Death of an Innocent (Richard and Amelia Patton)

by Roger Ormerod

  ‘It is.’ I tinged the bell, with no result. ‘Nancy wouldn’t have had to prove anything.’

  ‘But we don’t know what she looked like. If she looked like — well, a female Mark, then Olivia would’ve just assumed she was Mark’s sister, and probably sent her packing, whatever Nancy said.’

  I stared at her. She said: ‘You didn’t leave the room key, if that’s what you’re after. It’s in your pocket.’

  My mind was jumping about. We didn’t know what Nancy looked like! How many other people hadn’t known that?

  ‘Yes, here it is. There’s something in our cubby-hole, though.’

  ‘Then go round and get it.’

  I did that. It was a manila envelope, unsealed. Written on the outside was: ‘Mr & Mrs Patton.’ I recalled that Larry had said he’d left us a photo. I returned to her side and slid out the contents.

  We were looking at a 6x4 colour print of a young woman seated in the stern of a sailing dinghy. It was heeling, in the wind, and she had flung herself back against the angle, the wind streaming her hair in the sunlight, laughing with white, perfect teeth, her eyes dancing, and with all the joy of living shining from every line and every element of her existence. It was a perfect photograph for a magazine. This must surely have been Larry’s finest achievement.

  Amelia had been holding her breath. She released it on a sigh.

  ‘Richard...it’s her. To the life. Olivia as she was, twenty years ago, with her whole life before her, and every bit exciting. Oh...Nancy, Nancy...’

  ‘There’s your answer,’ I said quietly.

  We went up to our room. I threw our empty suitcases on to the bed.

  ‘You’re determined on leaving, then?’ she asked quietly.

  ‘Call it running away, if you like. Will you start the packing, while I go and dig the manager out and settle our account?’

  ‘Running away from what? It’s not like you, Richard.’

  I sat down on the edge of the bed and ran my fingers through my hair. ‘Amelia...my dear...it’s not as though I’m still in the police. In that case I’d have to carry it through. I’d have to get statements and make a charge. And I’d have a backing of legal experts I could send it all to, in a great thick file, and they would say if there was a case they could put before a court. I was just a cog in the machine. The rest was the law and the judge and the jury. But what have we got now? We’ve talked to people, and we’ve put two and two together, and that could make four or twenty-two. But we know Mark killed Nancy. So what can we do about it? There’s absolutely nothing but conjecture, nothing we can hold up and say: because of this, no one else could’ve done it, and because of that, only Mark could’ve done it.’

  ‘Let Melanie have it all.’

  ‘Have what? My statement? Your statement? They’d mean nothing. Would Larry or Mark, or Philip or Olivia repeat to the police what they’ve told us? No. They would’ve had time to think about it. The only thing physical I can produce is the photographs. And Melanie’s already indicated they mean nothing. Even what they mean to us we’ve differed about. And you’ve got to agree, the photos mean nothing tight, not definite, not positive.’

  She was staring at me with a frown, searching my face. ‘But we can’t just go,’ she protested. ‘There’s this terrible thing hanging over Olivia. We can’t leave without an explanation. I’m her friend, Richard. You can’t get round that. I ought to stand by that. I want to be with her. She couldn’t stand the truth, not alone, and Philip would be useless. We’ve got to stay, Richard. Oh yes, I know I said I wanted to leave. I can change my mind, can’t I!’ And she attempted a weak little smile.

  I could barely force myself to look into her eyes, afraid of what my own would reveal. Every element of my dormant police officer’s instinct demanded that I should go on. I’d spoken of the lack of proof. Very well then. That only meant I had to search until I had it. Otherwise Mark would go free. She offered me the chance to do this, but I couldn’t hurt her by accepting.

  ‘And what explanation would you like me to give Olivia?’ I asked. ‘Would you care to stand by her, supporting her, while I tell her that the young man she thought was her son was in fact not, and that she’d made a complete fool of herself? She’d need your support then, sure enough. And I’d have to go on and explain how Nancy became a threat to the relationship between herself and Mark, so that he had to kill her. Oh yes, she’d need your support. And I’d have to tell Olivia exactly why Nancy was a threat, because Nancy was her daughter, her real child. By heaven, you’d have your work cut out for you by then, my love. And to prove it, I’d have to produce the picture of Nancy alive. Very much alive. Damn it all, it’d break her up completely.’

  ‘Oh dear Lord — it wouldn’t come to that!’

  ‘It’s how it would be. And all through this I’d be her attacker, you the defender. That’s how it would seem to her. Would you want that? Huh?’

  She looked away, drawing in her lower lip. Then she turned back.

  ‘You’re stopping me from going to her...’

  I shook my head. ‘No. I’m stopping myself from going to her. Our hands are tied.’

  ‘So we simply go away and let Mark get away with it!’

  I sighed. ‘What do I do? Go and beat it out of him? Force him into putting it in writing? If anything I did resulted in his arrest, it couldn’t help but add suffering to what’s already happened. How could Olivia be kept out of it? Ask yourself.’

  She looked round the room miserably. ‘But he should pay for it. He should!’

  ‘Judge, jury, prosecutor. And hangman, too? That’s me.’

  ‘You exaggerate everything out of all proportion, Richard.’ ‘I’m trying to be realistic.’

  Trying, too, to speak in a calm and reasonable voice, when inside I was raging to do all that Amelia asked: to see that Mark paid for it. But at what cost? I had to keep asking myself that. At what cost, too, to us?

  She was looking at me as though I was a stranger. ‘Of course, you’re right. I can see that. Only...oh, very well, I’ll start the packing. You go and settle things. Everything’s sure to look worse in the morning.’

  I left her to her tears of frustration, which I saw were close. The bar was closed, so I found the manager in the lobby. He clearly thought it was a strange time to leave, but we settled matters, and I told him I’d leave a letter on the desk when we left, along with our key.

  When I got back to our room Amelia had recovered her composure, and said she would share the driving. It was something she’d be able to put her mind to. I didn’t argue. Take it as it came. It was going to be an exhausting journey, certainly. Then I sat down and wrote a note to Tony.

  Tony,

  Amelia and I have come to a point where I’m convinced there’s nothing more to be gained. All I can see is distress and unhappiness. Please feel free to reveal anything of our conversations to Melanie. I’ll leave it to your discretion. If she comes to the same conclusion as I have, I’m sure she still wouldn’t be able to make an arrest, certainly not a valid case.

  Best wishes to yourself and to Melanie, and love from Amelia.

  Richard

  I sealed this in one of the hotel’s envelopes, addressed it to Mr Tony Brason, left envelope and keys on the desk on the way out, and we loaded luggage and ourselves into the car.

  Then I drove away from it.

  14

  Christmas came, and slid past almost unnoticed. Mary had gone to stay with her sister for a week, so we were quiet, Amelia and I and our Boxer, Sheba. We had not gone visiting, and it had seemed too much effort to send out invitations. We had nothing to celebrate; the Norfolk affair still hung heavily between us.

  Every morning I had expected some sort of communication from Olivia, who must surely have been wondering about our sudden disappearance, but there was nothing, not even a Christmas card, though we had dutifully sent one, after much careful consideration. This consideration was the only time our conversation even touched on the events
in November. At other times we spoke together casually on day-to-day matters, and behind it all was the haunting knowledge of failure. Or perhaps even worse. The matter had not been resolved. We were tense, waiting. We couldn’t have said for what.

  I had an uneasy feeling that Amelia was searching her mind for some obscure way in which she could have helped her friends. Beneath her composure I could detect that there was a certain coldness towards me. I had not handled the matter conclusively; I had not tried hard enough.

  January came in, damp and dreary. The river was running high, and when I took Sheba for her run along its bank, I reckoned we needed only another foot of rise in the water level, and we’d not be able to take our walks. These were becoming precious to me as I could allow my thoughts full rein, without Amelia observing, and deducing the subject of them.

  On the third of January Mary came back, full of news and chatter to which we tried to respond cheerfully. But she soon detected the atmosphere, and became more silent. I guessed she thought we’d had a disagreement. I couldn’t explain that it was an agreement that was troubling us.

  On the following day the spell, as I was now beginning to think of it, was broken. At ten in the morning, when I returned from Sheba’s walk, the water having gone down, I found that Tony had come to visit us.

  Amelia said ‘Here’s Tony.’ She meant, here’s Tony with trouble.

  ‘Just timed it right for a pot of tea,’ I said, trying to sound welcoming.

  Tony smiled awkwardly. ‘If you don’t mind, I don’t think there’s time.’

  ‘You’re in a hurry?’

  ‘If you’re going to get back tonight.’

  I looked round at Amelia, trying to lighten the implication with a laugh. ‘He’s very mysterious.’

  But she was frowning, her eyes on his face. ‘Tony, what is it?’

  ‘Melanie wants to see Richard.’

  ‘Oh?’ I asked. ‘She issues her orders and I go running?’

  ‘Richard...’ Tony sighed. ‘I’m not trying to be officious, but it is official. She phoned me, because she didn’t know how to contact you. I wasn’t going to tell her and leave it at that, not knowing. So I had a word with the Super, and he phoned her back, and...well, it’s now official. I’m to escort you to Melanie’s office.’

  ‘But you can’t expect...What’s happened?’

  ‘I can’t tell you.’

  ‘Can’t or won’t?’

  ‘My instructions are to say nothing. She’ll do the talking.’

  ‘So you know what it is, Tony?’

  He nodded solemnly.

  ‘Then it’s serious. I’ll have to go, Amelia,’ I told her, making it sound as though I was decidedly reluctant, when I couldn’t wait to get there and find out.

  ‘I’ll come with you.’

  ‘She didn’t say...’ Tony bit off the sentence. ‘Oh, what the hell! As though I’m going to stop you, Amelia.’

  ‘I’ll throw some things together, then,’ she said, ‘just in case.’ And she hurried away, no doubt to mystify Mary even more, leaving Tony and me staring at each other and wondering what to say.

  ‘We could use my car,’ he suggested.

  ‘I’d rather take ours. That’ll leave us both independent.’

  ‘Please yourself. To tell you the truth, I’d prefer it that way.’

  ‘Oh, why?’

  ‘With you in the same car all the way there, I can’t see how I’d hold out against your everlasting questions.’ He grinned. ‘Safer like this.’

  ‘And I’m in trouble?’

  He cocked his head. ‘To put it mildly, yes.’

  We left it there, and though round for other topics. Tony told me Ken Latchett had sent his best regards. Then Amelia was back, thumping two cases down the stairs. I threw them on the back seat of the Granada, and we drove after Tony out on to the road.

  Tony, I noticed, was using an official car, not his own. We therefore proceeded at a steady and fast pace, he using his blue winker and siren sparingly, and only when any traffic seemed to be holding us back. The visibility was poor, and I had to keep too close to his tail for my liking. But Amelia was fascinated at the way the obstructions seemed to melt away, as though a preceding shock-wave was parting them, though at the same time the urgency disquieted her.

  Melanie Poole had an office in a new building, square and purposeful and seemingly innocent of activity. There was even a lift. She was on the third floor, with her window overlooking the car park. I wondered whether she’d watched us arrive, from that window, and had posed herself at her desk accordingly. She looked up from its surface and said, ‘Here you are then. Good. That was very quick, Tony.’

  ‘There was no trouble.’ I hoped he meant with the traffic. ‘And Amelia. I’m glad to see you again.’

  She didn’t say she was glad to see me, simply pointed a pencil to the chair facing her. There were two other chairs, set back against the rear wall. I could no longer glance at Amelia for guidance. I sat. Melanie gestured.

  ‘I have a tape recorder, and as you can see it’s switched off. No one’s taking notes. That’s just so you’ll know how we stand.’

  I nodded. So we were just going to talk. But when she began her voice was too crisp, more positive than for mere talk.

  ‘Mr Patton, when we spoke together last time, my hands were tied because I had no case. A young woman had died — Nancy Ruston — but her death had all the elements of an accident. I could do nothing. Now the situation has changed. I have a case. At the moment I’m in charge of it, but as you know that can’t go on for long before the big boys from HQ come charging in.’

  I nodded again. She was telling me it was an important case. To her. I wasn’t going to interrupt.

  ‘Naturally,’ she went on, ‘I intend to clear this up before that can happen. I know you can help me. I know that I can demand that you should help me, but I don’t think it will come to that.’

  I cleared my throat. She waited. I said nothing. Undeterred, she went on:

  ‘I know that you were very active during the few days you were here. From that, I suspect you saw and interviewed a number of people I had no official access to, and I can deduce, from the fact that you left so hurriedly, that you discovered something you didn’t like the sound or the smell of, and wanted to keep it to yourself. Well, now is the time to reveal it.’

  This was all very formal. She might even have had it written down on her blotting pad, and was reading it. There was nothing else on her desk.

  ‘Why is this the time?’ I asked.

  ‘Mark Ruston is dead, Mr Patton.’

  Amelia made a sound in her throat. No more. Then silence. ‘And this...Are you saying it was suicide?’

  She didn’t answer directly. ‘He was found, late last night, hanging by a noose from one of the rafters in a shed.’

  ‘And you believe I can —’

  ‘Can explain it? Possibly.’

  She leaned back in her chair, rolling the pencil in her fingers. Now she could not have been reading her lines. I saw that her eyes were shadowed, her hair not as tidy as it might have been.

  She would have had no sleep, and could expect none for a great number of hours.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘You’re showing no enthusiasm. I gather you’re a cautious man. But I’m going to remind you, Richard, that you owe me something. You were careful not to tell me one direct lie — oh, don’t worry, I noticed that — but you were devious with me. Is it only your own discretion you think you can trust? No - don’t trouble to answer that. I’m coming to my point. You owe me, and I now want to call in the debt. Tell me to go to hell if you like, and you can walk out of here. Then you’ll owe me even more, because you know damn well I could charge you with obstructing the course of justice. Yes. I think I could make that stick. And I might do it, just out of sheer cussedness. You haven’t co-operated in any way. Now I’m giving you that chance. Yes or no?’

  This was a different Melanie Poole from the one I’d m
et before. She was in her own office. She was confident, proud, official. She knew what she was doing, and in no way was she conceding one iota of her pride.

  ‘Perhaps justice has been done, and I didn’t obstruct it very much,’ I suggested.

  ‘Don’t try your word play with me, Richard, please. Not now. I’m asking for your co-operation, because I believe you can cut straight through weeks of official enquiries for me. And my enquiries, which aren’t going to last very long, wouldn’t get anywhere in the time I’ve got.’

  ‘I can show you why it is unarguable that Mark Ruston killed his sister, Nancy. Circumstantial evidence, but nevertheless valid.’

  ‘Can you indeed? The why haven’t you told me before this?’

  I hesitated. ‘Oh, come on, Richard,’ she said, a touch of impatience in her voice. ‘Stop playing around. This is a murder enquiry I’m talking about.’

  I allowed the air to sag from me inaudibly. But it was a huge sigh. Of relief? I didn’t know. But a murder, and official one, forced my hand.

  ‘So it wasn’t suicide?’

  ‘I’ll tell you. There was a blue nylon rope tossed over one of the crossed rafters in the roof. One end went to a winch, the other had a hook on it. The rope had been placed around Mark’s neck, and the hook looped on to it. You can see, it formed a noose. Then he was hauled up with the winch. There was a bruise on the back of his head, so no doubt he was knocked out first. It’s early days yet. But from the look on his face he was allowed to become at least aware of what was happening to him before his feet were hauled from the floor and the ratchet locked in place on the winch. Anyone would have been capable of doing this. Do I make myself clear?’

  I said she had. I’d heard Amelia make a choking, sobbing protest. I agreed that Melanie had a murder on her hands. In view of the fact she’d been using my Christian name, I said:

  ‘I don’t know what you want from me, Melanie. I said I can prove Mark killed his sister. How does that help you?’