Murder on the Moor Read online

  He accelerates – he wants to check the registration. But immediately he realises the futility of what he has in mind; towing his boat is like running a three-legged race; the narrow winding lanes will thwart him. And when, in hamstrung pursuit he passes first the deserted right turn to Overthwaite, and then reaches the crossroads signposted left to Keswick and right to Cockermouth, and all is quiet, his pessimism is confirmed as mere pragmatism.

  He waits at the junction, pondering his next move. The clock on the dashboard reads five past one. He grimaces – not because of the time, and the realisation that the takeaways will all be closed – but because he knows someone who owns a small yellow hatchback: his colleague, DS Jones.

  7. OVER MOOR

  Tuesday morning

  ‘Cheers.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’

  DS Jones sounds surprised – perhaps it is the tone of her superior’s word of thanks, as much as that he even uttered it at all. She takes her regular seat before his office window; he has the blind down and tilted to deflect the harsh morning sun. Though the window itself is open and an invigorating potpourri of birdsong carried on the cool morning air infiltrates between the slats. Skelgill takes a couple of thirsty pulls at the mug of tea she has supplied; she does not have one for herself; instead she is provisioned with notes and an electronic tablet.

  After a few moments, during which it is evident to DS Jones that Skelgill has something to get off his chest – and for which reason she waits in silence rather than introduce her own subject – he seems to regard her with a mixture of frustration and regret. Or is she reading too much into his reticence? She smiles demurely and crosses her legs and looks away. When his question comes it is rather prosaic.

  ‘How did you go on last night?’

  Yet DS Jones glances up sharply – perhaps she is sensitive to his precise phraseology, which might be considered indiscreet to the acute ear.

  ‘Oh – er – I finished the report. I emailed it – about midnight?’

  She appends a question mark to her statement, suitably inflecting the final word.

  Skelgill frowns; he casts a defensive hand towards his creaking in-tray.

  ‘I’ve not had chance to log on.’

  Unfazed, that when he might have commended her efforts but instead has self-referenced, DS Jones switches into a businesslike mode. She pats the pile of admin on her lap.

  ‘It’s okay – I’ve got printouts.’ She hesitates for a moment. ‘But, to be honest, Guv – it’s only what you already know. I think the feedback that has come through first thing this morning is more pertinent.’

  Skelgill appears to give up on whatever is troubling him and resigns himself to following her line.

  ‘Aye?’

  DS Jones glances at the vacant seat beside the tall grey filing cabinet.

  ‘Should we wait for DS Leyton? He just took an urgent call as I left. I don’t suppose he’ll be long.’

  Now Skelgill flaps his hand carelessly.

  ‘He can catch up after.’

  DS Jones looks momentarily doubtful, as though she knows her colleague might be disappointed.

  ‘Sure, Guv.’

  Briefly, to refresh her memory she interrogates the tablet. Then she lays it down again.

  ‘Taking things in a logical sequence, Stan – Carol Valentin Stanislav – is who he purports to be. The Moldovan authorities have confirmed the passport is genuine and the family have identified him from the photograph. No criminal record. He’s from the capital, Chisinau. He is not known to hold a Romanian passport. The family say he has been working abroad for several years, mainly in the agricultural line. He is unmarried but had a long-term girlfriend in Chisinau whom he used to return to visit, but they believe she moved to work in Germany about a year ago. They say they last saw him in December – the dates correspond to what Daphne Bullingdon told us. They didn’t know he was in the UK – but Immigration have confirmed his visa is valid.’

  Skelgill looks like questions are occurring to him, but he holds his peace. His sergeant is not to be underestimated, and he is immediately proved correct.

  ‘A work visa isn’t easy to obtain for non-EU nationals – especially in a kind of general handyman role. It’s possible that the Shuteham Hall estate is his sponsor – but normally it would be for a more highly technical position. We might want to look into that, Guv? Also I wonder why he didn’t tell his relatives he was here in England.’

  Skelgill nods, politely but without great enthusiasm.

  ‘As for the more immediate situation – no sightings, obviously.’ Now Skelgill adds a single more decisive bow of the head – he has automatically assumed that any such news would have been broken first and immediately. ‘We’ve got some basic mobile data. His phone was last active – in other words last switched on – until just after one a.m. on Saturday. At that point it was somewhere in the approximate vicinity of the estate, but not necessarily on the property itself. It could have been intentionally switched off – it could have run out of battery. It has not been on the network since – which might be a matter for concern. We’re waiting for details of any recent calls and texts. It would appear to have had very low usage generally – of course, they have two-way radios for contacting staff around the estate, although Stan wasn’t issued with one over the weekend.’

  Skelgill, thinking, and drinking, puts down his mug.

  ‘He could have another phone – or SIM card.’

  ‘I agree, Guv – we’re just going by the number that he provided to Daphne Bullingdon. I’ve requested an analysis of all mobiles used in the vicinity of the estate in the last month. It could be a bit of a tortuous process, but by elimination we might be able to narrow it down – see if there is a number that has been regularly active and is now suddenly elsewhere.’

  Having reached the extent of her update, DS Jones lays her palms upon her pile of materials and leans forward, as though she is soliciting her superior’s opinion – but she decides he might respond more candidly to an assertion.

  ‘This information points to him still being in Britain. That would fit with the theory that he took the jewellery and has either hooked up with criminal associates, or has realised it would be too risky to attempt to try to leave the UK and has simply gone to ground.’

  Accordingly this triggers a rejoinder, though Skelgill’s tone is rather unfairly dismissive.

  ‘Underground. Underwater. I’d say drag the lake – the little one, Troutmere – except his rod and his wellies are back in the gatehouse.’

  But DS Jones knows her boss well enough to appreciate that he is a man who uses the maxim “many a true word is spoken in jest” as an actual technique – to provoke those around him, and no doubt to provoke himself.

  ‘But, Guv – we don’t have anything to indicate that he came to some harm.’

  ‘Since when did lack of evidence blind us from the blindingly obvious?’

  Now DS Jones cannot suppress a wry smile. Here is another classic Skelgillism: oxymoronic, and attributing his own questionable habits to his colleagues.

  She persists with her efforts to encourage him to reveal what he really thinks.

  ‘Then again most mispers turn out to be false alarms.’

  But Skelgill will not be drawn; his tone remains dry.

  ‘Aye, he could have gone native for all we know. He might be living wild in the woods. Having a crack at the Bob Graham. Then got injured. Fell walking, as Leyton would say.’

  As if by some clever intuition on Skelgill’s part, his mention of his sergeant brings the sudden appearance of DS Leyton in the doorway of the office. Indeed, as if summoned like a dutiful genie, he skids to a halt, necessitating his grabbing onto the door’s jambs. His mop of dark hair is more than usually tousled, and his complexion flushed. A corner of his shirt has escaped from the belt that restrains his somewhat out-of-condition midriff. He takes a gasp of air and yanks at his tie to loosen it.

  ‘Guv – just reported – on O
ver Moor – a body.’

  Skelgill glares as though he is actually annoyed – as if this news is unwelcome in the sense that it spoils everything he knows. He glances to see that DS Jones is regarding their colleague with considerable trepidation.

  Skelgill utters just one word, his intonation flat.

  ‘Stan.’

  DS Leyton opens his mouth to speak, but having sprinted from his desk and evidently having used the stairs rather than the lift, is still in oxygen debt.

  ‘No, Guv – not Stan.’ Now he wheezes out the words. ‘It’s that cocky geezer – the gamekeeper, Melling.’

  *

  ‘Who found him?’

  ‘A twitcher chap, sir. Mr Neil Vholes.’ PC Dodd, the first officer on the scene, cocks his head in the direction of Over Water. ‘He’s ower at yon bird hide – I’ve asked him to wait. He weren’t keen on bringing me out here. Reckoned there’s some rare buzzards nesting – and he don’t want ’em mithered by us.’

  Skelgill regards the young constable pensively.

  ‘Aye, hen harriers they’re called.’ He casts about, calculating his bearings from the roof and angle of orientation of the hide. ‘The nest’s a good way off. We should be alright.’

  Notwithstanding Skelgill’s reassuring words, the constable appears to be consumed by self-reproach.

  ‘I thought he were winding me up, sir. Happen I might have upset him.’

  Skelgill does not look particularly concerned – questions are queuing up in his mind and he turns to DS Leyton to delegate those most pressing.

  ‘Leyton – get over to Shuteham Hall – I’m assuming they don’t know. Don’t let anyone leave before we speak to them. Call the SOCO team – make sure they put up a tent – and bring as many screens as they’ve got – to cover the approach from the lane.’

  His sergeant is looking a little pale faced.

  ‘Righto, Guv – I’ll get that sorted. I reckon I’ve seen enough here.’

  DS Leyton nods to his trio of colleagues and lumbers away. Skelgill watches him for a moment; it is not like the phlegmatic Londoner to be squeamish. He pulls from his pocket his map of Shuteham Hall estate and beckons to PC Dodds.

  ‘For the time being, you mount a guard at the stile beside the bridleway – where you came in.’ Now he jabs a finger at a spot on the map. ‘And we’ll need an officer here. That’s where this beaters’ path is accessed from the grounds. Just to stop folk from the hall coming along. Otherwise, no one’s likely to approach the scene from any other direction; it’s private shooting land for miles around.’

  PC Dodds nods, perhaps a little apprehensively.

  ‘Yes, sir. I’ll radio that in while I take up position.’

  He looks like he feels he ought to salute to Skelgill in order to excuse himself, but Skelgill saves him the trouble by turning away and gazing broodingly across Over Moor towards the site of the harriers’ nest. The constable grins rather inanely at DS Jones; she smiles and helpfully tilts her head to indicate he should feel free to depart. As former schoolmates their career paths have been parallel if not line abreast. DS Jones walks across to stand beside Skelgill, though she does not speak, and simply looks the same way. After a few moments they are diverted by a bellicose grunt from behind them. It is the sound of the hefty and none-too-spritely pathologist, Dr Herdwick, rising from a kneeling position held overlong. He puts away a notebook and pencil, and peels off a pair of nitrile gloves. Knowing he has the full attention of his audience, he brushes down his unsuitably heavy tweed outfit before declaiming in a tone that to an outsider would sound decidedly lacking in solicitude.

  ‘It appears your man shot himself in the foot.’

  The two detectives cross to stand facing their medical colleague. Skelgill, for the first time in the ten or so minutes that they have been at the scene, finds himself looking analytically at the reason for their presence. Why, he cannot say, but his senses have been attuned to the surroundings, innocuous though they might seem, rather than the dramatic sight at their epicentre. But now he focuses. And his eyes immediately narrow.

  The body of Lawrence Melling lies contorted and stiff on the hard baked earth of the beaters’ path, a pose reminiscent of a ‘fouled’ footballer frozen in the throes of faked agony. But any pain felt was surely real, for the left leg is clamped at the shin and calf by the jaws of a cast iron mantrap. The archaic apparatus bears a striking resemblance to that which Skelgill saw displayed in the fortified entrance to the castle. By the dead man’s right side is a shotgun. On his face and hands there are smears of blood. The ragged trouser leg, shredded by the pathologist in the fashion of Robinson Crusoe, is even more heavily bloodstained.

  But it is not the barbaric medieval spectacle that now arrests Skelgill – indeed he assimilated all this within the first few seconds of his arrival upon the scene. That he feels suddenly detached, and that the voice of Dr Herdwick fades to a distant drone, has a more mundane cause: a varnished staff capped by an antler that protrudes from the heather bordering the beaters’ path; a waxed-cotton hat that lies close by; and a cape, crumpled beneath the dead man.

  “The teeth of the trap alone would not have resulted in such catastrophic hypovolemia. However, what remains of his lower leg is full of lead pellets. The fibular artery has suffered acute trauma. Exsanguination would have occurred within a few minutes.” The voice halts, as though the speaker is expecting a question, but when none is forthcoming he adds a clarification. “That’s death by loss of blood – is that plain English enough for you?”

  Skelgill exits his trance.

  ‘He’s got Bullingdon’s gear.’

  This statement means nothing to Dr Herdwick; his great bushy brows become knitted – but DS Jones at least reads the gravity in her superior’s tone.

  ‘Pardon, Guv?’

  ‘Remember – when he came flapping into the estate office, looking for his wife? He’d put on that cape and hat, and was carrying the thumbstick – like he was on a mission to search the grounds.’

  DS Jones looks searchingly at each item in turn. She suspects that if Skelgill were asked to describe what Miranda Bullingdon had been wearing, quite likely he would just say, “white”. But outdoor paraphernalia is right up his street. She makes a quiet observation.

  ‘It didn’t rain last night.’

  Skelgill jerks his head around to look at her. But, when he might comment, he holds back, as though a second thought has outranked the first. It is a little while before he does have something to add. Tentatively with the tip of his boot he taps the shotgun.

  ‘I don’t reckon that’s the gun he had the day the buzzard was shot.’

  DS Jones frowns, her normally smooth brow creased; during her interview with Lawrence Melling he demonstrated several of the firearms, trying to impress her with their value, especially Lord Bullingdon’s prized possession; but they were so similar in appearance. She realises this is her own ‘white’ moment.

  ‘Why would that be?’

  Yet Skelgill regards her question as rhetorical – for it can only be speculative – and he demonstrates no inclination to reply. But mention of the weapon has prompted the pathologist, who is always glad to stick in his two penn’orth when it is not his department.

  ‘If it was an unfamiliar gun it might explain why it went off when he walked into the trap. Snap. Boom. Goodnight Vienna.’

  For a second Skelgill glares angrily at his medical colleague; but he knows the man well enough to contrive a way to put him in his place. He adopts a sardonic tone.

  ‘You mean he didn’t try to blow off his own foot to escape from the trap?’

  Dr Herdwick affects the taking of offence.

  ‘Now, now, Inspector – I’m just trying to help. It looks plain enough that you’ve got an unfortunate accident on your hands.’

  Skelgill decides there is no need to argue. Besides, Herdwick can be a cankerous old devil and he doesn’t want him taking his bat home. He notes already he has used ‘you’ and ‘your’ w
hen ‘we’ and ‘our’ might be more collaborative. So he nods slowly, thoughtfully – even ostentatiously. Then, when the man appears placated, he speaks.

  ‘But I’d like to know what time of accident.’

  It is a curious phrase, but it suffices; indeed it would bear semantic scrutiny, especially when uttered as it is by a detective. And the doctor, having found the ball returned to his specialist court, now grimaces with a good degree of reluctance.

  ‘We’ll know more when the cavalry arrives. And more still when we get him back to the lab. There’s factors such as the temperature profile last night. His physical condition. The rate of blood loss. There’s computer programmes for this sort of thing nowadays.’ He stares rather ruefully at the corpse, his lined face seemingly regretful of these modern advances. And, when eventually compelled to speak – perhaps to fill the expectant silence, unaware that the detectives are biting their tongues – his words perhaps echo such sentiments. He begins with an exclamation of frustration, best not printed. ‘But from a good old-fashioned perspective: the condition of the dried blood, the advancement of rigor mortis – not least, gut feel,’ he checks his wristwatch as the detectives look on, ‘I’d say you wouldn’t be far wrong with midnight.’

  ‘Midnight!’

  Skelgill cannot help his reflex reaction, and a tone that implies he thinks this is impossible. But the doctor responds stoically.

  ‘Give or take. You know your darts, aye? Midnight’s your bullseye – between ten p.m. and two a.m. is your twenty-five. Name your odds.’

  Skelgill looks a little more relieved upon hearing the wider range. But his thoughts are racing. It places his own presence very close to the probable time of the gamekeeper’s demise. The implications of this are yet to be appreciated and acted upon. For the present, he pushes them to the back of his mind. He turns to DS Jones.