Page 50 of Slack Tide Kill

"Removed by who?"

"My DCI. Robert Stewart. He was looking out for me."

A few seconds passed, then Sally picked up the thread. "The same DCI who hung himself three weeks into the investigation?"

"That was Rob," Mercer said. "A good man, a great boss. Kind to a fault." He sighed. "I used to rack my mind, thinking what I could have done, to prevent him from doing what he did."

Nobody spoke. The rain tapped at the window.

"I know what you want to ask next," Mercer went on. "Why he did it? I honestly don't know. Not then, not now." He took a moment. "Maybe the murder was too much. Things were different back then, more innocent maybe, and a killing like that? It got in everyone's head. Like we were all somehow rotten, all to blame."

That hung for a moment. "So he felt responsible."

"I think so. And the case was going nowhere. We were circling the drain. No real suspects. And you never really know what's going on in someone's life, do you? I mean under the surface. Maybe this murder, it was just the trigger that pushed him over the edge."

Sally studied him. There was a real pain there, still. "He sounds like a good man. There were no signs of foul play?"

"No. We looked long and hard, but found nothing." He looked at them both. "And after that, the case became radioactive. Like it was cursed. The press only flooded in harder after that, coming after everyone, followed by the news that the reactors were shutting down, and…"

Mercer trailed off, arms raised in a faint shrug.

Sally thought about all that. The press. The suicide. The lock-in. "You were close to him."

Mercer looked up, smiling now. "We were. Rob was a mentor, even a kind of second father. Funny thing, I'm far older now than he ever was. Just, that thought strikes me sometimes."

Sally looked at Liam. She saw much the same thing in his eyes. Empathy, but another dead end.

"I'm sorry for the loss, Jack," she said softly. "Were there really no other suspects at the time? Nobody you liked for it at all?"

"I wouldn't say nobody. Dungeness had its share of oddballs, drifters, outcasts. Just like now. It's a strange landscape, you know?" He paused, reflecting. "There was one guy, I think his name was Lean? Anthony Lean. A hobo on the shore, maybe unemployed out of Brighton. Reduced to begging by the reactor entrance. We questioned him, but got nothing. There was no reason to hold him." Mercer stopped, sipped his coffee, then went on. "I kept tabs on him for years. On all the potential suspects. A few local fishermen, an engineer on Reactor B. Most of them are dead now. Some are hundreds of miles away, or infirm, or in jail. I can give you all their names and last-known whereabouts now, if that helps, but I do think it'd be wasting your time."

"You've ruled them out?"

"A dozen different ways. But I've got all the files. I'll bring them by."

"Thanks."

They sat quietly. Sally studied the man before her. Clearly, he'd been badly damaged by the original killing. His mentor had committed suicide, and it had left a mark. He'd fled the area. Gone to London for decades. Not so unlike her, really, coming here...

"The original body," Liam said. "I read the notes. Tom Richter. His head was craned back, his face pointed at Reactor A. And the cockle shells. Did you ever have any theories about what those things meant?"

Mercer nodded slowly. "Sure, lots of theories. There was talk it was some kind of eco-terrorist act." Liam frowned. "Yes, we had those back then, too. Like the shells were the beach taking revenge for the placement of the reactor? There was even a man who fit that bill, a local environmental warrior, kind of, but there wasn't a shred of evidence to tie him in, and Rob shut that down cold."

"The beach taking revenge?"

"I know, it was crazy talk, but we were reaching for anything we could find. Rob said it was like trying to thread a needle through sea foam. He had the best expressions."

"Any other theories?" Sally asked.

"Just some out-there stuff. Eyes are the windows to the soul, right? So maybe our killer was a spiritualist. Religious. Or maybe it was the opposite direction, and he was an extreme atheist, militant even. Trying to prove some kind of point about heaven and hell, something we can't even grasp because it frankly makes no sense at all."

"What about numbers?" Liam asked. Sally looked over at him sharply. That was not something she'd intended to share.

"Numbers?" Mercer asked.

"Anything on the body like that? Numbers, a message. Anything on the shells?"

Mercer considered for a moment. His lips twitched, like there was a question he wanted to ask, but he'd noticed Sally's sharp look at Liam, and just nodded.