was only so much data the brain could take on board in a day. They also knew that the big hope now was that their teachers might identify the Southney School girls when they were asked about them by Mrs Foreshore, and that that wasn’t going to happen till the morning.
In the end, Cori parked with Grey a minute after pulling up opposite and just along from the solicitor’s office visited earlier, the lights of which were still burning in all but their shop window.
‘So what’s the beef?’ she asked.
‘I think I’ve been bamboozled, told a lot to be told nothing; and it was by was by someone I liked, which doesn’t thrill me.’
‘Raine Rossiter?’
‘I wish I knew what was going on in there.’
‘But we know what — they’re getting our documents ready for in the morning.’
‘Or deciding which ones we see?’
‘Then get in there.’
‘No, I don’t know what I’m asking yet, or how it affects anything. You know,’ he said suddenly and not necessarily following on from his previous statement, ‘that they are losing five thousand a year on that cheesplant flat Stella wouldn’t let them sell. Would that be enough for someone on the Committee to see her as a hindrance to be rid of? Especially when there’s talk of wanting to expand and build more rooms.’
‘But property costs a lot more now, sir,’ counselled Cori, whose mortgage repayments reminded her of that fact clearly enough each month. ‘Five thousand’s a drop in the ocean.’
He conceded his theory wasn’t floating.
‘I’ll see you in the morning,’ he said; and with that he was off, heading, with only minor detours to pick up his tea, back to his small house on its unobtrusive street ten minutes walk from the High Street.
Chapter 8 — The Hills Estates
Wednesday
The Inspector woke to a dull repetitive thudding, that in his dream had been his friend and landlord of the Young Prince Hal Tavern, Bill Blunt, banging tankards down along the bar; but upon waking was discovered to be insistent fists against his front door. He instinctively looked for the mobile phone he knew would be on the bedside table, only to see it instead on the floor and broken into three pieces. He looked to the bedside clock but there wasn’t even the light to illuminate the hands clearly.
He jumped up and, pausing only to grab his dressing down, rushed down to speak to the colleague he knew it must be waking him at such an hour — for it was still pitch black outside.
‘Sir, sorry for waking you up like this.’ The Constable seemed as apologetic as he did agitated. ‘We couldn’t raise you on your mobile.’
‘My phone fell on the floor; it’s in bits. What’s up?’
‘There’s been developments at the Cedars, a man called Charlie Prove is dead.’
Grey looked at the clock in the hall, that caught the light of the streetlamp coming through the open door — it was only one am.
‘Wait inside while I dress, make yourself a drink.’
‘Did you leave it on silent, sir?’ asked the practically minded Constable from down in the hall. ‘They can sometimes vibrate themselves off the edge of flat surface.’
Grey had left it on silent, after quietening it for the interview at Tudor Oak School.
Ready in five minutes, he was driven the short distance not to the Cedars but to an area in the Hills estates, where already there were cordons, crowds and harsh artificial light. Superintendent Rose met him sombrely. The Inspector had telephoned him only a few hours before, to report on much background information but no motive or suspect as of yet. Now the case was blown wide open.
‘It’s an ugly business, Grey,’ began his superior. ‘Charlie Prove, you met him earlier?’
‘We hadn’t a chance: he was under sedation.’
‘Well he seems to have come out from under it some time after midnight, to come dashing out in this direction, where someone stove the back of his head in with heavy instrument.’
‘Any witnesses?’
‘No. He was found by a resident of the flats he was left outside as she came back from work; though others we’ve spoken to have reported a commotion outside just before then — she must have been seconds from seeing the killer.’
‘Where’s Cori?’
‘She’s been directed straight to the Cedars, to manage things there. She’ll be going through his room, I expect.’
Grey’s mind was working now, recalling, ‘You know sir, another resident told me Charlie came from somewhere on the Hills, before living in the Cedars.’
‘We’ll know for sure by morning.’
‘And he had a daughter, sir, who died here.’
‘Eunice — I recognised the surname.’
‘Sarah was finding me the file out.’
‘I’ll re-read it once I’ve spoken to the Chief Constable’s office.’
‘Trouble?’
‘No; but you can see why they’re eager for updates — two murders in two days…’
‘We can solve this, sir.’
‘I know, and that’s what I’ll be telling them.’
Though Southney was a fair sized settlement in itself and had all the amenities the modern British citizen would expect, the fact remained it was a town ringed at arm’s length by major cities, all with much larger forces. The town’s police were always under pressure to show they could handle the big cases.
The Super said with a start, ‘Well, I’m getting back to the station. I don’t think any of us will be getting much sleep tonight.’
So much for recharging batteries. With a hand on his shoulder, Grey was left to gather, collate and manage the activity on the site. Under the watchful eye of maybe thirty local people, he walked over to where the white tent was being unfolded. The site was something like a tarmacked square beneath the blank wall of an apartment block, the windows evidently facing out from other sides — in short one of those civic spaces owned by everyone and no one, and so where no one kept watch. He spoke to the officers there,
‘What’s the light like here, without our floodlights?’
‘Jet black, sir. You’ll see the streetlight’s out.’
‘The victim?’
‘Dead when they found him, though still warm.’
‘Show me.’
The team moved apart to show the slumped form of a big man, the garish light catching red splashes across the back of his light pyjama jacket and on the tarmac besides. The victim had had brown hair, which was now dark crimson. The whole scene stunned him,
‘Pyjamas?’
‘And slippers too, sir.’
‘One blow, do you think?’
‘It looks that way, sir, though the doctor’s on his way.’
Grey was confident that that man would have an easy job.
‘Anything else done to the body?’
‘No, sir, though the killer might have been disturbed moments after first hitting him.’
‘Charlie Prove.’ Grey shook his head in disbelief. ‘Who ID’d him?’
‘I saw him yesterday when we were taking statements at the Cedars, a few of us did. We’ll need to get a relative in to identify him formally, of course.’
