One of Us Is Dead

55 Monday 10 October 2022

Roy Grace’s phone had rung again, moments after he’d ended the call, this time from Roads Policing Inspector James Biggs. And now a copy of the Argus lay on his desk, with a dramatic photograph of the rear half of a wrecked Ferrari taking up much of the front page. Inset below was a smaller picture, showing the front end of the car, clearly some distance away.

The headline: SUSSEX MILLIONAIRE AND GIRLFRIEND DEAD IN HIGH-SPEED SMASH.

He had already had the details from James Biggs. It appeared the driver, Dermot Bryson, a wealthy businessman, had lost control of the car on the approach to the entrance to his country home, a few miles away from the police HQ in Lewes. Grace had also been, unenthusiastically, privy to a number of photographs taken by the Forensic Collision Investigation Unit, which fortunately for the general public had not made the pages of the Argus, but through which he was now scrolling on his screen. They did not make pretty viewing — particularly the photographs of the two victims.

Ordinarily, as Head of Major Crime, he wasn’t concerned with fatal road traffic collisions, but both Biggs and he had a gut feeling there was more to this accident than was initially apparent. And, as he stared at the photograph of a lacerated, severed head lying in undergrowth — which very definitely was not going to be appearing in any newspaper — he was thinking hard.

In his long years as a homicide detective, he had learned never to take anything at face value. Dermot Bryson was an extremely rich man. Grace had googled him and discovered that he had a passion for fast cars, and held a motor racing licence. Bryson regularly raced a number of exotic classic cars he owned in fixtures around Europe. Earlier this year he had raced a Lola at the Goodwood Members’ Meeting. And only two weeks earlier he had raced a short-wheelbase Ferrari at the Goodwood Revival, narrowly missing a podium place.

He clearly knew how to handle a potent car.

So what had gone wrong here?

Three questions went around in his head. He couldn’t help it. Twenty years of being a detective, of being endlessly lied to by suspects, of looking at things that all too often were not as they seemed, had made him suspicious of just about everything. The same three questions he always posed:

Why him/her?

Why here?

Why now?

James Biggs said that data the FCIU had obtained from interrogating the Ferrari’s onboard computers indicated the car had been travelling at excessive speed at the time it left the road.

Showing off to his girlfriend? But this was a man who knew how to drive fast cars fast. He was unlikely to have been drunk as apparently he was not a big drinker any more, according to his social footprint.

And, Biggs informed him, there were other things that had made the first attending Forensic Collision Investigator, DC Rideout, who was nobody’s fool, think this wasn’t a straightforward accident. He was concerned the pattern of tyre marks on the road were indicative of someone taking evasive action rather than losing control from going too fast. Swerving to avoid a deer had been one possibility considered at first.

The post-mortems of both Dermot Bryson and his girlfriend, Tracey Dawson, would show whether alcohol or drugs had played any part in this crash. But at this moment, Grace was staring intently at the photograph James Biggs had just sent through, of an item that had been found in the glove box of the wrecked Ferrari.

Not something that would have come as an optional extra in any motor car, however exotic, in most countries of the world.

It looked like a heavy-duty Glock .44mm handgun. It fired the kind of rounds that wouldn’t just stop someone in their tracks: depending on where it was aimed, it would either blow a football-size hole through the target’s midriff, or take most of their head off.

It was a weapon of choice for a killer. But most concerning of all to Roy Grace was that, according to the Sussex Police firearms expert to whom Biggs had given the weapon for examination, and to make it safe, it wasn’t an original Glock weapon, but an illegally manufactured version made using 3D printed components. Equally deadly and a lot harder to trace, because there would be no serial number and no record of it ever having been made.

A ghost gun.

So just what nefarious business had Dermot Bryson been involved in that required him to carry a handgun in the glove box of his car? And did it have any bearing on the accident that killed him? Ordinarily, people did not carry firearms in their cars, unless they were either crackpot sociopaths or paranoid about their security.

He googled the man’s name, and after going through several Dermot Brysons, found the Wikipedia page, with the photograph that corresponded to the one James Biggs had sent on Bryson’s driving licence and the rather more distorted face on the FCIU photograph of Bryson’s severed head.

Just as he began to read about Bryson’s business activities, which ranged from construction, engineering and venture capital to a global container business with offices in several countries including China — all seemingly legit — he was interrupted by the sound of the door opening, and Glenn Branson’s voice.

‘You’re looking pale, Roy, you need a few days in the sun — you should try the Caribbean!’

Grace gave him a sideways look. ‘I’ve actually been working while you’ve been sunning your tum.’

‘I wish.’

‘So it rained — the whole time?’

Branson shrugged and, as he regularly did, turned one of the chairs facing Grace’s desk around the wrong way and straddled it. ‘It rained. It rained for all two days I was there.’

Grace stared at him. ‘You want me to start crying?’

‘A bit of sympathy would be nice.’

‘You didn’t go there to sodding sunbathe!’

‘Yeah, well, I thought I might at least get a few hours on the beach. At least it was warm rain.’

‘I’m sorry to bring up the name John Baker — I hope he didn’t interrupt your holiday too much?’

Ignoring Grace’s sarcasm, Branson said, ‘Found him — got lucky, he was just back from a three-week fishing trip. But, as I said on the phone, I didn’t really get anything extra of value from him. He told me he’d already said everything he had to say in the statement he gave Barbados Police two years ago. I emailed that to you.’

Grace nodded. ‘I read it.’

‘I asked him how he even connected the remains of the jacket he’d fished up — wrapped around one of his net ropes — with Rufus Rorke. He said he saw a photograph of Rorke in the newspaper; he was at a restaurant called the Cliff with his wife, and was wearing a distinctive white jacket, and Baker put two and two together.’

‘Did you get anything that wasn’t already in his statement?’ Grace was thinking about what he was going to say to ACC Downing when he asked him about Glenn’s trip.

Branson grinned and wiggled his fingers in the air. ‘You need to cover your butt, right?’

‘I need to solve this case.’

‘Well, the one thing I got was that John Baker was lying.’

‘You did?’

Branson smiled, looking very pleased with himself. ‘He was very definitely lying.’

‘What was he lying about?’

‘How he found the jacket. And why he contacted the police.’

‘You’re certain?’

‘Everything about his demeanour tells me I’m certain. He’s not exactly a man of many words. I think what he said was well rehearsed. But he couldn’t remember the precise details of what he’d already told the police and there were several contradictions. He was no doubt comfortable with the local police, but as I questioned him he became uncertain, clearly agitated, and was definitely hiding something. My contacts in Barbados are continuing their interest in Baker and will come back to me if they find anything new.’

‘Great. So anything else that you found out while you were on the island?’

‘I spoke to a number of Baker’s associates and the impression they had was that his story was all very convenient and they were not sure if they believed him. Two of them told me they were convinced he was lying.’

‘OK, well done. So it seems less and less likely that Rufus Rorke did go overboard and get eaten by a shark and more and more likely he is still with us.’

‘AKA the Phantom Mushroom Switcher?’

‘Indeed. There’s another thing that’s been bothering me about this jacket — remains of — which is why?’

‘Why the jacket?’

‘We have an eyewitness — a member of the yacht crew, who says he saw him go overboard. Wouldn’t that be enough to satisfy people that you had died — to go overboard off a boat several miles off the coast, at night, in a rough, and shark-infested, sea? It almost feels that the addition of the fisherman finding the jacket remains is gilding the lily a bit too much.’

Branson nodded. ‘Maybe it was done for extra precaution?’

‘Maybe. OK, so meanwhile we’ve got something else come in.’ Grace nodded at the paper.

Branson, scanning the front page of the Argus upside down, said, ‘Shite, that’s no way to treat a Ferrari! Or does it come in kit form like that, with instructions and you have to assemble it?’

Grace smiled wryly.

‘Guess if I was going to snuff it in a crash, doing it in a Ferrari would be a lot classier than in my clapped-out car,’ Branson said.

Grace grimaced, well aware just how reckless Branson’s driving was. ‘Do me a big favour, mate?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Just don’t snuff it in a crash.’

Branson stared at him, wide-eyed. ‘Hey, I’m qualified — I’ve got my advanced permit and my pursuit TPAC ticket!’

Just as he was about to reply, Grace’s phone rang. It was Inspector Biggs, and instantly he had Grace’s full focus.

‘Guv,’ he said. ‘My team at the scene have recovered a dashcam from the wrecked Ferrari. It was buried deep in a hedge some distance from the main crash site itself, and appears to have sheared off in the impact. The broken stem is an exact match with the base still attached to the top of the dashboard in the Ferrari’s cockpit.’

‘Have you recovered any footage from it, Biggsy?’ Grace asked.

‘We have, boss. I think you need to take a look at it. Something’s seriously not right here, and that’s confirmed by what’s been found at the scene.’

‘Which is?’

‘Take a look at the footage first, guv. Start at twenty-two minutes in. Then bell me.’

Intrigued, Grace said, ‘Ping it over.’

‘On its way.’

Sixty seconds later, the file began to download on Grace’s screen.