Ghostly Hitchhiker Box Set

by Rodney Strong

  Is that fact, or ghostly intuition?

  (Does it matter?)

  But Angus didn’t sound as confident as his protestations of innocence for George. There was so much about hitchhikers that Oliver didn’t know. He believed that George was innocent. The power of that had been enough to bring Angus back from a peaceful rest. What he wasn’t sure about was whether that same belief applied to the rest of the family. Louise didn’t strike him as a killer, although he would be the first to admit that he hadn’t thought that about the last murderer he’d come face-to-face with either. He hadn’t talked to Richard enough to get a feeling on him, other than that he didn’t particularly like Oliver poking around. Then there was Claire. Someone else he couldn’t recall seeing at the funeral.

  At that moment, so the universe could prove that he had no clue what he was talking about, Claire walked out of the hall. She took a deep breath and turned her face to the sun. She spotted him and gave a little wave.

  Up close, the strain on her face was painfully visible, even under the heavy make-up that she’d used to create a mask.

  ‘I’m allowed out for the service, then I have to go back.’ She laughed bitterly. ‘Listen to me, like I’m out of prison. Anyway sorry about yesterday. I told them to let you up, but they had other ideas.’ Her handbag was clenched tightly in white knuckles.

  How are you holding up would have been the natural thing for Oliver to ask, but also the most pointless. It looked like she was being held up by the thinnest of wires attached to the sky. One snip and she would collapse into an untidy heap on the ground.

  (Tell her it’s not her fault.)

  Of course it’s not her fault. Unless you suddenly think she murdered Ashley.

  (Not the lass. The drink. Tell her it’s not her fault.)

  Claire’s eyes exploded into saucers when Oliver relayed the message.

  ‘That’s not what my father says,’ she said in a miserable voice.

  (Aye, that’s not what my son said to me either. But they’re both wrong. Tell her that the alcohol isn’t something that she did, it’s something that’s happening to her.)

  Tears began to track down her cheeks when Oliver repeated the words, then Claire threw her arms around him and squeezed so hard he thought he heard a rib pop.

  When she finally let go, he took a deep breath and subtly stretched his back out to search for damage, but apart from a slight twinge, all bones and organs seemed to be in working order.

  ‘Thank you,’ Claire said.

  She rushed away, tears streaming down her face, almost knocking George over as he came out the hall door.

  ‘What did you do to my sister?’ George asked. His tone was idle curiosity, rather than accusation.

  ‘Nothing. She’s upset about the funeral.’

  ‘We all are, mate.’ George’s eyes were red to indicate he’d also shed a tear or two. ‘Have you found out who killed her?’

  Oliver shook his head.

  ‘Don’t worry about it, then.’

  ‘You don’t want to know why she died?’

  George looked at his feet, then fixed his gaze on the wooden planks on the side of the hall. ‘What difference will it make? She’s still dead.’

  Got any words for him?

  (Tell him it makes all the difference to some people.)

  ‘Yes, she is, and knowing who and why it happened won’t change that, but it might help with your healing.’

  George shrugged and continued to be fascinated by the cream paint peeling off the weatherboards.

  ‘Do you know Alex?’ Oliver asked.

  That drew the boy’s attention.

  ‘That idiot. Yeah, he had a thing for Ashley. Why?’

  Oliver’s turn to shrug. ‘No reason, he doesn’t seem to like you very much.’

  George laughed, then clamped his mouth shut guiltily at the happy sound.

  ‘Like I said, he had a thing for Ashley, only I got there first. He never forgave me. I think he was a bit of a stalker to be honest. Always finding excuses to hang around her. It was annoying. We were looking for a new place to live because of him.’

  ‘Did you tell the police? If he was becoming a problem they could have trespassed him.’

  ‘Wouldn’t have done any good. He never came onto our property. Didn’t need to did he? His uncle lives next door.’

  ‘Wait. His uncle is Sean?’

  ‘Yeah. He used to visit,’ George wiggled his fingers in the air like rabbit ears. ‘And we didn’t want to say too much. Didn’t want to annoy the landlord.’

  ‘Hang on,’ Oliver said, struggling to keep up. ‘Are you saying Sean is your landlord?’

  ‘Yeah, I thought you knew that. You went to see him. What difference does it make?’

  Oliver restrained himself from grabbing the boy and shaking sense into him.

  (Aye, what difference does it make?)

  Landlords have keys. We just found out how the murderer got in.

  TWENTY FOUR

  Oliver was halfway to his car before he started having second thoughts about rushing over to the house and accusing Sean of conspiring to murder Ashley Trent.

  By the time he climbed into the driver’s seat he had changed his mind entirely. He needed to think through the implications of what he’d learned. More importantly he needed to talk it over with the one person he knew would find the logical side of it all.

  (Aye, that Amanda lassie.)

  Oliver dialled, and a ringing sound came through the car speakers.

  ‘Hey honey,’ Jennifer said. ‘How was the funeral?’

  ‘As you’d expect,’ he replied. ‘Lots of grieving people.’

  ‘I trust you didn’t say anything to add to their grief?’

  ‘Your faith in me is comforting.’

  Her laughter echoed briefly through the car.

  ‘I may have made one girl cry,’ he reluctantly admitted.

  Her laughter returned with a vengeance and he waited until it died away before filling her in.

  ‘So what are you going to do next?’ Jennifer asked.

  He stared at the world outside the car window and tapped his fingers on the glass. Busy people raced past with their noses in their phones and their mouths full of sushi or burger or sausage roll.

  ‘I was hoping you’d tell me.’

  ‘You mean, you know what you should do but you don’t want to do it?’

  ‘I mean I’m tired and can’t think of the best way to accuse a giant man, who could probably eat me and use my spine as a tooth pick, of helping his nephew murder someone.’

  ‘Well, just as a suggestion, don’t lead with that.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He started the car but left it in neutral, still unclear about where to go.

  On the opposite side of the street, he saw a woman dressed in a business suit push the button at the crossing. Impatiently she pulled out her hair tie, then retied her long hair into a ponytail. It gave him an idea.

  ‘Got to go, you’ve been a big help, see you tonight,’ he told his wife.

  He switched off the engine again, then called Amanda.

  ‘Can’t keep away from me,’ she said upon answering.

  Eighteen months ago that semi flirty response would have made Oliver extremely uncomfortable, but he was used to her now and knew she was winding him up.

  ‘What can I say, I can’t live without you.’

  ‘What’s up?’

  He filled her in on the revelation about Alex and his uncle. Then he plunged on with his idea.

  ‘Nice plan, Oliver. Devious. I must be a good influence on you. Okay, I’ll let you know how it goes.’ She clicked off.

  Now what?

  Oliver looked at the car clock. ‘Now I need to get something to eat, then go do some writing before picking the kids up from school.’

  (Didn’t ye just launch a book? What are ye writing now?)

  He restarted the car and joined the slow crawl through the city. ‘It takes a while to write a book and get it
published. I don’t get a holiday. Well, actually I can’t work when the kids are off school, or during their holidays, so I guess I do get a holiday sort of. But that’s why I need to write as much as possible when they’re not around. There’s nothing more I can do for the case at the moment. I need to think about something else.’

  There was a grunting sound, then Angus began singing. Or strangling a ghost cat.

  ‘What was that?’

  (‘That lucky old sun’ by Frankie Laine. If you’re writing, I’m going to be bored, and when I’m bored I like to sing.)

  ‘Is that what you call it?’ Oliver muttered.

  Angus’s response was to sing louder. Oliver turned the radio up. Angus’s voice reached new off-key heights. Oliver tried the radio again, before finally switching it off in disgust. It was too difficult to drown out a voice when it’s in your head.

  ‘Okay, so what do you want to do for the rest of the day? Bearing in mind I still need to pick Reed and Rose up from school.’

  (I’ll tell ye, but ye mustn’t laugh.)

  ‘I promise.’ They reached the tunnel leading to the motorway and accelerated as the traffic stretched out.

  Angus told him and Oliver didn’t laugh. He was too surprised. After a quick stop at the supermarket, Oliver pulled into the driveway and carried the shopping into the kitchen.

  ‘We’ve got ninety minutes until I have to get the kids. What would you like to bake?’

  Angus’s revelation was that he enjoyed baking, a picture that did not go along with everything Oliver had learnt about the man.

  (My favourite thing to make was a silver cake.)

  ‘What’s a silver cake?’

  (Listen carefully and don’t mess it up.)

  Seventy minutes and sixty Scottish swear words later, Oliver admired the perfectly iced round cake. ‘So you were a baker.’

  (Did you not think to ask me what I did for a job? I owned the best bakery in Johnsonville for fifteen years.)

  Oliver scooped a finger load of icing from the bowl and savoured the smooth chocolate hit on his tongue.

  ‘Let me get this straight. You were a professional baker, and yet you said nothing the whole time I was making a hash of Rose’s unicorn cake?’

  (It was fun to watch. Besides, I’d never done a unicorn.)

  Oliver repeated one of Angus’s words back to him. Far from being insulted, the man almost sounded impressed in his response.

  ‘Just for that I’m going to let the children eat your cake.’

  (And what sort of threat is that? What else would ye do with it?)

  ‘You wait,’ Oliver said with an evil grin. ‘Hang on, so you were a baker?’

  (That’s what I said.)

  ‘It’s just the way you’ve talked about bashing people I figured you for a more violent profession.’

  (Well if it’s the truth you want. I never hit anyone in my life.)

  Amanda picked that time to call.

  ‘We’ll talk about this later.’ Oliver left the phone on the bench and answered on speaker.

  ‘The man does nice work. I might have to get my wigs from him in future. He doesn’t have a very high opinion of his nephew though. I believe that idiot musician were the exact words he used. He did say Alex started hanging around a lot more at his place, until about a week before the murder. Want to guess why he stopped?’

  ‘So you can tell me I’m wrong? Tell me.’

  ‘Have more faith in your abilities, Oliver.’

  ‘Because he got caught stealing a key from his uncle?’

  ‘You’re wrong.’

  (You must have seen that bus coming straight at ye.)

  ‘But it was Ashley-related. Sean caught his nephew spying on her. Like full on, hiding-in-the-bathroom-with-binoculars-peering-through-the-window-at-Ashley-in-her-underwear spying.’

  ‘That’s disgusting,’ Oliver said.

  ‘That’s a motive,’ Amanda replied.

  ‘Even though his surname isn’t Darcy?’ Oliver couldn’t resist.

  ‘I didn’t say Alex did it. I said he had a motive. He was obviously obsessed with her, on a sick level. You don’t have to have watched thirteen seasons of Criminal Minds to know that never ends well for the girl.’

  ‘No arguments from me. Although…’ Oliver trailed off as he thought it through. ‘Something’s not adding up. If he was going to kill her, why was he trying to break her and George up. He was obsessed with Ashley, so he thinks, maybe if I break them up I’ll have a chance. He sets George up in the bar, then swoops in and comforts Ashley in her time of need. I get that. But if he was going to kill her, why bother?’

  ‘I guess that’s one of the many things we’ll have to ask him tonight.’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Alex and his band are playing a gig at the Green Man, and we’re going to ambush him afterwards.’

  Oliver saw his early night evaporating before his eyes. ‘What time?’

  ‘They’re on at ten.’

  ‘P-M?’ he asked in a vain hope that she would say otherwise.

  ‘P-M, Oliver. It’s a real time. Meet you outside five minutes before. And Oliver? Bring ear plugs. Word is they cover up not being very good by being very loud.’

  Amanda disconnected the call.

  (Good, I’m tired of ye wasting time at night sitting around doing nothing.)

  ‘That’s what night time is for. It’s specifically designed for parents to sit around and do nothing.’

  (Not when we could be out there clearing my great, great grandson.)

  ‘You wait,’ Oliver muttered.

  (Wait for what?)

  An hour later he had picked the children up from school and was watching with a satisfied smile as they demolished the perfect silver cake, using fingers, forks, and once Reed shoved his face directly into the plate. Oliver would normally have pulled his son up on that behaviour, but the gasping dismay in his head was satisfying enough for Oliver to let Reed get away with it this one time. When the kids were finished, the plate was a sticky pile of crumbs and icing.

  Oliver had half hoped that Jennifer would tell him not to go out that late. No such luck. Because it was after the children’s bedtime, and there was no direct impact on her evening, she told him to have a good time.

  ‘I’m going to the pub with another woman,’ he argued.

  ‘To talk to a potential murderer.’

  ‘Right, exactly. So you’re saying I shouldn’t go. I’ll call Amanda.’

  ‘I’m sure she can protect you from any dangerous situations,’ Jennifer laughed.

  Without admitting that the real reason he didn’t want to go had nothing to do with danger and everything to do with feeling old, Oliver found himself standing on a street corner shortly before 10pm. It was dark and cold and all he wanted to do was get back into his warm car. A dull thudding came from inside the bar. Every now and then the door would open and a blast of warm air and strangled electronic noise would escape as red faced laughing people emerged.

  ‘Are you ready for this?’ said a voice behind him.

  Oliver turned to see she was dressed as Tracey, her hair in a ponytail, jeans with designer holes in the knees, and a warm, yet what he presumed to be trendy, black jacket.

  ‘Are you ready for this?’ he countered.

  She grinned and opened her hand to reveal two small blue ear plugs. Oliver stared blankly at them, realising his own were on the kitchen counter at home.

  (How bad can it be?)

  Remember the songs on the radio you hated? These will be worse.

  But it wasn’t. It definitely wasn’t Oliver’s type of music, and he was at least fifteen years older than the majority of people in the bar, but the band was pretty good. At least to start with.

  By the fifth song Oliver realised that they were basically singing the same lyrics over and over, just in a different order. He glanced at Amanda to see what she thought, but she was happily moving her head up and down in time with the music, while occasionall
y sipping her white wine. He caught a brief flash of blue in her ear and concluded that it was easy to be happy when you could barely hear the music.

  Angus hated it.

  Thankfully, between the music and the buzz of conversation, Oliver couldn’t really hear him.

  Alex played lead guitar in the four-piece band and shared the vocals with a woman playing the bass guitar. After a while Oliver managed to tune the music out enough to focus on the band members. Alex obviously subscribed to the train of thought that went: if you can’t sing very well then don’t sing very well at the top of your voice. Sweat poured from his smooth head down his face and on to his lips, where it was launched towards the front row with every grunted vowel. Oliver wondered if the first few rows had been warned that they were standing in the splash zone.

  What proved more interesting was the way the bassist kept looking at Alex, especially on the slower songs. Although slower was a relative term. He didn’t know whether she was intending to be so blatant, but every time they sang the word “love”, which seemed to be a lot, she would give him a look that backed up the word. Alex never turned her way once. There was something familiar about her, although he was sure they’d never met. If only he could think properly. It was too loud.

  (Unrequited love!)

  Another possible suspect. If she has feelings for him but he was hung up on Ashley, then she has a motive to get Ashley out of the way.

  (Seems a stretch.)

  Well, we’re here to talk to Alex anyway, we might as well talk to her.

  Fifteen minutes later the band announced they were taking a break. Alex picked up a towel from the top of a speaker and mopped his face before heading towards the bar. The woman bass player fell into step next to him, speaking animatedly as they approached where Amanda and Oliver were waiting. Without the music, sound levels fell to bearable, although the ringing in his ears made it difficult to hear properly. Oliver noticed his companion had removed her ear plugs.

  ‘Nice set, guys,’ Amanda said. ‘Can I buy you a drink?’

  Alex stared, as if trying to figure out how he knew her. The bassist had an openly hostile look on her face.

  Alex’s eyes shifted to Oliver and he adopted a similar expression to the woman.