Love You Dead

79 Wednesday 11 March

Roy Grace was not sleeping properly. His mind was still working overtime and, in addition, Noah was teething and cried almost continuously, despite his and Cleo’s efforts to soothe him.

Each time Noah was quiet and asleep again, Grace had gone back to bed and closed his eyes, listening to the sounds of his son’s breathing. Terrible memories of several cot deaths which he had attended when he’d been a uniformed officer still haunted him. He knew that now Noah could turn himself over in bed, there was less danger of him overheating. But there was still a risk, nonetheless.

As he lay awake, an endless succession of names presented themselves to him in sequence, like newsflash footage. Jodie Danforth; Jodie Bentley; Jodie Carmichael; Jemma Smith; Judith Forshaw. And now from his late phone call with Kelly Nicholls he had added another name, Cassie Danforth. Jodie’s sister who had died in a cliff fall when Jodie had been out for a walk with her on a family holiday.

Her sister dead in a cliff fall. Her fiancé dead in a fall from a precipice. Her first husband dead from a snake bite. Her second husband dead from a snake bite. A string of names, some real, some fake.

He’d googled Christopher Bentley and learned he was an eminent herpetologist, and the author of books on venomous and poisonous creatures. His wife, Jodie, was mentioned but there was no photograph. Bentley also had an elaborate website, but it was basically an information-sharing forum for other herpetologists, and there had been no posts on it, other than a few condolence messages, for several years.

His search also revealed a wide range of obituaries, including The Times, Telegraph, Guardian and Independent, as well as a humorous and slightly cynical article in the Spectator, talking about the irony of a man who had met many of the world’s most dangerous snakes, scorpions and spiders in their natural habitat, yet had died from a bite at his own home. The article went on to warn people of the danger of experts. It quoted the late Peter Ustinov as saying that if the world was to explode, the last words anyone would hear would be an expert explaining why it couldn’t happen.

Despite all the coverage on her first husband, Grace could find nothing at all, other than a few brief mentions, about the earlier life of Jodie Bentley. But in the past few weeks there was plenty on her in relation to the tragic death of Walt Klein and the financial shenanigans surrounding him.

Through the night that was both long and far too short at the same time, a course of action steadily began to take shape in his mind.

Finally, he’d lapsed into deep sleep. It seemed almost moments later that his alarm was buzzing beside his face. It was 5.00 a.m. He tapped the off button, instantly awake. Had to be awake. Snoozing wasn’t an option. And he was feeling strangely energized.

He rolled over in the darkness and kissed Cleo’s cheek. She did not stir. Then, very gently and slowly, trying not to wake her, he slid out of bed into the chilly air. He gulped down the glass of water on the table beside him, then went through into the bathroom, closed the door behind him, switched on the light and peered blearily into the mirror. He looked ragged, he thought. He looked like shit. Yet he felt positive.

His master plan was a gamble; Cassian Pewe might reject it out of hand. But he was fired with excitement. He squeezed toothpaste onto his electric toothbrush and worked around his mouth for the next two minutes, feeling even more sure of what he needed to do.

He went through to Noah’s room in his dressing gown and slippers and gently placed his hand on his son’s back, checking that his breathing felt fine; then, careful not to wake him, went downstairs. Humphrey came bounding up to him.

Grace knelt and stroked him. ‘I’ll take you out, Humph, but I’m afraid no run today. Make it up to you tomorrow, OK?’

He opened the back door and walked out into the streaky dawn light with a torch. The smell of wet grass and the silence of the countryside gave him an intense feeling of calm. He loved it here. This little piece of paradise. The moon was low in the sky. He felt just how insignificant he was in the universe. A tiny speck. Here for a fleeting moment in time.

Humphrey squatted and did a dump, then ran towards him, looking pleased as punch.

‘Good boy!’ He knelt and patted him. He walked over to the hen coop and, in the beam of his torch, saw all five sitting on the roof, not yet ready to start their day.

‘Hi, girls! What are your plans today? Maybe lay a few eggs? Rob a bank? Get up to some internet fraud? Help me lock up some villains?’

He went back inside and microwaved a bowl of porridge. While the machine was whirring he took six red grapes from the fridge. Cleo had read somewhere that six red grapes a day warded off ageing and all kinds of disease. He loved how she took such a keen interest in health matters.

Then he made the first of several phone calls, apologizing for the early hour, brimming inside with excitement. It was a gamble. A massive gamble. But he was convinced it was the right thing to try.

When he had finished, he ate his porridge, which was now tepid, but in his eagerness to get to the office, he barely noticed. He hurried upstairs. Cleo was sitting up in bed, checking messages on her iPhone.

‘Lots on at work today?’ he asked.

‘Five post-mortems,’ she said. ‘You?’

He told her quickly about his plan.

‘I like it!’ she replied. ‘But could you really do that?’

He shrugged. ‘I’m going to give it a go!’

He showered and shaved, and dressed quickly, then & left & the house shortly after 6 a.m. As he pulled into his parking slot outside Sussex House at 6.20 a.m., his phone rang.

It was Glenn Branson. Grace did a quick calculation — he would be an hour ahead of UK time in France.

‘Bonjour!’ he said. ‘Ça va?’

‘Merde!’ Branson replied, grimly. ‘I think that’s the right word for it.’

‘Tell me.’

Grace listened for some moments in almost stunned silence. ‘Disappeared? Escaped?’

‘Looks like he used that old Ted Bundy trick of faking a broken arm. Lured a prison officer into his cell in the hospital wing to help him remove his T-shirt for bed, overpowered him, whacked him unconscious, tied and gagged him and put him on his bunk, facing the wall, with a blanket over his head. Left the two halves of the plaster cast in the bed with him.’

‘Didn’t anyone check his bloody arm when he was booked into custody?’

‘Clearly not. He was taken straight to the prison hospital.’

‘Even so, how did he get out of there — surely it was secure?’

‘Nobody knows at this stage. Perhaps through the sewers or drains.’

‘Shit!’ Grace responded when he had finished. ‘Shit!’ he repeated. ‘That seems to be his MO. He’s a cunning bastard — I’ve heard of wanted people using a prop to steer attention away from their faces when they travel through airports. That’s what he must have done. But how the hell did the French authorities let this happen? He’s got away twice, he must be having a right bloody laugh on us.’ God, even though it wasn’t his fault, how on earth was he going to explain this to Pewe? he wondered.

‘Let’s hope he had to wade through plenty of merde,’ Branson replied.

‘Yeah. So what’s the French for the stuff we’re in now — deep doo-doo?’