by Anita Waller
Rosie tucked the card inside the flap on her mobile phone cover after sending the requested photograph.
Sam checked it had arrived and the two police officers stood up. ‘I’m going back to pass this information on to the team, and we’ll be in touch as soon as possible to let you know what’s happening. Unfortunately it’s the weekend and we have a murder to investigate alongside Mrs Ledger to track down, but be assured it will be started tomorrow.’
Sam’s phone rang, and he went out into the hall to answer it. Fiona stayed in the kitchen, to prevent either of the two warring adults from following him and hearing any part of the conversation Sam was having.
The front door banged open and Megan, followed by her father, came bounding through. ‘Mum, why is… oh.’ She stopped speaking when she saw the figure of DC Sam Ellis standing in the hallway, speaking on his phone. Her father touched his finger to his lips to tell Megan to be quiet, and they edged past Sam to get into the kitchen.
‘Everything okay?’ Dan asked, looking at his wife’s face for confirmation that she wasn’t about to murder Mark.
‘It’s not Shirley,’ she said. ‘The body from the woods has short dark hair. It’s not Shirley,’ and Rosie burst out crying.
Dan pulled her into his arms, and they were quickly joined by Megan. All three stood there, only pulling apart when Sam returned to join his colleague in the kitchen.
‘Can we sit down, please,’ he said. ‘I have some further questions to ask of you.’
‘You’ve found her,’ Mark said, his voice cracking. ‘She’s dead, isn’t she?’
‘No we haven’t found your wife, Mr Ledger. I understand Mr Patrick Ledger is related to you.’
‘He’s my younger brother. Why?’
‘And he lives with his partner, a Miss Melanie Brookes?’
‘He does. What’s he done? It can’t be much; he never does anything wrong. Does he need me?’
‘Probably. Our colleagues are with him now, telling him that the lady we found in the stream has been identified through fingerprints, and it’s Melanie Brookes. He has asked that we take you over to his home, so can you follow me there, please?’
Rosie stifled a sob. ‘Mark? Will you be okay? Do you want me to go with you?’
‘I’ll be okay, thank you, Rosie. You stay here in case Shirley turns up. I’ll get over to Patrick.’
Mark spoke and acted like an automaton, and knew his control had temporarily deserted him. For heaven’s sake, he’d been nice to bloody Rosie. Melanie, dead. How? His mind whirred with thoughts of her and their Monday nights. He hoped there was a reasonable explanation for her death, because if not the police would start to dig, and they might come up with little things that pointed directly to him as being someone Mel knew well. He shivered, and pulled his coat around him.
‘Will you take me?’ he asked Sam. ‘I think maybe I shouldn’t drive. Rosie, I’ll leave my car here until I know what’s happening, if that’s okay.’
‘That’s fine, Mark,’ Dan said. ‘Give our condolences to Patrick, and tell him we’re here if he needs anything.’
Mark left with Sam, and once again Dan pulled Megan and Rosie into his arms.
‘I liked Melanie,’ Megan whispered. ‘I liked her a lot.’
12
Patrick’s face was ashen. ‘I last saw her Thursday lunchtime. We were at a function on the Wednesday night to see my brother speak, and we both booked the morning off work knowing there would be a fair amount of drink. I took her to my home after the do, and we both went off to work about twelve on Thursday. She was going to York with her job on Friday and staying overnight, so we said we wouldn’t meet up until tonight. I’ve been ringing her since about lunchtime, but assumed she was shopping or something.’ His voice faltered at the end as reality was starting to hit home.
‘You didn’t live together?’
‘Mostly. My place is bigger, and we spent a lot of our time here, but her home office was perfectly set up in her second bedroom, and sometimes she needed to be at home. It was easier to run both places, and it was also good to have time out. We had a really good relationship. We loved each other…’
‘Who would want to hurt your partner, Patrick?’ DCI Stamford tried to speak gently.
‘I have absolutely no idea. What killed her? Did she fall into the stream? She liked to run, maybe she tripped…’
‘I’m sorry, Patrick, it wasn’t accidental.’
His eyes widened in horror as thoughts invaded his brain. ‘Murdered? She was murdered?’
‘She was.’
‘We have officers with your brother at the moment on an unrelated matter, and he has been informed of Melanie’s death. He’s on his way over here with my DC.’
‘How did you know Melanie and I…?’
‘We went to Melanie’s house. Her neighbour came out and told us about you, luckily they knew where you lived.’
It was obvious to Grace and DS Harriet Jameson that Patrick’s mind wasn’t able to function properly, and Harriet leaned across the table. ‘Mr Ledger, would you like me to make you a cup of tea?’
Patrick nodded; it hadn’t reached the extremities of his brain that these two women knew of Mark’s existence.
Harriet stood and switched on the kettle. She ran a hand through her short blonde curls, trying to decide which cupboard was likely to hold mugs, then busied herself making the drinks. She brushed away the beginning of a tear in her grey eyes; she hated this part of her job, the notification of death.
Sam drove Mark to his brother’s home, leaving Fiona at the Steer home. He felt it was the best call, hoping Fiona would be able to get the family talking, maybe get some information as to possible places Shirley Ledger could be.
Patrick was slumped over the kitchen table, his head in his hands. Grace was trying to question him, but getting little in the way of answers.
‘Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt Melanie?’
‘No.’
‘Had she fallen out with anyone recently?’
‘No.’
‘Do you have a key to her place? We had no way of getting in the first time we went.’
‘Yes.’ He made no move to produce it.
‘Can I have it, please? We’ll return to her home as soon as we leave here.’
‘Yes.’ Patrick stood and walked carefully to a kitchen drawer, removing a bundle of keys. He carefully selected one, prised it off the ring and handed it to Grace.
‘Thank you.’
He looked up momentarily as he heard the front door open.
Mark strode through to the kitchen. He stopped in the doorway and looked at the abject sorrow on his brother’s face, then moved across to him. He hugged him, not even registering that it was probably the first time he’d hugged his brother for quite a few years.
‘God, Patrick, I’m so sorry, mate. Couldn’t believe it at first.’
Patrick didn’t speak, as if unsure what to say, unsure how to feel. Mark knew it wouldn’t seem real, Mel not being around anymore.
‘Mark,’ Grace said, ‘for the record, when was the last time you saw Melanie?’
Mark turned to her. ‘At the do on Wednesday night. I think Patrick and Mel went home around eleven but I can’t be sure about that. I was a little worse for wear by the time they left, and I ended up walking home. Didn’t get home till six the next morning.’
‘Six?’
‘Look, I’m not proud of it. I threw my phone at a tree in temper, then ended up sleeping propped up against another tree. As I said, I was wasted. A postman on his way to work woke me up and I carried on to my house, where I found out my wife had disappeared. It’s been a shitty couple of days, as you can imagine.’
‘I certainly can,’ Grace said, having formed her own opinion of the man in front of her. ‘So, while you’re both here, I want to check timelines with you. You two plus Melanie attended the same seminar or whatever it was on Wednesday evening. Melanie went home with you, Patrick, and not back to he
r own place. In the meantime, you staggered home eventually, Mark, getting home after six. Am I right so far?’
Both men nodded, and Mark added that he actually had a taxi for the final part of his journey, after using the postman’s phone to call one.
‘Okay. Patrick, you and Melanie went to work at lunchtime on Thursday. You didn’t see her Thursday night because she had work to do at home to prepare for a trip to York on Friday, where she planned to stay overnight, returning home on Saturday. Mark – have you been to work?’
Mark shook his head. ‘No, Shirley leaving has thrown me a bit. I rang in and booked a couple of days off, didn’t explain why because I thought Shirley would be home by now.’
‘Can I ask… how long Mel had been in that stream?’ Patrick winced as he said it.
‘I can’t answer that yet, we’re waiting for the forensic reports. We don’t believe she went in where she was found, we think she went in higher up where it’s much deeper and faster flowing, and the current took her down until she was snagged on tree branches that were in the water.’
‘And she was… murdered? You’re positive about that?’
‘Yes, we do know some things, it’s the finer details we’re still waiting for. She was strangled, we believe manually and not by ligature, and we do know she was dead before entering the water because there was no water in her lungs.’
Grace allowed that to settle in their minds before continuing. ‘We’re now at Thursday night. Patrick, you definitely didn’t see Melanie?’
‘No, I rang her to wish her goodnight about elevenish. I went to bed with a book, read about two pages and then went to sleep. I didn’t speak to her when I rang her, it went to voicemail, but that’s not unusual, before you jump to conclusions. If she has something that really needs her concentration, she switches off her phone. I assumed she was busy, so didn’t bother her again. I wished her good luck for her presentation the following day, and then said I loved her and goodnight. If you get hold of her phone, you can hear it for yourself.’
‘You didn’t hear from her on Friday?’
‘Not at all, but I wouldn’t expect to. It wasn’t only about presentations with Mel, she had to network, to chat to people. Her enthusiasm for her job absolutely shone out of her, and although she wasn’t in sales, she sold the idea of a new system to a lot of people merely by talking to them. When she was away, I never rang her. I waited for her to ring me, then I knew I wasn’t interrupting anything important. We did have a system for emergencies. If I needed her for anything urgent, I would ring twice in quick succession, then she would call me as soon as she could. We’ve only once used that, when her Mum was rushed into hospital with pneumonia. Mel was in Germany for the week, but she cut it short and came home.’
‘And today? You tried to ring her?’
‘I did but not until after lunch to give her time to get sorted from her journey home. She didn’t answer, so I left a message to say ring me when she could.’
‘And you, Mark.’ Grace turned to the older brother. ‘Have you spoken to Mel since Wednesday night?’
‘Me? No, I’d have no reason to speak to her. To be honest, since I collected my car on Thursday morning, I’ve done nothing. I haven’t been out, I’ve constantly rung my wife who doesn’t respond at all, and I’ve watched bloody daytime television.’
‘Where does Melanie work, Patrick?’
‘It’s a company in Newark called Global Systems.’ Patrick took out his wallet. ‘This is Mel’s business card, with the office number on it. God, I’d better ring them…’
‘I’ll notify them,’ Grace said. ‘We’ll be speaking to them tomorrow, so I’ll tell them what’s happened. They’ll probably ring you.’
‘But they’re not open Sundays.’
‘They are for us.’
He gave a brief nod. This woman could open doors to hell, he reckoned, if she was so inclined.
‘Okay.’ Grace handed both Patrick and Mark business cards. ‘If there’s anything, and I mean anything at all even if it seems minor to you, I would like you to ring me. Patrick, we will need you to identify Melanie fairly soon. I’ll confirm that later. In the meantime, can you provide a list of all Melanie’s friends, addresses if you have them but phone numbers if not, and we’ll start interviewing them tomorrow. My email is on the card, so send it as soon as it’s complete. I’ll leave you two for now, but obviously I’ll have to speak to you again. We’ll need a statement from both of you, but it can wait a couple of days.’
PC Fiona Harte was in the lounge with Dan and Rosie sitting opposite her, on the sofa. They were holding hands and Rosie kept wiping away a tear.
‘All of us really liked Patrick and Melanie, which I know sounds odd considering how much we dislike Mark. Shirley once told me Mark was seriously bullied at school because he stammered and wore glasses, and that’s why he is how he is, but he’s compounded the issue by sending Adam and Seth there. Surely, if you’d had such a miserable time at a school, you wouldn’t want your kids anywhere near it!’
‘And didn’t Shirley see any of this when she first met Mark?’ Fiona was carefully probing, trying to understand the dynamics of the family.
Rosie gave a short laugh. ‘No, he was Mr Charm until they got married, then the dictatorial side of him really shone through. He didn’t want her going to work and meeting other men, so she quickly became pregnant. She’s been on the pill since the twins were born, but he doesn’t know. I wish she’d ring me, we’ll help her, and she knows that.’
‘There wasn’t another man?’
‘She’s never even hinted at anything like that. She comes round here most days because we have an Etsy shop. We make stuff. It gives her an income without him knowing about it. Before Mum died, Shirley had nothing, but Mum left us a large insurance policy. Shirley has money that Mr Big knows nothing about, plus the regular small income from our shop. She uses our address for her mail concerning her account and so far we’ve kept it from him. She hasn’t withdrawn anything since she went missing…’
‘Do you see anything of your father?’
‘No, he apparently died fifteen years ago. We only found out on Wednesday when our father’s wife came here to tell us. She knew nothing of us until a couple of weeks ago. It’s been a strange sort of time all round.’
‘You hadn’t seen this person before?’ Fiona went on full alert. ‘This woman married to your father, she was a newcomer in your life?’
‘She was, but I’ve had contact since. She’s nice.’
‘Name and address, please.’ Fiona bent over her notebook.
Rosie picked up her phone and removed Doris’s card from the front cover. ‘I don’t have her home address, but that is her business card, I’m sure you can track her down from that.’
‘Connection? Doris Lester of Connection?’
‘You know her?’
‘Not personally, but believe me, their excellent reputation goes before them. She met Shirley?’
‘She did. We’ve spoken since, Doris and me, but only by phone.’
‘Ring her. Tell her what’s happened now. You’ll not regret it.’
13
Doris and Wendy decided not to go to church, partly because Doris didn’t want to get out of bed; a late Saturday night, a surfeit of wine and a good film on television had made her realise that Sunday was indeed a day of rest.
Wendy was reading the newspaper when Doris finally made it downstairs. ‘I’ll get you a coffee,’ she said, and Doris smiled at her.
‘You don’t have to wait on me, you know.’
‘Hey, this is a free holiday for me, I’m happy to help. You want breakfast?’
Doris shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think so. Shall we go out for lunch instead?’
‘Sounds like a plan, my treat.’ Wendy stood. ‘I’ll get us a coffee.’
She heard Doris’s phone ring as she was switching on the kettle. She made the drinks and could still hear Doris talking. She hesitated, not wanting to dist
urb the phone call, but heard Doris say goodbye, so pushed open the door into the lounge.
‘I waited,’ Wendy said.
Doris seemed deep in thought.
‘You okay?’ Wendy put the cup down in front of her friend, and Doris shook her head, clearing her thoughts.
‘I’ve got an apology to make,’ she said.
‘You need me to go home?’ Wendy said, a catch in her voice.
‘Not at all. The apology is because I said the only dead bodies on this holiday would be long-time dead corpses. That’s not proving to be strictly the case.’
‘You haven’t been anywhere to find a dead body. And if you have, how come I missed out on it?’ There was indignation in Wendy’s tone, and Doris laughed.
‘No, I haven’t found one, but there is one, nevertheless.’
Wendy sat down. ‘Who was the phone call from? No – let me guess. Rosie. Is Shirley…?’
‘It was Rosie, but Shirley is still missing. That’s what the call was about. She asked if I would take the case on an official footing, find some trace of Shirley. I kind of said we’d go out and see them. The body found in the woods wasn’t Shirley, thank God, but it was somebody who was part of the family, somebody called Melanie Brookes. She was the partner of Mark’s brother Patrick. I think I’ve got that right.’
‘And Mark is?’
‘Oh, sorry. Mark is Shirley’s husband, so the dead woman is sort of his sister-in-law. Rosie sounded a little lost, and she’s worrying herself silly that there is some connection between Shirley disappearing and Melanie Brookes’ death, which, by the way, was murder.’ Doris pulled a notepad towards her, and quickly sketched out a family tree showing who was who, then pushed it across to Wendy. ‘Commit that to memory, then you’ll know who we’re dealing with.’