Where Death Delights

SIXTEEN

Those Swansea bobbies had plenty of other work to occupy them for the next few days, while they waited for a response from the Forensic Laboratory. They decided to hang fire on most aspects of the case, though Lewis Lewis did go across to Porthcawl and interview Daphne Squires, whose address he had obtained from Trevor Mitchell.

It was a fruitless exercise, as the blonde hotly denied any knowledge of anything, apart from being a ‘friend’ of Michael Prentice, which she stridently proclaimed as being the right of any British citizen. No, she had never met or even seen Michael’s wife, as she had never been to the house until after her death. No, she knew nothing of any strife between them, though she did admit to knowing that he was seeking a divorce.

She certainly knew nothing about any physical violence taking place and she managed to distance herself so well from the man that it sounded as if she hardly knew him.

Lewis gave up the struggle before long and drove home in disgust at a wasted journey. Ben Evans had considered sending Lewis on up to Reading to interview Marjorie Elphington, the friend to whom the dead woman had written the letter that had started all this – but he decided that unless and until the case was a ‘runner’, it would be a waste of the inspector’s time.

The ball was now in the court of Dr Archer, the chemist, and knowing of the case overload from which all the forensic laboratories suffered, Ben Evans and Lewis Lewis settled down for a long wait, as many police requests took weeks to come back.

However, the unusual nature of their problem played in their favour, as Archer was intrigued by an analysis that he was certain none of his colleagues in the other six Home Office labs had ever come across. The scientist even thought he might give a talk about it sometime at one of their regular scientific meetings. He read up more about molybdenum and decided that a ‘spot test’ was a fairly straightforward procedure, just to determine if any of the substance was present.

Archer even gave up his Saturday morning to come in and start playing about with the methods described in the manuals and on Monday, he finished off the analysis.

By the afternoon, he was able to ask the liaison officer to phone Gowerton with the result. Lewis took the call and moments later, came into Ben Evans’s cramped office next to the CID room.

‘Here’s what you want, boss! The lab have broken all records this time.’

He put a page from a message pad in front of the superintendent. Evans picked it up and read Lewis’s neat handwriting aloud.

‘All three samples contain molybdenum sulphide. Two control samples of similar commercial motor oil are free from that substance. Written confirmation to follow.’

Ben laid the note back on the table and looked up at his inspector. ‘The bastard! Let’s see how he explains this one away!’

Lewis Lewis was not so enthusiastic about the significance of the discovery.

‘So now we know his Jaguar was parked on the cliff above where his wife’s body was found. But he can wriggle out of that, surely?’

Evans hoisted himself out of his chair and reached for his hat on top of a filing cabinet.

‘Well, let’s go and see what fairy tales he’ll spin us this time.’

As it was still too early to expect Michael Prentice to have returned from his office, the two detectives drove past his house in Pennard and carried on until they reached the spot where the oil leak had been found.

Lewis parked the Vauxhall a little further on and they walked back, the long slope running way down to the rocks on their left. The sky had scudding clouds and there was a stiff breeze, but it was still a pleasant day to be by the sea. Ben Evans scanned the ground at the edge of the stony track and his broad brow furrowed as he failed to find the black smudge which had been sampled the previous week.

‘Where the hell’s it gone?’ he muttered to himself. Realizing that he had overshot the spot, he turned around and bent almost double, retraced his steps.

Suddenly he stopped and beckoned to Lewis, who was watching his boss imitating a bloodhound.

‘Come and look at this! The silly fool, hasn’t he learned that when you’re in a hole, you stop digging!’

The inspector came across and stooped to see what the senior officer was pointing at.

‘That was the rock, you can see that rubbed-off white tip where the sump dragged across it. But most of the black stuff has gone!’

Lewis saw that a six-inch strip of limestone looked cleaner than the surrounding rock, but there were still hair-like streaks of black visible.

Ben Evans straightened up, his hands on his hips.

‘He’s used a wire brush on it, the idiot! If he’d left it alone, he might have got away with some excuse.’

‘We’ll have to get this photographed again,’ said the inspector. ‘Then the “before and after” difference can be proved.’

They walked back to their car and drove back to Southgate village. As the car they had taken from the transport pool had no radio, Lewis telephoned Divisional Headquarters and arranged for a scene photographer to come out, for they did not want someone to drive over the rock and obliterate the evidence. As he came out of the phone box, he saw a black Mk IV Jaguar drive past and in a leisurely fashion, they followed it back to Bella Capri.

Prentice was just closing the garage when they arrived, after having put the car inside. As Evans walked up towards him, he noticed that the hardstanding outside the garage also appeared to have been cleaned, though a faint discoloration from dropped oil was still visible.

‘My God, you lot again!’ snarled Michael. ‘What d’you want this time?’

The superintendent jabbed a finger towards the concrete.

‘Your car leaks oil, by the looks of it.’

Prentice scowled. ‘Yes, it did, a little. I had my fitters tighten the sump bolts today, as it happens.’

‘A bit too late, I’m afraid, sir,’ said Evans easily.

‘What do you mean by that?’ demanded the other man, though he had a dreadful feeling that he knew where this was leading.

‘When we questioned you the other day, you said you walked almost to Pwlldu, when you were looking for your wife on the evening she disappeared.’

‘What about it?’

‘You said walked, not drove.’

‘Did I? I don’t really remember which it was. I was worried and confused,’ said Prentice, desperately trying to fudge the issue.

Ben Evans waited a moment before delivering his knockout blow.

‘If you don’t remember, why have you been down there since and used a wire brush to try to remove the oil stain you left?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ blustered Michael. ‘Scores of cars use this track, there are oil drips everywhere.’

‘Not ones with molybdenum sulphide in them, sir.’

Prentice looked like a stag at bay, but he made one final attempt. ‘That van that was stolen – it could have been that.’

‘You mean the thief was trying to return it to you at your home?’ suggested Lewis, sarcastically.

Prentice stared at him desperately. ‘It could have been one of my staff, they all have to test the stuff. Yes, that’ll be it, one of my engineers came out to see me not long ago, it must have been him.’

‘In that case, we’ll interview them all, and see if any went and parked half a mile away,’ replied Lewis remorselessly.

‘If it was your engineer, why do you think he came all the way back here with a wire brush to clean up the drip?’ asked Ben Evans. ‘Come on, sir, don’t play silly buggers with us, we all know you drove over to that cove where your wife’s body was found. What were you doing there?’

Ben had bet his inspector a packet of Gold Flake that Prentice would yell for his solicitor at this point, but he lost the wager. The new widower’s face became ashen and he seemed to crumple. A tall man, he suddenly became bowed, as he buried his face in his hands.

Then he recovered and groped in his pocket for his keys.

‘You’d better come inside, there’s something I must show you.’

Mystified by the turn of events, but still suspicious of the man, Ben Evans and his assistant followed him into the room on the left of the hallway. No one sat down and they watched him carefully as he went to a small table and pulled open a drawer.

‘You’d better read this,’ he said dully, handing the superintendent a folded sheet of paper. Lewis moved closer so that he could also see it. It was typed and quite short.

Michael, I cannot go on like this. You have betrayed me with that woman, as you have done so often before. You have been cruel and violent and now I know you have never loved me. Life is no longer worth living, so I shall end it in the place I have found so much pleasure.

Linda

Evans placed the letter on the table, carefully avoiding touching it other than by the edge he had been gripping. If he had known what it was, he would not have handled it, to avoid adding to any more fingerprints.

‘Are you now trying to tell us that your wife committed suicide?’ he demanded, with incredulity in his voice.

Prentice nodded, standing head bowed and with his hands behind his back, like an errant schoolboy before the headmaster.

‘I found that in the typewriter when I came home that evening,’ he said in a low voice.

‘It’s all typed, there’s no signature!’ rasped Lewis. ‘You could easily have written it yourself.’

Michael looked up, then slowly shook his head.

‘But I didn’t, believe me. It was waiting for me when I came home.’

Lewis hauled out a notebook and a pen, as the senior officer began his questioning.

‘Start at the beginning, please. Tell us exactly what happened. You’ll have to make a full statement later, but that will be at the police station.’

Prentice gave a great sigh and rubbed his eyes with a handkerchief before answering.

‘I came home late, about ten o’clock and called out as usual, but had no reply. I looked in here and in the kitchen and called up the stairs without any response. Then I walked into the other room across the hall and saw that the cover was off the typewriter. This sheet of paper was still wound on to the roller.’

He spoke in a dull monotone, unlike his usual confident and often hectoring style.

‘Then what?’ prompted the senior officer.

‘I couldn’t take it in at first. I poured myself a drink and sat down in a daze. Then I thought it was some cruel hoax she was playing on me, to get even.’

‘Get even for what? The note says you physically abused her, which is confirmed by the pathologist.’

Prentice rubbed a hand fiercely across his mouth.

‘That was no big deal! I admit I grabbed her once and shook her, when she was ranting on to me about Daphne. She repeatedly refused to even consider a divorce and I lost my rag a bit, but I wasn’t beating her up, for God’s sake! It was just temper.’

Evans had his own ideas about that, but he carried on with his questions. ‘What did you do then?’

Michael sank down onto the nearest chair and sat on the very edge.

‘She said “the place that’s given me most pleasure” so I knew she meant the little beach below the house. I rushed out and though it was starting to get dusk by then, I went down the path opposite, to the edge of the sea. The tide was out and that little bit of sand was showing in the gully.’

He stopped and dropped his face back into his hands.

‘So what did you find?’ persisted Evans, whose heart was not softened by the man’s apparent distress.

‘She was lying there, rolling in the surf just at the water’s edge.’

‘Dressed in her bathing costume, was she?’ interposed Lewis.

Prentice nodded. ‘The blue one, she had several. Her hair was streaming back and forth, as the small waves pushed at her. I knew she was dead.’

‘So did you try to revive her?’ grated Ben Evans.

The widower lifted his head. ‘Of course I did!’ he said hoarsely, with a hint of anger in his voice. ‘I waded in and picked her up, but I could tell she was gone, as she was so limp. I carried her out and put her face down on the beach and started squeezing her back, though I knew it was pointless.’

‘Did you know how to give artificial respiration?’ asked Lewis. Prentice shook his head. ‘Not really, I’ve never been taught. But it was just a gesture anyway, she was long dead.’

‘Then what happened?’ demanded Evans, in a tone that suggested that he didn’t believe a word of it.

‘I gave up pumping her back, all I was doing was forcing up froth from her mouth and nose. I decided to carry her back up here to the house.’

‘Didn’t you think it better to run for help – send for an ambulance or a doctor?’ snapped Lewis.

Prentice raised his face to look up at the detective inspector. ‘What would be the point? I knew she was dead. I just wanted to get her home.’

‘Was there anyone about who could have seen you?’ asked Evans.

‘No, it was getting late and almost dark. I had a job stumbling back up the path, especially carrying her in my arms.’

‘It takes a big stretch of the imagination to accept that you could get back up that rough slope lugging your wife’s body,’ grunted Lewis.

‘I’m a big chap, officer – and Linda was very short and slim… and desperation lends strength.’

‘Yes, I’m sure you were desperate enough,’ said Ben Evans, cynically. ‘So tell us the next part of this unlikely story.’

‘It’s not unlikely at all!’ cried Michael, with another flash of anger. ‘I brought her into the house and laid her on that settee.’ He pointed dramatically at a velvet-covered sofa against the opposite wall. ‘I fact, you can still see the dried stain where she leaked sea water from her mouth over the cushion.’

Neither officer took him up on his invitation to examine it, though Lewis made a note in his book.

‘I sat shivering and confused, then had a stiff drink and thought about what I should do.’

‘What you should have done was to run to the phone and call a doctor, ambulance and the police,’ said Evans, sardonically.

‘So how did the poor woman get back into the sea?’ added Lewis Lewis.

Prentice took a deep breath and then sighed. ‘I took her there in the car, of course. I must have sat thinking for a couple of hours, too afraid to call anyone.’

‘And why was that?’ demanded the superintendent.

‘She had left a note saying it was all my fault and then gone and killed herself. How would I look when all that came out? She would be just as dead if it was thought to be an accident.’

‘So it was your callous need to protect your good name?’ snapped Evans.

‘And her reputation and the feelings of her family. It avoided the stigma of suicide, and having that note read out at an inquest. It might just as well be called an accident, a swim which went tragically wrong.’

‘From what I’ve heard, the feelings of her family, especially her father, weren’t very high in your list of priorities!’ retorted the detective.

‘It seemed the best solution at the time,’ muttered Prentice, sullenly.

‘So what was the next act in this remarkable drama?’ demanded Ben Evans.

‘It must have been gone midnight before I made up my mind what to do,’ muttered Prentice. ‘I wrapped her in a blanket and put her in the boot of the Jaguar. There was no one about, so I drove down towards Pwlldu and stopped where that bloody oil must have leaked out.’

‘Then you just carted your dead wife down the path and chucked her into the sea,’ said Evans harshly.

‘Why go to all that trouble?’ asked Lewis. ‘She was already in the water back nearer the house. One bit of sea is much the same as another, if you want to drown.’

Michael swung his head from side to side, as if he was a bull being baited by dogs.

‘I don’t know, I just don’t know!’ he groaned. ‘I had brought her up to the house on impulse, it seemed the right thing to bring her home, not leave her almost naked on that lonely beach. Then when I decided to put her back in the water, I thought that deeper water near the headland might take her out to sea.’

‘Oh, charming! You wanted to save yourself the cost of a funeral, did you?’ snapped the superintendent.

‘What difference would it make, if you were fabricating an accident?’ contributed Lewis.

Michael Prentice grabbed at his hair with both hands.

‘I don’t know, I tell you!’ he shouted. ‘I can hardly remember that awful night, I came back here and drank half a bottle of whisky!’

‘So what about your wife’s dressing gown – the one found under a bush?’ asked Evans, remorselessly.

‘I don’t even remember seeing it that evening,’ grated the husband. ‘It was found where it should have been, I suppose. I don’t know where she usually left it while she was in the water.’

Evans looked at his inspector, who closed his notebook.

Then he turned back to Michael, who was still sitting on the edge of the chair, staring at the carpet.

‘Mr Prentice, we’re going to take you back to the police station in Gowerton now, where for a start, you’ll be formally charged with obstructing Her Majesty’s coroner in the pursuance of his duties. Other charges may follow in due course.’

Michael Prentice rose slowly to his feet, his face drained of all colour. ‘I want to telephone my solicitor,’ he said dully.

‘You’d better do that from here, and ask him to arrange representation for you at Gowerton as soon as possible. You won’t be going home tonight, I can assure you, so you’d better collect a few things in a bag now.’

He nodded at Lewis to accompany the man to his bedroom, in case he either tried to make a run for it or even cut his wrists.

As the inspector passed his boss on the way out of the room, he murmured ‘You still owe me twenty Gold Flake.’