Mucklow held his hand up. ‘Just hang on there a minute,’ he said. ‘I’ll fetch the senior investigating officer and you can make a statement.’
Nelson Futura looked troubled. ‘My employers don’t have to know, do they? I’ll get the sack for sure.’
Mucklow shook his head. ‘I don’t see why they’d have to know,’ he said. But already he could see a problem with this. They would have to check the driver’s cab for any sign of trouble. But they could cross that bridge when they got to it.
Randall faced the driver across the interview table. He looked an honest man and a troubled one too. Mucklow had filled him in with the work conditions and he’d promised to see if he could keep this angle a secret.
‘Where did you pick him up?’
‘Just on the outskirts of the town. Just after the roundabout by the Two Henrys.’
So their man had already selected that road?
‘He was already on the A53?’
Futura nodded.
‘Have you ever seen him before?’
‘No. And I wouldn’t normally pick up a tramp,’ Futura said frankly. ‘They smell. But there was something about this man. He did look like one of the great unwashed but he was dragging his leg.’
Randall felt a little skip at this statement. They knew something else about their man now. Mark Sullivan had been right. Their man’s old skiing injury had resulted in a limp.
‘And besides,’ Futura continued, more comfortable now, ‘it was about to chuck it down. He wouldn’t want to get caught out in that.’
‘So …?’ Randall was thinking quickly. ‘You were heading for …?’
‘Moreton Corbet Farm,’ Futura said.
‘What time was this?’
‘Just after five in the afternoon.’
‘Did you know where he was heading?’
‘No. I asked him if he wanted to be set down on the main road and he said no, he was heading for Moreton Corbet himself. I made a joke …’ Futura looked proud of himself. ‘I said it was fortuitous.’
Randall looked at him. One day, many moons ago, someone had used this word, fortuitous, to Nelson Futura and he had savoured it, remembered it, waiting for an opportunity to use it. And now he had finally aired it.
‘Is there anything else you can tell us about the man? Did he seem fearful? Worried that somebody was looking for him? Did he mention any family, friends?’
Bemused Nelson Futura shook his head vigorously.
‘Where did you drop him off?’
‘I turned into the farm and said that was as far as I was going. I knew Mr Sharp wouldn’t want to see the likes of him around so I told him he’d better get out and go wherever it was that he was going. He thanked me for the lift and off he went.’
‘Did Mr Sharp see the man leave your lorry?’
‘I don’t know. I couldn’t be sure either way whether he saw him or not.’
‘Was the gentleman carrying anything?’
Futura shook his head. ‘Not that I saw but then he had that big thick coat on. He could have hidden anything under that.’
‘Quite. OK. We’ll need to take a quick look round the cab of your lorry.’
‘That’s all right.’
Randall frowned. ‘Is there anything else you want to add?’
Futura shook his head. ‘I reckon,’ he said, ‘I was the last person to see him alive.
Not quite, Randall thought. Not quite.
SIXTEEN
They found nothing obvious in Nelson Futura’s lorry and let him go, but Randall resolved to check out whether Sharp had seen their man as he had climbed out of the cab.
PC Gary Coleman, in the meantime, was having a whale of a time on the internet. He was always happiest sitting in front of a screen anyway, asking it questions and evaluating the results, fingers flying over keys. He loved the feeling of all those facts literally at his fingertips. At the moment he was searching for some information on the medals that they had found stitched into their man’s overcoat, and later he had arranged to meet up with an ex-serviceman in Oswestry to see if he could find out a little more about them. The serviceman’s name was Mark Loftus and Coleman had tracked him down through the local branch of the ex-serviceman’s club. He’d supplied the club with a sketchy background, that the medals had been found on a so far unidentified body, and they had recommended Major Loftus.
‘Bit of an anorak,’ they’d said, ‘but if anyone can shed some light on your Second World War medals, it’ll be him.’
Coleman had thanked them and arranged to meet up with him.
Mark Loftus, retired major, turned out to be in his nineties, with piercing blue eyes, a loud voice and still with an upright military bearing. Coleman almost expected him to salute as he approached him. But almost before he’d introduced himself he realized that the retired Major Loftus had all his mental faculties, a wonderful memory, an excellent power of recall and very good eyesight. He was a credit to the ninety-plus club. They met at the clubhouse, a little shabby these days, but the same could not be said of Major Loftus. He was up to scratch in a navy blue jacket, which now hung a little loose and grey trousers, a blue shirt and regimental tie with well-polished lace-up shoes, and greeted him with a bone-cracking handshake. On his left pocket also hung a pin with four medals attached.
‘How do you do,’ he said. ‘Mark Loftus. Ex-King’s Shropshire Light Infantry.’ A smile crossed his face. ‘Disbanded now and numbers dwindling. Only a few of us left sadly.’ He spoke in a staccato tone, like the rat-tat-tat of gunfire.
Coleman mumbled something about him looking great for his age and the ex-soldier grunted, satisfied, and sat himself down. ‘Don’t do too badly,’ he admitted. ‘Sheltered accommodation, you know. They keep an eye on me.’
Coleman smiled and said he still thought he looked very well. The old chap brightened up at that. ‘Mustn’t grumble,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Now, what was it you wanted to know?’
Coleman showed him the four medals with their various ribbons. Three were copper-coloured and star shaped. The fourth was silver and the size of an old crown or five shilling piece. Coleman’s grandfather had proudly presented him with a 1953 Coronation boxed crown when he had been sixteen years old so he recognized the size. Each of the ribbons was differently coloured. Gary Coleman knew a little about them from the internet but what he could not do was deduce anything from the collection. This was what he hoped Major Loftus would be able to help him with.
Loftus went first to the medal on the right, the silver crown-sized one. ‘This,’ he said, ‘is the War Medal, sometimes erroneously known as the Victory Medal.’ The blue eyes skewered the policeman as though to scold him. ‘That,’ he said severely, ‘is quite incorrect.’
Coleman nodded and the ex-serviceman continued with his explanation.
‘It was awarded to those who served in the Armed Forces or Merchant Navy for at least twenty-eight days between the third of September 1939 and second of September 1945.’
Coleman thought that this medal would have been given to an awful lot of servicemen and asked him if it had.
It provoked quite a response. ‘Good gracious me, yes. Thousands.’
Hardly narrowed the field then.
Major Loftus continued, unaware of the policeman’s disappointment. ‘The second one …’ He moved to the one to its left, one of the copper-coloured stars. ‘The Atlantic Star,’ he said, ‘awarded for six months’ service afloat.’
Coleman’s pulse quickened. Afloat. That, surely, narrowed the field? He looked expectantly at the old soldier.
‘The next one is the Italy Star, another campaign medal in Italy, Greece, Yugoslavia and so on. Your man,’ he said, looking up, ‘had quite a war.’
But he wasn’t his man. He was The Man who couldn’t possibly have gained all these medals in the war. He hadn’t been born until twenty-five years after the Armistice had been declared.
‘And the last?’ Coleman asked, trying not to let his chagrin show.
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‘Another Campaign medal. Known as the 1939–1945 Star.’ He looked at the pin thoughtfully. ‘I suspect,’ he said, ‘that your man was a merchant seaman.’
‘He isn’t exactly my man,’ Coleman said awkwardly, ‘and he can’t have served in the war at all. The deceased is only in his mid-forties.’
Loftus thought for a moment about this before barking, ‘Not even his father then.’ He frowned. ‘I wonder how many grandchildren hang on to their grandfather’s old medals.’ He gave Coleman another piercing glare. ‘I bet mine won’t. These things …’ his eyes moved over the strip of medals with real sadness, ‘… come up for sale in their numbers these days on the internet and that eBay thing. My niece told me the other day that there were even a couple of Victoria Crosses on there. Disgraceful, I call it.’ It was said with real feeling. ‘These fellows gave up their lives, their loves, their futures. And does anyone care?’
Coleman was at a loss for words.
The old soldier gave another heartfelt sigh and Coleman carried on. ‘Would it be possible,’ he asked slowly, ‘for a search to narrow it down to a specific officer? You see, we don’t know who this man is – was. It would help to at least know who he was. There isn’t a name engraved on these?’
‘No. For some reason no names were engraved unless you were Canadian or Indian and I think the South African and Aussies had their names on too, but not our boys. There were too many of them.’ The old soldier went into reminiscent mode again. ‘Too – bloody – many,’ he said. ‘Young, fit.’ He stopped himself from a second rant and said instead, ‘Bloody awful thing, war, Constable.’
Coleman nodded. He’d always thought so.
He rose to go and the old soldier rose too in a dignified, polite gesture, getting to his feet stiffly and slowly. Coleman shook his hand and thanked him for his help and Loftus, retired major, haw-hawed. ‘Glad to be of assistance,’ he said. ‘Wouldn’t want the world to forget.’
Lest we forget. It was the phrase, along with the going down of the sun, that best evoked an old soldier. War poetry, some of the most terrible and beautiful words. Coleman was in a reflective mood as he drove back to Shrewsbury, and vowed to put a tenner in the poppy tin in November.
SEVENTEEN
Wednesday, 17 September, 6 p.m.
The press conference was well attended, journalists still filing in at six o’clock, the official starting time. Perhaps it was the dramatic backdrop of Moreton Corbet Castle alongside the bloodthirsty image of an unknown tramp with his throat cut that made such good copy.
Randall looked around the room – standing room only – and wondered who was responsible for some of the more lurid headlines.
Homeless man found in tragic ruin.
Who is this man? An artist’s impression followed below.
Cut throat at the castle. He’d winced at that one.
Bloodbath in twelfth-century ruin. Not exactly!
Murder at Moreton Corbet Castle. Well, at least that was factually correct.
The curse of the castle. Sounded almost Shakespearian.
He made a face and knew he could never have been a journalist. What would they make of his story? he wondered, and quickly shut this question down in his mind.
Interestingly, the papers had chosen to feature not only the instantly recognizable facade of the ruin but also had printed a potted history of the place. Moreton Corbet Castle was now famous suddenly for housing a Royalist Civil War sympathiser. After four hundred years?
Randall could never quite understand how things captured the public imagination.
They’d even dredged up Holmyard’s ancient curse – the curse, as legend had it, that after the bombardment of the Parliamentarians the castle would never be completed. And looking at the house one could see that curse or not this had come true. It was and always had been unfinished.
All these dramatic headlines and scurrilous stories had made the police’s job harder. They had brought the general public day-tripping out to the area in their numbers. And the road system simply could not cope. The personnel manning the forensic van had reported increased problems with traffic, so they’d shut one or two of the narrower country lanes and restricted access. Randall gave a cynical smile as he surveyed the journalists. He had always thought that the press made a great servant but an unpredictable leviathan of a master. One could not control it. Particularly in these days of tweets and instantly accessible news supplied by the internet. Not just the internet sat in front of your computer safely connected at home but anywhere, anytime or any place on your 4G smartphone or tablet. The general public as well as the newspapers, TV and radio would be always be drawn to a dramatic place with a dramatic story, however tackily it was presented. And yet, he thought as he scanned the full room, so far, even with the full exposure they still did not know who their man was.
No one, it seemed, could tell them his name. The most simple fact of all. And as for finding out the perpetrator, they were nowhere near.
Randall pinned both the artist’s impression and the man’s picture, taken before the post-mortem, on the board and the room stilled.
He began with the bare bones, the approximate age of the murdered man, using a plan of the area around the ruin to indicate where the body had been found. Then he released some forensic detail: the blood spattering and lividity, giving a brief explanation of post-mortem pooling of the blood for the hacks, though he knew full well that hardened crime correspondents would know exactly what lividity was and its significance. The body had not been moved after death. He also told them the findings of the post-mortem: the old injuries to the leg and wrist.
The detail about the shoe and the medals he kept back until later on in the meeting.
He drew their attention to the leg. ‘It was the right leg,’ he said. ‘A fractured shaft of femur, that’s the large thigh bone, which had been repaired with a pin and plate. We believe the injury was done sometime in the nineties, and was probably repaired abroad.’
Immediately a hand shot up.
He recognized her. Jennifer Purloin, intelligent representative of the Metro, the London freebie. ‘How can you know, sir, that it was repaired abroad?’
Good question. He nodded approvingly. ‘The prosthesis is of a type that is not used over here.’ He hesitated. ‘The pathologist told us that it had a bad track record …’ He was on shaky ground here, struggling to recall precisely what Mark Sullivan had told him. ‘There are more complications with this prosthesis than the one we use in the UK. The significance of this is that it resulted in a limp. We now know this is so.’
They started scribbling and Randall continued, ‘We are working on an assumption that the wrist injury and the leg injury were possibly the result of a skiing accident.’
More scribbling.
‘We know now how our man arrived at his destination. He hitch-hiked a lift in a lorry which was going to Moreton Corbet, so it’s quite possible that it was a coincidence that he was there and took shelter in the castle from the rain. His coat was dry.’ He made a mental note to pursue the source of that coat as well as the trousers. He would send PC Shaw off on that one.
He continued. ‘Our man had no possessions on him except … I’ll come on to those later. He had no sleeping bag, which, if he had been sleeping rough, he would have needed. His fingerprints are not on our database.’ To these hardened hacks he hardly needed to spell out what that meant.
‘We have visited the various haunts …’ He wished he hadn’t needed to use the word but he repeated it, ‘… haunts,’ pause, ‘of the homeless and he has been recognized, but none of the people who had dealings with him when he was alive are aware of either his name or his background.’ As he spoke he realized how very unusual this was. Everyone has a name. Why had this man kept his secret in life as well as in death? He frowned. Could it be because it was a well-known name? Instantly recognizable?
He felt he should add something here. ‘This is a particularly violent crime, which might h
ave been premeditated. The assailant must have had a sharp knife on him.’ The comment pricked Sullivan’s phrase in him. Kitchen devil. Sullivan’s words. ‘We don’t know whether this was a chance meeting or a coincidence. Other attacks in the area on vagrants have been different and we’re working on the assumption that the crimes are not connected. We are naturally anxious to know the exact sequence of events and find out who committed this crime.’ He’d done this before, involved the press in the intellectual solving of a crime, coaching them to ask the questions the police themselves ask.
To rope them in he threw questions out into the room.
‘Was the motive possibly theft? Unlikely. Perhaps a personal resentment against homeless people? Was it a sudden outburst of rage at finding the man there and our assailant just happened to have the knife? Is it possible that our man was the one carrying the knife, possibly as protection? We don’t know. What we do know is that in his possession were two objects.’ He indicated the PowerPoint pictures. ‘This, which appears to be a Victorian child’s shoe or clog. Its age is estimated by Shrewsbury Museum as being around 1900 and, judging by the size, was probably worn by a child of around six.’ He looked at it, knowing there was something there which he should be registering. What was it? It had been described as a country child’s shoe. What was the phrase the woman had used? Clod hopper. And then he knew what it was. This shoe never had hopped through clods. It was hardly worn.
And that was it.
He realized the newspaper people were watching him curiously, waiting for him to continue.
‘Did he find it somewhere and keep it, possibly as a trophy? Is it possible he stole it?’
He hardly knew whether to say this and almost dreaded reading the papers in the morning. ‘All sorts of theories have been put forward. Is there some significance in the object? It has even been put forward that a shoe could be used as a talisman against witchcraft or evil. Is that why he carried it?’
The entire room simply gawped at him.
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