‘Mr Dryden. I’ve just had a brief chat with DI Jock Reade from Ely. I understand you know each other. I’d like to try that statement again, if it’s all right with you. Now, please. I’m at the camp, we’ve set up an incident room in the old dining hall. I’ll expect you. Frankly, if I don’t see you by dusk one of my officers will come and get you.’
Humph leant forward and turned up the radio volume ‘… and for East Anglia the Met Office has issued a severe weather warning. Freezing rain showers have reached the north coast of Norfolk and will deepen towards nightfall. Ground temperatures are likely to remain at minus 5 or lower, leading to widespread formation of ice on trees, overhead wires, rails, roads and other artificial surfaces. By mid-evening the storm front will have passed from coastal areas, with skies clearing, leading to severe freezing temperatures of minus 10 and below. Police in North Norfolk advise all motorists to stay off the roads unless their journey is vital. Conditions are already described as treacherous.’
‘Super,’ said Dryden. Humph killed the radio and resisted the language tape: an eloquent, and rare, offer of uninterrupted communication.
‘The camp’s still crawling,’ said the cabbie. ‘They want to know what I’ve been doing parked up on the beach.’
‘What did you tell ’em?’
‘The truth. That I was keeping an eye on Laura because someone had tried to kill you. I think the copper wants another word.’
‘You don’t say,’ said Dryden. ‘I may have overlooked mentioning it in my statement. So I’ll look forward to that.’
Dryden closed his eyes, trying to blot out the storm. ‘OK,’ he said to Humph. ‘Stick with me. I see some light at last…’ He slurped more beer and then balanced the pint on top of the glove compartment, spilling peanuts into the shallow plastic depression.
Humph folded his arms like a Buddha.
‘Paul Gedney is – how can I put this nicely – romantically attached to Elizabeth Lutton, Whittlesea District Hospital’s senior pharmacist. She’s in a marriage she will later escape, she’s thirty-five, or thereabouts. He’s fifteen years younger – and as far as we know a manipulative and damaged young man. This may not be his fault, but for the sake of the argument, who cares? So what does he see in her? It’s only a guess, but I reckon our Paul sees a way of lifting drugs out of the pharmacy without being caught. So Elizabeth is a means to an end; in fact, everyone he knows is probably a means to an end, a fact only marginally more palatable when you remember the object of his little money-raising scheme was to pay for medical treatment for his adopted mother. Then it all goes wrong. The police find some of Gedney’s customers reeling around the low spots of Whittlesea and the Fen towns and they’re prepared to name their supplier. He gets to hear on the grapevine they’re going to bust him, so he does a runner.’
‘And ends up at the Dolphin,’ said Humph, attempting to winch a four-inch-wide crisp into his mouth without breaking it.
‘Indeed. He tries to tap his friends for some money is my guess – which they refuse, and instead offer him refuge for the night. It’s just possible Ruth Connor – who is another one of his former conquests – decides that he deserves more help than that, and she slips him the combination to the office safe. Anyway, the plan goes wrong and Chips catches him and wallops him with the stapler. What happens next? My guess is he rides east on the coast road and then doubles back to Lighthouse Cottage, where he dumps the bike – it’s still there. Then I reckon, once the police have been and gone, he tracks down Ruth Connor. And that’s when they see their real chance.’
Dryden slapped the dashboard and corralled some nuts. Outside, the lights of the Eel’s Foot came on, a string of Christmas bulbs swinging violently in the wind.
Humph shrugged, but for once played the game. ‘Which was?’
‘It’s perfect. Two people – two problems. Paul Gedney is on the run and needs to disappear. Ruth Connor is stuck with a husband who – even by his own admission – wasn’t happy living in the same world as she was. Emotionally, he’s a ten-year-old, with a fragile personality which can break when exposed to the slightest stress. Next stop the funny farm. So Ruth and Paul Gedney figure it out: Chips has got the robbery on the record, the police have got the stapler as exhibit number one if they ever track down the thief. The lovers decide to fit up Chips Connor for Paul Gedney’s murder. That way, Chips goes to jail and Paul Gedney gets a new life.’
‘How do they fake the murder scene?’ said Humph, hooked now, despite himself.
‘Blood. Lots of it. Gedney is a trained nurse – or at least part trained. He’s done a hundred blood transfusions. She sets him up in the boat – the Curlew– over in the marsh, on the riverbank, well out of the way. The police aren’t looking anyway, they think he’s beggared off by motorbike like Chips said. Five pints of blood – that’s all it takes. He had nearly six weeks – plenty of time for his own body to have replaced the blood. He stores it in a blood box – a metal container which preserves it at the right temperature. The technicalities are beyond me, but it’s not rocket science, all he needs is a generator.’
Humph looked out the driver’s side window, unconvinced. ‘Why’d he cut himself up with the knife?’
Dryden covered his eyes. ‘I don’t know.’
Humph, rallying, filled in the gaps. ‘So once they’ve got the blood they choose a spot – the old huts are perfect. Then they spill it all in one go and give it a few days to dry so the police aren’t tempted to give it the full forensic treatment?’
Dryden shook his head. ‘I’ve read the trial reports. The examination on site was done by the local man – there’s no way they would have spotted the different ages of the blood samples taken at the scene. They’d take three, six, whatever, but only to make sure it was all from one body. That’s it. Standard practice.’
‘Then they set up the other stuff – clothes, hairs… how about the fingerprints?’ asked Humph.
‘Every item with a print was movable – the clever bit was the iron bed end, but if you look in the old huts you can see they’re easy to take apart. They knew where Chips had been working. It was easy enough, and they had so much time. Chips was out of the way by then – at the clinic – so they could choose their moment. And they had time to plant evidence on his fishing boat too – so it looked like he’d dumped the body at sea.’
Dryden took the glasses back and Humph fired up the Capri, but they didn’t move. ‘Then what?’ said the cabbie.
‘Good question. He got away – right away. Gedney has to think fast. He’s got a face no one can forget. The police have got a picture, and within a week every copper in the east of England has got a copy. OK – he’s got some cash, perhaps a lot of cash.’ He paused, sensing he was close to something. ‘He may have touched Lutton again. She’s still got a job, although by now everyone’s crawling all over the pharmacy records, so she’s heading for the best exit she can negotiate that protects her pension. So he leans on her.’
Humph burped, rocking the Capri. ‘Is that where he got the kit, the blood box, the transfusion gear?’
‘Brilliant. Exactly. Elizabeth Lutton. It has to be. A quick call, a plea for help not very subtly wrapped up in a threat. The blood box, transfusion gear, even a fresh supply of blood for a full transfusion.’
‘Blackmail,’ said Humph. He squirted water on the windscreen automatically and the ice cleared, but re-formed quickly between swipes of the wipers. ‘Blimey. We’ll be lucky to get back in this.’
Dryden felt the blood draining from his face. ‘You’re a genius,’ he said, turning to the cabbie.
‘Piss off,’ said Humph, sensing an unpardonable excursion into sarcasm.