Читать книгу Death on the Driving Range - Brian Ball - Страница 6

CHAPTER 4

“So what happens when your mates get here, Arthur?” Gary wanted to know, as two plainclothes officers came at a steady pace along the light rough on the left of the fairway.

“You say nowt. Do what they teach you in the army. Hold your water.”

“All I want is to get off home,” said Owen Burroughs.

So do we all, Root concurred silently as Sergeant Isaac Strapp puffed up the rise to Anglers Kop. The lithe female officer with him looked as if she should be in a gym-slip. When he had outlined the nature of the find, and who had made it, Strapp made sure he had got the details right.

“And this is, again?”

“A friend, Gary Brand. He saw and heard no more than I did. And this here’s the driver of the JCB. Not too good yet, are you, Owen?”

Strapp was examining the remains. “You feeling all right?”

This was to his fellow-officer. “I’ve seen a corpse before, Sergeant. I’ll do,” she said firmly, moving forward a half-pace.

“Skin’s just bits of leather,” said Strapp. He turned to the still-trembling finder, but addressed Root. “I just want the basics, Constable. What have we got, for a start?”

Root indicated the area sloping away from the seventeenth tee, in the direction of the woods below; and then to the newly acquired land.

“See down there? That’s the practice ground. There’s an extension in hand. This hill’s being levelled. So the earth-moving vehicle’s here. You can see what’s turned up.”

“Turned up is right. Obviously human. And old. Well?”

“It’s a chance discovery. Owen here stopped his digger-blade a few feet from the remains.”

“Full name, sir?”

“Owen Burroughs, what of it? I’m just the poor sodding driver and I want out of this soon as—”

“In a minute or two, sir, please. I won’t keep you long, I promise.”

He nodded for Root to continue.

“Short, Arthur. This is only the start, you know.”

* * * *

They waited under the broad portico. Six pillars supported a severe classical portico. Nervously, the Secretary lit a cigarette. “We can smoke inside, but I don’t, usually. Matches, lighter, damn. Major?”

“Join you. Inspector? No? I like the Dutch cigars. Willems. Bliss keeps them for a few of us. Does it take this long to get a bloody battery changed?”

“Damned gout,” he told Tomlinson. “So you’re what, the Johnnie in charge, what d’you call it, Site Manager, something like that?”

“Usually, we’d say Crime Scene Manager, Major, and yes,” Tomlinson went on quickly, “yes, Mr. Church, I appreciate the fact that we’ve not established that a crime has been committed. Just keeping your Captain in the picture, sir.”

He remembered Mabbat’s advice and rechecked. “We’ll need to talk to your greenkeeper, sir. Has he been sent for?”

He had. Necessarily, this. Birtwhistle would know more about the lie of the land than any member possibly could.

Church muttered, “I should have brought a raincoat. I can’t say I’m looking forward to this, not at all. Won’t the, er, the remains get wet?”

The CID inspector took it in his stride.

“We’ll arrange to have them covered shortly, sir. By the way, I gather that you’ve not long since had another fatality here at the club.”

“Sheer bloody murder! Bad business, yes, right, Phil?”

“Ghastly!” said Phil Church. “Three years ago it was, and my nerves were shattered for months, had to lay off the gin and down tranquillizers.”

There was a growl and a hiss of pain from the Major.

“Steer round the bloody dips, man!”

Tomlinson did not offer sympathy as they made their way fairly smoothly down the eighteenth and then up again; and less smoothly off the fairway to the excavation. “We’ll have the media types here soon. Tarts from the telly, they’re the worst,” came another growl. “Right, Phil?”

“We’ll keep them in hand for you, sir. I have express orders on that point.” Straight from the top, that had become clear. “Right here, Mr. Summers, that’s close enough. Now, I’d like you all to have a good look at the remains and this Kop, then please stay beside the buggy, gentlemen, will you?”

Tomlinson motioned to his CID colleagues and Root.

“Right, we’ll have the run down soon. First, who’s who?”

Summers thoughtfully produced umbrellas as the rain began to lash the thin poor soil. The clenched fingers of the skeletal hand shone white, cleansed by the driven rain, as the three men advanced to the beginning of the area Root had designated as the discovery site. The skull glistened. A flap of skin fell away from the left cheekbone. Seconds passed. A minute.

“The buggy?” suggested Tomlinson.

“Gladly,” Church agreed. “The way that arm’s sticking out of the ground. Fingers—! As if they’re pointing! Horrible! What a way to end up!”

Tomlinson spoke briefly to his sergeant and DC Amy Briggs, then he asked Arthur Root to fill him in on what he knew. Like Izzy Strapp, he asked for a short briefing. “You’ll stay, Sergeant,” he ordered. “Keeping dry?”

“And you gentlemen,” Tomlinson went on, “before you go back to the clubhouse, what can you tell me about this matter? Anything come to mind immediately? Mr. Summers, you first, please.”

Summers shook his head. He explained that he had been appointed only in the late spring, and he could think of nothing that the inspector wasn’t already aware of. Neither the major nor Church had anything to add, except for an expression of regret at the passing of a life. The Secretary had paled noticeably. He indicated that the big man beside him would speak for both.

“Had enough? Up you get then, Phil,” Major Wynne-Fitzpatrick ordered. “Shocking sight. Don’t blame yourself. Never get used to it.”

He cursed his gout and continued.

“Not much for you, Inspector. Can’t help with an identification. Could be anyone. It’s over to you, really. As for this hill we’re having levelled, we’ve only got rumours, ancient tales, just a fog, like any old battle story, none of it substantiated. Can’t really say any more that will help, so we’ll get ourselves off,” the Captain grunted as he heaved himself onto the golf-buggy. “As Phil here says, there’s a mystery of sorts about the Kop. We’ll have a natter in the bar when he’s come round a bit. How about the JCB driver? Take him back with us? Looks all in.”

“He’s needed here, sir. Now, I’ll be here for quite a while, but please remain in the clubhouse. Anything you can tell me later will be of use in our investigation, so perhaps you’ll review what you’ve seen? This officer will go with you. She’ll answer any questions you might have in the meanwhile. Oh, leave me an umbrella, will you, Mr. Summers?”

The golf-buggy slid away. Root wondered if he himself would ever find himself in need of one. He glanced at Gary. The lad was holding up well. Soon, the back-up vehicles would arrive. And very soon he would have to make his initial report; just as soon as Izzy Strapp was done with.

“Constable?”

“I’ve started the log, sir. All down in my notebook.”

There was no hint of approval. Police training was comprehensive. Good, ordinary coppering. “Don’t give it to me verbatim. Just the basics, for now.”

So he got them, such as they were.

Arthur Root gave a time and a place, sixteen forty-three hours, those present, himself alerted by a form of distress signal, three whoops on the JCB’s air-horn. Unemotionally, he detailed what he saw, what action he had taken. There was a skull, entirely visible above recently-turned soil, together with what were obviously the remains of a human arm. And so on. Three minutes, no more, he judged. “And, after ensuring that the said vehicle was in a safe state, and ascertaining that no medical attention was needed immediately,” he finished, “I completed my notes, sir.”

“Clear enough,” said Tomlinson. “Sergeant? Anything to add?”

“Just normal procedure, Inspector. The constable had it all in hand. Not much for me to do, really. Wait, that’s all.”

Tomlinson turned, splashing Root with the cold rain on the bright umbrella. “Now, Mr. Burroughs. Just tell me what you did, why you’re here and what you saw. Please?”

It took no more than a few minutes to have the facts confirmed by the driver. Less, for Gary. Both would make more than adequate witnesses at the inquest. Tomlinson referred again to the two officers, then declared that both Gary and Burroughs might go to the clubhouse, there to record a statement.

“If I have to,” said Owen Burroughs. “Then I want out of here. I’m not touching that JCB either. It can stay where it is for me.”

It would, whatever his preferences. Or those of his employer.

“Well, get along, man. Meanwhile,” he said to Arthur Root, “You’re the one with the local knowledge. No one gets under a heap of soil by choice. So, who is he, how did he get there? And did he fall into a hole, or did someone help him into it. Any ideas?”

Identification was the first issue, as Wynne-Fitzpatrick had pointed out. All stemmed from that. Who, indeed, was he?

“I can’t say anything about who he was, sir. It’s got to be something to do with the metal-detector, of course. They’re only used by amateurs for one thing, and that’s for finding old artefacts, preferably valuable. So the Kop’s got to be in it, but like Mr. Church told you, it will be just guesswork. Mr. Joshua Jowett’s the expert.”

“And I’m told he’s made himself scarce, Root. We’ll leave that for now. Let’s get back to your own area of expertise. Golf, say. Coincidence doesn’t exist, so it has to. Where’s the link, do you suppose?”

The rain spattered musically on the taut bright yellow nylon.

“I’d be whistling in the dark, sir. Comes back to the basics, I’d say.”

Tomlinson stooped over the skull, careful to keep clear of the adjacent ground. “Male, old, a big frame,” he said, and, echoing Root’s thoughts, “but who, that’s the thing. Never come across anything quite like this.”

Vehicles arrived, several of them. All but one made for the car park, and then were lost to sight from the Kop. A flashy little MG, that would be the Home Office pathologist, Dr. Jane Anderson, come to tell them that the punter in the rain was most definitely dead, Tomlinson noted. A Crime Scene van followed, then a blue Transit with a contingent of detectives, likely briefed already to start the interviews; and, in a big SUV came the man himself.

“Well,” said Inspector Tomlinson. “Company.”

He got up, to find Strapp indicating the progress of a dark blue Landcruiser as it made its noisy way towards them. Permission must have been given for the intrusion, thought Root. It was full, mostly with large male bodies, two in blue. It was not a decorous easy-paced trundle by an almost silent buggy: the blue patrol four-track thumped over rough ground alongside the eighteenth with panache.

Arthur Root felt a sense of déjá vu. The back-up Tomlinson had sent for. Uniformed constabulary would take over his duties. And he was back with Mabbatt.

“Can’t be,” said Strapp, squinting through the rain. “In the front, sir. Not the Super is it?”

Root knew that he would not have a great deal of contact now with the investigatory proceedings: the CID inspector had got all he needed. Maybe the evening meal would not be too far gone in Ursula’s new Bosch oven. Waiting around was over. The wheels had turned. A bit late, a bit slowly, but things would move fast now. He knew who, and what, was coming.

“Well, now,” said Tomlinson. “Surprise, surprise.”

* * * *

“Saw your bike out in the rain,” Josie told Gary Brand. “Nice bike. You got the Lycra gear? Bet you look good when you’re racing. I put it in Fred’s shed, the wooden one. Want to see it’s all right?”

From the kitchen window, Bliss watched her vanish with the tall young man. “Oh, you bitch,” he said.

“So why haven’t I met you before?” asked Gary.

“What I was asking myself,” Josie told him, drawing the creaking old door close. “I can’t stay long. Charlie’s always on the lookout. You’re not engaged or going regular, or owt?”

Gary knew that whatever answer he formulated, it wouldn’t much matter, not right now. The girl was firm and pliable at once; well-rounded but with taut muscle beneath. He put his arms round her and looked down into dark blue eyes that picked out a reflection of the bar of grey light where the door was slightly ajar. Tensions and flickers of violent flashbacks vanished. “Over here,” he whispered, drawing her to a darker corner.

“Oh, Gary,” she said, “we can’t be doing this, not right away, can we? Not so soon, love?”

In the same moment, they weren’t. A loud incoherent shout broke the quiet of the interior, with its heavy smells of cut grass and oil and its aura of secrecy and remoteness from the solid conservative Wolvers milieu:

“You mad bastard! You can keep your sodding job!”

The door was flung back, and a figure staggered halfway through the doorway. Gary’s fírm arms tightened. “Keep quiet, Josie,” she heard him whisper. “The JCB driver’s getting slagged off. We leave it alone. Not our problem. I’ve had my say to the police. I’m out of it.”

* * * *

Owen Burroughs recovered himself and faced his boss in the car park. He had been summarily sacked, after a bawling out that left him at first bewildered and then fiercely indignant.

“You’re telling me what, you bastard!” he yelled. “Just plough the poor sod back into his grave—you mean, just go on with levelling the Kop and shove him down a few feet under, like!”

That was exactly what Knight had meant.

“It could have been a few old bones from years back—it could have been an old dog or a few pigs they’d buried with swine-fever, for all you know, you bleeding Welsh git! Why couldn’t you just do what you’re paid for, not get me into a shit of a mess with the law! They’ve cordoned off the whole damned site, and I’m buggered if I’m keeping you on a minute longer! Just get off before I—”

That was when small, but thickset Owen Burroughs realised that seven years of labouring in the depot had just gone up in smoke. He’d signed up with Knight when he had come along to buy the ill-run business for peanuts. So far he’d shown acumen and kept the competent employees on. Owen went with the site. Now, he was out of it.

“Pick up your envelope in the morning,” Knight told him, quietly, but hard. “And don’t think of making waves. Ever. You got that?”

At a safe distance, Owen Burroughs yelled:

“You’re not right in the ’ead, you know that? You don’t act like—”

He stopped. There was no going back, not with such venom in the man. Out. Owen looked down at his wide, calloused hands. There was still strength in them. Maybe there was work Swansea way.

“Me, I’m gone!”

Listening at one of his many sounding boards, the steward smiled. The members and clientele, the paid help and the chance drop-ins: all their misfortunes nourished him, and more than made up for low pay and unending faux-subservience. And now that the coppers were involved, things were stewing nicely. Voices, low but young and passionate, vibrated around the old cupboard, long forgotten, never opened in half a century, where he accreted fragments of lives.

* * * *

Josie Marsden said it for both of them.

“I’m not in the mood any more, Gary. I hate all this kind of thing. That boss of his must be a real hard case. I heered too many of his kind on a rough night at the bar. Poor old bloke. Outed, just like that. My dad never got over being kicked out when the pits around here closed. Will I see you again?”

“Count on it.”

The day had closed in. So had the all-too-omnipresent echoes of fierce explosions, shrieks of pain and blackening blood as warm with insects. Gary Brand too wanted no more of violence and sudden death.

“I’m away,” he said. “Got to be.”