The Murder Suite: Book One - The Audrey Murders (15 page)

              Audrey gave it a quick look. “I’ll head up to the chalets. If you need me, you know where to find me.” Audrey noticed they had brought the dogs.  She wondered if they would be searching inside the suites. Of course they would. When she reached Suite B the phone was ringing.  It was Pearl.

              “I saw all the cops heading your way,” panted Pearl. “Are they at your place?” 

              “Yes. I can’t talk now I have to run out and get some supplies. I’ll catch you later.” Audrey hung up the phone. Pearl was not what she needed right now.   She needed to think.  

Grabbing her purse and headed off to her car. She would drive down to Kaeo and pick up some supplies. As she turned into her other driveway, Audrey opened her window and called out to Constable Driver.  “I am off to the shop. I’ll be back soon.  You are all welcome to come up for morning tea at half past ten,” she said.  

              “Great,” said Driver “That is kind of you. I will tell the boys.”

              The trip into Kaeo was uneventful.  The locals were curious about the bones found on her property.  Audrey said she was shocked about the findings and would be pleased when the police finished their investigation.  She was worried what it would do for business having the police around.    She stopped for petrol at the Fuel stop and, again, the conversation focused on the bones.  No one wanted to call it a murder and yet an accident seemed less likely.   Audrey was pleased when she arrived back at the chalets. No one even slightly suspected her.

              The group arrived at exactly ten thirty. Audrey had set up a nice spread upstairs on the large deck of Suite A. There was seating for twelve and every seat was taken. She had picked up the moist carrot cake from the Kaeo bakery and offered savory biscuits with cheese and tomato.  She poured out the tea and coffee and said for the men to help themselves.   Some of the guys lit up cigarettes.   They had put the dogs back in the cars. Audrey asked if the dogs needed any water.  They said they had already been taken care of.    She listened as they talked.   They had searched the lower swampy paddocks and after morning tea they were going to search up on the pa.   They had found nothing of any interest so far.  The flood had washed away any scent or evidence of Blackmore being in the area.   Audrey knew the worse was yet to come.    She excused herself and went inside to the kitchen.   She knew her nice, relaxed demeanor would prevent any suspicions they may have about her.   Audrey was a pro at hiding her feelings. 

              Suddenly she could hear cell phones going off.   She went outside to see what was causing the commotion.  The police were suddenly very animated.  

“Sorry Audrey, we have to go. We will be back when we can,” said Driver as he picked up his hat and headed off down the steps to where his car was parked.

Within minutes the deck was empty and cars were speeding down her driveway with their lights flashing.   There was obviously an emergency.   Audrey racked her brains trying to figure out what could possibly have happened.   Did she miss something?    She noticed the cars had gone up towards Tauranga Bay.   She could hear their sirens now fading in the distance.  Are they going up Radar Hill? Surely they haven’t found the car.

What should she do?  Should she follow them?  No, why would she do that? It would only draw attention to her.   She must be patient and wait and see.   In the meantime she would go to the pen site.   She could now work on getting rid of any human blood that may have been left there.   She changed into her jeans, put on her gumboots and headed on up the hill. 

              Audrey had done research online to find out how to get rid of the blood off the ground with no result.  Even disinfectants cannot totally get rid of blood.  It can still be seen with luminal.   She had remembered last night she had a dozen bags of blood and bone fertilizer in her garage.  She had a plan.  She piled her gardening tools into her trailer along with bags of topsoil and fertilizer and headed up to the site.  

By the afternoon she had cleared a good size patch of ground and spread the topsoil, blood and bone and sheep fertilizer, She used the corrugated iron panels and posts to create a wall around the freshly formed garden area.  When Audrey had driven into Kaeo she had picked up a selection of vegetable plants. Now she planted them neatly in rows. Placing the chicken netting over the whole area to keep out the birds and animals was the final step.    She stood back and looked at the results of her labor.    Much better, she thought.   She had tossed her poor little lamb’s remains further up in the forest.   The police dogs may smell the dead animal.   She had read it was difficult for dogs to differentiate between animal and human blood.   She pulled the hose to the garden area and gave everything a final watering.    She was proud of the result.   She wondered if the police would even bother to come back again.   Audrey felt a lot more confident that she had outsmarted them all.    I need a nice glass of wine to celebrate, she thought as she collected all her tools and the empty bags and put them in the trailer and headed off down the hill towards the chalets.

C H A P T E R   6 0

              Sure enough, it was the same 4runner Driver had seen parked at Whangaroa on Saturday.  He also remembered seeing the car leave the restaurant in Whangaroa the night before and head up Wainui Road. He was sure of it.  He had noticed it because it had looked so clean and out of place.   Some young local boys had climbed down the cliff face to search for “stuff they could sell” they told the police. “People just dump stuff over the cliff” one of the young Maori boys told him. “Good stuff too.  We tie a rope around it and pull it up.    When we saw the flash, new 4runner we thought we should call the cops incase people are lying around here dead or hurt or something.  It wasn’t here yesterday so it must have fallen down here last night.”

              The police and the dogs searched the area at the base of the cliff.  There was no sign of anyone.  The car had golf clubs, fishing gear and a suitcase inside filled with a man’s clothing and personal items.  The police called the local towing service and while they waited they checked for any identification that might have been left inside.   There was no wallet or ID in the car.  They were careful not to disturb anything. 

              Driver called in the plate number and they quickly responded with the name “John Campbell” Address: 872 Longs Drive, Devonport, Auckland.    “Wonder what he was doing up here?” he said.  “And if anyone else was traveling with him?  I saw this car yesterday parked down by the dock.  Maybe he had booked a fishing trip.  He must be around here somewhere.  Search again” he said.  “Looks as though we may have another missing guy.  What’s going on around here?”

              By the time the tow truck had taken the 4runner away. The police had spent a couple of hours searching for the body. 

              “Maybe he survived the fall and simply climbed up the cliff and hitched a ride somewhere,” said one of the detectives.  “He definitely is not here or the dogs would have found him by now.   It is unlikely he wandered off down here in the valley unless he was badly hurt.”               

              Lets leave a couple of guys and the dogs here while we check out the area to see if anyone saw anything.   I will call around the fishing charters to see if he booked a trip,” said Driver.

              The team split into three.  It was going to be another long day.  As Constable Driver drove back towards Whangaroa Harbor he wondered, did they have a murderer on the loose, or was it simply a coincidence that two cars were being driven over banks and their occupants were not found at the scene?  Did this John Campbell and Doug Blackmore have anything in common?  Was there any connection?   What did he know about them?   He started a mental list.  Both men came from Auckland.  Both men were fishermen based on the fishing gear in the cars.  Both men were golfers.  Both men were in their late fifties, early sixties.  Both men’s cars were found abandoned and wrecked but all their personal items remained in the cars so it can’t have been a robbery.  

He needed to get back to his office and make a detailed list.  But first he would check out the local game fishing office to enquire if John Campbell had hired a charter boat.

              After Constable Driver had spoken with Captain Todd and learned that indeed a John Campbell had booked a day trip on his boat, and had not turned up for the seven o’clock departure, he knew that something wasn’t right.   Driver had seen Campbell’s car parked at the dock.   Why didn’t he board the boat?   How did his car end up over Radar Hill?     He had asked the Captain if he had a local phone number for Campbell.   He said the Three Suites at Whangaroa were his contact and had left a number of messages with the lady there.  Constable Driver was shocked.  Two more things the men had in common.  He guessed the man he had seen getting into the hot tub in Suite C was, in fact the, now missing, John Campbell.   He also remembered seeing him get out the hot tub in haste and follow Audrey somewhere, but where?  He wondered.   Time to get back to the office and make some calls.  First he would call Campbell’s family. He would need to track them down first.

C H A P T E R   6 1

              She heard a quad bike coming up the driveway.  She was pleasantly surprised to see it was her neighbor, Harry Armstrong.   She walked out to meet him on the driveway. He was a good- looking man.  Tall, lean, rugged body topped with a cowboy hat. He sat astride the bike wearing gumboots and smoking his cigarette.  His loyal old cattle dog sat behind him. He always seemed so shy.  Audrey liked his demeanor.  He was not loud and arrogant like the other men in her life. She thought he was married and she knew he had children.   She had met his wife a year or so ago.  She was a pretty blonde woman.

“Just checking on the sheep,” he said. “We will need to get them sheared in December.”

              Audrey invited him in for a coffee and was surprised when the shy man accepted.   He tied his dog with an old string to his bike and followed her to the outside table on her patio.   Audrey went inside to make the coffee.  Harry sat outside smoking his cigarette.

              “How are your wife and family?” Audrey called out. 

              “My wife and I are separated,” he replied “She has got herself tied up with a drunk.  I’m worried about the kids,” he said.

              “I am so sorry, said Audrey. “Divorce is an awful thing.  I know. But it gets easier in time”. 

              “Yeah the divorce is costing me big time,” he said   looking sad and angry.  

Over coffee the two shared stories about going through the divorce process. Audrey liked his company.  He was easy to talk to.    She explained the little lamb had gone missing and she had found it on the pa this afternoon when she was making a vegetable garden up there.  “Looked as though the wild pigs got to it,” she said.  It must have escaped under the fence.” 

              “Do you want me take it away?” asked Harry.  

              “Would you? Asked Audrey looking helpless.  “That would be great.  It is so sad losing her. She was my favorite.”

              Audrey climbed on the back of his quad bike with the dog and off they went down the road and up the driveway next door to the new garden site. She could feel the warmth of his body as she wrapped her arms around his waist for support.

Harry was impressed with her new vegetable garden.   She had cleared the bush away from the site to allow the sun to get to the garden.  Yet it was sheltered enough to prevent wind damage.  “Good job” he said obviously impressed. “The veges should do well here.   Where is the lamb?” 

              Audrey led him further up the hill to where she had thrown the lambs remains.               

“Yeah, wild pigs, alright. I had better come up here later with my rifle and the dogs.  You don’t want wild pigs wandering around your property.”

              Audrey nodded and said she was grateful for his help.

              He put what was left of the little lamb in an old food sack he had tied to the bike and threw it on the front rack of his bike.   His dog had already leapt off the bike and was sniffing around with interest. “He can smell the pigs,” said Harry. “Looks as though there are at least four or five of them” he commented studying the ground.  

On the way back down Harry checked out the other sheep.  He was impressed how Audrey had tamed them.  She was obviously fond of animals.  Anyone who loved animals had to be a good person he thought.   He dropped Audrey at the Chalets and headed back to his farm.   After dinner he would get the other dogs and head back up to the pa. Audrey had installed a gate between their properties so that the cattle could cross through.  He would take that route so as not to disturb her.   Plus it would take more than one trip if he shot more than one pig. He liked pig hunting.  It was his favorite sport.  Many an evening he would go up to the hills behind his farm with his dogs and bring back a pig.  Sometimes he would capture wild weaners and bring them back to the pigpen, fatten them up and sell them to the local Maoris.  Wild pigs fed on cows’ milk were popular with the locals. In fact, pigs were Harry’s favorite animals.  His father had liked pigs and so did he.   He had eighty pigs at the moment.  It was a busy time.  By Christmas they would all be gone. Except, of course for his sows. He had nine sows and two boars the rest were all being fattened for sale.  He knew Audrey did not like pigs.  He had told her once about how vicious they can be and now she was terrified of them.   He hadn’t meant to scare her.  Audrey biggest love was her cattle.  He had sold her two steers a year ago and she had tamed them too.