Peter James - Dead Simple

'Houston, we have a problem' Glenn Branson said quietly to Grace, but there was no humour in his tone.

'We do.' Grace stood up and turned away. 'It's suddenly a whole lot bigger than it was two hours ago.'

'So how the hell are we going to find Michael Harrison now?' After a moment's silence Grace said, 'I have an idea, but you're not going to like it.' Glancing uncomfortably at the occupants of the car, Glenn Branson said, 'I don't like anything much at the moment.'

90

An hour and a half later, Grace helped buckle the diminutive, wiry figure of Harry Frame into the front seat of the pool Ford Mondeo he and Branson had used this afternoon. The pony-tailed, goatee-bearded medium, reeking of patchouli oil and wearing his trademark kaftan and dungarees, had a street map of Newhaven laid out in his lap, and held a metal ring on a length of string in his right hand. Grace had decided to leave Glenn Branson out of this. He didn't want any negative vibes, and he knew that Harry Frame's energy was sensitive at best.

'So did you bring me something, as I requested?' Harry Frame asked Grace as he climbed behind the wheel of the car. Grace dug a box out of his pocket and handed it to the medium. Frame opened it and removed a pair of gold cufflinks. 'These are definitely Michael Harrison's,' Grace said. 'I took them from his flat on my way here.' 'Perfect.' It was only a short distance along the coast from Harry Frame's Peacehaven home to Newhaven. As they drove past the seemingly endless sprawl of shops and takeaway restaurants, Harry Frame was holding the cufflinks in his closed palm.

'Newhaven, you said?' 'There was a car we were interested in that was involved in an accident in Newhaven earlier today. And Newhaven is where Michael Harrison's mobile signal came from. I thought we'd drive to that spot and you could see if you pick anything up. Is that a good idea?' In his effusive, high-pitched voice, the medium said, 'I'm already picking up something. We're near, you know. Definitely.' Grace, following the directions he had been given, began to slow down. Some tyre marks, a spill of oil on the road and a few sparkling shards of safety glass showed him where the Mercedes had been in the accident, and he turned right into a modern housing development of small, detached houses with immature gardens, then immediately pulled over and stopped.

'OK,' he said. 'This is where the accident happened this morning.' Harry Frame, holding the cufflinks in his left hand, began to swing the pendulum over the map, taking increasingly deep breaths. He closed his eyes tightly and after a few moments said, 'Drive on, Roy, just drive straight on. Slowly'

Grace did as he was instructed. 'We're getting closer!' Frame said. 'Definitely. I see a turn-off to the left coming up shortly - might not even be a road, just a track.' After about a hundred metres, there was indeed a track going up to the left. It had been metalled, very many years ago, but had fallen into a state of total disrepair. It went uphill, through windblown, scrubby wasteland, and it did not seem from here, at least, that it was going to lead to anything. 'Make a left turn, Roy!' Grace looked at him, wondering if he was cheating by peeping through his eyelids. But if Harry was looking anywhere, it was down into his lap. Grace turned onto the track and drove up it for a quarter of a mile, then a squat, ugly detached house came into view just on the crest of the hill. It had fine views over Newhaven and the harbour beyond, but little else to recommend it. 'I see a house, all on its own. Michael Harrison is in this house,' Frame said, excitement raising his voice even higher. Grace pulled up outside.

The pendulum was swinging fast in a tight circle, and Harry Frame, eyes still tight shut, was juddering as if he had been plugged into an electrical socket. 'Here?' Without opening his eyes, Harry Frame confirmed, 'Here.' Grace left him in the car, then stopped at the front gate, staring at the neglected front lawn and the flower beds, which were a tangle of bindweed. There was something odd about the house, which he couldn't immediately figure out. It looked as if it had been built in the 1930s, or maybe early 1950s, and the design was strange, lopsided. He walked up a path of concrete slabs with weeds sprouting between the cracks, and pressed the cracked plastic front-door bell.

There was a shrill ring, but no one came to the door. He tried again. Still no answer. Then he did a circuit around the house, peering into each window as he went. It had a forlorn, neglected air about it, both inside and out. All the furnishings looked twenty or thirty years old, as did the design of and appliances in the kitchen. Then he noted, to his surprise, that there was a stack of newspapers on the kitchen table. He looked at his watch. It was just gone 6 p.m. He ought to get a search warrant, he knew. But that would take another couple of hours - and with every minute that passed the chances of finding Michael Harrison alive were shrinking. How much did he trust Harry Frame? The medium had been right on several occasions in the past - but he had been wrong on just as many. Shite. The thought of what Alison Vosper would say to him if he was caught breaking into a house without a warrant bothered him. He didn't have enough to back his judgement up, but it would have to do.

Time was running out for Michael Harrison. With a loose brick from the garden, he smashed a kitchen window pane, then wrapping his hand in his handkerchief, he removed the pieces of glass that remained lodged in the putty, found the window catch, opened it and crawled in. 'Hello!' he shouted. 'Hello! Anyone home?' The place felt and smelled dingy. The kitchen was clean, and other than some newspapers, all bearing yesterday's date, there was no sign of anyone having lived here recently. He checked out each of the downstairs rooms.

The large sitting room was drab as hell, with a couple of framed prints of seascapes on the walls. He noticed there were lines on the carpet, as if someone had recently moved the sofa. He moved on into a dark dining room, with an oak table and four chairs, and flock wallpaper, then on to a small lavatory, with a 'God Bless This House' cross-stitch hanging on the wall. Upstairs felt equally unloved and unlived in. There were three bedrooms, all the beds stripped to bare mattresses with old, yellowing pillows, without slips, lying on them, and a small bathroom, with a geyser boiler and stained washbasin and bath.

Above the bed in the smallest room was a loft hatch. By placing a chair, precariously, on the mattress, then standing on it, he was able to push open the hatch and peer in. To his surprise there was a light switch just inside the hatch, which worked, and he could see in an instant there was nothing up here. Just a small water tank, an old carpet sweeper and a rolled-up rug. He opened every cupboard and cabinet door. Upstairs, all the bed linen and bath towels were folded away in the cupboards. Downstairs, the kitchen cupboards contained basics - coffee, tea, a few tins, but nothing else. It could easily have been a year or two since anyone had been here. No sign of Michael Harrison. Nothing. Nowhere. He checked the hall cupboard, in case there was a cellar entrance in there, although he knew that few houses after the Victorian era had cellars.

He needed to find out who owned this place and when it was last lived in. Maybe the owners had died and it was in the hands of executors? Maybe a cleaning lady came up here occasionally? A cleaning lady who read every national newspaper? Grace let himself out of the back door and walked around to the side of the house, where there were two dustbins. He lifted the lid of the first one, and instantly he had a different story.

There were eggshells, used tea bags, an empty skimmed milk carton bearing a sell-by date of today and a Marks and Spencer lasagne carton bearing a sell-by date that had not yet been reached. Thinking hard, he walked round to the front of the house, trying again to work out what it was that was wrong with the design. Then he realized. Where there was now an ugly plastic-framed window to the right of the front door, there should have been an integral garage. He could see it now, clearly; the tone of the bricks didn't match the rest of the house. At some point someone had converted this into a living room.