Grave Doubts (44 page)

Fenwick shook his head, frustrated at the delay.

‘It’s more important than we find Mill Farm but we need better directions. Her brother’s are next to useless. Who would know how to find Mill Farm? What are the best sources of local knowledge?’

‘Local post office, the church, pub, general store…they’re good places to start.’ Oakham suggested.

‘Why don’t we ask them while we wait for additional support?’

‘You can’t go knocking up the village. Our top priority is to catch Smith not find Nightingale. If he’s here you’ll alert him.’

Fenwick resisted the urge to punch MacIntyre, reasoning that it probably wouldn’t win his cooperation.

‘Tell you what, here’s the deal,’ he said, his voice tight, ‘you let me go down there. If there’s any sign of life, I’ll question whoever’s still awake, quietly.’

‘If you scare him off…’ MacIntyre didn’t need to finish the threat.

‘I won’t. I want him as much as you do.’

He followed the signs for the harbour down a cobbled street so steep it was stepped in places. On either side, pretty cottages were dark and closed against the night, their climbing roses and hedges black in the moonlight. Shops and cafés soon outnumbered the houses but they too were dark. He was just about to give up when he saw a circle of yellow light on the cobbles coming from a pub. The publican must still be up. Conscious of his unspoken promise to MacIntyre, Fenwick resisted the temptation to hammer on the door and demand entry. Instead, he found a few coins in his pocket and threw them against the glass of the lighted window. After several tries a man stuck his head out and said, none too quietly.

‘Whatdaya want?’

‘Police. It’s an emergency. Open up.’

‘How do I know you’re police?’

Fenwick stretched up as far as he could to show his warrant card. With a grunt the man slammed the window shut. After several minutes there was the sound of bolts being drawn and the door opened, momentarily blinding Fenwick as light fell into the street. He could see a man silhouetted against the glare and flashed his warrant card again, introducing himself.

‘I’m looking for two people, not necessarily together. A man, David Smith. Late twenties, six foot, slim build, could have cuts or signs of injury.’

He passed over an e-fit of Smith and paused for the man to say something and was rewarded with a shrug. Stepping closer he was able to see his eyes. Generations of smugglers’ genes had shaped the expression of distrust he saw there.

‘I get hundreds in here every day. Can’t help you.’ He made to close the door but Fenwick blocked it with his foot in a movement so quick it surprised the burly publican.

‘And a woman, perhaps you’ve seen
her.
’ Fenwick thrust Nightingale’s photograph at him, forcing him to take it.

‘Can’t see.’

The man turned towards the wall light, keeping his back towards Fenwick. His shoulders stiffened.

‘No, seen neither.’

But the tension in the man’s body said otherwise.

‘Think again, sir.’ Fenwick’s eyes went flat with anger. ‘What’s your name?’

‘What business is it of yours?’

Fenwick looked up at the words inscribed in fading gilt above the door.

‘Are you Tremayne, the publican?’

The man weighed even this question before answering, then nodded.

‘Well now, Mr Tremayne you’ll oblige me by answering my question. Have you seen this woman?’ It was clear to Fenwick that he had but that either his habitual distrust of law enforcement or a desire to avoid becoming involved was keeping him dumb. ‘I say that you have.’

A flicker of calculation crossed the man’s face but he held his silence.

‘Did you hear me? That man is a murderer, and that woman,’ he took a step forward for emphasis and Tremayne retreated in his path, ‘is his next victim.’

He shouldn’t have said any of that but he was desperate. Tremayne just stared at him. Fenwick’s temper was almost past the point of control.

‘If he gets to her and I find out that you knew
anything
at all, I’ll have you as an accessory. Right now you’re just heading for a charge at wasting police time.’ Tremayne made to turn away. ‘Think again before you do that.’

The publican walked through to the saloon bar and put the e-fit of Smith and photograph of Nightingale on the green baize of the snooker table before turning on the overhead lamp.

‘That’s better. Yes,’ he tapped Smith’s face, ‘he was in here this evening. Left before closing time.’

‘And the woman?’

Tremayne was looking less sure of himself now.

‘He was asking about a girlfriend who owed him money. This photo doesn’t do her justice.’

Fenwick felt panic flutter at the base of his throat.

‘You’ve seen her?’

‘She came in a month or so back. Haven’t seen her since.’

‘Do you know where she’s staying?’

The landlord scratched his scalp through thinning hair. It was all Fenwick could do to keep his hands off him.

‘Come on! This is life and death for God’s sake.’

‘Maybe. Her family’s been down here forever.’

‘I know, at Mill Farm. How do I get there?’

‘Up in the hills somewhere westerly way. Backs onto the cliffs. A good eight miles from here. Never been there.’ From the way he spoke it was clear he’d said all he was going to and nothing Fenwick could do was going to persuade him otherwise.

He left feeling he’d been deceived somehow. The bottom line was that he was no closer to finding Nightingale. Above him at the top of the hill he could see a long line of officers deployed along the street. Reinforcements had arrived, organised effortlessly by MacIntyre. At least now they could start waking people up. He went straight to the post office and knocked on the door. A worried looking man in his thirties opened up.

‘Police. We’re conducting a murder investigation and need to find a young woman before she becomes the next victim.’

The man’s eyes widened in alarm and he beckoned Fenwick inside.

‘DCI Fenwick. We need to reach Mill Farm, owned by the Nightingales. We know it’s near here but we need exact directions.’

‘The wife might know, she’s local. Hang on.’

They came back together.

‘I know of the Nightingales, of course I do, quite notorious they were back in my dad’s day.’

‘And the location of the Farm?’

‘That I don’t know but I know a man who does, Pete Trewellin. He was postman here for over thirty years. I’ll have his number somewhere. He and my dad were mates.’ She rummaged in a bureau whilst Fenwick tried to keep his breathing under control.

‘Here. He’s still local.’ She scribbled something down then handed him a number and pointed to the phone. ‘Feel free.’

It took a while for the call to be answered and when it was Fenwick was greeted with an earful of blasphemy. As soon as there was a pause he introduced himself and explained the information he needed. He had to repeat himself several times before Pete Trewellin understood him and gave him detailed directions filled with a local man’s guidance. ‘Turn right just before you get to the hornbeam that was struck by lightning three years ago’ – was a classic explanation. Eventually he thought he had enough to find the farm.

It was about nine miles away, not eight, and he couldn’t believe that Smith would have set off to find it on foot. Perhaps he was still in the village after all, but he couldn’t rely on that. He marched uphill and found MacIntyre directing local operations from the car park.

‘I know where to go.’

He was given a two men and a patrol car and set off into the dark.

Nightingale woke to the sounds of the house at night: the clatter of loose guttering, scratchings of mice in the attic, the flutter of a bat around the ceiling, confused and searching for the open window. They were customary noises so what had woken her? There was a shrill bark of a vixen outside and she had her answer.

Moonlight from her uncurtained window made it bright enough for her to read the time on her watch: almost one o’clock, an unwholesome time to wake. She lay in bed, willing sleep to return, enjoying the faint ache in her calves from her run that afternoon. Minutes passed but sleep eluded her. She decided that she needed to go to the bathroom. Perhaps that would settle her. As she walked barefoot along the landing, up and down the steps that negotiated the various parts of the house, she heard a rustling that did not belong, as if something was walking in the long grass outside. She wasn’t frightened, more curious. Badgers and foxes prowled her garden at night looking for food.

The noise stopped. When she looked outside the silver-black bars of moonlight and shadow through the surrounding trees cut the familiar view into a visual puzzle of distorted shapes. It was impossible to tell whether anything unusual was out there as everything looked strange.

She went to the bathroom without bothering to close the door, waited for the noise of the flush to die then padded over to the casement window on the landing above the front door. From here she could see straight down the lane. All was quiet and still in the warm night. When she returned to her bed she fell asleep straightaway and did not dream.

The vixen pulled the baby rabbit squealing from its hole, shook it by the neck until the noise stopped, and loped off to find her young. They would have fresh meat tonight. The hunting was good in this place, the scavenging even better. She lifted her head, raising the rabbit so that it did not drag, and quickened her pace. The kill would not be hers until she had returned to her earth and litter. She sniffed the air. Her path through the woods and down the hill was empty, her territory clearly marked but something tonight was not right. There was a disturbance in the air.

The she-fox quickened her pace, concern for her cubs even greater than her hunger. Half way down the hill a shift in the breeze brought a familiar scent with it, one that did not belong to the night. She recognised the smell and fear for her cubs grew. There was another predator down there, heavy and dangerous. Dropping the warm carcass she stopped and let out a series of shrill warning barks before lifting the dead weight again and running off.

Whoever would have thought that moonlight could be this bright and yet still be so confusing? The rising woodland was floodlit, as clear as day but with colour replaced by impenetrable blocks of shadow. Lying in wait, rabbit holes, roots and old tree stumps were ready to trip the unwary. He sucked at recent scratches on the side of his hand and kicked the bramble away viciously.

Smith had started his journey confidently. Despite his sojourn in the pub he had emerged into the street with a clear head. The path that had been described to him – old tarmac overgrown with weeds – had been easy to find, though further away from the village than he had been led to expect. He had walked onto the thin ribbon of clear asphalt at half past twelve, feeling as fresh as when he had left the village. Only his neck and jaw troubled him. For the rest, he was as fit as he had ever been.

The first easy miles had lulled him into complacency. When the moon hid briefly behind a stray cloud, he had paused, looked about him and realised that he must be lost. Instead of seeing a wooded hillside ahead of him there was a smell of gorse, with the sound of water running far below.
‘If you reach the vale, you’ve
gone too far. And no point trying to follow the river back to its source, that’s impossible.
’

So he had retraced his steps until he found the footpath leading from the track that he’d missed first time. It was late now. He’d been told that Mill Farm lay in a fold on the far side of this hill, beside a river that had once been powerful enough to turn the heavy wooden wheel. He would have to go over the hill, keeping the sound of the sea to his right as he came to the summit.
‘Avoid the cliff top,’
the man had said,
‘it’s treacherous, particularly at night. That’s where her aunt topped herself.’

There was a stump by the path so he sat for a moment and opened his rucksack. Smith pulled out a heavy black felt roll from the pack, enjoying the familiar weight of it in his hands. There was a faint clink as one piece fell against another. He spread it open on his knees, then lifted each blade from its wrapping and stroked it. Since Wales, he had kept his tools safe in the rucksack until right at the last minute. Losing his penknife still hurt.

It had amused him how a penknife was considered innocent. Sharpened and shaped it could slide between ribs and slip straight into heart muscle. It could flay, cut and slice as well as any weapon. Of course, he had added to his collection for tonight’s very special killing. He had a Stanley knife, the sharpest blade he possessed and good for carving; a sheath knife with a serrated edge; and a scalpel with a remarkably fine replaceable razor blade that he had bought in an art shop. But the penknife was his favourite.

Running his fingers along the cool steel calmed him. The momentary sense of disorientation shrank back and his thinking regained perspective. He reminded himself that this was the night that he’d been waiting for a long time. But he needed energy. The tin of emergency rations was at the bottom of the rucksack. He ate a bar of chocolate, swallowed some pain-killers and more pills, and washed it all down with a high-energy sports drink. Some of his vigour returned; it couldn’t be far now. In the distance he heard a fox bark a warning and the wood fell silent.

He wrapped and packed his knives and stood easily, the pain from his wounds fading. His thinking, never logical to a sane person, had a graphic simplicity. The bitch had trapped Wayne, broken their partnership and threatened his own freedom. She’d walked free when Griffiths had been condemned to the cells, so she had to die in order to restore his sense of world order. Not once did he consider the advice he had given Griffiths, the advice his sometime companion had ignored to his cost:
never become fixated; remain detached.
That he could, himself have become obsessed never occurred to him.

As he walked, his mind turned to the imminent killing itself. At first the variety of options was overwhelming but then, as always happened, he started to match his method to what he thought was the personality of the victim. The perfect assault found the woman’s weaknesses and played on them for as long as possible. Usually it was vanity and the threat, then reality, of disfigurement could sometimes cause more agony than simple torture. But occasionally there were other fears. The girl at the caravan park had been scared of water, more petrified of drowning when he’d washed her than of his fists. Her fear had excited him and in the shelter of rocks as he held her face under, he’d taken her again.

But with this bitch there was a problem. He’d watched her for two days in court, automatically searching for weaknesses. She wasn’t vain and she was strong, physically and mentally; hard to scare. Her mock faint hadn’t fooled him. The only possible source of weakness he could identify was her independence. His intuition, never more sensitive than when he was focused on his victims, told him that having her own space and living on her own terms would be essential to her.

Ideas began to blossom, fed by the knowledge that he would have plenty of time. He would disable her first, crippling her and then smash her fingers. He imagined her trying to crawl away from him on her stomach. When she was whimpering in a corner, he would tell her what he was going to do next, each injury removing mobility and control, every one more destructive than the last. Of course, he would have her too, for as long as it took to rip away her pride and superiority. And all the time his little knives would be working away, busy, busy.

He would let her think that she was going to live, otherwise the idea of being crippled would lose its impact.
‘No more jogging, Miss Nightingale,
’ he’d say as he sliced and hammered away. Then he would take her again, his hands sticky with her blood, touching her all over.

Afterwards he might pause, have breakfast perhaps, or forty winks. Revived and ready again he would string her up and return to his work. Images of what he could do to that perfect skin consumed him, making him stumble as his vision blurred. Perhaps by then she would be so weakened that she would cry out as pain ripped through her.

His breathing was harder now and he forced himself to take a few, calming breaths. Images of her naked and defiled filled his mind. He would hold her, eye to eye, body to body. Little Miss-Fucking-Independent would die in terror, as slowly as he could make it.

He reached the top of the hill and looked down at last into the valley that had cradled Mill Farm for half a millennium. His hands were trembling. The biggest challenge would be to remain in control long enough to complete everything he had planned. He forced himself to stand still and hold out both hands until they were steady. When he was sure that his thoughts were under control he started to climb down to the farm.

‘There must be a better way of handling this’.

Fenwick looked haggard in the light from the headlamps as he spoke to MacIntyre over the radio.

‘I can’t spare more men yet, Andrew. We need to cover the town. His car was there and the chances are that it’s where we’re going to find him. Your tracing Nightingale is only a precaution.’

‘He’s a walker, remember? We heard only yesterday that he was seen disguised as a rambler miles from Ginny’s house.’

‘He’d be crazy to go out all that way on foot. How would he escape?’ MacIntyre’s voice crackled over the radio.

‘Escape from what? He doesn’t know we’re here. He probably thinks that we’re still searching around Telford.’

‘I disagree. Wendy’s body would lead us to him.’

‘He doesn’t think we’re smart enough to have found it yet, let alone to make the connection to Nightingale.’

‘Sorry, Andrew I’m expecting more men within the hour and as soon as they arrive I’ll send some over.’

‘If we don’t get lost, we should be there in fifteen to twenty minutes and I’ll need back up. Will the helicopter be here soon?’

‘No! I won’t put her up in case it alerts him to our search. He escaped from under Cave’s nose, remember; the helicopter did no good at all.’

‘But using one will help us find her more quickly.’

‘Forget it. You’ll have more officers soon and with luck we might have him in custody before you even reach the farm.’

Fenwick shook his head. It was no good arguing. He wasn’t SIO and he had no control of the way the operation was being conducted. It galled him but if he alienated MacIntyre he gained nothing.

‘I’ll call in fifteen,’ he said, biting the skin at the side of his thumbnail in frustration, and then urged the driver on.

The moon was too bright, that was the problem. Nightingale lay in bed cursing her decision to do without curtains. Twice she’d forced herself back to sleep but this time none of her well-tested techniques would work and she decided to make a cup of camomile tea.

She swung her bare legs out of bed and found her trainers with her feet. The old T-shirt she wore was because of the chill of the house not for modesty and it hardly covered her buttocks. As she sat at the table waiting for the kettle to boil she almost nodded off. Feeling certain that she would fall asleep as soon as she was back in bed, Nightingale soaked the teabag and left it in the mug to brew as she padded up the back stairs, yawning.

As she sipped her tea in bed, Nightingale had to struggle to keep her eyes open. She’d barely finished drinking before the camomile flowers did their work and she was asleep.

The wood was completely silent, unnaturally so. In the clearing in front of the farm moonlight burned the earth ash grey. There was no wind and the shadows of the trees pooled in the margin of the forest to create utter darkness, still and expectant. Part of the shadow stirred, detached itself and became a man. He stared up at the rambling house, its empty windows unreflecting holes in the stone. It looked derelict, with no signs of life.

Smith felt a hot bubble of rage swell beneath his ribs. He’d come so far and had been so sure of success that the blank face of the farm was an insult. Then he smelt smoke, soft on the air, and saw it drift up in a column from the chimney. Life. He crept to the door and it opened to his touch.

The air inside was fragrant with soap and herbs. His hope soared. He needed patience and caution now and waited for his eyes to adjust to the deeper darkness. A current of warmer air came from a doorway ahead of him. He followed it into a kitchen, the Aga still warm. He touched the kettle experimentally and pulled his fingers back in shock at the heat.

Someone lived here and had boiled this kettle not long ago. He retreated into the hall and checked the rooms that opened from it. Discovering nothing he paused to orientate himself and decide what to do next.

She would be upstairs asleep. It was time to get ready. He locked the downstairs door and took the key then retreated to the kitchen and placed his rucksack on the table. The knives didn’t make a sound as he pulled them out, then the rope and tape, which he put in one of the pockets of his cargo pants. The sheath knife went into a holder on his belt, ready to hand; the Stanley knife in the right pocket of his cargo pants, the tiny scalpel with its protective cover he slipped into the side of his heavy walking boots. He saved the penknife until last and put it in his other trouser pocket. With the familiar weights lying against his skin he was properly dressed again.

Although his eyes were now fully adjusted to the night, he took a torch anyway before returning to the hall. He studied the stairs. As he reached the first step there was a mechanical whirring from behind him and he spun round, sheath knife in hand. A harsh metallic chime rang out. One…two… It was a grandfather clock, standing in the shadows. The noise snapped through the hall and ricocheted up the stairs. When it finished he held his breath, straining to catch any sound from above. He counted to one hundred as the house settled back into silence.