The Cadaver Game (6 page)

‘Sorry, love, I’ve got to go.’

She sat up, her brown hair falling in messy morning strands around her bare shoulders. ‘Are you going to be working all weekend?’

He detected a note of reproach in her voice, but that was hardly surprising. He couldn’t lie – and if he tried he knew she
wouldn’t believe him. ‘Sorry.’ He knew the word was
inadequate. ‘It’s that woman in Morbay – the one who’d been there a week before she was found.’

Pam looked at him, a little more sympathetic now. ‘You’d think someone would have missed her. Are you looking for a boyfriend?’

‘It’s a question of finding out who he is. According to the neighbours she kept herself to herself, but we know she had a
child.’

Pam raised her eyebrows. ‘So where is he … or she?’

Wesley shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. Hopefully we’ll find out sooner or later.’

He kissed her and she closed her eyes and lay back on the pillow. ‘Wish you didn’t have to go.’

‘Me too.’

She opened her eyes again and put a hand up to touch his face, brushing her pale fingers against his dark cheek. ‘I should
have known what I was letting myself in for when I married a policeman.’

‘I promise I’ll make it up to you when we’ve sorted out this case. Maybe your mother can babysit and we can go—’

She hauled herself upright. ‘Not my bloody mother. Not after she nearly got me killed.’ When she lay down again and turned
her back on him, he wished he’d never brought the subject up. Della was hardly one of his favourite people, and the way she’d
led Pam into danger earlier that year still haunted him when he thought of how things might have turned out. But the rift
between mother and daughter made him uncomfortable.

He went downstairs to make a healthy breakfast of toast and muesli – or bird seed as Gerry always called it. He was sipping
his tea and scanning the front page of the
newspaper he’d found lying in the hall when his mobile phone rang and he saw the caller was Neil. He’d imagined his old university
friend would still be fast asleep at his Exeter flat and he was surprised to hear him sounding so alert.

‘I wanted to catch you before you went out. Pam OK?’

‘Fine.’

There was a pause before Neil continued. ‘I’ve got a legal question for you.’

‘Go on.’ Wesley was intrigued. He put his half-eaten toast back on his plate and listened.

‘Can an artist make you sign a confidentiality clause?’

‘What?’

Even when Neil repeated the question, Wesley was none the wiser so he asked him for an explanation. But what he said didn’t
seem to make much sense.

‘So let me get this straight – this man wants you and your team to excavate a picnic that was buried sixteen years ago.’

‘Not a picnic, Wes. A Feast of Life. He’s paying handsomely and I’m intending to use it as a training excavation for a select
band of post-grad students. The only thing is, he wants us all to sign this confidentiality agreement. I think it’s in case
any rival conceptual artists pinch his idea. Or perhaps he’s just being a pretentious prick.’

Wesley couldn’t help smiling to himself. If only he had Neil’s problems instead of a body down at the mortuary. ‘If I were
you, Neil, I’d sign on the dotted line and take the cash. Anyway, what can be down there that’s confidential?’

‘My thoughts exactly, but I thought I’d better run it by you – seeing as you’re the nearest thing I’ve got to a mate in the
law.’

‘So you’re going ahead with this picnic thing? I thought you were working at Fortress Point.’

‘Dave’s taking over there for a while – holding the fort.’ He groaned at his own joke. ‘The artist, Kevin Orford’s making
a really generous donation to the unit for my services.’

‘Even Neil Watson has his price.’

‘Don’t be like that, Wes. We need the funds. You know how things are with all the cuts and …’

‘I’ve heard of Kevin Orford.’

‘Everyone has. He’s the
enfant terrible
of the British art scene – although
enfant
isn’t quite the word – he’s probably knocking on forty.’

‘So where is this great artistic masterpiece going to be unearthed?’

‘It’s in a field near Catton Hall Holiday Park. I went there once when I was a kid.’

‘It’s closed now, isn’t it?’

‘That’s right.’

Wesley glanced at the clock above the fridge. ‘Sorry, Neil. I’d better go. I promised Gerry I’d be in by quarter to eight.’

‘How is he?’

‘Same as he always is. See you.’

He slipped on his jacket and stuffed what remained of the toast into his mouth. It was a lovely day and the sky was a cloudless
blue. He lived at the top of the town and as he walked down into the centre he could see the river sparkling in the sunlight,
bobbing with boats that looked like playthings in a giant’s bath. He never tired of this view when the weather was good. But
in the cold, damp months when the river turned dark grey and mist
shrouded the hills, it could be bleaker than his native London.

When he reached the incident room it was already half full of officers typing into computers and sorting through papers. Others
were arriving, exchanging pleasantries and helping themselves to a cup of coffee from the machine before starting a day’s
work. Gerry was waiting for him in his glass-fronted office, feet up on his desk with a large mug of tea in his hand. He looked
relaxed for somebody who had the heavy responsibility of investigating a woman’s murder. But appearances can deceive.

‘You’re late, Wes.’

‘There was a time when you used to own a malfunctioning alarm clock, if I remember right.’

‘Joyce bought me a new one for Christmas.’

Wesley suppressed a smile. Before his lady friend, Joyce, arrived in his life, Gerry, a widower of long standing, had led
a chaotic existence. ‘How is Joyce?’

‘She’s gone to one of those health spa places with one of her mates this weekend. Good timing, eh?’

‘Yes,’ he said, recalling the reproach in Pam’s voice. ‘Anything new come in?’

‘We’ve got a name. The phone that reported the body is registered to a Keith Marsh – Manchester address.’

‘Manchester? Holidaymaker?’

Gerry’s eyes lit up and he looked like a child desperate to recount a thrilling tale. ‘We had a call first thing from Neston
nick – traffic division. A car was involved in an RTA last night. Bloke overtook on a blind bend and went straight into an
oncoming tractor. He’s in Morbay Hospital – Intensive Care. Anyway, when the constable at the scene searched the wrecked car
he found a mobile phone and he
had the presence of mind to go through the recent calls. The driver had made a nine nine nine call a few hours before the
crash, and when the constable checked he discovered that the anonymous call reporting that body in Morbay had come from the
driver’s number.’ A triumphant look appeared on Gerry’s face. ‘The car’s also registered to a Keith Marsh – same Manchester
address. Looks like we’ve found our man. I’ve asked for the phone to be brought over and I gave the hospital a call first
thing and they said Marsh was stable.’

Wesley knew that was hospital-speak for ‘no change’. But if the patient had been in the dead woman’s house, they needed him
conscious and talkative.

So far Trish had had no luck contacting the two people who’d provided Tessa Trencham’s references. However, she felt a little
more hopeful about the other avenue she was about to explore. Tessa’s dentist didn’t work on a Saturday, but it had been easy
to get his home address.

It was a routine matter and Trish wasn’t particularly optimistic that she’d learn much about the dead woman. To him she had
probably been nothing more than a set of teeth.

The dentist, Steven Bowles, lived in the village of Belsham, halfway between Neston and Morbay, in the sort of thatched cottage
that had graced a thousand chocolate boxes in days gone by. It had fresh paintwork, fashionable blinds at the small windows
and a glossy black front door flanked by a pair of bay trees.

Before ringing the doorbell, she looked around and saw the church on the opposite side of the road behind an extensive graveyard.
She knew DI Peterson’s sister was
married to the Vicar of Belsham and she stared at the church for a few seconds out of simple curiosity. It was very old with
the sort of pinnacle-topped tower so common in the locality. Like the cottage it was pretty, but she knew she had no time
to admire the architecture.

The door was opened by a tall man in his late twenties or early thirties. He wore his dark hair fairly long, but what Trish
noticed most about him was his eyes, which were a striking cornflower-blue. As she produced her ID and asked whether she could
have a quick word, she found herself wishing she’d taken more care over her appearance that morning.

There was a slight worried frown on his face as he stood aside to let her in.

‘It’s just routine,’ Trish said. ‘I believe you have a patient called Tessa Trencham.’

‘I have a lot of patients. I can’t remember them all.’

‘A woman was found dead at Ms Trencham’s address in Morbay yesterday. We need her dental records to confirm her identity.’

‘That shouldn’t be a problem.’

‘If she’s a patient of yours, I wonder if you can tell me anything about her. Did she talk about her family or her job?’ She
took a copy of the E-fit picture out of her bag. ‘This might jog your memory.’

As he took the picture from her, his hand brushed hers. She stood quite still and waited for him to speak.

‘It’s not very good, is it?’

‘The body had been there a while so we couldn’t really use a photo of …’

He stared at the picture for a few moments before speaking again. ‘I think she said she ran her own jewellery
business in a converted barn near Stoke Raphael. I’m sure I remember her saying that she was from London originally and before
she started her business she’d worked in admin or accounts or something. When she was down in London I think she had quite
a high-flying job but she came here because she wanted to get away from the rat race. The old story, eh.’ He smiled again.

He had a lovely smile, warm and sympathetic, and Trish began to wonder how easy it was to change your dentist.

‘Is there anything else you can tell me? Her date of birth? Next of kin?’

‘All her details will be at the surgery. We can go there now if you like. I’m meeting someone at two but it’s on my way.’

Trish felt the pull of temptation but she knew that, in the interests of operational efficiency, she should decline. ‘Can
you call me with the information?’ She produced her card and handed it to him. ‘And when I get details of the deceased’s dental
work to compare …’

‘Yes, that’s no problem. Her dental records are back at the surgery too. Will you come along yourself?’

‘When would be convenient?’

‘First thing Monday?’

‘I’ll be there.’

Bowles looked into her eyes. ‘I’ll look forward to it.’

‘Me too,’ she said before she could stop herself. If Rachel could see her now, she’d tell her she was being unprofessional.
And that was the last thing she wanted.

An hour after she returned to the incident room, she received a call. Bowles had called into his surgery on the way to his
appointment and had looked at Tessa Trencham’s file. She’d given her address as Lister Cottage,
St Marks Road, her date of birth was the 1st April 1972 and she had no underlying medical conditions or elaborate dental work.
He ended by saying he was looking forward to seeing her on Monday when she brought him the dead woman’s dental chart for comparison
with his records.

Never before, in Trish’s experience, had anybody made the subject of teeth sound quite so appealing.

Kevin Orford’s message had been terse – quite rude really. ‘Meet me at Catton Hall at three o’clock.’ He had ended the call
without waiting for an answer.

As it was the weekend Neil had been looking forward to a day of leisure, catching up on his reading and leafing through some
of the archaeological journals that had piled up on his coffee table. Then he’d planned to meet some post-graduates for a
drink and to discuss the strange proposed excavation at Catton Hall. He’d assumed Orford would realise that the arrangements
would take a day or two to finalise. But it looked as if the man didn’t inhabit the same planet as lesser mortals who had
to work for a living.

He toyed with the idea of sticking to his original plan and not turning up. Why should he be at the beck and call of a man
he considered to be a pretentious fool? He’d looked him up on the Internet and learned that his previous projects included
the pile of rotting oranges, with which he had triumphed at the Turner Prize exhibition; the hundred naked men eating takeaway
pizzas on the Millennium Bridge over the Thames and his twelve-foot-tall tower of rotting apples in a field next to Heathrow
Airport. Then there were his smaller works, so beloved of
wealthy collectors: the plastic fruit arranged in a toilet bowl; the Union Jack made from discarded meat bones. His creations
hit the news and he was taken seriously by the art establishment and notable collectors, so if Orford was a fool, he was a
fool with money. The way things were in the world of archaeology at that moment, Neil’s unit needed all the cash it could
get so at half past one, he climbed into his old yellow Mini and set off down the A380, hoping he wouldn’t get held up by
the Morbay holiday traffic.

He arrived at Catton Hall at ten past three, reasoning that being just a little late would make a point. Orford had specified
the hall rather than the field where they had last met, so Neil drove through gates topped by a pair of stone eagles, one
missing a head, the other a wing. The drive was rough and pitted and he drove slowly, fearing for the Mini’s suspension, but
eventually the house came into view. It was long and low and built of a rough, brown-grey stone that blended perfectly with
its surroundings. He guessed that the stone had originated at the disused quarry near Fortress Point; somehow local materials
always made a building appear in harmony with its surroundings. It was hard to tell the age of the house. This was no grand
fashionable dwelling to impress the neighbours. It sat solidly in the landscape and had been constructed without a thought
to passing design fads. This was the timeless seat of the local gentry.