by Ford, P. F.
‘Which would include the time when she had a brother,’ finished Jolly, as she caught up with his thought process.
‘And that’s why she calls herself Florence, and not Julia,’ suggested Slater. ‘Maybe being Julia was full of painful memories. Florence was a good character, right?’
‘Yeah,’ agreed Norman. ‘I’m pretty sure Florence was usually in the garden. There were flowers and trees and the sun usually shone. Oh yeah, Florence had a nice, happy life. It sure would have been better than the horror of being an abused kid.’
He thought for a moment before adding one more observation.
‘Wow!’ said Norman. ‘That must have been really tough for the guy to deal with. How would you cope with that?’
‘How about by changing your name to become one of the characters in her fantasy?’ suggested Slater.
‘And selling all your property so you could buy a derelict house,’ added Jolly.
They sat in silent contemplation for a few moments. It was Slater who broke the silence.
‘Of course, you idiot,’ he said, aloud, to himself as moved across the room and sat down at his desk. ‘Why didn’t you think of that before? It’s been staring you in the face all the time.’
He tapped away at his keyboard.
‘What?’ said Norman. ‘What’s been staring you in the face?’
‘Dah-Dah!’ sang Slater, his face beaming. ‘Look. I’m in. The password is Magic Roundabout!’
Norman rushed over to Slater’s desk and they stared at the open folder on Slater’s computer screen.
‘This is all very well,’ said Jolly, as a gleeful Slater finally gained access to the CD. ‘But what about Florence? She could be an important witness and she’s gone missing. It could be she’s in a lot of danger. We can’t just ignore that, can we?’
‘Well, no,’ agreed Slater. ‘But this CD could tell us everything we need to know to sort this out.’
‘You’ve already had to wait this long,’ argued Jolly. ‘And you think this crime was committed years ago, so do you really think a few more hours is going to make that much difference? There could be a woman’s life at stake here.’
‘You’re right,’ agreed a chastened Slater. ‘I think we need to find Florence sooner rather than later. If we assume someone else has that hard disk, it’s possible they’ve joined up the dots like we have, and they’re looking for her too.’
‘Why don’t you stay here and check out that CD,’ suggested Norman. ‘I’ve already got everyone keeping an eye out for Florence. If she’s out on the streets, someone will spot her. Me and Jane can go back to Hatton House and take another look around. We’ll check out Mr Winter’s house in Canal Street on the way.’
‘Okay. I’ll call the people who sent the CD out, too. Maybe they can tell us something useful.’
Chapter 21
It was mid-afternoon by the time Jolly and Norman had checked out 17 Canal Street, and had a look around inside the derelict Hatton House, but there was no sign of the missing Florence. The sky was heavy with clouds threatening to bring more snow and the light was already beginning to fade by the time they got back to the log cabin, but still nothing had changed.
‘There would have been footprints in the snow if she’d come back,’ said Norman.
‘I’m tempted to light that wood-burner and stay out here all night,’ said Jolly, sadly. She had hoped that they would find Florence, safe and sound, with her little dog.
‘I think that would be a waste of time. I doubt it would make you feel any better, and the chances are if she sees you’re here she won’t come near anyway.’
‘But we have to do something,’ said Jolly, desperately.
‘If she hasn’t appeared by the morning, we’ll grab some more bodies and escalate this into a full search,’ said Norman. ‘For now, I think we need to head back.’
Jolly wasn’t at all happy about this, but she knew there was a limit to what they could do. Florence was an adult, and if she wanted to move on there was nothing to stop her. Unless they had evidence to suggest there was anything wrong, they had no reason to instigate a full alert just yet.
‘Come on, Jane,’ said Norman, gently. ‘Let’s head on back before it gets so dark we can’t see where we’re going.’
Reluctantly, Jolly followed Norman back through the woods towards the old towpath. Neither seemed to be in the mood to engage in their normal conversation and, with the blanket of snow that covered everything acting as a good sound muffler, a heavy silence settled around them as they walked. They had just turned left onto the old towpath to begin the trek into town when Jolly thought she heard something.
‘Did you hear something?’ she asked.
Norman stopped and turned to face her. He stood quietly and listened, but there was nothing.
‘I could have sworn I heard something,’ said Jolly, with a heavy sigh.
‘Shh!’ said Norman. ‘Listen.’
Jolly did as he said.
‘There,’ she said, turning away from him. ‘It’s coming from further along the towpath.’
‘Here, let me go first,’ he said as she began to head off. ‘It’s getting dark and we don’t know what’s out there.’
As he finished speaking the noise came again.
‘Shit. What is that? A wolf?’ asked Norman.
‘There aren’t any wolves in England, you fool,’ said Jolly. ‘It’s a dog. I’ll go first if you’re frightened.’
‘Of course I’m not frightened,’ said Norman, indignantly. ‘It’s just a weird sort of noise to hear, just as it’s getting dark. Now step aside and let me lead the way.’
Jolly stepped aside and allowed Norman to assert his authority. She reasoned that he was the boss, and if he wanted to lead the way that was okay with her. The light was fading fast and Norman took out his torch. In its powerful beam, they could make out a vague path to follow through the undergrowth. There was now no doubt the sound they were heading towards was a dog, but how far away was it? They followed the path for about thirty yards, and then suddenly they were in a small clearing. Someone had cleared the undergrowth right up to the bank of the canal. An old bench, which had obviously been there for many years, stood facing the water.
‘Wow,’ said Norman. ‘I wonder what this is all about?’
‘Maybe she liked to sit by the canal,’ guessed Jolly. ‘It must be a nice, peaceful spot here. Maybe she feeds bread to the ducks.’
There was no sign of the dog, but they could hear it whining on the other side of the clearing.
Jolly got to her knees.
‘Here, Dougie,’ she called. ‘Come here. Good boy.’
The little terrier suddenly ran from the undergrowth and bounded towards her. He jumped into her arms and frantically licked at her face, his tail wagging furiously.
‘What’s he doing out here on his own?’ asked Norman, sweeping his torch from side to side around the little clearing. ‘You’d think he’d stick with Florence.’
‘It doesn’t feel right, does it?’ said Jolly. ‘Something’s wrong for sure. This dog’s really stressed, like he’s been hiding or something.’
Norman had spotted something caught on a bramble close to where they had entered the clearing. He moved over and crouched down for a closer look, focusing his torch upon it.
‘It’s a bit of fabric,’ he told Jolly. ‘Sort of dirty white colour.’
‘From her coat?’ asked Jolly.
‘It could be,’ said Norman.
He stood up and headed towards the canal bank, sweeping the water with his torch. This part of the canal was hidden from what sparse sunlight there had been earlier in the day so the thin coating of ice that had formed overnight hadn’t thawed at all and was still intact. About three feet from the bank, just beneath the ice, the beam fell upon a dirty white object.
‘Oh My God,’ said Jolly, following the beam of his torch. ‘That’s her. Quick, we have to get her out. She might still be alive.’
She rushed to the edge of
the canal, still clutching the dog in her arms.
‘Jane,’ said Norman, moving across and gently taking her shoulders. ‘She was in there when the canal froze last night. There’s no way she’s still alive.’
He guided her towards the bench, sat her down and sat next to her.
‘It’s all my fault,’ said Jolly, rocking backwards and forwards. ‘I must have scared her. She didn’t run away, she committed suicide, didn’t she?’
She held the dog close and buried her face in his neck. Then she began to sob quietly into his fur. Norman placed an arm gently around her shoulders.
‘Hello, Jane. Have you found her?’ Slater asked into his phone, a few minutes later. ‘If she’s a witness to what’s on this CD we’ve got a real case.’
‘It’s Norm. I’ve got no signal out here, so I’m using Jane’s phone.’
‘Oh, right. So have you found her?’
‘Yeah,’ said Norman. ‘I think it’s her. You’d better get over here with a full forensics team, SOC tent, lights, the lot. She’s not going to be a witness to anything. She’s in the canal.’
‘Oh bloody hell, no!’ said Slater.
‘And I think we need a paramedic or a doctor. Jane’s in shock. She thinks this is all her fault.’
‘Okay. Norm I’m on it. I’ll be there as soon as I can.’
‘It might be best if you lead the guys in through the front gates,’ said Norman. ‘You know the way, and it’ll be quicker than taking hours to walk all their gear along the towpath.’
Chapter 22
By the time Slater had led the forensic team up the front drive and shown them where the site was, Norman had managed to coax Jolly away from the scene of the crime and down to the main house. She was still clutching the dog tightly in her arms when he handed her over to a paramedic and a concerned WPC colleague to get her fixed up and then taken home.
Now they were back at the small clearing which, being the crime scene, was now a hive of activity. The temperature seemed to have dropped several degrees in the hour or so they had been on site, and everyone was puffing huge clouds of vapour. In the glow of the hastily erected emergency lights, and the glow of light from inside the SOCO tent, it created an eerie sight. The rattle of the small generator powering everything seemed to add to the effect.
Florence’s body, still wrapped in her dirty white coat, had been removed from the icy water and lay inside the tent awaiting the arrival of the pathologist.
They were all dressed in the new blue paper suits, but for once Slater didn’t picture the familiar swarm of smurfs.
‘All this bloody snow doesn’t help us, does it?’ he observed, moodily. ‘It’s hiding any evidence on the ground.’
‘We’ll thaw that out and see what we can find,’ said Ian Becks. ‘The bigger problem is the fact that we’ve had detectives, divers, and who knows bloody who, wandering all over the site. If there is any evidence under the snow, it’s probably ruined by now.’
‘It couldn’t be helped, Ian,’ said Slater. ‘We didn’t know we were looking for a body when we first came up here.’
‘I know, I know,’ said Becks. ‘I’m not trying to blame anyone, I’m just saying.’
‘Can you tell us anything yet?’ asked Norman.
‘I can tell you we’ve fished the body of an old lady, in a dirty white coat, out of the canal. And the doctor has justified his existence by assuring us she’s dead, but you didn’t need a medical degree to work that one out.’
‘Yeah, he’s not exactly the friendliest of guys,’ agreed Slater. ‘I thought warmth and compassion were supposed to be part of a doctor’s armoury.’
‘Not that one,’ said Becks. ‘Someone should tell him there’s no “I” in team. I’m sure it’s his fault the temperature’s dropped so much since we’ve been here. It must have gone down a good ten degrees when he arrived.’
‘Is he still here?’ asked Norman.
‘You must be joking. He couldn’t wait to get away.’
‘I was hoping he might have some idea what happened.’
‘Oh he did,’ said Becks. ‘He said to tell you, she died. I suppose that’s in case you were in any doubt. And that’s about it so far, I’m afraid. We’re not going to be able to work very quickly in these conditions, so I wouldn’t expect a major breakthrough anytime soon. The pathologist is on the way. Maybe we’ll know a bit more when he gets here.’
‘There’s not much we can do up here to help,’ said Slater, grimly. ‘So we’ll get out of your way and have a poke around in the cabin.’
‘We’re going to move down there when we’ve finished up here,’ said Becks. ‘But I expect we’re going to be up here for a good while yet. Can you try not to destroy any evidence before we get down there?’
‘I should warn you me and Jane were in there earlier,’ said Norman. ‘We were looking for any clues that might tell her where she could have gone.’
‘Oh, wonderful.’ Becks sighed. ‘So you’ve already contaminated it down there.’
‘Sometimes Becksy, you can be an insufferable arse, do you know that?’ said Norman, angrily. ‘Dave’s already told you we didn’t know we had a death on our hands until a couple of hours ago.’
Ian Becks looked stunned by Norman’s comments.
‘It just annoys me that you lot seem to think we can still do our job when you’ve already trampled all over a crime scene,’ he began.
‘You know what, Ian?’ Slater interrupted. ‘Norm’s right. You’re bloody brilliant at what you do, and we all appreciate it, but we have a job to do as well. I’m sorry if we’re not perfect like you seem to think you are, but we don’t yet have the ability to see into the future. We have to make decisions based on intuition, experience, and procedure. We don’t have the benefit of hindsight.’
He pointed to the tent.
‘Right now, there’s a little old lady lying dead in that tent and we, as a team, have a duty to find out what happened. Just now you said someone should tell the doctor there’s no “I” in team. As the head of this investigation I think I should tell you you’d do well to remember that yourself.’
Ian Becks face had gone scarlet, whether from rage or embarrassment it was hard to say, but before he could take the argument any further, a familiar figure loomed into view carrying a medical bag.
‘Evening all,’ said Dr Eamon Murphy, the pathologist. ‘I hope I’m not interrupting anything.’
He offered a beaming smile to one and all, even though Slater thought the atmosphere could be cut with a knife.
‘Hello, Eamon,’ said Slater. ‘Thanks for coming.’
‘What else could I possibly want to be doing on a freezing February night?’ said Murphy, cheerily. ‘It was an invitation I couldn’t refuse.’
‘She’s in the tent,’ said Slater.
‘Let’s have a look, then.’
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ said Becks, shortly. ‘There’s one of my guys in there if you need a hand, doc.’
The two detectives led the pathologist across to the makeshift tent where Murphy slipped into one of the blue suits and then they eased their way inside, stepping aside to allow Murphy access to the body. A blue-suited forensic guy nodded to them as they entered.
‘Do we know who she is?’ asked Murphy as he knelt next to the body.
‘Her name’s Florence,’ said Norman. ‘We believe she’s the sister of Dylan Winter.’
‘Isn’t that the guy whose PM you asked me to reconsider?’ asked Murphy, looking up at Slater.
‘Yeah, that’s him. She’s been in hiding for years, but we’re pretty sure she’s his sister.’
‘A DNA sample will check that easily enough,’ said Murphy. ‘I’ve still got samples of his.’
He turned his attention back to Florence’s body. She was lying on her back, her long, wet hair, plastered across her face.
‘So you don’t think this one’s an accident.’
‘You’d need to rule that out,’ said Slater. ‘It could ev
en be suicide, but we don’t think so.’
‘Can you give me a hand to roll her over?’ Murphy asked the forensic technician.
They carefully and gently rolled her over and revealed the ugly mess that was the back of her head. Murphy leaned in closer for a better look.
‘As you know, I’m not a forensic pathologist,’ he said. ‘But I think even I can say, with a fair degree of certainty, that it’s unlikely she bashed herself across the back of the head and then threw herself into the canal.’
‘Could it be an accident?’ asked Slater.
‘There’s no way you could accidentally do that much damage to your own head,’ said Murphy, standing up. ‘I think I’d be happy to say we can probably rule out suicide or an accident as the cause of death.’
‘I was sort of expecting you to say that,’ said Slater, grimly. ‘But at least we know what we’re dealing with. Thanks for confirming that for us.’
‘I’ll have her taken down to the hospital now,’ said Murphy. ‘When I get back, I’m going to flag this one up the line and get a proper forensic pathologist to do the PM. I’ll book it for tomorrow at eleven. I’ll let you know if that changes.’
After Murphy had left, Slater and Norman were left without much to do. Ian Becks seemed to have split his team so they could make a start on the log cabin so they decided against getting in his way and instead headed back to the main house.
‘I’ve probably pissed Becks off big time,’ said Slater to Norman. ‘And I really don’t need to start another argument right now.’
‘I wouldn’t worry about it. I think he’s had it coming for a long time. It’s okay to know you’re good at what you do, but a little humility now and then wouldn’t go amiss. If he’s as professional as he claims he is, he should be able to accept a little constructive criticism and make use of it.’
A generator had been set up outside the front of the main house and someone had set up some lights in the hall. It was probably that same someone who had erected a table and set up a tea urn which was puffing its excess steam up at the ceiling. Slater was impressed with this attempt at providing some sort of refreshment for the workers and he made a mental note to find out who had been responsible so he could thank them.