Dave Slater Mystery Novels Box Set Two

by Ford, P. F.

  ‘The guy had been living in the skip for weeks–’

  ‘It’s not the same guy!’ Norman’s voice was getting louder. ‘How many times do I have to tell you? And the guy who was living there did not have a hurricane lamp. I know that for a fact.’

  Now Biddeford was getting irritated. ‘And how many times do I have to tell you I’ll believe you when you bring this guy to me! How come there’s a fire and the guy disappears? Tell me that.’

  ‘I told you. His name’s Ryan. The dead guy is called Morgan. It’s not the same damned man!’

  ‘So, where is this “Ryan” then?’

  ‘He’s on the run because he believes he was the intended victim.’

  ‘No,’ said Biddeford. ‘He’s disappeared because he was the crispy cracker we found in the skip. It’s just that you won’t believe it.’ He turned to Slater. ‘Will you tell him?’

  ‘I think the respect you show for the victim is telling us all we need to know about how seriously you’re taking this investigation,’ snapped Norman, shaking his head.

  Now it was Norman’s turn to exchange glares with Biddeford.

  ‘I can see where you’re coming from, Steve,’ said Slater, ‘but it’s not that simple–’

  ‘For instance, if he’s dead, how come he turned up last night?’ Norman crossed his arms in front of him and glowered.

  ‘What?’ asked Biddeford.

  ‘Ryan. He turned up last night.’

  Biddeford looked doubtfully from Norman to Slater.

  ‘He was there,’ Slater said, coolly.

  Biddeford sighed. He really couldn’t decide if these two were just trying to waste his time and wind him up. ‘So why don’t you bring him to me and prove it?’

  ‘Like I said, he was there,’ said Slater.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean? Where is he now?’

  ‘We’re not sure. He ran away before we got a chance to ask him to come and speak to you.’

  Biddeford sat back and folded his arms across his chest. So they were taking the piss . . .

  ‘We’d just got Ryan settled at a table with his meal when these two hard guys turned up in the doorway,’ explained Norman.

  ‘This would be the same two guys you reckon beat up your mate Doddsy, would it?’ asked Biddeford, raising an eyebrow.

  ‘Dave and I went over and told them to clear off, and when we looked back, he’d done a bunk out through the fire exit.’

  Biddeford gave them a knowing smile. ‘That’s very convenient, isn’t it?’ Who is he really, this Ryan? The Invisible Man?’

  ‘You think we’re bullshitting, don’t you?’ asked Slater.

  ‘Well, it has crossed my mind, that you two might just feel the need to waste my time. I mean first you have a guy called Ryan who’s never around when you want him, and now you’re asking me to believe there are two thugs who seem to have appeared from nowhere and are just as invisible as your mate Ryan. This is all a wind up, isn’t it? Just for old time’s sake, you know?’

  ‘Can you hear yourself?’ asked Norman. He pointed at Slater. ‘He admits he can be childish–’

  ‘No, I don’t’ said Slater, indignantly.

  ‘–but he’s just a bloody beginner compared to you!’ continued Norman, ignoring Slater’s protestations. ‘When are you going to get over this stupid idea you have that we want to hold you back? We never have! We just want you to open your damned eyes and look properly at this case. Two homeless guys are dead, and at least one more seems to think his life is in danger, but all you care about is a grudge that doesn’t even exist!’

  ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ Biddeford fixed them both with icy stares. ‘I suggest you find yourselves another hobby and stop wasting my time. It was a hit-and-run, alright? We’ve done forensics, and we’ve put signs up at the scene asking for information. With no witnesses to what actually happened, that’s all we can do. And I’m warning you – if you mess me around again, I’ll have you charged with wasting police time.’

  He stood up and marched away from their table towards the exit.

  ‘I take it that means he’s not going to pick up the bill for the coffees,’ said Slater, quietly, as he watched Biddeford wrench the door open so violently it almost came off its hinges.

  ‘How much of an arse can one guy be?’ asked a very frustrated Norman. ‘Did he listen to anything we said?’

  ‘Well, I don’t want to say I told you so,’ said Slater.

  Norman glared at him. ‘So don’t,’ he said, but Slater carried on anyway.

  ‘I said it would be a waste of time and that he won’t listen to anything we say, simply because it’s us, and my, didn’t he prove me right? In any case, he doesn’t have the imagination to do anything unless Goodnews tells him to.’

  ‘Talking to her will definitely be a waste of time,’ said Norman, gloomily.

  ‘So it looks like it’s down to us, then. And the first thing we need to do is find Ryan.’

  With all the distraction of Doddsy’s death and giving statements to the police, they’d been unable to get to the bakery that morning.

  ‘We can start by trying the bakery tomorrow,’ said Norman. ‘But you agree with me, right? There is something going on here.’

  ‘That’s what we’re going to find out,’ said Slater, pushing his chair back. ‘Come on, you’ve got to pay for these coffees.’

  ‘How come I get to pay?’ protested Norman, as he pushed his own chair back.

  ‘Because it was your dumb idea to invite DS Tunnel Vision to come here and join us.’

  ‘I suppose I have to admit to that.’ Norman followed Slater towards the door. He patted his pockets. ‘Err, I have no money on me. Can I borrow a fiver?’

  Slater stopped in his tracks and sighed. ‘You are unbelievable, you know that? With a pained expression he paid the bill and led the way out of the cafe.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  St Anne’s wasn’t the biggest of churches, but even with the dozen or so people Norman could see as he looked around before the service, it seemed a cold and unwelcoming place. As he surveyed his surroundings, he thought it was probably one of the gloomiest places he had ever been. He thought back to the last time he’d been here, when he and Slater had been two of barely a handful of mourners to see off a lonely man. At least this time there were a few more in attendance.

  It would have been just himself, Slater, the vicar, and his wife, but the numbers had been swelled by a handful of people who, although they didn’t actually know the dead man, had identified with his situation as they were homeless themselves. Chris and Diane had made a point of inviting anyone who ate at the church hall of an evening, promising tea and sandwiches afterwards for all those who made the effort. Ten of them had decided to take advantage of the offer to attend in exchange for a free lunch, and as more than one of them had observed, “it was something to do for a couple of hours, wasn’t it?”.

  Knowing the majority of the homeless present were likely to get bored easily or fall asleep, Chris had chosen to keep the service short. This hadn’t been difficult, as he knew next to nothing about the dead man.

  To Norman’s surprise, the entire congregation made the walk across the neat, tidy graveyard to a distant corner where a grave had been prepared, and they all stood in silence and watched as the vicar said a few words before the coffin was slowly lowered into the ground. It was at this point Slater had turned away and stared into the distance. Norman guessed he was thinking about the relative he had just rediscovered and then lost, and he reached across and patted his friend on the shoulder.

  Then he felt a tap on his own shoulder and snapped his head around in surprise. As he did, Ryan stepped up alongside him, finger pressed to his lips.

  ‘Shhh!’ he said, nodding respectfully towards the disappearing coffin. He stood to attention as Morgan disappeared for the last time. Then, as the others hurried off for tea and sandwiches, he hung back by the grave, Norman and Slater waiting respectfully to one side
while he bowed his head and seemed to say a few silent prayers.

  ‘How did you know about the funeral?’ asked Norman, when Ryan turned towards them.

  ‘Someone told Ginger at the bakery yesterday morning and she told me,’ he said. ‘I’ve been keeping a look out to make sure there weren’t any unwanted guests waiting to jump on me. I wouldn’t want to cause a scene at me old mate’s funeral.’

  ‘So you did know him?’ asked Norman.

  ‘We spent a couple of years together,’ said Ryan. ‘That’s why he came down here to look for me. He needed help and he didn’t have anyone else to turn to. Fat lot of use I turned out to be.’

  ‘You can’t blame yourself for what happened,’ said Slater. ‘The police say it was an accident. He knocked over a hurricane lamp.’

  ‘But that’s a load of shit. He didn’t have a lamp,’ said Ryan. ‘The only light he had was a torch, and he would have had a hard job starting a fire with that!’

  ‘Yeah, that’s what I told ’em,’ said Norman, ‘but they found a burnt-out lamp in there, and it’s the easiest solution. Anything else suggests foul play, and they don’t want to go down that road if they can avoid it.’

  ‘So you think the fire was started deliberately, and it was intended to kill someone?’ asked Slater.

  ‘It was intended to kill me,’ said Ryan. ‘But I let Morgan have the skip that night because he was in such a bad way.’

  ‘What was wrong with him?’ asked Norman.

  ‘The silly bugger told me he’d had an operation of some sort. But instead of going through the National Health Service like any normal person, he’d used some bloody backstreet doctor or something. He needed a hospital, but he didn’t want to go to one because of what he’d done. I let him have the skip for the night because it was warm and dry. I was going to come back next morning and get an ambulance out to him. It’s got to be better to be alive and have some explaining to do rather than be dead, hasn’t it?’

  ‘The pathologist reckoned he’d had a kidney removed,’ said Norman. ‘He thinks he might have sold one. Would Morgan do something like that?’

  ‘Who knows,’ said Ryan. ‘Morgan was mental. You could trust him with your life, but he had no respect for his own body. He wouldn’t put anyone else in danger, but he took all sorts of risks with himself. He was a risk junkie, you know? If he was desperate he’d probably think nothing of flogging a kidney. You can get by with one, can’t you?’

  ‘You say it should have been you in that skip and the fire was started deliberately. So why would anyone want to murder you?’ asked Slater.

  ‘I’ve pissed off a lot of people over the years. It’s what you tend to do when you’re in special forces. I expect someone’s tracked me down and wants revenge.’

  ‘You mean the two big guys who turned up at the church hall the other night? Who were they?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t wait to find out.’

  ‘But you think they were looking for you?’ asked Norman.

  ‘My skip was just torched, and then two heavies turn up. What would you think?’ asked Ryan.

  Norman surveyed Ryan for a moment and then looked at Slater, who raised an eyebrow slightly. Slater couldn’t help but feel Ryan wasn’t telling them something.

  ‘Where’s Doddsy?’ asked Ryan. ‘I didn’t think he’d want to miss out on a chance to bury a fellow soldier.’

  ‘You haven’t heard, then?’ Norman sighed and rubbed his chin. ‘He died the night before last. The police are saying it’s a hit-and-run, but we found him, and he says he was jumped by two or three guys who beat the crap out of him.’

  ‘Jesus. Why would they do that? I know he was a bit of a tit, but he was all talk. He was harmless enough.’

  ‘He told us they were looking for you,’ said Norman. ‘But he said to tell you he didn’t tell them anything. They won’t find you through him.’

  Ryan looked away and said nothing.

  ‘How about you cut the crap,’ Slater cut in, ‘and tell us why these guys are looking for you?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Ryan. He turned to Norman. ‘You know what a bullshitter Doddsy was, Norm. The police are probably right, and he did get hit by a car. But being Doddsy, he has to come up with a load of bollocks to make it look something it wasn’t. I bet he was off his tits, wasn’t he? Pissed I expect. You know what he was like.’

  ‘They say he’d been taking drugs, but you know he never did drugs, did he, Ryan?’ asked Norman.

  ‘Sooner or later, most people turn to drugs when they’re on the street.’

  ‘Why do you think his sleeves were removed?’ asked Slater suddenly.

  Ryan licked his lips and looked from Norman to Slater. ‘What?’

  ‘His sleeves.’ Slater indicated the seam at the top of the sleeve of his own jacket. ‘They were sliced off. His coat, sweater, and shirt. Now, you tell me how that could happen in a road traffic accident?’

  ‘I don’t know. What do the police say?’

  ‘Oh, they say Doddsy was off his head and cut them off himself,’ said Norman. ‘But why would he do that?’

  ‘People do all sorts of weird things when they’re off their heads,’ said Ryan, shifting from one foot to another.

  ‘Buy you don’t really believe Doddsy did it, do you?’ asked Slater. ‘So tell me, why would someone want to hack off his sleeves?’

  ‘I told you, I don’t know.’ Ryan glanced around. ‘And I’ve got to go.’

  ‘We can’t help you if you don’t tell us what’s going on,’ said Norman, reaching out to hold Ryan’s arm.

  ‘You can’t help me anyway,’ said Ryan, shrugging Norman off and stepping away from him. ‘You’re better off out of it.’

  ‘Out of what?’ asked Norman, as Ryan turned and started to walk away. ‘We just want to help you, that’s all.’

  But Ryan didn’t stop walking.

  ‘Crap.’ Norman turned to Slater. ‘Now what do we do?’

  ‘Well, we can’t actually force him to accept our help, can we?’ said Slater. ‘On the other hand, I’m getting intrigued now, and I really don’t have anything better to do, so how about we keep poking around and see if we can find something useful?’

  ‘I need to eat,’ said Norman.

  ‘We just had breakfast a couple of hours ago,’ said Slater.

  ‘Yeah, I know, but I can’t think on an empty stomach.’

  Slater sighed. ‘Okay, okay. Come on, let’s go.’

  As they walked away from the now-deserted grave, a small digger trundled into position and began to push soil into the grave. Within half an hour, the only evidence anyone had been buried there was a neat and tidy mound of soil.

  An hour and a half later, Slater and Norman made their way back through the graveyard. They’d had to come back this way because Slater’s car was in the church car park, which was at the opposite end to the pub they had walked to for lunch. Norman was grumbling as he walked.

  ‘Will you stop complaining?’ asked Slater. ‘It’s good exercise for you. And God knows you need to walk off some of that lunch.’

  This silenced Norman temporarily, but Slater knew it wouldn’t last for long. He glanced over to his left, towards the grave they had been standing at a couple of hours earlier. A single, lonely bouquet lay on top of the mound of soil. He walked on for another few steps before he realised. He stopped and turned to face the grave. Head down, still grumbling quietly to himself, Norman walked on for another four or five steps before he realised Slater had stopped.

  ‘What’s up?’ he called as he turned to Slater.

  Slater pointed towards the grave. ‘Was that there earlier?’ he asked as Norman shuffled alongside.

  Norman turned his gaze to follow Slater’s finger. ‘You mean the flowers? I didn’t see any. There weren’t even any in the church. They didn’t have the money to get flowers.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Slater, heading towards the grave. ‘So where did that come from?’


  They walked over to the grave. The bouquet lay across the middle. Slater bent down for a closer look.

  ‘Is there a card or a message of some sort?’ asked Norman.

  ‘There’s a card.’ Slater reached for the card, tucked in the wrapper. As he stood, he read the message to Norman.

  ‘So sorry I wasn’t there for you. Love always. C.’

  ‘I thought we didn’t find any friends or family,’ said Norman.

  ‘We didn’t,’ said Slater. ‘But we were wrong. Someone obviously loved the guy enough to feel they owed him this much.’

  ‘It’s gotta be someone local. No one outside the immediate area would have known anything about his death.’

  ‘Even then, it wasn’t exactly shouted from the rooftops, was it?’ asked Slater. ‘There can’t be that many people who would have known.’

  ‘I know what you’re thinking, but don’t get too excited,’ said Norman. ‘They created a computer-generated image of what he looked like and printed it in the local paper a couple of days after he died. They were hoping someone might recognise it, but no one ever came forward.’

  ‘Maybe no one came forward,’ said Slater, ‘but it looks like someone recognised him. So, if I’m right, now we have to ask why wouldn’t they come forward?’

  ‘I think I see where you’re going with this. You think it was a woman. You think he had a lover.’

  ‘I think it’s a distinct possibility.’

  ‘But he’d only just arrived in the area. He came to find Ryan.’

  ‘That’s what Ryan told us,’ said Slater. ‘But what if he was wrong? What if this woman was an old flame, and Morgan came to find her? What if Ryan being here was a coincidence?’

  ‘That’s a bit of a long shot, isn’t it?’ Norman studied Slater intently.

  ‘If you’ve got a better explanation for these flowers being here, I’d love to hear it,’ said Slater. ‘The man had only been here a day. We know he was in trouble. What if he’d been in touch with this old flame and she’d told him to come here so she could help him?’