Betrayed in Cornwall

by Janie Bolitho

  But where did Mark come into it? Why would this man involve someone else? Because he didn’t know Sarah by sight and needed to find someone who did. This still didn’t explain the packet of heroin but maybe the unknown man had used it to pay Mark to lead him to Joe and it had been dropped accidentally; maybe it had been planted on Joe to draw attention away from the real cause of his death. One thing was certain, the police needed to do a lot more investigating before the whole truth came out.

  ‘You’re right.’ The cork came out of the bottle with a satisfying plop. ‘I’ll have to tell Jack. Let’s hope he’s back by now.’

  Rose poured her parents’ coffee and a glass of wine for herself then went to the telephone, a little worried when she discovered Jack still could not be reached.

  10

  When Jack opened his eyes everything overhead was still moving but swaying in a different kind of way and the sky had turned a shiny white. ‘It’s all right, sir, you’re on your way to hospital,’ a disembodied voice informed him before the face of the paramedic swam into focus. ‘You were shot but you’ll be all right.’

  ‘Was anyone else hurt?’ Jack struggled to sit up but a firm hand pushed him down again.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Thank God.’ The sequence of events came back to him. It had all been his fault and he had, in all probability, ruined the whole operation.

  The ambulance pulled into the bay at West Cornwall Hospital and Jack was lowered down on a stretcher and wheeled into the building. He felt impotent and impatient to learn what had happened – whether Rose and Sarah were safe, whether Mark Hurte and the second man had been arrested – but no one here was able to tell him and if the officer who had accompanied him knew, he wasn’t saying.

  The ambulance crew had called ahead to say that the bullet had exited the flesh and were told that it could be dealt with locally rather than at Treliske Hospital in Truro.

  It seemed an eternity to Jack before his wounds were cleaned and dressed yet he had been attended to promptly. He had been lucky, he was told after he was examined, the bullet had sliced through the fleshy part of his thigh and he did not need surgery. Whoever had fired that gun had either wanted him incapacitated or else was a very bad shot if they had aimed to kill. Then Jack realised it was more likely that whoever had shot him had panicked, had possibly not even meant to fire.

  ‘It’s going to hurt once the local anaesthetic wears off,’ the casualty doctor warned him. ‘I’ll give you enough pain-killers to get you through a couple of days. After that go and see your GP.’ He had shaken his head, half in despair, half in relief, when Jack insisted he was well enough to go home. The inspector ought to stay in overnight for observation; on the other hand, the free bed would be welcome. Within less than two hours of his arrival at the hospital Jack was on his way home, sitting uncomfortably in the back of a police vehicle, his thigh throbbing in rhythm with each beat of his heart.

  It was several minutes before he could bring himself to ask the outcome of his mistake.

  ‘One man under arrest, sir, and the girl’s unharmed.’

  One man? The girl? Were there only two people in that hut when he had believed there were four?

  ‘Just the two of them,’ the officer confirmed. ‘The boy was scared stiff. Shaking like a leaf, apparently, and ready to spill the beans.’

  ‘Do you know what happened?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Some of it, what I heard over the radio whilst they were seeing to you. After the lad fired that shot he went to pieces. Threw out the gun when he was asked to and came out crying, the girl by his side. She was shaken up badly, barely able to speak, so I don’t know her side of the story. They took Hurte to Camborne and he’s being interviewed now. Home, I take it, sir?’

  As much as he would have liked to be in on the interview, Jack knew it was impossible. Weakened with flu, and in pain, he would only repeat his earlier error of judgement and ruin things for a second time. ‘Yes. Home, please.’

  The hospital had loaned him a stick which Jack felt foolish and clumsy using. When, assisted by the officer who had driven him, he entered his front door he found it hard to accept that it was still not late, only ten o’clock. So much had happened in the last three and a half hours. ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘I’ll be fine now.’ But he had to grit his teeth to make it into the living-room.

  Leaning against the table he pulled the white plastic pharmacy container containing the rest of the pain-killers from his pocket. He had a choice – take one and go to bed, or forgo it and have a large whisky and hope he didn’t regret it later. He had been warned of their strength and knew it was unwise to mix them with alcohol.

  Beside the whisky bottle was his favourite cut-glass tumbler. Heavy-based, it tapered up into thin glass which chinked when tapped with a fingernail. It was decorated with delicate tulips which, in comparison with the glass, were slightly opaque. It had been a present, one of a pair given to him by his colleagues when he left Leeds and returned to Cornwall. Since that time the second glass had broken in much the same way as his marriage had done. Marion had remarried but had never prevented him from seeing the boys as often as he wanted when they were young. Looking back, his marriage to Marion seemed to have taken place in a different lifetime. The boys were men now and had their own lives, but they visited him just as often as they had done in their childhood. His decision to move back to Cornwall had been the reason Marion left him, no one else had been involved on either side. She hated the West Country just as Jack had hated city life and she had moved back to Leeds.

  ‘If you can’t stand it here, why did you ever leave?’ she had often asked him when he complained.

  ‘Because I needed to know.’ It was true. He had not wanted to end up never having been anywhere or done anything. So he had discovered he wasn’t happy outside Cornwall and returned with the wife he had met and married in Yorkshire. But just as he had been unable to settle, neither had Marion in her new home. Within two years they had separated.

  Jack wondered why he was thinking of her now when he so rarely did. Then he remembered and smiled at the irony. Marion had never been able to relax when he was on duty, always imagining the worst, the knock on the door to say he had been hurt or killed in the cause of duty. He never had been, not until now. If Marion knew, she would appreciate the black humour of the situation. One of her reasons for agreeing to their move west was that she thought he’d be safer and the children would have better lives.

  ‘Damn.’ There were messages on the answering-machine. He hobbled towards it, ignoring the pain.

  ‘DC Green here, sir. Message from a Mrs Trevelyan. It’s a bit cryptic but she says she’s at home now.’

  ‘Oh, you bitch,’ Jack said as his breathing quickened. ‘You sodding bitch.’

  He played the second message. ‘Jack, it’s me, Rose. I need to speak to you. Will you ring me tonight, no matter how late?’ He’d been shot because of her and now she was ringing as though nothing had happened. He sank into a chair and took several deep breaths, his fury at her nonchalance hurting almost as much as his leg. It was thanks to her that he was in such pain. No, that was unfair. He had not been shot because of her, the reason had been his feelings for her and his own stupidity. Rose was not to blame. He would very much like to know exactly where she had been during the time she was supposedly missing.

  But at the same time he wanted to go over to Newlyn and wring her neck.

  The whisky was having its effect more rapidly than usual because of his state of mind and the temporary weakness of his body. He picked up the telephone and rang for a taxi. He would have it out with her once and for all and then he would be shot of her for ever. A one-sided relationship was no use to anyone.

  It was easier said than done. For a start he had to ask the driver to go as far up the drive as the two cars parked there allowed because he would never have made it on foot, even with his stick. And then there were Rose’s parents. He had hoped they might be in bed.

  All
three were seated around the kitchen table, their supper dishes stacked but not washed. Their faces were serious.

  ‘Jack, come in,’ Rose said when she looked up and saw his figure pass the window and pause in the open doorway. The air was heavy and oppressive and there was no cross-draught to alleviate it. ‘I’m so glad you’re here. We’ve been talking about Joe and Sarah and – Oh!’ She took two steps backwards. ‘What’s happened, Jack? You’re hurt. Come and sit down.’ She reached for his arm and guided him to the remaining empty chair.

  Grim-faced, wondering what on earth he was thinking of coming here at this time of night with a very large whisky under his belt, Jack did as Rose said. ‘Sarah’s safe,’ were the first words he spoke as he lowered himself carefully into the hard-backed kitchen chair, his left leg extended straight in front of him.

  ‘Thank goodness. What a relief for Etta.’ Rose, too, sat down, brushing her loosened hair back in a familiar gesture.

  Jack saw that it was a relief for Rose, too, because tears came into her eyes. Her father reached across the table and held her hand. ‘We’ve all been worried,’ Arthur said. ‘So many odd things have been happening.’

  ‘And Mark Hurte’s been arrested and charged.’ Rose had noticed he had been injured but she still hadn’t asked why one trouser leg was pinned together, wadding and bandaging visible between the cut seam, and why he was carrying the hospital-issue walking-stick.

  ‘With what?’

  ‘Abduction, possession of an unlicensed firearm and –’

  But realisation dawned. Rose stared at his leg, her mouth wide open. ‘He shot you?’

  Jack nodded. ‘I’ll get over it.’ He paused. ‘I thought you were with them,’ he said quietly.

  There was a stunned silence as the implications sank in. Rose and her parents guessed that he had risked his life for her. He allowed them to think it: it was, in part, true. But he could not bring himself to own up to the fact that he should not have been there to start with and that he had made a dreadful mistake. It was not only his own life he had risked. Deep down he was no different from Rose, he realised.

  ‘Rose, dear, I think you ought to let Jack know why you wanted to speak to him then he can either do something about it or go home to bed which is where, in my opinion, he should be right now. Can I get you something, Jack? A hot drink, or something stronger?’

  To hell with it, he thought. It might prove to be a long and painful night but he would not be working in the morning. ‘A whisky would be very welcome, if you have it.’

  ‘I think we’ll all have something.’ Evelyn went off to pour their drinks, leaving behind undercurrents she had no hope of interpreting and another awkward silence. It was Jack who broke it.

  ‘Your parents contacted me to say you had not come home. They sounded so worried I had no option but to take what they said seriously. Then, when I heard that someone believed they had found the place where the Chynoweth girl might be hidden, I imagined they’d either got you as well or you knew more than you were saying and had got there ahead of me.’

  It was, in its way, a flattering statement. It meant Jack did not doubt her capabilities of deduction, whatever he might say to the contrary. But she still felt the need to make excuses. ‘Yes. My mother said she’d rung you, and she did try to get back to you, or, at least, I did. I rang the station and I left a message,’ she added defensively. ‘But Jack, I wasn’t that late. I mean, it wasn’t the middle of the night or anything, I was only late by an hour or so.’

  ‘They were worried, Rose. They acted in what they thought were your best interests.’

  Here we go, she thought. Someone’s taken a shot at the man, might even have killed him, but that’s irrelevant, there’s no way he’s going to let me off a lecture. ‘It was a misunderstanding. I apologise if it caused you to get things wrong.’

  Colour flooded Jack’s face. She could not possibly know what he had done. No, it was Rose’s way of offering an apology without actually meaning it. She had managed to make him the guilty party as usual.

  Evelyn returned with the drinks on a small silver tray and handed them round. ‘Tell him, Rose. Tell Jack everything that you told us earlier.’

  Once more she went through what she had learned from Amy and Roz, hesitating only when she mentioned Etta’s affair. ‘I had no idea, she didn’t even hint at it,’ Rose admitted, but loyalty to her friend stopped her from mentioning what she had learned from Maddy Duke earlier that evening.

  Jack listened without comment, realising that Rose did not know about the trawler which was under constant surveillance. But then, there were things she had told him which he had not known, and maybe more she had not told him. He had been aware of her hesitation at one point in the narration. It would be typical of Rose to hold something back. Yet all that she suspected was possible and showed that there might be more than one incident involved here. ‘Who is this man?’

  ‘Does it matter?’ Rose was biting the end of her hair, a sure sign that she was prevaricating.

  ‘Of course it does, after what you’ve suspected. Ah, you do know who it is.’ He realised by her question that she did.

  Rose blushed. Etta had enough on her plate without having to face local gossip. And if the affair was over why risk breaking up a marriage? Then she saw Joe as he had been on that Sunday lunchtime when he had talked of the sea and she knew that for his sake Jack had to know the whole truth.

  Inhaling deeply she began. ‘Maddy rang me. Maddy Duke. That’s when I knew I had to leave a message for you, you had to know tonight. But I really hoped I could keep his name out of it, for Etta’s sake.’ Jack nodded, wishing she would get to the point. He ran a hand through his hair signalling impatience then moved his leg a few inches to the left. ‘I don’t know if I told you but Maddy’s daughter has finally made contact. Anyway, she told me on the night we were all at Geoff’s gallery then rang tonight to ask if I’d like to meet her.’

  ‘Is this relevant?’

  ‘Yes. That was the reason why Maddy rang, you see, but the conversation turned into something else. I said I wasn’t sure I could make it this week because my parents are here until Thursday and, at the time, I didn’t know that Sarah was safe and I wanted to be on hand if it turned out to be bad news and Etta needed me. Maddy had heard of Joe’s death, of course, but she didn’t realise I was a friend of the family.

  ‘Anyway, I was explaining what happened to Maddy when she interrupted me. I could hardly believe what I was hearing, Jack.’

  He sat back with folded arms as Rose related the main points of the conversation …

  ‘Etta?’ Maddy had said, sounding surprised when Rose explained she was Joe’s mother.

  ‘Do you know her?’

  ‘No. But I know the name. It’s unusual, that’s why I remembered it.’

  Rose had taken notice then. Etta’s boyfriend lived in St Ives, Maddy Duke worked and lived there too, perhaps she knew him. ‘Where did you hear it?’

  ‘In the shop. A customer wanted a gift made. One of my necklaces – you know the ones I make from wood?’

  Rose did. Maddy was capable of carving the most intricate designs on tiny blocks then stringing them on thongs. It was not the sort of jewellery which appealed to Rose, she liked more feminine pieces, but they sold well, especially to younger customers and what Rose called the Earth Mother type. And Etta Chynoweth fell into the latter category. How strange that her life had evolved in such a way that she had had to live up to her name. Etta had once explained that it was of German origin and meant ruler of the home. ‘Yes. Go on.’

  ‘Well, this tall, good-looking guy came in and had a look around. I thought at first that he hadn’t got a clue what he wanted so I asked if I could help. It was then he said he’d like one of the necklaces but instead of me carving the name on the blocks he wanted the actual letters carved out of the wood.

  ‘I said I could do it. The name he wanted was Etta. He offered to pay in advance. Later I suspected that he’d wai
ted until the shop was empty before asking, and that’s why he’d been so busy looking around.’

  ‘Did he collect it?’

  ‘Yes, about three or four weeks ago.’

  Around the time of Etta’s birthday, Rose thought. For a man of his supposed wealth it was not an extravagant gift, but it was personal and he would have known Etta could not have explained away gold or diamonds. It had to be the same man. ‘Can you remember his name?’

  ‘Oh, yes, that’s easy, because here’s another coincidence. About an hour ago I heard on the local radio that his place has been burgled.’

  At that point Rose had sat down on the arm of a chair. Coincidence? She did not think so. Maddy was still speaking: she made herself listen.

  ‘He and his wife had been on holiday and they weren’t expected back until next week. From what little the news said I gather he’s rolling in money. Art works of all descriptions went missing. No sum was announced but they said the value was probably somewhere in the region of seven figures if the collections remained intact.’

  Seven figures? Did Etta have any idea just how rich the man was?

  ‘What’s he called?’

  ‘Sorry. Didn’t I say? Roger Hammond.’

  Roger Hammond. The name meant nothing to Rose. ‘Thanks, Maddy. Can I let you know another time about getting together? I really would like to meet Julie.’

  ‘Of course. I can’t wait to see her, Rose. I’m so excited. I mean, first the letter, then she followed it up with a telephone call and we made the arrangements. It’s as if she can’t wait either. I didn’t expect her to come down for several weeks. I just hope I’m not a great disappointment.’ In her excitement the tragedy in the Chynoweth household took second place.

  ‘You won’t be, Maddy. You couldn’t possibly be. Take care, I’ll speak to you soon …’

  Arthur and Evelyn sat quietly while Rose related all this to Jack even though they had heard it once already.

  ‘What do you think, Jack? Is there any way you can speak to him discreetly?’