A Painted Doom (25 page)

‘It seems that he found the body of Jonny Shellmer in the Old Vicarage at the other end of the village, and he claims that
he moved it out of the house so that it wouldn’t delay the house sale. Would you say that was the sort of thing he’d do?’
Wesley knew the question was forthright but he considered it would do no harm to have someone else’s view of Heygarth’s story.

Flowers nodded solemnly. ‘Paul’s never been worried about cutting a few corners, and it’s common knowledge that his ex-wife’s
bleeding him dry, so he wouldn’t want anything to stand between him and a few thousand in commission. I’ve heard through the
office grapevine that Nicola Tarnley helped him. Is that right?’

Wesley nodded.

‘Silly girl,’ was Flowers’ only comment before picking
up his mug and taking a long drink.

Gerry Heffernan shifted his body forward in the chair and looked Flowers in the eye. ‘Did Heygarth ever mention Shellmer?
Did he say he knew him?’

‘He said he was very interested in the Old Vicarage.’ He pressed his lips together. That was all he was prepared to say.

Maggie floated into the room with a big wooden tray which she set down on the coffee table. Like the perfect hostess in a
1950s advert, she offered round tea, biscuits and home-made cake. Gerry Heffernan swooped on the latter as if he’d not seen
food for weeks and bit ecstatically into a large wedge of fruitcake.

Wesley was glad of the interruption. Whenever Paul Heygarth’s name was mentioned Gerry Heffernan seemed to acquire a zealous
gleam in his eye. Perhaps he had a down on estate agents; perhaps he just didn’t like the man. But whatever it was, Wesley
hoped that he wasn’t allowing his feelings to interfere with his judgement.

He decided that there had been enough small talk. Now that they were all sitting comfortably it was time to get to the point
of their visit. He produced a small book from his pocket and turned to the front page.

‘This is Jonny Shellmer’s address book. We found a telephone number written in the front. Would you take a look at it and
tell us if you recognise it.’ He handed the book to Jim Flowers, who took it from him with nervous hands.

Flowers stared at it but said nothing. Maggie took it from him, glanced at the number, then handed it back to Wesley.

‘I’m sorry, Inspector. We can’t help you.’

‘Look at it again, Mrs Flowers.’

He held the book out to her and sensed that she was about to object. Then she relented and took it from him.

‘I’m sorry. I still don’t …’ She passed it to her husband stiffly. ‘Does it ring any bells, Jim?’

Jim Flowers shook his head and looked at his watch. ‘I’m sorry, I really must be going.’ He heaved himself out
of the soft upholstery, handing the book back to Wesley quickly. Nobody had wanted to hold on to the thing for long – it was
like a game of pass the parcel.

‘It’s the number of your old house. Shipwreck House. Is that right?’

Jim and Maggie glanced at one another. ‘I’ll take your word for it,’ said Jim casually. ‘We moved out about eighteen months
ago. I’d ask the new people about it, if I were you. Jack Cromer, the TV presenter bought the place.’

Pass the parcel again. Jim Flowers was anxious to deny any connection.

‘We’ve asked them already,’ said Wesley. ‘They say they didn’t know Shellmer. They also said that they received a phone call
last Sunday, three days before Shellmer died. We think the call was from Jonny Shellmer and, according to Mr Cromer, he was
asking for you.’

Jim Flowers looked wary. ‘I’ve never met Jonny Shellmer. Why should he want to talk to me? He was dealing with Paul, and why
would he have my old number? I don’t understand.’ He frowned, turning over the possibilities in his mind. ‘Unless he wanted
to speak to Maggie about the cheque he gave for the village hall. Perhaps he’d looked in an out-of-date telephone directory
and got our old number.’ Jim Flowers looked pleased with himself. It was as good an explanation as any.

‘So you’ve never spoken to Jonny Shellmer?’

Jim Flowers shook his head, avoiding Wesley’s eyes. Wesley watched him closely. ‘By the way, sir, where were you last Wednesday?’

Flowers shifted awkwardly. ‘Er, I was at work. I had a couple of surveys to do but I was in the office the rest of the time.’

‘What time did you get home?’

Flowers hesitated, his brow furrowed in concentration. ‘Around six o’clock. Maggie was in London visiting her sister. She
stayed the night.’

Maggie Flowers nodded in confirmation and Wesley stood up. Unless he was going to start interrogating this pair – something
he had no inclination to do at this point – he felt that there was nothing more to be said.

But Gerry Heffernan had just helped himself to another slice of fruitcake.

‘Will you be helping out with the dig today, Mrs Flowers?’ Wesley asked, killing time.

‘I suppose so.’ There was no enthusiasm in Maggie’s voice. She wanted them gone.

Wesley tried again. ‘How’s the village hall appeal going?’

She forced herself to smile. ‘Very well. We’re just two thousand pounds off our target. Perhaps you and the chief inspector
…’

The doorbell rang and Maggie hurried out to answer it. If she hadn’t, Wesley suspected he would have been shamed into making
a donation. Gerry Heffernan finished his cake and stood up, shamelessly scattering crumbs onto the plain beige carpet.

‘My wife makes a good cake,’ Jim Flowers said pointedly as he made his way into the hall and picked up a dark grey anorak
from the coatstand. The two policemen followed him.

‘By the way, Mr Flowers,’ said Heffernan. ‘I can’t quite place your accent. Australian, is it?’

Flowers shuffled his feet awkwardly. ‘New Zealand, actually.’

‘How long have you been over here?’

‘About fifteen years now.’

‘I believe it’s nice, New Zealand.’

Flowers nodded and looked at his watch.

‘We’ll leave you to it, then, sir.’

Wesley noted the relief on Jim Flowers’ face as they moved towards the front door. But their exit was blocked by Maggie Flowers,
who stood with her back to them talking to a tall, middle-aged man with a shock of white
hair. Wesley was certain that he’d seen the man somewhere before, then he remembered. It was Jeremy Sedley, the actor who
had so impressed Rachel on their drive through the village.

Maggie and Sedley stood aside to allow the policemen to pass, their expressions neutrally pleasant, giving nothing away. Jim
Flowers, Wesley noticed, was still in the hallway, hovering, hesitating. Perhaps waiting for them to leave.

They walked to the car in silence, Wesley craning his neck to see into the field. Neil still wasn’t there.

‘What do you think?’ Heffernan asked bluntly. ‘Do you forget your old phone number that quickly?’

‘Some people might,’ said Wesley, turning the key in the ignition. ‘But I thought they were definitely hiding something.’

‘Then we’ll just have to dig it out of them,’ Gerry Heffernan replied, stretching out his legs. ‘That bloke who called – his
face looked familiar.’

‘It was Jeremy Sedley, the actor. He’s been in a lot of things on television.’

‘That explains it. Seems the Flowers like to have friends in high places.’ He sighed and patted his abdomen. ‘All that cake’s
given me an appetite. Fancy an early lunch at the Red Bull?’

Wesley nodded. Perhaps he’d think better on a full stomach.

Wesley finished his frugal tuna sandwich, the cheapest thing on the Red Bull’s lunch-time menu. Gerry Heffernan had consumed
a fat sausage and an enormous quantity of chips. Not the best thing for a middle-aged man with a tendency to overweight –
but then in all the time Wesley had known him Heffernan never had eaten healthily.

Perhaps he ought to suggest to the boss that he should go on a diet. But how could he say anything without sounding nanny
like, and health obsessed? Perhaps women could
have a tactful word with each other about such things … but men were different creatures altogether. It was a pity, he thought,
that Gerry and Mrs Green hadn’t become closer in the time they’d known each other, or that Rosemary Heffernan, away studying
music in Manchester, couldn’t keep a better eye on her father. It was terrible that Kathy Heffernan had died so young. Tragic.

Perhaps he’d mention the problem in passing to Pam to see whether she had any tactful suggestions.

Heffernan’s mobile phone rang and he answered it while chewing a mouthful of the syrup sponge he’d ordered for pudding. Wesley
had done without.

‘That was Tom. He wants us round at Hoxworthy’s Farm now. He says he’s found something interesting on Lewis’s computer.’

Wesley waited while the syrup sponge was consumed with an enthusiasm he considered a little unseemly in the circumstances.
Missing youngsters usually had the opposite effect on Wesley’s appetite. When they left the comfort of the Red Bull there
was a fine drizzle in the air again, the kind that soaks by stealth, so they drove the three hundred yards to Hoxworthy’s
Farm and emerged dry at the other end.

Jill Hoxworthy opened the front door to them. Her face was drawn, almost grey, and the flesh around her eyes was puffy and
reddened. She had been crying. Wesley had thought her a good-looking woman when he had first seen her, but now grief and worry
had robbed her of her looks.

She stood aside to allow them to pass and mumbled something about Tom being upstairs in Lewis’s room. Wesley looked around
the hallway. There was no sign of Terry Hoxworthy. But then a farmer’s work, like a woman’s, is never done.

Tom was waiting for them, sitting on the typing chair which he twisted from side to side with restless energy. His bright
young face, which still bore the faint scars of adolescent acne, was alight with the triumph of discovery as he
gazed upon Lewis Hoxworthy’s computer.

‘I’ve managed to retrieve all his e-mails. I’ve printed them out for you.’ He handed Wesley a sheaf of A4 paper and waited.

Wesley read in silence, then passed the sheets to Gerry Heffernan. ‘Looks like we’ve got him. He arranged to meet an H. Lancaster
aboard his boat, the
Henry of Lancaster
, the day he disappeared. That’s Hal Lancaster. Jonny Shellmer’s ex-manager. It’s a connection.’

‘Right, Wes, we’ll have him brought in, never mind waiting until he turns up in Tradmouth again. I want him and I want him
now.’

Wesley reread the e-mails, flicking through the boastful ones meant for teenage friends, the ones which made Lewis Hoxworthy
sound as if he possessed a glamour and confidence that were far from reality. Some poor girl in the States was under the illusion
that Lewis drove a Porsche and ran his own software business. Wesley smiled – at least the boy had had his dreams.

But it was the correspondence with H. Lancaster that interested them. The rest of the stuff seemed irrelevant. Lewis had advertised
what he described as ‘rare old letters’ on the Internet and he had had a reply from a H. Lancaster asking for details. Lewis
had replied that there were thirteen of them, they seemed to be extremely old and they mentioned the Wars of the Roses. He
said he’d found them in an old box in a barn which someone had told his dad was medieval, and he reckoned the letters were
medieval too. Lewis’s literary style was rambling and immature. English probably wasn’t his best subject.

‘Hal Lancaster’s housekeeper said he was a collector and we didn’t think it was important at the time,’ said Wesley. ‘If it’s
old manuscripts he collects …’

‘Look at this one,’ Heffernan said, pointing to the last e-mail from Lancaster. ‘He arranged to meet Lewis at the time he
disappeared. He told him to come to his boat at the exact time Lewis said he was going to Yossa’s.
He even sailed up from Tradmouth to Derenham to meet him.’

‘It’s not far,’ Tom chipped in. Heffernan gave him a withering look. Computer experts should know their place. Tom fell silent
again and pressed some keys.

‘Do you still think Lewis’s disappearance is linked to Shellmer’s death?’ Wesley asked.

‘Well, Lewis had the gun. And if the theory about the paedophile ring stands up …’ He didn’t finish the sentence.

‘If it is a paedophile ring, it’s likely they’ve done something like this before,’ Wesley said, deep in thought. ‘We should
ask about Alec Treadly’s associates, if he had any, and find out if he knew the others.’ He looked at Lewis’s computer. ‘Mind
you, with these things it’s easy to make contact with like-minded people you may never have met before. Maybe Lewis was the
first lad they’ve managed to lure away like this.’

Heffernan shuddered. ‘Well, at least we know who to look for now,’ he said quietly. ‘If Lancaster tries to moor that floating
Rolls-Royce of his in any harbour in Britain, I want to know about it. And we can get on to the French authorities and all.’

‘Let’s hope he makes life easy for us and comes back to Tradmouth like he said,’ mumbled Wesley. ‘We could do with some luck
on this case.’

‘You can say that again.’

Gerry Heffernan swept out of the room and Wesley looked at his watch. It was going to be a long day.

The Derenham Doom, as it was beginning to be called in museum circles, had been moved from the barn and now stood propped
against the wall in the north aisle of All Saints church. A great wooden semicircle, it had once fitted into the arch above
the rood screen, where the congregation couldn’t have avoided its horrors.

But it held no terror for Neil Watson. He didn’t believe
in such things as hellfire and the torment of the damned. He stood there staring at it, a curiosity, a relic of more colourful
and desperate times perhaps. He had once seen a Doom in a church at Wenhaston in Suffolk which was of a similar size and subject
matter. But the artist who had created Derenham’s Doom had far outstripped his Suffolk contemporary. The suffering of the
damned in Derenham’s version was real, vivid; their faces contorted in agony. Whoever had painted this thing so long ago in
a small Devon village had possessed a formidable talent.

‘Death, judgement, heaven and hell.