DS Mike Poole stared down at the body in the chair. By the looks of his surroundings, Bob Silver hadn’t had much of a life and his death looked like that of Gordon Henderson at first glance. However, the general opinion was that this hadn’t been another murder as such, yet the man had died with a photograph screwed up and stuffed into his mouth. Bob appeared to have died from a stroke or a coronary by the looks of him – his passing lubricated by the application of alcohol, judging from the empty cider bottles. Either way, it would all have to be verified – no one could assume it was natural causes. The SOCO had just bagged up the photograph and Poole asked to see it. From the creased picture a young girl peered up at him through the thin layer of plastic, her face all wide-eyed innocence. The name Lou had been scribbled in pencil on the back, no date, no surname, just Lou. A flash of something whipped through Poole’s mind, like he’d seen her somewhere before but couldn’t recall where. The feeling left something hollow and tragic in its wake but he put it down to empathy for Bob, who looked as if he’d lived a small, sad life. ‘Who found him?’ he asked.
One of the uniformed officers called through the door, knowing better than to come in, clodhopping all over a crime scene. ‘The solicitor, came to serve notice to quit. Found him in the chair just like you see him now.’
Poole looked around the ramshackle dwelling, more cinder-block garage than house, and said, ‘Can you evict someone from a shed?’
The officer who’d answered his first question started to answer the second, but Poole put his hand up. ‘It was rhetorical, don’t worry about it.’ His phone vibrated in his pocket, telling him he had a message. The forensic anthropologist had arrived to assess the bones and DI James wanted him back at the station. He instructed Kelsoe and Gallan to stay put and oversee the scene, brushed some dog hair off his sleeve and turned towards the door, where he paused. ‘That’s a point. What happened to the dog?’
Everyone else exchanged glances and shrugged, and Poole didn’t have time to worry about it. ‘Someone find out about the dog, yeah?’
A splintered human, stripped of flesh and sinew, lay on the table, with all its bones placed carefully where they had been situated in life. It wasn’t even a carcass, just a collection of brittle, yellow sticks and lumps. The skeleton was so far removed from anything remotely resembling life that it was hard for Poole to connect the disjointed form with a living, breathing human soul. Yet she had been.
The forensic anthropologist, Dr Frances (Call Me Frank) Channing, had a touch of the cadavers himself. Tall, gangly and spare, he bore a greater resemblance to the bones on the table than he did to either DI James or Poole. There was an ashy tinge to his skin too, which only served to heighten the effect that the man had a foot in both camps, looking like he trod a fine line between the living and dead himself. Poole had read that dogs often resembled their owners, but it was the first time he’d noticed that human beings could take on and display the nature of their occupation through their appearance. Poole was pretty raddled himself. Perhaps that was how he personified his own profession – by looking half-arsed and not quite up to the challenge. With a fifth body linked to Essen Grange about to hit the cold store, it was hard not to see it any other way.
Call Me Frank was talking about the skull. ‘The damage here was clearly caused by the equipment that was being used when the remains were discovered. It would appear the skull was also dropped. Some of the teeth were dislodged, and there are several cracks that would indicate it. I won’t be able to give you a definitive answer until I’ve had chance to thoroughly examine the remains, but from the size and structure of the long bones, my guess would be that this female was born with a trisonomic disorder, possibly trisomy 21.’
DI James rolled her eyes and frowned at Poole. ‘In lay terms?’
Call Me Frank didn’t look up from his loving attendance to the bones. ‘Sorry, more used to lecturing than explaining these days. You’d know it as Down’s Syndrome. I’m fairly convinced already – the set of the skull almost confirms it – but I don’t want to state it as a fact until I’ve made specific measurements…’ He tailed off as Poole’s voice cut across him.
‘Barbara. The Hendersons had a Down’s Syndrome daughter called Barbara.’
DI James threw her head back in disgust. ‘And how long have you been keeping that little gem to yourself, Mike?’
Poole rubbed his hand over his face. James’s ire was not something he relished provoking. ‘Since yesterday, but I’ve been trying to get it verified. There are no records of her. Until now I had to assume she might just be a figment of local gossip.’
DI James scowled at him and strode towards the door. ‘My office, now.’
Poole offered an apologetic smile to Frank Channing, who by then was idly nursing a femur in his gloved hands. He followed the DI out, studying her tense, determined frame as she walked. It was not going to be an easy conversation.
It wasn’t. DI James was festering with discontent, her knuckles white with tension as they gripped the arms of her chair. ‘What the fuck, Poole? Don’t you think this whole scenario is screwed-up enough without you withholding essential information?’
Poole knew better than to interrupt her. It was always better to let her roll and burn out than fan the flames of her temper with arguments or excuses. She ranted on for a minute or two, which was a longer time than people imagined when all you were there for was to hear all your faults reeled out in a barrage of criticism. She ended only when she had run out of complaints and had no choice but to pitch the ball back into his court. ‘So, what’s the excuse for it, Poole? We’re up to our necks in this shit and I want answers.’
Poole did too, but they were proving hard to find, despite his best efforts. ‘I was in receipt of what can only be called gossip yesterday, regarding the possible existence of a Down’s Syndrome daughter of Gordon Henderson. I couldn’t verify via the alleged mother, as she’s currently a long-term resident in an EMI unit and probably hasn’t made the trip to planet Earth from la la land since the early eighties. Having only had someone’s secondhand allegation I felt it only right that I should try to establish the veracity of the claim before bringing it to the table. There’s enough confusion with these cases as it is, without one of us bringing more,’ he said.
DI James was beginning to look less tense. The yelling seemed to have acted as a purge and the expression on her previously livid face told Poole she just might be back in her rational mind. She was a good detective, but she liked things easy and straightforward. It wasn’t in her psyche to be patient (Poole supposed it might not be in his either if he had a baying mob of superintendents and DCIs breathing down his neck). ‘Well? What did you manage to find out?’
Poole sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. He needed a shave, and a week off, maybe two – perhaps even a holiday involving bugger all but lying on a beach and surreptitiously watching scantily clad women… ‘Naff all. Technically she doesn’t exist – no birth certificate, no school records, no dental records, no medical records. All I can surmise is that, because of her disability, she was kept as some kind of dirty little secret. The information I was given implied she’d been placed in care when she’d become too difficult to handle. I think what we just saw courtesy of Dr Channing would imply they found an alternative means of disposing of a problem child.’
James tapped her fingers on the desk, implying deep thought. ‘Hmmmm, it’s not a scenario that’s out of the way. Who gave you this information?’
Poole had been waiting for that and it annoyed him that he’d have to tell her. ‘Maura Lyle. She was told by Connie Nixon, Cheryl Nixon’s mother.’
DI James frowned. ‘I thought we’d eliminated Lyle and Nixon from the enquiry?’
‘We have. Maura Lyle works at the hospital where Jane Henderson is an inpatient. I saw her there and she volunteered the information.’
James’s frown didn’t falter. ‘How very convenient… Have we talked to the mother, Connie?’
Poole shook his head. ‘Not yet, not about this anyway. She certainly didn’t volunteer it when we talked to her before. I was about to go and see her when we got the news that Bob Silver had been found dead. Looked initially like he went the same way as Gordon Henderson, but the suggestion is that he had a stroke, or a heart attack. Kind of muddies the waters having a natural death in the mix, though we know someone was there, unless he put the photograph in his own mouth.’
If anything, James’s frown tightened. ‘Talk to Connie Nixon, find out what she really knows, because it’s sure as hell she didn’t tell Maura Lyle the truth.’
Poole had to agree. ‘She said she wasn’t sure why Connie had told her at all.’
‘Then let’s find out, shall we? I want to know what happened to that poor kid and I want to know who’s responsible for decreasing the local population so fucking effortlessly. Besides, the way it’s going, who’s to say Connie Nixon will still be with us this time tomorrow if we don’t pull her in now?’
Poole had to agree she made a fair point. He was about to leave when her desk phone rang, but she held up her hand to indicate that she wanted him to stay. He sat back down and watched the myriad reactions play across her face as she listened to the call – it ended with the manifestation of another deep frown. She didn’t say anything for a few moments, just creased her face in such a way that she was in danger of wearing permanent grooves into her skin. ‘It appears,’ she said eventually, ‘that we have a case of mistaken identity to add into the mix, which I might add is a mix that’s beginning to stink like a cesspool.’
Poole didn’t have a clue what she was talking about. ‘Eh?’
It was James’s turn to rub her face. ‘Who went out to see Mrs Moss after the husband’s body was found?’
Still confused, Poole said, ‘Kelsoe and Gallan. They couldn’t get any answer if you remember. We’re still looking to locate Elizabeth Moss. Why?’
‘Because it wasn’t Elizabeth Moss they spoke to. Elizabeth Moss is lying in a morgue in Suffolk. The body, it turns out, was identified by the presence of Estelle Hall’s belongings and identifying documents – primarily an out-of-date, unusable passport. The postmortem, however, told a different story. The dead woman has been formally identified as Elizabeth Moss.’
Poole couldn’t think of much to say except ‘Jesus!’ – an entity he wasn’t known to invoke very often.
James nodded. ‘I’ll raise you Mary and a fucking Joseph to that! Right, I want you and a DC round at the Moss house pronto and I want whoever is available round at Connie Nixon’s.’
Poole paused at the door. ‘At least it explains the weird DNA match. Looks like Estelle Hall might be our killer after all.’
James slapped her hands on the desk. ‘Then get the fuck out of my office and go and bloody find her!’
Poole gave her a mock salute. ‘Yes, boss,’ he said, grinning. Finally, they had something to go on.
That enthusiastic sentiment was completely obliterated when he reached the Moss house with his team and realised someone had been there before them. Since Kelsoe and Gallan’s unproductive visit to locate the widow Moss, someone had placed secondhand crime-scene tape across the door and left them a smear of blood as a calling card. No prints, just the blood.
Of course, none of the neighbours had seen a thing.
The last thing Maura expected when she answered her phone to an unknown number was to hear Cheryl sobbing down the line.
It took several attempts to calm her down and, even then, talking to her was a garbled mess.
‘Cheryl, are you really trying to tell me they’ve arrested your mother?’
Cheryl blew her nose. The sound of it trumpeted down the line and caused Maura to hold the phone away from her ear. ‘Took her to the station and everything. She’s sixty-seven years old!’
Maura tried to keep her voice impassive. Being sixty-seven didn’t preclude a person from being capable of committing a crime, but the real shock was that Connie Nixon was as young as that. If Maura had had to judge on looks alone, she would have guessed Connie was nudging eighty at least. It was a hard life that produced something that haggard. ‘Did they actually arrest her?’
Another loud sniff. ‘They took her to the station.’
‘So they didn’t read her her rights in front of you?’
‘No, but they took her.’
Maura had no doubt that Connie could hold her own if necessary. ‘Did they say why?’
Cheryl made a loud, snotty sniffing noise and Maura winced. ‘Just that they wanted to ask her some more questions about the Hendersons and Bob.’
‘That’ll be it then,’ Maura said, offering what she hoped was a reassuring response. ‘But what’s the concern about Bob?’
Cheryl gasped. ‘Don’t you know? Bob’s dead. They found him this morning dead in his chair just like Mr Henderson. That Solicitor it was, went to serve him eviction papers and found him there. The dog’s gone too.’
Maura struggled to absorb this new information. ‘Bob? Why him? He never harmed anyone.’ She had liked Bob, felt sorry for him. He’d been a kind face among the madness of the Grange.
Cheryl snorted. ‘Didn’t he?’
‘What do you mean? Do you know something?’ Maura was thinking of bloodstains on doors, of the days of blissful ignorance, of the time when no one had died on her watch.
Cheryl blew her nose again. ‘How would I know anything? It’s just that, with everything that’s gone on, you just don’t, do you? I mean, no one’s quite what they seem. Anyway, it’s why I wanted to ring. I’m scared. Me and Mum both are. We don’t have anywhere else to go and I don’t feel safe here any more. Besides, it’s all too late now, everything has gone.’
‘I understand your worry, Cheryl, but I’m sure everything will be OK. I can’t imagine, after everything that’s happened, that the police won’t be looking out for you.’
‘They weren’t looking out for Bob Silver, were they?’ Cheryl snapped. ‘I thought we were friends. I thought you’d be willing to help.’
The petulance and temper were back and Maura found them familiar if not comforting. It was hard to credit at what point Cheryl had deemed their incidental connection a friendship. Maura would have reluctantly described them as acquaintances at best. When she had left the Grange she’d very much hoped they wouldn’t bump into each other again.
‘I don’t know, Cheryl. I don’t know that I’m the best person to help,’ Maura said, feeling the pressure but trying not to give in.
‘We don’t have anyone else, or anywhere else. Mum is at her wits’ end, and I haven’t been coping for a while. I’m under the doctor, you know, and neither of us can be expected to deal with this on our own, not when I’m finding dead birds on the doorstep – it’s like a sign.’ Cheryl was pleading. It tugged on Maura’s sympathies and the mention of the bird made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.
‘You found a dead bird?’
Cheryl nodded, her brow furrowed with fear and worry. ‘On the doorstep, half rotted and stinking, just dumped there. It was a magpie, and they’re always unlucky,’ she said with a shudder. ‘Never did hold with people keeping birds, filthy bloody things.’
It seemed too much of a coincidence to Maura, but she had to ask. ‘Perhaps it just died there?’
‘I don’t think so. Someone put it there and it’s a message. We’re next. Will you come? I just don’t want to be on my own, especially without Mum here.’
There was nothing worse than being put over a barrel and Maura loathed the idea that she was now obligated to these two women purely through Cheryl’s perception of a relationship that didn’t exist, or hadn’t existed to Maura’s knowledge. It was hard to say no to a frightened woman, and she already knew Connie was frightened. Cheryl, however, came across as a drama queen, even though Maura could understand her fears regarding the dead bird: one for sorrow, two for joy. There would be little joy in this situation, not until someone was caught and they could move on with their lives. But she’d already compromised her conscience enough by walking away from a potential crime scene. Maybe helping Cheryl would rebalance the karma. Cheryl had a point – there was a killer out there who seemed to be targeting anyone and everyone associated with the Grange. Perhaps there was greater safety in numbers.
‘I’ll come over and sit with you until we know what’s going on with your mum, and we’ve had some more news from the police. I just can’t take it in about Bob, I can’t believe it,’ she said, distracted by the thought of the man’s untimely and unexpected death. ‘What about Buster?’
Cheryl shrugged. ‘Dunno, he’s gone.’
Maura didn’t know which to feel more sorry about, Bob’s death or her missing furry friend. She’d become quite fond of the dog and had liked Bob. She’d even intended to help him look for his missing daughter, until all hell had decided to break loose. ‘OK, stay put, lock the doors and I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
It would beat sitting alone in her own house dwelling on what had happened. Sharing Cheryl’s troubles would at least distract her from her own.
Maura had never considered herself to be a stupid person, yet the events of the last year were making her question that assumption. And it was an assumption – she had been entirely stupid by lurching from one unsatisfying crazy situation to another with no conscious thought other than to flee her own bad decisions. Maybe showing a little kindness to the strange Cheryl and her awful mother would be redemptive in some way. Maybe it would lead to her liking herself a little more.
It was only as she began to pull on her coat that she noticed how sore her arm had become. The deep scratch, bequeathed by Gordon, was raised and red and had begun to weep. She’d have to sluice it with a bit of TCP later, but there was no time for it now.
There’s nothing like a bit of fear and panic to galvanise people into action. Those bloody women are so predictable, so malleable. So dead so very soon.
They know not to mention my name, not to tell anyone who I am or what I did. If I go down, they come with me and Connie will do anything to save her own neck. She will lie through teeth as false as herself. Shame she can’t put her conscience in a glass and soak the stains out overnight too. Oh, I forgot, she doesn’t have a conscience. Cheryl has one, but it’s not as big as her fear of her mother and that is where my power lies. Fear. You can mould fear, exploit it and make it do whatever you want.
I should know. I was moulded by fear myself and it didn’t save me either.