by Lisa Cutts
‘Don’t look so bloody smug, Baldy. We didn’t shake on it.’ I hit the Answer button.
A slightly shaking voice said, ‘Hello, Nina. Minutes after you left, the hospital called. Tommy had a stroke. He died an hour ago.’
73
Tommy’s death was hardly a surprise, but it still shook me. It did, of course, mean that, if he had been involved in the murder of a woman in 1964, or in covering it up, he’d got away with it. Leonard Rumbly wasn’t likely to want to help us with her identification or the investigation into her death, either. We had no idea who she was, but it wouldn’t stop us trying. I liked a sense of justice and people being held to account for what they’d done, even though we had little to go on. Missing women from 1964 or unidentified bodies fished from the Thames fifty years ago would be a start, so that was where we would begin, as soon as we were back at the station.
Despite everything that was unfolding, Tommy still had my sympathy, although now I wondered what else he might have been involved in. Rumbly, however, still had my loathing. I would have preferred it to have been Rumbly, with his lifetime of criminal activity, who had died alone in a hospital bed, feeling he had nothing worth living for, but life wasn’t always that fair.
We got back to Riverstone police station feeling worn out by a morning of emotions, rather than hard work. I’d given in and bought Wingsy’s lunch, although I argued that not only had we not actually made a deal, Marilyn had telephoned for something completely different. Largely because he’d sulked, I had splashed out on a tea and sandwich for him in the service stop, and now he was moaning that he had indigestion.
‘Stop going on about it,’ I said as we went back through the office door. ‘Anyone would think I made you eat it.’
The sight of Harry staring straight at us as we came through the door stopped me in my tracks. Wingsy halted beside me too.
‘I’ve been with the CPS today,’ he said. ‘They’re saying we definitely don’t have enough on Leonard Rumbly as far as the train crash goes. It’s too long ago, only a couple of people saying he was behind the conspiracy to delay it by any means, and now, to top it all, we find out that he was on the sodding thing.’
‘I thought they might at least give it a go,’ I said, sitting down opposite Harry, feeling misery taking hold. ‘They knew we were going out to arrest him. There’s something else?’
‘The drugs we dug up from his garden.’ Harry loosened his tie. ‘They said that the photos and video we have showed him burying the box, but the contents aren’t seen in the pictures. CPS are saying that the information came from his son and his son has a lot to gain from putting his own father in prison. There’s all sorts coming to light about Leonard and Andy falling out about one thing and another – probably drugs – but, whatever the reason, there’s a good chance anything Andy is telling us is to be taken with a pinch of salt.’
‘Hang on,’ said Wingsy. ‘Did the drugs’ wrappings have Leonard Rumbly’s fingerprints on them?’
‘They’ve just come back, and yes,’ answered Harry. ‘But no one else’s. No one else’s at all. Pretty unusual, wouldn’t you say? What are the chances of a man who’s escaped the law for so long getting caught for something so trivial, not to mention careless?’
This was now a very bad day.
‘We really can’t charge him with anything at all?’ Wingsy asked.
Harry laughed humourlessly. ‘CPS suggested he might accept a caution for possession.’
‘Well, there is something else,’ I said, sitting down beside Harry. ‘We’ve been speaking to Marilyn and there is a chance that Rumbly senior was involved in a murder in the 1960s. What with you being the DS for Cold Case and all, you’re definitely the best person for me and Wings to start with.’
Harry listened as Wingsy and I went through Marilyn’s account of the conversation she’d overheard many years before. He flicked through my notebook so he could read for himself my scribblings as she’d spoken to us.
‘We start off in force,’ he began as he leafed through the pages, scratching his stubble with his cheap, police-issued pen. ‘We search on any missing persons, unsolved murders, that kind of thing. We’re only assuming that the body ended up in the Thames because of the conversation that Marilyn overheard: they were in London near the Thames, that’s all. Even so, we’ll liaise with the Met’s Cold Case that covers that location, speak to Case Review – both theirs and ours – check old newspapers and see what SCAS turns up.’
I must have pulled my ‘what are you talking about?’ face, as he glanced up and added, ‘Serious Case Analysis Section.’
‘Are we going to find out who she is, Harry?’
‘When do we ever give up?’ He winked at me before looking at his watch and saying, ‘You two get yourselves off home too, but in the morning there’s something I need you to sort out. Rumbly’s at home on the mend and he’s now got a solicitor. She’s been on the phone and he wants his passport and a couple of other things back. Can one of you sort it out?’
‘First thing,’ said Wingsy. ‘We can go together and wake him up. He’s an old man, but it’s probably safer if we both go.’
‘That’s a good idea,’ I said, putting my jacket back on. ‘Old man with a heart problem or not, I feel like shoving his passport somewhere. I’ll probably be in a better mood by tomorrow.’
I said my goodnights and made for home. It had been a difficult day but another was about to follow, starting with a visit to Leonard Rumbly.
74
The office was empty when I got to work at eight o’clock the next morning. I checked the diary and saw that Jemma and Micky had already gone out, Jim was on leave but Harry and Wingsy were nowhere to be found. As I was pondering calling one of them, Harry came through the door, swearing and moaning about an overnight kidnap he’d been called out for at three in the morning. I let him get it out of his system as he rummaged through his desk, found the notebook he’d been looking for and left.
Alone once more, I called Wingsy’s mobile. He answered on the first ring.
‘Hi, duchess,’ he said, ‘I was about to call you.’
‘Everything OK?’
On the other end of the line, I heard a door click shut. ‘Don’t want the kids to hear,’ he said. ‘Mel’s not too well. I’m going to have to sort out a lift to school for the kids and then I’ll be in.’
‘You sure you don’t need anything?’
‘No, no. Wait for me. I’ve sorted the stuff out for Rumbly. It’s locked in my drawer. I’ll be in in about twenty minutes and we can go over there then.’
I set about busying myself and trying to take my mind off the last few days. Nothing seemed to be working to distract me. In the end, I went over to Wingsy’s desk to see what he was planning on returning to Rumbly. He had locked the stuff in his desk, but I knew that he always kept the key under his coffee cup when he wasn’t on duty. I unlocked the drawer and was bent over, mid-rifle, when Kayla appeared in the doorway.
‘Yous look guilty,’ she said as I looked up.
‘I’m going through Wingsy’s desk,’ I told her.
‘Need a hand?’
‘No, I’ve got this. Were you looking for me?’
‘Yes, I thought I’d drop by and say hello,’ she said. ‘I’ve been in since six. I’ve got so much to do. I wanted to let you know that we’ve had some more developments from the Lea Hollingsworth murder. I’ve just got an update on the head injuries. You know that they were caused by something long and possibly tapered at one end, like a baseball bat?’
I nodded. I remembered the pathologist saying at the post mortem that she had head injuries.
Kayla continued, ‘There was a tiny fragment embedded in the back of her skull, and it turned out to be wood. It was being dealt with as a murder anyway because of the other drugs deaths, but this has really pushed the button.’ She yawned and stretched out her arms. ‘No prizes for what I’ll be spending the next six months doing. Well, I’ll leave you to it.’
I watched her walk back out of the office and into the corridor.
I busied myself until I heard Wingsy bang through the office door, swearing and muttering under his breath.
I wasn’t sure how to approach the subject of his wife, so I went with, ‘Still OK to take this stuff back to Rumbly today?’
He glanced at the items in front of me on the desk, raised his eyebrows at me and said, ‘You managed to find them in my locked drawer, then.’
‘Latte? Or do you want to talk?’
‘Latte, please. And a sausage roll.’
Even I realised it wasn’t a good time to tell him that Mel wouldn’t like him eating that, so I got my purse and spent my last fiver.
75
Finding myself back at Leonard Rumbly’s house so soon was not something I was particularly pleased about. I knew who he was, how he’d made his money and the dirty, low tactics he’d think nothing of sinking to. However, as we pulled up outside in the muddy unmarked police Ford, I had to hand it to him: he had a very fancy house. On my other visit to his home I had only glanced at it from an officer safety point of view. Today, I was able to take my time. The three-storey Georgian vicarage stood within its own gardens and orchard. I liked orchards, apart from in the month of September when they were full of wasps. Perhaps they’d all attack him and sting him when the time was right and bring on another heart attack. A woman had to live in hope.
Wingsy hadn’t said a word to me on the journey over, so I gave him some peace. As soon as we finished at Rumbly’s house, I’d have one last try talking to him. I watched him get his notebook from the back seat and saw how he kept his eyes and the corners of his mouth towards the ground.
Grabbing my own notebook and bag from behind the driver’s seat, I locked the car and made my way along the gravel drive. Glancing up at the sash windows, I thought how pretty they looked and how easy they were to gain entry through if you were intent on burglary. Despite never having broken into a property in my life, I expected I could manage it well enough. It was something often shown on daytime television, in case you were a criminal on a career break and didn’t fancy in-the-field research.
By the time, we’d reached the front door, Leonard Rumbly was waiting on the doorstep for us.
‘Mr Rumbly,’ I began. ‘You’re dressed. We thought we’d make an early start. You wanted some of your property back.’ All the time I was thinking how much I hated this individual. He’d made his living and livelihood by ruining other people’s lives. He’d taken full advantage of those with a weakness and exploited them. The world would always have despicable bastards like him in it, but few of them would be standing before me looking so smug, taunting me, knowing that there was nothing I could do to bring about his downfall.
As he smiled at me, I wanted desperately to punch him into the middle of next week. Two things stopped me: I was a police officer, and he was a septuagenarian. Even so, the first outweighed the second.
I took a deep breath and remembered the simple task we’d come here for.
‘Hello, officers,’ he said. ‘Please, come in. I was making tea.’ He fully opened the door to allow us inside. As I stepped over the threshold, he said, ‘What can I get for you both?’
‘Some further information on the 1964 train crash would do for starters,’ I said glaring straight into his gaze for a second. ‘You can follow it up with what you know about drug overdoses in the local area. I’m guessing that you don’t know what I’m talking about?’
‘Officer, officer – ’ he chuckled as he leaned across behind Wingsy to shut the front door ‘ – not only do I not have a clue what you’re talking about, but I think you’re forgetting that I’m not a well man.’
Now I was really angry. Evil took many forms, and here it was in an M&S cardigan.
We stood in the hall waiting for him to lead the way. He shuffled in his carpet slippers past us towards the kitchen. I’d bought my great-uncle Eric similar slippers for three consecutive Christmases because he kept losing them. I then figured out that he’d been throwing them away because he hated them so much. That, of course, made me think of Walter McRay’s wife’s lost wedding ring, burglary, and how people robbed and stole to get their hands on drugs provided by the likes of this git.
Rumbly’s breathing was laboured as he made his way along the bright and airy hall towards the kitchen.
He sat in the chair furthest from the dim light. Without being asked, I took a seat opposite him. Wingsy drew up a chair next to me. Rumbly’s creepy smile broke halfway and became a wince. I watched him bring one gnarled knuckle up to his chest. Don’t try that one again, you old codger, I thought. It might have got you out of the last tricky situation but it isn’t going to wash with me now.
Fake chest pains under control, Rumbly locked eyes with me.
‘So, Miss Foster,’ he said. ‘What brings you and your colleague to my house on this beautiful morning?’
‘I have some receipts for you to sign and some property to return.’ I bent down to pick up the briefcase I had placed next to my chair. I rummaged through it and got out his passport and a couple of paper items DI Hammond had agreed he could have back.
Rumbly reached out his liver-spotted hand for the passport. I snatched it away. I gave him a look that seemed to make amusement flare around his cold eyes.
‘If you can just sign the receipt? It’s not that I don’t trust you…’ I paused and then added, ‘Oh, no – actually, I don’t trust you.’
I pushed the paper and a pen towards him.
‘Officer, how kind. You’ve even put kisses where you want me to sign.’
I watched the top of his bald head as he bent forward to sign the paperwork. Our faces were feet apart. I could see every line and wrinkle on his face. He’d added a few to my own, too.
‘It’s very quiet here, Mr Rumbly,’ I said, not moving an inch despite being repelled. ‘You seem to be in your beautiful home all alone. Where is everyone? I suspect that your own grandson’s doing time because of you. Your son is nowhere to be seen. What about your great-grandchildren? Are they allowed anywhere near you?’
As I spoke to him, as I mentioned each generation of his family, he moved his face back an inch at a time. It was quite a relief, as his breath smelt of death. I watched his snaky little tongue dart across dry, cracked lips.
‘Where are your family, Leonard? Where are your friends? At the end of the day, you can buy people to do jobs for you, beat people up for you, even kill them, but you can’t even buy someone to be here with you. You’re a lonely old man.’
Rumbly’s face had gone very pale. I seemed to have hit a nerve. I was feeling fairly pleased with myself. He put his hand up to his chest and grimaced.
‘Here’s your passport,’ I said, throwing it on to the table and taking the receipt. ‘And the other bills and identification we took from you. Happy it’s all here?’
He nodded at me, still holding his chest. This time, he gave a sharp intake of breath.
‘And you can cut that out. I’m not falling for that.’
I pushed my chair out, scraping its legs along the stone floor of the kitchen. For the first time since we’d left the office, Wingsy spoke. ‘I don’t think he’s kidding. He doesn’t look well.’
Standing there ready to leave, I watched Rumbly’s face contort with pain. This time, I was inclined to agree with Wingsy: I was no longer sure he was pretending. My initial instinct was to help a fellow human being – rush around the table, call an ambulance. Then I remembered: he wasn’t a human being. He was Leonard Rumbly. I stayed exactly where I was, next to a motionless Wingsy.
Despite the nastier side of my personality tempting me into walking away from a dying man, without realising I’d done it I had my phone out of my bag and in my hand to dial three nines. It had no signal. Rumbly was making the worst kinds of noises I’ve ever heard someone emit. The moaning noises coming from his throat were a sound I’d never heard before but, by instinct, I knew what I was
listening to. I could hear Leonard Rumbly’s dying breaths. If we didn’t do something, and do it fast, he was going to die.
For a few seconds, we stood side by side watching him. ‘We should do something,’ said Wingsy, backing away. I wanted to back away too, shut the door and pretend I hadn’t seen what was happening. Deny all knowledge when I was eventually hauled into the DCI’s office and asked how Rumbly had been when I last saw him. In weeks from now, when his decomposing body was riddled with maggots.
Something stopped me. Something else jolted me out of it. At the time I wasn’t sure what it was, but whenever I played the scene back in my mind I think it was my shock at Wingsy’s attempt to distance himself. His action forced me to do the right thing. I owed my friend more than he could ever know – he stopped me from walking away from a dying man.
I ran around the table to Rumbly as he slid off his chair. His body was contorted with pain. Helpless to stop his clumsy impact with the floor, I got to him just as I saw the back of his skull smack against the red tiles. I knelt beside him. He gave a low groan like a wounded animal. His face was now a ruddy colour, similar to that of the tiles his head was on, jerking from side to side.
His eyes were open but his eyeballs had started their ascent towards his eyelids. They couldn’t quite manage it. Some part of my brain reminded me that many years ago I had stood in a Magistrates’ Court and proudly sworn an oath to the Queen. Preservation of life was my number one priority. Even a life as disgusting and parasitical as Rumbly’s.
‘Wingsy!’ I shouted. ‘Help me!’
He jolted, as if he too realised he couldn’t stand by and do nothing. He knelt down beside Rumbly and held his hand out towards the groaning figure. He felt for a pulse.
Leaving him to it, I ran to the hallway, looking for a landline. I hesitated at the foot of the stairs. An old man who lived alone would probably have a phone in the bedroom, but the house was massive and I might miss it. I ran back towards the kitchen, aware of Wingsy saying something to Rumbly, but I didn’t concentrate on the words.