"Not exactly a hero's gratitude if that's the case. No sign of a struggle, though," Tom said, turning to Fiona. "You're sure about that?"
"There are no outward signs, no cuts, grazes, or abrasions to the skin. Perhaps there will be some trace evidence under the fingernails but if there is a violent struggle then skin tends to build up under the nails as you rake someone's hand or arm and is clearly visible. The deceased's fingernails are long – for a man anyway, so I would expect to see it. Aside from the facial injury, there is nothing to indicate he was brought here under duress or was involved in an altercation."
Tom looked back at the car park. The number of onlookers seemed to have increased.
"Any chance he was planning to hang himself and fell from the tree, landing face first?" Tom asked, although the suggestion seemed daft to him the moment it left his mouth. It didn't look like an easy tree to climb; the branches were evergreen and densely packed.
"There's a stepladder propped up behind the second tree," Cassie said, pointing it out to Tom. That confused things even more. Had it been under the noose then his theory might work, but for it to be leaning against the next tree was impossible unless …
"Someone else must have been here," Tom concluded.
"My thoughts, too," Fiona agreed. "As to what role that person—"
"Or persons," Cassie said.
"Or persons played, I'll leave with the two of you, Tom," Fiona said with a smile.
"Thanks very much," Tom said quietly, glancing between the noose and the body. He looked at Cassie. "Better have forensics get down here," he made a circular motion with his hand, "have them try to make sense of all of this." Looking back up to the car park, he added, "And when the photographers are here, make sure they take some pictures of all those people over there paying attention. There might be one who's keener than the others."
"Got yer," Cassie said, looking at the members of the public now lining the police cordon, her mobile already pressed against her ear.
"Do we have an identification for the victim?" Tom asked.
Cassie passed him a plastic bag containing a black leather wallet. Donning a pair of gloves, Tom opened the seal and took it out. The button clasp looked like it had ceased working a long time ago and the wallet fell open in his hands. He took out the driving licence. The picture was a few years old but it was easily identifiable as their victim.
"Gavin Felgate," Tom said quietly. "I recognise that name."
"Where from?" Cassie asked, angling the mouthpiece away from her lips. She was on hold.
"Not sure, but I recognise the name." His brow furrowed. "I don't think I've nicked him before." Tucking the licence away again, he examined the rest of the contents. He counted forty pounds in cash and there were several credit cards still in their slots. He looked back at the body. "Does he have any valuables on him, watch, mobile phone?"
"Both," Fiona said. "But no car keys."
"We can probably rule out robbery as a motive, unless he has a nice car. How did he get here, anyone know?" The question was asked of anyone in earshot and one of the uniformed constables stepped forward.
"There were no cars in the car park when we arrived, other than that belonging to the local man who found the body and called us." Tom encouraged him to continue. "Local, lives nearby in King's Reach," he gestured towards a housing estate that was beyond their view, "walks his dog here every morning. Stumbled on this."
"Right, we'll need to speak to him," Tom said, nodding to Cassie who agreed. "Has anyone run Gavin Felgate through the system?"
"Lives in Heacham," the constable said. "No criminal record. Married, but we've not been able to reach any next of kin yet."
"Okay, thanks. We'll take care of it."
The officer seemed relieved, which was understandable. Passing on such news wasn't the most enjoyable part of the job, and sometimes, from a detective's viewpoint, it paid to be present when the relatives learnt of the death, especially if they were suspects. Eyeing the noose again, Tom couldn't help but think that there was a lot more going on here than they yet understood. He stepped away from the others and called Tamara Greave, she picked up on the third ring.
"This suspicious death you had me visit …"
"Straightforward?"
He glanced back at the body. "Far from it. Can you ask Eric to find out everything he can regarding a man called Gavin Felgate? He's our victim, if I can call him that."
"Felgate. Right. That sounds very cryptic. What do you think we are dealing with?"
"To be honest, it's all a little odd and I haven't got my head around it yet. You may come to regret agreeing to do this favour. I already have his address in Heacham, so Cassie and I will drop by there before coming back in."
"Okay. We'll see what we can find out this end."
Chapter Three
The house looked unoccupied. The curtains were drawn across every window and despite repeatedly ringing the doorbell, there was no response from inside. Tom stepped back from the porch and scanned the windows for any flicker of movement; a twitch of a curtain or an interior light but there was nothing to see. There was a car in the driveway, a blue Mazda saloon. Tom tried the handle but it was locked. Cassie turned and looked around the surrounding area.
"Are people afraid of heights around here or something?"
Tom followed her eye line, unsure of what she meant. "Say again?"
She nodded towards the properties opposite. "The bungalows. There are rows and rows of them in this place."
Tom smiled. Heacham was a coastal village occupied since the Iron Age, but one that had grown over the years off the back of becoming a popular seaside resort following the advent of the age of steam. There wasn't a lot of substance to the old village; a few rows of terraced properties and larger Victorian semi-detached houses but the main construction in recent times had been the building of single-storey residences and the expansion of the holiday parks.
"Well, it is Norfolk. We're not known for high points around here," Tom said.
Cassie shrugged. "Not a lot going on, is there? The place is dead."
"It's rammed during the summer though. Haven't you been this way yet? You can walk or cycle the coastal path from Hunstanton. It doesn't take long."
She frowned. "Lauren's been on at me but …"
"But?"
"I prefer the gym."
"Excuse me." They both turned to see who was addressing them. A short, rotund man with red cheeks and a receding hair line leaned on the boundary fence between Gavin Felgate's house and his own. "Can I help you with something?" He was eyeing them warily. Tom approached, taking out his warrant card and introducing himself and Cassie. "I'm Terry Sherman," he said, nodding his head back towards the house behind him, "and I live next door."
"We were hoping to speak to Mrs Felgate."
Sherman shook his head. "I never see her these days. I don't think they're together anymore. At least, if she's ever here I don't come across her. He does have a lady friend who calls round a couple of times a week. Never spoken to her, mind you."
"Right. How about Gavin Felgate? Have you seen him recently?"
The man's brow creased as he thought about it. "Yesterday morning … maybe. Otherwise, the day before I reckon. Why? What's he done?"
Tom figured the question was asked out of voyeuristic curiosity rather than concern. He ignored it.
"How did he seem?"
"Normal. He's not the chattiest of fellows. Sometimes he'll stop to talk about whatever he's up to but, other times, I'm lucky to get more than the briefest hello. A man who likes a chat when he hasn't got anything better to do would be an apt description."
"And what it is you do, Mr Sherman?" Tom asked.
"Ah ... I used to do a bit of this and that, you know.”
"And now?" Cassie asked. He hesitated momentarily before scratching absently at the back of his head.
"I'm afraid I'm on the sick." Cassie bobbed her head in understanding, Sherman pointing down to h
is right leg. "I have a cartilage problem with my knees." He sighed. "I'm on the list … but who knows when the appointment will come through?"
"Operation?" Tom asked. Sherman nodded. "Do you know what Gavin did for a living?"
"Journalist," Sherman said. "Nothing highbrow, local stuff, I think. I don't know if he was freelance or salaried somewhere. He once told me he used to work down in London but the lifestyle didn't suit him."
"Lifestyle?" Tom asked.
"Yeah, he said it was fun during the eighties when he was starting out but he didn't care much for the way things went after that."
"Meaning?"
Sherman shrugged. "Don't know. He didn't say, not to me anyway. What's he done anyway?"
"Who says he's done anything?" Cassie asked.
The neighbour didn't answer. Looking back at Felgate's house, Sherman casually pointed to it. "Listen, I have a key to the house if you want to go in." Tom and Cassie exchanged a glance. "I mean, he gave it to me for emergencies. Does this count as an emergency?"
Tom smiled. "Yes, I believe it does."
* * *
Tom hammered his fist on the frame of the back door but there was still no response from inside. He turned the key in the lock and the hinges creaked as he opened the door. Terry Sherman was standing behind Cassie, trying to see past her into the interior, and judging by Cassie's expression she thought he was invading her personal space. She turned to him and held up a hand.
"What are you expecting to find?" Sherman asked eagerly.
"What do you think we might find?" Cassie countered.
He was confused for a moment, then raised his eyebrows. "I don't know. Say, you don't think he's done himself in or something, do you?"
Tom was curious. "Why would you ask that?"
"Just … I–I don't know really. Gavin was an up and down kinda guy, you know? Like I said, some days he would talk and others he'd brush you off without looking at you. I did wonder if he was depressed."
"Was he depressed?" Cassie asked.
He shrugged, shaking his head. "If anything, I'd say he had a spring in his step recently. I thought it was his new lady friend but…"
"But? Go on," Cassie said.
"Well, he'd been going out more at all times. Usually, he was a creature of habit but recently he'd been keeping odd hours. As I said, at first I figured he was out with his new love interest, but then I wondered if he was just working more." Sherman craned his neck to see into the interior, not easy with Tom's bulky frame standing in between.
"Thanks for your time, Mr Sherman. If we need anything more from you, we'll call round," Cassie said. She was polite but pointed. Sherman frowned but didn't protest, his disappointment clear to see. He wandered slowly around to the side alley between the two properties, glancing back over his shoulder and lingering at the corner. Cassie smiled her encouragement for him to keep moving and then he disappeared from view. She heard the latch on the gate click into place moments later.
"Irritating man," she said under her breath, stepping into the kitchen to join Tom.
"I doubt much gets past him, though. He might be invaluable."
"Aye, true enough. I'll bet you a tenner he keeps a diary of the neighbourly goings-on."
"I'll take that bet," Tom said, casting an eye around the kitchen.
"You'll lose," Cassie said drawing a laugh from Tom. The blinds to the window above the sink were down and on a winter's day, even a reasonably clear and bright one as they had today, the interior was still dark. The rear garden must face north. "Interesting smell he's got going on in here." Cassie screwed her nose. "Bachelor-itis?"
"I'll have you know my place never smelled like this," Tom said, noticing the large kitchen bin in the corner that obviously needed emptying, judging by the smell of food waste in the air. The kitchen worktop alongside the sink had several plates stacked up alongside some foil takeaway food containers; Chinese, Tom figured, inspecting the dried-on leftovers within. He counted the different containers, plates and forks. He found a credit card receipt dated for the night before, no details other than the total of the order, a little over twenty-two pounds. "Unless he had a very healthy appetite it looks like he wasn't eating alone. Call round the local takeaways and check to see if he collected the order or if they delivered it. You never know, they might remember someone with him."
They moved through the house. The scene was repeated in most rooms they entered, generally untidy and stuffy. Tom felt the nearest radiator and it was hot.
"He likes it warm."
"Hasn't he ever heard of opening windows?" Cassie asked, unzipping her coat as she moved through the living room. Tom indicated for her to carry on and he stayed to examine the room they were in. The dining room and living room were shared, stretching the length of the house. The dining table had several piles of paper on it and a laptop with the lid down. Tom scanned the top sheet of the first pile and then flicked through those below it – printed copies of old newspaper articles. Checking the first few from the top, Tom checked who had the by-line on each article, but none were written by Gavin Felgate. They all had some impressive camera shots attached to them though, depicting military units in active theatre by the look of them. Opening a Manila folder lying next to this collection, Tom found a number of documents that resembled invoices or purchase orders. He didn't recognise the company name but the logo on the headed paper looked familiar to him but he couldn't place it. Lifting the lid on the computer, he stroked the glide pad but the machine was fully shutdown and not in hibernation. Tom closed the lid and flipped the folder, lying alongside it, closed at the same time.
Turning his focus to the living room, he moved over to it. There was a three-seater sofa and matching armchairs arranged around a television in the corner of the room. An electric fireplace was on the far wall with a mantelpiece set into the plasterwork above. Tom went over and looked at several photographs lined up next to one another. Surprisingly, he found several were family shots. They didn't look too old but at the same time not recent either. Gavin Felgate's hair was less grey in one where he was standing with his arm around a woman – his wife? – with two children in front and beside them. The older one was a boy and the girl, with her mother's hands on her shoulders, looked a couple of years younger. Beside this picture was another of the couple taken at a table in a restaurant. The decor in the background looked Mediterranean, perhaps Greek, and they were both recently tanned suggesting they were on holiday abroad. Gavin was raising a glass to the camera, the woman smiling awkwardly as if she was uncomfortable. Tom guessed this was the ex, the photographs didn't look recent enough to be Felgate's so-called lady friend. It struck him as odd to be in a relationship with someone new and to still have such visual records of a previous, failed partnership on show. There didn't appear to be any indication of anything untoward happening in the house. Whatever befell Gavin Felgate most likely didn't occur here.
Cassie appeared at the doorway. "Got something?" he asked.
She shook her head. "Not really. There's a study off the hall but I don't think he used it very much. It's the tidiest room in the house. Your man next door was right though, he's got some framed articles on the wall; looks like he did some work for the tabloids back in the eighties. Nothing recent, though. Trading on past glories, I reckon. A few front pages he appears to be proud of, typical tabloid fodder of the time – or any time – but they weren't even using colour print in the photographs. Hard to imagine that now."
Tom nodded. "I remember. Makes you feel old."
"Not me. MTV was old hat when I was a teenager. I've a long way to go before I feel old."
"Lucky you, wait until you have kids," Tom said.
"That would take some doing," Cassie said, and Tom remembered belatedly that Cassie was in a same-sex relationship, which would introduce a new level of complexity if they ever chose to go down that path.
"What about upstairs?"
"Two bedrooms and a box room. The box and spare room are full
of crap, master is as you'd expect from a bloke…"
"Neatly presented and smelling April fresh?"
Cassie laughed. "Close."
"Let's see if we can find a bank statement or something lying around here, see who's paying Gavin Felgate and maybe we'll find out where he works. And have Eric track down his ex-wife, she might still be local." He pointed to the photographs on the mantelpiece. "I don't think he's necessarily moved on, even if she has."
Chapter Four
Tom walked into the ops room. Cassie stayed behind at Gavin Felgate's home to wait for a uniformed presence to arrive and seal off the house until the CSI team could get there. That wouldn't happen until after they'd processed the scene on Roydon Common. Not that he knew what they would be looking for at his home; it remained unclear as to what they were investigating. Eric was sitting at his desk, a phone pressed to his ear but he waved a greeting as Tom entered.
Upon seeing him, Tamara stepped out of the office and bounded over to speak to him. She seemed much more energetic than she had been first thing in the morning.
"So, what's going on?"
Tom hung his coat up. "A fifty-something male found dead on Roydon Common. He appears to have suffered a blow to the face but the cause of death is inconclusive. No sign of a struggle or altercation on the victim's body, no tears to clothing and no defensive wounds that are visible. The FME suggests we might have some joy with trace evidence but," he shrugged, "she isn't hopeful."
"That's odd," Tamara said, folding her arms across her chest. "But it's not quite the mystery I was expecting."
"Well, that's because I haven't told you the weird part yet."
Tamara opened her hands, palms up by way of encouragement.
"He was found dead beneath a hangman's noose tied to the branch of a tree above."
Tamara frowned. "Botched suicide?"
Tom shook his head. "Only if he managed to fall off a stepladder, die on impact and then pick the ladder up and set it against another tree four metres away."
A Dark Sin: Hidden Norfolk - Book 8 Page 3