by David Blake
Tanner crouched down beside the dead girl’s head to compare the two items; but it was clear from the outset that they weren’t the same. The earring the dead girl was wearing consisted of a simple gold spiral. The one in the bag was in the shape of a blue butterfly.
‘Is it a match?’ asked Jenny.
‘Not even close.’
Overhearing the conversation, Burgess asked, ‘Is what a match?’
Standing back up, Tanner said, ‘We found an earring near to where the missing girl lives.’ As he handed the evidence bag back to Jenny, he added, ‘We also found what we think might be blood.’
‘And where was that, exactly?’
‘Under the railway bridge,’ replied Jenny. ‘Upriver from Wroxham.’
‘And that’s where you think she was killed, do you?’ Burgess asked Tanner. ‘Before her body was dumped in the river?’
‘The thought had crossed my mind.’
‘So you’re saying that the body floated from Wroxham, all the way down the River Bure, where it would have popped out just over there.’
Burgess pointed downstream to where Tanner could see another river entrance, about a hundred metres further on.
‘Then the body somehow managed to defy the laws of physics by miraculously floating upstream,’ continued Burgess, ‘to end up where it is now?’
Realising he’d allowed himself to be led into what was obviously a gaping hole of impossibility, Tanner said, ‘I must admit that I don’t know the river system around here, so I’d have to agree that that does sound a little unlikely.’
‘Which is exactly why we need local people working for us, not a bunch of bloody Londoners!’
Tanner elected to remain silent. He’d no desire to engage in a discussion with this man about his ability to work effectively in Norfolk. After all, Burgess was right; he didn’t know the Broads, but he didn’t think it would take him long to learn their layout. Despite the area he’d covered in London being relatively small, it was vastly more complex in comparison, covered as it was by a labyrinth of motorways, flyer-overs, streets and paths, all of which heaved with humanity from every corner of the planet. In contrast, the Broads seemed to consist of just a few rivers.
Burgess gave Tanner a long provocative glare, almost daring him to come back at him.
But Tanner wasn’t rising to the bait.
Feeling distinctly pleased with how exceptionally well he’d been able to prove his point that the new DI really was worse than useless, turning to face the other direction, Burgess said, ‘She’d have probably gone in somewhere around Hickling Broad, or Horsey Mere. Certainly beyond Potter Heigham. She could even have gone in near Martham. It’s a big area, so it will be difficult to pinpoint exactly where.’
Doctor Johnstone began easing himself up from where he’d been kneeling. After stretching out his back he handed Burgess two clear plastic evidence bags, one containing the necklace, the other the earring.
‘These might help to identify her,’ he began. ‘As far as DNA evidence goes, I think it’s unlikely we’re going to find any, not with her having been in the water for so long. But I’ll bag her hands before I leave, which will help protect anything that may be lodged under her fingernails.’
Holding the two bags up to examine their contents, Burgess asked, ‘When do you think we’ll be able to have the results from the post-mortem?’
Giving his watch a quick glance, Johnstone said, ‘Tomorrow afternoon.’
‘How about tomorrow morning?’
‘I can try,’ replied Johnstone. ‘It will depend if anything unexpected crops up.’
Giving Jenny the evidence bags, Burgess looked over at Tanner. ‘You may want to show those to the husband of your missing girl, to see if he recognises them. If he does, then I suppose you’d better arrange for him to come in and identify the body; but only if he does, mind! If he doesn’t, then I think it would be fair to say that this must be someone else.’
Burgess was hoping that that would be the case, and that the dead girl wasn’t the same as Tanner’s missing person. That way he hoped Barrington would pull Tanner off what he now considered to be his investigation. As much as he liked the idea of having the new London DI working as his personal assistant, the novelty factor had already worn off, and it now felt more like he was there to keep tabs on him.
With a nod, Tanner left Burgess to call Barrington, and having taken one last look over the scene, he led Jenny back the way they’d come.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
AT SIMON RICHARDSON’S house, Tanner rang the doorbell and waited.
As the door opened, he said, ‘Sorry to bother you again, Mr Richardson, but we were wondering if we could speak to you for a moment?’
‘I take it that means you haven’t found her?’ asked Richardson, giving Tanner a disparaging glare.
Unable to say if they had or hadn’t, again Tanner asked, ‘May we come in?’
‘Of course. Sorry. It’s been a long day.’
Stepping back inside the house, he led them down the hall towards the kitchen.
Once there, Tanner said, ‘We’ve found a couple of items of jewellery that we’d like you to take a look at.’
On cue, Jenny removed the two clear plastic evidence bags containing the necklace and the earring from her handbag, and placed them on the surface of the kitchen island beside them.
Frowning down at them, Richardson asked, ‘Can I pick them up?’
‘You can,’ agreed Tanner.
As he carefully lifted each one, he said, ‘I assume you’re thinking that they might belong to my wife?’
‘We’re not assuming anything, Mr Richardson. It would simply help us to know if you recognise them.’
After studying each item, Richardson eventually said, ‘I’m not sure. I don’t think they’re hers, but then again, she does have rather a lot.’
‘So they could be?’
‘I suppose they could, yes. At least they look like the sort of thing she’d wear, but I don’t recognise them.’
‘I see,’ said Tanner. He’d been hoping for a more conclusive answer, and was forced to hide his disappointment.
Remembering the other piece of jewellery they’d found, the one from under the railway bridge, he looked up at Jenny. ‘DC Evans, could you show Mr Richardson the other item?’
‘Of course,’ she replied, retrieving it from her handbag to place down on the worktop.
After staring at it for a few moments, Richardson eventually shrugged and said, ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t recognise it either. May I ask where you found them?’
Tanner hesitated. Had the man been able to confirm that the items found on the woman’s body had belonged to his wife, then he’d have told him, before asking if he’d be willing to make a formal identification. But with his responses being so vague, they were no closer to figuring out who the woman was. Even Tanner was having his doubts as to her identity. When he’d first seen the body he’d have put money on it being that of Richardson’s wife, and that someone had killed her underneath the railway bridge on her way back from work. But with such ambivalent responses to the jewellery, combined with Burgess’s comments about how she’d had to have floated upstream to end up where she’d been found, he wasn’t sure any more. Until they had a more positive identification, as Barrington correctly said, they should keep quiet about the whole thing. News of dead bodies being discovered always spread like wildfire, especially in small local communities. Even more so when the body in question was that of an attractive young woman, and Tanner knew that the last thing such an investigation needed was for harmful rumours and speculation to begin circulating about a possible identity, whether or not the victim had been murdered, and if so, who the killer was most likely to be. So instead of answering, he decided to change the course of the conversation. ‘I understand you were able to speak to your wife’s parents.’
‘Sorry, I forgot to tell you. I spoke to her father this morning, shortly after you left, but he didn�
��t know where she was either.’
‘To be honest, Mr Richardson, we already knew that. Mr Lambert called the station himself.’
‘He did say that he would. I assumed he’d tell you that I’d spoken to him.’
‘And you didn’t think it necessary to tell us who he was?’
‘No, why? Should I have done?’
‘Well, Mr Richardson, when the daughter of a wealthy man goes missing, there is another possibility as to her whereabouts, other than that she decided to stay over at a friend’s house and had forgotten to tell you.’
‘Sorry, I’m not with you.’
‘That someone may have kidnapped her!’
Richardson stared at him. ‘Do you think that’s what’s happened – that she’s been kidnapped?’
‘At the moment, we’re simply keeping all possibilities open, but it would have been useful to have known who her father was when we first spoke, certainly before he had a chance to put a call into the station to tell us himself!’
‘Of course, yes, sorry.’
‘Anyway,’ Tanner continued, ‘have you been able to get hold of her friends yet?’
‘A couple, but they’ve not heard from her.’
‘And what about other family members?’
‘Jane’s father said he was going to give them a call.’
‘Do you know if he has?’
‘I don’t. Sorry.’
‘What about male friends?’
‘What about them?’ questioned Richardson, in a defensive tone.
‘Does your wife have any?’
‘You mean - do I think she might have run off with one of them?’
‘As I said earlier, Mr Richardson, we’re just trying to keep all possibilities open.’
‘Well, she’s never mentioned any, but then I suppose if she was having an affair with one of them, she probably wouldn’t, would she!’
‘So you don’t know of any then?’
‘I don’t. The only one she’s ever talked about was some guy from university.’
‘And what was his name?’
‘Phil, I think.’
‘How about a surname?’
‘No idea.’
‘I assume you don’t know where he lives either?’
‘I think she mentioned somewhere in London.’
‘Well, that certainly narrows it down,’ said Tanner, with a thick layer of sarcasm.
‘Look, I’m sorry, but as I’ve said before, I don’t hang out with my wife’s friends, so how the hell should I know what they’re all called, or where they all live?’
Tanner hadn’t meant to have been quite so facetious, but he was becoming increasingly frustrated by the fact that Richardson hardly seemed to know a single thing about his own wife; what jewellery she wore, who her friends were, or even if any of them were men.
Deciding it was probably best to call it a day, Tanner said, ‘OK, that will do for now, Mr Richardson. But if you do think of anyone she might be staying with, or anything at all, please let us know.’
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
AS THEY WALKED over to where Tanner had parked the car, Jenny said, ‘I was a little surprised by his response to the jewellery. I’d have thought he’d have been able to recognise them if they had been his wife’s.’
‘I think it’s a man thing,’ replied Tanner.
‘A man thing?’
‘You know; like in the way a woman would see flowers in a room the moment she walked in, whereas a man probably wouldn’t, even if they stood on a pedestal right in the middle, and were lit by a spotlight.’
‘I thought we were talking about jewellery?’
To help clarify his remark, he said, ‘I’d say it’s fairly normal for a man not to be able to recognise his wife’s jewellery, unless of course the item had some sort of special significance, or was something she’d wear all the time. It’s just not something us men pay much attention to, I’m afraid.’
‘You’re saying that men aren’t interested in jewellery?’
‘I don’t think most of us are, no.’
‘I see,’ said Jenny. ‘So if I was to offer to buy you a really expensive watch, for example, you wouldn’t be interested?’
‘I don’t think watches count as jewellery, so if you’d like to buy me one, feel free!’
They smiled briefly over at each other; then after a moment’s pause, Jenny said, ‘I’ve been thinking about what Burgess said earlier, about where the body was found.’
‘Oh, yes. What about it?’
‘You know how he said that she couldn’t have fallen in the river along here, because if she had, she’d have had to have floated up the Thurne to have been found where she was?’
‘And that things can’t float upriver. How could I forget?’
‘Well, I’ve had a bit of a think about it, and I’m not sure he’s right.’
Reaching the driver’s side door, he looked at her over the XJS’s low sleek roof. ‘So you’re suggesting that the body could have floated upriver?’
‘I am.’
‘Even though he said it would go against the laws of physics for it to do so, which I must admit did sound like rather a convincing argument.’
‘Yes, but he was forgetting that the Broads are tidal, especially at this time of year. If the tide was coming in at the right time, the body could have easily been carried up the Thurne.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I’m fairly sure, but only if the tide was coming in at the time.’
‘Why wouldn’t Burgess have known about that?’
‘Well, he’s from Norwich. He’s not a Horning girl, like me.’
‘No kidding!’
‘He’s also not a sailor. And you can’t sail on the Broads without knowing something about the tides.’
‘And you are a sailor, I take it?’
‘Well, yes, although I can’t say I had much choice in the matter. My dad made sure of it. According to my parents, I could sail before I could ride a bike.’
‘You can ride a bike as well!’
Jenny narrowed her eyes at him, before the corners of her lips creased up into an amused smile, winning her a grin in return before he ducked to climb inside.
As he started the engine, Tanner said, ‘If you know so much about sailing, maybe you should come round to my place sometime.’
‘And why’s that?’ replied Jenny, clipping on her seatbelt. ‘I suppose you’re going to tell me that you live on a boat?’
‘Er, actually, I do!’
‘You live on a boat?’ she repeated, staring over at him.
‘An old wooden sailing-type one, yes.’
‘What, by choice?’
‘Well, sort of, although I must admit that had I known how small it was going to be, I’d have found a flat instead.’
‘How on earth did you end up living on a boat?’
‘It’s a long story,’ Tanner replied. ‘But for now, I think we’d better get back to the station and let Barrington know that DI Burgess isn’t quite the local he thought he was.’
With that, he reversed the car off the grass verge, executed a perfect three-point turn, and drove back down the narrow un-tarmacked track, heading for Wroxham Police Station.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
BY THE TIME they’d left Richardson’s house, it had already gone five o’clock. Feeling both tired and hungry, they decided to stop off at a garage on the way back to pick up coffee and a snack.
Walking into Wroxham Police Station about ten minutes later, coffees in hand, Tanner told Jenny that she’d better stick around for a while before heading for home, just until he had a chance to catch up with Barrington. He crossed to his superior’s office, noting on the way that Burgess wasn’t at his desk.
Before knocking, he took a quick peek through the glass partition. Inside he could see Burgess, sitting with one leg crossed over the other, chatting to Barrington. Thinking it would probably be better to leave them to it, he was about to turn away when Barrington
saw him standing there and beckoned him inside.
With a reluctant sigh, he pushed open the door.
‘Ah, Tanner, we were just talking about you!’
‘Nothing good, I hope,’ replied Tanner, which was about the only response he could think of that didn’t make him sound like he was being unnecessarily paranoid.
Not getting the fact that he’d meant it as a joke, albeit a rather poor one, Barrington said, ‘No, no, nothing like that. Take a seat, won’t you.’
Still carrying his coffee, Tanner entered, and closed the door behind him. He pulled out the free chair, away from Burgess and the desk, as Barrington said, ‘DI Burgess was just giving me an update on the girl’s body.’
Sitting down and crossing his legs, Tanner suddenly found he was very curious to know what the other officer had been saying. So he looked directly at Burgess, raised his eyebrows and said, ‘Oh, yes?’
‘I was just telling DCI Barrington,’ began Burgess, looking particularly smug, ‘that at this stage, there’s no evidence to suggest that it’s anything other than an accidental drowning.’
‘Apart from the marks on her neck and the wound to her forehead,’ interjected Tanner.
‘Which Dr Johnstone thinks could have easily been caused by her having tripped over and hitting her head on a cleat, before becoming entangled in a mooring line,’ rebutted Burgess, his self-satisfied smile turning into more of a sneer.
Apparently unaware of the tension that had grown between his two DIs during the course of the day, Barrington told Tanner, ‘And Burgess doesn’t seem to think that there’s any connection between the woman’s body and the missing person.’
By way of confirmation, Burgess nodded and said, ‘That’s correct, sir.’
Turning to him, Barrington asked, ‘Are we anywhere nearer to being able to identify who the dead girl is?’
‘I’m afraid not, sir. As I mentioned on the phone, there was no ID found either on or about her. Neither were there any tattoos or distinguishing marks. And the photograph we had of the missing person bore little resemblance. All we have are the items of jewellery, and we’re still waiting for Dr Johnstone to send back the wedding and engagement rings, which he was unable to remove on site.’