Deadly Waters (3 page)

‘Can you tell us where we can find him?’ Horton asked.

‘At home I guess, though if you wait a couple of hours he’ll be along here. What’s happened? Why do you want to see him?’ She was beginning to look worried.

‘Do you know where he lives?’

After a moment’s hesitation she said, ‘Corton Court, number fourteen.’

That backed on to the ex-forces club, where the break-in had been last night. Not that it had any significance to this case, Horton thought, but it reminded him that he hadn’t detailed an officer to go round and interview the steward who had been injured.

Elaine Tolley said, ‘Has something happened to Mr Morville?’ She fiddled with a pen that had been lying on the desk. By her manner and her wary look, Horton got the impression that she knew this Eric Morville quite well and probably intimately.

‘Not that we know of, Mrs Tolley. Does he have any family?’

Her worry frown deepened. ‘He’s never said.’

‘Do you know why he should write that on one of your betting slips?’

‘No.’

‘Do you have a female customer or member of staff about five foot seven, shoulder length dark hair, mid-forties?’

‘No.’ She looked alarmed.

‘Have you ever seen Mr Morville with a woman who fits that description?’

Her eyes widened and her skin paled as she shifted nervously. ‘No. What is all this about? Eric Morville just places his bet, reads his newspaper and watches the telly.’

‘Big winners?’ interjected Cantelli.

‘Hardly,’ she said caustically, swivelling her gaze to Cantelli. ‘The boss wouldn’t like that.’

No, thought Horton, recalling his encounters with Charlie Vinnaker. He was a shrewd businessman in his early sixties, the owner of a chain of amusement arcades and casinos, as well as betting shops. Horton knew that he had been involved in some shady deals but he’d never yet been able to prove it.

Horton terminated the interview without giving her any hint of their line of inquiry despite her efforts to extract it from him. There was nothing here, and he was keen to get away and elicit some answers from Eric Morville. He hoped she wouldn’t telephone Morville to alert him of their impending arrival.

Letting out the clutch, Cantelli slipped into the heavy traffic by the railway station. ‘What’s happening about Mickey Johnson?’

For a moment Horton had forgotten all about him. ‘I managed to get WPC Somerfield on to the case before Uckfield grabbed all the decent manpower.’

‘Kate will enjoy that. She’s a good officer. Maybe she can work her feminine charms on Johnson and get him to open his mouth.’

‘Isn’t it politically incorrect to say that?’

‘Is it?’ Cantelli sneezed.

‘I hope you’re not going to go sick.’

‘What, and miss all the fun?’ Cantelli said with heavy irony.

Horton threw him a sharp look. Had Cantelli heard about Dennings’ appointment? If he had then surely he would have mentioned it. Soon it would be all over the station, and the tongues would start wagging. Damn Uckfield. OK, so Dennings was a good undercover cop, with years of experience working in vice and drugs, but a detective on the major crime team? No. Horton, with his background in CID and experience undercover whilst on specialist investigations, would have been far more suitable. But then, he had to keep telling himself it wasn’t about suitability.

He saw Uckfield’s choice of Dennings as a criticism of his capabilities both as a detective and a police officer, and he felt sure everyone else would see it as the same. But, he told himself, Cantelli was a friend and a loyal colleague and if he couldn’t face it out with Cantelli then how was he going to handle the snide comments and sidelong looks that would swirl around the station like dirty dishwater when everyone knew?

Abruptly he gave Cantelli the news. The sergeant threw him a surprised glance before quickly putting his eyes back on the road. ‘I thought that was yours.’

‘Yeah, so did I.’

‘So why the change of heart?’

‘Funnily enough Uckfield didn’t take me into his confidence,’ Horton replied sarcastically, but silently vowed that Uckfield would. He’d make him.

Cantelli sniffed. ‘I suppose it was inevitable. Each to his own.’

‘What do you mean?’ Horton knew Cantelli didn’t much care for Uckfield, and that the feeling was mutual.

‘He cuts too many corners—’

‘So does Uckfield.’

‘That’s what I mean. That’s why Dennings has got the job, even though you’re the best man for it.’

Horton felt warmed and encouraged by Cantelli’s loyalty.

And perhaps he was right. Strangely enough he found himself defending Dennings. ‘We’ve all done it, Barney.’

‘Yeah, but there’s cutting corners and shaving them off to fit. Pity the poor bloody DCI who has to play piggy in the middle with those two. What will you do?’

‘Stay in CID and worry the life out of you. Can’t you go any faster?’

‘Not unless this car can fly.’

Horton stared out of the window at the traffic queue. Would there be others in the station who would see this appointment as Cantelli did? Perhaps he was being over sensitive in believing everyone would assume he’d been sidelined because he wasn’t good enough. And who
would
be appointed the DCI on Uckfield’s team? With his record Horton guessed promotion was a long way off. Perhaps it would never happen and he’d be stuck a DI for the rest of his career. Would he mind? The answer was in the involuntary tensing of his body, and the feeling of anger swiftly followed by despondency.

Once he’d had such high hopes.

For a moment his depression seemed to match the dreary October day, but it didn’t last long. As they turned into Corton Court, Horton’s determination to show Uckfield that he’d picked the wrong man was rekindled. After all, years spent fending for himself after his mother had left him when he was only ten hadn’t made him a quitter.

Cantelli said, ‘This place gets worse every time I see it.’

Horton agreed. Corton Court exuded a damp aroma of desolation and neglect. It had been built in the sixties and it looked as if it hadn’t been touched since. The small communal front garden had long ago given itself up to nature and rubbish.

He picked his way through the lager cans and cigarette packets littering the stairs, and could hear the blare of the television long before he reached Eric Morville’s front door on the third floor. It took a few stout knocks to get an answer.

From inside came, ‘If you’re selling something I don’t want it, and if you’re Jehovah’s Witnesses you can bugger off. I’m Catholic.’

‘Police. We’d like a word, Mr Morville,’ Cantelli shouted.

After a moment Horton could hear shuffling footsteps and the scraping and jingling of a door chain. The door was opened a crack, just wide enough for Cantelli to insert his warrant card.

‘What do you want?’ came the surly reply.

Did he already know, thought Horton, pushing back the door and saying, ‘A word.’ Had Elaine Tolley told him? ‘I take it you are Mr Eric Morville.’ Horton eyed the thin man in his early sixties in a red-and-white striped pyjama jacket and a pair of grubby trousers and wondered if he could be the father or brother of the dead woman on the mulberry.

Could he be her killer? Morville didn’t look as though he had the strength for it.

‘Yeah, that’s me. What’s it to you?’ Morville’s anger shifted to wariness. Behind his bloodshot light-brown eyes Horton could see his mind racing as he tried to think what he might have done to bring the law down on him. Horton revised his opinion that Elaine Tolley might be involved with this man.

If by some remote chance she was, then she badly needed a new pair of spectacles he thought, taking in the gaunt face, unshaven chin, lank hair and the yellowing telltale skin of a heavy drinker.

‘Can we come in?’ Cantelli asked, easing past him.

‘Looks like you already have,’ grunted Morville.

Horton stepped through the small hallway and into a room on his right. He’d seen many flats like this: shabby, dirty, and minimally equipped. The smell of fried food, tobacco and stale sweat clawed at his throat, making him want to retch. There were two very worn and grubby armchairs in front of a large television screen showing a chat programme, and between them was a stained coffee table, on it a mug of coffee, a half empty bottle of whisky and a tobacco tin.

On the wall to the right of the electric fire was a sideboard that looked as if it dated from the same time the flats had been built; like the room it was in it was devoid of photographs and ornaments. Only a rickety lamp and a clock adorned it.

‘Had your fill?’ Morville asked harshly, crossing to one of the chairs. Lifting the television remote control, he punched down the volume only to let the loud music from below thud up through the floor. ‘I suppose you’ll tell me what this is about in a moment.’

Cantelli extracted the betting slip from his pocket. ‘Is this your handwriting, sir?’

Horton watched Morville carefully as he scrutinized it. The slightest of starts betrayed that it was.

Morville sat down. ‘Who wants to know?’

‘We do.’ Horton forced himself to speak gently despite the fact that he’d taken an instant dislike to Morville. He told himself this man could just have lost his daughter or younger sister. He could, of course, be the killer. ‘Did you write that?’ he repeated the question Cantelli had asked, but with more force.

Morville picked up his tobacco tin and began to roll a cigarette with hands that were steady, yet he avoided direct eye contact. Horton had the impression of an arrogant man whom alcohol and laziness had made surly and bitter.

‘The manager of the betting shop claims it’s your writing,’

Cantelli persisted, taking out a handkerchief and blowing his nose.

‘Does she?’ Morville replied airily, still not looking at them.

He was beginning to get on Horton’s nerves. ‘Perhaps we should conduct this interview at the station. If you’d get dressed—’

‘OK, it’s my writing. Satisfied?’ Morville glanced up.

Far from it, thought Horton. ‘Why did you write that note?’

‘None of your business.’

Horton leaned closer to Morville, despite not really wanting to; the man smelled. ‘It
is
our business, Mr Morville, because we found that scrap of paper this morning on the body of a woman.’

Morville’s eyes widened. ‘You’re having me on. This is a trick . . .’ He glanced at each of them in turn, must have seen that they weren’t kidding him, and poured a generous measure of whisky into the earthenware cup, which he knocked back in one go.

‘You know who she was?’ Horton asked sharply.

‘No. Why should I?’ The surliness was back and along with it an increased nervousness that Morville was doing his best to disguise.

‘How did it get on to her body then?’

‘How the bloody hell should I know? You’re the detectives.’

He took a drag of his cigarette, his eyes flicking up at Horton. In them Horton thought he saw guilt, but then maybe he just wanted to see something that would give him a quick lead in this case.

‘When did you write that note?’

‘Can’t remember. Tuesday. Wednesday.’

‘Do you have any family?’

‘No.’

‘Have you ever been married?’

‘No, and I’ve got no kids either, least, ones that I know about.’

Cantelli said, ‘What about brothers or sisters?’

‘I had a sister. She died ten years ago, massive stroke.’

So the dead woman wasn’t a relative.

‘How long have you lived here?’ Horton asked.

‘Long enough.’

Horton felt like shaking him. ‘Mr Morville, why won’t you co-operate with us? Is there something you’re hiding?’

Morville stubbed out his cigarette. He poured himself another whisky. Horton glanced at the clock. It was barely ten. The gesture was lost on Morville.

‘About fifteen years,’ Morville said pointedly.

‘And before that?’

‘I was in the navy for twenty years.’

That made Horton think of the sea and in particular Langstone Harbour where their victim had been found. But being in the navy didn’t mean that Morville could sail or even pilot a boat, though it probably meant he was aware of the rhythm of the tides. Time to increase the pressure. His voice harsher, Horton said, ‘What does the note mean?’

‘Probably the name of a horse or greyhound.’

‘“
Have you forgotten ME?
” It doesn’t sound like a name to me.’

‘Some of them greyhounds have funny names.’

Then why hadn’t Elaine Tolley recognized it?
‘Which race was it in?’

‘I can’t remember. I didn’t bet on it. Just wrote it down.

I liked the sound of it.’

‘I think you’d better get changed—’

‘All right, so I wrote that on the betting slip and was going to give it to Elaine.’ Morville shifted nervously. ‘She’s the manager of the betting shop. We went out a couple of times and I was going to ask her for a date again. The note was a joke, a tease.’

Again, why didn’t Elaine Tolley tell them this? Morville must have read Horton’s thoughts because he added: ‘She’s married. I don’t expect she wants anyone to know about us.’

No, and who could blame her, thought Horton? No wonder she had looked worried.

Morville continued, ‘I must have dropped it.’

That didn’t explain how it came to be in the victim’s pocket.

And, if Morville was telling the truth, then why hadn’t he jumped to the conclusion earlier that the dead woman could be Elaine Tolley? Horton hadn’t described the victim to Morville. It was obvious Morville was making this up as he went along. Why?

‘Where were you last night between ten p.m. and one a.m?’

‘At the ex-forces club until just after eleven, then here.’

Morville glared defiantly at Horton.

He was too cocky. Morville could have killed their victim after eleven p.m., but why should he? And how would he have got her to the mulberry? To do that required a boat, and judging by what he had seen so far Horton thought that Morville wouldn’t be able to afford a model boat let alone a real one.

‘Can anyone vouch for you returning here?’

‘I doubt it.’