The companion, p.17
The Companion, page 17
‘Rex is seventy, no children and he’s widowed. His wife Emily was killed in a car crash five years ago, actually on Blacklock Lane near here. Rex tortures himself over it: her car smashed into a tree for no obvious reason. Garry Haslem told me Rex has Parkinson’s, Rex has never mentioned it and Garry was not a reliable source. Rex seems fit enough, although at church a few weeks ago I saw him freeze as he went down the aisle, and that is a symptom.’ Freddy was suddenly wistful. ‘Now Timothy comes down to the van for the fish order, I don’t see Rex.’
‘Meaning Rex Lomax is cut off from the outside world?’ Toni’s warning bell clanged in her ear.
‘I don’t know if he sees other people.’
‘Might Garry Haslem have spotted Timothy had gained influence over Rex?’
‘I doubt it.’ Freddy was adamant. ‘No way would Rex Lomax be under anyone’s influence. He’s handled enough smart criminals to know every tactic.’
Toni wheeled around. ‘What? Wait, Rex Lomax, the criminal defence QC?’
‘Toni, don’t let that put you off him. Rex is not like Sarah.’
Crap. Toni had gone on at Freddy, saying that her being influenced by Rex into ferrying him to Mass every Sunday was exploiting her good nature, but she’d never actually asked about him. Far worse that he was a retired defence QC. A man who unpicked the police’s strenuously assembled evidence against guilty suspects, allowing them to waltz out of court for a pint with the red tops was on the side of the devil.
‘Rex was like a white knight out to protect the criminal justice system from miscarriages.’ Freddy looked way too dreamy.
‘Is that meant to sell him to me? Why would you choose to work for villains?’ Toni didn’t add that casting yourself as a horse-riding saviour had to be some kind of medical complex. She caught Freddy’s expression. ‘OK, for now, Rex Lomax is my new best friend. Tell me about Timothy Mew.’
‘Can’t tell you much. Rex said Timothy works for Silversage, that charity which supports the elderly. He works on the helpline from home, flexible hours allow him to be a companion. He’d have been vetted for Silversage and Rex said Cuckoo’s Nest, the organisation that matched Rex and Timothy, checked Timothy out.’
‘We’ll vet Timothy.’ Toni wasn’t letting go of Timothy Mew as a predator. No matter how streetwise a person was – and she had to agree, going by his reputation, Rex Lomax was up there – anyone’s better judgement could fall prey to wishes and desires. Had he been keen to sue an elderly woman who had accused him of murdering an owl because, while innocent of that crime, he had murdered Garry Haslem?
‘I liked the look of the friend who brought Timothy here. Martha seemed warm and friendly, shame she’s not Rex’s companion.’
‘Is it now?’ Toni raised an eyebrow.
‘Stop it.’ Freddy swiped Toni’s shoulder. ‘I only mean Martha was curious, a life and soul sort of person. If she’s Timothy’s friend that says something; he’s rather the opposite, I think.’
‘They’re not a couple?’ Toni knew that the nicest people had friends or partners who were horrors. Take Freddy with Sarah the lawyer. Freddy’s judgement could be skewed by her wish and desire for a partner.
‘I gathered Martha was seeing Patrick Bell, the accountant who lives in the attic.’
‘That was speed dating, since this Martha only appeared here five weeks ago.’ Toni had sketched a circle in her notebook with each resident as numbers on a clock. ‘Did she already know him? Is Martha Merry the reason why Timothy Mew is Rex Lomax’s companion?’ Toni’s thoughts ran ahead.
‘I don’t think so. Thinking about it, before we found Garry, Bunty had asked Patrick if he’d mended Martha’s car last night. She wanted to know why Martha had been prepared to drive off in the storm. From the shifty way Patrick confirmed he’d fixed it, I wondered if she’d dumped him.’
‘Martha was here last night?’ Toni hoped Freddy’s wondering wasn’t just wishful thinking.
‘Martha was at their residents’ meeting.’
‘Sounds like she and Patrick might be serious?’ Toni said carefully. ‘Like having the key to a bloke’s home?’
‘Could be.’ Freddy’s tone gave nothing way.
‘So, who else lives here? We have six flats.’ Toni flipped a page over on which she had sketched a child’s version of the house, divided into six spaces. ‘Garry Haslem had the ground floor to the left of the front door with Lady Erskine across the hall. Carry on down the passage past Garry’s front door and you reach the Old Library which they use for parties and meetings apparently. Garry’s place takes in the side of the first floor with a mezzanine. He showed me once, it’s pretty incredible. Rex Lomax and Timothy Mew are opposite also on the first floor above Bunty. The two doctors are on the second floor above Rex opposite Barbara Major who is above Garry. She’s always complaining about his music.’ Freddy indicated the six squares on the house diagram. ‘Patrick Bell is in the attic. He’s quiet and polite, if a bit dull.’
‘Which one is Patrick?’
‘He left just before we found Garry.’
‘Convenient. Did he say where he was going?’ Toni heard that bell again.
‘No, but there’s no reason he should have.’
‘What about the doctors? Do they buy fish?’
‘Yes, although more often than not their card fails – they’ve racked up quite a tab.’ Freddy laughed.
‘No fish for them then.’ Toni told Freddy.
‘They do pay eventually. Martyn Burnett’s retired, Garry called him a drug addict, and used to accuse Sylvia of being “The Lady Procurer”. She’s a GP in Burgess Hill. They don’t have kids.’
‘Any truth in the drug thing?’
‘Martyn looks dreadful most days, so it’s possible he’s on something. I don’t know why he comes down to the van with Sylvia. Perhaps to protect her from Garry’s insults, although most Tuesdays it’s the other way around. That said, I took what Garry said with a large pinch of the white stuff.’
‘You might want to rephrase that.’ Toni nudged Freddy. ‘So, no love lost between Haslem and the doctors?’
‘They hated him, he humiliated them every time their card was refused. Garry was chair of the residents’ committee and that seemed to give him power over them all. Sometimes I’ve even suspected they were frightened of him.’
‘Do you like any of them?’
‘I like Rex, obviously. Bunty’s a laugh. Garry could be too. I’ve got other customers who make the Blacklock House crowd look like angels. Otherwise, there’s no one else I’d want a cup of tea with.’
‘Who’s in this flat?’ Toni pointed at a square on the second floor above Garry Haslem’s mezzanine.
‘Barbara Major. Garry called her Major Barbara.’
‘Remember reading that at school? Didn’t have him taped as a Bernard Shaw fan,’ Toni said.
‘Vaguely,’ Freddy said. ‘It was an army reference, I think. Barbara is single, in her fifties, and does research for a crime writer. She won’t say who. Rex said he checked all the famous ones and didn’t find her name in the acknowledgements.’
‘Would any of them admit they don’t do their own research?’
‘I don’t see why they wouldn’t. It’s not the same as ghost-writing.’
‘What about less famous ones?’
‘Whoever it is must sell a lot of books, they paid for Barbara’s flat.’
‘Must be easy to trace the buyer’s name on the deeds.’
‘Apparently it’s Barbara’s name. It drove Garry mad, he hated people getting something for nothing. Although Barbara is always researching something or other so it’s hardly nothing.’
‘Why wouldn’t you have tea with her?’ Toni thought that, with her neighbours, Ms Major was paying through the nose for the flat.
‘I don’t trust Barbara, she’s passive aggressive. She’ll say something nice then stick the knife in.’ Freddy pulled a face at the phrase. ‘Last week she told me she’d loved the scallops, but what a shame two were broken. She didn’t care, but was warning me in case I got complaints.’
‘Eeeughh.’ Toni grimaced. ‘Tell me you didn’t give her a refund.’
‘That’s the job.’ Freddy shrugged.
‘Now you know why I don’t like defence lawyers.’
The white flapping canvas, green lawn and marble fountain conjured up a wedding scene. If only. Meeting Malcolm outside the tent, he told Toni that Forensics had finished and Garry Haslem’s body was on its way to the morgue in Eastbourne for the post-mortem. She and Malcolm would head there after they’d seen the residents.
‘Timothy Mew, who is companion to Rex Lomax, just told me that when he called his friend Martha to tell her about Garry Haslem, she sounded scared. Patrick Bell, the accountant who lives in the attic, had turned up at her salon.’
‘Divert Sheena there now.’ Toni and Malcolm had no need of please and thank you.
‘Sounds like Bell is trying to get Merry back.’ Half listening to Malcolm talking to Sheena, Toni thought out loud to Freddy.
‘Sounds like Martha doesn’t want that,’ Freddy said.
Malcolm was back. ‘The murder weapon—’ Perhaps recalling Freddy wasn’t police, he stopped.
‘Call me if you need to know anything else.’ Freddy headed away.
‘Thanks, mate.’ Toni blew Freddy a kiss. She turned to Malcolm. ‘If Tristan Robinson was seeing someone, he was using a burner phone, and we need to find it.’
‘Could the killer have taken it?’
‘He didn’t take Sally’s phone so if he did, it could be that it would lead us to him. It could link the two sets of murders. Or it could prove that there is no serial killer after all.’
‘It’s definitely a serial killer, Toni.’ Malcolm passed Toni an evidence bag. ‘Forensics found this under Haslem’s body.’
Sun beating on her forehead, Toni stared at the contents of the bag. ‘Is this—’
‘Series C. Like the other one.’
‘That means…’ Despite the relentless heat, Toni felt cold as ice.
‘It means Garry Haslem is the latest victim of the serial killer.’ Like the double act they were, Malcolm finished Toni’s sentence. He cleared his throat. ‘And it gets worse. Like the one we found on the heath, there’s a number on the Britannia side of the note.’
‘Not a bank teller’s tally.’ Toni flattened out the plastic bag to see better. ‘It’s a ten.’
‘I’m guessing it’s a tally of our man’s victims.’
‘I’m guessing you’re right.’ Toni might have been punched in the stomach. She put up a hand to shade her face from the sun and then let her arm drop.
‘Sorry to bother you, guv.’
Malcolm and Toni stared at Darren as if he was a stranger.
‘…one of them wants to report the murder of her pet owl. Lady Dorothy Erskine. She wouldn’t let me take details.’
Close on Darren’s heels was a tall, sparrow-thin woman with the patrician face that said she expected the waves to part for her.
‘I will only deal with the horse, not the stable-hand.’ She bore down on Malcolm.
‘I’m the groom.’ Malcolm stepped forward.
‘I’m the horse.’ The discovery of the series C five-pound note like the one they’d recovered from Dedmans Heath pointed to Haslem as the latest of – Christ, ten? – victims, which made Lady Bunty, dead owl regardless, an unlikely suspect. However, Toni needed to confirm this for herself. It meant the Crime Squad would not take Haslem off her hands. Garry Haslem was now part of Operation Foxglove.
‘It started with Maud.’
‘Molly?’ Thinking of the baby owl, Toni corrected Bunty.
‘Maud is a stuffed tiger, ma’am.’ It seemed Darren did a good poker face. But Toni’s ability to see the funny side had gone west.
‘My father shot her. Pow. Clean kill.’ Bunty brandished an imaginary rifle. ‘Maud belonged in the hall until that scoundrel stole her. Now Haslem has killed Molly, he will not get away with it.’
‘Bun— Lady Erskine, are you aware that Garry Haslem has been the victim of a fatal crime?’ Toni did her worst police officer’s voice.
‘I’m not batty, Detective Inspector Kemp. Nor am I one iota sorry the rotter is as dead as Maud.’ Bunty bashed the wall of the tent. ‘I must hold the guttersnipe to account. Take a statement, please.’
Malcolm’s pen was poised as Toni got a call from Darren.
‘We’ve got another fiver, boss. In a marshy puddle a good fifty metres from where Sally Robinson was found.’
‘And?’ Toni held her breath.
‘There’s a ten written on the back.’
28
Martha
‘…in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’
The police officer, who had announced herself as Detective Constable Sheena Britton, having established Martha was unharmed, was arresting Patrick Bell.
‘Martha, tell her,’ Patrick urged her.
‘Tell who what?’ Martha snapped.
‘I will remind you, sir, that I have arrested you.’ Martha thought Britton seriously scary.
‘Tell her I haven’t killed anyone.’
How can I?’ Martha pictured Patrick’s smile when she’d told him Garry Haslem was dead. He’d apologised, calling it nerves, but the damage was done. He had smiled.
Martha had been relieved when the CID officer arrived. Surprised too, that Timothy had been as good as his word. ‘All I know about you is you stalked me and disabled my car.’
‘What are you saying, Ms Merry? Is Patrick Bell not a friend?’ the Scottish detective constable said.
‘No, he is not,’ Martha said.
‘You’re with us, sir.’ DC Britton put a hand on Patrick’s shoulder.
‘Can we go out the back way?’ Patrick pleaded. ‘I’ve caused Martha enough trouble without the whole street seeing this.’
‘That all right with you, Martha?’
‘Take him through the roof for all I care.’ Martha escorted them past the wash basins and driers and boxes of products she had yet to unpack to the yard where she parked her car.
‘Is this yours?’ Sheena had taken scary to a new level.
‘Yes.’ Insurance, road tax up to date, no broken lamps. Martha retreated to the salon door, ‘If there’s nothing else, I need to—’
‘That’s a lot of mud on the bumper and the wheels hubs. Been in the countryside recently?’ A chatty question.
‘No,’ Martha snapped, then thought better of it. ‘No, I haven’t.’
Sheena’s phone rang. Answering it, she did a circuit of the Fiesta before returning to say, ‘Martha, we’re going to need you to come to the station. I’ve been told you were at a meeting at Blacklock House last night.’ All business, Sheena Britton slotted her phone into her holster.
‘I left last night.’ Martha backed against a dustbin by the shop wall. ‘I didn’t murder Garry Haslem.’
‘Blacklock House.’ Examining the mud on the car, Sheena appeared puzzled. ‘Hmm, that’s in the countryside, isn’t it?’
29
Martha
‘You say Mr Haslem mended your car.’ The detective tapped her pen on the scuffed table in the interview room. If the sound was meant to irritate Martha, it was working. ‘What was wrong with it?’
‘I didn’t take it in. All I cared about was that he’d got it going.’ Martha hesitated. ‘He said someone had tampered with it.’
‘You mean deliberately?’ DC Sheena Britton shifted in her seat. ‘Who would do that?’
‘Garry said it was Patrick Bell.’
‘Why would he do that?’
‘Patrick expected me to stay the night. He’d got food and champagne.’ Martha had started, she might as well finish. ‘He admitted he did follow me to my salon after I dropped Timothy Mew at Blacklock House on his first day. At the time Patrick claimed it was a coincidence that he’d walked into my salon out of the blue. He came back later and suggested a drink. But he planned it all along.’
‘Did you go?’
‘Yes.’ Behind blackened glass at one end of the room and via the wall-mounted camera people would be watching. What were the mannerisms of a guilty person trying to look innocent? What gestures and expressions would get her? Martha kept still. Dead giveaway. ‘It was only a drink, I saw no harm.’
‘You went out more than once. Last night – Monday – you attended a residents’ meeting at Blacklock House. I’d see that as significant step in a relationship, it suggests you’re a resident. Are you planning to move in with Mr Bell?’
‘No.’ Martha felt hot. Don’t fidget. She folded her arms. Defensive gesture. ‘I said no, then thought that at least I’d see Timothy after the meeting. I hadn’t seen him since I took him there.’
‘You didn’t expect him to be at the meeting?’
‘No. He’s a companion, not a resident.’
‘So, you came to the meeting to see Timothy, not because of Patrick?’
‘Both, I suppose.’
‘Could Timothy have tampered with your car?’
‘He was annoyed I was there, why prevent me from leaving?’
‘Why was Mew annoyed you came to the meeting?’ DC Britton was relentless.
‘Timothy has a fantasy that he’s an aristocrat. Whenever we ate out, he’d book a table in the name of Lord Mew. For a laugh, I used to think, but he meant it. Now he’s living in a stately home, I’m guessing he is immersed in his world. He wouldn’t want me spoiling the image. Also, he hates surprises and me being there was a surprise.’ Martha didn’t say she’d partly gone to the meeting to annoy Timothy – it did her no favours.
‘What happened when Garry Haslem got your car started?’
‘I drove away.’
‘You said Bell had got food and drink. Once your car was mended, why not eat with him and leave later?’
