Dead of Winter

Chapter 52

Ebony was still chewing things over — she had a sinking feeling about the phone.

Carter looked across at her.

‘You can’t do anything about the phone now, Ebb. Robbo will tell us the damage when we get back. You forget about it now and concentrate on the job in hand. James Martingale.’

Carter parked a little way up the street and they walked back to a large detached house. It took a few minutes for Martingale to answer. A cat stopped to wind around Carter’s legs. Carter bent down to pet it.

‘Don’t touch her,’ Martingale said. ‘She pretends she likes you and she wants you to pet her, but if you do, she bites.’

Carter looked down at the cat, still meowing up at him and arching her back as she purred. ‘Story of my life. .’ He smiled at Martingale. ‘Would you mind if we talk to you for a few minutes? We tried the hospital but they said you didn’t work Mondays.’

‘Of course, come through, and do you mind if I carry on with what I was doing while we talk?’ Martingale held gardening gloves in his hand.

‘No. . of course not. . thought it was a bit cold for gardening?’

‘Not in my garden. Follow me.’

They walked through the kitchen at the back of the house then into a room floor-to-ceiling with orchids. The room was a blaze of tropical colour and heady scent.

‘Wow. .’ Carter said. He smelt the air and closed his eyes. The mist settled on his face. It reminded him of a holiday he’d had in Thailand. When they got off the plane he had felt that same humid air settle on his face. Funny. . he hadn’t thought about that holiday in a long time. It would be ages till they could go away again, especially with a baby. . maybe not. . maybe her mum could look after it. Or maybe Cabrina would never come back to him.

‘Thank you. I think of it as my piece of heaven.’

‘You’ve done well.’ Carter pointed to a wall full of framed certificates for first place in orchid shows around the world. ‘Fascinating. . I watch those programmes on the telly sometimes — about when to cut this back, dig up that. . don’t know why. . haven’t even got a window box. But this is sophisticated stuff. .’ He knelt down to have a look at the timers on the misting system.

‘Maybe you’ll get a garden one day. . then you’ll be ready.’ Martingale smiled and picked up his secateurs to start pruning.

‘Do you mind if I take a photo to show my mum?’ Carter got out his phone.

‘Please. . go ahead. I’m very proud of my orchids. I keep striving for perfection. They are wonderful survivors in nature. They don’t need soil. They can grow on moss, tree fungi or on the jungle floor.’

‘Are they like parasites?’ Carter started taking photos.

‘Not parasites. They are survivors. What is it you want to talk to me about?’

‘We didn’t get to chat much the other day. How is the kid, by the way? The one with the appendicitis?’

‘Doing well, thank you. How can I help?’

‘Can we just go through some of the events thirteen years ago? You weren’t in this country at the time?’

‘That’s right. I was working in Europe.’

‘Poland.’

‘Poland. . yes, in a hospital out there. I flew back as soon as it happened.’

‘Can I ask you something about Chrissie’s mother Maria?’

‘What do you want to know?’

‘It would be helpful to have an insight into her life. Start with how you met?’

Martingale gave a look of curious amusement.

‘I met Maria when she was travelling and came to South Africa. She was a friend of a friend. We met at a dinner party; she’d already been in Africa a few months. She was an artist. I invited her to stay at my family’s lodge near Kruger National Park and our romance began there.’

‘The marriage only lasted a short while, didn’t it?’ Ebony asked.

‘That’s right. She was pregnant when we married and we were divorced by the time the child was born. A whirlwind romance, you might say. .’ He smiled.

‘Chrissie was born in South Africa?’

‘Yes. . It was important to me to be there at the birth; to make sure everything went okay. It was just as well because the birth didn’t go as planned and Maria almost died. She was very poorly afterwards. She needed to stay in hospital and I took care of things. As soon as she and the baby were well enough she left me and sadly I did not see my daughter grow up. I visited her when I came over to work. I made sure she had the best of everything but I was denied a relationship with her.’

‘Seems strange that she didn’t want that relationship when she was older. She followed in your footsteps, after all.’

‘Yes. . in some ways. She was more of a general practitioner than a surgeon. She followed a different, no less worthy, but different path to me.’

‘And she didn’t decide to come out and stay with you in South Africa? Or maybe she could have joined the family business and been part of your hospital empire,’ said Carter.

Martingale smiled, flattered.

‘An empire is kind of you, but it’s still small in the world. I want nothing more than to do some good on this earth. I see so much suffering, especially in the poorer countries. You can’t just allow these killer diseases to remain unchecked. You can’t stop trying to wipe them out. I may not be any good at curing the common cold but I hope to be one step closer to curing cancer.’

‘You must have made many sacrifices in your life for the sake of your career in medical science?’

‘Yes, I suppose I have. I believe it is what I was meant to do. My massive regret is sacrificing my relationship with Chrissie. It was only after her death that I realized she had no one.’

‘What about her mother? Were Chrissie and her mother close?’ asked Ebony.

His eyes lingered on her.

‘No. Anything but.’ He half laughed. His teeth perfectly veneered.

‘Even though she had no other children? Maria didn’t marry again, did she?’

‘No she didn’t and yes. . even though she only had one child Maria was an unloving mother.’

‘I come from a massive family,’ Carter chipped in. ‘Always wanted to be an only child. . get some attention. . we had to fight for it. So many of us we were given numbers not names. . you know how it is?’

Martingale smiled. ‘As I told you last time. . I have many regrets. Chrissie went from boarding school to university. She was a scholarship kid, very bright, not brilliant, but I was immensely proud of her achievements.’

‘So what happened to her mother?’

‘She died in a fire. Very sad. Mental illness is a great shame. It’s a hard thing for any of us to understand. It’s an awful thing to be afflicted with it; it’s even worse to have to live with someone who has it.’ He held Ebony’s gaze. She looked away. ‘She was dead before Chrissie’s body was released. I had to bury them both. I always thought it could have been Maria who killed Chrissie. Maria got harder and harder to control and she turned psychotic.’

‘Yesterday we discovered another body buried in the garden of the property in Totteridge Village. It’s an eleven-year-old girl. Her name is Shannon Mannings. Does it mean anything to you?’

‘No, sorry.’

‘She was one of the children that the Chrissie Newton Foundation helps. She’s from the Lea Vale children’s home in mid-Wales.’

‘Sorry. Her name doesn’t mean anything to me. What a terrible shame. How did she die?’

‘We don’t know. Whoever did it tried to dispose of her body by burning it.’ Ebony watched Carter; he had lost interest in the flowers and now was much more intrigued by the complicated timing devices for climate control. ‘We identified her by the operation she’d had to put a pin in her broken arm. Don’t suppose you did that for her, did you?’ Carter turned back from examining the humidifying system.

Martingale shook his head again. ‘No.’ He turned reluctantly from Carter and smiled at Ebony.

‘Okay. . well. . worth asking.’ Carter stood up. He turned one of the pots around to get a better look and took a photo.

‘Please. .’ Martingale turned it back, a flash of anger flitting across his face. Carter smiled.

‘Beg your pardon.’ He put his phone away.

‘It’s just that I have them all perfectly placed for maximum growth and light, according to their type.’

‘Wow. . that’s what you call a perfectionist. Isn’t it, Ebb?’

She nodded.

‘I try.’

‘Do you have a garden in South Africa?’

‘I don’t tend to it. It’s more structural. It’s not ornamental.’

Martingale began walking them back towards the front of the house. He was getting bored by the conversation. He was getting irritable. At the front door Carter paused.

‘Sorry. . I forgot to ask. Can I have the number of your daughter, Nikki?’

‘Yes. Of course. . wait. . I’ll get it for you.’

Martingale came back with a number written on a piece of paper. ‘Can I ask you why you want it?

‘It’s just that she and her husband run the Chrissie Newton Foundation, don’t they? I wonder if they would know the name Shannon Mannings? Apparently they’ve accompanied the children, including Shannon Mannings, on trips from the home paid for, very generously, by the foundation.’

‘Yes, of course. . Nikki will be very sad and shocked by this news, I’m sure. She and Justin are very active in their role as directors of the charity.’

‘Well. . thanks for your time, Mr Martingale. Thanks for your understanding. Hopefully we won’t have to bother you many more times. Now I can picture you tending to your orchids. . so beautiful. Amazing.’

‘Thank you.’ Martingale opened the front door for them.

‘Sorry. . Can I just ask. . one more thing?’ Carter stopped in the doorway. ‘How do you manage the orchids when you go away?’

‘That’s what the expensive machinery’s for.’

‘You can check things remotely?’ Martingale nodded. ‘What, you just sit at your PC in Africa and check the humidity levels, set the timer, that kind of thing?’

‘Exactly. Plus orchids don’t flower in summer and I’m usually away then. I tend to come back in the winter. That’s when they come to life.’ He stepped back into the house.

‘I noticed that. . all the prizes you won in shows; they’re all in the springtime.’

‘Yes.’

Carter turned to wave at Martingale at the end of his garden.

‘Charming bloke.’ Carter winked at Ebony. ‘But remember, Ebb. . not parasites, survivors.’

‘He seemed to have a touch of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Sarge. He definitely didn’t like you messing with his plants.’

‘Think we saw a little flash of temper then, don’t you, Ebb? He’s not a man used to compromise. He doesn’t like being challenged.’

‘Control freak, Sarge.’

‘Yes. We know he lives in a bubble. His work and his flowers seem to be all that matters to him. Let’s keep pushing, Ebb. I want to know the real Martingale.’

Ebony wasn’t sure whether Carter was being mischievous or whether he was excited by the thought of peeling off Martingale’s armour.

Carter took out his phone and the piece of paper Martingale had given him and dialled the number for Nikki de Lange: ‘Straight to answerphone, Ebb. It’s either engaged or switched off. . what a surprise.’