Worthless Remains (31 page)

‘Don't really know. Carla suddenly called for Middleton and told us that the car was on fire. We all came out here but it suddenly went whoosh! Not much left now. I hope it won't spread to that van . . .'

The one person missing from the ring of spectators was the car's owner. ‘Where's Middleton?'

‘Don't know, Carla couldn't find him.'

‘Tell Carla to open the gate. The police are out there.'

I jogged on past the strange spectacle of people solemnly observing the burning of a 4×4. It had something ominously ritualistic about it and I hoped they wouldn't start chanting. Through the hall, the central gallery and the drawing room, out on to the verandah. It was quite dark now on this side of the hall, which was not illuminated by the car fire, and the gardens lay silent and empty. I walked out on to the lawn, making do with the feeble light of a moon obscured by high cloud. A feeling that Guy was in trouble had been growing into conviction the moment I had seen his burning car. Would calling for him be any use or make things worse? With ninety acres out there what else was I going to do?

‘Guy Middleton!' I hollered. ‘It's Honeysett! Where are you?' I walked rather than jogged now, but I walked fast. The large trench was once more covered in the khaki tent against more rain, a darker presence in the darkness. I found the entrance and stuck my head inside. It was utterly dark within. I had been relieved of my little Maglite at the police station but even without it I could sense that no one was breathing in there. I walked on cautiously past suddenly-looming test pits, roughly filled-in holes dug by treasure hunters and the long hump of the spoil heap. ‘Middleton, you out there?' Nothing. The first of the hedges loomed like a black brushstroke inked across the dark landscape. Sensing more than seeing the overgrown opening in it, I dived through. On the other side the still figure of a garden sculpture made an eerie shape in the space between the hedges. From memory I found the next opening to the left. I stopped in front of it and held my breath, listening. There were distant sounds behind me now, back at the Hall. I tried to tune them out and instead listened ahead. A tiny noise. It could have been anything, a bird, a rabbit. Then it occurred to me that if Middleton was in trouble then I had been shouting the wrong name. ‘Julie! Julie Rhymer!' I called. I stepped through the opening in the hedge.

There were three dark shapes on the other side. One I knew to be a four-foot terracotta griffin. The other two were breathing. ‘Julie? Guy?' There was a simpering sound from the shape to the left. Then torchlight blinded me.

‘Don't move. Go away. No, stay where you are. I have a gun.' It was unmistakably Julie's voice but it was shaking, not with fear but with suppressed emotion.

‘Do something, Honeysett,' came Guy's querulous voice. The beam of light left me and moved to Middleton who was standing with hands raised head high, as if to ward off a blow. ‘She's got one of Stoneking's shotguns; she says she's going to kill me.'

I could see now that Julie was indeed holding one of Stoneking's expensive guns, with a long torch taped to the barrels. Julie swung the barrels and pointed the gun at me. ‘You'll do nothing at all, Chris. I'd hate to shoot you but I swear I will if you get in my way.' The torch beam swung back to Middleton who had been inching towards me, his protector.

‘Stop moving, you arsehole,' Julie hissed.

‘And you're going to kill him because naturally that's what April would have wanted?' I said flatly.

At the mention of her sister's name she stiffened. ‘What would you know about it?'

‘Very little.'

‘Exactly, so keep out of it. This piece of scum here is responsible for her death. The stupid girl had a schoolgirl crush on him from watching him on telly, with his tomb raider outfit and his stupid ponytail. And he took advantage. He screwed her and what's more he got her pregnant. And when my dim-witted sister told him he got scared. He sweet-talked her into getting rid of her baby, saying it was the wrong time for them and a child would get in the way or some such lie, then as soon as she'd had the abortion he broke off all contact.'

‘It was just a schoolgirl crush,' Middleton said.

‘Shut up!'

‘A child would have been a millstone round her neck.'

‘Yours, more like. God, how I wish I had a millstone now so I could hang it round your neck and drown you in the lake. I wanted to drown you. I often thought about it, the bubbles, especially your last bubbles. But this will do, a shotgun will do. They use shotguns on vermin, don't they?'

‘What about your parents?' I said. I was standing just beyond the opening in the hedge and could hear quiet footsteps behind me. I wasn't sure Julie had heard them. I was trying to slow Julie down and at the same time make sure that whoever was approaching knew what he was walking into. ‘If you shoot Middleton now they will effectively lose both their daughters.'

‘Since my sister's death my mother has spoken only when spoken to first. It destroyed her.'

‘Sounds like she needs you.'

‘What about what I need?' she asked angrily, pointing the gun at me, then turning it back on Middleton as he took a couple of quick paces towards me. ‘Don't move a muscle, Middleton,' she bellowed. He was only about twelve feet away from me now. Any closer and Julie could no longer be certain that a blast from her gun wouldn't also fell me. I felt a presence close behind me, then a hand in the small of my back. ‘Move aside,' murmured Needham.

I took a step towards Middleton on my left.

‘Not that way, you moron,' said Needham loudly.

‘Stop there!' Julie shouted, waving her gun from side to side.

‘Do something!' Middleton screeched.

Needham stepped through the opening and turned on a strong flashlight, illuminating the scene. He was careful not to blind any of us, keeping it pointed in the centre of the space between us. ‘Stay calm, everyone,' said Needham in his most sonorous baritone. ‘Deep breaths, everyone. I'm Mike Needham. I'm a police officer, Julie. You've met me before, the night you missed Guy Middleton and shot Morgan with the
ballista
.'

‘Yeah, well, I didn't get to practise with that thing, did I?'

Ten feet of self-interest made me ask: ‘And have you had much practice with shotguns?'

The gun was pointing straight at Middleton now; she was making sure of her quarry. ‘No, but any moron can use a gun. The safety is off, in case you all wondered, and it was conveniently loaded when I found it in Stoneking's office.'

‘Nevertheless,' Needham said in his most reasonable voice. ‘I'd like you to lower it for the moment so we can talk.'

‘What's to talk about? You're trying to keep me talking until you get armed police here so they can put a bullet through my head.'

‘No, but I do want some answers. Not about him; we know about Middleton and your sister. We saw the pictures Paul Fosse took of them together.'

‘You saw them? So did I. Paul was blackmailing him. I caught him collecting the money from under a stone once and eventually we talked. I thought he was on my side. But when I told him I was going to exterminate the bastard he said he couldn't allow it.'

‘So you hit him over the head with a shovel?' I asked.

‘No one gets in the way of this; let that be a warning.'

Needham made a small move towards her. ‘Middleton will get what he deserves if you leave him to us, Julie. He won't get off lightly, I promise. We'll throw the book at him.'

‘I have a better idea,' Julie said, swinging the gun round to him. ‘You take Chris here and piss off or I'll do some shotgun practice on you. Move! Now!' She was extremely agitated now, perhaps sensing that time was running out.

There was a pause, then Needham had made his decision. ‘Walk to me, Honeysett,' he said quietly. Julie responded by turning her gun back on Middleton.

‘Don't leave me here, Honeysett!' Guy begged. ‘You're supposed to protect me. Protect me!'

‘I'm not obliged to stop bullets for you, Guy,' I said and slowly moved away from him, feeling more like a coward with every step.

‘Get behind me, Honeysett,' Needham said, pushing me along without taking his eyes off the gun. ‘Now please, Julie,' he said as he moved slowly, bravely forward, ‘think of your parents. Middleton isn't worth it, none of it. And I promise you, I'll make sure he'll go to prison.'

‘I'll make sure he goes to hell!' Julie stiffened and pulled the trigger. Guy's scream was cut short as the blast knocked him clean off his feet. Julie stepped closer and fired the second barrel into the writhing figure on the ground.

Seconds after the blasts had rung out Needham had taken the gun from Julie, dropped it on the grass and handcuffed her in the eerie light from the two torches where they had dropped to the ground. I picked up Mike's torch and rushed over to Middleton where for the first time I could see at close quarters what devastating effect a double-barrelled shotgun blast of two portions of pudding rice can have on the human form. Middleton was gasping for breath and groaning. The impact of countless rice grains had broken his skin all over his hands and face. He was holding his midriff where the second blast had hit him like a sledgehammer. His jacket was in tatters.

Soon the space between the hedges was flooded with police, followed immediately by an ambulance crew. Needham was as surprised as Julie that Middleton was alive, only he didn't spit in his direction like Julie did when she was led away by two officers. I explained to Needham.

‘Pudding rice,' he mused as we walked back to the house. ‘Quite effective. Perhaps we should arm officers with it. Did you know it was loaded with that?'

‘No.'

‘Do you think she knew?'

‘I doubt it.'

‘Shame. Real shame,' he said shiftily. ‘It makes a difference to the charge. To coin a phrase.' He gave me a sideways glance. ‘Didn't do too badly back there.'

‘Didn't stop her from shooting him.'

‘But we were there to stop her from using the blunt end to finish him off.'

‘That's a good thing, is it?'

Needham didn't answer that.

The house was ablaze with lights from every door and window. Arc lights and generators were being set up in the grounds. Mark Stoneking stood on his verandah, watching with fascinated horror as police and ambulance swarmed over the gardens once more. Behind him stood Carla, watching him watching us. Keeping an eye on everything from a window in the north tower was the figure of Olive Cunningham. Mark Stoneking looked very much like he had finally had enough excitement to get him through his old age.

B
y the middle of the next morning things at Tarmford Hall had quietened down considerably. The filming had been abandoned and the production team of
Time Lines
had shaken Stoneking's hand, crossed his palm with silver and driven away. The cherry picker was taken away but the digger remained; it would be needed eventually to fill in the large trenches. What remained were the archaeologists. Ungraciously the production team had pulled out the catering van but Carla had volunteered to feed Andrea and her tented gang of diggers. The atmosphere around the table at lunchtime was quite different now. The diggers all appeared to get on with each other and showed quite a different kind of enthusiasm from the TV crew. To them, television had just been a distraction.

The expected rain had not materialized and the weather was once more fine and warm. When I suggested we walk off our lunch in the gardens, Annis shook her head.

‘No thanks, the gardens give me the creeps. Why don't we check out the village instead?'

We walked. The wrought-iron gate to Tarmford Hall stood wide, almost as though it had been left open to give the whole place a good airing. The village of Tarmford was picturesque but felt under-populated. We stood by the green and the pond for some time and saw just one elderly lady walk up to the village shop and disappear inside.

‘Don't know about you but after that excitement I think we deserve a drink,' I said and made for the Druid's Arms. I tried one of the local beers while Annis was playing it safe with a pint of lager which shone golden in a patch of sunshine on our window table. It was while we were mulling over the events of the last week that the message alert on my newly returned mobile chimed. It was a text from PC Whatsisname.

Tom Dealey, Paulton, electrician, single. Crashed Hayabusa uninsured, no tax / MOT. Idiot family. That do ya?

It did. It made me think. ‘What is it?' Annis asked, noticing my brain working. I pushed my mobile across so she could read the text and continued to picture the Dealeys in my mind. One brother had recently cashed in on three-quarters of a million pounds compensation after a crippling bike crash, the other was an electrician, living in a detached house on a prosperous village estate. This brother drove a car but in his garage kept an expensive superbike. Which was uninsured, untaxed and had no valid MOT.

‘Why do people usually drive around uninsured?' I asked.

‘Because they can't afford the premiums?'

‘And if they can afford them?'

‘Because they don't qualify.'

‘And they don't qualify because they don't have a driver's licence.' I know, it was slow, but I was getting there.

‘Hon, that's my lager you're drinking,' Annis complained.

‘Exactly. It should have been Guinness,' I said and got up.

‘Are you feeling all right, hon?' Annis asked.

‘Never better. I suddenly feel quite well-off, too.'

It took me several hours to track Dealey down. I had called Mike Dealey's bungalow and got no answer. I had let it ring and ring at Tom Dealey's Paulton house. I had driven to both properties and leant on their doorbells. It was once more at the Royal United Hospital that I spotted Mike Dealey's red Honda in the disabled car park. Just in case I missed him inside I blocked his car in by parking an inch away across his rear bumper. It might land me a hefty parking fine but I could put that on expenses.