Page 17 of Murder in Shades of Fire and Ash

“I’ve got nothing to add to my findings about the cause of death,” Hector began, “but I can tell you that Unwin died within a couple of hours of ingesting a meal. Did you find out what he ate and when?”

“Salad, about six o’clock,” Charlie said.

Hector nodded sharply. “That fits.”

“So, some time around eight?” Charlie asked.

“It’s not an exact science, but that’s a good place to start. Any time from when he was last seen alive, until maybe nine or even ten o’clock at a stretch. Does that help?”

Charlie shook his head. “Not really. There’s no chance he died after, say, eleven or midnight?”

When I had Patsy right next to me for several hours.

“Anything is possible. I’m sure we could come up with a plausible scenario for later, but if you want my professional opinion, ten would be the absolute outside.”

With that, Charlie had to be content. Hector Powell’s professional opinion would sway a jury, and Clwyd police treated his findings like the word of God. If Hector said Unwin was dead by ten, he was going to have to look harder for evidence to exonerate Patsy. Or, and he heard Ravensbourne’s voice in his head:to convict her.Not a thought he planned to share with anyone else.

On the drive home,Charlie updated Ravensbourne on the post mortem, and in her turn she told him of their inability to discover anything about the elusive Jeff Britton, even though she had requisitioned Will Wayward’s help. Then there was a pause.

“Boss?” Charlie said. And it came back to him. “The right-wing nutters. I owe you an apology, Boss.” He heard the unmistakeable sound of Ravensbourne lighting a cigarette.

“You certainly do, DS Rees, but given the circumstances, I’m prepared to let it go, just this once.”

But there was no anger in her voice.

“Did they turn up? The nutters, I mean,” he asked.

Ravensbourne exhaled loudly. “They did. About fifteen of them. With placards. They told the uniformed PC that they intended to march to Llanfair Holiday Park to make their point. He wished them well, and advised them to take plenty of water, as it was quite a long walk.”

Charlie couldn’t help his snort of mirth. “How far did they get?”

“Who knows? Who cares? Seriously, I think they made it to the supermarket car park by the river, and then packed it in. No one in the town took any notice of them. We sent a patrol car with a couple of specials to drive along the route, and they didn’t see anyone except holidaymakers. No doubt they are claiming a great victory on social media. Now go home, have something to eat, a decent night’s sleep and I’ll be over first thing.”

“I was going back to the station,” he said.

“No, you’re going home, and that’s an order. No more work tonight, it’s too bloody hot.”

The car’s air-conditioning had been keeping the heat at bay, but as soon as Charlie parked and stepped outside, it hit him anew, despite the darkening sky. The air felt thick, as if the pressure was building, pressing down on the town and its surrounding hills. The knowledge that sooner or later it would break and there would be a storm didn’t help. Everyone wanted to keep the sunshine; they got little enough of it, but this enveloping heat was becoming too much. From the back of the house, Charlie heard voices and the play of water from a hosepipe as Tom watered the garden. One of the voices was Patsy’s. He let himself into the house, dropped his keys and phone into the dish on the hall table and walked through the kitchen to the back garden.

No way should she be here.

But here she was, sitting on their garden bench, looking down at her knees, next to Tom. The hosepipe poured water onto a bed of courgettes and tomatoes. Tom saw him first.

“Charlie,” he called, and to Charlie’s mind, there was an element of desperation in his voice. Patsy looked up and Charlie knew he wouldn’t be sending her away, even though that was the right thing to do. Her face was swollen and red from weeping, and her posture, always so perfect, had turned to that of an ancient rag doll. Her blonde hair was pulled back into a tired pony tail, and her clothes were limp, hanging on her as if she had lost half her body weight overnight.

Tom stood up. “I’ll make a drink and some food.” With that he disappeared into the house.

Patsy turned to Charlie. “I know I shouldn’t be here, but I couldn’t not come. I can’t talk to Eddy, and Mags has the baby … I have to know what’s happening. Please.” She couldn’t seem to stop the tears beginning again, though from the state of her face, she must have been crying continuously since he saw her last.

Charlie took her hand and held it between his own. “I’ll tell you what I can, but I can’t compromise the investigation, and none of it will bring him back.”

Patsy nodded. He saw there was a box of tissues from the house on the bench beside her. “I just need to know.” She took a tissue and mopped her face. “I can’t stop seeing him lying there.”

Nor could Charlie. “All I can tell you is that he wouldn’t have known what happened, and that he was almost certainly murdered, not long after he left Dylan’s house yesterday evening. I don’t know what he was doing in the shop, or who else was there. I don’t know who set the fire, and I don’t know who the fire officer was who showed us up there.”

“Everyone thinks it was me who killed him,” Patsy said. “DI Ravensbourne, the Chief Super, Unwin’s vile sister and probably the rest of his family. But Ididn’t.I didn’t know he was inLlanfair. I thought he was with Dylan. I wasworking. Unwin knew I was working, and anyway, he was supposed to be withDylan.”

“So, you didn’t hear from Unwin at all yesterday?”

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