‘No. His wife had brought their newborn son down to see her father at the Palace Hotel. He might even have been playing bridge, I can’t remember, but Will Hudson had taken their daughter to see his own parents in Wales, from memory. The daughter was two, I think.’
‘And how did he react to Rodwell’s story?’
‘Not well. The family weren’t short of a bob or two and they engaged the services of a private investigator, who interviewed all the witnesses. There was no secret about who they were; all the players at the bridge thing were listed on the English Bridge Union website, but he didn’t turn anything up either. There was nothing on the CCTV, before you ask. We checked it all – car parks, the leisure centre, all of it.’
‘There are some discs in the box,’ said Louise.
‘There you are, you can check for yourselves. There was a journalist too, made a nuisance of herself investigating it. There were a couple of articles in the local rag, and she had some podcast thing, but she never came up with anything that wasn’t pure speculation. That child died in the fire, I’m telling you.’ The tremble had gone from Campbell’s voice, but so had the certainty.
‘Did you check with the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages?’
‘Yes. And with Social Services.’ Campbell glanced up at the bar where a man was waiting, snooker cue in hand. ‘There were no recorded deaths of three-month-old babies, apart from young Patrick Hudson, registered that year or the year before. No bereaved mother looking to replace her lost son. We checked and double-checked.’
‘The coroner registered his death?’
‘Eventually, there was an inquest, after we’d exhausted all lines of enquiry. The coroner arrived at the same conclusion we did: Rodwell was lying and the boy was dead. The only real doubt was exactly how he died, so it was an open verdict; and let me tell you, I sleep soundly at night. Now, if you’ll excuse me,’ Campbell said, standing up, ‘my snooker partner is here.’
Dixon waited until Campbell had gone, listening to the footsteps on the stairs, an exchange just carrying over the noise of the dishwasher.
‘Who was that?’
‘Police stuff, you know how it is.’
‘Unfinished business?’
‘Not as far as I’m concerned.’
Louise had snatched the interview transcript off the coffee table and was reading the passage Dixon had read aloud. ‘What if he survived and he’s out there somewhere?’
‘Think I’m barking up the wrong tree this time?’ asked Dixon.
‘No, Sir.’
‘If you accept Rodwell’s version of events is true, and everything else he said in that interview is, then the bridge team lied about the baby. And they’ve paid for it with their lives.’
They had crossed the border from Devon into Somerset before Dixon spoke again.
‘Have someone meet us at Deirdre’s bungalow with the keys.’
Louise had known better than to interrupt his train of thought, reaching for her phone that was charging on the centre console of the Land Rover.
‘Yeah, we’re about half an hour away,’ she said. ‘No idea.’ Then she rang off. ‘Someone will meet us there.’
Dixon was deep in thought; he could feel the heat, smell the smoke – standing on the hotel terrace, the ballroom on fire, people milling about, sirens, blue lights, a group standing together, one of the women holding a baby.
Snatched? Really? How could you possibly plan that?
Unless Rodwell had started the fire deliberately to provide cover – a diversion, opportunity.
But there was no guarantee the opportunity would arise anyway, even in the confusion presented by a fire.
No, opportunity was close, but wasn’t quite the right word.
Opportunistic; that was much better.
Campbell had said he slept soundly at night. Maybe he did, but Dixon doubted very much he would tonight.
Blue tape – ‘Police Line Do Not Cross’ – had been entwined in the steel gates at the bottom of Deirdre Baxter’s drive, one end shredded and fluttering in the prevailing January wind; the tape on the gate at the bottom of the garden path ripped off by the wind and tangled in a rose bush.
Someone had been in; footprints in the flowerbed. The postman, probably, given that the tape on the front door had been pulled away from the letterbox.
A patrol car turned into the far end of Parsonage Lane, the unmistakable figure of Nigel Cole behind the wheel, no doubt enjoying the peace and quiet without Sarah.
‘I was on my way home, Sir,’ he said, pulling up adjacent to Dixon’s Land Rover and winding down the window, a set of keys in his outstretched hand. ‘You wanted these?’
‘Thanks, Nige.’
‘D’you want me to come in with you?’
‘No, that’s fine, you go home.’
Dixon had the key inserted in the lock before Louise asked the obvious question. ‘What exactly are we looking for?’
‘You should know. You found it.’
‘Did I?’
