The Altered Case by Peter Turnbull Page A

and something clearly happened to the Parr family of Camden, London. It made quite a media splash as you might well imagine.’
    â€˜Yes.’ Carmen Pharoah sensed the gentle scent of air freshener in the room. ‘I saw and read the newspaper cuttings which were attached to the missing person report. Quite a splash, as you say, local, regional and national newspapers all carried the story.’
    â€˜Yes, I remember.’ Adrian Clough glanced up at the ceiling of his living room. ‘And no one heard or saw anything. You know it’s that which I find the most difficult thing of all to comprehend about the whole case. The hotel the family were staying in initially reported the family as doing a runner, absconding without paying the bill, which was quite a large bill because they had been staying at the King Henry, no less.’
    â€˜So . . . monied,’ Carmen Pharoah commented, ‘that’s not a cheap hotel. They were very comfortably off.’
    â€˜Yes, they were no fly-by-nights.’ Adrian Clough nodded briefly in agreement. ‘Then their car was found abandoned. It was a top of the range Mercedes Benz, which then scotched any notion that they had run off without paying the hotel bill and confirmed that something untoward had happened. I mean, parents and their two daughters with no known links or connection to York disappear in the night . . . as if abducted by aliens . . . sinister, passing sinister.’ Again Adrian Clough took a deep breath which seemed to Carmen Pharoah to cause him great discomfort.
    â€˜Are you all right, Adrian?’ Carmen Pharoah could not restrain her concern.
    â€˜No, I am not.’ Adrian Clough forced a smile. ‘But all that can be done has been done. It’s just pain relief now, this is my last lap. Comes to all of us and it’s come to me. Let’s just talk about the Parrs.’
    â€˜Of course.’
    â€˜You have to put it into context. I lived to have my three score and ten plus a year or two on top. I reproduced . . .’ He inclined his head towards his ‘rogues’ gallery’. ‘The two daughters of the Parrs were barely in their twenties when they died. I mean they had to have been killed, so sinister.’
    â€˜Yes, sinister is just the word.’ Carmen Pharoah spoke softly. ‘This is something that you probably don’t know, sir, but we will be making it public in the press release, and at the press conference, and that is that the grave in which the Parr family was found . . . it seems certain it will be them . . . there was also a fifth body buried with them.’
    â€˜Oh . . .’ Clough gasped, ‘that is news to me . . . that really is news, a fifth body?’
    â€˜Yes, I’m sorry, I thought that it might come as a surprise.’ Carmen Pharoah sat back in the armchair she occupied. ‘It deepens the mystery somewhat.’
    â€˜I’ll say.’ Adrian Clough shook his head. ‘I’ll say it deepens it. A male or female?’
    â€˜Female, of the same age group as the daughters. The forensic pathologist has a very finely developed eye. At first she thought that she was dealing with a family of five with one daughter being significantly taller than the others because of a dormant gene carried in the family line, four of the skeletons being quite short in terms of stature. I was observing the post-mortem for the police, you see.’
    â€˜Yes.’ Adrian Clough adjusted his position in the chair. ‘Yes, I remember the hotel staff remarking that they were a short family, I remember that quite well.’
    â€˜But the fifth body, the tallest of the skeletons, was of average height and Dr D’Acre, that is the forensic pathologist I mentioned, she at first thought it was because of a dormant gene, which can happen apparently.’
    â€˜You’re telling me.’ Clough smiled. ‘You should see the height of one of my grandsons. He is