ‘Good Lord, I don’t know, she comes and she goes. She wasn’t on shift yesterday evening, when was she last here, would you say, Roxanna?’

  ‘I saw her yesterday, I think, when I was stock checking the Shack. She was just coming out of the chalet,’

  ‘And what time would that have been, Miss?’

  ‘I don’t know, half four maybe,’

  ‘Look, what is this all about?’

  ‘I am afraid I have some very bad news, Mrs Shute. The body of a young woman was found this morning, we believe that it may be that of your daughter, Amanda.’

  Mrs Shute stood up behind the desk. Although her groomed and statuesque deportment was maintained, as she assimilated the shock of Monica’s words the true age of her face and the artifices of her appearance were revealed without mercy. She turned to Roxanna,

  ‘I think I would like a brandy,’ she said, ‘Get me one, would you,’

  Roxanna opened a satinwood cupboard behind the desk.

  Sergeant Bee moved the chair for her to sit down again.

  ‘I’m quite all right, thank you,’ she said. She shook her head once as though to reorient her bearings and twitched at the edges of the cardigan. Roxanna handed her the brandy, she took a mouthful and motioned at the cupboard ‘Perhaps you had better pour one for yourself. When did this happen, Inspector?’

  ‘At some time during last night, we don’t yet have confirmation,’

  ‘Was it her driving?’ asked Roxanna.

  ‘No, Miss, she wasn’t in a car, she was found by the roadside,’ said Sergeant Bee.

  Roxanna frowned ‘Look, it’s Mrs, actually …’

  Mrs Shute set her empty glass on the desk ‘So, what are you saying then, that she was knocked down?’

  Monica said ‘No, Mrs Shute, I’m sorry to tell you that we believe your daughter was murdered.’

  Roxanna drew in her breath in a gasp and put out a hand to her mother’s shoulder.

  Her mother did not respond. Her expression was fixed on a point in the wall beyond them.

  ‘We will need you to make a formal identification, Mrs Shute,’ said Monica, ‘if you could accompany us to the hospital at Newquay?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course,’ she stood up.

  ‘Do you want me to come with you, Mum?’

  She looked at her daughter, considering.

  Then ‘No,’ she said, ‘No, you will need to stay here and run things. I think I would like Conrad to come with me. Yes, I would like Conrad to come. See if he’s back from Jersey, would you, he was due to fly in last night and come down on the sleeper. I’ll go and collect my things.’

  Roxanna followed her mother out of the office. Sergeant Bee looked questioningly at Monica, she gave a nod and he edged his foot to keep the door ajar. They watched Roxanna use the switchboard telephone. Her call was answered by a gruff, accented male voice. She said

  ‘Conrad, something’s happened, something awful, Mum needs you to come over,’


  When she came back into the office Monica asked

  ‘Who is Conrad?’

  ‘Conrad Gerstmann. He’s my mother’s business partner, he and his wife Maria.’

  ‘Do you work here with your mother all the time, Miss – sorry it’s not Miss is it?’ the sergeant asked.

  Roxanna had taken a cigarette from a box on the desk.

  ‘No, it’s not, it’s Mrs, Mrs Blencowe. And yes, I’ve worked here since my divorce. I have two children, I fit in the hours around them.’

  ‘And Amanda, did she work here too?’

  ‘Yes, when the mood took her. She worked between our sites - sometimes she helped out at Trenant Woodlands, that’s our caravan park and campsite, or at the Old Parsonage in St Columb, sometimes here.’

  ‘And do you all live here?’

  ‘No, I live in a house down the hill with the children. My mother has a small suite upstairs. Amanda had the chalet flat over the garage. Not that she was ever there much.’

  ‘And your other sister, Alexa is it?’

  ‘She’s got her own business. A boutique, in Truro. She lives with her boyfriend, at Grampound Road.’

  ‘Why wasn’t Amanda there much? In her flat?’ asked Monica.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know, Amanda was always out and about. And if she did a late shift at the Old Parsonage she’d stay there.’

  ‘Were you close, as sisters, Mrs Blencowe?’

  Roxanna took a deep drag from the cigarette, exhaled the smoke in a fierce burst and then stubbed it out irritably.

  ‘Not really, no. I suppose it’s Alexa that gets on best with Amanda.’

  Mrs Shute appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Conrad’s on his way, Mum.’

  ‘Good. I think I shall wait out in the car park, I would like some fresh air – you don’t mind, Inspector?’

  ‘Not at all, we’ll come with you. And Mrs Blencowe, perhaps you could show Sergeant Bee to your sister’s accommodation - we’ll need to put seals on it for the time being.’

  At the door Mrs Shute paused, ‘Roxanna, keep it from the guests for as long as you can, will you? And the staff, you know how they gossip.’

  ‘What about Alexa, Mum?’