‘No, of course not. I’m not Daniel Burgess. What is this?’
‘And so this isn’t your birth certificate either?’ he said. The name appearing on that was Daniel Burgess too.
‘I’ve no idea what all this is about. Has someone been trying to steal my identity?’
‘Or someone’s been trying to create a new one. Interestingly the real Daniel Burgess has been dead twenty-five years. These were found in the flat where we discovered the murdered woman. And one last thing…’ he turned to Styles who up till this point hadn’t said a word.
‘You’re a photographer,’ DI Styles noted. His voice was crisper, more incisive. Like he was in a hurry to get to wherever he was going.
‘So I already said.’
‘We found two of your framed, limited edition prints in one of the rooms. Bought from Foster Specialist Art Galleries. Seems you have a real fan.’
‘This is getting weird,’ said Gareth.
‘Very. You knocked over a young woman in the lane not far from your cottage, is that right? A day or so before you discovered the symbol on the wall.’
‘Yes. I gave a statement to the police.’ An officer came from behind and placed a glass of water on the table. Gareth picked it up and drank the lukewarm contents, glad of the relief on his parched throat. ‘You think the two are connected?’
‘You’d never met her before?’ said Styles. He replied no. ‘Did she give you her name? I understand you visited her at the hospital.’
‘I wanted to check on her,’ he said. ‘I wanted to check she was OK. I was worried I’d done something terrible.’ He hesitated. ‘She never told me her name,’ he lied. He felt himself heat up because of it. What was he doing? Lying to the police!
‘Did she tell you anything about herself, anything at all?’
‘Do you think she has something to do with the murder in Manchester?’
‘Please answer the question,’ said Styles. ‘Did she tell you anything about herself?’
‘No, not really.’
‘No not really, or simply no?’
‘No.’
‘Describe her.’
He did so, but remained deliberately vague about the description. ‘She looked scared though, as if she were on the run from someone. That was my first impression.’
Styles glanced down at his notes. ‘It says in your statement that someone had been snooping around your car on the night of the accident. Did you see anyone?’
He said no. ‘I thought I heard someone outside the car, thought I saw a shadow, footprints in the snow, but now I can’t be sure. Maybe I made them myself; I panicked, because I thought I’d done real damage to her.’ He took another swig and drained the glass. ‘Is she in some kind of trouble?’
‘We don’t know, Mr Davies,’ said Styles. He went on to ask where he was during a range of dates and times. Gareth managed with difficulty to provide an answer for the majority.
‘Am I a suspect?’ he asked.
‘There’s definitely something strange going on, Mr Davies,’ said Stafford. ‘But don’t worry you’re not being charged or anything.’ He smiled but Gareth wasn’t put at ease.
Just when he thought the questioning was drawing to a close they went over the same things, framed differently each time but designed, he thought, to trip him up. Another hour later he was beginning to feel the stress, his head crackling with pain, his body telling him he needed sleep. It had turned into a very long day.
It was during the final stage that Gareth inadvertently gave away the fact that he was in possession of Erica’s box of jewellery. As soon as he let it slip he cursed to himself.
‘You never mentioned this before,’ said Stafford, his eyes suddenly alight with the thrill of a new chase.
‘I didn’t think it important,’ he said lamely.
‘Where is this box now?’ he asked him. ‘And what did you intend doing with this jewellery, Mr Davies?’
‘I guess I was holding onto it in case she came back.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s back at the cottage.’
‘Holding onto it… I guess you were,’ he said. ‘You weren’t withholding information, of course.’
‘As far as I know it was a box belonging to a young woman, that’s all. Now she’s a young woman involved in something dodgy, according to you.’
‘Perhaps she is. We don’t know yet, Mr Davies. But we’d like to see this box.’
‘You weren’t planning to use the jewellery for your own ends by any chance?’ asked Styles.
‘Of course not!’ Gareth burst. ‘What are you suggesting? I’d have probably handed it over to the police eventually!’
‘Probably,’ echoed Styles.
‘Had I known there might be a connection with this Manchester thing then I wouldn’t have hesitated.’
‘Well it could be stolen,’ said Stafford. ‘A boxful of jewellery is rather suspicious. And you must contact us immediately if this woman turns up again.’
Gareth nodded dumbly. ‘One more thing which might not be important and I don’t want to sound paranoid. There’s this man; I think he’s been following me,’ he said. ‘An American or Canadian, don’t know which. He was asking about the woman at the hospital and apparently he turned up in my village looking for me.’
Styles cocked his head. ‘Can you describe him?’
He did so, as much as he could remember. ‘Seems you can recall him better than the young woman,’ noticed Stafford.
‘One of those things, I guess,’ said Gareth tiredly. ‘He was quite distinctive.’
Then it was all over. They reminded him to contact them if the woman or this man turned up again. They’d be round soon to collect the box of jewellery and run some forensic tests on the symbol. He was driven home, totally hollowed out and exhausted.
Things couldn’t get any worse, he thought.
22
The trail went cold.
Weeks passed. She never came back. Not that there ever was a trail. Erica disappeared as readily as she’d entered his life. He had nothing to go on. A first name. He didn’t even have a surname. And there was a chance even Erica might be false. He refused to believe it, of course. He hung onto the notion that he had a sister like a dying man hangs onto his last breath. The forensics team descended, scraped off slivers of black paint from his wall, took fibres from the carpet, dusted for prints, and looked a little displeased he’d attempted to paint over the symbol. They made a mess of the wall by the time they’d chipped away at it. They shook their heads when he told them he’d cleaned the carpet of muddy footprints ages ago.
Clive Foster contacted him the day after he’d been hauled in by the police. ‘I say, you’re not in trouble are you?’ he asked. ‘Only I had the law around here asking about your prints, who bought them, that kind of thing.’
‘So who bought them?’ said Gareth, intrigued.
‘I checked the edition numbers and it turns out those were the ones sold on the night of the exhibition to the woman claiming to be your sister. You remember, the rather attractive one I told you about? Didn’t take an address or anything for the receipt.’
‘Did you tell the police that she claimed to be my sister?’
‘I told them she seemed to act a little strange and left it at that. Not a fan of the police, old man; bad for business having them sniff around. This isn’t going to get to be a habit is it? Only I have my business to think about. You know how it is. Some of my wealthier clients, let’s say they’re particularly edgy when the law gets involved.’
‘Clive, I haven’t had so much as a speeding ticket before now. I hardly think you and your wallet need worry over this.’
‘A relief, old man. Strange, though, I had this Canadian guy in the gallery asking about the same set of prints a while before the police. He was interested in knowing all about you.’
Gareth frowned. ‘Canadian, you say?’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘Middle-aged, grey hair, nice teeth?’
‘You know him?
‘I’m getting to know him better than I’d like,’ he replied. ‘What happened?’