Fatal Catch Read online

  He said, ‘Westerbrook was released from prison two years ago when Langham would have been banged up. Could they have met there?’

  ‘I’ll check when we get back.’

  Horton continued his scrutiny of the cupboard. There were two bottles of whisky and one of rum, a third full, and some dusty glasses. He straightened up and looked around. There was no phone. Cantelli confirmed there hadn’t been one in the bedroom either. So Westerbrook only used his mobile. Again Horton retrieved it from the plastic bag and this time flicked to the photographs on it. There was one of Westerbrook’s boat and one of him with a rather large fish, and that was it. None of his son or of anyone else.

  ‘Anything of interest in the kitchen?’

  ‘Just a drawer full of circulars, some milk that’s gone off and some mouldy bread and cheese. No sign of a bloody knife or even a curved one,’ Cantelli added, tongue in cheek.

  ‘Try ringing these numbers when we get back.’ Horton handed Cantelli the evidence bag with the phone in it. He picked up the laptop computer, adding, ‘Walters might be able to get something from this.’ Horton left everything else where it was. There was no need to bag it up or call SOCO unless Dr Clayton discovered Westerbrook had been killed.

  ‘Hope the neighbours don’t think we’re burglars,’ Cantelli said, locking up.

  ‘We’ll soon know if blue lights come flashing after us.’

  But they reached the station without incident where Horton put Westerbrook’s computer in front of Walters. ‘Christmas present for you. See what you can get out of it.’

  Walters’ eyes lit up. Horton asked if he’d got any further information on Westerbrook.

  ‘He’s not registered as a licenced financial consultant with the Financial Services Authority and he hasn’t filed a tax return since he came out of prison. He’s not registered as being self-employed either and there’s no record of him being employed.’

  Horton was puzzled. ‘So what does he do for a living and one that sees him driving a new car and owning an expensive boat? The boat’s an old model but it would still have set him back about fifteen, or twenty thousand pounds. There’s no paperwork in the flat to show he bought that boat or car, see if you can find any record of the transactions on his computer.’

  Cantelli said, ‘I’ll contact the Saab garage. And I’ll make an appointment to see his bank manager.’

  ‘Also get in touch with the landlord.’

  Cantelli nodded.

  Elkins called to say that Westerbrook had never kept a boat at Horsea Marina. So he’d lied to Julian Tierney, the marina manager at Fareham. Not that that was a crime. Maybe he’d said it to make himself appear big.

  Horton gave Walters Westerbrook’s medical card and asked him to contact the surgery. He made his way along the corridor to Bliss’s office and as he did a text came through on his mobile. It was Carolyn. His pulse beat faster as he read it. ‘Dinner tomorrow night, my place, eight thirty.’ He texted back. ‘Great, see you then.’

  He reported to Bliss.

  ‘So it looks like natural causes,’ she said.

  He admitted that was probably the case but added that there were several factors about Westerbrook that needed looking into.

  ‘But not connected with Graham Langham,’ she insisted.

  He shrugged.

  She said that DCS Adams was unconcerned about Westerbrook and that they could continue with their enquiries. He asked if she’d heard any news about Alfie Wright but she said he hadn’t been found. Horton, heading for the canteen, thought the press in the form of Leanne Payne must be harassing Uckfield for a statement.

  He intended buying sandwiches and taking them back to his office but he caught sight of PCs Seaton and Kate Summerfield and, after buying a cheese salad roll, he took it to their table.

  ‘How did you get on at the car breakers?’ he asked, biting into his roll. Bliss hadn’t mentioned it. But then Langham wasn’t their case and whatever information she’d gained from the two officers she’d have sent over to DCI Neame and DCS Adams, there would have been no need to tell him.

  Seaton answered. ‘The van was collected for scrap two months ago. The owner, Daryl Farnley, has all the correct paperwork for receiving it but not for breaking it up. He swears blind that neither he nor any of his staff recycled it and sold it on but then he would. We got a list of his staff, there are only three, one of them has a record for being drunk and disorderly, theft and violent assault. His last conviction was eight years ago, he was out in five, Wayne Gower. He used to live in Portsmouth with his common law wife and kids on the Paradise Estate. He probably knew Graham Langham and sold him the van. We reported to DCI Bliss.’

  ‘Did you speak to Gower?’

  Summerfield answered. ‘He denies selling it on but he worked in a garage before his convictions, so he’d know how to recycle vehicles.’

  Horton thought she was right. He returned to CID where Walters greeted him with the news that the medical centre had a Karen Tempson listed as Westerbrook’s next of kin, his ex-wife, but that he hadn’t tried the number they’d given him. Horton did but it was obviously an old number as the line was dead.

  Cantelli reported that Langham and Westerbrook hadn’t served time in the same prison. ‘Langham was at Winchester prison, Westerbrook on the Isle of Wight.’

  So that put paid to the theory they might have known one another while serving time.

  Cantelli added, ‘I couldn’t speak to the manager at the Central Bank where Westerbrook has an account but I made an appointment to see him. The only problem is it’s for Monday.’

  Horton had guessed that might be the case.

  ‘I contacted the garage where Westerbrook bought his car. They phoned me back to make sure I was who I claimed to be and said that Westerbrook paid cash and bought it nine months ago.’

  Horton raised his eyebrows. ‘Where did he get that much money?’

  ‘He told them he’d won it.’

  ‘And they believed him!’

  ‘I don’t think they cared either way as long as they got a sale. I’ve been through his phone numbers. There was a voicemail on a few of them but I didn’t leave a message, and a couple of those I spoke to said they hadn’t seen or spoken to Clive for some time and seemed keen to distance themselves from him. One of the numbers was his landlord and he said that Westerbrook was heavily in arrears with his rent and that he was in the process of having him evicted.’

  ‘Well he won’t have to bother now,’ Horton said, somewhat cynically.

  ‘I told him he could do nothing until we had finished with the apartment. But one of the numbers was that of Aubrey Davidson of Seaturn Marine, his business is servicing marine engines.’

  ‘That’s the van that was at the marina when we talked to the manager, Julian Tierney.’ Horton recalled that it had left by the time they returned to their car.

  ‘Yes, and he’s also secretary of the Lee-on-the-Solent angling club. He wanted to know why I was calling him on Westerbrook’s number so I broke the bad news. He assumed it was a heart attack. I said that we might want to speak to him. I didn’t mention Lesley Nugent.’

  ‘Call him back and ask if I can meet him at the angling club.’

  ‘Do you want me along, only it’s the twins school nativity play tonight and—’

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of depriving you,’ Horton said with sincerity. He only wished he could attend Emma’s school Christmas production and with a flood of guilt realized he had no idea what that was or even if she was involved in one. He felt ashamed and angry with himself for being far too wrapped up in work and his personal investigation. He’d remedy that and soon. There was no reason why he shouldn’t go to Emma’s private school. He wasn’t barred from it or from seeing Emma there. Just because Catherine didn’t want him there didn’t mean he had to comply.

  Cantelli said, ‘We’re taking Mum. It’ll be the first year that Dad won’t be there to see it,’ he added sadly. Horton knew it was fast approaching
the anniversary of Toni Cantelli’s death, which had been a year ago last December. Looking more cheerful, Cantelli continued, ‘Joe’s a shepherd and Molly’s an angel, although that might be an offence under the Trades Description Act or the United Union of Angels might object.’

  Horton smiled. The twins at six were the youngest of Cantelli’s brood of five and all the children as far as Horton could see and knew were good kids.

  ‘I’m sure she’ll look, act and behave angelically.’

  ‘Until we get her home, yeah.’

  Cantelli called Aubrey Davidson who said he’d be happy to see DI Horton at the angling club in about an hour, if that suited. It did perfectly. And although the meeting was earlier than Horton had anticipated he still insisted that there was no need for Cantelli to join him. He’d return to the marina and collect the Harley.

  TEN

  Horton didn’t head straight for the angling club. He took the scenic route along the Lee-on-the-Solent seafront and pulled up opposite a modern apartment block. Several lights blazed and Christmas lights twinkled in the windows but there were none showing in the small retirement flat on the top floor of the four-storey building that had once been the home of former PC Adrian Stanley, the copper who had cursorily followed up Jennifer’s disappearance. Perhaps the flat was still for sale or the new owners were out. There was nothing he could glean from being here except to recall his only conversation with Stanley which had been in April. It had been a bright cloudless day. The yachts had been racing off Cowes in the Solent. Now it was dark and cold.

  Shortly after his visit Stanley had died following a massive stroke, but he’d muttered something about a brooch before dying. It was the one his late wife had been wearing on the day Stanley had been given the Queen’s Gallantry Medal for Bravery in 1980 after he and another officer had gone in pursuit of armed robbers and had come under intense fire. It was also the same brooch that had once been in Jennifer’s possession and which Horton had been told by DCS Sawyer had been part of a private and extremely valuable collection of jewellery stolen from a house in north Hampshire in 1977. Horton had found the report of the robbery and the list of stolen items, only there had been no mention of a brooch having been stolen.

  The brooch that had been in Stanley’s possession had vanished along with all photographic evidence of it. Stanley’s son, Robin, couldn’t remember it and Horton, only glimpsing it once in the photograph and a couple of times on his mother couldn’t recall it in detail, all he had was the impression of an inky-blue stone in the centre surrounded by other stones, possibly diamonds. He hadn’t asked Sawyer for a description of it, maybe he should. He wondered if Sawyer would tell him, or rather tell him the truth. He had denied his and his unit’s involvement in taking the brooch and the photographic evidence of it and Horton thought that was the truth, because his suspicion of who was behind the theft fell in another direction.

  He turned towards the sea. Across the Solent was Lord Eames’ extensive holiday home fronting on to a private beach. Horton wondered if any of the family would be there for Christmas, Agent Harriet Eames, for example, Lord Eames’ daughter whom Horton had worked with on a couple of cases. She was based at Europol in The Hague. Or perhaps Eames, like Catherine’s new boyfriend, liked to spend Christmas in sunnier climes. If Eames had ordered the removal of that brooch and the photographic evidence of it then it had great significance in the case. And if his mother had worn it then how did she come to own such a valuable piece of jewellery, if the stones were real, it could have been paste and he could be mistaken about seeing her wearing it.

  He gazed at the lights twinkling across the Solent on the small town of Cowes. The drizzling rain had passed over leaving a fresh clear early evening but there was still a stiff north-westerly wind making it bitingly cold. What had induced Clive Westerbrook to go fishing in similar weather on Wednesday? The fact he had to dispose of a body? Not so according to DCS Adams. Why had Westerbrook invited a man he had only met once to go fishing with him on a cold grey winter’s day midweek, if they could believe Nugent’s story? Well, he wasn’t going to get the answers here.

  He found the angling club easily and pulled up alongside a large four-wheel drive car in the otherwise deserted car park. Aubrey Davidson’s he presumed. He’d obviously left his work van at home.

  The club was closed but the door opened before Horton reached it and a large man whose muscles were rapidly turning to flesh greeted him warmly. His hands were broad and his handshake strong and firm. He waved aside Horton’s apology for being delayed with a wide smile in a round face that was clean-shaven and offered Horton a drink, which, he said, he could fetch from behind the shuttered bar at the far end of a long rectangular room bedecked with garish Christmas decorations and a swirling-patterned brown and orange carpet. Horton declined. He got straight to the point.

  ‘I’d like some information about Clive Westerbrook.’

  ‘Yeah, terrible what’s happened. Heart attack. Can’t say I’m surprised. He’d had warnings.’ Davidson’s voice was as large as his build. Horton was glad the club was closed otherwise they’d have attracted an audience of curious eavesdroppers.

  ‘You knew him well.’

  ‘Yes, for some years.’ Davidson looked slightly uneasy.

  ‘Before his prison sentence?’

  Davidson nodded his big head. His expression clouded. ‘It’s the gambling.’ He sank heavily into the seat at one of the tables. ‘That’s what got him into trouble.’

  Horton sat down opposite him. This new information was interesting. It explained his debts and might explain how he’d been able to buy a car for cash, and possibly his boat in the same manner. But even then, without a job and only state benefit to rely on, he must have been either a damn good gambler or very lucky to have won such huge sums of money.

  ‘Bloody mug’s game,’ Davidson continued. ‘I tried to tell him to chuck it in but it’s an addiction, an illness, like being an alcoholic. He couldn’t stop himself. Clive got sucked in real bad. It destroyed his marriage. We used to live next door to one another. He was earning a fortune as a financial consultant and bloody good at his job. He used to advise me. But he lost a lot of money and I mean a lot. He and Karen used to have one of the large houses along the seafront nearby. They had to sell it because of debts, which was when they came to live next door to me and Marilyn. Not that they were slumming it, we have a lovely house just behind the seafront here,’ he quickly added. ‘Clive seemed to be doing well. Then one day the bailiffs turned up on his doorstep. Clive was out, Karen was in a terrible state and that was it. She packed a case of his clothes, threw it out on the lawn, refused to let him in, changed the locks and filed for a divorce. But she had to leave the house. Clive had gambled everything away. And then there was that business of the fraud.’

  ‘For which he got convicted.’

  Davidson nodded sadly. ‘That was the last I saw of him until Sunday morning when he called me and asked if he could come over to the club.’

  ‘To see you.’

  ‘He said he’d like to rejoin. We used to go fishing together and he was club treasurer before he went to prison.’ Davidson swallowed and his eyes dropped. Horton could read the rest.

  ‘He stole money from the club to fuel his gambling addiction.’

  ‘He repaid every penny though,’ Davidson said quickly and defensively. ‘He swore he’d never do it again but I told him to step down as treasurer so as not to be tempted and to get medical and professional help. He promised he would, through Gamblers Anonymous. The next I hear is that he’s been sent to prison for mortgage fraud. Then he rang me like I said on Sunday morning. I was surprised to hear from him but I wasn’t going to turn my back on him. He arrived just before midday. I signed him in, we exchanged a few words but I didn’t get much time to talk to him because Ed, who was due to be behind the bar, called in sick and I had to help out. And now Clive’s dead.’

  ‘How did he seem on Sunday?’

  ‘OK
.’ Davidson answered vaguely.

  ‘But?’ probed Horton.

  Davidson frowned as he considered his response. ‘More uptight than he used to be, I’d say. Edgy, like, but perhaps prison had made him like that.’

  Horton wasn’t sure if that was hindsight talking or rather Davidson was saying that because he was expected to say something.

  Davidson continued. ‘He told me he’d returned to his financial investment business.’

  That was a lie then. Maybe Westerbrook said it to save face.

  ‘Clive said he’d bought a boat. He wanted to relax more, doctor’s orders because of his heart problem. And he wanted to put the past behind him, get back into circulation, meet more people. He thought fishing would help him.’

  ‘Does his ex-wife still live here?’

  ‘No, married a Welshman and moved to Porthcawl. I can give you her number if you’d like it. My wife is still in touch with her. Does she know about Clive yet?’

  ‘Only if your wife has contacted her. We don’t have a current contact number for her.’

  ‘I haven’t told Marilyn yet.’

  ‘Could you ask her not to contact Karen until we do? I’ll arrange for an officer from the local police to call round and break the news.’

  ‘I don’t think you’ll find she’ll be heartbroken but there’s a boy, though Clive hasn’t seen him since Karen threw him out six years ago. He was seven then so he probably doesn’t know or remember much about his dad.’