Dark Waters Page 14

  ‘Here we are my dear. You look as though you could do with a bit of something inside you.’ The woman put a plate down in front of her. Alex’s mouth watered. A beautifully cooked deep yellow fried egg, two rashers of crispy bacon, a large, fat pork sausage, a field mushroom, two slices of black pudding and two slices of toast. And it was proper butter in the little pot on the table, with small bottles of ketchup and brown sauce. And English mustard.

  ‘Thank you, this looks fabulous.’ She reached for the ketchup.

  And it was fabulous. Fresh and not at all greasy. Alex couldn’t remember when she’d last had a breakfast this good. She finished the last of the tea in the teapot, two teabags in there instead of the usual one you get in cafés. Altogether very satisfying.

  ‘Are you done?’ The café owner came out smiling. ‘Can I get you anything else? Toast, perhaps?’

  ‘No, that will set me up for the day nicely.’

  The woman began to clear the plates.

  ‘You’re in a lovely position here,’ said Alex, wanting to open a conversation. ‘I mean you can see the boats, the marina, a lot of the village.’

  The woman laughed. ‘You can that. It’s a great place to sit and people-watch.’

  ‘Terrible thing that happened on the boat the other day.’

  The woman nodded. ‘Terrible. Hired it from Colin down at the bridge.’

  ‘Yes, I was talking to him about it.’

  The woman looked at her carefully. ‘Ah. You’re that journalist, aren’t you? Colin told me about you.’

  ‘Did he?’

  The woman suddenly smiled. ‘He’s my other half. Not the better half, mind you,’ she chuckled. ‘I’m Dorothy.’

  Alex grinned, relieved she didn’t have to pussyfoot around Dorothy to ask her questions. ‘Then you’ll know I’m looking into their deaths?’

  Dorothy nodded.

  ‘I heard that one of the men who died was seen arguing with a woman just before they hired the boat? I wonder, did you see anything?’

  Dorothy frowned. ‘Which day would that be?’

  ‘The Tuesday, probably?’

  ‘I wasn’t here then, my day off. I haven’t heard anything. Hang on a minute.’ She hurried back inside.

  When she came back, she was followed by a young man dressed in chef’s whites with Crocs on his feet. He looked about twenty-five, with spiky ginger hair.

  ‘This is James,’ said Dorothy. ‘He’s our cook most of the time; though when I’m on a day off he serves in the cafe.’ She looked at the man. ‘This lady—’

  ‘Alex,’ she said. ‘And that breakfast was so good, thank you.’

  James nodded.

  ‘Alex wants to know if you saw anyone arguing somewhere round here last Tuesday.’

  James thought for a minute. ‘Can’t say I did. Even if I had, I wouldn’t have taken any notice, y’know? It’s not like I don’t have enough to do.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Dorothy. ‘Was that the day you were in the kitchen as well?’

  ‘Yep. That was the day. Juggling cooked breakfasts and scone dough. Not to mention carrot cake and chocolate gateaux.’

  ‘As long as you didn’t serve a fried egg with the carrot cake,’ said Dorothy.

  ‘Interesting combination, I should try that out some time,’ James grinned.

  Alex’s heart sank. He hadn’t seen anything. It had been a bit of a long shot.

  ‘I saw them, love.’ The old boy sitting at the round table spoke.

  Alex sat up straighter. ‘Really?’

  The old boy folded up his newspaper and put it carefully back down on to the table. Alex could see a photo of the boat where Daley and Fleet were found across the front page. It was still news, then.

  ‘Well, now, love, I couldn’t rightly say if it’s the couple you’re looking for, but there was certainly a man arguing with a young lady just over there.’ He pointed towards the moored boats. ‘I see a lot of what’s going on. Like to have my tea here, don’t I, Dorothy? While I’m waiting for the pub to open.’

  Alex took the picture of Roger Fleet and Derek Daley over to his table. She pointed to Fleet. ‘Is this the man you saw?’

  He peered with rheumy eyes, then shook his head. ‘No, love, it wasn’t him.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Alex tasted the bitterness of disappointment.

  ‘I may be old but I’m not losing my marbles yet, young lady. Of course I’m sure, I wouldn’t have said otherwise, would I? I’ve been reading the paper same as everyone, haven’t I?’ He wagged his finger at her. ‘And perhaps if you could let me finish?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Alex, trying not to smile. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘It wasn’t that man.’ He pointed to Roger Fleet. ‘But it was him.’ He pointed to the other picture.

  Derek Daley.

  ‘The woman – young lady – then came in here; don’t you remember, James?’

  James shook his head. ‘Don’t reckon so.’

  ‘She was upset, crying. She had a pot of tea.’

  He shrugged, as if a lot of women came into the café to cry and have tea. ‘Can’t say I noticed. I’m sorry. But I have seen the bloke around here before. Spoke to him a few weeks ago when he came in. Said he had a holiday home around here. Somewhere in the village.’

  ‘Really?’ Derek Daley with a holiday home in Norfolk. Roger Fleet not many miles away. Both at university together. Yet they meet on an Internet site and decide to get together that way. Why? Coincidence? Surely not?

  ‘The young lady, did she say what they were arguing about?’ she asked.

  The old boy sniffed. ‘No, just that her dad had upset her. Again. But she couldn’t talk about it.’

  Her dad. Derek Daley’s daughter.

  ‘Do you happen to know where the holiday home is?’ she asked, holding her breath.

  ‘That’ll be the Butlers’ old house,’ said the old boy. ‘My son helped with the garden. Landscaping they called it. Just pulled out some weeds and dug a few beds.’

  ‘I bet it was more than that,’ said James, grinning.

  ‘Well, I call it old-fashioned gardening, nothing fancy. And they gutted the kitchen. Perfectly good it was.’ He picked up his newspaper again.

  ‘It needed gutting,’ said James.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Alex interrupted, not wanting the conversation to go off at a complete tangent. ‘Where is the Butlers’ old house?’

  The old boy peered over the top of his paper. ‘Out of here, down the road a bit, turn right and you’ll see the sign. Says Glory Farm. That’s it. Back in my day it was a proper farm, now it’s a second home. I don’t know what the world’s coming to, I really don’t.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Alex. ‘You’ve been really helpful.’

  She stood. No time like the present.

  Down the road a bit and turn right wasn’t exactly the most accurate of directions, but it was a beautiful morning and she’d had a good breakfast, so Alex wasn’t too worried if she made a few wrong turns here and there.

  But, as it happened, she found the sign that said Glory Farm easily. The pretty brick and flint house was set back off the road, with a path to the front door. There was a side driveway that led to what looked like a brand new cart lodge, big enough for at least two cars. The front garden did look new – the path was lined with box hedge that hadn’t quite settled in; the lawn either side was lush and green – no sign at all of wear and tear. The trees looked as though they had been planted strategically. Her footsteps crunched on the pristine gravel. The house had an air of no one home; nevertheless she pulled on the bell-pull to the right of the front door. It echoed through the house.

  Nothing.

  She turned the handle. Locked. She went round to the back. The garden was long and beautiful. There was a pond, its surface brushed by the weeping branches of a willow tree. The grass was as green as the front lawn and there were beds full of plants, but it showed more life, more individuality than the front. There was a wooden climbing frame, s
wing, and slide. Must be for the grandchildren.

  She knocked on the back door. Waited for a couple of minutes before trying the handle. It was locked. She looked around for a likely place for a spare key and— What the hell did she think she was doing? Was she really going to break into the house and have a snoop around? Snoop around and find out why a successful magazine editor would want to kill himself along with an old friend?

  She was being ridiculous.

  Hurrying round to the front of the house and down the gravel path, she closed the gate behind her, looking back over her shoulder waiting for someone to shout at her that she was trespassing.

  At that moment a Land Rover came along the road at speed and indicated left. It swung into the driveway of Glory Farm, just missing the gateposts. Alex could see a woman at the wheel – probably mid-thirties – and an older woman sitting beside her. Daley’s wife and daughter or daughter-in-law? And why were they in such a hurry?

  She got her answer a couple of minutes later, when two trucks with satellite dishes on the top raced down the road and pulled up with a screech of brakes outside the house. The logos on the side of the vehicles were those of rival digital television companies.

  A man and a woman jumped out of one of the trucks, smart suits, all of them. Another man, more dressed down – scruffy beard, ill-fitting jeans, open-necked shirt – clambered out of the second truck. Their heads swivelled as one towards her, hard gimlet eyes boring into her. Oh yes, she thought, the hard-nosed squad have arrived.

  The woman waved her iPad at her. ‘Hey, you,’ she called. ‘Is this where the Daleys come for their holidays?’

  The first man strode towards her. ‘Do you live round here? Is that their house?’ He nodded towards Glory Farm. ‘Do you know them?’

  Whether it was because Alex sensed more of a story, or because of the arrogance of the journalists, treating her as though she was a village idiot – whatever it was – she shook her head, trying to look gormless. If they thought she was an idiot then she would behave like one. She screwed her face up. ‘No, it’s not. Might have been.’

  ‘What do you mean, “might have been”?’ The woman from the truck asked.

  Alex shrugged. ‘It was sold last week. Just before – well, y’know. All that business and what-not.’

  What-not? That was taking her acting skills a little too far.

  ‘Before he was found on that boat?’

  ‘Yeah. New people will be moving in soon. They’re from Dorset, I believe. Wanted to come up here because their mum was—’ She was enjoying this.

  ‘All right, all right,’ the woman said testily. ‘I get your drift.’ She turned to her companion. ‘Duff info.’

  ‘Why do you want them? The Daleys?’ Alex asked, still trying to look dim and innocent at the same time.

  The woman narrowed her eyes. ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Just wondering, that’s all.’

  ‘You’ll have to watch the news, then, won’t you. Come on, Nigel, let’s get out of here. Do some door knocking. Find some people who knew them. And we’ll get some shots of where the boat was moored.’

  The woman and Nigel jumped into their vehicle and it roared off. The second man watched it go before sighing and climbing wearily into his truck.

  ‘Thanks love,’ he called, before slamming the door shut.

  ‘No problem.’ Alex waved.

  19

  Alex watched the television vans with their reporters disappear down the street.

  She looked at the house again, wondering what she should do. No, she knew what she should do – go and knock on the door and find out what was happening. But suddenly she didn’t have the stomach for it. They had lost a husband and a father in horrible circumstances, she didn’t want to make it worse for them.

  A curtain twitched and a face appeared at the side of the window. It was the younger of the two women from the car. The daughter? She nodded to Alex, before disappearing again.

  Alex walked down the road and found a bench to sit on before taking her phone out of her pocket.

  Heath’s number went straight to voicemail. Damn. She really needed to know why there was this sudden interest in the Daleys.

  She sat thinking. Could she do it? And how should she approach it? Carefully, that’s how. She punched in Bud Evans’s number.

  ‘Bud, it’s Alex Devlin.’

  ‘Alex. What do you want?’ His voice was friendly, if a little cool.

  She heard him shuffle papers on his desk, then: ‘Damn, sod it, blast’, as a pile of them fell onto the floor.

  ‘I’m in Lowdham—’

  ‘Alex, could you be quick. I’m busy. News and all that.’

  And thank you for dropping everything and going to Dillingham Broad to play lackey for one of our other reporters. Ungrateful man.

  ‘I hope my copy was okay for you. About Derek Daley and Roger Fleet.’

  ‘Yes, thank you for that. Was there something else?’

  There was the sound of more papers rustling, emails pinging into his computer. A phone began to ring. She drew a deep breath. ‘Derek Daley had a holiday home in Lowdham and a load of reporters have just turned up. I was hoping—’

  ‘Wait one minute, Alex. What do you mean? You’re in Lowdham at Derek Daley’s holiday home?’

  The phone was still ringing forlornly.

  ‘I … look, I’ll come clean. I thought the story about Daley and Fleet’s deaths on the Broads was worth a bit more. I was interested in the suicide forum angle.’

  ‘Heath told me. And, if I remember correctly, I said I wasn’t interested.’

  ‘I know, but—’

  ‘You’ve been doing a bit of investigating?’

  She nodded, then realized Bud couldn’t see her. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Bit of a waste of your time, isn’t it?’ His voice was cool.

  ‘I thought if you weren’t interested, someone else might be.’ Sometimes the threat of a possible story going to a rival paper was enough to get a news editor interested at least.

  ‘Don’t be too hasty, Alex.’ She heard him puffing on his e-cigarette – Bud had taken up vaping big time. ‘I’d be interested in a feature on Internet suicide, so don’t go touting it anywhere else. But Daley and Fleet killed themselves. End of story.’

  ‘They knew each other before, though.’

  There was a silence. She heard Bud breathing. ‘Really? Could be interesting. More likely a coincidence. I’ll have someone look into it.’

  ‘But I—’

  ‘You stick to the Internet suicide line, give me something on that.’

  Alex gritted her teeth. ‘Okay. The reporters—’

  ‘What reporters?’

  ‘The ones who turned up here a few minutes ago. They wouldn’t tell me why. I thought maybe—’

  ‘That I might know? Why?’

  ‘Daley was a colleague of yours.’ This was like pulling teeth.

  ‘I wouldn’t say that. He was in the same business as me, but our paths didn’t cross often. I never liked the man.’ Bud sighed. ‘Okay. I’ll give you this. He was about to be arrested for kiddie porn. Before he died. That’s presumably why he killed himself.’ The phone, which had gone silent, began to ring again. ‘I’ve got to go. Keep me up to date with what you’re doing.’ He ended the call.

  Alex wanted to throw her phone onto the grass in frustration. Bud had given her a half-hearted go-ahead for the Internet forum feature, but was not too interested in the fact that Daley and Fleet had known each other before. But if they had known each other before, then why bother with the Internet forum? And now this new development. What was she supposed to think about that? Children. Pornography.

  She leaned back on the bench and closed her eyes.

  Alex sensed someone near her and opened her eyes to see a woman with lank hair standing by the bench. She looked as though she had been crying for a week. Her complexion was grey and there was a cold sore at the corner of her mouth. The woman gripped the ba
ck of the bench.

  ‘I saw you as we turned into the drive,’ the woman started. ‘And you were talking to those revolting people, sending them away. I don’t know what you said to them but, whatever it was, thank you.’ The woman looked as though she was about to cry.

  Alex smiled at her. ‘No problem. And you must be—?’

  ‘Laurie. Laurie Cooke. I’m Derek Daley’s daughter, but I guess you knew that already. And I know who you are.’ She gave a wan smile. ‘I used to love your articles in The Post. I recognize you from your byline picture. I guess you know why the TV people were so keen to get hold of us.’

  ‘I’ve just heard—’ Alex held out her phone. ‘From my, er, news editor.’

  Laurie nodded. ‘Right. So you know he was going to be investigated for child pornography. Child porn.’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t believe it. Still. The police have taken away his computer, so I expect they’ll find something on that. Well, I wanted to say thank you and I have.’ She made to go.

  ‘I’m so sorry about your father.’ Alex wanted Laurie to stay and talk some more.

  Laurie looked into the distance. ‘Are you? I don’t know what to think. Mum’s in the house at the moment, tearing open boxes Dad put in the attic when we bought the farmhouse. She’s crying, and her nails are getting ruined, but she’s convinced she’s going to find horrible photos. She wants to see for herself, she says.’

  ‘Did … did your mother know? About the—’

  ‘Paedophilia? That’s what it was, wasn’t it?’ Laurie said, the bitterness evident in her voice. ‘Persuading children to take off their clothes and pose for him. So here’s a question.’ She turned and looked at Alex. ‘They say that wives, family, should have known something when this sort of thing happens, and I’m trying to think, to remember. But, from Mum’s reaction, I’d say no, she didn’t have a clue. What do you think? She seems genuinely shocked and has aged about twenty years. All the Botox and fillers in the world aren’t helping her now.’ She shrugged helplessly. ‘What do I know? Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe she did know.’