Dead and Gone

by Dorothy Simpson

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  To Charlotte, James and Elliot

  And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.

  Mark 7. 20–23.

  ONE

  Thanet and Joan were getting ready for bed when the telephone rang. It was just after midnight. Their eyes met. Alexander?

  Joan was nearest and she snatched up the receiver. ‘Hullo?’ The tension showed in every line of her body, in the intensity of her concentration. Then she relaxed. ‘It’s Pater,’ she said, handing Thanet the phone.

  The Station Officer.

  Thanet found that he had been holding his breath. ‘What’s the problem?’ he snapped. Anxiety was making him short-tempered these days.

  ‘Woman gone missing, sir.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Couple of hours ago.’

  ‘Only a couple of hours? So why all the fuss? She probably had a row with her old man and walked out to cool off.’ Literally and metaphorically, thought Thanet. It was high summer, school holidays and the middle of a heatwave, a prime time – along with Christmas – for domestic disputes to escalate.

  ‘Her “old man” is Mr Mintar, sir. Mr Ralph Mintar.’

  The rising inflection in Pater’s voice indicated that he expected Thanet to know who he was talking about. As indeed he did.

  ‘The QC?’

  ‘The same.’

  ‘Ah.’ Thanet had come across Mintar in court from time to time. The barrister was hardly the type to lose his head in a crisis. If he had reported his wife missing he must have good reason for concern. ‘I see. So what’s the story?’

  ‘Apparently she disappeared in the middle of entertaining friends. After they finished eating they all decided to go for a swim and everyone went off to change. Only she didn’t come back. It was a while before anyone noticed she wasn’t there and they’ve been looking for her ever since.’

  ‘And no apparent reason for her to walk out?’

  ‘Not so far as PC Chambers could gather. And he’s pretty much on the ball, as you know.’

  ‘Quite. Well, I’d better get out there. The Super been informed?’

  Superintendent Draco liked to keep his finger on the pulse of what was happening on his patch.

  ‘He’s away for the weekend, sir.’

  ‘Of course. I forgot.’ That was a relief, anyway. Draco had a nasty habit of dogging Thanet’s footsteps at the start of any remotely interesting investigation. ‘Contact Lineham and lay on some reinforcements, will you? What’s the address?’

  ‘Windmill Court, Paxton, sir.’

  Thanet scribbled the directions down. It was all too easy to get lost in a maze of country lanes in the dark.

  ‘Sorry, love,’ he said to Joan, who was in bed by now.

  She shrugged. ‘Can’t be helped.’ But her pretended insouciance did not deceive him. She would have liked him to be with her in case there was any more news.

  They were both desperately worried about their daughter Bridget, who was thirty-two weeks pregnant with her first baby and had suddenly developed toxaemia. Although Lineham’s wife Louise had had similar problems when their first child was born, until a few days ago Thanet and Joan hadn’t known precisely what the prognosis was, but Alexander, her husband, was keeping them up to date on what was happening and they had learned fast: Bridget’s blood pressure was alarmingly high and there was protein in her urine. She was therefore in danger of pre-eclampsia – fits – and the baby’s oxygen supply was threatened. She had been taken into hospital for monitoring.

  Thanet finished knotting his tie and went to sit on the bed, took Joan’s hands in his. ‘If you need me, just ring and I’ll get back as soon as I can.’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t suppose we’ll hear anything more tonight.’

  ‘All the same . . .’

  ‘I know.’

  He kissed her and left.

  Outside it was still very warm, well over twenty degrees, and Thanet took off his jacket and slung it on to the passenger seat before getting into the car. Then he wound down the window to get a breath of fresh air as he drove. At this time of night there was very little traffic about and once he plunged into the country lanes his seemed to be the only vehicle on the road.

  In an attempt to damp down his worries about Bridget he tried to focus on Ralph Mintar. What did he know about him? Not a lot, it seemed. As a member of the South-Eastern Circuit Mintar was a familiar figure in courtrooms all over Kent and Sussex – less so, of course, since taking silk a few years ago. QCs travel further afield, sometimes having to stay away from home for weeks or even months at a time. Still, he didn’t suppose Mintar had changed much. Always looking as though he had just had a wash and brush-up, the QC was a dapper, well-groomed figure, reticent and self-contained. He belonged to what Thanet always thought of as the softly softly school of advocacy, leading witnesses gently on from one apparently innocuous point to another until they suddenly found that they had fenced themselves in and there was no way out but the direction in which counsel had wanted them to go.

  Thanet knew that in a high percentage of cases of domestic murder it is the husband who has perpetrated the crime. If the worst had happened and Mrs Mintar had come to a sticky end, Mintar would be a formidable suspect to deal with. Thanet felt the first stirrings of excitement. He hoped, of course, that she would be found alive and well, but if she wasn’t, well, he had always relished a challenge.

  He braked sharply to avoid a rabbit which had appeared from nowhere to scuttle across the road in front of him and had then stopped dead, transfixed by his headlights. He put the car into bottom gear and began to edge forward. Go on, go on, he muttered. Move! At last, just as he was about to brake again, it turned and dashed off into the undergrowth at the side of the lane.

  He was on a slight rise here and ahead of him he could now see some scattered lights. That must be Paxton. Street lighting would be sparse, as it always was in the villages, and he guessed that there would be few people still up – though more than usual, perhaps, as it was a Saturday night. He was right. Apart from the occasional glow from an upstairs window, Paxton appeared to be sunk in slumber. The village consisted of one long, straggling street with a pub at each end, one of them opposite the church. There was also a Post Office cum general shop, increasingly a rarity nowadays as the supermarkets killed off their smaller rivals.

  Thanet had memorised Pater’s directions: Turn left at the far end of the village into Miller’s Lane. Take the first right then the second left and it’s on the right, a hundred yards past the windmill.

  There was the dark bulk of the windmill now, its sails a stark silhouette against the night sky and this, no doubt about it, was Windmill Court, lit up like a cruise liner. Thanet swung in between the tall wrought-iron gates and halfway up the drive pulled up for a moment to admire it. The mill owner must have been a prosperous man for he had built himself a fine dwelling. Classic in proportions and as symmetrical as a child’s drawing, it looked for all the world like an elegant doll’s house awaiting inspection. One half expected the front to swing open, revealing exquisitely furnished miniature rooms. As Thanet studied it someone came to peer out of one of the downstair
s windows. There were no cars parked at the front so he decided to follow the drive which curved off around the left side of the house. Here, in front of a long low building which had probably once been stables, were several parked cars, one of them a patrol car. Lineham’s Ford Escort was not among them, he noted. As he got out a uniformed constable hurried forward to greet him.

  ‘Ah, Chambers,’ said Thanet. ‘No one else here yet?’

  ‘No, sir. Just the two of us until now. Simmonds is inside.’

  ‘They’ll be along shortly. I gather you were first on the scene. Fill me in, will you?’

  There wasn’t much more to tell at this stage and as Thanet listened he looked around, taking in his surroundings. The cars were parked on a gravelled area which flanked a well-illuminated L-shaped courtyard with an ornamental well in the middle. One side of the L was a single storey extension. A granny annexe, perhaps? Someone was a keen gardener: carefully trained climbers clothed the walls, and there were numerous tubs and urns of bedding plants. A faint fragrance hung in the still, warm air.

  A door opened, casting a swathe of light across the paving stones, and PC Simmonds emerged, peering into the relative darkness where Thanet and Chambers were standing. There was a woman behind him.

  Thanet moved to meet them and Simmonds introduced him. ‘And this is Mrs Min tar senior, sir/

  ‘You took your time getting here,’ she said. ‘And I don’t know what good you think just one more policeman is going to do.’

  ‘Reinforcements will be along shortly, ma’am,’ said Thanet. He was about to suggest that they go inside when, as if to prove him right, vehicles could be heard approaching and a few moments later two more police cars arrived, followed by Lineham’s Escort. They’d supplied him with eight officers. Good. That would suffice for now. There was only a limited amount that they could do in the dark. If necessary they’d draft in more tomorrow.

  ‘Excuse me for a moment, Mrs Min tar.’ Thanet went to meet Lineham, pleased that the sergeant had arrived. They had worked together for so long now that he felt incomplete beginning an investigation without him.

  ‘What’s the story, sir?’ said Lineham.

  ‘I’ve only just got here; you probably know as much as I do at the moment. I’m about to interview the mother-in-law. Get this lot organised to do a search of the grounds, then join me.’

  Thanet accompanied Mrs Mintar into the house. She led him through a well-appointed kitchen and square hall into a spacious drawing room. It was, as might be expected in a household such as this, an elegant room, furnished with well-polished antiques, luxuriously soft sofas and curtains with elaborate headings. French windows stood wide open to admit the marginally cooler night air and moths were fluttering around the lamps. Thanet crossed the room to glance outside: a broad terrace surrounded by a low brick wall with a gap opposite leading to a shallow flight of steps. Beyond, the shimmer of water. A swimming pool, by the look of it.

  Mrs Mintar did not sit down. Instead, she went to the window at the front of the house and stood looking out, as if she expected her missing daughter-in-law to come strolling up the drive. ‘Everyone has gone off again to look for Virginia.’ There was impatience rather than anxiety in her tone. ‘My son will be here shortly, I expect.’

  ‘Everyone?’

  She turned to face him and he saw her properly for the first time. She was older than he had first thought, he realised, well into her seventies. He should have known she would be as Mintar must be in his fifties. He had been misled by her slim, wiry figure, the vigour with which she moved and her hair, which was a deep chestnut brown without a trace of grey and was cut in a cropped, modern style. She was wearing cinnamon-coloured linen trousers and a loose long-sleeved silk tunic in the same colour. Around her neck was a leather thong from which depended an intricately carved wooden pendant. The effect was stylish, somewhat unconventional, and not exactly what Thanet would have expected of Mintar’s mother. What would he have expected, if he’d thought about it? What was it that Joan called that flowery print material? Liberty lawn, that was it. Yes, made up into a dress with a high neck and full skirt. No, Mrs Mintar senior definitely wasn’t the Liberty lawn type.

  She sighed. ‘Oh God, I suppose I’m the one who’ll have to give you all the dreary details, as there’s no one else here.’ She turned to peer out of the window again. ‘Where on earth has Ralph got to? He surely should be back by now.’

  Still no word of concern about her daughter-in-law, Thanet noted. ‘Meanwhile . . .’ he said. Then, ‘Won’t you sit down, Mrs Mintar? I need as much information as you can give me.’

  With one last glance down the drive she perched reluctantly on the very edge of a nearby chair. ‘If I must.’

  Thanet sat down facing her. ‘If you could begin by telling me who “everyone” is?’

  She sighed again and ticked the names off on her fingers as she spoke – long, elegant fingers with short workmanlike nails. ‘My son Ralph; Virginia’s sister Jane and her boyfriend Arnold something-or-other, they’re down for the weekend; Howard and Marilyn Squires, our next-door neighbours, they were here for dinner too; and my granddaughter Rachel and her—’

  As if on cue hurried footsteps could be heard on the terrace and a young couple erupted into the room, the girl towing the man behind her.

  ‘Gran! Have they found her?’ she said, dropping his hand and rushing across to her grandmother. Thanet might just as well have been invisible.

  She was in her late teens, Thanet guessed, with the type of middle-class good looks which feature in the Harpers & Queen portrait: regular features and long, straight, blonde hair which shone white-gold in the lamplight. She was wearing an abbreviated bright pink cotton sundress which revealed a perfectly even golden tan.

  The man hung back, acknowledging Thanet with a nod. He was considerably older than the girl – in his late twenties, Thanet guessed – and had the type of good looks Thanet always associated with male models: clean-cut, chiselled features and immmaculately cut hair as fair as Rachel’s. He was wearing slightly baggy dark green chinos, a pale mauve long-sleeved silk shirt – brand new, by the look of the tell-tale creases down each side of the front – canvas deck shoes and white socks. Irrationally and instinctively Thanet felt a twinge of . . . what? Dislike? Mistrust? He wasn’t sure. He only knew that he was glad Bridget had never brought home anyone like this. Oh God, Bridget . . . Please let her be all right . . . With an effort he dragged his attention back to the matter in hand.

  Mrs Mintar shook her head. ‘Not yet.’

  Lineham slipped unobtrusively into the room. All organised.

  ‘And you’ve called the police!’ said Rachel. ‘We saw the cars. Oh, Gran . . .’ The girl dropped to her knees beside the old woman and buried her head in her lap. ‘I can’t bear it. It’s Caro, all over again.’

  Thanet’s eyebrows went up and he gave Mrs Mintar a questioning glance. But her attention was focused on Rachel. ‘Now don’t talk like that, darling,’ she said, stroking the girl’s head. ‘That simply isn’t true. Your mother’s only been gone a couple of hours. She’ll be back soon, you’ll see.’

  Rachel looked up. ‘But where can she be? Why should she just disappear like that? Where can she have gone?’

  ‘Miss Mintar?’ said Thanet gently.

  She swung around to look at them. ‘You’re policemen.’

  ‘Yes. Detective Inspector Thanet, Sturrenden CID. And this is Detective—’

  She jumped up. ‘A Detective Inspector! I knew it! She really has disappeared, hasn’t she? Oh, Matt . . .’ She whirled and ran to the man, who opened his arms to her. ‘What if they never find her? Oh God, oh God, oh God, I can’t bear it. It is Caro all over again. It is, it is, it is.’ And she burst into tears, burying her face in his chest.

  ‘What does she mean?’ Thanet asked her grandmother softly. ‘Who is Caro?’

  Mrs Mintar shook her head irritably. ‘Her sister,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Caroline eloped, four years ago
. The circumstances are entirely different. Rachel was very upset at the time; she and Caroline were very close. All this is bound to bring it back to her.’

  Headlights flashed briefly across the window. Another car was coming up the drive. Mrs Mintar hurried across to peer out. ‘That may be Ralph now.’

  ‘Dad?’ said Rachel, twisting out of her boyfriend’s arms. ‘Perhaps he’s found her!’ And she dashed out.

  Mrs Mintar shrugged and pulled a face. ‘I’m not sure it was him.’ She returned to her chair. ‘We’ll soon find out, no doubt.’

  Thanet glanced at the man called Matt. ‘And you are . . . ?’

  ‘Matthew Agon. Rachel’s fiancé.’

  This last was said with a hint of defiance and a sidelong glance at old Mrs Mintar.

  Her lips tightened but otherwise she declined to give Agon the satisfaction of reacting.

  The first hint of family disapproval? Thanet wondered. Scarcely surprising, considering his own reaction to the man. ‘You and Miss Mintar have been searching the garden, I suppose?’

  ‘Yes. Pointless, really, we’d all hunted there for ages before splitting up.’ Agon crossed to an armchair and sat down. ‘Anyway, Rachel wanted to have another look so we did. Mr Mintar and Mr Squires both went off by car, in different directions, with Mrs Mintar’s sister and her boyfriend.’

  A Londoner, thought Thanet. East End, by the sound of it. And, he guessed, not really at home in this setting, although he was doing his best to appear at ease.

  ‘Are the gardens very large?’ Thanet asked the old woman.

  She lifted her shoulders slightly. ‘A couple of acres or so, I suppose.’

  The door opened and Rachel came back in, followed by Mintar and a woman, their faces betraying their lack of success. For the first time Thanet saw the barrister less than immaculate: his hair was slightly dishevelled and the sweatshirt which he had pulled on over his open-necked shirt was inside out. The woman must be Mrs Mintar’s sister – Jane, was it? She was in her early forties, he guessed, and looked both prosperous and self-possessed. Her face was too wide, nose too prominent and eyes too small for beauty, but she had taken considerable trouble over her appearance: her shoulder-length brown hair had been cut by an expert hand and she was carefully made up. She had done her best to disguise her broad shoulders, wide hips and heavy pendulous breasts with an ankle-length straight black skirt and a silk tunic top similar in style to old Mrs Mintar’s in a black and white print.