Suffocating Sea (18 page)

‘Ah! Depends what he was poisoned with,’ she replied, spinning round to face him with an eager expression on her face.

She looked so radiant that he felt a stirring deep in his loins, and hoped his expression didn’t betray his surprise. He’d never considered her in that light before and now he found himself rather warming to the idea.

‘Was there any nausea?’ she asked.

‘Mr Gutner, who saw him collapse, didn’t mention it, and he would have done.’

She turned back and finished drying her hands. Horton let out a surreptitious breath.

Throwing the paper towel into the bin she continued. ‘Some poisons cause paralysis of the heart muscles, others the lungs, like curare, for example, which has no effect if taken by mouth, but if injected will kill. During the death throes the victim turns blue, but no one at the hospital mentioned the victim’s colour. I think even they might have noticed that despite how busy they are. Curare is almost impossible to detect after death. Then there’s hemlock, which is similar to curare in that it causes paralysis of the muscles. The first symptoms can take half an hour to appear and it may take several hours for the victim to die but this victim died fairly quickly after the paralysis set in so I doubt it’s curare. And it’s not hyoscine, because I didn’t find any trace of it in the liver. Neither is it strychnine or antimony, which is similar to arsenic, plus a few others I’ve ruled out. But the lab will come back with more accurate results.’

She pulled off her green gown to reveal her boyish figure in a pair of tight jeans and T-shirt. Horton wondered what she’d look like in a dress, the kind she might wear to the police dinner and dance, if he invited her. And if she accepted.

‘I’m going to do some research, and I’d also like to talk to someone who saw the victim collapse.’

Horton could see nothing for it but to put her in touch with Kenneth Gutner. He would ask him not to mention the conversation he’d overheard between Brundall and Gilmore. If he told him it had to be kept quiet, as it was vital evidence, then he trusted Gutner to do so.

‘And Anne Schofield?’ Horton asked.

‘There was no evidence of soot in the airways below the level of vocal cords, and the levels of carboxyhaemoglobin were well below ten per cent, which means that she was already dead when the fire started.’

That was a relief. He didn’t like to think of her regaining consciousness to be consumed by flames.

‘She was struck on the back of the head,’ Gaye said, ‘and, judging by the indentation in the skull, I would say you are looking for something that has an edge to it, and is five inches in length.’

Horton thought of that brass candlestick that Taylor had shown him. Its base was about the right size.

‘So it’s a similar pattern to Tom Brundall’s death.’

‘Yes. He was knocked unconscious before the fire was started but the shape of his wound is different, which means different implements were used.’

‘Sherbourne was strangled before being left to burn.’

‘You’ve let one get away from me!’ she teased.

‘Sherbourne was killed in Guernsey.’ He wished though he could have got Gaye Clayton to examine him. It wasn’t that he distrusted the Guernsey pathologist, just that he would have liked some consistency in this case.

Her face flushed red and her eyes blazed. ‘So that’s what prehistoric man was driving at. Did he think I’d missed something so basic like strangling?’

Gaye was going to have Dennings for breakfast when he got back. Horton hoped he’d be there to witness it. It would cheer him up no end because he was convinced that Gaye Clayton would make mincemeat of the DI.

‘Sherbourne was Tom Brundall’s solicitor,’ he said hastily.

‘He visited him on the day that Brundall died.’

‘You have got your work cut out!’

‘And that’s not all—’

‘Not another one!’

‘Yes. But this one’s been dead for some time. We found a skeleton in the air-raid shelter in Gilmore’s garden.’

She widened her eyes at him.

‘There’s no indication how long it’s been there, but the same man who witnessed Rowland Gilmore die says he went into the shelter in 1995 and there weren’t any bones then. I’m having the bones bagged up and brought over to you. It’ll probably be later today.’

‘Well, never let it be said that I don’t like a challenge and you’re certainly giving me that with this case. Just don’t let ape man anywhere near me.’

‘I’ll make sure all the flights from Guernsey to England are cancelled.’

She smiled. ‘Are you sure he can’t walk on water?’

‘Not righteous enough. He’s worked in the vice squad.’

‘That explains it.’

‘What?’

‘Never mind.’ She turned away and then almost instantly turned back again. ‘Oh, how’s Sergeant Cantelli’s dad? Dave Trueman told me.’

‘He’s not doing too badly.’

‘Good.’ She held his eyes for an instant, and he found it difficult to interpret what she was thinking, only that whatever it was it made the blood once again rush to his loins.

She had reached the plastic curtained door before she called out, ‘Give the sergeant my love.’

‘Which one?’ Horton shouted back, then wished he hadn’t as his voice ended on a squeak.

‘The dark romantic one.’

That had to be Cantelli, didn’t it? And, surprised, Horton found himself feeling mildly jealous before she said, ‘And look after that throat, Inspector.’

Thirteen

By the time Horton reached his office it was early evening.

It had been a long day with a painful chest and a sore throat that hadn’t improved as the hours had sped by.

Marsden had drawn a blank at the cemetery, and Cantelli, who had been scouring the CCTV recordings for the last couple of hours for signs of Brundall’s car in and around that area, had had no joy either. Walters was still trying to track down the muggers, as well as handle a spate of afternoon burglaries in Southsea where thieves had targeted Christmas presents, and DCI Bliss looked as though she was about to have a seizure unless she got some extra officers, or they managed to clear up one case, at least.

Trueman told him there had been words between her and Uckfield behind the closed door and shuttered blinds of the super’s office, and he’d heard DCI Bliss had complained to Superintendent Reine. Horton wasn’t sure what that would achieve; every department was stretched at this time of the year, and Reine was notoriously weak when it came to fighting his corner with Uckfield. Thankfully Bliss had left the station to attend a community meeting. Horton had half expected her to delegate the task to him, which was usual, but perhaps she’d taken pity on his throat. Either that or there was some prestige in her being there, which he suspected was nearer the truth.

He felt emotionally drained as well as physically tired as he closed his door and shut the blinds behind his desk on the wet, cold and windy December night. His prophecy had come true and it was sleeting heavily. He powered up his computer and called up the missing persons’ database. He’d had all day to consider this from the moment this morning when he had been interviewing Sebastian Gilmore; it had come to him that Brundall and Gilmore might have killed his mother.

He’d modified his opinion since then, but now that his curiosity was well and truly fired he wouldn’t be able to rest until he found out more.

His hands were sweating and his heart was racing as he tapped her name into his computer keyboard: JENNIFER HORTON.

He felt cold even though his radiator was belting out the heat. It was the first time he had spelt her name since he was eleven when in desperation he had written a letter to her and posted it to the tower block they’d taken him from in the vain hope that she might have returned there, found him gone and was looking for him.

The thought made his heart somersault even now, as the long ago emotions flooded back: searing optimism, excitement at the sound of the doorbell ringing in the children’s home, hope at the sight of the postman, all to be followed by disappointment, hurt, bewilderment and finally anger. That had been the first time he had run away.

He steeled himself to look at the screen. Suddenly she was there, smiling at him. The breath caught in his throat. She looked so young, barely out of her teens. If she were still alive how would she look now? Maybe he could get the tech-nical people to produce a computer-generated picture of her.

Was it possible she was still in the area and he’d actually walked past her or seen her? But, no, if she had stayed or returned to Portsmouth, surely she would have tried to find him? His guts twisted at the thought that maybe she didn’t want to.

He turned his attention to the details on the screen. She was born on 25 November 1950 and had been reported missing on 30 November 1978. That meant she had disappeared on her twenty-eighth birthday. He didn’t know that, or maybe he’d forgotten it. Was it significant? Had she arranged to meet someone, a friend or lover perhaps, for a meal and a few drinks?

It took a conscious effort to keep his breathing steady as he read on. Mentally he called on his police training to consider this as a case like any other; he needed to distance himself from the emotions, but it wasn’t easy. Beyond his office he could hear nothing. It was as though only he existed in the station.

She was five feet five inches tall, slim build, about nine stone, with shoulder-length, wavy blonde hair and blue eyes.

She had no distinguishing features or birthmarks. There was one child, a boy. At the time of her disappearance she had been working for a year as a croupier in the casino opposite the pier. It was now a nightclub and caused the uniformed officers a great deal of trouble at kicking-out time.

On the morning of her birthday she had waved her son off to school, but hadn’t shown for work in the evening. No one had bothered to find out why, they had simply assumed she’d gone sick and later, when she still didn’t show, that she had walked out on them. The last sighting of Jennifer Horton had been that morning when a neighbour had seen her leave the flat just after one o’clock. She had seemed, the neighbour said, to be in high spirits and was dressed smartly and wearing make-up. She had no family, except the boy, or so it said on the screen.

Horton sat back deep in thought. The policeman in him was asserting itself quite strongly. His mother had been meeting someone, of that he was certain, but who? Was it the sharp-featured man he recalled? Or someone else he’d forgotten about, or never met? Could it have been Rowland Gilmore, who by then was married to Teresa, or maybe Tom Brundall?

At least if Gutner was correct it couldn’t be the remains of his mother in that blessed air-raid shelter. What attempts had the police made to find her? Had they interviewed his mother’s friends or work colleagues?

He rose, restless and angry with himself and the organization he worked for. But hundreds of people went missing in a month, thousands in a year. The police were busy, he reasoned; there had been no suspicion of foul play so why should they spend time on it? But now he wanted to know.

He could not go back to where he had been before and forget her. No matter how long it took, he had to find out what had happened to her.

He sat and began to enter an online request for the case notes, which he hoped would be with him either late Monday or early Tuesday morning, when his door was suddenly and violently thrust open making him start guiltily. Uckfield stomped in with an angry expression on his craggy features.

Horton quickly tapped his keyboard and his mother’s face vanished from the screen as Uckfield sank heavily in the seat opposite him.

‘Dennings has drawn a blank finding anyone travelling to and from Guernsey by boat,’ Uckfield declared.

Horton had been expecting it. It wouldn’t be that simple.

This killer was clever. Horton had spoken to John Guilbert earlier about his theory that the killer could have travelled by boat and Guilbert knew as well as he did that he would be difficult to find. To someone like Dennings it would be impossible.

‘It’s a waste of time him staying there. He’ll be back on Monday morning.’

‘You’ll want me off the case?’

‘What did you get from the post-mortems?’

Horton noted the evasive answer and wondered at it. Perhaps Uckfield and Bliss were fighting over him. The thought pleased him. He hadn’t yet spoken to Uckfield directly about Gaye Clayton’s findings so he briefed him quickly and succinctly.

Uckfield listened but he appeared uneasy, shifting in his seat and letting his eye contact drift. Horton was puzzled by his manner, and why he was here in Horton’s office. When he had finished, there was silence. Horton knew Steve Uckfield of old. There was something he wanted or needed to say.

Horton found himself tensing. He wasn’t sure he was going to like this. He had stopped trusting Steve in August when he had resumed duty after his suspension and Uckfield had actually believed him capable of murder.

Finally Uckfield said, ‘Sebastian Gilmore owns a boat, and he keeps it in Horsea Marina.’

Horton covered his surprise. Sebastian hadn’t mentioned it, though perhaps he saw no reason to. Was that why Rowland Gilmore had written Horsea Marina on his blotter – because he’d discovered his brother kept a boat there? Perhaps Sebastian had called Rowland and it had come up in the conversation. But why would it have? Had Sebastian telephoned to Rowland to tell him Tom Brundall was moored there? Horton knew he was speculating, but he was curious and he was convinced those words on that blotter related to Brundall’s death. And why hadn’t Uckfield mentioned this before now?

Horton would have asked him, only he saw that there was more to come.

He waited and a moment later was rewarded when Uckfield said, ‘He also went out on it on Tuesday afternoon. I saw him. I was on my boat.’

So that was it. Why hadn’t Uckfield said so earlier? And what had Uckfield being doing on his boat? Horton couldn’t recall it being his day off.

‘What kind of boat?’ Horton asked.

‘A Windy 52 Xanthos.’

Horton whistled softly. Sebastian Gilmore seemed to be doing very well for a humble fisherman with a boat worth over half a million pounds, a mansion house and expensive car. But, of course Sebastian Gilmore was no longer a fisherman, and neither was he humble.