Читать книгу Murder at the Gorge - Frances Evesham - Страница 5

Max had little faith in Ali’s reliability. What could have kept her in South America – Brazil, in fact – for so long? It must be that boyfriend she’d travelled with. What was his name? Andy, that was it. Just Andy. The man must surely have a last name. He’d ask Libby. Presumably, Andy No-name would show up for the wedding, as well.

The two of them had just better bring a decent present.

At least Libby hadn’t enquired further about Max’s ‘business’ in Bristol. Used to his occasional disappearances on financial investigations, some of them on government business, she’d hardly batted an eyelid. Her only request, as Max prepared to leave, was that he should take the dogs. ‘I feel so mean, when they’re with me in the cottage and I have to keep them indoors, but if I let them into my tiny garden, they make the lawn even worse. It’s full of ridges and bare patches as it is, not to mention those yellow rings.’

Max joined her at the window where she stood, surveying the forlorn winter garden.

She said, ‘It’s a good thing I changed my mind about selling the cottage. Who’d buy a place with a garden that looks like a ploughed field?’

Always happy to have the dogs for company, Max kissed Libby and left the cottage. He turned to wave at the door, but she was already on the phone, presumably announcing the news of the rescheduled wedding to Robert. Robert would have a word or two to say about his sister.

The weather made Max’s trip up the M5 a penance. Nevertheless, he wished Bristol was further away. He dreaded meeting Stella. Whatever news she had for him, it was bound to be bad.

Thinking about his ex-wife left him depressed, balanced on a painful axis of guilt and relief. Their marriage had resulted in two great gifts; Joe, their son, now a detective inspector in the West Mercia police service, and their daughter, Debbie. The old Max had thought himself the luckiest of men, with a glamorous, if demanding, wife, two children, and a job in finance that brought in enough money to keep Stella in expensive dresses and send the children to good London schools.

In one terrible day, that whole world had collapsed, when Debbie fell from her horse and suffered a fatal head injury.

Max, devastated, had been unable to help Stella. She’d been furious with him for quarrelling with Debbie that day. ‘You shouldn’t have let her ride when she was upset,’ Stella had insisted, over and over again, as though he hadn’t blamed himself enough.

Max had buried himself deeper in work, while Stella drowned her pain in alcohol.

Their divorce had been the result.

For years, Max had believed he’d lost his son as well, for Joe had stayed with his mother, but recently, the broken bond between father and son had begun to regrow.

Wrenching his thoughts back to the present, Max pulled together the little he knew of Stella’s current life, most of it relayed by Joe. She lived in Surrey with a glamorous young entrepreneur, younger than Joe, reputed to have made millions from property development. Ivor Wrighton, that was the name. Max had exchanged an occasional, formal Christmas card with Stella over the past ten years or so, but they hadn’t met. She’d seemed as reluctant as he to keep in touch.

The mere idea of seeing her in person tied his stomach in knots.

He drew up next to Leigh Woods and parked, making bets with himself over which car belonged to her. Not the Porsche. Too flashy. Stella’s faults had never included ostentation.

Ah. A BMW 8 Series was parked two cars away. That was more Stella’s style.

Bear and Shipley tumbled over each other in a scramble to get through the door of the Land Rover. ‘Settle down, boys. Best behaviour, or I’ll shut you in the car.’ Max climbed out, clipping leads to the dogs’ collars.

Stella, a horses and dogs country-lover, had asked to meet here, in the woods, rather than in a hotel. A little clandestine, Max thought.

Once well away from the road, he let the dogs run free, trotting behind them through the trees.

The path took a turn to the right, and there was Stella, in a clearing, waiting, peering at her watch.

Max fought an instinct to turn tail, run back to the car and speed home to Exham. Instead, he called back the dogs and forced himself to keep walking, as though into battle, Bear and Shipley positioned like a pair of body guards, one on either side of him.

‘Hello,’ he said.

At least Stella didn’t attempt a handshake, or worse, a hug.

Slim and tall, she wore jeans and a Barbour coat, her neck muffled into a scarf. Skiers’ ear warmers partially covered the hair he remembered as expensively streaked blonde, but which had now turned stylishly white. Turning fifty, Stella remained a striking woman.

‘Thank you for coming,’ she said, ‘I didn’t know who else to turn to, and I didn’t want to upset Joe. But you know everything about computers and fraud, don’t you?’

‘I wouldn’t go that far, although I still take clients. But surely you don’t want to employ me?’ The thought horrified him.

She twisted her gloved hands together.

She hadn’t yet met his eyes. This clearly wasn’t a business deal. What could be wrong?

Bear, friendly as ever, padded towards Stella. She bent down to pet him, and looked up at Max with a quizzical smile. ‘Dogs, Max? You?’

Shipley, on his best behaviour, joined Bear, only some noisy panting and a lolling tongue betraying his excitement at meeting a new friend.

‘It’s a long story.’ One Max didn’t want to share. ‘Tell me what you need.’

She was looking around now, expectantly.

‘Are you waiting for someone?’ he asked.

‘Hoping not.’

That made no sense.

‘I’m sorry to call you away from Exham,’ Stella began, another smile flitting across her face. She had never liked the place. Exham, she’d declared, was too quiet, too dull, for her. That was before the series of murders Libby and Max had helped to solve. ‘You see,’ Stella said, ‘someone’s looking for me.’

‘Looking for you? Who? Why?’

She grimaced, ‘I don’t know.’

This was like getting blood out of a stone, and Max’s feet were cold. ‘Why don’t we find a pub, or something, and you can tell me all about it in comfort. Are you booked into a hotel?’

She gave a short laugh, the sound grating on his ears. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t be appearing in Exham on Sea to spoil your small-town contented idyll with your little friend, Libby. Oh, yes, don’t look so surprised. Joe’s told me all about her, and the investigations you run together. That’s why I’m here. I’m in Bristol for a few days and I thought you could help me. Ivor’s going to join me in a couple of days, for a little holiday.’

‘Ivor? Your –’ what should Max call this man? He was pretty sure she wasn’t married at the moment. Maybe toy boy fitted the bill best. He swallowed a grin.

‘Ivor is my friend,’ Stella said, with dignity. ‘We share a home.’

Max sighed. ‘Are you using me to make this Ivor jealous?’

Stella took his arm. ‘Oh, no. I just want to consult you about something.’

A free consultation – just like Stella.

‘Walk with me for a while,’ she said. ’Your dogs will love it in these woods.’ That was true, at least. ‘It’s good to see you again. You look well. I’d say retirement suits you, but Joe tells me you’ve been busier than ever. Fighting crime seems to run in the family.’

The edge had left her voice and Max could hear echoes of the old Stella. He’d loved her once, very much, before the marriage went sour.

They strolled through trees where the wind barely reached, reminiscing. They talked of Joe, happily married and moving fast up the police hierarchy in Hereford, and even, hesitantly, touched on Debbie’s death.

For Max, the raw, unbearable agony had calmed to a lower-level ache. Now, he could remember some of the happy moments of Debbie’s short life. He liked to recall her as a four-year-old, dancing round the sitting room in a ridiculous pink tutu, singing, ‘Look at me, Daddy, look at me.’ At school, she’d shone at maths, once winning a school prize, and he’d treasured a secret hope she’d grow up to be a scientist.

Stella cleared her throat. ‘I know you blamed yourself for Debbie’s death, but at least she died doing something she loved.’

Max felt a mild resurgence of affection for Stella. Maybe time really did heal, a little.

‘Do you think we’d still be together, if Debbie hadn’t died?’ she asked.

Surprised, Max took a moment to think. Would they? Yesterday, his answer would have been an emphatic ‘no.’ Their marriage had collapsed under the weight of his guilt.

‘I honestly don’t know,’ he said.

Stella laughed, suddenly, harshly, breaking the spell. ‘Don’t look so worried. I don’t want us to get back together.’

He dropped her arm, annoyed. ‘What’s this problem you want to consult me about?’

‘Some odd things have happened, and I thought, for old times’ sake, you’d help me out. I didn’t want to worry Joe.’

‘If I can.’ Max was cautious. The last thing he wanted was to become embroiled in Stella’s life. ‘What kind of odd things?’

‘I’m getting phone calls with the caller number blocked, and when I answer, the line goes dead. Then, I get funny emails, too, and I don’t know where they come from.’

‘What sort of funny emails?’

‘I had one telling me the Inland Revenue are chasing me, and another said I was owed £2000.’

‘You didn’t click on any of the links, did you?’

‘No, I’m very careful. It’s the withheld number calls that worry me – they’ve been coming in the night as well as during the day.’

Max felt on safer ground. Her worries were quite common. With the internet accessible to everyone, cold-calling, scams and phishing attempts at identity theft were two a penny. Probably, Stella had simply been one of millions targeted by fraudsters. At least she had the good sense not to click on links.

‘Block the calls, report the emails and change all your passwords. I don’t think it’s anything to worry about, but don’t click on anything, or give away your bank details or passwords. It’s all a try-on, but send anything that worries you to me and I’ll look at it.’

‘Thank you. Max. I know it’s not much to go on, but I really feel as though someone’s after me. For one thing, how do they know my email address?’

Max shook his head. ‘It’s upsetting, but it’s not personal. Scammers buy lists of addresses and phone numbers. They don’t know you.’

He’d worked on cyber fraud many times with his clients. As a financier-turned-investigator, he’d travelled deep into the darker side of the world wide web, and it was familiar territory.

The least he could do was try to trace the emails. ‘Look, it’s getting dark, and I have to get back to Exham.’ He wondered how much of this incident to relate to Libby. He wanted to tell her, to be as open and honest with her as she was with him, but he dreaded pulling her into the mess of his earlier life with Stella. His instincts always told him to solve his own problems.

‘Where are you staying?’

She looked surprised. ‘The Avon Gorge Hotel, of course, just for a couple of nights. Then, Ivor’s joining me.’

Trust Stella to find the best hotel in the area.

‘Here’s my email address.’ He fished around in his pocket, pulled out an old business card, and handed it over. ‘Send me everything strange you receive, and I’ll look into it. I have your phone number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.’

‘Thank you, Max.’ She turned one of her best, full-beam smiles on him – oh, how well he remembered it – and walked away. He watched until she left the trees and reached her car.

With a wave, she drove off.

Max’s spirits rose as her car disappeared. He called for the dogs. ‘Well, Bear, what do you think of my ex-wife?

Bear pulled his head away from Max’s hand. Max followed the direction of the dog’s gaze to see Shipley, who until now had been trotting happily through the woodland, searching for rabbits and following the scent of hidden deer. The springer spaniel stood several yards away, stiff, his body trembling slightly. He barked, once.

Bear left Max’s side, lumbering across to see what Shipley was up to, and whined.

‘What are you doing?’

Bear had begun to scrape at a pile of oak leaves, newly fallen, not yet rotted down into compost. Max joined the dogs and took hold of Bear’s collar.

Shipley ignored him, standing rigidly to attention, his eyes on the ground.

Max peered at the leaves. They lay in a heap. Had the strength of the wind thrown them together, or had they been piled up deliberately?

His heart pumping, he stirred the leaves, parting them gently with his gloved hands.

The pointed toe of a tan suede boot poked through.

Moving the leaves with even more care, Max uncovered the bottom half of a pair of coffee-coloured leggings, the second boot half on and half off. Working carefully, a lump of horror blocking his throat, he found a fur-lined jacket, and finally, gently, stroked the remaining leaves from a pale, mud-streaked face.

The middle-aged woman’s dark hair was tangled with mud and debris, her eyes open, her mouth a little ajar.

Max’s hands shook. He’d never been the first to find a dead body before, despite the murders he’d worked on. He straightened up, taking deep breaths, fighting to stay calm. ‘Well done, Shipley,’ he muttered, his voice muffled. He coughed. ‘And you, too, Bear.’

He extracted dog treats from one pocket and his phone from another, handed the treats to the dogs and called the police.