shoulder.
Carole got a little cheer from Dad’s Navy when she was dumped unceremoniously on top of the sea wall. But her immediate concern was what was happening in the boat below.
One of the Fethering Yacht Club members proved he could do something right by turning the broad beam of his torch down to the little launch.
The bedraggled figure of Nick Kent looked very unsteady, but at least he was upright. He gave Carole a wave and a sheepish little grin.
Standing either side of him were Denis Woodville and, soaked to the skin but triumphant, Bill Chilcott.
? The Body on the Beach ?
Thirty-Six
“My friend Carole and I have been working it out, you see,” Jude explained. “We’ve got these two deaths and a disappearance. There’s the body you found, Tanya – the one you refuse to tell me more about. There’s Aaron Spalding, who committed suicide. And then there’s the dentist, Rory Turnbull, who we’re meant to think has committed suicide.”
The girl had looked frankly bored throughout the speech, but the last words lit a spark of interest. “What do you mean by that?”
“You know Rory Turnbull, don’t you, Tanya?”
“Sure.” She was about to say more, but changed her mind. Sullenly, she went on, “He was Treasurer down the Yacht Club. I saw him there quite often.”
“And he sometimes gave you a lift from Brighton to Fethering for your evening shifts, didn’t he?”
She was surprised. “How’d you know that?”
Jude shrugged. “You can find out most things if you ask around enough. Tanya, when did you last see Rory Turnbull?”
The girl coloured. “I don’t know. I finished working at the Yacht Club Friday before last…Round then, I suppose.”
“You’re sure you haven’t seen him since?”
“No. Where would I have seen him?”
The answers sounded clumsy, but then the girl’s normal manner was clumsy. Jude couldn’t be absolutely certain that she was lying.
“Anyway,” Tanya went on, “I couldn’t have seen him the last few days, ‘cause he gone missing, hasn’t he?”
“How do you know that?”
“It’s common knowledge.”
“Common knowledge in Fethering. I wouldn’t have thought it got talked about much in Brighton.”
“I’m still in touch with people from Fethering. Denis Woodville told me.”
“I see.”
Petulantly, the girl kicked at the carpet with one black-booted foot. “Anyway, what’s all this about? Where’s it all leading? Is there something you definitely know about this body I saw on the beach?”
“There are two things I definitely know. One is that there is a connection between the body on the beach and Rory Turnbull. And the other is that Rory Turnbull is still alive.”
“Well, you’re right in at least one of those.”
The bathroom door had opened silently and there was a third person in the room.
Rory Turnbull.
? The Body on the Beach ?
Thirty-Seven
Maggie Kent arrived at the sea wall just after Carole had been deposited there by Ted Crisp. Which was probably just as well. In time she would hear the details of how close her son had come to death, but at least she had not had to witness the agony of the previous half-hour.
Moments later, the three from the motor launch disembarked at the floating jetty a little further upstream and Nick Kent, with a grubby blanket wrapped around him, was led by Denis Woodville and Bill Chilcott towards the waiting group. Carole and Maggie hurried forward to greet him. The mother, oblivious to the filth in which he was covered, threw her arms around her son. Both of them sobbed.
“You two did brilliantly,” said Carole to the rescuers. “Amazing bit of cooperation and coordination.”
“Only did it because my boat was the closest,” said Bill Chilcott gruffly.
The Vice-Commodore’s reaction was equally ungracious. “Yes, in an emergency you can’t choose the people you have to work with.”
There was a silence. A moment of potential rapprochement between the two sides of the feud…?
It seemed not. “I must get this incident entered in the club log.” Denis Woodville turned abruptly on his heel and set off towards his cronies.
“And I must get out of these wet clothes.” Equally abruptly, Bill Chilcott turned in the opposite direction and strutted off squelching on his way back home.
Carole moved across to the muddy embrace of mother and son. Nick had stopped sobbing, but his breath was coming out in little jerky wheezes. “Should I call an ambulance, Maggie, or get him to a doctor?”
“No, I don’t want him to get caught up in hospitals and all that. Nick’s freezing cold and he’s had a terrible shock. I just want to get him home, get him into a hot bath and clean him up. Then, if there’s anything wrong with him, I’ll call the GP.” Maggie Kent looked dubiously at the crowd of elderly campaigners still clustered by the Yacht Club. “Wish I could smuggle him away without talking to anyone.”
“I’ll give you a lift,” said Carole.
She fixed a meeting point and five minutes later was back in the Renault to pick them up. Carole hadn’t even wiped the mud off her own shoes and she made no demur as the slime-covered boy in his filthy blanket was laid across the precious upholstery of her back seat.
¦
Maggie Kent ushered Carole into the bleak front room. “Would you like a coffee or something? I’d offer you a real drink, but I’m afraid I don’t have anything.”
“Don’t worry. You just go and sort Nick out.”
“Yes. He’s gone up to start the bath. There’s lots of hot water. I’ll give him a good scrubbing.”
“And, Maggie…”
“Yes?”
“It’s not my business, but if I were you I wouldn’t ask him about what happened. He’ll tell you when he wants to.”
The mother nodded. “I’d already decided that.”
“Good.”
“But would you mind staying till I’ve put him to bed? I’d like to hear your account of what happened.”
Carole couldn’t say no, could she? “That’s fine.” She took a look at her watch. “But may I use your telephone?”
¦
It was the moment after Rory Turnbull had appeared from the bathroom, before Jude had had time to recover from her surprise and say anything, that her mobile rang. She snatched the phone immediately out of her pocket. “Hello?”
“Jude, it’s Carole. Nick Kent’s all right.”
“Thank God. Listen, I’ve found – ”
But the mobile was ripped from her hand and switched off. “I don’t think you need tell anyone what you’ve found,” Rory Turnbull said coolly.
