Dying For You

by Evans, Geraldine

  Rafferty, not wishing another of his cousins to have a hold on him, had told Terry he hadn't reported the burglary because he wanted to avoid the paperwork. Thankfully, Terry, aware of Rafferty's aversion to pen-pushing, had swallowed his excuse and agreed, for a consideration, to ‘discover’ the burglary for him.

  ‘I've arranged for Terry Tierney to ring you with the bad news,’ he had told Jerry, ‘just to cover our backs. It will be natural for you to rush home and go through the motions of checking what's been ‘stolen’.’

  ‘Just make sure that nothing else goes missing in the meantime. It'll be down to you if it does. I've got a lot of expensive gear in that apartment and–’

  ‘It won't.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ Jerry sneered. ‘And how did you explain that? A burglar who doesn't like top of the range electrical gadgets? It's not very likely.’

  ‘A lot of burglars are opportunistic. They'll take credit cards, money, passports and other portable stuff that can be easily sold on. And another thing,’ Rafferty had added as he thought on the hoof. ‘Don't forget you'll have to query the bill from the Made In Heaven dating agency on your credit card statement, as it'll be a large one. And cancel the card.’

  At this reminder of the additional trouble to which he'd be put, Jerry cursed Rafferty. ‘This is the last time I do you a favour,’ he hissed down the phone. ‘As if it's not enough that I'm now the chief suspect in a murder enquiry I'm going to have the grief of replacing my passport as well. Not to mention having hassle with the credit card company. They're sure to think I'm pulling a fast one to get out of paying their huge bill.’

  Rafferty tried to inject a little humour. ‘I thought you said not to mention that?’ Unsurprisingly, it didn't go down too well.

  ‘Don't get funny with me, you bastard.’ By now, Jerry had totally lost the smooth estate-agent-speak and reverted to his normal voice. It was thin with spite. ‘I've a good mind to drop you in it.’

  Alarmed, Rafferty soothed him. Luckily, he had remembered in time to call his cousin by his adopted name. ‘Don't do that, Nigel. You might be the family's first estate agent, but surely you don't want to be its first grass, as well? Please. Trust me. I've sorted it.’

  ‘You'd better have,’ Jerry told him. ‘I trusted you before and look where it's got me? I'm going upstairs to pack now while I wait for Terry's call. Your ‘sorting’ had better have cleared me by the time I get home.’

  Rafferty had thought it prudent not to mention to his cousin when he had rang him on Monday that his expensive designer suit would also have to be disposed of. Being too-easily identified as the one Rafferty had borrowed, it would also have to form part of the ‘burglar's’ haul along with his passport and credit card. He sighed as the thought hit him again that it was something else for which he would be expected to pay. Unfortunately, after his self-administered pep talk, Rafferty had gone shopping on the Sunday after he had met Estelle and his purchases of new suits, shirts, etc, had put a serious dent in his credit card limit. He had invested in three new suits, six new shirts and another pair of Italian loafers. They were currently sitting in his wardrobe and taunted him every time he opened the door. So much for his ‘investment’. God knew when he might next have an opportunity to wear them.

  Uneasily, he wondered what Jerry would say – and do – when he discovered the ante had now been upped to two murders... He didn't even dare to ponder how much it would cost him to buy his cousin's silence a second time.

  Rafferty was beginning to think fondly of his trouble-free days as a sad, lonely, unloved git. He was still all those things of course, but now he had other worries. Joining the dating agency had brought more than its share of grief; so much for positive thinking, look where it had landed him.

  But as he thought of Jenny and Estelle and their poor, slashed and battered bodies, he reminded himself that he still had his life. And where there was life there was hope. He must remember to tell that to Jerry/Nigel.

  It was later that week when Rafferty learned the one piece of good news to come his way since Bill Beard had broken his happiness bubble. And it came courtesy of Superintendent Bradley of all people. Although Rafferty felt sorry for Harry Simpson, he was relieved to learn that the fates should have played into his hands so swiftly.

  ‘So, with Harry Simpson gone off on long-term sick leave, the Lonely Hearts case is now your baby.’ Brusque as only a true Yorkshire-man can be, Bradley dumped a pile of files about the murders on Rafferty's desk. ‘Familiarise yourself. Go and see Simpson and pick his brains, see what he's been keeping to himself. When's Llewellyn back from honeymoon?’

  ‘Monday.’

  ‘You can have him on the team.’ Bradley gave what for him passed for a smile. ‘Posh lot at that dating agency,’ he commented. ‘All double-barrels and how-now-brown-cow accents, likely. You'll need Llewellyn's dainty touch. Not to mention his intellect.’ Bradley added the acid reminder. ‘It was your sergeant who solved your last case, wasn't it, Rafferty?’

  Rafferty sat silent and grim-faced at Bradley's taunt, knowing he daren't defend himself. If he got his dander up who knew what he might let slip? He consoled himself with the thought that, although he hadn't gone to university like Llewellyn, and whatever Bradley might infer, he wasn't about to be voted in as the Village Idiot.

  But perhaps he was, he reflected, as Bradley slammed out of his office. After all, finding himself in charge of a double murder investigation in which he, or rather, his alter ego, Nigel Blythe, featured as chief suspect, wasn't the brightest of achievements.

  How simple it had seemed at the time. His plans had slipped into place with a magical ease previously unknown to him. But of course the magic had turned out to be of the black variety which had used a siren's voice to lure him in. Now he was snared, good and proper.

  But at least, he assured himself as he looked down at the pile of reports the super had dumped on his desk, by having this case under his own control he would be in a position to steer it away from his cousin. And while he waded through the pile of reports to ‘familiarise’ himself with the inquiry, he had the perfect excuse to avoid interviewing any of the other suspects. Better yet, Llewellyn would be back on Monday. Somehow he'd manage to palm most of the interviews off onto him. At least, by then, the changes in his appearance he had decided were necessary would have matured sufficiently to render the witnesses’ recognition of him as Nigel Blythe far less likely. He hoped so, anyway.

  Rafferty, now officially in charge of the case, made the time to get himself over to Harry Simpson's home. As the Super had remarked, Harry Simpson had a habit of keeping certain things to himself in his investigations. Rafferty was desperate to find out if Harry had kept something back on the Lonely Hearts case.

  Harry lived in a tiny flat in a shabby house on St Mark's Road, near the busy commuter station. The street was noisy, not only with the sound of trains, but also with through traffic and the revving of engines as people queued to get into the station car park a few yards down from Harry's front door.

  As Rafferty parked and got out of his car, he reminded himself to stay in his own character and out of Jerry's. Harry Simpson might be sick unto death, but he was still sharp enough to notice if he let slip something that only Nigel Blythe could possibly know.

  Rafferty pressed the buzzer for Harry's flat and waited. It was some time before Harry answered and released the front door. Rafferty climbed the stairs to the first floor, knocked and walked in through the door of the flat which Harry had opened for him.

  Harry lived alone. Divorced by a wife tired of being a police ‘widow’, he was father to four children he barely knew and never saw. Now, stripped of family, home and money, the career for which he had sacrificed everything had also abandoned him.

  The flat had two rooms plus a tiny kitchenette with bathroom off. It was a grim little place, the wallpaper faded circa 1950s drab and curling off the wall in places. The furniture screamed ‘job lot of other people's discards’. But Harry ha
d never cared about such things. Until he had finally gone on sick leave, home, whether the marital one or this dreary bachelor flatlet, had been a place he had spent little time. He rarely even ate there as the station canteen was both Harry's larder and cafe. The police force had been his life, even when not on duty or eating, he had still spent a lot of his time loitering in the station canteen to pick up snippets of gossip about other cases.

  The only possessions of any interest in the living room were the mementoes of a lifetime in the police force. Scrap books of newspaper cuttings of his cases – both successes and failures – were piled high on every flat surface. Half-a-dozen commendations were piled in another corner, though on the floor this time and more carelessly than the newspapers. But then Harry Simpson had never thought much of his so-called superiors or their commendations. Invariably, as he had confided to Rafferty, they had been given at the wrong time and for the wrong reasons.

  The gas fire was full on and churning out such a blast of heat that as soon as Rafferty entered the living room he began to sweat. Harry, though, looked to have no sweat in him. Bone-dry and brittle-looking, he appeared skeletal. The effort of answering the intercom in response to Rafferty's ring had clearly exhausted him. He lay collapsed in an old armchair that sagged nearly as much as Harry, breathing from an oxygen bottle.

  Strange, thought Rafferty, that during all the weeks Harry had gritted his teeth and dragged himself into work, he had managed to stave off the exhaustion. It was clear he could stave it off no longer. The acceptance that he was unfit for work had finally allowed him to give in to his body's weariness; his body had taken advantage of such weakness to get its own back

  When he could get his breath, Harry gasped out, ‘I know. I look like death. Just don't say it.’

  Even Rafferty wasn't that tactless. He offered to make tea, his ma's cure-all, but Harry, long past such cures, shook his head. ‘Can't stomach it. Make some for yourself. There's no milk.’

  More to give him time to compose some non-incriminating questions about the case and for Harry to get his remaining breath back, Rafferty walked the few steps through to the tiny kitchenette, filled the electric kettle, plugged it in and began to assemble the makings of tea.

  After a while, Harry asked, ‘You said on the phone you've been assigned to the Lonely Hearts’ case.’

  Rafferty came to the doorway and nodded.

  ‘Thought you would be.’ He sighed, adding as if Rafferty was entitled to an explanation for his presumed lack of grit. ‘I knew, when the second girl was found and I realized we might well be in for the long haul of catching a serial killer, that I wasn't up to it.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘You should have heard the Super when I told him I wanted to be taken off the case. You'd think I got this bloody disease deliberately just to spite him.’

  Rafferty could imagine. ‘So you won't be expecting him to come sick visiting bearing a bunch of grapes and a bottle of Lucozade?’

  ‘Every cloud has a silver lining.’ Typically, Harry didn't waste time on self-pity. ‘You've read the files?’

  ‘Made a start, anyway,’ Rafferty admitted cautiously.

  Harry grinned. ‘You and paperwork were never soul-mates, were you? Suppose you want to pick my brains?’

  ‘That's the general idea. Bradley seemed to think you might have kept something back from the reports.’

  ‘Into casting aspersions as well now, is he?’

  ‘And – have you?’ Rafferty forced himself to ask.

  He might as well not have bothered because Harry just said, ‘All in good time,’ and posed a question of his own. ‘The first victim – the presumed Jenny Warburton – the one found behind the rubbish bins at the Cranstons’ home – you managed to get a confirmed ID yet?’

  Rafferty nodded. ‘After you established that red hatchback left at the side of the Cranstons’ house was hers it was always going to be unlikely that the body wasn't also. You said in your report that the Made In Heaven staff you'd managed to question denied that any Ms Warburton was at the party, which is a bit suspicious, as I know-’ Abruptly, Rafferty broke off. He had been about to add that he knew that Jenny had been at the party as not only had Guy Cranston introduced them, Rafferty himself had chatted to her for a sizeable part of the evening. His name, or rather, Nigel's had been marked off on Caroline Durward's clipboard; surely Jenny's had been also? Of course, his had been marked off while he had been at the bar collecting refills, but hidden in the alcove as she had been for much of the early part of the evening, it was possible Jenny had been missed out which would explain the discrepancy. From the reports Rafferty had so far waded through, it was clear that Guy Cranston had yet to be questioned about her presence.

  ‘You were saying,’ Harry prompted.

  ‘What?’

  ‘As I know, you said. What do you know?’

  Harry's sunken eyes looked, to Rafferty's guilty conscience, to have a certain sly knowingness. He had the uneasy feeling that Harry was playing him like a gipsy violin. Quickly, he improvised. ‘Just that the agency must have a record of her if she is one of their members.’

  ‘According to Mrs Cranston – Caroline Durward as she seems to call herself – Jenny Warburton is a member. At least, she's on their computer as such. I hadn't been able to speak to Guy Cranston about the matter before I went sick. Although neither Mrs Cranston nor any of the other staff admit to knowing the girl, she seems to think a part-time member of staff took the Warburton girl on. They must have done, because she's certainly in the agency computer as being a member. Unfortunately, I was told this part-timer is currently on holiday and uncontactable.’

  ‘Damn. That's inconvenient.’

  It's all in my records. I thought you said you'd read them? Missing Llewellyn I take it?’

  ‘I said I'd made a start,’ Rafferty corrected. Harry's comment made him uneasily aware that his efforts to backtrack and appear to know nothing were as likely to place him under suspicion as knowing too much. It was going to be a very rickety bridge for him to balance on in the coming days. Scared now to open his mouth at all, Rafferty thought it wiser to say nothing.

  Harry, after another penetrating stare, told him, ‘the agency's rechecking their files. Said they'd get back to me. You'd better let them know you've taken over the case.’

  Rafferty knew what he had to do, but he let Harry have his say and merely nodded, made his tea and sat down opposite his old colleague.

  Harry stared at him as if only now taking in his changed appearance. It seemed to amuse him, if the harsh splutter that issued from his lips could be called laughter. ‘So I was right,’ he managed to force through the spluttering before a bout of coughing took over.

  Rafferty licked suddenly dry lips. And though his mouth now felt as arid as Harry's laughter, the raised tea-cup made it no further, but hovered in mid-air while the scalding black tea slopped dangerously. ‘Right about what?’ he asked warily when Harry's coughing bout had subsided to a dull wheeze.

  ‘About you being the man who we thought had done a bunk – the chief suspect, Nigel Blythe.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  As Harry uttered Nigel's name, the hot tea jerked from Rafferty's cup and scalded his hand. He cursed, leapt from his seat and hurried through to the kitchen to run cold water over it. As the water gushed over his puckering flesh, he muttered to himself, ‘How did he guess? How did I give myself away? What did I miss?’

  But the damage was done. And little as he relished the prospect of Harry grilling him, he could hardly remain in the kitchen posing questions when Harry was the only one who knew the answers.

  When he had sat down again, Harry held out a piece of paper. Rafferty looked at it for several seconds before he took it, as gingerly as if he feared it might suddenly grow a mouth and bite him. And as he looked at the paper, he suddenly found himself having to fight for breath as hard as Harry. For it was an artist's impression of his pre-disguise self and an excellent likeness.

  ‘That's this so-called
Nigel Blythe,’ Harry told him. ‘I take it you recognise him?’

  Stunned, Rafferty could only nod. His hastily constructed cover-up had been for nothing, he realized. He might have known it would be a waste of time. Didn't murderers always give themselves away? But I'm not a murderer, Rafferty silently protested. Maybe not, but things were looking black for him. After he had told so many lies who was going to believe him now if he tried to protest his innocence? What would Superintendent Bradley say? Worse, what would he do? But Rafferty feared that was one question to which he did know the answer.

  Shock had slowed his thought processes and it took him several more seconds to wonder why Harry had so far failed to report his discovery. He tuned back in to what Harry was saying to find out.

  ‘Luckily for you, none of the witnesses could agree about Nigel Blythe's appearance. The witness who gave that description,’ he nodded at the paper fluttering like a wounded butterfly in Rafferty's hand, ‘came the closest, but I managed to wear him down until he doubted himself and ended up describing someone far less like you.’ Harry's sunken eyes were again staring at Rafferty. ‘Tell me I was right to do that.’

  Rafferty managed to gasp out, ‘You were right, Harry. Never doubt it.’

  Harry simply nodded and handed him something else. ‘You'll be wanting to lose this as well.’

  ‘This’ was a small cassette tape of the type used in telephone answering machines. ‘It's from the Warburton girl's ansafone.’

  Rafferty had been worrying about the messages he had left on Jenny's machine; Harry was offering Rafferty the lifeline he had been denied. Overcome with gratitude, Rafferty felt a desire to unburden himself. ‘Let me explain– ’