Particular Stupidities (The Romney And Marsh Files Book 5) Read online

  Particular Stupidities

  The Fifth Romney and Marsh File

  Oliver Tidy

  Copyright 2015 Oliver Tidy

  Find me at http://olivertidy.wordpress.com/

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please download an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any persons without the permission of the author.

  Oliver Tidy has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  ***

  This Romney and Marsh File is dedicated to the primary school teachers of the world.

  ***

  The Romney and Marsh Files now number five. They don’t have to be read in order; they do all work as stand-alone novels. However, to get the most out of each it is recommended that they are consumed in the order in which they were prepared, a bit like the courses of a good meal. (Who wants to eat ice-cream before a bowl of soup?)

  The first R&M File, Rope Enough, is permanently free to download as a try before you buy offer.

  Here are the books of the series in order with their Amazon.co.uk links.

  #1 Rope Enough http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enough-Romney-Marsh-Files-ebook/dp/

  #2 Making a Killing http://www.amazon.co.uk/Making-Killing-Romney-Marsh-ebook/dp/

  #3 Joint Enterprise http://www.amazon.co.uk/Joint-Enterprise-Romney-Marsh-ebook/dp/

  #4 A Dog’s Life http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dogs-Life-Romney-Marsh-Files-ebook/dp/

  #5 Particular Stupidities

  ***

  Table of Contents

  Chapter1 Chapter2 Chapter3 Chapter4 Chapter5 Chapter6 Chapter7 Chapter8

  Chapter9 Chapter10 Chapter11 Chapter12 Chapter13 Chapter14 Chapter15

  Chapter16 Chapter17 Chapter18 Chapter19 Chapter20 Chapter21 Chapter22

  Chapter23 Chapter24 Chapter25 Chapter26 Chapter27 Chapter28

  1

  Detective Inspector Romney glared at his mobile phone, swore, reached over and answered it.

  ‘Evening, guv. Sorry to bother you.’

  The nasal-sounding duty officer at Dover police station hadn’t relished calling and making himself unpopular by association for spoiling Romney’s Saturday night.

  Romney grunted and awaited the bad news – they wouldn’t be ringing him to see how his weekend was going.

  ‘A body’s been found at Dover and District Self-Storage.’

  ‘A dead body?’

  ‘Yes, guv.’

  Romney exhaled audibly. ‘Bollocks. Final starts in an hour.’

  ‘X-Factor?’

  ‘Do me a favour. Champions League.’

  ‘Sorry. Seems death isn’t recent, just recently discovered.’

  Romney tutted and swung his legs down from the sofa. Stifling a yawn, he said, ‘Anyone we know? One of the Holloways, maybe?’

  ‘No one’s saying so, guv.’

  ‘What are they saying?’

  ‘Not to go up there without vapour rub.’

  Romney let out a deep breath of lager fumes, stir-fried chicken and frustration. He’d been looking forward to the climax of the European season. His soldiers were nicely chilled – labels front – and his bowls of crisps and salted peanuts were already organised, awaiting the whistle that would kick off his snacking.

  ‘Call DS Marsh. Ruin her Saturday night. Tell her to meet me there.’

  ‘Right you are, guv.’

  The duty officer replaced the handset thinking it could have gone worse.

  Scowling, Romney heaved himself up off the sofa, turned to his company and said, ‘Sorry, love. I thought it was too good to last.’

  ‘Work?’

  Romney nodded.

  ‘On a Saturday night?’

  ‘Afraid so. Enjoy the game.’

  He could tell she wasn’t happy. He risked kissing the top of her head and went to get changed.

  *

  DS Marsh was home alone. She’d been curled up on her sofa in front of the telly long enough to have radiated a cosy warmth through the cover she’d draped over herself. Her hot drink was finished and she was feeling like having a bath before calling it a night. Tomorrow promised to be a taxing day.

  Ordinarily the phone call from the station would have irritated her with its timing, but on this occasion the reverse was true. Was she going to be handed a perfect excuse for cancelling Sunday’s plans at the last minute?

  *

  Dover and District Self-Storage – or D&DSS, as they liked to abbreviate themselves – was run by the Holloway brothers: Buddy and Elvis – non-identical twins. They had inherited the business from their father. He’d originally started up a scrap metal business and had done well for himself in a Darling Buds of May kind of way.

  With the scrap business doing nicely, Billy Holloway had looked to other baskets for his nest eggs. He’d seen a gap in the self-storage market – somewhere between budget and no questions asked. He’d bought the field next door, acquired a dozen containers and let them out for cash by the month.

  For some, it was all they could afford for legitimate storage in times of need and cash flow problems. For others, D&DSS was a blind eye that gave them the opportunity to satisfy their needs without the complications of paperwork, inspections, accountability and large deposits.

  By daylight, the field was strewn with rubbish, discarded and broken things and the odd vehicle in varying stages of decay. Where there were no storage units or car carcasses rotting into the land, nettles, weeds and brambles thrived, checked only by the wandering ponies and the odd goat – creatures that were encouraged to wander freely in exchange for the management’s expectation that they would contribute to the upkeep of the place, if not its reputation. By night the place was much the same, although in the dark it was harder to be appalled.

  The shipping container at the centre of everyone’s attention was one of several randomly placed, rusting and rotting metal boxes of varying cubic capacities that littered the field, which was hemmed in on all sides by thick hedges. From the air the place looked like a giant toddler had lost his temper with his Duplo.

  At least it hadn’t rained for a while; the ground was firm and dry. In fact, the weather had been clement for a good few weeks, something that had contributed to the advanced state of putrefaction of the corpse.

  As Romney bounced his car over the uneven field on his way to the bright lights he was glad to see that those who needed to be there were already in place and going about their business. There was something almost comforting for him in turning up to even the most horrific of crime scenes to see that order had once again been established out of chaos. Being among the first to attend scenes of violent crime – before the rest of the circus had arrived – was not something he enjoyed. The ugliness, the horrors and the brutal effects of physics and matter and wicked thoughts crossing paths at high speed were often exaggerated for him by the absence of the system. They generally stayed with him a lot longer too.

  Romney parked, stubbed out his cigarette in the car’s ashtray, stuffed some gum into his mouth and got out.

  He immediately noticed the lack of human noise. Banter among the troops was something that could usually be counted on at remote crime scenes. The chatter was a way to deal with it. The quiet h
inted at something particularly unpleasant.

  He smelled the cloying stench of rotting meat hanging on the still night air. Romney was reminded of the vapour rub that he’d left in the car and stopped walking. If it was that bad from a distance, it had the potential to make him physically sick close up.

  He turned abruptly and almost collided with DS Marsh.

  ‘Evening, sir.’

  ‘Joy.’

  They were standing on the periphery of the temporary light source that had been rigged up. Romney caught a whiff of menthol. He noticed the gleam of smeared vapour rub on her top lip, like a child with a snotty nose. She had her hand in her bag. When she brought it out she was holding a little jar of the stuff. She offered it to him and he accepted it without comment.

  As he was plastering it generously across his top lip and around his nostrils, a series of bright flashes inside the container took their attention. They made Romney think of someone welding in there.

  Romney didn’t particularly want to get any closer. But it would look bad all round if he kept his distance. His was a leading-by-example rank.

  He pulled his handkerchief out of his pocket, held it tightly to his nose and walked into the light.

  He saw that most of those present wore disposable masks that covered the lower halves of their faces. It was another explanation for the lack of chatter.

  The nearer they got the stronger became the smell of menthol until it was almost enough to compete with the reek of the decomposing body. Almost.

  Romney and Marsh stopped short of the container’s open doors as the local pathologist, Maurice Wendell, stepped through them and into the night. Wendell wore a disposable crime scene suit, a disposable face mask and a matching close-fitting cap. Were it not for his instantly recognisable bag he could have been anyone.

  Romney gave him a little wave and Wendell changed direction to meet them.

  They said their hellos.

  ‘I see you’ve come prepared,’ said Wendell, indicating the vapour rub. ‘That’s good. It’ll help a little.’

  ‘What have we got to look forward to?’ said Romney.

  ‘If you mean generally, Tom, that’s rather a deep question for a Saturday night,’ said Wendell. ‘If you mean in there,’ he gestured towards the metal box, ‘young adult male at a guess. Decay is advanced, as anyone without a head-cold could tell you from a hundred paces.’

  ‘How long’s it been in there?’ said Romney.

  ‘Hard to be precise just now with the condition of the body. Weeks at least.’

  Romney turned to Marsh and said, ‘Do we have any MisPer males that would fit that?’

  She shook her head. ‘Can’t think of one.’

  Romney breathed out heavily through his nose.

  Wendell said, ‘As soon as I have something definite to tell you, Tom, I’ll be in touch. I’ll get on to it in the morning.’

  ‘You know it’s Sunday tomorrow?’

  ‘I do. Conference in Brighton for three days starting Monday. I’m sure you’d like me to get this out of the way before then.’

  ‘Another knees-up at the taxpayers’ expense?’

  ‘Fingers crossed,’ said Wendell.

  Romney thanked the pathologist and he and DS Marsh continued on to the wide open double doors of the brightly lit shipping container. Neither officer was encouraged to enter. Not only would it mean the bother of suiting up in crime scene outfits but it was cramped in there with people and junk and there wouldn’t be anything more to see.

  They were watching in silence when Superintendent Vine arrived. The fairly new station chief and DI Romney had not got off to the best of starts. They had crossed swords and words within hours of the astonishingly red-headed Vine – a woman who put Romney in mind of Boudicca of the Iceni – taking over from the long-serving and easier going Superintendent Falkner.

  Vine was a far more visible station chief than her predecessor. And far more ambitious. She would often turn up in CID unannounced and was fond of surprising her officers in the field, management tactics that Bob Falkner had not often seen the need for.

  ‘Good evening, Tom, Joy.’

  They chorused their ma’ams.

  ‘A dead body.’ said Vine.

  ‘Yes, ma’am. A dead body.’ said Romney. ‘Until the pathologist has done his bit that’s all we’ve got.’

  ‘Identification?’

  Marsh thought she caught the sound of grinding teeth.

  Romney said, ‘Apparently not, ma’am.’

  Boudicca grunted and took a handkerchief from her bag. She put it to her face giving off a waft of an expensive fragrance. ‘Please keep me informed. For now, I’ll leave you to it.’ She moved off in the direction of some uniforms to bother.

  Romney waited for Vine to get out of earshot before saying, ‘Let’s go and speak to the management. See what they can tell us.’

  A uniformed policewoman was waiting outside the converted container that served as the site office. Buddy and Elvis were in there with an older rheumy-eyed man. Romney recognised him as a member of the Holloway clan. Romney entered without knocking. Marsh followed him in. The air was thick with smoke and even though Romney was a smoker he didn’t like it. The men stopped speaking abruptly.

  Although twins, the Holloway brothers were very different in appearance. Buddy was tall and broad with thick, short-cropped dark hair. He showed a few days of stubble. His eyes were large, brown and well spaced apart. He would have been almost handsome but for his horribly broken nose. It was obvious that he was a naturally strong man. Elvis was three-quarters the height of his brother and about half his weight. He was thin, with small, deep-set eyes. His facial features were slightly skewed, making him look like he’d been squashed in his mother’s womb by his bigger sibling. Elvis was the meaner of the two and the smarter.

  ‘Detective Inspector Romney,’ said Elvis. ‘Nice of you to turn up. Long time no see.’

  Romney said, ‘Elvis, Buddy. Not long enough. Who’s this?’

  ‘Uncle Len,’ said Elvis. ‘He often does the night shift for us.’

  ‘I’m sure you remember DS Marsh. Are you going to get us some chairs?’

  The three men were sitting in plastic seats around a battered desk.

  ‘We haven’t got any other chairs,’ said Buddy. Like the rest of the conversation it was not said unpleasantly.

  Romney said, ‘Surely you don’t expect us to stand.’

  After a moment’s hesitation, Buddy stood and kicked Uncle Len’s chair to get him up too. He brought the chairs around, set them down and went to lean against the wall behind Elvis, one elbow resting on a dented metal filing cabinet. Uncle Len perched on an upturned beer crate.

  Romney made himself comfortable. ‘Thank you. Who found the body?’

  ‘We did,’ said Buddy. ‘Me and Elvis.’

  ‘Behind on the rent, were they?’

  ‘We’re not a charity, Mr Romney,’ said Buddy. ‘We’re running a business here and we’ve got families to feed.’

  Elvis said, ‘Punters know the rules. It’s in the agreement.’

  ‘Don’t tell me you have paperwork these days,’ said Romney, trying to look astonished.

  Buddy smiled. ‘Verbal agreement, Mr Romney.’

  ‘Tell me what happened then.’

  Elvis said, ‘Couple of the dogs starting making a right old fuss outside the container. Couldn’t shut them up. Thought we should take a look. Make sure everything was all right. There was a nasty smell around. When we got the door open that turned into a proper stink. Nearly had my fish and chips up.’

  ‘Funny time of the week to be exercising your managerial rights, isn’t it?’ said Romney.

  ‘When you’re in business for yourself, Mr Romney, you’re always on duty,’ said Elvis.

  ‘Hilarious. Go on.’

  ‘When we opened the door, the smell… it was like a wall. We had to back off for a bit. Give it a bit of an airing, like. We thought it was probably a fox or cat or so
mething had got itself shut up in there and died. When we took a gander we couldn’t see anything obvious like that. We found the chest freezer. The lid was open. I shone the torch in it.’

  After a long quiet pause, Romney said, ‘And?’

  ‘Haven’t you seen it?’ said Buddy.

  ‘I want to know what you saw,’ said Romney.

  ‘A body. A body wrapped in plastic sheeting.’

  ‘Did you touch it?’

  ‘You must be kidding. Neither of us hung about.’

  ‘How could you be sure it was a body?’

  ‘To be honest, I couldn’t have sworn it was a body. I just got a glimpse, something with hair and teeth that was too big for a cat or a dog.’

  ‘So you called the police?’

  Buddy nodded. ‘Now we know it was a body.’

  Romney said, ‘Who rents that unit?’

  Elvis made a face. ‘That’s the thing, see, Mr Romney. It’s the school next door.’

  *

  Romney and Marsh were back outside. They’d found a bit of room for themselves. Romney lit up and checked his watch. ‘We’ll have a number on file for them. Find it out will you.’

  ‘Don’t all schools have an emergency contact number on the school sign? Or at least the caretaker’s number.’

  ‘Tut tut, Sergeant, they’re called site managers these days. Good point, though. And it’ll probably end up being quicker. Fancy a stroll? Shouldn’t take more than a couple of minutes there and back.’

  To Marsh, it wasn’t a question. It was her senior officer telling her to run along and take a look and then come and find him with the number. And so she was pleasantly surprised when she realised that Romney had fallen into step beside her. She hadn’t found very appealing the idea of stumbling around alone in the dark in an uneven field in the middle of nowhere – a place littered with all sorts of rusting hazards and brambles – and then finding her way up the narrow unlit country lane to search for the school board.