The Conspiracy Theorist (6 page)

Of course by then, the papers were
beginning to make a big deal of ‘Sunny’ Prajapati’s supposed inexperience as a
sailor.
 
Even without this element,
it was good media fodder: the birthday, the waiting family, the photogenic
wife, the successful businessman, quite apart from the whole ‘missing at sea’
angle.
 
This they blamed on his
lack of experience, the testimony of club members who had ‘watched appalled’ as
he put on his brand new buoyancy aid and deck shoes, while Sir Simeon waited.

‘Daddy being Daddy thought that there
was more to it than that.
 
But then
he always did.
 
First,
that sections
of his blessed Sailing Club wanted him ousted
as President.
  
Then it was
all about sea conditions.
 
How
could the
Cassandra
possibly run
aground in such mild seas?
 
On and
on, he went about it.
 
The
Cassandra
must have been deliberately
rammed by another vessel.
 
That was
Daddy through and through, always talking about conspiracies; he was quite
well-known for it.’

Her father had also said he suspected
that someone was briefing the local press against him, making it seem like an
accident.
 
He complained to the
local police but they had done nothing.
 
They were carrying out their own investigation on the assumption it was
death by misadventure.
 
They kindly
assured Sir Simeon that they would not prosecute him.
 

I was thoughtful.
 
Sometimes beer has that effect on me.

‘But why would someone want to kill Mr Prajapati?’

‘I don’t know,’ she had said.
 
‘Something to do with his company,
Daddy said.
 
He saw conspiracies
everywhere.
 
A hostile take-over, he
said, something like that.
 
I told
him if that was the case all the more reason to get that cheque cashed ASAP.’

The sobbing had started again.
 
What do people say, I thought, about crying
into your gin?
 
In the case of Jenny
Forbes-Marchant, if anything it made her more attractive.
 
So I asked another question, largely to
distract myself.

‘But he didn’t cash the cheque?’

‘No.
 
I have it in the office.
 
The police returned it to me.
 
For all the good it will do.’

On
the train back to Canterbury I tried to sober up.
 
I bought a copy of the
Telegraph
and attempted its cryptic crossword, my favourite puzzle.
 
But I could not get into it.
 
The so-called Quick Crossword similarly
foxed me, so I gave up and, as a last resort, read the newspaper.
 
Anything to take my mind off the case
of Sir Simeon Marchant, the missing sailor ‘Sunny’ Prajapati and the
disconcerting presence of Jenny Forbes-Marchant.

I read about the Prime Minister’s
wife’s new shoes, which were apparently the same brand worn by Mick
Jagger.
 
There was photographic
evidence to this effect.
 
Sir Mick
was propped up against his much taller wife and looking very pleased with
himself.
 
Further on, a child
killer, himself a child at the time of his offence, had been given his fourth
new identity.
 
It was the problem
of giving new identities while people were still in custody.
 
Word got out.
 
Each new identity, the article said, cost the taxpayer
£250,000.
 

I whistled.

Meanwhile in other news: academics had
made the link between crime and the obesity crisis.
 
An increase in the fear of violent crime had apparently put
people off walking anywhere.
 
This
decline was at a rate equivalent to an eleven-degree drop in temperature.
 
I was pleased, not least because the
article had a lot of statistics in it.
 
I like statistics.
 
And some
of these even made sense.
 

There was also some worrying news for
attractive women.
 
It seemed they
were less likely to get treatment from their doctors as they
looked too well
.
 
Whereas females who had ‘let themselves
go’, according to the article, seemed to get all sorts of tests.
 
There was a wonderful quote from a
doctor from the European Society of Cardiology.
 
She said her findings suggested that women should gain
weight in order to reduce the risk of death.
 
The unhealthier you looked, the research suggested, the
longer you lived.
 

Finally, I fell asleep reading a letter
to the Editor that explained why Russia would not back US intervention in
Syria.
 
I dreamt of Chechens in
red-lined suits, beautiful women with concealed diseases, child killers with
new names, and old men being mugged down the Euston Road.

The
weather broke as the train drew into the East station.
 
Fat raindrops pitted the dust on the
concourse; the commuters scattered towards their cars and scrambled for taxis
like old ladies at a jumble sale.
 
Shielding my iPad in my newspaper and the paper in my jacket, I ran
across the road and up the stone steps to the city wall.
 
The morning seemed an eternity
away.
 
I had forgotten how time
felt different when you were on a case.
 

But I was not on a case.

I jogged home, feeling the rain on my
hot face.
 
It would be strange now,
I thought, to have that heart attack.
 
I slowed, and jogged on considering all the ways there were to die, and
which one would finally find its way to me.
  
Back at the flat, I stripped off and got into a hot
shower.
 
I stood there for ten
minutes just enjoying the warmth.
 
I knew as soon as I got out, I would need to write everything down to
get it straight in my head.
 
But I
dreaded that moment.
 
There was
a certain
nebulousness about things at present, full of
beauty and mystery, that I knew from experience would dissipate as soon as I
wrote up my case notes.
 

Who was I kidding?
 
It was not even my case.
 
I was not
employed
to do anything.
 
I was that terrible thing: an interfering amateur.
 
What I was doing could not be said to
be in the public interest, because I didn’t define what that was.
 
But still I felt compelled to write it
down.

I padded through to the living room in
my bathrobe.
 
The cathedral loomed
hard and fast in the window.
 
Its
presence never ceased to amaze me.
 
It was why I had paid over the odds for the flat.
 
As soon as I had seen the view, it had
become the only possible place to live.
 
Just as now, writing it all down was the only possible reaction to the
day’s events.
 
While the computer
was loading, I took a bottle of Spitfire from the crate and poured it slowly into
a glass.

Talking to Jenny Forbes-Marchant had
put the whole affair into a different perspective.
 
Firstly, there was the meeting of Messrs. Prajapati and
Marchant and the sale of the
Cassandra.
 
Secondly, there was the imputation that
Sir Simeon had sold the yacht to a novice—almost as if he had neglected
to uphold a duty of care in the sailing world.
 
And thirdly, there was the not unrelated suspicion that the
Indian had been the victim of some kind of contract killing rather than an
accident at sea.
 
All of these Jenny
Forbes-Marchant knew something about and, after three G&Ts at the Lamb and
Flag, had an opinion on.
 
These I
tried to match against the few facts in the public domain.
 
The rest was conjecture until Mr
Prajapati’s inquest next week.

I googled Sir Simeon Marchant again.
 
I passed over the
Evening Standard
report of the mugging, such as it was, and went on to the next page.
 

Here were some more press results for
Sir Simeon’s death.
 
The Chichester
Observer
reported it as did the
Hayling Islander
and the Island’s own
website, which also lamented the growth of vehicle crime on Elmore
Crescent.
 
The local media
concentrated on Sir Simeon’s exploits in the general vicinity of Chichester:
President (Emeritus) of Hayling Island Sailing Club, arch-deacon at the local
church, member of the Rotary Club, Parish Councillor (retired).
 
It seemed a laudable contribution to
his local area.
 

Farther down, there was one listing for
a ‘
Simon
Marchant’ speaking at a
conference in the United States eccentrically entitled ‘ConGress 13’, and then
I found it.

At the bottom of the page, above the
web address of a national newspaper, the headline:
Body of ‘vanishing yachtsman’ who disappeared as he sailed to...

Underneath, the teaser said:

21
August 2013 – Vanished:
Sunil
‘Sunny’ Prajapati,
48, was trying to
sail from Hayling Island, Portsmouth to Shoreham-on-Sea, Sussex when he
disappeared...from
Sir Simeon Marchant

I clicked and read on:

Body
of ‘vanishing yachtsman’ who disappeared as he sailed to meet his wife on boat
he had just bought has been found

·
 
‘Sunny’ Prajapati body found on
sandbank off the Sussex coast

·
 
He went missing on Friday after setting
sail from Hayling Island

·
 
The 48 year old had only bought the
boat the same day

·
 
Massive sea, land and air search had
found no trace of skipper

The body of an Indian businessman who disappeared at sea
just hours after buying a new yacht has been recovered.
 

Sunny
Prajapati,
48, was reported missing
on August 16 after setting sail from Hayling Island, Portsmouth with plans to
meet his wife in to Shoreham-on-Sea, Sussex.

The
35-foot vessel, Cassandra, was found hours later unmanned off the Selsey Bill
and an investigation was launched to locate Mr Prajapati.

His
body was found on Pilsey Island and was identified by Police yesterday. Mr Prajapati
of Lancing, Sussex, was last seen sailing out of Chichester Harbour with his
new purchase on Friday –the day after he celebrated his 48
^th
birthday.

He
was planning to travel to Shoreham-on Sea where he was a member of the sailing
club. His family and friends had organised a champagne reception.

But
his yacht, Cassandra, was found aground on a sandbank with the engine running
and one sail up, near Middleton-on-Sea, Sussex, on 9.15 pm on Friday
night.
 
By then,
the
alarm had been raised by concerned family and friends
.

Despite
an extensive search by coastguard helicopters and RNLI lifeboats, no sign of
him was found and the search was called off on Saturday. Coastguards had
received no distress signal from the Cassandra and it is believed that Mr Prajapati
was wearing a buoyancy aid rather than a lifejacket when he left the harbour.

Described
as ‘extremely fit’ by his wife, Annie, he was an inexperienced sailor who was
studying for British
yachtmaster
qualifications.

His
family says Mr
Prajapati
was excited about the trip
and was even planning a ‘round the world adventure’ in the Cassandra.
 
The boat was advertised on eBay and was
thought to have cost in the region of £75,000.

The seller,
Sir
Simeon Marchant
, 87, of Hayling Island, declined to comment.
 
Sir
Simeon
has faced criticism in some quarters about selling the yacht to an
inexperienced sailor.

An
inquest is scheduled for later this month.

I
read a few more reports and then texted my contact at Scotland Yard.
 
Fortunately she was still at her
desk.
 
The reply came back almost
immediately.
 
It took a few more
minutes for me to decipher her shorthand.

Yes, the message said, the system did
flag a link between the two cases: the disappearance of Mr ‘Sunny’ Prajapati
and the death of Sir Simeon Marchant.
 
It also informed me that I should ‘get a life’ and not bother her again
that day.
 

Then, I rang Reuben Symonds at the
Alconbury Estate Community Office.
 
To my surprise he was still there.

‘Quick question,’ I said when he
remembered who I was.
 
‘Did the
boys hear anything the men said?
 
Anything they heard?’

There was a long pause at the other
end.

‘Just that they were foreign.’

‘Foreign?’

‘Sounded foreign.’

I had a vision of the men in suits
showing their holsters, shouting at the boys as they rummaged through the bin
looking for the mobile phone.

‘You mean they had foreign accents?’

‘Darren said they sounded Russian.
 
God knows where he got that from.’

‘They were Russian?’

‘Sure he said Russians.
 
Something
like
that, anyway.
 
Something Eastern European.’

‘Did he mention anyone else?’

‘Like who?’

‘An Indian bloke called Prajapati.’

‘Nope,’ Reuben Symonds said.
 
‘No Indians.’

And the phone went dead.
 

I took a long swig of Spitfire and
started writing up my case notes.

When a story starts with a disappearance
or a death,
I wrote,
we often find it convenient to trace
everything back to the inevitability of that event.
 
Philosophers call this teleology, I believe, where causes
are traced back from the effect.
 
That is often how we make sense of the world.
 
But it was by no means inevitable that either Sunil
Prajapati or Sir Simeon Marchant would die when and where and how and why they
did.

I paused and recalled my last question
to Jenny Forbes-Marchant.

‘What did DCI Richie say about the
disappearance of Mr Prajapati?’

She looked confused.
 
I added, ‘In relation to your father’s
death?’

‘What possible connection could it
have?
 
He said it was a
coincidence.
 
There was no more to
it than that.’

In my experience there is always more
to it than that.
 
And you can
always read more into these things than is strictly necessary.
 
Over the years I had investigated
hundreds of quite serious and complex police complaints that turned out to be
what I termed ‘honest fabrications’—people reading too much into the actions
of officers.
 
True, sometimes the
accusations were malicious or revengeful in intent but most of them were based
on sincerely held beliefs.
 
Television drama encourages us to look for intent that, in most cases,
just isn’t there.
 
Thankfully, life
is not like TV.
 
But even though
you know this, I thought, even though you know there is probably nothing to it,
you still have to investigate the facts as they are presented to you.