Unreliable Witness (a serialized mystery novel - Part 3)

Meghan stopped thinking about the phone call and Judith. She knew the wrecking Frank was talking about had happened nearly 120 years ago.

‘Last week, Frank?’

‘Yizz.’

It was not unusual for Frank to embellish a bit when he talked, to fill in the odd gap in his long-term memory with authentic sounding stories, but it was not something he did with more recent memories. His recent and short-term memory was normally good. He showed no signs of dementia, which was a blessing. Meghan hoped this wasn’t a sign of things to come.

‘How did you know he was the captain?’

‘From his uniform. Soaked through it were, but I could tell it was not a modern uniform. Different. Not Royal Navy, though. Merchant, I reckon. Too big for him, an’ all.’

Meghan checked her watch. She had at least three other cottages to clean in the area and tomorrow was Saturday, changeover day for four more. That Frank was remembering historic gossip ¬¬¬– there was never any evidence the Mohegan’s captain wasn’t lost with his ship – was not so much the issue as dealing with his feelings in the here and now. Meghan made the time.

‘Did it upset you Frank, seeing someone go past like that?’

‘Only thing upsetting me is these ’ere leaves, falling off the wallpaper an’ landin’ all over the floor. What you are doin’ about them, eh?’

As Frank swept at her feet, Meghan punched in Davey’s number with a certain thumb.

The phone rang in Davey’s pocket just as he was making his way down the slippery, steep scree path to Polpeor Cove, where an early morning surfer had made a grim discovery. He reluctantly let Meghan’s call ring out. Torrential rain over the past two days had made the path more treacherous than usual, but years of playing on these coves and paths meant he was nimble for a man of his size. At his last medical his six feet two frame registered more than the recommended BMI of 25 and since he’d stopped playing rugby for the force, muscle had turned to unwelcome fat. He was also aware his fiftieth birthday loomed on the not-too-distant horizon, and he was moving more slowly these days, even on familiar territory.

By the time Davey had arrived at the top of the cliff, there was already an ambulance and a blue and white parked at the nearest access point to the tiny cove. Davey grimaced as he recognised the vehicle next to it, a short wheelbase Land Rover belonging to someone Davey had once described to Meghan as ‘that bloody posturing Coastguard volunteer.’

Apart from the odd bit of rivalry and banter, relationships between the emergency services were cordial with a shared dedication to ensuring wherever possible the lives and well-being of others. Locals tolerated with good grace the occasional ‘pull up a sandbag’ tale told by a tiddly RNLI volunteer, always appreciating their role and the unpaid risks they took. Anyone questioning those risks needed only to google Penlee Lifeboat. The search engine will immediately bring up the loss with all hands of the Solomon Browne in 1981.

But Davey’s view of the Coastguard was irrationally less tolerant and toward one individual, it bordered on the contemptuous. Gritting his teeth, Davey had marched past the Land Rover with its proliferation of Volunteer Coastguard and Pirate FM stickers and made his way down to the tiny beach below.

As he neared the end of the path that cut through the wind-burnt bracken and the gorse that would soon smell of coconut, he could see a two-person paramedic team standing stock still with their hands on their hips. Opposite them, with not a hair on his well-gelled head stirring in the strong onshore breeze, was Marine and Coastguard Agency volunteer Darren Creasley.

Davey had first knocked heads with Creasley a few years before, when a bunch of youngsters pinched a small petrol engine from a boat locked in a dry mooring and attached it to a homemade raft constructed from empty oil barrels and a wooden pallet. They had been lucky to survive in one piece as the raft rocked and capsized in the swell. Creasley had appointed himself judge and jury and prioritised reading the riot act when the youngsters were more in need of treatment for hypothermia. Davey saw Creasley as all mouth and trousers. Known for setting out his pager dramatically for all to see, he would warn of the possibility it might go off at any minute in which case he would have to dash from the room and make haste to whatever lifesaving emergency that demanded his time and attention. He particularly liked to direct his intimations of derring-do toward any females in the vicinity. It turned Davey’s stomach.

But today, Creasley’s attention was totally absorbed by what lay between him and the two paramedics. Even Davey’s arrival, which usually lifted his nose that bit higher in the air, failed to distract from what transfixed them.

‘All right there?’ Davey queried as he jumped the last three foot onto the soft sand, still sodden from the recent high tide and rain. But there was no response. The attending emergency personnel remained frozen until Davey coughed loudly, and the female paramedic looked up and then toward him. Her face was pale, and her expression bewildered as she stepped aside. Davey followed her gaze as it returned to what lay on the beach at her feet. She looked back at him as if expecting him to have some explanation of what they could see.

Davey didn’t have a clue.

2.

As Judith cruise-controlled her Audi down the A303 she mulled over the conversation she’d had that morning back in Southampton.

‘So, give me three likely causes for a brand-new yacht with state-of-the-art navigation equipment sinking within an hour of launching on her maiden voyage, and on a reef that stands out like several sore thumbs on a piece of coastline with arguably more mapped shipwrecks than anywhere else in the country.’

Judith’s immediate boss did not believe in edging around the subject in hand. ‘Cut to the chase’ was a frequent encouragement in team meetings. In the early days it had caused Judith to feel somewhat intimidated, and she had made her thoughts or findings as brief as possible. It was only after getting to know him better, while working a challenging and more complex case involving cocaine smuggling between the Normandy and Kent coasts she realised he wasn’t asking her to be brief, he was asking her to pull out the key issues and outline them accurately and efficiently without speculation. He wanted hypotheses, not guesswork, evidence not assumptions, and above all, he wanted facts: what happened to whom, why, when and how. Judith quickly realised her boss, Harry Ramsden, was encouraging her to be an honest and effective investigator, and Judith appreciated the respect showed to her. She continued.

‘Human error, mechanical or ambient conditions. Or a combination of,’ she replied. ‘Weather conditions were unexceptional. Visibility was good. According to weather reports from RNAS Culdrose, ‘Wind: Easterly 3-4, Visibility: Fair, Sea State: Moderate’.

‘So, we can discount conditions?’

Judith was not prepared to be pushed on this. Sea conditions could be both predictable and unpredictable; the tabloids love of a freak wave whenever a holidaymaker or fisherman got washed off rocks showed a lack of comprehension of wave states. The popular belief that waves come in sevens, the largest being the last, is a myth, but it serves as a useful reminder that waves vary in size and power; that one litre of water weighs a kilo, and bigger waves can be expected, but not predicted, so to exercise caution and keep a respectable distance from the edge of rock outcrops, harbour walls and shorelines. But people didn’t. The fascination of eing so close to nature in the wild is hypnotic and every year, without fail, causes loss of life.

‘They’re not at the top of my list.’

‘What else?’

‘Systems failure is a distinct possibility. Yes, she was brand spanking new, but does that increase or decrease the likelihood of failure? Newness would lead to thinking decrease, but new also means less tested, maybe. So, something could have failed unexpectedly.’

‘And third?’

A frown creased a furrow between her eyebrows. Something about this case had already nagged at her.

‘Human agency. Accidental or deliberate.’

‘Scuttled for an insurance claim?’

‘That would be one example.’

‘Others?’

‘An open mind –’

‘Is a thing of beauty.’

‘Is a clear channel,’ she corrected.

‘So, you suspect deliberate human agency other than scuttling?

‘It’s a possibility. It will be worth monitoring eBay for the sale of yacht parts.

Harry didn’t disagree.

‘When are you travelling down to Cornwall?’

‘Tomorrow.’

‘Okay. Keep me up to speed. And watch what you say. Everybody knows everybody down there. Two and a half degrees of separation if you’re lucky.’

‘I’ll remember that.’

Judith had been about to leave when Harry had added:

‘And say hello to Andrea Carwinion if you bump into her.’

‘Carwinion?’

‘Coroner. From a family of Cornish Carwinion coroners. Like I said, two and half degrees of separation.’

Judith assured him she would watch her P’s and Q’s, her mind being already halfway down the A30, en route, she hoped, to Meghan’s cottage. Dragging her thoughts back to the present, it occurred to her she had better let Meghan know she was planning to drop in. She flicked the paddle on the steering wheel to switch the radio to phone, then selected Meghan’s number.

Meghan was standing in the middle of Frank’s tiny living room. She’d left a brief message on Davey’s voicemail reassuring him there was nothing to worry about, but could he give her quick ring when he had a minute. Just as she finished, her phone lit up and played the default ring tone she had never found the enthusiasm to change. This time she answered. She loved Judith dearly, maddening as she could be, and in the past, Judith’s warmth and energy had gone a long way to making Meghan smile.

‘Great news isn’t it! I mean, not the accident, obviously. That’s not pleasant news at all. Well, certainly not for whoever was on the yacht. Thirteen of them, apparently. All missing in action. Well, not exactly action, but you know what I mean, terrible for their families, but it’s my case. Lead investigator. You still there, Meghan?’

Meghan looked at Frank, who was still working the large, well-worn yard broom to clear up the leaves he believed he had seen fall from the wallpaper.

‘Yes, I’m here.’

‘It’s been ages. The minute I heard I’d landed the case, I thought, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant chance to catch up with Meghan. I mean, you live so close to where the yacht wrecked. It’s witness statements I’m down for mainly. And the shipyard in Falmouth, you know, where the yacht was built. Have you seen these super-yachts? Top spec. Cost a fortune. Maiden voyage and wrecked. Why? How? Tragic, but fascinating.’

Catch Part 4 on the 1st December 2021!