Wilt in Nowhere

Chapter 31

‘This blasted business is getting out of hand,’ the Chief Constable told the Superintendent at Oston. He’d driven over in his wife’s small car to convey this message unostentatiously. The disappearance of the Shadow Minister for Social Enhancement had aggravated an already difficult situation. The media had returned in force and were encamped outside Leyline Lodge in even larger numbers than before. ‘I’ve had the Home Secretary on the line asking where the precious Shadow Minister has got to and the Shadow Cabinet are practically hysterical at the adverse publicity they are getting. First Battleby and the arson and paedophile charges, then the ghastly woman with those damned bull terriers and now that idiot Rottecombe’s disappeared. They’re sending someone up from Scotland Yard or MI5. I have an idea there’s something else. Has to do with the Americans but hopefully it’s not our pigeon. Now then, I want those media blighters out of the way when you pick her up. But it’s got to be done tactfully. Any ideas?’

The Superintendent tried to think. ‘I suppose we could create some sort of diversion and get them away from the house for a time,’ he said finally. ‘It would have to be something pretty sensational. Ruth the Ruthless is the one they’re after. And I can’t say I blame them. She’ll make good headlines.’

They sat in silence for a few minutes, the Chief Constable considering the damage the wretched Shadow Minister for Social Enhancement and his sadistic wife had inflicted on the county.

The Superintendent was more preoccupied with his idea of a diversion. ‘If only some lunatics would let off a bomb. The Real IRA would be perfect. The media horde would be off like a shot…’

The Chief Constable shook his head. One gaggle of media hounds was bad enough, a second swarming over the place would only bring more awful publicity. ‘I can’t take responsibility for anything like that. Besides, where the hell could you get a bomb? You’ve got to come up with something less complicated.’

‘I suppose so. I’ll let you know,’ he told the Chief Constable who’d got up to go.

‘What we don’t want is anything that’s sensational. You understand that?’

The Superintendent said he did. He sat on in his office thinking dark thoughts and cursing the Rottecombes. An hour later a Woman Police Sergeant came in and asked if he’d like a cup of coffee. She was slim and fair-haired and had good legs. By the time she’d fetched the stuff they called coffee he’d made up his mind. He crossed the room and locked the door.

‘Take a seat, Helen,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a job for you. You don’t have to take it but…’

By the time he had finished the Sergeant had reluctantly agreed. ‘What about those two bull terriers? I mean, I don’t want to be torn to bits by them. What they did to those two reporters wasn’t funny.’

‘We’ll have taken care of them. Dropped some doped meat into the garden from a helicopter. They’ll be snoring their heads off in no time at all.’

‘I certainly hope so,’ said the Sergeant.

‘We’ll go in this evening when those fellows down by the gate are taking it in turns to go to the pub.’

Inside Leyline Lodge Ruth Rottecombe was expecting the raid. She’d been phoned a number of times by the police asking her to go to Oston to answer some more questions and had, after the first call, simply not bothered to answer the phone. She took only those she could identify on the LCD panel. She’d also been bothered by a great many calls from the Central Office demanding to know where the Shadow Minister for Social Enhancement had got to.

For a moment Ruth was tempted to say he was probably holed up with a rent-boy but Harold still had his uses if only she could find him. The journalists besieging the Lodge made it impossible to leave the house. She’d been up to the skylight to check and had seen something else that scared her. Two uniformed policemen in the field across the old stone wall. They weren’t hiding, either, just making it obvious she was under surveillance. But why? It had to be something to do with what the forensic men had found on the floor of the garage and taken away in plastic bags. That was the only explanation she could think of. Bloodstained earth from the man’s head wound. That had to be the answer. She cursed herself for not having scrubbed the floor. As the sun began to sink in the West Ruth the Ruthless sat in her husband’s study and tried to think what to do. About the only thing she could come up with was to lay the blame on Harold. After all, his Jaguar had been parked over the patch of oil and blood and there was nothing to indicate she had moved it there.

She’d just reached this conclusion when she heard the sound of a vehicle coming up the drive. It wasn’t the usual police car but an ambulance. What the hell was an ambulance doing outside the house? And where on earth were Wilfred and Pickles? They usually went into the hall when a car arrived. She found them in their baskets in the kitchen, fast asleep. She prodded them with her foot but they didn’t stir. That was strange but before she could do anything to wake them the ambulance had turned in the driveway and had backed up to the front door. For a brief moment Ruth Rottecombe thought they must have found Harold. She opened the door and a moment later had been hustled into the back of the ambulance by two hefty policewomen dressed as nurses and was being held face down on a stretcher. Four constables had entered the house only to return carrying the bull terriers, still sound asleep in their baskets. They joined her on the floor. Ruth tried to turn her head but failed.

‘Where are the keys of the Volvo?’ a woman asked.

‘Don’t know,’ Ruth tried to scream but her face was pressed against the canvas and her words were muffled.

‘What she say?’

For a moment they lifted her head and this time Ruth called them fucking bitches before being shoved down again.

‘Don’t worry. I’ll find them,’ the Woman Sergeant called Helen said and got on the walkie-talkie. ‘Just see you open the gate when I come down in the Volvo and clear that mob out of the way. I’ll be moving fast.’

As the rear doors of the ambulance were slammed shut she went into the house and the ambulance drove off at high speed. Ten minutes later she emerged wearing Ruth Rottecombe’s skirt and twin set. She had the keys of the Volvo and was driving very fast when she swung through the open gate, nearly taking a reporter with her. As he leapt to one side she turned to the left at speed and took a side road to Oston.

‘Which hospital they going to?’ a cameraman who had taken refuge in the hedge asked one of the cops on the gate.

‘Blocester, I’d say. That’s where emergency cases go. Wouldn’t be anywhere else. You turn right on the main road,’ he said and padlocked the gate. The media mob ran for their cars and set off in pursuit. The leading car was stopped by a patrol car a mile further on and the driver was threatened with dangerous driving. Behind it the other cars skidded to a halt. A mile ahead the ambulance turned left, slowed down and waited in a lay-by for the Volvo. By the time the reporters’ cars reached the T-junction and were heading for Blocester, Ruth Rottecombe had been transferred to the Volvo. And at Oston Police Station she was taken through to a cell that had been occupied by a drunk who had puked the previous night. It still stank of vomit. Ruth had slumped on to the metal bed bolted to the floor and with her head between her hands was staring at the floor. Outside, the empty ambulance had turned and was moving at normal speed towards Blocester. After three hours she was escorted to the Superintendent’s office, demanding to know why she had been treated in this outrageous fashion and promising her husband would be making official complaint to the Home Secretary.

‘That’s going to be a little difficult,’ came the answer. ‘You want to know why?’

Ruth Rottecombe did.

‘Because he’s dead. We’ve found his body and it looks very much as though he was murdered.’ He paused to let this news sink in. As Ruth sagged in her chair and was apparently going to faint he went on. ‘Take her back to her cell. She’s had a tiring day. We’ll question her in the morning.’ There was no sympathy in his voice.