Blood on the Sand

'Yes. Why?'

'What kind, sir?' asked Cantelli.

Elms looked surprised and baffled at the question. 'A Ford. It's taxed and insured and has a current MOT if that's what you're after.'

'It's colour?'

'Blue. But what's that got to-?'

'Where were you on the third of January?' Horton said briskly. Now let's see what the little gnome comes up with as an alibi for the night Arina had been killed.

'I can't remember.'

'It was the Saturday after New Year's Day, if that helps,' Horton said.

Elms bristled at Horton's sarcasm. He looked set to make some smart remark but Cantelli quickly intervened.

'Perhaps consulting your diary will help, sir?'

Elms considered this for a moment, then replied stiffly, 'I'll fetch it.'

'I'll come with you.'

'There's no need, Sergeant.'

But Cantelli ignored him.

As soon as they had left the room, Horton crossed to the mantelpiece and studied the photographs of Elizabeth Elms. Elms had said that his mother had died in 1981. How old had she been then, he wondered, picking up the gold-effect frame and peering more closely at her. She looked to be about forty when this picture was taken with Gordon, and if she had been in her twenties when working as a nurse at the military hospital in Tripoli then she had died young. Certainly before she had reached fifty.

He could still see traces of the attractive young woman in the photograph that Dr Nelson had shown him, but whether life, betrayal, desertion, disappointment, or all four had made her mouth tighter and her eyes harder he couldn't say and would never know. And neither would he know whether his own mother might look the same if she were still alive, which he doubted. Or maybe he wanted to believe she was dead because that was easier to cope with than acknowledging the fact that he'd been deliberately ignored for years. The only photograph he'd had of her had been burnt when his beloved boat Nutmeg had been torched by a mad killer. That reminded him that soon he'd have to give up living on the boat borrowed from Sergeant Elkins' friend and find a new home for himself. It was something he had been putting off in the hope of a reconciliation with Catherine, which was now completely out of the question. New Year, new decisions, he thought, pulling himself up. Get somewhere to live, sort out your life.

He turned his mind to Elms. Had Elizabeth Elms told her son who his father was? Did Gordon Elms know what his father had been doing during that missing year? Trueman had confirmed that Sutton had bought Scanaford House in 1976 and that his wife had died in 1980. It was possible that Elizabeth Elms had returned to nursing in London where Gordon Elms had told him they had lived. Maybe she had kept her eye on Christopher Sutton's career and, hearing the news that his wife had died in 1980, had come here in 1981 hoping to rekindle some of the passion or love between her and Christopher Sutton but it had never materialized.

Horton couldn't help his thoughts flitting back to his own mother. Had she done the same on that fateful day in November when she'd left their council flat dressed up in her best clothes, according to the only witness he'd managed to find? Was his father someone like Christopher Sutton, an eminent man, who didn't want his affair acknowledged? Or was he the powerful underworld figure that only recently the Intelligence Directorate had claimed was possible? But perhaps her disappearance had nothing to do with either of these — quite the opposite in fact, and he felt a stirring of excitement that told him he could be right before a reality check said it was more likely he was the result of a one-night stand. He told himself he didn't really care or want to know, but as he heard footsteps in the hall he guessed Gordon Elms had said much the same over the years. And Horton knew it was a lie.

Brandishing the diary, Elms said, 'On the evening of the third of January I was at a private meeting with a client in Newport.'

'Doing what?'

'Helping her to communicate with a loved one.'

'A seance.'

'You can scoff all you like, Inspector, but there are powers out there you can't even begin to imagine.' And there are powers I've got that you don't need to imagine, he felt like saying, but didn't. 'What time did you leave your client?'

'It was late, about eleven thirty.'

After Arina had been killed. But Horton would check.

'I'll need the name of your client.'

Elms drew himself up. 'That information is confidential. And I don't see any reason to breach that confidentiality.'

'I'm going to have to insist.'

'You can insist until you're blue in the face; I am not giving it to you.'

'Then we'll just have to take you to the station.'

Elms looked alarmed. 'On what grounds?'

'Murder.'

Elms made to laugh, then seeing that Horton was serious, his face fell. His eyes flitted nervously between Horton and Cantelli. 'You can't mean it? Who am I supposed to have murdered?'

Cantelli answered, 'Arina Sutton, Owen Carlsson and Jonathan Anmore.'

Elms' protruding eyes widened so much that Horton thought they'd pop out of their sockets. 'This is ridiculous,' Elms declared.

Horton said smartly, 'Unless we can confirm with your client where you were on the third of January how do we know it's ridiculous?' Before Elms had a chance to reply, Horton swiftly continued. 'And what were your movements between Saturday the seventeenth of January and Monday the nineteenth of January?'

Elms shuffled. 'I was here.'

'Can anyone confirm that?'

'No.' He shifted nervously.

'And last Thursday between six twenty p.m. and ten twelve p.m.?'

Elms brightened at that. 'I was at the hospital all day Thursday until just after nine o'clock-'

'You're ill?' Horton asked so sharply that Elms jumped.

'No. I'm a volunteer with the League of Friends.'

Horton's mind whirred. St Mary's Hospital was almost the size of a small town. Elms could have been working anywhere within it but what if he'd seen Thea Carlsson there during that Thursday morning and, recognizing her as the woman who had come asking questions, and ones he didn't want to answer, he'd disposed of her? But why should he? the silent voice inside him nagged. It didn't stop him asking though, 'Where is she, Elms? What have you done with Thea Carlsson?' Horton stepped forward.

Alarmed, Elms took a step backwards towards the door. Cantelli quickly slid between Elms and the exit.

'I haven't done anything with her,' Elms cried, crashing into a small table and spilling its contents.

'You saw her in the hospital. She thought you were a friend. But you weren't, were you? Did you tell her you'd take her out of there? Or did you just lie in wait until she came out then offered her a lift?'

'I don't know what you're talking about.' Elms swivelled round, appealing to Cantelli.

But Horton knew there was something Elms was not telling him. Time to frighten him into revealing it. 'Gordon Elms, I'm arresting you on suspicion of the abduction of Thea Carlsson and the murders of-'

'I haven't killed anyone, I swear it.' He spun round to Cantelli and back to Horton. 'I didn't abduct her, she came willingly.'

Horton felt as if time had stopped. His fists clenched. If Elms had harmed her… He wanted to grab Elms and shake the hell out of him. He saw Cantelli's warning glance — go easy — but he was prepared to ignore it.

Elms couldn't get the words out quick enough. 'I was leaving the hospital Thursday morning. I'd promised Mrs Westleigh — she's elderly and very ill — that I'd fetch her husband — he's blind — and that I'd take him to the hospital to visit her. I saw Miss Carlsson walking across the car park. I was just climbing into the car and I asked how she was. She asked if I'd give her a lift.'