She was concentrating on herself with such intensity that she very nearly overshot the Cedars. She squealed to a halt in front of the entrance and froze. The driveway was blocked by a police car. She killed her engine and sat there unmoving, as possibilities too horrible to contemplate raced through her head. She shivered, despite the heat of the day. Eventually she bullied herself into getting out of the car. She walked down the drive, past the police car and up the very slight incline towards the house. She was conscious of the gravel crunching under the sensible lace-up shoes that Mullen had insisted would be necessary. There was another car parked up by the house, but it certainly wasn’t Mullen’s. There were two people standing there talking, a female uniformed officer and a very big man in a suit that was struggling to contain his bulk. Their faces turned in unison. The big man was Detective Sergeant Fargo. He had interviewed her with Dorkin. A man like Fargo, once encountered, is hard to forget (especially when he is named after your favourite Cohen brothers’ film).
“Miss Wilby,” he said advancing towards her with huge strides. He was holding his right hand up in front of him like a policeman whose secret wish (never fulfilled) had always been to direct the traffic. “You can’t come in here.”
“What’s happened? Is Doug all right?”
“Mr Mullen is not here.” The two of them stopped. Fargo was a single pace away from her and she could see the sweat on his face. He looked unhappy with life. “You must leave,” he said.
“Is Becca here?” she said. Fargo’s eyes opened wider, his interest piqued. “Doug had a text from her,” she continued. “She said she was in trouble and needed his help.”
“When was this?” She had certainly got his attention.
She shook her head, as if so doing would clear it. At least, she told herself, Doug is alive. “About an hour ago. Or maybe a bit more.”
He nodded, as if this made sense or fitted in with what he knew.
“So you were with him when he got the message?”
“Yes. We were in South Oxford. We had just been visiting my mother and . . .”
“Did you see the text?” Fargo spoke with surprising gentleness.
“No. He just told me about it as we were walking to his car.”
“Did he say anything else?”
Rose faltered. Fargo was looking at her with a slightly furrowed forehead as if he could sense the dilemma inside her. “I wanted to help him,” she said. “He told me I wouldn’t be any use to him in my sandals, so I went into my flat to change and when I went outside again he had gone.”
Fargo nodded. “I see. That’s very helpful.”
Rose didn’t like the idea that she had been helpful, not if, as she suspected, being ‘helpful’ meant she had confirmed the police’s suspicions of Mullen. “So why are you here?” she said with sudden aggression, “if neither Doug nor Becca is here?”
There was a guttural noise from behind Fargo. Rose peered round his bulk. It was Dorkin. He was standing on the top step of the doorway. She had no idea how long he had been there or how much of the conversation he had heard. All she knew was that she preferred Fargo.
“Ms Baines has been taken to hospital,” Dorkin said.
Rose felt a mixture of shock and relief, but mostly relief — not only that Mullen was not lying dead on the drive, but that the two of them had not done a runner into the sunset.
“Is she alright?”
Dorkin was watching her through narrowed eyes. “Someone drugged her,” he said. “Very likely it was your friend Mr Mullen. I was wondering if you knew where he might have gone.”
“Why should I know?”
“You’re pally with him, aren’t you? Maybe he told you. Maybe you’re planning on meeting up with him.”
“What on earth do you mean? I am a friend. But I don’t know where he is. And if, as you seem to be implying, you think I am involved in some criminal activity with him, then why on earth would I have come here when there are police swarming all over the house?” She couldn’t help feeling pleased with her own logic. But that didn’t stop Dorkin giving her his grade one hard-man stare. She tried to face him down, anger beginning to stir. She hated bullies. Starting with her father, she had always hated bullies.
But Dorkin had not finished. “Let me tell you, lady, that assisting a murderer is a very serious offence.”
A murderer? Mullen a murderer? Surely not. She shuddered, but held Dorkin’s gaze. “Am I free to go?” she said after a long pause.
Dorkin nodded. “Please do.” He was suddenly as polite as pie. “This is potentially a murder scene so we don’t want it contaminated. But if you do a runner, make no mistake — we will catch you and we will question you until we get the truth out of you.”
Rose turned and walked away, back towards her car. Fear had been replaced by fury. ‘Lady!’ The word resounded in her head and she felt something not far from hate for Detective Inspector Dorkin.
* * *
Dorkin and Fargo watched Rose Wilby get into her car and drive off down the road in the direction of Wooton.
“So you don’t think she’s involved?” Fargo said.
“No.”
“She likes Mullen.”
“She wouldn’t have come here if she was complicit with his plans. She’s an innocent stooge who’s been taken for a ride.”
“So where’s Mullen?”
“He’ll have an escape route. People like him always do. A fake passport. A boat moored in a marina on the south coast under another name.”
Fargo looked down at his feet because he couldn’t bear to look Dorkin in the eye. It was as if his boss had given up on catching Mullen. Fargo found that deeply disturbing.
“We need to get a marker on his car,” Fargo said. “If he’s heading for the south, he’ll probably have gone down the A34. We’ll soon pick it up.”
“He’s probably changed his car or switched the number plates. He doesn’t strike me as being a stupid criminal.” Dorkin was up to his thighs in his slough of depression.
Fargo pressed on. “There will be evidence in the house. If he’s got a boat, there will be some paperwork somewhere to tell us that.”
“You think he’s going to leave stuff lying around for us to find?”
“He’ll have made a mistake,” Fargo said, trying to sound more confident than he felt. Dorkin’s gloom was infecting him.
“Fat chance.” Dorkin spat into the gravel and pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket. He lit up and sucked in a lungful of smoke before releasing it into the Boars Hill air. He turned towards Fargo. “Well what are you hanging about for then, Sergeant? Get on with it.” And he stamped off down the drive.
* * *
Rose Wilby only decided at the last second to pull into the car-park of the Fox pub. It wasn’t the call of nature which impelled her to do so, even though she did want to go to the toilet. It was more a case of needing to think and a car-park seemed as good a place as any to do so. She switched off the engine, but made no move to get out of the car. Mullen was a murderer? She couldn’t grasp the idea. How could he be? He was too nice. He wasn’t the type. Except, of course, she had never as far as she was aware met a murderer, so how on earth could she know that he wasn’t the type?
Eventually she got out of the car, walked the length of the parking area and entered the pub. She had been here once before. She went to the ladies, did what she needed to, looked with dismay into the mirror and exited. She stopped in the porch, taking advantage of the shade, and rang Mullen’s mobile. It went straight to an answering service. He had turned it off. No surprise there. She was pretty sure that the police could trace you through your mobile nowadays, so it made perfect sense.