Sun, Sea and Murder (An Inspector Alvarez Mystery) - Softcover

Jefferies, Roderic

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1847511074 ISBN 13: 9781847511072

Verlag: Severn House Publishers Ltd, 2009

Inhaltsangabe

An Inspector Alvarez Mystery - Rich and arrogant, when Tyler's love of good wine leads to the deaths of a young couple in a country lane in Kent, he drives his car to his extensive property in Mallorca so the English police can't examine it. When laid-back Mallorcan Inspector Alvarez is ordered to investigate whether Tyler is in the area, he's reluctant, to say the least. He soon discovers, however, that this routine inquiry has far-reaching consequences . . .

Über diesen Titel

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Sun, Sea and Murder

An Inspector Alvarez Mystery

By Roderic Jeffries

Severn House Publishers Limited

Copyright © 2009 Roderic Jeffries
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-84751-107-2

CHAPTER 1

The car twitched on the wet road before the traction control killed the potential skid. Tyler told himself he must drive more slowly. It had been a good lunch; a very good lunch. The wine – Clos de ... Clos de something, had surpassed its reputation; the cognac, Courvoisier Wellington ... Napoleon? He must remember to tell Bill that and hear the deep belly laugh. A good cognac was captured sunshine. He found he was heading towards the grass verge and hurriedly altered course.

A triangular field ready to be harvested marked the beginning of his estate. He chuckled.

He passed Fiddler's Wood. Who was Fiddler? A corruption of the local word 'fibbler' meaning thief. Some old fool had recently told him that it was just the name of one of the past owners of the wood. No Fiddler was mentioned in the estate's papers.

He looked down at the clock on the dashboard and could not immediately read the time. Then his sight sharpened. It was already five and he had told Julia he would be with her by four. She would be in a bad mood. Would shout that he never could be bothered to show her any respect. Strange how women of her ilk demanded the illusion of respect. Their shield from reality? The later he was, the longer it would take to warm her up. He increased speed and failed to note Hopfeld Corner until he was almost upon it.

He braked sharply as he turned in to the corner, but this time the car was unable to counter his stupidity. The skid took him across the road and into a man and woman who had been walking arm-in-arm along the lane. The man was thrown violently to the left, the woman up and on to the bonnet and then on to the road.

He braked to a halt. Shock cleared his mind sufficiently to understand that to stop there and call for an ambulance would lead to his being breathalysed by the police and found to be well over the limit. Then, what chance would he have of claiming the couple had suddenly stepped off the grass verge in front of the car or that the steering had failed?

His mind raced. The car had hit them with such force they must be either severely injured or dead. His wealth would count against him, thanks to the common hatred of success, and the law would pursue him with zeal. He might have to face the charge of causing death by dangerous driving when under the influence. The usual penalty for that was jail. But jail was for the robber, the rapist, the corrupt businessman, not people like he. He drove on, desperately trying to work out how to escape suspicion of guilt.

The light rain had stopped and the sky was beginning to clear. A car pulled to a stop and Detective Inspector Knox climbed out, lifted the police tape to pass under it, crossed to where Detective Sergeant Cameron stood.

'What's the latest on the victims?'

'One dead on arrival, one critically ill and unlikely to survive.'

'Shit!'

They watched the forensic team, in white plastic suits, finger-searching the road and grass verge. Knox was silent for a short while as he visually assessed the area and the searchers, then asked: 'Do we know who they were?'

'Neither of them carried any ID. They're likely locals since they had been walking and judging by the lack of coats, before the brief drizzle stated. I've sent a Uniform along to see if he can learn anything in Eastingford which is the next village, half a mile or so further on.

'The chap from Vehicles is reasonably certain the car was driving down that lane' – he pointed – 'came in to the corner far too quickly, went into a skid which took him into the couple. So far, Forensics have found a broken wing mirror very recently wrenched off its stand, so there's good reason to think it was from the crash car. Seems likely the mirror's from a luxury job.'

Knox brought a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. 'Smoke?'

'Not for the past couple of years, sir.'

'Want to live long enough to draw your pension?' The two men liked and respected each other; their relationship was as near friendship as rank allowed. Knox lit a cigarette. 'Let's hear your thoughts.'

'These lanes don't lead directly to anywhere and become a bit of a maze if you don't know your way around, so the driver might well be local.'

'Or visiting friends who live nearby. Whichever, he will have driven off as if the hounds of hell were gnawing at the back tyres, assuming the driver was a man. Can't see a woman carrying on, careless of what happened to the couple. If he's fairly local, he'll have reached home some time ago. If he's not local, he'll have made for the quickest possible escape route. How far is the nearest motorway junction?'

'A couple of miles.'

'Are there speed cameras there?'

'Can't say, Guv. I'll get on to Traffic and find out.'

'Tell them we're looking for a car, luxury class, which has lost a wing mirror and is being driven at high speed.'

The victims were identified on Sunday. Irene Drew, twenty-one. Blaise Newcome, twenty-six. Partners for a couple of years and intending to marry in August.

It was Knox's task to inform the parents of the tragic deaths. A task he hated and which left him emotionally disturbed for a long time.

Traffic had reported that cameras on the motorway had recorded a car heading south at speeds ranging from 90 to 115 miles an hour. It was identified as a Bentley and its nearside wing mirror was missing. Registered in the name of Tyler, Two Oaks Manor.

'Something in this case is out of kilter,' Knox said suddenly as they drove out of the town of Arlington and entered countryside.

'Why so?' Cameron asked as he changed gear.

'The car's registered in the name of a local estate owner. If he was driving, why head for the motorway instead of home; hoping we'd fail to trace the car and he could hide it until it would be safe to have it repaired without comment?'

'Sheer panic?'

'Wouldn't that rush him to the supposed security of home?'

'Maybe the driver was one of the staff, too terrified to go back and report what had happened.'

Knox stared out at a field in which a herd of Friesians were strip grazing. 'Have you ever wanted to live in the country?'

'I wouldn't mind it, but Gwen certainly would.'

'Why so?'

'She'd feel cut-off, too lonely.'

'A degree of solitude, yes, but in this day and age that's a luxury. Win enough money and it'll be an Elizabethan farmhouse for the wife and me; oak beams, inglenook fireplaces, and a shoe bricked up in the wall.'

'A what?'

'When they built a house in those days, they bricked up a shoe to bring good luck to everyone who lived in it. I could do with a life in which there's more good luck than bad.'

'The only way you'll find that is to retire from the force.'

'True.'

They turned right and drove past a small wood, a part of which had recently been cut down.

'You don't see that very often these days,' Knox remarked.

'See what, Guv?'

'Coppicing.'

'So what's that when it's at home?'

'No one will ever mistake you for a countryman.'

'Because I sometimes smile?'

A cock pheasant suddenly flew out of the hedgerow and with frantically beating wings, voiding, flew across the front of the car.

'Another ten miles an hour and I could have had it for supper,' Cameron said.

'A poacher who's totally ignorant of the countryside?'

'That would be a gift, not a poach...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Severn House Publishers Ltd
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2009
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1847511074
• ISBN 13: 9781847511072
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 187
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: eucomply OÜ; hello@eucompliancepartner.com; ; Pärnu mnt 139b-14; Tallinn; 11317; Estland