Witchmoor Edge (21 page)

"He came out of the office for a few minutes
and met me in a café in Broadway. He took the stuff, but he brushed
me off."

"What time?"

"You're going to think me deliberately
unhelpful, but I don't know. It must have been about a hour and a
quarter after he called me."

"Come on now," Millicent said. "What time did
you arrange to meet?"

"The arrangement was to phone from a call box
when I got to the City Centre, which is what I did. We spent about
fifteen minutes together and I just sat there on my own for another
half hour or so feeling really low. Then I went home."

"So why did you still go to the ‘Bulldog’ in
Burley Woodhead on Saturday?"

Rosie shrugged. "I tried to compete in the
bike race, like I said. When I dropped out, Gloria and I had
something to eat. After that I rode back via Woodhead and stopped
off for a while in the pub, feeling sorry for myself."

"Now. The stuff you gave Simon killed him.
Did you deliberately give him something rather more pure than
usual?"

"It wasn't cut as much as usual, but he knew
that," Rosie said.

"We only have your word for that."

"What I gave him could have been cut to
provide three or four shots at least and he knew that. If he died
from what I gave him it was either because he gave himself a shot
knowing he hadn't cut it or done anything to dilute it, or ..."

"Yes?"

"Or he cut some of it and someone else
switched the cut stuff and the uncut stuff."

"And who would do that?" Millicent asked.

Rosie shrugged. "I don't know," she said.
"Shirley?"

Lucy thought that, in Shirley’s place, she
might have done it.

"I think that's about it for the moment, Miss
O’Connor," Millicent said, getting up. "We will have to bother you
further, I'm afraid, but that will do for now."

* * *

Lucy did not usually talk about the specifics
of her job to Julia, but she had already talked about Alice Dent
and Ellen Barnes because of the similarity between their
relationship and her own and Julia's. Now she told Julia of Rosie
O'Connor, doing no more than thinking out loud.

"You don't think she did it, do you?" Julia
remarked.

"This bloke had led her a dance," Lucy said,
"got her hooked on heroin, lost her a job and then tossed her
aside. Here she was, still breaking the law for him after all that.
He takes the stuff and gives her the brush off. It would have been
easy to omit to tell him the stuff was purer than usual and let him
give himself an overdose." She paused and thought about it, then
added, "Funny though, I don't feel she did that and we'd never
prove it anyway, even if she did."

"If she didn't forget on purpose to warn this
nasty little get," Julia remarked, "Who gave him the overdose?"

"That's the problem. Either, one: Rosie
didn't tell him. Two: he forgot the warning and it was an
accidental death. Three: he did it on purpose, which is suicide, or
four: some one swapped doses and murdered him. It's going to be the
very devil to prove which."

* * *

Tommy Hammond did not usually talk to his
girlfriends about his work at all. He had long since discovered
that policemen often have difficulty with their private lives in
that area. Many women don't like a relationship in which so much
quality time is taken up with work and other people and in which
personal and family relationships have to take a back seat.

On this occasion Francesca Sapori was
presenting a problem he did not usually have. She was slender and
elegant and Italian looking, as her name and parentage suggested,
though she was as English as he was himself.

Francesca was getting to him more than most
women did. Tommy himself was smart, clean cut and quite a handsome
bloke. He possibly looked like a policeman once you knew his
background, but that wouldn't have been your first thought. Now he
was thinking that something more than a casual relationship with
Francesca might be possible. First, though, he'd have to acquaint
her with his profession. He wondered how best to do that - a
candlelit dinner on Saturday perhaps. Not that, come to think of
it, an August evening was quite suitable for a candlelit
dinner.

* * *

Millicent let herself into the cottage in
Baildon and gathered her post as went in. She dumped the post,
turned on the music centre and put in a CD. She tidied up a bit,
made herself a tuna salad and buttered a crusty bread roll she had
bought on the way home, tossing the salad in olive oil and cider
vinegar, in time with the beat of Blanket on the Ground.

Until she had finished her meal and washed up
it was quite definitely a Country & Western evening she ate to
the accompaniment of Dolly Parton, Don Williams and Mary Chapin
Carpenter; cleared the plates to Loretta Lynn and made a coffee to
Johnny Cash. The singers and the songs belonged largely to her
teenage years, but her mother and brother had both been Country and
Western music lovers and, though that part of her life was gone as
surely as her life with Carlos, the music remained.

Once her work was done, she changed the CD to
one of the Chilean group Quimantu, turned the music down very low
and sipped her coffee reading more of Footprints in the Psychic
Wilderness.

Chapter 14: Saturday 18th August 2001

The next morning Millicent arrived at her
desk in the incident suite in good time, but already Tommy Hammond
was reading the report from forensic about the jack handle. Another
report from forensic about the syringe lay on her desk.

"Both Knowles's prints and Hunter's were on
the jack handle," Tommy read, "and there were traces of skin and
blood. They're trying to match the DNA."

Millicent nodded. "And what do you conclude
from that?" she asked.

"Maybe no more than that Hunter left it
behind and Knowles moved it," he said. "But ..." He shrugged.

"But it could be that Hunter attacked Knowles
with it and Knowles grabbed it from him," said Millicent. "You're
absolutely right. Without knowing where the blood came from we
can't even guess. However," she added, "We could have another go at
Knowles and see if he sticks to the same story."

"And," Tommy said, grinning, "We could try a
bit of bluff."

"Such as?"

"We could let him think we know whose skin
and blood."

"We would have to be careful not to say
anything we have to unsay later," Millicent pointed out. "On the
other hand, if we go round now he probably hasn't gone out anywhere
yet. I think we'll go now and you can drive."

Tommy handed the forensic report to
Millicent. She took it, but was skimming through other folder.

"I'd forgotten we hadn't had a written report
on the syringe yet," she remarked. "It's a good job Gary Goss
brought us the detail."

She read through the brief report on the
syringe, put down the folder and led the way out, saying, "Remind
me to ask Shirley Hunter whether Simon was left handed!"

Shipley wasn't busy yet, and the main road up
to Guisley still had little traffic either. The sky was a cloudless
blue and Millicent pressed the electric window button and breathed
in warm August morning, the scent of cut grass and garden flowers
from the houses they were passing, the petrol fumes of a major road
and the slight background smell of the heather moors as they
slipped out of the town. The day was doubtless going to be hot. Up
on the moors there might be a slight breeze, but here in the valley
only the draught of the car's travel disturbed the still air.

Bernard Knowles was washing his car on the
drive when they pulled up outside his house. Millicent noted as
they walked up the drive that it was largely invisible from the
road. Knowles was watching them arrive and emerged from behind the
car with a fairly neutral expression, turning off the hosepipe as
they approached.

"Another week without rain and there'll be a
ban on hosepipes and washing cars," he remarked.

"You don't seem surprised to see us,"
Millicent observed in passing.

"My wife told me of your visit yesterday, and
that you left with a jack handle. I imagine you've come in
connection with that."

"Yes," Millicent agreed. "Forensic told us
that there were your prints on it, which is not surprising since it
was in your garage. They also told us that Simon's prints were on
it too. That also is not so surprising, since the initials SK would
seem to imply that it was his wife's - your sister's - before they
married. There are, however, three odd things about it, and an
interesting coincidence."

Millicent counted off on her fingers.

"First, it is odd that the jack handle was on
the bench in your garage. Second, many possible explanations for
that oddity require the rest of the jack to be in your garage, and
it wasn't. Three, there are traces of skin and blood on the jack
handle. I have asked forensic to check whether they are those of
Simon Hunter. I did that because there is the coincidence. Shall we
call it a fourth oddity?"

Knowles said nothing and his face betrayed
nothing. He was a pleasant man, looking pleasantly interested.

"The fourth oddity is that Simon Hunter
received a blow to the head while alive. The doctor at the autopsy
is quite certain it did not kill him, but it may have knocked him
out. I think, Mr. Knowles you know how Simon Hunter received that
blow to the head between twelve thirty and one last Saturday, and
it would save us a lot of time and trouble if you would tell us
what happened."

Knowles looked down, face still impassive and
breathed a deep sigh.

"Very well," he said. "You'd better come
inside and sit down."

Bernard Knowles took Tommy and Millicent into
his study. It was a spacious room, with desk and easy chairs, a
computer and shelves of books. He looked older and wearier than he
had been when they had interviewed him at his office, less than a
week before.

"It was something of a surprise and a relief
when the autopsy showed he died of a morphine overdose," Knowles
began. "I thought I'd killed him."

"Tell me what happened," Millicent said.

"I told you that Hunter was a vicious crook
and quite unscrupulous. He lied and cheated at every turn and he
was wantonly violent towards my sister. He was a brute. Last
Saturday, about 1.45 - I've no idea of the exact time so don't ask
me - Shirley drove into the driveway in great agitation. She said
Simon had been more than usually violent. He had threatened her
with a jack handle. In fact, he threw it at her but missed. She
jumped in her car and when he tried to break in the car she knocked
him out of the way and drove here.

We were wondering whether we ought to drive
back to her house and see whether he was seriously injured, when he
arrived here in the Porsche. He drove right into the driveway; half
staggered, half leapt out of the car and attacked us with the jack
handle. I wrenched it from him and hit him with it. He went down
unconscious. Shirley felt for a pulse and said he was dead. We
looked around carefully. The house is hidden from the road and
there was nobody about, so we put him in the luggage compartment of
the Porsche and took the body up to the picnic spot by the
reservoir. Shirley said there were a few picnic items in her car
and we could make it look like a picnic."

"Let's go back a bit," Millicent said. "You
said 'half staggered, half leapt'. What did you mean?"

"I suppose," Knowles said, "that he had been
injured when Shirley's car hit him. He was limping a bit, but he
was staggering as if he was drunk."

"He was a younger man than you. Were you
surprised you wrenched the jack handle from him?"

The question seemed to surprise Knowles and
he hesitated before answering. "I was too busy panicking at the
time," he said. "I supposed that desperation lent me strength. Now
you ask me and I think about it, I think I am surprised." Knowles
paused, and then added, "I'm convinced he meant to kill us though,
he was in such a rage."

"Why didn't you just plead self defence?"

"Of course that's what I should have done,
but I only saw that afterwards."

"Okay," Millicent said. "Now tell me what
happened at the picnic spot."

"I drove the Porsche," Knowles explained.
"Shirley drove her car up and parked it on the grass verge, while I
drove Simon's car right in, where we would not be seen from the
road. We opened the bonnet but we heard another vehicle
approaching. Shirley said to take her car and she'd get some friend
to pick her up. I ran out through the bushes and climbed over a dry
stone wall to Shirley's car."

"What did she do?"

"I didn't see."

Millicent drummed her fingers absently on the
chair arm and considered the story for a moment.

"Concealing a body is a criminal offence,"
she said, "because the body is the property of the coroner until he
has discharged it for burial. It's much the same offence as teenage
girls commit when they hide the body of a still born child they
don't want their parents to know about."

She continued drumming her fingers. "I don't
think a court or the CPS would consider the affray as anything but
self defence, but we still haven't ascertained how Mr. Hunter got
the overdose."

"I'm afraid I can't help you there," Knowles
said with a gesture of helplessness.

"No. Your story doesn't throw any light on
that," Millicent agreed. "Well, you'll have to come into the
station and make a new and detailed statement. I'll arrange for
Sergeant Gibbs to do that this morning, while we go and talk to
your sister."

Millicent stood up and took her mobile phone
from her belt.

Shirley Hunter was not at home, so Millicent
and Tommy drove to Bradford Royal Infirmary and tracked her down to
the neurological ward, where she was just about to take a break.
The two detectives and the nurse went into an empty day room.