He cast a shadow over her as he reached her, dropping his bag on the floor, shaking off some of the rain that had caught on him.
“Good evening,” he said pleasantly.
The girl met his eye and made a slight face, picking up a pad of paper and turning it his way.
“Good evening,” it read, “and welcome to The Fox Inn. My name is Daisy. How can I help you this evening?”
Alexander looked from the page up to the girl, who was smiling at him patiently and pleasantly.
“Deaf?” he asked. Her eyes dropped to his mouth as he said the word, and she nodded.
“Say no more,” he muttered, taking the pen and paper.
“Good evening,” he wrote, “I’d like to check-in, please. Major Alexander Riggs.”
He turned it her way, and her face lit up with a nod before she turned to the computer, hit a few keys, then grabbed a key from the wall behind her and walked out from the desk. He picked up his bags and followed her up the stairs to the second floor. Normally, he supposed, you’d have to make small talk about how many guests were here or complain about the weather, and he was rather glad that he didn’t. He’d had a long day and didn’t want anything more now than a hot shower and a nice bed.
Daisy stopped outside a room, unlocking it and held the door open for him, waving him in. Alexander entered, looking around. Oh, yes, he thought, very nice. Daisy handed him the key, then pulled a card from the pocket in her cardigan.
“Please let me know if there is anything I can do to make your stay more comfortable.” The number for the desk was underneath it, but he doubted that he would call. He gave her a grateful smile, and she pulled out a small notepad, writing something down. Alexander ought to learn sign language, really. She turned it towards him.
“Any food or drink?” she’d written. He took the pen.
“No, thank you. What time is breakfast in the morning?” he scrawled back, hoping his handwriting was legible.
“Between seven and nine,” she wrote back. “Also, the service is terrible. If you need to make a call, try the garden or the farm across the road.” There was always at least one downside to places like these, but he doubted he’d be making many calls this weekend, and there was wi-fi at least.
“Thank you,” he wrote again. Daisy clipped the lid back on the pen, showed him where the bathroom was, and left, shutting the door quietly behind her. Nice girl, he thought.
She’d left some things for him on the desk, along with the usual kettle and mugs for tea and coffee. A map of the local area and some places he might like to see if he had the time. He wondered how well she got on here, especially during the busier months, but there was no reason she wasn’t the best employee in the whole building. If anything, she was ideal, efficient, quiet, though it seemed mean to acknowledge.
Alexander drew the curtains shut and shucked off his heavy coat and damp uniform, padding into the little bathroom to shower. He was glad that he stopped for some food at the service station, so once he was clean and in some comfier clothes, he switched off all the lights, locked the door and fell into bed.
He had hoped that given it was the weekend, he could lie in a little, but his body woke him up at half six like clockwork, even without his alarm. Alexander groaned and sat up in the large, comfy bed and looked around. It was still dark outside, and he couldn’t hear much else going on in the inn. He thought about heading out for a run, seeing what he could see, but Sybil would whack him if he turned up with a pulled muscle or something. He stayed in bed for a while, scrolling through his phone, answering a few emails that came in late last night, made himself a little cup of tea to drink in bed, a rare luxury. When he got hungry, he forced himself up, washed, dressed, and headed downstairs. The sun had at least risen properly now, so he could see the inn in all its glory. Soft sofas and chairs were placed around the fire, bookshelves lining the wall, floral wallpaper that reminded him of his gran. It was empty inside, with no sign of Daisy or anyone else at the desk. Not that it mattered, he could manage quite well on his own.
He headed out, taking a little stroll around the village looking much more cheerful than it had last night, too early for any of the shops to be open. He stopped by a little cafe and thought about eating breakfast here, but Sybil was running a tight ship today, and he’d feel more at ease the sooner he actually got into the city, so he went back to the inn and jumped in the car, heading out of the village. Twenty minutes later, he found a little café and stopped in there for some breakfast before making his way to his sister’s house.
It was only a five-minute drive to get to Sybil’s house from the cafe, and several cars were already parked outside. Alexander climbed out, smoothing down his coat and walked up to the front door. As he lifted his hand to knock, the door swung open, and Sybil stared out at him.
“You’re late,” she told him.
“I am not,” he argued. “I’m never late.” He pushed his way inside, making her walk backwards to let him in. Sybil kicked the door shut and hugged him tightly. It was noisy in the house, voices rising up from the kitchen along the hall.
“I’m losing my mind,” she muttered against his shoulder.
Alexander chuckled, patting her on the back. “You never had it to begin with.”
Sybil pulled away and whacked him on the shoulder. “Not helpful, Alec.”
“I know, I know. I’m here,” he assured her, following her down the hall. “I’m here to help.”
As they walked into the kitchen, they were met with an onslaught of greetings. He said hello to Ernest first, Sybil’s fiancée, then greeted the few cousins and relatives of their own before walking over to Ernest’s family. They were an old-fashioned bunch, the sort of people who had multiple holiday homes, but for as stuffy as they could be, at least Ernest was the most relaxed of the bunch. Alexander shook their hands as Sybil introduced him to the few he hadn’t meant, putting an emphasis on Major each time.
“So,” he said when he steered her over to the kettle for a few minutes’ peace. “What’s the plan for today?”
Sybil sighed, tucked a strand of curly hair behind her ear, and passed him a notebook with the day timed out.
“You’re worse than a drill sergeant,” he told her, turning the page over.
“She was close to giving people allotted times to use the bathroom,” Ernest said, dipping in between them to grab his tea. “I managed to dissuade that.”
Alexander chuckled. “Good work.”
Sybil rolled her eyes and looked at him. “How’s the inn?” she asked.
“It’s nice, very nice. I’d like to stay in it again someday, I think. Come back for a proper look around. See the moors.”
Sybil fixed him with a look. “Because we didn’t grow up five minutes from Dartmoor?” she asked dryly.
“Let me enjoy myself.”
“No. You’re here for my wedding rehearsal, not enjoying yourself. I’m stressed,” she hissed.
“You need to calm down,” he told her. “What are you going to be like at the actual wedding?”
Sybil groaned, rubbing her hands over her face. She peeked at Ernest and his family through her fingers.
“They still don’t like me much.”
“Sod ‘em. You’ve been together for almost ten years; I think it’s safe to say you make their son happy, and you’ll be sticking around.”
Sybil snorted a laugh and picked up her tea, sipping slowly. “Probably a good thing mum couldn’t make it this weekend,” she said. “She’d probably start looking for a fight.”
“She’d win and all,” he replied with a laugh.
“She sent me this earlier,” Sybil said, pulling her phone from her pocket and handing it to him. He looked at the picture their mother had sent of herself out on the wetlands, her blonde hair buffeted around her face, blue eyes sparkling as she grinned at the camera. She was a conservationist down there, and this weekend had taken her by shock when a building was badly damaged in a storm. For the best, Alexa
nder thought, handing the phone back. Their mother was a wonderful person, but she wouldn’t help to make Sybil relax. That had been dad’s job when he was alive, the calm, steady one in the corner pulling them all into line. Sybil had a photo of him on the wall in the kitchen from the time he visited his cousin in Egypt. It was one of the few pictures where he was smiling as widely as their mother did.
“Come on then.” He slung an arm around his sister’s shoulders. “Let’s get cracking, yeah?”
He never knew that weddings were so much effort and vowed that should the day ever happen for him, he would be fine with a registry office and a cake. So would Sybil, but Ernest’s family expecting a grand wedding, and so a grand one they would have. Sybil had been at odds with them over every little detail, the flowers, the venue, the priest. Even Alexander was growing annoyed as the day dragged on. But it did, at long last, end. He went back to their house, just the three of them for dinner before making his way back to the inn. He couldn’t remember ever being more tired, and over what? Standing in a church for several hours.
The constant clamour of the day made him happy to be in the remote village and the quiet little inn. He didn’t see anyone as he walked in again, so he headed up to his room, showered and pulled on his dressing-gown over his clothes, very glad that he’d had the foresight to bring it. He still felt frazzled, though, and God only knew how his sister was managing to hold it all together as well as she was. Alexander slid from the bed, his wallet with a few cigarettes and his lighter inside, and slipped from his room. He headed downstairs, creeping down the hallway that ran past the kitchen to the door that led into the garden, where he’d spotted a smoking area before.
As he crept along the corridor, he heard voices rising from the kitchen, the door slightly ajar.
“I say we just do it,” a man was saying in a gruff voice. “Lord knows it’s up to us.”
“How?” a woman asked.
“Make it look like an accident!”
Alexander stopped, hovering outside the door, stunned. It was quiet for a bit.
“We do have to if we have any chance of keeping ourselves in business,” the woman said.
“You know we’re right,” the man added. “It’s the easiest way to solve our little problem, and nobody will be that surprised by it. She’s always drinking and causing a ruckus; they’ll never know it was us.”
Another pause.
“Stop bringing that up. It’ll be fine,” the woman said.
Alexander stared at the door, mouth agape. Surely they weren’t discussing what he thought they were? He considered barging in there, but that wasn’t his job. He crept away, cringing as a floorboard creaked under his foot. The voices went again, but nobody walked out, and he managed to get back upstairs to his room, heart thudding as he grabbed a sheet of paper, recalling every word that had been spoken before ripping it off and grabbing his phone. He froze, no signal. A noise outside had him clenching his fist, the paper screwing up, another noise, and he dropped it, kicking under the bed in his haste to get out of the building.
He managed to get downstairs and sneak out the side door into the carpark, running to where he might find a signal. It took a while, but eventually, the bars were high enough, and he started to dial. There were no street lights out here, and the clouds dimmed the moon, so there was no shadow to give away the person that walked up behind him as he rang 999, nothing to give them away as they held something up and brought it swinging down across the back of his skull.
Two
Thatcher
It was a freezing night; the cold air managed to sneak it wherever it could, through the door frames, through the windows, down the chimney. I’d made sure the heating would be on, but even then, Liene and I had huddled under the duvet in pyjamas and socks, roosting together for warmth like a pair of chickens. When my phone went off, blaring in the dark room, I had to peel myself from the warmth, groaning and grumbling, snatching my phone from the bedside table and huddling back under the warmth.
“Sorry,” I muttered to Liene, who grunted in reply. It wasn’t that early. In fact, her own alarm would go off in fifteen minutes. I had a much different wake-up call, it appeared, as Mills’s contact flashed up on my screen.
“Thatcher,” I answered, stifling a yawn.
“Sorry to wake you, sir,” he said, his own voice sounded tired. “But we’ve got a body.”
Bloody hell. I slowly sat up, making sure the sheets still covered Liene.
“Where?” I asked.
“Bank of the Ouse, a few miles north of Beningbrough. I’ve got the exact location. Want me to pick you up?”
“Please. Give me fifteen.”
“I’ll grab coffee,” he told me before hanging up. I groaned again, dropping my phone back on the bedside table, and rolled out, shivering in the cold. It was still dark outside, the faintest tinge of sunlight on the horizon.
“What is it?” Liene’s muffled voice called.
“Work,” I told her, leaning over to kiss the top of her head, the only bit of her not under the duvet.
I forced myself up, padding into the bathroom and stepped into the hot shower, tipping my head back and letting it warm me. Getting out wouldn’t be fun. I managed it, though, hurriedly shoving on my trousers, shirt and tie, throwing a thick jumper over the top for warmth before brushing my teeth, yanking my boots and coat on and grabbing all my things. I poked my head back into the bedroom. Liene was awake, groggily sitting on the end of the bed, wrapped in a blanket. I walked over, kissing her forehead.
“I’ll call you when I know more,” I told her. She smiled up at me, looking tired, but she made herself climb off the bed as I headed to the front door, stepping out just as Mills rolled up the street, the only car up and about this early.
God, it was cold. I ran down to meet him, and he unlocked the doors, letting me slide into the warm car.
“Christ,” I muttered, rubbing my hands together in front of the heater.
“Coffee.” Mills held out a cup in the way of greeting and passed me a paper bag with a pastry inside.
“You spoil me,” I muttered, taking a large bite, cradling the hot cup in my other hand. He just smiled tiredly and typed in a postcode on the satnav. It showed a location out really in the middle of nowhere, a few fields on either side of the river. Excellent.
Mills pulled away from the kerb, keeping the radio quiet. We watched the roads as we drove through, a few other early risers making their way to work, the buses trundling along without any traffic to hold them up. Most of the houses we passed were still dark, only a few windows lit up, and I envied the ones that were still sleeping.
Twenty minutes later, we were out in the countryside, the sun rising up over the fields in a way that made it all seem worth it. Farmers were, of course, up and about, but otherwise, it was just us, some birds and a field of cows that we parked by, spotting the police cars just down the road.
“Do we know anything?” I asked, draining the rest of my coffee and climbing from the car.
“No, sorry, sir,” Mills answered. “But Crowe should be here, if not now then in a little bit.”
I nodded, sticking my hands in my pockets for warmth as we walked over to the white and yellow tape stretched across a perimeter or the river. It was full of weeds up here, the current strong and the water cold as anything.
“Morning, sir,” Fry greeted us just inside the tape. “Mills.”
“Fry.” I nodded, ducking under the tape. “What have we got?”
“Young man washed up on the bank, sir. A local dog walker found him,” she said, nodding to a flustered looking middle-aged woman who sat with another constable, cradling her spaniel in her arms.
“Does she know him?” I asked.
Fry shook her head. “Says he is not from the local village, that’s for sure,” she told us. She stopped by one of the cars, handing us both a pair of wellies that we stuck our feet into before following her down the slippery bank.
The man ha
d been pulled from the water, SOCO marking out the area where he had been found. I suppose we didn’t want to risk him being swept away.
“ETA on Dr Crowe?” I asked.
Fry checked her watch. “Five minutes or so, sir.”
“Thank you.”
I walked down to the body, studying the victim. Young man, early thirties, I would guess. I imagined it was his dark skin that made the dog walker sure he wasn’t local. It was a shame to say it, but in villages as small as these, he’d stick out like a sore thumb.
He was dressed, oddly, in a dressing gown over a pair of joggers and a t-shirt, his feet bare and covered in mud. There were scratches all over his body, bits of river sediment and dried blood, but we’d need Crowe to ascertain how those came about. Was he injured before he went into the water, or did the riverbed knock him about a bit too roughly?
“Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay, to muddy death,” Mills muttered as we looked down at the river-drenched body.
“Shakespeare?” I guessed.
“Hamlet,” he confirmed, handing me a pair of gloves. “Ophelia’s death.”
“Got a thing for Hamlet, don’t you?” I asked. Mills didn’t answer, just pointed at the body.
“He’s wearing a dressing gown,” he murmured in disbelief.
“Where the hell did he come from?” I asked, pulling the gloves on, then squatting down beside the man, fishing in his pockets. “Oh, that’s handy,” I said as I pulled a wallet from his pocket and flipped it open, pulling out the driver’s licence. “Alexander Riggs,” I said, handing the wallet to Mills and checking the rest of him.
Buried With Honours: A DCI Thatcher Yorkshire Crime Thriller Page 2