Already Dead

24

Diane Fry never realised it could be so dark during the day. Even when there was a total eclipse, you got a bit of light creeping round the edges to remind you that the sun was still up there, the universe still functioning in the normal way. Today, there was almost no natural light in Edendale. The clouds were so dark that the sky seemed to have decided it could do without the sun.

She had to walk a couple of hundred yards from the offices of Richmond Jones in the Market Square to reach the car park where she’d left her Audi. In the distance, above the roofs of Edendale, she could see clouds lying against the hills on either side of the valley, blocking the skyline and swallowing the horizon.

Fry began to feel suffocated. The air was so humid and thick it felt as if she was walking through warm soup. She knew she’d have a headache before the day was over. The tension in the air was concentrating behind her eyes, squeezing her head until it buzzed. Was it possible to feel so claustrophobic in a wide open space like the Eden Valley? With weather like this, it was. Natural forces were pressing down with all their might, trying to squash a nest of ants. It would be a relief when it rained again. And rain it surely would, before long. An ocean of moisture was gathering overhead in that sagging grey blanket. It couldn’t hold much longer.

Lights had come on in the shops along Clappergate. Cars drove on sidelights as they crossed the junction. People were hurrying along the street, their heads down as if they needed to get home before a curfew. An air of tension was palpable. The whole world was waiting for the moment.

Suddenly the atmosphere changed. A moment of hesitation, a pregnant pause. People stopped and looked up, perhaps sensing the first, solitary plop of rain on the back of a neck, then responded to the warning, quickening their pace in the vain hope of reaching shelter before the deluge. Most wouldn’t make it. In the next few seconds they vanished in sheets of water, vertical curtains of rain soaking them in an instant, plastering their hair to their skulls, penetrating their summer clothes, bouncing mud off the pavement on to their shoes.

As she ran for her car, Fry was deafened by the roar of the torrent. Cars swept by on the road, swishing through pools of water, hissing over wet tarmac, throwing up spray like a tidal wave. A Transit van went past and its nearside wheels hit the deepest part of the water, creating a tidal wave that surged across the pavement and swept over Fry’s shoes. The force of the water as it withdrew to the road almost pulled her off her feet.

There was still time for her to get to Prospectus Assurance before the end of the afternoon. As Fry arrived in Nathan Baird’s office she was conscious of a murmur of speculation from the bank of call handlers she passed. Word had gone round the company. Perhaps some of them were hoping that their manager would be arrested for crimes against humanity.

‘Yes, well, the incident itself was just a bit of fun,’ said Baird when she challenged him on Glen Turner’s paintballing injuries. ‘It’s part of what team building is all about, letting your hair down and having a laugh with your colleagues. People get to know each other better that way, in an informal setting.’

‘It seems Mr Turner didn’t think it was a bit of fun,’ said Fry. ‘He wasn’t laughing at the time.’

Baird waved his slender hand in a gesture that Fry remembered, as if an irritating fly had returned. ‘Oh, I know Glen took it a bit too seriously. But he got over it.’

‘He had photographs taken of his injuries, and he went to see a solicitor on Monday to discuss legal action. Possibly against you, Mr Baird.’

‘No, no, no. That was all a lot of nonsense. Glen was sulking for a while. He didn’t come in to work on the Monday, just to make a point. And when he appeared on Tuesday morning, he had this exaggerated limp, as if his leg had been shot off. I suppose he thought people would feel sorry for him. But it didn’t wash. We just got on with the job as usual. Water under the bridge and all that.’

‘Did you actually talk to Mr Turner about it?’

‘Yes, he came in here and we had a chat. As I said to you yesterday, my door is always open. Glen knew perfectly well he could talk to me about things. So that’s what we did. He never seriously considered suing me or any of his colleagues. It was just hot air, believe me. He got it all off his chest, we shook hands on it, and he went back to work. Job done.’

‘You did tell me yesterday that nothing unusual had happened on Tuesday, sir.’

‘Well, it wasn’t all that unusual. I’m team leader. Sorting out little issues like that — well, it’s all part of my job. Besides…’

‘What?’

‘Well, poor old Glen. It didn’t seem fair to spread the story far and wide. You don’t want to make your employees’ discomfiture public, do you? What happens at Prospectus stays at Prospectus. Do you know what I mean?’

Fry discovered that Ralph Edge wasn’t at work, so she phoned him at home. He laughed at her question.

‘Yes, poor old Glen,’ he said. ‘I told you he was sore afterwards, didn’t I? I mean, I was the one who told you about the paintballing excitement, Sergeant.’

‘You didn’t tell me you were one of the individuals responsible for it,’ said Fry. ‘You let me believe it was the opposing team from Sales.’

‘Well, is there actually any proof who did it?’ asked Edge in an innocent tone.

‘Mr Turner’s statement to his solicitor.’

‘Would that stand up in court?’ He laughed again. ‘No, it’s a fair cop. But it was all part of the office banter, you know. Someone gets paintballed every time. This time, it was Glen. It could just as easily have been me, or Nathan Baird. Nothing to get upset about. He didn’t report it to the police or anything, did he?’

‘No, he didn’t,’ admitted Fry.

‘There you are, then. He calmed down, saw the funny side eventually. He probably did something weird to make himself feel better, if I know Glen. Bought himself a little present, maybe. Oh, I’m sorry he’s dead and all that, but he was a bit of a funny bugger in some ways.’

‘Maybe so.’

‘Speaking of funny buggers,’ said Edge, as she was about to end the call. ‘You’ve got some among your people too, haven’t you? A right weirdo we had here this afternoon.’

When she got back into the office, soaking wet and uncomfortable, Fry found that Luke Irvine had been developing a theory. Suspicious, Fry glanced at Gavin Murfin, who smirked back at her round a cheese pasty. Had he been taking the mentoring role too seriously?

‘Go on then, Luke,’ she said. ‘Let’s hear it.’

‘Well, first of all, you have to realise there are a lot of angry people around at the moment. I mean home owners who’ve lost everything in the floods, and not for the first time either. This time round, some of them have been abandoned by the insurance companies.’

‘Yes, I’ve heard that. There was a failure to reach a deal that would let everyone get flood insurance, even if they’d made claims before.’

‘Exactly. So imagine how those people are feeling now. Betrayed and upset.’

‘What has this got to do with Glen Turner?’

‘It was his job,’ said Irvine. ‘Turning down legitimate claims.’

‘Wait a minute,’ said Fry. ‘Are you suggesting a posse of outraged citizens are roaming the country to hunt down insurance claims adjusters?’

‘No, but-’

‘What, then?’

‘Well, it would only take one or two, wouldn’t it? People who had personal dealings with Glen Turner, and were furious at what they saw as an injustice. Angry enough to want revenge. Some form of justice. It’s difficult to focus that sort of emotion on an anonymous institution or the people working for it. But if you’ve got an actual human target for your vengeance right in front of you, that’s a different thing.’

‘If home owners couldn’t get insurance against flooding any more, it surely wasn’t the fault of a claims adjuster like Turner,’ put in Hurst. ‘Isn’t it the job of underwriters to assess the risks?’

‘Probably. But if you’re angry enough, who’s going to be thinking logically or asking questions about the structure of the insurance industry? No, I don’t think so. A target is a target. It’s whatever comes within reach.’ Irvine looked pleased with himself now. ‘Revenge isn’t about a fair distribution of justice, but about making yourself feel better.’

‘So whoever carried this out, it might all have been about them, and not about Glen Turner at all?’

‘That’s it,’ said Irvine. ‘It’s a small flaw in the theory of victimology, I think.’

‘You’ll be lecturing to Senior Investigating Officers at Bramshill next.’

‘It’s true, though, isn’t it?’

Fry looked at him. It wasn’t very compelling as a theory, of course. It had too much of a revenge fantasy about it, and she’d never be able to justify putting resources into following it up. Not unless some concrete evidence presented itself, which seemed unlikely. But at least Irvine was thinking for himself a bit. That fresh view was what she needed. A challenging opinion, even if she didn’t agree with it. It was surprising how much that helped to focus her own mind.

‘Mr Turner bought his mother a new greenhouse recently,’ she said. ‘Expensive looking. He had a windfall from somewhere.’

‘There’s no record of any large amounts of money coming into his bank account,’ said Irvine. ‘And since he’s been paying all the household bills for the property on St John’s Street, he hasn’t been putting much aside in savings from his salary either.’

‘He must have received cash.’

‘A pay-off for something?’

‘Yes, but I don’t know what.’

Photographs of Glen Turner’s Renault Mégane were on her desk, including a shot of the fossil and its accompanying receipt from the National Stone Centre. Well, she’d said that she wanted everything.

Fry examined the fossil. It was just a dead sea creature that had been turned to stone over millions of years. She shared Mrs Turner’s view on these things. They were dead and gone, rock and dust. So what had interested Mr Turner so much about this object that he’d gone to the stone centre to buy it straight after his consultation with Mr Chadburn at Richmond Jones?

That evening at the Wheatsheaf, Luke Irvine was eager to be the first to buy Carol Villiers a drink when she described the time she’d spent with Ben Cooper earlier that day.

‘How did you do it?’ asked Irvine in admiration.

‘It was actually quite easy,’ said Villiers. ‘He’s still the same old Ben Cooper deep down, you know. Some things he can’t resist. An interesting case, for example.’

‘You’ve been giving him information about the murder inquiry?’

‘Yes, some.’

Irvine felt uneasy. ‘It’s up to you. But Diane Fry mustn’t find out.’

‘No, Diane mustn’t know.’

He looked at Murfin and Hurst, checking to see that they shared the need for conspiratorial silence. He could see from their faces that they did.

‘So do you think you’ve distracted him from his obsession, Carol?’ asked Irvine.

‘Sure.’ She hesitated only slightly. ‘Well, I think so.’

‘You can have my medal,’ said Murfin, raising his glass in a toast. ‘You deserve it more than me. It’s still in my drawer at the office.’

‘Your Diamond Jubilee medal? I thought it was your most treasured possession, Gavin. You couldn’t wait for it to arrive.’

‘I know,’ said Murfin. ‘It’s funny, though. Getting it was the really important thing. Just knowing they hadn’t forgotten me completely, the people up there. The thing itself, well … it’s just a bit of old metal, isn’t it?’

Irvine watched them in silence. He wasn’t convinced about Ben Cooper. But he didn’t feel able to say so. Both Carol Villiers and Gavin Murfin had known Cooper much longer. They ought to be right about these things.

Still, Irvine had an uneasy feeling — one of those feelings you were supposed to keep to yourself. So that was what he’d better do, he supposed.