The Suffocating Sea Read online

  He found Walters munching a large baguette and drinking coffee.

  'On holiday are you, Constable?'

  'This is lunch, guv. It's taken me forever to get round the shopkeepers in Queens Street, complete waste of time, no one saw anything. We've done better with the CCTV though. There are a couple of youths, wearing dark hoodies, lingering outside the bookies. Don't know why the control operators didn't see them, perhaps they didn't think it relevant as they don't actually show up attacking the tourist. Then they disappear into Cross Street and a few minutes later they're walking down Queens Street. I've asked for the pictures to be enhanced; we might get enough of a description to put out.'

  'Check with Sergeant Cantelli, he might recognize them, and then see if they match anyone in our records. Oh, and Walters –' Horton called out on the way to his office – 'take another look at the recording and see if you can spot Brundall's car.'

  'Right ho.'

  Walters' reply was uncharacteristically cheerful. It was amazing what love could do, he thought with an edge of bitterness.

  Horton checked his messages, cleared some of his paperwork with half a mind on it, the other half on that conversation between Brundall and Gilmore, and then reported to DCI Bliss.

  Marsden returned from the cemetery, with the news that there were no flowers on the Brundalls' grave and no one had seen Tom Brundall there. He'd return tomorrow. Cantelli couldn't get a sighting of Brundall's car from the tapes either.

  Another day without getting any nearer to the killer, thought Horton, heading out of the station, but at least they had gained some new and valuable information. He had reached his Harley when his mobile rang. His heart skipped a beat when he saw who the caller was: Reverend Schofield. Did she have some further information on his mother?

  'I need to see you urgently,' she said without preamble.

  She sounded out of breath and anxious. It was just after seven. 'Where are you?'

  'In the church. Can you come now?'

  He tensed and said, 'OK.'

  It was wet, dark and windy and the traffic was thick with Christmas shoppers, and even though he was on the Harley, it still took him fifteen minutes to reach the church. He tried the front doors but they were locked so he hurried round to the back feeling a sense of danger so strong that his spine shivered and contracted. What had Anne discovered about his mother? Why had she sounded so upset?

  It was even darker in the backyard without any streetlights, and there didn't seem to be any lights on inside the church. Perhaps she had returned to the vicarage. But surely she would have called him if she had.

  As he pushed open the door his sense of menace heightened. He felt instinctively that something was wrong. He could have switched on the light but he didn't. Was it because he had the impression that someone or something was waiting for him, or had a noise alerted him? Perhaps it was just the rain beating against the grilled windows and the wind howling round the building sounding like a hundred dead souls wailing to be let in, or should that be out, he wondered. Whatever it was, it made his flesh crawl.

  Slowly his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness. There was a sink on his right underneath the window, with a cupboard beneath it. He noted the two coffee mugs on the wooden draining board as he stepped around the table in the centre of the room towards a tall cupboard where he guessed the surplices were kept. To its left were three stone steps leading up to a door. It must open up into the church, he thought. Anne Schofield must be there.

  He tried the door. It was locked, and there was no key in it. He frowned. He felt cold. Leave the bloody place. She's not here. Get out now. He turned and something in the gloom caught his eye. The cupboard door was open a fraction and wedged in it was a piece of black fabric.

  With a pounding heart he twisted the handle, then cried out and leapt back as the body of Anne Schofield fell out. Revulsion and shock gave way to an upsurge of anger but he barely had time to register this when he heard a clunk. Swiftly he turned and raced to the outside door knowing already, with a sinking heart, that the noise he had heard was someone locking it. Shit!

  His senses heightened, he caught the soft shuffle of feet outside and with a flash of instinct knew what would happen next. He had to get out or he'd end up like poor Tom Brundall and Nigel Sherbourne.

  Desperately he scoured the room but saw no way out. Then came a shattering of glass; he leapt as far away from the window as possible as a bottle crashed on the stone floor, and exploded with a great whoosh and a searing heat.

  Horton dropped to the floor, choking and coughing. Think of a way out of here. There had to be one, he couldn't die here, now, like this. Gutner's words flashed into his mind as his lungs strained fit to burst and he felt as though his flesh was on fire. He'd said there was a door to the upper gallery that came up from the vestry. Yes, but where the bloody hell was it? Was it the one he had already tried? God, he hoped not.

  He inched along the floor with his nose to the ground, spluttering and coughing. His eyes were smarting, his lungs screaming fit to burst. He could smell roasting flesh as the crackling fire devoured poor Anne Schofield. Where the bloody hell was this other door?

  The room was filled with thick black smoke, which was hard to penetrate, but to the right of the cupboard a curtain was alight. It was the only place left. It had to conceal the door. As the flames licked around his ankles he leapt up and tore at it. The burning fabric fell on his back, and he thanked the Lord he was wearing his leathers. He'd found the bloody door. Please God don't let it be locked. He had to stand up to open it and fling it back before the black clawing smoke got to him. He had one chance and this was it.

  He reached up, and scrabbled for the handle ...where was it? His eyes were smarting, his lungs heaving...He had his fingers on it. He pushed against it and with an overwhelming sense of relief felt it open. Then he was through and slamming it behind him. He was stumbling, crawling and groping his way up a set of steps.

  There wasn't any time to waste. Onwards he went until he was high enough to escape the choking black monster of smoke below. At last he came out to the right of the organ. Fumbling inside his jacket for his mobile phone, he prayed it wouldn't have melted in the heat. He punched in a number, hardly registering that his fingers were burnt, and found himself hoarsely and miraculously speaking to the emergency services.

  Then he staggered on towards the far end of the gallery above the front door and collapsed on to the floor. His chest and throat were raw with pain, and his hand was stinging. When he coughed he brought up blackened phlegm and thought his ribs would be ripped apart. It seemed a lifetime until he heard the marvellous sound of the fire engines and saw the blue lights reflected in the windows. And in those minutes he saw a thousand times over the burning flesh of the once kind and gentle Anne Schofield and it sickened him.

  But he was safe. He'd escaped, but for how long? He knew now that there had been no news about his mother. He had just assumed it. Anne Schofield had sounded distressed, not anxious, on the telephone because someone had forced her to make that call to him. She hadn't been the intended victim. He had. Quite clearly he had been lured here with one purpose in mind: to kill him. The killer hadn't succeeded, but he would try again. Next time Horton guessed he might not be so lucky.

  Ten

  Saturday: 9.30 a.m.

  'Are you OK?'

  'I've felt better.' Horton was touched by the worried expression clouding Cantelli's dark features. His throat felt as though he had been inhaling eighty cigarettes a day since he was fourteen, and a tight band of pain gripped his chest as if his ribs had been strapped up. His right hand was bandaged but his burns had been superficial. Apart from that, and being exhausted after a sleepless night, he was fine, and very glad to be alive.

  'What the devil happened?' asked Cantelli.

  It was the same question that Uckfield had put to him last night. Horton hadn't told him the truth and he couldn't tell Cantelli. Besides, he didn't know the truth. He had suspec
ted that someone had lured him to his death and used Anne Schofield as bait but in the cold light of day he wasn't sure about that any more.

  Sitting in his office with Cantelli the other side of his desk, Horton relayed what he'd told Uckfield and DCI Bliss: he'd called on Anne Schofield to get some background information on the relationship between Rowland Gilmore and his brother Sebastian, and had found her dead. He'd been trapped inside the building when Anne Schofield's killer had tried to destroy the evidence. Of course that didn't explain the phone call he'd received from her.

  'Did the killer know you were in there?' Cantelli seemed to eye him a little suspiciously. Had he detected a lie? Had some minute gesture or inflection in his voice given him away? If anyone could read Horton then Cantelli was in with the best chance.

  Horton coughed, unsure if he was stalling for time or if it was genuine, and then wished he hadn't because his chest went into a painful spasm. That would teach him to lie. He saw Cantelli frown with concern and managed to rasp, 'My Harley was parked in front of the church.'

  'But why kill Anne Schofield? She's a newcomer to the area.'

  Horton didn't like deceiving Cantelli, but consoled himself with the fact that the sergeant had enough on his plate at the moment with his father's illness. Croakily, Horton expounded another theory that had come to him whilst he had waited for medical attention last night at the hospital.

  'Perhaps Brundall left an incriminating letter or document in the vestry when he went to see Rowland Gilmore. Or perhaps Rowland had a pang of conscience and wrote a confession which Anne Schofield discovered.' Horton held his breath, willing Cantelli to believe that. He didn't think he was far wrong anyway, only that he guessed the incriminating letter or confession had also mentioned his mother, and Horton couldn't be allowed to discover it. But why make Anne Schofield call him? Was the killer afraid that he'd already discovered something about his mother's past life?

  Cantelli looked thoughtful as Horton continued. 'I'm certain now that Gilmore's death and Brundall's are connected. Dr Clayton is doing both Gilmore's and Anne Schofield's postmortems today.'

  He reached for the bottle of water on his desk and took a long draught from it. It didn't seem to help his throat very much. He could have gone sick he supposed, but how could he let an investigation that might involve his mother proceed without his involvement?

  'So are we looking at the same killer for all three deaths?' Cantelli asked.

  'Four if you count Rowland Gilmore.' Horton exhaled and felt the pain in his chest. 'If Gilmore was murdered then the MO is very different to Brundall's, Sherbourne's and Anne Schofield's deaths. I think it possible that Brundall killed Rowland Gilmore before returning to his boat. Brundall was then killed, and his killer followed Sherbourne to Guernsey, and then returned here to murder Anne Schofield. Which means our killer is no longer in Guernsey.'

  Horton had expressed exactly that opinion to Uckfield earlier that morning and Uckfield had agreed. He'd called for the passenger lists of all the flights from Guernsey to England on Friday to be checked. But that wasn't the only way to travel between England and the Channel Islands, as Horton had pointed out and now explained to Cantelli.

  'Our killer could be using a boat to travel back and forth.'

  Horton could see Cantelli following his train of thought. 'You mean if he keeps it in Horsea Marina then he'd know the security code to the pontoon and could easily have slipped on to Brundall's pontoon and killed him.'

  'Yes, which means we'll have to check all the boat owners for any connection with Brundall. But it's not that straightforward.'

  'That doesn't sound very simple to me,' muttered Cantelli.

  'Our killer could keep his boat in Guernsey.' Horton sat forward. 'Let's say our pyromaniac follows Brundall from Guernsey but didn't moor up in Horsea Marina; I called the marina and they say no other visitor came in after Brundall either on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. So he must have moored nearby. He manages to get the security code for the pontoon, kills Brundall and then returns to Guernsey, by boat, but he arrives too late to stop Sherbourne from going into his office on Thursday morning. Our pyromaniac does, however, manage to catch up with Sherbourne as he leaves his office and follows him to his client's. He lies in wait for Sherbourne, abducts and kills him before dumping his body in his office and setting light to it before returning to Portsmouth by boat early Friday morning.' Horton took another swig at his water before continuing. 'Uckfield has asked Dennings to check if any boat owner left a marina in Guernsey at about the same time as Brundall and then returned late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning, plus if that same person then left Guernsey yesterday. There's only one snag though with my theory.'

  'He'd have to have a pretty powerful boat.'

  'That's not the problem. Anything over twenty-five feet and with a powerful engine could have done it. No, our problem is the killer might not keep his boat in a marina. He could have his own private mooring, and that will be more difficult to check. Still, Guernsey's a small place and you don't live and work on an island only thirty-one miles long and twenty-four miles square without understanding the sea and knowing who's out and about on it. Guilbert will find it, if it's there to be found, because Dennings won't have a clue where to start.'

  'Does Catherine know about your dice with death?'

  'No, and I made Uckfield swear not to tell her, or Alison. If Catherine finds out, she might think I'm in danger and stop me from seeing Emma on Christmas Eve.'

  'We'll have the case sewn up by then.'

  'That's what I like about you, Barney, your blind faith and sheer bloody optimism. Come on.' Horton rose. 'Let's go and talk to a man about his brother, after which you've got an appointment with the Dean.'

  And whilst Cantelli was with the Dean, Horton was going to take a good look around the vicarage, which had been sealed off with an officer posted outside. He'd managed to forestall anyone entering the house. It hadn't been too difficult because Anne had been killed in the church. Horton wanted to be the first inside that vicarage to make sure the newspapers that mentioned him and his mother were destroyed.

  Then there were the words 'Horsea Marina' on the blotting paper. Would that piece of blotting paper still be there, or had the killer taken it away after killing Anne Schofield and trying to kill him? If it had gone then Rowland Gilmore's killer couldn't have been Tom Brundall. And if it was still there ...? That could either mean the killer missed it or thought it unimportant, in which case Rowland Gilmore's killer wasn't Tom Brundall. He felt he was going round in circles.

  'Does the Dean know about Anne Schofield's death?' Cantelli asked, breaking through his thoughts as they headed out of Portsmouth towards Sebastian Gilmore's home. Trueman had obtained the address, but Horton hadn't rung to make an appointment. Quite honestly he'd forgotten after the excitement of last night and there was no point in bothering now.

  'Yes, Uckfield broke it to him last night. The Dean said he'd have both Rowland Gilmore's and Anne Schofield's files available for you.'

  'What about her family?'

  'There's a sister who lives in Abertillery, South Wales. The Dean notified his equivalent there last night and he and the police informed her. She's an invalid and can't get down here. There's no point in her coming anyway. We said we'd send her sister's belongings back, but I think her vicar is coming down to collect them on Monday.'

  'The poor woman.'

  Horton wondered if Cantelli meant Anne Schofield or her sister.

  As Cantelli drove to Gilmore's home in a small village on the border between Hampshire and West Sussex, Horton mulled over the events of the previous night. He experienced that same knot of anger he'd felt last night when he had stared down at her blackened corpse. The gentle, kind woman he'd only recently met hadn't deserved such a terrible fate. She'd been an innocent victim in whatever was going on and he had vowed then, and silently reaffirmed now, that he would find the bastard who'd killed her.

  When the hospital had re
leased him at close on midnight he'd ridden home, nervously checking for anyone on his tail. But whoever it was who had tried to kill him had thought they'd finished the job; all was quiet and there was no one suspicious lurking around the marina. He was safe for one night at least. Soon, though, he guessed the killer would realize that he was still alive and would make another attempt on his life and Horton didn't intend ending up like Brundall, Sherbourne or poor Anne Schofield.

  He gazed out of the window as Cantelli drove carefully through the country lanes. The rain had finally stopped and the blustery wind was tearing holes in the cloud big enough to let a glimpse of blue through; he didn't think it would last though. He wondered if he should have moved the boat this morning on the high tide, but consoled himself with the fact that the killer probably didn't know where he lived and besides it had been too windy to risk it. By the next high tide this evening it would be dark and too late to move Nutmeg. Perhaps tomorrow morning he might motor along Hayling Bay and up the Emsworth Channel to Northney Marina at the top of Hayling Island, and stay there for a few days, and yet he felt that was like giving in, or running away. It reminded him of his mother: had he run away from the truth of her disappearance all these years? He guessed he knew the answer to that one.