Chapter 3
Detective Inspector Hayley Gibson lifted the police tape and ducked under it.
The plastic booties over her shoes made a soft swish swish sound as she walked the short distance to where the three women stood.
They had given their brief reports and had been asked to wait.
Jake, who generally enjoyed a crowd, had picked up the sombre atmosphere and was lying calmly at Julia’s feet.
‘Sorry to keep you waiting,’ said the detective. ‘I was getting the forensic team started.’
‘Do you know what happened?’ asked Coral, at the exact same time as Hester asked, ‘How did he die?’
Julia was too rattled to ask anything. The sight of the body had given her such a shock that she felt her knees weaken and the blood leave her brain.
Hester had found a roll of gumdrops in the van’s glove compartment, and the sugar had helped, but Julia still felt horribly wobbly and sad.
Glancing in the direction of the building and the digger, she saw two figures peering down at what she knew was a lifeless body.
She recognised the short, stocky figure of Bob Jones, the forensics chap, and another taller, leaner figure, both dressed in white overalls.
‘And who is he?’ asked Coral, having received no reply to her previous question to the detective.
Julia answered. ‘The victim’s name is Basil Crow.’
Hayley shot Julia a quick look. She hadn’t been pleased to discover that Julia had ascertained this information from his wallet, despite Julia having been so careful not to touch it.
‘And how did he…?’
‘The post-mortem will tell us that.’ Hayley was curt.
Walter Farmer came over, looking solemn. ‘Afternoon, all.’
Hayley spoke. ‘DC Farmer will take a full statement from you, Julia, as you found the body. Hester, Coral, you can go home. We’ll be in touch if we need anything further from you. All good? I’m going to get back to the scene.’
It was decided that the two women would take Jake home, and that Julia would get a lift back with DC Farmer.
As she encouraged Jake into the van, he looked at her worriedly, wondering why she wasn’t coming with them.
Julia gave him a pat and a kiss on the head.
‘You’ll be all right, Jakey,’ she said, and he would. ‘I’ll be home soon.’
Julia waved them goodbye, and turned her attention to Walter. She described exactly what had happened, from the time they arrived, to the awful moment when she came upon the body.
‘And that’s when I saw him lying there. The crumpled body… The traces of blood on the grass…’
‘Did you touch anything?’ Walter asked.
‘No. I didn’t even check for a pulse.’ A terrible thought struck her. ‘Gosh, do you think I should have? I might have been just in time. I might have been able to save him.’
‘No, Julia.’ Walter spoke soothingly. ‘Bob says it looks like he’d been dead a good few hours already when you found him. There was nothing you could have done.’
She nodded, and took a slow breath to steady her skittering heart.
‘Walter, what do we know about Basil Crow? How did he die?’
‘Blow to the head, for sure. But with what, and how it happened, we don’t know.’
‘Do you think it could have been an accident? A construction-related mishap? Knocked his head on the gear stick of the digger or something?’
Walter Farmer looked sceptical, but said, in an echo of Hayley’s earlier words, ‘That’s for the post-mortem to determine.’
They were interrupted by the sound of a powerful vehicle.
A white pick-up truck came tearing through the meadow towards them, and pulled up sharply a few feet from where they stood.
The words Eco Evolve were printed on the side of the truck in green, the capital Es designed to look like the curled shoots of a plant.
Walter Farmer pocketed his notebook and waited.
The driver’s door opened and a large man got out and stamped towards them with a purposeful gait.
He stopped and folded his arms, and addressed Walter.
‘What’s going on here? I heard there was an accident.
What happened? Who’s hurt? Who’s in charge here? ’
It was clear that this was a man who was used to being in charge himself.
A man accustomed to demanding answers – and getting them.
He was a very big man, but in proportion, like an ordinary person who had simply been scaled up by about 15 per cent.
Julia was on eye level with his upper arm, as thick and solid as a side of roast beef.
She felt like a little bird beside him. Or perhaps a roast potato.
‘I’m Detective Constable Farmer,’ Walter said, stepping forward and squaring his shoulders in an attempt to rival the other man’s bulk. ‘And you are?’
‘Colin Williams. I’m the managing director of Eco Evolve Developments. This is my site. What’s going on?’
‘I’m sorry to inform you that there’s been a death in the meadow.’
‘A death? That’s not possible! The site isn’t even active. We break ground on Friday. There should have been no one working here. Who the hell was here and what did they—?’ He stopped himself and asked in a more measured tone, ‘Who was it? And how did the accident happen?’
‘It appears to be a man by the name of Basil Crow,’ said Walter, answering one of the man’s questions, but not the other.
A small storm of emotions flitted across Colin Williams’ face. It was clear that he recognised the name.
Julia would have asked what their connection was, but Walter asked, ‘When you say it’s your site, what do you mean by that?’
‘We own it. My company. We’re building a bespoke boutique shopping centre here.’ Julia was still working her way through what a bespoke boutique shopping centre might be, when the man said, ‘Work starts here on Friday.’
‘Clearing the meadow?’
‘Clearing the site,’ Colin Williams said, emphasising the last word to make the point that this wasn’t some pretty bit of nature they were talking about, but a building in the making. Having established this, he returned to his earlier line of questioning: ‘How did he die?’
‘He appears to have sustained a head injury, the cause of which is as yet undetermined.’
Colin looked around as if measuring up if there was anything on the site that might be blamed for Basil’s death; and therefore blamed on Colin himself. There was nothing.
‘I would say it’s most likely a robbery,’ he said confidently.
‘A robbery gone wrong. There’s been a lot of crime in the village, isn’t that so?
’ Colin Williams seemed pleased to have hit upon this neat solution to the body in his field that was entirely not his fault. But Walter Farmer was not impressed.
‘I’d like to ask you some questions, if you don’t mind,’ said Walter crisply, cutting him off.
Julia felt a little rush of satisfaction, almost pride, at Walter’s unusual display of assertiveness.
He took out his notebook with a determined air, flipped to the next blank page and hovered his pen over it in readiness.
‘Now, tell me, what is your relationship with Mr Crow?’ he asked.
Julia sneezed.
He looked at her in surprise. ‘Julia. I’m sorry, I should have said. You can go.’
Though reluctant to leave before hearing the answer to Walter’s question, she bade them goodbye, still listening in as she walked away, but without catching anything more.
She was halfway back to where the van had been parked when she remembered that she hadn’t come in her own car.
She stopped, unsure what to do next. Much as she wanted to hear more of Walter’s interview with Colin Williams, she couldn’t go back and interrupt them.
She would just have to wait until he or Hayley or one of the other officers decided to head back to Berrywick. Or phone Sean for a ride.
She was mulling over her options when a car drew up and Jim McEnroe got out. He looked neater than usual, his long hair tied back and his reporter’s notebook clutched in his hand.
‘Well, if it isn’t Julia Bird,’ he said, walking over to her with a grin on his face. ‘Why am I not surprised?’
‘I could say the same for you,’ she said.
‘Where there’s a dead body…’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said crisply. Although, of course, she did.
‘Don’t tell me. You found the body.’
Julia held his gaze and said nothing.
‘So, Jim. What are you here for?’
‘Call me a humble journalist doing his job. I got a tip-off, actually. An anonymous phone call to say that a man is dead at the Meadow Court site. It sounded worth investigating. So here I am. And from what I hear around the place, it might have been a robbery gone wrong.’
‘Who said it was a robbery?’
‘Sources,’ he said, smiling infuriatingly, and tapping the side of his nose. ‘And instinct. And we all heard Hayley warn us that the culprit in all the thefts around here is dangerous.’
‘Actually, she specifically said that he wasn’t dangerous,’ said Julia.
‘Six of one, half a dozen of the other,’ said Jim, in complete defiance of logical thought. Before Julia could point this out, he turned and looked at her as if he had just noticed her presence. ‘So, Julia, can you describe finding the body? What did it look like? How did you feel?’
Julia hesitated, conflicted. She would prefer to have her name kept out of the newspaper.
‘Oh, Jim, I don’t know… I’m not one for publicity.’
‘Only a comment. It would really help my story, getting a first-hand account…’ said Jim, his tone wheedling.
Fortunately for Julia, DC Walter Farmer interrupted them. ‘Afternoon, Jim,’ he said politely.
‘Ah, Walter, exactly the man I wanted to see. What can you tell me? Robbery, was it?’
‘Who said that?’ Walter looked around, glancing at the forensic team, any one of whom might be the source.
Jim didn’t answer.
‘I’ve no comment, Jim.’
‘I’m going to take a look around, for a bit of background colour.’
‘As long as you don’t dis—’
‘I know the rules. I won’t disturb the crime scene. Promise. Cheers, Julia.’
Walter stared after him, but said nothing. He looked pale.
‘You all right?’
‘Just a bit tired.’ The very word prompted a gigantic yawn. Which set Julia off yawning. The yawns set off a round of sneezing.
‘Sorry,’ he said with a little smile. ‘Didn’t mean to get you going, too.
The baby is due in a few weeks. Poor Amaryllis can’t get comfortable, she’s up and down all night.
She wakes me with her tossing, and then when I’m up I give her back a rub.
Then she falls asleep. And I’m tossing. And by the time I’m asleep, she’s up again… ’
‘I remember that; it was exhausting,’ said Julia. In fact, so much time had passed that the thought of it made her feel gently nostalgic. What a privilege to be hatching a small human inside your body, even if the small human was sitting on your bladder half the night.
‘Ah, well, the little one will be out soon,’ Walter said. ‘I can’t wait to meet her. Or him. Either way, I’m not fussed.’
Julia didn’t mention the obvious fact that they’d be sleeping less and worse, rather than more and better, once the baby was out in the world.
‘Walter, about the robbery theory…’
‘Yes?’
‘Do you really think this could be a robbery? Linked to the others?’
‘Well, it’s a working theory. In the absence of other information. Someone might have been poking around for tools and things to sell, and the victim surprised them.’
‘I saw the dead man’s wallet. It was fat with fifty-pound notes, as if he’d recently drawn the money from the cash machine. Surely if it was a robbery, the robber would have taken them. Are they still there?’
‘Really? I didn’t look. The wallet was bagged by forensics before I…’ Walter looked abashed, and a bit panicky. ‘Gosh, I should have… It’s the sleep deprivation. I keep forgetting things. Brain like a sieve. I’m not myself.’
‘Of course. Don’t worry, it’s quite understandable. You know now, and you can take a look when you get back to the station. Or phone and ask someone to check the wallet for you.’
‘I’ll do that,’ he said, relieved. ‘Thanks, Mrs B. You’re a good one.’
Before Walter could call the station, Jim came back with his recording device in hand. ‘Hello, Walter. A few questions for the Southern Times, if I may. First off, would you say that there’s been a rise in unsolved crime in Berrywick and surrounds of late?’
‘Come on now, Jim, you know the boss answers the questions.’
‘A crime spree, the locals are calling it.’
‘Ah, no, it’s definitely not a—’ Walter stopped himself.
‘And what are Berrywick police doing to combat the crime? Residents want to know if they are safe in their homes and on the streets.’
‘Now, come on, Jim.’
‘Have you considered that this death might be a hit? There’s organised crime to think of.’
‘Organised crime?’ Walter looked at him in astonishment. Julia was surprised, too. It wasn’t like Jim to be quite this pushy.
Walter’s sleep deprivation seemed to have made him snappy, because he said, ‘Jim, I think you’ve overstepped the line this time. I’m not going to answer these questions. Speak to the boss.’
Hayley ducked under the police tape and strode towards them. She didn’t seem delighted to see the reporter.
‘Ah, speak of the devil!’ said Jim. ‘No offence implied.’