Clock Face of Ills

by Paige Elizabeth Turner

  Hugging the edge of the void, stand three tall Post Pack tubes of the type used for mailing poster prints, house plans and artists’ canvasses. I open the first. Find a huge sheet of paper of similar size as that once used by butchers to wrap meat. As it unfurls, the plans of the manor flatten before me, each end kicking up like a baby’s first kiss-curls. The second tube holds Land Registry documents, and an enlargement of the estate.

  A series of cross-hatches forms a pattern near the rear boundary and extends into the adjacent land. On first sight, I consider it the work of an idle public servant doodling away an hour between morning tea and lunch breaks. Then I see a detailed ‘legend’ box at the foot of the page. I decipher the scale computations and symbols for gates, fences, trees to be retained, but stall at the cross hatch. It commands my attention, but disappoints me with the one word reference: ‘reserve’. Reserve what? It certainly can’t be a reserve as in public land – there is no designated right-of-way. More puzzling, the marking extends into the neighbour’s land. Such notations would usually pertain only to the land described by the title.

  I open the remaining tube. A translucent sheet provides a full topographic layover of the Ashton Hill property while another details measurements and cross-hatching of Blackshaw’s Mill. This plan displays red dashes, inked across a line six metres parallel to the boundary, suggesting that McMaster might be, or has been, involved in one of Britain’s most common disputes: property boundaries and fence lines.

  Neighbourly friendships have been lost and destroyed over this phenomenon. As a police officer, I’d attended my share of quarrels of neighbours ranting about incorrectly sited fences. One complainant demanded a fence’s removal and realignment; another claimed entitlement to a four-inch strip because the fence palings had been attached to the ‘wrong’ side of the frame; and another complained that a neighbour’s hedge had spread so wide, it reduced her rear garden by ‘two-feet-nine-inches’. Before I’d learnt to pass off these complaints as civil matters, I advised that particular neighbour to trim back the offending hedge. ‘But then I could be charged with wilful damage,’ replied the complainant.

  Two weeks’ later, my partner and I attended a dispute at a familiar address. This time it was the house next to the former complainant. It transpired that the neighbour had trimmed the hedge. The hedge died. I tried hard to conceal my embarrassment because it had been my naïve advice that caused the predicament. All I could do was take a hard-line stance by insisting the complaint remained a civil matter as no crime had been committed. ‘Surely it’s wilful or criminal damage?’ the complainant contested. I would not debate the delicate legal distinction, so deflected the question: ‘I’m sure your neighbour’s intention was only to reduce its size, not kill it. It’s a shared responsibility; perhaps you could have assisted with the trimming.’

  ‘But that’s her side!’

  ‘My point exactly. You can’t then complain that she’s done something wrong.’ At that juncture, we excused ourselves before becoming further embroiled in the trivial exercise of a neighbour’s quest for one-upmanship.

  I refocus, and wonder if a similar dispute had festered between these two property owners. Sure, I was drawing a long bow if I were to conclude that the felling of a tree directly onto a vehicle was part of a property dispute, but nothing can be discounted in the battle of cross-boundary war. I make a mental note to further examine the trees on my way out. Tomorrow will be too late – forensics will burrow through them like termites.

  Before returning the items to McMaster’s sill-safe, I probe inside the crevice in the event some remaining gems have evaded me. This might sound very ‘Treasure Island’ – but it is likely that a secret map or document has been expressly secured. It’s a common trait of the paranoid. They see everyone as a threat: the postman; the census statistician; and the relations who believe they’re entitled to a share of their bloodlines’ wealth – yet those same people are reticent about sharing anything of their own. I’ve discovered secret bank accounts, wills, share scrips, Birth Certificates and pornography stashes taped beneath drawers, behind bookcases and in freezers. In one memorable instance a shelf had been hollowed out with a router and a £200,000 share certificate concealed before the shelf was restored with a veneer edge. The only reason I discovered this was because the shelf housed only a few books in an otherwise crammed bookcase.

  Perseverance rewards me when I pull two books from the depths of the void: Gold Production from Beginning to End and The Crown Lands Act 1702. Why the frig, I wonder, would these be hidden instead of standing in the adjacent bookcase? My knowledge of statutes informs me that the Crown Lands Act governs the ownership and use of the Queen’s land holdings, which, as most Britons know, comprise vast acreages set aside for fox hunting and exercising Corgis.

  I flick through the gold production book and note the recent publication date. Hadn’t British mining been wiped out in the 1980s – courtesy of Arthur Scargill some would say – whose 1984-5 miners’ strike sealed the workers’ fate? I learn about lode deposits (original gold formations) and placer deposits – fragmented remains of the original lode which have been separated by erosion, land movement or previous prospecting activities. I skim through tunnelling, gold separation, and refining. This is serious reading.

  McMaster’s obsession with mining stuns me. Nothing here suggests he has a financial interest in either North Sea oil exploration or overseas mineral deposits. And I don’t see him as a weekend warrior lugging around a B&Q metal detector pinging the earth for Roman coins and gypsy treasures. I suddenly wonder whether his attack might have something to do with this interest. I replace the items and restore the false sill to its correct position.

  Padding through other rooms reconfirms my impression of McMaster: slovenly and careless. The washing is stockpiled – both dishes and laundry – and telltale cobwebs crave a tickling from John Dyson’s latest invention.

  Rich beeswax draws me to the main reception room. It appears rarely used, reminding me of a ‘best’ room my parents cherished. ‘Don’t go in there Olivia, we might have visitors.’ In my twelve years of living in that house, I saw guests on only three occasions, and that means, quite unequivocally, that the room was inhabited only three times.

  This room is devoted to a cause. It enshrines McMaster’s history like a buried time capsule; from schoolboy and sportsman to husband and father and police officer. A dozen photos of Phillip and his wife hang from the walls, and two gold-leaf framed portraits of a young daughter stand erect on each end of the mantelpiece. There is no evidence within the home of a wife and child – nor is there in many police officers’ homes. The stress and hours become too much for the young couples, causing love and wedding vows to dissolve into the deepening well of crime and degenerating society. I’m one of few who proudly endorse the practice of remaining unmarried – but not necessarily unattached.

  En route to a quiet exit, I pass another reception room, or what might once have been a gallery or library. It oozes the gentlemen’s clubs’ décor I once experienced during an afternoon’s spoiling by a senior police officer. A huge fireplace with a three-metre mantle of polished marble sits like a pulpit in a Gothic cathedral, and rich leather Chesterfields watch over period tables lazing on Brintons carpet. In the elliptic yellow of my torchlight’s waning beam, a clock’s luminous Roman numerals reflect fuzzy digits. The hourly divisions read not as II, III, IV, V, VI, VII; they diffuse a superimposed subliminal message. Although I shun any form of the occult and supernatural (I used to laugh at friends’ tales of séances) as I study this timepiece, words leap from the numerals: bill, hill, mill, Jill, Gill, sill, quill and even more eerie, the clock’s owner, Phil. I step back from this clock face of ills.

  I retreat to an adjacent den which reconfirms McMaster’s domestic habits of chaotic disarray. The bed is chaotic, sheets and duvet appear as abstract human entanglement, and a lipstick and eyeliner lay on the bedside tab
le. Someone had fled the room, perhaps fearful of Mrs McMaster doing her utmost to spring surprise on her defiant husband.

  Bedside tables provide many clues and bonuses to police and private investigators. I pick through the drawers. One side is empty, save for the characteristic stinging aroma of fresh pine. I taste varnish used to transform the £٤٠ knocked-up setting into a £299 Edwardian reproduction befitting a Lord, rewarding retail copywriters with their industry association’s ‘Best use of Poetic Licence’ award.

  Its counterpart shocks. This guest room doubles as a love parlour. I guess McMaster’s own bedroom is too personal and private to use for casual flings and nocturnal transgressions. On opening the drawer, I feel the same rush of nerves that felled me when I entered an adult DVD store – for official police business, of course. I ogle the variety of flavoured gels (and take a sniff for interest’s sake), magazines, freaky condoms, a battery-powered cucumber, and a camera. I don’t need a PI licence to query why one would have a camera in a guest room drawer. I power it on, and click through the digital frames. The first face to grace the screen is Gillian’s – in a pose I choose to not describe.

  Now I understand why Thornton commissioned me. Closer to my heart is the fact that Gillian has tainted my new profession. I consider taking the camera, but remove the SD memory card instead. Either way, McMaster will, hopefully during an amorous moment, realise that something is wrong.

  I creep from the back door into darkness. Bloody cigarettes. A faint whiff of tobacco fouls the fresh rural air. I put it down to residual stench from the McMaster home.

  XIX

  Angelo slouches against a tree in his mother’s garden, drawing on a cigarette. He winces with pain as fractured ribs protest against the pressure of deep inhalations. He fixes upon a flickering light in an upstairs window of Ashton Hill. Experience tells him it is a person wandering by torchlight from room to room. And he knows it isn’t McMaster.

  Despite Angelo’s issues with his neighbour, he has to act – his mother’s home could be next. He races across the paddock, pumping and flexing ready to meet any challenge. A creaking rear door forecasts an imminent exit, so he crouches against a wall. Darkness is also his enemy, for he is unable to identify the retreating figure. He shuffles a few paces. Prepares to rush the intruder to the ground. A shard of moonlight strikes the prowler’s face. Angelo recognises the profile and wonders why the woman who’d assisted his mother is now slithering away from his neighbour’s house.

  He ditches plans to attack, clings to the wall, and allows her to continue through the night. Reporting the intrusion to McMaster could restore his favour. Just as the phrase ‘knowledge is power’ is professed by academia, so too is the cliché a bastion of the criminal element, and Angelo is its number one advocate. The reality of his proposal unnerves him: Refer it to McMaster? The guy’s supposed to be dead. The alternative is unthinkable: What if he’s still alive?

  He darts back to his mother’s house. ‘I’m going now mama. Have a good sleep.’ As if asking for a cup of tea he follows with: ‘By the way, mama, any word on how the neighbour is?’

  ‘No. I know nothing. The ambulance takes him and that young lady who brings me home says she will let me know, but she’s no come back.’

  Angelo doesn’t reply. Something else to play by ear at the appropriate time.

  Maria ponders her son’s attitude to the young lady and is disturbed to see her recently departed husband reappear through Angelo.

  When faced with confusion over their offspring’s direction in life, mothers across the world view a flickering newsreel of their child’s journey to maturity. Maria has many happy memories of Angelo’s childhood and his relationship with his brothers. Yes, he has been in trouble – just part of growing up, she defends. Today, he is as troubled as he had been in his teens. The short temper is indisputably inherited, but the fresh facade of fear and concern draws his face into a grim caricature of his former self – and of his father.

  Perhaps the sorrow of his father’s passing has finally hit. With the fire of denunciation ablaze, he might now regret having not resolved their differences when opportunities arose. Maria also wonders if the burden of handling the sale contract might have ignited his spirit.

  XX

  Minutes after midnight, I race home to check McMaster’s family snaps. From my investigator’s kit I pull out the superseded Fuji el-cheapo camera which I’ve permanently ejected from my weighty handbag. The introduction of efficient mobile phone cameras has converted me to a Samsung Galaxy. My downfall is failing to list the old Fuji on eBay.

  I press the power button. A faded menu appears. I slot in McMaster’s SD card. A bedroom scene springs to life – one I might enjoy as a participant, but not as a home viewer. I flick through the photos. Frame four bares Gillian accepting McMaster’s animalistic advances. Talk about mixing business with pleasure! I ogle more frames of the motel room romp, clearly identified by a ‘Premier’ logo on a background ‘Rules of House’. Now I have something.

  Photo eleven is a steamy image – in more ways than one – of a contortionist’s act in the shower, and frames twelve to fifteen depict a huge shed. The abrupt change of venue confounds me – I haven’t a clue where it is or what it means. The next shots perplex me even further.

  Abysmal lighting. No flash. I squint and scrunch as I decipher grainy images taken in a cave-like tunnel with chiselled walls. One shot aims down a shaft, capturing the depths of what appears to be a disused wishing well. A timber structure resembling tangled house framing supports the walls. I try to link this to the preceding intimate moments. Vivid imagination conjures a discipline dungeon where McMaster role plays with a tribe of fur-clad hunters and gatherers. I discount its relevance to a police investigation because of its inclusion within a series of very personal shots.

  I flash back to the 1997 movie, Dante’s Peak. I wasn’t supposed to be watching TV; it was way past my bedtime. I snuggled up to mum, and, well, you know mums are a sucker for a bit of a cuddle. So I got to stay up late that night. Much of the movie was shot in a mine, and it is that setting I see in McMaster’s photos. Nothing is suspiciously illegal, other than signs of a peculiar interest. I click to the next series of photos.

  Two long-range shots portray photographic skills of an amateur trying to claim professional status with sub-standard equipment. I’ve done it myself when snapping a clear shot some 200 metres distant with a measly 4x zoom. Dead loss. But in this shot, I recognise him: Angelo on a bike. Appears to be a Harley, but I can’t discount the possibility of it being one of those thumping V Twin Japanese impersonations. Another snap shows him applauding a mature marijuana crop. The next is an unposed pic of Maria Caruso beside her back door.

  I’ve seen shots like these. They’re not family snaps. If they were, they would not have been taken from a distance. Nor would they be for evidential purposes. For a start, no electronic time-stamp appears on the frames, and, as I’ve identified, they are within a collection of personal snaps. Conscious of McMaster’s reputation, I think these are fuel for bribery. He could command immense power wielding the threat of exposing Angelo’s marijuana crop. The photos are meant to threaten: we know where your bike is and will steal it if you don’t cooperate, and the big one: we know your mother – she wants a long life, doesn’t she? I hate to think that McMaster would sink so low, but resign myself to the possibility.

  The next few show the interior and exterior of The Knight’s Arms. These have been taken covertly. The shots are out of focus, but there is no mistaking Gillian at the bar. A pic of an executive-looking gentleman entering the pub arouses my interest. I’ve no idea how anyone could capture such a good close-up of the guy slipping an envelope into his jacket pocket. I have to assume the photos were taken by McMaster, possibly with a remote action. Given the location, and Gillian’s inclusion, I make a second assumption that this string of shots was taken for ‘insurance’ – the envelope e
xchange being the focal point. It also becomes my focal point: what was in the envelope and to whom was it given?

  I’ve spent enough time with the camera, so copy the card onto my computer. I write a quick statement detailing what I’ve seen and how I’ve come by the various items. It has no legal standing, but will supplement Thornton’s enquiry.

  As I list shots fifteen to eighteen – depicting the structural formwork – all comes clear. There must be a tie-in between the photos and the goodies I’d found concealed in the window sill.

  The change of pace revitalises me. I check the remaining shots and pause over the last few. A young girl. Miss Average on a shopping expedition along the High Street. Could be his daughter or relation. But it’s not, because the next snap of the girl strolling into Heavenly Spirits stitches it together. Shit! Rose Hernandez.

  XXI

  McMaster lies rigid, neck craned toward a television mounted high on a robotic arm. He flicks the remote through a sequence of channels: bloody housewife television. Is there no sports channel? Presses the power button and crunches the remote onto a bedside trolley. Finding nothing on TV is more traumatic than the broken leg and arm, dislocated shoulder, and two ruptured discs.

  On being told he will be hospitalised for up to five days, McMaster objects with the predictable male psych: what do you think I am? A pansy? I can walk out of here and return to work tomorrow. Pain does not blunt McMaster’s temperament; nor does the high dose of Valium jade his mind.

  The ‘accident’. He chastises himself for stopping at the felled tree: I should have questioned the closed gate; should have seen the sawn trunk; should have realised that pines do not fall of their own accord; and I should have known that Main and Angelo would seek retribution.