Authors: Hilary Bonner
‘Do not think this is the end of the matter,’ she commented rather lamely, she thought, over her shoulder. ‘We will be back.’
‘I look forward to it,’ he responded, his manner teasing, his voice displaying more than a touch of arrogance, she reckoned.
It was too much for her.
As Turner stepped into their squad car, Karen returned to Parker-Brown, who had not moved from his position in the doorway of his home.
‘I met your wife,’ she told him quietly.
‘Ah,’ he said. She waited to see if he would make any further comment. He didn’t.
‘Why?’ she asked.
He understood what she meant at once.
‘I didn’t think you’d have anything to do with me if you thought I was married.’
He could have no idea, of course, how ironic she found that remark. He didn’t know about Phil Cooper. Married men, unfortunately, had not always been off her agenda. Congenital liars were.
‘You’re a grade A bastard in every direction of life, Gerry,’ she told him, her eyes blazing with anger. ‘And I am going to get you, I promise.’
He said nothing, but she thought there may have been the merest flicker of concern in those strangely feminine brown eyes. And with this man, she thought, as she turned away from him again, even that was a result.
*
Kelly stayed in the armchair in the window for the rest of that day and the whole of the night, going over and over everything in his mind.
There had been a total of six sudden deaths of young soldiers stationed at Hangridge: Trevor Parsons, Jocelyn Slade, Craig Foster, James Gates, Alan Connelly and Robert Morgan.
Parsons’ death, it seemed, could well have been a genuine suicide after all. Jocelyn Slade and Craig Foster had, according to Nick, both been murdered by the monstrous and mysterious Irishman. James Gates’ death remained unexplained, although Kelly strongly suspected he had been murdered too, probably on the instructions of Parker-Brown. Connelly had almost certainly been dispatched by the Irishman and Parker-Brown. And Nick’s silence when his father had accused him of killing Morgan made Kelly quite certain that he was guilty of that final murder.
It was mind-blowing. Kelly felt sick. He sat staring into space, desperately trying to come to terms with it all. The phone rang several more times but he continued to ignore it.
He did not sleep properly all night, only occasionally dozing fitfully.
In the morning, still feeling nauseous, he decided to check his messages, even though it was highly unlikely that he would do anything about them.
There were several from Margaret Slade.
‘John, things are really starting to happen. We’re planning to do our bit, too, just to make sure this investigation doesn’t get swept under the carpet as well. We’re going to march on parliament at the end
of the week and we want to publicise that. We also want to announce that we are calling for a full public inquiry. The papers already know there’s something up. People talk, don’t they? Neil Connelly has apparently told his local rag in Scotland that he now thinks his son was murdered and that he might not be the only one. I’ve had the
Sun
, the
Mail
, the
Mirror
and the
Guardian
on to me already and so far I’ve stalled, because I need to know what you are planning. Please call me.’
‘John, where are you? I think I’ve now had every paper in the country on the phone. They’re all champing at the bit. John, it has to be time to make our move.’
‘John. Please call me.’
‘John. If I don’t hear from you tonight, I’m going to try to handle everything myself. I’m going to have to start giving interviews.’
Kelly stared blankly at the machine. He knew he should call Margaret Slade back. She didn’t deserve to be suddenly abandoned. He just didn’t feel able to do so. He couldn’t tell her any of what he had learned. Not yet. But worse than that, unless he did something, unless he did tell Karen Meadows all that Nick had told him, unless he shopped his only son, he had a dreadful feeling the truth was never going to come out – even if the families did force a public inquiry.
There were also several messages from Karen Meadows.
‘I do hope you’re there, Kelly. I heard from uniform that you did a disappearing act. Will you please pick up the phone. I still need you on the case. You’d never believe the wall that the army are
building round this little lot. One thing is certain, this investigation is only just beginning.’
The final call was from Jennifer.
‘I’ve also left a message on your mobile, John. I thought you were planning to come over? I’ve got some news.’
He switched off the answering machine, pulled the telephone socket out of the wall, and sat staring into space for several minutes. Eventually, he went up to the bathroom and removed the packet of Nurofen he always kept in the cabinet. Then he went downstairs and raided the cupboard in the kitchen, where he kept the rest of whatever other medical supplies he had. There was some paracetamol, some more Nurofen, and, best of all, a three-quarters-f bottle of sleeping pills that had been prescribed for Moira when she had first begun to feel ill. And the remains of the blockbuster painkillers, which the police doctor had supplied him with, were still in his jacket pocket. He piled the lot of them into the wicker basket on the worktop which Moira had used for bread. Then he went to the other cupboard in the kitchen, which served as a bar. Kelly knew that an alcoholic who can only refrain from drinking by avoiding all contact with alcohol was unlikely to succeed in his aim, and he had, so far at least, not been tempted to start drinking again simply because he kept alcohol in the house. He had always felt that visitors to his home should not be deprived of alcohol, just because he was no longer able to drink without destroying himself. He rummaged through the contents of the cupboard and at the back found an unopened bottle of Glenmorangie, which, ironically enough, was Nick’s favourite malt whisky.
And when Kelly had been a drinker, it had been his favourite too.
He took the bottle from the cupboard, found a suitable glass, picked up the little basket of pills and headed for the living room. He switched the radio on. Something by Mozart, he was sure, though he didn’t know quite what it was, was being played on Classic FM. He turned the radio up as loud as it would go. He didn’t want to be able to hear himself think.
He drew the curtains on the bay window that overlooked the street, and sat down in his favourite armchair, leaning back, trying to relax. For the second time in three days, he prepared to die. But this time it would be by his own hand.
There was a pen and a notepad on the table by his chair, and for a moment he considered writing some kind of letter. But he had absolutely nothing to say. And for the first time in his life, just as he was about to end it, Kelly understood why only twenty-five per cent of suicides leave a note, a statistic he had always previously thought surprising.
For a few minutes more he let the music wash over him, hoping that it might help to numb all of his other senses. Then he sat upright in his chair, opened the bottle of Glenmorangie and began to pour the whisky into the glass tumbler alongside it on the table. He filled the tumbler to the brim. Then he took the bottle which contained Moira’s sleeping pills, emptied the pills into his hand and counted them. There were twenty of them, surely enough to do the job. He glanced at the other packets of medication on the table. He thought he might take the paracetamol as well, just to make sure, but decided to begin with the sleeping pills.
He put two in his mouth, picked up the glass and prepared to drink a big mouthful of the whisky to wash them down.
Then the doorbell rang. Instinctively, Kelly put the whisky glass down. Then he picked it up again. It didn’t make any difference who was at the front door, he told himself. In any case, it was probably his police watchdogs, and he certainly didn’t want to be confronted by them. He would just carry on with what he had planned. He could think of no reason at all why he should want to remain in this world.
The doorbell ran again. Kelly took a gulp of whisky and swallowed. The first two pills disappeared down his throat. He was about to take two more when she called through the letterbox.
‘John, John, are you there? We’re worried about you. I’ve phoned and phoned. Answer the door, John.’
Damn, thought Kelly. It was Jennifer. The one person he could never easily ignore. He still didn’t intend to answer the door, though. But he did put down the whisky glass and empty the pills from his hand onto the table.
Jennifer continued to call through the letterbox.
‘John, I told you, I’ve got some news. Good news. Paula’s pregnant again, John. And she’s going to have a girl. She’s had the scan and she’s going to have a girl. Mum’s second grandchild, and so soon after her death. It’s like it was meant, John. Isn’t it wonderful?’
Kelly put his head in his hands. It was aching, of course. But then, it had been aching for three days, ever since his only son had tried to kill him.
‘John, John.’ The voice was more plaintive now, as if Jennifer were giving up on him being there or at
least on him answering the door. He heard the letterbox snap shut. He imagined her turning and trudging off down the little garden path, disappointed at not having been able to share her news, and probably still worried about him.
Suddenly Kelly found himself on his feet and hurrying out of the living room, almost unaware of what he was doing, acting on some kind of autopilot. He flung open the front door just as she was stepping out through the gate and onto the pavement.
‘Jennifer,’ he said.
She turned smiling, but the smile faded when she saw his face.
‘Good God, Kelly, what on earth has happened to you?’
‘Uh, I had to stop suddenly in the car and I bashed my head on the windscreen,’ he lied fluently. ‘That bloody Volvo, I hate it.’
She smiled again.
‘I’m sorry,’ he continued. ‘I was lying on the bed. I don’t feel all that hot.’
‘I’m not surprised. Oh dear, John, are you sure you’re all right here on your own? Have you seen a doctor?’
‘Yes, I have, and I’m fine. Just tired and a bit sore, that’s all.’
She nodded.
‘John, did you hear what I said?’
‘About Paula? Yes. That’s really great news, Jennifer.’
He found that he meant it too. It was great news.
‘They’re going to call her Moira, after Mum. She’d have liked that, wouldn’t she?’
‘Yes, she would.’ Kelly felt his eyes moisten.
‘Do you want me to come in and make you something to eat or anything?’
‘No. No, thank you. I just need to sleep, I think.’
‘Paula and Ben are coming down at the weekend. Will you come over for Sunday lunch? To celebrate their news.’
Kelly hesitated.
‘We’d really like you to be with us.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Of course. I’d love to.’
‘Great.’ Jennifer left with another smile and a wave.
Kelly closed the front door and went back into the living room. He scooped all the pills back into the wicker basket, picked it up along with the bottle of malt whisky and the still nearly full glass, and made his way upstairs to the bathroom.
There, he poured the contents of both bottle and glass down the sink, and flushed the pills – all except the packet of Nurofen and the remaining few blockbuster painkillers, which he still had considerable need for – down the loo. Then he closed the lavatory lid, sat down on it, and proceeded to cry his eyes out.
Six months later, Karen was sitting at her desk in Torquay police station, disconsolately leafing through some of the numerous files and reports which had by then been compiled on the Hangridge affair. She feared she had little choice except to put it all behind her now, but the case remained one of the most frustrating she had ever been involved with.
The police investigation she had fought so hard to put in place had so far been spectacularly unsuccessful, and although it was officially still ongoing, in fact most lines of inquiry had now been completed and there seemed scant chance of taking matters much further.
Karen had done her best to make sure that every possibility had been fully explored, every piece of evidence meticulously followed up and recorded. However, her highly unsatisfactory confrontation with Parker-Brown, and the contents of his statement to the National Crime Squad, consisting almost entirely of denial and evasion, had rather set the trend for the entire investigation. It had led nowhere. And the involvement of the NCS, throughout, had compromised her autonomy as senior investigating officer, as she had known that it would, and indeed suspected had been the intention of those in authority, both in the military and the police, who had involved the NCS in the first place.
No evidence at all had been found to indicate that Trevor Parsons’ death was anything other than suicide, and Karen had been forced to accept that the death of the unfortunate young squaddie really might be no more than a coincidence.
The body of Jocelyn Slade had been exhumed and an independent ballistics expert employed to study the gunshot wounds she had suffered. His findings, however, had not been conclusive. He reported that in the case of at least two of the five wounds Private Slade had suffered, the bullets had entered from an angle suggesting that the SA80, which had killed her, had been held considerably higher than he would have expected in a self-inflicted shooting. However, all five bullets had been fired from a distance which was consistent with a suicide attempt. And similarly, the ballistics expert found that while it was perhaps surprising for as many as five bullets – even fired from a fast-action automatic weapon – to have found their mark in a suicide bid, it was possible.
No evidence had been found to prove that the deaths of Craig Foster and James Gates were anything other than tragic accidents, although there were some particularly suspicious circumstances surrounding Foster’s death. The logbook of his SA80, which would have contained the rifle’s entire history, had inexplicably disappeared soon after Foster was killed, and the clothes Foster was wearing on the fatal exercise had since been destroyed.