He took a breath. In the silence Horton heard the rain start up again, thrashing against the window, and the solemn ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece, where there was a photograph of a couple that was clearly Lawrence Sanderling and his late wife. In the flat above a dog began barking incessantly and a baby started crying.
‘Then just as I thought I’d be in the car all night she came down the boardwalk and got into her car.’
‘What time was this?’
‘Ten fifteen. She headed for Portsmouth. For a moment I thought she must know where I lived and was coming to see me. See how stupid I am,’ he said with a bitter laugh. ‘But she turned off and headed for the old boatyard at Tipner. I stayed well back because there are no street lights there and I didn’t want her to see me. I knew there was no other way out except that road, or by sea. So after a while I followed her, dimmed my lights and pulled up at the sailing club.’
Eames interjected. ‘Were there any cars there?
‘No. And it was in darkness. I had a torch in the car. I saw her waiting on the quayside. I headed for her. She must have heard me because she swung round. Perhaps if she hadn’t spoken I wouldn’t have killed her.’
Eames interrupted. ‘Sir, I should warn you that—’
‘Oh, don’t bother with all that now, you can caution me or whatever later. Besides even if she hadn’t spoken I guess I still would have killed her. After all, what have I got to lose? A prison cell has got to be better than this dump and I’ll be fed and kept warm.’
Eames flicked Horton a sad glance.
Sanderling continued. ‘Besides I didn’t only have a torch in my hand, as you well know. I also had the knife I use for gutting fish, which I keep in the car along with some other bits for fishing, when I get invited out. She said, “Who are you? What do you want?” I said something like, “You don’t remember your victims, then?” But why should a woman without a single shred of conscience, an evil wicked woman, remember the people she had destroyed? She told me to go away. And that if I didn’t she’d call the police and have me arrested for pestering her. I said, “Go on then call the police and I’ll tell them what you and that boyfriend of yours did to me, Edgar Willard and countless others.” That pulled her up sharpish for a moment then she said she didn’t know what I was talking about, and that obviously I was confused, suffering from some kind of dementia, and that people like me should be locked away in a home. She turned away. I grabbed her, caught the chain of her handbag on my arm, it broke and fell. She made to turn. I still had hold of her and I plunged the knife in her back and thrust her into the sea. I remember staring down at the water thinking, Good, now you won’t destroy anyone else’s life. I put the handbag in the boot of her car and drove it to the multi-storey car park at the ferry port. The car had a foreign number plate and I thought it was the natural place for it. It must still be there, unless you’ve found it.’
They hadn’t because they’d only recently got the registration number and no one had thought to check a legitimate car park for it. They’d been looking for it abandoned or flashed up somewhere.
Sanderling said, ‘I returned to the boatyard, got in my car and came home.’ He looked at both of them in turn. ‘I’ve been following the investigation on the news. I’ve been waiting for you to come. I didn’t know there was another body down there. Is it connected with that wicked woman?’
Horton answered, ‘We believe it to be the remains of Ellie Loman.’
Sanderling’s eyes widened with surprise. ‘Was she murdered?’
‘Yes.’ Horton knew he shouldn’t say anything about the case but Sanderling, although a killer – and Horton couldn’t condone what he had done – should know. ‘But not by Sharon Piper, although she knew about it. Patricia Harlow killed Ellie.’
‘My God!’ A veil of sadness touched his eyes.
Eames rose. ‘Would you fetch your coat, sir? Is there anyone you’d like to call? Your daughters perhaps?’
‘No. There’s no one.’ At the door he said, ‘When you’re old people stop noticing you.’
Yes, and that had been Horton’s mistake. He had thought nothing of the man going to the toilets in the crematorium until less than two hours ago. And if had recognized the significance of him earlier perhaps he could have saved two lives.
TWENTY-THREE
Sunday
Horton stepped out of the station and gazed up at the pale pink sky in the calm, fresh morning. The streets were silent. It had been a long night. They’d taken statements from Loman and Sanderling, both had refused to have a solicitor present, neither man seemed concerned about what would happen to him. Loman would probably receive a suspended sentence unless Patricia Harlow died but even then he would in all likelihood escape prison given the circumstances behind the attack, unless he was very unlucky with the Judge. And Sanderling? Horton simply didn’t know.
He took a breath. Uckfield had been bouncing around the station with a big grin on his craggy face, elated at clearing up one of Dean’s failed cases and disappointed that there was no one around to hear him crow about it. Monday though would be different. Horton thought they would hear about it on Ben Nevis. Uckfield would get his revenge on Dean for pulling in DCI Bliss to review one of his cases. He’d gone home about an hour ago along with an extremely tired Trueman and a weary and relieved Marsden because Uckfield in his joy had forgotten all about the press debacle. Only Eames remained inside the station. Horton thought he should call Mike Danby and tell him about Ellie Loman’s murder. Or perhaps he’d delegate that to Eames. Danby was staying in one of her family’s properties, after all.
He heard footsteps behind him. Eames.
‘Thought you’d like to know, sir. A call’s just come through from the hospital. Leo Garvard died this morning at three thirty-three.’ She looked as tired as he felt. Fatigued she appeared vulnerable, more approachable, and even more beautiful. He experienced a strong yearning to wrap his arms around her and hold her, which he quickly nipped in the bud, not without some difficulty. What was the point? She was out of his reach and she’d be returning to The Hague on Monday. He knew that wouldn’t have stopped other men from trying and might even have made seducing her more attractive but he wasn’t most men. He didn’t want a one-night stand. He wasn’t sure if Eames would want that either. God, he didn’t even know her first name.
‘Did they tell him what had happened?’
‘Yes, but whether he heard . . .’ She shrugged. ‘He was unconscious.’
Horton knew though that hearing was the last sense to leave a person. So perhaps Garvard did know, and knowing, he had finally let go.
Eames continued. ‘We might discover who left the photograph of Sharon in Woodley’s cell now that Garvard is dead. I’m assuming that Garvard had the photograph all the time.’
‘Probably, but I don’t think anyone’s going to admit to putting it in Woodley’s cell.’
Eames considered this for a moment before saying, ‘And Ross Skelton attacked Woodley and because he made a hash of it first time he picked Woodley up from the hospital and took him to the marshes where he left him to die.’
It was the conclusion that Uckfield had drawn and the timing of Woodley’s visit to the coffee stall seemed to match it, although they didn’t have the exact date for when Iris saw him. Uckfield’s reasoning behind it was that Skelton had been planning to join forces with Sharon. ‘He was a crook and a killer,’ Uckfield had reiterated. ‘Woodley must have told Skelton, under Garvard’s instructions, that Sharon had a scheme he’d be interested in that would make him a great deal of money but that no one should know about it. That would have been enough for Skelton to silence Woodley. He proved himself a killer with Gregory Harlow’s death. He followed Woodley to the pub, waited until he came out then attacked him but he botched it. Then he picked Woodley up and took him to the marshes.’
‘How did he know Woodley was going to leave the hospital?’ Horton had thrown in.
In exasperation Uckfield ha
d answered, ‘Skelton telephoned him or visited him and spun him some yarn about someone being after him and that he’d help get him away.’
It was the theory that Uckfield was clearly going to stick to, and one which would never be disapproved. It meant the clearing up of another case, and a notch on Uckfield’s proverbial promotion belt, but Horton said to Eames, ‘Skelton didn’t attack Woodley.’
She frowned. ‘Lawrence Sanderling couldn’t have attacked Woodley and neither did Patricia or Gregory Harlow, so if Skelton didn’t, who did?’
‘When we catch our metal thieves we’ll ask them,’ Horton said.
She looked at him in surprise.
‘Whoever struck Woodley was disturbed doing it. Our metal thieves were in the area that night, not at the church, but the date matches that of when they stole that bronze statue from a garden in Old Portsmouth and a fountain from the wine bar. They cut through the back streets in their van and prevented Garvard’s instructions from being carried out. Woodley was expendable, a messenger boy. He’d delivered the message and needed to be eliminated.’ His words suddenly conjured up Edward Ballard. Several thoughts galloped through Horton’s mind but he was too tired to even grasp one of them as they flashed past.
‘So who killed him, or rather left him at the marshes to die?’ Eames asked baffled.
‘Ask Marty Stapleton, although I don’t think he’ll tell you.’
‘Shit!’
He smiled. ‘That’s not a very nice word for a girl like you.’
‘I know a lot worse. So Stapleton was in on it.’
‘Yes, in letting himself be attacked by Woodley in prison, and in providing someone to take Woodley out after he’d delivered the message. Garvard probably didn’t know who Stapleton ordered to do it and didn’t care, just as long as Skelton was on the hook.’ And the person who had attacked Woodley could have been in the pub drinking, watching and waiting for Woodley to leave, knowing that he had finally delivered his message to Skelton. Either that or he had waited outside, and it wasn’t Reggie Thomas because Thomas like Woodley would finally blab. Garvard had wanted someone who had no connection with Woodley and who would never be traced. For a second Horton’s mind leapt back to Edward Ballard before he continued, ‘Garvard had no idea that Woodley’s funeral would coincide with Amelia’s Willard’s.’
‘Gambler’s luck.’
‘Bad luck for Gregory Harlow and Lawrence Sanderling.’ He should also say bad luck for Patricia Harlow and Sharon Piper but he couldn’t bring himself to do so. ‘Woodley had only the one message to deliver and that was to Skelton. For all Garvard’s planning he hadn’t foreseen Lawrence Sanderling.’ Or had he? He had known that by bringing Sharon back for the last of the Willards’ funeral, and assembling those still alive from the time of Ellie’s death, something would happen. And it had.
Eames, clearly following his train of thought, said, ‘So who did he plan to kill Sharon? Or is “plan” too ambitious?’
‘Maybe. He knew that Sharon would see Patricia and that they were both involved in Ellie’s death. Perhaps he thought that Patricia would kill Sharon. And he judged that Edgar and Amelia’s friends would be at her funeral; friends he and Sharon had conned, so one of them could do it for revenge.’
‘And they did,’ she said sadly and quietly.
‘Yes.’ There was a moment’s pause before he continued. ‘Or perhaps Garvard thought Skelton might be prompted into doing it because he thought Sharon knew too much about him employing illegal immigrants and perhaps even assisting in bringing them into the country. Maybe Woodley delivered more than the message Iris overheard.’ Horton shrugged.
‘And in return for organizing Woodley’s death, Stapleton gets whatever money Garvard has stashed away.’
‘Well, it’s no good to Garvard now.’
‘We might find it,’ she said optimistically.
Horton doubted it. ‘I don’t think that will be of much comfort to Lawrence Sanderling and Kenneth Loman.’
‘No.’ She sighed before adding more brightly, ‘Buy you a coffee, guv?’
It was the first time she’d called him guv. He looked at her clear-skinned face with its dark smudges under her intelligent blue eyes and his heart quickened. He’d like to have said yes. He’d liked to have talked to her and not about the case, but what did he have to say to a woman like Eames from a background so totally opposite to his? ‘Think I’ll give coffee a miss for a while.’
‘I’ll see you tomorrow, then.’
He thought she sounded disappointed but perhaps he was only hoping she was. He eyed her surprised. ‘I thought you’d be returning to Europol.’
‘I’m waiting instructions and there’s no one to give them to me at this ungodly hour or should I say godly hour seeing as it’s Sunday.’
He watched her climb into her car and drive away. Cantelli would be back tomorrow and he’d be very pleased to see him.
Despite what he’d said to Eames about not wanting a coffee he headed for the Hard not knowing if Coastline Coffee would be open. It wasn’t but the cafe serving the taxi drivers was.
He waited while the taxi driver in front of him ordered a big breakfast and chatted with the cafe proprietor. He was in no hurry. Mentally tuning out the radio music his thoughts turned to Edward Ballard and the idea which had occurred to him earlier. He knew that Ballard had had nothing to do with Sharon Piper. Ballard was a messenger boy, just like Woodley. He’d delivered the message and had left. But what message? And why? Even more importantly, whose message? Sawyer’s words came back to him: We believe that someone connected with Zeus will try to make contact with you.
Had that been Ballard? Did Sawyer know that? Was that why he’d arrived at the marina before Horton, because he had been tracking Ballard’s movements? Had he known Ballard had arrived and would try to make contact with him? Had the gang member Europol apprehended in Stockholm, who had died of an allergic reaction to aspirin, told them about Ballard? Had Eames really come from the Netherlands? Even if she had, Horton wondered if she’d been in Stockholm before that. Maybe he should ask her.
We don’t believe you’re in imminent danger because Zeus needs to know who you are and how much you know first. Had Ballard reported to Zeus, or someone connected with him, who was living in Guernsey and now that he had done so he was on his way back across the English Channel? To where, though? And what could Ballard have told Zeus about him? He’d said nothing worth relaying and there had been nothing on his yacht about Jennifer Horton, not even her photograph.
‘What can I get you, mate?’
Horton brought his weary, troubled mind back to the cafe proprietor and ordered a black coffee to take out. He was exhausted and his head was thumping. He was too tired to think, but snatches of Sawyer’s conversation continued to play in his head.
Do you remember Jennifer talking about any one man more than the others; or someone who called on her or she met or who took you out?
Could that have been Ballard? Maybe Sawyer had access to Jennifer’s history. Yes, that made sense. Sawyer could have discovered that Ballard had worked with or known Jennifer, perhaps even been her lover.
Horton paid for his coffee and took it along the Hard. He couldn’t get Ballard out of his mind. He thought of that can of Coke he’d sent for DNA and fingerprints. Ballard had hardly touched the drink and after accepting it he’d been keen to get away. Was that the message that Ballard had delivered to him? Ballard had wanted to leave his mark in order for him to investigate. To discover who he was. Perhaps fingerprints and DNA would tell him who Ballard was. But he had a suspicion neither would. He knew it wouldn’t be that simple. He again thought of Sawyer’s offer to go in with him; should he take that secondment to the Intelligence Directorate? It could be a short cut to the past and the truth, as well as a promotion albeit temporary.
He was convinced there had been a purpose to Ballard’s visit and he was equally convinced that the attack had been phoney designed so that Ballard could make con
tact with him. Then there had been that farewell gesture which niggled away at the back of his mind. He’d seen it before . . . Suddenly and sharply the picture snapped into focus. My God! Of course!
He’d come home from school early, he couldn’t remember why. He might even have bunked off. A man had been talking to Bernard, his last foster-father and a policeman. They’d been standing just outside the house. Horton had seen the man hand something to Bernard, a small tin. The man turned, walked towards his car where he’d turned, looked back and raised his hand in farewell. Bernard had nodded and gone inside the house. Then the man had looked around and his eyes had alighted on Horton where they had lingered for some moments before he’d climbed in his car and driven away.
Ballard! Horton saw him quite clearly now, fit, muscular, blond. Several questions jostled for space in Horton’s head as he stared out to sea. Did that mean Ballard was connected with Zeus? If so then had Bernard been? But no, he couldn’t believe that. But why not? Maybe Zeus had wanted to take care of his son, or Jennifer had made him finally promise to make sure that her boy was OK and that was why he’d been fostered with Bernard. But surely he couldn’t be corrupt?
Horton swallowed his coffee not tasting it and threw the paper cup in the bin. He knew very well that coppers could be bought or got at, or be basically unsound, but gentle, kindly Bernard? No. His chest felt tight with emotion and his brain whirled with questions. Why had he been fostered with Bernard and Eileen Lichfield? Who had placed him there? Where had Ballard come from? Who had he been working for? But two questions clamoured in his brain refusing to be silenced: why had Ballard given Bernard that tin – and Horton knew it was the one that had contained the photograph of his mother and her birth certificate, both of which had been destroyed in the fire on his previous yacht – and why had Ballard visited him now?
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