Frozen Grave

Chapter 53

After they left Emily Porter, the three detectives walked back to their car in the visitors’ car park in Prince’s School.

‘Are we going to make it down to see Megan Penarth tonight, guv?’

‘How far is it now, Tucker?’

‘It’s at least three hours to Exeter and then half an hour on from there.’

‘Is there anywhere to stay there?’

‘Yes. There’s a really good pub that does rooms.’

‘Ring ahead and get us fixed up with some accommodation there and then we’ll visit Megan Penarth as well. We have to stay somewhere tonight, after all. If nothing else, we can find out a bit more about her from the locals.’

Tucker got the number and phoned through to the Boulder Inn.

‘All done. Three rooms, breakfast included. They have a restaurant there for dinner.’

‘Sounds great,’ said Willis.

Carter glanced across at her and grinned. ‘Must be getting hungry again by now.’

‘Starving.’

‘Yeah, and me,’ Tucker spoke up from the back seat.

‘Jesus…’ Carter started up the engine and put on the headlights. The place was suddenly swarming with noisy children, loading into home-time coaches in the car park.

‘Let’s get out of here – where we can hear ourselves think.’

They hit a heavy stream of traffic making its way towards the motorway. It was rush hour. They were stuck in a queue before they’d managed to get a mile.

‘We may as well get some work done… impressions of Emily Porter?’

‘Interesting to hear that she thought all the women were lying,’ said Willis.’ She was definitely having trouble sticking to the script – she’d expected us and rehearsed it. She has a lot she’s covering up.’

‘Covering up about what?’ Tucker asked. He’d found some chewing gum in his pocket. He passed the packet forward to the two in the front. Willis took it from him and unwrapped a piece of gum for Carter and handed it to him.

‘I tell you something that I know she’s lied about,’ Tucker added. ‘She sure as hell lied about her lack of expectations for the future for her and Ellerman. No one invests five years of their life and their savings with someone and says it’s still just a casual thing.’

‘She was straight out of a failed a marriage,’ said Willis. ‘If she met Ellerman on the rebound, does that make a difference to the way she sees him? Is he more of a friend that helped her through a bad time?’

‘No, I don’t think it does. She would have gone through a lot of emotions in those five years. Maybe her expectations would have changed from the start, when maybe she just saw it as flattering that he would come and see her once a week. After all, he comes across as a good catch. It would have helped to rebuild her bruised ego, but, by now? By now, she’s got to want something permanent. She may have known there were others but she’s got to have thought she’d come out the winner in the end.’

‘Maybe she still does,’ said Carter. ‘She didn’t want to tell us how much money she’s given him.’

‘I think it’s a case of think of a number and double it,’ said Tucker. ‘She’s not going to let Ellerman get into trouble if she can help it. It’s her and him and she doesn’t seem to see the others.’

‘You have to take your hat off to him, how he’s managed to inspire loyalty,’ Carter said. ‘I suppose we have to look at it from her point of view. She needed a friend, she needed to feel attractive, and he didn’t promise her that anything would happen fast; so, in her opinion, he hasn’t really lied – that much.’

‘Yeah – I’ve got a horrible feeling you’re right,’ said Tucker.

‘What did Megan Penarth seem like when you met her?’ Willis turned to ask.

‘She seemed very bright, very independent, confident, used to doing things her own way.’

‘Olivia was the same type – driven, confident; quite a loner at work. Gillian too. Lisa was a boss at a gym,’ said Carter. ‘Emily seems independent, quirky, strong.’

‘Megan Penarth organized the meeting between the women,’ said Tucker. ‘We need to know, did she contact others who were going to come and couldn’t make it or were these women the only ones interested?’ Carter turned.

‘These are his regulars,’ said Willis.

‘A fast-diminishing group,’ Tucker said.

‘Do you think Emily will see Ellerman again?’ asked Carter.

Willis replied: ‘Yes. Definitely.’

At just before eight they arrived at the Boulder Inn. They parked up, signed in and went straight to the bar and restaurant with their room keys in their pockets. They sat in the restaurant of the old mid-eighteenth-century coaching inn. Willis switched her phone on to vibrate only. She had texted Tina, to tell her that she wouldn’t be home tonight; having previously promised that, if she was back in time, they’d meet for a hot chocolate and a catch-up.

Carter ordered a pint of the local beer and Tucker had the local cider. Willis ordered a Coke. They sat in the restaurant and spent an hour making meaningless chitchat in a room without background noise and with too few people for them to talk privately without being overheard. At the end of the dinner they went back to the bar.

Tucker pulled out a brochure of Megan Penarth’s work from his briefcase.

He put it on show on the bar. ‘She definitely lives very near here,’ he said, within earshot of the landlady – Rachel Goody, a woman who had run a bar in Chelsea before buying the inn seven years ago. ‘I wonder how far it is to her studio?’

‘It’s not far.’ Rachel, glancing at the brochure, commented as she pulled a pint. ‘But you have to make an appointment – she doesn’t welcome people to her house. You could try and catch her tomorrow morning. She’s a bit odd like that – you’d think she would be grateful for the work and walk-in trade, but apparently not.’

‘Do you know her personally?’

‘Oh, yes. We all know her. She’s down here complaining about the noise or the light pollution. Her husband was a practising Wiccan.’

‘What’s that?’ Carter asked.

‘One of those “would-be” witches. But, he was a good bloke – he brought in a lot of custom here. He was all about the area – bringing tourism in and making sure he contributed to the area, but she doesn’t do any of that.’

‘She’s not well liked then?’

‘No, not just by me – I’m also a newcomer. But I don’t feel she makes any effort with the locals. She behaves oddly; we see light sometimes, coming from the old quarry. People say it’s her carrying on with her husband’s pagan ceremonies – but I don’t know – all a load of nonsense what people say when they get talking.’

They said goodnight and Willis was so excited to get inside her room, or rather to stand outside the door and put the key in the lock. She had never stayed in a hotel until she first went on holiday as an adult and that was with Tina. They’d gone to Ireland and stayed with Tina’s family but, besides that, they’d spent three nights in a hotel in Dublin and it had been the best fun Willis had ever had. Now she felt enormous excitement and pleasure at turning the key in the lock and pushing the heavy door open to her room. She almost laughed out loud as she walked into a beautiful beamed room with a large kingsize bed with scatter cushions. She walked around the room, looking at the place with delight. Her phone vibrated in her pocket.

‘Miss Willis?’

She answered: ‘Yes?’

‘This is Dr Lydia Reese. I’m afraid we’ve had some problems with your mother.’

Carter and Willis met up on the way down to breakfast.

‘They’ve had something serious happen with my mother.’

‘We’ll drop Tucker off on the way and then we’ll head back as soon as we’ve seen Megan Penarth, Eb.’

‘Please, guv, it’s okay. As far as I could tell there’s nothing I can do. They’re merely informing me that my mother has committed an act of violence against another inmate; they’ve given no further details. I am not rushing to her side. I wouldn’t be any help. We have work to do today and I don’t intend to dwell on my mother. Whatever her reasons, whatever the scheme behind them, I can’t keep trying to work it out.’

‘Okay. I respect that, Eb, but if you change your mind, or you hear something to the contrary, let me know and you can get a train back up or hire a car and go.’

They went into the breakfast room, which had been the restaurant the previous evening, and were shown to their table by the window. It was the first time they had seen it in the light and they looked out on clouds racing across the moors. Ponies were grazing in the hedge opposite their window. Tucker was last to appear. By the time he did, Carter had finished. Willis was on her second plate of English breakfast from the buffet.

‘What a place.’ Tucker joined them at the table. ‘I could live out here, no problem. Couldn’t you?’

‘No,’ Carter answered.

Carter looked at Willis and tried hard to suppress a smile.

After breakfast they walked down through the village and up the lane to Megan Penarth’s house. They knocked at the door but she was out. They walked back up to the pub. The landlady, Rachel, was clearing away breakfast.

‘We were hoping to catch Megan Penarth in but there’s no answer. There’s a car in the driveway. Do you know where she could be?’

‘She’s up at the quarry most days. If you’ve got walking boots, you just need to cross over at the top of this hill and you’ll be on the moors; you’ll see Haytor in front of you, right at the top. Instead of walking straight up towards it, take a detour right and you’ll see the quarry. The front entrance is there through a gate behind the granite pile.’

‘Thanks. Great help.’

‘Have we got wellingtons?’ asked Tucker. They looked at one another.

‘Straight answer – no,’ said Carter. ‘We’ll just have to prepare to get muddy.’

They set off up the hill and crossed the road. They kept to the tufts of grass between the bog areas frosted with ice as they walked up towards the Tor and then veered right. They found the entrance to the quarry and opened the gate. Saplings had rooted on the sides of the cliff face. Beyond them was a sheer drop.

‘Christ, that’s a long way down,’ said Carter as he stepped closer to the edge.

‘You’d think you wouldn’t be allowed to have something so dangerous without a railing in front of it,’ said Willis, recoiling from the edge.

‘Willis – you’re such a townie!’ Tucker laughed at her. ‘It’s not all about sanitizing. This isn’t Disneyworld.’

‘Point taken – but you’ve got to have deaths off here?’

‘Suicides, yes, tragically, and the odd dog falls off, or sheep.’

‘Clever sheep to open the gate,’ said Carter.

‘There’s another way to get in here from the back,’ said Tucker.

Willis looked down at the frozen water. ‘How deep is it?’

‘Fathomless.’ Tucker turned back and smiled at her. He was enjoying exposing the Londoners to a bit of ridicule. ‘Legend has it – it has no bottom to it and it calls for a new victim to be sacrificed to it every year.’

‘Cut the crap, Tucker.’ Carter stopped walking and listened – the icy wind had dropped as they descended into the quarry. There was an oppressive stillness. As they walked further down and wound their way around the outside of the first of the three lakes, they saw a figure standing at the far side, in a sharp cut-out in the granite rock. The figure turned and studied them.

Megan Penarth came down from her place and walked towards them. In her hand were bunches of bright yellow gorse; she was watching the three people but she kept her eyes mainly on Tucker. When she was within hearing distance, she said, ‘Strangers in the quarry – always a bad idea in civilian clothes.’ She smiled. ‘Detective Tucker, I presume?’

‘Morning, Megan. I’ve brought a couple of Londoners down to talk to you.’

‘Great – fresh meat.’ She came level with them and smiled at Carter. ‘Only joking.’ Her eyes were red-rimmed from the cold. Willis waited her turn. Megan glanced round to acknowledge her and there was a peculiar softness in her eyes. She reached out to touch Willis on the hand. ‘You’re freezing.’

Willis felt no warmth coming from Megan’s hand – it was a block of ice. Willis shivered.

‘This is an eerie place,’ Tucker said, looking about him.

‘Yes, the place of legends.’

Willis was distracted, looking at a bunch of roses drying on a rock. Her eyes went upwards to the top of the cliff directly above.

‘It’s a sad place sometimes, did you hear about the tragedy of the suicide a couple of months ago?’ asked Megan.

‘I saw it on the news. It was here?’

‘Yes.’

‘It would be awful to come here for that; such a lonely-feeling place,’ said Willis.

‘Ideal then.’ Megan smiled at her. ‘It’s not that lonely for me. I am surrounded by friends here.’

‘I was telling them about the legends here. The water claims another person each year,’ Tucker said.

‘You’re thinking of the legend about the River Dart crying when it wants to claim a new heart. They say it’s a meteorological fact that it makes the sound like crying when the weather is getting bad, gales are coming and the river is swelling. I suppose in the old days when people had to cross it, there were many lives lost. It must have seemed like a curse. But here in this quarry, the water doesn’t ever disappear. It’s very deep. Surprising it freezes as often as it does.’

‘You love it here?’ asked Willis, looking around at the granite rockface.

‘Yes, I do. My husband loved it here. He came here every day. He was a Wiccan. A Wiccan believes in the power of nature’s spirits.’

‘What about you?’ asked Carter.

‘Yes – I guess I believe in it too. I believe in two gods – the Moon Goddess and the Horned God.’ She smiled at the expression that was creeping across his face. ‘It’s just the male and female sides of the universe, equal and necessary to one another. Yin and yang.’

‘You’re a witch too?’ asked Carter.

‘Not really. I just believe in the power of certain things: moon, stars, earth, sun.’

Her dark eyes were watching him intently – they were bright in the gloom.

‘What is it about this quarry that makes it special to you?’ asked Carter. ‘The landlady at the pub says you come up here most days.’

She shook her head. ‘Just a world of its own in here. Its own climate; its own life. I feel connected here. It gives me inspiration for my work. There – I’ve made you think I’m a complete nutter. Do you want to follow me back to my coven for a witch’s brew, otherwise known as a coffee?’

‘Sounds perfect.’ Carter smiled.

‘Come with me.’

She led them back and up out of the quarry.

Halfway up, Willis stopped.

‘Megan, do you mind me asking? What happens to Wiccans when they die?’

Megan stopped and turned and smiled at Willis.

‘You feel their presence here, don’t you?’

‘Just curious.’

‘Decomposition should happen as fast as possible. No casket, just a cloth and then laid in the ground, or left in the air, placed in the water, so that you can nourish other life quickly.’

‘Are there places you can bury someone like that?’

‘Yes.’

She turned and led them away from the quarry.

‘Please come in, sit down. Make yourselves comfortable.’ They took their muddy shoes off at the door and stepped inside the warm kitchen as Megan stood on a stool and hung the gorse up to dry from the hooks above the dresser. She got down and slid the kettle across onto the top of the Aga.

‘What can I help you with? You have questions you’d like answers to?’

‘Since the last time I saw you, have you had any calls from the women on the list or contact with Ellerman?’ asked Tucker. ‘I understand you went to meet some of the other women.’

‘Yes… I did… last Wednesday. I went to Reading, to meet them in a coffee shop.’

‘Who did you meet exactly?’

‘I met Paula, Emily and Lisa. I can’t believe Lisa is dead.’

‘Who told you?’ asked Carter.

‘Paula – she was very upset – we all are.’

‘Do you and Paula talk often?’

She laughed. ‘We have a lot in common.’

‘How did the meeting go?’ asked Carter. Willis was already taping Megan Penarth’s voice but it hadn’t escaped her notice.

‘It went fine.’ She smiled curiously at Willis.

‘Who called the meeting?’

‘Me.’

‘Why? What reason did you have to do it?’

‘I called the meeting because I felt we all had a lot to discuss – after all, I was the newcomer in terms of knowing JJ but some of these women had known him for years. I felt they needed support. I mean, how difficult must it be to find out something like that?’

‘Something like what?’

‘Like the fact you’re part of a harem.’

‘How did you part that day?’

‘As friends, I hope.’

‘How did you leave it? Were there any decisions made about going forward?’

‘Going forward?’ Megan asked. Willis wrote in her notebook: She repeats question – giving her time to think of an answer.

‘We left it in the air – we decided to support one another as best we could.’

‘Did you stay in London that evening?’

‘Yes. I had things to do.’

‘Busy time?’

‘I spent the evening with my agent.’

‘From what time was that?’

‘From seven. I left the other women and I walked to the station with Lisa. Emily was going the other way, Paula was just next door, working. I left Lisa at the station and then went to do some shopping and met up with my agent at about nine.’

‘That’s quite a long time to go shopping.’

‘Of course it isn’t.’

‘But the shops close normal time now – that’s half five.’

‘Okay, so you’re right – I spent my time drinking in various bars, until I met my agent. I don’t get into town much so I like to enjoy myself. I was staying the night at my agent’s, so I could afford to let my hair down.’

‘Did you drive up to town?’

‘Yes. It’s just too much of a nuisance sometimes to leave the car at Plymouth Airport or at Exeter St David’s to catch the train. By the time I do that I could be halfway there. Then there’s all the disruption to the track because of the storms. Look – I’m sorry but I don’t get your line of questioning. Have I done something wrong?’

‘We would urge that you don’t entertain the idea of having JJ Ellerman to stay here until we solve these deaths.’

‘I can’t believe he is capable of anything like that.’

‘You never saw any flares in his temper, or any behaviour that worried you?’

‘I’ve seen the normal stuff associated with a man who is used to being Mr Big. He loves the sound of his own voice. He is short-tempered, but I wouldn’t say his temper is a major problem.’

‘When we went into Lisa’s house, we found something that we think belongs to you.’ Tucker took out his phone and showed Megan a photo of her painting. ‘We found this on Lisa’s lounge wall.’

Megan shook her head. ‘Figures. JJ often came down with random gifts. I expect we’ve all got things that belong to others. It sums him up, doesn’t it? We’re all part of a chain, aren’t we? Interlinked.’

‘Can I ask you again what you and the other women decided to do about your “interlinked” relationships and financial dealings with JJ Ellerman? I am trying to persuade the women who have invested in his so-called business ventures to consider pressing charges. It will give us the ability to thoroughly investigate him.’

‘Personally? I didn’t invest money and I will chalk it all up to experience. I can’t speak for the other women. I intend to have my say with JJ Ellerman, then walk away for ever.’

After the detectives had left, Megan phoned Emily and left a message for her to return her call ASAP.

Twenty minutes later she got a call.

‘I’ve had the police here too,’ Megan told her. ‘They’ve just left. Remember – they can’t start investigating the fraud case unless one of us makes a complaint. As long as no one does that then there’s a chance to get the money back straight from Ellerman. How are you getting on with drafting a statement for him to sign?’

‘I think I’ve taken everyone’s case into consideration. I have stipulated that we all become equal partners and decision-makers in his Spanish business. Everything he does is run through us first and we get total control of his funds for the business.’

‘When will it be ready and when can you come down?’

‘I can come tomorrow.’

‘They told me about poor Lisa.’

‘Yes. It was a shock.’

‘Are we suspects?’ asked Emily.

‘I think they’re just trying to tie it all up in a time-frame. If anyone’s a suspect – it’s JJ.’