The Man by the Sea (The Slim Hardy Mystery Series Book 1)

by Jack Benton

  ‘Of course, it wouldn’t be simple,’ he said. ‘Nothing is with Joanna Bramwell. Why would this be any different?’

  ‘You’re not making any sense.’

  ‘I’ll explain when we arrive.’

  Despite the captain’s reluctance, they paddled onto the rocks in far choppier waters than before. The tide was slurping and sucking at crags and gullies as they lodged the dinghy.

  ‘Right there,’ Slim said, clambering over a jagged ridge onto a ledge extending out into the water. ‘See the way the chop comes in here but doesn’t splash up over the rocks? That’s because it’s not meeting the same resistance. There’s something down there.’

  ‘What?’

  Slim pulled off his shirt and unzipped the holdall he had brought. The ragged wetsuit had cost him his last few quid in Carnwell’s Oxfam shop, and it tore a little as he pulled it on. Before he zipped it up, he stuffed a sealable plastic bag containing a torch and an old camera Arthur had lent him inside the suit, nestled it against his stomach, then zipped it up again.

  ‘Slim, we have police divers,’ Arthur said. ‘At the very least I could have got you some decent gear. You don’t even have a face mask. This is—’

  ‘Reckless?’ Slim grinned. He held up shaking hands. ‘I’ve had one drink in twenty-four hours, and that tasted of spearmint. I spent the morning vomiting in Tesco’s public toilet. Right now, cracking my head on those rocks doesn’t sound so bad.’

  ‘Your suit’s on backward,’ Arthur said. ‘The zip should be at the back.’

  Slim grinned. ‘Wish me luck.’

  ‘Good luck, you crazy fool.’

  Slim looked down into the water. The sea, sucking and pulling at the rocks, was doing so with frightening force. It was likely to smash him like a rotten apple against a wall.

  Taking what he hoped wasn’t his last breath, he shut his eyes and jumped.

  Even with the wetsuit, the shock of the cold was staggering. He gasped, losing the precious breath he had saved, and then he was under, freezing, salty water wrapping around him.

  With currents tugging him, he had no control of direction. Aware of the shelf of rock on which Arthur stood above, he flapped his hands to push downward, letting the momentum of the water drive his progress. It sucked, pulling him out, then with a roar it flung him forward at what should have been a wall of jagged rock.

  Slim waited to die, but where he should have met cold, bone-crushing resistance, there was nothing. Face down, his back scraped at something above, and his hands found rock beneath. The water surged, pushing him forward again, and he burst out of the water, arching his neck at the same time to take in a desperate breath.

  He was in darkness.

  The rock beneath his hands was smooth and slick. Water still sucked at his feet, so he scrambled forward, and wet rocks became dry and rough, and then he felt pebbles and shale under his fingers. With the sound of the water behind him, Slim rolled over and sat up. He sat quietly, his eyes closed, listening to the hollow echo of the sea battering the headland, and the wind whistling around the cliff.

  When he opened his eyes, he saw a thin shaft of light.

  Water dripped from the end of a natural borehole in the ceiling onto a patch of rock gleaming in the sun. Slim looked up the shaft, barely wide enough for a person to enter. Rocks had been piled beneath it to provide a way up to where hand- and footholds chipped into its sides gave access to the cliff face some ten or fifteen metres above.

  ‘That’s how you get in and out,’ he whispered, his voice echoing back at him from the damp cave walls.

  He pulled off the top half of his wetsuit, noticing the warmth of the cave compared to the air outside.

  The torchlight illuminated a cavern stretching some way past the borehole, an accumulation of rock debris gradually rising up to meet the sloping cave roof.

  As the light fell over a flat area cleared of stones, Slim stopped and stared.

  Around him, stacked up against the rock walls, was a life: a miscellany of accumulated items, everything from foodstuffs to books, threadbare blankets, plastic chairs, bottles and cans, old torches, a heap of rusted batteries, gas canisters and even some electrical items that may never have worked.

  Slim picked a dog-eared paperback out of a plastic box and turned it over.

  Romeo and Juliet.

  As he opened it to a bookmarked page, the folded piece of paper fell out.

  He picked it up and turned it over in his hands.

  A flyer for a Shakespeare company. On the front, in all their headline splendour, Ted Douglas and Joanna Bramwell.

  Slim replaced the bookmark and put the book back into the box. A strange feeling came over him, one that blended euphoria with a bittersweet regret.

  ‘I’ve found you,’ he whispered. ‘At last.’

  45

  ‘YOU’RE A MADMAN,’ Arthur said, shaking his head. ‘But if you want a job on Carnwell’s police force, say the word. I’ll find some way to fast-track you. You’re wasted spying on dirty old men.’

  Slim smiled. His face still ached from where he had struck his cheek during the arduous climb out. At the time seemingly a good idea, in hindsight it would have been less dangerous to risk the underwater tunnel a second time, but by the time he had scrambled to the top of the borehole on cut and bleeding feet, only to find himself facing fifty metres of near-vertical rock face with only a few rusty chains and ladders to help him, going back was as dangerous as going forward.

  From the clifftop he had hurried to the beach, where he had been able to attract the attention of the boat’s captain. The bemused fisherman had let Arthur know, and then come in close enough to the beach for Slim to swim out. Back on the boat, Arthur had stared at Slim as though he were Joanna Bramwell herself.

  ‘Where the hell did you get to?’ he exclaimed, shaking his head. ‘I was about to call out the coastguard to look for a body.’

  Slim smiled. ‘I’m not sure you’re going to believe this.’

  The photos Slim had taken were proof enough of Joanna Bramwell’s secret den. Arthur flicked through them, shaking his head in disbelief.

  ‘How on earth did she find that place?’ he said.

  ‘She didn’t. It found her. After a streak of bad luck, Joanna got some fortune. It’s my belief that after your friend Mick threw her body into the sea, the water washed her into the cave. There she woke up, born again.’

  ‘It sounds like you’ve been reading a bunch of that Shakespeare, too,’ Arthur said.

  ‘I have no other explanation, but it fits. And how else can you explain such a place? My guess, it was a cave used by smugglers—hence the chains and ladders. Perhaps it was a local legend? I don’t know.’

  ‘I’ve never heard anything,’ Arthur said. ‘But it was so well hidden I can believe you’re right. It’s invisible from both the sea and the clifftop.’

  ‘A perfect hiding place,’ Slim said. ‘Now we just have to find her. I don’t think it’s the only place she hides out. There was no fresh food, nothing to suggest she had been there in some time.’

  ‘Another cave?’

  Slim shrugged. ‘I think it’s unlikely. It might be time you called in a full police manhunt.’

  Arthur looked pained. ‘I tried. I don’t have the authorisation. There’s still not enough to go on.’

  Slim clenched his fists. ‘There’s a dangerous woman out there.’

  Arthur shook his head. ‘Here’s what it came down to with my superiors. All the cases involved have been officially solved. And even if they weren’t, there was nothing to say they were murder. Unfortunately fear isn’t a murderer’s weapon.’

  ‘Then we have to find her ourselves,’ Slim said. ‘Listen, this is going to make me sound bad, but I need some cash.’

  ‘For drink? Slim, if you’re that desperate, I can clean out my liquor cabinet—’

  ‘Food, bus tickets, and I need to fix up some gear that got broken.’ He grinned. ‘But if you did, that would be grand.’<
br />
  ‘I can’t just hand over a wad of notes.’

  ‘I’ll pay you back. I just need a sub for a couple of weeks.’

  Arthur rolled his eyes. ‘I’ll do what I can.’

  ‘And I need CCTV footage. My street, the Douglases’ street, the approach to the hospital.’

  ‘I told you, I can’t authorise that level of manpower—’

  ‘Then I’ll watch it all myself. I have nothing better to do. And those photos I gave you—do you have them back yet?’

  ‘I’ve heard nothing.’

  ‘Chase them up. Supposing there’s a clue in all that getup. Anything you can do, I need. It’s important.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  Slim gritted his teeth. ‘I’m going to find Joanna Bramwell … even if it kills me.’

  46

  SLIM WAS BEGINNING to understand how Ted Douglas must have felt. He had never been haunted before, but he awoke to Emma’s snoring with a sheen of sweat across his back and a residue terror of being held underwater by a woman’s skeletal hands.

  He pulled back the sheets and crawled to the door. The door to Ted’s room was slightly ajar, so he crept inside, beginning another silent search through drawers and cupboards. Again, nothing. Emma had said the box of papers had come from the loft, so perhaps he would have better luck there. It was impossible to access without waking Emma, though. Perhaps he could convince her to visit Ted in hospital, leaving him at the house … he didn’t think so.

  He sat back against Ted’s bed, feeling frustrated. Answers were waiting for him, but where?

  A creak came from the hallway. Slim started to get up, but too late: a light came on in the hall and then Ted’s door was opening. Emma stood there in her nightgown, rubbing her eyes. With her hair ruffled, and without the benefit of makeup, she had gained ten years.

  ‘What are you doing in here?’

  Slim started to make an excuse, but gave up. He sighed.

  ‘I’m looking for clues,’ he said.

  For a few seconds he thought Emma would explode with anger at this intrusion into her privacy, but she just cocked her head at him like a tired parent, then sat on the floor beside him.

  ‘If there was anything to find, don’t you think I would have brought it to you?’

  ‘I thought you might have missed something.’

  ‘Believe me, all this business with Ted and Joanna was a surprise to me, too. I’ll admit our marriage wasn’t doing great—you can see that—but it was a marriage. Have you come up with nothing?’

  Slim thought about telling Emma about the cave, but he didn’t want to get her hopes up. Instead, he said, ‘I’m trying to get hold of some CCTV footage.’

  Emma nodded. ‘That might help. I hope you catch her soon. Shall we go back to bed?’

  Slim nodded. As they reached the hall, he nodded at the bathroom. ‘Just a minute.’

  Emma smiled. ‘I’ll be waiting.’

  They parted. Slim, his stomach churning as it had the previous night, squatted on the toilet and waited. Emma’s bedroom door clicked shut.

  When he was done, he went to wash his hands, but found the shaking worse than it had been in several days. He tried to hold his hands still enough to turn off the faucet, but it was no use. He nudged open the sink cabinet and reached for the mouthwash. It was better than nothing and would last him until to the morning.

  His fingers knocked it backward. The plastic wall at the cabinet’s back came loose. Slim grimaced, afraid it would fall into the space behind, but it had lodged tight. He tried to pull it out to realign it, but it was meeting resistance from something pressed in behind.

  Perhaps it had fallen out before. Slim tried to twist it back into place, but it lifted up, and he saw the corner of something paper poking out.

  A notebook.

  After a long swallow of mouthwash steadied his hands, Slim removed the other items from the cabinet and then slid out the plastic rear wall.

  An old pencil-lined notebook stood in the space behind, perched on a lip of plastic, leaning against an unpainted section of wall.

  Slim removed it and opened it to the first page.

  ‘I can’t believe I found you,’ he read. ‘I’ve always wanted to tell you I was sorry.’

  With hands shaking worse than before, Slim slid the notebook back where it had been resting, then replaced the plastic wall and the other items in the cabinet.

  When he climbed in next to Emma, she rolled over, waking from a half-sleep, and groaned.

  ‘You took your time,’ she said.

  ‘My stomach’s playing up,’ Slim answered. ‘Sorry.’

  47

  I THOUGHT my eyes were deceiving me. I mourned you, Joanna, and I suffered for what I did to you. For years I was dead inside. Even when I coached myself back into life through the simple need to exist, a part of me was missing. A part of me that died with you on that beach.

  I went to your funeral. I held my tears while others around me made rivers of theirs. Outwardly, I was a stone wall of respect, but behind the stoicism of my face, I was dying too, throttled inside with the twin garrottes of guilt and loss. You know, don’t you, that I made a mistake? I was selfish. I wanted you all for myself.

  I’m sorry, Joanna. I will never forgive myself for what I did, and I do not deserve your forgiveness. Yet, when you looked into my eyes, I felt it there.

  I don’t know what brought me to return to Cramer Cove that day I found you again. I guess I was hunting for ghosts, still haunted by the look in your eyes that last day, when you told me that our feelings didn’t matter, that you had made a choice. I wanted only to walk by the sea and think of you, but when I found you there, standing by the shoreline, I felt that I had also died and that our spirits would walk together forevermore.

  I almost let you be. I almost waited by my car until your apparition faded, but I felt a stirring inside that had been missing since the days we were together.

  ‘Joanna.’

  It was the first time I had spoken your name aloud in nearly ten years. From the way your shoulders shifted I knew you had heard me, and when you turned, the joy that flooded through me buckled my knees. I looked on your face for the first time in years from below you. The sun framed your hair, and I felt like I had been thrown back in time.

  As your eyes looked over me, I prayed that you would utter my name. I wanted to beg you, but you were already leaving me, returning to the water. You belonged to the sea now, I realised, a Shakespearean heroine brought to life. I watched you disappear, the water rising around you, and I cried for what had been found as well as what had been lost.

  There was little in life that has hurt me more than to turn from you and return to my now world, one in which you no longer exist.

  I will return for you, Joanna. I will never leave you again.

  48

  ‘HE LED A SECRET LIFE,’ Slim told Arthur over a coffee he had laced with a cheap no-brand whisky. Already half of Arthur’s quiet sub was gone on what Slim considered essentials—three cheap bottles of booze, a second-hand microwave and a stack of packet meals to go with it, and a four-week bus pass.

  Arthur shook his head. ‘But there are no clues to where Joanna might be?

  ‘None. He writes with what I’d consider a suppressed poeticism. Like this notebook is his outlet for everything that died in him when Joanna did. Some of it’s written in verse. It’s barely legible.’

  ‘Can I see it?’

  Slim shook his head. ‘I left it in the house. The wall of the cabinet had been warped over time because of the notebook and wouldn’t fit back in without the notebook behind it. My guess is that Ted has been stashing it there for decades. I had to put it back.’

  ‘Couldn’t you find something to replace it?’

  Slim grinned. I’m heading down to WHSmith when we’re done here.’

  ‘Didn’t you want Emma to see? It might have offered her closure.’

  Slim shook his head. ‘She’s not the fo
rgiving type, and I’m worried about how she might react to finding out her husband was effectively cheating on her with a ghost.’

  Arthur rubbed his eyes, then gave Slim a stern look. ‘You know, it does complicate matters that you’re sleeping with her.’

  When Slim feigned surprise, Arthur shook his head.

  ‘You think I haven’t noticed?’ He shrugged. ‘To be honest, I wasn’t sure until now. You’re not a good liar.’

  Slim shrugged. ‘It just kind of happened. I wasn’t preying on a woman in distress or anything like that.’

  ‘You’re putting yourself in the firing line.’

  Slim nodded. ‘I’m also close to the action if Joanna shows up. I wanted to end it—’

  ‘—before it ends you?’

  Slim gave a wry smile. ‘Something like that.’

  Arthur shrugged. ‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’ He leaned over and hauled a plastic bag up onto the table. Items jostled inside. ‘Keep the door locked behind you while you’re trawling through these.’

  Slim lifted the edge of the bag and peered inside. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘CCTV tapes.’

  Slim withdrew a VHS tape and lifted it up. ‘Actual video tapes? I’m not sure I have anything to play these on.’

  ‘There’s a mixture. Depends on how old the system was. I’ve labelled each location.’

  Slim grinned. ‘Should make a good date night with Emma. Popcorn’s in the bag, right?’

  Arthur ignored the sarcasm. ‘I’m allocating as many officers I can to this,’ Arthur said. ‘I’m doubling street patrols. I justified it as a precaution against the usual pre-Christmas crime you always get at this time of year, but they’ve all been briefed with Joanna’s description.’

  ‘Water-soaked, matted, shell-encrusted hair, dressed in a fisherman’s trench-coat and waders? You sure they took you seriously?’

  ‘I toned it down a little from the description you gave me. Made her sound like a vagabond, long-term homeless.’