He turned to survey the area. They were on the seaward side of Swan Lake, one of three small lakes, in an area of wild grassland, reed beds and shrubs. The entire area had once been Milton Lake until the land had been reclaimed in the 1960s by filling it with domestic rubbish and any other conceivable bit of junk nobody knew what to do with. In the mid-1970s the land had been capped and grassed and was now a Site of Importance for Nature Conservation.
The wind was blasting off the sea of Langstone Harbour, bringing with it the smell of seaweed and a cold easterly wind. He caught the call of a flock of Brent Geese flying overhead and he could see some grazing along the shore line in the harbour. It was an hour after high tide. To the west, behind him, was the dual carriageway that led out of Portsmouth on its eastern boundary. To the south was the densely populated area of housing called Milton, which wasn’t far from Eastney Lake and Horton’s marina, and where Freedman’s body had been found.
Horton, like Uckfield, was wearing a scene suit, which they now both climbed out of. He’d called the Super on his way to the scene, giving him a swift update, and had rung him again as soon as he and Cantelli had set eyes on the dead man. There was no doubt it was Vivian Clements, despite the fact the top half of his head was a bloody mangle of bone and brains where he must have put the gun to his temple. The pistol lay beside him. It looked old, or rather antique. It might have been on Clements’ list of stolen pistols but until he could get a closer look at it he wouldn’t know. He said as much.
Uckfield popped another throat lozenge in his mouth. ‘We’ll see what Dr Clayton comes up with and how Clements’ wife reacts to the news when we tell her that her husband’s dead. If she doesn’t give us permission to search the premises I’ll apply for a warrant.’
‘She denies any affair with Peter Freedman.’
‘She would,’ Uckfield scathingly replied.
It would have been dark when Clements had come here, if Constance Clements’ account could be believed, and raining lightly. There were no lights. The nearest were on the dual carriageway and that was too far away to illuminate this area. It was a very private place to kill yourself, Horton thought. There was a heavy-duty torch beside the body. Clements was wearing ordinary shoes not boots, the ground was soggy and there was mud on the bottom of his khaki trousers. But what was a bit of mud when you were intent on killing yourself? He was also wearing a heavy duty raincoat.
He looked up to see the petite figure of Dr Clayton heading towards them. Her large waterproof sailing jacket swamped her tiny figure and she looked almost childlike in the bright pink and yellow floral-patterned wellington boots. Cantelli’s were the more traditional green. He always kept them in the boot of his car while Horton’s shoes and the bottom of his trousers were mud spattered like Uckfield’s. Cantelli was carrying Gaye’s medical case and they were deep in conversation. She smiled broadly at something Cantelli was saying and he grinned back. Perhaps he was describing the antics of the twins or one of his other three children. Horton watched with an all-too-familiar feeling of being an outsider, of glimpsing a life from which he was for ever to be excluded. He had no reason to believe that the future would hold the same as the past but believing and feeling, in his experience, were two very different things.
She locked eyes with him. He took a silent breath, knowing that his feelings for her were deepening and he believed hers were for him, but he didn’t want anyone to know that. Certainly not Uckfield, who, if he discovered it, would announce it to the entire Hampshire Constabulary and make endless jokes and snide remarks about it. And Horton wasn’t prepared to take that. Not that he cared for himself, but he wasn’t going to have Gaye made the nudge, nudge, wink, wink innuendo of the police force.
He turned away but not before catching her puzzled glance, and nodded at Taylor who hurried across with a scene suit as Clarke emerged from the tent.
‘We’ll leave you to it,’ Uckfield said to her.
They stepped further away from the tent. Horton could see a couple of walkers talking to a uniformed officer on the outer cordon, probably asking why this area of the common had been sealed off. News would travel fast and probably already had. Leanne Payne and the photographer from the local newspaper might already be on their way. Two suspicious deaths in a short space of time would certainly be newsworthy, especially if Leanne Payne discovered they had both been caused by gunshot wounds. Uckfield was still keeping that, and Freedman’s identity, quiet for the time being, but Horton knew it wouldn’t be long before it was leaked. Anyone in the apartment block where Freedman lived could put it out on the Internet. He’d have to announce it very soon. He looked happier now that he thought these two cases might be neatly signed off as murder followed by suicide but Horton still had some questions that didn’t fit with that scenario.
‘Why would Freedman arrange to meet Vivian Clements on Tuesday night?’
Sucking heavily on his throat lozenge, Uckfield answered, ‘Perhaps he thought he was meeting Constance Clements. She’d arranged the meeting but her old man overheard her on the phone and they had a row. Then Vivian Clements slipped out before she could warn Freedman and killed him. She knows her husband killed Freedman or suspects it which was why she was nervy and upset.’
‘But why would he meet Constance Clements dressed as vagrant?’
Uckfield sniffed. ‘Perhaps she’ll tell us when we question her.’
‘Is there anything in Freedman’s flat or on his computer to indicate they were lovers?’
‘Not so far but the computer’s still being examined. Dennings has sifted through the paperwork from Freedman’s flat. There’s no birth certificate or anything of a personal nature – just a few bills, details of his accountant and a copy of his will leaving his body to medical science, as Dr Clayton told us. His worldly goods are to be split fifty-fifty between the Salvation Army and Gravity.’
Horton wondered how much that was. Ashmead would be pleased with the legacy, especially if it was a substantial one, but he thought Ashmead would have preferred Freedman alive not just for the continuous contribution of ten per cent of his income but, more importantly, for the vital work he had done for the customers of the centre.
Horton thoughts flicked to Evelyn Lyster. His enquiries that morning at the Hard seemed an age ago but he wondered how much her estate was worth. It looked as though Rowan Lyster was going to be a fairly wealthy young man if only on the proceeds of the sale of that flat, which had to be worth about half a million pounds.
Gaye emerged from the tent with Clarke following. She was holding a plastic evidence bag. She crossed to them and handed the bag to Uckfield, saying, ‘The contents of his trouser and coat pockets.’
Horton could see a wallet, a set of keys, a white handkerchief and a mobile phone. The latter might prove interesting.
‘Is it suicide?’ Uckfield asked eagerly.
‘You know as well as I do, Superintendent, that I can’t tell you that until I’ve examined him.’
‘But suicides usually shoot themselves in the head,’ he insisted.
‘Some do, not all. It has been known for suicides to shoot themselves in the back of the head or in the back.’
‘He’d have to have been a bloody contortionist,’ Uckfield grunted.
‘It’s incredible what people can do if they’re intent on killing themselves. I once had a corpse who had shot himself but had also put his head in a noose in case he failed to kill himself with a gun.’
‘Talk about belt and braces,’ Uckfield muttered.
‘Most suicides, though, shoot themselves in the temple – right-handed people in the right temple and left-handed in the left temple, although there are exceptions. Other than that, in descending order they shoot themselves in the mouth, under the chin and the forehead. But it has been known for some to even shoot themselves in the eye or ear, or on the top of the head.’
Cantelli was shaking his head in wonder.
‘From my brief examination, though, I’d say he was sh
ot in the forehead, using the gun in his right hand. He then fell back and the gun dropped from his hand to land a short distance away. But,’ she emphasized, stilling Uckfield’s reply, ‘I can’t say yet for certain if he used the gun or indeed if it was that gun found lying beside him that killed him. The pattern of injuries show that he was shot at close range but he didn’t press the barrel of the gun to his temple and fire. If he held the gun then he did so about a foot away. I’ll be able to confirm the distance once I take a closer look.’
Uckfield sneezed loudly into his handkerchief.
Gaye continued, ‘My initial estimate of time of death puts it about eighteen to twelve hours ago. It’s difficult to be more accurate because of the environmental conditions but you’re looking at some time between say five p.m. and eleven p.m.’
And that fitted with what Constance Clements had told them.
‘Why come here to kill himself?’ Cantelli mused. ‘Why not walk across the road from where he lived to the beach and do it there?’
Horton answered, ‘Maybe that would have been too public. Or perhaps as we’d thought for Freedman’ – and Evelyn Lyster, he mentally added – ‘this place had a special meaning for him.’
‘You mean he was a birdwatcher?’ sniffed Uckfield dubiously.
No, Horton didn’t have Clements down as a twitcher. ‘Perhaps he and Constance liked walking around here.’ But he didn’t see Vivian Clements as a walker either.
Gaye said, ‘I can’t confirm if the bullet exited the body, not without examining him, but you’d do as well to search for it just in case. I’ll perform the autopsy as soon as you get the body to me.’
Taylor emerged from the tent carrying the gun encased in an evidence bag. He handed it to Cantelli, saying in his usual glum manner, ‘We’ve managed to lift some prints from it but they’re very smudged.’
‘Any bullets lying close to it or the body?’ asked Uckfield.
‘No, sir.’
Horton judged the pistol to be about twelve inches in length with a barrel that he estimated to be about six inches. It had a dark-coloured, finely chequered walnut grip and he could see the name of the manufacturer and the serial number on it – Adams Patent No. 30088. He seemed to remember from his firearms training and studies that there had been a Victorian British gun manufacturer called Robert Adams. He said as much, adding, ‘If I remember correctly Adams revolvers were used during the Crimean War, the Indian Mutiny and the American Civil War.’
‘So unless we’ve got a ghost who’s returned from any of those conflicts to kill Freedman it fits with Clements and his antique pistols,’ Uckfield said a little sourly.
And mention of a ghost made Horton think of one who had walked into the casino where Jennifer had been working shortly before she had disappeared. According to her colleague, Susan Nash, the appearance of this person had shaken Jennifer so much that she had gone ‘deathly pale as though she’d seen a ghost’. She’d left the gaming table – strictly against the rules – and after she had returned, and in the days following this apparition, she’d been elated. Was this person someone she had believed dead? Was the ‘ghost’ her killer?
‘It wasn’t on the list of stolen items.’ Cantelli’s voice brought Horton up sharply. Cantelli would see that the pistol reached their firearms expert very quickly – the same expert who was studying Freedman’s wound. And neither had it been on Clements’ wish list obtained from his desk, thought Horton. That paperwork had been given to a uniformed officer to take back to Trueman in the incident suite.
‘How many more guns has he got that he’s not notified us about?’ growled Uckfield. ‘Let’s see what’s in his car.’
With Gaye they walked back to the road where Clements had left his car. A wide cordon had been set up around it and beyond it a gathering crowd, most of whom were taking pictures with their phones.
‘The ghouls are here,’ Uckfield muttered.
‘And the press,’ Horton added, spotting Leanne Payne’s lean figure. He heard her calling Uckfield. The latter ignored her and turned his attention to the car. Gaye stood beside him, making no effort to return to her Mini parked within the outer cordon. Extracting the keys from the evidence bag she’d handed Uckfield, Horton watched as the Super opened the boot. There was nothing inside except a rug and a large golfing umbrella. Uckfield told Cantelli to get the car towed away for forensic examination and to call the undertakers. Uckfield reached for his mobile phone and stepped away. He’d be ringing through to the incident suite and to ACC Dean.
Horton turned to Gaye. ‘I hope this won’t delay your trip to Denmark.’
‘I don’t leave until tomorrow evening. I’ll get everything tied up my end by then, but you can still reach me by phone and email, and I’ll have my laptop with me just in case you or Superintendent Uckfield need to discuss it further. I’ll have to inform the coroner that I’ll be away and I’ll pass all the information over to a colleague, unless the coroner agrees to delay the inquest.’
‘He’ll probably open and postpone it,’ Horton said.
She eyed him curiously. ‘You don’t think he shot himself, do you?’
‘I’m not sure.’ Horton told her what he and Uckfield had discussed earlier about Clements possibly killing Freedman and then himself, adding, ‘If Clements was murdered though and the same person killed them both wouldn’t he or she have aimed for the same part of the body?’
‘Not necessarily. Perhaps Clements stepped backwards, alarmed to see someone approaching him with the gun. He tried to reason with the killer, slipped in the mud or stumbled over a bramble and fell, landing on his back. Or the killer pushed him hard so that he lost his footing and fell. Before the victim had time to recover the killer aimed and fired at the head.’
Horton suppressed a shudder. ‘Must be a hard bastard to have done that.’
‘Hard, calm, cold, dispassionate, angry, desperate … who knows, but I have every confidence you’ll find out.’
‘Thanks.’ Now was the time to ask her for that dinner date on her return from Denmark but there was something else he wanted to discuss with her, maybe over that dinner, maybe not, and it had to do with his past, or rather his mother’s, and possibly the identity of that ‘ghost’. Uckfield was still on the phone and Cantelli was talking to a uniformed officer. They were alone but wouldn’t be for long. ‘There’s something I’d like to discuss with you,’ he began.
‘Concerning work?’
‘Yes and no.’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘Sounds intriguing.’
‘It’s about a fire that occurred in 1968 at a psychiatric hospital in Surrey.’ He registered her surprise but before he could elaborate Uckfield was steaming towards them. Hastily, Horton said, ‘We’ll talk later.’
Uckfield said, ‘I’ll give a brief statement to Leanne Payne if only to shut her up. You’d better break the news to the widow.’
Uckfield would withhold information on the identity of the body until they had told Constance Clements. Horton watched Gaye cross to her Mini and climb in. He wondered what she was making of his comment. Perhaps she thought him slightly mad. Maybe he was. Perhaps he shouldn’t have said anything because he’d have to explain why he was interested.
‘How do you think Constance Clements will take the news?’ Cantelli asked, interrupting his thoughts.
Horton focused his mind on the unpleasant task that lay ahead. He didn’t know. Losing her husband and her lover would be tough, but how tough they were about to find out.
FOURTEEN
‘Vivian would never kill himself,’ Constance Clements firmly declared.
‘Why do you say that?’ Cantelli asked gently. They were in the drawing room where the burglars had allegedly entered.
‘Because he has a very low pain threshold and, if he was ever going to kill himself, then it would be by a much less painful method.’
As evenly and as kindly as he could, Horton said, ‘Shooting yourself is a very quick and painless way of dying.’ Unl
ess it went wrong, of course, and maybe it had for Clements. He could have lain there and bled to death for some time before eventually dying. Gaye would be able to tell them if that was the case. But he wasn’t going to tell the widow that. He studied the confused expression on her harrowed face.
‘Are you certain it is Vivian?’ she asked.
‘There’s no doubt, Mrs Clements,’ Cantelli reiterated.
But they would need her to make a formal identification. Time to tell her that later.
She sank on to one of the sumptuous chairs in front of the fireplace. Bewildered, she said, ‘This doesn’t make sense. Vivian. Dead?’
Horton took the chair opposite across a heavy dark oak chest that doubled as a coffee table. ‘Did he give any indication to you that he intended taking his own life?’
Alarm registered in her dazed eyes. ‘No. Never. Oh, he’s been moody, but never depressed. And apart from being furious about the robbery … I didn’t think … I can’t imagine … to shoot himself.’ Her words trailed off. She clasped her hands tightly in her lap, as though trying to control her emotions by controlling them.
‘This is a picture of the weapon that was found beside him. Do you recognize it?’ Horton handed her his mobile phone. Jim Clarke had emailed one of the photographs he’d taken of the pistol. Horton wondered if she’d be appalled or if she’d shrink back, frightened and distressed at the sight of it. Or would seeing it prompt her to tell them about the fake robbery? But she only stared at it, baffled.
‘I don’t think I’ve seen it before,’ she answered hesitantly. ‘One gun looks very much the same to me. Is it on the list you got from the safe?’
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