The door opened, letting in unwelcome traffic noise.
“Frank, that’s good timing. What are you having?”
Frank peered at the beers on offer. “The same as you, please.”
They took their drinks to a fairly secluded table, sat down and took quick swigs.
“What do you know then?” Dylan asked.
Frank licked froth from his top lip. “Not a lot—other than the fact that Jack Fleming is in custody. What do you think of that?”
“I think they’ve got the wrong man.” What did he know? He was basing that on pure instinct, whereas CID would be looking at the facts. “What have they got?”
“I don’t know anything more than I’ve already told you. Apparently, Fleming was caught on CCTV—there are a couple of shops at the bottom of the Rodericks’ road and he was caught passing there and turning into the road. They reckoned he looked shifty and they also knew he was known to Roderick so, when they found a shoe print outside the Rodericks’ house, they checked out his shoes and found a match.” Frank played with the beer mat. “Fleming claimed he’d never been near the house until they presented him with that piece of evidence. He’s now saying he was watching Roderick.”
“He admits to being at the property?”
“Yeah. That was a damn fool thing to do but he did that before his lawyer arrived.”
It was an insane thing to do, but Dylan knew what it was like for suspects. They had no idea of the procedure. Rights were read, of course, but suspects didn’t understand what was happening and were often too shocked to ask.
“Why was he watching Roderick though?”
“I don’t know, mate.”
Dylan and Frank were alike in that they were both outcasts from the force. Unlike Dylan, though, Frank was still respected. Officers would talk to him. They’d have Dylan escorted from the building.
“I still reckon they’ve got the wrong bloke. Jack Fleming’s no killer.” He was just a bloke who locked girlfriends in their flats and scared the living daylights out of them. “What motive would he have?”
“No idea, but who needs a motive? He knew Roderick. He was there. That’s enough.” Frank drank his beer. “Christ, that went down well. I’ll get us another. Same again?”
“Please.” Dylan’s glass was still half full—or half empty—but it would save getting up again.
While Frank chatted to the barmaid, Dylan closed his eyes and tried to come up with a reason for Jack snooping around the Rodericks’ place. When Dylan had mentioned Alan and Marion Roderick, Jack hadn’t seemed duly concerned by either of them. He’d claimed he only saw them to say hello to. He’d also claimed that Sam hadn’t liked Alan. That wasn’t reason enough to kill the bloke though. Besides, Sam had disappeared months ago. It was old news.
“There you go.” Frank put two full pints on the table and sat down.
“There’s something bloody funny going on.” Dylan was getting adept at stating the obvious. “For one thing, I think Rob was being blackmailed. Probably by Roderick.”
Frank was reaching for his glass. He stopped. “You’re kidding me!”
Dylan probably was. He had no evidence.
“I know of two occasions when Rob had a wad of cash, at least a grand, lying around. When I saw it, it was in an open envelope. His cleaner saw him with a lot of cash, too, and she thought he was putting it in the mail.”
Frank gave him his “is that it?” look.
“Think about it, Frank. Roderick was a lorry driver. No way could he afford that lifestyle of his.”
Frank’s expression didn’t alter, but he was prepared to humour Dylan. “Okay,” he said, drawing the word out. “What would anyone have on Rob? What skeletons could he have lurking?”
“I don’t know. It could be anything. Something Marion knew about. She must have discussed Rob with her husband, and Roderick struck me as the sort of bloke to leap on any opportunity.”
“No. I can’t see it. Rob’s too—clean. Too respectable.”
No one was too clean.
“Then there’s this Scottish thing,” Dylan said.
“Scottish thing?”
“Yeah.” He was thinking aloud, throwing random thoughts in Frank’s direction. “Roderick volunteers to drive his lorry there. Everyone else hates that run, but he volunteers to go to Scotland. He goes to Hungary and Romania, too, but it’s still odd. Next, I see a postcard that’s been sent to Rob from up there. A week later, I see another postcard—same view, different short message. He claims he knows no one up there. His cleaner, though, says one of his old army chums lives up there. The postcards are signed with an M and his cleaner says his mate’s name is Mattie. Your friend’s lying about something, Frank.”
“Rob?”
Dylan might have tried to convince him the earth was flat.
“Yes. He claims he knows no one in Scotland and yet I’ve seen two postcards. According to Alice, his cleaner, he sometimes gets four a month.”
“Get a grip. Rob wouldn’t lie.”
“One card said ‘Wish you were here’ and the other said ‘Thank you. Most welcome.’”
“He wouldn’t lie.” Frank took a slug of beer. “I mean, for God’s sake, why would he? What does it matter how many friends he has in Scotland? Who would care if he kept in touch with some bloke he was friends with in the army?” Frank was growing more defensive on Hunt’s behalf and, at the same time, less certain. “Why would he lie, Dylan? All he wants is the truth behind Sam’s disappearance.”
A middle-aged couple strolled into the pub and seemed disappointed not to know any of the customers. Dylan knew that feeling. When he and Bev went to their local, it was always a let-down to see strangers there. It meant they had to talk to each other and they could do that as easily at home. It spoiled the night out.
Forgetting them, he turned his attention back to Frank. “I don’t know. I do know that Roderick had a much better lifestyle than your average lorry driver. That money came from somewhere and it sure as hell wasn’t driving. He was up to something. It was either to do with blackmailing someone or it was connected with the long trips he made. I also know that Rob denies all connections with Scotland and is obviously lying.”
“Bloody hell, Dylan.” Frank’s eyes were as wide as his pint glass. “First you reckon Rob’s being blackmailed by Roderick. Now you’re implying that they’re up to something together.”
“No, I’m not.”
Dylan didn’t know what he was implying. All he had were a few half-baked ideas.
All the same, Sam had said on that phone message left for Jack, the phone message that could be a work of fiction, that she’d learned something horrible. If she’d found out that her father and stepfather were involved in something illegal, she would have confronted her stepfather. She would have believed her father to be pure in body and spirit, and would have assumed that the blame should rest with Alan Roderick.
“There’s James Carlton too.” He was speaking his thoughts aloud. “Those cars that were allegedly stolen. I wonder if they turned up in Hungary or Romania. Or anywhere else Roderick liked to go. I wonder how full those lorries are when they head for the continent.”
“You’re forgetting something,” Frank said. “Jack Fleming’s the one currently banged up on a murder charge.”
Frank was right. Where the hell did Jack fit in?
“I’ll call in at the nick tomorrow,” Frank said, “and see if I can find out anything more. No promises but, if I hang around long enough, I might hear something.”
“Great, Frank. Thanks.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “Those postcards are of the view at Scrabster. Remember Jim Franks?”
“Oh, God, yeah. Constable Bloody Jim. Is that where he used to go?”
Constable Bloody Jim was an ex-colleague of Dylan’s. A keep-fit fanatic, he’d enjoyed climbing and he often visited the Orkney Islands to climb the Old Man of Hoy. He’d insisted on boring them to death with his snaps too.
“It i
s. He used to drive up to Scrabster and catch the ferry over to Orkney. As far as I know, and I wish I’d paid more attention now, the only thing at Scrabster is that ferry terminal.”
“If it’s the terminal for Orkney,” Frank said, “it’ll be as far north as you can get.”
“That’s right.” Roderick, as far as his colleagues were concerned, never took his lorry north of Inverness. All the same—“It’s a bloody funny place to send a postcard from, don’t you think?”
“Well—”
“Of course it is. There’s nothing there. You’d only go to Scrabster if you were catching a ferry to Orkney. You’d send a postcard from your destination, not the ferry terminal.”
“In which case, there’d be no point having postcards printed in the first place.” Frank’s tone was dry.
Dylan supposed he had a point. Someone must buy the damn things or they wouldn’t bother printing them.
It was no use, they needed another drink. Dylan had known this would be at least a four-pint problem.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Dylan overslept, missed breakfast at the hotel, and wandered into town and to Tesco’s cafeteria.
As he munched through a full English breakfast and downed two cups of strong black coffee, he tried to put his thoughts into some sort of order. Sam Hunt wasn’t in Lancashire, he was sure of that. Hungary and Romania insisted on flitting through his mind, but neither settled. Scotland then. Hunt received postcards from over the border and Roderick drove his lorry up there.
Perhaps Frank was right in that there was no link. Maybe Hunt was so wrapped up in his own problems—and he had plenty of those—that the regular postcards from his ex-army chum meant nothing to him. Perhaps those trips north that Roderick happily undertook were nothing more than a way to get paid while enjoying some spectacular scenery.
Dylan would do well to concentrate on facts and ignore gut instinct.
With his breakfast eaten, he wandered through the store. He’d once bought shirts for a fiver here but none caught his eye today. In any case, he’d mastered the washing machine since then. He hadn’t actually used it for weeks, and the shirt he was wearing was a little grubby round the cuffs, but he’d put that right tomorrow. He was spending Sunday with Luke, but tomorrow he’d concentrate on the washing machine.
He left the store and wandered down Dawson Clough’s pedestrianised shopping centre. Dark clouds scowled down on him, threatening heavy rain before the day was over. Great. There was nothing like a five-hour drive when filthy spray hurled up from lorries on the motorways made visibility nothing more than a dream.
That long drive wasn’t appealing. He and Frank had stayed longer at the Dog and Fox than they’d intended, and Dylan had woken with the headache from hell. Not a hangover, just a headache. All the same, he could do without it.
The town centre had been redeveloped and was dotted with bronze statues of weavers and miners. The shops were nothing special, though. Boots sat next to W H Smith’s, then came Argos, Next and M&S.
Dylan spotted a familiar face just as the first drop of rain fell. He dashed toward her. “Marion?”
She swung round to face him, reminding Dylan of a cornered fox about to be torn apart by a pack of baying hounds.
“Oh, hello.” She didn’t seem to know what else to say.
Plump raindrops landed on Dylan. “Looks like we’re in for a shower. Time for a coffee, I think. Can I get you one?”
Nerves had her so taut that Dylan half expected her to snap in half.
“Okay. Yes, thanks.”
By the time they strode the fifty yards to Costa’s and Dylan pushed open the door, the rain was bouncing off the pavement.
“What would you like?” he asked.
“Coffee, please.”
“Black? White? Cappuccino?”
She looked as if she’d forgotten how she took her coffee. “Regular. Black, please.”
They were lucky and managed to grab a table near the counter. A steady stream of rain dodgers followed them in. Some shook water from their hair like dogs leaping out of lakes.
For a moment, they both watched people dashing to escape the sudden storm.
“Perhaps this lot will clear the air,” Dylan murmured.
“Yes. They said it should feel fresher tomorrow.”
So she was aware of that. If Bev had been murdered, God forbid, Dylan couldn’t imagine giving a toss about weather forecasts.
“How are you doing?” He turned his chair slightly so he was directly opposite her.
“Okay. The girls have gone back to school today.”
“That’s probably for the best.”
She nodded. “I think so.”
She stirred her coffee as if she were mining for gold, and expressions flew across her face like shadows—anxiety, panic, fear. Dylan spotted all those but no grief.
“I’ll be opening the nursery on Monday,” she said.
He tried a gentle smile. “The children will have missed you.”
She picked up her cup, sending a wave of coffee into the saucer. “They’ve, um, arrested Jack.” She cleared a throat that sounded as if a sheet of sandpaper had been stuffed down it. “They’ve arrested Sam’s boyfriend. They—they think he murdered Alan.”
She was beyond nervous.
“Yes, so I heard.”
“He didn’t kill Alan, for God’s sake. Why—why would they think that? It’s insane.”
“That’s exactly what I thought.” Dylan added more sugar to his coffee. “I don’t claim to know Jack well, but I can’t imagine him as someone who would do that. Why would he? It makes no sense, does it?”
“He wouldn’t. God, it just goes to show how the justice system works in this country.”
There was no need to tell Dylan about the country’s judicial system. One moment he’d been doing his best to protect Joe Public from a known thug and habitual offender. The next, he’d been banged up on an assault charge.
“Have the police spoken to you about it?” he asked.
“Not a word. If they had, I’d soon have told them. For God’s sake, why pick on Jack?”
“I thought they had evidence that he was on your property.”
“What? No. Surely not.”
“It seems unlikely, but that’s what I heard.”
There was no doubt about it. Jack had confessed to being at the property. God alone knew what he was doing there. If Sam had thought she was Dawson’s Clough answer to Miss Marple, Jack must believe he was Sherlock Holmes.
Dylan was in no position to criticise. He had no real experience of how a real private investigator worked. Having been thrown off the police force, he’d taken the next logical step and registered as an investigator. He’d thought it would be a good career move, but he wasn’t so sure now. He’d had three boring matrimonial cases and this was his second missing-person case. No one would call him experienced.
“What if I went to the police?” she asked. “What if I told them Jack’s innocent?”
“They would want evidence. They would want to know why you were so sure.”
Her face was invaded by a tide of red. “I suppose they would.”
Something jolted in the region of Dylan’s heart. His throat was dry, leaving him unable to swallow.
“What makes you so sure he’s innocent?” He made his voice so casual he might have been asking her why she thought it might rain next Tuesday.
“You just know, don’t you?”
No. You didn’t.
Around them, people chatted over coffee while keeping one eye on the weather through windows blurred by condensation. Dylan almost envied their mundane conversations. They spoke of the weather, of plans they had for the weekend, and how young Johnny was doing at school. He and Marion spoke of murder.
“If you did go to the police,” he said, “they would assume that, if you knew Jack was innocent, you would also know who had murdered your husband.”
“That’s what I thought.” Her voice was
soft, little more than a whisper.
“What happened that morning?” His heart rate was a powerful thud, thud, thud.
“I’ve already told you.” She peered through the window. “It’s stopped raining. Thanks for the coffee, Dylan, but it’s time I was going.”
“Marion—”
“I was with the girls at the swimming pool, remember?” Already standing, she gazed down at him for long moments. “The police arrived to tell me Alan was dead.” She grabbed her bag. “Thanks for the coffee.”
Dylan felt the warm, damp air settle in the room as she left.
Slowly, his heart rate returned to normal.
All around him, people chatted about what was showing at the cinema, how evil their boss was and how wine was currently half price at the supermarket. It was easy for them. They hadn’t had coffee with a woman who had murdered her husband.
Chapter Thirty-Three
“I could do with a favour, Dylan.”
Dylan and Luke had only taken one step into the hallway of the marital home when Bev accosted them.
“Come into the kitchen,” she said. “I’ll get you a coffee. Luke, you can make yourself scarce.”
If she was offering coffee, it was a Big Favour.
Still, he wasn’t going to argue. Usually it took every ounce of deviousness he possessed to progress as far as the kitchen. His kitchen.
Luke grabbed a slice of chocolate cake, Tesco’s finest, and, with a wink for Dylan, dashed off to the lounge and the TV. Moments later, Bart Simpson shrieked at something.
“Do you want a piece of cake?” Bev splashed cold water over her arms as she attempted to fill the kettle. “Or a sandwich or something?”
This was an exceptionally Big Favour. Perhaps he’d agree to it on condition she allowed him back to his home.
“Coffee’s fine, thanks.”
Watching her deal with the coffee, he was reminded of the first days they were together. They’d lived in a cramped flat for six months before they were married, and Bev had been so eager to make their relationship work that she’d tried to convince him she was a domestic goddess. She wasn’t, never had been and never would be, but he’d appreciated the effort.
Dead Silent (A Dylan Scott Mystery) Page 20