A Well Kept Secret (41 page)

“Yes, I’m quite sure it is a bargain,” Martin cut in, “only I don’t actually want to buy a car right now.”

“You will be very sorry to miss this one sir, particularly as I can do you a deal that nobody else can match. Mind you, the offer is only open for twenty four hours, and naturally it will have to be cash and not terms you understand, but most definitely well worth it!”

“I’ll certainly bear it in mind,” Martin said struggling to keep a straight face as he kept up the pretence of not being that bright. “I actually came to see you about something else.”

“You want some spares?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then may I ask just exactly you
do
want?”

“Well, it’s like this. A good many years ago I owned a Ford Cortina. Things got a bit tight, and I sold it. My wife thinks it’s pretty certain it has long since been turned into scrap, only DVLA at Swansea have no record of that happening. For purely sentimental reasons I now want to track it down if humanly possible. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I have discovered that some years ago it was sold to a man called Carpenter. I’ve managed to trace Carpenter to Wellworthy, but no further. I think it is possible that he may have sold the car while he was here, and as everybody tells me that you are the man to see about cars, I thought I’d drop by and see if you can help me run it down?”

“Well, if you don’t mind me asking, if your wife is so sure it has been scrapped, why come here?”

“I told you; because there is no record at Swansea of that ever happening. You don’t need me to tell you what the law says about scrapping a car, so I think it still exists somewhere, and I just need to find out where it went to from Wellworthy.”

There were a few moments silence, and Martin continued to pretend that he wasn’t that bright, because he could sense that the man was weighing him up. He smiled vacuously and waited to see what would happen.

“Well, if there is no record at Swansea of it being scrapped, then I suppose you could be right; it may still be in existence somewhere,” the man agreed at last. “I still don’t see how I can help you?”

Martin pretended to look uncomfortable, moving from one foot or another.

“Look,” he said in what he hoped would be interpreted as a hesitant and slightly guilty tone of voice, “I don’t for a moment imagine that the car itself is any more than a rust-bucket by now; what I really want is the number plate. Clapped-out or not, I’m happy to buy the car just to get it. Now, I was told that you have no end of contacts in the trade and might just be able to track it down for me. Getting my hands on that car would be worth a lot to me, and even if you can only get the plates, I will pay anything within reason, and no questions asked about how you found them!”

He pulled out his wallet as he was speaking, making sure that the man could easily see that there could be no doubt it was well packed with bank notes as he extracted a twenty, and pushed it into the pocket of the man’s boiler suit.

“I know how busy you must be,” Martin continued. “If you would just do a bit of checking for me, even if you’re unlucky I will still make it worth your while. How about fifty pounds if you draw a complete blank, or a hundred, plus the price of the car if you do?”

Martin had seen the look of cupidity in the fellow’s eyes, and shrewdly guessed that he certainly knew at least something.

“How long ago was this?” the man queried.

“Oh, about twenty five years.”

“Twenty five!” the dealer exclaimed. “You’re asking a lot aren’t you?”

“I said I’m willing to pay?”

“What was the registration?”

“RJT 260 R.”

Watching the man covertly Martin immediately saw a tightening of the muscles around the eyes that denoted that the registration number had immediately struck a chord, and that was all he really needed to know. June’s suspicion that Castleman was involved in some way was undoubtedly right! Without a shadow of a doubt he knew something about the vehicle, and quite possibly he was involved in the same shady business as June’s father had been. What was patently obvious was that he would never admit to personally knowing anything about the vehicle if there was something about its background that was crooked because he would naturally have a vested interest in keeping the whole business secret. Martin was hoping that the offer of ready cash with ‘no questions asked might be enough to encourage him to part with the number plates if he knew where to lay hands on them, and though he would undoubtedly blame everything on an unspecified contact, it would confirm his suspicion that something unpleasant had happened to June’s father.

“OK,” he said with a show of doubtful reluctance. “I’ll ask around. Frankly, I don’t hold out a lot of hope. Twenty-five years you say; that’s a helluva long time ago. How can I reach you?”

“Oh, I’m flitting from place to place,” Martin said airily. “I’ll look in some time tomorrow or the day after to see if you have had any luck. Many thanks for your time.”

With that he sauntered out of the yard and back towards the main road. He was conscious that the man was staring after him, probably trying to make up his mind if it had been a genuine enquiry, or something a bit more suspicious. It also belatedly occurred to him that if Castleman was personally involved in some way with the double murder, then simply by prodding the man about the Cortina might provoke more of a reaction than he had bargained for! He glanced at his watch and decided that as it was approaching midday, it was as good a time as any for catching Dr Rawlinson. He walked briskly back to the surgery, and as luck would have it, he went in as the last patient was called through.

He settled down in the waiting room after announcing himself to the rather bored sounding receptionist, whiling away the time browsing through a well used periodical of no particular interest. About ten minutes later he saw the patient emerging, and a few minutes after that the receptionist leaned over her counter and asked him to go along to the doctor’s consulting room.

“Ah, Mr Isherwood,” Dr Rawlinson exclaimed as Martin entered the room. “Strange that you should choose to look in this morning; I was going to phone you after lunch. I suppose you must have been reading my mind!”

“’Morning Doctor,” Martin responded. “Although technically it is now afternoon I suppose! I’m afraid I cannot lay claim to possessing latent telepathic abilities; I just happened to be in town again today and thought I would drop in on the off-chance that you might be able to help me with a few matters?”

“Have a seat,” the doctor said, gesturing. “Not feeling unwell I hope?”

Martin noticed that his manner was less formal than it had been on his first visit.

“I’m fine thanks,” he responded as he accepted the seat by the side of the doctor’s desk. “I have been going through my late uncle’s personal papers and trying to make sense of matters. I confess that I am making little progress. No doubt I am imagining things, yet I get the feeling that there is some sort of mystery attached to the last years of his life. Many people have indicated that he seemed pre-occupied yet no one I have spoken to has been able to tell me exactly what may have been worrying him.”

“Indeed?”

“Amongst others, I have spoken with Mrs Jefferson who used to be his housekeeper, and she also appears to think that there was an undercurrent of something going on that she knew nothing about.”

“I shouldn’t read too much into that if I were you,” the doctor remarked, pushing some cards aside on his desk. “People are always sensing mysterious goings on where there aren’t any; your uncle was a doctor, remember? Quite properly there was a lot that he would never discuss with anyone outside of his practise, and some of his cases were naturally quite serious.”

“Quite, I fully understand that, and if it was purely her story alone that didn’t add up I would be inclined to dismiss it. However, without going into detail, I now find that quite a lot of things don’t add up, and I would like to be clear about certain matters in my own mind before I make any decisions regarding the future of Springwater House.”

“Well, I don’t know as I will be able you help you very much,” the doctor said. “After your last visit I became curious myself, and eventually I had a look through the old files that your uncle left. I confess it is something I was always going to do but hadn’t got around to. All the records of patients that were still coming to the practice I was of course familiar with. I was more interested in those cases that came up before my time. Perhaps you will understand my interest if I mention that I am trying to write a book on the subject of a country GP’s work, and how things have changed over the years. Old records like these are invaluable with such a project.”

“I should imagine they would prove fascinating,” Martin agreed. “I shall look forward to reading a copy of your book once it is published.”

“Thank you,” Dr Rawlinson responded. “I shall be delighted to provide you with a complimentary copy. However, what I thought it may be of interest to you is this. Tucked away in an old file with no name on it at all I came across something that has to stand out as being unusual in a quiet practise. It was because of this and the earlier questions you had posed that I thought I should contact you, but of course you have saved me the effort.”

“I’m happy to be of service,” Martin said lightly, wondering what the doctor was leading up to.

“What I came across was a copy of a report that Dr Marston had written in his capacity as police surgeon, a position he held long before I joined the practise. Frankly, until I came across this I never realised that he had ever held the post. In a quiet little backwater like this place the services of a police surgeon are hardly ever required; we have no real crime problem here as you have probably seen for yourself, we don’t get many traffic of industrial accidents requiring police attendance, so the position was very nearly an honorary one. I believe the position is currently held by Dr Barnes of Hartington. Anyway, this report, which was a copy of one that had obviously been submitted to the police, related to the only major crime that has ever happened here; you may perhaps have heard of the double fatality about twenty five years ago?”

“Yes, I’ve heard mention of it,” Martin acknowledged. His interest was naturally quickening, wondering what it was that the doctor had discovered.

“It was quite a detailed report, and written in Dr Marston’s own handwriting. It describes in technical detail how two adult males were found in the front seat of a wrecked car on the outskirts of town. His preliminary examination concluded that both men had died of gunshot wounds to the head with a provisional estimate that death had occurred some four to six hours prior to his examination which took place at oh seven hundred hours.”

“I should think that having to conduct such an examination must have been a most unpleasant experience for him?”

“I’m sure it was. However, what I found really interesting was the fact that he indicated in the report that the fatal injuries were produced by a heavy calibre automatic hand gun, fired at close range.”

“Why is that particularly interesting?”

“Does it not strike you as curious that following what can only have been a cursory examination to establish that life was extinct, a country doctor who has been in practice in this god-forsaken backwater of a place for all of his professional life would immediately recognise those injuries for what they were? Faced with much the same sort of situation, even in this more violent age, I doubt that I could be that confident without the benefit of attending a post mortem.”

“Yes, I see what you mean.”

“I read that report through several times. It was as meticulously done as everything else that Dr Marston did, yet there was something in the way that it was worded that didn’t seem quite right. I couldn’t put my finger on it at first. Later, when I compared it with many other reports penned by the doctor it eventually dawned on me what it was; the construction of sentences, the choice of adjectives were all different.”

“I’m not sure I follow your meaning?”

“For my money, that report was never composed by him at all.”

“You mean, somebody else carried out the examination, and he just signed the report?”