“Professional and friendly can be comfortable bedfellows you know.”
Chas nearly made a joke about Mulvey and him being professional and friendly bedfellows, but reined it back in. Physically she was worthy of flirting with, but he knew she did not much care for him. More importantly, he didn’t care for her. Even when she had a smile on her face he always felt there was a nasty bitch lurking behind it, waiting for him to slip on a banana skin.
True to form she followed up with another statement designed to tease him. “Shall I tell you what’s been happening on my side of this professional bed we’re in?”
Harrington nodded.
“I continued ploughing through those invoices we took from Hetherington-Jones’ filing cabinet. Yet again I had a few tricky telephone conversations that hit brick walls, but then I telephoned Abby Matthews in Cirencester. She has a landscape gardening business and once used Hetherington-Jones when she had bitten off more than she could chew. She said he was charming and gentlemanly at first but then revealed his darker side. I’m meeting her at four. Come with me if you have nothing better to do. It’s probably nothing for me to wet my knickers about.” Mulvey paused momentarily and grinned as she watched Harrington’s face for a reaction. His poker face surprised her. “But it might at least add something to our profile of the guy.”
“Will I have time for a tea and a pee before we leave?” His phone beeped and vibrated in his pocket.
“Only if you’re quick.”
He pulled out his phone and flipped it open. “Count me in then. Do you want another tea?”
“Please.” Mulvey drained her Styrofoam cup and threw it into the bin.
Harington read the message on his screen as he walked away from Mulvey’s desk. It brought a smile to his face.
They have been playing with my schedules again. I took them up on their offer of a shag room at a Heathrow hotel. Do you fancy joining a few of us for some fun tonight? We could eat first. Your naughty witness, Flighty.
He texted back straight away:
Yes please.
A follow up text hit Harrington’s phone as they approached junction 15 of the M4 motorway. He read it while Mulvey was driving the car up the slip road.
“Do you happen to know where the Prince Charming pub is?” he asked as they waited at the traffic lights.
“Do you mean the Charming Prince?”
“That’s right, the Charming Prince.”
“Some would say it’s near Slough, others would say it’s near Windsor. It depends on which council tax bracket you’re in. It’s a nice place mind. The food’s good. Why? You dithering bastard. What are you going to do, sit there until the lights go red again?” The car in front eventually moved and she followed it onto the roundabout.
Harrington waited for Mulvey’s anger to evaporate and then returned to the topic uppermost in his mind. “An acquaintance of mine has just asked me to meet them for a meal there.”
“I’ll show you where it is on the map when we get back to the station. I assume it’s a woman you are meeting?”
“Why do you say that?”
“The Charming Prince is the kind of place where lovers and businessmen eat. Not the sort of place two men would go together. The place doesn’t have a television in it.”
“Well, that sounds good to me. I have never understood why pub landlords think people go to the pub to watch telly. Not when you can stay at home and choose the channel you want to watch.”
“This is new,” sidetracked Mulvey. “This flyover wasn’t here last time I came this way. I queued for ages at the roundabout underneath us. Football, or any other crappy sport, that’s why blokes go to the pub to watch telly.”
“Oh, sport at a few pubs for those who want it is fine. But why does every pub nowadays have a TV? A lot of them have one on every wall. It’s almost as if they are deliberately trying to kill off the art of conversation.”
“I take it you don’t like football?”
“Big international matches, yes, but not any old collection of guys in coloured shirts trying to stop each other from playing.”
“And is that what this woman you are meeting likes about you, the fact that you are not like most blokes?”
“Is that meant to be an insult?” There was a hint of annoyance in Harrington’s voice.
“Oh God no. It’s just most blokes I know quite like to watch football down a pub with a pint in their hand.”
“What I will be doing tonight beats watching football any day of the week.” I shouldn’t have said that, he thought, but it was too late.
Mulvey was intrigued to know more about this woman her colleague from the Metropolitan police force was meeting, but instead of asking more questions she changed the subject.
“Did Hetherington-Jones win the competition?”
It took a moment for Harrington to tune into the new conversation. “Oh, right. Yes and no. Anita said he claimed six nationalities but as unsubstantiated champion he did not get the prize.”
“Which was?”
“A weekend for two in Amsterdam, paid for by the losers.”
“They would probably know about the Indian girl.”
“What? His rugby chums?”
“Yes.”
“I still haven’t got my hands on a team photo or team list. Hopefully within a day or two though.”
“It seems to me that your time would have been better spent tracking down the rugby team members rather than the people on the same course as him.”
The implied criticism put Harrington on the back foot for a moment.
“We knew he played rugby but the odds on him tying one of his teammates to a tree and killing him seemed quite slim. How was I meant to know about the other games they played together? And I still wouldn’t have known about it if I had not spoken to his course mates first,” he retorted.
“Blokes talk to each other about their conquests.”
“Well, I don’t think I could have hoped for a better contact than Anita. I am glad I tracked her down.”
“Bugger. Look at this lot. It’s going to take at least ten minutes to get to the roundabout from here. Why the fuck build a flyover over one roundabout and not the second one. What qualifications do these dickheads have? A-level in congestion creation no doubt.”
Harington looked at his watch. “We’ve got forty minutes. Try to enjoy the view.”
“I’ve never been too keen on looking at articulated lorries.”
The obstruction turned out to be a minor accident. Harrington struggled to disguise his amusement as they sailed past the next major junction on a newly built section of dual-carriageway.
Abby Matthews did not invite them into her semi-detached cottage as expected. Instead she grabbed a dirty old duffel coat and led them round through a side gate and into her garden. They walked one behind the other down a meandering gravel path to a bench by a fishpond.
Abby sat down. Mulvey sat next to her, leaving Harrington no option but to stand. He started to regret tagging along. His new navy-blue suit offered little protection from the wind howling across the farm fields at the back of the garden.
“This is lovely.” Mulvey gestured to the garden with her right hand. “All your own work I take it.”
“Yes. To be honest I spend too much time working in my own garden rather than other peoples’ gardens.”
“I would have thought there would be plenty of demand in an area like this.”
“Those were my thoughts exactly when I started the business four years ago. When my husband left me that is. The truth is that I am struggling to keep the place on. I’ve got the mortgage on interest only, but even then it is hard to keep up the payments.”
“Tell me about your contact with Mr Hetherington-Jones.”
“It was about two years ago.”
“Oh, but you only paid the invoice in October of last year.”
“I paid him late, very late. I had to borrow quite a bit of it.”
“Yo
u said on the phone this morning that you engaged Mr Hetherington-Jones to help with a project you couldn’t cope with.”
“Yes. I do general garden landscaping but also try to specialise in ponds and water features, something to make me a little different from others in this line of work. What I thought was my lucky break came my way. I was taken on to do a job by a wealthy local landowner. It was at his daughter’s house. Once we started planning the daughter started to expand things way beyond the original brief. The initial plan for a very large pond evolved into a request for a small lake. I should have backed out, but I didn’t. I was desperate for a break, something to put my business on the map.”
“I know about soil but not much about land. My normal techniques for lining ponds were not going to work on a project that size. I had no idea if I could just hire a JCB and driver to dig it out and then divert a nearby stream into it. That will give you an idea of what we are talking about, there was a stream flowing through the place. I had read an article about Hetherington-Jones’ company in a trade magazine. I phoned him for a bit of advice. All I wanted was a survey of the land to see if it would support a small lake. My understanding of it is that a survey like that can be done from information available from computer databases. I think they call it a desktop survey.” She stopped talking and put both hands over her ears as if she were shielding them from a deafening sound.
Mulvey waited the best part of a minute. “What did Mr Hetherington-Jones say?”
“He fancied a drive out. He would pop down the next day and cast his eye over it, all for the price of a pub lunch. Well, what he and I called a pub lunch were quite different things. But nonetheless, I was very grateful to him at the time. We parted with a verbal agreement for him to carry out some checks and let me know how they went.”
“Two days later I arrived at the estate to see boring equipment being unloaded from a lorry. I phoned him straight away. ‘What do you think I meant when I said we would carry out a few checks?’ is what the arrogant bastard said. Those words haunt me every time my head hits the pillow.”
“And his bill for this work was extremely heavy?”
“You’ve seen the invoice. If you don’t think that is heavy, I would like to be on your wages.”
“It’s heavy in anyone’s book.”
“And that’s the price after my fucking goodwill discount. How trading standards let him get away with it I will never know. The bastard argued that I had the opportunity to stop them unloading the equipment.”
“But you didn’t?”
“I panicked. I did tell them I couldn’t afford it but the bigger of the two guys told me I wouldn’t save much money by sending them back to Berkshire. I left them to it while I phoned Hetherington-Jones.”
“Was it trading standards involvement that led to the discount?”
“No, I wish it was though. I was such a fool.”
Harrington suddenly stopped staring out across the fields. No, he thought, she’s not going to suggest what I think she’s going to suggest. Mid-forties, her work keeps her fit yes, but she’s dressed no better than the scarecrow in the middle of that field, surely not.
“It may help us if you don’t mind continuing.” Mulvey prodded the woman’s story along.
Abby Matthews looked up at Harrington.
“DS Harrington is a police detective, Ms Matthews. He will not be judging you.”
“He kept phoning. Saying we should meet to discuss things. One of his favourite sayings was ‘I am sure we could find a way to reduce the bill.’ I knew what he meant. In some ways I was quite flattered that he even wanted sex with me. Of course, I didn’t know then what I know now.”
“And what do you know now?”
“He’s a kinky bastard.” She glanced at Harrington again and then dropped her eyes to the gravel under her wellingtons. “He was obsessed with the word nude. He kept making me say it while I took my clothes off. After that it was bondage. Like most couples Luke and I tried spicing our sex life up a bit in some vain attempt to save our marriage. But this was different. The bastard hurt me big time.”
“Are you saying he assaulted you?”
“Oh no, let’s not go there. Well, your honour, I let him tie me up and then to my surprise he used the whip from my bedside drawer to hit me. Please don’t suggest I should bring charges against him.”
“Not if you don’t think it is appropriate. I’m just grateful you are willing to talk to us about this.”
“You never did tell me why you wanted to talk to me. Has he done something bad?”
“I don’t think so. This is a minor part of a larger investigation. All we are trying to do is build up the bigger picture.”
“But you suspect him of something, right?”
“We suspect no one of anything at this stage. This is what we do. We turn over every stone until we find the little bit of evidence we need to guide us in the right direction. It is important that you do not jump to conclusions and even more important that you do not talk to anyone about this. It could jeopardise the work we are doing.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not about to phone the local paper. It’s not working, but I’m trying to move on from the whole sorry affair.”
Harrington suddenly asked a question. “Where did this sex take place?”
Her eyes met his and then looked over his shoulder towards the dormer window in her roof.
He followed her line of sight. “Inside the house?”
“Yes. The second time that is.”
“Sorry to have to ask, but can you tell us about the other time, or times.”
“There was only one other time officer. Not quite so sordid as the second.”
Harrington gave her time to compose herself.
“If you were local you would know about the picnic area up towards Cheltenham. He certainly knew about it and what goes on there. When he first said he ‘fancied a blow in a car park.’ That’s another one of his phrases I can’t stop bouncing around inside my head. Sorry. Well at the time I didn’t really want to do it but I guess it was a price I was willing to pay to get me out of the shit, and to save my home.” Her eyes flicked from side to side and she stopped talking.
Both officers were desperate to know if he tied her to a tree at any stage, but knew they had to let it come from her. They could not ask outright.
“Take your time.” Mulvey put a hand on the woman’s shoulder.
“We sat; we listened to the car radio. Well, not a car, we were in his Range Rover. He asked a lot of questions about my business and suggested ways he could help me. More haunting phrases came out of the bastard’s mouth. Things like ‘partnership,’ ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch your back’. I felt like a whore. Well, that’s what I am and a cheap whore at that.”
“What I hadn’t latched onto was that he was not only setting his stall out, he was waiting for other cars to arrive. It started with oral sex as anticipated. He was watching a couple in a car opposite at the time. The bastard then started to tug at my clothes and reclining my seat. He pressured me into having sex while others watched from their cars.”
“Sorry Ms Matthews, I have to ask.” Mulvey moved her hand across to Matthews’ neck. “Did he rape you?”
“No,” she said adamantly. “I said pressured me, not forced me. He pressured me into being a whore, he didn’t rape me. My legs invited the bastard in.” Tears streamed down her face.
“Okay, thank you.”
Harrington asked the question that had to be asked. “Am I right in thinking you never left the vehicle though?”
“No,” she sobbed.
Harrington drifted away and left Mulvey to do the sympathetic woman to woman bit. What annoyed him was that fact that he didn’t ask her for the car keys.
Ten minutes later the two women emerged through the side gate. After seeing Abby Matthews into her house, Mulvey clicked the remote to unlock the car doors. Harrington quickly climbed inside. He watched the officer from Reading make a c
all on her mobile. She deliberately turned away from him to avoid being lip read.
“Hi, Steve.”
“Hi, babe. How are you doing?”
“I’m fine. I’ll get to the point. How do you fancy eating at the Charming Prince tonight?”
“It’s not our wedding anniversary is it?”
“No, you stupid bugger. You know the guy they sent down from London to work with me, the one I told you about.”
“The guy from a different planet, good copper but crap around women?”
“That’s the one. Well, he’s meeting a woman at the Charming Prince tonight. I might suggest we join them.”
“Why?”
“Once a detective, always a detective, I guess. I just want to know what sort of woman would meet a bloke like him for a meal. Plain cardigan and starched knickers would be my bet.”
“You’re evil you are. But yeah, I’m up for it. There’s bugger all on telly tonight.”
“Great. I’m down in Cirencester at the moment but I should be home by seven-thirty. Make sure you’re shined up and ready to roll.”
“Will do girl.”
“Love you, bye.”
Mulvey snapped her phone shut without waiting to hear her husband’s reply.
“That all looked very cloak and dagger,” said Harrington as Mulvey climbed into the driver’s seat.
“Oh, I was just letting my husband know what time I would be home.”
“Right.”
“Who did you say you were meeting tonight?”
“Vivienne. I met her during a case I was on a couple of years back. A guy called Drummond and a woman called Latimer.” In many ways Harrington thought it best not to talk about Flighty or the cases he had worked on, but he was proud about both of them, and enjoyed letting people know there was more to him than people realised.
“Is that the case your lot never managed to get to court?”
“It wasn’t for the want of trying. We got spooked and the CPS would not prosecute.”
“So how was this Vivienne of yours involved?”
“I interviewed her and she gave us some very valuable information. We kept in touch.”
“Just good friend’s then?”
“That’s one way to describe it.”
Down in the Woods Page 8