Hung Out to Die

by Anthony Litton

  “And ‘how’, of course,” Gwilym added. “I mean, whichever way they came, there’s at least two fields to cross before you get to the spot where you found her. How the hell was that achieved?”

  Desmond nodded. “Yes, it’s not as though it was spring or summer, so ‘let’s have a lovely night-time walk’ isn’t going to work, is it? And anyway,” he added acidly, looking round the flat drabness of the field, “we may live in one of the loveliest villages in the country, but this field, sure as hell, is the bit God missed.”

  His partner nodded. He himself had always disliked the big field too, but more for its air of slightly haunted menace than its vast drabness. It was a drabness that was more underlined by it being so different from much of the rest of the surrounding countryside, with its patchwork of small fields bounded by traditional hedgerows. Both men could still recall, from when they were boys, the uproar Owen Sampson’s father had caused by his decision to uproot the ancient hedges that bounded the vast acreage of this and two adjacent fields. Fortunately, none of his land bordered the village, so the villagers were at least spared having to look every day at the stark results of his work.

  “There’s something else too, Gwil. Anyone being brought here would’ve known they were in for something unpleasant, even if they didn’t know exactly what. So how the hell was she persuaded to walk here – whichever way they brought her?”

  “That last question, anyway, is answered I think,” responded the Welshman, nodding to their left. Following his gaze, Desmond now saw a long line of tarpaulin stretching right from the edge of the field, where one of the two footpaths leading from the village entered the field, right to the spot where he’d found the body.

  “Oh yes, I hadn’t noticed that. They may not find anything of use though,” he added after a moment. “It was pissing down the night before I found her; still was, when I came out in it,” he added a little plaintively. “Everything will be just one big churned up mess. And it still doesn’t answer the question of how she was persuaded to come out here. Maybe there were two attackers?” he added suddenly. “That would give them the muscle to force her out here if, or, more likely, when she objected.”

  “Possibly,” replied the other man noncommittally, recalling both his conversation with the police, and his promise of silence. “There’s something we’re missing though,

  something obvious; something that I think Calderwood has already twigged onto,” he said out loud. “There was something in his voice when he asked me to let him know if anything occurred to either of us,” he went on, in response to Desmond’s look of enquiry. “But why, is what I can’t figure out. I mean, yes, we’ve been involved in one or two things in the past, but it doesn’t make us experts! What?” he broke off as he saw Desmond’s face.

  “That’s it!” he exclaimed, grabbing Gwilym’s arm. “We may not be experts in crime, but think what we are experts in!”

  Gwilym looked at him blankly for a moment, but then quickly realised what Desmond meant. “Bugger me, you’re right!” he said excitedly, snapping his fingers in a way that Desmond, to his irritation, had never been able to master. “The Theatre! That’s what he was getting at!”

  “Yes!” Desmond exclaimed with equal excitement. “He’d obviously spotted what we hadn’t – that the whole thing was so staged, almost elaborate, in the setting! He saw it wasn’t just a random way to dispose of a body. The scarecrow and the ripped clothing, the virtual nakedness, were all part of the production!”

  “But, hang on a minute! It may have looked theatrical, but for theatre you need an audience. Late at night, and this far out, there wouldn’t be one!”

  “Shit! That holes that one then, I suppose,” Desmond said, depressed his theory didn’t hold water. “But,” he went on after a moment, brightening suddenly, “it could have been a show for just one, perhaps two!” he said. “Once they’d got her here – by whatever means – strung her up and killed her, then they could stand back and view what they’d achieved. Oh!” he said, breaking off suddenly as he realised what his partner, judging by his expression, had already thought of. “Too dark.”

  “Yes, though they could have taken photos, video even, to watch and gloat over later. A lot of these new phones have lights which can be used to get a decent enough picture, don’t forget.”

  Desmond shivered as a picture stalked across his mind of killers hurrying home to a warm, safe house, leaving the butchered woman alone in the icy wind and heavy rain. Then, at home, cosy and secure, they could giggle and slobber as they gloated over the images, replaying their butchery. Somehow, it was even more repulsive and disturbing than imagining them huddled, cold and uncomfortable, out in the field, viewing the results of their vicious and appalling act.

  “It must have been something like that, I suppose,” Gwilym muttered, not entirely convinced. “Makes even less sense, otherwise.” He was jolted out of his thoughts when Desmond suddenly erupted, using the voice that, over the years, had quelled and moulded many a cast of highly talented and equally turbulent actors, though on this occasion was used with considerably less success.

  “Hey! Dog! Blast you! Dog, come here! Jesus! She’s heading straight to the bloody tent!” he yelped, as the puppy, pulling loose of her restraining lead, was belting back across to where she’d previously had such fun. Desmond set off after her, leaving Gwilym heaving with laughter as he half-heartedly tried to follow.

  Fortunately, she was headed off before she got to the tent by one of the constables on duty near it. Grinning, glad of the break in the monotony, the young policeman scooped her up, and, holding her wriggling face and slobbery tongue at arm’s length, handed her back to a breathless and grateful Desmond.

  Once his breathing had returned to something like normal, they decided they’d better leave the field before the puppy got loose again.

  “We can’t keep calling her just ‘dog’ or ‘her’ or whatever; you should give her a name,” Gwilym remarked as they walked between the winter starkness of hawthorn hedges and down the boggy, overgrown pathway leading back to the village.

  “I can’t think of one,” replied Desmond shortly.

  “What about Honey?” suggested Gwilym helpfully.

  “Honey? A bit twee, isn’t it?” Desmond remarked dismissively.

  “Well, you’ve not thought of anything and it is her colour – she’s golden, isn’t she?”

  “So’s syrup and I don’t fancy that either,” Desmond shot back, still brooding on having her at all.

  “What about Huffny, then?” suggested Gwilym after a rather long pause, part of which was spent deliberating on whether or not to thump his long-time partner.

  “Huffny!”

  “Yes, sort of short for ‘Honey for now’, ‘til you do think of a proper one.”

  Desmond, on the brink of offering a further withering retort, paused and then his sense of humour got the better of him and he laughed. “Good idea!” he said. “Mind you, I did think of calling her Eleanor.”

  “Eleanor!”

  “Yes, sort of in honour of my mother.”

  “Honour?”

  “Or revenge, perhaps!” admitted Desmond, laughing.

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “I lost my nerve!” he replied honestly as they approached the village, the thick, glutinous mud of the pathway almost pulling their boots from their feet.

  “That’s it!” Gwilym suddenly shouted. “The Ramblers! They were the intended audience!”

  “What? Oh! Of course!” responded Desmond, suddenly seeing what his partner meant. “They were due on their anti-capitalist walk the other day, weren’t they? But was it definite they’d be walking around here?”

  “I’d imagine there’s a bloody good chance. Don’t forget that old pathway that used to exist somewhere round here. It crossed the field, too, I seem to remember.”

  “Better let Calderwood know then, although I suppose they’re already onto it.”

  They were, indeed, onto it, as
Bulmer confirmed when they found him in the Incident Room. He also told them that the route planned wouldn’t have crossed Corbett’s field, or within half a mile of it.

  Chapter 6

  Desmond, having some important phone calls to make, left Gwilym chatting to the team and hurried back to Eleanor’s, where his partner found him some hours later.

  “The police think they may have a motive,” he said baldly as he entered Desmond’s temporary office.

  “What?” Desmond asked after a moment, looking up from some paperwork.

  The Welshman could tell that the other man had done what he always did when the world was bothering him – he’d got totally immersed in his latest project.

  Desmond smiled. He much preferred his way of dealing with stress, which was ordered and, ultimately, usually extremely profitable, than Gwilym’s, which was to stamp around mouthing obscenities, which got even more imaginative the more fired up he got or the more Scotch that he drank.

  “Are we going to do that after all?” he asked his friend, momentarily distracted from his news by the paperwork spread out on Eleanor’s large Jacobean dining table, currently doing service as Desmond’s desk.

  “I don’t honestly know, Gwil. I really don’t. I mean, in one way, it would be so dreadfully easy to do and, with the current craze for nostalgia, would make money too, I’m sure.” He pushed his hands through his hair as he usually did on the rare occasions he was unable to reach a speedy decision. The cause of his indecision this time was whether or not to produce, and probably direct, a lavish song and dance show held together by mega hits crossing four decades, with the four original stars performing them.

  “We know all of those who’d be starring in it, and we were actually there either when their first songs were released, or when they were at the peak of their career, but...”

  “But it would be hell working with Tessa again?” Gwilym questioned mischievously. The once world-famous – and still very temperamental – singing star, Tessa LaVerne and Desmond had had what one critic had carefully called ‘a mesmerising partnership based entirely on fire, passion and artistic conflict’. Gwilym had more accurately called it ‘all out total bloody war’.

  Desmond laughed. “Yes, but she’d be as inspiring as ever, to be honest. Also, don’t forget she’s a lot calmer now that she’s got rid of that bitch she was hooked up with, and Elizabeth has let her move in with her. No, it’s not that. Not entirely anyway. And the others would be enough of a challenge to her to help keep her in check if Elizabeth faltered.”

  “You’re still not sure, though?”

  “No, no, I’m not, and, until I work out why, I’ll leave it, I think,” he said, nodding his head as he finally decided to shelve the project for a while. “Anyway, I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

  “Oh, that the police may have found a bloody good motive for the murder… For one thing, apparently her real name wasn’t Riminton.”

  “With or without an ‘i’ or ‘g’ ?” murmured Desmond.

  “What?”

  “Nothing, just a remark in bad taste, go on.”

  “Her real Christian name was Debra – with an ‘a’ but without an ‘h’,” Gwilym murmured in his turn, earning an appreciative gleam from the other man. “Debra Addison.”

  “Addison? Debra Addison! Why does that name ring a bell?”

  “Because it bloody well should, even for someone who’s idea of important news is what the latest Versace collection has to offer!”

  “That’s it!” ejaculated Desmond, ignoring his partner’s jibe. “Wasn’t she a journalist or something? On The Sunday Voice, that appalling rag that made the News of the World look like the Church Times?”

  “She certainly was, and she left rather suddenly about six years ago.”

  “Oh yes! Wasn’t she suspected of phone hacking or paying the police for information and had to resign?”

  “Bloody hell, Des! For such a seriously successful man, you are so unworldly at times!”

  “Thanks for that, you Welsh git,” responded Desmond amiably. “What have I missed this time?”

  “Only that it was getting on for almost six years ago, and she was only suspected of that stuff. No one resigned over that sort of thing then. From what I heard, almost everyone was at it and got rewarded accordingly – before this present lot got finally rumbled, that is,” he added.

  “So, why did she leave then? From what I recall, she was rather successful, and, with her salary, expense account and what have you, she must have been on a helluva of an income. Certainly a lot to give up.”

  “Not if you thought your life was in danger, it wasn’t.”

  “Where’d you pick that up from?”

  “Oh, I’d heard the rumours at the time. I just didn’t realise that our glamorous Ms. Riminton and the ‘She-Wolf of Fleet St.’ were one and the same.”

  “So, if the police can find out who was threatening her, they may have their killer?” Desmond queried, sufficiently intrigued by Gwilym’s news to push aside his paperwork.

  “Possibly, though a bitch like that would have more than one person who’d be happy to see her dead, I shouldn’t wonder,” Gwilym responded bluntly.

  “Yes, but do the police know who was threatening her six years ago?”

  “Oh yes, they do indeed! It was our old friend, Jack Rizzio.”

  “The ‘Knifeman’? Bloody hell! She was into making dangerous enemies, wasn’t she!”

  “Yes, but I gather that, when she started the particular investigation which got him arrested, she hadn’t realised it was Black Jack that she was taking on. Though, to be fair,” he added, “knowing what I know about the woman, she wouldn’t have stopped even if she had. Whatever else you can say about her, being a coward wasn’t one of them.”

  “Keeping clear of Jack Rizzio isn’t cowardice, it’s just plain common sense,” responded Desmond tartly. “I know you had a soft spot for him, but, to me, he was always a hard-eyed thug who destroyed lives not because someone crossed him, but just for the pleasure he got out of it. He was a psychopath, Gwil, and you know it.”

  “Oh yes, he was certainly that; still is, I suppose, though he’s got much less chance of doing any damage where he is now.”

  *

  At about the same time, in the Incident Room across the Green, the same gentleman was being discussed by Calderwood and Bulmer.

  “Got thirty years, didn’t he? That would’ve clipped his wings a bit,” said Calderwood.

  Bulmer nodded. “Yep, life in one of the toughest jails we’ve got has a habit of limiting anyone’s options. Though it’s a pity we don’t hang ‘em anymore,” he added with a sideways look at his boss.

  “You’re not getting me started on that again!” laughed Robert.

  “Well, not until the next time we’ve both had a few pints!” grinned the unrepentant Bulmer.

  “Probably,” smiled his superior, glad again that he’d been partnered with such a good cop, and such a big-hearted man. Many, he knew, would have resented him; seeing him only as the favoured son of ‘them up there’, resenting his youth and fast rise through the ranks. Colin Bulmer, although a dozen or so years older, had been the reverse, helping him in every way he could. “We’ll need to speak to him, of course, though I doubt we’ll get anywhere,” he added.

  Chapter 7

  “You realise, of course, that we’re going to have to make some decisions soon,” Gwilym remarked quietly as they sat over their drinks a day or two later. They were finished with going over the events of the day, and they’d then relapsed into a companionable silence.

  Desmond nodded, knowing exactly the decision that the other man was referring to. “Yes, I know. It’s just so hard to know what to do.”

  “I know,” Gwilym responded. “But surely your mother doesn’t want us living here, under her feet, particularly with us trying to run the business from here as well?”

  “In some ways, I’m sure she doesn’t, but it’s a big place, and,
without my father, she’ll be lonely, whatever she may say,” replied Desmond worriedly.

  “I know, and the Dower House is even bigger, so her living there isn’t really on either, is it?”

  “No, but she won’t anyway. Not with my father collapsing with his stroke over there. She’ll never go back inside, let alone live there,” Desmond said with certainty.

  “Funny, isn’t it, it’s only fifty yards away, and yet they never really lived in it, even though they wanted extra space and went the other way to get it.”

  “I know. I asked Mother about it once. All she said was that it didn’t feel right, so, as you say, they went the other way and took over the other three weaver’s cottages adjoining the shop.”

  “I doubt they’d get away with it these days, merging three perfectly good houses into the two they already had. No, English Heritage or somebody would put a stop to it,” he nodded to himself.

  “You think so?” asked Desmond smiling.

  “Ah! On reflection, perhaps not. Not if Eleanor had set her heart on it,” he laughed, acknowledging the steely will of his friend’s mother.

  “What would you do, should we decide to move?” asked Desmond carefully, aware they were stepping onto somewhat delicate, if not outright dangerous, ground.

  “Oh, I’d keep the rooms at the pub,” said Gwilym. “Convenient, you know,” he added, equally carefully.

  “Yes, yes, quite,” murmured Desmond, unsurprised. “Anyway, talking about mothers, when are you going to see yours, or even phone her?” he asked quietly, keeping his voice neutral.. He made very sure that it betrayed none of the hearty dislike he felt for the woman who he always privately called the Welsh Witch.

  Gwilym shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Ah yes. I’ve been thinking about it,” he admitted, “but not very hard,” he added with a small laugh.

  “Gwil! You know you’re going to have to at least phone her! She must know we’re back in the village, and that you’re running the pub; the pub, incidentally, that she and your Dad ran, and where you were born. Even she... I’m sure she’ll be very interested,” he amended quickly.