Murder on a Winter Afternoon, page 13
part #5 of Melissa Craig Series
‘What about the burglar alarms? And how do you locate Gerard’s flat?’
‘That’s where the luck comes in. While I was talking to Damian, who should walk in but a representative of the firm that installed the security system. And guess who he was?’
Melissa shook her head. ‘You tell me.’
‘Jim Plant, a retired PC from Stowbridge nick. Nice, fatherly old boy, took me under his wing for my first few months with the Force. Still as chatty as ever.’
Melissa gaped at him. ‘Are you telling me an ex-copper in a position of trust has been showing you how to make an illegal entry?’
Bruce grinned. ‘Not intentionally. He’s just a natural communicator. Now, let me show you what I picked up while strolling around with him.’ He took a notebook from his pocket and began making a sketch. ‘This is a plan of the wing where Gerard has his private quarters. He lives on an upper floor, just above where this bit sticks out, making a right angle. His windows overlook the back garden, here and here. I figure this one,’ – the pencil made an extra heavy black line – ‘is the one we’re interested in; in fact, from what Jim said, I’m certain of it.’
‘What did Jim say?’
‘That’s the really interesting bit. There are two independent security systems at Blackwater. One is for the exterior lighting. Abraham Asser won’t allow permanent floodlights to be installed because they consume too much power and are bad for the environment, so he put in detectors that trigger lights when anyone approaches, but no audible alarm. The internal system works in a similar way, but as soon as one of the contacts is broken or any inside movement is detected by the sensors, alarm bells ring and the police are alerted by remote signal. They reckon to be on the spot within ten minutes.’
‘And did Jim tell you how to get in and immobilise all this electronic wizardry?’ asked Melissa as Bruce stopped to take breath.
‘Of course not, but he did point out a weak spot in the armoury. It’s here, right below Gerard’s windows. At some time, an extra bit was stuck on the building, but it’s only a single storey. I’ve no idea what the original purpose was, but now it’s used as a garage and storeroom. The roof is flat and surrounded by a parapet, so anyone climbing up could easily get in through a window.’
‘What about the floodlights and the other devices?’
‘That’s another weak spot. If you approach at this angle,’ – the pencil traced a dotted line across the paper – ‘you’re just out of range of the sensors on either wall. The only points at which the flat is connected to the internal alarm system are the internal front door and a door in the garage leading to it via a private staircase. It seems that when the system was installed – that was before Gerard’s time, of course – it was considered adequate.’
‘Hasn’t Jim pointed this out to Gerard?’
‘Not directly. Gerard’s function is curator of the collection and administrator of the AFTER funds. Anything to do with the maintenance of the building and grounds is handled from the headquarters of the Asser Foundation. Jim’s going to include some recommendations for tightening up the system in his next report.’
‘Okay,’ said Melissa. ‘You’ve hit on a way to get past the exterior sensors and you’ve established that the windows to the private quarters aren’t alarmed. How do you propose to get on to the roof?’
‘Another stroke of luck. A local firm is doing some tree-trimming in the grounds and the men have left their ladders lying on the ground against the wall. They’re ours for the taking.’
‘I’m surprised Jim doesn’t insist they lock them up.’
‘I’m sure he would if he knew they were there, but they’re covered by black plastic sheeting. I tell you, it’ll be a doddle.’
Despite her reservations, Melissa’s pulse was racing like an over-revved engine. What Bruce was proposing was hare-brained, possibly dangerous and certainly illegal … Ken Harris would have a fit … but if there was a chance of picking up just one solid piece of evidence that would help to find Leonora’s killer …
Bruce was watching her closely, as if trying to read her mind. She drew a deep breath and met the challenge.
‘You’re on!’ she said.
Eighteen
Bruce had calculated that it would take Gerard and Eloise about twenty minutes to drive to the restaurant.
‘If we’re in position a little before seven o’ clock, we should be able to spot them leaving,’ he said. ‘Then we’ll know it’s okay to go in.’
The position he had chosen was in a narrow lane that passed close behind Blackwater Hall. He had evidently reconnoitred it in advance, for he drove slowly but confidently for half a mile to a point where the entrance to a farmyard provided room to turn. He then drove back towards the main road for a short distance, pulled on to the grass verge and cut the engine. It was exactly a quarter to seven.
‘It’s best to be on the safe side,’ he said in reply to Melissa’s protest at the prospect of a long wait.
Spread out in the valley to their left, Gloucester sparkled with thousands of variegated lights, turning the heavy cloud that blanketed the sky into an illuminated dome. Blackwater Hall stood to their right, two hundred yards or so away, its outline indistinct at first, then slowly separating from the background of wooded slopes as their eyes adjusted to the darkness. Two pinpoints of light on an upper floor shone out, flickering from time to time as the wind disturbed the branches of intervening trees.
‘Those’ll be in Gerard’s flat,’ said Bruce. ‘When they go out, watch for headlights. We should see them clearly when they leave; the garage faces this way.’
Melissa huddled into her thick anorak and thrust her hands into her pockets. With the engine switched off, the temperature in the car was falling rapidly. ‘I hope they don’t hang about,’ she grumbled. ‘We’ll soon be frozen.’
Bruce gave an ironic laugh. ‘They won’t. Damian says Gerard gives everyone a hard time if he’s kept waiting for anything or anybody, Eloise included.’
They remained silent for a while, their eyes fixed on the two wavering points of light. Then Melissa said, ‘I take it you haven’t heard whether the police are any nearer finding Leonora’s killer?’
‘Not really,’ said Bruce. ‘House to house calls and appeals for witnesses haven’t turned up anything useful. With luck, we can give them a new line to follow – won’t that be great?’
‘Great.’ Sitting there in the chilly darkness, Melissa felt her enthusiasm for the adventure cooling as rapidly as her body. ‘They haven’t given up, though?’
‘Of course not, although they’re pretty stretched at the moment, what with organising security for a couple of royal visits and the hunt for Carole Prescot’s killer.’
‘The “Sex Strangler”?’
‘Ah … well …’
It was immediately clear he was holding something back. Melissa pounced. ‘Do they think it was someone else?’
‘This hasn’t been made public yet,’ said Bruce, after a moment’s hesitation, ‘so for Pete’s sake don’t let on I’ve told you. I learned off the record that they’re pretty sure Carole wasn’t killed by the Strangler, but by someone who tried to make it look like his MO. According to the PM, the pressure on her throat wasn’t applied in the same way – remember, the Strangler knows how to render his victims temporarily unconscious without killing them. There were differences in the way her hands and feet had been tied as well, although only minor ones. A granny knot instead of a reef … that sort of thing.’
‘That would suggest it wasn’t a random attack. Someone had a specific motive for killing her.’
‘That’s the line they’re working on at present, but it’s the motive that’s baffling them. She seems to have led a blameless sort of existence, not mixed with any dodgy company or taken drugs. For the time being, the fuzz are keeping their thoughts to themselves to avoid putting the murderer on his guard.’
‘Poor girl,’ said Melissa softly. ‘She had such a shy, gentle manner. Why would anyone want to kill her?’
Bruce turned his head in surprise. ‘You knew her?’
‘I met her once … no, a couple of times … in Mr Semple’s office.’
‘Charlie Semple – the solicitor?’
‘We didn’t get on first name terms, but I imagine it’s the same man. The firm is Rathbone and Semple.’
‘That’s him. Is he your solicitor?’
‘No, he’s handling Leonora Jewell’s estate. I went to his office to meet her executor before we all went off to her cottage to collect the manuscript. It turned into rather a creepy experience – I haven’t told you about that, have I?’ She described the visit and its aftermath; he listened attentively, chuckling over the clashes between Semple and Round, but growing serious when she described finding what she believed to be the murder weapon in the well, its disappearance and her subsequent brush with Inspector Holloway. ‘So how come you know Semple?’ she asked when she had finished her story.
‘I don’t really know him, but I’ve seen him down at the nick a few times. He and his partners are on a rota for when someone in custody asks for a brief.’
‘I see.’ Melissa thought for a moment, then said wistfully, ‘Carole phoned me the day before she was killed and asked to meet me. If only I knew what she wanted to talk about, it might give the police a clue. I reported the call, of course, but unless she confided in someone else they won’t get far.’
They fell silent again, concentrating on their vigil. After a further five minutes had crept past, during which Melissa felt as if the circulation in her feet had stopped for ever, she became aware of Bruce tensing beside her, like a predator that has spotted its prey.
‘They’re on the move, the lights have gone out,’ he said, rolling down the window. A blast of cold air hit them; Melissa gasped and pulled her woollen cap over her ears, but Bruce seemed impervious to the drop in temperature. ‘Listen!’ he commanded.
Borne towards them on the wind came the sound of a motor starting up. Headlights shone briefly in their direction, then swung in an arc as the car made its way along the drive that encircled the Hall and headed towards the main gates. As it did so, powerful lights came on at intervals around the building.
‘They were triggered as the car went past,’ Bruce explained. ‘They’ll go out in a minute or two.’ It seemed like ten to Melissa, but eventually the place was once more in darkness. ‘Right, we’re on our way. Don’t slam the doors when you get out. Keep close to me and mind how you go. The ground may be bumpy in places.’
They had parked opposite a gate into a field that lay between the grounds of the Hall and the lane. They clambered over it and Bruce set off across the uneven grass with Melissa at his heels. ‘How do you know which direction to take?’ she panted. ‘It’s almost pitch dark. Suppose we wander off course and trigger the lights?’
‘We’re not in range of the sensors yet. There’s a wall separating this field from the rear gardens of the house. Growing against the other side is an ash tree; we make for that.’
‘I don’t see any tree.’
‘That’s because it’s in a direct line with the house, so it doesn’t stand out.’
‘So how do we find it?’
‘We work our way along the wall. Here we are.’
Stumbling over a tuft of grass, Melissa almost fell against the rough, uneven stones. The hands that she put out to save herself were numb, despite her thick gloves.
‘Which way?’ she asked.
‘To the right. You can see the tree now.’
So she could. A black silhouette seemed to have risen out of the ground, its branches flailing and creaking in the wind. They made their way towards it.
‘Okay,’ said Bruce. ‘I’ll go first and give you a hand. The wall’s quite low and it’s got a smooth top, so it shouldn’t be difficult.’
In broad daylight, it would have been relatively easy. In these conditions, Melissa felt as if she was being asked to climb a cliff. ‘Why didn’t you bring a torch?’ she grumbled.
‘I did, but I’d rather not use it here. Someone might be looking out of one of the farmhouse windows and spot it.’
Convinced that she was ruining a perfectly good anorak and ski pants, Melissa managed to find a foothold and heave herself on to the flat coping stone. Bruce caught her by the shoulders and half guided, half lifted her down on the other side. ‘Okay?’ he whispered.
‘I suppose so. Now what?’
They were close enough to the building to pick out individual features. ‘See that row of white stone, level with the first floor windows?’ said Bruce. ‘That’s the parapet running round the roof that Gerard’s flat looks out on. We make straight for that corner. There’s a lawn and then a gravel path. Keep close behind me and crouch down as low as you can.’
Melissa expected to be blinded by floodlights at any moment, but it seemed that Bruce had got his calculations exactly right. Soon they were standing in the deep shadow made by the angle between the main building and the single-storey extension.
‘So far, so good,’ said Bruce. ‘Now, where did I see those ladders? There were two of them.’ He moved away; a few seconds later he called, ‘Here they are! Come and give me a hand. Keep close to the wall – the sensors are angled outwards.’
As Melissa moved in the direction of his voice, the world became dramatically brighter and she only just managed to check a cry of alarm. Then she gave a slightly hysterical laugh as she realised that what she had mistaken for floodlighting was in fact the moon, unexpectedly breaking through a gap torn in the clouds by the rising wind.
‘Great,’ said Bruce. ‘Now we can see what we’re doing. Grab hold of that and fold it up or something.’
‘That’ was what seemed like half a mile of black plastic sheeting in which the ladders had been swathed. As Melissa struggled to reduce it to a manageable package, a playful gust of wind first wrapped one end round her head and shoulders and then seized the other and flung it in the air, where it hovered, flapping and rustling, like the wings of a monstrous bat. Somehow, she got it under control and anchored it under one of the ladders while Bruce extended the second. Between them, they managed to get it into position.
‘It’s a bit shorter than I expected,’ Bruce remarked as he tested it for stability, ‘but I think it’ll do. I’ll lead the way.’
Clouds were again obscuring the moon so that in no time he was nothing but a vague shape above her head. Then his voice floated down through the darkness, ‘Okay, it’s a piece of cake. Come on up.’
As she gripped the sides of the ladder and began her ascent, an agonising question swept into Melissa’s mind: Going up’s going to be bad enough, but how the hell do I get down again? Driven by Bruce’s persuasive enthusiasm and her own wish to bring Leonora Jewell’s killer to book, she had overlooked one of her own weaknesses: vertigo. The prospect of lowering herself backwards over that low parapet, feet groping in a void for a ladder that she could not see because she dare not, even for a moment, look down, sent her head into a sickening spin. It was too late now, she was committed, but the prospect made her knees tremble so much that she could barely move. Her hands and forehead became clammy with sweat despite the cold.
‘Get a move on!’ came an impatient voice above her.
To go on meant facing a terrifying ordeal; to back out now would mean being branded a coward. She chose the lesser evil. ‘Coming!’ she called back through chattering teeth.
Somehow, she reached the top of the ladder. Another brief spell of moonlight illuminated the parapet and with a gasp of relief she grabbed at one of the slender pillars that supported the coping. ‘Give me your hand and climb over,’ ordered Bruce. Dumbly, she obeyed; the next minute she stood erect beside him.
The roof was about thirty feet square, bounded on two sides by the walls of the house. There were two pairs of windows, one pair facing west and the other north. All were in darkness. Cautiously, Bruce switched on his torch; the west-facing windows were curtained, but the narrow beam shone straight through the others into what was obviously a workroom. They saw a long bench with a few hand-tools neatly arranged in a rack and below it what appeared to be an assortment of empty picture frames. There were two rolls of off-white material at one end, and on a table at right angles to the bench lay two or three blank prepared canvases. Beside them was something covered with a piece of cloth.
‘Wonder what that is?’ said Melissa.
‘Let’s see if we can find out.’ Bruce was examining the old-fashioned sash windows. ‘I think we’re in luck. Hold this.’ He passed her the torch, took a Swiss army knife from his pocket and clicked out a flat, narrow blade. He inserted it between the top and bottom sections of one of the windows and attempted to lever the catch sideways, but it would not budge.
‘No good,’ he muttered. ‘I’ll try the other one.’
After a brief tussle, the second one yielded. Between them, the two amateur burglars managed to raise the lower frame far enough for them to clamber over the sill into the room. They made for the table; Bruce lifted the cloth and directed the torch at what lay underneath.
‘What do you make of that?’ he asked.
Melissa stared down at the picture. It was a simple seascape: a sandy beach beneath a summer sky flecked with clouds, low cliffs, scattered rocks, a solitary figure trudging along a shore and two children playing at the edge of a glass-green sea. Simple, but painted by a master. She looked for, and found, a signature.
‘I thought so!’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s a Boudin!’
‘Is it valuable?’
‘It’s worth a fortune, if it’s genuine. He was a leading Impressionist. This is the beach at Trouville, one of his favourite subjects.’
‘So it’s unlikely to have been donated to finance an AFTER project?’
‘Highly unlikely. I’d say it was even money this is one of the works pinched from Rillingford Manor.’
