Hilary Bonner - When the Dead Cry Out

She was indulging herself, just enjoying the feel of being with him, relishing his company, when their brief few minutes of peace were shattered by the insistent ring of her mobile phone. She answered promptly. This was not a time when she could expect peace.

“Sergeant Craig Brown, Inverness,” said a distinctly Scottish voice. “I have some information for you concerning Mr. Sean MacDonald.”

“Yes?” Karen could not stop an anxious note creeping into her voice. She really was fond of MacDonald, and there was something about the Scots policeman’s words which made her think she wasn’t going to like what he was about to tell her.

“We have so far been unable to contact Mr. MacDonald,” continued Sergeant Brown. “But we have talked to neighbours who said that they last saw him three days ago loading a suitcase into his car and nobody seems to have seen or heard from him since.”

“I see.” Karen had been right. This was not what she wanted to hear.

“There’s more,” said Sergeant Brown. “On the grounds that he is being sought in connection with a murder enquiry we gained a warrant to enter Mr. MacDonald’s home. It seems that he must somehow or other have managed to acquire a gun. We found empty ammunition packets in the dustbin, of the type that would contain bullets for a 45-calibre handgun. We are still searching the house but so far have not found the gun itself. I’m afraid, Detective Superintendent Meadows, that it seems reasonable to assume that Sean MacDonald took the gun with him wherever he may have gone to.”

“I see,” said Karen again. She wasn’t surprised. Mac was an old military man. She had suspected he might still have contacts who could supply him with hardware if necessary.

She ended the call and briefly told Cooper the news, then she called back to Torquay Police Station.

“Get on to Dorset and tell them MacDonald is now definitely the number-one suspect,” she instructed. “And put out an alert nationwide. I want him found, and I want him found fast.”

As she ended the call she turned to Cooper.

“Oh, shit,” she said. “I really don’t want to put Sean MacDonald in jail.”

The crime scene had been more or less dealt with by the time they got to Poole. Richard Marshall’s body was on its way to the morgue in the nearby hospital for a post-mortem. The scenes-of-crime officers had already done their stuff.

The officer in charge, Detective Inspector Gordon Crawley, reported fully to Karen.

“Marshall was shot point-blank in the forehead,” he said. “Classic entry-and-exit scenario. Small hole in the front of his head and the back of it damned near blown off. We found the bullet lodged in the plaster of the wall just behind the spot where Marshall would have been standing.” Crawley gestured with one hand to an indentation in the cream-painted wall. “One of our guys is a bit of a weapons expert. Was able to tell right away that the bullet was from a 45-calibre handgun, a Browning or something like that.”

Karen looked around the hallway of the small neat apartment and through open doors to the bedroom, living room and kitchen beyond. Nothing seemed out of place. But then Marshall had been a very organized man, you had to be organized to get away with what he had got away with for so long.

“There’s no sign of a struggle at all,” Crawley continued, as if reading her mind. “It looks as if chummy opened his front door and got it straight in the head, of which there is not a lot left, as you will see if you stay on for the post-mortem tomorrow.”

Karen winced. Partly at the news that it was a 45-calibre handgun that had been used, the same specification as the ammunition found in Sean MacDonald’s house, and partly at the thought of attending an autopsy on a body with most of its head blown off. She had done it before. She had learned long ago to toughen up and deal with such gory situations. That did not mean, though, that she liked it.

At the same time the thought occurred to her that she would be able to stay overnight with Cooper, and they didn’t get many opportunities to spend the whole night together.

Then she promptly gave herself a mental telling-off. This was too serious a matter to allow herself to start thinking about her sex life. And she suddenly remembered that nobody had mentioned Jennifer Roth at any stage.

“She’s not here anymore,” explained Crawley. “She and Marshall lost their jobs at the marina when he was first arrested, but of course he owned this flat. And he would have made enough money from that newspaper article to keep everything going, I imagine.”

He glanced towards Karen as if looking for confirmation. She nodded briefly.

“We understand Jennifer — or Janine, I suppose I should say — recently took off to London looking for work,” Crawley continued. “She may even have lined up a job to go to. Certainly she’s not been seen around here for weeks, not since quite soon after the appeal, in fact. But we’re on the case, ma’am, I can assure you.”

Karen then gave Tompkins and Smiley instructions to cooperate with the Dorset police in their search for Jennifer and anything else that they could help with which might speed up the investigation.

“I don’t want any cock-ups caused by lack of communication,” she told them. “DI Crawley is willing to let you have the run of his incident room, and before you head off back home I expect you to know the Dorset operation inside-out. No more mistakes, got it?”

Together with Cooper she left the flat then. They stood for a while looking out over Poole Harbour. It was a very different kind of day from the one the previous August when they had come to the marina to arrest Marshall. Different in every way. A light drizzle was falling. The sky was leaden and grey. It wasn’t cold but Karen found that she was shivering a bit.

Abruptly she turned to Cooper. “Got your toothbrush?” she asked.

“Always keep one in the car,” he responded.

“Good, ’cause I haven’t got mine,” she said. “I’ll need to borrow yours.”

“I can think of nothing I’d like more, Detective Superintendent,” he replied.

Using Cooper’s name they booked into the Hilton in nearby Bournemouth, a hotel Karen had rather liked when she had stayed there once before while on an antique-hunting weekend, with a former boyfriend and fellow enthusiast, around the many antique shops of nearby Boscombe.

She and Cooper treated themselves to a double room with a big balcony overlooking the sea. And as usual there were things they did because of the illicit nature of their relationship which Karen didn’t like to think about much and which they avoided discussing. Using Cooper’s name was one of these. She knew all too well that he needed to tell his wife where he was staying. He needed an address, even for one night away from home. She didn’t need to tell anyone anything. All Karen had to do in order to free herself for the night was to call her neighbour, Ethel, and ask her to feed Sophie the cat. Everyone she worked with had her mobile number and that was the only method of contact necessary.

Cooper did briefly express anxiety about the cost of the room, which was considerably more than he was likely to be able to reclaim on expenses. Karen would have none of it. She knew he spent very little on himself, and had no wish to increase his guilt by insisting that he spend money he would normally spend on his family — which was something else she didn’t want to discuss with him, not when they could be together all night in what turned out to be a rather good hotel with twenty-four-hour room service.

“It’s on me,” she told him shortly.

He didn’t argue. Instead, as soon as they had shut their bedroom door he took her by the hand and led her to the bed where they lay together, fully clothed, for almost an hour, just savouring their closeness.