by Ted Tayler
“Listen to Mr Freeman, daughter,” said Kelechi Umeh. “He’s a good man, and he will keep you on the straight and narrow. I suppose Miss Ferris will give him a lift home later? I would run him home if I knew the way.”
“Oh, that’s too much to ask,” laughed Maryam Umeh.
You’re not kidding, thought Blessing as she waved until they were out of sight.
CHAPTER 2
Monday 9th July 2018
Suzie nudged Gus at a few minutes before seven.
“Time we made a move, sleepyhead,” she said.
“What a day yesterday,” said Gus, “we avoided letting the cat out of the bag and offending Blessing’s parents.”
“Blessing kept the news of her Micra being in the garage from them too,” said Suzie, “I saw her crossing her fingers behind her back more than once during the afternoon.”
“Maryam got on well with Jackie, I thought.”
“Mum gets on well with most people,” said Suzie. “Dad mentioned when we visited the stables that the horse you rode still wonders when you’re getting back in the saddle.”
“I’ll bet,” said Gus. “Is that a none too subtle hint you’d like me to ride with you on Saturday mornings?”
“It would do you good,” said Suzie. “Better than sitting outside your shed on the allotment mulling over matters related to a case. You can do that as we ride. Where you need my input, I’ll be right beside you.”
“I’ll give it thought,” said Gus. “Who’s going into the shower first?”
“You go, I’ll make breakfast. After that roast dinner and several glasses of red wine yesterday, you won’t need anything too heavy this lovely July morning.”
Gus headed for the shower. That was something to look forward to, muesli and yoghurt, not so much. After he showered and dressed, he walked to the kitchen. Ah, things were looking up. Suzie had plugged in the waffle maker. Happy days.
Suzie passed him with a grin as she made for the bathroom. This living together business was a great idea. It was eight o’clock before he knew it, and Suzie was ready to leave for another day’s work at Gablecross.
“How long before you’re back at London Road?” he asked.
“If Gareth Francis pulls his finger out, we’ll wrap it up before the end of the week. I’ll see you at around six this evening.”
“Drive safely,” said Gus, “especially on the way to the gate.”
With that, Suzie left, and Gus wandered into the lounge. The room still felt the same as when he shared this bungalow with Tess. Every other place in the house now contained items Suzie had brought from home. He couldn’t be happier with things the way they were. But how could he stop feeling guilty for not keeping one place where memories of Tess hadn’t got shoved to one side? Ah well, it was time to drive to the office.
When Gus reached the car park beneath the Old Police Station office, it surprised him to discover he was first to arrive. He parked his Ford Focus and travelled up in the lift. No sooner than he’d hung his jacket on the back of his chair, his phone rang.
“Good morning, Gus,” said Geoff Mercer. “I have news on the Wakeley case that I’m sure you want to hear. The Metropolitan Police arrested Dominic Hurley and Caitlyn Bendick at an apartment in Chelsea Village yesterday evening.”
“That was quick work,” said Gus. “Did they come quietly?”
“Hurley’s first request was for the family solicitor,” said Geoff. “I don’t know whether he was shocked to find the police at his door, or relieved. According to the Superintendent that I spoke with, Hurley never once mentioned his parents.”
“Did he say anything more?” asked Gus.
“They constantly thought about getting caught,” said Geoff, “but the rush was worth the risk.”
“That’s a quote,” said Gus, “not Wardrip this time, but I’ve read it somewhere.”
“Caitlyn Bendick didn’t utter a word until the officers separated the couple and led them to the lift,” said Geoff. “Then she turned to them, and with a broad smile, she told them, you can never separate us from our memories.”
“They were as evil as one another,” said Gus. “If only we could have stopped them earlier.”
“Well, they’re under lock and key now, Gus. We believe Salisbury will have priority in carrying the case forward. Ursula Wakeley’s murder was on their patch and was the pair’s first kill. The forces on either side of the Midlands will want their pound of flesh, but they must take their turn in the queue. I’m concerned about the gap year. It could be ages before we learn whether they were busy during that spell overseas.”
“Alex uncovered the details of the Maisie Fletcher and Katherine McKenna murders by concentrating on the deaths of women living alone in the area near Warwick University. After Hurley and Bendick left there, did they move to London straight away? If so, there may be other deaths to link to those two yet.”
“I’ll be in touch as soon as I hear anything,” said Geoff. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure that those involved in the Far East and London are aware there may be more to come.”
“We like to keep people busy, don’t we, Geoff?” said Gus.
“Is DS Hardy still with us at the Hub?”
“Yes, he worked on the Burnside affair last week, breaking off to research the Hurley and Bendick murders. His progress is slow, but he’s getting there.”
“Would another pair of hands help?” asked Geoff.
Gus put his hand over the mouthpiece and groaned. Please don’t say WPC Cranston is at a loose end.
“Who did you have in mind?” asked Gus, offering a silent prayer.
“DS Chalmers has just returned to duty with us after working undercover for the past three months. He needs regular hours and less time chasing illegal immigrants landing on the beaches in Hampshire and Dorset.”
“Rick Chalmers? My daytime companion during the Eron Dushka affair. Rick was the fast-food king, as I recall. He seemed a solid sort. How long could we have him?”
“A month tops?”
“I think we’ll have found Grant’s killer by then,” said Gus, “or have given it up as a bad job. If you can find something useful for Rick to move to after a fortnight, I’m sure Alex will appreciate the help.”
“Okay, I’ll find Rick in a minute and send him to the Hub. Thanks, Gus.”
As Gus ended the call, the lift doors opened, and the gang arrived. Lydia was in full flow, and the others were hanging on her every word. Something must have happened at the weekend.
“Hi, boss,” said Lydia, “I’m just updating the others on the latest news of my father. I’ll fill you in later.”
Luke, Nick, and Blessing made their way to their desks, and once everyone had sat down, Gus told them what he’d heard from DS Mercer.
“That’s great, guv,” said Neil. “I can’t wait for their case to get to court. Those two are as good a case for life means life sentences as I’ve ever come across.”
“I reckon they’ll put Hurley in Broadmoor,” said Luke.
“Peter Sutcliffe’s there, isn’t he?” said Neil.
“They used to send women there too until ten years ago,” said Luke, “but these days someone like Caitlyn Bendick will go to Ealing, in London.”
“Wherever they go, I hope it’s secure,” said Blessing.
Gus reminded the team there could be other murders to add to the list.
“A sobering thought,” said Lydia.
“Right,” said Gus, “I suggest we carry out our usual tidy-up after completing our involvement in a case. Clear the decks for another cold case to get passed on to us by London Road. Also, double-check that everything on the Wakeley case in your part of the Freeman Files is up to date and ready for me to transfer to the ACC, or Salisbury, whichever shouts first.”
An hour later, Luke and Blessing went to the restroom. It was time for coffee. Gus thought it was as good a time as any to break the news.
When Blessing handed him his cup of black, no sugar, he
whispered:
“Did you say anything to the others about Suzie?”
“No, guv,” she replied.
“While you’re taking five,” said Gus, “I’ll tell you before you hear it on the grapevine. Suzie Ferris finally left home on Saturday. For some inexplicable reason, she wanted to spend her free time with yours truly in Urchfont.”
“You kept that quiet, Blessing,” said Luke.
“About time, guv,” said Neil. “I’m sure you’ll be good together.”
“I certainly hope so, Neil,” said Gus. “That’s my news out of the way. Has anyone else got something to add?”
“The kitchen’s finished, guv,” said Luke. “With a few final touches in the hallway, the ground floor redecoration will be at an end.”
“My little Micra is ready to get back on the road,” said Blessing. “The garage is sending someone over to Worton with it on Thursday evening.”
“We walked around Salisbury shops for two hours on Saturday afternoon and bought nothing,” said Neil.
“It sounds as if each of you had a pleasant weekend then,” said Gus.
“I’ll come and sit with you, guv,” said Lydia Logan Barre. “The others already know my news.”
As Luke, Neil, and Blessing attacked the walls and whiteboards, Lydia brought her coffee over to Gus’s desk.
“You sounded animated when you arrived earlier,” said Gus, “you and Alex must have made positive progress, am I right?”
“We knew it would be tough to trace my father from those few days in Da Nang in May 2007 until the present day. We spent Friday evening listing ideas on what jobs he might take when he no longer felt able to go to sea. I remembered what you said about how high he’d climbed in the Merchant Navy. So, I confined my suggestions to engineering and logistics roles. When I compared my list with Alex, I found that he’d attacked it from a different direction. He reasoned that if my father couldn’t face returning to life on board ship, then he’d work in a port that he’d visited. One that he particularly liked. Alex thought he’d pick a job that kept him in touch with people he used to work with.”
“A sailor’s mission?” asked Gus.
“That was one of several ideas Alex proposed,” said Lydia. “but where would we start our search?”
“Did you return to London for a list of ports frequented by the shipping company that employed Chidozie?” asked Gus.
“We did, and there were several,” said Lydia. “He only landed in Scotland on three occasions, whereas he sailed into Shanghai and Singapore dozens of times. Alex thought Chidozie would be more likely to move to Europe or the States. The most popular ports were Durban, New York, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Tangiers, and New York.”
“What did you do next?” asked Gus.
“We slept,” laughed Lydia, “by the time we’d driven to London and back, got the basic numbers we needed and aggregated the number of visits by port, it was midnight. We returned to it fresh first thing yesterday morning.”
“Define first thing,” said Gus.
“Around eleven,” admitted Lydia.
“Suzie and I had done an hour’s work on the allotment by then,” said Gus. “We had to leave for Worton by half-past one at the latest for Sunday lunch with the Ferris’s and Blessing’s parents.”
“Wow, how did that go?” asked Lydia, “Blessing hasn’t said much yet.”
“It turned out far better than she feared. John and Jackie Ferris are a terrific couple and Maryam Umeh, and Jackie clicked straightaway. Blessing’s father, Kelechi, is more formal. He doesn’t give much away, but it impressed him how well John and Jackie were looking after his precious daughter. I just hope they got home, alright.”
“Is his sense of direction as bad as Blessing’s?” asked Lydia.
“Worse, if yesterday was anything to go by. Okay, so pick the search up from your late morning start.”
“Yes, guv,” said Lydia. “Alex started in New York. He found a social media page for a bar in the Bronx that mentioned a Chi-Chi working as a cocktail server. I couldn’t believe it was my father. Alex argued that at the time my father was only thirty-five and as a new arrival in the States, he would need to start small.”
“Your Dad probably thought it better to be somewhere he could keep in touch with the sea, rather than chase a better-paid job a thousand miles inland.”
“That’s what Alex said. He found a telephone number for the bar, and we called them later in the day. The bar owner confirmed it was Chidozie Barre who worked for him, but he left at the end of 2009.”
“Did the bar owner know where Chidozie moved to next?” asked Gus.
“He thought he was heading for Europe.”
“So, you could be looking at Hamburg or Rotterdam.”
“Because of the time difference between New York and us, we had filled in the time before ringing the Bronx bar with searches in Dubai and Durban. I wondered whether my father might have returned to Africa. There had to be a reason he didn’t go to Lagos after the shipwreck, but I hoped he might return to his place of birth in time.”
“Did you find any trace of him?” asked Gus.
Lydia shook her head.
“After Alex spoke with the guy in the Bronx, we had a new start date. We looked for bars in Hamburg and Rotterdam majoring in cocktails. I searched social media for phone numbers, and Alex then chased owners hoping to learn Chidozie Barre was doing a Tom Cruise in his bar.”
“Did you have any luck?” asked Gus.
“Do you have any idea how many cocktail bars there are in Hamburg?”
“They’re not places I actively seek,” said Gus, “the only time I approve of an umbrella is when it’s raining.”
“On the thirty-first phone call, Alex struck lucky. Chidozie worked there from February 2010 until he left for Rotterdam in April 2016. He opened a bar on Leuvehaven. That’s a street running alongside the water on the west side of the port. It’s near the Maritime Museum and makes it perfect for him to mix with seafarers and tourists eager to learn what it’s like to get cast adrift in the South China Sea.”
“What’s the name of the bar?” asked Gus.
“Guess,”
“Chi-Chi’s Bar?” replied Gus.
“No. My Dad called it the Lady Eleanor,” said Lydia. “Isn’t that sweet?”
“Did you call him last night?”
“It was too late. Alex suggested we visit Rotterdam next weekend.”
“High risk,” said Gus. “You don’t know what his reaction will be to learning he has a daughter. I would call before dropping into the Lady Eleanor for jenever.”
“You’ve lost me,” said Lydia.
“It’s a fiery gin drink that the Dutch enjoy straight from the bottle.”
“We might need a couple of those before I broach the subject. I’ve waited so long to find my father, but now I’m so close I want to throw caution to the wind.”
“Take a trip to Rotterdam, give your Dad a call from wherever you stay and take it from there. At no point in your Dad’s history since that bar in the Bronx have you mentioned a family. Even though he’s moved from the States to Germany and now the Netherlands, it doesn’t prevent him having gained a wife and children along the way.
“That’s what Alex said when we traced him to that first cocktail bar. I could only visualise him as a lonely bachelor. Alex warned me of the old saying of a girl in every port. When Eleanor spoke of Chidozie, that wasn’t the impression he made on her.”
“Not that I know much about it,” said Gus, “but serial heartbreakers become very practised in hiding their past dalliances.”
“Hark at you, guv,” said Lydia. “I hope Suzie isn’t a dalliance. Anyway, it was the name of the bar that convinced me he’d not forgotten his first love. I might be an old romantic, but even the most despicable Lothario would avoid using a name from his distant past for his new business. It raises too many red flags.”
“You may be right. I hope you are. Tread carefully, Lydia, and I�
��m sure the team wishes you all the luck in the world.”
After their coffee break was over, Lydia resumed tidying her files ready for the next case. Life was never dull with the Crime Review Team.
Gus was putting the finishing touches to his recommendations to the detective squad at Salisbury when his phone rang. It was Monday morning. Who else could it be?
“Gus Freeman,” he replied.
“Truelove here,” said the ACC, “I wanted to add my congratulations to you and the team for your excellent work on the Wakeley case. Quite a story, that one. I hadn’t imagined it turning out the way it did when I handed you the file. I was confident you would solve the mystery, Freeman, but my money was on the brother.”
“You would have lost, Sir,” said Gus. “Arthur was never a suspect, despite religion playing a significant part in the case.”
“As you may have guessed, passing on congratulations was not the sole purpose behind my call. Can you get here for noon? I have another cold case to hand you.”
“The team have cleared the decks and are ready and waiting, Sir,” said Gus.
The ACC ended the call, and Gus looked at the team members in front of him.
“Was I right?” he asked.
“Almost there,” said Luke.
Neil and Lydia nodded their agreement. Blessing looked puzzled.
“I seem to have lost my copy of the Freeman Files,” she said, “temporarily.”
“No panic,” said Gus, “I don’t leave for London Road for another forty-five minutes. Plenty of time to get the entire package ready for me to take to the ACC. He can do the honours and chat to the top brass at Salisbury, then that’s another one done and dusted.”
“I’ll take a look, Blessing,” said Lydia. “It can’t have gone far.”
Between them, Lydia and Blessing replaced the errant file, and at eleven-thirty Gus left the Old Police Station Office with the necessary case files and headed for Devizes.
The ACC was staring at him from his office window as he parked the Focus in the one remaining visitor’s space. He resisted the temptation to wave and trotted up the steps to the main entrance. What were five minutes between colleagues? Gus blamed the binmen. They were on a go-slow today.