Making A Killing (The Romney and Marsh Files Book 2)

by Oliver Tidy

  ‘Make some calls in the morning. Phone this lot.’ Romney indicated the faces on the whiteboard. ‘Ask them how friendly they were with her. I’ll ask the two who I’ve yet to speak to.

  ‘I’m walking down into the town. Meeting Julie for a drink and something to eat. Would you like to join us?’

  ‘Thanks, but I’ve got a date with a fridge that’s been defrosting all day. I’ll walk with you though if you’re heading that way. I saw something today that I think, as a book collector, you might be very interested to hear about.’

  Some months before, Marsh and Romney had taken mutual pleasure in discussing their shared interest of crime fiction over a pub-meal that had almost cost Romney his new relationship with Julie Carpenter. Since then the two women, thrown together in an impromptu wake and with the misunderstanding behind them, had been able to relax and enjoy each other’s company on the odd occasion.

  While Marsh was an avid reader of the crime-fiction genre, with a couple of shelves in her small flat given over to crumpled paperbacks stained with red wine and bath water, Romney’s interest was in the first printings of the first editions. To him condition was everything. When he finally finished the renovation project that was his current home, he promised Marsh a visit and viewing of his collection displayed in all its protected-dust-jacketed glory instead of boxed as it was now.

  *

  Going home, DS Wilkie was in a far better mood than he had been for days. Finally, he was back and involved in some proper police work: hunting murderers rather than mentally disturbed car vandals. The relief revitalized him. He stopped at a petrol station and bought flowers for his wife. He had been neglecting her, preoccupied with the misery of his stagnant position and the curse of the nutcase. She’d been putting up with a lot. And he was going out again that night. A resolve had enveloped him: his determination to catch the crazy. He allowed himself another brief glimpse of a successful ‘resisted’ arrest and the professional appreciation that would follow and it made him smile. Dover wasn’t so big that The Fucking Parking Medal Fucker wouldn’t cross his path sooner or later.

  ***

  10

  Waiting in the cool early morning air on his driveway for Julie Carpenter, his ride to work, to appear, Romney couldn’t ignore the blot on the landscape that was his useless vehicle. The inconvenience of being without his car had gone from mild irritation to aggravated frustration. Perhaps it was simply a flat battery. Maybe he had left something on overnight. If maintenance couldn’t get someone out to it today, he’d borrow a battery charger from them. It would be something to try.

  *

  Marsh, as usual, was first to arrive in CID. A large brown envelope sat on her desk. She opened it to reveal a hard copy, sent by Phillip Emerson’s phone service provider, of the dead man’s current month’s call record up until the moment it abruptly terminated. She made coffee and sat down to go through it. She didn’t want to find a link between Emerson and Duncan Smart because that would explode her theory that they didn’t know each other and damage her belief in her copper’s intuition, something which she had great faith in.

  A scan of calls and texts made and received didn’t reveal Smart’s number and she slowly released a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding. That was a good start. When she examined the record for the evening of Emerson’s death what she did discover brought a smile to her face as she reached out distractedly to answer the ringing phone on her desk. The smile faded quickly as her attention turned completely to the information she was receiving.

  *

  Romney came in through the office doors fifteen minutes later wearing a grim expression. He made straight for Marsh’s desk. ‘Organised a car?’ She nodded. ‘Let’s talk as we go then.’

  Wilkie, tie in hand, unshaven and looking drawn and tired after another fruitless, chilly and exhausting night on surveillance, was arriving as they were on their way out. He stood aside to let them pass.

  ‘You’re late,’ said Romney. Wilkie silently cursed his luck for running into the DI and the bitch together. ‘Those two other golfers are coming in this morning. If I’m not back, you’ll have to deal with them. You heard me yesterday. You know what we’re after from them. Any questions?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Good.’ Romney took a moment to study the Sergeant. ‘Are you unwell. You look awful.’

  ‘I might be coming down with something,’ lied Wilkie.

  ‘A shave wouldn’t hurt you either.’

  Wilkie reddened and disappeared inside the building. Only then did he turn to watch Romney and Marsh get into a squad car – which accelerated quickly away – with what he realised was a twinge of envy.

  *

  ‘Are we sure it’s him?’ said Romney.

  ‘Doesn’t seem to be any doubt.’

  ‘Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Why would he do it?’ The question was as rhetorical as it was to be answered.

  ‘Why do they ever?’ said Marsh. She was struggling with the shock of the news as much as she was with the implications for the case.

  ‘A guilty conscience?’ said Romney. ‘Surely not that Spain business?’

  Marsh didn’t know what to say to him about it. She sensed in Romney’s tone a mixture of anger at the man they were going to see and guilt at what he, Romney, might have been a part of driving him to.

  ‘I received a copy of Emerson’s phone records this morning. He made two calls to Lillian West on the night he was murdered. One of them was very late.’

  ‘They were shagging. There were bound to be calls between them.’

  ‘But the last, late one, it could be that he told her where he was, or what he was doing, or where he was going. There might be something she could tell us to help with our enquiries. Why didn’t she mention it when we spoke to her?’

  ‘Because we didn’t ask her, she’d say. You saw what she’s like. Didn’t she mention it when you had your drink with her?’

  ‘No. Nothing.’

  ‘Well, follow it up if you think it’s worthwhile.’ Romney’s disinterested tone communicated the distraction of his own deliberations to her. She said no more about it as they were driven at speed the rest of the way, each preoccupied with their own thoughts.

  *

  They had no need of a guide to lead them around the White Cliffs Golf Club anymore. Their recent visits had equipped them well for that. For the second time in a week they were there to investigate a sudden death.

  Bill Thatcher, the head green-keeper, was not someone Romney particularly wanted to see on his return, but approaching the pro-shop from the car park he noticed him loitering in a closed group like some ghoulish carrion feeder waiting to move in and pick a carcass clean when appetites of the bigger interests had been satisfied.

  Romney and Marsh passed the group of club members and employees out to gratify their morbid interests without a word or a glance in their direction. A uniformed policeman guarding the entrance to the shop stood aside to let them pass.

  Disturbingly, Elliot Masters dressed immaculately in colour-coordinated golfing attire, was still hanging by the neck from the metal girder he had apparently attached himself to before kicking away the chair that now lay on its side beneath him. He swung gently in a draught from the thin rope that served as his umbilical cord to death. With a grimace Marsh averted her eyes from the distorted and brightly coloured swollen features of a man who she had only known briefly, but as jolly. The abiding memory, which would haunt her dark sleepless nights ahead would be of his over-sized almost black tongue protruding abnormally far out of his mouth.

  Romney wanted to bark at someone: what was he still doing up there? But he knew that he couldn’t be cut down until both the pathologist and the SOCO had done their work, neither of which was in evidence yet. He made a disappointing cursory sweep for a suicide note. Then spoke roughly to the constable on the door, ‘Who discovered him?’

  ‘His assistant, sir. Found him when he opened up this morning.’

&n
bsp; ‘Where is he?’

  The officer indicated a young man sitting on a plastic patio chair smoking. There were two dog-ends on the turf beneath him and he stubbed out the third as Romney approached. Recognising Romney from a previous visit, he got to his feet. He looked a teenager still and frightened and Romney pitied him for what he had witnessed and how it might stay with him. Romney tried to put the boy at ease with a sympathetic look.

  ‘You know who I am?’ The boy nodded. Romney sensed he might be about to cry. ‘Sit down,’ he said. The boy sat. ‘You found him?’ The boy nodded again, not trusting himself to speak, perhaps. ‘I’m sorry for that. I do just need to ask you, did you touch anything? Did he leave a note that you saw?’

  The boy shook his lowered head briefly and Romney saw a dislodged tear land on his neatly pressed golfing trousers. Romney thought about patting him on the shoulder, but given the audience refrained from such an intimate gesture. He thanked the youth, although he doubted whether he was really listening to him, and signalled to Marsh to join him away from the crowd.

  ‘What a fucking mess. I hate suicides. Selfish bastards. What about the people they leave behind? And who is it has to tell their nearest and dearest what they didn’t have the guts to tell them themselves? Us. Right, come on. Nothing more for us here. Let’s go and tell his widow that life with her just wasn’t interesting enough for him.’

  Romney was about to wonder out loud whether he had kids when he noticed a woman running from the car park in their direction. With a sinking, certain intuition, he knew she was Elliot Masters’ wife.

  With the advent of the mobile-phone bad news travelled faster than consoling police officers could ever hope to do and there never seemed to be a shortage of untrained ignorant volunteers wanting to make the life-destroying call to unwitting, unsuspecting and unsupported relatives. Too many people just didn’t think further than their boast that they had been the first to tell so-and-so their nearest and dearest was dead.

  ‘Oh shit,’ he said.

  Romney was about to call out a warning to the uniform on the door of the pro-shop when Marsh said, ‘I’ll go.’

  She cut the distraught woman off before she could get anywhere near being able to make her last memory of the man she had been married to something she would come to wish she hadn’t.

  Romney turned away from the depressing sight and sounds the woman made and towards the voyeuristic group of men who still hung around the little building. A couple of them disengaged themselves under his challenging glare and moved away. Bill Thatcher returned Romney’s contemptuous look with a lopsided sneer before heading off towards the maintenance sheds.

  Romney’s disgust at Mankind was countered somewhat when a small group of elderly women golfers who, knowing the woman or not, scurried out of the clubhouse to surround and rescue her. They led her away back to the sanctuary of the imposing building for what Romney hoped sincerely was comfort and care.

  ‘Organise her a PC, will you?’ he said to Marsh. ‘It’s the least we can do.’

  For the second time since their learning of Master’s suicide, Marsh sensed something resembling regret in Romney’s voice, possibly at the hard time he had given the club professional during his meetings with him. Although Marsh knew he had just being doing his job, she found herself wondering if what she’d witnessed and heard could have been handled differently – better.

  *

  Only one of the golfers Romney was expecting had been and gone by the time he and Marsh got back to the station. Wilkie reported he was a single man who showed no embarrassment at the images. In fact he had asked if he could have one as a memento. He claimed not to have heard from Emerson about the trip. As Wilkie was briefing Romney the other man arrived and the pair disappeared to interview him.

  Marsh took the opportunity to contact the men that had already been seen to ask if they or their wives knew Lillian West, and, if they did, whether they considered her a close friend. The answer in each case was an emphatic no. The suggestion from more than one of the men was that quite the opposite would be more accurate, although none of them cared to explain why.

  Marsh’s next call was to the mobile of Dorothy Smart – the name and number that had been displayed on the phone clutched in the dead man’s grasp. A computerised voice told her the number was unobtainable.

  According to the divorce paperwork retrieved from Duncan Smart’s home, Dorothy Smart had moved back in with her mother – a Mrs Mann. With a call to directory enquiries, Marsh got a landline telephone number and rang it. The call was answered by the mother who was most helpful. She provided her daughter’s new mobile phone number and confirmed her daughter was at work. Marsh dialled her. Dorothy Smart answered cheerfully enough, but her mood changed quickly when Marsh identified herself.

  ‘Where did you get my number from?’

  ‘Your mother. I need to come and speak with you about something.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Your ex-husband.’

  ‘I’ve got nothing to say.’

  ‘Mrs Smart, are you still Mrs Smart?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What name are you using now?’

  ‘How do I know you are who you say you are?’

  Marsh struggled to conceal her irritation. ‘Fair question. What you can do is phone Dover Police Station and ask to speak to me. In case you’ve forgotten what I just told you, I am Detective Sergeant Marsh. I have your address here on paperwork removed from Mr Smart’s home. I also have your work address. If I don’t hear back from you within five minutes, I will have no alternative but to have you collected by uniformed police officers. They will bring you here and I will ask you my questions. I suppose you could call that the hard way. Is that clear, Mrs whatever-your-name-is-these-days?’

  ‘Wait,’ said the woman. ‘My maiden name is Mann. I’m Dorothy Mann now.’

  ‘You know what happened to your ex-husband?’

  ‘Yes. I heard.’ There was no indication she was taking it badly.

  ‘Then you’ll understand why I need to speak to you.’

  ‘When do you want to see me?’

  ‘This afternoon. Where will you be?’

  ‘At work.’

  ‘The shoe shop in the high street?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Will it be a problem for you if I come there?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. See you then.’ Marsh rang off, a little more of her faith in human nature eroded by the conversation.

  Forensics called up to tell Marsh they were able to lift some good prints from the drinks can she had brought in. That was the good news. The bad news was they didn’t match anything on record.

  She followed up this call with one of her own to pathology to discover that Duncan Smart had a substantial amount of alcohol in his system when he died. The contents of his stomach comprised largely a hearty meal and fermenting beer leaving little to be imagined regarding the way he spent the hours before his death.

  Marsh jotted a note to herself to find out where his local was. On an impulse she then dialled Lillian West’s mobile number. When she answered, her tone was guarded.

  ‘Hello, Mrs West. It’s DS Marsh. Is this a bad time?’

  ‘It’s never a good time to have the police calling you up.’

  ‘I have a couple of questions for you.’

  ‘Go on,’ said West, already sounding bored.

  ‘When did you last see Phillip Emerson?’

  ‘Oh God, I’ll have to think. Two nights before he died.’

  ‘Are you sure about that?’

  ‘Positive. We were at his flat.’

  ‘And was that the last time you spoke to him?’ If Marsh was hoping to catch West in another lie, this time she had underestimated her. Of course, West would know that tracing Emerson’s last phone-calls would have been a natural path of investigation and one that would lead them to her door. Her answer, when it came, had a well-rehearsed ring to it.

  ‘No. I remember he
phoned me the night he was killed. It was very late and very inconvenient. We didn’t speak for long.’

  ‘What did he call you for?’

  ‘He wanted to meet. I think he may have been drinking. It was out of the question and I told him so.’

  ‘What did he want to meet for?’

  ‘Sex, of course. Phillip was insatiable.’

  ‘But you didn’t meet him.’

  ‘No. I told you, it was inconvenient.’

  ‘Did he give you any indication of where he might be, who he was with, or what his plans for the night might have been?’ Marsh knew the answer before it came.

  ‘Sorry, no. The phone call was short. We didn’t get into that. Is there anything else, only I’m driving?’

  Marsh ignored this. ‘Why didn’t you tell us about this when we spoke to you the other day? It could have helped.’

  ‘Sorry. Didn’t occur to me. I suppose I was still in a state of shock.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Marsh, trying to keep the sarcasm out of her tone. ‘Thank you, Mrs West. I’m sure we’ll be in touch again. Goodbye.’ Marsh terminated the call with a small sense of a point scored.

  Romney returned wearing a serious expression. As he passed her desk, Marsh asked if he had learned anything. He shook his head. ‘Just along to make up the numbers. Had the time of his life, apparently.’

  Marsh told him of her phone calls and got little response in return. She told him about her appointment with Smart’s ex-wife for the afternoon and he simply nodded and muttered something about letting him know how it went.

  *

  DS Wilkie had two police reports waiting for him on his desk. Both were for car vandalism from the previous night and consistent with the crazy’s MO. He sighed deeply and sagged down into his chair cursing his bad luck at not being in the right place at the right time. Under his desk were two boxes of written reports of similar incidents that spanned the entire campaign of his nemesis. He had had them sent up from archives so that he might be able to re-enter the information on to his computer when it came back from the dead. At the prospect of repeating such a time consuming, thankless and monotonous task he shot Marsh a look of unrestrained hatred.