Murder Knows No Season

by Cathy Ace

  In the meantime, there was the misery of the soup to contend with. Evan liked his food; sometimes he never knew when he’d get his next proper meal, so when he had one he wanted it to be just that – a proper meal, not some excuse for one, with no fat and just ten calories a serving. But there was no denying he’d filled out a bit over the summer; his shirts were pulling at their buttons just a bit, and his trousers could have been a little looser.

  The days when he could eat whatever he wanted because he’d be running it off at rugby practice, or playing it off on the rugby field at the weekend, were long gone, and his small frame – ideal for his beloved position of fly half – was now beginning to feel the strain of carrying what was, probably, about an extra stone. He sighed, and resigned himself to vile, watery, vegetable soup for a couple of weeks; it was a small price to pay, he supposed.

  ‘Just under two weeks now,’ Betty added brightly. Evan knew she was referring to their holiday; he was crossing off the days on the kitchen calendar.

  ‘I know, not long. And I might not be too late tonight. Might be a jumper, might not. Might be an accident – we’ll see.’

  ‘Thanks for phoning, and say “Hello” to Liz? Tell her to look after you for me? And don’t go too close to the edge – you know what you’re like with heights.’

  Evan signed off, sighing, but smiling. Betty was right, of course, he wasn’t good with heights, and he hoped this investigation didn’t mean he’d have to go peering over the cliffs at all.

  ‘Betty says “Hello”,’ said Evan, pocketing his phone.

  ‘And did she tell me to look after you, too, sir?’ asked Stanley, risking a wry smile at her superior’s expense.

  ‘As per usual,’ conceded Glover.

  Three Cliffs Bay was still about ten minutes away, so, with no information about the case to discuss, Stanley made a personal observation.

  ‘I expect she’ll be looking forward to your holiday, sir?’

  Glover and Stanley didn’t often have ‘personal’ conversations. They kept their off-the-job socializing to a minimum, too; Evan didn’t think it was fair to impose himself on Stanley in her spare time. He knew he’d never liked it when his superiors insisted upon inviting him to their homes or social gatherings, so why should he make Stanley suffer?

  ‘She certainly is,’ he replied, then decided to deflect the conversation a little, ‘but you’re off before us, aren’t you? Scout Leaders’ Camp, next week, isn’t it?’

  Stanley nodded. ‘Yes. It’s nice that, when all the kids go back to school, we scout leaders get to go to our own camp, and compare notes. And I suppose you could say we let off a bit of steam. I’m only an assistant leader in Swansea; I was a leader in Bristol, but I still get to attend.’

  ‘So where exactly does this week of canvas-covered debauchery take place?’ asked Glover, smiling.

  ‘We’re off to a place in North Devon; it’s got an excellent camp lodge. The bloke who runs it is a good sort, and there are at least four pubs within walking distance, so we never get on any one landlord’s nerves too much. But the best thing about it is––’

  ‘Don’t tell me, it’s the toilets, right? It’s actually got some?’ Glover laughed.

  ‘How did you guess, sir?’ asked Stanley, quite taken aback.

  ‘Third Swansea, 1973 to 1976, Wolf Patrol,’ answered Glover, giving the scouts’ three-fingered salute to his subordinate. ‘I remember digging “lat pits” at camp. Filthy job. And it always seemed to be me who got to do it.’

  ‘Same here,’ replied Stanley wryly. ‘But this place has a really good personal hygiene block – all white tiles, hot running water, closed shower cubicles – the lot.’

  ‘Ah, the joys of roughing it,’ smiled Glover.

  ‘The joys of not roughing it quite as much as usual,’ replied Stanley, laughing.

  Evan realized they’d become a little distracted. ‘Next left, Stanley,’ he announced. ‘It’s just before Penmaen Church, a tiny turning . . . there.’

  The car swung awkwardly into the narrow turning. Stanley managed to successfully avoid the hedges threatening the pool-car’s paint job. They pushed along the lane as far as possible, then their way was barred by a straggling group of other official vehicles.

  ‘Try and squeeze it into that corner there,’ said Evan indicating a slight widening in the lane, and he leaped from the still-moving car.

  ‘Sir,’ was Stanley’s formal reply.

  All thoughts of personal conversations were now gone.

  ‘Anybody here seen Rakel Souza?’ cried Evan as he approached an ambulance and a police car at the end of the lane.

  ‘She’s just coming up now, sir,’ came the reply from a suddenly erect uniformed constable who, until that moment, had been leaning nonchalantly against his car, laughing at the two uniformed men who were struggling to maneuver a heavily-laden stretcher along the narrow, winding path that led up, almost vertically, from the beach below.

  Glover could see Souza was much closer, and decided to wait where he was for her. He assumed any recovery team personnel had already left; they’d have been needed to retrieve a body from the cliff face, or base.

  By the time Dr Rakel Souza reached Glover she was smiling warmly. Despite the dark hue of her skin, Evan could see her cheeks were rosy; she almost seemed to be having a good time – she might have been on a carefree seaside hike for all he could gather from her expression.

  Evan enjoyed an excellent working relationship with Souza – they were friends as well as colleagues. It was true that, professionally speaking, DI Evan Glover and Dr Rakel Souza had shared many a post-mortem, but Evan and Betty also enjoyed spending time together as a foursome with Rakel and her husband Gareth. They’d shared plenty of dinners at each other’s homes – neither couple having children – and even the odd weekend away from Swansea together, though it had been some years since they’d had the chance to do that.

  Evan liked Rakel; she’d been brought up a strict Roman Catholic by her immigrant Goan parents, had attended Swansea’s St Joseph’s Catholic school, and had excelled academically, then in her chosen career. She was exceptionally bright, diligent and hard-working; he couldn’t have hoped for a better colleague – and friend. It only helped that her maths teacher husband, Gareth Williams, had once been a fellow rugby player of Evan’s.

  ‘Lovely day for it!’ was Souza’s first observation, followed rapidly by, ‘unless you’re this poor chap, of course.’

  Glover took in their surroundings. But for the emergency response vehicles, and the sad reason for their being there, it was, as Souza had noted, a lovely day; the sun was still some way above the horizon, the sky was a pale, fresh blue, and the sea glinted invitingly below them, surrounded by the craggy forms of the Three Cliffs themselves and the vivid green of the grass on the hilltops. It was stunning.

  Then Glover looked at the stretcher. To business.

  ‘Do we know what happened?’ he asked.

  ‘I suppose you mean can I tell you “did he fall, or was he pushed”?’ Dr Rakel Souza, Director of Forensic Pathology for West Glamorgan, and HM’s Coroner for the region, seemed pleased with herself at being able to use the well-worn phrase.

  Evan admired Rakel for her enthusiasm for everything she did, and the incredible knowledge upon which her enthusiasm rested. ‘Can you say?’ he asked, hopefully. Maybe there’d be some resolution to his superior’s earlier caginess.

  ‘Not yet, Evan,’ was Souza’s quiet response. ‘If he wasn’t dead or dying when he went over, the fall would most likely have killed him. His injuries are extensive, especially around the head and neck. I suspect spinal shock – a broken neck to the layman – but I’ll have to have a better look at him back at the “ranch”. I can tell you I can’t see any immediately obvious signs of attack – but, to be frank, even that’s pushing it, given the state of the body.’

  ‘Bad?’ Evan suspected he could guess the answer.

  ‘Bad,’ replied Souza, sounding grim. ‘He�
��s bounced down a couple of hundred feet of jagged cliff face. Not pretty.’

  ‘Any chance of an ID?’ was Evan’s next, obvious question.

  ‘Yes, I’m afraid so, Evan. And you’re not going to like it. The reason I mentioned your name to DSI Lewis, was because of this.’

  She handed Evan a wallet enclosed in a plastic evidence bag. He manipulated the wallet inside its protective cover until he managed to get it open.

  He caught his breath. No. It couldn’t be.

  Peering out from a blurred driver’s license photograph, was the unmistakable face of The Great One, the one and only GGR Davies himself – the best fly half who ever earned a Welsh Rugby Cap, and Evan’s sporting hero of thirty years’ standing.

  He couldn’t believe it.

  ‘This is GGR’s body?’ His eyes begged Souza to deny it.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Evan,’ said Souza softly. She reached out and touched him gently on the arm. ‘I know what GGR meant to you – and I have to admit I can’t be a hundred percent sure it’s him because of the damage to the face. But all the other observable physical attributes are consistent with it being the case. I fear The Great One is no more. It’s a sad day for you, I know, and a sad day indeed for Welsh rugby. Just wait until I tell Gareth. To say he’ll be gutted would be an understatement of epic proportions. If I had any sense I’d go out now and buy shares in the Fire Dragon Brewery; the amount of beer that will be drunk when news of GGR’s death breaks will be staggering.’

  Glover couldn’t have agreed more. The huge party thrown by the Fire Dragon Brewery – from which GGR had retired as a ‘super salesman’ just a week ago – had been headline news across the whole of Wales. He could imagine the next set of headlines: ‘GGR Dead!’ or ‘The Great One – Gone!’ Not many people in the world could be recognized by merely their initials, but GGR Davies was one of them.

  Immediately, the ‘did he fall, or was he pushed?’ question took on a whole new meaning for Glover. He knew that, if the body was confirmed as being GGR’s, he wouldn’t have a moment’s peace until the manner of the man’s death had been fully explained; no peace in his own mind, and no peace from the press, or his superiors. He cursed DCI Jenkins’s holiday once again.

  On a personal level, he was still trying to come to terms with the loss of the sporting hero he’d watched through the glory days of Welsh rugby – when GGR had stuffed it to the English, and anyone else who’d dared allow the man to get his hands on the ball. Four Triple Crowns in a row, three Grand Slams; those were the days. And GGR had been there every time Wales had chalked up another record; he’d been magic. He was more famous than all the other players of his generation put together. He’d inspired a thousand Welsh schoolboys to get out onto the field and run toward the try line like a train. Including Evan himself.

  Could it really be his remains on that stretcher being hauled up from the cliffs? Surely GGR Davies was immortal?

  ‘When will you know for sure?’ was Glover’s miserable question to Souza.

  Souza gave it some thought. ‘Well, it’s going to be an unpleasant identification for any family member, so I’ll start with dental records.’

  Glover pulled himself together. Focus on the job, focus on the job.

  ‘Right-o, Rakel, not a word about this possibly being GGR to anyone, until we know for sure. Get him back to your place and put a rush on identification, quick as you can – right? I’ll co-ordinate with Lewis.’

  Souza nodded. ‘I’ll handle the PM myself; I won’t hand it off to anyone else,’ she confirmed.

  ‘I’ll hang onto this –’ Glover nodded at the wallet – ‘and we’ll do some digging around about GGR’s supposed whereabouts. This might not be him. He might be going about his business completely unaware that someone has his wallet in their pocket.’

  Glover suspected he was clutching at straws. He continued, ‘Before you go, Rakel, can you point out to me where the body was found? Maybe we can work out where he might have . . .’ He hesitated. ‘. . . fallen from.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ replied Souza, ‘I’ll walk you over now – we found him pretty much directly below where the RSPCA lot found the dog.’

  ‘RSPCA? Dog?’ asked Evan.

  ‘Wheaten Scottish terrier, found dragging a shooting stick tied to its lead, over on the cliff top there. The RSPCA have taken the dog; your Forensic Investigation Team have the stick. I noted the telephone number printed on the dog’s collar. Dog’s named Arthur, by the way. Here’s the phone number.’

  Souza handed Evan a scrap of paper with a mobile phone number scribbled on it.

  ‘Damn!’ said Evan, his sunny disposition now completely clouded. ‘GGR had a dog named Arthur – I saw them together in the photos on the front page of the Evening Post last week. Oh Rakel, I’d give anything for it to not be him.’

  Rakel Souza patted him on the shoulder. Her small, bird-like frame meant she had to reach up to do so, even though Glover wasn’t tall.

  ‘Thanks for the sympathy,’ said Evan, ‘the phone number’s a start – let’s give it a go.’ Pulling out his mobile phone, he dialed the number Souza had handed him. He heard the ring tone on his own phone, and quickly realized he could also hear a musical tune coming from the approaching stretcher. He pushed the button to disconnect. The music stopped. He redialed. Once again the unmistakable strains of ‘Bread of Heaven’ could be heard coming from the stretcher that was now just a foot or two away. He let it ring, then the music stopped and Glover heard a familiar voice; a voice that had given triumphant post-game interviews through the 1970s; a voice that had given opinions about rugby internationals throughout the decades that followed; a voice that unmistakably belonged to GGR Davies.

  ‘Sorry I missed you. Leave a message and I’ll ring you back. Diolch.’

  Evan felt as though he’d been kicked in the belly; it wasn’t a formal identification, but he reckoned it was pretty close. ‘Looks like we’ve got several strong reasons to believe it’s him then.’

  Souza sadly nodded her agreement. ‘Gareth will be beside himself. Worshipped GGR, he did.’

  Evan squared his shoulders. ‘I’d better take a look at him, I suppose, and I’d better get that phone too; it could help us out. Amazing it still works.’

  Souza took charge. The injuries to the man’s head and face, were, as she had warned, significant. It was difficult to recognize any features, as few remained.

  Evan found himself struggling to be objective; given the number of dead bodies he’d seen over the years, it never ceased to amaze him that each one felt like the first. He had no idea how Rakel did what she did. He couldn’t have stomached it, he knew that.

  The facial injuries aside, Glover quickly assessed the body and noted the lightweight red jacket – from the inside pocket of which Souza extracted the telephone, placing it into a suitable protective bag – the plaid shirt, and khaki trousers, all torn by the sharp rocks and soaked by the sea. They clung to the body, wrinkled and gaping, revealing jagged puncture wounds.

  It was a sorry sight.

  Souza signaled that the remains should be taken to the waiting vehicle.

  ‘Let me show you where I think he might have gone over,’ said Souza, as Evan motioned to Stanley to follow, ‘then I’ll get back as quick as I can and get going with a formal identification.’

  Evan was lost in thought as the threesome walked across the headland, their eyes narrowing against the descending sun and stiff breeze. ‘We’d better proceed as though it is GGR, so let’s see what we can find here,’ he said.

  ‘Here’ turned out to be a grassy dell below the highest point of the cliff top, shielded from the wind by high rocks on all sides except that facing out to sea. The grass was badly trampled about and Evan could see quite clearly where the pointed end of a shooting stick had been stuck deep into the ground, then dragged out by a no doubt distressed little dog, probably wondering what had happened to its master.

  ‘No obvious sign of a suicide note, or any other ite
ms lying about, were there?’ Evan knew the Forensic Investigation Team would have done a thorough job – a large area was cordoned off.

  Souza shook her head. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘If the dog’s been running around, doubtless chased about by some pretty heavy-footed RSPCA types, there might not be anything here that’s of much use for us. But I’m sure I’ll get the FIT report in due course. We’ll hold off on the door-to-door around the farms and what-not in the area until we know more, and until we know if it’s GGR, or not. Let’s sort out next of kin, Stanley.’

  Stanley nodded her understanding, and headed toward the two uniformed officers who were still kicking their heels beside their car.

  ‘Anything for us down there?’ asked Evan, peering toward the edge of the cliff, but remaining at least ten feet back from the precipitous edge.

  ‘To be honest, it would be hard to say,’ replied Rakel Souza. ‘When the surfers initially spotted him, down there close to the base of the cliffs, he was, apparently, upside down, lodged between two outcrops. It was the red of his jacket that caught their attention. By the time HM Coastguard arrived by sea, the tide was coming in, and they couldn’t get close enough to effect a retrieval; their craft would have been pushed into the rocks. In any case, it was clear to them – from the injuries they could see – that he was dead. I was in my office when the call came in and, frankly, I thought a run to the seaside might be more pleasant than ploughing through my coroner’s paperwork. As you know, I like a bit of scampering up and down cliffs – in my spare time, usually – but this wasn’t a job for me. The recovery team brought him up. By the time they got to him, the sea was already washing over the body. Now the sea’s at least ten feet above where they found him – so I suspect anything that might have been down there would have been washed away. I’ve had a good look down at the cliff face with my binoculars, but I couldn’t see any evidence of exactly where he might have struck as he fell.’