A Detective in Love (A Harriet Martens Thriller Book 2) Read online

  ‘Yes, ma’am. Or that’s what her stepfather told me.’

  He seemed unaware that anything out-of-order had gone shooting through her mind.

  ‘And he seemed kosher?’ she asked. ‘Kosher at least as far as you could tell? No blood flecks on his clothes, nothing like that?’

  ‘No, ma’am. He was still in shock when I got here, but more or less normal.’

  ‘All right, we’ll assume he was giving you the facts straight. So, if he found her just after six, and judging by the state of the blood, not all of it quite congealed, plus still-damp sweat on that singlet — under the shade in the tent it’s been slow to dry off — she must have been killed only a few minutes earlier. He didn’t say anything about seeing anybody out here, I take it.’

  ‘No, ma’am.’

  She glanced back at the big house, still as set in its summer stupor as when she had arrived.

  ‘There are windows overlooking here,’ she said. ‘Have you spoken to anyone bar the stepfather so far? If someone was awake earlier they might have seen an intruder.’

  ‘No, ma’am. I haven’t had a chance to talk to anybody yet, except Mr Renshaw.’

  ‘No? Well, you’ve done a lot already. Good work.’

  Why — Why am I giving the fellow credit like that? Is it because ... No, damn it, he has done well, and I should tell him so. But ...

  ‘Right. So, the work of some outsider. Unless I find different when I talk to whoever’s in the house.’

  ‘The mother, a secretary, cook and gardener couple, plus Mr Renshaw. That’s all. I’ve got a list of their names.’

  ‘No boyfriend for Bubbles Xingara?’

  ‘No, ma’am. In fact, going by what I read in the paper, she hasn’t got anybody and hasn’t had anybody.’

  ‘You can’t believe everything you read in the papers, DI.’

  That’s better. Treat him just as I would any other glib-thinking subordinate.

  ‘No, ma’am. But they always say about her that she’s too busy with tennis to have any what they call social life. And it seems down at the Eastbourne tournament the other day some fan shouted out to her, Who’s your boyfriend? and she just turned her head and shouted back, Who’s yours? Sparky, I say.’

  Abruptly he looked down at the girl’s body in its ugly mess of blood and faeces. ‘Poor kid,’ he said.

  ‘You’re right. So we’re going to find whoever it was who killed her. Whoever it was.’

  Harriet went back to the car, where the officer who had been found to drive her, Sgt Grant, snatched from night duty at the Rape Unit, was waiting. Seeing her sitting there placidly with the door beside her standing open, she thought suddenly of what they had talked about as they had driven out of Birchester, across the Leven at Levenham and on to isolated Adam and Eve House.

  It had been ironically amusing. Because Sgt Grant, with whom she’d long been on friendly terms, had learnt that the detective inspector assigned to her, a DI Anderson, recently arrived trailing clouds of London glory from the Met, had most probably been chosen to shunt him away from Birchester’s B Division, where he had been creating nothing but trouble. Not in his work. But in his so-called social activities.

  ‘I don’t know how true this is,’ sturdy Sgt Grant had said. ‘But the gossip is he’s made it his target to have every woman in B Div. Handy Andy, the WPCs call him.’ She had given a bark of a laugh then. ‘He’ll have his work cut out if he ever gets round to me. In the Unit, I see too much of the trouble random sex brings about.’

  ‘So what’s the man’s great secret?’

  She had put the question idly enough.

  ‘I dunno really. Of course, he’s a handsome sort of hunk. But you have to be more than that to score the way he does. Total self-confidence is probably it most of the time. Golden tongue, and not afraid to use it to get what he wants. Something like that.’

  ‘Well, he’d better keep his prick in his trousers while he’s under my command.’

  ‘If anybody can keep that there, you could.’

  The sergeant had glanced across at her then, as if wondering whether she had gone too far. And had there been, too, a glint of speculation in her eyes?

  ‘Okay, thanks for waiting,’ she said to her now. ‘But no need for you to stay on.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am. And best of luck with the investigation. Eyes of the world on you.’

  Then as she started up the car she tossed out one more word.

  ‘Oh, did they tell you? You won’t be seeing Handy Andy till tomorrow. He’s had to be called back from leave.’

  Handy Andy, Harriet thought. Will I find bloody sex complicating my investigation at every turn?

  And, more to the point, has it in Bubbles Xingara’s life complicated the case already? All right, apparently she didn’t have an acknowledged boyfriend. But here at Adam and Eve House can there be some other sexual entanglement? And, worse than that, there’s all the sexual interest from outside that the poor girl’s bound to have aroused. Men everywhere making her the object of their fantasies. An unhealthy interest, isn’t that what they say? Women, too, come to that. A woman could have had the same thoughts about her. God, there’ll have been dozens of people who’ve gone to tennis tournaments just to see her in the flesh. And stalkers. Little doubt that she’ll have been followed at times, followed by stalkers thinking at least of seizing her and, as they say, enjoying her.

  And all of them lost to view. If it turns out in the end that one of those hundreds did this, the investigation’s not going to be a matter of hours, nor days or weeks, but of months and months, even years.

  On the other hand, it could still be some nasty close-knit family business. It could be.

  So, go inside and do some talking.

  Again she became conscious of the cuckoo, sending out its maddening call time and again into the still morning air. A male, if I’ve got my orni-what’sit right, seeking a female. And didn’t John once tell me that a cuckold was named after cuckoo? How someone whose wife was being unfaithful must have hated in those days hearing that silly bird’s repeated and repeated call.

  But through French windows, left just ajar, she could see the man who must be Bubbles’ stepfather, and coach. He was sitting hunched in a deep chintz-covered armchair staring down at the floor at his feet. Green-and-yellow striped cotton-knit shirt, tan-coloured shorts revealing legs matted with coarse black hair, feet in trainers topped by thick white socks. Aged forty-five or so, slicked-back black hair, well built with broad shoulders.

  At present bowed down.

  She stepped inside.

  ‘Mr Renshaw? Mr Peter Renshaw? I’m Detective Superintendent Martens, leading the investigation into this sudden, appalling death.’

  ‘Yes?’

  He seemed to have nothing more to say. But after a moment or two he roused himself and looked up. A strongly handsome face, heavy unshaven jaw darkened with black bristles, tangled eyebrows descending in a frown of bemusement.

  ‘I — I’m sorry, Superintendent. I — I — This — It’s left me stunned, to tell you the truth.’

  The truth. But is he telling it? Or is this man, this evidently sporting type, intent on concealing what, in place of taking blood pressure, he had done to his stepdaughter just two hours ago? A macho figure, clearly. So what had been his relations with pretty, extrovert Bubbles? Father figure and acquired stepdaughter? Coach and pupil? Or ... Or what?

  But a roundabout approach.

  ‘Tell me,’ she said, ‘how long have you all lived here? In Adam and Eve House?’

  ‘Oh, eighteen months. Or more. More.’

  The dulled voice. But attempting to play the suddenly bereaved stepfather? Was this a mind in turmoil after a sudden burst of rage, at maybe some sexual rebuff, had made him thrust that weapon into the girl’s throat?

  And — this had been itching away at her mind from the moment that she had set eyes on the wound — what sort of weapon could it have been that had caused that unusual injury?


  ‘Adam and Eve House,’ she said. ‘It’s an odd name. Was that what attracted you?’

  He looked up at her, slightly less dulled.

  ‘Oh, it was Bubbles who wanted the place,’ he said. ‘Teenager’s romantic notion, really. The name made her absolutely set on it. Apparently, there’s a story behind it. The house was built — it’s eighteenth century — by a man called Adam Something for his new wife, an Evelina. And in the first flush of marriage he linked their names together.’

  Love. Sex, Harriet could not prevent herself thinking. Was this whole business going to be infused with Tolstoy’s amorousness? John would claim it was bound to be. But would he be right?

  ‘So it was your stepdaughter who actually made the purchase?’ she asked, keeping her voice casual.

  ‘Oh, yes. She’s the one with the money. She’s been a corporation in the States ever since she was fifteen, you know. A tennis star makes a hell of a lot. Not from prizes so much as with sponsorships, spin-offs, endorsements of a hundred and one unlikely things from cars to wristwatches.’

  ‘But she must have had — what? — trustees, when she was fifteen. Does she still have them today, or not?’

  Was it going to be money, after all, lying at the root of this? Not, for once, sex?

  ‘Well, yes, she does,’ Peter Renshaw answered, seeming to be slowly coming back to the world as it had been before he had found Bubbles’ body down by the river. ‘I’m one of them. Or ... Or I was. It was to be until she reached twenty-one. That’s in a couple of years’ time. Her mother is the other. But we neither of us ever stood in the way of her spending what she earned on what she wanted. Word of advice, maybe, but when it came down to it she was her own woman.’

  ‘So — I have to ask you this — who monetarily will benefit now?’

  He looked up in bewilderment. Or false bewilderment?

  ‘I — I suppose ... Well, I presume Bubbles’ mother will. I’m sure Bubbles never made a will. But — But you’re not saying — Look, that’s ridiculous. Aimée couldn’t possibly have done — done what happened. She — She was in bed asleep. I had to wake her up to tell her. And how would it have benefited her? Or me? We both depended on Bubbles’ career being successful. We couldn’t — No, Superintendent, this must have been some maniac. Some sex maniac.’

  He shunted himself up towards her.

  ‘No. It was a sex maniac. And I hope to God you catch him.’

  ‘I hope so, too, Mr Renshaw. But what I’d like to know now is whether anyone in the house was up early enough to see any —’

  The French windows, which Harriet had all but closed as she had come in, burst open with a clatter. A constable stood there, panting hard, his face glistening with sweat. From far away, now that the doors were open, came once again that sweetly irritating Cuckoo, cuckoo.

  ‘Ma’am, ma’am,’ the fellow managed to gasp out, ‘DI Brent’s compliments —’

  ‘Yes? Yes, man? What is it?’

  ‘Ma’am, they’ve collared someone. Come. Come quick, he said.’

  Chapter Three

  Hurrying out, Harriet saw coming round the corner of the house a cluster of irrepressibly grinning Leven Vale Police officers. DI Brent was in the middle of them, with his hand — that hand, she could not stop herself thinking — gripping by the elbow a shambling, roughly dressed man of sixty or so, who was making his way forward, head hanging, as if each step was more than he could manage.

  As soon as he saw her, DI Brent handed his captive over to the nearest uniformed officer, a hefty-looking sergeant, and came across.

  ‘Look what we’ve found, ma’am,’ he said.

  ‘Well, who is he? Do you know?’

  ‘I certainly do. He’s an old friend of ours. Name of Rowley. Tim Rowley. Layabout we’ve known for years in Levenham, always in and out of work and — and this is what you’ll want to hear — a long, long list of convictions for — words of the Act — wilfully, openly, lewdly and obscenely exposing his person.’

  ‘And more serious offences?’

  ‘Well, nothing he’s ever been done for, ma’am.’

  ‘So, where did you find him?’

  ‘About a quarter of a mile away, just off the lane that leads to the house. Fast asleep under the hedge.’

  ‘Drunk?’

  ‘Breath still smelt of it.’

  ‘Anything to say for himself?’

  ‘Not much, ma’am. Surly bugger, really. Way he always is when we pull him in.’

  ‘Blood on his clothing?’

  ‘Nothing to see. But what look like semen stains on the trousers.’

  ‘No sign of the weapon, I suppose.’

  ‘We looked around but didn’t find anything.’

  ‘We’ve got to have the weapon. If only to see what it actually was. But, first things first, we’ll have to question this fellow under proper conditions. I imagine you haven’t got a recording machine in that boathouse you’ve taken over.’

  ‘’fraid not, ma’am.’

  ‘Right. We’ll have him taken to Levenham then, and you’d better go there with me since you know him of old. Anybody out here now you can leave in charge?’

  No sooner had she said this than she felt a dart of disquiet. Without a car of her own here, she would have to go in the DI’s, putting herself in close company with the man who had aroused that jab of desire in her. Was that stupid? Well, had to be done, stupid or not.

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ DI Brent said now. ‘Sgt Wintercombe’s well experienced.’

  ‘Very well. Brief him. Tell him to get every man and woman he can spare looking for that weapon. Number One priority. And, wait, no doubt the media hordes will be here any time now. He’s to keep them well out of the way. And to say nothing, nothing at all, to any of them, right? Now, is that the pathologist down there with the body and the Scenes-of-Crime people?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  Then I’ll have a quick word, and you can drive me over to Levenham as soon as I’ve done.’

  ‘I’ll get my car.’

  *

  Less than an hour later Harriet was standing outside Levenham police station watching Tim Rowley, Old Rowley as everyone seemed to call him with half-affectionate contempt, being hustled inside in advance of the media. DI Brent, who now, against her better judgement, she knew as Anselm, was beside her. Under the euphoria of the capture, as they had driven together in his cramped little VW, he had produced, turning towards her with a sudden shy smile, that somewhat odd forename. And she had seen it as churlish, in informal circumstances, not to use it.

  ‘Name’s a sort of family tradition,’ he had said. ‘Levenham parish church is St Anselm’s, and I don’t know why but that name’s been handed down in our family, father to son, for as long as there’ve been Brents in the place.’

  ‘So you’re solidly local then?’

  She had a suspicion that it might have been better not to let herself get on such friendly terms with the man who had shown her that triggering right hand. She had been conscious, too, as they sat side by side, all too conscious, of his faintly sweat-smelling male presence. But, if they were about to get a result here and now, if Old Rowley really was Bubbles’ murderer, then it was surely safe enough to allow herself to be aware of that presence. It was hardly likely, after the committal, that she would see very much of DI Brent of Anselm.

  ‘Yes, we’ve even a sort of family tradition of serving in the police,’ he had answered then. ‘Going right back to the days when it was just the Levenham force, before anyone had thought of Leven Vale.’

  ‘So your father was a police officer?’

  ‘He was. Ended up as custody sergeant at the station here. And I dare say my young nephew Jonathan, who’s next in line, seeing as I’m not married, will be joining one day.’

  Not married? Free, she had thought. And had at once suppressed the thought.

  ‘Oh, yes? So how old is Jonathan now?’

  ‘Eleven. First term at Levenham Grammar. Bright lit
tle chap, though I say it.’

  ‘But won’t you be providing someone in the direct line yourself one of these days?’

  Damn it, why am I asking him things like this? Probing into his private life. Surely to God, I’m not asking once more Are you free sex-wise? It’s not what I want to know. I do not want to have sex with a junior officer, different force or not. I don’t actually want to have sex with anyone bar John, despite our agreement. That’s okay for him, with his long stints abroad, but I don’t need it. Not even while he’s away. Bloody, bloody sex.

  She had taken a deep breath then.

  ‘Tell me,’ she had said, keeping her voice even and only mildly interested, ‘Levenham, don’t you find it rather — well, quiet?’

  His answer had surprised her. Or, rather, it was the look he had given her, turning aside from the wheel. There was the smallest hint of mockery in the forget-me-not blue eyes, and perhaps the very slightest of smiles on his lips.

  ‘Oh, Levenham’s quiet all right. There never has been much to do, but I’m happy about that. Used to be a cinema once, but it closed down when everybody got the telly. So now there’s what? The municipal tennis courts, of course, where I go almost every day, and what they like to call the Water Sports Centre on the Leven. One of my neighbours is the bailiff there, so I sometimes take out a kayak and paddle up and down a bit.’

  Yes, she had thought. He’s been quietly putting me in my place, telling me not to be bloody patronizing. Good for him. I like it. Yes, I like the way he did that.

  And it was at this point, as they stood on the pavement outside the heavy old, formidably impressive Victorian police station waiting while Old Rowley was hustled out of the van that had brought him from Adam and Eve House, that Anselm turned to her.

  ‘Could you do me a little favour, ma’am?’ he asked.

  She stopped. A favour? What was this? Had he somehow guessed that favours were what she wanted to give him? And were they? Were they? No, they were not.

  ‘Yes?’

  He smiled then, his occasional, devastatingly straightforward, bashful smile.

  ‘That lad hovering there,’ he said, nodding towards the corner of the building. ‘That’s young Jonathan. Well, on my way out this morning, crack of dawn, he was up — we live in the same house, you know, his mother joined us when his Dad died — and I mentioned where I was off to. Said my boss most like would be the famous Hard Detective. Well, thing is — Well, he’d love to have your autograph, ma’am.’