by John Dean
‘We had noticed,’ murmured Harris. ‘What did you make of him as a person?’
‘Like I told your constable last night, there was no reason for anyone to hurt him.’ She half-smiled at Butterfield as if seeking reassurance: none was forthcoming.
Harris returned to sit down at the desk.
‘I know what you said, Jane,’ replied the inspector, staring hard at her, ‘but what I want to know is what you really thought of him.’
She looked at him for a moment, her face a picture of confusion.
‘Look,’ said Harris, ‘a lot of people are telling us that there was no reason for anyone to kill Trevor, but someone did and it really is time that people started giving us answers.’
‘I have told you about the dog, surely that’s enough?’
‘I’m sorry, Miss Porter, but I really do need to know what you thought about him.’
‘Am I a suspect?’
The question took the detectives by surprise.
‘Should you be a suspect?’ asked Harris, fixing her with a stern look.
‘No, of course not.’ She seemed taken aback by the question. ‘I’m just … look, I did not like him, that’s all.’
‘You didn’t say that last night,’ said Butterfield.
‘I’m sorry, I truly am. It’s just that I did not want to get involved. This has shaken everyone up, I am sure you can appreciate that. I hardly slept last night, wrestling with my conscience. That’s why I rang you this morning.’
‘Most commendable,’ said Harris thinly. ‘Always nice to hear the truth after so many lies.’
She glared at him.
‘So why did you not like him?’ he asked, ignoring the look.
‘There was something about him. I mean, on the face of it, he was perfectly pleasant to everyone, it’s just that he never had his picture taken.’
‘What?’
‘He never had his picture taken,’ she repeated. ‘If the newspaper came round to do a story about one of our dogs, he would always get someone else to be in the picture. At first, I thought he was just shy or something, but then it happened at parties, Christmas, that sort of thing. He always found a way of keeping off the pictures. I mean, why would someone do that?’
‘You tell me.’
‘If you ask me, Trevor Meredith was not all that he appeared to be.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Sometimes when strangers came here, I got the impression that he was a bit – I don’t know – a bit nervous. Anxious, that’s a better word. Yes, anxious. He tended to keep out of the way unless he really had to meet them.’
There was silence in the office for a few moments.
‘Then there were the days off,’ said Jane.
‘The days off?’
‘Yes. Over recent months Trevor had been taking a lot of days off but not telling anyone why. He certainly was not owed as much time as he took. I mean, we all work so hard here and Trevor….’ Her voice tailed off again. ‘It has become a nightmare, a terrible nightmare.’
‘It certainly has,’ said Harris, eying her intently. ‘Do you know what I think happened to the dog he handed over to our friend from Manchester?’
Jane Porter turned dark eyes on the detectives and nodded.
‘I think,’ she said quietly, ‘that yesterday he tore poor old Robbie apart.’
‘I think,’ said Harris, ‘that you may just be right.’
Five minutes later, the detectives were back in the car-park and walking towards the inspector’s Land Rover.
‘Bloody woman!’ exclaimed Butterfield when she was sure they were out of earshot of any of the staff. ‘Last night, she told me that there was nothing wrong with Trevor Meredith.’
‘In which case, learn from the lesson she taught you,’ said Harris, producing his car keys and opening the door to let Scoot into the back.
‘Lesson?’
‘The lesson, Constable Butterfield,’ said the inspector, climbing into the driver’s seat, ‘that you should never listen to what people are saying. Always listen to what they are thinking. People can’t lie that way. We need to check her out.’
‘Surely you don’t think she is…?’
‘There’s too many people keeping secrets, and I don’t like secrets.’ He started the engine then gave the constable a half smile. ‘Apart from mine, of course.’
*
Shortly after 11.30 a.m., Jasmine Riley emerged tentatively into the street, clutching her overnight bag. Having stayed in her room as long as possible, knowing that her train was not due until noon, she realized that she finally had no option but to move and expose herself to the dangers of Roxham’s streets. Eyes flitting left and right, she stood outside the guest house and nervously scanned the pavements for signs of danger.
Such behaviour had become a way of life in her final days with Trevor Meredith: he had constantly reminded her that someone could be watching. It had become his mantra, but, if she was honest, Jasmine’s concerns at the time were more for Trevor’s state of mind than any reputed threat to their well-being. She had never been convinced that someone was after them. The incidents that had preceded their flight could, she had argued, simply been coincidences, events on to which Trevor had placed undue significance. The ringing of the doorbell when no one was there that one time, the dog faeces left on the doorstep a couple of days later, these things were the type of pranks played by children, and the local kids knew that he worked at the dog sanctuary, she had said. And, she had added, there had been one or two complaints of youths misbehaving in the area over recent weeks. As for the phone call late one night that rang off before they could answer, that could have been something innocent, she had told him. A wrong number, or one of those automated machines with the funny American voice trying to sell holidays on a cruise ship.
However, Trevor had refused to listen and had seemed increasingly on edge. There had been rows. Irrational rows. Their first rows in ten years together. Imagined slights. Wild fantasies. Was she, Jasmine had started to ask herself, witnessing a man experiencing some kind of breakdown? However, so convinced had he seemed to be that she had agreed that they should leave the area, if only for a few days. If only to appease him. Well, Jasmine had said a few days, a short break to recharge the batteries, but she was not sure Trevor had seen it that way. His preparations had suggested an air of finality. He had even said that he doubted he would ever see the cottage again.
Trevor’s disappearance and his subsequent failure to answer her phone call the night before had changed everything. Now, Trevor’s fears seemed only too real, now Jasmine Riley was as frightened as she could recall ever having felt, now she knew what her fiancé had been going through. Seeing few people on the street, she gave a sigh of relief, took a deep breath to regain her composure and started walking briskly in the direction of Roxham’s railway station, mind made up. She would not head over to Newcastle, as agreed. No, she decided, it was time to go home, to explain to her mother what had been happening, why she had not been in touch, why she had not returned her calls. To seek reassurance from someone she knew she could trust and could ask for help. Even the thought of home made Jasmine feel better as she walked along the street, enjoying the freshness of the air after the oppressive atmosphere of the storm.
She passed a television shop and stopped to stare in the window. On one of the sets there was an image of the hills above Levton Bridge and, heart pounding, she walked into the store and over to the TV, leaning over to hear the commentary. ‘Police have not yet named the man found in the copse,’ said the reporter’s voice, ‘but have confirmed that his dog died in the same incident. Superintendent Philip Curtis said that it was still early days in the inquiry.’ Jasmine clapped a hand to her mouth and gave a slight exclamation as the divisional commander appeared on the screen, standing in front of Levton Bridge Police Station.
‘Are you all right, madam?’ asked a young male shop assistant, walking across to her.
Jasmine did not reply but ran from the store and down the
street, her view obscured by the tears welling in her eyes. As she ran, she did not notice the man standing in the nearby shop doorway, watching her intently.
CHAPTER TWELVE
After leaving the sanctuary, the inspector guided his Land Rover out of Levton Bridge, the detectives speaking little as they left the houses behind and the landscape broke into moorland, the bright morning sunshine and the tatters of cloud casting darting shadows across the slopes. A mile and a half out of town, the inspector noticed a quad bike parked on the roadside with the key still in the ignition. He brought the Land Rover to a sudden halt.
‘What’ve you seen?’ asked Butterfield.
‘Apart from a quad bike asking to be nicked?’ said the inspector, getting out of the vehicle with Scoot and pointing across the moor. ‘Someone with a lot of explaining to do.’
They walked for several hundred metres to where a man in a fustian jacket and with a flat cap jammed on to his weatherbeaten head was leaning on a shepherd’s crook, watching his dog round up a flock of sheep. The man started when he noticed the detectives striding towards him and made as if to walk away.
‘Stay where you are, Len Radley!’ shouted Harris.
Radley sighed and waited for the detectives to arrive, eying them with trepidation. Scoot disappeared into the bracken.
‘I were drunk,’ said Radley before Harris could speak. ‘I never meant to try to lamp you. I am really sorry, it were stupid, but I were in me cups.’
‘I don’t want to talk about that.’
Radley, whose nose was swollen, looked relieved then his expression clouded over.
‘Then what do you want to talk about, Mr Harris?’ he asked.
‘First off, why the hell is your quad bike sitting there with the keys in it? Do you know, we had three of them nicked last month and all because the damn fool owners left the keys in? Didn’t Harry Galbraith give you that crime prevention sheet?’
‘I were going to read it, Mr Harris. Just ain’t not got round to it.’
‘Not got round to it! He handed them out six months ago!’
‘Aye, well, you know how it is.’
‘I am afraid I do, Len, I am afraid I do,’ sighed the inspector. ‘Anyway, that’s not what I want to talk to you about either. Why were you and Charlie Myles scrapping in the market-place last night?’
‘What did Charlie say?’
‘He didn’t say anything.’
‘Then neither will I,’ said the farmer firmly.
‘Then allow me – was it about your little gambling ring at the King’s Head?’
‘How do you know about that?’ Radley looked surprised.
‘Because I’m omnipotent, Len.’
Radley looked confused.
‘Never mind,’ said Harris. ‘Tell me, what has been happening at the King’s Head.’
‘Like I said, I ain’t going to say nowt about it.’
Harris glanced at Butterfield.
‘I wonder, Constable,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘if, having reconsidered the events of last night, we could perhaps charge Len here with assault after all? I mean, the magistrates have already said they will treat any such cases of drunken disorder as very serious. A crackdown, I think the papers called it.’
‘I think we might well be able to do that, sir. And I could act as the witness. I mean, I did see Len try to attack you. Oh, and maybe Charlie would press charges. It did look nasty, the more I think of it.’
Radley looked at the officers in alarm.
‘And,’ said Harris, ‘did I not hear tell that Len’s boss put him on a final warning the last time he got involved in something like this? Said he did not want his shepherd plastered all over the papers again.’
Len Radley had heard enough.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘All right, I’ll tell you – but it were only a little fun among friends.’
‘It didn’t look like you and Charlie were having much fun last night,’ said the inspector.
Radley said nothing.
‘In fact,’ said Harris, ‘from what I hear, there’s not been much fun for anyone. There’s a lot of money been lost, I think. Charlie owe you cash?’
Radley nodded.
‘I heard a hundred quid,’ said Harris.
Radley looked at him in astonishment.
‘How the…?’
‘That what you and Charlie were scrapping about last night?’
‘Aye,’ sighed Radley: he could see little point in denying what the inspector seemed already to know. ‘He said he would bring it yesterday, but he didn’t have it on him when he turned up. We had a few arguments about it then when we left that’s when we got to fighting. We’d had a few, mind. I know it were wrong, Mr Harris.’
‘Your sense of social awareness is commendable,’ said Harris, winking at Butterfield as the shepherd looked bewildered again. ‘So who else takes part in these poker games?’
‘Some of the regulars – and that new chap, the veterinary.’
‘James Thornycroft?’ said Harris. ‘He a friend of yours?’
‘No he ain’t! I wouldn’t trust him. The man’s a crook, Mr Harris. Do you know, he tried to tell me that Roy needed an injection which would have cost thirty pound.’ The shepherd gestured to his sheepdog, which had just rounded up the last of the flock. ‘I mean, Mr Harris, do he look like he needs an injection?’
‘Who else takes part?’
‘That man as got hisself killed on the hills yesterday.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘That posh bloke.’
‘Posh bloke?’
Radley nodded.
‘Aye, talked right proper,’ he said. ‘He’s called David Bowes. He’s not from these parts, mind. He said he were renting a cottage out down in Stonecliffe.’
‘What did he look like?’
‘Normal like. Short brown hair.’
‘Age?’
‘I weren’t never any good at guessing people’s ages, Mr Harris.’
‘Try.’
‘Forty summat, I would say.’
‘Anything unusual about him?
‘He had a scar, Mr Harris.’ Radley ran finger down the right side of his neck. ‘Looked like he’d been in a bit of trouble in his time.’
‘Did he now?’ said Harris softly. ‘Did he really?’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
It was shortly before 10.30 a.m. when Harris and Butterfield arrived at the RSPCA’s Roxham offices, which were housed in an Edwardian terraced house close to the town centre. On arrival, the detectives were ushered into a large first floor meeting room, given cups of tea and asked to wait. They had been sitting at the large conference table for the best part of fifteen minutes – with the inspector growing increasingly irritated at what he saw as discourtesy and displaying his annoyance by pacing up and down the room – when the door opened and in walked a grey-haired woman in her early fifties and a balding man in his mid-forties. Both wore uniform.
‘Ged Maynard, as I live and breathe,’ said Harris, standing up and smiling broadly at the man, his irritation banished by the sight of his old friend. ‘Long time no see.’
‘Been a while,’ nodded Maynard. ‘Just before you decided to move to Hicksville, wasn’t it?’
‘Our super likes to call it a rural policing area,’ said Harris, winking at Butterfield as the men shook hands, the inspector noting that his friend’s grip was firm but that the palm was cold and clammy.
‘This is Helen Jackson,’ said Maynard, gesturing to the woman, who had been watching their greetings with a frown at the way the two men were ignoring her. ‘Helen is my line manager and has travelled up with me this morning.’
‘Mr Harris,’ said Jackson, in a voice that lacked warmth.
Her handshake lacked warmth as well, the DCI noting that it was cold and limp. He disliked her immediately.
‘This is Detective Constable Butterfield,’ said the inspector, concluding the introductions as everyone took their seats, detectives on one side of the la
rge table, RSPCA officers on the other. ‘She is very keen to learn more about the work of your organization.’
Butterfield tried not to laugh, Ged Maynard gave a slight smile and Helen Jackson frowned again.
‘Can we please get down to business,’ she said, in a businesslike tone of voice, reaching into her black briefcase and producing several brown files. ‘I would like things resolved as quickly as possible.’
‘Well,’ said Harris, his delight at seeing Maynard again dissipating, ‘let’s start with the fact that, even though we are all supposed to be on the same side, someone has been keeping secrets.’
‘It’s not what you think,’ said Jackson.
‘It is from where I’m sitting, Mrs Jackson.’
‘Miss,’ she said starchly, ‘I’m a miss.’
‘Of course you are,’ said Harris. ‘However, your marital status matters somewhat less than what the hell has been happening behind my back.’
The RSPCA officers shifted uncomfortably in their seats. The slight pause gave Harris the chance to properly peruse his friend for the first time since the RSPCA officers had walked into the room. Ged Maynard seemed so much older than the last time they had met, not just because the waist was a little thicker and the hair greyer, but because a lot of his old energy seemed to have gone. Ged Maynard, Harris concluded, looked like a man who felt himself backed into a corner and not just by the presence of the detectives. There were clearly tensions between him and his superior officer, Harris decided. The inspector gave a slight smile: he loved situations when those on the other side of the table were at a disadvantage. Still irritated by the way Curtis had retained control of their meeting earlier that morning, Harris resolved not to let Helen Jackson do the same this time.
‘I mean,’ said the inspector, ‘the last time we worked together, Ged, I seem to recall that you were only too keen to ask for my help. Call me an old romantic but I had rather hoped that such a situation might be reciprocated. Seemingly not.’
‘Your help was much appreciated, Hawk,’ said Maynard earnestly. ‘It really was. We made a good team.’
