Betrayed in Cornwall

by Janie Bolitho

  The three-piece suite and the carpet matched but the curtains did not. The furniture was old but not antique, although there were some nice pieces which were in keeping with the age and style of the building. Despite Jack’s lack of interest it was a pleasant room which needed only a few touches to make it really attractive and welcoming. Rose knew better than to suggest so. She would have been told either to mind her own business or else to make the alterations herself, depending upon Jack’s mood.

  ‘Black or white?’ He drank it both ways. She stood beside him noting his greyish pallor and the sheen of sweat on his brow. Unshaven, his hair still ruffled from sleep, he looked older but no less handsome.

  ‘Black, please, two sugars. And there’s a bottle of pills by the sink, can you bring them with you?’

  He’s in pain, she thought, far more than he’ll let on. It was hard to imagine what being shot must have felt like, what would have gone through his mind when the bullet struck, if anything had at all. Maybe one day he’d tell her.

  Rose made the coffee and carried the mugs across the hall into the front room. She placed them on the mats that were kept permanently on the table by the window and took a seat opposite Jack before sliding the plastic container of tablets towards him. ‘They haven’t given you many.’

  ‘Enough to last until I see the doc on Thursday.’

  They sipped their coffee, not entirely at ease in each other’s company.

  ‘Have you heard anything more about Joe?’ Rose finally asked to break the silence in the room. Outside the rain continued to fall and the thunder to rumble. Gusts of wind rattled the sash windows. Rose could feel a draught from beneath the lower frame.

  ‘I’ve been trying to work out what’s going on here,’ Jack began. ‘These are the facts. Joe dies, a packet of heroin is found near his body, Sarah disappears only to be found with Mark Hurte who was seen with someone called Terry close to the place where Joe’s body was found. Mark was armed. Sarah was told she was to be released on Tuesday, today, sometime after midday, but we don’t know why that specific time was relevant or if it was true. Roger Hammond’s house gets broken into, and Hammond just happens to be Etta Chynoweth’s bit on the side.’

  Rose flinched. It had not come across like that the way Etta had told her, but she let Jack continue uninterrupted.

  ‘Out there is a trawler, anchored since the early hours of Monday and supposedly landing today.’

  ‘Yes, you mentioned something about that last night. But why are you telling me now?’

  Because it doesn’t matter now, and because, for all I know, you just might have worked it out already, Rosie, dear – and if you have I want to know, he thought. ‘Well, there has to be a connection. As far as I can make out, everything revolves around the Chynoweth family. On top of all that we were given information that a fishing-boat might be trying to land something other than fish within the next few days. The day Tuesday in particular was mentioned.’

  ‘Ah, the drugs connection.’

  Jack shrugged. ‘Possibly.’

  ‘Well, as you know, Sarah happened to mention the relationship between her mother and Roger Hammond to Mark. I could make a good guess at some of it, Jack, but even knowing about the boat I can’t get the drugs to fit in anywhere.’ Rose gazed out of the window. It was almost a week since she’d done any work. She had a sudden desire to forget Jack Pearce and the Chynoweth family for a few hours and put on her oilskins and find a high spot where she could paint the broiling, storm-ridden sea, or walk in the rain with the wind in her face until she felt cleansed. But it wouldn’t bring Joe back.

  ‘Care to elucidate?’

  ‘If you promise not to scoff.’

  Jack raised his eyebrows and tried not to smile. Damp and dishevelled, wearing baggy jeans and a fisherman’s shirt beneath the raincoat she had not bothered to remove, Rose still managed to look both provocative and fragile. He knew that the latter was far from the truth. He had made the mistake of thinking that before. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I think it was like this. Sarah met Mark and was either flattered by the attention of someone older, or she went out with him in defiance of Etta who disapproved of her friends. Not that they met on a regular basis, and then Sarah’s friends told me Mark wasn’t that interested, that he was probably using her. I also learned something else.’ She stopped. ‘Look, Jack, there are things I’ll tell you only if you promise not to act upon them.’

  ‘Rose, be reasonable, you know I can’t give you any such guarantee.’

  She sighed. It was an unreasonable request. ‘I know.’ She chewed her lip. Would it be a betrayal of Roz if she continued? Or would it be more a betrayal of Joe if she didn’t? Perhaps she could word it in such a way that Roz need not be involved. She had liked the girl. No, too many lies had been told by other people, she would not add herself to the list. ‘All right. Roz told me that Mark sells drugs. Nothing big, the odd joint, that kind of thing, but Sarah doesn’t take them as far as I know.

  ‘As you know, by chance Sarah and Roz discover that Etta is seeing Roger Hammond. They also discover, although not by chance, where he lives and that he’s rich. Roz’s view is that Etta’s private life is her own concern and she doesn’t show much sympathy for Sarah who is genuinely upset. Sarah, no doubt looking for comfort, confides all this to Mark. Mark, in turn, passes the information on; my guess is that it was Terry he told. No one seems to know anything about this Terry but it could be that he has friends in that line of business. I mean breaking and entering or whatever the legal terminology is. Meanwhile they’ve encountered Joe, for whatever reason, and he has to be silenced.’

  ‘Why?’ Jack leaned forward, forgetting his leg, and flinched with pain. ‘Why on earth would they need to silence him?’ It was the big question, the answer to which eluded him. Could it have been an accident after all?

  ‘I’ve thought a lot about this. There could be several reasons why they encountered each other. Maybe Mark told Joe about his mother’s affair and he and Terry asked him to go in on the burglary job as a way of revenge on Hammond, maybe they wanted him to bring in something on the boat, or maybe Joe approached them with the intention of warning Mark to keep away from Sarah. He would have hated the idea of his sister being mixed up with someone involved with drugs.’

  ‘You’re not making much sense, Rose.’

  ‘I know. It all seems clear in my head, I just can’t explain it properly.’

  ‘Have another go. I’ve got all day.’

  ‘If Mark did pass on the information about Hammond and the fact that he would be away for some time, maybe the heroin was his payment. If there was a struggle perhaps the packet went over the side with Joe or maybe it was put there to draw attention away from what really took place that night. Sarah believes Mark saw her on that bus and that he told Terry she’d seen them, so they had to do something about it. As you said, you don’t know if she would have been released today, but I think it’s possible. They had taken her to a place where she was unlikely to be found so why not kill her immediately and make a run for it? Because, if they were involved in the break-in at the Hammond place, they wanted her out of the way only until the job was over and the stuff out of the county. Terry had already made his exit and Mark was left with Sarah, armed and holding the baby, so to speak.’

  ‘Good point.’

  ‘How did they find her, by the way? Or, rather, the hut?’

  ‘Not by great detective work, as it happens. When you mentioned that she and Mark used a hut or shed as a place to meet we started a search of any likely building in the area. One of the officers on the case goes fishing in his spare time; a rod and line man. He’d seen the shed from his boat on several occasions.’

  ‘I see.’ She paused. Her information had been more than useful. She had yet to receive a thank-you for it. ‘Anyway, in the end I came to the conclusion that Sarah’s disappearance was nothing to do with Joe’s death. Roger Hammond wasn’t expected home for another week. I think the burglary
took place on Sunday and that’s why they wanted Sarah out of the way. If someone discovered it the same day and Sarah heard about it on the news she might have gone straight to the police and admitted what she’d told Mark before they had a chance to get clear of the area.

  ‘You see, they obviously knew what they were doing and they would have had to pack the stuff to prevent it becoming damaged. Such things take time.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘Whoever Mark and Terry passed the information on to. If you haven’t found them yet it must have been carefully planned. They probably broke in and packed the stuff during Sunday night and hid it over Monday night. Once it was on its way out of the county this morning, it was safe for Sarah to go home in the early afternoon.

  ‘Now, according to Sarah, Terry left the hut late on Monday afternoon saying he would return. I don’t believe he meant to do that. I think he went to join whoever he was in with, leaving Mark with the gun and Sarah as his hostage. Mark was too frightened to disobey Terry even if he ended up taking all the blame. No one knows who this Terry is or where he comes from. He’d probably intended all along to rejoin his accomplices at that point.’ She paused for breath and to take another sip of coffee. It was almost cold. ‘I’d imagine Mark hadn’t got a clue what was really going on and panicked when you lot appeared. Could I be right?’

  ‘Quite possibly.’

  ‘You’re not saying anything, Jack. Haven’t you got any views on this?’

  ‘Not as many as you, it seems.’

  ‘Oh, my God!’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Think about it, Jack. You’ve been worried about that trawler. Suppose it isn’t bringing something in, but taking something out? Such as Roger Hammond’s collections. I mean, they can hardly go by train, they’d be stopped easily enough, and the only other way out of the county is by road, and that has to be via the Tamar Bridge or the one at Gunnislake, and they’re both easy places to put up a road-block.’

  ‘Private plane?’

  Rose shrugged but when she looked up she saw Jack was grinning. ‘You’re right. The perfect way out is by boat, especially a private craft which doesn’t have to register its movements.’

  ‘Then the trawler…?’

  ‘Ah, there’s the snag. It’s on its way in now. The Joint Intelligence Cell has wasted an awful lot of time waiting for it to move but they couldn’t risk boarding it until they knew what it was up to. In the end they had no need to. It turned out to be engine trouble. The engineer thought he could repair it himself without extra expense, but he failed. He’d been working on it non-stop since they anchored. He had to give up and another vessel went to its aid early this morning, taking out a spare part. They’d started back for Newlyn as soon as they realised what was wrong, but they broke down altogether and didn’t quite make it. The powers that be couldn’t take a chance on questioning the owner of the vessel in case he was also involved.’

  Rose sat upright. Her hands were clasped around her mug and her lips were pursed in concentration. ‘I still believe a boat’s involved.’ She thought some more. ‘What if that trawler was a decoy? What if the crew were paid just to act suspiciously even though they weren’t doing anything illegal? How did you know about it anyway?’

  How, indeed, Jack thought. Douggie told me, although he didn’t give me much to go on. Maybe he’d been paid to inform the police to be on the look-out, and whilst they were watching incoming traffic, another vessel was leaving with its stolen cargo. He got to his feet and hopped across the room, causing Rose to hide a smile at his awkwardness.

  ‘Who’re you ringing?’

  ‘Plymouth. I think you’re right, I think they need to watch anyone leaving. If it isn’t too late.’ He passed on the information and came back to the table.

  ‘You think I might be right?’ Her eyes lit up.

  ‘Very possibly.’

  ‘Jack, I’ve had another thought.’

  ‘Oh, please. Spare me. Look, go and fetch some more coffee like the good woman you are then tell me what else has crossed your clever little mind.’

  ‘You didn’t take your pain-killers,’ Rose pointed out, for once ignoring one of his more patronising remarks which would normally have brought forth a sharp retort.

  ‘The rain’s easing,’ she said, when she returned with two more mugs of coffee. ‘I saw a patch of blue from your kitchen window.’

  ‘I’m not interested in the weather, Rose. Tell me what else you think.’ This time he did pick up the container and, frowning, finally twisted off the child-proof lid and swallowed two of the tablets.

  ‘This comes back to Joe again. I’d thought of three reasons why he might have come into contact with Mark and Terry, which I’ve just given you, but supposing they asked him if he was prepared to take some boxes out to sea? The trawler would be empty on its outward voyage – well, apart from fuel and supplies – so there’d be plenty of room. It would be easy enough to sail so many miles out to sea and meet another boat who would relieve them of their cargo, then they could carry on fishing as normal and no one would be any the wiser.’

  ‘The idea had crossed my mind, too, but it still comes back to the same thing: Joe was not the skipper, he would not have been able to make the decision.’

  Rose sighed and pushed back her hair. It was beginning to dry, the waves kinking back into shape. ‘So what happens now?’

  ‘Both Sarah and Hurte are being interviewed this morning. Sarah will be asked questions and asked to make a statement in a far more formal setting than her home and without the presence of her mother, which wasn’t strictly necessary last night.’

  ‘Oh? But the nice, kind policeman realised she needed her mum?’

  ‘We’re not all the bastards you think we are, Rose.’

  True, she thought, but two can play at that game. Repayment for earlier. We’re quits again.

  ‘We might hear a totally different version of events from the girl this morning, and at least we’ll be able to compare what she and Hurte say. It’s just a bloody nuisance we haven’t got a lead on Terry.’

  ‘But you will, if he’s got a record.’

  ‘Quite. If he’s got a record. Without one any fingerprints found in that hut will be useless. We don’t even know his surname, or if, indeed, he is called Terry.’

  ‘Look, I’d better go, Jack. I don’t want to worry my parents again, although they know I’m with you.’ She laughed as she buttoned up her raincoat.

  ‘What’s so funny about that?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Rose shivered. The dampness had penetrated the lining of her mac. She was not about to repeat to Jack her father’s parting shot or her mother’s acid reply. ‘Well, she ought to be safe enough there,’ he’d said.

  ‘Oh, she’ll be all right, it’s Jack I’m worried about, especially in his weakened state,’ Evelyn had stated.

  Rose had been wrong about the weather, the tiny patch of lighter sky had been swallowed up by cloud. She drove home through the dismal gloom, the windscreen wipers sending sheets of water left and right. She parked her father’s car behind her own and opened the kitchen door. A wet and doleful-looking Laura was sitting at the table with her mother.

  ‘You’re soaked,’ Evelyn said. ‘Take that thing off and I’ll hang it up.’

  Rose took off her raincoat and handed it to her mother. ‘Hi, Laura. Have they been entertaining you?’

  ‘Filling me in on your latest exploits, more like it.’

  ‘Not this time. I haven’t done anything, it’s Jack who had the lucky escape.’

  ‘Mm. So I understand.’

  ‘Where’s Dad?’ Rose asked.

  ‘He’s in the sitting-room watching cricket with the sound down. It’s not raining in London.’

  ‘Oh, good.’ They would not be interrupted. ‘You’re not your usual cheery little self. What’s up?’ Rose studied her friend’s face. Laura was always able to look on the bright side, with one exception, and that was where Trevor was concerned. There we
re lines in the tight skin of her thin face and her hands were restless in her lap. She had obviously not been there long because her black hair in its usual disarray was still misted with rain.

  ‘It’s Trevor,’ she admitted, as Rose had known she would.

  ‘Another row?’

  ‘Shall I leave, dear?’ Evelyn asked Laura, then looked at Rose with the same question in her eyes.

  ‘No, Evelyn, do stay. Maybe you could give me the benefit of your wisdom.’

  Evelyn laughed and patted Laura’s shoulder. ‘I might be older than you, but it’s no guarantee I’m any wiser.’

  ‘No, but your marriage works.’

  Rose decided a brandy was called for. She avoided making eye contact with her mother. If she wanted to drink brandy at eleven thirty in the morning, there was nothing to stop her doing so, not even parental disapproval. But even as she poured it she was aware that she still felt very much her mother’s daughter, that certain things never changed no matter what age you reached.

  The first glass she handed to Laura who accepted it without surprise or complaint, thus confirming Evelyn’s opinion of her daughter’s strange drinking habits. But both girls, as she thought of them, seemed a bit down and they were both wet, maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea after all. ‘Don’t I get one, too?’ she asked with a smile.

  ‘Of course.’ Rose raised her eyebrows at Laura.

  ‘Now, if you want my advice you’ll have to tell me what Trevor’s done to upset you.’

  ‘Nothing, Evelyn, that’s the point. Nothing I can put my finger on. I shouldn’t have mentioned it, I really came to find out if Rose knew if there’s any date set for the funeral yet.’

  ‘No. But surely Trevor as one of the crew will be one of the first to be told,’ Rose said.

  ‘Yes, but he’s not speaking to me.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh, Rose, it’s so ridiculous. It all started the other day as a bit of fun. He said he was thinking of giving up fishing. He could see I was horrified. It would never work, not if we were together all the time.