Dead Simple

quid. Any good theories why? And how the hell did she knew how to use it?’
    ‘Desperation?’ volunteered Nick Nicholl.
    ‘I don’t buy that,’ Grace said.
    ‘She obviously genuinely did not know where he was,’ Bella Moy suggested.
    Grace nodded distractedly. That made sense, but to him it did not fit.
    ‘She might have known that Michael Harrison had a walkie-talkie. Perhaps it was to try to communicate with him?’ Emma-Jane Boutwood said. ‘Or – how about – to listen in to who else he might be communicating with?’
    Grace was impressed. ‘Yes, good thinking.’ He looked around. ‘Any more theories? OK, let’s park this for a moment. Any other progress?’
    ‘Yes,’ Nick Nicholl said. ‘After you left Ashley Harper’s house, Joe Tindall started pulling up floorboards. We discovered an envelope full of receipts behind a chest of drawers we moved – it might have fallen there accidentally or it might have been hidden. Most of the receipts don’t seem that interesting to us, but there is one here you should see.’
    It was for £1,500 from a company with a Maddox Street, London W1 address, called Conquest Escorts. Underneath the name was the legend ‘Discreet, charming male and female escorts for every occasion’. Two dates were shown – the previous Saturday, the intended day of Ashley Harper’s wedding, and the previous Monday.
    ‘Turn it over, Roy,’ Nick Nicholl said. ‘Take a look at the other side.’
    Grace turned it over and saw written in ballpoint pen the name Bradley Cunningham.
    His mind shot back to the conversation he had had with Ashley, in her house, on Friday night. He could remember her sitting there so dejectedly, talking about her Canadian uncle, saying, ‘We adore each other…he took the whole week off just so he could be at the rehearsal on Monday.’
    ‘She’s faked an uncle?’ he said, puzzling.
    ‘She’s faked a whole lot more than just an uncle – E-J will tell you in a minute,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘Take a look at this first.’
    He handed Grace a photocopied sheet of A4 paper. It was a faxed instruction to Bank Hexta, registered on Grand Cayman Island, to transfer the sum of £1,253,712 to a numbered account at Banco Aliado in Panama. The instruction was signed by both Michael Harrison and Mark Warren, and the date and time at the top showed 11.25 p.m., the previous day.
    Grace read it through twice then frowned at Branson. ‘This is about twenty minutes before he went off his balcony.’
    ‘Yes, correct.’
    Grace thought about the note found in Mark Warren’s pocket. ‘So he went and transferred the money in order to save his friend’s life. Then he goes and tops himself?’
    ‘Maybe they had some big debt to pay. Panama could be tied up with Colombia – the Colombian mafia – maybe they got themselves into shit on a loan? They pay it off, and Mark Warren then tops himself?’
    ‘It’s a reasonable theory,’ Grace said. ‘But these two guys have been doing pretty well. They have this huge development at Ashdown – twenty houses – that could make them several million. Why top himself for – what would his share be – a few hundred thousand pounds?’
    ‘So he makes the transfer and then is killed.’
    ‘That’s a more elegant theory,’ Grace said. ‘I spoke to Cleo Morey at the mortuary just now. There’s a Home Office pathologist on his way down. We might have a bit more information later today.’
    DS Bella Moy then told Grace she had some information from the phone company. Vodafone had logged activity from Michael Harrison’s mobile between 10.22 p.m. and 11 p.m. the previous night, and there had been several 999 emergency calls made from Michael Harrison’s phone, but on each occasion the operator could not hear anyone at the other end and got no response to her questions.
    ‘What about the cell mast?’
    ‘I was just coming to that, Roy. Vodafone have been very helpful this morning, and we already have from them the location of the closest cell radio mast to Michael Harrison’s phone,’ she said.
    ‘Where is it?’
    Her face fell a little. ‘This is not such good news – it’s in the town centre of Newhaven, and the one mast covers the entire town.’
    ‘Well, it’s some help,’ Grace said. ‘Any coincidence that Newhaven is a Channel seaport?’
    ‘I’ve already put out an all-ports alert,’ she said.
    ‘For what?’
    ‘For Ashley Harper and for Alexandra Huron – that’s the name she was using