‘The only fly in the ointment is Hannah,’ Carpenter went on. ‘If he abandoned her in Lilliput before driving back to Liverpool, why did it take so long for anyone to notice her? He must have dumped her by 6 a.m., but Mr and Mrs Green didn’t spot her until 10.30.’
Galbraith thought of the traces of benzodiazepine and paracetamol in her system. ‘Maybe he fed, watered and cleaned her at six, then left her asleep in a cardboard box in a shop doorway,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘He’s a pharmaceutical chemist, don’t forget, so he must have a pretty good idea how to put a three-year-old under for several hours. My guess is he’s been doing it for years. By the way the child behaves around him she must have been a blight on his sex life from the day she was born.’
Meanwhile, Nick Ingram was chasing stolen dinghies. The fishermen who parked their boats at Chapman’s Pool couldn’t help. ‘Matter of fact it’s the first thing we checked when we heard the woman had drowned,’ said one. ‘I’d have let you know if there’d been a problem, but nothing’s missing.’
It was the same story in Swanage and Kimmeridge Bay.
His last port of call, Lulworth Cove, looked more promising. ‘Funny you should ask,’ said the voice on the other end of the line, ‘because we have had one go missing, black ten-footer.’
‘Sounds about right. When did it go?’
‘A good three months back.’
‘Where from?’
‘Would you believe it, off the beach. Some poor sod from Spain anchors his cruiser in the bay, ferries himself and his family in for a pub lunch, leaves the outboard in place with the starter cord dangling, and then tears strips off yours truly because it was hijacked from under his nose. According to him, no one in Spain would dream of stealing another chap’s boat – never mind he makes it easy enough for the local moron to nick it – and then gives me a load of grief about the aggression of Cornish fishermen and how they were probably at the bottom of it. I pointed out that Cornwall’s a good hundred miles away, and that Spanish fishermen are far more aggressive than the Cornish variety and never follow European Union rules, but he still said he was going to report me to the European Court of Human Rights for failing to protect Spanish tourists.’
Ingram laughed. ‘So what happened?’
‘Nothing. I took him and his family out to his sodding great bastard of a fifty-foot cruiser and we never heard another word. He probably put in for twice the dinghy’s insurance value and blamed the vile English for its disappearance. We made inquiries, of course, but no one had seen anything. I mean, why would they? We get hundreds of people here during bank holiday week and anyone could have started it up with no trouble. I mean what kind of berk leaves a dinghy with an outboard in place? We reckoned it was taken by joyriders who sank it when they got bored with it.’
‘Which bank holiday was it?’
‘End of May. School half-term. The place was packed.’
‘Did the Spaniard give you a description of the dinghy?’
‘A whole bloody manifest more like. All ready for the insurance. Half of me suspected he wanted it to be nicked just so he could get something a bit more swanky.’
‘Can you fax the details through?’
‘Sure.’
‘I’m particularly interested in the outboard.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I don’t think it was on the dinghy when it went down. With any luck, it’s still in the possession of the thief.’
‘Is he your murderer?’
‘Very likely.’
‘Then you’re in luck, mate. I’ve got all sorts of serial numbers here, courtesy of our Spanish friend, and one of them’s the outboard.’
Chapter Fourteen
Report from Falmouth police, following an interview with Mr and Mrs Arthur Harding
Subject: Steven Harding
Mr and Mrs Harding live at 18 Hall Road, a modest bungalow to the west of Falmouth. They retired to Cornwall in 1991 after running a fish and chip shop in Lymington for 20+ years. They used a considerable proportion of their capital to put their only child, Steven, through a private drama college following his failure to gain any A level passes at school, and feel aggrieved that they now live in somewhat straitened circumstances as a result. This may in part explain why their attitude towards their son is critical and unfriendly.
They describe Steven as a ‘disappointment’ and evince considerable hostility towards him because of his ‘immoral lifestyle’. They blame his wayward behaviour – ‘he is only interested in sex, drugs and rock and roll’ – and lack of achievement – ‘he has never done a day’s serious work in his life’ – on laziness and a belief that ‘the world owes him a living’. Mr Harding, who is proud of his working-class roots, says Steven looks down on his parents which explains why Steven has been to see them only once in six years. The visit – during the summer of 1995 – was not a success and Mr Harding’s views on his son’s arrogance and lack of gratitude were explosive and earthy. He uses words like ‘poser’, ‘junky’, ‘parasite’, ‘oversexed’, ‘liar’, ‘irresponsible’ to describe his son, although it is clear that his hostility has more to do with his inability to accept Steven’s rejection of working-class values than any real knowledge of his son’s current lifestyle as they have had no contact with him since July 1995.
Mrs Harding cites a schoolfriend of Steven’s, Anthony Bridges, as a malign influence on his life. According to her, Anthony introduced Steven to shoplifting, drugs and pornography at the age of twelve and Steven’s lack of achievement stems from a couple of police cautions he and Anthony received during their teenage years for drunk and disorderly behaviour, vandalism, and theft of pornographic materials from a newsagent. Steven became rebellious and impossible to control after these episodes. She describes Steven as ‘too handsome for his own good’, and says that girls were throwing themselves at him from an early age. She says Anthony, by contrast, was always overshadowed by his friend and that she believes this is why it amused Anthony to ‘get Steven into trouble’. She feels very bitter that Anthony, despite his previous history, was bright enough to go to university and find himself a job in teaching while Steven had to rely on the funding his parents provided for which they have received no thanks.
When Mr Harding asked Steven how he was able to afford to buy his boat Crazy Daze, Steven admitted he had received payment for several hard-core pornography sessions. This caused such distress to his parents that they ordered him from their house in July 1995 and have neither seen nor heard from him since. They know nothing about his recent activities, friends or acquaintances and can shed no light on the events of 9/10 August 1997. However, they insist that, despite all his faults, they do not believe Steven to be a violent or aggressive young man.
Chapter Fifteen
MAGGIE JENNER WAS raking straw in one of the stables when Nick Ingram and John Galbraith drove into Broxton House yard on Thursday morning. Her immediate reaction, as it was with all visitors, was to retreat into the shadows, unwilling to be seen, unwilling to have her privacy invaded, for it required an effort of will to overcome her natural disinclination to participate in anything that involved people. Broxton House, a square Queen Anne building with pitched roof, redbrick walls and shuttered upper windows, was visible through a gap in the trees to the right of the stableyard and she watched the two men admire it as they got out of the car, before turning to walk in her direction.
With a resigned smile, she drew attention to herself by hefting soiled straw through the stable doorway on the end of a pitchfork. The weather hadn’t broken for three weeks, and sweat was running freely down her face as she emerged into the fierce sunlight. She was irritated by her own discomfort, and wished she’d put on something else that morning or that PC Ingram had had the courtesy to warn her he was coming. Her checkered cheesecloth shirt gripped her damp torso like a stocking and her jeans chafed against the inside of her thighs. Ingram spotted her almost immediately and was amused to see that, for once, the tables were turned and
it was she who was hot and bothered and not he, but his expression as always was unreadable.
She propped the pitchfork against the stable wall and wiped her palms down her already filthy jeans before smoothing her hair off her sweaty face with the back of one hand. ‘Good morning, Nick,’ she said. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘Miss Jenner,’ he said, with his usual polite nod. ‘This is Detective Inspector Galbraith from Dorset HQ. If it’s convenient, he’d like to ask you a few questions about the events of last Sunday.’
She inspected her palms before tucking them into her jeans pockets. ‘I won’t offer to shake hands, Inspector. You wouldn’t like where mine have been.’
Galbraith smiled, recognizing the excuse for what it was, a dislike of physical contact, and cast an interested glance around the cobbled courtyard. There was a row of stables on each of three sides, beautiful old red-brick buildings with solid oak doors, only half a dozen of which appeared to have occupants. The rest stood empty, doors hooked back, brick floors bare of straw, hay baskets unfilled, and it was a long time, he guessed, since the business had been a thriving one. They had passed a faded sign at the entrance gate, boasting: BROXTON HOUSE RIDING & LIVERY STABLES, but, like the sign, evidence of dilapidation was everywhere, in the crumbling brickwork that had been thrashed by the elements for a couple of hundred years, in the cracked and peeling paintwork and the broken windows in the tack room and office which no one had bothered – or could afford? – to replace.
Maggie watched his appraisal. ‘You’re right,’ she said, reading his mind. ‘It has enormous potential as a row of holiday chalets.’
‘A pity when it happens, though.’
‘Yes.’
He looked towards a distant paddock where a couple of horses grazed half-heartedly on drought-starved grass. ‘Are they yours as well?’
‘No. We just rent out the paddock. The owners are supposed to keep an eye on them, but they’re irresponsible, frankly, and I usually find myself doing things for their wretched animals that was never part of the contract.’ She pulled a rueful smile. ‘I can’t get it into their owners’ heads that water evaporates and that the trough needs filling every day. It makes me mad sometimes.’
‘Quite a chore then?’
‘Yes.’ She gestured towards a door at the end of the row of stables behind her. ‘Let’s go up to my flat. I can make you both a cup of coffee.’
‘Thank you.’ She was an attractive woman, he thought, despite the muck and the brusque manner, but he was intrigued by Ingram’s stiff formality towards her which wasn’t readily explained by the story of the bigamous husband. The formality, he thought, should be on her side. As he followed them up the wooden stairs, he decided the constable must have tried it on at some point and been comprehensively slapped down for playing outside his own league. Miss Jenner was top-drawer material, even if she did live in something resembling a pigsty.
The flat was the antithesis of Nick’s tidy establishment. There was disorder everywhere, bean bags piled in front of the television on the floor, newspapers with finished and half-finished crosswords abandoned on chairs and tables, a filthy rug on the sofa which smelt unmistakably of Bertie, and a pile of dirty washing-up in the kitchen sink. ‘Sorry about the mess,’ she said. ‘I’ve been up since five, and I haven’t had time to clean.’ To Galbraith’s ears, this sounded like a well-worn apology that was trotted out to anyone who might be inclined to criticize her lifestyle. She swivelled the tap to squeeze the kettle between it and the washing-up. ‘How do you like your coffee?’
‘White, two sugars, please,’ said Galbraith.
‘I’ll have mine black please, Miss Jenner. No sugar,’ said Ingram.
‘Do you mind Coffeemate?’ Maggie asked the Inspector, sniffing at a cardboard carton on the side. ‘The milk’s off.’ Cursorily she rinsed some dirty mugs under the tap. ‘Why don’t you grab a seat? If you chuck Bertie’s blanket on the floor one of you can have the sofa.’
‘I think she means you, sir,’ murmured Ingram as they retreated into the sitting room. ‘Inspector’s perks. It’s the best seat in the place.’
‘Who’s Bertie?’ whispered Galbraith.
‘The Hound of the Baskervilles. His favourite occupation is to shove his nose up men’s crotches and give them a good slobbering. The stains tend to hang around through at least three washes, I find, so it pays to keep your legs crossed when you’re sitting down.’
‘I hope you’re joking!’ said Galbraith with a groan. He had already lost one pair of good trousers to the previous night’s soaking in the sea. ‘Where is he?’
‘Out on the razzle, I should think. His second favourite occupation is to service the local bitches.’
The DI lowered himself gingerly into the only armchair. ‘Does he have fleas?’
With a grin, Ingram jerked his head towards the kitchen door. ‘Do mice leave their droppings in sugar?’ he murmured.
‘Shit!’
Ingram removed himself to a window sill and perched precariously on the edge of it. ‘Just be grateful it wasn’t her mother who was out riding on Sunday,’ he said in an undertone. ‘This kitchen’s sterile by comparison with hers.’ He had sampled Mrs Jenner’s hospitality once four years ago, the day after Healey had fled, and he’d vowed never to repeat the experience. She had given him coffee in a cracked Spode cup that was black with tannin, and he had gagged continuously while drinking it. He had never understood the peculiar mores of the impoverished landed gentry who seemed to believe the value of bone china outweighed the value of hygiene.
They waited in silence while Maggie busied herself in the kitchen. The atmosphere was ripe with the stench of horse manure, wafted in from a pile of soiled straw in the yard outside, and the heat baking the interior of the flat through the uninsulated roof was almost unbearable. In no time at all both men were red in the face and mopping at their brows with handkerchieves, and whatever brief advantage Ingram thought he had gained over Maggie was quickly dispelled. A few minutes later she emerged with a tray of coffee mugs which she handed around before sinking on to Bertie’s blanket on the sofa.
‘So what can I tell you that I haven’t already told Nick?’ she asked Galbraith. ‘I know it’s a murder inquiry because I’ve been reading the newspapers, but as I didn’t see the body I can’t imagine how I can help you.’
Galbraith pulled some notes from his jacket pocket. ‘In fact it’s rather more than a murder inquiry, Miss Jenner. Kate Sumner was raped before she was thrown into the sea, so the man who killed her is extremely dangerous and we need to catch him before he does it again.’ He paused to let the information sink in. ‘Believe me, any help you can give us will be greatly appreciated.’
‘But I don’t know anything,’ she said.
‘You spoke to a man called Steven Harding,’ he reminded her.
‘Oh, good God,’ she said, ‘you’re not suggesting he did it?’ She frowned at Ingram. ‘You’ve really got it in for that man, haven’t you, Nick? He was only trying to help in all conscience. You might as well say any of the men who were in Chapman’s Pool that day could have killed her.’
Ingram remained blandly indifferent to both her frown and her accusations. ‘It’s a possibility.’
‘So why pick on Steve?’
‘We’re not, Miss Jenner. We’re trying to eliminate him from the inquiry. Neither I nor the Inspector wants to waste time investigating innocent bystanders.’
‘You wasted an awful lot of time on Sunday doing it,’ she said acidly, stung by his dreary insistence on treating her with forelock-tugging formality.
He smiled, but didn’t say anything.
She turned back to Galbraith. ‘I’ll do my best,’ she said, ‘although I doubt I can tell you much. What do you want to know?’
‘It would be helpful if you can start by describing your meeting with him. I understand you rode down the track towards the boatsheds and came across him and the boys beside PC Ingram’s car. Is that the first tim
e you saw him?’
‘Yes, but I wasn’t riding Jasper then. I was leading him because he was frightened by the helicopter.’
‘Okay. What were Steven Harding and the two boys doing at that point?’
She shrugged. ‘They were looking at a girl on a boat through the binoculars, at least Steve and the older brother were. I think the younger one was bored by it all. Then Bertie got overexcited—’
Galbraith interrupted. ‘You said they were looking through binoculars. How did that work exactly? Were they taking it in turns?’
‘No, well, that’s wrong. It was Paul who was looking, Steve was just holding them steady for him.’ She saw his eyebrows lift in enquiry and anticipated his next question. ‘Like this.’ She made an embracing gesture with her arms. ‘He was standing behind Paul, with his arms round him, and holding the binoculars so Paul could look through the eyepieces. The child thought it was funny and kept giggling. It was rather sweet really. I think he was trying to take his mind off the dead woman.’ She paused to collect her thoughts. ‘Actually, I thought he was their father, till I realized he was too young.’
‘One of the boys said he was playing around with his telephone before you arrived. Did you see him do that?’
She shook her head. ‘It was clipped to his waistband.’
‘What happened next?’
‘Bertie got overexcited, so Steve grabbed him and then suggested we put the boys at ease by encouraging them to pat Bertie and Sir Jasper. He said he was used to animals because he’d grown up on a farm in Cornwall.’ She frowned. ‘Why is any of this important? He was just being friendly.’
‘In what way, Miss Jenner?’
Her frown deepened and she stared at him for a moment, clearly wondering where his questions were leading. ‘He wasn’t making a nuisance of himself if that’s what you’re getting at.’
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