Murder Comes Calling (7 page)

nine

Rex managed to find
on-street parking in front of the firm owned by Chris Walker. Photos of properties surmounted by brief descriptions lined the window. None, he noted, were located in Notting Hamlet. Those must have been taken down. In a bare space in the glass, he saw the blurry reflection of a solidly built man with reddish hair and beard, his neck swaddled in a scarf. He blinked at his image and caught Malcolm’s beside him, greyer, thinner, and shorter. A lot of time had passed since their university days.

The door chimed brightly as they entered. Behind a partition at the far end of the office bobbed the heads of a couple of people whom Rex took to be sales associates. From a reception desk angled in the narrow space in the foreground, a buxom bleached blonde enquired in an ingratiating voice whether she could be of assistance. Her nametag, pinned to a ruffled crimson silk blouse, read “Lea.”

“I hope so,” Rex replied with what he hoped was his most amiable smile. “It’s regarding the homes for sale in Notting Hamlet.”

The woman’s face darkened around her creased blue eyeshadow. “Are you reporters?” she demanded, casting a look at Malcolm. Her hand reached for the desk phone.

“No, nothing like that,” Rex assured her, assessing the lay of the land. He surmised the office had been besieged by the media and nosy members of the public in weeks past. “I’m trying to locate my daughter.” This was the story he had concocted with Malcolm on the way to Chris Walker’s premises in the event they encountered resistance, a story designed to elicit sympathy and the most information possible. Rex’s inherently honest nature rebelled at resorting to subterfuge, but an innocent man’s freedom might be at stake and he had to help his friend out of a legal jam.

“I don’t see how I can assist you there,” the receptionist said in a relenting tone, her assumed one of formality failing to disguise her broad country dialect. Then, unable to contain her curiosity, she asked, “Is she missing then? I have an adult daughter myself.”

“Aye,” Rex said, sighing deeply into his muffler. “The police won’t help us because she’s of age, but she took up with an undesirable character and I need to get her back home before she throws her life away. This is my old friend Malcolm, who’s kindly helping me.”

Malcolm stood by, looking grave.

“But what does this have to do with Notting Hamlet?” the woman asked.

The ceaseless chatter and activity behind the partition led Rex to wonder whether the agents were packing up now that their employer was a prime suspect in a case where four stigmatized properties were listed under his name.

“Closing up shop?” he asked the receptionist.

“Reorganizing.”

He would have liked to ask after Chris Walker but her demeanour, which had reverted to guarded, warned him to stick to his story. “We tracked my daughter from Edinburgh to Bedford, and we understand they were going to settle down in the area. When we were asking around Notting Hamlet, a resident told us she had seen a young woman fitting my daughter’s description in the company of the individual we want to save her from. This was around three weeks ago.” Rex hoped his blend of fact and fiction sounded convincing. “We decided to try here when we saw your For Sale signs in the neighbourhood, in case she’d come in.” He gave Lea a pleading look, parent to parent.

“Do you have a photo?” she asked. “I never forget a face.”

Rex had not had time to prepare for this eventuality. He turned to Malcolm. “You have it.”

“Do I?” Malcolm patted down his pockets both inside and outside his raincoat. He began to look frantic. “I’m sorry, Rex. I think I must’ve left it at the pub when we were asking the staff if they’d seen her. The waitress took it to the landlord to see if he’d served the couple at the bar.”

“We’ll have to go back for it.” Rex stared reprovingly at Malcolm, but inwardly applauded his quick thinking and consummate acting skills. “She’s an attractive blonde, five foot-six, stylish in her dress,” he told the receptionist, attempting to compensate for failing to produce a photograph. “She may be using a false identity and trying to disguise her Scottish accent. Her real name is Amanda Graves. He’s dark-haired and dark-eyed, powerfully built, and he’s definitely foreign.”

Lea brushed her blatantly painted fingertips across the desk. “You do know what happened in Notting Hamlet?” she asked, looking up at Rex with a mixture of fear and concern.

“The murders. I know. That’s why we’re doubly anxious.”

“I’m surprised the police didn’t want to help you, considering,” Lea said astutely, leaving the statement hanging in the air.

Rex continued to recount his story in an attempt to distract her from this obvious point. Any visitor to Notting Hamlet at the time of the murders should have aroused police interest. “We have reason to believe my daughter and this man were interested in purchasing a property on Fox Lane. They were going by the names of Mary and John Jones.”

“Not very original,” the receptionist opined.

“No, indeed. We were wondering if they might have left a forwarding address or phone number.”

“I don’t recall them, and, in any case, I’m not supposed to give out such information,” the receptionist demurred, not without a hint of apology.

“These are special circumstances. Could you please—please!—check for their names in your system? You may be our only hope,” Rex said, appealing to the compassionate nature he discerned the woman possessed.

Expelling a sigh, she tapped the keys of her computer and spent some minutes reviewing the information on the screen, while Rex and Malcolm exchanged wondering glances. “I have a record of four couples and one man who viewed Fox Lane properties,” Lea said, glancing up at the men. “We have four properties on that street.”

Woods, Spelling, Trotter, and Blackwell, Rex recounted to himself. “The house belonging to a Mr. Ernest Blackwell is the one my daughter appeared to favour,” Rex supplied to make sure they were talking about the same property.

“Ernest Blackwell, deceased.”

“Right. Naturally, I’m even more concerned for my daughter’s safety now.” Rex watched anxiously as Lea screwed up her eyes once more and scanned the screen.

“There’s no John and Mary Jones anywhere here,” she said.
“They could have just walked in off the street without making an appointment. There’s a note here saying Mr. Blackwell called to say a couple were interested in his home and he’d referred them to Chris. He hadn’t managed to get their number and the name he gave was Juan and Maria Garcia.”

“John and Mary in Spanish,” Malcolm said. “And another common surname.”

“Who entered that information on the prospect into your system?” Rex asked.

“Chris Walker. The entry is dated the fourth of November. That’s right before the murders. There’s no follow-up. Not much Chris could do without any contact information. Why would your daughter and her boyfriend use a false name and pose as a married couple?”

“We pray they’re not married,” Malcolm said, with feeling. “Presumably they’re using aliases because they don’t want to be found.”

“They’d need to use their legal names to enter into a valid house contract,” Rex said. “Maybe they weren’t as interested as they said.”

“They’d do better renting if they want to stay anonymous,” Lea remarked. “I’m sorry I can’t help you further. I only met a few of these couples, and none of them were young, exactly. How old is your daughter?”

“Thirty,” Rex lied. That was the approximate age Charlotte Spelling had given, though it seemed a bit old for a father to be chasing after his errant daughter. “She’s very naïve and impressionable,” he added.

“You must have had her young,” Lea noted, contemplating him with compassion. “No, these other couples were older. Forties, fifties, at least.” She sat back in her swivel chair with an air of defeat. “I wish I could’ve been of more help. I do hope you find her.”

“Thank you,” Rex said. “And I really appreciate your time.” He produced his card from his wallet and handed it to her. “In case you remember anything more …”

“Oh, you’re a QC.” Lea was clearly impressed. “Not that it would do Chris any good since you’re a Scottish barrister.”

“Has Mr. Walker sought counsel?” Rex asked, seeing an opening for information on the suspect.

“I don’t know. But it probably doesn’t matter how good his representation is, since he doesn’t have much of a defence. He admitted to being at Mr. Blackwell’s house the day of the murders. No point in denying it. His car was parked outside for the whole street to see. What’s more,” Lea added, leaning forward in her chair, “he was charged with a drunk and disorderly when he was at university. I know that much because my nephew’s with the Bedfordshire Police. And,” she emphasized, looking behind her to make sure she wasn’t overheard, “Chris’s ex-wife took out a restraining order against him—said he was verbally abusive and attacked her on one occasion. But’s she’s a right little madam. Once he started making money in this business, she was always demanding more.”

It occurred to Rex that Lea seemed to know a lot about Chris Walker’s personal life, though whether more from her nephew or Walker’s own mouth he could only speculate. Significantly, however, not once had she referred to him as Mr. Walker.

“Have you spoken to your employer since he was taken in for questioning?” he asked.

“I haven’t. And that’s a bad sign. Ever since the murders, he’s been busy trying to save the business and going out of his mind with stress, and not getting any sleep. He looked like death warmed up even before the police were interested in him as a suspect.” Lea closed her blue lids and shook her head. “I dread to think what state he’s in now. In fact, I can’t believe this is happening at all!”

“Nothing’s happened yet,” Rex said. “It might not look good for your employer, but from here to court is a long way off.”

“My lawyer friend should know,” Malcolm put in with a grave nod. “It must be a shock for you. Do you believe he’s innocent?”

Lea gazed at him vacantly. “I do, deep down. But I’ll admit there are moments I have my doubts. I mean, you never want to believe it of someone close, do you?”

Rex sighed in sympathy. “Aye, well, all the best to you.” He held out his hand and squeezed hers warmly. He and Malcolm left in silence and regained the car parked out front.

“Didn’t get much,” Malcolm said, standing on the damp street decorated with Christmas lights and tinsel stars and stockings that did nothing to cheer the gloomy aspect of the aging buildings and leaden grey sky. “Except that now we know Walker has a history of violence.”

Rex agreed as he got in his car, but mostly with Malcolm’s first statement—that they had not learnt much. Lots of people got drunk and disorderly in college and even went on to abuse their spouse, but few ended up going on killing sprees. “It might be worth looking into any unsolved local murders,” he suggested. “If Walker is our man, he may have escalated from the charges on record before graduating to serial murder.”

“Good point,” Malcolm said, settling in the passenger seat. “And interesting about the foreign couple’s name change, don’t you think?”

“Aye, but we’re no closer to discovering who they are.” Rex turned the ignition and prepared to manoeuvre out of the small space.

“And no tie-in with the letters on the victims, except for Mary or Maria. But names beginning with ‘M’ are common. Not Malcolm so much, but Mark or Michael.”

Rex glanced over at his friend, who sounded agitated. “Relax,” he said.

“Easy for you to say. It’s not your initials that were written on the bodies. What is your middle name, anyway?”

“Clarence.”

“Really? I never knew that.”

“I don’t make it public knowledge.”

“Quite.” Malcolm gave a discreet cough. “Interesting, as well, that the couple were acting on their own and didn’t go through Chris Walker’s office,” he said, tactfully changing topic. “Since he never spoke with them, the only eyewitnesses we know of are Charlotte and Ernest, who’s dead.”

Rex let his friend’s comment loom in the air as they drove down the street. Was Charlotte Spelling, the other known witness, at risk?

ten

“So, what now, Sherlock?”
Malcolm asked Rex from the passenger seat.

“I’d like to try the Ballantines again, for starters.”

“I think their house went up for sale after the murders,” Malcolm reminded him. “You think the foreign couple went back to Notting Hamlet after that?”

“You never know.”

“We should probably pick up something for dinner while we’re here, unless you want frozen again. There’s a Sainsbury’s on the outskirts of Godminton.” Malcolm gave Rex directions. After a moment, he spoke again. “I remember there was a murder here almost four years ago that never got solved. A single mother of two who’d just moved to town. I did the autopsy. She’d been strangled, most likely by a neck tie or similar item, judging from the indentation mark on her flesh.” He sighed wistfully. “Lovely bone structure. Such a shame.”

“She’d just moved here?” Rex asked, taking the turn Malcolm indicated.

“Yes. There was no sign of a break-in, nothing stolen. The police tried to pin her murder on her ex, a foreign national, as I recall, but they never made it stick. Yvonne Callister.” Malcolm drew out the name as though it had just come back to him. “I think he might have been a Cypriot or a Spaniard. He ultimately got the children. They attended the local primary school over there.”

“You seem to remember a lot,” Rex remarked, glancing across at his friend.

“Well, some cases just stay with you. She was only in her mid-thirties, and for the two young ones to lose their mother in such a tragic way …”

“What I’m thinking,” Rex said, pulling into the parking lot of the Sainsbury’s supermarket, “is that she must have rented or bought her house from someone. And that someone might just conceivably have been Chris Walker, especially as the home murder fits the
modus operandi
.”

“Oh, yes, I see. I’ll find out, shall I? And I’ll dig into other cold cases around here, as well.”

“Grand. Well, let’s get to it,” Rex said, stepping out of the car. Shopping was not high on his list of favourite activities, but another frozen dinner did not appeal any more than Malcolm’s nondescript brand of coffee.

The two bachelors grabbed a cart and proceeded down the extensive aisles of packaged goods. It soon became apparent they employed radically different strategies for procuring items. Malcolm methodically rooted around the stacked shelves for the economically priced brands his late wife had preferred. “Jocelyn always got this,” he kept saying.

Rex, who lived with his mother when not at his Highlands retreat, was not a savvy shopper and pretty much threw whatever he fancied into the cart, much to Malcolm’s growing dismay. Rex told his friend the groceries were on him and he didn’t want to spend the rest of the afternoon at the store.

“But you can’t pay for all this,” Malcolm said ogling the bottles of Sainsbury’s label wine, gourmet cold meats and cheeses, and pricey ready-prepared food.

“Nonsense. My treat.”

“But I invited you down, and you’re being kind enough to help me out.”

“You paid for lunch. Now let’s get this stuff rung up so we can get oot of here.” Rex pushed off with the cart, leaving Malcolm to follow, uttering protestations.

By the time they reached the parking lot, the afternoon had darkened to dusk and the lamps had come on, helping them circumvent the puddles. Above the diffused brightness of the lights, black clouds scudded across the sky, but failed to chase away the rain that had started again when the men were in the store. The ominous weather only seemed to portend more misfortune.

The drive took longer on the way back to Notting Hamlet due to the rainfall. The lanes winding around the dripping hedgerows proved slippery and treacherous, and the car skidded a few times in the mud. The wipers sluiced the windshield while the downpour continued to shower the cottony landscape of flat fields and copses on either side of the road.

“You said Handy Randy lived on Owl Lane?”

“We’re not stopping there, are we?” Malcolm asked in shock.

“Why not? He did work on all four victims’ homes. It’s a coincidence worth looking into.”

“He’s worked on many homes in the Hamlet,” Malcolm countered. “He’s the resident handyman. And the police eliminated him from their inquiries.”

“But he knew the victims. He may be able to provide some insight. And since we have decided to meddle in this case, for better or worse,” Rex said, looking over at Malcolm, “I think we should call on him. There’s no point in approaching this half-cocked.”

“What about the shopping?”

“It won’t spoil in the boot, will it? Not in this temperature.”

Having run out of objections, Malcolm fell quiet. He seemed uneasy as they approached the ungated entrance to Notting Hamlet, shifting in his seat and sitting more upright. Rex felt sure, if his friend had been driving, he would not have turned onto Owl Lane.

“Left or right?” Rex asked.

“Left,” Malcolm said with obvious reluctance. “I really don’t feel safe on this street.” He stared out his window at the mock-Tudor homes, which were architecturally identical to those in the rest of the community, yet more neglected in appearance. Overturned trash bins and appliances discarded on the curb promoted the impression of an inferior neighbourhood.

“It’s this one.” Malcolm pointed through the passenger window.

Randall’s property was the best-maintained Rex had seen on Owl Lane. He took in the recently painted window frames and gutters free of leaves and debris, as befitted a jack-of-all-trades. A swing set stood on the tidy lawn beside a small kennel painted green, but, in spite of the fact the rain had eased off, he saw neither child nor dog.

They left the car on the street and walked up the cobble-paved path. Rex knocked firmly at the familiar four-panelled hardwood door with central iron knob. He had faced many such doors in the community. He did not have long to wait.

The door swung inwards to reveal a blondish woman in baggy sweatpants holding a runny-nosed toddler against her stained sweater. She looked impatient and suspicious at the same time.

“Sorry to bother you,” Rex said. “Is your husband home?” Not knowing Randall’s last name, he felt it best to refer to him in this manner. The woman looked about the right age to be his wife, though her appearance was by no means up to the level of her property, her dark inch-long roots and peeling nail polish in dire need of a touch-up.

“He’s on a job,” she replied in a coarse voice. “What do you want him for?” She eyed the men more suspiciously still.

“I was thinking of remodelling my kitchen,” Malcolm said. “I live on Badger Court, number Sixty-One. The name’s Malcolm Patterson. I’m in the book.”

The toddler began squirming and fussing in the woman’s arms. His chin began to crumple up even as Rex watched. From cherubic lips ensued a stuttering whine, precursor to a full-blown tantrum.

“I’ll tell him.” The prospect of a big job rendered the woman’s tone more agreeable. “Oh, I won’t have to. There he is now.” She jerked her unmade face toward the street, where an older-model grey panel van was turning into the driveway. On its side a decal advertised “Good-as-New Home Maintenance” and gave a phone number. The child started waving his arms energetically and uttering a series of shrieks.

Rex thanked the woman, turned from the doorstep, and headed towards the van, Malcolm in tow.

“Remodelling your kitchen, eh?” he asked his friend in a low voice, smiling at his deception.

“Thinking of,” Malcolm qualified.

The driver of the van, a man pushing fifty, rolled down his window and leaned out to greet them. “Randall Gomez at your service,” he said, nodding a greeting.

Rex guessed the uniformly jet-black hair was helped along with a little dye. Jaunty blue eyes stood out from the man’s olive skin, which was beginning to sag at the jawline and fold at the base of the neck where a plaited gold chain nestled in the flesh. A self-rolled cigarette hung limp between the fore and middle fingers of his right hand, now resting on the van’s windowsill. He got out and stood before the two visitors.

Malcolm reached out his hand and introduced himself. “I was thinking of putting in a new kitchen. I gave your wife my particulars.” The woman in question had taken the screaming child back into the house and closed the door. “I heard you’d done some work for Ernest Blackwell and others in the neighbourhood, and wondered if you might be able to provide some references.”

“You won’t get a reference from Ernest any more than I’ll get my pay cheque. He’s dead, mate. Don’t you watch the news?”

Malcolm pursed his lips before speaking. “Of course I do. I take it you didn’t get paid?”

“Oh, he was good for it, was old Ernest. Never forgot stuff like that, but his death was what you might call untimely. I’d all but completed a plumbing job for him, and next thing I knew someone had done the poor geezer in with piano wire. He loved all those music hall tunes, did Ernest. He’d be playing them while I worked. He’d always make me a cup of tea and we’d have a good old natter. He was partial to Jaffa cakes; I suppose because the sponge and orange jam was easy on his dentures.” Randall stroked away a tear from the corner of his eye. “Poor old bugger. Didn’t deserve that.”

“I’m sure the others didn’t either,” Rex said with a commiserating sigh. “Did you know them well?”

“Vic and Barry? Well enough. Barry was a character, too. Hard to have a conversation with, though, on account of his hearing aid. I kept telling him he needed a new one. I didn’t do much work for Vic Chandler. He could fix most stuff himself, but he didn’t have a head for heights and wouldn’t go up a ladder. That’s when he’d call me. I put up his satellite dish.”

Rex felt Malcolm bristle beside him.

“And Valerie Trotter?” Rex enquired.

“What about her?” Randy asked defiantly. The man took a long pull of his rollie.

“My friend’s been following the case,” Malcolm said on Rex’s behalf. “He didn’t mean to speak out of turn.”

“Right, well, about this job you want doing,” the handyman said. “I could come round and give you an estimate, bring some samples. I did Vera Murdock’s on Fox Lane. Came out lovely,” he said with a cocky air. “She’ll give you a reference all right.”

“Terrific.” Malcolm gave Randall Gomez his phone number and suggested he come by early the following week.

The two men got back in their car as Randall stood by, watching.

“Not sure he believed you,” Rex told Malcolm as he made a U-turn on the street.

“Well, I hope you’re satisfied. I told you it would be a waste of time.”

“Maybe,” Rex said.

“I don’t trust that chap, or his slattern of a wife.”

“Och, she wasna that bad!” Rex retorted in Scots vernacular, as he often did when indignant. “She probably does not get much time to herself what with a wee bairn and two other children.”

“You wouldn’t find their sort in Morningside,” his friend replied snobbily, referring to Rex’s genteel neighbourhood in Edinburgh.

“That’s as maybe. Well, let’s stop by the Ballantines’, see if they’re home yet.”

However, as they approached the two-story home in Otter Court, no lights were visible, contrary to what one would expect on such a dull autumn afternoon had someone been home. Leaving Malcolm in the car, Rex hurried up the path to the door and rang the bell, which chimed deep within the house, the high note followed by a lower, more resonant tone. He imagined the empty air surrounding the bereft furniture and abandoned spaces waiting for the family to bring the rooms back to life.

He waited a moment longer and rapped with the iron knocker. Only the dead silence responded.

_____

“I expect they’re still at work,” Malcolm said as Rex ducked into the car beside him.

“I was hoping the lad would be back from school. Does he drive?”

“Probably, but I don’t know if he has a car. I don’t come into this cul-de-sac very often. I sometimes see his upstairs light when I turn into mine.”

“What do the parents do?” Rex asked, driving back to Malcolm’s house.

“I think she’s a teacher. Rick’s an accountant, commutes to Bedford. That may be another reason for wanting to move, so he can be closer to work.”

“I got their house agent’s number off the sign. David Gleeson. I’ll see if the house was shown to a young couple. Any chance you could call DCI Cooper and elicit some more information?” Rex had to admit he was feeling pretty stumped at this point.

“I was at the station only this morning,” Malcolm objected. “It would look like I’m pestering him. And I doubt he’d tell me anything more than he already has.”

Rex pulled into Malcolm’s driveway and stopped the car. He sighed dispiritedly. Four corpses and little in the way of meaningful clues.

“You’ve only been on the case since yesterday evening,” Malcolm consoled him as he unbuckled his seat belt. “We’ve made some headway. We now know from Chris Walker’s receptionist that he has form. And we also know the young couple didn’t go through his office and probably never met him. So they wouldn’t be able to give us any information about him. It’s not a lead, but at least we know it’s a dead end. Perhaps you’ll have more luck with David Gleeson.”

While his friend unpacked the groceries, Rex put on the coffee, using the Colombian roast he had purchased at Sainsbury’s. At least Malcolm didn’t stint on the heating, and the kitchen felt nice and toasty compared to the damp cold outside.

When Malcolm went to watch the cricket on television, Rex settled at the kitchen table with his notepad, where he added Lea’s and Randall Gomez’s names to the list of people he had spoken to and jotted down the salient points of his and Malcolm’s conversations with them. He already had Lottie Green and Charlotte Spelling. Wasn’t Lottie short for Charlotte, he idly wondered? Those two residents, along with Win Prendergast, Malcolm’s neighbour, and Randall were the only residents he had met so far. Mr. Woods at number 45 Fox Lane, who had slammed the door in his face, barely counted.

Next he called Gleeson, the Ballantines’ house agent, and got his voicemail. As he finished leaving a message, his cell phone signalled an incoming text. It was from Helen: