by Ford,P. F.
‘That would have to be one seriously big story to want to murder someone for it,’ said Norman. ‘To be honest, I can’t see it. But even if he did, he wouldn’t have taken the risk of involving the kid, would he?’ said Norman.
‘Having a pair of eyes and ears down here would keep him informed.’
‘Hmm, maybe, but I’m not convinced,’ said Norman, after a moment. ‘If Winter had the story, why would Rippon kill him? Surely that would rather defeat the object.’
‘Do you think he’ll do a runner?’
‘No. I don’t think so,’ Norman said, chuckling quietly. ‘Because if he does, he’s going to promote himself from possible suspect to definite suspect, and that would be pretty stupid. Whatever our Mr Rippon might be, he certainly ain’t stupid.’
Chapter Twelve
It was 6am on Saturday morning and it was still dark. A mobile phone was ringing incessantly somewhere close by.
For God’s sake, thought Slater. It’s so bloody annoying. Why don’t people answer their phones?
He felt a finger jab sharply into his ribs.
‘Tell them to answer that bloody phone or I’ll arrest them for disturbing the peace,’ he mumbled, sleepily.
There was another jab, but much harder this time.
‘What the-’ he began.
‘Issyourphone,’ mumbled an even sleepier voice up close behind him.
‘What?’ he said, only half awake but totally confused.
‘It’s your phone,’ repeated the voice, a little less sleepy this time. ‘And if I have to answer it for you I’m going to throw it out of the window.’
He slipped an arm behind his back and felt the cosiness of the soft, warm body pressed up against him. For the briefest moment, he wondered where he was and who was sharing his bed. Then he smiled to himself as he awakened sufficiently to recall exactly where he was and who was snuggled up next to him. He fumbled around until he found her hair, and then the softness of her face.
He had met Cindy Maine during a case and had been attracted to her right from the start. To his surprise, she had seemed to be equally attracted to him. Once the case had been solved, they had started dating, and now, three months later, they seemed to have become something of an item. They didn’t see each other every night, and each had their own house, but they seemed to be spending more and more time together. It just seemed right somehow. He smiled to himself as he thought about how lucky he was to have her as a girlfriend. Then he yelped as she bit his hand.
‘Ouch!’ He grimaced. ‘Jeez, that’s not very friendly.’
‘Nor’s poking your fingers in my face and allowing your phone to keep ringing. If you don’t answer it right now, I’ll show you just how unfriendly I can be!’
He sat up, swung his legs over the side of the bed, switched on the bedside lamp, and grabbed the phone.
‘I hope I’m not interrupting anything,’ said Norman in his ear. ‘Only it’s been ringing for ages.’
‘You’re only interrupting my beauty sleep,’ said Slater, yawning.
‘And mine,’ shouted Cindy, loud enough for Norman to hear.
‘Now, in her case I can believe it’s beauty sleep.’ Norman chuckled. ‘But I have to say, it’s not working anywhere near as well for you.’
‘That’s because people keep calling me in the middle of the night and waking me up.’ Slater yawned again. ‘Anyway, if you’ve just called to share your beauty tips, I have to tell you not to bother. They don’t work. Just look in any mirror and you’ll see what I mean.’
‘You’re only jealous,’ said Norman. ‘I don’t know what that beautiful young woman sees in you. I mean she coulda had me. It was just lucky you got there first-’
‘Ha!’ Slater laughed loudly. ‘In your dreams, mate, in your dreams. She fell for the one with brains, as well as looks, and you know it.’
Cindy was now wide awake, and seemingly none too happy about it.
‘I don’t believe you two,’ she snapped in Slater’s ear, loudly enough that Norman could no doubt hear too. ‘It’s six o’clock on a Saturday morning, and I should be sound asleep, but instead I have to listen to you two sad people twittering on about how good looking you are.’
‘Oh dear,’ said Norman. ‘I appear to have set fire to the blue touchpaper. I guess the safest thing for me to do now is deliver my message and get the hell away.’
‘Yeah, right. Thanks for that, Norm. So what is it that’s so important, anyway.’
‘They had another break-in at Hunter’s last night. This time the place has been taken apart.’
‘Oh crap!’ Slater sighed. ‘So much for my lie in. Okay, give me half an hour and I’ll be there.’
He shut the phone off, stood up, stretched, and yawned so expansively he nearly turned his head inside out.
‘I’m sorry, love, I’m going to have to go in,’ he said, turning to face Cindy, but she’d pulled the covers over her head and Slater didn’t think she would be coming out anytime soon.
‘Cindy?’ He tugged gently at the covers. ‘I know you’re in there.’
‘Go away,’ she said. ‘I’m asleep.’
‘Okay,’ he said, moving away towards the bathroom. ‘I’ll leave you to it-’
‘No. Wait,’ she said, pushing the covers back from her face. ‘You can’t just go off and leave me like this.’
‘But I have to,’ he pleaded. ‘You know how it works.’
‘Yes, I think I’ve known you long enough to know exactly how it works,’ she said. ‘Work comes first, and I come a poor second.’
‘Now you know it’s not like that,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing I’d like more than to spend all my time with you, but I have a job to do, and a duty-’
‘I know,’ she interrupted with a sigh. ‘I know you have to go, but surely you can spare a few minutes, for me, before you go.’
She had that look on her face. The one that he just couldn’t resist.
‘It’s all warm and snuggly in here. Look,’ she said saucily, raising the covers just enough to suggest what he was missing.
Oh my, thought Slater. This just isn’t fair. But what can a poor boy do?
‘Five minutes, and that’s it,’ he said.
‘Oooh!’ she teased. ‘Does this mean I’m going to get the extended version?’
‘Ha, ha, very funny,’ he said, huffily. ‘Of course, I could just say I don’t have time, and leave you to it.’
She poked her tongue out at him and raised the covers a bit further so he could now see exactly what he was missing.
‘Mmmmm. I don’t think so, do you?’
And he had to admit, she was right…
‘I won’t ask what took you so long,’ said Norman, over an hour later, when Slater finally arrived at Tinton police station.
‘I got held up,’ said Slater. ‘I can explain.’
‘Please don’t,’ said Norman.
‘But, my car wouldn’t start,’ began Slater.
‘Yeah, right,’ said Norman. ‘You forget I’m a trained detective, and right now I detect a shedload of bullshit heading my way. I think I can probably guess what happened, and I have to point out that telling me about it is totally inappropriate. It’s also going to make me jealous, so please, let’s just say the matter’s closed, okay?’
That suited Slater just fine because he had no excuse anyway. Well, at least, not one that he was going to tell Norman about.
‘So what’s this about Hunter’s?’ he asked instead.
‘I got a call at 4.30 this morning,’ said Norman. ‘The duty sergeant thought we should be told as we were there yesterday. I went down to take a look, and I can tell you there was no subtlety about it this time. They ignored the alarm, smashed the door down, and tore the whole place apart. By the time anyone responded to the alarm they were long gone.’
‘Is there anything missing?’ asked Slater.
‘How can you tell when the place looks like it was hit by a bomb?’ Norman shrugged. ‘Forensics are o
n their way down there now, and I’ve called Hunter. He’s going to meet us there at eight o’clock. In the meantime, two uniforms are guarding the place. You wanna go take a look now?’
‘Might as well,’ agreed Slater. ‘Otherwise there was no point in me getting up so early. I’ll buy us a coffee on the way.’
When Norman had said it looked like a bomb had gone off, Slater had thought his friend was exaggerating. Perhaps he was annoyed about having to get out of bed so early. However, now that he could see the damage for himself, Slater thought it was actually a pretty accurate description.
At first glance, it appeared that nothing had been left untouched. Every cupboard, filing cabinet, and drawer appeared to have been emptied and then flung across the office. But, despite the appearance that this had been some sort of frantic, drug-fuelled robbery, Slater was convinced Ian Becks and his forensic team wouldn’t find a single shred of evidence to indicate who was behind it.
Slater had felt a huge amount of sympathy for John Hunter when he had arrived and seen the damage. He had been deeply shocked by the scene, and Slater had been wondering how he was going to cope with sorting the mess out, but then the cavalry had arrived in the form of Hunter’s formidable secretary, Sheila Bettsan, and his wife, Belinda. It seemed the two women were made of sterner stuff than Mr Hunter, and by the time Slater and Norman were leaving they had the situation firmly under control.
‘I take it you’re now prepared to accept this break-in is related to the previous one here and at Canal Street?’ asked Norman, as they walked back to their car.
‘It would be hard to think otherwise, wouldn’t it?’ agreed Slater. ‘As far as I’m concerned, there’s a very strong link. It can’t be a coincidence.’
‘I think there’s no doubt now that someone thinks Winter had some information, and now they think Hunter’s got it.’
‘But Hunter’s adamant he’s not been given anything.’
‘Well, someone doesn’t believe that,’ said Norman. ‘And that someone doesn’t care that we know they’re looking for it. In my experience, if someone doesn’t care we know, that means they’re desperate to get their hands on whatever it is they’re looking for, and desperate means dangerous.’
Norman plipped the car locks as they approached and they both climbed in.
‘It has to be something that was expected to be found on a computer, right?’ ventured Slater.
‘For sure,’ agreed Norman. ‘But that means it could be on a CD or a memory stick. It could even be stored somewhere in the cloud.’
‘Talk about looking for a needle in a haystack,’ said Slater, sighing and wondering how anything could be stored in a cloud. ‘And right now we don’t have a bloody clue who, what, where or why.’
‘I think this calls for some abstract thinking,’ said Norman, starting the car. ‘We might not have Mr Winter’s computer, but maybe he had some sort of online account that would give us a clue.’
‘But we don’t have that sort of expertise,’ said Slater. ‘And the waiting list for that sort of help will be a mile long.’
‘Only if we go through the official channels.’ Norman smiled, putting the car in gear.
‘What?’ said Slater, with dismay. ‘You’re not suggesting we involve your friend Vinnie again, are you?’
Vinnie the Geek, as he called himself, was a young man Norman had helped way back in the past, who just happened to be a genius with computers. Apparently, Norman had helped to turn his life around, so he always seemed ready to help whenever Norman asked. It just so happened he was also someone Slater found particularly difficult to get on with.
‘Have you got any better ideas?’ asked Norman. ‘Cos I think we need to act now before this gets out of hand. We already have one murder on our hands...’
He left the sentence unfinished.
‘Do you really think the risk is that high?’ asked Slater.
‘I think desperate equals dangerous,’ said Norman. ‘So yes, I do.’
‘But what if there’s nothing to find?’
‘We can’t take that chance,’ said Norman. ‘There must be something for someone to go to all this trouble. Maybe Winter was threatening to expose someone.’
‘A geriatric blackmailer?’ asked Slater. ‘Do you really think that’s likely?’
‘We have to consider the possibility. Like I said before, we can’t afford to take any chances,’ persisted Norman. ‘You know how good Vinnie is. If he can access Winter’s email account, or any online accounts he might have, who knows what we’ll find? We’ve got his bank statements so we should be able to see who he was paying for stuff like that. Vinnie doesn’t even need to come down here – I’ll send him the information and he can get onto it from home.’
Slater knew Norman had a point. It couldn’t hurt to take look, now could it?
‘D’you think this will convince the Old Man we have to put some sort of guard on John Hunter’s house?’ he asked.
‘I know he won’t like it,’ said Norman. ‘But yeah, I do.’
‘So do I. But he’ll be going spare about it. He’s trying to keep the overtime bill down, and we’re going to be spending it hand over fist.’
‘He’ll go ballistic for sure.’ Norman grinned wickedly. ‘I’m glad it’s not me that has to ask him. I’d love to be a fly on the wall, when you have that conversation.’
Chapter Thirteen
‘Coffee!’ announced Slater, coming backwards through the door into the incident room. In his hands, he balanced a tray with three cups of coffee and a plate of assorted doughnuts. He placed the tray down on his desk, set the coffees and cakes into three places around the desk and dragged up two more chairs.
‘Come on, over here’ he called to the other two. ‘Jane, get away from that screen for ten minutes. Norm, leave that paperwork and get your backside over here!’
‘I can’t eat all those doughnuts,’ cried Jolly in alarm, looking at the two cakes Slater had placed alongside her coffee. ‘What about my figure?’
‘I think your figure’s fine.’ Norman smiled as he eased himself into a chair next to her. ‘But if you really don’t want to eat all of those doughnuts, don’t worry. Whatever you don’t eat won’t go to waste.’
‘That’s very gallant of you,’ said Jolly. ‘But I really don’t think you need them either.’
‘It’s a sacrifice I’m prepared to make, for a lady,’ said Norman, letting out a theatrical sigh. ‘It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.’
Slater let the conversation become a discussion about the wisdom of Norman’s diet, and then on to what TV they watched last night and then their varied opinions about the latest news. After about fifteen minutes, he felt it was time to get back to the matter in hand.
‘So how’s your search going, Jane? Anything interesting?’ he asked.
‘This is what I’ve got so far,’ she began. ‘Henry Winter was born in 1946 and lived with his mother in Andover. His sister Julia arrived in 1951. Then in 1958, both parents were killed in a car crash. Neither of the parents appear to have had any relatives, and all the grandparents were dead, so the two children were sent to an orphanage.’
‘I thought his name was Dylan,’ said Slater, confused.
‘Bear with me,’ said Jolly. ‘I’ll come to that in a minute. Henry Winter resurfaces when he joins the Army in 1964. While he was in the Army, he built up quite a substantial property portfolio which he sold for over a million shortly after he left in 1993. He bought the house in Canal Street then, and appears to have been existing quietly there ever since, presumably living on his pension and the interest from the proceeds of his property sale.’
‘Now that’s a shrewd investor,’ said Norman, admiringly. ‘I bet he spent near enough all his wages on houses and they just sat there growing in value. And that was the period when house prices were growing like crazy.’
‘So where’s all that money now?’ asked Slater. ‘Didn’t John Hunter say the only asset mentioned in his wi
ll was the house in Canal Street?’
‘He certainly didn’t spend it on a lavish lifestyle,’ said Jolly. ‘Not if his house is anything to go by.’
‘We didn’t look back very far into his financial affairs.’ Norman sounded thoughtful. ‘I’ll go back to the bank and ask for more information on Monday.’
‘So how come he’s now called Dylan?’ asked Slater.
‘In 1994 he also changed his name from Henry to Dylan, by deed poll,’ said Jolly.
‘Do we know why?’
‘No idea. But people change their names for all sorts of reasons. Maybe he just fancied a change.’
‘What about the sister, Julia?’ asked Slater. ‘Where’s she been?’
‘I can trace her going into the orphanage in 1958 with her brother, but then after that she seems to disappear.’
‘Was she adopted?’ asked Slater. ‘Or did she die? It wasn’t unheard of for kids to die in those places back then.’
‘I’ve found no record of either so far,’ Jolly said.
‘Where was this orphanage, and when did it close?’ Slater’s curiosity was well and truly aroused.
‘That’s my next job,’ she replied.
‘See what you can find out about it. Maybe there will be some records stored away somewhere.’
‘Okay. I’m on it,’ she said, heading back to her desk.
An hour later, his thoughts were interrupted from across the room.
‘This orphanage,’ Jolly said. ‘It was called Hatton House. It’s only about five miles from here. It was closed back in 1964 and fell into disrepair.’
‘Good work, Jane,’ said Slater.
‘That’s very interesting,’ chipped in Norman, ‘but I’m not sure it helps us much.’
‘Ah! But that’s where you’re wrong,’ said Jolly, beaming. ‘I haven’t finished telling you what I’ve found yet. Here’s the really interesting bit. It was bought for £600,000 in 1995, by one Dylan Winter of 17 Canal Street, Tinton.’
‘What?’ said Slater and Norman in unison.