River Deep Read online

  Or was he a killer?

  The telephone broke into her thoughts, Jericho’s pedestrian voice asking her if she would mind speaking again to Frederica Bosworth.

  “Put her through.”

  She glanced around her office at the huge photograph of the twins, laughing into the camera. They had been three years old, even then as dissimilar as it was possible for twins to be. Martin was between them – looking tired and ill. It had been the era of tests which had all proved the same thing. The time had been one of desperate hope, weeks before the final, terrible realisation that these two beautiful children would never know their father. You could see the pain in Martin’s eyes, the tight, bony fingers clinging to the son and daughter they had named with such fun, optimism and joy, Sukey and Sam Gunn.

  Frederica’s harsh twang interrupted her thoughts. “I’m awful sorry to bother you like this. Specially when we’ve already spoke like.”

  “That’s all right, Mrs Bosworth. It’s what I’m here for.”

  There was the sound of a dry sniff into a handkerchief. “Only I want to get on with the funeral and the police said I would have to talk to you. Gerald was anxious to be cremated, you see. He was frightened of bein’ buried alive. Had quite a phobia about it, actually, so I promised him. When you go, I said, I’ll make sure you’re roasted. It was a sort of pact. If it was me went first – although I knew that was unlikely, me bein’ younger and all that. Anyway if it had of been me first he would have had me roasted. Know what I mean?”

  “I do,” Martha said quietly, “but there’s a problem.” The line went quiet. Martha almost wondered whether Frederica was still there.

  “What do you mean there’s a problem?” Her voice was shrill now.

  “In cases of violent death we don’t allow cremation.”

  “Why not? What do you mean, don’t allow?”

  Martha always hated having to explain this one. “Because,” she began reluctantly, “sometimes there is doubt – challenge through the courts – and we need to review the forensic evidence.”

  “Dig ‘im up?” Freddie shrieked. “I can’t allow that.”

  “Mrs Bosworth – I’m sorry. I’m really, truly sorry but you don’t have the right to refuse.”

  “I don’t believe this.” Her voice was almost screaming. “Me own husband? I’m takin’ this to my MP. To the European Courts of Human Rights. The papers. See if I don’t.”

  “Mrs Bosworth, it won’t do you any good. It’s the law.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “If you’d like to come in and discuss it…”

  “Not with you I won’t. Bloody ghoul.” She slammed the phone down.

  Martha stared into space. This was an interesting turn of events. The question was – was Freddie Bosworth speaking the truth when she said her husband had expressed a wish to be cremated? Or did she have some other reason for wanting his remains so totally and completely destroyed. Leaving no DNA trace. No dental records. No final evidence or proof of identity at all?

  11

  Martha scanned the papers over the next few days half expecting Freddie Bosworth to have fuelled some tabloid sensation –

  Ghoulish coroner threatens to exhume body – before it’s even buried!

  Or

  Martha Gunn, Resurrection Woman, refuses right to cremation.

  And all the time she was wondering about Haddonfield too and searched the pages for reference to him, wondering if his body had been found or if he had been spotted living it up with a blonde in the south of Spain, or even that he had been found suffering from amnesia in the general ward of a hospital. Anything other than this strange silence. It confused her.

  She half expected another contact from Frederica Bosworth about the release of her husband’s body for burial or querying some detail about his death but again the wires stayed silent. So she continued with her job and set the date of the inquest, Wednesday March 13th.

  She waited a whole week before contacting Alex Randall to ask him how the investigation was progressing. It wasn’t part of her duties to sit on the shoulders of the Senior Investigating Officers and the last thing she wanted to do was to inhibit him. But finally she caved in to her curiosity and dialled Monkmoor Police Station. She was soon put through and could sense, within seconds, that the case was no nearer solution now than it had been when Bosworth’s body had surprised PC Coleman. She told him the date of the inquest, knowing that Jericho would already have informed him. “I’m trying to ascertain the answers to some basic questions.”

  “Such as?” She could hear the depression in his voice. And could sympathise. It must be a fearful thought, that you might fail to discover who had committed this worst of crimes.

  “Well – for a start – was he killed in Marine Terrace?”

  “We think so.”

  Sometimes the easiest of questions proved almost unanswerable. Who, when, how and where.

  Randall continued. “I’ve spent a lot of time discussing the case with Sullivan. He’s of the opinion that once the fatal wound had been inflicted it wouldn’t have been possible to move Bosworth far. Certainly it would have caused attention had he been outside the cottage. Staggering. Of the appearance of having been assaulted. And remember the emergency services were hovering around from Sunday afternoon. Plenty of people were watching the river.”

  “So it’s more likely that the fatal wound was inflicted when Bosworth was in the sitting room?”

  “Again, Coroner, we think so. It seems unlikely that he would have allowed himself to be lured to the cellar.”

  Except, perhaps, on the grounds of watching the flood waters rise through the porthole window?

  “Was there no sign of a struggle in the room?” She pictured the small, square room, tiny nine-paned windows, sparsely furnished. Coffee table. Dead centre. Two armchairs. Television set. There had hardly been space to stumble and fall.

  “No.”

  “Have you found any connection between Bosworth and James Humphreys?”

  “Again no.”

  “And Haddonfield? Has he turned up?”

  “No sign of him according to Oswestry police.”

  She thanked him, asked that he keep her informed of any developments and rang Mark Sullivan, hearing the same tiredness echoing in his voice although his greeting was polite and formal.

  “I just wanted to clarify in my mind some details as to Bosworth’s injuries.”

  “Anything in particular.”

  “Yes – the bruises to his legs.”

  “Ah.” It was as though she had homed in on something he had been chewing over himself.

  “In your opinion were they the result of the body being bumped down the steps or of the water shifting him around?”

  “Almost certainly they’re the result of the body being bumped down the steps. He was quite a big man, remember. Even for another relatively well built man his would have been a dead weight to move.” It was an unfortunate phrase.

  “Would you mind just taking me through the reasoning behind this conclusion?”

  “‘Course not.” His voice was warming. “The bruises were on the sacrum, the backs of the legs, calves and thighs and some definite quite severe post mortem injuries to his occiput. These injuries are more consistent with the body being grabbed by the heels and bumped down the cellar steps than of a body floating face downwards making contact with the walls. Or of a tumble. In that case the injuries would have had different distribution. Forearms, shoulders, etcetera. It isn’t only the positioning of the injuries, Martha. It’s the severity of them. Besides – even though the cellar was completely flooded we have recovered some hair and blood from the surfaces of the stone steps. The marks match some of the indentations. There was a lot of wear on the actual steps. They were worn with the feet of two centuries. The edge of the steps were rounded rather than sharp.”

  “And the injuries in relation to the time of death?” she asked delicately.

  “Around the t
ime of death or just after. There was a little bruising around some of the lesions, none on others.” He didn’t need to spell it out.

  “And what about the circular contusion on his sternum?”

  A long sigh. “I haven’t worked that one out yet. It was done earlier than the other wounds. I think he was sort of shoved with something small and blunt. Almost poked.”

  The scene was vivid in front of eyes. The killing had been merciless. A ‘shove’ in the middle of the chest, an incisive strike to the heart. A dying man’s body being bumped down stone steps to a flooding cellar. It was an ugly picture. She squeezed her eyes shut and said her goodbye.

  Now she was left contemplating.

  It was a week before the inquest, a blustery dry day when the daffodils were forced to kowtow to the fierce winds of March, that at last some progress seemed to be made. Martha had spent an exhausting half hour talking to the widow of a man who had died on the operating table while the surgeons were battling to save him from a ruptured aortic aneurism. It had proved a futile exercise. The surgeons had lost the battle and the widow was left bereft and puzzled. Martha had done her best to explain to the elderly woman and her angry middle-aged son why exactly her husband had died. The son was inclined to blame an incompetent surgeon and no matter how plainly or how simply she explained that this was not the case he had persisted, furiously accusing her of a cover up.

  She felt drained after the bereaved relatives had left. Tired and depressed. She may be a doctor but she never would condone negligence or incompetence in any profession, particularly her own. Besides, her role specifically forbade any such opinions. But people these days felt the need to blame someone for death. God no longer fitted the bill so doctors caught it in the neck. They were the scapegoats. Mortality was now their fault, the ultimate failure of a mistrusted profession. And the price was high. The increase in litigation was strangling the Health Service. Obstetricians no longer delivered babies. Surgeons were bordering on dangerous caution, delaying tricky surgery – or not performing operations which might sully their success ratio. Doctors were afraid to speak the truth, to take risks, to allow people to die. The notes of hospital patients were now not only signed by a doctor’s name but with his Medical Defence Union number. This, in one swoop, illustrated the depths to which the medical profession was reduced. One day, she mused to herself, cupping her chin in her hands and staring out across the Shropshire plains towards the great lump of the Wrekin, the Health Service would have money to pay for nothing except lawyers to represent their employees against the ‘ambulance-chasers’ so disliked by Health Service employees.

  A phone call from DI Wendy Aitken was a welcome interruption. DI Aitken was brisk and wasted no time on preambles. “Doctor Gunn. You made a suggestion when we last spoke and I took it up. We’ve interviewed the van driver, Evan Watkins, again, under a light hypnosis. The results were interesting. We’ve recorded them. I wondered if I might bring them over and discuss them with you?”

  “That’d be great.” Had she known DI Wendy Aitken better she might have added, “I’ll put the kettle on.” But it wasn’t that type of acquaintance.

  The phone call had achieved two things. It had snapped her out of the morass of introspection about litigation. And it had rekindled her interest in the Marine Terrace case. She busied herself with some papers and waited for Wendy Aitken to arrive.

  12

  Wendy Aitken arrived at half past three, almost quivering with excitement, hovering behind Jericho who ushered her in with his customary deadpan expression. The door had hardly closed behind him when she slapped a small cassette on Martha’s desk. “I’m sure you’ll be interested in this, Doctor Gunn.” There was more than a hint of triumph in her voice.

  Martha poured them both a cup of coffee and sat down, crossing her legs, comfortable in her short black skirt, low-heeled pumps and a fine grey sweater as soft as moleskin. Her favourite.

  DI Aitken hardly paused to sip the coffee. “I’ve spoken already to Alex Randall and he’s on his way over. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “No.” If anything Martha was slightly amused. She found the detective’s enthusiasm endearing. “That’s fine.”

  “I should explain. After you made your suggestion I discussed the possibility of hypnosis with my Detective Chief Superintendant. He was keen on the idea – provided Watkins was willing to co-operate.” Martha nodded. “We had guidance from a clinical psychologist who suggested the route we should take to provide the best chance of finding out something Watkins’ subconscious knew but his conscious mind was unaware of. So – under his guidance – we carried out the exercise in three stages. First of all we subjected Watkins to light hypnosis – simply to relax him, chatted about his work, his home and so on. Then we asked him to recount the events of Monday night, February 11th. Finally we asked him, still in a very relaxed state, to look at some photographs.”

  “And?”

  Wendy held her hands out, smiling, her face relaxed and merry. Haddonfield had been missing for a month. She must have unearthed something. “I’m not playing with you, Doctor Gunn, I promise.” There was something of the tease about her. “But I think you’ll understand that if we work in sequence – as we did when we questioned Watkins – you’ll have a better picture. You’ll understand it.” She suffered a swift bout of anxiety. “Is that all right?”

  Martha shrugged. “Whatever.”

  Aitken slotted the tape into a player and sat back while Martha concentrated.

  “Your name is?” Wendy Aitken’s voice first.

  “Evan Watkins.” The voice was calm, monotonic. A flat line.

  Wendy leaned across the desk to whisper. “We used open-ended questions. Nothing leading, you understand, Coroner? The psychologist told us what we should ask, the correct wording.” Obviously an enthusiast of psychology, she settled back in her chair.

  Again Martha nodded her comprehension.

  “On the night of Monday, February 11th, you were driving?”

  “From Shrewsbury … (He used the Welsh annunciation of the town to rhyme with shoes) … back towards Llangollen.”

  “Which is where you live?”

  “Yes – and work. I got a garage, you see.”

  “Tell me about the weather that night, Evan?”

  “It was a foul night. Pissin’ down with rain.” There was no apology for the Anglo Saxon. Watkins was too relaxed for that.

  “At what time did you leave Shrewsbury?” Wendy Aitken mirroring the way he said it.

  “Just before six. I was worried, you see. The river was rising. I thought the bridges might get cut off or maybe floodin’ on the A5 so I didn’t stay. Once I’d picked up my stuff I left.”

  “Did you see anyone on the road?”

  “I saw a few people.”

  “Did you pick anyone up?”

  “Yes. There was a hitchhiker standing just after the island. Soaking he was. I pulled up, threw the door open and he climbed in.” There was a pause.

  “What does this man look like?” She was shifting gear as well as tense.

  And now Watkins was mirroring her, matching his answers to the questions. The descent to re-enter the past was complete.

  “He’s wearing a long raincoat, black, the collar pulled right up to his chin. He’s quite tall. Taller than me.”

  Wendy leaned across to whisper again. “Evan’s about five-five.”

  Watkins was still talking. “He’s quite slim. Dark hair, I think. Tidy. Not really the sort to be hitchhiking.

  “‘Where you going, pal?’ He’s staring at me. Not very friendly-like. ‘Look,’ I says. ‘Do you want a lift or not?’

  ‘I’d like that very much.’ Nice voice. Well spoken. Soft.”

  Aitken leaned across to speak again. “Remember. Haddonfield was a window cleaner.”

  “‘Where are you heading?’”

  It was eerie, hearing the recorded conversation between a missing man and the van driver, the last man to see him before
he vanished. With or without a puff of smoke.

  “‘Oswestry.’

  ‘Right then’ I says. ‘Hop in. I’ll take you there.’ He does that – hops in. Holds out his hand. ‘Haddonfield’, he says. ‘Clarke Haddonfield.’ I shake it. Soft voice. Soft hand too.”

  “A window cleaner,” Aitken reminded her again.

  “‘So what are you doing out, walking, on a night so wet?’

  ‘Car got stuck in Shrewsbury. They’ve closed the bridge, haven’t they? Can’t get my car out.’” It struck Martha then that the reason the reported conversation had such impact was because when Evan Watkins recounted the words of the hitchhiker he altered his accent subtly from his native North Walean. While his contribution to the conversation was unmistakably Borders, Wales or The Marches, the person he had spoken to had had an English accent.

  She glanced across at Wendy Aitken to see what the detective made of this. But of course, she was investigating the disappearance of Clarke Haddonfield. Her perspective was from a local angle. It was only Martha who knew that Bosworth was from Chester.

  Aitken’s voice cut in on the tape. “Would you describe the man to me?”

  “Dark eyes. Can’t see much of his mouth. Collar in the way. Heavy eyebrows.”

  “Go on, Evan,” she prompted. “Carry on with your story.”

  Immediately Watkins’ voice changed. “‘Whereabouts in Oswestry do you want dropping?’ He’s vague. ‘At the service station.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘The one on the A5.’

  ‘Oh – you mean Jarvis’s.’

  ‘That’s the one. Jarvis’s. BP.’ I’m quiet for a bit. He’s talking on the phone, you see. Sounds like he’s telling his wife – or someone – that he’s been picked up and is on his way back. I cut in, ‘I’ll take you home if you like, Mr Haddonfield. The weather’s awful. You’ll get soaked.’