A Stranger Death (Ch 10)

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Chapter 10

Soon after Sarah got home, her brother Robert came in from work. Rather than quiz him straightaway, Sarah made him a cup of tea first. When she thought he was relaxed, she broached the subject of the investigation.

"Is there any more news on the case Robert?"

"Not really. The guy died from poisoning, but how it came about has everyone foxed. The murder team have conducted house-to-house enquiries in the area, but no-one seems to know anything about it. They did find one old lady who thinks she saw a big black car pull up outside our house at around 2 am. She thinks two men got out, and it drove away again after just a few minutes. Apparently her dog woke her up wanting to go outside, and she was still half asleep, so no real significance is being attached to the sighting. As the neighbours don't overlook our back garden, no-one could have seen anything unless they came round our back way to look."

"Do they know who he was yet?"

"No. There was no identification in his pockets, and there hasn't been anyone reported missing that matches anything like his description, so I think they are finding it damn nigh impossible to identify him. Neither his fingerprints nor his DNA are on our databases either. They have circulated an artist's drawing to go into shop windows and onto notice boards in the hope that someone will recognise him, but that's drawn a blank so far. I'm quite glad that I'm not involved in the investigation; they seem to have hit a dead end."

"So is this going to end up as an unsolved murder then?"

"It's a bit soon to tell, but it could be. It would help if the team could determine how he got to be at the bottom of our garden. He could have died there I suppose, but it seems more likely that his body was just dumped there, although why our garden was chosen is a total mystery. Why are you asking? How come the sudden interest?"

"No reason really," Sarah hastened to tell him. "It's just that I'm back at work tomorrow and if it's anything like the other day half the village will be expecting me to tell them the latest news."

"Well, be careful what you say. I shouldn't be telling you any of this, although there's nothing in what I've told you that's confidential."

From what Robert was saying it seemed that the police were getting nowhere. If no new evidence turned up, it looked like they would be forced to put the case on the back burner. This made Sarah more nervous about what she and Darren were doing. But she had agreed to give Darren two days and, judging by Robert's summing up of the case, it wouldn't do any harm to keep the police waiting a bit longer. She couldn't wait to see what Darren found out in Exeter tomorrow.

After a short while, Sarah went up to her room and telephoned Darren to tell him what Robert had said. Speaking quietly to make sure she couldn't be overheard, she told him the latest news.

"It seems as though the police are getting nowhere. They still have absolutely no idea who he is and don't seem to have any way of finding out. They've been door-to-door asking if anyone saw anything, but they drew a blank apart from one old lady who thinks she saw two men get out of a car. However, she says the car then drove away again, so that doesn't seem to make much sense. They've handed out some artist's drawings of the dead guy in the hope that someone will recognise him, but no takers so far. It sounds as though the investigation might grind to a halt unless they can uncover anything new."

"Well," said Darren, "perhaps we'll be able to help them out in a couple of days. Who knows where our investigation could lead. If we can just find out who the boxes belong to, that could be the beginning of the end. Come over to the farm tomorrow when you finish work and I'll tell you what I found out in Exeter."

"Will do," replied Sarah, "but you go careful. If those diamonds are the proceeds of a robbery, the owner might not be the only person trying to get them back."

Chapter 11 will be posted tomorrow. Follow me to make sure that you don't miss an episode.