The Devil's Chair

by Priscilla Masters

  ‘However improbable.’ He looked up, a hint of a smile softening his features. ‘She hasn’t been taken by fairies, Martha, as one of the locals, a Mr Faulkener, has suggested.’

  ‘No,’ she agreed.

  ‘Or the Devil.’

  She shook her head. ‘Not him either.’

  His eyes were pleading with her for some rational explanation.

  ‘Well,’ she said, bound to respond to the detective, ‘call me a pedant but it would seem to me that whoever made the phone call has Daisy.’ She hesitated, before adding, with concern harshening her voice, ‘Who may well be injured. Was the caller a man or a woman?’

  ‘A woman, the call centre girl thinks.’

  ‘Thinks?’

  ‘She thought a woman with a gruff voice but it could have been a man.’

  ‘What exactly did the caller say?’

  ‘That there was a car,’ he gave an apologetic smile, ‘gorn orf the Burway and that a woman was hurt.’

  Martha frowned. ‘Someone,’ she repeated. ‘Not two people or anything suggesting a child was in the car?’

  ‘No. There was no mention of the child.’

  ‘I assume the caller didn’t leave a name?’

  ‘Correct. Until we called at the place and found out the facts we just assumed the caller was the owner of Hope Cottage. We were busy with the rescue operation so didn’t check out Hope Cottage for some hours.’

  Randall stopped speaking for a moment. He was frowning and looking out of the window, as though searching in the town for some clue. ‘There is something else,’ he said reluctantly. ‘The tyre tracks.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Tracy drove up the hill, it would appear, at quite a lick. There are fresh tyre marks around one or two of the corners. Obviously, at that time of night, she wouldn’t have expected to meet another car. Fact is she probably wasn’t in a state to care much. But whatever her mental state she came to an abrupt halt and started reversing madly as though she was panicked about something.’

  ‘Perhaps the drink overwhelmed her so she changed her mind?’ Martha suggested gently, ‘and thought she’d go home after all.’

  ‘It’s possible. The tyre marks veer all over the road so I suppose we can’t rely on her acting rationally.’

  Martha caught the doubt in his voice. ‘But?’

  ‘It was an emergency stop. There was quite a bit of tyre left on the road. She went into a skid then reversed. That’s when and why she slipped and fell into the valley.’ He made an attempt at levity. ‘Reversing on a notoriously dangerous road when drunk as a skunk is never a good idea.’

  ‘No.’

  He obviously felt he needed to emphasize this point. ‘The marks on the road suggest she made an emergency stop as though something was blocking her way forward.’

  ‘Another car, perhaps?’

  ‘There were no marks of another car. We’ve put boards out and made appeals on local radio and TV. No one’s come forward to say they were on the Burway Sunday morning around two a.m.’

  His eyes met hers. ‘Anyway,’ he said, ‘whatever the reason that Tracy Walsh lost control of the car it left the road, rolled over and over down into Carding Mill Valley and finally came to rest on its roof.’

  Martha was thoughtful for a moment. Then she started firing questions at him. Rat-a-tat-tat. ‘The child’s safety seat,’ she began.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Was the buckle open or fastened?’

  Randall’s eyes gleamed. This was exactly why he had left the scene of the investigation and come here. ‘Open.’

  ‘Was there blood on it?’

  ‘No,’ he said cautiously, ‘but there was blood on the back of the seat in front and some inside the roof of the car. We’ve taken samples for DNA and will be analysing all the bloodstains.’

  ‘Sorry, Alex.’ She apologized in advance of asking: ‘There’s no chance she’s underneath the car, is there?’ She didn’t really think so. Alex Randall was a thorough and intelligent officer but she had to explore all possibilities.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘When the fire service cut Tracy out they lifted the vehicle. Daisy wasn’t underneath.’

  ‘Toys? Did she have a favourite toy that was always with her?’

  ‘A Jellycat squirrel, according to Neil.’ Alex made a face. ‘If it’s the one we found at the scene it’s a horrible brown smelly thing.’ His eyes clouded with an apparent stab of a memory.

  ‘They always are,’ Martha said, without noticing the detective’s wince. She was recalling the twins at three years old. They too had had a soft toy, sucked to bits, grubby and smelly. Baba. They could never sleep without it.

  Alex’s next words brought her back to the present. ‘We found one like it in a bush a hundred yards away from the car, but as I say, we aren’t certain it’s Daisy’s.’

  She wanted to say, If it is, then Daisy cannot be not far away, but it would have seemed crass. Detective Inspector Alex Randall was a senior officer. He and his team would not have overlooked a child’s body. So, after staring at him for a few minutes, she substituted what she had wanted to say with: ‘Tell me about Neil Mansfield.’

  Randall made a face. ‘He’s not such a bad bloke. He works as a painter and decorator – quite hard – all hours. People speak well of him.’

  ‘How old is he again?’

  ‘Forty. He’s been married before. His marriage broke up when he started an affair with Tracy. He was doing some painting for her.’

  ‘Tell me about her.’

  ‘From photographs, she’s very attractive. Flirty, blonde, vivacious, fun in a tawdry sort of way. According to people who knew her she was sultry, volatile and fiercely jealous, a heavy drinker.’ His face clouded. ‘Now she’s just a thing, breathing via a machine. Anything but vivacious.’

  Martha lifted her eyebrows.

  Randall’s face changed again. ‘She’s very smashed up now, Martha. Some of her facial bones are broken. She has multiple injuries. Her face is badly cut and bruised. She’s currently on life support and would win no beauty competition.’

  ‘What are her chances of survival?’

  For the first time since he’d arrived, Alex grinned, though only for a second. ‘You know doctors, Martha. I can’t get a straight answer out of them but things don’t look good to me.’

  ‘And Neil, has he visited her?’

  Again, he felt that her point was significant. He shook his head. ‘Not yet. He’s waiting at the house in case …’ He didn’t need to finish the sentence.

  ‘Did anyone else see Daisy in the car that night?’

  Randall shook his head. ‘We have some CCTV footage of the vehicle travelling up the High Street in Stretton. We can just about make out Tracy but we can’t tell if Daisy is in the back or not.’

  ‘So it is possible that Daisy was never in the car?’

  ‘Possible, yes. Some officers are having a go at enhancing the images, though, well, I’m not too hopeful. But the little toy, Martha, if it is hers … Surely that points to her having been in the vehicle? Neil says she was never without it.’

  ‘Well, she is now.’

  It was a sobering thought. They were both silent, Martha recalling Sukey’s screams when she had mislaid her Baba.

  ‘I take it you’ve checked the house where the couple lived?’

  ‘Superficially. Yes.’

  ‘And Hope Cottage – have you been inside?’

  ‘It’s locked up,’ he said. ‘We’ve looked through the windows and shouted through the letterbox but it’s almost a mile from the crash scene. The weather’s been so cold. I can’t see a four-year-old child managing the distance.’

  ‘Your caller might have carried her.’ She regarded him with concern.

  He added, ‘We’re getting in touch with the owner to see who has a key and gain access.’

  ‘The cleaner – surely?’

  ‘She’s on holiday in Spain,’ Randall said heavily. ‘We can’t get hold of her – at lea
st we haven’t yet.’

  ‘Do you know what the Saturday night argument was about?’

  DI Randall smothered a smile. He was well used to the coroner’s interest in cases; how she would direct the topics, examine events from all angles. Upside down, inside out. Back to front. Front to back. ‘Again, according to the neighbours – they lived in a semi with very thin walls –’ he explained, ‘Tracy suspected Neil of having an affair.’

  ‘I see,’ Martha said, unsympathetic. ‘History repeating itself, then?’

  ‘We haven’t broached the subject with him yet,’ Randall said. ‘It would seem a tad insensitive with his partner so badly injured and the child missing.’

  ‘It isn’t like you to worry about being insensitive,’ Martha commented drily.

  ‘He isn’t a suspect in a crime. I don’t need to pry so deeply into his personal life.’

  ‘But you’ll be taking the car in for forensics?’

  ‘It’s routine in a near, still possibly fatal, crash. The car might have been faulty.’

  ‘But you don’t think so.’

  ‘No.’

  Neither spoke the words, or tampered with.

  Instead Martha continued, ‘And Neil didn’t pursue Tracy and the little girl?’

  Randall opened his notebook. ‘He said, and I quote, “We’d both had a fair bit to drink. Tracy ran up the stairs. I didn’t know what for. I thought maybe to be sick or go to the loo but she came running back down with little Daisy in her arms. I tried to stop her but off she goes, blasting into the night. It was two in the morning. I’d had a shedful. I was in no fit state to go in hot pursuit. Last thing I remember is crashing out on the sofa. I woke up the next morning with a sore head.”’

  ‘I don’t suppose for a minute that you checked his blood alcohol level?’

  ‘Didn’t need to,’ Randall said with a smirk. ‘I could smell it right across the room. His hands were shaking and his breath was pure booze. But he wasn’t driving anyway and he’d admitted having a drink. We had no reason to breathalyse him.’

  Martha nodded.

  He paraphrased the contents of his notebook. ‘He half thought that Tracy would go around the block and then come back, tail between her legs. She’d done it before but as he came round the next morning he realized that she wasn’t back. He tried her mobile phone but it went straight through to answer phone. He started ringing round friends and relatives, including Wanda Stefano, the friend Tracy had mentioned. When he got no joy there he rang us. By that time we’d got the call about the car and were already on the scene.’

  Martha thought for a moment. ‘Apart from the mystery person who phoned, who else was first on the scene?’

  ‘When the squad car got to Carding Mill Valley the car was surrounded by the party of youngsters doing their Duke of Edinburgh Award. They’d camped out the night a little further up the valley. It was about a quarter past six by then.’

  ‘When they got there did they see anyone else?’

  ‘No – they said the place was deserted.’

  ‘Did the D of E girls hear anything in the night?’

  ‘They weren’t sure. Most of them said they’d slept really soundly as they’d done a fifteen-mile hike the day before. And their camp site was about half a mile from the crash site.’

  ‘Was Tracy wearing her seat belt?’

  ‘According to our preliminary forensic accident investigators she must have been. If she’d not been wearing one she would have exited the car either through the windscreen or through the side or rear window depending on the roll. The vehicle might even have landed on top of her. She’d have to be very lucky to have survived that.’

  ‘Tell me about Hope Cottage, where the phone call was made.’

  ‘It’s a lovely place – Victorian stone and pretty as a picture but you’d need a four-wheel drive to live there. It’s reached by a muddy track and must get cut off by heavy snowfall or even heavy rain. The trade-off for the inconvenience is its views across the valley, which are wonderful, and its sheer isolation.’

  ‘Isolation? Carding Mill Valley?’ Martha queried. ‘You must be joking. Every time I’ve been there it’s been packed.’

  ‘Weekends maybe but in the week and out of season it’s quite peaceful.’

  ‘What about the D of E students camping?’

  ‘Well, those too,’ Randall conceded.

  ‘I take it none of the students has admitted entering the cottage and making the call?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is there any sign that Hope Cottage was broken into?’

  ‘No.’

  Martha stood up, stared out of the window and then said softly, ‘You must find her, Alex.’

  And he stood behind her, close enough for her to sense his nearness. ‘I’d like to promise we will,’ he said softly, ‘but I’ve learned not to make promises I might not be able to keep.’

  And before she had a chance to turn around and face him, he had gone.

  FIVE

  Monday, 8 April, 2 p.m.

  Detective Sergeant Paul Talith parked neatly on the road and tugged open the gate, which not only sagged but badly needed a lick of paint. He and his wife, Diana, had recently moved house and Talith was gaining an interest not only in football, which had always been his abiding passion, but in DIY, so he was particularly noticing things like a gate that needed a paint job and a new hinge.

  Tracy and Neil had lived with Daisy in a sixties’ semi which also needed a total makeover: it had peeling paintwork and a gutter which had leaked down the walls leaving a long, mossy stain. Talith’s interest in home building extended to the garden and he scanned this area too with a critical eye. Unlike others in the row, the front garden was messy. A few optimistic daffodils poked cheerfully through a lawn that was sadly neglected, weedy with bare mud patches and more than its fair share of moss. The path was a series of concrete slabs which lurched drunkenly towards the front door.

  Talith pursed his lips in disapproval, lifted a meaty fist and banged hard, making WPC Lara Tinsley almost jump out of her skin. The door opened. With reluctance, it seemed, almost on a ratchet, one stiff inch at a time.

  Whatever the misgivings Talith might have had about Neil Mansfield’s home-caring skills there was no doubt that his world had been turned upside down by recent events. He was a plump, lazy-looking man of medium height with a beer gut which bulged the size of an eight-month pregnancy. He was tidily dressed in a maroon crew-necked sweater and jeans, and he was wearing slippers. His face was lardy pale, very slightly sweaty and sagging with tiredness and grief. He looked unhealthy – a cardiac risk. Again, this was a knowledge and skill Talith had acquired since the mortgage company had advised him to lose weight and quit smoking. He was trying but it was proving much harder than he’d thought. Cigarettes even invaded his dreams, pushing their way between his lips. He would wake with the scent and taste of tobacco in his mouth, feel his lungs dragging in the forbidden smoke and think of a fry-up for breakfast. Talith took a deep breath in and savoured the evocative scent while Neil Mansfield stared back at them, his eyes hollow and haunted. He looked as though he hadn’t slept for a week.

  ‘Have you …’ he asked with eagerness, his eyes sparking for the briefest of moments as he looked from one to the other, only for the spark to extinguish as quickly as it had risen. Even Talith, who was not known for his sentiment, felt a lump in his throat. He simply shook his head with an apologetic, ‘Sorry, mate,’ quickly followed by a, ‘can we come in?’

  Mansfield stood back politely, then led the way into a small square sitting room, garish black and orange wallpaper on one wall, the others, mercifully, painted plain cream. The television was on, but the sound was down and they had the feeling that Mansfield hadn’t really been watching it. It had been a distraction, something to mop up his ragged senses and fill the gap of emptiness and silence. On-screen people moved and gesticulated and words below added detail. At a quick glance it looked like The Jeremy Kyle Show. The people
looked angry and there was a baying audience, their jeers felt even through the silence. Mansfield glanced at it, his head tilted to one side, uncomprehending. He’d just wanted to fill the void. With this? Talith was surprised but looking at Neil Mansfield he realized that nothing on the television was penetrating his consciousness. His eyes looked vacant. Spaced out, lost and unhappy. The room smelt stale, testimony to many past nights of alcohol and cigarettes and little fresh air. There was a pungent scent of some plug-in air freshener but it didn’t – not really. In the corner, peeping around the edge of the sofa as though it shouldn’t really be there, stood a large plastic toy basket. Both officers saw it and immediately shifted their glances away. No one needed a reminder of the missing child. Mansfield passed a hand across his forehead and sank down on the sofa without inviting the two officers to do the same.

  They did anyway, dropping heavily into the saggy brown armchairs.

  Next to where Mansfield had been sitting a baby doll in a grubby pink Babygro was lying face down. It looked as though Neil Mansfield had been holding it and dropped it when he’d heard them at the door. He looked down at the doll, then up at the police, and shook his head as though he had suddenly come to his senses. ‘But I’ve already …’ he protested.

  ‘… Given us a statement,’ Lara Tinsley filled in smoothly, sympathy oozing out of her flat, plain face. ‘We know that, Neil. We just want to go over it with you. Why don’t you tell us a bit about you and Tracy first? How long have you two been together?’ she asked chattily.

  It did the trick. Tinsley was adept at putting people at their ease. Besides, people love to talk about themselves and this wasn’t a dangerous subject – surely?

  After the briefest of pauses Mansfield started up. ‘I met her couple of years ago,’ he said, before explaining, ‘she needed some work doing.’ He looked up, a light warming his pleasant brown eyes. ‘Her bathroom needed a lick of paint and some tiling.’ He smiled. ‘You know how awkward some of these little rooms can be. I went along to sort it. And things …’ Now there was hesitation in his voice. ‘Things sort of went from there.’