by Paul Finch
At the bottom, Heck leafed through their sheaf of paperwork. ‘This guy who saved Lansing after he fell in … Gary Edwards. Where was he exactly?’
‘That headland.’ Gail pointed past the weir to a bend in the river about fifty yards short of the iron bridge.
‘But he didn’t actually see Lansing fall into the river?’
‘No. Nor the plane as it made contact. Apparently Lansing screamed for help as he was going over the weir. That’s when Edwards noticed he was in trouble. He told me he’d seen the model planes buzzing around overhead, but hadn’t thought much about them. He said they’re here every other weekend, usually too high up to pose any kind of problem for walkers or anglers.’
Heck read through Gary Edwards’s statement. Edwards was young, only twenty-five, but fit; apparently he played football for a local amateur club. ‘How high is too high?’
‘About sixty to seventy feet.’
‘And what do we know about Edwards?’
‘He’s clean. Well, he’s not in the system.’
Heck thought about this. ‘That meadow where they fly these planes is … what would you say, fifty, sixty yards in that direction?’ She nodded. He mused again. ‘Only a stone’s throw. Wouldn’t be difficult for the odd one or two planes to stray over this way.’
‘Gary Edwards said he’s seen that occasionally, but he’s never seen any of them come down to ground level. I think there are rules governing that.’
Heck nodded. ‘There are. It’s a code of conduct laid down in the Air Navigation Order. The main elements of it, for our purposes, stipulate that the fly zone must be unobstructed, the model craft must at all times be a safe distance from persons, vessels, vehicles and structures, and – this is the really important bit – must never leave the sight of the operator at any time.’
‘I see …’
‘I saw that online, just in case you were thinking I’m a bottomless pit of knowledge.’
She shrugged. ‘The main thing is I’ve already taken statements from the Doversgreen Aviators.’
‘Yeah, I’ve read them. They’re not having it, are they?’
‘Not a single one will admit responsibility.’
‘Surely that doesn’t surprise you?’ Heck walked back along the towpath. ‘Even if it was an honest accident, it could lead to prosecution by the Civil Aviation Authority.’
‘Okay, so where are we going now?’
‘For a pint.’
‘Come again?’
‘You know a pub called the Ring O’Bells?’
‘Sure. It’s next to the local parish church.’
‘Good – that’s where they’re meeting us.’
‘Who is?’
‘The Doversgreen Aviators.’ Heck checked his watch. ‘In approximately twenty-five minutes.’
‘And when did you arrange that?’
‘I rang their club chairman last night. Wasn’t difficult, his details are on the website. I said I wanted them at their usual watering hole at two this afternoon. It’s Saturday, so there shouldn’t be a problem.’
‘And he agreed, did he?’ She sounded amused. ‘Just like that?’
‘Yep.’
‘Or so he said.’
‘I told him I didn’t need every member there; just the eighteen who were present at the meeting on 21 June.’
‘Some chance.’
‘Chance won’t come into it.’ Heck diverted from the path up a gravel track to the car park. ‘I told their chairman the alternative was that we visit them all at home, with search warrants and a view to seizing their model aircraft for forensic examination. I made sure he understood that anyone whose craft shows signs of recent damage, or recent immersion in water, or maybe has threads of unexplained fabric connected to it, no matter how microscopic, may have to answer questions under caution.’
They’d now reached Gail’s Punto. She regarded him over its roof as she unlocked the driver’s door. ‘Bit heavy-handed, don’t you think?’
‘What was that phrase you used – means to an end?’
The vault of the Ring O’Bells was a small side chamber into which only a corner of the bar protruded. Its low, smoke-browned ceiling was supported by heavy oak beams. Its handsome original features served to create the aura of a confined space, as did the double doors to the beer garden when they were closed – as they were now.
The eighteen members of the Doversgreen Aviators were crammed in like so many sardines, sitting along the benches, standing in corners, clustered around the brass-topped tables. They were exclusively male, but every group was represented, from teenagers to the husky middle-aged. Most looked like countrymen – weather-beaten faces, wild hair, patched woollen jumpers, but there were also shirts and dicky bows on view, even the occasional walking stick.
Not one of them had ordered a drink. Instead they sat or stood perfectly still, regarding Heck in silence as he leaned against the bar. He’d already checked, and found that none of the nervous faces in front of him had a criminal record. That was perhaps to be expected, as he didn’t actually believe that any of these weekend recreationists would be a regular offender.
‘Okay …’ He cleared his throat.
They listened with rapt attention.
He glanced at Gail, who was standing in front of the double doors, equally fascinated to know what was coming next.
‘I’m Detective Sergeant Heckenburg from the Serial Crimes Unit. You already know Detective Constable Honeyford, as you’ve all given statements to her in the recent past. Statements in which you acquit yourselves and your fellow club members of any wrongdoing. Which is unfortunate, because I have to tell you that I’m not at all satisfied by that … not least because this sad affair is looking like it may turn into a murder enquiry. I don’t mean it possibly will, I mean it probably will.’
He scanned them with his best ‘interview room’ intensity. There were more than a few facial tics. Several brows had moistened with sweat.
‘Excuse me,’ one of them said. It was the club chairman. His name was Rex Murgatroyd; he was a tall, elegant sixty-year-old, wearing a tweed suit. ‘I understood that Mr Lansing died in a car crash?’
‘You’ve been following the case,’ Heck said. ‘Excellent – that’ll save us a few explanations.’
‘But how is that anything to do with us?’
‘It’s quite simple, Mr Murgatroyd. I’d like to dismiss you all from this enquiry. But before I can do that, I need to know the exact truth about what happened at Deadman’s Reach on 21 June. How is it that Harold Lansing was knocked into the river by a model aircraft?’
There was a discomforted shuffling of feet.
‘I’ve already explained to you gentlemen that the stakes have been raised significantly since you were last interviewed. If anyone has something to tell me, now would be the time. Perhaps you lost control of your model? Perhaps it wasn’t adequately fuelled? If anything like that happened, I need to know right now. So stick your hand up.’
Their hands stayed resolutely down. They fixed him with bright, unblinking stares.
Heck folded his arms. ‘I can assure you that we are not going to let this drop. So the next thing I’ll do, if I’m forced to, is look through the statements that you men gave to DC Honeyford. I’ll be taking very careful note of who said what, so when I find the person responsible for the incident at Deadman’s Reach, I may also be charging him with perverting the course of justice. And that could mean prison.’
The Aviators exchanged haggard glances.
‘Up to you, fellas. Come clean now. Tell me what happened, and that mendacious statement can be filed in the dustbin.’
He was pleased to see a number of downcast eyes, various bottoms squirming on seats. One more layer of menace should do it.
‘And if there’s anyone here who may be trying to protect a friend – say, for example, you happen to know that one of your fellow Aviators owns a model plane matching the one involved in this incident, and now all of a sudden there�
�s no sign of it, and you’ve decided not to say anything – well, let me tell you what such misguided loyalty is going to cost you: all your other friends.’ Heck’s taut gaze roved from one to the next. ‘If I walk away from this pub without an adequate answer, I’ll be getting straight in touch with the Civil Aviation Authority, not to mention the British Model Flying Association, expressing grave doubts about your group’s suitability to function. I’ll make sure they know exactly what happened down at Deadman’s Reach, and exactly how uncooperative you were with the resulting investigation.’
‘But please,’ Rex Murgatroyd said. ‘We can’t cooperate if we don’t know anything.’
‘You think the CAA will buy that?’ Heck said. ‘You think they’ll believe it was someone else’s plane that knocked Harold Lansing into the River Mole? Will they write it off as mere coincidence that you guys were right on the spot where it happened?’
‘Sergeant Heckenburg … please,’ Murgatroyd insisted. ‘None of us is responsible for this incident. I would know, I’m sure.’
‘I’d like to believe that, Mr Murgatroyd, but how do you expect me to?’ And yet, in truth, Heck was starting to believe it. The silence greeting him was not the stubborn bullheadedness of seasoned suspects. By their body language alone, these men weren’t being furtive – they were disconcerted, alarmed, frightened.
Gail seemed to sense this too. ‘Look, guys,’ she said, ‘Harold Lansing did not die as a result of what happened at Deadman’s Reach. At the end of the day, an accident is an accident. There’ll be no far-reaching consequences for his being knocked into the river. But we need to establish what happened.’
Still there was no reply.
‘Did any of you film the meeting on 21 June?’ Heck asked.
Murgatroyd shrugged. ‘Not officially.’
‘Unofficially?’
Hesitantly, one of the men, the youngest there – a scruffy youth of no more than eighteen – put a hand up. At the same time, he placed a mobile phone on the nearest table. ‘I … I don’t know how much you’ll be able to see,’ he said in a reedy voice. ‘It was just a fun day, you know. I shot a few minutes’ worth. That’s all.’
‘And you are?’ Heck said.
‘Ed Pritchard.’
‘Want to show it to us, Ed?’ Gail said.
The youth did as they asked, and they had to squint to watch a series of confusing, apparently meaningless events unfold on a small, badly pixellated screen. The image cavorted back and forth, whipping from face to face, down to scuffed boots on green grass, and back up to clear blue sky, where a clutch of minuscule, insect-like objects wove in and out of each other. There was distorted shouting and laughter, and a very distant drone of tiny engines. Occasionally, when the camera’s eye returned to the level, men were visible – some of them identifiable among those gathered in the pub – standing in groups, eyes shielded against the sun as they operated their controls.
In total, it lasted no more than four and a half minutes. After they’d watched it through a second time, Heck knuckled at his chin. ‘Ed, can you email this video to me?’
‘Erm … yeah.’ The youth looked surprised as he took the ID card Heck was offering, which held all the necessary contact details. ‘But it doesn’t show anything, does it?’
‘Why don’t you let us decide? If you can send it now, that’d be great.’
Five minutes later, with the Doversgreen Aviators – many of them in a mild daze that they’d actually been released – trooping stiffly out of the pub, Heck and Gail had settled at a quiet table in the fireplace nook where, thanks to the pub’s free wi-fi, they were able to access Heck’s emails on his laptop. They ran through the flying club footage again, now as a blown-up image. One minute in, Heck advised Gail to take note of the vehicles, which the camera occasionally glimpsed parked in a row on one side of the meadow.
‘And what’s that supposed to signify?’ she asked.
‘Just wait …’ Another minute in, he hit pause and thumbed at a different part of the image. It was distant and blurred, and had only been captured fleetingly, though on this larger screen it was more evident what they were looking at: another vehicle, but this one parked alone on the iron bridge over the river.
Gail said nothing while Heck advanced the MPEG slowly.
The vehicle on the bridge, though no details of its actual make or model were distinguishable, looked like a four-by-four of some sort and was metallic green in colour; it was visible on each occasion the camera flirted by, in exactly the same position.
‘That motor was there at least as long as Ed Pritchard was filming,’ Heck said.
‘There could be any reason for that.’
‘One of which might be so that a non-club member could fly his own model plane.’
‘And hope it wouldn’t get noticed because of all the others, you mean?’
Heck nodded.
Gail mused. ‘And then use it to strike at Harold Lansing, assuming we would blame the resulting death or injury on the incompetence of the Doversgreen Aviators?’
‘Which is exactly what happened, isn’t it?’
She sipped her lemonade. ‘Interesting thought, but pure guesswork.’
Heck pondered. ‘I can’t see any other obvious reason why anyone would park on that bridge, can you?’
‘Unless they wanted to watch the model aircraft?’
‘It’s quite a distance away.’
She twisted her lips as she gave it further thought. From the corner of his eye, Heck caught the last of the Aviators drifting towards the pub exit. ‘Excuse me,’ he called. ‘Mr Murgatroyd?’
The club chairman ventured over. He still looked a little nervous.
‘I notice from this video that you chaps usually park on the meadow where you fly your planes?’ Heck said.
‘We have full permission, I assure you.’
‘I don’t doubt it. But do any of you ever park on the surrounding lanes?’
Murgatroyd looked puzzled. ‘Not to my knowledge. What would be the point? There’s ample room on the meadow.’
‘And do any of your members drive a metallic green four-by-four?’
‘No such vehicle springs to mind. I can certainly find out and let you know.’
‘If you would that’d be excellent … again ASAP, yeah?’
Murgatroyd nodded and shuffled away.
Gail regarded the image on the screen, still undecided about what she was seeing. ‘Heck … you don’t think this a tiny bit fanciful?’
‘Only one way to know for sure.’
They found their way to the bridge some fifteen minutes later, and were able to park the Punto on the same side of it where they’d seen the four-by-four. The road crossing over the bridge was easily wide enough to permit this – occasional passing vehicles were unimpeded, though the pavements to either side were very narrow. Heck climbed onto the latticed barrier, and found that he could see along the river valley for several miles. It made a peaceful scene, the curved waterway gliding lazily between fertile terraces, only broken by the brief foamy obstacle of the weir. Deadman’s Reach was easily identifiable – Harold Lansing must have made a solitary but distinct figure standing down there alone.
‘Perfect vantage point from which to fly a model plane,’ Heck said. ‘He could even sit in his car and do it, so there’d be even less chance he’d be spotted.’
Gail was still pondering this when her mobile rang. ‘Yeah, DC Honeyford?’ She moved away from the barrier.
Heck peered again along the valley. If his thesis was correct, someone had gone to an awful lot of trouble, and it had very nearly worked. Harold Lansing’s death would almost certainly have been written off as a fatal accident, with the Aviators carrying the can – the only problem was that Harold Lansing hadn’t died. Not on that first occasion.
‘That was the lab,’ Gail said, coming back round the car.
He climbed down from the lattice. ‘And?’
‘That tooth you found on the roadside bel
onged to Harold Lansing.’
‘Thought it probably did.’
‘There’s something else.’ She chewed her lip. ‘A trace of foreign DNA, in other words someone else’s blood, is embedded in the tooth cavity.’
Heck felt a stirring among his neck hairs. ‘So he was punched in the mouth?’
‘Or he bit someone.’ She pocketed her phone and glanced again towards Deadman’s Reach. ‘The problem is, the foreign DNA is unknown to us. They’ve run it, and there are no comparisons anywhere on the database. So it doesn’t really confirm much.’
‘Well … it confirms Harold Lansing was murdered. You must admit, that’s a step forward.’
Chapter 10
‘He must have been outside the car at some point, otherwise his errant tooth couldn’t have ended up in the roadside undergrowth,’ Heck said.
Gail pondered this as they walked the stretch of lane outside Rosewood Grange. It was now two days since Heck had arrived in Surrey and though she had taken the Sunday off, he apparently hadn’t because it was only Monday morning and already, at his request, extensive crime-scene tape and forensic shelters had been deployed along several sections of the verge, and a single uniformed bobby was on guard; he currently stood by the left gatepost, lunchbox in hand, chomping his way through a pile of cheese sandwiches. Despite this, both Heck and Gail knew that no specialist analysis of the scene would be authorised unless they came up with something fairly conclusive; in fact, unless they found something soon, they’d lose the site security as well.
‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘Hot summer day … his tooth got knocked out on impact, went flying through an open window.’
‘That’s a stretch.’
‘You’re saying you think he survived the impact and got out?’
‘And had an altercation with someone.’
‘The other driver maybe?’
‘Nah. Dean Torbert was killed instantly in the crash. Or so his postmortem said.’
‘A passenger?’
‘Could be. But according to the accident investigation team, there was no sign of a passenger in either of the two vehicles.’
‘And yet, somehow or other, Lansing finished up back inside his burning vehicle?’