Death Surge (20 page)

Horton studied Eames’ expression as her eyes followed them. She looked a little irritated, Horton thought. He wondered if Uckfield had asked her to accompany him on the interview with Darlene just to keep her occupied afterwards in writing up the report from it. Perhaps. He was just grateful to get out of the station and to be doing something. Clearly, Cantelli felt the same although Walters didn’t look too keen. Horton would have liked a quick word with Trueman to find out if he had been able to get some information on Masefield and his crew, but with Harriet Eames listening that was out of the question.

He headed for Hayling Island after exchanging a brief word with Cantelli in the car park. There was no need to urge him to go easy with Tyler; in fact, it was time to do the opposite. So, instead, he asked Cantelli to call him if he picked up any information that might help with the investigation and have an impact on him questioning Stuart Jayston.

Twenty minutes later Horton was turning into a winding leafy lane on Hayling Island and pulling into the long driveway of a large house that was in the process of being made even larger. He drew up behind a small white van with Jayston’s emblazoned across it and several larger white vans beside it. One of the workmen told him where he could find Stuart. ‘Round the back.’

Horton headed there. The expansive gardens backed on to a small inlet of Chichester Harbour, where he could see a number of dinghies, yachts and motorboats in the distance. There was also a boathouse and slipway, but he found Stuart Jayston pacing the edge of the swimming pool to his right, with his phone clasped to his ear. Horton eyed him with interest. Stuart Jayston looked as though he’d done very well for himself since that court appearance seven years ago. His clothes – smart jeans and an open-necked cotton shirt – looked expensive. There were no painter’s overalls or grimy jeans and grubby T-shirts here. And he was sporting a lot of gold jewellery, along with an expensive wrist watch. He’d filled out and grown flabby. His fair hair was still cropped short but his face was more sullen, with a mouth that turned down and eyes that were moody and suspicious.

‘What do you want?’ he demanded, coming off his phone as Horton approached.

Horton eyed the petulant mouth and thought the same about Stuart Jayston as he had about Tyler Godfray: spoilt, and most probably by his mother. Jayston was also lacking in manners as well as intelligence because he hadn’t even considered the fact that Horton could be a relative or friend of the owner. He flashed his ID.

Jayston didn’t even bother looking at it. ‘Look, I don’t know where Johnnie is. I haven’t seen him for years.’

‘Why do you think I’m here to ask you about Johnnie?’ Horton asked smoothly against the backdrop of hammering and drilling coming from inside the house.

‘Well, you are, aren’t you?’ Jayston answered belligerently and looked away.

So who had told him? Tyler Godfray or Ryan Spencer? Had Cantelli been right in suggesting that Ryan and Johnnie had come here last Wednesday afternoon? If a taxi had brought them then perhaps the driver would remember them. And where had they both gone after that? He could see that Jayston was uneasy about something.

‘Have you
heard
from Johnnie recently?’

‘No. I’ve got work to do.’

But Horton blocked his way. ‘And what about Ryan Spencer?’

‘What about him?’

‘When was the last time you saw him?’

‘Bloody years ago.’

Was that the truth? Jayston’s eye contact was weak, but that could be normal for him.

‘Are you sure it wasn’t Monday night?

‘Course I’m bloody sure.’

It sounded and smelt like the truth.

‘Where were you last Wednesday afternoon?’ If Tyler had warned him the police had been asking, or if he’d been involved with Ryan, then he’d have his answer off pat.

‘Here, I guess.’

‘You don’t know!’ Horton eyed him keenly.

Jayston shifted under the intense gaze and was forced to add, ‘Look, I get around, I can’t remember where I was exactly when. We’ve got more work on than we know what to do with and you can’t be slack with builders and decorators, they need a kick up the arse now and again. I have to visit them and make sure they’re not slacking.’

Oh, I bet they love you
. ‘That must be tough.’

Jayston eyed Horton suspiciously. ‘It bloody well is, and if you’ve finished I’d like to get on with it.’

But Horton hadn’t, not by a long chalk.

‘Do you drive?’

‘Course I do, how do you think I got here, by magic?’

‘What do you drive?’

‘A car,’ Jayston sneered.

‘So not always the works van.’

Jayston looked surprised and then wary, as though he’d been caught out. ‘No. Got an Alfa Romeo.’

‘Were you out in it on Monday night?’

‘No.’

‘Maybe the works van then?’

‘No. I was at home,’ Jayston answered nervously.

‘All night?’

‘Yeah. Nothing wrong with that, is there?’

‘Alone?’

‘Yeah. Mum and Dad were away.’

‘You live with them?’

‘What’s it to you if I do?’

‘And Wednesday night?’

‘At home.’

‘Again?’ Horton raised his eyebrows

‘Yeah. OK?’ he sneered. His phone rang he snatched it up. ‘Finished?’

But Horton didn’t move. He watched as Stuart registered the caller before answering. Did he see relief cross his face? ‘Yeah, the job’s going OK, Dad, only they haven’t delivered that bloody wood.’

Horton left Stuart to his call. He didn’t like him, and he was betting the workforce and subcontractors didn’t go a bundle on him either, but that didn’t make him a kidnapper or killer. But there was something troubling Stuart Jayston. Behind the bluster Horton smelt fear. Maybe Uckfield was right and they should get him down the station, then the bravado might evaporate. And he found it curious that Stuart hadn’t demanded to know why Horton was interested in his movements last Wednesday and particularly on Monday night. It was possible that Tyler Godfray had told him about Johnnie’s disappearance last Wednesday but nothing had been mentioned about Monday. He eyed Stuart’s van. Could it have been used to take Johnnie away and Ryan to the Hilsea Lines? He noted the registration number. Or had Stuart taken his own car there?

Horton called Trueman and gave him the van’s registration number. He also asked him to get hold of the vehicle licence number for Stuart’s car and check for them both on the CCTV footage for Monday night. ‘Anything on Masefield?’

‘Still checking.’

That meant Harriet Eames was within earshot. He’d only just rung off when Cantelli rang him. ‘Tyler Godfray didn’t show for work this morning. We’re on our way to Gosport to see if he’s at home.’

Horton returned to Jayston. ‘Thought you’d left,’ he grumbled.

‘Tyler Godfray hasn’t come into work today. Why?’

‘How the hell do I know?’

‘Did he phone in sick?’

‘Ask the office.’

Horton felt like shaking the little tyke. He made to leave, noting a flicker of relief in Jayston’s eyes, and then turned back.

‘Have you ever been on holiday abroad?’

‘Course I have,’ Stuart Jayston answered, clearly surprised at the question.

‘Where?’

‘What’s it to—’

‘Where?’ Horton barked.

‘France, Italy, Greece.’

‘Get around, don’t you?’ Horton sneered. ‘Ever been to Sardinia?’

‘Might have been, yes, last year,’ he added hastily at Horton’s black look.

‘See Johnnie there?’

‘No.’

Horton left him, noting that Jayston looked troubled. In the lane outside the house he stopped the Harley and called Jayston’s office to be told that Tyler hadn’t reported in sick. They’d not heard from him. Horton felt uneasy. That jagged feeling between his shoulder blades was back. Stuart didn’t have an alibi for the critical nights in question but that didn’t mean he was involved. Perhaps his shifty manner was his normal personality.

He found a message on his phone. It was from Gaye Clayton. Leaving the Harley where it was he walked along the road towards a footpath that led down to the shore and called her. She didn’t waste time with small talk.

‘The Odontologist has confirmed the body is not that of Johnnie Oslow.’

That was a relief, although it would be short lived. It had to be Ryan Spencer. Horton quickly relayed the news to her.

Gaye said, ‘Has he any connection with Johnnie?’

‘Yes.’

‘Ah. Tell me how it’s going when you have a moment, and give Sergeant Cantelli my love. If there’s anything I can do, just ask.’

‘I will.’

He stepped on to a narrow footpath that bordered the shore and headed west to the rear of the property where Stuart Jayston was working. It was only a few hundred yards and he passed a handful of exclusive properties on his way that appeared to be deserted. Perhaps they were all holiday homes inhabited by the rich who were on holiday elsewhere. Cowes, maybe? He stopped and eyed the boathouse and the slipway he’d seen earlier. There was no sign of Stuart. He continued onward but the house was the last in the row that backed on to the shore, except for the derelict one that faced on to a stretch of waste ground and an equally derelict former boatyard.

His phone rang. It was Cantelli. ‘Can you talk, Andy?’

‘Yes. What is it?’

‘I’m at Karen Godfray’s. She had no idea that Tyler didn’t show up for work this morning. He’s not here. She was out all last night and went straight to work at the Co-op this morning without coming home. She’s a cashier. She last spoke to her son on his mobile at four thirty yesterday afternoon to tell him she’d left his dinner in the oven. He didn’t say that he was going out. And she didn’t call him again. I got the impression she usually runs around after him, but for once she didn’t and she feels as guilty as hell. She was with a man overnight, a new boyfriend. It looks as though Tyler never came home last night. His bed’s not been slept in, and she says he never makes it himself. His work overalls are still here, but there’s no sign of him or his mobile phone.’

Horton cursed, while his head spun with this news.

Cantelli hastily continued, ‘According to Les Batten, Tyler’s boss, Tyler left work last night at five but they didn’t give him a lift to the Gosport Ferry as usual. He said he had a date.’

With a killer? Horton hoped not. But why go missing? Could Tyler, like Ryan, be involved with Johnnie’s disappearance? It was beginning to look very much like it.

‘There’s another thing,’ Cantelli added. ‘His mobile phone is dead.’

Ditched or broken?

Cantelli said, ‘He’s got a computer, and I asked Mrs Godfray if we could take it and have a look at it. She’s almost hysterical and blames you and me for bullying her boy and driving him away. When I said looking at his computer might help us find him, she agreed to it, but she’s adamant that she’ll make a formal complaint against us for harassment.’ That didn’t frighten Horton and neither would it Cantelli.

‘None of his clothes or belongings are missing. So it doesn’t look as though he’s gone on the run.’

Horton gave Cantelli Gaye Clayton’s news. He heard him take a deep breath before he said, ‘Could Stuart Jayston be behind this? According to Les Batten he was at the property in Old Portsmouth last Wednesday, but Les couldn’t say for certain at what time.’

‘I don’t think he’s bright enough. He and Tyler could have seen who Johnnie met, though. But where does that leave Ryan? Why is he dead if he wasn’t there? It should have been Tyler or Stuart we found dead. Not Ryan.’ But, as he was beginning to fear, perhaps Tyler was already dead, and if so that put Stuart in danger.

He did have another idea, though. Was it possible that the three of them had ganged up on Johnnie and kidnapped him to teach him a lesson? Maybe they’d seen him on the sixteenth of July and Johnnie had bragged about what he’d done with his life and who he’d met. Ryan had nothing and was a thief, Tyler was a painter and hated it and was firmly tied to his mother’s apron strings, and Stuart liked expensive cars and jewellery and thought he was the big ‘I am’ … then along comes Johnnie and shows them all what the big ‘I am’ really is and tells them who he’s met and how he’s travelled the world. Stuart flips and says
let’s get even
. But something went wrong? They met at the Hilsea Lines and argued. Stuart or Tyler lost it and Ryan was dead. Then, seeing what they’d done, they hastily tried to cover their tracks by setting the fire. And now, after the police had interviewed Tyler, he’d got scared and had gone on the run. But without taking his clothes or belongings? No, Horton didn’t think so. And why was his phone dead?

He said, ‘Ask Tyler’s foreman if Stuart and Tyler were both at the property in Old Portsmouth on the sixteenth of July.’

Horton rang off and stared across the sea at the boats and yachts in Chichester Harbour. This wasn’t making any sense. Mentally, he ran through all the scenarios they’d explored so far. That Johnnie had run off with a woman – then why was Ryan dead and Tyler missing? That Johnnie had simply done a bunk to change jobs – again, why were Ryan and Tyler involved and why hadn’t Johnnie called his mother? Had Johnnie got involved in something illegal like drug smuggling and enlisted the help of one of his old school mates? Stuart, for instance – he could have seen him in Sardinia, or Tyler come to that, and one of them had roped in Ryan. Then Johnnie’s paymasters had found out and were cleaning the trail. Stuart had looked uneasy but not scared, though, and Horton thought he would be very scared indeed if that were the scenario.

Then there was Sawyer’s theory about the jewellery robberies and Uckfield’s about blackmail, and the only way Ryan, Tyler and possibly Stuart could be involved was if they’d seen someone with Johnnie at the Camber and that someone had found out from Johnnie who they were. Yes, that was possible, because this person might have taken until Monday to extract that information from Johnnie, after which he’d killed Ryan. Horton shuddered in the midday sun. If that were so then Johnnie was most certainly dead too.

So he was back to Masefield, who had an accomplice in Portsmouth. Neither Sawyer nor Eames had categorically denied that Masefield was involved in the robberies, and there were several connections between him and his crew with Johnnie and Xander Andreadis’s rich friends. Horton thought it was time he had another word with Masefield, and sod Sawyer’s instructions to keep his distance. Besides, there was someone else he wanted to consult, and she was at Cowes. He rang Sergeant Elkins and gave instructions to be picked up from Oyster Quays.