Evan Blessed (23 page)
Authors: Rhys Bowen
Evan waited, trying to conceal his impatience, while she rambled on.
“So which debs can you think of who were at school with Bronwen? She told me, but my mind was on other things at the time and the names escaped me. One of them was a quite ridiculous hyphenated nameâ”
“Amanda Fanshaw-Everingham, I believe.” Miss Posey looked up from pouring the water into the teapot. “She's now the Viscountess Montague, of course.”
“And the other was Penny somebody?” Evan grasped at a fleeting wisp of memory.
“Ah yes. Penny Mowbray. She certainly qualified as a debutante in the old sense. The family was very thick with the royals. Her mother was the daughter of an earl. The father played polo with Prince Philip.” She paused and a smile crossed her face. “Such a naughty girl, but fun.”
“There was some incident in which she and Bronwen stole a car?”
“Oh dear, yes. That dreadful incident with the motorbike. They were so lucky that the man wasn't hurt more seriously or the police would have had to press charges. Fortunately he walked away with just some bruises and some damage to his hand, I believe, although Penny's father had to pay for the motorbike.”
“Do you happen to remember the man's name?”
Miss Posey shook her head. “I don't think I ever knew it. It was just some tourist who was passing through the area.”
“Do you know what Penny is doing now?”
“She died, poor girl. In her early twenties. Tragic accident. She was passionate about riding, like all her family. Her horse took a tumble and she broke her neck. Such a waste.”
So the deb had died. But in an accident.
“Any other debs you can think of?” Evan asked. “Any unpleasant incidents while Bronwen was at schoolâstalkers or a man threatening the girls?”
“Good heavens, no,” she said, then her expression changed. “Strange you should ask that. Penny Mowbray played the violin. One day she came into her room and found her violin smashed to
pieces. An extensive inquiry was carried out but the guilty party was never found. Some of us suspected it was a certain girl who was jealous of Penny, but we could never prove anything.”
pieces. An extensive inquiry was carried out but the guilty party was never found. Some of us suspected it was a certain girl who was jealous of Penny, but we could never prove anything.”
She put a cup of tea in front of Evan and placed the sugar bowl and milk jug beside him.
“I always believe in letting people help themselves,” she said. “Although I don't take sugar myself.”
Evan forced himself to drink the tea while Miss Posey prattled on to him. As soon as he had drained the cup, he stood up. “If you'll excuse me, I have to be going. I've got to try and find out more about that motor accident.”
“You don't think it has anything to do with Bronwen being kidnapped, do you?”
“Right now I'm just clutching at straws,” Evan said, “but this is a straw and it's the only connection between Bronwen and a deb that I can find.”
He left the cottage, hurried back across the kitchen garden, and was soon driving out through the forbidding gateway. He hadn't been driving for five minutes when his mobile phone rang.
“Evans, where the hell are you?” Watkins voice echoed through the car.
“On my way in, sir. Be with you shortly,” Evan said.
“I thought you weren't supposed to be driving.”
“I didn't want to tie up another officer in waiting on me, sir. I'm doing okay. I had to meet with Bronwen's parents.”
“I bet that wasn't a piece of cake.”
“Bloody awful. Any news?”
“Nothing big. But we've had Roger Thomas here and your presence would have been useful.”
“Roger Thomas? Did you get anything out of him?”
“Strangely enough, yes. We now know why he lied about where he was that afternoon. He was having it off with the lady park ranger. Diana somebody. Rather ashamed of himself and didn't want it to get back to his choir.”
In spite of everything, Evan laughed. “Roger and Diana? Good
God. That's something I never would have guessed in a million years.”
God. That's something I never would have guessed in a million years.”
“We're still looking for Rhodri Llewelyn. Get down here if you're feeling up to it.”
“I'll be in as soon as I can, sir,” Evan said and hung up, glad that he hadn't had to reveal where he actually was and what he was actually doing.
There was an elderly sergeant on duty at the closest police station in Leominster.
“An accident twelve or fourteen years ago, you say?” he said in response to Evan's request. “Was someone killed?”
“No. It wasn't serious. Some girls, joyriding in a car, hit a man on a motorbike, but he was okay.”
The sergeant's face showed scorn. “I expect there's a report on it filed somewhere in the bowels of HQ in Shrewsbury, but we don't have nothing like that here.”
“I see.” Evan turned to go.
“You probably won't find anyone in records at the weekend,” the sergeant called after him, seeming to delight in being the bearer of bad news. “They've been cutting back on support staff. They've cut us down to one officer in the station and one on the beat at weekends too, which is bloody stupid because that's when people have time for crime. Why don't you write down the details and I'll call the request in for you on Monday.”
“Monday?” Evan spun back to him. “This is damn important. A matter of life and death.”
A smile twitched on the sergeant's lips. “Bit dramatic, wouldn't you say? But then you Welsh like your drama.”
Evan's fist curled, longing to hit him. He took a couple of steps toward him, leaning a little too close to be comfortable. “Look you. We have a madman who has kidnapped a young womanâthe second woman to disappear in a week. He'd built a bunker with handcuffs in it. He tried to kill me last night, so no, I don't think that life and death is at all an exaggeration!” The words came spitting out.
The sergeant recoiled. “Sorry, mate. No offense meant. But I seriously
think you'll have little luck in records on a Saturday, even if they've kept anything as trivial as a minor accident that long. Your best bet would be the local paper. They publish a weekly police blotter and your accident is likely to have made that, especially if it involved girls from the school.”
think you'll have little luck in records on a Saturday, even if they've kept anything as trivial as a minor accident that long. Your best bet would be the local paper. They publish a weekly police blotter and your accident is likely to have made that, especially if it involved girls from the school.”
“And where's the local paper?”
“Ludlow. Not quite ten miles from here.”
“Thanks.” Evan ran back to his car. Frustration and tension were building to snapping point. It was like being in one of those board games in which he was constantly drawing the card that sent him back to Start.
Ludlow was busy with Saturday commerce. He had to ask several times before he found the newspaper office, just off the High Street. The girl at the front desk listened with sympathetic ear and pretty soon Evan found himself going through back issues on microfilm.
“It's all on CD these days.” A buck-toothed cub reporter, who'd been stuck with weekend duty, perched on the edge of the desk, ready to chat. “And we write our columns with one of these publishing programs. Ever so advanced we are, for a small paper.”
Evan just wished he'd go away. Week after week flashed past on the screen. Burglaries, drunk and disorderly, some weeks with nothing at all. A very law-abiding community, it would seem. Then finally he was staring at it.
JOYRIDE ENDS IN NEAR TRAGEDY
Two students from Malvern Priory were involved in a traffic accident on the Wigmore to Knighton road, late on Sunday, the 18th. Their car, which was borrowed without the owner's permission, struck the motorbike driven by Shrewsbury resident Neville Shorecross, who was passing through the area on a camping trip. Mr. Shorecross was brought to Ludlow Infirmary, kept overnight for observation and then released.
She woke to light, unbearably bright after hours of darkness. Instinctively, she squeezed her eyes shut and turned away. Her heart jolted in fear as something touched her face. Then she cried out in pain as the tape was ripped away from her mouth. She tried to put her hands up to her burning skin.
Gradually, her eyes were adjusting to the light. She saw now that it came from a trap door above her head. A ladder extended down from it and the hazy form of a person was leaning over her.
“I don't know why I'm bothering to do this,” said a well-bred voice. “It's really a waste of time to feed you, when you won't be around much longer, but I suppose I'm a humane person at heart.”
Bronwen flexed her stiff jaw and felt her lips stinging as she moved them. “Humane? You're a monster.”
“Here. Drink this.” He held a glass of water up to her lips.
“The last thing you offered me to drink was drugged,” she said.
“This one isn't.”
She sipped, relishing the water flowing down through her parched mouth.
“Why are you doing this?” she demanded.
He looked surprised. “You must know why you're here.”
“I have no idea, unless I'm fulfilling some kinky kidnap fantasy.”
“You didn't notice my reaction when I first heard your name, when you walked into my bank?”
“I noticed nothing.”
“You mean you don't remember? The accident?”
“Accident?”
“You stole a car. You and that Mowbray girl. You crashed into my motorbike.”
“That was you?”
“It was indeed. You destroyed my life that day.”
“Destroyed your life? They said you weren't seriously hurt.” Bronwen blinked as she tried to look up at him. Make eye contact. Establish a human connection with the captor. Those were the things one was supposed to do. “You were released from hospital the next morning. Penny's father paid for your bike.”
“Paid for my bike?” he shouted, his face distorted now and eyes bulging with rage. “Paid for my bike? What about my life? Who paid for my life?” He raised his left hand and waved it in her face. “Look at this!”
She noticed that the hand was missing the top of a finger. The ring finger.
“It was severed when your car ran over it.”
“I'm very sorry, but I hardly see thatâI mean, I've watched you write. You're right-handed.”
He knelt on the floor, close enough that his breath blew into her face. It was a surprisingly sweet breath as if he'd just cleaned his teeth. “Do you know how many fingers it takes to play the piano? Ten. It takes ten fingers to play the piano. I wanted to be a pianist. I was studying and hoping to get into the Royal Academy of Music.”
“Weren't you a little old?” she asked, realizing too late that this was probably unwise. “You looked quite grown-up to us, so you must have already been at least in your mid-twenties.”
His face distorted even further. “Yes, I was a little old, but I didn't grow up with moneyed parents like you. My father worked in a bank. In a stupid bank. They were always poor. Terribly genteel, but always scrimping and saving. They paid for my music lessons while I
was growing up, but when I finished school they expected me to go out and earn my living. He got me a job in his bankâexpected me to be grateful, to be pleased, to be bloody proud. To go to the Royal Academy, to pursue my piano studies would be frivolous. âA waste of time,' my father called it. He never appreciated my talent.”
was growing up, but when I finished school they expected me to go out and earn my living. He got me a job in his bankâexpected me to be grateful, to be pleased, to be bloody proud. To go to the Royal Academy, to pursue my piano studies would be frivolous. âA waste of time,' my father called it. He never appreciated my talent.”
“And so you killed him.”
“How astute of you. Yes, I did. I made it look like an accident, of course. Nobody ever suspected. After that I put every second and every penny into my piano studies. One day I would have been good enough to sit the Royal Academy exam and they would have appreciated my talent instantly. Only you spoiled that for me.”
“Penny Mowbrayâ” She heard her voice waver. “Did you kill her too? Was she the deb?”
“Another unfortunate accident. Nobody ever suspected otherwise. Really, people are very dense. I hunted for you after that, but I couldn't find you.”
“No, I was married and living in London.”
“Married? But I thoughtâ”
“My wedding next week will be my second marriage.”
“Would have been. Unfortunately, you won't have the chance to compare.”
Bronwen looked him squarely in the eye. “They'll find me, you know. It's only a matter of time.”
He smiled then. “As you say, a matter of time. I gave them three days, but I don't think I'm prepared to wait that long. We'll see. I must say it rather amuses me to watch their pathetic attempts. But I rather think I'll enjoy watching you die.”
“How do you plan to kill me?” she asked.
“I haven't quite made up my mind. Too many changes of plan.” He looked at the half-full glass of water in his hand. “I must read up on how many days a human can live without water.” Deliberately he turned the glass over and watched the rest of the liquid splash onto the stone floor.
“And you really think you'll be able to get on with your life and live with your conscience afterward?” Bronwen asked him.
“Oh yes,” he said. “You forget, I've done it before. Third time's a charm, as they say.”
“It's Neville Shorecross,” Evan yelled into his mobile phone as soon as D.I. Watkins was put on the line. “He was injured in an accident when Bronwen and another girl stole a car when they were at school.”
“Neville Shorecross? Who the hell is he?”
“The bank manager at Lloyds.”
“The bank manager? Surely not. I bank there too. He's an inoffensive, well-bred kind of bloke.”
“It has to be him. The other girl who stole the car was connected with royaltyâa deb. And she's dead now. Bronwen might have stopped at the bank yesterday if she was intending to buy that brass bed.”
“How the hell did you find this out?”
“I went to the school.”
“Where are you?”
“North of Oswestry, just about to join up with the A55.”
“Does the word âpermission' feature at all in your vocabulary or are you going to be the rogue officer all your career?”
“Sorry, sir, but I had to act in a hurry. I couldn't risk you saying no on account of my shoulder.”
“Too bloody right. I would have done.”
“Come on, guv, you'd have done the same thing if someone had taken Tiffany or your wife.”
“Maybe I would.”
“And I couldn't just sit there and do nothing. I was going crazy.”
“Well, get back here as quick as you can. I'll assemble a team and bring back that psychologist chappy. If you're right in what you say, we'll only have one chance and no margin for error, so we're not rushing things.”
“I'll be there, sir.”
Evan put down the phone and pressed the pedal to the floor. He arrived forty-five minutes later, having exceeded the speed limit all
the way. His shoulder now ached alarmingly and he swallowed a couple of painkillers and retied the harness before going into the police station. The team was assembled and paying attention to the profiler.
the way. His shoulder now ached alarmingly and he swallowed a couple of painkillers and retied the harness before going into the police station. The team was assembled and paying attention to the profiler.
“âcarries a grudge,” Evan heard him saying before they all looked up at his entry.
“This is the plan, Evans,” D.C.I. Hughes said as Evan returned Glynis's smile. “You will go with Watkins to confront Shorecross at his home. You will do or say nothing to alarm him. We will ask him to come with us and open up the bank, which we will search. We will then thank him for his cooperation and take him home. If what our profiler suggests is true, he will think he has outsmarted us yet again. We will then have the house under surveillance and wait for him to lead us to the girl.”
Evan noted he didn't use her name. It was so much easier to be removed from the victim.
“I'd like to have you along, Evans,” Watkins said, “but I'm not taking you if you don't think you can keep your cool. He mustn't suspect for an instant that we're onto him. So let me know now. We can bring him in. We can maybe get him to confess, but if we can't get him to reveal where he's hidden her, then there's no point.”
Evan did see the sense in this. He nodded. “Don't worry,” he said.
“Let's do it.” Hughes clapped his hands. “Surveillance team in place?”
Watkins nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Let's go.”
Ten minutes later they parked outside a Victorian terraced house in Bangor. An unprepossessing address, not unlike the house in which bank clerk Hillary Jones lived. And not too far from it, either. More thoughts rushed through Evan's already whirling brain.
Neville Shorecross opened the door with a surprised smile on his face.
“Mr. Evansâwhat a surprise. You must have a very urgent banking need to seek me out on a Saturday.”
He was wearing well-pressed slacks and a cardigan over a checked shirt. The typical British gentleman on his day off.
“Nothing to do with banking, Mr. Shorecross,” Evan said. “Something more important than that. My fiancée, Bronwen Price, is missing. The second missing woman in a week.”
Shorecross's face grew grave. “How alarming. And you suspect foul play? You don't just think she's gone off somewhere and forgotten to tell you?”
“It's our wedding in one week,” Evan said. “Her parents have just arrived. Where do you think she'd possibly go?”
“I see. So you're taking me up on my offer.”
“Your offer?” Evan asked.
“My Scout search and rescue team. We've been ready and available all week, you know. My boys have a rucksack packed and can be out on the mountain at a moment's notice. They're well trained.”
Watkins stepped forward. “It's not your Scouts we're interested in at the moment, sir. We'd like to ask you some questions about yesterday afternoon, if we could possibly come in.”
“Come in? Yes, by all means.” Shorecross opened his front door wide and ushered them into a narrow hallway. “This way, please, gentlemen. I don't actually have a front parlor anymore, because my piano takes up so much damned space.” He pushed open a door to reveal a gleaming polished grand piano, occupying most of the small front room. “Still, I wasn't about to give it up when I moved here. I'll get around to looking for more spacious quarters when I have time. In here, then, gentlemen. I'm afraid it's rather cramped, but it's just me, so I manage.”
The back room contained a dining set, armchairs, a large stereo on one wall, and neat racks of CDs. Shorecross motioned Evan and Watkins to the two armchairs situated on either side of a fake log fire. Evan perched uneasily at the edge of his chair. The man seemed so at ease. Was it possible he'd got it wrong and Shorecross wasn't the one?
“Mr. Shorecross,” Watkins said, “when did you last see Bronwen Price?”
Shorecross frowned. “You know, I'm really not sure.”
“Did she come into your bank yesterday?”
“She may have done. Fridays are always busy for us.”
“So you don't remember seeing her? She didn't have a specific interview with you in your office?”
Shorecross frowned. “What exactly are you asking me, Inspector? Are you somehow insinuating that I might be responsible for her disappearance?”
“Oh Good Lord, no, sir.” Watkins sounded if anything a trifle too hearty, Evan thought. “We're trying to piece together her movements yesterday afternoon, so that we can work out who was the last person to see her before she disappeared. We know she took the bus down from Llanfair. We know she didn't show up at an antiques store to look at a brass bedstead she intended to purchase. It's possible she stopped in at the bank first, if she was intending a large purchase.”
The frown left Shorecross's face. “Come to think of it, I think I did hear her name mentioned. I think I recall Hillary saying something about âOnly one week to go, Miss Price.' But I didn't actually see her, so I couldn't tell you what she was wearing.”
“I wonder if you'd be good enough to accompany us down to the bank now, sir,” Watkins said.
“Now? What for?” For the first time there was a sharpness to Shorecross's voice.
“We're leaving no stone unturned right now. We'd like to search the bank and have you unlock the vault.”
“Unlock the vault? This is preposterous.”
Watkins held up a conciliatory hand. “I assure you that we're putting every other business she could have visited through the same degree of security. A bank vault would be a good place to hide someone, wouldn't it?”
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