Against the Tide

by Stephen Puleston

  A bead of sweat formed under both armpits as Drake entered the senior management suite. Hannah examined his shirt and tie carefully as he stood by her desk. ‘You’re a minute late.’

  Drake sat down to wait. All he could think of was the practical difficulties of tracing the girls in the photographs on Fairburn’s computer. Each of them had mothers and fathers, maybe sisters and brothers. There were young lives that had been corrupted. It might take them days or weeks to trace all the girls. The enormity of the task began to overwhelm him and they still had no clear motive for the murders.

  ‘Ian.’ Price stood in the doorway and waved a hand over at Drake.

  Drake got up and followed the superintendent back into his office. Price had the local newspaper open on his desk; its headline proclaimed – serial killer loose on holiday island. ‘The press are having a field day. You’d better have something positive to tell me.’

  Price waved to one of the visitor chairs as an invitation for Drake to sit down.

  ‘We’ve found dozens of photographs of young naked girls on the computer owned by Rhys Fairburn.’

  Price raised his eyebrows.

  ‘There’s a photograph of Rhys Fairburn and Maldwyn Evans. And another of a man we can’t identify. He had his back to the camera and he was moving out of the shot.’

  ‘So who took the photograph?’ Price said eventually.

  ‘That’s what we need to find out. I’m convinced that Somerset de Northway is involved. We have an eyewitness who saw him move furniture out of the cottage the day after Jane was killed. And his wife had lent money to Maldwyn Evans. We’re almost certain that these photographs were taken in one of his cottages.

  ‘Well, you had better be really careful. You know how well connected de Northway is.’

  Drake paused. ‘We’ll need to speak to Judge Hawkins.’

  ‘What!’ Price snorted. ‘You must be joking.’

  ‘Two men in the Cambrian Club photographs have been killed and another kills himself. There are two other men in the pictures – de Northway and Hawkins.’

  ‘But that’s too random,’ Price said. ‘You can’t go around questioning all the members of the Cambrian Club.’

  ‘Evans and Fairburn are pictured with the girls.’

  Price shook his head, exasperation evident in his eyes. ‘You’ve got nothing to suggest de Northway or Hawkins could be the perpetrators. Nothing at all. You haven’t given me one shred of credible motive.’

  Drake hesitated for a moment. ‘I was thinking of them as possible victims too.’

  *

  Drake fiddled with the air conditioning in the Alfa, cursing its unreliability, which meant occasionally he had to turn it to maximum before it would engage. Superintendent Price had his jacket and cap laid over his knees in the passenger seat. A film of perspiration gathered on Drake’s forehead, but by the time he pulled out onto the A55 the air conditioning was blowing a stream of cool air into the car. Apprehension filled his mind as he powered the car eastwards.

  During the half-hour car journey Price rehearsed aloud all the matters he wanted to raise with Judge Hawkins and hearing them out loud only exacerbated Drake’s anxiety. Prosecutions for historic sexual offences and child abuse could be difficult; abusers close ranks, protect their own, knowing that the girls would want to move on, forget about the past. And how did the abuse link to the murder of Mostyn and Fairburn? Maybe they had missed something, and perhaps it was all linked to the sale of the land. Money can be a strong motive, Drake thought.

  He pulled into the car park at the rear of the crown court building. After pressing the intercom a voice crackled and Price asked for the judge’s clerk. The door buzzed open and a thin woman in her mid-fifties held out her hand. ‘Francis Wadham,’ she said. ‘I’m Judge Hawkins’s clerk.’

  Price shrugged on his uniform jacket and tucked his cap under his arm. Drake fastened both buttons of his suit. Despite the warmth outside, the building was cool. Two flights of stairs later Wadham pointed to a couple of chairs and they sat down as she punched a code into the security pad.

  Moments later the door opened. ‘Judge will see you now,’ Wadham said.

  They followed her towards a door with the notice ‘Judge’s Chambers’ screwed to the middle. Judge Hawkins sat by a large oak desk, a tray with a stainless steel teapot and a china tea set having been pushed to one corner. The red gown of a circuit judge hung on a wooden coat stand, his wig placed in an oval tin box on top of a nearby cupboard. Wadham directed them towards the chairs at the conference table, which were at right angles to the desk.

  ‘Good morning, Superintendent.’ Hawkins sounded affable.

  ‘Good morning, Your Honour.’ Price put his cap neatly on the conference table in front of him. ‘This is Detective Inspector Ian Drake.’

  Hawkins gave him a brief nod. The judge’s face looked older than in the photograph Drake had in the folder he was holding. There were pouches either side of his chin and the hair was grey, less healthy.

  ‘I hope this won’t take long. I’m needed back in court.’

  ‘DI Drake is the SIO in three recent murders. Ed Mostyn was killed four weeks ago and yesterday a man called Rhys Fairburn was found dead. Exactly the same MO and both men were members of a Cambrian Club.’

  Drake thought he caught a glimmer of recognition crossing the judge’s eyes.

  ‘Both dead men had photographs of a Cambrian Club dinner taken several years ago.’ Price nodded at Drake. He opened the folder and pushed one of the photographs towards the judge.

  ‘I believe, Judge, that you were present at the same dinner.’

  Hawkins pulled himself nearer the desk, threaded the fingers of both hands together and dropped them onto the desk with a thump. ‘Let me be absolutely clear as to what you’re suggesting.’

  The superintendent ran his tongue over his lips and blinked repeatedly before asking, ‘How well do you know the men in these photographs?’

  ‘I’m sure you know full well that I was in the army with Somerset de Northway.’ The judge’s cut-glass accent reminded Drake of the documentaries from the 1950s. He gave the photograph a cursory examination. ‘And I was certainly at that dinner. But as for the other men…’ He shook his head.

  ‘Apart from this dinner, did you ever meet Ed Mostyn or Maldwyn Evans or Rhys Fairburn?’

  Hawkins sat back in his chair. ‘No, I don’t believe I have.’

  ‘Between both murders a young girl was killed. And it’s become clear that she was abused in a paedophile ring when she was under sixteen.’

  Hawkins raised his voice. ‘Are you suggesting that I might—’

  ‘If there’s a link, Judge, then you might be a target,’ Price said.

  Drake saw the aggression on Hawkins’s face evaporate as he frowned.

  *

  Drake switched on the lamp and slumped into the chair by his desk. Until the previous weekend it was the time of day when he’d be leaving headquarters for home. He reached for the handset and dialled home, at least what he still considered to be home.

  Sian sounded distracted. ‘How are you coping, Ian?’

  ‘Okay. I was ringing to talk to Helen and Megan.’

  ‘Give me a minute.’

  Drake flicked through the emails his inbox as he waited. A memorandum of the conversation with Price caught his attention, as did various emails from Assistant Chief Constable Osmond in Cardiff asking for the latest developments. He scanned a dozen emails that had no relevance for him. It always struck him that it was far too easy to c.c. irrelevant recipients in the vain hope that nobody would be left out and therefore complain.

  Helen’s voice broke his concentration and he asked about her day. After a couple of minutes of stilted conversation she passed the handset over to Megan, who sounded more relaxed. He rang off, promising to see her on Saturday.

  A tranquil silence from the Incident Room seeped into Drake’s office. He fired off emails to Winder and Howick about the house-to-hous
e enquires they needed to coordinate next to Fairburn’s farmhouse. Occasionally a telephone rang somewhere in the building and then the dull humming of a vacuum signalled the cleaners starting their nightshift. He turned his attention back to the emails in his inbox. Then it struck him: would Rhys Fairburn have been comfortable using emails and the Internet?

  It took him almost twenty minutes to find the right computer, the one that held Fairburn’s data. There were two email addresses, one for Fairburn – RhysFairburnfarmwr@gmail.com and another for his wife, both linked to a Microsoft Outlook account. Drake scanned through the various emails, not certain what should be catching his attention. There were emails from members of the Cambrian Club about social events and then emails from friends and his children. Fairburn had booked a holiday in Spain the following Easter and there was a flurry of emails confirming the arrangements.

  After an hour Drake rubbed his eyes vigorously but the tiredness remained. He found an old Filofax-style notebook in a box of battered files and old magazines that one of the team had removed from Fairburn’s house. He flicked through the various pages. There were contact names, telephone numbers and the occasional address, including Dafydd Higham’s business and Somerset de Northway again. Someone in the team would have to construct a matrix of all the people involved in the investigation and how they were linked. This was a small community, where people would know each other, and their secrets. How many scandals were buried in the pages?

  By the time he reached the final page Drake had a troublesome sense that he’d missed something. But it was late and he needed to sleep. He went back to the beginning and he turned the pages more slowly this time. If he had missed something he needed to spot it quickly, otherwise Winder or Howick could check everything again tomorrow.

  By the second page he’d found a list of email addresses. He paused. There was an address for sden@gmail.com, which he knew he’d missed and it gave him a brief sense of achievement. Further down Drake read rjf@gmail.com. He checked all the records relating to Fairburn and smiled to himself when he discovered that Fairburn’s middle name was John. If it was Fairburn’s email address, it hadn’t been linked to the Outlook account and Drake began to feel his pulse increasing.

  He accessed the Internet from Fairburn’s computer and then found Gmail. He typed in the email address and held his breath. The box marked ‘password’ was automatically populated with a line of asterisks. Drake hesitated and then clicked ‘OK,’ praying the computer would have been programmed to remember any password.

  ‘Yes,’ he said out loud, as the monitor screen opened in a new page. He made a brief tapping motion with a clenched fist like a tennis player pleased with the outcome of a difficult shot.

  He moved nearer to the monitor and paid far more attention to these emails than the ones in the Outlook account. He didn’t keep track of time until he read one very clear, very specific email. Then he knew that tomorrow would be another long day.

  Chapter 32

  ‘He gave me the morning off.’

  Drake stared at Becky, who was fidgeting in the chair and checking the time on her watch repeatedly. There were loose ends that he had to check that morning and he’d arrived at her home before she was properly awake.

  ‘Are you certain?’

  ‘Of course. It was the day that Ed Mostyn was killed. I got to work at lunchtime. Everything seemed normal.’

  ‘Does he give you time off regularly?’

  Becky yawned and patted her hand on her mouth. ‘Not really. Look, I’m late already.’

  Drake stood up, thanked her and left, pleased that another small part of Llywelyn’s life had fallen into place.

  Drake drove through the narrow country lanes to the home of Eifion Cooper, hoping that his second meeting that morning would resolve another loose thread. Mostyn had made a will, even though all record of it had disappeared, and the possibility that Cooper knew something had preyed on Drake’s mind.

  That morning’s Welsh language news programme was playing on the radio inside the yard at Eifion Cooper’s house. Drake recognised the voice of the Welsh government’s health minister complaining bitterly that the criticism by the London government of the health service in Wales had everything to do with party politics and nothing to do with the correct statistics. At least it was a change from the regular criticism of the policing powers that had been devolved from London to Wales.

  Drake banged on the door before undoing the latch.

  Eifion Cooper squinted as the smoke from the cigarette clasped between his lips crawled up his face. He sat on an old box fiddling with the bottom of a lobster pot. Cooper took the cigarette from his lips. ‘I didn’t expect to see you back so soon.’

  Drake took a couple of steps into the yard. ‘Did you know that Ed had made a will in which you were given a legacy?’

  Cooper threw the remains of the cigarette onto the concrete by his feet and rubbed the butt with the sole of his boot. ‘And you think I killed him because of that?’

  ‘I’m asking whether you knew about the will?’

  ‘He mentioned that he was going to look after me, but I didn’t pay it much attention. He could be full of bullshit.’

  ‘Did he say anything else about his personal affairs?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Did he ever mention financial problems?’

  Drake could see from the look in Cooper’s eyes that he had something to add.

  ‘What did he tell you?’

  ‘It’s nothing.’

  ‘Let me be the judge of that. We’re talking about a man’s life here.’

  ‘It must have been about a year ago when he said that de Northway had offered him a lot of money for the house. Ed couldn’t make out what was going on. Apparently de Northway used a load of bollocks like “family land”, and that for centuries they’d owned Ed’s place – even though Ed had a secured tenancy. He’d spent thousands on the cottage over the years. And he always paid his nominal rent on time.’

  ‘How much money did de Northway offer him?’

  Cooper shrugged. ‘He didn’t tell me.’

  ‘How much did you think it was?’

  ‘Ed never told me. He had so much fishing gear, he didn’t think he could find somewhere else suitable.’

  Cooper rolled another cigarette and, as Drake gathered his thoughts, he wondered how Somerset de Northway with an ailing business could afford to buy out Ed Mostyn. Somewhere in the middle of this investigation he hoped that he could pull together all the right threads.

  ‘I’ll need a statement from you.’

  It took three sparks from an almost empty lighter before Cooper could draw on the next cigarette. ‘Yeah, whatever.’

  Drake drew the door closed behind him and retraced his steps to the car. He’d parked in exactly the same spot as he had done before, opposite the terraced houses. The car had been sandwiched tightly between a large estate car and a small hatchback. He checked that the bumpers front and back had not been damaged and then calculated that one of the cars would have to move for him to manoeuvre. He looked over at the terraces and noticed that the door of the end house was open. A woman’s voice floated out from inside and then a man appeared in the doorway. Drake walked over. ‘Is that your estate car in front of my Alfa? Only it’s in my way.’

  The man glanced over Drake’s shoulder. ‘It’s my wife’s.’ He shouted into the house. ‘Nerys, you’ll need to move your car.’

  He turned to Drake. ‘Sorry about that. We’re just sorting a few things.’

  ‘Is it your father who lives here?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘The elderly gentleman who lives here. I spoke to him last week when I called to see Eifion Cooper.’

  ‘I think you’re mistaken.’

  ‘No. We had a chat. He was making porridge in the back kitchen. And he knew my father – quite a coincidence really.’

  ‘Look. I don’t know what you’re talking about. My father died three months ago.
The house has been empty ever since.’

  *

  Drake drove back to headquarters, his mind a complete daze. At first all he could think about was the last time he had spoken with his father and his eyes filled with tears as he recalled that conversation. It had been forced, almost unreal, an exchange of platitudes and assurances and false smiles.

  He drove on autopilot, keeping to the speed limit by some instinct. That morning he had intended to make progress with investigating de Northway; the photographs Fairburn had emailed de Northway completed the corroboration they needed for the historic sex offences. And his wife’s involvement with Evans gave him more than enough to arrest de Northway. A search of Crecrist Hall would inevitably produce some forensics.

  His mobile rang as he was on the Britannia Bridge. He fumbled for the handset but there was no easy place to park so he juggled driving the car and pushing the mobile to his ear.

  ‘They’ve found Dylan South,’ Caren said.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Bangor. I’ll text you the address.’

  Drake slapped the steering wheel in excitement, and indicated left at the next junction.

  The text arrived on his mobile with the address and he made his way through the town to the old port area that shimmered in the late afternoon sunshine. Drake parked behind a car from the local station. The front door was already ajar, so Drake pushed it open and, noticing that the small lounge was empty, headed down the hallway.

  South sat by the kitchen table, an enormous mug with ‘Keep Calm I’m A Terrorist’ printed in bold letters. He had a centre parting with hair that draped his shoulders. A pair of small oblong glasses had been pushed to the top of his nose.

  ‘This is police intimidation.’

  ‘Are you Dylan South?’

  ‘And who are you? Special Branch? MI5? MI6?’

  Drake pulled up a chair, sat down and looked at South. He fished out his warrant card. ‘Detective Inspector Drake.’

  ‘I’ve got human rights. I’m entitled to a solicitor. I can make one phone call.’

  Drake waited. ‘I haven’t arrested you. Yet.’