Plus, Markham wanted another crack at Chris Burt — without Noakes’s hulking presence and louring disapproval. The caretaker had looked terrified of Noakes, so Doyle was a better bet for any re-interview.
‘I’ll head over to the Newman once I’m done at the community centre,’ the DI concluded.
‘God, I hate that place.’ Noakes shuddered pleasurably. ‘All them screwballs jus’ waiting to pounce.’
‘Overflowing with the milk of human kindness — that’s you, Noakesy.’
The DS took it as a compliment.
* * *
They sped back towards town in meditative silence.
Markham couldn’t shake the feeling of profound uneasiness that had come over him. He had the car window wound down, but the air tasted of thunder.
What were they missing?
Peter Elford died because he chanced upon a killer’s secret.
What if someone else, wittingly or unwittingly, threatened their security?
If that happened, they were looking at another death.
8. A Trinity
The storm broke that afternoon while Markham and Doyle were closeted with Chris Burt, great sheets of rain veiling the community centre as though wrapping it in its own Perspex cocoon. At least the air was now somewhat fresher, and the oppressive humidity dispelled.
What Doyle irreverently called the ‘odd couple’ had set off to Bromgrove General a short time earlier.
‘“When shall we three meet again?”’ Noakes quoted at Markham as he issued instructions, leading Burton to goggle at her colleague in unflattering astonishment.
‘I took the missus to see Macbeth at the Exchange,’ he mumbled, ears slightly pink at the tips. ‘Your Olivia thought we might enjoy it. And we did,’ he added truculently, his fists balling as though he was ready to take on all comers.
‘Excellent, Sergeant, excellent. I like my team to be eclectic in their pursuits.’
Noakes mentally stuck out his tongue at Burton. See, I’m not a total ignoramus!
‘I want to know what symptoms Rebecca Shawcross exhibited . . . and what was the course of treatment at that adolescent unit,’ Markham said crisply. ‘Also, the names of anyone she came into contact with.’ Burton dutifully scribbled it down while Noakes examined the sediment beneath his fingernails.
‘What about the council?’
‘Anything you can get on Phil Carmichael — his family background, contacts . . . maybe see where Hope and Leo Cartwright fit in . . .’ Markham sighed. ‘If at all . . . We’re pretty much groping in the dark, but let’s face it, this is the strongest motive for murder so far and we need to check it out.’
‘Rebecca Shawcross was a complex character.’ Burton’s puritanical streak had surfaced on learning of the ‘friends with benefits’ set-up. ‘Maybe this is all about something in her . . . sex life.’
‘You might well be right, Kate.’ Markham tried to shake off the feeling that something in this case was eluding them . . . like a floater in the eye . . . something out there on the periphery . . . something they had missed. ‘But we need to get a handle on her — and fast.’
Now he and Doyle, perched on canvas camping chairs, contemplated the caretaker across a stained Formica table in the cubbyhole which was nominally his ‘office’ but looked more like a cupboard. A tiny cracked window admitted some badly needed ventilation.
‘We can chat in the staffroom if you’d prefer, Mr Burt.’ Markham wasn’t at all sure that being wedged between mops and bottles of Dettol was likely to establish a mood of easy confidence. Certainly Doyle looked thoroughly uncomfortable, his ginger head almost touching the sloping roof.
The caretaker shook his head. Most likely he wanted to escape the officious Thelma, his sister having already thrust herself forward as an ‘appropriate adult’ before being courteously but firmly rebuffed by the DI. Chris Burt had the mental capacity to cope with questioning, and would no doubt close up like the proverbial clam if his sibling was hovering in the vicinity. There was something else too. Markham had the feeling Burt didn’t want to be seen talking to the police . . . that he was scared. Perhaps, like Markham, he was sensitive to an indefinable menace hanging in the air. A sense that someone was watching and waiting in the wings. Almost as though the community centre was some horrible version of Cluedo, poised for a malevolent genius to set the pieces in motion.
‘What were your impressions of Ms Shawcross?’ Markham enquired gently. ‘Did you see much of her?’
‘Not really. Not to talk to. Mr Elford said not to bother patients . . . said they wanted to be private.’
‘But she wasn’t just a patient, was she? I mean, you’d have seen her with the students upstairs from time to time.’
Burt ducked his head awkwardly. There was something terribly vulnerable about his bald cranium with its sparse grey fringe round the base. Difficult to imagine him as a predator. More like an ageing Granville in Open All Hours. But Markham knew appearances could be highly deceptive. The harrowing Newman Hospital investigation had been proof of that. He nodded to Doyle to take over the questioning. Time for them to play good cop, bad cop.
‘Why’d Mr Elford tell you to leave the patients alone?’ The DC was using his gangling frame to good effect. Chris Burt seemed to shrink. ‘Was he worried about you making a pest of yourself or something? Worried about you being . . . inappropriate?’
‘No . . . nothing like that . . . I wouldn’t.’ Glaucous eyes held an expression of panic and the irresolute, spatulate fingers were restlessly pleating his brown overalls.
The man had been frightened at some point, thought Markham. Badly frightened. But when and
