Missing: Presumed Dead ib-1 Page 4

  Patterson shrugged, “He probably knew there was an open grave.”

  Bliss turned from the map with a throwaway remark, “I’m beginning to wonder if there is a body.”

  “Of course there is — there’s witnesses; blood on his clothes, the knife, the duvet; four people saw …”

  Bliss’s eyes lit up with inspiration. “No!” he exploded. “What if the Major isn’t dead — only wounded? It doesn’t negate what the witnesses say — they heard a fracas; saw Jonathon dump him in the pick-up; found the knife and blood. But what if Jonathon stabbed him and has taken him somewhere …”

  “But, Guv …”

  “Have you checked the hospitals?” Bliss cut in.

  “No … we didn’t think …”

  “That should have been routine.”

  “Why, Guv? Jonathon said he’d killed his dad, not wounded him.”

  “And what if he was lying?”

  “Why on earth should he?” asked Patterson with a tired testiness bordering on insolence.

  Bliss recoiled at the reproach and, feeling boxed in, felt compelled to come up with a reason. With his eyes firmly focused on the map he sifted determinedly through memories of past cases, even drifting into the realm of crime novels, seeking an explanation. “What if,” he began, an idea springing out of nowhere and slowly taking shape in his mind. “What if they got into a fight, the Major gets stabbed … accident … self-defence … whatever. Then he refuses point blank to be taken to hospital. I can just imagine the crusty old Major saying, ‘I’m not having some snotty-nosed kid in a white coat digging needles into me. Anaesthetic — phooey — just get on with it. Didn’t have anaesthetic in my day — In my day they’d stick a lump of wood between yer teeth and cut yer bloody leg orf.’”

  Patterson was laughing at Bliss’s impersonation. “You might be right, Guv. That would certainly explain why Jonathon isn’t fazed; why he says he doesn’t need a solicitor.”

  “Because he knows his dad will pop up right as rain once his wound has healed … ”

  “Then sue the Chief Constable and all of us for unlawful arrest,” continued Patterson projecting the unlikely scenario forward.

  “He’d be wasting his time,” said Bliss screwing up his nose and shaking his head. “All we have to show is reasonable cause — we have plenty of that.”

  “O.K., but why bury the duvet?”

  “It was covered in blood — he probably realised the dogs would easily scent it out. Wait … There is another possibility — what if he took him to a hospital and registered him under a false name to save the old man’s embarrassment, and avoid answering awkward questions.”

  “But why?”

  “I don’t know — but try the hospitals anyway. Alive or dead, he has to be somewhere. Bodies don’t just disappear into thin air.”

  “This one has.”

  Bliss ignored the comment. “Get onto it right away — All hospitals within 45 minutes — an hour to be on the safe side. Any males over sixty-five admitted since 9.30 last night. Better check all doctor’s clinics as well. Shit. Why didn’t we think of it before — as soon as the body couldn’t be found? It explains everything.”

  Patterson was less sure, “Maybe.”

  “I’d better bring the Super up to date,” said Bliss feeling pleased with the progress they had made. Selecting a phone from one of the D.C.’s desks, he dialled Donaldson’s home number and listened to the ring until a gravelly sleep-filled voice answered, “Donaldson.”

  “D.I. Bliss, Sir.”

  The superintendent catapulted himself awake. “You’ve found the body?”

  “Not exactly, Sir.”

  “Exactly what?”

  “We found the duvet in a grave and we’ve got a tin soldier …”

  Excitement swung to annoyance at the other end of the line. “What are you babbling about. He didn’t kill a tin soldier. He killed a real one. Tin soldiers don’t bleed all over the place.”

  “I just thought …”

  “I said call me when you’ve got the body, not when you’ve found something to play with.”

  Bliss sensed that the superintendent’s phone was angrily heading for its cradle. “Sorry, Sir …”

  “Click.”

  “Shit,” he muttered, hurriedly adding. “Pat — you stay here and work on the hospitals, I’ll go and see the widow.”

  “Do you know where the place is?”

  “No, but I’ll pick up Dowding from the cemetery — I can find my way back there. Oh, and I’d like to interview the last person who saw the Major alive.”

  “That’d be the suspect, Jonathon Dauntsey.”

  Bliss scrunched his face in mock pain. “Use your loaf, Pat.”

  “Sorry, Guv. — I don’t think we know who saw him last, apart from those who saw him being dumped in the pick-up. I guess it was probably the landlady at the Black Horse.”

  “I’ll go there after I’ve seen the widow.”

  Daphne was hovering in the foyer with half an eye on the rain as he made his way out.

  “Still here, Daphne?” he called cheerily, heading for the door.

  “Just look at that weather, Chief Inspector. It’s getting worse and I didn’t think to bring a brolly today.”

  Was she angling for a lift? “I’m going back to St. Paul’s churchyard, if that’s any help. I could give you a ride.”

  “If you’re sure you don’t mind …”

  “Not at all, Daphne. Actually I wanted a word with you,” he said, scooping her in an outstretched arm and shepherding her out under his umbrella.

  “How is Jonathon?” she asked as soon as they drove off.

  “He seems O.K. Remarkably calm, though not what would call happy.”

  “Never has been, that one. Always sour. I remember him as a kid. Always sour — always walking around with a face like a smacked bum.”

  The wrought iron lych-gates were under heavy guard. Two bulky uniformed policeman, grateful to be out of the drizzle, were determined no-one would get through without authority while ignoring the fact that almost anyone could simply step over the two foot high stone wall forming the remainder of the cemetery’s perimeter. A few disgruntled mourners were clustered under a couple of black umbrellas close-by, discussing tactics, looking, thought Bliss, as if they were deciding whether or not to rush the gates and bury their dead anyway.

  “D.I. Bliss,” he said, heading for the gap between the two uniformed men. They stood their ground and an arm closed the gap.

  “Sorry, Sir. You can’t … this cemetery’s closed today. Who did you say?”

  “Detective Inspector Bliss.”

  “I’m sorry …”

  “Oh, get out of the way you idiot,” snarled Daphne pulling off her plastic rain hood, pushing her way between them and opening the gate. “This is your new chief inspector.”

  “Is that you, Daphne?” said one.

  “Well, I ain’t one of the Spice Girls, if that’s what you were hoping?”

  He turned to Bliss, “Sorry, Sir.”

  “It’s alright; you were only doing your job — and I’m the D.I., irrespective of any promotion Daphne may bestow on me.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  With the gate swinging shut behind him, Bliss paused to look along the ancient ranks of lichen covered gravestones lolling about like disorganised soldiers waiting for a drill sergeant to shout, “Ten … tion!” An aura of sadness hung about him as he spent a moment imagining all the suffering that had preceded the erection of each stone, and the pain in his expression caught Daphne’s eye.

  “What is it, Chief Inspector? Are you alright?”

  “Ghosts, Daphne. Well, one particular ghost anyway.”

  “I thought you hadn’t been here before.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “How d’ye know about the ghost then?”

  “Whose ghost — what ghost?”

  “The Colonel — Colonel Dauntsey.”

  “I thought he was a major.�
��

  “No. I’m not talking about him. Not Rupert Dauntsey — the Major. He’s the one you’re looking for now. I mean his father — the old Colonel. His grave’s over there, look — that posh job with the fancy statue on the roof.”

  A white marble blockhouse stood out against the back wall and appeared almost floodlit in the murk. “The mausoleum?” he enquired.

  “Yes, that one, Chief Inspector — anyway his ghost is supposed …”

  Bliss wasn’t listening as she steered him toward the mausoleum; he was reading the names off gravestones, half expecting to see “Mandy Richards” — knowing he wouldn’t. Knowing Mandy inhabited a cemetery a world away. Not for her the tranquillity of a country churchyard with overhanging beeches and chatter of birdsong. Even the vicar’s words at her funeral, “In the midst of life we are in death,” had been lost to the roar of a 747 struggling to escape the gravitational pull of Heathrow Airport.

  They had reached The Colonel’s resting place and Bliss stood back to admire the statue soaring above the sarcophagus — a white marble winged chariot drawn by a team of flying stallions.

  “Very mythical,” said Daphne, following his eye-line.

  “That’s strange. Jonathon mentioned something about Homer’s Iliad. I wonder if there’s some connection?”

  “What did he say?”

  “It didn’t make any sense to me — something about letting fate choose. I don’t remember to be honest.”

  “Probably the bit about Hector and Achilles … ” she started, then cried in surprise, “Oh look! His name was Wellington … Wellington Rupert Dauntsey.”

  “Didn’t you know?”

  “No. He wasn’t the sort of man who needed a name. He was just The Colonel. I suppose his family called him something, but I assumed Rupert — Major Dauntsey — called his father ‘Sir’ or ‘Colonel’ like everyone else.”

  “‘Sir,’” repeated Bliss. “You think he called his Dad ‘Sir?’”

  “Not a Dad, Chief Inspector. People like that don’t have Dads. Dads are warm friendly creatures who cuddle their children, take them on picnics, play silly games and make funny noises … People like the Dauntseys have fathers who totally ignore them for eight years, then pack them off to a boarding school saying, ‘Thank God for that — children can be such an inconvenience don’t you know.’”

  The ornately carved wooden door to the family tomb was locked, and the huge galvanised padlock demanded his attention. “I wonder who holds the keys,” he muttered, examining it carefully, noting that it did not look as though it had been opened recently.

  “The family probably — The Major I expect,” said Daphne, peering over his shoulder. “The Vicar will know.”

  “I must ask him,” said Bliss with tepid intention, thinking it unlikely that Jonathon would have put his father’s body in such an obvious, albeit appropriate, location. “I’d better get over there,” he continued with a nod toward the knot of policemen still clustered around the open grave.

  Daphne’s eyes lit up. “Could I come and have a peek?”

  “There’s nothing to see really, just an empty grave. The Major’s body wasn’t in it, just the duvet.”

  “I always reckoned he’d have trouble getting past St. Peter, but I thought he’d manage to get as far as the grave,” she whispered, as if fearful of being overheard.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “What?”

  “That he’d have trouble getting past St. Peter.”

  “I don’t talk ill of the dead, Chief Inspector,” she said stalking off huffily. “I’m surprised you’d even ask me.”

  He caught up to her and tried flattery. “I just thought as how you’re so much part of the police here …”

  “Not me, I’m not. All I do is clean up after the filthy beggars — you should see those toilets — piss all over the floor — young girls today wouldn’t do it. Most of them would throw up at the thought.”

  Bliss let her cool down for a few seconds then tried again. “So, without speaking ill, what can you tell me about him — the Major?”

  Daphne’s face blanked to an expression of deep thought as she put together a picture of the missing man, then she screwed up her nose. “He was nothing much to look at, certainly no oil painting, but then neither was his father, the old colonel. It was the chin mainly, or lack of it. I think his Adam’s apple stuck out further than his chin. He wasn’t a big man either, although his rank added a foot or so to his height. It’s a good job for Jonathon he took after his mother.”

  “When did you last see him — the Major?”

  “Oh, I haven’t seen him for a long time, Chief Inspector, I’m not in the landed gentry league.” Then she suddenly changed her mind about inspecting the grave. “I’ll walk home from here,” she said, turning and heading back to the gates. “The rain’s eased, and it’s not far.”

  Bliss stopped and watched her, feeling she knew more than she’d let on. Then she paused, and swung around with an afterthought. “Where are you staying?” she called. “Presuming you’re not driving back and forth to London every day.”

  “It’s only an hour or so outside rush hour, but I’ve booked in at The Mitre for a few days ’til I sort something out.”

  “Well you won’t want to eat there.”

  “I won’t?”

  “Good God no, Chief Inspector. Mavis Longbottom’s cooking there — she’s already lost two husbands?”

  “What do you mean — food poisoning?”

  “No — Lost ’em to other women — doesn’t say much for her cooking though does it? … Well you’d better come to me this evening.”

  “Oh, I couldn’t …”

  “Don’t talk nonsense, of course you can. Anyway, it’ll give me a chance to tell you what I know about the Major.” Then she looked at him with a cheekiest of sideways glances, “If you’re interested that is.”

  He would have said as how he couldn’t possibly impose when she held up a hand to block his refusal.

  “I shall expect you for dinner at seven, Chief Inspector,” she said, adding without pause for dissent. “I noticed my butcher had a nice tray of pork chops laid out this morning,” as if her directive was not in itself sufficiently compelling.

  Bliss folded. “Alright, Daphne. It’d be a pleasure, but we’d better say eight to be on the safe side, I’ve a feeling it’s going to be a very long day.”

  “Roger Wilco. Eight it is,” she said and bounced away like a ten-year-old whose best friend was coming to tea.

  Still half expecting to come upon Mandy Richards name on a tombstone, Bliss made his way to the open grave. No further evidence had been uncovered, and Detective Constable Dowding was only too happy to accompany him to the nursing home. Anything was better than guarding a hole in the ground, in the rain, while photographers and scenes of crime officers bustled excitedly around, seizing on anything that may have the slightest connection to the case.

  The nursing home was not at all what Bliss had anticipated. His vision of a stately stone mansion with wide terraces and sweeping lawns translated into a grubby backstreet terrace of Victorian red-brick, with a narrow raised pavement protected from the road by an iron railing that looked as though it had been hit more often than missed.

  An ancient man with a crinkled spine was polishing a brass plate which was the only shiny thing about the entire place.

  “We’ll be sorry to lose old Mr. Davies,” said the matron, answering the door herself having spotted their arrival from her office window and guessing their identity.

  “Is he leaving?”

  “In a manner of speaking, Inspector …” she said, leaving the words to find their own meaning. “Now I suppose you’ve come to see the Major’s wife,” she continued, her voice as starchy as her uniform. “You do realise this could kill her,” she added, as if it were his fault.

  “Perhaps you could give me a bit of background information first,” he half whispered anxious to be discreet.

  �
��Like what?” she boomed, as if he’d made a smutty suggestion.

  “Oh,” said Bliss, taken aback. “I just wondered what you know about the Major and his wife — were they close?”

  A teenaged girl, her unrealistically large bosom encased tightly in an all-white nurse’s outfit, had drifted into the hallway and was hovering. The matron looked at her queryingly, as if expecting her to provide the answer, but was apparently disappointed in the blankness of the response. Am I missing something? wondered Bliss, and waited while the matron re-arranged her apron, her hair, and her face, while considering the prudence of her reply. “From what I understand Mrs. Dauntsey had been separated from the Major for sometime,” she answered with obvious disapproval. “She never spoke of him, not to me anyhow. Young Mr. Dauntsey said there was a distance between them.”

  “So she wasn’t excited at the prospect of his visit?”

  “I got the impression she never really expected to see him again. I’m not aware she was expecting a visit. She certainly never said anything to me about it. Not that she would. Not her — not that one. Thinks she’s too good for us does Mrs. Dauntsey.”

  “Has her husband visited her since she’s been here?”

  “Not as far as I know … There’s no need to look at me like that, Inspector. This isn’t a prison, you know. Our guests don’t have to get visiting orders; unlike yours.”

  “No, no, I wasn’t being critical. I was just wondering why he should suddenly decide to visit. Maybe he was hoping to get a mention in her will.”

  “Oh no. Mrs. Dauntsey doesn’t have much. That’s why she’s in here — if she had money she’d be in Golden Acres over at Fylingford.” She lowered her tone reverently, “That’s where all the moneyed people go — this is a council home. No — I think you’ll find it is the Major who has the money, not her.”

  “She’s got cancer, I’m told.”

  “Mrs. Dauntsey has Invasive Ductal Carcinoma,” she said with her nose in the air. “Nurse Dryden will take you to her in the day lounge, although I think it would be wise if only one of you should visit her — two hulking great men might be too much for her — scare her to death.”