Spoken Bones

by N. C. Lewis

  A collective groan filled the room.

  Tess raised her hands, palms out. "I'm just the messenger. But you should know Councillor Ron Malton will speak—"

  Another groan. This time a voice booed.

  Tess shrugged. "Mr Malton is a champion for law and order and will speak first since he sits on so many police boards. But others will get a chance. Equal time for all." She paused and placed her hands on her hips. "This is a joint effort. The Cumbria Constabulary is doing its part for town relations. Please spread the word. Any comments?"

  "Will Chief Constable Rae attend?" The question came from Dexter, more growl than voice.

  Tess responded with a quick shake of her head. "He wants to play this one down since the victim served with him on the Lighthouse Restoration Board."

  "Any word about Mr Shred?" This from Earp.

  Tess turned to Fenella as if for the okay to go on. Fenella gave a swift nod and Tess said, "There are online rumours about a link to Hamilton Perkins. They are baseless. Our line to the media is, there is no link. You all know that, don't you? So, no gossip on our side, please."

  Fenella waited for Tess to return to her seat, then said, "Ideas?"

  Jones sidled sideways without getting up. Then he raised a quick hand, still holding his cup. "Mugging gone wrong, ma'am."

  "Go on," Fenella said. "What have you got?"

  "I'd guess a local yob in need of cash to fuel the next hit. The person botched up the attack." Jones lowered his arm and squeezed his eyes tight for a moment. Eduardo did that too, when he got a hairbrained idea. "Yes! The thug wanted cash. And Miss Brian wasn’t much taller than a nine-year-old child but she wasn’t the type to be pushed around. She put up a fight, and the yob knocked her on the head with a log. Might not have meant to kill her."

  "Seventy-five pounds and change in her purse though," Fenella said. "Why didn’t the yob take the cash?"

  "Someone frightened the person off and they legged it," replied Jones.

  "We are talking about an attack that took place between midnight and two in the morning. Even on Bonfire Night, the beach wouldn't have a lot of folk about." Fenella thought it over. Did he have a point?

  She said, "Why hasn’t the person or people who scared off the yob come forward?"

  Jones shrugged. "They might not have heard the news yet. I'll check with the tip line to see if anything comes in."

  "And see what you can find out about the whereabouts of town louts. Make a list and follow up."

  "Will do, ma'am."

  "Family?" Fenella continued before anyone responded. "Miss Brian had a sister who passed a few years back. Jones get on it, see if the sister had any children, a husband, or cousins. Find anyone related to Maureen." Fenella liked to use the victim's first name, felt it made the investigation more personal.

  Jones began typing into his laptop.

  Fenella moved to the next item. "Earp, what did you find out from the gawkers at the crime scene yesterday?"

  "Got a decent list of names, ma'am." He pulled out a spiral-bound notebook. "Twenty people were on the beach between five a.m. and the time Mrs Audrey Robin discovered the body. I'm working through them."

  "Eliminate as quick as you can. Until forensics get their act together, it's old-school and shoe leather. And get onto Dr Mackay. Hurry him along. We know it was a blow to a head, but what else has our pipe-smoking pathologist got for us?" A thought wriggled into Fenella's mind. She took a sip of coffee, waiting for it to take shape. "Yesterday, in the crowd, did anyone notice a tall man, large… big head?"

  "Name is Martin Findlay," responded Earp. "Local man, lives in town."

  "Check his alibi for the night of the murder." There was something else. Fenella closed her eyes and saw it immediately. "And a young woman in an orange jacket, tall with pigtails?"

  "I saw her," Dexter said still prowling the walls. "Teenager."

  "I noticed her too," Jones added. "I'd say fifteen at most but dressed older."

  "Anyone get a name?" Fenella asked.

  No one responded.

  "Earp?"

  "Sorry, ma'am, she was gone by the time I made my way over."

  "Why wasn’t she in school?" Fenella folded her arms, but the question faded into the next as she continued. "Dexter, what do we know about Maureen's friends?"

  "Bugger all, Guv."

  "Well find out, will you?" Fenella moved to the next item on her mental list. "Mrs Audrey Robin found the body, like a daughter she said, so there's another one for you, Dexter."

  "Aye, will do."

  "Tell you what," Fenella raised a hand. "Why don't we both pay her a visit, get a list of contacts from the horse's mouth as it were." And this time there'd be no annoying paramedic to hamper her questions. "Mrs Audrey Robin lives in Seafields Lane, if my memory serves me well?" It did. She'd memorised the addresses. She filed it along with all the other facts of the case in her brain cells. Every detail. Down to the blue headscarf wrapped tight around Maureen Brian's head.

  "Constable Crowther," Fenella said. "Can you visit with Mr Noel O'Sullivan, get a formal statement. Call ahead, Pastors are busy, and a flock of crusty Cumbrian folk aren't easy to tend. And will someone find out what time they closed the beach on Bonfire Night. Earp, that ball's in your court."

  Fenella gazed at the enlarged photograph of Miss Maureen Brian's corpse.

  "And Dexter…"

  "Guv?"

  "After the press conference, let’s you and me have a butcher’s around Miss Brian's home. See if we can't get a more flattering photo of her to pin on our board."

  Chapter 14

  Fenella knew it would be a rugby match, but did Jeffery have to steal all the air time?

  The public and press squeezed between the oak walls of the town hall's great room. Jeffery shoved her face into the spotlight, grinning with her wolfish smile. She knocked about the media’s questions like a tennis pro. Even Tess Allen, the press officer, could barely get a word in. Fenella had planned to make an appeal for witnesses. She had prepared a brief speech, if asked. But no one asked. And the questions from the press led to squabbles across the political divide. Jeffery stayed clear of that melee, but dropped her sound bites when a chance opened.

  "A tragic event."

  "A one-off."

  "No. no. Not a serial killer."

  "The public can sleep easy in their comfortable beds. This is a quiet town and my officers will catch the killer."

  Fenella left before the press conference finished, with Dexter in tow. They drove to Miss Maureen Brian's house on Seafields Lane. Only there wasn’t a row, just a narrow dirt lane with bare hedges on either side, and trees with branches so low they almost touched the ground.

  "Be careful," Fenella said to Dexter, who drove. "Don't scratch my car. I know it's a banger, but I have some pride."

  "Damn branches are like witches’ hands out to block our path," Dexter replied.

  The lane snaked up a sharp slope. At the end, on a patch of gravel and tufts of brown grass, stood a run-down, three-storey Victorian red-brick house. It had wide windows and thick net curtains. A faded sign proclaimed—Seafields Bed and Breakfast. Luxury Accommodation at Great Rates.

  They climbed out of the car to dull clouds and a brisk breeze which softened the splash of the sea. The beach was near; they could smell it in the air. Fenella glanced around, and through the broken fence saw a broad sweep of sand dunes and the white surf of distant waves.

  The detectives took quick steps through a rusted iron gate. They hurried along a gravelled path which snaked in a slow arc to stone steps. Twenty at least. They stopped and peered up at the faded front door.

  "Stairway to hell," Dexter said as he took the first step. "Wonder if we have the right address. I can't see a seventy-six-year-old skipping down these first thing in the morning to do her shopping. And she'd have to climb back up with her bread and milk."

  "Come and join my Pilates class," Fenella replied as she skipped two steps at a time. There w
as nothing like being outside of the office and working a case. She felt as energetic as a beagle on the scent of a fox. "We've got three octogenarians. The other women are in their thirties and forties. You never know, one of them might like a bit of stale gristle. Then you'll thank me for introducing you to the new love of your life."

  "Guv," Dexter huffed. "I've no plans to perform the double leg stretch or kneeling side plank, even with a gaggle of fit sweating ladies."

  It was tough going. Fenella paused midway and dabbed a handkerchief at her brow. She pretended to wait but couldn’t hide her long drawn-out gasps. Dexter laughed, but knew better than to rub her nose in it. Instead, they sucked in cold air and gazed at the wide sweep of beach and the dark sea farther out. A squawking flock of black-headed gulls walked the sands.

  Now they took their time. There was no rush and the slow pace gave Fenella time to run things over in her mind. Who else lived in the place? Where were they on the night Miss Brian was killed? They shuffled close together like rock climbers easing along the ridge of a Himalayan mountain range. As they shambled and huffed onto the top step, the front door opened.

  "I was expecting you," said a grinning man with black button eyes and a beard that tapered off into a devil's wisp. "You guys must be keen, most folk use the side ramp. Few tackle those steps."

  Fenella didn’t have the breath for speech, noted the gold loop in his nose, and pulled out her warrant card. He waved it away with an easy smile.

  "I'm Ben Griffin. I run the place with my wife, Safiya. We wondered when you would show up. Come on in, I've just brewed a fresh pot of coffee."

  Fenella and Dexter panted like beagles back from a fox hunt. They followed Ben along a dark hall with soft carpet. It smelled of boiled vegetables and pine and bleach. There was no sound other than their soft footfalls. He stopped at a frosted glass-panelled door.

  "This is the dining room. We can talk in here if you don't mind."

  "Perfect," Fenella replied.

  The door squeaked open.

  "Ladies first." Ben flashed a dazzling smile and made a low bow.

  Charmer. Fenella had a soft spot for compliments. Eduardo had charmed her into dating. He was a poor starving artist with nothing but a pencil, sketch pad, and a head full of beautiful dreams when they met. And she on the first rung of her police career. He still had his dreams and pencil and sketch pad. Fenella loved that about her husband. Then she thought of how Jones had dazzled Lisa Levon in the crime scene tent. Now she wondered whether Ben had dazzled her too. Nice skill to have with the ladies.

  They sat at a long table with a red-and-white tablecloth by a window that gave them a view of the flat sands and sea. The faint trace of fried food and coffee and boiled dinners of long ago mingled in the still air. Ben poured three mugs and joined them.

  "A Bonfire Night I'll never forget," he said. "Safiya and I got back home after the fireworks, around ten. Maureen wasn’t home yet. But there was nothing strange in that. She often stayed out late, and given the festivities, we thought nothing of it." He paused. "I'm sorry, you have questions?"

  Dexter gulped his coffee down in two sharp swigs and said, "Which room can we find—"

  Fenella touched his arm. "No point rushing. Especially as Mr Griffin has gone to the trouble of making coffee. We might as well take our time. Let's do our bit for community relations, shall we?"

  Dexter frowned. "Guv?"

  But Fenella just sipped and watched Ben as he returned to refill the coffee pot. She wanted to get her breath, clear her mind and think about the next steps. This was not what she expected. She'd expected a cottage, not a dilapidated bed and breakfast. She wondered who would want to stay here. Not tourists with money. Even in the dim light, she could see the threadbare swirls on the worn red carpet. The dark furniture from two decades ago was stained and chipped. And the patterned wallpaper with giant green peacocks didn’t sit well with her image of Miss Maureen Brian the artist. The place looked like an orphan from a slum street the town council knocked down in the nineteen seventies.

  "Busy?" Fenella asked.

  "One or two guests," Ben replied. "We are lucky to get even that at this time of year, and with the wet weather this summer, it's been tough."

  Fenella's phone buzzed. "Excuse me," she said, and picked it out of her handbag. She knew it was a message from Superintendent Jeffery before she glanced at the screen:

  Civic meeting went well for everyone. Community relations on a solid footing now. Missed you at the end. Is everything on track?

  The superintendent had outpoliticked the politicians at the press conference. She came up smelling of roses. Fenella had never been great at politics. Not even the office kind. All those weasel words and doublespeak made her stomach queasy. She'd joined the force to be a detective, not to tangle in the political debates of the day. But the higher you went in today's force, the deeper the political mire. Not for her. Best left to Jeffery. Still, the superintendent's political adroitness sent a cold tingle along her spine.

  She continued to read:

  Please speak with Dexter and then send him in to see me for a nice little chat.

  Fenella stared gloomily through the window at the beach and flat sea. The black-headed gulls took to the air, a shimmering blanket of cackles and screams.

  At the sound of the dining-room door creaking open, she turned away from the window. A short goose-faced woman with long greasy black hair waddled into the dining room. She wore a sky-blue sari and white pumps which bulged at the edges with her fat feet.

  Fenella watched her splay-footed gait, felt a motherly glow, and said, "When's the baby due, luv?"

  "Oh, this is Safiya, my wife." Ben got to his feet and helped his wife to the table. "You should be in bed having a nice nap, luv."

  "Not too long now till the bairn arrives," Safiya said, ignoring her husband's words. She had a deep voice which honked from her throat. "I'm seven months."

  Seven months! Fenella put down her mug. Oh my God, she looked like she was going to burst. Poor lass. Fenella recalled a slim coach in her gym. Her husband worked at the fish-tinning factory in Maryport, a small coastal town. The coach was forty-two when she went through infertility treatment. The quadruplets grew large and fast, but the birth was hindered by high blood pressure, rupture of membranes, and caesarean section. After, the coach blew up from stress. Her weight had grown even more with the late nights and feeds at dawn. Babies aren’t easy, and four fresh from the womb would test the nerves of a saint. She got diabetes and lost the use of her legs. Now she scuttled around in a wheelchair.

  "Are you expecting twins?" Fenella asked.

  "Only one boy," Safiya replied.

  "Must be a biggun," Dexter said.

  "Takes after his dad. Fifteen pounds, weren't you, darling?" Safiya smiled. "Our first; makes us a proper family at last."

  "We can relax now, honey," Ben spoke in soothing tones, like the presenter on a late-night radio jazz show. But there was also the hint of an alert in his voice. "These nice people are from the police. They are here at last."

  "About bloody time," Safiya said, in almost a shout.

  The loud honk startled Fenella, but she kept her voice level. "We are sorry to have kept you waiting."

  "I thought you were travellers come to stay as guests." Safiya gave her husband a quick look. "I suppose Ben told you we saw the press conference on the local news. At the end they asked for anyone who knew Miss Maureen Brian to come forward, and since no one has been here yet, Ben called the station. We didn’t expect you so soon."

  "We aim to serve, madam," Fenella replied. She detected a sense of disappointment that they weren't paying guests. And something else. But she couldn’t put her finger on it. "My name is Detective Fenella Sallow, and this eager-to-serve gentleman is Detective Robert Dexter."

  "Detectives!" Ben stared as his face turned a greasy grey. "I thought you were community support officers. I… I… well, I don't know if what we can tell you will be of any help."
/>
  Dexter opened his notebook.

  Fenella said, "Normally, we'd send a constable around to inform the relatives. We appear to have messed up on that one. We hope our delay wasn’t too disturbing for you." She paused for a moment, watchful. "You say you called the station?"

  "Yesterday morning when we realised Maureen didn’t come home," Ben replied. "We were told she was an adult and not to bother the police until she'd been missing at least forty-eight hours. Even then, since we aren’t relatives, the officer said there wasn’t much they could do. Later in the morning we heard about what happened on the news. We called again yesterday around noon and again in the evening, and just now after the press conference at the town hall. But each time, we got a different person and they said they'd pass the message along."

  Fenella fumed. Damn cutbacks have turned the service into a shambles. But she leaned forward like a close friend eager to hear good news. "Please go on."

  "And I would have gone to the police station myself," Ben continued, "but as you can see with my wife…"

  Safiya spoke. "We are not one to make a fuss, but when there is trouble you hope the police will be there for you. That is why I made Ben call our local councillor last night. Do you know Mr Malton? He said he'd take up the matter with your superiors."

  Everyone in town knew Councillor Malton. He was a man of the people who'd lost his legs in the army. He rolled about town in a wheelchair and snarled like a rottweiler. And he bit, too. Frequent and hard. Fenella imagined him in the superintendent's office, and for an instant felt sorry for Veronica Jeffery.

  "We are here now, luv." Fenella sounded apologetic. "Let's make a fresh start, shall we?"

  Safiya said, "From what I've seen of the police, half the town will be dead before you catch the bugger." She jerked to her feet. "Find the person who killed Maureen before they strike again."