Dead to Me

by Pamela Murray

  ‘I believe I do,’ Ambleton said firmly. ‘Why did you say you were freelance?’

  ‘I am freelance.’

  ‘Hardly. You’re a student, it says so on your university card,’ Fielding reminded her.

  ‘But I’m almost a fully qualified journalist.’

  ‘Almost is not the same as actually being one, Amanda,’ Ambleton reminded her. ‘In fact, I’d call what you did fraud.’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ the woman said, finally dropping the façade. ‘I did it as a credit towards my finals, all right? I thought that if I got a scoop then it could only benefit my future career.’

  ‘Be that as it may, you shouldn’t have been allowed into the conference room, and I think you know that.’

  The young woman had guts, along with confidence and intuition. She’d likely make a good journalist with those attributes and the drive to succeed. But she needed to refine her approach, and it didn’t excuse her from the fact that she knew about the poison when no member of the public should. Both police officers were keen to hear exactly how she’d become aware of it.

  ‘Well, that’s the funny thing,’ Amanda began, ‘I didn’t hear about it; I was told by my mother’s friend. She knew I was training to be a journalist, and thought it would be a good chance for me to get a foot up on the ladder, you know, to get myself recognised.’

  ‘Well, you certainly did that,’ Fielding said sarcastically, still annoyed by the way the whole press conference had panned out. Although she’d had some difficult questions, which she thought she’d managed to handle adequately, they were nothing by comparison to this woman’s bombshell at the end. Amanda had timed it to have the most impact, and it had worked. Fielding wasn’t sure what Ambleton had said after she and Summers had led Amanda away, but she hoped that it was to remind the journalists that what they’d just heard was confidential and not to be made public.

  ‘We’ll need the name of your mother’s friend,’ Ambleton said.

  ‘I’m not sure I can release my source–’

  ‘Oh, do stop this, you’re not a fully-fledged journalist yet you know!’ Fielding glared at the woman; her usual unflinching patience replaced by something akin to anger. ‘And if you keep up this act, we can make sure you never will be.’

  Ambleton looked towards her colleague with admiration, along with one raised eyebrow. Of course, the police didn’t have the power to stop anyone pursuing their choice of career, but chances were the woman wouldn’t know that. Unbeknown to Fielding, her own presence at the press conference was double-edged. Firstly, as it was her officer’s first time before the press, the DCI was there to support her; and secondly, but perhaps more importantly, she was there to assess her as part of the inspector’s practical exam.

  Fielding wasn’t sure where the outburst had come from, but it served its purpose as the woman’s posture stiffened at the rebuff. She was probably not used to being told what to do; she looked to be that sort of person. Whereas Ambleton saw her having the potential to be an adequate journalist at some point in the future, Fielding just saw her as an arrogant spoilt brat who thought she knew everything and deemed herself invincible. She remembered the type from her school days, the ones who believed themselves to be better than anybody else, always attention-seeking, making those less confident feel inadequate.

  When Amanda Pearson answered, she seemed to have lost most of her confidence. Fielding’s temporary aggression had apparently paid off.

  ‘My mother is on the Board of Governors at Thornton School, and it was the Head Teacher, Mrs Sinclair, who told her. One of the teachers there died, and also one of the governors. She thought it might help my career along if I could get a scoop on the story.’

  Not another connection, thought Fielding. Everybody in this, the victims and the suspects, and now this young interloper at the press conference, all seemed to be linked to one another. The one common denominator in all this appeared to be Madame Ortiz; even the astrological signs on two of the bodies pointed towards her. If she was being framed, what on earth was she being framed for, and why did someone think she deserved it?

  ***

  Amanda Pearson was let off with a warning.

  ‘You did very well back there,’ Ambleton smiled, as they walked to the lift after leaving the interview room. ‘I sensed a new take on things?’

  Fielding took that to mean she had not been her normal self during the interview and she had to agree with her superior. The question was, should she apologise for that, or should she take it as a compliment? In the end she decided to keep quiet. But that didn’t stop her launching into a rant about the young pretender.

  ‘The woman got my back up, coming into the meeting like that. She blatantly gate-crashed, the attention-seeking bi–’

  Ambleton cut her off before she could fully vent her anger. ‘I wholeheartedly agree with you. Could it be that heading up the investigation has given you a whole different outlook?’

  ‘It’s different, I’ll give you that.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s why you did it in a new way.’

  Fielding knew that when she sat in with Burton when he was conducting interviews, she was more of an observer than overseer. She would, of course, ask questions when she had something to ask, but she’d always leave it to him to lead the way. As acting DI on this case, and now senior investigating officer, it seemed that she’d naturally adapted to take over his role; although his outbursts were very few as his approach was one of calm, and perhaps more subtle, interrogation. Her explosion at the faux journalist was unexpected, even to her, although DCI Ambleton seemed to have liked the way she’d handled the situation.

  ‘Do you mind if I come into the incident room to take a look at how things are going?’ the DCI asked as they reached the lift doors. Fielding didn’t mind in the slightest. In fact, she welcomed a new pair of eyes looking the board over.

  ‘Joe tells me you’ve got more suspects than a whodunit crime novel.’

  ‘He’s not wrong there. I’ll tell you what’s odd, as well. It seems that everybody, victims and suspects, are somehow linked to one another.’

  Ambleton’s brows furrowed; it was an unusual scenario, with not many cases having all the main players intersecting like that. Burton had already told her as much, but she wanted to see it for herself. She knew how much he missed being partnered with Fielding on this case, it was obvious from the way he’d discussed it. But, as far as she was concerned, both he and Fielding were managing very well with their new challenges.

  Ambleton carefully looked over the photos and information beneath them. Whoever had been working on it had now gone all-out and criss-crossed red string to and from each link. Burton and Fielding were right; at least five people were connected in some way to one another. That in itself was unusual.

  ‘And you say the common denominator seems to be this Madame Ortiz,’ the DCI said to Fielding as she pointed to the promotional photograph of the astrologer/fortune teller taken from her website.

  ‘She seems to be. Firstly, because Maria Turnbull had just visited her prior to her death. Secondly, there’s the fact that Maria’s friend Caroline Watkins is a solicitor who, along with Norman Bishop, Harry York, and possibly Maria Turnbull’s husband, had a connection to her via their work in the form of a tenancy agreement for the premises she operates out of.’

  ‘Why John Turnbull?’ Ambleton asked.

  ‘It’s just a tentative thought, and we haven’t checked it out yet, but he is an architect with a firm in the city, and we were wondering if he had anything to do with the building itself.’

  ‘You mean like some kind of bribery, or corruption in high places even?’

  ‘Still not sure, but maybe. Perhaps it involved one or two of them, and another found out.’

  ‘Enough to get them all killed?’ Ambleton pondered, sitting on the edge of a desk and crossing her arms while still staring at the array of victims and suspects.

  ‘That’s
something we’re busy working on.’

  ‘So, what about forensic accounting; did they turn anything up?’

  Fielding shook her head. ‘No, unfortunately not, so that idea fizzled out.’

  ‘So, what’s next?’

  ‘Well, after I speak to the head teacher at Thornton School we’ll see if John Turnbull’s firm can either confirm or deny any link to Madame Ortiz or the building she’s in.’

  ‘Okay,’ Ambleton said, rising from the desk. ‘But if you don’t mind, I’d like to ring the head teacher myself and remind her of confidentiality breaches. It’s all very well trying to help the daughter of a friend, but not when we’re in the middle of murder enquiries and trying to keep what information we give to the press to a minimum.’

  ‘Do you think we’ve done enough to deter young Amanda Pearson then?’ Fielding was still concerned by the woman’s cockiness and overly self-confidence.

  ‘I think you have,’ Ambleton smiled. ‘But seriously, I hope this teaches her a very important lesson.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That members of the press, or those intending to join them, don’t have the freedom they think they have, at least not when it comes to murder enquiries.’

  ‘Let’s hope so.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  While the DCI returned to her office to contact Thornton School’s head teacher, Fielding concentrated on making enquiries into John Turnbull’s background. If she discovered that his firm was in some way connected to the building which was home to Madame Ortiz’s business in the Northern Quarter, it proved that he, too, was a credible suspect. Could it simply be a case of back-handers between him, Caroline Watkins’s firm of solicitors, local planner Norman Bishop, Harry York’s estate agency and Madame Ortiz? It didn’t appear to be a strong motive for killing three people, although Fielding knew that people had killed for far less. So, as the survivors, the only real suspects in her mind were John Turnbull, Caroline Watkins and Madame Ortiz. Then again, why use a concentrated poison that Maria Turnbull took in a small-dose tablet form, to kill the victims?

  All of this was going through Fielding’s mind as she drove to John Turnbull’s firm in the city. Entry to the building’s car park was via a numeric code, so she pulled up to the barrier and pressed the help button. A man’s voice came through the cackle and asked if he could help her. Announcing herself in her official capacity, and stating that she wished to visit the offices of Durning and Tate, she was directed to park in space right beside the main entrance. As she thanked the disembodied voice, the barrier rose to allow her to drive in.

  Once inside, she was asked to sign in and received a visitor’s badge to wear. Someone by the name of Martin Scott had been informed of her arrival and would wait for her at the lift on the fourth floor. Fielding had no idea who he was, but got the impression that he was aware of her reasons to visit.

  Martin Scott was standing by the lift doors when they opened. She took his outstretched hand; he had a firm, if slightly clammy grip. Fielding assumed it was down to the fact he was dressed in a three-piece suit and tie when the temperature outside was high. Fielding disliked buildings such as these, the ones where you couldn’t open a window, and the temperature control was artificially regulated by technology. They seemed to be hit and miss at the best of times. At least in the office where she and her team worked, anyone could open a window, and the men would have their ties off and shirts rolled up to the elbows under conditions such as these.

  Scott was a middle-aged man with thinning hair, which he appeared to be very conscious of. He had styled it into a neat comb over, but his attempts to keep it there were proving unsuccessful, as strands of it were fighting for freedom. She wanted to suggest a hair spray, or maybe just a barber to have the elongated strands cut off. As he led her into his office, she realised why he was feeling the heat so much. The corner office he worked out of had two large picture windows on two sides of it, with a desk directly in front of one of them. And despite the fitted vertical blinds on both, they didn’t prevent the glorious June sunshine and the heat that came with it from pouring in through the partly-opened slats. They would defeat anyone in this heat, herself included if she had to stay in the room for too long.

  ‘Please sit down,’ he said, sitting himself and indicating Fielding to take the chair in front of his desk.

  She wanted to scream take your jacket off, but it remained firmly on his back. Chances were it was stuck onto him like a piece of discarded chewing gum on the sole of a shoe.

  ‘I imagine this is about poor John Turnbull?’ he asked, clenching his chubby fingers together on the desk. ‘Dreadful news about his wife, dreadful. They’d only been married a short time too.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ Fielding confirmed. ‘Just how long had they been married?’

  ‘Oh, let me think,’ he began, leaning back in his chair, ‘it must be, what, seven, eight months now. No time at all, really.’

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ she agreed. ‘And what is John’s position in the firm exactly?’

  ‘John’s one of our best architects; he actually helped us win one of our finest awards last year.’

  ‘My sister is an interior designer, and I know that she does work with architects, but talk me through, if you could, what an average day for him would be.’

  ‘Ah! Does your sister work here in Manchester?’

  ‘No, she’s from the North East, although she does quite a bit of work around the country, London and the South in particular.’

  ‘I see, I see. What’s a typical day for John? Well, apart from drawing up designs and plans, he also goes out to sites to see how we can either develop or improve them. He works very closely with surveyors from both the council and private building companies.’

  ‘And would he have worked upon any buildings in the Northern Quarter?’

  Scott laughed. ‘I think every architectural practice in the city has! It’s been such a huge development, and good for the business as a whole. Yes, he will have been involved with a few, most certainly. I can get someone in to help with this, you know, get records and the like, if there’s something in particular you’re looking for?’

  ‘Yes, that might be a good idea.’

  Scott leaned forward again. ‘If you don’t mind, can you tell me why you’re asking about this? I thought that you’d perhaps just come to ask about John himself, not the work he’s doing.’

  ‘I’m just interested in one particular property on Portland Street, so if he’s had anything to do with that area, I’d be grateful for any information.’

  ‘Of course,’ he said, picking up his telephone and dialling what looked like a four-digit extension number, ‘I’ll get one of the admin assistants to come in to help out.’

  ***

  John Turnbull had been instrumental in developing most of the Portland Street offices and, much to Fielding’s delight, had also worked on the block Madam Ortiz’s business premises was situated.

  ‘This one here,’ Fielding said, pointing to the astrologer’s number on the schedule. ‘Do you hold any further information on it like, say, who moved into it and who handled the legal work? Or perhaps your firm is only involved with the design and doesn’t hold that kind of information?’

  Scott leaned in to take a look before picking up the receiver again and instructed the person on the other end to retrieve the required documentation.

  ‘Yes, we do hold that, simply as an extension of the work we do. If we didn’t, the company feels that it’s like leaving the job half-finished.’

  ‘I understand.’ Fielding was grateful; she hadn’t expected the company to be this efficient. But, as Scott said, you can’t leave a job half-done; it was something she wholeheartedly agreed with.

  When a further document arrived, she scrutinised it carefully, looking for any suggestion that John Turnbull had met or had had dealings with Madame Ortiz, either in person or on paper. As she now knew that Caroline Watkins
, Harry York and Norman Bishop had, to find out that John also had a connection would officially confirm his place on the list of suspects. And she did find it, clearly in black and white. John Turnbull had met with Madame Ortiz prior to her taking the tenancy to discuss the actual function of the business.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  On arriving back at the station, Fielding found that she had acquired another team member. Fielding had had the go-ahead for letting profiler Louise Simmons come on board, but Simmons wasn’t sure when she’d be arriving due to her busy work schedule. So, to now find her in the office already looking at the board was a great relief. Just what Fielding needed now, an expert profiler to take a good long look at this from a psychologist’s point of view. After giving the team instructions as to how to proceed next, she took Simmons into Burton’s office to discuss the case.

  ‘I hope you don’t mind that both DCI Ambleton and Phillipa have filled me in on this,’ Simmons said, sitting down and opening up her briefcase.

  ‘No, of course not, I’m glad they did. So, now that you’ve had a chance to look at it, what is your initial take on it all?’

  Simmons put a notebook on the desk and opened it. Fielding saw the first page filled with comments and asides.

  ‘Well, I have to confess it’s an odd one.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ Fielding laughed.

  ‘For one thing, there are far too many suspects.’

  ‘We now have that whittled down to three: John Turnbull, Caroline Watkins and Madame Ortiz.’

  ‘Even so,’ Simmons continued, ‘that’s still too many for my liking. And the victims, they are all oddly connected, aren’t they?’

  ‘So, what would someone’s motive be, from a psychological point of view; what would the killer get out of this?’