Dying to Know (A Detective Inspector Berenice Killick Mystery) (9 page)

‘Hush,
hush…’ Virginia reached across and laid her hand on his shoulder. ‘Tom, dear, it’s all right…’

He
quietened.

Helen
looked from Tobias to her husband. Chad was staring down, his hands gripping his knees. She turned a page of the book. ‘“He is an uni
form Being,”’ she read, ‘“void of Organs, Members or Parts,
and they are his Creatures subordinate to him,
and subservient to his Will; and he is no more
the Soul of them, than the Soul of a Man is the
Soul of the Species of Things carried through
the Organs of Sense into the place of its Sen
sation – ”’

‘Newton,’
Chad said, a false brightness in his voice. ‘That’s what’s so fascinating about the book. Great chunks of people copied out, references to all sorts, even alchemy, mercuries, all higgledy-piggledy.’

‘The
Prof says you can have nothingness.’ Tobias was calmer now. He addressed Chad directly. ‘And I tell him he’s wrong. But he’s not a nice man, is he, Auntie?’

Virginia
shook her head. ‘Prof Moffatt. He runs the lab. My husband didn’t like him either.’

‘He
says that some of the bits are mass-less and I say what about gravity, then, and he just laughs at me as if I’m stupid, I don’t like him.’ Tobias stopped, breathing fast.

‘He’s
a difficult man. Brilliant, everyone agrees,’ Virginia said. ‘But not to be trusted. Murdo always said he’d steal your research and take the credit for himself.’

‘Perhaps
he killed him, Auntie,’ Tobias said, with an odd equanimity.

She
shook her head. ‘He might be difficult, but I wouldn’t go that far.’

‘Well
someone did,’ Tobias said.

‘Yes,’
Virginia said. She looked even smaller, sunk in her corner of the sofa. ‘Someone did.’

Helen
looked from one to the other. She wondered if anyone was going to explain.

Tobias
met her eyes. ‘They hit him on the head,’ he said. ‘They pushed him from Hank’s Tower into the sea, that’s what the police told Auntie.’

Helen
glanced across at her husband, waiting for him to step in, to explain, to take control. He didn’t look up.

Tobias
got to his feet, and began to roam the room, running his fingers along the edge of the bookshelves. Helen stood up too. ‘The potatoes will be done, I expect.’

‘Ballet
shoes.’ Tobias was standing by the window, framed by the heavy gold curtains. He was holding up her shoes, one in each hand.

She
blinked at him. ‘Yes. They’re mine.’

‘I
did that, didn’t I, Auntie? Dancing. I used to do it at school.’

‘He
loved it,’ Virginia said.

Helen
looked at him, standing in the window’s light. She tried to see a dancer in this huge figure, his hands dangling at his sides, his feet at odd angles as if they were so far away he’d forgotten all about them. But then he raised his arms to shoulder height, one shoe still grasped in each hand, and turned a perfect double pirouette. He stood and faced her, perfectly still.

‘Pirouette
en
-
dedans
,’ she said.

‘And
this one’s
en
-
dehors
,’ he said, and did another perfect turn.

It
was as if the proportions of the room had been restored, she thought, watching this tall boy-man suddenly graceful in the golden light.

‘Where
did you learn that?’ she said.

‘His
school…’ Virginia’s voice was weary. ‘He had five years at an excellent school. While his Mum was still alive. It closed…’

‘She
danced too.’ Tobias was standing poised, balanced. ‘My mum. She was a dancer too.’ He placed the shoes back on the floor.

There
was a brief silence. ‘Well,’ Chad said. ‘Lunch, I think.’

Tobias
shifted from his ballet posture, and immediately seemed to forget his feet again, as he lumbered towards the door. Virginia followed him. Chad glanced at Helen as she joined him in the doorway, and briefly squeezed her arm.

‘Nice boots, Ma’am,’ Detective Sergeant Ben Conway said, as he sat down.

‘Thank
you.’ Berenice nodded a smile at him. Well-turned-out too, she thought, crisp checked shirt, and those jeans look brand new.

They
sat alone in the airless office. ‘How was she?’ she said.

He
settled into his seat. ‘We followed the rules,’ he said. ‘But how do you tell someone that her husband was hit on the head and then thrown from that lighthouse thing…’

‘Estranged
husband,’ Berenice said.

‘There
is that,’ he agreed. ‘No tears. No – hist… what’s the word? Cowling always has these posh words – ’

‘Histrionics?’

‘Yeah.’ He gave a quick smile. ‘But – she said this weird thing. She said, “So he didn’t even have the courage to kill himself”. Weird, eh?’

Berenice
reached for a notebook and wrote down the words. ‘Weird,’ she agreed.

‘Guess
that means she didn’t do it,’ Ben said, as footsteps approached and the door opened.

‘You
can never tell with wives,’ Berenice said.

Mary
stood in the doorway. ‘Don’t get the Boss started on marriage,’ she said. She handed a series of photographs to Berenice. ‘CCTV,’ she said.

‘Any
good?’ Berenice spread them out on the desk.

‘I’d
say not.’ Mary took a seat. ‘A couple of number-plates they’re following up. There’s this guy here…’ She pointed. ‘And he’s here again, along the seafront, but we’re nowhere further on until they confirm time of death.’

‘What
about the physics lab?’ Berenice flicked through the photos in front of her.

‘They’re
obviously a tight team – more tearful than the wife, I’d say.’ Mary glanced at Ben, then opened her laptop, clicked on a few keys. ‘There’s Liam Phelps, nice chap. We met a colleague of the dead man’s, Iain Hendrickson. He said they had a controversial experiment that was Murdo’s own, he said they were at a loss as to how to carry on. The rest of the team, we didn’t meet them but I got their names. Roger Newbold, he’s a physicist. The director’s called Alan Moffatt, he wasn’t in. And there’s a woman on Murdo’s team, Elizabeth Merletti. Merletti’s her married name. Used to be known as Elizabeth van Mielen.’ She closed her laptop.

‘Can
you get those names to Ben here?’ Berenice stacked the photographs and tucked them into her file. ‘Well, thanks, both of you. You might as well go back to Sunday lunch.’

Ben
got to his feet. ‘Cool. Mum’s doing chicken specially.’ He gave a sort-of bow, and left.

Berenice
stared at the door. ‘How old
is
he?’

Mary
laughed.

‘What
I need to know is…’ Berenice picked up her phone, and glanced at it. ‘What changed in this man’s life? It all seems so stable. Whoever wanted to kill him, it must have been triggered by something.’

‘The
wife?’

Berenice
gave her a look.

‘OK,
not the wife. The physics,’ Mary said. ‘This ground-breaking experiment?’

‘They
all sound tight-knit.’

‘They’ve
had death threats.’

‘We
need to look into that.’

‘They
don’t take them very seriously,’ Mary said.

‘That’s
the seaside for you.’ Berenice put her phone into her bag. ‘Any talent?’

‘Talent?
We’re talking scientists.’

‘Some
of them must be OK.’

‘I
think my radar went dead as soon as I came South,’ Mary said. ‘It ain’t quite party city out there.’ She got to her feet. ‘Am I allowed to go home to Mum too?’

‘What,
seriously?’

Mary
looked down at her. ‘Mum is three hundred miles up the M1, as is yours. No roast chicken for me.’

‘Nor
me.’

Mary
passed Berenice her jacket. ‘How about the pub, then? Steak and chips? Or are you going home?’

Home,
Berenice thought. Cold white rented formica and a shabby floral carpet. ‘Steak and chips sounds great,’ she said.

They
walked along the corridor together. ‘Boots not too warm, then,’ Mary said.

‘There
was rain forecast,’ Berenice said, as they walked out into the sunny afternoon.

Chapter Six

Liam
Phelps leaned back against the scruffy common-room armchair, crossed his legs awkwardly in front of him.

‘It’s
just not the same,’ he said.

‘Without
Murdo, you mean?’ Elizabeth set two mugs of coffee down in front of them.

He
tapped on the edge of his packet of cigarettes. ‘It was his experiment. And now it’s all going weird, and I keep thinking, if he was here, he’d have an explanation. As it is, every time I look at the results I just feel…’ He pulled out a cigarette and looked at it.

‘You
know you’re not allowed,’ she said.

‘I
know.’ He put the cigarette back into the packet. ‘I mean, one would expect B-mesons – ’

‘They
can’t be.’ She sipped at her mug of coffee. ‘Though, I don’t know what else they are.’

‘If
it’s true, it means that we’ve – ‘

‘
– we’ve made anti-matter that survives for seconds. Minutes, even.’ She shook her head. ‘Except, we haven’t.’

‘No,
of course we haven’t.’

‘And
if this shows an axion pattern…’ she began.

‘That
doesn’t make sense either.’

‘No,’
she agreed.’

They
sat in silence.

‘It
must be weird for you,’ he said.

She
looked up at him. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It is.’

‘You’d
only just come back…’

‘Not
to him.’ Her voice seemed loud. ‘I’d come back to the lab. Not to him.’

Liam
shifted his long legs. ‘It’s not for me to intrude…’ he began.

‘I
mean even if there is a funeral…’ She seemed not to hear him. ‘What’s to stop her just excluding me? I don’t think I can bear it.’ She passed her hand across her eyes, shook her head.

The
door opened and they both looked up.

‘Sorry,
I’m…’ Iain Hendrickson was standing in the doorway. ‘I wasn’t sure if you…’

‘It’s
fine - ’ Liam indicated the seat next to him.

Iain
was in denim, as usual. Liam wondered whether he’d ever seen him in anything else. It gave him a boy-ish, student-y look, in spite of his seniority, the touch of grey in his hair. He looked weary, sleepless, he thought, though probably we all look dreadful…

‘These
charges,’ Iain was saying. ‘The whole standard model turned on its bloody head. We ought to be delighted, I suppose.’ He spoke with a soft Scottish accent. ‘Ground-breaking results. Those boys in Geneva being kept on their toes…’ He sat down next to Liam. ‘But of course, what we want as scientists, is to add to knowledge. We don’t want to take the whole damn rug out from under everyone’s feet so we all have to start again. And have you seen this?’ He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. ‘Another in the green ink correspondence, though not green. And ramped up, I’d say.’

He
passed it to Liam.

Liam
scanned the crumpled, lined paper. He looked up at Iain. ‘One down?’

‘It
means Murdo. “That will show you all you bastards.”’ Iain took the letter back. ‘Our friend seems to think that Murdo’s death is our fault for interfering with the rules of nature.’

‘We
should show the police.’ Elizabeth reached out for the letter.’

Iain
passed it to her. ‘Are you OK?’ he said.

‘What
do you think?’

Liam
got to his feet, knocking the table as he did so. ‘Sorry… Um…’

‘Don’t
leave on our account,’ Iain said. ‘What shall we do about this?’ He pointed at the letter, which Elizabeth was holding between two red-polished finger-nails.