Read Witchmoor Edge for Free Online Page A

constable to
help her through it. We'll also need a signed statement. I'll type
up this little lot and she can check it and sign it at the same
time."
    Barry Musworth just nodded, so Tommy made a
note of the phone number and Barry let him out in silence.
     
    Detective Constable Gary Goss was making
heavy weather of Joe Davis. It wasn't that he was elusive or
reluctant to talk, more that he rambled off on irrelevant side
roads of thought and reminiscence. Moreover, he had actually seen
very little and reports from both DS Gibbs and the Fire Brigade had
already covered everything Joe knew.
    The one possible exception to that was a
remark that he had seen two or three youths on the concrete quay
below the boarded warehouse, now a ruin. He was not sure when - the
last week or two was the best he could manage - or how often - more
than once was a bit vague.
    DC Goss put that in his report to be included
in the statement, but it was probably unimportant and might well
refer to a quite different bunch of youths.
     
    As he was pretty well next door to the
Sansoms's flat, Tommy knocked at that door as well. The contrast
with the Musworth's was considerable. Mrs. Sansom was a big woman
of Afro-Caribbean extraction and a girl of about five came to the
door with her mother. She stood cautiously eying Tommy and sucking
her thumb.
    Tommy was more sensitive than a lot of
officers to how intimidated by the police black Britons can be and
how this often manifests itself as surly and suspicious, so put on
his best smile and said politely, "I'm sorry to bother you, but I
need to speak to Wayne. He was with a boy who was pulled out of the
canal drowned and I was sort of hoping he might be able to throw
some light on it."
    "Wayne's not been around since Saturday
night." She sounded alarmed. "It wasn't him that fell in the canal
was it? He never was no good at swimming"
    That, thought Tommy, might be why he had
tried to escape the fire without jumping in the water. He kept his
thoughts to himself, however.
    "It was a white boy fell in the canal," he
said. "We think it was young Kevin Musworth."
    "Oh my gawd," Mrs. Sansom said. "They was
together on Saturday night. Wayne don't usually cause me no trouble
and he hadn't never stayed away from home like this. You don't
think he's hiding?"
    Tommy was pretty certain Wayne had died in
the fire and he knew he'd have to break the news to her sometime.
This, however, was not the moment.
    I don't think so," he said. "I'd better get a
search started for him though. Do you have a photograph."
    "There's the photo he had took the last term
at school," Mrs. Sansom said. "You can only borrow it though. I
want it back."
    DC. Hammond felt sure this fairly pleasant
looking boy, now only a year or so older, was the body from the
burnt out ruin. He knew he was only postponing the moment of grief
for the Sansom family, but let them learn the truth as gently as
possible. Not that it was a very gentle truth.
    But what had Kevin Musworth, Wayne Sansom and
John Koswinski been doing in the boarded up warehouse, and where
did Simon Hunter come into it. Perhaps Millicent Hampshire had some
idea. His boss was a smart cookie, when it came to detective work,
and not bad as a boss either.
     
    Goss and Hammond typed up their various
reports and the statements for signing and arranged for a
switchboard operator to call up both Joe Davis and Mrs. Evans in
the morning. He also asked for someone from the uniformed branch to
pick up Mrs. Musworth and get her to identify Kevin's body. Lucy
Turner arrived back at the station to type up Mrs. Hunter's
statement. Tommy, on the other hand, rushed off to keep a date.
    That young man, Millicent thought, was a nice
catch for some young lady, but he wouldn't be easily caught. He was
tall and sturdy, always immaculately groomed and dressed and really
quite handsome. He was, however, always rushing off to see some
woman, and she had a feeling it was a different one each time.
    Millicent herself