Dead Man's Wharf (2 page)

  'Oh, yes, sorry. I didn't think you meant them. It can't be anyone we know.'

  'Perhaps you could give Sergeant Cantelli a list of names.'

  Jackson exhaled noisily. 'It's a waste of time.'

  'If you wouldn't mind, sir,' Horton said firmly, eyeing Jackson coldly. The man flushed angrily, but he pressed his lips together tightly. To Horton he seemed a man with a short fuse. 'Has anyone threatened you in the past?'

  'Look, I'm sure you've got far more important crimes to solve than bothering with this.' He scraped back his chair, preparatory to rising, but neither Horton nor Cantelli moved.

  'The call was on the hotel phone not your mobile?' Horton enquired.

  'Yes.'

  'Then it must have come through the switchboard. We'll check it out and ask them to screen all further calls to your room.' Now, Horton rose and gathered up his jacket. 'How long will you be in Portsmouth, Ms Denton?'

  'Until Saturday.'

  'You'll let me know if there are any further calls, Mr Jackson?' Horton extracted a business card and handed it over. 'Or if anything unusual happens?'

  'If I must.' Jackson looked pointedly at his watch. 'Now, I've got a meeting for which I'm already late. I'll see you later, Nick.'

  Why did Horton get the feeling it sounded more like a threat than a friendly farewell?

  Farnsworth addressed Horton. 'He's not usually that grumpy. These calls have unnerved him more than he wants to let on. You did the right thing by calling the police, Corinna, but as I said, Inspector, it's probably just some nutcase.'

  Farnsworth now also glanced at his watch. Horton noted that it, like his clothes, came with a designer label and an expensive price tag, whereas Jackson's had been of the High Street chain-store variety.

  'Time we were making a move, Corinna,' Farnsworth announced, pushing back his chair. 'Aren't we meeting the dive boat owner?'

  She scrambled up, grappling for her phone in the depths of her capacious handbag. 'I'll call them to tell them we're on our way. Where the devil is Jason?' She was punching a number into her mobile as they left the restaurant.

  Horton's gaze followed them. He was even more convinced it was a publicity stunt, but he said, 'I'll check with the hotel staff, just to show willing. Get a list of the people who know they're staying here, Barney.'

  The duty manager confirmed that no calls had been put through to Mr Jackson's room at any of the times mentioned and there were no telephones available in the public areas that could connect directly to a guest's room, which meant that the threatening calls, if they had occurred at all, must have come from another hotel bedroom.

  Horton asked for a printout of the guest list for the previous night and that morning. His request was greeted with as much enthusiasm as a health and hygiene inspector. He told them he would send an officer along to collect it later. He'd get DC Walters to run the names through the computer to check for any previous convictions. Of course, even if there was someone staying in the hotel with a criminal record, that didn't mean that he was the mysterious caller. It could be a member of staff. Until Jackson received another call – if he did – then Horton wasn't going to waste too much time on it. His desk was groaning with paperwork and not all of it crime related. This morning he'd found an email from DCI Bliss announcing yet another crap initiative called C.A.S.E. = R. He had no idea what it stood for because he hadn't bothered to read it.

  'Farnsworth gave me a signed photograph for Marie,' Cantelli said, as Horton climbed into the car. 'She'll be chuffed to pieces.'

  Marie was one of Cantelli's five children. The ten-year-old, Cantelli had explained to him earlier, was an avid fan of the programme.

  'And the list of people who know they're staying here?'

  'Corinna says she'll give it to us later. You should have heard Farnsworth rip into the poor sod of a cameraman,' Cantelli added, starting up. 'He made Superintendent Uckfield sound like a Sunday school teacher.'

  Across the wet and windswept car park, Horton watched Farnsworth climb into a new Range Rover whilst Corinna pushed a large holdall into the back of an old Ford and made an impatient gesture to a thin, scruffily dressed scraggy man to get in. He wondered why they hadn't all gone together in Farnsworth's car.

  The radio crackled into life and Cantelli stretched across to answer it.

  It was Sergeant Stride. 'PC Somerfield and PC Seaton are at the Rest Haven Nursing Home in Whitaker Road, Southsea. They've got a bit of trouble and want assistance.'

  'What kind of trouble?' asked Cantelli warily.

  'Well, it's not armed response. I don't think the old dears are going to shoot their way to freedom.'

  'Ha bloody ha.'

  'There's a relative kicking up a fuss. Claims his mother's been assaulted.'

  'By a member of staff ?' asked Cantelli, concerned.

  'No, by an intruder. There's no sign of a break-in though, and the manager swears blind no one's assaulted Mrs Kingsway. Somerfield says they've done their best to calm her son, but he won't have it. He insists on speaking to someone from CID, and DC Walters is still at Oldham's Wharf.'

  Where Horton knew the detective constable was investigating a suspected break-in. He said, 'Tell them we're on our way.'

  He was getting the impression it was going to be one of those days, full of frustrations and frayed tempers, and on top of the list was his. As they headed along the blustery, deserted seafront he wondered if he should call his solicitor, Frances Greywell.

  He doubted, though, if she'd achieve the miracle of getting permission for Emma to spend some time with him next week, when he was on holiday. After this morning's debacle, Catherine would probably ensure he was prevented from seeing his daughter for at least another six months. Maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to go tearing up to Heathrow Airport. But it was too late for that now. Just like it was too late for many things – his divorce was progressing slowly and painfully, and his initial enquiries into the disappearance of his mother over thirty years ago had come to a stumbling halt.

  Over Christmas he'd reread her missing person's file. It hadn't got him any further forward with fathoming out why she had walked out of their council flat one November day in 1978 and had never returned. He had thought about trying to track down some of the people who had known her, such as Irene Ebury, who had worked with his mother at the casino. Thoughts weren't action though and he knew his unusual indecisiveness was because a small part of him was telling him to let the dead past bury its dead and to get on with living.

  His thoughts had taken him to the nursing home, where he could hear a man bellowing as soon as PC Somerfield answered the door to them. She hastily introduced Cantelli and Horton to the manager, Mrs Angela Northwood.

  'He's upsetting all our residents. I've tried to pacify him, but it's impossible,' Mrs Northwood said.

  Horton noted the Irish accent and the fact that Mrs Northwood – a large-boned woman with untidy bleached-blonde short hair and a tired expression – looked fit to drop. He wondered how many hours she'd been on duty. He nodded Cantelli towards the direction of the booming voice, where he guessed PC Seaton was trying to calm Kingsway, obviously without success.

  'I've never seen him like this before. He's usually such a calm, quiet man,' she continued. 'I tried to tell him that with his mother's condition – she's got vascular dementia – this sort of confusion is common, but he just won't have it.'

  'Where is Mrs Kingsway now?'

  'In the residents' lounge, staring at the television.'

  Which Horton could now hear because Mr Kingsway had stopped shouting. Cantelli was working his magic. 'Can you show me her room?'

  'It's on the first floor.'

  She led the way. Squeezing past the stairlift, Horton noted that the decoration in the hall of this sprawling, detached Edwardian house looked as tired as Mrs Northwood. The paintwork was scuffed and the carpet on the stairs was wearing thin in places. At least the smell of urine and sickness had been blotted out by the reek of disinfectant.

  There was a small turning halfway up the stairs and Horton glanced out of the window to look down on a flat-roofed extension and a small garden, which gave a view on to the gardens and the backs of houses on the adjoining road.

  Mrs Northwood said, 'Mrs Kingsway shared a room with another lady who passed away on New Year's Eve. The doctor visited her in the early morning of New Year's Day to certify death, and I'm convinced this is where Mrs Kingsway has got her story from. She's simply got the night muddled up in her head. Dementia patients have very little or no concept of time. Here's her room.'

  It was directly opposite the staircase with a bay window that faced north on to the street. Horton took in the two single beds with mauve floral counterpanes, each with a bedside cabinet. On top of one was a box of tissues, a glass jug and beaker, and a lamp. There was a white painted wardrobe facing each bed astride a chimney breast and in the bay, under the window, a matching chest of drawers. In the corner, behind the door, was a commode and a sink basin and beside it a cabinet with towels and toiletries. Horton noted that there were no curtains around the beds to screen them off and provide privacy. The room felt cold even though it was centrally heated. It smelt of old age and death and made him shudder.

  'This is Mrs Kingsway's bed.' Mrs Northwood indicated the one nearest the door. Horton had already guessed as much. 'I'm sorry to be wasting your time, Inspector, when you must have so much else to do. I can understand Mr Kingsway being upset. It is terribly heartbreaking for the family when they see someone they love suffering.'

  He crossed to the window, thinking that this didn't feel like a waste of his time, unlike his interview with the television divers. He thought of the puffed-up egos of Jackson and Farnsworth, who obviously considered they were doing something of vital importance by filling the public's television screens with their diving antics, when the really valuable jobs, like Mrs Northwood's, went relatively unseen and unrecognized. The contrast between the splendour of the Queen's Hotel and the shabbiness of this nursing home also struck him. But then, that was the nature of his job. It took him into all walks of life.

  He lifted the net curtain and peered out. There was a burly, dark-haired man in a green waxed jacket on the opposite side of the road, walking away from the nursing home towards the junction. Other than that, the street was deserted. All the houses in the road were of a similar period as the Rest Haven, but most, as he'd noted on arrival, had been converted into flats, except for the bed-and-breakfast hotel opposite. The curtain twitched as he turned away. Probably someone being nosy like him. There was nothing to see here and Mrs Northwood's explanation of the circumstances seemed logical enough. Now they just had to convince Mr Kingsway that his mother was mistaken about this mystery night visitor.

  'Who was the lady who died?' Horton asked casually, as they headed down the stairs.

  'Irene Ebury.'

  Horton started with shock. It was as though thinking about her not ten minutes ago had

suddenly conjured her up. He could hardly believe what he'd just heard. Surely it couldn't be the same Irene Ebury – the woman who had worked with his mother? Could there be more than one Irene Ebury in Portsmouth? It was possible. But with spine-creeping certainty he just
knew
it was her.

  Angela Northwood had said that Irene had died on New Year's Eve, so who had collected her belongings? A son or daughter? Perhaps a husband. Would Irene have spoken to them about Jennifer Horton? Why should she though? It was over thirty years ago and they had only worked together for a year between 1977 and 1978. But what if Irene
had
spoken about his mother? And what if she had kept diaries? Chance had brought him here. Wasn't it silly not to go that little bit further and check? He knew he was clutching at straws, but now that the idea had entered his head, he couldn't ignore it.

  'No one's collected her things. They're still in storage here,' Mrs Northwood said in answer to his question. 'Her son Peter is her next of kin and he's in Kingston prison.'

  Horton hid his surprise. That was a Category B lifer, and Category C prison, which meant that Peter Ebury must have committed a very serious crime to be there.

  He told himself not to raise his hopes. There would probably be nothing in the old lady's belongings that was useful. But still, he needed to be certain.

  Angela Northwood looked surprised at his request to see them. She made as if to protest, then must have thought better of it, because she said, 'They're in the cellar. I'll fetch the keys.'

  Perhaps she was too tired to argue, he thought, following her into an office about the size of a broom cupboard, where she took a set of keys from a board behind the door. Locking it again, she said, 'I suppose you're interested because of that son of hers?'

  She'd given him a reason. Good. Let her think that. He contrived to look both secretive and knowledgeable. He wasn't sure it convinced her, but she led him to a door under the stairs, which she unlocked.

  Horton peered into the gloom and his heart leapt into overdrive. Suddenly the memories of being locked in a cellar in that God-awful children's home rushed in to torment him. He could feel the walls closing in as he followed her down the stairs. His heart was racing and the sweat was pricking his back. He struggled to fight away terror and panic and to ignore the smell of dust, damp and decay.
Think of Irene Ebury, think of Emma
.
Think of anything but that bloody cellar twenty-seven years ago.

  'There's not much, just a...that's strange.'