Murder in Mind (29 page)

Without medication, Deacon was prone to 'flashes of temper', his mother had told him earlier. Had he taken his medication on that Saturday night?

Reluctantly, Matt picked up his phone again. He didn't have Bartholomew's contact number with him – the card was under a fridge magnet in the kitchen at Spinney Cottage – but a directory enquiries company put him through to Charlborough Police Station. At this point he suffered a check. Asking for DI Bartholomew, he was told that he was at present unavailable. Declining to speak to anyone else, Matt gave his name and requested that Bartholomew call him back as soon as possible.

Frustrated, he cut the connection. Thinking of Joy had presented him with another dilemma. Should he tell Deacon's parents what he'd found out from Wintermann and warn them that he'd contacted Bartholomew? He shrank from the thought of Joy's distress, but it was inescapable. And what of Charlie, who was so desperate to present a normal front to the world that he had kept his son's illness a secret – even from his daughters? How would he react to the possibility that Deacon had been responsible for Sophie's death?

While Matt was debating his next move, a movement caught his eye. Away up the lane, at the dim limits of the car's headlights, a figure was climbing over a gate from one of the fields. Even though it was too distant to be distinct, the idea that it was anyone other than Deacon didn't occur to Matt for a second. Wearing only jeans and a pale tee shirt, in spite of the bitter wind, the person was slender but unmistakably male. As Matt watched, the man glanced back down the lane towards the car, shielding his eyes with his hand, and then set off, half walking, half running, in the other direction.

Losing sight of him round a bend in the lane,
Matt put the car in gear and drove slowly in pursuit. Just as his headlights picked out the hurrying figure once more, his mobile phone began to trill. He picked it off the seat with his left hand.

'Is that Matt Shepherd?' It was Bartholomew.

'Yes. Thanks for getting back to me.'

'Well, strictly speaking, I'm off duty. I just popped back to the office for something, but my sergeant said this sounded important.'

'Yes, it is – but . . .'

Ahead of Matt, Deacon picked up speed and, worried that he was panicking the youngster, Matt pulled in and stopped the car at the side of the lane, its two nearside wheels on the verge.

'Look, can you hold on for a moment?' he said into the phone and, without waiting for an answer, dropped it back onto the seat and opened the car door. Stepping out into the biting wind, he shouted, 'Deacon wait! It's Matt. Wait for me.'

To his relief, Deacon slowed and turned, squinting against the lights as he continued to walk backwards with short, jerky steps.

Realising that the lights were intimidating, Matt reached in and switched them to dipped beam, turning the hazard warning lights on at the same time.

'Deacon, stop! I just want to talk.'

This time Deacon hesitated.

'Who is it?'

'Matt – you know, Kendra's boyfriend.'

Leaving the car door open, he stepped round it and walked forward a few paces.

Deacon looked blankly back.

'Where's Kendra?'

'She isn't here, Deke. She's gone out with Grace.'

'I can't see you – I can't see your face. Who are you? Stay away from me!' Panicking, Deacon started to back away again, his own face sheet-white in the glare.

'It's all right. I'll stay here. I won't hurt you.'

Through the open front of his leather jacket the wind was cutting through the fabric of Matt's sweatshirt as if it didn't exist and, even at a distance of several feet, he could see that Deacon was shuddering with cold, hunching his back and hugging his bare arms, his dark hair whipping around his head. Matt remembered that he had his new fleece in the back of the car.

'Deke, stay there. I'll get you a coat. Just hang on.'

Keeping an eye on the figure outlined by the lights, he retraced his steps and reached in. On the passenger seat his phone was emitting a tinny voice and he picked it up.

'I'll be with you in a moment,' he told it, without preamble. 'Please hang on. It's really important.'

Moments later he was advancing cautiously towards Kendra's brother, the navy fleece, with its red and white logo, held before him, invitingly.

'This'll be warm, Deke. Come on, take it. Put it on.'

Although Deacon looked longingly at the garment, he made no move to reach for it, but neither did he move away as, approaching as if to a nervous horse, Matt drew closer. Finally, stepping slightly to the side, he held the fleece up and Deacon obediently slipped first one arm and then the other into the sleeves.

'Good. That's better,' Matt said.

'Matt?' The word was spoken on a note of discovery.

'That's right. What are you doing out here, Deke?'

Deacon looked away across the darkened landscape and, for a moment, Matt thought he wasn't going to answer, but then he said, through chattering teeth, 'I had to try and find her.'

'Who? Kendra?'

Deacon shook his head.

'The girl. She was pretty – really pretty. She was dancing.'

Matt was touched by dread.

'Do you mean Sophie, Deke?'

'Sophie . . . ?'

'The dancing girl. Was her name Sophie?'

Deacon looked away again.

'Where's Frannie?'

'She's with Kendra,' Matt said, beginning to shiver himself. He wasn't sure whether Deacon's slightly irrational state of mind was the result of too much medication, or not enough. 'They've gone out for the evening. They'll be home later.'

'Frannie's kind. She's my favourite.'

'Why don't you come and sit in the car and I'll see if I can get Frannie on my mobile,' Matt suggested. 'It'll be warmer in there.'

The temptation was to try and lead Deacon back onto the subject of the dancing woman, but he wasn't at all sure it was either wise or in the lad's best interests. As it turned out, his thoughts drifted back that way without prompting.

'She wouldn't wake up,' he said suddenly.

'Who wouldn't?' Matt's heart began to thump heavily.

'The dancing girl. She had pretty hair – long and blonde. She sat down and went to sleep. I didn't know what to do.' He turned towards Matt and there were tears running in sparkling trails down his thin face. 'She wouldn't wake up.'

'So what did you do, Deke?'

'I just wanted to talk to her. She looked so pretty, dancing.' Then, with a sudden shift, 'I was smoking – you won't tell them, will you?'

Matt assured him that he wouldn't.

'I knew you wouldn't. I like you, Matt.
You
wouldn't hurt me, would you?'

'Of course not. Why? Who's hurt you, Deke?'

Deacon's face screwed up like that of an upset child and he started to walk again, turning away from the car and its promised shelter.

'Niall said I mustn't talk about it.'

'Has Niall hurt you? What has he done?'

'He took care of her.'

'Took care of the girl?'

Deacon nodded.

'He says I mustn't talk about it or I'll be locked away. He says he'll tell everyone I'm mad and they'll take me away. Can he do that?'

Matt shook his head.

'No, of course he can't,' he said, with more conviction than he felt. Delafield could certainly set things in motion – cause questions to be asked – but, unless Matt was very much mistaken, the minder would be just as reluctant to have his charge committed to an institution as Deacon would be to go. If Matt's suspicions were correct, then just under the troubled surface of the youngster's mind were memories that could have Delafield consigned to a cell for a good few years to come. Took care of the girl, did he? Hefted her body over the side of the bridge and down into the undergrowth, more likely.

'When did he threaten you?' he asked. 'Was it today? Is that why you ran away?'

'Yes. No. It was the dream . . . Oh God! I can't get it out of my head.'

Deacon's hands flew to his temples and he stopped so abruptly that Matt passed him and had to turn back.

He saw the lad's fingers curl tightly into his dark hair and heard the tormented groan that he uttered.

'It was horrible,' Deacon said brokenly. 'And I keep thinking – what if it wasn't a dream? What then? What if I really killed Benjy without even knowing it? What kind of person does that make me? Oh, God, I wish I could just remember, instead of seeing things – pictures – that don't make sense. It's like it's all there on the edges of my mind but, when I try to look at it, it slides away. What's the matter with me?'

Matt was way out of his depth, but he felt that, whatever Deacon had or hadn't done, this wasn't the best time or place to try and exorcise his demons. He put a hand on the lad's arm, but the contact made Deacon jump as if an electric shock had passed through his body.

'Come on,' Matt urged gently. 'Come back to the car, Deke. There's nothing that can't be sorted out.'

Deacon shook his arm free, moving sideways a pace.

'You don't understand. I loved Benjy. How could I do that?
How?
And the girl – she's in my head, too, kissing me, smiling at me. I thought she liked me.'

In spite of himself, Matt said, 'And then what happened?'

Deacon tilted his face to the night sky, where windblown scraps of cloud scudded across the darker vault. One or two stars showed, and a three-quarter moon.

'She smelled wonderful. I tried to hold her, but she pushed me away . . .' He put a hand up to his face again, running his fingers down his left cheek.

Matt remembered the stinging blow Sophie had dealt Jamie.

'Did she slap you? Is that what happened?'

'I pushed her and she sat down. I only wanted a kiss. She wanted it, too – didn't she? She was so pretty, and now . . . now she's dead.' Deacon's gaze dropped to Matt's face, his eyes gleaming in the light from the distant car. 'Was it me, Matt? Did
I
do it? I can't remember.' His voice began to rise in an apparent agony of frustration. 'I can't bloody remember! Did I kill her? Oh God, I wish all this stuff would get out of my head and leave me alone!'

Deacon started to walk again, weaving from side to side as though drunk, but nevertheless swiftly putting distance between himself and Matt, who stood helplessly watching him go.

He was rapidly moving beyond the reach of the car's headlights and, fearful of losing him completely, Matt decided to go back to the vehicle and bring it closer.

Breaking into a run, he retraced his steps and slid behind the wheel of the idling MR2. Shutting the door, he shifted the gear lever into first and was about to pull forward off the verge when a glow in the rear-view mirror signalled the approach of another vehicle.

Hoping that it was either Brewer or Delafield, Matt lowered the side window and signalled for it to slow down, trusting that the driver would see his hazard warning lights and pull up alongside.

It didn't.

Barely slowing to pass Matt's car in the narrow lane, a four-wheel-drive vehicle whooshed by, its full-beam headlights instantly picking out the moving figure on the brow of the hill, the red and white target on his borrowed jacket bobbing with each stride.

Matt's first thought was to thank God that he'd loaned Deacon the highly visible fleece, his second, bewilderment that the other driver didn't appear to be slowing at all.

'Slow down . . . For God's sake, slow down!' he muttered. 'What the hell are you doing?'

Frantic, he leaned on the car's horn, watching with growing horror as the vehicle rapidly closed on the walking man. Whether Deacon heard the warning or not, Matt would never know. The bulk of the 4x4 hid him from view in the last few moments before – with no attempt to brake – it hit the youngster with a sickening thud that was clearly audible where Matt sat, frozen in his seat, some sixty or seventy yards away.

'No!'

Matt's cry was worthless, coming eons too late and going unheard by anyone but himself. Seconds later, he was once more out of his car and running to the scene of the collision, still struggling to believe that the driver of the 4x4 hadn't seen Deacon before he had run into him. Had he been on the phone perhaps, or fiddling with his radio? Whatever the case, reality was in the motionless form at the side of the road, its outline just visible to Matt in the glow of the vehicle's reversing lights as it backed up.

The 4x4 stopped, slightly slewed across the lane, a few yards from Deacon's body, and, as Matt drew nearer, the driver's door opened and someone stepped out, but instead of immediately hurrying to see what – if anything – could be done for the casualty, he stood stock-still, with one hand on the door, watching Matt's approach.

Shock, Matt supposed, slowing as he reached the scene.

'What the hell were you doing?' he demanded. 'Didn't you see him?'

Deacon lay partly on his side, face down in the frosty grass of the verge, with one arm outflung and both legs hideously misshapen, the thigh bones curving impossibly.

'Ring for an ambulance!' Matt instructed, and then knelt down, wishing he had a torch. The moon was free of cloud now, but Deacon was in the shelter of the hedge and his face and upper body lay in shadow. There was no way Matt was going to move him; Kendra's brother was in a pretty good approximation of the classic recovery position, and experience with racing falls had taught him that you don't touch if you don't have to.

Putting a hand lightly on Deacon's chest, he felt the shallowest of rise and falls, and, giving up on the silent bystander who still hadn't moved, he unzipped his jacket and reached into the inside pocket to find his own phone, only to remember that it was lying on the passenger seat of the MR2.

A beam of light fell on Deacon's face, and, with renewed hope, Matt looked up. The 4x4 driver had found a torch and was coming closer.

'Is he dead?'

'Not yet, but he will be if we don't get an ambulance here!' Matt told him, urgency rendering his voice sharp. 'I haven't got my phone.'

The torchlight transferred to Matt's face, catching him full in the eyes.

'Get that bloody thing out of my face!' he snapped, blinking.

'He's wearing your jacket,' the voice beyond the light said in a faintly accusing tone.

'Yeah, well he was cold,' Matt replied unthinkingly. 'Look, have you got a mobile or not?' He was beginning to think he was dealing with a second case of mental imbalance. Surely everyone had a mobile phone these days; certainly you'd expect the driver of what appeared to be a fairly modern Land Rover to have one, so why on earth didn't he use it to call for help?

The driver ignored his question, and the light stayed, infuriatingly, on Matt's face.

He stood up.

'Phone . . . ? All right, I'll get mine. Look, don't just stand there! Have you got anything to put over him? He needs to be kept warm but, whatever you do, don't move him.'

'You've fucked everything up now!'

The driver's voice was vehement, but so low that, for a moment, Matt wasn't sure he'd heard the words aright over the noise of the wind. He paused in the act of turning to run back to his car.

'You what?' he demanded, squinting against the torchlight which was still shining in his face.

'Giving him your fucking jacket! What did you go and do that for?'

'I told you – he was cold. He only had a tee shirt . . .' As he began to speak, recognition came to Matt. The slightly gruff tone, the Land Rover, the fact that the man had recognised what was, after all, a fairly new coat – the man with the torch was Niall Delafield.

Suddenly, the full, chilling significance of his remarks was borne home to Matt. Delafield had
meant
to hit the running figure; and not because he'd thought it was Deacon but because, in that distinctive jacket and having just passed the MR2, he had mistaken him for Matt.

Almost involuntarily, he took a step back, glancing down at the motionless body at his feet. What to do now? The very fact that Delafield had drawn Matt's attention to his mistake augured badly for the future. By not attempting to pass the deed off as an accident, he had, in effect, signalled his intention of finishing the job.

'Look – he's still breathing. If we can get him an ambulance, he might still be all right.'

'Do I look like I care? He's a fucking fruitcake – he'd be better off dead. Tidier all round.'

Matt took another step back. He was loath to leave Deacon to the mercy of Delafield, but he had no choice. The lad needed an ambulance and his erstwhile minder was clearly not going to call for one. Added to which, if he was reading it right, his own situation was looking increasingly precarious. For both of their sakes, he needed to get to his phone, but all at once the car seemed a frighteningly long way away.

'You can't just leave him,' he said, mentally poised to run and trying to disguise the fact. 'After all,
you
ran him down.'

'Ah, yes. A shame, that,' came the answer, and Matt sensed rather than saw the accompanying shrug. 'Just stepped out in front of me with no warning. Off his head, poor bloke; suffering a psychotic episode, no doubt. Who's to argue? There'll be no witnesses . . .'

Matt swallowed, his mouth dry.

'They'll know you're lying. The forensic people can tell exactly what happened.'

'Why don't you let me worry about that?' Delafield suggested calmly. 'Time they get their act together, I'll be long gone.'

There didn't seem to be anything more to say, so Matt ran.

He'd expected Delafield to give chase, and hoped that his own fitness would give him the edge he needed over the bulkier man; what he didn't expect was for Delafield to give chase in the Land Rover. Matt had barely covered twenty yards when he heard the powerful engine roar, and twenty more when the headlights caught him, sending his running shadow leaping fifteen feet ahead of him down the road.

How the hell had he got the damned thing turned round so quickly in the narrow lane?

Matt ran harder than he'd ever run before, desperate to reach the relative safety of the car and the phone that represented a lifeline for Deacon and himself.

Slipping slightly as he decelerated on the gritty surface of the lane, Matt grabbed the car's door handle and pulled it open, glancing back at the oncoming Land Rover as he did so. In that instant he realised that, as before, Delafield had no intention of slowing. He was aiming the 4x4, like a lethal weapon, squarely at the front of the MR2, and Matt had no illusions about which vehicle would come off best in the encounter.

Casting one regretful look at the mobile phone on the passenger seat, he abandoned the idea of retrieving it and concentrated, instead, on his own personal survival. His instincts were shrieking at him to get away from the car, given the speed at which the Land Rover was travelling, to go behind it was clearly suicidal, and to move to the side a moment too soon would make him an easy target should Delafield swerve to follow him.

He had only fractions of a second to play with and, in the end, he left it one crucial moment too late – his dive to the right being thrown off course by the reflex action of the open door as the Land Rover ploughed into the nose of the silver sports car.

Tarmac, hedge, and sky barrelled crazily round Matt and he fetched up on his back at the side of the lane with his head and shoulders resting on the grass verge. From there he had a grandstand view of the Land Rover as it mounted the bonnet of his car like some giant copulating metal monster. The sound was horrific as the sleek bodywork collapsed under the strain and the windscreen imploded, showering the interior with glass.

The impact had driven both vehicles several yards down the road, the Land Rover finishing up with its front wheels dropping into the seating compartment of the MR2, a chilling affirmation of the wisdom of Matt's decision. For a moment, there was relative silence, broken only by the small sounds of settling machinery. The Land Rover engine had stalled, but any hopes Matt might have entertained that the danger was past were swiftly routed as Delafield attempted to restart it. Obediently, the 4x4 hiccupped back to life and, with a creaking groan of distressed metal, Delafield began to rock it to and fro in an attempt to break free.

Pushing himself up into a sitting position, Matt saw to his dismay that the manoeuvre showed every sign of success; with each pull backwards the Land Rover rose higher, and it looked to be only a matter of time before it would have all four wheels on the tarmac again. While it couldn't be said that Matt's brain was functioning at full power after being thrown across the lane, his self-preservation instincts were unimpaired and they were unequivocal in urging him to put as much distance as he could between himself and the Land Rover as quickly as was humanly possible.

Scrambling to his feet, Matt was relieved to find his limbs were all in working order – if a little bruised. He glanced up and down the lane in momentary indecision and came to the rapid conclusion that his best hope was to head back down the lane towards Rockfield, though he knew he had little chance of reaching it on foot before the Land Rover caught up with him. Even a practically unachievable goal was better than no goal at all, which was what he would face if he went the other way, past Deacon Brewer's inert form and on into the no-man's-land beyond.

Seconds later he was sprinting past the revving 4x4 – still riding high on the mangled remains of the MR2 – and away round the bend in the lane. With the wind in his ears, Matt couldn't hear anything except his breathing and the slapping of his soft-soled shoes on the road, and the sensation that the Land Rover had broken free and was bearing down on him began to prey on his mind to the extent that he had to keep checking over his shoulder. He had covered the best part of two hundred yards and glanced back half a dozen times when he finally saw the sight he'd been dreading – the oncoming lights of a vehicle.

There was never any doubt in his mind that it was the Land Rover; quite apart from the fact that traffic was rare on this road, this vehicle was dragging a section of metalwork beneath it, scraping over the tarmac with a horrendous screech, and sparking like the fifth of November.

Whatever was caught under it didn't seem to be slowing the Land Rover much, and, desperately, Matt searched the dark line of the right-hand hedge for a thin patch as he ran. He was instinctively looking to the right because that way, albeit a good mile or more distant in the valley bottom, lay the farmhouse and stable yard of Rockfield. However, as the roar of the pursuing vehicle grew ever louder, he would have taken any route that offered.

Finally, just when Matt had begun to think his luck had run out, a gap appeared in the blackthorn and, stepping up onto the verge, he launched himself through in a flying leap designed to clear any wire that might span the opening.

There was indeed wire, its barbs making themselves felt in a burning pain down the length of his right leg as he caught his toe in the top strand and sprawled untidily onto the spiky stubble headland of the field beyond. The lights that had chased him down the lane followed him still, shining above his head as the Land Rover bumped up onto the verge and ploughed into the fence in its turn. At this point, the wire – which Matt had been roundly cursing just moments before – now earned his gratitude, as the three strands combined to bring the heavy vehicle to a halt, its engine stalling and its headlights illuminating nothing but empty acres of ploughed earth and a couple of startled pheasants.

'Fuck!' Delafield said plainly into the sudden silence that followed, and, keeping low, Matt raised himself onto all fours and scuttled closer to the hedge, where he paused to catch his breath, taking in the lie of the land while he waited to see what Delafield's next move would be.

On this side of the hedge the wind was bitingly cold and Matt could feel the chill of evaporating sweat on his body. Above, the moon was sailing in a sky that was now clear of all but the wispiest ribbons of cloud, and it was plain to Matt that any attempt to cross the huge open field would leave him horribly exposed. Looking to his right, he could see a dark cluster of farm buildings on the skyline, but he'd driven past them many times and knew there was no farmhouse amongst them. The barns and stables might offer a place to hide, in the short term – always supposing he could reach them unseen – but they offered little in the long term.

While Matt racked his brains for a plan of action, the Land Rover engine turned over twice and came back to life. Twanging free of the wire, the 4x4 reversed and moved off up the lane, but slowly – as if searching for something. That something turned out to be a gateway and there was clearly no gate to hinder its progress, for, as Matt watched with a sinking heart, its headlights blazed out across the field once more, some twenty yards further on, and began to swing round in an arc that would inevitably bring them towards his position by the hedge.

It was time to be moving again.

Standing up, Matt bent the top strand of wire down as far as it would go and stepped carefully over. Back on the tarmac, the need to make a decision about which way to go became imperative. His idea of heading for Rockfield had lost some of its feasibility but, then again, he didn't have a better one, so he set off at a run along the lane once more, hoping that the next field might perhaps be less accessible to the Land Rover and gain him a little leeway.

Slowing down as he reached the first gateway, he peered round the gatepost and saw the Land Rover in the far corner but heading back. It looked as though Delafield was doing a sweep of the whole field, driving round the perimeter to avoid the uneven plough.

Matt hesitated. The long metal gate to the field was opened right back against the hedge and he toyed with the idea of shutting it, to buy him some precious time. On the other hand, it would be a clear signal of his whereabouts, so, resisting the temptation, he stepped back and ran on.

Pounding over the tarmac, Matt was grateful for the endurance fitness that his profession required, but aware that a prolonged game of catch-me-if-you-can with a motor vehicle could have only one ending. He had to get off the road and out of sight; after all, surely Delafield couldn't afford to remain in the area for too long, with the evidence of what he'd done laid out for any chance passer-by to see. On the other hand, where could he go? As the only witness, did Delafield think that removing Matt would solve his problems? Matt couldn't believe he'd be that short-sighted. He must know that he'd burnt his bridges, so his determination to silence Matt could only be to buy himself time in which to make a clean getaway.