I leaned around the bookshelf that divided the two rooms and yelled, ‘Do I need to wash these dishes before putting them in the cabinets?’
The floor around my friend was littered with boxes, cables and instruction manuals, one of which she held up for my consideration. ‘It’s written in English, French, Spanish and Arabic, but does it tell me where to attach this damn wire? In any language? It does not.’ She tossed a cable that terminated with three plugs – banded in red, yellow and white – aside. ‘I’d like to tell them where they can shove their bleeding wires!’
‘Does that mean I don’t have to re-wash the dishes?’
She flapped a hand. ‘Never mind. I’ll figure it out.’ She picked up the manual, flipped over a few pages and began to read, eyes narrowed and brow furrowed in concentration. ‘Who drew these illustrations, anyway? Three-year-olds?’
Back in the kitchen, dust motes danced in slants of sunlight streaming through the window. My nose began to itch, and I felt a big, juicy sneeze coming on. I twitched my nose like Samantha in Bewitched, but not even magic would stop that sneeze from coming.
I slipped the platter I’d been holding back into its protective nest of crumpled newspaper, and plunged my hand into the pocket of my cotton jacket, hoping I’d find a tissue. What I came out with was a wad of newsprint.
Oh, right. I’d forgotten about that. It had fallen out of Alison’s car the other day, and since I firmly believed in Keeping Dartmouth Green, I’d picked it up off the street fully intending to throw it away.
I started to pitch the scrap into the bin with the rest of the packing trash, but as I closed an eye and lined up the shot, a single word leapt out at me: Parker.
Curious is my middle name, so I took the scrap of paper over to the kitchen counter and smoothed it out on the granite:Police Seek Help of Public in Solving Hit-and-RunForensic analysis of clothing worn by the victim of a hit-and-run on the North Embankment nearly two weeks ago has revealed that a blue coloured vehicle was involved.Sergeant Barry Evans, Dartmouth Police, said finding the vehicle with this coloured paint is crucial in helping to find the driver who was responsible for the hit and run.Popular medium and television personality Susan Parker was walking her dog on the Embankment when she was struck from behind, killing her instantly. The hit-and-run happened around 8.15 in the morning.‘We hope that the paint analysis from fragments on the victim’s clothing may focus public attention to a blue vehicle that has recently been damaged.‘From the extent of the victim’s injuries and the paint fragments on her clothing we know that the vehicle involved will have some body or paintwork damage. The driver or owner may have taken it to a panel beater for repairs. They may have tried to fix it themselves or have parked it up out of sight.‘If anyone has any information about a vehicle with blue paint that has recently been damaged then we would like to hear from them,’ he said. ‘The driver who struck Ms Parker must know what happened. We urge that person and anyone with information about the hit-and-run to contact police.’
Why did Stephen Bailey go to all the trouble of tearing that particular article out of the paper, then crumple it up and save it? Thinking about the trials and tribulations of Bailey’s car lately, the man couldn’t be acting more guilty than if he’d run Susan Parker down himself.
Blue car. Check.
Body damage. Check.
Out of sight. Check.
But Alf Freeman had motive. And he’d confessed to the crime, hadn’t he?
I dragged a chair out from under the dainty bistro-style table I’d helped Alison pick out at the IKEA store in Bristol and sat down to think.
Stephen Bailey knew that Susan Parker had been planning a visit to Slapton Sands, but even if that visit were to lead to the location of the remains of American soldiers some sixty years dead, the only thing she’d prove was that Ken Small was right and Stephen Bailey was wrong about the disposition of some of the victims’ bodies following the disastrous training exercise.
At her live show in Paignton, Susan had called on Bailey, saying she had a message from somebody named Rose, but she’d been wrong, hadn’t she? Or had Bailey lied about ever knowing a woman named Rose?
I couldn’t make the pieces fit. Unless…
My bag was on the table, so I pawed through it until I found my cell phone. A few taps later, I reached Olivia. ‘Got your text, Olivia. So, tell me. What’s up with Alf?’
‘Oh my God, Hannah! Him and Derrick got arrested for human trafficking!’
‘What? You mean he didn’t kill Susan Parker?’ If Alison hadn’t had the television and its paraphernalia spread out in pieces on the carpet all around her, I would have rushed right out to click the set on.
‘Coulda knocked me over with a feather, and that’s a fact.’
‘But, but…’ I’m seldom at a loss for words, just ask my husband, but human trafficking was the last thing that came to mind when I thought about Alf God-Loves-Me-Better-Than-You Freeman. Sex slaves? Prostitution? Diminutive Alf with the pasty skin and thinning hair, dressed in the height of last year’s fashions from the Men and Boys department at Walmart? I tried to reconcile that image of Alf with the burly, dark-haired, gold-chained Mafioso so recently popularized on HBO. Fuhgedaboutit.
As Olivia rattled on, however, the penny dropped. Calais, she said. Chunnel. A BMW that was even more ‘special’ than the manufacturer intended, with an undercarriage compartment that was impervious to heat sensors and infrared cams.
Alf had been smuggling illegal immigrants from France into the United Kingdom at £1000 a pop.
‘Strange occupation for a man of God,’ I huffed.
TWENTY-ONE
‘Important meetings. The area described below is to be requisitioned urgently for military purposes, and must be cleared of its inhabitants by December 20th, 1943.’Notice, Mortimer Bros. Printers and Publishers, Totnes, November 12, 1943‘The Chairman of the Devon County Council, Sir John Daw, was ordered to requisition an area of 30,000 acres [including] the villages of Torcross, Stokenham, Chillington, Blackawton, East Allington, Slapton, Strete, Frogmore and Sherford. It also included 180 farms and many small hamlets. It affected 750 families and totaled 3000 men, women and children.’Robin Rose-Price and Jean Parnell, The Land We Left Behind, Orchard Publications, 2005, p.10
‘The trouble is,’ I said to Paul as we were getting ready for bed that evening, ‘I like Stephen Bailey. It’s hard for me to believe that he’d deliberately run anybody down.’
Paul rinsed his toothbrush and dropped it brush-end up into a drinking glass. ‘How would you feel if he were just an ordinary Devonian farmer and not the father of one of your closest friends?’
‘I’m trying to keep that out of the equation, darling.’ I crawled into the bed, propped some pillows behind my back, and pulled the duvet up to my chin. Maybe I could think better that way.
A few minutes later, Paul joined me under the duvet. ‘So, what are you going to do with the information?’
‘What information? I don’t have information, just hunches. The police aren’t going to be interested in my unsubstantiated theories.’
He rolled over and started to trace circles on my upper arm with the back of his index finger. ‘Which are?’
‘Whatever it is, it’s rooted in the past. Susan either sensed it, or Bailey was afraid she would come to sense it. Maybe Alison’s father had a beef with one of the American soldiers. Maybe they fought, the soldier got killed, and Bailey buried him on the farm.’ I sat up a bit straighter. ‘Yes! That explains why Bailey has this love-hate thing going on with Yanks.’