Stephen Booth - The kill call

Cooper looked at the old man. He had probably been quite a fit person once, perhaps even athletic. But now he was the giant tortoise. It would take him half an hour just to get to the end of his street.

‘And where did you walk to, sir?’

Wakeley laughed again, a dry chortle that suggested to Cooper he was making the old man’s day, probably his week. He was starting to think that he’d been given the duff job, the visit to the old fogey who just wanted a bit of attention and someone to talk to for a few minutes. There were plenty of them around.

‘I only got as far as the bench at the corner of the lane,’ he said. ‘That’s my limit these days. I used to hike up Longstone Edge without batting an eyelid, but they seem to have made it a lot higher and a lot steeper these days. I blame the government.’

‘Was it raining at that time?’

‘A bit. But a drop of rain never did anyone any harm.’

Cooper nodded. It was what he’d expected. Mr Wakeley was one of that tough breed who had almost died out, even in Derbyshire.

‘So these people you heard…?’

‘Up on the moor,’ said Wakeley. ‘They must have been a good two miles away. Funny how sounds travels at that time of the morning, when no one’s about. If you get the right sort of weather conditions, you can hear a dog bark at Birchlow.’

‘I see.’

The old man grinned at him, showing a set of fine white teeth that must have come courtesy of the NHS dental service.

‘Nothing wrong with my hearing,’ he said. ‘You young ’uns expect old folk to be deaf as well as daft, I suppose. But my ears are as sharp as yours. Maybe sharper. I never damaged my ear drums with loud music, you see. Children now, they stick those little ear plugs in their ears and walk around with music blasting all day. Now, they’ll be deaf as posts by the time they’re sixty.’

‘If you could just — ’

‘Oh, aye. I’m getting round to it. I have to take my time these days, as you can see.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I was just sitting on the bench, being quiet, waiting for the birds to start singing with the light coming up. And there were at least two people, shouting. A man and a woman. They went at it pretty good, too. No doubt they thought no one else was about to hear them.’

‘Could you hear what they were arguing about?’

‘I might have good hearing, but I’m not bionic.’

‘No, of course. So where exactly were they? Could you — ’ Cooper had been about to ask the old man to take him to the bench in question and point out the location, but he realized that it would take all afternoon. There were other jobs waiting for him to do. Shame — Mr Wakeley would have enjoyed it. ‘If I showed you a map, could you estimate their position?’

‘I’ll have a go.’

Cooper fetched his OS map from the car and spread it out on Mr Wakeley’s table.

‘You would have been around here?’

‘Yes, the old silk road, that is. The pack horses used to go that way, to get up over the moor. No cars on that road early in the morning.’

‘So the people you heard would be where?’

‘Whereabouts is Birchlow on here?’

‘Here.’ Cooper placed a finger on the map.

‘One of these fields, then. Back of the church, near where those trees are.’

The contour lines on the map showed that the location Mr Wakeley had indicated was on the northern slope of the moor. Because of the lie of the landscape, anyone who had been up and about in Birchlow might not have heard the argument. But there would be direct line of sight to the bench on the old silk road where the old man had been sitting. Clear air, except for the rain that had been falling.

‘Do you know Birchlow?’ asked Cooper.

‘Birchlow? Aye, there’s a lot of history in Birchlow. Some amount of dry rattle there, if you know what I mean.’

‘Skeletons in the cupboard, Mr Wakeley?’

‘More than skeletons. If you shake the cupboard too much, half the village will fall out. But you don’t want old gossip.’

The old man chuckled, and coughed.

‘Are you all right?’ asked Cooper, wondering whether Mr Wakeley didn’t have quite so much toughness, after all.

‘I will be, when I’m dead.’

Cooper smiled. The old man and his clock seemed to be running at different speeds. The clock still ticked away at a regular pace, but Mr Wakeley had slowed down, as if his internal spring was unwinding and losing its tension, no longer able to push his body around at the old rate. He was gradually slipping out of real time.

And one thing was certain. He wasn’t going to find out who had been having that argument in the early hours of the morning by standing here in the sitting room at 6 Laurel Close. He would have to follow the trail closer to Birchlow.

Standing in the residents’ lounge of the Birch Hall Country Hotel, Fry was impressed by a series of oak bookcases lining the wall. While she waited, she peered through the glass to study the contents. Shelves were full of volumes that were clearly more for display, and creating the right ambience, than for reading. Bound volumes of Punch, a complete set of Sir Walter Scott, Who Was Who 1951–1960. Their dark bindings formed an impenetrable wall behind the glass.

She’d obtained a copy of Patrick Rawson’s account from the head receptionist, who had expected Mr Rawson to be staying at the hotel until the weekend. It wasn’t unknown for guests to miss sleeping in their room for a night, but there was always the chance that something regrettable had happened. From the response to her news, Fry wasn’t sure whether the hotel would be sorry to have lost a guest, or relieved that they had a scan of his credit card to settle the bill.

A quick search of Patrick Rawson’s room had been unfruitful. Clothes, yes. Toiletries, of course. But anything that could provide useful information must have been back home, or in his car. She would have to make sure the room was kept locked until a proper search could be conducted.

When her phone rang, she found that it was Gavin Murfin, calling with the first solid information on Patrick Rawson.

‘Has he a record?’ she asked. ‘Anything on the PNC?’

‘A bit of juvenile vandalism,’ said Murfin. ‘Keying cars, mostly — with a special fondness for the more expensive motors.’

‘Oh, early anarchist tendencies, then.’

‘What?’

‘Never mind. I was kidding.’

She could imagine Murfin staring at the phone in amazement. Diane Fry kidding? Cracking a joke? It was almost unheard of. She sighed ruefully.

‘Now we have Patrick Rawson’s mobile phone numbers, we can get hold of a record of his calls.’

‘Did you say “numbers”?’

‘Yes. His wife says he had one phone for personal calls, and another one for business. Sounds like he was the sort of person you’d really hate to be on a train with, listening to him taking two calls at once. I gave both the numbers to Becky.’

‘Right.’ Murfin seemed to turn away from the phone for a moment. ‘I think she’s on to it. So when we get the records for Mr Two Phones, what are we looking for?’

‘Local numbers, in or out. He must have been in touch with someone up here, both after he arrived and in the days before he came.’

‘Got it,’ said Murfin. ‘By the way, we’ve got initial forensics on the Mitsubishi. No prints except Rawson’s and his wife’s.’

‘A shame, but no surprise.’

‘He did leave a paper trail all over the Eden Valley, though, by using his credit card for everything. Hotel bill, restaurant, petrol station… So we know where he slept, where he ate dinner, and which way he was heading. If we hadn’t found him already, we’d have a head start.’

‘There’s a lesson in that, Gavin. If you don’t want to be found, pay cash.’