Invisible Grave - Crime - Short Story

Detective Inspector Lock

Case One: Invisible Grave

Detective Inspector Edward Lock looked at the ostentatious gold door bell of the large, imposing house in front of him and stuck his hands firmly into the deep pockets of his black rain coat. At Lock’s elbow Sergeant Daniel Brett peered through the windows of the house and then turned back to his DI.

“I just don’t get it, Sir, if everyone is so sure that James Richardson murdered his business partner then why is he in this fancy house and not banged up?”

Rather than give the young man an answer DI Lock closed his eyes and tipped his head back, inclining his bloodless white face to the afternoon sunshine. After a few moments of silence Brett leaned forward and jabbed the doorbell with his thumb. A shrill buzz emanated from within the walls of the house and but no one came to answer.

“Not to mention,” Brett continued, “if the original investigation team of twenty-six officers couldn’t crack this case how are we supposed to get anywhere? I know you’re supposed to be brilliant, Sir, but the man hours they’ve already shelled out on this case is legendary.”

“It seems very sad to me,” Lock murmured.

“Sir?”

“People flee cities for towns and villages to barricade themselves out of the world. Little do they know they’ve sealed themselves in with the same beast they were running from. At least in the big, bad city light and darkness mix, out here in the countryside the one can exist independent of the other.”

Brett looked at Lock in dismay. This was his first day on CID and his first ever meeting with the newly appointed DI Lock. If Brett could get a permanent place in CID he and Lock would be working together all the time. That prospect suddenly had him very worried. As Brett reached out to ring the doorbell again the front door opened a few inches and a deeply lined, middle-aged face appeared in the gap, “Mr. James Richardson?” Brett asked.

“Oh God,” said the man, swinging the door fully open, “it’s the Chesterford plod squad.”

James Richardson may have been a man trying to cast off the shadows of suspicion in a criminal investigation but the air of smug superiority about him was palpable. His thin lipped mouth twitched with amusement as Brett displayed his warrant card. This amusement visibly increased when Richardson looked over at the figure of Edward Lock, still with his eyes closed and his head tilted up to the sky.

“So you’re Detective Inspector Lock?” Richardson barked, “the latest copper earning his brass by whiling away an afternoon at my house. As if I had nothing else to do but play host to an endless trudge of uninvited guests.”

Lock opened his eyes and looked Richardson up and down, “perhaps you feel harassed, Sir? If you prefer you can refuse us entry and then we can see in due course if a warrant is justified.”

The precise reply seemed to unnerve Richardson. His eyes darted furtively between the two police officers, “oh no, no, I’ve maintained since the beginning that there’ll be no body found in this house,” he narrowed his eyes, “there’ll be no body found.”

“And no body means no murder. Isn’t that what you told police after the disappearance of Russell Miller?” Lock replied.

Richardson frowned at Lock who smiled genially back at him. The DI’s words were sharp when they came but there was a languid nonchalance which wreathed his presence like the sticky lethargy of cigar smoke. After a few moments Richardson was back in his element. “I told the police then what I’ve maintained for the three years since and what I’m saying now. My story has never changed, although some of you police officers have had your facts all over the place.”

Suddenly, without explanation, Lock turned on his heel and wandered out of view around the corner of the house leaving Brett and Richardson staring open mouthed after him. Brett had heard tell of Detective Lock’s strange personality and unorthodox ways of working but he’d also been told that there would be no better boss for an ambitious Sergeant with an appointment to CID in his sights. Brett decided to try and establish some control over the situation and cleared his throat, “now, Mr. Richardson, do you have any objection to myself and the DI taking a look around the premises in line with the ongoing investigation into the disappearance of your business partner?”

At that moment a large, red headed man blustered out past Richardson and set off down the garden path. His overstuffed briefcase, almost as overstuffed as his straining suit seams, swung wildly at his side. “Great lunch, James, see you later,” the man bellowed as he marched off.

Brett coughed, “I’m sorry, your former business partner, Russell Miller.”

Richardson snorted in amusement, “my former business partner is probably alive and well somewhere. In America, most likely.”

“His name and description hasn’t matched anything in police databases, hospital records or coroner’s office records. It seems that either he got wiped off the face of the planet one night or he died.”

“Then where’s the body?” Richardson almost whispered as a smile spread slowly across his face, “you are aware there isn’t enough evidence against me for a charge to be brought? Miller couldn’t wait to get away from his wife, Laura, he probably had a new woman lined up.”

Brett’s face flushed with irritation, “rest assured, Sir, we’ll be looking at all the relevant leads, in fact the DI was telling me on the way over here that-”

“Mr. Richardson, this house is glorious! What a blessing to have the beauty of the moor on your doorstep.” Lock had returned from his foray around the grounds and stood before the bemused homeowner and Sergeant with his hands in his pockets, his thin limbs stuck out at angles and a wide smile on his handsome, if rather worn, face. In his black coat and funeral director suit he looked like a pterodactyl which had been knocked through the millennia and found itself stalking sunny, green lawns in the Chesterford suburbs quite by accident. “Why not give us the grand tour of the house and then we can get out of your way. You have a very high spec property, so I’m told.”

Richardson brightened, “the best, actually. The best is standard in this house. Come in, I’ll get my housekeeper, Mrs. Dixon, to show you around.”

As they filed in Lock paused in the hallway and looked over a collection of weapons on the wall. He raised an eyebrow at Brett as they followed Richardson through into a large, modern kitchen. There was a back door which led onto a patio with chairs and tables set out. Beyond the patio and lawn was a fence separating the property from the fields which stretched off towards the distant moor; the majestic yet eerie landscape that either drew people into the area or repelled them away. Indifference towards Chesterford Moor was impossible. Despite the sunny day the kitchen was like an ice-box. Richardson put some tea mugs out on the sink side and called up the stairs for his housekeeper. When she didn’t appear he put the mugs back in the cupboard.

“I couldn’t help but notice the impressive weaponry in your hallway as we came in,” Lock said blandly. “I assume those items are purely decorative. Family heirlooms, are they, Mr. Richardson?”

“Antiques. Very valuable antiques. If you want to start messing around with those you’ll need a warrant. The insurance is probably twice what you earn in a year.”

Lock said nothing in reply but Brett noticed a little ghost of a smile flicker across the DI’s face, “they look dangerous to me,” Brett cut in, “how long have you had them?”

“If you’d read your case file you would know that those items are new. I didn’t own them until months after the disappearance of Miller. Everything in my house is new, I’ve got the money to keep things fresh so why shouldn’t I? And while we’re on the case file you should know that when the police came here on the night of Miller’s disappearance I was asleep in bed, not hastily bleaching away evidence. They tested me and every piece of clothing I own for evidence of a fight or blood stains and they found nothing. This whole house became a crime scene, they even took the floorboards up and sent them off to a lab and they still found nothing.”

“Nothing except Miller’s fingerprints on a wine glass and in several other places around the house,” Lock said.

Richardson gave an exaggerated sigh, “I had a party a few nights before the disappearance and Miller was here for it. Wouldn’t it have been strange if there had been no prints found anywhere at all? There were prints from the other party guests and from my girlfriend, Emilia. All of which neatly goes to show yet again that nothing in this house was unduly disturbed or scrubbed down since the party. Not to mention the fact that we’re talking about Miller’s prints on a glass, not his blood and brains smeared all over the walls.”

“Your office is in the city as I understand it,” Lock said, “quite a few winding country lanes from here.”

Richardson smiled slyly, “I know what you’re after, Inspector. On the day in question, as you coppers like to say, I had been at work until nine in the evening at my company in the city. I left the building at quarter past nine and I arrived home at quarter to ten. Thirty minutes is enough time to drive here and not to stop off somewhere along the way. No one can verify my arrival at quarter to but I had a video conference call at ten on the dot. That finished at around half ten. By eleven I was in bed. At midnight the police arrived and told me that Miller had gone out at seven o’clock that evening on foot and not come back. His wife, who has never liked me, had said to police that I must have been involved because no one else could be. Since I was still at work when he left his house it’s more likely that he went off to do something else with someone else. The previous lot even went through phone records, Miller and I had no phone contact by calls or text for over a week before the disappearance. Miller wasn’t much for the phone anyway, he preferred e-mail.”

“That’s interesting,” Lock returned, “because I thought that you must have left at nine and not quarter past and arrived here at ten and not quarter to. That’s one hour to make a twenty minute journey.”

“Why would you think that? It takes more than twenty minutes. The time I left the office was confirmed by my secretary and the video conference was with my client, Mr. Takahashi, who knows my face well enough to be sure it was me and not a stand in. We discussed the events of the day in the markets, demonstrating that I couldn’t have used any technical wizardry to fool him.”

“That still leaves fifteen minutes unaccounted for on the arrival side of your journey. Also, myself and Sergeant Brett drove here today from your office in the city and the journey took us nineteen minutes.”

“It’s less busy in the day,” Richardson said, getting visibly annoyed.

“It took you twenty minutes yesterday evening,” Lock replied, “I called your secretary and asked her to note down exactly when you left the office and it was six forty-five. Incidentally she told me that on the night of Miller’s disappearance she couldn’t be sure what time you left. When you arrived home yesterday your neighbor, Mr. Jefferies, seems to think the time was just after seven.”

Richardson stared hard at Lock and thought seriously before giving his next answer.

“Jefferies is unreliable, he drinks, and most certainly he loathes me. He was probably passed out drunk yesterday evening and just told you that out of spite.”

“That’s strange because I never told him what time you left the office and yet he fabricates a time which lines up exactly with my theory that if your secretary saw you leave at six forty-five you would arrive here twenty minutes later at five past seven or thereabouts.”

Lock gave Richardson a genial smile. It was not returned. Both men dipped their heads slightly, like bulls leveling their horns.

“The word at the local pub is that you’re new to the force in this area. May I ask, are you new to Chesterford also?”

“I’m new to both, Mr. Richardson. I transferred from Manchester.”

“Well something they may not have told you in Manchester, Inspector, is that in business everyone wants to kill everyone else. We’re ruthless, vicious and often there’s a good dose of the Machiavellian in all that’s said and done but murder? Real, body-in-the-well style murder? That’s not something most of us have the stomach for.”

“Wasn’t it a matter of public record that you and Miller had a more serious disagreement than most?” Brett asked, “the company you co-owned took a drastic shift in direction just a few weeks after his death. Those with a suspicious kind of mind might wonder if you wanted to take the company somewhere he didn’t and there was only one way to get around that. As I understand it your manufacturing has now been moved abroad.”

“Everyone outsources to the cheaper markets now, the fact that Miller couldn’t accept that just shows how unsuited he was to the world of business. Even the fact that he was relatively young didn’t excuse his awe-inspiring naivety. If you want to pay double for half as much you should be in politics and not business. Let the do gooders waste their own time chasing their tails and let those of us with the brains get on with running the world.”

“So is that your answer to the question of motive then?” Lock asked demurely.

“My answer is that if I bumped off everyone I had reason to want out of my way then I’d never have stopped for the past twenty years. I don’t expect either of you to understand but for the world of big business to keep turning the little man needs to step aside. Miller was a small, insignificant man and they always get eaten alive and swept away in the world.”

“I suppose it depends,” Lock said, “if one day you meet a little man who is cleverer than you.”

Richardson glared at Lock, “be that as it may, on the night of Miller’s disappearance my car was taken in for forensic testing all of which came up negative for Miller ever being in the damn thing let alone turning up his teeth in the tire treads. I’ve bought a new car since and if you came back in twelve months time I’d have a new car once again. The house was negative and the car was negative. So whether my journey that night took twenty minutes, twenty hours or twenty years the God damn car wasn’t involved.”

“You owned no other car at that time?”

“No. And I didn’t hire one either if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Lock’s eyes widened as he watched Richardson’s gradual escalation, “I am aware of that since no car was hired on or near the date of Miller’s disappearance in your name, with your credit card or by a person matching your physical description.”

Richardson took in a breath sharply.

“That doesn’t rule it out of course,” Lock went on, “but moves it across to the realm of the ultimately very unlikely. You’re a little over six foot two, Mr. Richardson, hard to disguise that or let it escape notice as I have often found problematic myself.”

“I think you’d better finish what you came here for and get out,” Richardson said.

The flustered businessman stormed out of his kitchen and howled up the stairs. This time Mrs. Dixon eventually appeared and took Brett to look around the upper floors. Lock made his way around the ground floor with no help or guidance from Richardson who lurked in the conservatory scowling down into a glass of wine.

Brett was given a tour of pristine bedrooms, high end bathrooms and more storage space for towels than he felt would be necessary for a city center hotel. There was an upstairs office that he recognized from the photos in the case file even though the fixtures and equipment had been upgraded. There was nothing suspicious or indicative. Brett wondered once again how if the house had yielded nothing when the crime was fresh how Lock expected to find something now the trail was cold and Richardson’s home had undergone several makeovers. Brett eventually left Mrs. Dixon fretting over dust accumulation on spotless shelves and bounded back down the stairs. He looked around the hallway and reception rooms for Lock and when the DI was nowhere to be found Brett went back into the kitchen and stared out of the window at the neatly manicured lawn. “I wonder,” he muttered.

Lock appeared suddenly at Brett’s side, “if what you’re wondering is whether Miller is buried under that green masterpiece then don’t waste your grey matter.”

“Sir?”

“The ground is level, if Russell was buried under it the process of decomposition would have caused the ground to sink at that spot.”

“Something happened. People don’t just vanish off the face of the earth. Something happened to him and Richardson did it.”

“Well it would seem he didn’t do it in this house,” Lock said, “or indeed in the vehicle. Nor was the vehicle used to transport a body at any time.”

Brett frowned and stared out at the lawn, “what about poison? We’ve already established that Miller’s prints were found in the house. How about this? Richardson plans to kill Miller, he throws the party to get some excuse for the presence of DNA or fingerprints in the house. A week or so later he invites him over, poisons him and then they walk out to the moor where Richardson knows it’s possible that no one will ever find the evidence. Once they’re out there all he has to do is watch Miller succumb to the poison and make sure he’s dead.”

“What poison do you think was used if no traces of it were found in the home?”

“Many common household chemicals are deadly in the wrong hands. Antifreeze, for example.”

Lock raised an eyebrow appreciatively, “the taste of ethylene glycol is by no means unpleasant. It’s sweetness means it can be easily disguised in a curry dish or cocktail and the early effects of ingestion can be mistaken for alcohol intoxication. However, Brett, even if antifreeze was the weapon I have no idea how you would ever use that against Richardson. Even if we found Miller’s body and even if against all the odds traces of poison could be identified in his remains there’s still no way to say that James Richardson was the person who administered a fatal dose. Find the body and we’ll find out how Miller died. Knowing how he died won’t get us to the body.”

“Was there a spot they both knew? Somewhere Richardson could have lured Miller to?”

“Richardson isn’t stupid. He’d never pick a spot that connects to him in any way. Out on the moor he knows it will be years before the body is found if it ever is. By then it will be decomposed completely. Even if Russell Miller’s remains are found there’s no way to tie Richardson to them if he’s been as careful as I think he has. All it would prove is Russell Miller died on the moor and maybe there’s evidence of an injury but one thing for sure it won’t have been inflicted with one of those antique toys on the wall. I’m sure Richardson bought those for the specific purpose of wasting man hours. I happen to know that the senior investigating officer on the original case heard they were purchased, found it odd and traced them thoroughly.”

“Nothing came of it?” Brett asked.

“Nothing,” Lock replied, “and so another police lead involving Richardson crumbled, which of course was what he planned, it made him seem partially exonerated. Tell me, Brett, did you find anything of interest upstairs?”

“Nothing. Bedrooms and an office with a fancy new computer. I checked the case file for anything found on the computer he had at the time of Miller’s disappearance but it came up negative so I guess that’s that out.”

Lock turned his gaze out of the window towards the moor, “so it will interest you to know that the old computer is still in the house?”

Brett turned around sharply, “but if Richardson is so hooked on everything being new and modern then the first thing he’d want to keep up to date is his tech!”

Lock led Brett into a well equipped office on the ground floor which overlooked the front garden. A large video conference screen almost covered one wall. There were three different top of the range laptops around the room and on a corner table under a pile of newspapers was the older desktop computer Brett remembered seeing in the case file.

Brett grabbed a swivel chair, sat down in front of the computer and powered it up. When the operating system loaded he clicked his way through the files and programs. It looked like nothing had been used for a long time and there wasn’t much data on the disc. Lock gave a gentle cough and Brett lifted his eyes up to where the DI’s long index finger was tapping the bookcase.

“My God,” Brett hissed. He was staring at a manual on hard drive reformatting and data deletion, “why would he leave that there where we can see it?”

“Because on the one hand he knows it proves nothing concrete and on the second if he had known we were going to be here I believe he would have removed it just to be sure our thoughts were not directed by it. Now that we have seen it I believe this is how we catch him out,” Lock whispered.

Brett swiveled around to face Lock, “but I read the case file, Sir, this computer was checked by computer forensics experts and it seems like they did a thorough job.”

“I don’t doubt they did. I’m sure if they say this disc is clean then the disc is clean.”

Brett was about to ask Lock what he meant when James Richardson walked into the room. Brett felt the hairs stand up on the back of his neck as he saw pure rage in the businessman’s face.

“I didn’t give you permission to come in here and snoop through my personal files. I’ve got good grounds to have the two of you sent to your own cells!”

“You did tell us we could search the house,” Brett said.

Richardson walked up to where Brett was sitting and stared down at him menacingly, “that computer was taken and examined three years ago. Nothing was found.”

“Perhaps that was the problem, Sir,” Brett said holding eye contact.

“What?” Richardson whispered in rage.

“Like you said before, a total absence of fingerprints in your house would have been suspicious and a hard disc with no data on it seems equally strange.”

“Well one thing is for sure,” Richardson shouted, “Miller’s body wasn’t stuffed into the damn thing. Now if you two goons don’t mind I’d appreciate it if you got out of my house! If you want to come back you’ll need a warrant.”

Two minutes later Brett and Lock were standing on the gravel driveway with the crash of the oak front door ringing in their ears. Brett took a moment to regain his composure, DI Lock never lost his. He turned on his heel and, without a word, marched out to the lane where Brett’s car was parked. By the time Brett caught up and got in the driver’s side Lock was rooting through the glove compartment stash of maps.

“Well what do you make of it, Brett? What do you make of him?”

“Cunning as a fox, Sir.”

Lock laughed, “he’s above average intelligence, I’ll give him that, but he’s above average in arrogance too. He doesn’t see that his whole scheme is only hinging on one lucky factor.”

“Sir, you don’t mean you‘ve-”

“Solved it? Of course I have. Proving it might be the problem. But I want you to give me your impressions and let me tell you before you start that everything you need to solve it was in that house.”

Brett swallowed hard, a recommendation from Lock could secure his transfer into CID, “well, Mr. Lock, we know the body isn’t in the house not only because the first investigation team stripped it down to the timbers but also because Richardson would never be so chirpy showing us round it if there really was anything incriminating to see. I’m guessing that your excursion off round the back was to check something without him around.”

Lock smiled, “so you picked up on that? Very good. I could tell by Richardson’s casual, condescending attitude that he would more readily assume I was incompetent and bungling than actually after something specific if I wandered off alone. I wanted to make sure his car really was new but if I’d had to examine it as closely as I wanted to in front of him that might have sparked his defenses. He may have insisted on a warrant, thought things through and got rid of that computer. I’m sure he’s in there now wishing he’d done just that.”

“But, Sir, we can’t find anything on it can we?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then you’ve lost me. The car is new and so is everything else in the house except the downstairs computer. That’s the only item still in the house from the time of the murder, because a murder is obviously what happened. The old computer being kept and the disc obviously having been wiped is a strong indication that the old computer was involved somehow, maybe a series of incriminating internet searches. So now Richardson doesn’t want to ever let it out of his hands in case technology advances and then if the computer could be traced the information would be retrieved.”

“Bravo, Sergeant!” Lock slapped Brett on the shoulder, “you have it.”

“I just don’t know what we can make of it, Sir. Whatever was on that computer got wiped off and forensics never retrieved any data. Richardson may be paranoid that there might be a way to retrieve it one day but personally I think a properly wiped hard drive is pretty damn clean.”

Lock smiled in a way that made Brett wonder if he was about to fall asleep, “here ends investigation and so now deduction must begin. We know that something connected with the disappearance of Russell Miller was wiped off that computer. One possibility is your suggestion of internet searches and if that is so then we have reached a dead end. We must examine other possibilities. You are aware of the old trick of examining the top sheet of notepaper for impressions left by a pen?”

“Yes, Sir,” Brett said slowly.

“Well sometimes the person writing notes has been careful to leave no traces but the person they correspond with has not been so careful.” Lock leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes, “you have to examine every aspect logically, Brett. If Miller was never in Richardson’s car and Miller’s own car was left at his house that night then we can surmise that wherever the two met Richardson drove there and Miller walked.”

“Right, and it has to have been on the moor because Richardson then drove home, again without Miller in his car or forensics would have picked it up, and Miller didn’t go home at all which means wherever they met that night Miller’s body is still there.”

“People don’t just meet up in secluded locations by accident, Brett, they arrange it specifically. It could have been a spoken arrangement in which case we’ll have a hard time following the lead. It could have been a phone call but we know that there were no calls between Miller and Richardson in the days leading up to the disappearance. So how did they arrange the meeting?”

Brett snapped his fingers, “e-mail! Richardson could have deleted the e-mail he sent to Miller on his computer and wiped the drive for good measure.”

Lock smiled and nodded, “but a record of that communication might have been saved on Miller’s computer. Even when files get deleted they still exist in unallocated space until the area used to store them is overwritten by new data. Miller’s side of the arrangement to meet might still be on his computer in unallocated space. The data could only be deleted permanently when Miller used the computer again which, since he disappeared, has been never.”

“If the computer was never used by anyone else that is. It does make sense; get an e-mail in the morning, delete it by force of habit, something Richardson would have known about Miller as his business partner, and come sundown supposedly walk off the face of the earth. But why did the original investigation never think to focus in on this?”

“James Richardson is a highly manipulative individual. He made it his mission during that investigation to keep suggesting that the case hinged on finding a body or evidence in his house when he knew there was none. Laying down a challenge like that cemented the idea that Miller’s body was in the house for the investigative team. Also we have the advantage of seeing that of all the possessions which have come and gone in his home he retains the one thing which seems least explicable to retain.”

“So shall we go and call on Laura Miller and see if she’s still got the computer?” Brett asked, “I checked before we came out, she lives in Farnook Village about five minutes drive from here. Even if she sold it we can follow the trail to the new owner and check if some traces of Miller’s files are on the disc.”

“Deleted e-mails and deleted files are not quite the same,” Lock replied, “so you have to be prepared for the possibility of failure in this instance.”

“Don’t worry, Sir, I know someone in traffic with an MA in computing. I’m sure if anyone can get to the information then it’s Jane Parker. I’ll give her a call now and she can meet us there.”

“I’ll let you get on with that,” Lock said.

To Brett’s surprise the DI stuck the maps he had found under his arm and got out of the car. He leaned in through the open window and gave Brett a reassuring smile. “I’ll go to the hospital in the town here and check if anyone remembers Russell Miller coming in with poisoning symptoms. It’s possible Richardson tried and failed before he succeeded. If Miller drank something at Richardson’s house and felt ill he may have gone and checked himself in.”

“But I thought you didn’t reckon that would help us even if it happened?”

“I don’t,” Lock said, “but we have to follow all our leads. Call me if you get something solid.”

With that Lock turned and marched off down the lane towards the town of Hain where a small hospital and other amenities were located. Brett stared at Lock’s retreating figure in the rear view mirror as he went, the black tails of his rain coat flapping in the wind behind him.

Forty minutes later Brett was pacing up and down Laura Miller’s living room while Jane Parker sat hunched over a dusty PC in the corner, intermittently hammering keys and then staring into the screen and scratching her head. Blonde hairs stuck out in all directions as the pretty traffic cop became the mad professor she’d probably been before she joined the force. She would sometimes tell Brett about late nights pumped up on energy drinks trying to weave code together to achieve seemingly innocuous results like getting her answer machine messages into e-mail documents. Brett had always wondered why she didn’t just listen to the messages and be done with it but he had enough sense not to actually say that.

“Hey, Dan?” Jane said, turning to look at Brett.

“Yeah?”

“I heard you’re on this case with the new DI, Lock, what’s he like?”

“Something tells me I’m going to get asked that question a lot,” Brett said rubbing his temples and dropping down onto the sofa.

“He’s supposed to be brilliant. He left Manchester because he wanted to pursue criminal masterminds rather than the standard cases they were giving him. Before he transferred he worked on the big, Fort Road murder case. That was just after he got promoted to DI. Can you believe he’s only thirty-four?”

Brett looked up sharply, “hey, I’m only twenty-nine.”

Jane gave a little shrug and went back to staring into the depths of Russell Miller’s computer. Spurred on by Jane’s unintended comparison Brett pushed his focus back to the case. Laura Miller had been visibly shaken to hear her husband’s name. It seemed that three years had done little to ease the pain of what she said she accepted must have been his death. His phone records and bank statements stopped dead on the day of his disappearance and in her heart she had understood what that meant.

Laura came into the living room carrying two steaming cups of tea. She placed one on the desk next to Jane and handed the other to Brett. She sat down opposite the Sergeant with her thin knees hunched together and her pale fingers clawing at the velvet folds of her dress.

“So, Mrs. Miller-”

“Call me Laura.”

“Laura, are you sure that your husband could only have gone out on foot the night he disappeared?”

“Yes, he left his car here.”

“Couldn’t have got a taxi?”

Laura blushed and looked down at the carpet, “the truth is he probably would have taken the car but we were worried about money. Russ thought he was going to get pushed out of the company by James and we didn’t know what we were going to do, we didn’t want to give up our home. Russ was very practical and capable so as soon as our troubles began he saved every penny he could. He thought we could make it if we were careful. He even said we would still be able to take the kids on a holiday down to the sea like we had planned. Family was everything to Russ and he never liked to disappoint the children if he’d promised them something like that.”

“Did your husband say anything specifically about this disagreement with James Richardson? I read in the papers at the time that it was to do with outsourcing.”

Laura looked up from the carpet and into Brett’s face. Her eyes were a haunted, washed out blue. “There was nothing truly illegal about what James was trying to do but it went against what Russ believed in. It boiled down to the fact that James wanted to outsource a lot of production to factories abroad with very low health and safety standards. Russ found out that it was not only a dangerous working environment but that many of the workers were children and a number of them had died of chemical exposure. Nothing could be proved of course but it was as plain as day that’s what had gone on. Then there were the jobs that would be lost here in Chesterford where the manufacturing was already based.

“Russ confronted James and told him that if he didn’t drop the policy he’d use his influence with the shareholders and put a stop to it that way. If I know anything about James he’d have lined up some sort of backhander for the deal and spent the money before he was paid it, he’d be desperate to make it happen. James went into business with Russ because he thought he’d be able to control the full business and effectively buy it for half the price but people liked Russ and they trusted his take on things. James never saw that coming.”

The watery blue eyes lit up for a moment with memory and Brett leaned forward to listen. “The outsourcing deal was worth over a million pounds in the difference to the company’s books, aside from whatever James was getting. Someone like James would kill for a hell of a lot less than that. One night me and Russ had a party here at the house. James was speaking to our friend Michael and I overheard them talking. Michael mentioned something about a couple who disappeared years ago out on the moor. They were never found due to the nature of the landscape, how hard it is to search. I remember Michael told James that if you didn’t know where to look the place was impossible to navigate.

“I keep thinking about that night and how interested James was in that story. Can you imagine how I feel now, knowing what he was planning even as he stood right here in this very room? A few weeks after Russ disappeared the deal got voted through at the company because there was no one to tell them what it really involved.”

“Ok,” Jane said from across the room, “I’ve got it. Got something, at least.”

The sky was beginning to darken when Brett went outside and called Lock. Brett knew he had to impress the DI if he wanted to work with CID on a permanent basis rather than just being a helping hand. He remembered something an old university lecturer had said to him; if you can’t be inspired be thorough, it often gets the same results. The DI took his time to pick up and was out of breath when he spoke.

“Sergeant, what news?”

“Sir, I’m at Russell Miller’s house. Jane’s got a successful retrieval of a possible meeting location from the computer and I’ve managed to establish a much stronger motive than we previously thought existed. Apparently Richardson wasn’t just trying to make money with the outsourcing deal but he’d already spent a hefty amount in expectation of a big back hander from the outsourcing company bosses. So an intervention by Russell could have ruined Richardson completely rather than just left him less well off.

“I’ve also found out that the Millers were planning a family holiday at the time of Russell’s disappearance which doesn’t tie in with this supposed plan to run off with another woman. Last, but certainly not least, Russell Miller left his house at seven and it takes just under two hours to walk onto the moor from here. So he would have been up there about the time Richardson was coming home from work.”

“That’s marvelous, Brett,” Lock replied, “I can see you’re a valuable resource. Jump through a few more hoops for me and you’ll be looking at a permanent position in CID.”

“How did you get on at the hospital, Sir?”

“Hmm?”

“The hospital where you said you were going.”

“I didn’t make it to the end of the road before I got a very interesting phone call.”

“Oh?” Brett patted his jacket down for a pack of smokes. The DI had an element of sharpness to him which had not been apparent earlier in the day and Brett felt apprehensive as he listened to the almost alien voice continue down the line.

“Richardson called me and said that he had an idea where Miller might have walked to on the night of his disappearance and that perhaps walking around late at night some accident had befallen him. Quite a turn around for an afternoon don’t you think?”

Brett’s mind raced, “but, Sir, Richardson probably only told you that because he saw us looking at the computer and maybe overheard or worked out what we meant to do. Then he figured he’d tell us rather than let us find out. That’s just pitching one point to the defense lawyers.”

“Dead right, Brett, quite the only move he could make in the situation.”

Brett stopped stock still, “hang on, where did he say to go?”

“Crows Way, a little intersection of paths in the center of the Chesterford Moor.”

“But Jane’s data showed a different location. Crow’s Way isn’t where Miller met with Richardson.”

“It’s not? Ah, interesting,” Lock said with a distinct lack of concern. Brett heard a rustle of paper over the phone, “then let’s see,” Lock went on, “I think I can guess the location that was on Miller’s computer.”

“Sir, if this is a joke-”

“It was a mile or two from Crows Way, south, about a half a mile in from the road.”

“Yes, yes it was,” Brett said, stunned, “but how did you-”

“Never mind that for now, Brett. We’ve beaten the odds to get the location of Miller’s body but that alone won’t put James Richardson behind bars, in fact it may destroy the one chance we have of doing so. I told you at the house that with no body we had no case.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Well I’m telling you now that with a body we have a case but we don’t have a conviction. We can prove Miller died but from the way Richardson confidently mentioned that accident as if he’s sure about what we would find I don’t think he was stupid enough to have killed Miller in any way that could be traced back to him. There’ll be no smoking gun; no bullet lodged in the remains that matches up with a gun he had access to, no striation marks on a bone that matches his kitchen carving cleavers. Richardson may prefer that the body remains lost to stifle the progression of the case and block it from ever coming before a jury but I’ll stake my entire career on my certainty that the body itself won’t yield evidence.”

Brett’s mind was reeling, “Sir, if what you’re saying is right and Jane’s data is right then Richardson has sent you up to a part of the moor where he doesn’t expect you to find anything.”

“Speaking of Richardson, I think I see his car in the distance. Four-wheel drive is an amazing innovation.”

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Mr. Lock.”

“From what I could glean from the personnel files I looked over when I joined the Chesterford force I recall that Jane Parker did very well in her advanced driving course, excelled at pursuit driving.”

Brett started to understand what Lock meant for him to do. He was caught up between the desperation of the moment and a stunned amazement that the DI would roll the dice with his own life to nail the man he’d set his sights on.

“You can be here in fifteen minutes, Brett. There’s no other way than to catch James Richardson in the act.”

The phone cut off abruptly. Brett looked out for a moment at the moor, off beyond the scattered houses that made up the semi-rural outskirts of Chesterford. Adrenaline surged through him and, uttering a curse under his breath, he crashed back into the house to find Jane.

Up on the moor Edward Lock snapped his phone shut and watched James Richardson park his Range Rover a few hundred yards away. Lock allowed himself a quick glance backwards, a few paces away from him there was a deep ravine in the landscape; a steep drop ending in a bed of jagged rocks. Richardson got out of his vehicle quickly, slammed the door shut and started to march purposefully across the brittle looking grass that clung to the rocky terrain. One of his hands was stuffed deep into his Macintosh pocket as though he was holding something.

Richardson advanced until he was a few paces away from Lock and then stopped short. His eyes were furtive and bright.

“Who were you speaking to just now?” Richardson barked.

“My Sergeant, Daniel Brett. You met him earlier today. He’s quite the tenacious and ambitious youngster. I suppose he reminds you of Russell Miller.”

“Why would he?”

“Because Brett is still young enough to be looking at the world as though it is going to square off to what he wants from it. He believes he’s the master of his own destiny as Russell Miller did when he climbed up this moor to have the last conversation of his life with you. Men like us, Mr. Richardson, we understand that expectation and disappointment are just two sides of one coin. Our situation at this moment reflects that truth unavoidably. We have both come here today with expectation and we know that ultimately one of us will be disappointed,” Lock let his gaze drift to where Richardson’s right hand was still buried in his coat pocket.

Richardson sneered in disgust, “so you worked out that Miller didn’t die here and you still came? That’s very stupid, even for a washed up copper from Manchester. You’d have done better not to tangle with me. I saw you split up from your Sergeant and I had a good idea what he meant to go off and do. If the Sergeant finds the body of Miller he can’t prove anything. It’s not your Sergeant I’m worried about, it’s you, Mr. Lock.”

Richardson withdrew his hand from the Mac, his long, knotty fingers were wound tightly around a wheel wrench, “having you on my back for the rest of my life would cause more problems than the body ever could. Men like you don’t know when to quit.”

“Like Russell Miller?”

“Yes, just like Russell Miller.”

“Is that why you killed him?”

“I didn’t kill Miller and I’m not going to kill you, but you’ll die all the same. You’ve had leisure to notice of course that this spot boasts a rather stunning ravine. There’s another of similar size a mile or so south from here but with you not being local I’d not expect you to know that.”

“Ah, so let me see,” Lock said casually, “you push me over the ravine’s edge and tell Sergeant Brett that it was self-defense. After all a wheel wrench is a weapon that might be picked up in the moment, when you felt threatened, rather than something you brought with you to act out a pre-meditated murder. Perhaps I was trying to frame you in order to embellish my flagging career and after you came up here to help me look for Miller’s body I attacked you. Fearing for your life in the face of a deranged and dangerous man you had no choice but to defend yourself.”

“The framing is a nice touch,” Richardson said, “you don’t mind if I use that do you?”

“Not at all,” Lock returned, “I realize that you’re resorting to the wheel wrench as the most easily excused weapon in the circumstances but in Miller’s case would I be correct to assume that you remained completely unconnected to the scene? I’d considered that maybe you fought with him and pushed him over but I recall from the case file that none of your clothes were dirty or damaged and there were no scratches or bruises found on you.”

Richardson smiled an ugly smile, “I threw a rock at him as he gazed out over the moor like an idiot. So busy staring at the scenery that he never saw it coming. I knew the fall would kill him if the initial head injury didn’t. I didn’t want to use a weapon like a gun or knife that could potentially be traced back to me. I was determined that not only would my outsourcing deal go through unopposed but I’d be able to sleep easy as well.”

“So you can sleep easy after murdering someone just as long as you’re reasonably sure you won’t get caught?”

“I was wearing gloves when I came up here with Miller. After the blow from the rock stunned him all I had to do was,” Richardson gestured with his hands, “push. I threw the rock down after him. If the body was found it would be impossible to establish that he died from anything other than the fall. I threw the rock from a distance so there would be no blood on my clothes although I did bring a change of clothes with me and dumped the suit I’d been wearing in a public charity collection bin on the way home just to be sure.”

“You have an admirable command of logic but unfortunately for you it is marred by a lack of true self reflection. You have too much faith in your own superiority to double check your thinking. I had been looking forward to meeting you so that I could pit my mind against yours and prove you to be guilty even without Miller’s body,” Lock raised his hands up slightly against the slate grey sky, “and you see I’ve done that. Before heaven and earth and a jury of your fellow man you look pretty guilty to me.”

“I know what you’re doing, you idiot,” Richardson said, laughing breathlessly as he moved closer, “you’re stalling for time so your Sergeant can get here. Do you think I’m that stupid? I saw you hang up the phone, that can’t have been more than five minutes ago. It will take your knight in a shining squad car at least another ten to get here and it doesn’t take ten minutes to do what I mean to do.”

“Oh but I know what you’re doing, I came here fully anticipating that you aimed to see me at the bottom of this ravine. I knew that’s what would have happened between you and Miller because you gave it away on the phone. Saying he might have had an accident while walking clearly indicated that you expected us to find something consistent with that. Since there are only a handful of ravines as deep as this on the moor it made sense that you had asked me to meet you here in order to play the same trick a second time.”

“That speech bought you two minutes, Lock, I could give you seven more however if you don’t mind I’d rather have that extra time to be prepared for when your Sergeant arrives, so if you’re ready-”

“There’s just one problem.”

“What’s that?”

“You’re not going to be able to just push me over the edge in that clean way.” Moving his hands slowly Lock pulled open the left side of his raincoat to reveal a small Dictaphone clipped to the inner pocket, a tiny green LED shone on the side. “Because that whole conversation is now recorded. If I go over with it, well, that’s the end for you. Even if this little thing is smashed I’m sure the tape will be salvageable. You’ll have to get it off me to destroy it and that’s going to seriously eat into your six and a half remaining minutes.”

Richardson let out an enraged snarl and raised the wheel wrench up high above his head, “I won’t let you ruin me, Lock, not now, not ever. You wanted to find Miller so badly, you can rot out here with him!”

Jane Parker deftly steered her squad car across the rugged terrain of the moor. Brett scanned the landscape for Richardson’s Range Rover and when he saw it he opened the door of the still moving police car and hit the ground running. As he got closer to the four by four he could see two figures on the ground up near the ravine. It looked like James Richardson was pressing some sort of weapon down onto Lock’s neck. Brett didn’t bother shouting out to Richardson to stop his assault because he could hear Jane behind him and see in front of him that her words were having no effect. He closed the distance with a few powerful strides and knocked Richardson to the side. Brett caught a glimpse of Lock’s face, the whites of his eyes were completely red and the thought crossed Brett’s mind that they might be too late.

Richardson put up a bestial struggle as the cuffs went on him and Brett barely had enough breath to give him the right to silence. The captured man growled and rolled around on the ground like he was possessed. Eventually when Richardson’s rage ran out and he stayed still Brett became aware of the strong grip of a bony hand resting heavily on his shoulder and he looked up.

“My God, Sir, you look terrible,” Brett said, unable to tear his gaze away from the puffed up, bloodshot eyes.

“Petechiae will fade, Brett,” Lock said in a hoarse but cheerful voice, “a murder conviction will stick.”

Jane Parker took the Dictaphone from Lock and listened in awe to his explanation of what it contained, then she helped Brett haul Richardson to his feet. He had stopped resisting but his face showed the extent of his hatred. Unmasked, he looked every bit the dangerous man he had really been all along. Gone was the calm, superior demeanor which had shrouded him ever since he stood in Laura and Russell Miller’s living room one summer night and heard a story about a disappearance on the Chesterford Moor.

“There’s one thing I’d like to know,” Brett said to Richardson, “you told the DI to come up here to Crow’s Way knowing that the location retrieved from Miller’s computer would be different. But you should have expected that the first thing we would do is contact each other and in the process realize what you were up to.”

“There would only have been your word to put forward the suggestion that I told Lock to meet me here rather than the other way around,” Richardson replied. “I would have insisted that when I got here to meet him he attacked me and in the process of self defense he met his end. Are you naïve enough to believe, Sergeant, that in a court of law your word against mine would carry any weight? I’m sure there’s a plethora of unpleasantness and stupidity in your background just waiting for a high paid defense lawyer to dig up.”

“Well, Mr. Richardson,” Jane broke in, “it looks like it’s your unpleasantness and stupidity they’ll actually be discussing now, doesn’t it?” As Jane pushed Richardson over to the squad car Lock sat down on a large flat rock a few meters back from the ravine. Brett sat next to him and brought out his pack of cigarettes, he noticed that when Lock took one his hand was shaking badly.

“Hell of a first day, Sir.”

“You having second thoughts about the position?” Lock asked through his teeth as Brett lit the cigarette for him.

“No way, but I do wonder if I’m right for this after all. There’s a few things I didn’t quite understand. If you knew where Miller’s body really was then why send me and Jane to try and retrieve data off his computer and why come here knowing Miller was setting you up?”

“Well,” Lock replied, puffing out smoke with an exhausted breath, “when we left Richardson’s home I had no idea where the body was although we both appreciated it would likely be on the moor. However my mind was alive with the thought of Richardson in that house pacing up and down like a caged animal when his worst fears about the computer started coming to light. We had homed in on it and yet we made no effort to remove it, he knew it was wiped and he knew we knew it was wiped. Edmond Locard, student of the great Alphonse Bertillion, is probably unknown to James Richardson but his exchange principle was something our criminal mastermind had paid attention to.”

“Every contact leaves a trace, Sir?”

Lock nodded, a small smile of approval flickered across his face, “Miller was killed by Richardson. We could reach that conclusion by the way motive, opportunity and inclination all culminated in that shady business deal. You must also have noticed his maniacal insistence that no body in the house meant no body at all, a sure indication of guilty logic.”

“I noticed. I also understand what I think you’re referring to, which is that Richardson knew he had to leave no traces on Miller’s body and no traces in his house connecting to that body. So essentially he was doubly protected.”

“You have it, Brett. As soon as we went out to the car this afternoon Richardson knew there was a good chance we would find the location of Miller’s body. He also knew there would be no definitive proof when we did find it but then the worries started. It would look bad after all to have arranged a meeting with Miller on the night he fell from a ravine. It can be explained away perhaps with good legal counsel but Richardson started to wonder that if we could do so much damage in a couple of hours what could happen in a whole investigation. I made up my mind to go to the hospital to check the poisoning lead but really I wanted to see if Richardson would make a move and I was elated when he did.”

“So elated that you rushed up here and risked your life to catch him out?”

“I wouldn’t say that I risked my life, Brett. Essentially I placed my life in the balance weighed down with my own powers of logical thinking and your ability to act quickly. As soon as Richardson told me to check Crow’s Way I looked the location up on a local map and noticed that a feature of this area is a deep ravine.”

“So when I told you that Crow’s Way wasn’t the location you took a guess from the other points on the map where a deep ravine appeared?”

“I did better than guess, I took the closest to Crow’s Way. Richardson had to move away from where Miller’s body would be found because it would have been too suspicious to throw the victim and the detective off the same precipice. That said the locale of Miller’s demise was clearly a comfort zone for our killer and it made sense that he wouldn’t go further than necessary in order to utilize his familiarity with the area. I’m sure Richardson picked this spot with the reverse method, he took the point where he killed Miller and searched for the closest ravine to that.”

“You were sure he’d not use a more deadly weapon on you because he fully anticipated not having time to dispose of it or adjust his appearance?”

“Correct. His choice of a wheel wrench was uninspired but flawless, it gave the appearance of being a weapon of necessity rather than of choice.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so, Sir, your choice of weapon was pretty inspired.”

Lock grinned, “the Dictaphone? Having that on me meant that he had to try and kill me, take the tape and then throw me over. That leeched valuable moments away from him.”

“You didn’t have too many of those valuable moments left, Mr. Lock, although you got him bang to rights every which way. Maybe next time you should go a bit slower and think things through.”

“Any slower and we’d have lost our case. Prosecutions on circumstantial evidence do happen, Brett, but they’re rare and I’d rather have my cases well done.”

Lock struggled unsteadily to his feet. Brett stood up and looked back to the squad car where Jane was patiently waiting. The moor around them was bleak and desolate and Brett felt the urge to get back to the city where after dark the lights went on and the crimes, though plentiful, couldn’t hide in the open like in the wild places of the world. Suddenly Brett looked across once again to Detective Lock.

“Was that a joke, Sir?”

“Nearly,” Lock returned with a smile.