Stone Dead

by Frank Smith

  Paget braced himself. ‘We have no proof that your daughter is in fact dead,’ he said. ‘And neither Mr Foster nor anyone else is being held at the moment.’

  There was a stunned silence that was palpable at the other end of the line, but before Constance Remington found her voice again, Paget asked a question. ‘Tell me, did Lisa ever mention anyone by the name of Gray to you?’

  ‘Gray? No. Who is this Gray? And what is all this in the morning’s paper about Sean being alive? You told me yourself that Sean was dead.’

  ‘That is what we were led to believe,’ Paget said patiently, ‘and since we had no reason to suspect otherwise, we believed it to be true.’

  ‘Seems to me you’ll believe anything down there. My God, you let that evil little bastard lead you around by the nose. Is he still at the cottage?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then I’m coming down to take everything that belongs to Lisa. I want everything out of there. I don’t want Peter touching them, and I’m not letting Sean get his filthy hands on any of her stuff, either. He’ll try, you know. He’ll reckon that because he’s still her husband, he’ll have a right. Some of Lisa’s gowns are worth a pretty penny, and I don’t intend to let that drunken bastard get his hands on them. I have a right. I’m her mother.’

  ‘Until the case is resolved, no one has any rights to any of Lisa’s belongings, Mrs Remington,’ Paget told her. ‘They will be released in due course, but until that time they will remain where they are. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.’

  ‘You’ll hear more about this!’ There was venom in every syllable, and it wasn’t hard for Paget to imagine the distorted features of the woman at the other end. ‘I’m calling my solicitor,’ she went on, ‘and then we’ll see who has a right, Mr bloody Chief Inspector!’

  The phone crashed in his ear.

  * * *

  ‘I’M GOING TO follow up on this man, Gray,’ Paget told Tregalles, ‘but I’d like you to have a talk with Tom Tyson. Find out whether he has seen anything that might tie in with the killing at the cottage, and see if he can get anything out of young Eric. The boy may have seen something; he seems to hang around the cottage quite a bit. It’s worth a try.’

  Tregalles nodded. He looked tired. ‘Anything more on this business with Olivia?’ Paget asked. ‘How did it go this morning?’

  The sergeant shook his head. ‘Not a sign of him,’ he said.

  The man had probably been scared off by the increased activity, Paget thought, but people like that were very persistent. He’d most likely be back as soon as everyone thought the danger was over. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked.

  Tregalles nodded. ‘A bit tired, that’s all. Not sleeping too well, lately.’

  Paget gripped his arm. ‘They’ll get him, John,’ he said quietly. ‘I know it sounds trite, but try not to worry. What about Audrey?’

  ‘She’s worried sick,’ Tregalles said. ‘She tries not to show it, but she is.’ He smashed a fist into the palm of his hand. ‘I’d just like five minutes with the bastard!’ he grated. ‘Just five, that’s all.’

  TEN

  THE MISSING PERSON report was dated March 14th, the day after Foster claimed to have discovered the body he’d sworn he thought was that of Merrick. But according to Janet Freeman, Gray’s fiancée, Gray had been missing since March 12th. Gray was a software program specialist with Freeman Protronics, and shortly after two o’clock that day, he had received a telephone call at work, after which he left the office. He told his secretary that he was going out on an emergency call for assistance from a client in Bridgnorth. The client was a Mr Hambledon, owner of Travis Hambledon (Manufacturers of Fine Office Furnishings and Supplies), and Gray told the girl that he might have to stay in Bridgnorth overnight.

  It wasn’t until the following evening that Janet Freeman became concerned about Gray’s absence. He had promised faithfully to go over the wedding invitations one last time before they were sent out, and when he failed to return to the office by five o’clock, and he hadn’t phoned, she telephoned the firm in Bridgnorth, but the office had closed for the day. When David Gray hadn’t appeared by nine o’clock that night, Janet Freeman telephoned Hambledon at home, only to be told that neither he, nor anyone else from the company, had called Gray. They’d had no trouble, and the last time he had spoken to David Gray was several weeks ago.

  Puzzled, but not unduly worried (she said she thought the secretary must have got the message wrong), she went round to Gray’s flat. When no one answered the door, she let herself in with her own key, but there was no sign of Gray at all. Everything was as it should be. She tried to see if his car was in the lock-up garage behind the flats, but she couldn’t see inside. In any case, Gray had taken a company car.

  It was not unusual for any of the software people to spend long periods of time working on a tricky problem, so even then Janet Freeman was not unduly worried. More annoyed, she told the policeman who had taken her statement, because Gray hadn’t phoned to tell her how long he expected to be away, and time was growing short for sending out the invitations. She also said she had tried repeatedly to call him on his pager, without result. But when questioned closely, she admitted that Gray quite often left his pager off.

  When he failed to appear by Thursday morning, Janet Freeman went to the police and reported her fiancé missing.

  Nothing had been done until the following day, Friday, when a detective constable was dispatched to Gray’s flat. He was met there by Janet Freeman. They went through the flat together, but no clue to Gray’s whereabouts was discovered. The DC questioned several people on the same floor, as well as the caretaker, and the owner of the flats, but learned nothing. The lock-up garage was opened, and Gray’s car was there. The constable returned to the station where he wrote up his report, checked Gray’s description against recent reports of unidentified accident victims, arrests, etc., and made a note to talk to the Freeman Protronics staff on Monday morning. A description of Gray and the company car he was driving was written up and circulated, and then he went home for a well-deserved weekend.

  Paget read on. During the interviews on the following Monday, one of the clerks in the office happened to mention that the car Gray had taken on the day he disappeared was now parked in the company car-park. No one seemed to know when or how it had got there. The odometer reading showed twenty-six miles more than the last entry in the log, which was dated March 11th, so wherever the car had been, it could be no more than thirteen miles distant from Freeman Protronics.

  Paget sat back and thought about that. It was roughly six or seven miles to Bracken Cottage, which left something like thirteen miles unaccounted for. But regardless of the unexplained mileage, if Gray had driven the car out there and had been killed, who had driven the car back again? And what about the keys? None were found in the car. He made a note to have the keys found at Bracken Cottage checked to see if any of them belonged to the company car.

  He returned to the report. The DC had called for an examination of the car. Nothing of any apparent consequence was discovered—with one exception. There were no prints of any kind on the steering wheel or in the immediate vicinity of the driver’s seat—no fingerprints; no palm prints; no hand prints—whereas the prints of several Freeman Protronics employees were found in other areas of the car. Someone had been very thorough.

  The rest of the report was predictable. The lack of prints was suspicious, but it was not of itself proof that anything untoward had happened to Gray. Although it might be unusual, it was not unheard of for someone to get cold feet prior to a wedding and simply disappear. True, Gray had left everything behind, including his car, but that still didn’t mean there had been foul play. The search was broadened; circulars went out across the country; friends and even distant relatives were questioned. Gray’s picture appeared on TV, and the usual rash of sightings came pouring in. But when all of the supposed sightings proved false, and nothing was heard within ten days, the investigation stall
ed simply because no one had any idea where to look for the man.

  And, thought Paget, by the time the body at Bracken Cottage turned up, no one connected the two incidents because the body had been identified as that of Sean Merrick within twenty-four hours of its discovery.

  DI Abercrombie, into whose lap the Gray file had fallen, was only too happy to let Paget take it from there. It allowed Abercrombie to write off his part of the investigation, and it left Paget out there to take the flak.

  Who said there was no justice in the world?

  * * *

  THOMAS TYSON was a dour, stocky, square-built man with the neck and shoulders of a bull. His face was weathered and what little hair he had was turning white. It was hard to tell his age: late fifties or early sixties, Tregalles guessed and left it at that.

  Tregalles had telephoned ahead to make sure that both Tyson and his son would be there. Tyson had been less than enthusiastic, saying that it was his busy time, and he could spare little of it, but in the end he had agreed to be there. Now, they sat on wooden chairs in the kitchen of the farmhouse.

  ‘I suppose you’d best come through,’ Tyson had said when he answered the door. ‘The wife seldom leaves the kitchen.’ He led the way down a passage even narrower than that of Foster’s cottage to a large, bright room. It was, in fact, two rooms knocked into one, Tregalles observed, and it was furnished as both kitchen and living-room. A squared-off bay window overlooked the field between the farmhouse and Bracken Cottage, and set in the bay was a day-bed. A woman sat half on and half off the bed, struggling to stand upright with the help of a pair of stout walking-sticks.

  ‘This is the wife,’ Tyson said brusquely as he indicated a chair and sat down himself.

  Tregalles hesitated. The woman was obviously in pain, and yet Tyson seemed oblivious to it. ‘Please don’t get up on my account,’ he said. ‘I just want to ask a few questions, Mrs Tyson.’

  ‘There’s work to be done and the Good Lord gave me two good hands to do it,’ the woman said as she made her way painfully to the Aga cooker. ‘You sit yourself down. Kettle’s on the boil.’

  Emily Tyson was a thin, wiry woman with a care-worn face and judgemental eyes. She moved about the kitchen with great difficulty, and Tregalles felt uncomfortable watching her. Tyson caught his eye and must have guessed what was going through his mind. ‘Displaced hip,’ he said cryptically. ‘Happened when Eric was born. Nothing they can do.’ He spoke softly, but his wife had sharp ears.

  ‘Aye, it were a judgement,’ she said without turning round. ‘It’s God’s will.’

  Tregalles looked around the room. Everything in it was modern and made for convenience. Handrails were placed strategically beside the bed, beside the cooker, and in various places along the walls, and Emily Tyson made good use of them as she made her painful way around the room.

  ‘Is Eric about?’ Tregalles asked.

  ‘He’ll be in shortly,’ Tyson told him. ‘Now, what was it you wanted, Sergeant? Something to do with the goings-on at yon cottage, I’ll be bound.’

  ‘Tea’s ready,’ said Emily.

  Tyson rose from his chair and carried the heavy pot of tea from the cooker to the table. Cups and saucers were already set out, and he poured three cups. Meanwhile, Emily made her way back to the bed and pulled herself up until she was sitting with her back to the window. Beside her on the sill was a bible and a pair of binoculars.

  ‘Chairs are a bit hard for Ma,’ Tyson said by way of explanation. ‘Help yourself.’ He indicated the milk and sugar, then took a cup of clear tea to his wife.

  Tregalles sipped his tea. ‘Very good,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Mrs Tyson.’ He set his cup down. ‘You’re right,’ he went on. ‘I am here about what happened at Bracken Cottage, and I’m especially interested in anything you might have seen between, say, March 11th and 15th.’ He glanced at the window. ‘I should think you’d have a good view of the cottage from here.’

  ‘He’s back,’ said Emily.

  ‘Sorry?’

  She flicked her head in the direction of the cottage. ‘He’s back,’ she repeated. ‘Came home late last night. Why isn’t he locked up? Should be after what he did.’

  ‘You mean Mr Foster?’

  ‘Aye. Who else?’

  ‘What is it you think he’s done, Mrs Tyson?’

  ‘Why, murdered that girl and one of her fancy men, of course. What else would they be digging for? Caught them at it, didn’t he?’

  ‘What we need,’ Tregalles said, ‘are reliable witnesses.’ He nodded toward the window. ‘Did you, by any chance, happen to see anything that would help us, Mrs Tyson? You mentioned “fancy men”. What did you mean by that?’

  The woman sipped her tea in silence. Tregalles waited patiently.

  ‘There’s two at least,’ she said abruptly. ‘The one with the black car and the one with the blue one, although sometimes he comes in a red one.’

  ‘Can you describe the men and the cars?’

  The woman shrugged her narrow shoulders. ‘The men are ordinary,’ she said. ‘Not much difference between them, although the one does a lot of shouting and waving his arms about. You can hear him shouting from here.’

  ‘Would he be the one in the black car?’

  Emily Tyson shot him a shrewd glance. ‘Aye,’ she said slowly. ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘When did you last see him there?’

  She thought for a moment, then glanced up at a wall calendar. ‘Three, maybe four weeks ago,’ she said hesitantly. She looked across at her husband. ‘It was the day you said you heard someone shooting up there,’ she said. ‘When was that?’

  Tom Tyson shrugged. ‘Don’t remember,’ he said.

  ‘You actually heard shots coming from the cottage?’ Tregalles prompted.

  ‘One shot,’ Tyson said. ‘That’s all it was. Just the one. And it was outside. And then this car roared off up the road. The black one.’

  ‘So you didn’t see who actually fired the shot?’

  ‘No.’

  Tregalles looked at Emily Tyson. She shook her head. ‘But the other one was there the next day,’ she said. ‘He had the blue car that day. They both came back together. Him and that girl. Funny, that, because she left in her own car and came back in his. I remember thinking it was funny at the time.’

  ‘What about that night, Mrs Tyson? Were you disturbed at all? Did you happen to see or hear anything unusual?’

  ‘Something woke me up about one o’clock in the morning,’ she said. ‘Don’t know what it was, but I heard a car drive off shortly after. Him going home, I expect.’ Her lip curled in disapproval.

  ‘Anything else?’

  The woman thought. ‘Not that day, but he came back the next night and the lights were on half the night.’

  ‘The same man?’

  Mrs Tyson shook her head impatiently. ‘No, Foster,’ she said. ‘I remember he had a bonfire the next day, and then he started taking down those sheep pens.’ Her mouth turned down even further. ‘Don’t know why. Those old pens have been there more than a hundred years. Why folks have to start tearing things down for no reason, I don’t know.’

  ‘That’s enough, Ma,’ Tyson said. ‘Time you had a rest. You’ll get all tired out and then where will you be?’

  Emily Tyson’s eyes glittered. ‘You leave me be,’ she said waspishly. ‘It isn’t often we have visitors. More tea, Sergeant? Pour the sergeant another cup, Tom.’

  ‘I understand you wanted to buy a piece of Mr Foster’s land,’ Tregalles said as Tyson filled his cup. ‘For direct access to the road.’

  Tyson set the pot carefully to one side. ‘And what if I did?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m told that you had a deal with Foster, but Miss Remington stopped him from going ahead with it.’

  Tyson eyed him over the rim of his cup. ‘And what’s that got to do with what’s happened over there?’ he asked.

  ‘What do you think happened over there?’ Tregalles countered.

  Tys
on shrugged his massive shoulders. ‘He came home, found them in bed together, and shot the both of them,’ he said. ‘Word is, he stuffed them down that old well in the shed out back.’

  ‘Didn’t I say there’d be a judgement?’ his wife said. ‘Didn’t I?’

  ‘You did, Ma,’ Tyson said.

  ‘One man is dead,’ Tregalles said, ‘but we don’t know what happened to Miss Remington. She is still missing.’

  Tyson flicked his head toward the cottage. ‘Like as not you’ll find her there,’ he said.

  ‘You were not very fond of Miss Remington, were you, Mr Tyson? I believe you had words with her not so long ago.’

  Tyson’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ he asked belligerently. ‘Are you accusing me of something?’

  ‘No. I’m just trying to establish what happened, that’s all, sir. Did you have words with her? Over that piece of land?’

  Tyson got up and went over to a shelf where he found a pipe and began to fill it with tobacco. ‘Aye, I had words with her,’ he said at last. ‘Not that it did much good.’ His expression hardened. ‘Might as well have saved my breath. Bloody woman wouldn’t listen.’

  ‘Tom! Language!’

  ‘Sorry, Ma. Got a bit carried away, that’s all. But that woman would drive anyone to swearing. Not a brain in her head.’ Colour was rising in his face. ‘Twenty-five feet! That’s all I wanted. Just twenty-five feet. The planning board approved it, and Foster was ready to let it go. It was no use to him, but then she came.’

  Tyson suddenly spread his arms and allowed his hands to flap helplessly. ‘Oh, no,’ he mimicked in a high, falsetto voice, ‘we simply can’t have smelly tractors and cows and things going past the window all the time, can we, darling?’ He dropped his arms and continued to press tobacco into his pipe.

  The change in the man had been so swift and unexpected that Tregalles found it hard not to laugh. But Tyson wasn’t laughing. His face was set and his jaw thrust out as he clamped the pipe between his teeth. He struck a match and sucked the flame down hard.