Missing: Presumed Dead (7 page)

Bliss left Mrs. Dauntsey and her living mortuary after a few minutes. “I'm feeling rather tired,” she had said somewhat pointedly, giving him no option but to excuse himself.

As he got up to leave a hushed voice somewhere behind him murmured, “Bloody whore.”

“What?” he said, spinning around, fearing he'd misheard. No-one moved. The “dead” were as lifeless as ever. Had he heard it or was it extra sensory perception, a powerfully malicious thought pulsing through the ether and colliding with his brainwaves. Perhaps I dreamt it, he thought, seeking the eyes of those closest, hoping to establish contact, but the eyes were as lifeless as the bodies and he brushed it aside. “Goodbye, Mrs. Dauntsey.”

“Fucking whore – needs locking up.” There it was again. He hadn't misheard this time, and the vehemence in the words stopped him in his tracks.

“Sorry – did you say something?” he asked one old lady, noticing her eyes open. She closed her eyes slowly, as if deliberately shunning him, and he turned back to Jonathon's mother. There was nothing in her face to suggest she'd heard, although there was no doubt in his mind she was the target of the abuse. “I'll probably have to come and see you again,” he said, listening carefully for the whisper, hearing nothing.

“I won't be around a lot longer.”

“You shouldn't talk like that ...”

“Oh, don't worry. I used to think I'd live forever, but I guess God has other plans.”

He mumbled, “Sorry,” though it sounded forced, and as he turned to find the matron sweeping across the room toward him, wondered if he was sorry she wouldn't live forever, or sorry that God had let her down.

“Is there any hope for her?” he asked, his mind still spinning with the whispered accusations, as the matron guided him out onto a damp grey flagstone terrace having pointedly said, “You can get out this way, Inspector.” He got the message – she doesn't want the police to be seen leaving by the front door – probably makes the undertaker carry the coffins out the back way as well.

“There's always hope, Inspector,” she replied. “But whether or not one's hopes are fulfilled is a matter of perspective.”

“I'm not with you.”

“Most of our patients hope to die quickly and painlessly, Mrs. Dauntsey's no exception. It's her son who can't accept the inevitability of her passing.”

“It's the one's who are left behind who suffer the most, Matron,” he said, and felt the pain of the truth in his heart. “It's very peaceful here,” he added conversationally to lighten the tone.

“Sunday afternoon is our noisy time – families coming to say goodbye to Gran or Gramps. If the kids aren't wailing and crying, their parents are.”

“What about the Major? Did he ever come on a Sunday.”

“Like I said before, I've never seen him. I suspect this would have been his first visit, although I wouldn't know for certain. But her son is here all the time – even when she's asleep – the drugs you know – sits there holding her hands, crying silently. Nothing dramatic, just the odd tear, bleary eyes, occasional sniffle – pretends he has a cold. Keeps his Kleenex in a briefcase – thinks we don't notice. It's rather touching really and quite uncommon. You see this is just a dumping ground. By the time we get them most of the relatives have had enough.”

“Can anything be done for Mrs. Dauntsey?”

She shook her head with a finality that eclipsed any words. “Don't tell her son though. He dotes on her. He's got a notion into his head about some sanatorium in Switzerland – some quack making a fortune out of desperate people with elaborate claims of a cancer cure. He's promised to take her there.”

“Could it help?”

“Might extend her life for a few weeks – if the journey doesn't kill her, but if it did, it wouldn't be anything to do with the drugs – purely psychosomatic – even with something as physical as cancer the patient's will to survive can prolong life. Belief in a cure is often the only cure someone needs, but Mrs. Dauntsey's cancer has metastasised throughout her body.”

“I reckon I could get a date with her,” muttered Dowding as the top-heavy nurse was closing the side-door behind them a few minutes later.

“Would that be alright with your missus then?” asked Bliss with a smirk.

Dowding, taking the hint, slunk to the car.

“You drive,” said Bliss throwing him the keys. “It'll take your mind off naughty thoughts – anyway, I don't know my way around yet.”

“Sergeant Patterson called on the radio while you was with Mrs. Dauntsey, Sir,” he said unlocking the door. “He's checked all the hospitals – negative.”

Bliss was surprised to find the Black Horse open for business, and, by all appearances, doing a roaring trade – gawkers, he had no doubt.

“Who authorised this?” he demanded of the uniformed policeman hemmed against the bar by the throng of rumour driven drinkers.

“I did,” boomed the landlady from across the bar, her voice as brassy as her hair – a Michelin woman with spidery legs that threatened to collapse under the weight at every step. “What's it got to do wiv you?”

Silence spread in a wave through the bar like a scene from,
Showdown at the O.K. Corral.

Bliss introduced himself without pleasantries, saying, “Right. I want this bar closed immediately ...”

“Oh no you don't. You lot have caused enough inconvenience without costing me a day's takings.”

“This is ridiculous. This is a murder scene – it should be entirely cordoned off ...”

“Not fucking likely – who's gonna pay me staff? You gonna pay 'em, are you? This is the biggest crowd I've had since Christmas.”

The constable threw up his eyebrows in exasperation as if to say, “See what I've had to deal with.”

“This is Mrs. Bentwhistle, Sir. She's the landlady ...”

“Bertwhistle ... ” she corrected. “And before he gets the chance to stitch me up – I'm the one who cleaned up the mess they made here last night.”

“I want to speak to you about that,” said Bliss as coldly as he could.

“Don't blame me – nobody told me not to clear up, and they're bloody lying if they say different. All they said was, “Don't let no-one go up there – and I didn't, but I weren't having those stains drying in. I only 'ad those carpets put down last year ... or maybe the year before. It were the year our Diane got married ...”

“The damage has been done ...”

“Well, don't look at me like that. I didn't do no damage; I didn't ask him to do his old man in, not in my pub, I didn't.”

“What time did the Major arrive last night?”

She turned away and threw down a large gin in disgust. “Gawd – how many more of you are goin' to ask me that?”

“Sixish,” answered the constable. “That's what she told me, Sir.”

“What did the Major say?”

“Nothing – not to me anyhow. I didn't see him. He went straight up. Jonathon came to the bar and got the key; said his dad was tired.”

“So, he didn't come through this way.”

She shook her head. “Went up the backstairs.”

“No-one saw him,” said the constable butting in. “We've asked everyone.”

“Everyone?”

“Well – all those who were in the pub and outside at the time.”

Bliss was unmoved. “I still want this place closed, and all these people out until I'm satisfied there is no evidence.”

“You ought'a be out catching criminals,” grumbled a loudmouth as he was led from the bar. Bliss ignored him.

“Now,” he said, feeling he was getting somewhere. “Let's begin again.”

An hour later, without a scrap of new evidence, Detective Inspector Bliss, feeling more cheated than unjustified, allowed the bar to re-open and retreated to the police station. Superintendent Donaldson was back in his office, according to the counter clerk, and was anxiously awaiting his arrival.

Some serious bloodletting on my first day, he thought as he trod the superintendent's corridor for a second time that day. Just what I need. And, with a readied apology he tapped gingerly on Donaldson's door. “You wanted ...”

“Bliss ... Dave ... Come in. Sorry I snapped at you earlier ... tired you know ... lot of strain. Chocolate digestive?” he added, holding out the packet as a peace offering.

Bliss relaxed with a “Thanks.”

“So, I understand from Patterson that we've made some progress even if we haven't found the body.”

“Just the duvet really. His mother says he didn't do it but she's in a wheelchair in a ...” he paused, finding himself on the verge of saying, “concentration camp,” reconsidered and said, “She's in an old folk's home.”

“She was bound to say it wasn't him.”

Bliss nodded in agreement. “The complexion of this case is changing ...” he started.

“Rapidly going down the toilet if you ask me,” broke in the superintendent. “Initially, I thought we'd get the whole thing sewn up in a few hours, now we've got blokes running round in circles just bumping into each other. So what precisely have we got?”

“It might be easier to analyse what we haven't got – no body, no motive and very little physical evidence.”

“No, I disagree. We've got plenty of evidence ...”

Bliss, sensing Donaldson was about to catalogue the evidence at the Black Horse, held up a hand to stop him making a fool of himself. “Patterson hasn't told you about the balls-up at the pub then?”

“What balls-up, Inspector?” The superintendent's eyes demanded a response and his entire demeanour darkened as Bliss explained how the landlady had sterilised every inch of the crime scene; wiping out footprints, fingerprints and blood stains; vacuuming up every trace of fibre and hair; even spraying disinfectant everywhere to mask scents that the dogs may have picked up.

Donaldson deflated into his chair like a punctured inflatable doll. “Oh my God, Dave. How did this happen?”

“I'm assuming everyone dashed off after the suspect, or were tied up taking statements from the witnesses.”

Donaldson, realising he was personally in the firing line, pulled himself together, shot out of the chair and stomped around the office. “That's obstruction. She knew very well she wasn't supposed to touch anything. I told her ... You don't think she could be in on it do you?”

Bliss shrugged, “I shouldn't think so.”

“But we've got a full confession ...”

“True, although I'm always a tad suspicious of someone who's keen to fall on his sword. I'd like to re-interview him, in light of the discovery of the duvet. By the way, what did he actually say about the body in his original statement?”

“I've got a copy of the tape here,” Donaldson said, dropping it into a cassette recorder and comforting himself with another digestive.

Jonathon Dauntsey's polished accent and deep clear tone sang out of the machine and contrasted with the country brogue of D.S. Patterson as he answered the standard questions relating to his name, age and address. Patterson then launched into the scripted spiel of: date, time, place and persons present – just himself, Dauntsey and a Detective Chief Inspector Mowbray.

“D.C.I. Mowbray?” Bliss mouthed quizzically at Donaldson.

Donaldson hit the pause button.

“He's gone on leave – flying to Nairobi this morning – I didn't have the heart to tell him he couldn't go.”

“What do you want me to say?” enquired Dauntsey as the machine started up again, his voice sounding more confused than contrite.

“I should remind you that you have been cautioned and we could start by asking you to describe your relationship to Major Rupert Dauntsey.”

“He was my father ... but you know that, I told you that already.”

“Perhaps you could just answer the questions,” Patterson said, as if Dauntsey had strayed from the script and mucked up the tape. “This tape is for the court to hear.”

“Sorry – shall we start again.”

“No! It's alright ...”

“Well, I do think it's important to get it right, Sergeant,” he continued, digging an even deeper hole. “Perhaps we should have some sort of rehearsal ...”

Exasperation coloured Patterson's tone as he firmly rebuffed the offer and began again. “Mr. Dauntsey, how would you describe your relationship with your father?”

“I would say we were quite distant,” he replied, apparently leaning close into the microphone and speaking with a dictationist's metre.

“You can just speak normally – the microphone will pick you up.”

“Roger,” he said, then added in a stage whisper. “I think that's what you say, isn't it?”

Bliss would have sworn Patterson said, “Will you stop fucking about,” although there was no trace of the sound on the tape. However, Patterson clearly did say, “Mr. Dauntsey. Please tell us where you were between nine-thirty and eleven o'clock this evening.”

“I was disposing of my father.”

Bliss hit the pause button this time and gave Donaldson a querying look. “What a weird answer; it sounds more like he was getting rid of a used condom.”

“Perhaps that's what he thought of his father.”

Patterson was making another point as the tape came back on. “A number of people have advised us that they heard a disturbance emanating from the general direction of your father's room at the Black Horse public house ...”

Bliss cringed at the witness-box jargon.

“Yes,” said Dauntsey.

“And,” continued Patterson, plodding on through the script he'd mapped out in his mind, “several witnesses allege they saw you placing a large object wrapped in a duvet into the rear of a Ford pick-up truck: registration number ... T173 ABP.”

“It would be foolish of me to deny it, wouldn't it”