Death Without Pity

By John Eider

A body is discovered at the side of a rural road, a victim of a hit-and-run at violent speed, a young man without a name or identification. No car can be found and no driver. The case is destined to be closed without result; though Inspector Graham Rase cannot accept this. He, with only the cautious support of his Sergeant, is determined to resolve the case and name the boy. This despite considerable difficulties in his own life, and the emergence of other criminals in town distracting the police’s attention – a smuggling gang, a series of house-breakings. Though might these other criminals be involved in his case? And might they even be the route to solving it?

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Eider
• Release date: Aug 13, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370575039

John Eider

Hello, my pen name is John Eider. I am the writer of nine novels, most recently Over-Anxious Anonymous.All are available for free on Smashwords.I work full time and write at evenings and weekends.I'm a mental magpie and change genre a lot, including Detective Fiction, Science Fiction, Adventure and Office Drama. I have nine books on Smashwords:Personal/Office/Political Drama– Over-Anxious Anonymous– Wheels in the Sky– Playing TruantDetective Novels– Late of the Payroll– Not a Very Nice Woman– Death Without PityPsychological Thriller– The Winter SicknessScience Fiction– The Robots– The Night the Lights Went OutI write because I have characters, scenes and stories on my mind, and need a stage for them to play on. I hope you enjoy reading them.

Book preview

Part 1

Chapter 1 – A Public Health Funeral

Sergeant Cornelia Smith dashed over the uneven paving of the churchyard to reach her colleague, Inspector Graham Rase. He was standing alone; a man apart. Like her, he was dressed in black against the bright morning.

‘You didn’t have to come,’ he told her.

‘I wanted to,’ she told him back.

‘Well, it’s good of you.’

Together the pair left the path behind, to walk the soft turf between the rows of stones.

‘If only for so many dead lay round,’ intoned Grey (as he was generally known around the town).

‘You’ve always got a line for the occasion,’ noted Cori (whose name was also shortened in their speaking). His observations always brought her pleasure, although, given where they were, she was careful not to smile too much. The new graves were in an open yard; though to reach them they first walked through an older part of the cemetery, thick with trees and tombs and listing crucifixes. Grey always liked this part, it being, for him, what a graveyard should be. Once past the trees though the lawn opened out, lined with the low neat stones of low neat people, reflecting the recent history of a town industrious but never grand.

At the far edge of the yard, along the newest row of plots, was the Reverend, and the coffin, and the hole. Also there was a besuited man from the Council: he was the accountant who had funded the service. Also the undertaker, the undertaker’s assistant, and others from the town who remembered the deceased.

Stood just a little further back from the mourning party were the men who’d wheeled the coffin on its trolley, and who would later do the lowering. They remained to make up the numbers, which were not to grow throughout the service.

Cori’s children had recently entered a painting phase. The kitchen table, that had once had crayons ground into the grain of its varnished oak, had lately become wet with watercolours. And with the tools available, she had dabbled herself. And so it occurred to her now that, had she wanted to paint the scene before her, she would have needed only three colours: black, for the earth and the dark wooden box and the Reverend’s cassock; blue, for the sky full of bright mist; and green, for the grass that that bright sky illuminated.

The Reverend greeted them,

‘Officers. It’s good of you to come.’

‘This is my Sergeant.’ Grey introduced Cornelia to the Reverend, who took her hand and shook it gently, before looking at them both,

‘I’m sure Mr Baxter would be much obliged by your attendance.’ The three joined the others at the graveside, where there were nods and handshakes all around. The Reverend asked, ‘Shall we begin? And none dissented.

‘Man born of woman hath but a short time to live...’

Grey settled into the ceremony. Vicars had a way with words which he appreciated. They took them seriously, gave every syllable its due.

‘...and now we commit his body to the ground. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust...’

Grey liked the sound of someone talking properly, not glibly or ironically or sarcastically (although he could be all of those things himself). A man had to have a proper measure of seriousness in him to conduct such a service.

‘...in sure and certain hope of resurrection to eternal life, Amen...’

Grey only hoped he offered those who he dealt with in his capacity as a police officer the same respect the Reverend was now offering Old Baxter; him being the man in the coffin, his luck dodging traffic having finally run out.

As the Reverend had spoken, the three men had come forward to remove the supporting planks and lower the coffin into the ground.

‘Inspector, would you care to say a few words?’

Grey had prepared for such a request,

‘Thank you, Reverend. Ahem, Old Baxter. What to say? A local fixture on our streets. A much-loved man; though he himself might have baulked at such sentiment. The fact was that there were many of us who looked out for him. More than once we scooped him up from one scrape or another. Alas, we were not able to do so this time.

‘I myself can only marvel at the way he lived without the things so many of us take for granted – a roof, an income, a home. Of course, these things were offered, but he always refused. This was his own idea of pride. For him, a man must stand alone, and I respect that, no matter the situation it put him in. And he would always just seem to get along, and perhaps we all assumed he would be here forever.’

A woman in the audience sobbed suddenly, pausing Grey a moment, before he continued,

‘But it was not to be. For the truth was that all of the town was his home; and the streetlights his canopy; and sometimes the very streets themselves he treated as his own space. None of which we minded, but for the fact of his own safety. And so it was a shock when his keen senses of preservation finally let him down.

‘It is a factor of such precarious lives that they might end at any moment. The circumstances of the motor accident, I’m sure we all know. No one else was hurt, which I’m sure Old Baxter would be grateful for, deep down, somewhere within that unreadable frame.

‘Alas, I hadn’t known him in his early life. I didn’t know him as the son, the husband, the father, all of which we are led to believe he was. Again alas, no family could be contacted after so many years passed. And so it fell to Mr Egan of the Council here to arrange this ceremony today.’

All looked to the besuited man and nodded respectfully.

‘We all thank you, Mr Egan. And I thank the people of Southney, whose public funds were lent towards this quiet plot and these modest proceedings. And, on a police note, I assure you that our own enquiries are ongoing, and I hope very much one day to bring a member of his family to this grave.’

The woman sobbed again.

‘There is so much I could say, that we all could say. For what brings the words flowing faster than a life ending, a person we all knew being committed to the ground, as though it was the last chance to speak in their presence?

‘But I will sum up simply with the notion that, should the worst happen, and any of us find ourselves lost or cast down; if we have not a friend or family member within reach or a penny to our name, that the offering of a simple service such as this one is a reassurance. And so, even as we say goodbye to an old friend, we may take pride in the kindness of our town, and hold a small crumb of comfort for ourselves should the tides turn against us.

‘To Old Baxter, I salute you. Thank you.’

The small crowd burst into a smattering of applause, which didn’t feel out of place, and which seemed to seal the ceremony. With that, Mr Egan said a very few words on behalf of the Council; and the crying woman threw a rose into the grave on behalf of herself and her colleagues at the shop where she worked. They had been leaving him close-to-date food for many years, she explained, ‘We would never take it to him, we would just leave it on the back step. He wouldn’t have wanted to be seen taking charity.’

With that, the crowd began to move away, and the three men took up their shovels.

Chapter 2 – On a Lonely Street

In Cori’s car afterwards, the mood was reflective. She offered,

‘That was nice. I don’t like to speak ill, but... it must have been hard to find a thing to say about him.’

‘He didn’t give a lot away,’ conceded Grey.

‘That’s an understatement. The phrase Keeping his own counsel could have been written for Old Baxter. Did he say a word to anyone in twenty years?’

‘He spoke to those who tried to help him.’

‘But only to refuse that help.’ Cori changed tack, ‘And have we any lead on the family?’

‘A deed poll from the Eighties.’

‘So, next to nothing then.’ She sighed. Then added kindly, ‘Boss, don’t burn yourself out over it.’

And he smiled, ‘Don’t worry, I won’t.’

At that moment, Cori’s phone pinged. She had had it switched off for the funeral, though now the backed-up messages were filtering though. They may have been allowed an hour’s time-out from being police officers, but the town never ceased in calling them back to their duty.

‘We’ve had a call, boss.’ And she smiled, ‘And you won’t believe where.’

Lord Ashford Avenue wasn’t that far out from the centre of Southney, though it retained a rural feel. The road was too long to see the crime scene from the end they pulled up at, but Grey always liked to get a feel for a place.

‘Millionaires’ Row,’ his partner cooed, as they got out of the car.

‘That’s what they call it now.’ He looked to his side and saw a brand-new mansion. ‘We used to call it The Ashfords. We used to cycle along it, it was all cottages then.’

As they began their walk, he remembered what would be their major problem – there were no pavements. They heard an engine behind them, and went to move off the tarmac, and discovered there was nowhere for them to go. A Jaguar sped past them, its engine whining like a giant corkscrew.

‘Nice,’ said Cori.

‘Par for the course along here,’ said Grey. ‘They’ve probably only been down to the shops in it.’

‘Stop trying to burst my bubble,’ she joked. ‘Do you know how long I’ve wanted to visit this place?’

‘Yes, there is a sense of needing an appointment.’

‘But these rural roads...’ remarked Cori with a shake of the head, trying to keep along the tarmac’s edge and not step on anyone’s lawn.

‘We’re only five minutes out of town,’ he reminded her. ‘Don’t let the illusion fool you. Though this was a private road for many years; and I always wondered whether it was by accident or design that they never added pavements. It rather keeps out anyone without a reason for being here.’

The pair soon arrived at their destination. The call had been waiting for them, and it would be a bad one.

The officer who greeted them in their sombre suits offered the remark,

‘Where have you pair been? In court?’ Though in the police force this wasn’t the insult that it was in other walks of life.

‘No; a funeral,’ answered Grey. However, the Detective Constable was already moving onto his next duty, that of informing the senior officers of the apparent facts,

‘It’s a body, sir.’ He pointed along the portion of road that was cordoned off before them.

‘Anyone we know?’ Grey dreaded the answer, as if they’d feel it any less.

‘No, sir. It’s a young lad. No identification on him. From the look of his clothes, he might have been living homeless – though he’s not a face that any of the coppers here remember moving on. Some of the locals think they’ve seen him on the road in recent weeks.’

‘Sleeping rough? Along here?’ Grey cast his eye across the fine homes around them.

‘Not all of the houses are occupied, sir; and then there are garages and sheds and long gardens. And the properties are so spaced out that it’s hard for the residents to be sure if he was camping out in someone else’s garden.’

‘Travelling everywhere by car can really kill the community spirit,’ mused Cori.

Grey nodded, ‘When you only see your neighbours as a blur in the windscreen.’

‘Well, sir,’ offered the constable, ‘that might have been the problem.’

Chapter 3 – Lost Boy

The constable lifted up the cordon, and let the officers under. ‘The doctor’s that way,’ he instructed. The hastily erected white tent was clearly visible at the side of the road.

‘From the sublime to the ridiculous,’ muttered Grey, as he pulled white overalls over his black suit.

Cori had a harder job with her straight dress. ‘Trust today to be a murder,’ she said.

‘Do we know that yet?’

‘I can feel it in my waters.’

‘No, that’s just your clothes bunching up.’

She gave him a look as they were let under the raised doorway of the tent.

‘I hate this bit,’ he grumped. ‘I feel like an astronaut on a mission to Mars.’

‘I always think of those scientists in ET,’ she reflected.

With the lush lawns and the absence of pavement, in some places trees and bushes had grown right up to the roadside. It was over such a clump of greenery that the canopy had been erected. Now, instead of basking in the sunlight and swaying in the breeze, these plants and the ground around them were being snapped by official photographers. As the pair neared, Cori saw a sports shoe poking out from beneath a laurel bush.

A senior pathologist looked up to greet them,

‘Sergeant, Inspector.’

‘Doctor.’

‘Prepare yourself before you come around this side of the bush.’

Which they did do, though it was not enough. Once all were looking at the same scene, the doctor stood over the victim, summarising,

‘Here he is: our luckless boy. We haven’t moved him yet, although already I can see that barely a joint in his lower body is set right. Given also the flailing motion of his arms and the angle of his head, he bears every early indication of having been in a collision with an automobile at tremendous speed. The siting of the body at the side of the road also fits with that.’

‘When?’ asked Grey.

‘The body temperature suggests several hours. I’ll be able to confirm once we see if the blood has settled in his legs as they are currently resting.

‘What else can I tell you? His face is still remarkably clear, and so I can guess early twenties at a push, probably no older. He seems to have been generally healthy, though his hair and fingernails had not been washed for a while. This is borne out by his clothes, which give the impression of being sturdy but dirty. He may have been living outdoors.’

‘And you estimate that he’s been dead for several hours?’ asked Cori

The Doctor nodded.

‘Though only found an hour ago,’ muttered Grey.

‘Given the location and the camouflage of greenery, then I can understand the handful of residents in the area not spotting a foot or hand poking out from behind one hedge of many.’

He turned to his assistant, ‘I wonder, could you see if there’s any coffee?’ This left the three in the tent, and then the doctor let the detectives see his true face.

‘Somehow it became my job to have to witness such things. I put on a stern visage for my trainees – it wouldn’t do to give them a bad example so early in their professional development. Though, I must confess, I haven’t seen one so... since the girl in the river.’

Grey and Cori both remembered that one too. Grey spoke for both,

‘That was a tragic accident, a life