Night Fall (24 page)

Molly remained silent, but her eyes were steady on his face. ‘All right, so what if I did?' he said belligerently. ‘That was a while back. There was nothing to it. It was just sex. It didn't mean anything.'

‘So you weren't jealous when you saw her being chatted up by another man? And a good looking one, according to you.'

‘Jealous?' Crowley scoffed. ‘Of someone chatting up Con? You must be joking.'

‘You say it didn't mean anything to you,' Molly persisted, ‘but what about Connie? How did she feel about it?'

‘Grateful, I should think,' Crowley said cockily, and laughed.

Molly had to bite her tongue. She looked down at her notes. ‘I need a better description of the man Connie was talking to,' she said, ‘so if you could give me the names of some of the people who were in here that night, I'll see if any of them remember this man.' She stood with pencil poised over her notebook. ‘What about this man Peacock, for instance? You say he lives close by?'

Crowley shook his head impatiently. ‘It's no good asking him,' he said. ‘Silly old bugger's out of it half the time, and he can't see more than a yard or two ahead of him.'

‘So what about some of the others?'

Crowley shrugged. ‘Like I said, it was a quiet night, and this bloke didn't come in till after ten, so the few regulars who were here were gone by then. As for the rest, I've seen one or two of them before, but I couldn't tell you who they are or where they live. So, sorry, can't help you. Are we finished?'

Molly closed her notebook. ‘Not quite,' she said. ‘I'm afraid I must ask you to come down to the Charter Lane police station to make a formal statement, and to work with one of our photofit technicians to put together a picture we can circulate. I know it's inconvenient,' she continued as Crowley started to protest, ‘but considering the fact that three people have been killed in Broadminster in recent weeks, I think we should treat the disappearance of Connie Rice very seriously indeed. So the sooner—'

The sound of her mobile cut off whatever she was going to say. She looked at the screen, which showed it was Ormside calling. What now, she wondered. She excused herself and moved away from Crowley, who took that as his cue to duck into the lounge.

‘We've found Connie Rice's car,' the sergeant said when she answered. ‘It was parked illegally in a residents only zone in Windsor Street. Been there since yesterday morning, till someone phoned and asked for it to be removed. Are you still at the pub?'

‘Yes, I am.' Molly was trying to remember where Windsor Street was.

‘Good,' Ormside said, ‘because you won't have far to go. Windsor Street is a little cul-de-sac one street over from where you are. A two-minute walk at best, so get over there now and keep everyone clear until I can get a forensic team down there to take over. Has Crowley been any help?'

‘More or less,' Molly said guardedly.

‘What about the man who was chatting up the girl just before she went missing? Can he give us a description?'

‘He says yes, but he's reluctant to come in because—'

Ormside snorted. ‘Never mind reluctant,' he said. ‘It's not his call. We need that description, and we'll need a statement from him. And with the car being found so close to the pub, he could be a suspect as well.'

T
regalles and Molly arrived back at Charter Lane within minutes of each other. ‘Lots of books and magazines,' Tregalles told Ormside, ‘but I'm afraid Connie Rice wasn't big on committing things to paper. We found an old diary of sorts, but it stops in March 2009, and it made pretty boring reading anyway. No personal letters, and as Sandra Palmer told us, not so much as a suggestion of a boyfriend.'

‘Any indication of a lesbian relationship?'

Tregalles shook his head. ‘Not if the magazines she likes are any indication,' he said. ‘The team's still over there, but I don't think we can expect much from them.'

Ormside turned to Molly. ‘What about your man?' he asked. ‘Is he cooperating?'

‘I had to almost drag him here,' she said. ‘I think he sees Connie's disappearance as nothing more than an inconvenience to him. I don't think he could care less about what might have happened to her.'

‘Do you believe his story about a stranger chatting up Connie?'

‘Yes, I do,' said Molly. ‘I don't think he's lying about that.'

‘Right. In that case, I'll have Maxwell take his statement, but I want you to read it over and see if there are any discrepancies or deviations from what he told you. And get Keith Morran together with Crowley to see if they can come up with a credible photofit. He may or may not have anything to do with Rice's disappearance, but the sooner we find him and talk to him the better.'

‘Right.' Molly was about to turn away, but Ormside stopped her.

‘Almost forgot,' he said. ‘Peter Jones, the choirmaster, is in room three. He came in looking for you and decided to wait when I told him you were on your way in.' Ormside glanced at the clock. ‘He's been there close to half an hour now, so better go and talk to him.'

Peter Jones was older than she had expected. Late fifties, maybe sixty. Not very tall but solidly built. Short grey hair, broad forehead, steady grey eyes, strong facial features, and you knew he was paying attention when he looked at you.

‘It was very good of you to come in, Mr Jones,' said Molly as she sat down facing him across the table. ‘Sorry you had to wait. It's been a bit of a busy day.'

‘No problem,' he said. ‘It's been that sort of day for me as well, or I would have been here earlier. But when a bank calls and says it's urgent, we have to respond immediately. Fortunately, it didn't take long to fix the problem.'

‘I wish I could get that kind of response when my computer crashes,' said Molly, ‘but then, I'm not a bank.'

Peter Jones took a card from his pocket and handed it to Molly. ‘Try us next time,' he said. ‘You may not be a bank, but we do pride ourselves on our response time.'

Molly looked at the card. ‘I will,' she said, ‘and thank you.' She looked at the card again and said, ‘Percival Street? Is B and B fairly new in Broadminster?'

A rueful smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. ‘So much for advertising,' he said. ‘We've been there almost three years, which is when I moved here. I used to work for Danforth DataCom as a technical programme manager in Wolverhampton until they were taken over by an American firm. I could have kept my job with the new company, but it meant moving to America, and I didn't want to do that. Fortunately, Bill Bristow, who owns B and B Data Specialists, is a personal friend; he was about to open a branch in Broadminster, and he offered me a job. So I moved here and I'm glad I did. I like Broadminster, and I've made quite a few friends here.'

‘Through the church, I imagine,' Molly said. ‘And now choirmaster. You must have a good voice.'

‘Only fair,' he said modestly, ‘but I do have a degree in music. I used to teach it many years ago, but I couldn't make a decent living at it, so I went back to university and found my niche in electronics. But I do enjoy the choir, so when no one else would take on the job of choirmaster when Adam Fairfield left, I volunteered.'

‘Which brings me to why we're here,' Molly said, taking out the photograph found among Gavin Whitelaw's possessions. ‘I know this was taken years before your time here, but I'm wondering if Mr Fairfield left any pictures or a record that might tell us the identity of the junior members of the choir in this picture?'

Jones studied the photo, then shook his head. ‘I'm afraid not,' he said, ‘and I can't say I'd given it any thought until you rang. But there must be some sort of record of those times.' He eyed Molly levelly. ‘I take it this is to do with the tragic death of Billy Travis,' he said quietly, ‘but I don't understand what it has to do with the choir. How is it involved?'

‘We don't know that the choir's involved at all,' said Molly. ‘We have reason to believe there's a common purpose behind the killings, but the only link we've found so far between the victims is that two of them were in the choir when they were teenagers, and one of those victims contacted an existing member of the choir shortly before he was killed.'

Frowning, Jones looked at the picture again. ‘So that was Billy back then,' he said soberly. ‘To be honest he wasn't the greatest of singers, but he enjoyed being in the choir and he was rarely absent or late, even for rehearsals, which is something that can't be said for all members, I'm afraid.'

He tapped the picture. ‘Mike Fulbright, the tall chap at the back, has probably been with the choir longer than anyone, so he might remember who they all are. Have you spoken to him? His father was the minister there for years.' He leaned closer and said, ‘Good Lord! Is that Meg Bainbridge when she was young?' He shook his head. ‘She's still with us, you know. Lovely voice. She could have gone further with training. Pity.'

He handed the picture back to Molly. ‘Thank you for showing me that,' he said. ‘Where did you get it?'

‘It belonged to one of the victims,' said Molly, ‘and one of the others had a picture of himself in cassock and surplice that was taken around the same time.'

‘So what is it you're looking for, exactly?'

‘This picture's estimated to be something like fifteen years old,' said Molly, ‘and while only two of the victims appear in it, some of the other youngsters in the picture may be able to tell us if the other victim was ever in the choir.'

‘I suppose I should have asked Adam Fairfield about that,' he said, ‘because the book I have was fairly new when I took over. Why not put the picture in the local paper? Some of those kids are probably still living here.'

‘We thought of that. But it was felt that, since the connection is so tenuous, and we could be wrong, we didn't want to start rumours and speculation about the choir without more evidence.'

‘Then why don't I contact Adam Fairfield and see if he can help? He may have taken some of that stuff with him. He must have kept some sort of records over the years. He doesn't have a computer, but his daughter does, and I've been in touch with him through her before. I don't remember the e-mail address offhand, but if I could have a copy of that picture, I'll send it off tonight and explain what it is you want. Even if he can only identify a few of the people in the picture, that could lead to others.'

The team of detectives and uniformed constables making door-to-door enquiries around Windsor Street and the Red Lion were kept going until ten o'clock that night before Paget told Ormside to bring them in. ‘But I want them back at it first thing tomorrow morning,' he said. He kept reminding himself that Connie Rice's disappearance probably had nothing whatsoever to do with the killings of three men, but he couldn't shake the feeling that it just might.

Surprisingly, once he'd stopped complaining, Rick Crowley had become interested in the process of building a picture of the man he claimed had been talking to Connie, and by three o'clock that afternoon, he declared the result ‘a pretty good likeness'. Warned of the consequences if he was misleading them, he stuck to his guns. ‘That's him!' he declared. ‘It might not be
exactly
right, but it's as near as makes no difference. So, now I've done your job for you, can I go and get on with
my
job?'

Paget had ordered the picture to be given to the media, together with the usual request for anyone who had seen the man to contact the police. Four people had called in by late evening, and those leads were being checked out.

One of the searchers in the Red Lion car park found a good-luck charm in the shape of a shamrock half embedded in the gravel some distance from where Connie usually parked her car. ‘It was about twelve feet away,' the man told Ormside. ‘Thing is, it was nowhere near the line she would normally take between her car and the door of the pub, but it could have come off if she were being carried or dragged to another car. I've shown it to the staff in the pub, and they say they're sure it came off her bracelet. We don't know
when
it was lost, but they said Rice was always fiddling with the bracelet, and she would have said something if she'd lost it earlier.'

Connie's car had been towed in for further examination, but the initial report from forensic was that there was no obvious evidence of a struggle.

‘So it looks as if she was attacked in the car park and dragged over to another car,' Ormside said. ‘Her attacker then drove her car out of the car park to make it look as if Connie had gone home. He parked it close by, then went back and drove away with the girl.' The sergeant's eyes were bleak as he looked at Paget. ‘Which would mean she would have to be unconscious or incapacitated in some way while he moved her car . . . or dead.'

W
indsor Street was a cul-de-sac consisting of eight houses on each side, with three forming a semicircle to close off the end of the street, and every one of them had been visited, without result. Some residents said they'd seen the car there, even noticed that it wasn't one they'd seen in the street before, but hadn't thought much about it at the time. Others said they hadn't noticed it at all. Even the woman who reported it said she hadn't noticed the car in front of her house until midday on Thursday. ‘I thought it must belong to someone visiting,' she told Tregalles, ‘so I left it, thinking it would be gone by evening. But when I saw it still sitting there this morning, I reported it and asked to have it removed.'

‘They're mostly older people in that street,' Tregalles explained to Ormside. ‘In fact I think half of them were on their way to bed by the time we packed it in last night. But even if they had been looking out, what could they tell us? Connie Rice didn't leave the pub until midnight; it was dark; there was no moon, so whoever drove her car around to Windsor Street wasn't taking much of a chance.