Blood on the Cowley Road (DI Susan Holden 1)

It was about 10.45 on Thursday evening when Peter Mellor slipped out of Mill View Cottage in the village of Iffley, jogged gingerly down the hill with Gemma, his boxer dog, at his heel, and walked over the weir bridge. The two of them followed the narrow path as it swung sharply to the right, burrowing its way between the dark trees until it brought them to the big double lock gates. For two or three minutes, the man stood in the middle of those gates, looking down river into the blackness, where the Thames disappeared towards Sandford, and remembering a woman he had once known. Then, with a sigh, he turned round, called his dog, and started to retrace his steps along the path to the weir bridge. There he stopped, aware that Gemma was no longer with him. He whistled, then called her sharply by name. Gemma barked, once, then again and again. But she was not, as the man had thought, trailing behind him. She had, in fact, already crossed back over the weir bridge, and was perched on the edge of the bank, barking down into the shadows where the cold water spat and hissed.

‘What’s up, girl?’ the man asked, but the dog merely barked again. The man walked to where she was and looked down to see if he could see what she could see, but the darkness was intense and unforgiving. Only as his eyes grew accustomed to the lack of light did the shape that was attracting the attention of his dog became apparent: a circular object that bobbed around on the surface of the water. ‘It’s only a ball!’ the man said to his dog, trying to reassure himself as much as the distressed old bitch. ‘Let’s just leave it.’ But then suddenly whatever it was that had been anchoring the object in the swirling current released its restraining grip. With a violent jerk, a man’s body leapt up vertically out of the water causing Peter Mellor to shriek and his dog to yelp. For several moments it appeared to stand miraculously there on the water, before – almost in slow motion – it began to pirouette round like some grotesque ballet dancer. Finally it teetered, first backwards, then more savagely forward as it crashed face down into the darkness below. As one, the watching man and the watching dog turned and fled back up the hill towards Mill View Cottage.

At 8.45 the following morning, Detective Constable Wilson tapped on Detective Inspector Holden’s half-open door.

‘Morning Guv,’ he said tentatively.

‘What time of day do you call this?’ Holden asked waspishly, without looking up.

‘Sorry, Guv. I overslept.’

‘And where the hell is Fox?’

‘He had a dentist appointment first thing,’ he said defensively. ‘Broke a tooth yesterday,’ Wilson elaborated. ‘He was in a lot of pain.’

‘Well, that’s a bloody fine bit of timing,’ Holden responded without sympathy.

‘Yes, Guv,’ said the hapless Wilson, still standing there half in the room and half out, and wondering what the hell had happened to make the DI so sharp.

Finally, she looked up and locked eyes with him. ‘We have another dead body, Wilson,’ she said. ‘Fished out of the river at Iffley lock last night.’

Wilson’s thoughts at that moment should have been straightforward, curious, and focused directly on this news. And to give him credit he asked the obvious question: ‘Do we know who it is?’ But it was the first time he had been on his own with Holden, and the scrutiny he suddenly found himself under from her caused his thoughts to be anything but straightforward. He hoped it didn’t show.

‘Oh, yes,’ Holden said with a thin smile. ‘We do indeed. The gentleman concerned had a wallet stuffed full of ID information. Debit card, credit card, library card, Blockbuster card. You name it, he had it. Very helpful was our Jake Arnold.’

‘Jake Arnold?’ Wilson’s whole face seemed to gape in surprise. ‘Shit!’

Holden smiled, pleased at the affect her piece of news had had on the young man. ‘As you so delicately put it, Constable,’ said Holden. ‘Shit!’

Ted Smith was a big man, with thinning grey hair and sideburns that might once possibly have looked trendy in the valleys of Wales, but not within recent memory. He had a stomach which betrayed a fondness for too much of his own beer, and a rather melodious, deep voice which took Holden quite by surprise. ‘I’ve been expecting you lot,’ he said, as he showed them into the Iffley Inn.

‘We just need to ask you a few questions,’ Holden said. ‘Purely routine.’

‘Of course,’ he said eagerly. ‘Fire away.’

‘I understand the dead man had been in the pub. Perhaps you can tell us what you can remember about his visit.’

‘Well, let’s see. He came in about nine-ish. It was very quiet, don’t you see, what with it being this time of year and a Thursday. So I was quite glad to see a new face. Hoped he might become a regular.’

‘So you hadn’t seen him before?’

‘No, I don’t think so. We’ve only been here three months, you know. Anyway, I pulled him a pint, and we exchanged a bit of football chat. His hat and scarf were in the Oxford United colours, so we talked about how rubbish they’ve been playing recently. Then Mick – he’s one of my regulars – wanted another pint, so I had to deal with him and this boyo went and read the paper over there in the corner. Ten or fifteen minutes later he bought another pint, then he started chatting to this Yank tourist who had had a meal, and next thing was he was showing him how to play bar billiards. They mus

t have had a couple of games, then the Yank said he had to be going, but he bought him a pint. So he sat drinking it over with the papers again. Then – I guess it must have been about ten o’clock – he brought his glass up to the bar, and I thought he wanted another pint, but he just wrapped his scarf round his neck, pulled his hat down tight on his head, and walked off without so much as a “Goodnight”.’

‘Did he eat while he was here?’ Holden asked.

‘No, only a bag of pork scratchings. I remember because he wanted a second packet, but we’d run out.’

‘Did he appear to be OK? I mean, some people hold their drink better than others.’

Ted Smith rubbed his unshaven cheeks while he pondered this question. ‘He seemed all right,’ he said finally. ‘I mean, he managed to play bar billiards without any problems. I keep an eye open for people who look like they might damage the baize, but he was fine. It was the Yank I was more concerned about. He looked as though he had never picked up a cue in his life.’

‘So what happened after he left?’

‘Well, we closed at the normal time. There was only Mick and a group of students left – it was bloody quiet really – and after a bit of tidying up, I went outside for a bit of fresh air and a fag, and that was when I saw all the lights up near the lock. So I walked up there and saw them pulling this body out of the water by the weir, and I noticed he was wearing a striped scarf. His hat was missing, but I was pretty damn sure he was the bloke in the pub, so I told one of the coppers there.’

‘How come you were so sure?’ Holden asked. ‘Lot’s of people must wear Oxford United scarves round here.’