Kennedy 04 - The Broken Circle

by Shirley Wells

The light on her answer machine was flashing and she hit the Play button.

  ‘Hi, it’s me,’ Max’s voice greeted her. ‘Something’s cropped up so we’ll have to forget dinner. Better get yourself a takeaway, kiddo.’

  Damn. She’d been promised a meal out. Max was right; she’d have to order a takeaway. There was no point looking in her cupboards and, from memory, her fridge contained nothing more than a carton of milk, a bottle of white wine, some orange juice and a lettuce that needed throwing out.

  She went to her bedroom and undressed. She’d had a new shower installed, her toy of the moment, and she hit the button above the bed. The tiny light began flashing. She loved her shower. Every morning, she could stay in bed until the light stopped flashing, at which point the water would be at the right temperature.

  Except it seemed to be taking a while this afternoon. She could hear the water running, but the light continued to flash.

  Cursing to herself, she pulled on a dressing gown that Max reckoned Captain Oates would have killed for, and went to the bathroom. There was no hint of steam coming from the shower cubicle.

  She padded downstairs in her bare feet, ignoring all thoughts of treading on a dead mouse, and went to the boiler. Sure enough, the red light was on. Again. She hit the reset button and vowed that, come the morning, she wouldn’t leave home until she’d extracted a promise from a plumber.

  By the time she got back to the bathroom, there was steam, and she stepped beneath the deliciously hot jet and closed her eyes to allow the water to cleanse and soothe. When she finally stepped out and wrapped a thick towel around herself, she felt more or less human again. That was the thing about Styal; it stripped you of your humanity.

  When she was dressed in jeans and a sweater, she went downstairs, touching radiators to check for warmth as she did so.

  She put coffee on, and looked around her cottage. It would probably be OK having Max staying, and it was only for a fortnight anyway, but it was so long since they’d lived together that she had forgotten how untidy he was. He was incapable of returning things to their rightful place and she knew from experience that he didn’t even notice the trail of clutter he always left in his wake. He’d obviously made himself a cup of tea before he left that morning. The milk hadn’t been returned to the fridge, the empty cup sat on top of the dishwasher, a spoon and, worst of all, a tea bag had been abandoned in the sink.

  The jacket he’d worn last night was slung over the back of a chair and a pile of loose change sat on top of the television.

  She took her coffee into the sitting room and made a fuss of her cats. Max’s dogs would be frequent visitors during the next couple of weeks and her cats wouldn’t approve. Who could blame them?

  Fortunately, Max’s mother-in-law was looking after the dogs at the moment. After the death of her daughter, Kate had moved into the self-contained flat at Max’s place and was always on hand to look after her grandchildren, three dogs, the house or anything else. She was a true gem. And a good friend.

  Knowing she could put it off no longer, Jill picked up the phone and tapped in her parents’ number.

  ‘About time,’ her mother greeted her. ‘I thought you’d emigrated.’

  ‘Just busy working, Mum. So what’s this big idea for the party?’

  ‘We’re having it at the Royal Hotel.’

  ‘What? Good heavens.’ Jill didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Her dad’s idea of having a few pints at the working men’s club had clearly been ignored yet again.

  ‘As you know, I was quite set on the community centre,’ her mum rushed on, ‘but—’

  ‘It will probably have been razed to the ground again by then?’ Jill suggested.

  ‘Well, yes, there is that. But it meant getting caterers in and it was difficult to organize the bar. So it’ll be at the Royal Hotel.’

  ‘Blimey, I hope Dad has some good winners to pay for it. What does he think about it?’

  ‘You can guess, can’t you? But it won’t hurt him to dress up for the day.’

  Jill grinned at that. ‘You mean he has to wear a tie?’

  ‘Too right he does. Forty years I’ve had to put up with him. It’s payback time.’

  They spoke—at least, her mother spoke and Jill listened—for another half-hour. One thing was certain, Jill thought as she switched on her computer, this party would be an experience never to be forgotten.

  She glanced at her watch. It was time to see how Manor Boy had done. Forgetting the notes she intended to write up, she opened the web browser and checked William Hill’s site. It took a few minutes, but then she saw it. Her horse had won by a short head. At fourteen to one!

  ‘Yay!’ She scooped her lazy old tom cat into her arms and gave him a squeeze. ‘Fourteen to one, Sam. That’s saved him from cat food for a while. We’re almost three hundred quid better off.’

  She wished now that she’d invested a sensible-sized stake.

  Feeling greatly cheered, she began typing up her notes on her meeting with Claire Lawrence. Claire might not be very communicative, but any visits broke up the monotony of her days and, given the chance, she would play on this for months. Jill didn’t intend to let that happen.

  An hour later, no further forward on her impressions of Claire, she switched on the TV. She often put it on for company, but she rarely paid attention. She didn’t today until, at six thirty, she heard Kelton Bridge mentioned.

  Her head flew up and there was a picture of Bradley Johnson filling the screen. Not a very recent picture at that. He’d lost weight since it had been taken. A wiry man, with thick dark hair, a direct, unsmiling gaze at the camera—

  The body, believed to be that of local businessman Bradley Johnson, was found in woodland in the village. Detective Chief Inspector Trentham of Harrington CID has confirmed that a murder investigation has been launched and has appealed for witnesses.

  The shock had Jill’s heart racing.

  On leaving Styal, she had thought how lucky she was to live in a sleepy Lancashire village where everyone had a friendly word and residents looked out for each other. No one had looked out for Bradley Johnson, had they?

  Bradley Johnson dead. Murdered.

  ‘Something’s cropped up,’ Max had said. It certainly had.

  It was no use, she couldn’t concentrate on Claire Lawrence now.

  At a little after nine that evening, she heard Max’s car pull on to the drive. He came inside, bringing a blast of icy air with him, and she saw that his hair, thick, dark and swept back from his face, was dotted with rapidly melting snowflakes.

  ‘Whatever’s happened, Max?’

  ‘Someone’s murdered the lord of the manor.’ He shrugged out of his jacket and threw it over the back of a chair.

  ‘I do possess coat hooks, you know.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Never mind. I don’t suppose you can teach an old dog new tricks. So what happened to Bradley?’

  ‘His wife reported him missing at about seven this morning. He’d gone out yesterday afternoon and, when he hadn’t returned in the evening, she assumed he’d stopped off at the pub. She went to bed and only realized he hadn’t come home when she woke up this morning.’

  Max gave her a quick, absent peck on the cheek as if they’d been married for a quarter of a century, and headed for the kitchen.

  ‘Drink?’ he called over his shoulder.

  ‘Please.’ She followed him. ‘Have you eaten?’

  ‘Post-mortem,’ he said as if that explained everything.

  Jill supposed it did. She knew Max could never face food after—or before—attending a post-mortem. Knew, too, that he would soon be complaining about the smell cloying his nostrils and sticking to his clothes.

  ‘How was he killed?’

  ‘Three blows to the head.’ He took two glasses from the cupboard and filled them with generous measures of whisky. ‘Meredith had suspended me when the call came through, too.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah.’ H
e grinned at her astonishment.

  ‘Whatever for?’

  ‘Harassing a friend of the Chief Constable’s.’

  ‘Good grief.’ She chuckled at that. ‘You mean he has friends?’

  ‘Few and far between, I’m sure, but unfortunately, Tom McQueen happens to be one of them.’ He handed her a glass of whisky and took a swig from his own. ‘I met McQueen at Manchester airport this morning and he must have been straight on the phone to make a complaint. Funny that,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘I’d just heard that Bradley Johnson was missing so I asked McQueen if he knew him. Coincidental, don’t you think? I ask about Johnson and he makes sure I’m warned off.’

  ‘I expect he’s just tired of you dogging his every move.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Max agreed. ‘Anyway, I came straight out here and pulled a team together. Thankfully, Melissa did the post-mortem. And Yvonne Drever is back from leave so she’s one of the family liaison officers assigned to the Johnsons.’

  ‘How’s Phoebe holding up?’

  ‘Very well,’ he answered, looking deep in thought. ‘She may have been expecting the worst—having reported him as missing, I mean. She’s quite calm. It’s a job to tell. Yvonne’s with her, though. And she’s good.’

  Jill knew Yvonne. She was a young WPC with a natural instinct for the job. She would watch and listen.

  ‘So that’s my day,’ he said, throwing himself down in an armchair in the sitting room. ‘How’s yours been?’

  Instead of sitting next to him, she sat on the floor by the fire.

  ‘Awful. I hate Styal.’ She took a big swallow of whisky and felt the warmth in her throat. ‘Claire’s very uncommunicative. She’s also been put on suicide watch. I’m there again tomorrow.’

  She shuddered at the memory of Styal and turned her thoughts to other matters.

  ‘What do you think about Bradley Johnson, Max? Was it premeditated or was he in the wrong place at the wrong time?’

  ‘I don’t know. His wallet was in his jacket pocket untouched. There was two hundred and forty quid in that.’

  ‘Not a mugging then.’

  ‘It’s hard to say. He was also wearing a money belt, and that was empty.’

  ‘So someone could have emptied the belt and left the wallet?’

  ‘It’s possible. Two hundred and forty quid is a lot to leave behind though.’

  ‘It is. Almost as much as I won today,’ she added with a small smile.

  Her winnings didn’t seem quite so exciting now.

  ‘When I drove past the manor this morning,’ she explained, ‘there was a patrol car parked outside. I had a quick look at the horses when I got to Styal and saw that Manor Boy was running. Now that was a coincidence, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was,’ he said, amused. ‘And you mean it won?’

  ‘Easily. It’s netted me three hundred quid.’

  ‘Aw, hell. You could have bought me dinner out of your ill-gotten gains.’ He sniffed his shirt. ‘Do I smell like a mortuary?’

  ‘No.’ And Jill didn’t want to think about it.

  ‘Hm. I’d better go and have a shower.’

  Before he could move, the doorbell sounded. Jill’s good friend, Ella Gardner, was standing on the doorstep brushing snow from her coat before removing a blue hand-knitted hat.

  ‘What a surprise,’ Jill greeted her. Ella was usually in bed by ten and, like many pensioners, didn’t venture far after dark. ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Fine,’ Ella replied, stepping inside. ‘I would have phoned but—well, it didn’t seem the sort of thing to discuss on the phone. Oh, Max, am I glad to see you.’

  Ella wasn’t a typical pensioner. In her late sixties, and a widow, she dressed conservatively, but she had more energy than a lot of teenagers and often had Jill in gales of laughter with her colourful accounts of life in the village.

  ‘Let me take your coat,’ Jill offered, but Ella was having none of it.

  ‘I can’t stop.’ She went to the fire and held out her hands to its warmth. ‘I’ve been in Manchester all day so I’ve only just heard about Bradley Johnson. What a dreadful business. The thing is, I think I must have been one of the last, if not the last person to see him alive.’

  ‘Oh?’ She’d got Max’s interest.

  ‘I nipped up to the shop for a loaf of bread yesterday,’ she explained, ‘and decided to do a detour through the wood as it was such a lovely afternoon. It was bitterly cold, of course, but bright and sunny. Or it was when I started out. I was just coming out on to Ryan Walk when I met him.’

  ‘What time was that, Ella?’ Max asked.

  ‘The sun was almost set so, oh, about four o’clock, I suppose.’

  ‘How did he appear?’

  ‘In a bit of a hurry, to be honest. I had the impression he was meeting someone.’ She grimaced. ‘After we’d passed the time of day and chatted about the weather, he looked at his watch and said he must be off. Of course, he might not have been meeting anyone at all, he might just have been bored. It wasn’t the most scintillating of conversations. I was bored stiff myself.’

  ‘Which way did he go?’ Jill asked curiously. ‘Through the wood? When it was almost dark?’

  ‘He did.’ Ella nodded. ‘It wasn’t that bad so he would have been through it before it was really dark. He was probably heading for the pub. People often use the wood as a short cut.’

  Jill nodded at the truth of that.

  ‘I didn’t think anything of it at the time,’ Ella went on, ‘mainly because I had other things on my mind. I heard a dog barking and I thought it might be that yappy little ankle-biter of Olive’s. She often takes the thing for a walk through the wood. As you can imagine, the last thing I wanted was to bump into her, old gossip that she is. She saw me coming out of the doctor’s surgery a couple of weeks ago, and ever since, she’s been fishing for information. It was only a routine check-up, but I’m sorely tempted to tell her I’ve caught something unpleasant from too much unprotected sex.’

  Jill spluttered with laughter. She, too, had been on the receiving end of Olive’s interrogations in the past.

  ‘Did you see anyone else?’ Max asked, and Ella shook her head.

  ‘I walked on to the shop, bought a loaf, and walked home without seeing anyone out of the ordinary. There were a few children hanging about in the high street, but that was all.’ She sighed, impatient with herself. ‘I’ve always considered myself fairly observant but, no, I can’t think of anyone else.’

  ‘That’s OK,’ Max told her. ‘You might find that you remember something else in a day or so.’

  ‘If I do, I’ll be sure to let you know. I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ Max told her. ‘That’s great, thanks.’

  ‘I’d better be getting home,’ she said, adding a rueful, ‘It’s way past my bedtime.’

  ‘I’ll walk with you,’ Max offered.

  ‘Thanks, but there’s no need, Max. Don’t worry, if I bump into any murderers, I’ll scream loud enough for you to hear me.’

  ‘It’s no trouble.’ Max was already putting on his jacket. ‘I’ll nip into the pub on my way back and have a chat with the landlord.’

  Not wanting to be left out, Jill grabbed her coat. ‘I’ll come with you.’

  By the time they reached the end of Jill’s lane, it was snowing heavily. Very little was sticking, but it could be a different story in the morning. With luck, Kelton Bridge would be cut off and she wouldn’t be able to get to Styal …

  They soon reached Ella’s bungalow and, once they’d seen her safely inside, they headed for the Weaver’s Retreat.

  One of the best things about the pub was the landlord’s passion for roaring log fires. There were two huge fires, one at either end of the main room, and Ian tended them with a dedication that bordered on obsession. Customers could never complain about being cold. Everything in the pub was well looked after. Ian was never idle. If he wasn’t pouring pints, he was dusting the ol
d jugs that hung above the bar, wiping down tables, or polishing the long mahogany bar.

  If the building was impressive, however, trade this evening certainly wasn’t.

  ‘It’ll be this weather keeping people at home,’ Ian grumbled. ‘I don’t remember the last time it snowed in November.’

  The pub was deserted apart from a couple that Jill didn’t recognize sitting at the table nearest one of the fires.

  ‘Either that,’ he added in a voice low enough not to put off his customers, ‘or this business with Bradley Johnson is too close to home. Any idea what happened?’ he asked Max.

  ‘It’s early days. Two double whiskies, please, Ian,’ Max added as an aside. ‘We were wondering if you’d seen or heard anything.’ He handed over a twenty-pound note. ‘It’s possible that he was on his way here to meet someone.’

  ‘Oh?’ Ian put their drinks and then Max’s change on the bar. ‘If he was, he didn’t make it, and I can’t think of anyone who looked as if they were waiting for him. Trade wasn’t exactly brisk in the afternoon, but it did get busy early evening. A gang of people came on here from a funeral.’

  ‘What did you think of him, Ian?’ Jill asked, perching on a stool.

  ‘To be honest, I didn’t know him that well. It seemed to me—and this is only my opinion—that you were either in favour or out. I was never in.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  The other customers left and Ian collected their glasses.

  ‘He threw extravagant parties, I gather,’ he said, ‘but I was never invited.’

  ‘I saw him in here once or twice,’ Jill said, ‘but he wasn’t a regular, was he, Ian?’

  ‘No. He’d call in two or three times a month for a couple. He always drank brandy. He was pleasant enough, I suppose, and made a point of speaking to everyone.’

  There was nothing Ian could tell them so, when they’d finished their drinks, Max took their coats from the pegs.

  ‘If you two are off, I may as well lock up for the night,’ Ian grumbled. ‘Who’d be a publican, eh? First it was the drink-drive thing, then the smoking ban—as for the price of beer, soon there’ll be none who can afford a drink.’

  ‘And on that cheerful note,’ Jill grinned.