Salton Killings (7 page)

“That's all I bloody needed,” Woodend said, under his breath.

He turned and read the sign over the door: ‘Harry Poole, licensed to retail ales and stouts . . .'

“Deny the Devil and all his works,” said a voice just behind his left shoulder.

Sighing heavily, Woodend turned again. The speaker had an impressive face: a broad forehead, a large nose, and blazing blue eyes. But there were also lines, deeply etched into his brow and around his mouth, that made him look as old as God himself. He seemed like a man who had chosen to carry the whole weight of the sinful world on his shoulders.

“Do not enter this evil place,” the man said. “Have the strength to say, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan.'”

Woodend briefly toyed with the idea of a theological exchange, then dismissed it. So what if Christ drank wine himself, even lavished a miracle on producing some when regular stocks ran out. People like the man before him had a knack of being able to blot out anything that did not fit in with their own rigid beliefs. Besides, it was a pint he wanted, not an argument.

“I think you'd better go home, sir,” he said in his best village bobby voice. “Strictly speakin', you're causin' a public nuisance.”

“You are hard of heart,” the man said, “but fear not. The Lord in His infinite mercy has the power to melt even stones.”

To Woodend's relief, there was the sound of bolts being drawn. The pub door swung open, revealing a short, dour man of about forty, with thinning, pale, sandy hair. He was wearing a collarless shirt and a cardigan. He glared at the man in black, gave Woodend an only slightly more welcoming look, and retreated into the bowels of the pub.

Woodend followed him. The man in black stepped forward and then stopped, as if the threshold of the pub presented an impenetrable barrier which even in his zeal he could not cross.

In the public bar, Woodend found not the morose man who had admitted him, but a stunning woman in her early thirties. She had black shoulder-length hair and coal black eyes, set off by delicate pale skin. Her mouth was warm and generous, her lips inviting and seductive.

“What's your pleasure, luv?” she asked.

You know already, Woodend thought, but I'll settle for a drink.

“A pint of bitter, please,” he said.

The woman stretched up to reach for a pot, then placed it under the tap. She wrapped her long fingers around the pump and persuasively but firmly pulled it towards her. She slid the pint across the bar, and Woodend placed half a crown in her hand. She walked over to the till and rung it up.

She was wearing a straight fawn skirt, its hem just above knee level, and an emerald green blouse that some might have considered a size too small but Woodend thought was just fine. Her legs were slim without being skinny, and if the rest of her body had put on a little weight over the last few years, that was all to the good.

She placed his change on the counter, and favoured him with a friendly smile.

“You'll be that Chief Inspector – up from London.”

“You're remarkably well informed,” Woodend said. “You even got my rank right.”

Most women would have looked guilty or blushed. This one just laughed.

“There's not much I don't know,” she said. “It's not that I'm nosey, but you can't miss it. If you think women are gossips, you should listen to the fellers in here after they've had a few pints. So, what do I call you? Chief Inspector?”

“Woodend. Charlie Woodend. And you'd be . . .?”

“Liz Poole, the landlady. You'll already have met my husband.” She glanced over her shoulder towards the corridor. “The miserable old bugger.”

She spoke the words without rancour, as if she was merely stating something that should be obvious to everybody.

“Aye,” Woodend said drily, “I have.”

“Are you gettin' anywhere with your investigation?” Liz Poole asked.

There was an intensity in her voice that was more than just idle curiosity. Her face was transformed too: it was strained, almost haggard, as if a black cloud had blocked out her sun. There could only be one reason for that.

“It's early days yet,” he said, gently. “I've only just arrived.”

She forced a rueful smile to her lips.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “You've not even had time to look around yet, and here I am mitherin' you. Only . . .” concern crossed her brow once more, “I've got a daughter, an' I worry.”

So he had been right about her expression.

“Course you worry, luv,” he assured her. “What mother wouldn't? But I don't think you need be bothered about anything happening to your little girl.”

She smiled again, a half-amused, half-mocking grin that had nothing forced about it.

“
My little girl
,” she said. “Sup up. You've just earned yourself a pint on the house.”

He would have liked to have taken advantage of her offer and stayed longer, but he had things to do. There was half a pint still left in his glass and he drank it with one deep swallow.

“I like a chap who can knock back his ale like a man,” Liz Poole said.

Maltham Police Records Department was situated in the basement of the Headquarters. The room was badly lit and stuffy. The filing cabinets had an air of neglect, the files in them seemed thin on material, and the material itself was badly presented.

“If they'd give me the run of this place for just six months . . .” Rutter thought.

It was a different world from the Yard Central Records Office. He had put just one call through to them, and they had been back with the information he wanted less than twenty minutes later. Only one of the boat owners who had been in Salton the day Diane Thorburn died had a criminal record. Jackie McLeash – city of origin: Glasgow – had done six months some years earlier for receiving stolen property, which scarcely made him a prime suspect in a murder case.

He flicked through the records of sexual offenders. Flashers, peeping Toms, fathers who had seduced their daughters. They were a pitiful bunch. Then he came across the case of Fred Foley, a Salton man, and felt his pulse quicken. A few years earlier, Foley had enticed a girl under the bridge by the salt works and asked her to let him feel her up. When she had refused, Foley had thrown her into the canal. But as he read on, Rutter felt the heavy weight of disappointment descending on him. Pushing a girl into the water on the spur of the moment was a very different thing from cold-bloodedly planning in advance to strangle one. Besides, Foley hadn't followed it through. He'd stood there and let the girl climb out of the canal again.

It was not enough to take back to Woodend.

Rutter cross-referenced the sexual offences files with individuals' named files, jotted down the details of other crimes and cross-referenced again, his search taking him from Breaking and Entering right through to Vandalism. Nothing.

His mouth was parched, he could feel the sweat clinging to his body, but still he would not give up. There had to be something else. He started searching for the something else in all the sections he had not previously checked. He found it in a dusty file stored in the drawer between Larceny – Grand, and Negligence – Criminal.

Davenport delivered his report in a dull, flat monotone. He had checked out the workers at Brierley's. None of them had been absent for anything like ten minutes between ten fifteen and eleven fifteen on Tuesday morning, he had their foremen's words for that. A few discreet questions had confirmed that none of the foremen had slipped away either. He had talked to the Thorburns and got the name of Diane's best friend.

“It's all good work, Constable,” Woodend said, “but your attitude's wrong.”

“Sir?”

“You're sulkin', Davenport. You're takin' it as a personal insult that I've requested the help of Cadet Black, aren't you?”

Davenport shifted uneasily in his seat.

“I think I know as much about the village as he does, sir, an' I've got more experience.”

Woodend clasped his hands, laid them on the desk, and leaned forward.

“Do you? Do you indeed?” he asked. “I'll tell you what I'm goin' to do, Constable. I'm goin' to give you a little test, ask you about somebody in the village. An' I'll put the same questions to this lad when he arrives. If, at the end of it, you can't see his value, I'll give him the boot.”

Davenport looked down at the floor.

“That's not necessary, sir.”

“Oh, but it is,” Woodend said. “I need a team I can rely on, an' I can't rely on you while you're harbourin' a grudge. Tell me about . . .” the first name that came into his head was Liz Poole, but he quickly rejected it, “tell me about the people who live in the big house on the corner of Harper Street.”

Davenport smiled confidently.

“The Wilsons, sir. Mr Wilson was born in the village, moved away to Manchester, made his pile, then came back and had that house built.”

“Why did he choose to return to Salton?”

“Maybe he was homesick, sir. Anyway, he's a very serious feller, doesn't drink.”

“Why?”

“Very strict C of E.”

“And Mrs Wilson?”

“He married her while he was in Manchester. She's very retirin'. Rarely leaves the house.”

“Children?”

“They did have one daughter. She died. They don't talk about it in the village.”

“Anything else you want to add?” Woodend asked.

“I don't think so, sir,” Davenport said smugly.

As if he had been listening for his cue, there was a knock on the door and a tall young man with an unlined, cherubic face and curly hair, walked in. Had it not been for his police cadet's uniform, Woodend would have taken him for a well-developed fifteen-year-old.

The youth gaped around the room, looking first at Woodend, then at Davenport, and back to Woodend again.

“Ph . . . Phil . . . Cadet Bl . . . Philip Black Cadet reportin' for duty, sir,” he stuttered.

Woodend, who had seen even experienced officers unbalanced by meeting a Yard man, was not surprised at Black's nervousness.

“Take a seat, Cadet,” he said.

Black sat down next to Davenport and clasped his knees with his hands. It wouldn't do to give the young man the test just then, Woodend decided, better to break him in gently.

“Tell me where you were when you first heard about the murder,” he said.

The question seemed to confuse Black more than ever. His mouth flapped open, but no words came out. Finally, he said, “It was my day at the Magistrates' Court,” and then dried up again.

Woodend noticed Davenport's superior smile.

“What's a police cadet doin' at the Magistrates' Court?” the Chief Inspector asked.

“It's the Super's idea,” Davenport explained. “Every cadet has his day in court once a week. It's supposed to be so that they can see the law in action, but if you ask me, it's to learn 'em early how to field the defense lawyer's questions when the evidence is a little bit iffy.” He caught Woodend's expression and realized he had made a mistake. “What I meant, sir . . .” he said attempting to backtrack.

“I know what you meant, and I know it goes on – but that doesn't mean I approve of it,” Woodend interrupted. He turned back to Black. “Carry on, lad,” he said encouragingly.

“Well, sir, after the court had finished for the day, I walked home. I knew there was somethin' wrong as soon as I got to the church, because of all the folk standin' around. Then old Mrs Hawkins come up to me and said they'd found a girl in the salt store, with her throat cut from ear to ear. Well, I didn't pay much attention to her, her whole family's barmy. Her brother's in the loony bin and her uncle Arthur was so round the twist he put pictures of the Kaiser up in his window durin' the First World War.” He chuckled as though he had seen it himself. “Didn't make him very popular, I can tell you.”

That's better, Woodend thought, he's gettin' into the swing, buildin' up his self-confidence.

“Anyway,” Black continued, “I am a policeman – well, nearly – an' I thought I'd better find out about it from somebody more sensible. I mean, old Mrs Hawkins is so daft that she once . . .” His mouth froze, his eyes widened, his face flushed red. It look him fully twenty seconds to recover. “I'm sorry sir,” he said. “I know you don't want to listen to village goss––”

“It's exactly what I want to hear,” Woodend said.

He had heard enough to be sure that Black was the man he wanted. He glanced across at Davenport and saw that the constable was far from convinced.

“Forget the murder for a minute,” he told Black. “What do you know about the Wilsons?”

“I have personally known Mr and Mrs Wilson since I was a child,” Black began, attempting to compensate for his earlier lapse. “Mr Wilson made a considerable sum of money, I believe in the chemical indust––”

“No, no, no!” Woodend said in exasperation. “Talk to us like you were talkin' just now. Give us the dirt. Pretend you're gossipin' with your mates in the pub.”

“I don't drink, sir.”

“All right, then, chattin' to your mum. Can you do that?”

Black gulped.

“I'll try, sir. Well, Mr Wilson ran away from home when he was not much more than a kid an'––”

“Why did he do that?” Woodend asked.

“Oh, his dad was a real bad bugger – sorry, sir. Not at first, not when this Mr Wilson was a little lad, but later on, when he got taken by the drink. His wife and children lived in terror of him. He was forever givin' them hidin's. He stopped goin' to church an' all, except once he went when he was drunk an' tried to piss in the font – sorry, sir.”

“Doesn't matter,” Woodend said impatiently. “Go on with your story.”

“Anyway, nobody heard of Mr Wilson – Paul – the present Mr Wilson, for thirty years. When he came back, his mum and dad were dead. He bought their old house and the four next to it.”