Chapter Fifty-three
Gardener and Reilly were on the A65 heading towards the Ross & Sinclair Foundation. After having digested all the information from the incident room, they had only one option: arrest Robert Sinclair.
Dave Rawson had been the final member to join them, and he’d informed them that he’d spoken to the dog-walking couple at the Harrogate Arms. Although they hadn’t remembered all of the registration of the white van, they had supplied the first two letters and numbers.
The husband had also stopped and tried to engage Graham Johnson in conversation about the vehicle that night, because he was currently in the market for one. The dogs had been uneasy around the carpet that Johnson claimed he and his colleague had recently bought and were shoving into the back of the van. He had seemed nervous and unwilling to talk, fidgety, biting his nails. His colleague had remained at the rear of the van without speaking a word. The couple hadn’t been able to describe him.
Gardener had put a marker on the PNC against Sinclair’s vehicle: ‘to be stopped and detained if found.’ The vehicle was also on the ANPR database. A number of the local officers had been posted in and around Bursley Bridge. Before he’d left the station he’d called Sinclair’s housekeeper, but the phone remained unanswered. Staff at the Foundation said he had been there.
He suddenly realized the car was slowing down.
“We’ve got a problem, boss,” said Reilly.
Ahead of them, Gardener noticed three cars parked at the side of the road at odd angles.
Reilly brought their pool car to a stop, and both officers jumped out. As Gardener walked towards the small gathering of motorists, he flashed his warrant card. He glanced past the broken fencing and saw a silver Vauxhall Corsa wrapped around a tree. The front of the car had a huge V-shaped dent going back almost to the dashboard. The wheels were splayed outwards. The windscreen was smashed, the driver’s door open, with a body dangling out of the car.
Gardener’s heart sunk when he saw Gary Close.
Whilst Reilly controlled the crowd and used his phone for back-up and an ambulance, Gardener walked through the fence and over to the body.
He checked for a pulse. Gary Close was dead. His skin was tinged blue, and his swollen tongue lolled out of the right side of his mouth. He was clutching his mobile phone.
“Jesus Christ! What’s happened to him?” asked Reilly, as he joined his SIO.
“I’ve no idea, Sean. It looks to me like he’s suffocated, but how the hell that’s happened is anyone’s guess.”
Reilly glanced past Gardener in the direction of the A65 and the Foundation. “Seems to me like he was driving at high speed. Look at the state of the car. You reckon he’s been to see Sinclair?”
“Probably,” said Gardener. “According to a report earlier, Sinclair was supposed to have been there.”
“I wonder if young Gary here has had an attack of conscience. Maybe he confronted the doc about it all.”
“That would be enough to cause an argument, send tempers flaring.”
“They have a fight, Gary leaves in a rage and doesn’t pay attention to what he’s doing, ends up smashing into a tree.”
“I’d go along with that, Sean, if Gary wasn’t blue. Something’s happened to him. You don’t suffocate without a reason.”
The approaching sirens halted their conversation. Along with an ambulance, Thornton and Anderson arrived in one car, and Fitz in another.
“I might have known you two would be involved,” said Fitz, walking towards them with a case in one hand and wearing an overcoat. “If anyone’s going to disturb me at odd hours, it’s usually you two.”
Fitz glanced at Close. “Oh my word, what’s happened here, then?”
“Why do you always ask us what’s happened?” asked Reilly.
“The Lord only knows. Makes you wonder, doesn’t it? Perhaps it’s a senior moment. I’m sure it will pass.”
“I doubt it.”
Gardener noticed Thornton and Anderson closing off the road with scene tape. Two officers from traffic division had turned up and were helping.
Steve Fenton, the CSM, was the next to arrive. Gardener put on a set of latex gloves, and handed him Gary’s mobile phone as he approached.
“I need the results as fast as possible, Steve.”
“He’s died within the last fifteen minutes,” said Fitz, glancing up at the SIO as he knelt over Gary’s body. “Respiratory failure judging by the colour of his skin.”