A Good Death

by Chris Collett

  ‘Do you remember seeing him with anyone, or if he was here for any particular event?’ Mariner asked, but unsurprisingly the receptionist’s memory did not stretch to those details. He was apologetic nonetheless. ‘We have so many guests staying here.’

  CCTV was deleted on a weekly basis and Mariner didn’t want to waste time trawling through it, though he asked for a copy of the last week’s material to be emailed to him, just in case. He couldn’t then think of anything more. It was annoying to come so tantalisingly close to Sam Fleetwood, but to leave with nothing.

  He’d only been back in the car a few minutes however when his phone rang. Bingley was beside himself. ‘Sam Fleetwood’s debit card has been used to draw out two hundred quid,’ he said. ‘His bank has just been on to let us know.’

  ‘When and where?’ said Mariner.

  ‘This morning, from a cash machine in Redditch.’

  So perhaps they were closing in; geographically at least. Hopwood and Redditch were within spitting distance. ‘Are they sure it was him?’ Mariner asked.

  ‘The pin number was used too,’ said Bingley. ‘So unless he’s pretty stupid … Anyway, turns out there’s CCTV on the machine, operated by Redditch district council and monitored by West Mercia. I thought as you were down that way, you might want to go and see.’

  ‘You thought right,’ Mariner told him. ‘Let them know I’m on my way, will you?’

  ‘I’ll text through the details,’ said Bingley.

  At Redditch police station Mariner met local bobby Sergeant Ron Wheeler, who found him coffee and a spare interview room, where he could wait while the CCTV was located and sent across. Sitting waiting reminded him of his time at the QE and he took the opportunity to check in with Nell at Manor Park. They hadn’t heard anything from the hospital either, and Jamie was much the same. Nell was in the middle of recounting to Mariner what Jamie had been up to the previous day, when Wheeler appeared again, signalling that the CCTV had come through.

  When Mariner and Wheeler watched the footage, it was immediately obvious that it wasn’t Sam Fleetwood who had used his card. ‘Chantelle Brough,’ Wheeler said straight away. ‘She’s one of our regulars, but petty theft and shoplifting are more her line. She must think her luck has changed. We know her usual haunts; I’ll get the area cars looking out for her and let you know when we’ve brought her in. I’ll get the CCTV clip sent to you for exhibits too. Do you want to wait around?’

  Mariner decided he’d give it an hour. If Chantelle Brough wasn’t brought in during that time, he’d have to rely on Wheeler to pass on any intel. Fifty-five minutes later, just as he was thinking about returning to Granville Lane, Wheeler had a call to say that Chantelle was on her way.

  Chantelle Brough may have thought her luck had changed for the better, but it wasn’t going to last. She claimed to have found Sam Fleetwood’s wallet, completely by chance. She was bony and pasty-skinned, with lank brown hair, and Mariner guessed that most of the money had gone on some or other intoxicating substance. Certainly Chantelle seemed oblivious to or ignorant of the trouble she was in, but was delighted with her good fortune, and grinned inanely at everyone throughout the interview.

  ‘Where did you find it, Chantelle?’ asked Wheeler.

  ‘It was just lying there, on the ground,’ she said, her eyes wide with wonder.

  ‘Really.’ Wheeler’s voice was heavy with scepticism.

  ‘I know! I couldn’t believe it either.’ Chantelle beamed, displaying stained and crooked teeth.

  When asked to be more specific, she identified a street close to Redditch town centre and the cash machine she’d used. ‘And you didn’t think to hand it in to us, that someone might be looking for it?’ Wheeler asked.

  For the first time Chantelle’s face clouded a little, as if that thought had genuinely never occurred to her. ‘Well … no. Finders keepers, innit?’ She looked up at Wheeler, perturbed. ‘Are they, looking for it?’

  Wheeler rolled his eyes at the two-way mirror. ‘How did you get the pin number, Chantelle?’

  ‘It was written down on a piece of paper in the wallet. How lucky is that? That’s how I knew, you see.’ Chantelle sat back, satisfied.

  ‘Knew what?’ asked Wheeler, suspiciously.

  ‘That the wallet was left there for me to find.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘The number! It was 1993, the year I was born.’

  Wheeler expelled a heavy sigh. ‘What else was in the wallet, Chantelle? How much cash?’

  She pouted. ‘Not much – a couple of notes is all. That’s why I used the card.’

  ‘And what did you do with the rest?’

  ‘I chucked it away. Weren’t no good to me.’

  ‘The wallet belonged to a man called Sam Fleetwood,’ said Wheeler. ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘No. Why would I? I didn’t steal it!’ She was outraged by the suggestion.

  Afterwards there was time for Mariner to have a few words with Wheeler. ‘I’ve known Chantelle a while now,’ he said. ‘And I believe her.’

  Mariner trusted Wheeler’s judgement. Someone smart could have done far more damage with those bank cards by buying expensive goods online, but Chantelle hadn’t thought of that, or maybe she didn’t have access to the Internet. ‘I don’t think she’ll be able to tell you anything about where your MisPer is,’ Wheeler went on. ‘I’ve got a couple of PCSOs looking for the wallet in the area and I’ll let you know if they find it.’

  On his way back to Granville Lane Mariner considered the implications of Sam Fleetwood’s wallet having turned up as it had, combined with the fact that he had been last seen heading out of Birmingham on the A441, the Redditch Road. The most likely scenario was that he had been in Redditch and had dropped or lost his wallet. It could have been stolen, but why would the thief then discard it, along with its contents, for Chantelle to find? And why would Sam Fleetwood, a seemingly intelligent man, include his pin number conveniently written down alongside the bank cards? Unless it had been planted; a deliberate ploy, to cast off his old life, and conceal his true whereabouts. The other, less palatable alternative was that something untoward had happened to Fleetwood. It was a possibility that had lurked at the back of Mariner’s mind, but so far with no evidence to support it.

  Mariner was considering all this when his phone started going off like a Geiger counter at Chernobyl, texts and calls coming through simultaneously. As soon as he could, he pulled over and returned the first call to Vicky Jesson.

  ‘Where are you?’ she said. ‘We need to get down to Wellington Road right away. They’ve found another body.’

  SEVENTEEN

  As Mariner arrived at Wellington Road, he pulled in behind a line of cars that included one he recognised; this wasn’t going to be good. The find had effectively suspended the operation in the ground-floor room, and the investigation and forensic teams were kicking their heels out in the front garden. Someone had done a tea run to the nearby McDonald’s and the cups and donut bags were lined up on the garden wall. Jesson was already on-site, deep in conversation with Gerry Docherty as she got suited up. Mariner cleared his throat as he approached, clearly interrupting a more than professional chat. ‘What do we know?’ he asked.

  ‘Nothing much yet,’ said Docherty. ‘We sent Dougal in to locate any further accelerant sites from the newly excavated areas, but he was going nuts, trying to drag Lance under that one last area that we haven’t cleared. Come and see for yourselves. Stuart Croghan’s in there having a look at the moment.’ So Mariner had been right about the Land Rover.

  Mariner and Jesson trod the now familiar route into the house behind Docherty, as far as the door into the ground-floor room. More headway had been made since the last visit, and it presented a surreal sight. Look to the left and the room was forensically clean back to the grey, stained walls and floor. Look to the right and debris was still heaped up like a snowdrift, ten feet high against the far wall. Underneath this pile, a crude kind of cave had been hollow
ed out, its roof held up by steel supports. It was inside this cavity that Croghan squatted on his haunches, while the photographer took shots from various angles. With a brief greeting to the two police officers, Croghan shuffled back to allow them to see, and Mariner heard Jesson draw breath. The body, resting on a blackened slab, was burned beyond recognition, a skeleton of brown stretched skin, with just a few sparse strands of black hair sprouting from its scalp. It looked like one of those perfectly preserved prehistoric beings, periodically discovered in peat bogs. ‘Not pretty, is she?’ said Croghan. ‘All I can say for sure at this stage is that she’s female, and that’s mainly from the jewellery she was wearing.’

  ‘To be honest we’re lucky we’ve even got that,’ said Docherty. ‘Given the intensity of the fire, she could have been cremated to nothing.’

  ‘So why didn’t that happen?’ asked Jesson.

  ‘When the ceiling collapsed, some of the debris fell at an angle and created a small pocket of space that would have halted the fire’s progress.’

  ‘So who the hell is it?’ said Mariner, looking at Jesson. ‘The only person Salwa Shah was concerned about that night was her father. No one else was mentioned as being in the house.’

  ‘And when we talked to her, she didn’t give any impression that she was hiding anything, or anyone, from us,’ Jesson agreed.

  ‘We’re pretty certain now that the fire was started deliberately?’ Mariner checked with Docherty.

  ‘As sure as we can be,’ Docherty answered.

  ‘So this gives us a whole new dimension,’ said Mariner, turning to Vicky. ‘Only Salwa Shah can tell us who she is.’

  They left Croghan to his investigations and made their way out to Mariner’s car. ‘How did you get on with Mustafa Shah?’ he asked, once they were on their way.

  ‘He gave me some files relating to people they’ve crossed swords with at the advice centre,’ said Jesson. ‘I haven’t had a chance to read them yet, but Shah also mentioned an outfit called Going for Gold. They’re on Fraud’s radar, but the brothers behind it haven’t been seen now for about three weeks. The consensus is that they’ve scarpered. Apart from them, all we’ve got is possible professional conflicts of interest.’

  ‘I don’t think this is about a professional disagreement,’ said Mariner. ‘This is personal.’

  ‘So what were you doing in Redditch?’ asked Vicky. ‘Has something happened with Sam Fleetwood?’

  Mariner told her about the wallet. ‘I’m still trying to work out what it means,’ he said.

  ‘And you’re certain that this Chantelle Brough just happened upon it?’

  ‘I’ve got to trust Wheeler on that,’ said Mariner. ‘He seemed pretty confident that her involvement could be innocently explained – if that’s the right word.’

  ‘Does Fleetwood have links with Redditch?’ Vicky asked.

  ‘Not that anyone’s told us, but we know he was heading in that general direction the last time he was seen. If we work on the assumption that Sam Fleetwood is seeing another woman, who’s to say that he hasn’t just taken off with her, and somewhere along the way left his wallet for us to find.’

  ‘But we still don’t know who this other woman could be?’ asked Jesson.

  ‘Not really,’ said Mariner. ‘I left the boy wonder doing a bit of digging.’

  ‘Well, if anyone can come up with the goods it’ll be him,’ said Jesson.

  And so it proved. As they waited at traffic lights to cross the Moseley Road on the way to Sparkhill, another call came through from Bingley. Mariner put him on speakerphone.

  ‘You’ll be relieved to know that Sam Fleetwood went to university in Birmingham,’ Bingley said, naming one of the newer rebranded establishments. ‘His sister couldn’t remember the exact subject he studied, except that it was to do with environmental science.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ said Mariner, meaning the opposite.

  ‘Well, it’s a start,’ said Bingley cheerfully. ‘I’ve found four different programmes that seem to meet that criterion,’ he went on. ‘Supposing that the titles haven’t changed since Fleetwood left. And the staff profiles help too – only four females out of twelve tutors, so that narrows the odds.’

  ‘So what are you going to do?’ asked Mariner. ‘Phone each of them to ask if they had an illicit affair with Sam Fleetwood? That will make you popular.’

  ‘That’s one idea,’ said Bingley, missing the irony. ‘But I think I might have cracked it. One of them is called Ursula Kravitz.’

  ‘Should that mean something?’ Mariner asked.

  ‘Well, I’ve got this telescope at home,’ Bingley explained.

  ‘Why does that not surprise me?’ murmured Jesson, just loudly enough for Bingley to hear.

  ‘It’s relaxing watching the stars,’ he said. ‘You should try it before you make a judgement.’

  ‘Is this going somewhere?’ said Mariner. ‘We’re nearly at the Shahs’.’

  ‘Well, that’s it really,’ said Bingley. ‘The Little Bear – Ursa Minor. Ursa and Ursula are similar, and it’s not that common a name. From her photograph she looks exotic, if you like that sort of thing, so she fits the bill.’

  ‘I don’t suppose it tells you where she lives, or can you divine that from the stars?’ said Mariner.

  ‘Unfortunately not,’ said Bingley. ‘But I thought maybe I could go and talk to her? DC Khatoon won’t be in again until Wednesday, and it would save her having to …’

  Mariner mulled it over. ‘Why not?’ he said eventually. ‘Tread carefully, though, Bingley. Oh – and you can take today’s prize for lateral thinking.’

  ‘Bingley?’ said Jesson, after Mariner had ended the call. ‘I thought—’

  ‘As did we all,’ said Mariner. They had come to the house belonging to Salwa’s sister-in-law, Ettra Shah. Things were quieter today; the crowd of mourners dispersed.

  ‘How are we interviewing Salwa?’ Vicky asked, before getting out of the car. ‘Is she a witness? A suspect?’

  ‘Let’s just gauge her reaction for now,’ said Mariner. ‘At the very least she’s a significant witness, and depending on what she has to say, we might then need to interview her formally in a witness suite, to get it all down on tape.’

  Mustafa Shah was at work, and the children had gone back to school, so they were able to speak to Salwa on her own. Ettra brought refreshments again, but Jesson waited until she had left the room before explaining to Salwa why they were there. ‘The jewellery on the body leads us to believe it’s female,’ she said.

  By Mariner’s calculation, it was at least four seconds before Salwa Shah reacted, during which time her face was blank with incomprehension, while she scrabbled for a mental foothold in what Jesson was saying. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said finally, her voice hoarse. ‘Oh God.’ Her head swayed from side to side. ‘No, no, no!’ She jumped up and walked to the window, wringing her hands. She sat down again. If this was fake surprise she was a brilliant actress. ‘It can’t be,’ she said, distraught. ‘She had gone.’

  ‘Who?’ asked Jesson. ‘Who do you mean?’

  ‘Talayeh, my husband’s cousin. She came to stay with us. She had to sleep in the store room because we had nowhere else to put her.’

  ‘But why you haven’t mentioned her before?’ Now Jesson was incredulous. ‘You’re saying you forgot that she was there?’

  ‘But it’s not possible. She wasn’t there. She had gone!’ They waited her out. ‘Talayeh left us on the day before the fire,’ Salwa said. ‘She went to stay with her aunt and uncle, in Bradford.’ Her eyes gleamed with intensity. ‘I put her in a taxi that afternoon with the money for her coach ticket. She had gone. Please. You must believe me!’

  Although far-fetched, her explanation wasn’t entirely implausible. ‘Have you had any contact with Talayeh since, or the people she went to stay with?’ Mariner asked.

  ‘No.’ Salwa shook her head. ‘We don’t really know them. Even my husband has never met them. They are her mothe
r’s relatives.’

  ‘So you don’t know if she got there,’ said Mariner.

  ‘In all that had happened I just thought she must have. I put her out of my mind.’ Silent tears made wet trails down her cheeks.

  ‘And up until Saturday, Talayeh was sleeping in the downstairs front room,’ Jesson verified.

  ‘It was the only room where there was space. We put a mattress on the floor. It wasn’t perfect but in an emergency—’

  ‘What kind of emergency?’

  ‘No, not emergency, that’s too strong,’ Salwa corrected herself. ‘I just meant it was a sudden decision for her to come here. She just needed a place to stay quickly.’

  ‘Why didn’t she go straight to her relatives in Bradford?’ Jesson asked.

  ‘She flew into Birmingham airport and my husband hadn’t seen her for a long time, so …’ She tailed off. ‘And she said she had a friend she wanted to visit.’

  But as far as you were aware she had left your house earlier in the day,’ said Mariner. ‘What time did she go?’

  ‘It was in the afternoon,’ Salwa said. ‘Soon after lunchtime. It was a rush at the end. I thought her coach left at two fifty, but when I checked the timetable it was two thirty, so I had to call a taxi quickly to take her to the coach station.’

  ‘Which taxi firm did you use?’ asked Mariner.

  ‘I don’t know. We had some cards next to the phone. I had to try several because I had left it till the last minute and they had no one free.’

  It would be tiresome but shouldn’t take too long to track the company down; another little task to keep Bingley busy.

  ‘Did anyone else see Talayeh get into the taxi that afternoon?’ Jesson asked.

  ‘I don’t know. The children were here at my sister-in-law’s. My father was there!’ Salwa said, suddenly hopeful, before realising her mistake. ‘I gave the driver her fare,’ she went on. ‘Talayeh doesn’t understand English money, so I didn’t want him to take advantage of that.’