Last to Leave: A Superintendent Mike Yeadings Mystery (Superintendent Mike Yeadings Mysteries)

by Clare Curzon

  Miranda let the cabbie take the case from her hand and tried to step in, clumsily entangled with the rug. It was snatched from her. She took the seat in the far corner of the rear. The car had eight panes of glass for its windows, including the windscreen. There had been ten clouds in the sky when she woke up this morning. Now there were thirty-three smaller ones. That was good. She didn’t know why, but it made her feel better. Clouds you could have a game with, because they were always changing. Too many other things stayed, fearfully, the same.

  Not Jessica, though. Like the sky, every time she saw her cousin, Jessica was different. She came and went, like a wild dog that had never had a lead on. The policeman with the puppet face had asked last night when she’d last seen Jessica, and she’d said Friday, downstairs after dinner, just like everyone else. She’d remembered, because then Jessica had been going out to the terrace wearing a necklace with fifteen shiny green stones hung from a fine gold chain.

  Something she hadn’t mentioned was seeing the white oblong of the letter being drawn from under Jess’s door much later. That was because she hadn’t seen the hand that took it in, though she had seen Flo, who worked in the kitchen, when she came back to deliver the letter. The policeman hadn’t asked about her.

  Miranda had been sitting on a library windowsill, (forty-eight small panes in a six by eight arrangement over its two sashes), and wondering at all the empty spaces on the shelves. Only one hundred and twenty-two books left. She wondered what had happened to the rest.

  When Flo came indoors she’d silently followed her up the sixteen uncarpeted steps of the backstairs and watched as she pushed the paper under Jessica’s door. Flo hadn’t seen her standing back in the shadows. When Flo had gone she’d waited there five hundred and thirteen seconds until the note had been pulled fully in. But she hadn’t seen Jessica do it. Then she’d felt tired and gone to bed.

  Well, the questioning was past and over now, she consoled herself, as the taxi gathered speed over the short trip to the old house. (In passing she counted seventeen cows in Harper’s field; then two police vans in their old driveway; a white plastic tent with five men in white overalls still examining the pit they’d dug where the kitchen used to be.)

  She stepped down and waited while her mother paid off the cab. (Five pound coins and three fifty-pence pieces. No change.) It drove off, the suitcase and rug having been transferred into the ancient Daimler. Claudia backed it out of the stables. A white-overalled man came across to speak to her and didn’t seem pleased at what she told him. Then, seated behind her parents, Miranda was in the soot-smudged Daimler on their way to Cooden Beach, Sussex. To the holiday bungalow, which Mother said was all the home they had now.

  The Daimler had just left the M40 at the M25 junction when a patrol car came up behind, flashing its lights. ‘I was doing sixty-five in the centre lane,’ Claudia dictated grimly to Carlton as she pulled onto the hard shoulder. ‘I want you to stand witness to that.’

  The police car pulled in ahead and a plain-clothes man got out, approaching with his warrant card extended. He wasn’t one they’d met already. ‘DC Silver,’ he introduced himself cheerfully. ‘I’m afraid you failed to inform my inspector that you were moving out of the Thames Valley area.’

  ‘I have just informed one of your men who was examining the old house,’ Claudia said icily. ‘And obviously he has passed that fact on to you. Will you now kindly let us continue our journey.’

  ‘When you have satisfactorily answered a few more questions, madam. May I know the address you’re making for?’

  Claudia opened her mouth to put him in his place. ‘Oh, tell him and have done with it,’ Carlton muttered, foreseeing complications.

  Claudia frigidly dictated the address. ‘It is a holiday bungalow.’

  ‘And how long are you intending to stay there?’

  ‘Really, young man, I don’t see that …’

  ‘Indefinitely, I imagine,’ said Carlton. ‘We have nowhere else to go at present. Fortunately we left a few of our possessions there last autumn.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. In that case we shall be in touch with the Sussex police force, and if there are further questions we need to ask, you may expect a visit from them.’

  ‘Is that really necessary?’

  ‘This is a major crime, sir. An unidentified body was found in your house. We need to find out who else might have been present overnight, apart from your family as listed.’

  ‘How on earth would we know?’ Claudia interrupted impatiently. ‘Obviously somebody broke in, a stranger, and set fire to the place.’

  ‘I understand you employed a catering firm that evening, who left in their van at ten-fifteen. All are accounted for. Was there anyone else, a domestic help of any kind …?’

  ‘Florence from the village, she stayed on to clear up. I was paying her overtime. She came for her money at about ten to eleven.’

  ‘And left straight after?’

  ‘I assume so. She had her hat on and a bag with some leftover food.’

  ‘Right. I shall need her full name and address, madam.’

  ‘Florence Carden. She lives in one of the old almshouses down Church Lane. Either the third or fourth. That’s all I can tell you.’

  ‘The third,’ Miranda muttered.

  DC Silver peered into the dim rear of the old car. ‘Ah, miss. Anything you can add?’

  His face loomed palely through the glass like a white-bellied fish in an aquarium and startled her into speech.

  ‘She came back. Not right then. Much later, after midnight.’

  Everyone was staring. She closed her eyes and waited for the fury to burst on her, but the detective got there first. ‘You saw her? Where did she go?’

  ‘She’s imagining it,’ Claudia rapped out. ‘She doesn’t know what she’s saying, constable.’

  ‘Where, Miranda?’ Carlton quavered.

  ‘To the attics. She had a note for Jessica. She pushed it under her door.’

  ‘And then?’ Silver pursued.

  ‘She went away. And I went to bed.’

  Everyone relaxed a little. ‘That would account for the girl leaving,’ Claudia said sharply. ‘An assignation with some lover, no doubt. And she hadn’t the common courtesy to leave a note to explain she was going.’

  ‘How do you know she didn’t?’ Silver asked pertly, glad to put one over on the old trout. ‘In a blaze like that, what chance had a piece of paper?’

  He’d have delayed them further if he could think what else to fish for. As it was, he’d have a small tiddler to take back to the Salmon. But first he’d have a word with this Flo, who just might have observed something of interest about this stuck-up family. He hoped to find more commonsense in the kitchen department.

  The extended Regional Crimes team had taken over the canteen for the morning’s briefing, sitting around on tables, chairs and service counter. DI Salmon planted himself opposite the mobile whiteboard which had been rolled in from the Incident Room. ‘Settle down,’ he growled and the conversation died.

  His grotesque grin panned the watching faces. ‘It’s like Christmas,’ he told them, ‘the way crimes are being crammed into our stocking. First, we have suspected arson and the insurance adjusters sniffing round for reasons not to pay up. Second, overnight we discover an extra person gained access to the property, either by stealth or invitation. And thirdly this unidentified person is found burnt to a crisp. Fourthly, a young woman guest, Jessica Dellar, has gone unaccountably missing from the house. Fifthly, it appears she was a bit of a water gypsy. Her narrowboat on the canal near Denham has been broken into in her absence. A neighbouring boat-dweller quotes this as happening during the evening of Friday when she was with the Dellar family at the house that was torched, and the neighbour had gone to see a film in Slough. He discovered the padlock broken and the boat’s contents disturbed when he went the following morning to – as he claims – “water her plants”.

  ‘Sixth, the young woman’s brother, havi
ng escaped the fire and at present in a coma at High Wycombe hospital, has injuries consistent with being viciously attacked. While still conscious but confused, he claimed he had damaged himself blundering through a wood.

  ‘The bruises have now had time to develop and some are quite specific. Photographs are available in the Incident Room.’ Salmon grinned fiendishly, his grating voice laying on the heavy sarcasm. ‘As we all know, trees don’t wear boots, so it’s clear he was well and truly done over. Among other recognizable marks, his ribs were kicked in. His coma arose from a blood clot on the brain.

  ‘Some of you’ve had time to familiarize yourselves with the family in question. And the question gets more complicated as time goes on. It appears that the elderly householder, Carlton Dellar, his wife and adult daughter have removed themselves outside our authority. All further questioning must be by arrangement with the Sussex force. In view of the arson, as yet unofficially confirmed by the Senior Fire Officer, I want every detail of these people’s financial affairs sifted. DC James, take a uniform officer and see what bank details you can get locally. Two estate agents have given the opinion that the property was in very poor shape and worth less than the valuable ground it stood on. Total destruction while so many were present in the house could have been an attempt to blur the issue and spread the blame.

  ‘The family has dispersed. From today Sir Matthew Dellar can be contacted at his daughter’s home in Ascot. In view of his legal background we are already checking on death threats made to him when he was a Prosecuting Counsel, and more recently a Queen’s Bencher. His daughter, her husband and stepson also live at the same address. His son, a city journalist with the Independent has returned to London and will be in touch with us daily.

  ‘The unidentified body may, I’m told, still yield DNA, so let’s hope for a match already on our books – er, computer. There’s an assumption that the body is male and fell through to the cellar with the collapse of the kitchen floor. Damage to bones in the throat indicate that he was strangled, and confirm the case is one of murder.

  ‘Your incident room manager is Sergeant Harry Thomas. Let him have your individual reports within half an hour of return to base. You will continue in the teams already drawn up, and tasking will be arranged by your team leader. The fingertip search of the grounds at Larchmoor Place will resume immediately after this briefing. A mobile canteen will be laid on at midday. Any absence requests will be dealt with by myself. So think twice before you bother me. Any questions?’

  A hand went up from a rear table. ‘The missing girl. What were her relations with the others?’

  Salmon scowled. ‘She was family. Carlton Dellar’s niece.’

  ‘Yeah, but I mean could she have duffed up her brother and then run off? Family doesn’t mean they all got on well together, and these two were twins. Maybe too close for comfort.’

  Salmon grunted. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Callow, sir. Community PC.’

  Salmon ignored the titters. ‘Well, Callow, you can look into that yourself and give me the answer by four o’clock. Anyone else?’

  No one ventured further, and the briefing broke up. From his seat in the rear, Superintendent Yeadings folded his notes, rose stiffly to his feet and nodded across the room to Z. She would find him in his office.

  He had barely gone three steps when DC Silver burst in from outdoors, red-faced and out of breath. ‘Sir,’ he said desperately, to cover both Yeadings and Salmon. ‘Sorry I’m late. I’ve been chasing something up.’

  ‘And?’ Yeadings enquired. Salmon glowered.

  ‘Carlton Dellar’s daughter Miranda saw a note delivered to Jessica Dellar’s room late on Friday night. It was Florence Carden, the kitchen help, who brought it, so I went and questioned her at her home. A nice old girl about sixty, she said it was from a young man, her sweetheart, who was waiting in the garden to speak to her. That is …’

  ‘Jessica’s sweetheart, not the kitchen help’s,’ Yeadings suggested helpfully.

  ‘Yessir. And she’s coming in later today to make a statement.’

  ‘What was in the note?’ Salmon demanded.

  Silver looked embarrassed. ‘She didn’t read it, sir. She said she respected their privacy.’

  ‘And you believed her?’ The DI was incandescent. Only his superior’s presence, mildly looking on, prevented his taking the naive young DC apart. ‘I’ll see her myself,’ he threatened. ‘Get out there and bring her in right away.’

  Yeadings nodded. The DI was going for the only available information on activities late on the fatal night, but he doubted his bull-in-a-china-shop approach would draw out an elderly countrywoman trained to domestic service. Either she’d be intimidated into silence or she’d resist him out of stolid independence. It seemed a good moment to step in.

  ‘If you’ve a free moment,’ he suggested, ‘I could offer you a decent coffee upstairs.’

  Salmon hesitated, suspicious but flattered by the invitation. ‘Right, sir.’

  ‘Ah, Z,’ Yeadings called across the emptying room. ‘You busy at present?’

  ‘Not immediately, sir.’ It was quite evident Salmon hadn’ t found a niche for his female detective-sergeant.

  ‘Good. Just pop up to my office and get the percolator going, will you?’ With his back to the DI he closed one eye and signalled with his furry caterpillar eyebrows. She caught on to the ‘woman’s work’ irony and smiled back. ‘My pleasure, sir.’

  Yeadings waved Salmon ahead. Now he’d be under control when this Florence Carden arrived for her grilling, and Z could be dismissed in advance with instructions to head her off. She would treat the woman with tact. Meanwhile, if the DI accepted him as equally the male chauvinist, too bad. He’d sort that out later, with interest.

  As Z stood aside for Salmon to leave, Yeadings noticed the knot of uniform men who were waiting to ambush him ahead. They closed round the DI with requests to be taken on the CID team.

  Quietly Yeadings explained his requirements to Zyczynski. He made no apology for relegating her to parlourmaid duties. She was happy to turn her hand to anything, quick to pick up that he was being devious. He then took a turn round the building, examined his front teeth in the men’s room, calculated that enough time had passed and sauntered upstairs.

  In his office the aroma of freshly brewed Mocha welcomed him. Salmon was already seated, with his chunky backside overlapping the straight-backed chair, and facing the paper-strewn desk. On which nothing of importance was left open to prying eyes, Yeadings reminded himself happily He seated himself and pushed the piles of irrelevant reports away with the sigh of a suffering bureaucrat.

  Z poured two cups of dark brew and set them before the men. ‘Is that it, sir?’ she asked. She almost stood to attention.

  ‘Thank you, Rosemary,’ Yeadings said graciously. Salmon’s small eyes flickered at his use of her first name.

  ‘Got any milk?’ he demanded curtly.

  ‘Only Long-life.’ Her tone was dismissive.

  ‘That’ll do.’ He let her attend to him then nodded her away. She went out, quietly closing the door.

  Yeadings relaxed behind his desk. ‘Good briefing,’ he approved. ‘You covered almost everything.’

  ‘Almost?’ Salmon snapped alert, on the defensive.

  ‘Which is all we can ever be sure of,’ Yeadings sighed. He sounded weary, worldly-wise, almost defeated. It seemed to satisfy the other man.

  Maybe I’m laying it on too thick, Yeadings warned himself. Mustn’t let him lose total confidence in me. Just enough to give him his head, let him paint himself into a corner and then demand a way out.

  It wasn’t as though Salmon was a permanent fixture. Give it a month or two and Angus would be back. Heaven and earth would be moved before then to ensure Mott was promoted but not moved away. He’d be wasted in any other posting than Major Crimes.

  ‘So what hasn’t been covered?’ Salmon challenged.

  ‘Ah, yes.’ Yeadings sat, apparently sunk in
thought. What the hell was there? Then something resurfaced. It had troubled him in bed last night. ‘Mrs Kate Dellar,’ he reminded the DI. ‘You’ve read her statement together with all the others’ who escaped the burning building.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Something a bit odd. She was late waking, had taken a sleeping tablet. Her cousin Robert Dellar warned her off the back staircase because the kitchen was ablaze. And just then flames shot up the front stairwell, so that too was out. She ran to the library, hoping she could get out on to the front portico and attract someone’s attention.’

  Salmon grunted to indicate he was on the ball. ‘Followed by Robert Dellar. She escaped down a ladder. He twisted an ankle or something and was given a fireman’s lift.’

  ‘Yes, but the window,’ Yeadings pointed out. ‘She said it was already open. In the early hours. Why was that?’

  ‘Someone had already gone out that way.’

  ‘But nobody was waiting marooned on top of the portico. I want you to check on all the others’ statements. Ring them if necessary. Who, if anybody, got out that way? If a ladder had been used why wasn’t it left there?’

  Salmon treated him to an ox-like stare. ‘Somebody opened it but chickened out at the height. The front stairs were still usable then. He preferred that to a jump.’

  Yeadings nodded. ‘Possible. But it doesn’t appear in anybody’s account of what happened. I want you personally to go over every report and check. We could find that that window was used for entry rather than exit. That could be the way a cat burglar got in. We do have a spare body to account for.

  ‘Find a recent photograph of the house front, and see if there was wisteria or strong creeper growing up the pillars or wall. Alternatively, the fire may not have burnt out the roots if it was well established. Send a DC out there to look; someone who’s clued up on gardening.’

  Salmon’s stare held a mixture of consideration and scepticism. Just the right combination, Yeadings thought, to get him moving. But moving only as far as his own office telephone: conveniently out of the way when Florence Carden turned up.