Secrets of Death

by Stephen Booth

  Frowning, Cooper read Anson Tate’s note again before he passed it to Fry. He wondered if Carol Villiers was right and Tate would take the first opportunity to end his own life. And, if so, whether Tate’s victims would be waiting for him on the other side. And what they might have to say to him.

  The note read:

  This is the third secret of death. A secret they don’t want you to know. That death is actually quite … pleasant.

  Yes, death. It’s a subject I think about often. Not that I spend much time wondering what happens afterwards, whether there’ll be something waiting for me on the other side. Eternal life, rebirth, heaven or hell. Whatever. Nor do I waste any effort wondering when it will happen. I don’t understand that obsession with how long you’ll live, what disease will carry you off, whether you’ll survive to see your grandchildren growing up or if you’ll face growing old alone. Speculation about the future. None of that interests me.

  For me, it’s the moment. The actual instant of death. What is that like? How do you feel and what are you thinking? What goes through your brain in those final seconds? Is it like falling asleep? Or something quite different – something unique, which we’ll never experience at any other time? What is it like?

  I can’t wait to find out.

  32

  Cooper was getting ready to go home now. He didn’t dare look at the time. His stomach told him he was hungry, but he didn’t feel like eating. Takeaways had been brought in for the team in the CID room and he could smell the spices from here, but they just made him feel sick.

  Diane Fry stuck her head round the door.

  ‘Still here?’ she said.

  ‘Yes, but I’m surprised you are. Nothing to go back to in Wilford?’

  ‘No, thank God.’

  Cooper was puzzling over that remark, but not making any sense of it. He probably wasn’t capable of making sense of much in his present condition.

  ‘I thought you’d like to know,’ said Fry. ‘We’ve tied both Hull and Sharif in to the break-in at Forest Fields now. When we pulled Sharif in we were able to take prints and DNA, and we got matches for both. Hull has admitted the blackmail. Sharif isn’t talking, but Hull has already implicated him on that one. We’ll have a tight case against them.’

  ‘I suppose Hull’s concern was to remove anything from the house that might still link him to Farrell. They used to work together at the car dealership in Arnold. The two couples became quite friendly, hence the photo.’

  ‘Yes, and, when Simon Hull set up on his own, Farrell continued taking his cars to Hull’s garage for servicing.’

  ‘Of course – the invoices and MoT certificates. Those were what had gone from that file.’

  ‘If you say so. And, at a guess, he was probably looking for that photo.’

  ‘It wasn’t there. It was in Farrell’s car.’

  Fry hesitated. ‘Hasn’t this inquiry been the wrong way round somehow?’ she said.

  ‘I know what you mean. The perpetrator is supposed to take the honourable way out at the end of the story, not at the beginning.’

  ‘I don’t even know what that means,’ she said.

  ‘Never mind. It’s to do with a study of suicide. The socio-economic factors.’

  ‘Have you been taking night school classes in psychology?’

  ‘No, just talking to someone interesting.’

  ‘Oh, well. I can take a hint. Goodnight, Inspector.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Cooper distractedly. ‘Yes, goodbye. Goodbye, Diane.’

  But Cooper still wasn’t finished. Carol Villiers came running in for instructions about the next day. He was the DI, after all. It was his responsibility to decide these things.

  ‘There’s the post-mortem on Gordon Burgess happening in the morning,’ she said. ‘Do you want to go yourself, Ben?’

  Cooper hesitated. He wouldn’t be at his best in the morning. He was bound to say the wrong thing, blurt out some embarrassing remark. How awkward would that be?

  ‘You could do it, Carol. Or I could send Dev Sharma, if you prefer. Now we’ve got him back, he might as well be doing something useful.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t mind doing it,’ said Villiers cheerfully. ‘There’s a new pathologist there, you know.’

  Cooper wondered how she managed to stay so cheerful, even at this time of night. She must have an almost superhuman constitution.

  ‘Ah, yes, I’ve met her,’ he said.

  ‘Chloe Young. I know her family – they’re from Sheffield. Believe it nor not, I went out with her brother for a few months. It was years ago, of course, before I met Glen.’

  ‘You already know her, then?’

  ‘Very well. In fact, she got in touch with me when she first came back to the area.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘As it happens,’ said Villiers, ‘it was Chloe I went to Derby Book Festival with the other day. She’s great company. She’s very bright too, you know. She’s got qualifications coming out of her ears.’

  Cooper’s mouth hung open as he watched Villiers leave. The news came as a complete shock. His exhausted mind began to whirl with questions. Had Chloe Young been hearing all about him from Carol Villiers before she met him that evening at the Barrel Inn? And did that also mean Villiers knew where he’d been on the night his car was run off the road? What had they been saying about him?

  Slowly, Cooper put on his jacket and closed the door. Like so many other things in his life, he might never find out.