Fear of Drowning

by Peter Turnbull

  ‘So, you’ve arrested my husband?’ She smiled, but haughtily so.

  ‘Not yet. He is helping with enquiries.’

  ‘He once told me what that phrase meant. The first time he helped the police with their enquiries, he was fifteen and a policeman threatened to break his arm unless he confessed to a crime he hadn’t committed.’

  ‘No comment,’ Yellich said coldly. ‘So you help your husband in the gym?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ Yellich glanced to his left through the pane of glass at men and women in brightly coloured sportswear pushing weights and running on small conveyor belts, moving to music with a strong beat.

  ‘No. He helps me run the gym. It’s my gym. We are married but the gym is mine. It belongs to me, lock, stock and barrel. I’m a wealthy woman, I was when I married him. He was not a wealthy man, he comes from Tang Hall, he’s still there in his mind. My father’s a businessman, farming equipment, has a house in Nether Poppleton.’

  ‘Different side of the tracks. Literally.’

  ‘Yes. He’s lucky to have me, don’t you think? I am a woman with everything, looks, charm, money. He’s a nice hunk of man flesh … he at least looks the part.’

  ‘Appearance means a lot to you, does it?’

  ‘It means everything. Appearance and money. But I’m secure. If I divorce him and cast him out into the great unknown, he goes back to Tang Hall and crime. And he knows it. I can control him. If he steps out of line he’s by himself. He dare not even look at another woman. Are you married?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is your wife pretty?’

  ‘No.’

  Vanessa Sheringham smiled.

  ‘She’s beautiful. She’s a very beautiful woman. In every way.’

  ‘I see, the old “eye of the beholder” number…’

  ‘We’ll keep this official if you don’t mind, Mrs Sheringham.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Just then the music in the gym suddenly stopped.

  ‘Your husband can’t be very secure in his marriage. I mean, from what you’re telling me, if you were to divorce he has no claim, even in part, on the house or the gym.’

  ‘He doesn’t. Both were my possession before we married and he has signed a contract that should we divorce he will not lay claim to either. He gave his name to the gym because it has a certain ring to it. Before that it was called “Vanessa’s Gym”, but Sheringham’s is a little classier sounding. Don’t you think?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ But privately he conceded that names of products are very, very important in terms of marketing strategy. That was why dog fish used to be sold as ‘rock salmon’. When the practice was outlawed, nobody bought dog fish, though they’d been eating the inexpensive and highly nutritious ‘rock salmon’ for generations, so Yellich had once read.

  ‘But yes, I suppose he is a little insecure.’ Vanessa Sheringham turned to her side and replaced another compact disc in the hi-fi machine – once again, music of a strong beat and rhythm played loudly in the gym. ‘But I like that, you know.’ She smiled as she once again turned towards Yellich. ‘It keeps him on his toes, he’s very attentive. I’m happy with the arrangement. He’s not, but that’s the way I like it. I’m not prepared to surrender the least bit of control.’

  ‘What I’m driving at is that your husband has a lot of motivation to keep you happy?’

  ‘Yes.’ Vanessa Sheringham nodded. ‘That I like … a lot of motivation to keep me happy. He’s nothing without me, and an awful lot of women would be queuing up to fill my shoes. Not only because of what nature has given me, but because I have a fit, healthy and a handsome husband who will do my least bidding because he’s terrified of our marriage ending. That’s power. Power is lovely, it’s as profound as an orgasm.’

  ‘That’s very interesting.’ Yellich spoke softly. ‘Very interesting indeed.’

  ‘Power is, I’ve always liked power.’

  ‘No, I meant that your husband would do much to keep his marriage alive.’

  ‘Oh, he would. He comes from poverty, he’s frightened of going back to it. One step out of line, as I said, and he can kiss goodbye to the good life.’

  ‘He must be totally faithful to you?’

  ‘Like I said, Mr Yellich, my husband would not even dare to look at another woman.’

  ‘Can you tell me how many members you have?’

  ‘Two hundred. About.’

  ‘As many as that?’

  ‘They don’t all come at once.’

  ‘So I see.’

  ‘Members book in for one-hour sessions. We can accommodate thirty at any one time, we’re open from eight a.m. to ten at night. So you see, we can accommodate more than twice our membership in one working day, but with about two hundred members, the gym doesn’t get crowded. They pay an annual subscription, plus an entrance fee each time they come. We also sell snacks and hot drinks and sportswear. We do all right. We … I have a nice, steady growth rate. My husband may give the impression that we’re struggling, but that’s Tang Hall man speaking. If you grow up in Tang Hall, you rapidly learn to keep quiet about your money, if you’ve got any.’

  ‘Can I have a look at the membership list?’

  ‘Do you have a warrant?’

  ‘No. I can get one, then we’ll search the gym, who knows what steroids we’ll find?’

  ‘You won’t find any.’ Vanessa Sheringham reached for a drawer in a filing cabinet. ‘But you can have a look at the list. Male or female?’

  ‘Male, for now.’

  ‘That relieves me.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes.’ Vanessa Sheringham handed Yellich a sheet of paper containing a list of names and addresses. ‘Well, if you’ve arrested my husband, or he’s at least helping you with your enquiries, and you wanted a list of my female members, then I’d start to get a little worried that I might have to divorce him. I mean, who knows what he’s been up to?’

  ‘Who indeed?’ Yellich scanned the list of names. ‘Or what indeed?’ He found the ‘Rs’. Michael Richardson’s name came between John Richards and Donald Rye. ‘May I keep this?’

  ‘Yes. We have other lists.’

  ‘What does your husband do in his free time?’

  ‘He doesn’t have any free time. The only two days of the week when he’s not here with me at the gym are Wednesdays and Sundays, they’re our ladies-only days. On those days he’s addressing a list of jobs I leave for him. I add on, he does and ticks off when done. In any order he likes, keeps him busy about the house or collecting things. That’s how we work it, that’s how I like it.’

  Yellich stood and said he’d see himself out.

  * * *

  Louise D’Acre took the length of scaffolding and held it against the linear fracture on the top of Amanda Williams’s skull. She rotated it along its length over the skull. ‘It’s a little wide,’ she said. She wore a green smock, the laboratory smelled of formaldehyde. Behind her, the laboratory assistant, Mr Filey, dutifully arranged surgical instruments on a trolley. ‘It’s possible,’ she added. ‘It’s not impossible but I cannot say that it was this or any other length of scaffolding which killed her. I’ve a better chance of identifying the murder weapon by examining her skull than his, the single blow, you see, classic case of going out like a light, left a neat injury. His head was battered repeatedly. His death might have been prolonged.’

  ‘Prolonged?’ Hennessey asked.

  ‘By a few seconds, but a second is a long time, long enough to know what’s happening to you and if you’re conscious for four or five seconds, then it’s long enough to feel emotion.’

  ‘Such as fear?’

  ‘Such as terror, such as the certainty of death this instant … knowing you haven’t the time to prepare for it. He knew what was happening to him. She, on the other hand, either did or did not know what happened to her husband. His head was battered out of shape … there was real passion there. In fact, his skull reminded me of the Choctaw Indian skulls. They were appar
ently one of the east coast tribes of what is now the USA. One of the early victims of the Pilgrim Fathers either by way of execution or the measles. But they used to flatten their skulls with tight bindings, in much the same way that the Chinese used to bind the feet of their girl children. Max Williams’s skull reminded me of the Choctaw Indian skull I once saw in a museum of anthropology. It was battered out of shape, which may or may not have been instantaneous. But she, bless her, was despatched by means of a single blow. Probably with something thinner than a length of scaffolding.’ She handed the piece of metal back to Hennessey.

  ‘Thanks, Dr D’Acre.’ Hennessey slipped the scaffolding pipe back into the holdall he had used to carry it from his car into the hospital, to the department of pathology.

  ‘Why pick on a length of scaffolding as the murder weapon?’

  ‘Oh, just that one of our suspects was seen and heard threatening Mr Williams with just such an object.’

  ‘Fair enough, but the murder weapon, if you find it, will be covered with blood and hair and possibly slivers of bone from Mrs Williams. I was able to obtain some grit and oil from the back of the heads of both the Williamses.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. Would have faxed you, still will, but I did note that they were laid face up on a cold surface soon after death, that accounts for the hypostasis on the posterior aspects of both bodies. If there is a garage adjoining their home, then that’s where they were laid.’

  ‘There is.’

  ‘Might be worth getting the Scene of Crime people to give it the once-over.’

  ‘Might well.’

  ‘So you’ve got a suspect already?’

  ‘Got two, in fact. Both have motives and Sergeant Yellich has had the inspired notion that if we can link the two together, then we can really build a case, at least we can begin to. The only problem is that they’re not going to cough and neither of them are alibi merchants. They know the value of leaving the burden of proof with the police.’

  ‘Hard life you have. If my customers don’t tell me what I need to know, I can always put them back on ice, and pick my colleagues’ brains, or just leave them until medical science advances and tells us … oh … I’m sorry…’

  ‘No problem.’ Hennessey smiled. ‘Don’t worry about it.’

  6

  Thursday afternoon

  … in which Sergeant Yellich feels he travels back in time and Chief Inspector Hennessey meets a pleasantly unpleasant individual.

  ‘A bit like Humpty Dumpty before the fall.’ Yellich swilled his coffee around in his mug. ‘Milady’s view of the world is a little askew, as is her view of her place in it.’

  ‘Sounds like it.’

  ‘When her eyes are opened, she’ll have a great fall and she just won’t get put together again no matter how many horses and men His Highness can offer.’

  ‘But there’s a link between Richardson and Sheringham. Your intuition is paying off, Sergeant. It’s paying off handsomely. Handsomely.’ Hennessey leaned forwards on his desk and beamed at Yellich. ‘We’re still a tad short of evidence though. I couldn’t hold Sheringham.’

  ‘Not even with the fingerprint in the bathroom?’

  ‘Not if he had been a regular visitor to the house. His solicitor jumped on that point, pounced, fell on it like a sparrowhawk.’

  ‘Fair enough, I suppose.’

  ‘Annoying though. But onwards and upwards – we’re getting there Yellich, we’re getting there. And the motivation is strong now, very strong, especially for Sheringham: he was scared that Max Williams was going to blow the whistle on him to the Drug Squad and he was scared that Amanda Williams was going to blow the whistle on him to his old lady. Makes him something of a Taipan in my mind.’

  ‘A what, sir?’

  ‘A Taipan, it’s an Australian snake. It’s just a nugget of information I stored away. You see, snake venom falls into two distinct categories, apparently. One that paralyses the nervous system, and one that coagulates the blood preventing it being pumped round the body.’

  ‘Blimey.’

  ‘As you say. The Taipan isn’t the most venomous snake in the world in terms of the strength of its poison, but it’s the only snake in the world whose venom is double acting. It both coagulates the blood of its victim, and paralyses the central nervous system and that makes it the most deadly snake in the world. Sheringham is like that, he’s got a double motivation.’

  ‘And Richardson too. He wasn’t a million miles from suspicion in the Kerr case, as you’ve pointed out. A man who owed Richardson money is found in a field with his head smashed in and his brains sticking out. And now Williams owes Richardson money and his head is also smashed to a pulp. That’s too much of a coincidence, Sergeant. And both would, in a sense, be more angry with Max Williams than Amanda.’

  ‘That would tie in with what Dr D’Acre said. You know, Mr Williams was murdered passionately, Mrs Williams coldly. One single, neat blow to the head would enable Sheringham to sleep at night. But Richardson’s anger would make him want to repeatedly batter Max Williams, and keep battering him, long after he’s dead. Then they team up and tidy the house, sanitize the crime scene and dig the grave, easy job for men built like they’re built. Pity they’re not stupid enough to alibi each other.’

  ‘We’ve still got to get the Crown Prosecution Service to run with it, it’s not for nothing that the CPS is known as the Criminal Protection Society in the canteen and the Police Club.’ Hennessey paused. ‘You look worried, Yellich.’

  ‘I am. It’s the cleaning of the house, sir.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘Well, it’s not actually politically correct.’

  ‘Cleaning a house?’

  ‘No … my point. It’s not politically correct.’

  ‘Come on, within these four walls, out with it.’

  ‘Well, boss, it has a woman’s touch to it.’

  Hennessey paused. ‘It does, doesn’t it?’

  ‘I just can’t see the likes of Richardson or Sheringham being efficient with a cloth and a bottle of disinfectant.’

  ‘I can’t either.’

  ‘Mrs Richardson!’ Both men spoke at once and held eye contact as they did so.

  Hennessey completed it for both of them. ‘It was her livelihood that went down the tubes as well. By the sounds of it, Mrs Sheringham would be more likely to murder her husband than either of the Williamses, nor can I see her being handy with the housework, that sort always has a “woman who does”. Is that the phrase?’

  ‘Mrs Richardson claims she was in Ireland over the weekend. If that alibi can be broken we’re on our way, boss.’

  ‘We are indeed.’

  ‘So what do we do now, boss, pick her up?’

  ‘Yes.’ Hennessey sat back in his chair. ‘Or do we? I wonder? No. Look, you seem to have a way with the ladies…’

  ‘I wouldn’t say that, boss.’ Yellich grinned.

  ‘You did well with Mrs Sheringham, you got the measure of her, allright. Go and see Mrs Richardson, take the measure of her. Me, I’m going to Selby.’

  ‘Selby?’

  ‘Selby. “Shored-up” has contacted me. Reckons he’s got information to sell. You know him and his games … but he’s come up with the goods before. And the weather’s fine, and Selby’s a pleasant little town. It’s certainly better than the last place we met. Have you ever been to Doncaster on a rainy day in January?’

  ‘No, can’t say I have, boss.’

  ‘Don’t. When you’ve seen her, visit his bank.’

  * * *

  Yellich had to keep reminding himself to keep an open mind. The phrase ‘salt of the earth’ kept occurring to him when he spoke to Mrs Richardson. Yet he was all too well aware that the most unlikely people had committed desperate, terrible crimes. In his early days as a fresh-faced constable, he had allowed first impressions to cloud his judgement and let possible suspects go on their way only to find later that they had committed the crime in question and had
slithered out of the arms of the law with a display of relaxed innocence. Now, with some years’ service behind him, did he accept that everybody can commit crime, and even the most unlikely person will do so. Reluctantly, he accepted the police-canteen culture which states that, “They’re all guilty unless you know otherwise. And I mean know”.’

  ‘There’s no point in denying it, son.’ Colleen Richardson was a tall, well-built, large-boned woman, who sat in a leather armchair in the front room of her Georgian-style house at the entrance of a new build estate on the edge of Huntingdon. A Persian cat slunk into the room and hopped silently onto Yellich’s lap.