I could not say with a hundred percent certainty, but I was convinced that these were the same people I heard talking on the beach earlier. I considered calling Hildegard and Philski aside to give them a heads up about it, but I was not sure how that could have been done discreetly, and I thought it better to not alert the visitors about it, at least not at this point.
Apart from the gold, curly hair, Kimberly Campbell had a long face dotted with freckles, mostly in the area below her green eyes. Her nose was small and slightly pointing upwards, whilst her lips were thin and in a pinkish hue. When she spoke, her voice was on a higher tone than I expected it to be, and her accent was somewhat neutral, with a little twang of Essex here and there, as of someone who's once lived there a long time ago.
"It is a tragedy, really. Poor Johnny, bless him. Unfortunately we all knew where this was heading, with the life he was leading. Bad company, drinking, drugs. There is no future in that kind of life, and he is now just another example of that."
Somehow her tone of voice contradicted the words coming out of her mouth - she did not sound like she was sorry, but that she was triumphant to be proven right all along. George Campbell spoke next. He was a tall, thin man, with ginger, almost orange hair, thick eyebrows and a well kept goatee in the same shade of colour as his hair. His eyes were brown, and reminded me of discoloured tree bark. He did not looked anyone in the eye when he spoke, which I found a bit unusual. His voice was not as high as hers, but also not in a deep tone. His accent was very similar to hers, maybe a little more neutral.
"Bad parents, I say. Never gave the kid any sort of limit, discipline. Grew up to become a useless sod. And we always ended up dealing with the mess. My poor wife, bless her heart, always worries, always crying. It's her blood, they grew up together for heaven's sake. Bad parents."
"It's OK, Georgie. He's with them now, they're in a better place."
Maybe it was the fact that their tone was different when I overheard them earlier, but I found the whole thing very theatrical. I also tried to guess their age, as they sounded in a way that they were much older than the victim, which I assumed now was the man I saw down by the floor earlier. The Campbells were maybe in the beginning of their thirties, which would not put them in a very big age gap with the deceased. Hildegard had a neutral expression, but she seemed very interested in the situation. Philski had a calm smile, which was very welcoming to the couple. When he spoke, his tone was soothing and calm, which matched with his expression.
"I am terribly sorry for your loss. I appreciate you were Johnny's only family members, and it must be a terrible blow, especially given the circumstances. Unfortunately we will need you to get involved with a few procedures, like identification of the body and providing a statement, but first I wanted to give you some time to absorb the news. Can we offer you anything to drink, maybe a cup of coffee or some tea?"
"I'll take a coffee, my husband will take a tea. Black for me, he'll have it with a drop of milk. One spoon of sugar each."
"Right away. Alana, could you please get the Campbells the drinks?"
The assistant left the room, closing the door behind her. Kimberly continued, and her tone was still condescending - it felt like she was a mother at the principal's office, asking what did her troubled kid get himself into this time.
"So, what happened to Johnny? Was he finally killed by one of the thugs he's always around? Did he overdose on something? Got himself drunk and got in a fight?"
"Mrs Campbell, at the moment it is still very soon to have any concrete hypothesis. All we know so far is that Johnny was found dead in front of his flat. The forensics team is trying to determine things like the cause and time of death, and from there we will start building a picture. You see, an investigation is like a massive jigsaw puzzle, each piece individually might not tell us a lot about the whole picture, but if we trust the process, that picture will appear at the end."
I noticed that, for the second time, he did not refer to the victim by his last name as I expected him to do, but called him Johnny. I assumed that, by now, he would have that information already. That did not seem to bother Kimberly.
"If you don't know, what is she doing here? Isn't she a big shot detective?"
Hildegard smiled. It might have been the raw honesty of the question, it might have been the compliment, but I think in some ways she was happy to be acknowledged. After all, Philski could be a bit of a showman. I expected her to answer, but she stayed quiet. The detective once again spoke.
"Mrs Hildegard has been helping us with some police affairs, and I thought her presence here would be reassuring to you, so you know that we are employing the best team to the matter. Now, you will be asked to give a statement, which is voluntary, but I wanted to have an informal chat with you about Johnny, if you are ok with this, of course?”
“There is not much to talk about. We grew up together, his mum was my dad’s brother. They moved to Brighton when we were sixteen, well I was sixteen, Johnny was probably fourteen or thirteen. I think he’s a couple of years younger. I’m thirty one now, d’you know how old he was, babe?”
“I think he was twenty-nine, love.”
“Yes, so he was probably thirteen. We kept seeing each other on the holidays and the odd weekend my parents would come to Brighton, or his parents would come up. My parents don’t really like Brighton, it’s too liberal for them. I mean, it was paradise for Auntie Bev and Uncle Ollie, they were both hippies and loved this kind of, well, free life. It’s been like that his whole life, Johnny could do whatever he wanted. Broke something in a shop, mummy and daddy pay, ‘oh let the kid play, kids need to be kids’. I get it, nan was very strict, but kids need manners. Thankfully my folks gave me structure in life.”
“Are your parents still with us, Mrs Campbell?”
“Yes, mum and dad still live in the same house where he grew up, in Ipswich. I live just a couple of blocks away from them. We have always been a modest family, we never had the means that auntie Bev and uncle Ollie had. Life in our house had to be strict, we had no other option.”
“Am I correct to assume that Johnny’s parents have passed away? I am jumping to this conclusion as you are his next of kin, and if I’m correct, the only close relative?”
“Yes, nan was an only child, and she only had dad and auntie Bev. No more cousins, no more kids. It was just us. Which is why it was very sad when they passed away. Tragic affair, really. They took Johnny for a picnic at the Seven Sisters, car drove off the road down a cliff dark at night. Poor Johnny was the only survivor. He never spoke about it, but I can bet you all this drinking and rousing came from there. He was a lovely kid, to end up like this.”
“How long ago was this?”
“About ten years ago, I’d say? Georgie, when was the accident?”
“Yeah, I think it was a good ten years ago, my love. Awful business.”
“Ah, I see. And I assume you became responsible for your cousin, Mrs Campbell?”
“Yes. There was nobody else. Mum and dad are too old for it, so it had to be me. George here helps, because there is a lot to do, with all the finances…”
At this point, George Campbell interrupted the conversation abruptly.
“Sorry, detective, is there a toilet around here? Also, what are the things that Kim and I need to do? We are happy to help, but we still need to get some other stuff sorted before we head back home.”
Philski smiled and politely indicated the way to the toilet, then turned to Kimberly and started explaining to her the next steps whilst her husband went away. First she would recognise the body officially, and then she would be invited to provide a statement to the assistant detective. The detective would be beside her throughout it all, and her husband could also participate. He would also be invited to provide a statement. And then they would be free to go. George Campbell came back into the room and they were both preparing to leave, but Hildegard spoke, and it took us all by surprise.
“Mr Campbell, may I ask you something a quick question before you leave? In your opinion, do you think the death of your wife’s cousin was an accident?”
He stopped and looked at her with a curious expression on his face. His answer was short and simple, but at the same time it felt like he chose his words carefully.
“Who knows? Accident or not, we all knew it was just a matter of time. People like Johnny don’t stay long in this world.”
And with that, they left. Philski told us he’d be back in about half an hour, so we decided to grab a coffee at the shop around the corner from the station. About half an hour later, we reunited in the detective’s room. He was already there, waiting for us.
“Well, my dears, I can confirm to you two that the deceased is Johnathan Aaran Smith, he’s been officially identified. Sanjay will be in shortly to give us a briefing of everything the forensics team found out. There is also something else, but I will leave the juicy bits to the end.”
Not long after that, Dr Parkheet arrived and started to give us the details.
“Well, let’s start from the beginning. Mr Smith was spotted this morning, around six-fifteen AM, by the girl opening the cafe beside his apartment. It was not the first time he slept in the street, outside his place, so the barista did not pay too much attention to it. After she finished opening the cafe, a few customers came in and reported that he was looking ‘weird’, and that they called emergency services. They were not sure if he was breathing, but they did not want to touch anything. Emergency services arrived around a quarter to seven and he was pronounced dead not long after. It was clear to them that he’d been dead for a while, so there were no attempts of resuscitation. We are still looking into everything, but right now we are estimating death occurred between midnight and two AM. I might be able to narrow this down, let’s see how things go. Cause of death is likely poisoning of some kind, the team is conducting a few tests, we should have something concrete by Monday, maybe Tuesday.”
“I'll get it by Monday, doctor.”
“Thank you, detective. The area does not have a lot of CCTV apart from private ones, from the businesses around. We have requested footage and we are hoping that they record them for more than twelve hours. Now, to make matters more complicated, the Albions were playing yesterday, which means that the lanes were packed, and this morning there was a chill in the air, which means people are wearing big jackets and beanies over their heads, it can be harder to identify people. We shall see what we come up with. And then there's the postcard.”
We all looked at him and a certain excitement could be felt in the room. The doctor continued, in his keynote-like tone.
“It is a very generic kind of postcode. We might be able to check when it was produced and where it was sold, but based on my experience, these things are sold everywhere and year round, so I'm not really holding my breath for a breakthrough here. The only thing written on it was the symbol for hash and the number one, which seems to be an indication that they are tied to the original postcard received by Mrs Hildegard, I guess?”
“Do you think the two facts are not connected, doctor?”
“Look, Mrs Hildegard, I'm a man of science. I am good at seeing facts, proof, evidence. I don't think I'd be a good detective, ‘cause I'm not very good at making theories based on conjecture. I mean that with all due respect, I think you guys are the real heroes.”
“And based on the facts you have so far, what do you think of this case? Do you think it's an accidental death or do you suspect foul play?”
“It's too soon to tell. We're grasping at straws here Ma'am, at least right now. When we have more evidence, you guys should be able to build a better picture. One thing I'll say though, is that the postcard, that's the joker here. If it wasn't for it, this would look like a night out gone really wrong.”
That concluded the briefing. Dr Parkheet asked if he could offer any more assistance, and as this was not the case, he left for the day. It was approaching five PM, and I suddenly realised how tired I was. Philski seemed to keep his energy at the same level.
“I saved the best for last! Are you ready for this? Our friend Johnny has been well acquainted with law enforcement for a while, because he’s been a known troublemaker, and it was not hard to get some intel on him. As it turns out, he is rich - but not just rich, filthy rich. When his parents died, they left him a huge inheritance. But here is the juicy part: he is not able to administer the funds, so everything is controlled by… Drumroll please: the Campbells. We have motive, folks.”
I thought that was very amusing, but Hildegard does not seem very entertained. She might have been tired. The detective then explained that they would now check the alibis of the Campbells and some other things, he did not expect for anything else to happen until Monday morning, and we were free to go and enjoy the weekend. He would get in touch if anything else happened before then.
We walked out of the police station, and I expected Hildegard to walk in the opposite direction of me, but she walked by my side instead. We didn’t speak for a moment, and when she did, she sounded more relaxed, like our conversations normally go.
“What do you think of this whole thing?”
I took a moment to give an answer, and it reflected why I did so.
“There is a lot to digest. A lot of information to process. The postcard, the postcode, the victim, the whole story about his parents, the inheritance, their tragic death. I imagine you are as surprised as I am, I don’t know how you can seem so calm.”
“I am not really surprised, to be honest. I know all about the tragic story of Beverly and Oliver Smith, and their son Johnathan. I was part of the team who investigated their deaths.”
“You… WHAT? Oh wow! Of course, you used to work for the police, and something like that would have to have been investigated, especially if they had money. Come on, I need to know all the details!”
“Not now, mate. It’s been a long day, I think we both need some rest. Come for dinner Sunday evening, I’ll tell you more about this story. I’m sure Jill won’t mind.”
“Is that why you walked this way, to tease me?”
I said that in a light, joking tone. Hildegard smiled, and we had just arrived in front of my place. She then spoke again, in a friendly tone.
“Not really. I wanted to give you a piece of advice”.
“And what should that advice be?”
We kept the friendly, relaxed tone, so it came as a surprise to me when she said the next words.
“Be careful with detective Debowski.”
“What do you mean? Why should I be careful with him? Do you think he’s not on our side?”
“It’s not about sides. We are all trying to reach the same goal here, and I know you admire him, which I think it’s great. I just worry about you getting disappointed with how things turn out.”
“I’m not sure I’m getting what you mean.”
“Time will tell. I just hope this advice is of no use to you, and I’m proven wrong. I’ll see you Sunday evening, yes? Should we say six PM?”
I knew Hildegard enough by now to know that I was not getting anything else, at least not at that moment, so I resigned myself to a hug and she left. I was exhausted, both physically and mentally, so I draw myself a bath, got a glass of red and put on a podcast about bad gays, to take my mind off things and help me relax. After a good forty-five minute soak, I was ready for some food and quiet time in front of the TV, and I thought I heard someone knocking at the door. I was not expecting anyone, and I thought I must have been tired, but there was another knock, stronger than the first one. My first thought was that Hildegard wanted to talk about something else and might have come back.
When I opened the door, to my surprise, the person knocking was not Hildegard. It was Philski.
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