The Footprints of the Fiend

  Title Page

  THE FOOTPRINTS OF THE FIEND

  By

  William Stafford

  Publisher Information

  Published in 2013 by Andrews UK Limited

  www.andrewsuk.com

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published, and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  The characters and situations in this book are entirely imaginary and bear no relation to any real person or actual happening.

  Copyright © William Stafford 2013

  The right of William Stafford to be identified as author of this book has been asserted in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyrights Designs and Patents Act 1988

  1.

  “And stay out!”

  The landlord of the Barge Inn gave the drunk another shove for good measure. The quicker this nuisance was away from the premises the better. Business would not suffer; this particular berk did most of his drinking before he even set foot in the bar and then would nurse half a pint of mild all night, pestering the other patrons to keep him topped up. No, Andy Adams considered, I don’t need the likes of him in my pub.

  The nuisance collided with a folding sign that advertised ‘pub grub’. The sign collapsed and the drunkard along with it. Adams swore and went back indoors where the nicer people were waiting to be served.

  Desmond Smith’s drunken state meant he was unable to feel injuries to anything other than his pride; he extricated himself from the sign, kicking it away and yelping as though he was being attacked by a Punch and Judy crocodile. He managed to get himself reasonably vertical. The lights from the pub windows seemed to be spinning like a Ferris wheel. Desmond Smith found the contents of his stomach swishing around in sympathy with this display. But he would never throw up; he considered that a waste of alcohol. He steadied himself against the low wall edging the bridge over the canal that separated the Barge from the B road. A wave of grief overwhelmed him, buckling his legs anew. To be barred from the Barge! His favourite hostelry! Its picturesque canalside setting. Its buxom barmaids. Its gullible clientele.

  He belched loudly. It resonated in the night air, momentarily drowning out the sounds of happy drinking bastards in the pub.

  Well, fuggem, Desmond Smith grumbled. Fuggem all.

  He patted himself down, hoping to find a packet of cigarettes in one of his pockets, forgetting he had given up years ago. Health reasons. Bah. Bollocks to it. It was enough to drive a man to drink.

  Drink! Excellent idea!

  And what a stroke of luck! There’s a pub! And not just any old pub but his favourite.

  He took a step towards the Barge and wobbled on the spot, suspecting there was something about recent history he should be taking into consideration. He stared mournfully at the pub, willing it to keep still long enough for him to have a fighting chance of getting through the door.

  On the low, sloped roof above the restaurant extension, flames sprang up. A pair of golden shapes, each as big as his hand. Desmond Smith watched in fascination. Another pair of fiery shapes appeared about a yard away from the first. And then a third pair, a yard away from the second... The fourth pair appeared on the higher roof of the main building, the fifth by the chimneystack. Desmond Smith staggered backwards trying to anticipate where a sixth pair of flames might materialise.

  Unfortunately for him, he never saw them. He backed onto the arch of the bridge. The backs of his thighs struck the low wall. He toppled over backwards and into the greasy water of the Dedley canal. No one saw this accident just as no one saw the mysterious apparitions on the roof. The drinkers tottering home after closing time all crossed the bridge in darkness, laughing, chatting and singing as the mood struck them.

  It was only the next morning in the light of day when Andy Adams came out to tidy around the smokers’ picnic tables that he became aware of the body floating face downwards under the bridge.

  Shit me, he thought, recognising the clothes.

  He rang the police.

  ***

  Detective Sergeant Melanie Miller was apprised of the details by Detective Sergeant Gary Woodcock who had been called to the scene to investigate. He sounded disappointed that it was going to be considered a case of accidental death. There hadn’t been a juicy case of murder in the Black Country town of Dedley for a good six months.

  “You’m terrible,” Melanie Miller laughed, enjoying the sound of his voice in her ear.

  “Gotta go, love,” he said, sounding genuinely sorry. “Safe journey, chick.”

  “You too,” she replied. “I mean, I’ve got to go too. This is my exit. Speak to you later.”

  “Bye, chicken.”

  “Bye!”

  The line went dead. Miller didn’t usually approve of people taking phone calls while driving. But this was different. This was her boyfriend! She laughed, relishing the thought. A boyfriend! All of my own!

  “At the next exit turn right,” the sat nav intoned, uninterested in her love life.

  Miller left the M40 and plunged into deepest Warwickshire, thinking all sorts of benevolent thoughts about England’s green and pleasant land. She had volunteered to make this trip. Indeed, as she explained to Chief Inspector Wheeler, she (Miller) was not only the best person to go but probably the only one who indeed should go. She (Wheeler) had barely looked up from a folder she was pretending to read, muttered ‘Whatever’ and dismissed her with a perfunctory wave towards the door of her office. Woodcock (her boyfriend - Miller’s boyfriend that is and don’t you forget it!) had been unenthusiastic. Miller could guess why. He suspected she still held a torch or a candle or something else that burned for her unfortunate colleague. Miller thought about this carefully. It was true that there had been a time when... Bah! It had soon become apparent that Detective Inspector David Brough was not interested in her in that way, or any woman in that way...

  Miller was taking this trip not just out of professional duty, but also out of friendship. Brough might be more receptive if the message came from her. They had been through a lot together and there was a bond there - although it was nothing for Woodcock to worry his handsome head about.

  “Turn left. Turn left!” The sat nav was becoming more insistent. Miller glanced in panic at the hedges that lined the road. There was nowhere to turn, left or otherwise. She informed the stupid device of this fact. It went into a brooding silence. She came to a crossroads. The sat nav held its tongue. Miller took an educated guess and took the right hand turn.

  The road took her through a couple of picturesque villages. She began to imagine herself and Woodcock living in every house she passed. It was a pipe dream, she realised. Even if you combined two detective salaries...

  After the second village, all signs of human life disappeared. There were only the fields (and they all looked well tended so somebody must be in the vicinity) and the odd sprinkling of sheep and cattle among the longer grass. Miller began to think she had got herself lost. She consulted the sat nav screen. It was recalculating the journey and appeared to be scrolling through a map of Azerbaijan or somewhere. Miller pulled over as soon as the road became wide enough to provide a lay-by.

  She plunged her hand into the glove box and pulled out a map, like a bear fishing for salmon.

  “Huh!” she sneered at the sat nav. “We’ll try old school, shall we?”

  She found the motor
way exit and was able to plot her route so far, running her finger along the blue lines but, wouldn’t you credit it? The place you always want is always over the fold, isn’t it? She fought with the huge sheet of paper, trying to keep it a manageable size in the confines of the driving seat.

  “Carry straight on,” said the sat nav.

  “Piss off,” said Miller.

  ***

  “I wish you’d stop grinning like the Cheshire Cheese,” grumbled Woodcock’s partner, the evolutionary throwback, Detective Inspector Benny Stevens. “You’ve had that face on you for weeks now and it’s making me sick.”

  “Jealous?” Woodcock upped the wattage of his grin. He pulled the top off his yogurt. A spurt of fruits of the forest shot unheeded onto his tie. He licked the underside of the foil disc. Stevens watched him with a look of disgust curling his 1970s moustache.

  “Bloody yogurts!” he observed. “She’ll be having you doing that whatsit, tai chi next.”

  Woodcock dipped his spoon into the pale pink substance and then made a show of enjoying the taste of it.

  “Any road,” Stevens pushed his own plate away. Nothing wrong with good old-fashioned sausage rolls. “It’s confirmed. Mister, um,” he consulted his notes, “Desmond Smith died accidentally. Pissed as a fart, fell in the cut. Too drunk to notice. Drowned. Dead.”

  “Hmm,” Woodcock licked his spoon clean. “That’s what the landlord reckons and all. Everyone’s a detective nowadays.”

  “Huh!” Stevens dismissed this. “You mean they wish they was. It takes a special sort of mind to do this job properly. You need more than six DVD box sets of CS-fucking-I.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “What I’m saying, Gary my lad, is it’s always worth double checking. We’ll go back to the...” he consulted a promotional flyer from his notes, “Barge Inn and stick our noses in. Perhaps somebody knows something. Might be relevant.”

  Woodcock snatched up the leaflet and glanced at both sides.

  “And the fact that it’s the best place for a wide range of real ales in the county, might that be relevant too?”

  “I think I like you better when you’m mooning over your precious lady friend.” Stevens got to his feet, scraping the legs of his canteen chair on the floor. “You’ve got spunk on your tie.”

  Woodcock blushed and looked down at the stain. He knew there was no point explaining to his so-called superior that it was only yogurt.

  Stevens laughed all the way to the car park.

  ***

  Wrought iron gates broke up the ivy-coated wall that Miller had been following for what seemed like ages. Bloody big garden wall, she thought. Ergo: bloody big garden.

  She left the engine idling while she got out to talk to the intercom on the gatepost. She was by no means a tall woman and had to keep jumping up, trying to keep the talk button pressed and speak into the circular grid at the same time. She had no chance of hearing what was being muttered as a reply. The loudspeaker was far too high for her ear.

  Eventually, the gates emitted a whirr and a clang before gliding open. Miller tottered back to her car, breathless and ruddy-faced. As soon as she was through, the gates closed behind her. She took a few minutes to sort herself out. It would not do to turn up looking as though she’d done some kind of record-breaking attempt on a trampoline.

  Why wouldn’t it do?

  For his sake? For Brough?

  Piss off, Miller told herself in her compact mirror. Got to make myself presentable for professional reasons, nothing more. And Brough’s old man was a big noise in the Force, wasn’t he? Oh, Miller knew he’d retired long since but he still had connections. Influence; that was the word. And if she turned up looking like she’d been tossed into a hedge and the hedge had spat her out again, well, there was no chance Chief Constable Peter Brough (Retired) would look favourably on her. Or on Gary....

  She tootled up the long driveway, taking in the vista that was opening up before her very windscreen.

  The Broughs weren’t short of a bob or three; you didn’t need to be a detective to see that.

  The drive eventually curled around an ornamental fountain and delivered her to the front door. The house was both inviting and imposing. Miller didn’t know much about architecture but the Brough residence seemed to combine large farmhouse with country mansion. Ivy covered the walls like the spray paint that blighted far too many buildings in Dedley’s town centre, but this was an altogether more agreeable sight. The windows were divided into diamonds by strips of black lead and, what made them imposing, there were so many of them. Miller couldn’t begin to guess how many rooms were behind those windows.

  Out of habit, she locked her car and approached the varnished wood of the oaken front door. There was another intercom but she opted instead for the quaint little bell that was fixed to a bracket above her head. She pulled the chain. The bell rang overhead.

  “Lovely,” thought Miller, “But they won’t hear that indoors. Why would they have a bell outside if no bugger can hear it...?”

  She waited a couple of minutes just in case. She was just about to push the intercom button when the door opened.

  An elderly man, not stooped by the advance of years, looked at her from beneath heavy, curling eyebrows. His eyes were dark and bright and his white hair of a militaristic crop.

  “D S Miller, I’ll be bound,” he smiled. He stepped aside and ushered her over the threshold.

  “Chief Const -“

  “Peter, please.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Miller stepped into a hallway of chequerboard tiles and wooden panelling. Peter Brough offered to take her coat but Miller chose to keep it on.

  “Through here,” he beamed at her. She followed the direction of his arm into a living room of overstuffed upholstery and cosy chintz. Peter Brough indicated a low sofa where she might sit. Miller lowered herself onto the cushions in what she hoped was an elegant movement.

  “Not too much trouble finding the old place? We are a bit off the beaten...”

  “Yes; I mean, no.” Miller wished the old man would sit down as well. Towering over her like a seemingly benevolent headmaster about to tell her she would have to continue her education elsewhere.

  “Bad business,” he reflected. “Thoroughly bad business.”

  “Well, that’s the M40 for you.”

  “What? Oh no, I meant this business with the, ah, the pathologist.”

  “Oh. Oh yes. Terrible.”

  Miller waited for him to elaborate. What did he mean? The bad business of Alastair’s gruesome murder? Or the bad business that his only son and heir had been and got himself a boyfriend of the homosexual persuasion? You couldn’t be too careful with the older generation.

  “And the woman they found at the scene - she was responsible?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Bad business. Just when you think your boy’s got himself in a good place, something like that has to go and happen. Life, eh?”

  Miller nodded.

  “Where is, um...?”

  Peter Brough raised his eyes upwards. Miller hoped he meant to indicate an upper storey and not somewhere more celestial and after-lifey.

  “It’ll do him the world of good, you coming here. He hasn’t seen anyone... since... Well, since it happened. Shuts himself away. I mean, there’s grief and there’s milking it, isn’t there?”

  “And that’s what you think he’s doing up there?” Miller nodded to the ceiling. “Milking it?”

  “My dear, I have no idea what he gets up to up there. It’s like having a teenager in the house. We don’t see him. We only see evidence of him. Food that’s been eaten. A diminution of toilet paper supplies. That kind of thing. At first we were very worried but we’ve sort of grown accustomed to it. My wife says it’s like livin
g with the Invisible Man and I’m inclined to agree. But then I learned a long time ago to always be inclined to agree with her. Secret of a happy marriage, you see. She’s at the shops. Doing a damn sight more than browsing, I shouldn’t wonder. Are you...?”

  Miller took a gamble and guessed he was asking about her marital status.

  “What? Me? No.”

  “Attractive little thing like you? I find that dashed hard to believe! What is the matter with men these days? They can’t all be -”

  He stopped himself with another glance at the ceiling before he could utter something politically incorrect.

  “Could I... see him, do you think, perhaps?”

  “Who?”

  “David. It’s what I’m here for, after all.”

  “Oh. Yes, yes, quite. I’ll show you up. And then I’ll get the kettle on. What do you say to that?”

  “That would be lovely, thank you.”

  “This way, then.”

  He left the room, expecting Miller to follow. She had difficulty getting out of the sofa’s clutches. She found him halfway up the dark oak staircase. He seemed surprised that she wasn’t directly behind him.

  He led her along the landing and around a corner, then up another smaller and narrower staircase. Almost every inch of wall space had an ornamental plate mounted on it, but here there was no decoration. It was like part of another house altogether.

  “Old servant’s quarters,” Peter Brough explained like a casual tour guide. “We put him in here so he could have his privacy. Not quite the madwoman in the attic but, well...”

  He knocked smartly on the door with his knuckles. Miller could imagine him heading many a dawn raid with that attitude.

  There was no answer.

  “He rarely answers,” Peter Brough shrugged. “Good manners mean little to him these days, but if you talk to him, through the keyhole, you might get something out of him. Meanwhile, I’ll go and see about that kettle.”

  He gave her an encouraging pat on the arm and scurried away.