Murder Unearthed

by Anita Waller

  ‘So why do you think the man Mouse and Nan met impersonated the real Michael Fairfax?’

  ‘I can only guess, but I think it was to close down our investigation. And it would have done. In our heads it was out of the question that Ewan could be Michael’s father. It was only when Ewan spoke of Carla’s photograph, and the child with blonde hair, that we realised somebody was steering us away. But that leaves us with a real problem, because Ewan is our client. He has tasked us with finding his son and has paid a considerable amount of money to do that. We have this new information from Carla Newton and it was clear from the photo that the child was probably Ewan’s. It’s a black and white snap with the baby held up towards Carla’s face, so there’s no doubting that.’

  ‘But all of this is irrelevant, isn’t it?’ Carl said gently. ‘The only thing on your mind right now is Nan. She’s started seeing a man who has violent tendencies, and you two have to tell her. Am I right?’

  ‘You are. And she’s shooting off to Scarborough in the morning, so it will have to be tomorrow afternoon. We have to fill her in as soon as possible, although maybe we won’t be the ones breaking it to her. If they track down the real Michael Fairfax tomorrow, she will find out from him, if what we’ve been told is true. Helen Fairfax ran away from Ewan, Carl. She must have been terrified. She’s never let him anywhere near her baby, not even now that baby is fifty years old. You think she told Michael? I do, and because she is quite close to death, he’s following her wishes that he doesn’t ever see his father.’

  ‘You’re probably right, it does make sense. But what happens when she dies?’

  ‘No idea. I wish we’d never heard of this bloody man. He seems so nice, but leopards and spots and all that…’

  Carl pulled her to him. ‘Maybe we should have had brandy. Do you want me to go and see this estate agency tomorrow?’

  ‘No, I need to run it by the others first. I won’t see them until tomorrow afternoon, so hold off on that until after we’ve had a meeting.’

  ‘Oops, I almost forgot. Tessa’s calling in at Connection tomorrow afternoon. Think she needs input. Every avenue she follows turns out to be a dead end. She’s a lot like you, talking it out usually shows the solution.’

  ‘That’s good. I’ll text Mouse in the morning, let her know. They maybe won’t swan off into Scarborough for fish and chips if they know Tessa is coming.’

  ‘You feel any better for the chat?’ Carl felt concerned for his fiancée. It seemed to him she looked… haunted.

  ‘I’m fine.’ She flickered a smile. ‘Hearing about Ewan and his violence towards Helen Fairfax brought the whole situation with Leon back to me. He only hit me once, but it certainly counted. Every so often it overwhelms me, but I get through it. And you help, you know you do.’

  Carl pulled her into his arms once more and kissed her. ‘Would it help if we moved? It must be a constant reminder, living here.’

  ‘I don’t want to move. We’d probably have to leave Eyam, and I don’t want to do that. I love this village, its history, the people who live here. But houses coming up for sale are a bit few and far between, so I’ll have to get him out of my mind. I can do it.’

  ‘Whatever you say. Bear in mind I’ve accepted an offer on my house today, so we could buy somewhere bigger, or move just for the hell of it, if we wanted. I need you to be happy, to forget all the bad stuff.’

  ‘The bad stuff goes into the background a little more every day. And life will be a lot better when we sort out this with Nan. I bet Mouse doesn’t sleep too well tonight. Maybe I’ll give her a ring later, check she’s okay.’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Doris chose to drive; Mouse chose to think. Her mind refused to close down to everything they had learned about Ewan, but of one thing she was sure. It was better to wait until today’s expedition was over before approaching the subject with all three of them there.

  After fifteen minutes of silence, Doris broke it. ‘You okay, sweetheart?’

  ‘I’m fine, Nan. It’s a bit early. I don’t think I’ve surfaced properly yet. And we’ve no idea how today is going to pan out, my mind’s careering through all sorts of possibilities.’

  ‘Then close your eyes for a bit. It doesn’t need two of us to drive this car. And I’m a better driver than you.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Nan, if I close my eyes, you’ll be doing eighty in about ten seconds.’

  ‘So? You won’t need to worry about it, you’ll be asleep.’

  ‘I’ll stay awake, thanks.’ Mouse turned to look out of the window. ‘Lovely scenery, isn’t it?’

  ‘Mouse, we live in lovely scenery. Grab that cushion out of the back, and lean your head on it. I’ll have us there in no time.’

  ‘That’s what I’m worried about.’ Mouse reached behind her for the cushion. ‘No speeding,’ she warned her nan, and tucked the pillow comfortably behind her head.

  Doris smiled.

  They pulled onto the cul-de-sac, and Doris switched off the engine. ‘Now we wait,’ she said, and glanced at the car clock. ‘I reckon he’ll be on the move in about half an hour. You still want to tackle him here and not at work?’

  ‘I do. I think he’ll be taken by surprise here and that’s what we need. Get him to work and he’ll have security around him, and I suspect we wouldn’t get in a second time. I’ll put the bonnet up.’

  She reached down and pressed the bonnet release, then got out of the car and stretched her body before walking round to the front and anchoring the raised bonnet in place. She reached down and picked up the cushion that fell out of the door as soon as she opened it, and threw it onto the back seat. ‘I’m awake,’ she announced.

  Doris smiled at her. ‘Good. Do we need to go over what we’re doing?’

  ‘We could, if we actually knew what we were doing, but I reckon if a different man to the one we’ve already met walks out of that property there,’ she pointed, ‘we get out and cross over the road. He needs to hear us call Michael, that will tell us if we’ve got this right.’

  They settled down to wait, and when the tap came on the side window, Doris didn’t flinch. They hadn’t driven all this way to be side-tracked by a neighbour wanting to know if they were burglars. Mouse dealt with him.

  She smiled sweetly and lowered the car window.

  ‘Do you need help?’ The small dog to which he was attached gave a low growl.

  ‘No, we’re fine, thank you. We pulled onto this cul-de-sac so we didn’t affect other cars on the main road. It’s jumping about like a kangaroo, so we’ve called the AA. They’ve said they’ll be here in the next ten minutes.’ Once again she smiled.

  ‘Oh, okay… I’ll leave you to get on with it then. Can’t be too careful these days,’ he said, and let the little dog drag him away.

  It was two minutes later when the door they were watching opened. A man with light grey hair stood in the open doorway.

  Doris and Mouse moved fast. Doris, who was closest to him, immediately headed across the road, and Mouse dropped the bonnet. She caught up with Doris, and they watched as the man walked to his garage.

  ‘Michael!’ Mouse called, and he stopped and turned to face them. His head dropped as if in surrender, and he made no further moves towards getting his car out of his garage.

  Doris held up her ID, and he shook his head.

  ‘I don’t need to see that. I saw you both on CCTV the other day at Fairfax.’

  ‘You are Michael Fairfax?’ Mouse asked.

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Then who did we speak to on Monday?’

  ‘My half-brother. My mother married a man called Walter North. Patrice was their child.’

  ‘We really need to speak with you, Mr Fairfax. We can head to your offices if it will be easier for you.’

  ‘No, I’ll call and tell them to cancel my appointments for today. I get the feeling I may not want to go to work. Please, come in.’ He moved towards his door, defe
at written across his features.

  He had a beautiful home, and they moved into the lounge. He headed towards the kitchen to make drinks.

  Mouse walked around the room, occasionally picking up photographs. If the one on the windowsill was Helen Fairfax, she was a good-looking woman. As Michael walked in carrying a tray, Mouse turned to him. ‘Is this Helen?’

  ‘It is. She’s beautiful, isn’t she?’

  Mouse moved to sit down, and she smiled at him. ‘We haven’t come here to upset any apple carts, or cause any bother. We’re here to give you some facts, and then we’ll leave you to decide what you want to do. If you want to do nothing, that’s fine.’

  ‘Maybe I should give you some facts, as a starting point. When you called at the office on Monday, Patrice and I panicked. We’d sort of known this would happen one day, and to be honest, if it had happened in six months’ time or so, there would have been no need for subterfuge. We thought we could close down your investigation by Patrice saying he was Michael Fairfax. Where did we go wrong?’

  ‘Your mother had a friend, and shortly after you were born, a photograph of you in Carla’s arms was taken. Carla still had the photograph.’ Mouse took out her phone and found the picture. She handed it to Michael.

  He stared at it. ‘I’ve never seen this before. I expect Mum sent her the only copy. But there’s no way this baby is anything like Patrice,’ he said with a rueful expression clouding his features. ‘As I said, it was a spur of the minute thing on Monday, and we actually thought we’d pulled it off. It came as a shock to see you outside my door this morning.’

  ‘I’m sorry, we don’t want to cause you any upset or grief, but we have a client, your father.’

  ‘Ewan Barker,’ he said quietly.

  Mouse felt Doris stiffen and she turned to check she was okay.

  ‘You’ve been told about your birth?’ Mouse asked Michael.

  ‘I have. Do you know, my mother is near to the end of her life, and she’s still terrified of him. It’s why neither of us have any presence visually on the Internet. His treatment of her when they were together was horrific, and while it’s a kind of reaction in me to meet up with him and batter him senseless, it would be pointless. Mum’s coming to the end of her life, I don’t want to rock the boat in any way. She’s still quite mobile, although every day she seems a little more fragile.’

  There was the sound of a key being inserted followed by a door opening at the back of the house, and a woman’s voice called out. ‘Michael? Are you okay? I watched for your car leaving…’

  Michael’s sigh spoke volumes. ‘I’m in the lounge, Mum.’

  Helen Fairfax entered the room, and even at such an early hour, she looked beautiful. Michael stood and walked towards her.

  ‘Mum…’

  Mouse rose to her feet and held out her hand. ‘Mrs Fairfax. I’m so pleased to meet you.’

  Helen looked first at Mouse, then at Doris. ‘Who are you?’ Her body stiffened, and Mouse knew Helen was adding two and two together.

  Nobody spoke, and Mouse looked to Michael for assistance.

  ‘Mum, come and sit down. Do you need anything? You’ve had your pain medication?’

  ‘I have. Is this to do with… him? Ewan is it? Have you looked for him?’

  ‘Mum, slow down and I’ll tell you what I know, which isn’t very much because we’ve hardly started talking. These ladies have been hired by… him… to trace me. Not you, me. You don’t need to fear anything. He can’t hurt you.’

  Mouse shot a quick glance towards her nan, but Doris’s face was like stone. To continue to be professional was imperative, but Nan wasn’t reacting too well to what she was seeing, that much was clear.

  ‘Nan,’ she said quietly, ‘would you like to go out to the car? I can deal with this.’

  Michael turned round at Mouse’s words. ‘Are you okay?’ he asked, but one look at Doris’s face could tell him she was far from okay.

  Doris took a deep breath. She had to know what had happened all those years ago to cause such fear in this woman, a fear she had presumably lived with all her life, and was taking to her grave.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she announced. ‘Mrs Fairfax, come and sit down, please, and we can talk, then we can get out of your son’s house. I hope you’ll feel easier in your mind when we’ve finished.’

  Helen stared at the woman who she presumed to be of a similar age to her, and nodded. ‘Tea, please, Michael,’ she said, and sat by Doris’s side.

  Michael carried his mother’s cup of tea through, and placed it on the coffee table in front of her.

  ‘Right,’ she said, ‘let’s hear what you all have to say. Michael, tell me how you met these two ladies.’

  Michael gave a short bark of laughter. ‘They shouted me from across the road this morning, as I was leaving for the office.’

  ‘And is this connected with Ewan Barker?’

  ‘It is, Mrs Fairfax,’ Mouse interrupted. ‘But he has no idea we’re here, and he doesn’t know we have located you. I give you my word that we will not be telling him we met you. He has paid us to track down his son. However, it is up to Michael whether he sees him or not. We’ll not be disclosing where he lives if he says he doesn’t want Mr Barker to know.’

  ‘That man,’ Helen Fairfax almost growled, ‘very nearly killed me and Michael. He was the most controlling person I have ever known. He wouldn’t let me speak to anyone, and if another man so much as glanced my way, I paid for it with a good hiding. I was seven months pregnant, scared of my own shadow, and he insisted I go over to his house where he lived with his mother. He said he wanted to talk about our wedding. I didn’t want to marry him, but I couldn’t make him see that. I caught the bus, and he was waiting at the stop when I got off.’

  She paused, the tears in her eyes evident.

  ‘I said thank you to the conductor who steadied me as the bus pulled up. It was obvious, of course, that I was pregnant. I paid for saying thank you with the hammering of my life. I was almost unconscious when he kicked me in the stomach. Luckily his mother came back from wherever she had been, and rang for an ambulance. They kept me in hospital for over a week, and I prayed every day my baby would be okay. They saved his life, but nobody knew if he would be damaged by the kick.’

  Helen took a sip of her drink, her hands shaking.

  ‘Mum,’ Michael said, placing an arm round her shoulder. ‘You don’t have to speak of this.’

  ‘Oh, but I do. I have to make sure that dreadful man isn’t fooling these two ladies. He was full of charm when I met him, but within a month he was showing his true colours. Did he marry?’

  Mouse nodded. ‘He did. I believe his wife died five years ago.’

  Doris didn’t speak. She couldn’t.

  ‘Then I hope they checked for foul play,’ Helen said. ‘The man is capable of anything. I was released from hospital and the police took me to my aunt’s place at Scarborough. They locked him up, but I was too scared to press charges. I thought he would come for me again once he was released, so I backed down. They had to release him but he bothered my friend continuously, trying to find out where I was. In the end we took a photo of her holding the baby, thinking he would stop bothering her if he saw a picture of him. I never heard from Ewan again but I knew one day he would want to meet Michael.’

  ‘And that’s why you kept under the radar? No social media, no pictures on your website…’ Mouse sounded thoughtful.

  Doris finally spoke. ‘And that’s why he came to us. He didn’t know where to start, but he knew of our reputation. He knew we’d find you.’

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Marnie stared at her husband. ‘I can’t stop thinking about it. I don’t think we’re going to be able to recover from this. I trusted you with the rest of my life, my daughter, my everything, and you had sex with her.’

  ‘And I’ve explained it all – how it came about, that it was only the once…’

  ‘But what I don’t understand is how she co
uld have sex with you in here,’ Marnie swept her arm round in contempt, ‘then never refer to it again, and carry on as she always had done with you. That’s the hardest part, Andy. It seems like I never knew you, and I never knew her.’

  He tried to take her into his arms, to offer some comfort, but she pulled away. ‘Sorry, Andy, I don’t need you near me.’

  ‘Do you want me to move out?’

  ‘Of course not. I don’t want the whole village discussing us, and that’s what would happen if you moved out. And we’ll have a funeral to arrange before much longer, so I’ll need you here then.’

  ‘And after that?’

  She sighed. ‘I don’t know. Maybe if we had counselling…’

  ‘So you’re quite happy to talk to someone else, but not me? Have I got that bit right?’

  The tears that seemed to be a permanent part of her life these days suddenly appeared once more. ‘I don’t know,’ she sobbed. ‘I don’t know anything. Not anymore.’

  ‘Who do you think killed her?’ Ruby’s eyes lifted towards her husband’s face, and she saw him frown.

  ‘I’ve no idea, Ruby, but it wasn’t me.’

  ‘I’m aware of that.’ Despite her pain her voice was clear, and cutting. ‘I imagine yours was the best alibi of them all. I can’t help but feel sorry for her, to lose her life so young. And I also can’t help but feel there’s a connection between you having sex with her and her death. Maybe an indirect connection, but it’s there somewhere.’

  Finally he looked at her. ‘And what on earth could that connection possibly be?’

  ‘I don’t know yet, but if there comes a day when I do find out there is one, it will be our last day together. It’s hard enough for me to know you slept with her, although I half understand that as I’m not much good to you, but if there’s anything at all linking you anywhere near the reason why she died, I won’t be able to forgive you.’

  Steve stood. ‘I love you, Ruby. If I could take everything back a couple of months I would do it in a heartbeat, but I can’t. It would break me if I lost you. It hasn’t broken me losing Orla. Maybe that’s something for you to think about.’