Murder in the Blood

Book 15: A Libby Sarjeant Murder Mystery Series

by Lesley Cookman

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

Libby Sarjeant and friends are taking a well-earned holiday at a village on the Turkish coast – but despite their best intentions it seems that murder has even followed them there. When out on a boat trip they discover a body, but at first it has nothing to do with them, for once…until they find out that the deceased was English – and so are the suspects.

Release date: June 18, 2015

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 304

Sample

WHO’S WHO IN THE LIBBY SARJEANT SERIES

From Steeple Martin

Libby Sarjeant

Former professional actor, artist and director of The Oast Theatre, resident of 17 Allhallow’s Lane, Steeple Martin; owner of Sidney the cat

Ben Wilde

Libby’s partner, son of Hetty Wilde, former architect, manager of The Manor Estate and architect of The Oast Theatre

Hetty Wilde

Widow, owner of The Manor

Peter Parker

Freelance journalist, co-owner of The Pink Geranium restaurant and life partner of Harry Price

Harry Price

Peter’s life partner and co-owner and chef-patron of The Pink Geranium

Flo Carpenter

Best friend of Hetty Wilde

Lenny Fisher

Flo’s partner and Hetty’s brother

Adam Sarjeant

Libby’s son

Ali and Ahmed

Owners of the eight-til-late in the village

Reverend Bethany Cole

Vicar of Steeple Martin

Joe, Nella, and Owen

of Cattlegreen Nurseries

Anne Douglas

Librarian; close friend of Reverend Patti Pearson, vicar of St Aldeberge’s Church

From Nethergate

Fran Wolfe

Former actor, occasional psychic, Libby’s best friend, and owner of Balzac the cat

Guy Wolfe

Fran’s husband, artist and owner of the Wolfe gallery and shop; father of Sophie

Jane Baker

Assistant editor for the Nethergate Mercury; mother to Imogen

Terry Baker

Jane’s husband and father to Imogen

Susannah Baker

Pianist and mother to Robbie the Kid

Emlyn

Susannah’s partner and father to Robbie

Lizzie

Owner of the ice cream stall

George

Owner of the pleasure boat Dolphin

Bert

Owner of the pleasure boat Sparkler

Mavis

Owner of The Blue Anchor café

British Police Force

DCI Ian Connell

Kent Force

DS Bob Maiden

Kent Force

DI Michael James

Metropolitan Police

Commander Johnny Smith

Metropolitan Police

From Erzugan

Geoff and Christine Croker

Owners of The Istanbul Palace

Alec Wilson

British ex-pat

Sally Weston

British ex-pat

Justin Newcombe

British ex-pat

Martha and Ismet

Owner of restaurant, Martha’s

Mahmud

Owner of The Red Room

‘Jimmy’

Owner of hotel, Jimmy’s

Captain Joe

Owner of the Paradise pleasure boat

Visitors to Erzugan

Neal Parnham

Betty and Walter Roberts

Greta and Tom Willingham

Chapter One

The sea lapped gently into the granite cave, dark as ink. The moon, orange as a dying sun, touched wavelets and turned them into dull fire. Caught on an unseen finger of rock, the body bobbed gently to the surface.

There are secret places in the Mediterranean. Along the coast of Turkey, in the foothills of the Taurus Mountains, lie villages the tourists do not see. Ramshackle hovels of brick, breezeblock, and corrugated iron line the unmade roads, the odd discouraged goat tethered in a patch of dirt droops its head. Everywhere, acres of white-roofed glasshouses. Further inland, the pine-covered slopes rear up above the rusted metal hoops of abandoned polytunnels and half-built concrete houses left to the elements. Along the better surfaced roads, small groves of pomegranate and olive trees proclaim the more affluent villages, with their newly built villas announcing themselves to be ‘Satilik’ – For Sale, and a sudden clutch of billboards advertising hotels. There are still hovels, but the goats look more cheerful, and chickens cluck drowsily in the sun.

Women in headscarves and baggy trousers carry baskets and bundles through the tiny centre with its statue, pharmacy, and market, the road leads winding to the beach. And here are the small family-run bars and hotels, a few sunbeds on the beach, a few boats tied up to a leaning wooden jetty. It was to one of these villages that Guy Wolfe had brought his wife and friends.

Libby Sarjeant stretched her arms above her head and sighed. ‘This beats the Isle of Wight.’

Ben Wilde, her significant other, smiled. ‘At least we’re not investigating murders and family feuds.’

From another sunbed, Fran Wolfe sat up suddenly and stared at the sea.

Peter Parker lifted his sunhat from his face and gave his partner Harry Price a dig in the ribs. Five people watched Fran apprehensively.

Eventually, Libby could bear it no longer. ‘What is it, Fran?’

Fran gave the appearance of someone jolted to reality. ‘Eh?’

‘What happened?’ asked Guy.

Fran looked confused and shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’

Libby sighed. ‘It was a moment, wasn’t it?’

Fran’s unwanted psychic gift often resulted in what her family and friends called her ‘moments’. These ranged from seeing a picture of a plant to a vision of murder, sometimes with attendant feelings of suffocation.

‘Yes,’ said Fran slowly. ‘Someone was drowning.’

The other five groaned.

‘No, my lovely, please,’ said Harry, sitting up and glaring at her. ‘We’re on bloody holiday.’

‘I can’t help it.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Libby, crossing her fingers. ‘There must have been lots of drownings round here in the past. I expect that’s what you saw.’

Fran smiled at her gratefully. ‘That’ll be it. Thanks, Libby.’

Guy stood up. ‘I think we now deserve a drink. It must be nearly lunchtime.’

The little party stood up and gathered various belongings.

‘Are we coming back to the beach after lunch?’ asked Harry. ‘Do we leave the towels here?’

‘I thought Captain Joe said he’d take us out on the boat this afternoon?’ said Peter, perching his hat on the back of his head.

‘So he did.’ Harry slung his towel over his shoulder. ‘Come on, then, last one to the bar’s a sissy.’

The tiny hotel sat right on the beach, its bar at the front. The six friends perched on bar stools and ordered the local beer. The owner, known to all British guests as Jimmy due to his unpronounceable Turkish name, handed them glasses frosted from the fridge.

‘You enjoying your holiday?’ he asked them, as he had asked every day since their arrival. ‘You glad Guy bring you?’

‘Yes,’ they all assured him. ‘Very glad.’

Guy had mentioned the previous summer, when they were visiting the Isle of Wight, that he knew of a small bay in Turkey little-known by the general run of tourists. After the events of the past year, they had decided to award themselves a holiday, and even Harry had closed his beloved restaurant, The Pink Geranium. And Guy had been right.

The sweep of the bay, backed by the foothills of the Taurus Mountains, was dotted with twenty or so ‘paynsions’, hotels, and bars, and one supermarket. At least, that’s what it called itself. Guy had seemed to know at least half the proprietors, and they had all greeted him with fond cries of recognition, even though his last trip there had been years ago, before he had met Fran. The other guests were mostly regulars, who guarded their little treasure jealously and were quite happy with the two-hour journey through the mountains from the airport, which put off the tour operators and all but the most intrepid holidaymakers.

Now they ordered soup and borek, the Turkish version of cheese straws – only more substantial – and salad, to see them through the afternoon boat trip. A couple of the other British guests joined them, and one, a solitary Englishman wearing a panama hat who rarely spoke, sat at the farthest table from the bar.

‘Who is he, Jimmy?’ asked Libby. ‘Has he been coming here for years like the others?’

Jimmy shrugged. ‘No. I do not know how he came here. He book over the phone. He know people in the village, I think.’ He shrugged. ‘Very quiet.’

One of the other guests leant forward. ‘We gave him a lift into the village the other evening when we went to The Roma.’ The Roma was a Turkish-Italian restaurant that provided a change from those in the bay. ‘He barely said a word, but he seemed to know where he was going.’

‘Oh, well,’ said Harry, ‘nothing to do with us.’

‘No …’ said Libby thoughtfully, and was drowned out by protests from her friends. Libby’s nosiness was legendary.

An hour later, and they were gathered on the wooden jetty while Captain Joe, bearer of another unpronounceable name, let down his little gangplank for them to board his boat, the Paradise. There were several small boats competing for trade from the tourists, all taking trips round the coast to visit bays only accessible from the sea, where one could swim, eat freshly caught fish, and drink beer or raki, according to taste. This afternoon Joe was taking them to a small bay, rarely visited, where there had been recent sightings of turtles.

The boat chugged off towards the headland, where a rocky island guarded the entrance to the bay.

‘Reminds me of our Dragon Island in Nethergate,’ said Libby to Fran, as they approached it.

‘Same sort of shape,’ agreed Fran. ‘I love that someone’s planted a Turkish flag on top.’

‘They do that everywhere, don’t they?’ said Libby. ‘I must say, I’m glad Guy brought us here. I want to come back, don’t you?’

But Fran wasn’t listening. Her back was rigid and she was staring at the sheer rock face rising from the sea. Turning her back on the island, Libby tried to see what she was looking at. And realised that Captain Joe was turning the boat slowly inshore.

The six friends stood together peering into the darkness of the cleft in the rock and saw what Fran had seen. Bobbing face down on the surface of the water – a body.

Chapter Two

‘I am sorry, my friends,’ said Captain Joe. ‘The coastguard say I must stay until they arrive.’ He shrugged and spread his hands wide. ‘What can I do?’

Everyone assured him they understood and sat down with their backs towards the cliff.

‘At least we weren’t expected to haul it out of the sea,’ said Libby.

Five voices protested.

Captain Joe appeared from the tiny galley. ‘Tea?’ he asked.

Everyone nodded, and Libby pulled out a packet of biscuits from her bag.

‘What do you suppose they do now?’ said Fran.

‘With the –’ Guy jerked his head backwards.

‘The body. Yes.’

‘I can’t imagine they’ve got a morgue here,’ said Ben.

‘And don’t they like to bury bodies really quickly?’ said Harry.

‘Nothing to do with us,’ said Peter. ‘The coastguard will pick it up and take it away to wherever it needs to go. We needn’t hear anything more about it.’

‘Tea.’ Captain Joe appeared with a tray of tea glasses. ‘Coastguard on the way.’

Libby opened her mouth and Fran and Ben both kicked her. She closed it again.

They sat in silence until the sound of a boat travelling at high speed reached them.

‘Coastguard,’ said Captain Joe.

The boat slowed and came alongside. Captain Joe proceeded to demonstrate, with many arm gestures, how they had come upon the body. From the looks directed towards them by the uniformed officer, the six friends got the impression that their presence was being questioned and possibly thought suspicious. Eventually, a notebook and pencil was produced and handed to Joe.

‘He wants you to write down your names and the address of the hotel,’ he said with a shrug.

‘Why?’ asked Libby. ‘We’re just tourists.’

‘Witnesses,’ said Guy, taking the pad.

They all wrote down their names, while activity on the other side of the coastguard boat suggested that the body was being retrieved. Sure enough, as Joe handed the notebook back across the gap between the boats, something was hauled aboard. Libby turned her back and Joe started the engine of the Paradise. The officer on the coastguard boat shouted and gestured again towards the friends.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Joe helplessly. ‘He wants you to look at it to see if you know the person.’

‘Why on earth would we? We aren’t local,’ said Ben.

‘That’s ridiculous,’ said Peter, standing up suddenly and crossing to the rail. ‘We’re English,’ he announced in stentorian tones. The officer simply looked at him with his eyebrows raised.

Joe broke into a torrent of Turkish and the officer slowly nodded.

‘He says please the men look, but not the ladies,’ said Joe, looking miserable.

The other three men joined Peter, and Libby and Fran looked at each other.

‘This is extremely unpleasant,’ said Libby.

‘Not to put too fine a point on it, yes,’ said Fran.

There was further conversation in Turkish and Peter, Harry, Ben, and Guy rejoined them.

‘Nasty,’ said Harry, and the others nodded.

‘But we don’t know him,’ said Ben.

‘I don’t feel like a boat trip now,’ said Libby.

There was murmured agreement, and Guy turned to Joe, who unhappily agreed to take them back to the village.

‘Not good,’ he kept saying, shaking his head.

The little boat chugged slowly back into the bay and the wooden jetty. Under the tree where the boatmen sat, several heads turned in surprise. Joe and his passengers trudged up the sandy slope to tell them what had happened. There was much shaking of heads and pursing of lips.

‘They say unlucky,’ Joe told the friends. ‘Very unlucky.’

‘Especially for the victim,’ muttered Guy.

‘Do you want to come back to the hotel for a beer, Joe?’ asked Peter.

Joe shook his head. ‘No. I stay here. Coastguard say Jandarma will come.’

‘Where will they land the body?’ asked Fran.

Joe shrugged and shook his head.

‘Come and have a drink later, then,’ said Ben. ‘Thanks for the trip anyway, Joe.’

As they walked the short distance to the hotel, Libby pointed out to sea.

‘The coastguard boat’s coming in to the other end of the bay.’

‘So they’ll take it off there,’ said Harry. ‘But where will they put it?’

‘Perhaps they’ll send a hearse or an ambulance to take it to a morgue,’ said Fran. ‘No idea how the system works in this country.’

When they got back to the hotel, the couple who had joined them for lunch were on sunbeds by the pool. The woman sat up.

‘That was quick! Did Joe’s boat break down?’

Fran and Libby went over to explain, while Harry began to commandeer other sunbeds.

‘How horrible.’ The woman had turned quite pale. ‘I’m so glad we didn’t come.’

Her husband sat up beside her. ‘I wonder if we’ll ever know who he was? Or what happened?’

Libby shuddered. ‘I’d rather not think about it at all.’

Jimmy strolled over.

‘The Jandarma will want to talk to you,’ he said.

‘But why? How could we have known anything about it?’ asked Libby.

‘In England the police talk to everybody, no?’

‘Yes, they do,’ said Ben. ‘And we were on the boat, Lib. In their eyes, it was Captain Joe and us who discovered it.’

Libby sighed. ‘Yes, I suppose it was.’

‘I’m going to have a swim,’ announced Fran. ‘Take my mind off it.’

‘Beatcha,’ said Harry, and disappeared into the water with a splash.

‘Too energetic,’ said Peter, appropriating one of the sunbeds Harry had pulled into the shade of a large umbrella. ‘I shall sleep.’

‘I think I want tea,’ said Libby.

‘I bring you chai?’ said Jimmy.

Ben smiled. ‘I think she wants good old builders’ tea, Jimmy.’

‘Builders?’ Jimmy looked bewildered. Guy tried to explain.

‘Never mind.’ Libby patted his hand. ‘I shall go and make some in our room.’

By the time the friends met at the bar in the evening, the events of the afternoon had been discussed and dissected over and over. Several of the other guests of the hotel had also gathered for pre-prandial drinks and had to hear the story all over again, so when the bright blue van drew up and discharged three uniformed Jandarma officers it came as a an unpleasant descent into reality.

Jimmy’s office was not large enough to accommodate nine adults, so the senior officer unwillingly took over a corner of the bar building and glared at anyone who dared come anywhere near it. As it happened, neither he nor his two underlings spoke English, so Jimmy had to leave his position at the bar to stand in as interpreter. Luckily, some of the other guests were long-term visitors and took over as temporary barmen.

After some obviously dissatisfactory verbal skirmishing, Jimmy turned to his guests.

‘The man was English,’ he said. ‘This officer thinks you know him.’

‘Why?’ asked six voices.

‘Because you are English.’

General laughter. The officer looked thunderous.

‘We don’t know every English tourist here,’ said Ben.

‘He was not tourist. He lives in the village,’ said Jimmy, darting an uncomfortable look at the three Jandarma.

‘Oh, I see,’ said Libby. ‘Well we don’t know anyone who lives here, I’m afraid. Only the people we’ve met since we arrived.’

Jimmy repeated this to the Jandarma.

‘Has he got a photograph?’ asked Fran suddenly.

Jimmy repeated the request. Grudgingly, the senior officer brought out a blurred photograph.

‘Where did they get that?’ asked Harry.

‘His passport,’ said Jimmy. ‘In a bag tied to his …’ He indicated his waist.

Fran picked up the photograph, raising her eyebrows at the officer, who nodded. She pushed back her chair and went over to the bar. It drew the other guests in the bar like iron filings to a magnet. After a moment, Fran returned to the others with the lone Englishman, panama in hand, in tow.

‘This gentleman says he recognises the picture,’ she said, and sat down.

The officer waved a hand and spoke rapidly to Jimmy.

‘He says you can go, but he will speak with this gentleman. Mr Parnham.’ Jimmy sat down beside the newcomer, looking even more miserable.

‘Well!’ said Libby, as they retrieved their drinks from the bar. The rest of the guests milled round wanting to know what happened.

‘I wonder,’ said the woman they’d been talking to earlier, ‘if that bloke knew the dead man? I said he looked as though he knew where he was going when we took him into the village, didn’t I?’

‘Perhaps he did,’ said Ben.

‘We’ll ask him when he comes back,’ said Libby. ‘I’m Libby, by the way.’ She held out a hand.

‘I’m Greta Willingham. This is my husband, Tom.’ Greta took the proffered hand and introductions were made all round.

‘You said he was English?’ asked someone else, as chairs were pulled up into a rough circle.

‘So the officer said.’ Guy sat down next to his wife.

‘I bet Sally would know him,’ said Greta.

‘Sally?’ queried Fran.

‘Sally Weston. She’s lived here for years,’ explained Tom. ‘She started by coming out on holiday and stayed.’ Tom turned to Guy. ‘You must have met her when you were coming here before.’

Guy looked worried. ‘Don’t tell me I met you and I’ve forgotten?’

‘Only in passing,’ said Greta. ‘You were always with your little girl. How is she?’

‘Sophie? All grown up now. Did an art degree at university.’

‘Oh, you were an artist, weren’t you?’ said Tom.

‘Yes, and I do apologise for not remembering you,’ said Guy. ‘So, no, I don’t remember a Sally. Sorry.’

‘Things have changed a lot in the past few years,’ said a comfortably built elderly woman with pink hair. ‘We’ve been coming for over ten years and things are very different.’

‘So,’ said Libby, determined to bring the conversation back to the dead Englishman, ‘no one except Mr Parnham there recognised him?’

There was a mass shaking of heads.

‘We don’t know anyone except a few bar and hotel owners,’ said the pink-haired lady. ‘And we don’t go far.’

‘We go in to the market,’ said Greta, ‘and we have a drink in the village, sometimes with Sally.’

‘Do you hire a car?’ asked Ben.

‘Oh, no, dear. We have a taxi,’ said Greta. ‘We use them to go to the river restaurants, too.’

‘River restaurants? Libby turned to Guy. ‘You haven’t told us about them?’

‘I don’t think I ever went there,’ said Guy.

‘Oh, there was only the one when you came here,’ said Tom. ‘There are three now. Lovely places.’

‘We’ll go tomorrow,’ said Peter. ‘Harry’s very keen on trying as many different restaurants as he can.’

‘Really?’ Greta looked interested. ‘You like food, then?’

‘I’m a chef,’ said Harry, with a grin. Several of the other people leant forward. ‘I have a Mexican vegetarian restaurant called The Pink Geranium.’

‘Nearly vegetarian,’ said Libby.

‘Yes, petal, nearly.’

‘How, nearly?’ asked the pink lady’s husband, a short, bushy-moustached individual.

‘I branched out,’ said Harry. ‘I now do a selection of non-vegetarian dishes in a separate kitchen.’

‘Why separate?’ asked Bushy Moustache.

‘You can’t cook meat – or even prepare it – in a veggie kitchen, dear,’ explained his wife.

‘Bloody nonsense,’ said Bushy Moustache, and buried his face in his beer glass.

Mr Parnham left the table with the Jandarma officers and approached the group by the bar.

‘Everything all right?’ asked Guy.

Parnham frowned.

‘I’m not sure,’ he said. ‘You see, I’d met him.’

Chapter Three

‘Really?’

‘Where?’

‘Did you know him?’

The questions seemed to distress Mr Parnham.

‘I – I don’t know. Do excuse me.’ He gave an odd little bow and walked swiftly away from the bar towards the beach.

‘Oh, dear,’ said Libby. ‘We upset him.’

‘Let’s go and find dinner,’ said Harry. ‘It’s really nothing to do with us, is it?’

The group stood up and said goodbye to their fellow guests, but as they stepped out on to the beach road, the senior Jandarma officer came up behind them with Jimmy trailing in his wake.

‘He says he will want to talk to you again,’ said Jimmy. ‘Something Mr Parnham said.’

The officer gave a curt nod and strode past them to his blue van. His two cohorts scampered after him.

‘What’s Mr Parnham’s other name?’ asked Fran.

‘Neal, I think. This is the first time he’s been here.’ Jimmy turned back to the bar. ‘I shall see you later.’

‘And what could Neal Parnham have said about us that would make the Jandarma want to speak to us again?’ said Libby, watching the blue van turn round at the end of the bay to make its way back along the road and out of the village.

‘Next time we . . .