The estate agent’s advert had said that Mountain Meadows was a pleasant development on a flat strip of land alongside the canal. There were only seven houses, all detached and with decent gardens. Sparky and myself went to investigate, in my car, after ringing Mr Wood with the latest bombshell. The roads were empty and I drove fast. Soon we were clear of the streetlamps, tearing along through the night.
“You seem to know where you’re going,” Dave observed.
“I came to look at them, once,” I replied.
“What? You were thinking of moving?”
“Mmm.”
“You kept that quiet.”
“I don’t tell you everything.”
A cat darted halfway across the road, then stopped and stared into my headlights. I hit the brakes and the front of the car dipped and pulled to the right as a wheel locked. The moggie regained the power of movement and leapt to safety.
After a silence Dave said: “You and Annabelle?”
“Yeah. We could have afforded one reasonably comfortably if we’d pooled our resources.”
Annabelle was my last long-term relationship. We were together for about five years, which was a personal best for me, but she decided the grass was greener when seen through the windscreen of a Mercedes. I live in the house I inherited from my parents, and she owned an old vicarage. When things were good between us we’d done the tour of a few places, including Mountain Meadows. On paper it had looked ideal, but a quick visit one summer’s evening destroyed the dream. The smoke from all the barbecues and the incessant drinky-poos with the neighbours would have ruined our lungs and livers. Then she left me, so it was just as well that we hadn’t moved.
Except, maybe, if we had… Ah well, we’d never know.
“So what do you think,” Dave asked, changing the subject.
“We’ll soon find out,” I replied. “This is it.”
I turned off the lane and slowed down for the speed humps, hardly recognising the place. The darkness was almost absolute, broken only by an occasional lighted window, and all the twigs with garden centre labels on them that had dotted the open plan gardens were now luxuriant shrubs and trees. As my headlights swung around, probing the shadows, we saw that the conservatory salesman had done a roaring trade, and since my last visit the registration letters on the cars parked outside every house had progressed two places along the alphabet. Two houses, next to each other, had speedboats. Tony Silkstone had told us that his house, The Garth, was the last one on the right. “The one with the converted gas lamps along the drive,” he’d added. Somebody’s million-watt security light flicked on behind us, turning night into day.
The panda sent by Inspector Adey was parked outside The Garth. We’d radioed instructions for them to guard and contain the property until we arrived. I freewheeled to a standstill behind it, yanked the brake on and killed the lights as the two occupants opened their doors and stretched upright. “Got the key?” I asked the driver.
“Right here, Boss,” he replied.
“Thanks. Hang around, we might need you.”
The converted gas lamps were not switched on and a Suzuki Vitara stood on the drive, nose against the garage door. The house was in total darkness, although all the curtains were pulled back. Dave put the key in the Yale latch, turned it and pushed the door open. When Silkstone dashed out he hadn’t locked the door deliberately; he’d just pulled it shut, or it had slammed behind him. Mr Yale had done the rest. So far, so good.
As we stepped inside a wind chime broke into song above our heads. “I could do without that,” I hissed.
The feeble illumination from a digital clock was enough to tell us that we were in a kitchen, and it was a good deal larger than the last one we’d stood in. Edges of implements and utensils in chrome and stainless steel reflected its glow. Unblinking green and red pilot lights watched us, like animals in the jungle, wondering who the intruders were, and a refrigerator added a background hum.
I found a light switch and clicked it on. The shapes became Neff appliances and the jungle animals lost their menace. Dave handed me a rolled-up coverall and I started to pull it over my feet. I wasn’t sure if it was necessary, but I was playing safe. Sometimes I cut corners, occasionally I’m reckless, but never where forensics are concerned. Hunches are no good in this game. A hunch never swayed a jury or earned the sympathy of a judge. Motive, opportunity, witnesses, forensic. They’re what convict criminals, with the emphasis on the forensic. You can fudge the other three, but not the forensic. That’s what I’d always believed, and, so far, it had done well for me. That was the received wisdom, as taught at Staff College.
We had a lot to learn.
“Close the door,” I said, and Dave pushed it shut with an elbow. We pulled latex gloves on to our hands and eased our feet into over-socks. We didn’t bother to pull the hoods over our heads. My mouth was dry and I could feel my heart banging against my ribs. The thrill of the chase had long since degenerated into the drudgery of killing, the sordidness of death. It always does. Apart from the occasional gangland shooting there’s no such thing as a good murder. This wasn’t a straightforward, cut-and-dried jealous husband killing any more; it was something squalid. A clock was ticking somewhere in the room, measuring each second with well-oiled precision.
“OK?”
“OK.”
“C’mon, then.”
The interior door opened on to a hallway. I wasn’t there to admire the furnishings and look at the pictures — that would come later — but I couldn’t help doing it. I switched the light on and absorbed the scene.
The Axminster carpet was covered in swirly patterns and felt as heavy as leaf mould under the feet. Facing us was an oil painting of a vaguely European city scene on a rainy day, churned out on a production line in Taiwan, hanging over an antique captain’s desk that I’d have accepted as a week’s salary anytime. The wallpaper was red, cream and gold stripes and a grandfather clock modelled on Westminster stood in a corner. Here, I thought, lived a man who knew what he liked. I found another switch and illuminated the staircase.
It’s the boss’s prerogative to lead the way. I climbed the stairs slowly, keeping well over to the left in case we needed to do a footprint check on them, and Dave followed. “Silkstone said first door on the right,” he reminded me.
The door was open, and we could already see what we’d expected by the glow from the landing lights. I reached around the doorframe and found the bedroom switch, just to do the job properly.
She was lying face down on the bed and appeared to be naked below the waist. I stepped forward into the room and stooped beside her, looking into my second dead face that night. There was a pair of tights knotted round her neck, and the bulging eyes and pig’s liver of a tongue lolling from her mouth confirmed that she’d died by throttling. I’d have preferred the knife in the heart, anytime. I scanned her body feeling like the worst sort of voyeur and noticed that she was, in fact, wearing a short skirt that had been pulled up around her waist. My eyes went into the routine, as they had done too many times in the past, and the questions popped up one by one like the indicators on an old-fashioned cash register: Signs of a struggle? Anything under the fingernails? Bruising or bleeding? Is this where the attack took place?
Dave was standing just outside the room, to one side, and I rejoined him. “Seen enough?” I asked, and he nodded. We stepped carefully down the stairs and retraced our path back out to my car. I rang Gilbert and told him the news. He’d contact the coroner and the pathologist and off we’d go again. We decided to get the SOCOs on the job immediately and leave everything else until after the morning meeting. Which was, I noticed, looking at the car clock, just six hours away.
“You didn’t really want to live here, did you?” Dave asked as we sat waiting.
“It was just a thought,” I replied.
“You wouldn’t have been happy.”
“I’m not happy now.”
“Unhappy with money in the bank is better than unhappy skint,” he replied.
“I suppose so.”
“This’ll bring the property prices down,” he added, looking out of the window.
“That’s a consolation.”
The SOCO’s white van came swaying round the corner, bouncing over the speed humps and triggering the big security light. “Looks like Michael Schumacher’s on duty tonight,” Dave observed as we opened our doors. I pointed to a spot behind me and the SOCO parked there and doused his lights.
He’s young, fresh faced, and can still boogie ’til dawn then appear in court bright as a squirrel. “Hi, Mr Priest,” he said, slamming the van door. “What’s going on? Is it two-for — the-price-of-one night, or something?”
“First of all, it’s Charlie,” I told him. “Secondly, there are people in bed and I’d prefer them to stay there, and thirdly, don’t be so bloody cheerful at this time in the morning.” We told him what we’d found, and a few minutes later another patrol car came into the estate, followed by the other SOCO and the photographer. Bedroom lights came on in the neighbouring houses and curtains twitched. We were having an operational meeting, in hushed voices, when we heard a police siren in the distance, gradually growing louder. A minute later a traffic car, diverted off the motorway, careered round the corner and nearly took off over the humps. Somebody had dialled 999. I had words with the driver, persuaded him to turn his blue lights off, and sent him back to cruising the M62. A man from one of the houses joined us, saying he was chairman of the local Neighbourhood Watch, demanding to know what was going on. He wore a flying-officer moustache and a dressing gown over pyjamas. I ushered him to one side and asked him — “just between the two of us” — what he knew about the people who lived at The Garth, adding that I’d be very grateful if he could put it all in writing for me, before nine o’clock in the morning. He wandered off composing a hatchet job on the neighbour with the ghastly street lamps in his garden.
That was all we could do. Priorities were identification of the bodies and times and causes of death. These would be checked against Silkstone’s story and we’d see if anything else we discovered supported or disputed the facts. If he were telling the truth the Crown Prosecution solicitors would decide the level of the charge against him; if he were lying I had a job on my hands.
We left the experts doing their stuff, with the uniformed boys outside to keep the ghouls at bay, and went home. Come daylight, we’d be back in force.
While I was addressing the troops about the killing of Peter Latham, young Jamie Walker was practising the new scam he’d learned at the detention centre. He’d strolled into a pub in the town centre, one he knew the layout of because they had no scruples about serving juveniles, and sidled his way towards the toilets, carefully avoiding being seen by the bar staff. When nobody was looking he’d slipped upstairs to the landlord’s living quarters and rifled them. Pub landladies collect gold jewellery like some of us collect warm memories, and he made quite a haul. He escaped in a Mini taken from the car-park and celebrated by driving it through the town centre flat out. The traffic car that came to Silkstone’s house had earlier chased young Jamie for a while, but he escaped by driving along the towpath. Two of our pandas spent the rest of the night driving from one reported sighting to another, without success. We know it was Jamie because he left fingerprints in the pub and in the mini, which he had to abandon before he could torch it.
I found all this out much later. When I arrived home I took off all my clothes, found a fresh set for next day and cleaned my teeth. I slipped under the duvet and closed my eyes.
The house Annabelle and I nearly bought was two along from Silkstone’s, backing on to a rocky field that the estate agent called a paddock. It had a double garage that dominated the front aspect, with an archway over the path and a wrought iron gate. Inside were four bedrooms, two with en suite bathrooms, and a study. The downstairs rooms had dado rails and patio doors, and the next door neighbours were members of the National Trust. They introduced themselves, saying we’d be very happy there, and gave us some membership forms. Annabelle said they were sussing us out.
We could have been happy there. The house was warm and dry and airy, with decent views over the fells; and pissing — off the neighbours would have been no problem. We could have locked the doors and closed the curtains, and played her Mozart and my Dylan to our hearts’ content. I’m sure we’d have been very happy there if we both hadn’t been such bloody reverse snobs.
Today — no, yesterday — I pulled a carving knife out of a dead body, standing astride it as if I were harvesting carrots. Play the film in reverse and you’d see the knife going in, feeling its way between rib and cartilage, following the line of least resistance as it severed vein, nerve and muscle. A dagger in the heart doesn’t kill you. It’s not like an electrical short circuit that immediately blows a fuse and cuts off the power. Blood stops flowing, or pumps out into the body’s cavities instead of following its normal well-ordered path, and the brain dies of starvation.
Today it was strangulation. A pair of tights knotted around the neck, stopping the flow of air and blood until, again, the brain dies. A pair of tights: aid to beauty; method of concealing identity favoured by blaggers; murder weapon. She had black hair and white skin, and may have been attractive, once. Before fear twisted her features and the ligature tightened, building up the pressure in her skull until her eyeballs and tongue tried to escape from it.
Murder doesn’t come stalking its victim at night, skulking from shadow to shadow, whispering unheard threats. It comes in the afternoon, with the sun casting shadows on the wall and the curtains blowing in the breeze. It comes from familiar hands, that once were loving.
The collared doves that live in next door’s apple tree were tuning up like a couple of novice viola players, and my blackbird was doing his scales prior to the morning concert. I got out of bed and staggered to the bathroom for a shower. I put on the clean clothes, brushed my hair and opened the curtains.
The sky was light, with Venus the palest speck on the horizon, not quite drained of its glow by the advancing sun. Above it was the disc of the moon, a duller blue than the sky, one edge dipped in cream. They hovered there like the last two reluctant guests to leave a party. I picked up the alarm clock and went downstairs to grab an hour’s rest on the settee.
The night tec’ was sitting at my desk when I arrived in the office, reading the morning paper. “Hi, Rodge, anything in about us?” I asked, slipping my jacket off.
“Morning, Charlie. No, not yet,” he replied, moving out of my chair.
“Pity. I was hoping they’d have it sorted for us.”
“You’ve had a busy night.”
“Oh, just two murders,” I replied. “Nothing special. And you?”
“Sex or money?”
“Sex. Sex all the way.”
We only have one detective on duty through the night, in case the uniformed boys come across anything that requires a CID presence. He slid a typed report across to me, saying: “Jamie Walker. He was out causing grief again but we’ve got some dabs — I had to borrow a SOCO from City because ours were otherwise engaged. Hopefully, we’ll pick him up today.”
“And as soon as we put him in front of the mags they’ll give him bail,” I said. “God, I could do without him.”
I told him to carry on looking after the stuff outside the murder enquiries, adding that we’d have them sorted as soon as the PM results came through to confirm what we already knew. He went home to breakfast with his wife, a nightshift staff nurse at the General, and I read his report. “Jamie Walker, aged fourteen, why do I hate you?” I said to myself as I slid it into the Pending tray.
The team, plus a few reinforcements from HQ CID, reassembled at eight in the small conference room and there were gasps of disbelief when Mr Wood told them about the developments. After his pep talk I split them into two groups and appointed two sets of control staff, as if the murders were separate enquiries, and sent the troops back out on to the streets. Priorities were the backgrounds of the three leading players and their relationships with each other. The neighbours would be given their opportunity to dish the dirt, so that might throw up something, and we needed the post-mortem results desperately. I told the Latham team to reconvene at three and the Silkstone team at four.
We could hold him in custody without charging him for twenty-four hours, and then ask for extensions, but we’re supposed to charge a prisoner as soon as is practicable. We decided to do him for a Section 18 assault, that’s GBH with intent, purely as a holding charge, and let the CPS lawyers decide at their leisure whether to go for murder or manslaughter. He appeared in front of a magistrate that morning and our man explained the seriousness of the offence. It’s not necessary to present any evidence at this stage. The magistrate obligingly remanded Silkstone into our custody for seven days while we completed our enquiries. After that period he would appear again and hopefully be committed to appear before the crown court at sometime in the remote future. We booked his solicitor, Prendergast, for eleven a.m., when the fun would begin.
Dave and I made a return visit to Silkstone’s house at Mountain Meadows. The sun was shining after a shower as we turned into the development, and it looked good. Several of the gardens had weird trees with twisted branches and dangling fronds, like you see in Japanese watercolours, and pampas-grass was popular. There were two panda cars outside The Garth and blue “keep out” tape stretched across the driveway.
The PC in charge showed me the visitors’ book and entered our names in it. I saw that the undertakers had called at six a.m. to take the body away, and a reporter from the Gazette had been tipped off by a friendly neighbour. We stepped over the tape and walked down the drive.
It looked different in the daylight. Allowing for the Silkstones’ crap taste, it looked highly desirable. Everything they had was expensive, top of the range, and they had everything. We stood in the kitchen, where we’d stood with such different feelings a few hours earlier, and took it all in. The wind chime gave a single, hollow, boing but I reached up and disabled it before it could run through its repertoire. There were Toulouse-Lautrec prints on the walls and a rope of garlic hanging behind the door.
“Not bad,” Dave admitted. From him, that’s an Oscar.
I sniffed the garlic, then felt it. “Plastic,” I said. “No wonder it didn’t work.”
“Work?”
“It’s supposed to keep evil at bay.”
He looked at me without turning his head, and said: “Er, listen, Charlie. I wouldn’t put that in your report if I were you. One or two people have been saying things about you, recently…”
The sitting room was a surprise. With its two leather chesterfields and dark wood it looked more like a gentlemen’s club than a room in a suburban house. The fireplace was polished stone, complete with horse brasses, and a photograph of the householder took pride of place above it. A beaming Silkstone was standing next to a much taller and slightly embarrassed man who looked remarkably like Nigel Mansell, former World Formula 1 champion.
“He moves in fast company,” I remarked.
“Golf tournament,” Dave said, which was fairly obvious from the single gloves, silly trousers and the clubs they were leaning on. “Probably a charity do, or something.”
“Right. What do you think of the room?” The carpet was plain blue and vertical blinds covered the windows. There were no flowers or frills, no Capo di Monte shepherd boys — Alleluia for that small mercy — and not a single pot plant. The wallpaper was blue and cream stripes, edged in gold, on all four walls.
“It’s a bit austere,” Dave remarked, turning round in a circle. He paused, then said: “The wife wanted me to put one of them up.”
“One of what?”
He pointed. “A dildo rail.”
I said: “It’s called a dado rail,” not sure if I’d fallen into a trap.
“Is it? I’m sure she said dildo.”
“Maybe you misunderstood.”
“Sounds like it.”
“C’mon,” I told him. “Let’s go upstairs. That’s where the story of Tony and Margaret begins and ends.”
The path we’d pioneered the night before was designated with blue tape so we stayed with it, although it wasn’t necessary. In the bedroom little adhesive squares with green arrows on them indicated items of interest that were invisible to my eyes. They were scattered randomly over the carpet near the bed, and concentrated around the disturbed surface of the duvet. Dave bent down and examined the area.
“Doesn’t look like blood,” he announced, straightening up.
“Other bodily fluids,” I suggested. The SOCO had probably found spots and splashes by using an ultra violet lamp or Luminol spray.
Next door was the woman’s room, all done in pink and lace, with a dressing table crowded with the things some ladies need to apply before they can face the world. She wore Obsession perfume and Janet Reger undies. A wedding photograph, similar in style to the one in Latham’s room, stood on the dressing table but pushed to the back, behind all the jars and bottles and aerosols. It was lightly covered with powder either from her compact or left by the fingerprint experts. In it, Silkstone was wearing a morning suit and his wife a traditional white dress. They were a handsome couple and it was impossible to date this one, unlike Mr and Mrs Latham’s.
The husband had his own room. It was furnished in a mock tartan material that looked pretty good and the bookcase was filled with coffee-table manuals about cars. We had classic cars, the world’s fastest cars, the most expensive cars, Ferraris, Porsches, and so on. There were yearbooks about the Grands Prix going back about ten years and a collection of Pirelli and Michelin calendars for a similar period. They were all big glossy books, heavy on pictures, light on words.
I found his reading books on the bottom shelf. They were by people like Dale Carnegie and Mark McCormack, and had titles such as How To Sell Crap To People Who Didn’t Know They Needed It; and What To Do With That Second Million. When this is over, I thought, I could do worse than read one or two of these. Or perhaps even write one.
There was a framed photograph of Silkstone on the wall behind the bed, and another of Nigel Mansell, autographed, on the facing wall. Silkstone was posing beside a Mark II Jaguar and looked about twenty. It was a snapshot, blown up to poster size, and was badly focused, but the numberplate was legible. He had a faint blond fuzz on his head, like a peach, which for a young bloke was seriously bald. Dave joined me as I was staring at it.
“Not as nice as your Jag,” he said.
“It’s not, is it.”
“Ever regret selling it?”
“Mmm, now and again.” I turned to face the other picture. “What do you reckon to that one?” I asked.
“It’s great. Our Daniel would love it.” Daniel was his son, a couple of years younger than daughter Sophie.
“Why Mansell? He’s not a gay icon, is he?”
“No, of course not. He’s a happily married man.”
“He has the moustache.”
“So has Saddam Hussein.”
“He is gay.”
“Yeah, as gay as a tree full of parrots. Listen,” Dave said. “Mansell was the greatest driver of his day, and lots of other days, because he was such a fierce competitor. He liked to win. At everything. That’s why people like Silkstone look up to him. He’s a winners’ icon, not a gay one.”
“Mmm, makes sense,” I agreed.
Dave looked at his watch, saying: “It’s time we were off.”
The friendly neighbourhood spy had informed his contact at the Gazette that I was on the scene, and a reporter was waiting for us as we emerged from The Garth. She had spiky red hair, a ring through her nose and a bullish manner.
“Are you the investigating officer?” she demanded.
“Yes,” I told her, resigning myself to making some sort of statement. “And just who are you?”
She rattled off one of those names that rhymes with itself, like Fay Day or Carrol Barrel, as if it were self-evident who she was and only a parochial fool like myself wouldn’t know. This woman was ambitious, going places, and a small-town murder meant nothing more to her than a by-line. Next week she’d either be applying for Kate Adie’s job or back on hospital radio. “And is the raid on this house related to the murder last evening at West Woods?” she asked.
News travels fast, I thought. I drew a big breath and launched myself into it: “We are investigating a suspicious death at a residence in the West Woods estate,” I told her, “and have arrested a person. Our enquiries have brought us here, where we have found the body of a woman. At this point in the investigation we are not looking for anybody else. Our press office will release further information as and when it becomes available.” I can reel out the cop-speak with the best of them, when I don’t want to say what I’m thinking.
She couldn’t believe her luck. “You mean there’s still a body in there?” she demanded, her eyes gleaming.
“No,” I said. “It was removed earlier this morning, for post-mortem examination. Now if you’ll excuse me.”
She produced a mobile phone — it was hanging on a thong around her neck — and called for a photographer, House of Death headlines buzzing through her head.
The PC on duty asked if I wanted the integrity of the scene maintaining and I said I did. We had a quick word with the house-to-house people, but they had no great revelations for us, and drove back to the nick.
On the way Dave said: “You’re not happy with this, are you?”
“Just playing safe, Dave,” I replied.
“What’s the problem?”
“No problem. According to Silkstone, Latham killed his wife so he killed Latham. Motive — revenge. Taking into consideration the balance of his mind, and all that, he’d be done for manslaughter and could be free in a year.”
“That’s true,” Dave said. “And if he was on remand for a year he could be released straight after the trial.”
“But what if,” I continued, “they were both in on it? What if they were both there when Mrs Silkstone died? That could mean a life sentence. This way, he’s put all the blame on Latham, who is in no position to defend himself.”
Dave thought about it, before saying: “You mean, they were having some sort of three-in-a-bed sex romp, and it all went wrong?”
I glanced sideways at him. “Do people do such things in Heckley?” I asked.
“Not to my knowledge,” he replied.
“Maybe they were over enthusiastic,” I suggested, “and she died. They invented some sort of story but Silkstone thought of a better one. He killed Latham and came to us.”
“It’s a possibility,” Dave agreed.
“Alternatively,” I began, exploring the possibilities, “ perhaps Silkstone did them both, all alone and by himself. It’d be cheaper than a divorce.”
“And tidier,” Dave added.
“And possibly even profitable,” I suggested. “That’s something to look at.”
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves,” Dave cautioned. “Let’s wait for the DNA results.” He was silent for the rest of the way. As we turned into the car-park he said: “The bloke’s lost his wife, Charlie. Don’t forget that.”
“I know,” I replied, adding: “I think I’ll ask the professor to look at the crime scene, see what he thinks.” The professor is the pathologist at Heckley General Hospital, and at that very moment he was turning his blade towards the fair skin of Mrs Margaret Silkstone, subject of our debate. I locked the car doors and we headed for the entrance.
There was a message from Annette waiting for me at the front desk. A neighbour had positively identified Peter Latham, who had died from a single knife wound to the heart. Time of death between three and six o’clock, Wednesday afternoon. I passed it to Dave and asked if Prendergast had arrived yet. He was locked in the cell with his client, I learned, discussing strategies, defences and tactics. The truth was outside his remit.
“’Ello, Mr Priest,” a squeaky voice said, behind me. I spun round and faced two traffic cops straight in the eye. They were wearing standard-issue Velcro moustaches and don’t-do — that expressions, but neither had a ventriloquist’s dummy sitting on his arm. I tilted my gaze downwards forty-five degrees and met that of a grubby angel standing between them.
“Jamie!” I exclaimed, treading an uneasy path between disapproval and surprise. “What are you doing here?”
“Bin invited in to ’elp you wiv enquiries, ’aven’t I?” he replied.
“And can you ’elp — help — us?”
“Nah. Don’t know nowt about it, do I?”
“Well do your best.” I turned back to the desk, but he said: “’Ere, Mr Priest. Is it right you used to ’ave a knee-type Jag?”
“That’s right,” I told him. “A red one.”
“Cor!” he replied. “Best car on t’road.”
They took him away to feed him on bacon sandwiches while he fed them a pack of lies, and we arranged to interview Silkstone in ten minutes. I went to the bog and washed my face. There was a mounting pile of reports on my desk, but they’d have to wait. I always read them all, but on every murder enquiry we have a dedicated report reader who siphons off the important stuff. I like to read all the irrelevant details, too: the minutiae of the lives of the people who pass through our hands. Sometimes, they tell me things. As Confucius say, wisdom comes through knowledge.
Prendergast was wearing a blue suit and maroon tie, and could have been about to deliver a budget speech. He didn’t. He launched straight into the attack by complaining about our treatment of his client, who was, he reminded us, traumatised by the sudden and violent death of the woman he loved.
I apologised if we had appeared insensitive, but reminded them that Mr Silkstone had, by his own admission, killed a man and we were conducting a murder enquiry. We’d collect some of his own clothes for him, I promised, as soon as the crime scene was released, and I told him that his wife’s body had been taken to the mortuary. We needed Silkstone to formally identify the body later, and he agreed.
“Will he be taken there in handcuffs, Inspector?” Prendergast asked.
“As Mr Silkstone surrendered himself voluntarily I don’t think that will be necessary,” I conceded. I must be getting soft.
The preliminary fencing over, we started asking questions. Silkstone stuck to his story, saying that he’d come home to see Latham leaving his house. Inside, he’d found Margaret lying on the bed with a ligature around her neck. He’d attempted to remove it, but quickly realised that she was dead. The rest was a bit vague, he claimed. It always is. He agreed that he must have followed Latham home and gone in the house after him. He suddenly found himself standing in the kitchen, with Latham’s body lying on the floor, between his feet. There was a knife sticking out of Latham’s chest, and on the worktop there was one of those wooden blocks with several other knives lodged in it. He did not dispute that he stabbed Latham, but claimed to have no memory of the actual deed.
When he realised the enormity of what he’d done he sat in the front room for a while — about ten minutes, he thought — then dialled 999. Prendergast made sympathetic noises about the state of his client’s mind and suggested that Unlawful Killing might be an appropriate charge.
“Do you think there was any sort of relationship between your wife and Latham?” I asked, and Silkstone’s shrug suggested that it was a possibility. The tape doesn’t pick up shrugs, but I let it go. “Could you explain, please,” I asked.
He stubbed his cigarette in the tin ashtray and left the butt there with the other three he’d had. Only prisoners are allowed to smoke in the nick. “I wondered if they were having an affair,” he said. He thought about his words for a while, then added: “Or perhaps Peter — Latham — wanted to start one, and Margaret didn’t. Last week, last Wednesday, I went home early and he was there, talking to her. He said he’d just called in for a coffee, and she said the same. But there was a strained air, if you follow me. They seemed embarrassed that I caught them together. Maybe, you know, he was trying it on.”
“How well did Margaret know him?” I asked, adding: “Officially, so to speak.”
“Quite well,” he replied. “We — that’s Peter and I — married two sisters, back in 1975, and he came to work for me. Neither marriage lasted long, but we stayed friends.”
“What line of work are you in?”
“I’m Northern Manager of Trans Global Finance, and Peter is — was — one of my sales executives.”
“Wasn’t he working yesterday?”
“No. He often sees clients at weekends, when it’s convenient for them, and takes a day off through the week.”
“Is it usually Wednesday?”
“Yes, it is.”
“And Margaret? Did she work?”
“For me. TGF is heavily into e-commerce, and Margaret acted as my secretary, working from home.”
“E-commerce?” I queried, vaguely knowing what he meant.
“Electronic commerce.”
“In other words, your company doesn’t have a huge office block somewhere.”
“That’s right, Inspector. We have very small premises, just an office and a typist, in Halifax and various other towns. Our HQ is in Docklands, but that’s quite modest. Our parent company resides in Geneva.”
I exhaled, puffing my cheeks out, and tapped the desk with my pencil. Dave took it as his cue and came in with: “Mr Silkstone, you said that Latham was at your house the previous Wednesday, when you arrived home early.”
“Yes.” He reached into his pocket and removed a Benson and Hedges packet.
“What time was that?” Dave asked.
“About four o’clock. Perhaps a few minutes earlier.”
“Was it unusual for you to come home at that time?”
“Yes. Very unusual.”
“So Latham could have been there the week before, and the week before that, and you wouldn’t have known.”
He lit a cigarette with a gold lighter borrowed from his brief and took a deep draw on it. “Yes,” he mumbled, exhaling down his nose. There were four of us in the tiny interview room and three of us were passively smoking the equivalent of twenty a day, thanks to Silkstone. The atmosphere in there would have given a Greenpeace activist apoplexy. Carcinogenic condensates were coagulating on the walls, evil little particulates furring-up the light fittings. What they were doing to our tubes I preferred not to imagine but I vowed to sue him if I contracted anything.
“But yesterday you came home early again,” Dave stated.
Good on yer, mate, I thought, as our prisoner sucked his cheeks in and felt round the inside of his mouth with his tongue.
“That’s true,” Silkstone admitted.
“Twice in eight days. Very unusual, wouldn’t you say?”
“Gentlemen,” Prendergast interrupted. “My client is senior management with an international company. His hours are flexible, not governed by the necessity to watch a clock. He works a sixty-hour week and takes time off when he can. I’m sure you can imagine the routine.”
“But still unusual,” Dave insisted.
“He’s right,” Silkstone agreed, talking to his lawyer. Turning to Dave he added: “Last week I wasn’t feeling very well, so I skipped my last appointment and came home early. It wasn’t business, just calling on one of my staff for a pep talk. Yesterday — ” he shrugged his shoulders. “I finished early and went home. That’s all.”
Dave stroked his chin for a few seconds before asking: “Are you sure that’s all?”
Prendergast jumped in again, saying this speculation was leading nowhere, like any good lawyer would have done. What he meant was that if his client went home early because he thought he might catch his wife in bed with her lover, we could tell the court that his actions were premeditated. And that meant murder.
Silkstone moved as if to stub the cigarette out, realised it was only half smoked and took another drag on it. “I don’t know,” he replied, ignoring his brief ’s protestations. “I’ve been wondering that myself. Did I expect to find them together again? Is that why I left the afternoon free? You know, subconsciously. I don’t think I did. I loved my wife, trusted her, and she loved me. If I’d really expected to catch them together I’d have returned home even earlier, wouldn’t I?” He took another long draw on the cigarette while we pondered on his question. “Truth is,” he continued, “I’ve been worrying about the old ticker a bit, lately. Decided to cut my workload. That’s why I came home early.”
Which, I thought, was a good point. I quizzed him about how he’d felt as he drove to Latham’s house; how he gained entry; about the knife and any conversation he had with Latham. It was a waste of time. Everything was obscured by the thick red mist of convenient memory loss. There’s a lot more of it about than you’d ever believe, especially among murder suspects. “Interview terminated,” I said, looking up at the clock and reading off the time. Dave reached out and stopped the tape.
“Your case papers will be sent to the crown prosecutors,” I told Silkstone, “who will determine the level of charge against you. Assuming the results of the forensic tests validate what you say they may decide to go for a charge of manslaughter. If not, I shall be pressing for a murder charge. You will be committed for trial at crown court and we shall be applying for you to be remanded in custody until then. Is there anything you wish to ask me?”
Silkstone shook his head. Prendergast said: “I have explained the procedure to my client, Inspector. We will be making our own clinical and psychiatric reports and demand full access to any forensic procedures that are being undertaken. It goes without saying that we will be applying for bail.”
“You do that,” I replied, sliding my chair back and standing up.
We grabbed a bacon sandwich in the canteen and drove to Latham’s house on the West Wood estate. There are no trees at the West Woods, because the landscape around Heckley does not suit them. The ground is rocky, the winters harsh and the sheep omnivorous. Archaeologists following the builders’ excavators found remnants of a forest in the patch of peat bog they were building on, and an imaginative sales person did the rest. There is no North, South or East Wood.
We wandered around his home from room to room, looking in drawers, feeling through the pockets of his suits, like a couple of vultures picking over a carcass. Wilbur Smith’s Elephant Song was lying on a shelf within reach of his easy chair, with a bookmark at about the halfway point. In the smallest bedroom, filled with junk, there was a big bag of fishing rods and a box of tackle. I hadn’t marked him as a fisherman.
On his fridge-freezer door, held in place by a magnetic Bart Simpson, was a postcard showing a painting that I recognised. I eased it off and looked at the back, but it was blank. “Gauguin,” I said, flapping the card towards Dave.
“You’d know,” he replied.
I replaced it exactly where I’d found it and opened the fridge door. He ate ready meals from the supermarket, supplemented with oven chips, and was seriously deficient in vegetables.
“He didn’t eat properly,” I said.
“You’d know,” Dave repeated.
I was drawn, as always, to the bedroom. I was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking at the two photographs, when Dave joined me.
“Who do you reckon she is?” I asked.
He looked at the picture of the young girl without handling it. “Mmm, interesting,” he mused. “Taken a while ago. Could be his wife, assuming that’s them in the other picture. Is it, er, a bit on the salacious side, or is that just me?”
“It’s just you,” I told him, untruthfully.
“I don’t think it’s a daughter or niece,” he continued.
“Why not?”
“Well, I wouldn’t frame a similar picture of our Sophie and have it on display, and she’d certainly have something to say about it if I did. I reckon it’s his wife, when she was at school. They keep it there for a laugh, or a bit of extra stimulation. I don’t know, you’re the one with all the experience. I’m just a happily married man.”
“The SOCO reckons it was taken about the same time as the wedding photo,” I said, “which means it’s not the wife.”
“Fair enough,” he replied, adding: “Maybe all will be revealed at the meeting, when we learn something about his background.”
“Let’s hope so,” I said. We left, locking the door behind us, and told the PC on duty that we still wanted the crime scene maintaining.
In the car Dave said: “That photo.”
“Mmm.”
“Of the young girl.”
“Mmm.”
“Maybe it’s just a curio type of thing. The sort of picture you might pick up at a car boot sale, or something. Know what I mean?”
“I think so,” I said. “A collector’s item. Like some dirty old Victorian might have drooled over.”
“Yeah. Voluptuous innocence and all that crap.”
“Lewis Carroll and Alice,” I suggested.
“Exactly. He used to photograph children in the nude, you know.”
“Crikey,” I said. “So where did he keep his spare films?”
We’d told the Latham team to assemble at three, but the Mrs Silkstone investigators were there too, keen to learn the big picture. Annette and Iqbar were sitting in the front row, and she passed me a foolscap sheet of the PM findings. That was what I’d wanted most of all. I perused it as everybody found seats and joshed with each other. The small conference room doubles as a lecture theatre, and is equipped with all the usual paraphernalia like overhead projectors and CCTV. At one minute to three I picked up the wooden pointing stick and rattled it against the floor, calling out: “OK, boys and girls, let’s have some order.”
As the hubbub died down Mr Wood entered the room. “Keeping them entertained, Charlie?” he said.
“Just doing a few quick impressions, Boss,” I replied.
“I see. Any chance of you impersonating a police officer for the rest of the day?” He has a vicious tongue, at times.
Gilbert told the troops that HQ had sanctioned their overtime payments, which is what they wanted to hear, and thanked them for their efforts before handing over to me. I started by adding my appreciation for their work. A murder enquiry is always disruptive to the private lives of the investigators, as well as the principal characters. “This is a double murder enquiry,” I told them, “and the eyes of the world are upon us, so it’s important that we show them what we can do. As always, you have responded to the challenge, and we are grateful.” I outlined the bare bones of the case, and then asked about the identity of the first body.
Inspector Adey said: “First body confirmed to be that of Peter John Latham. We contacted his ex-wife — he’s a divorcee — who lives in Pontefract. She was reluctant to come over to ID him because she has young children, and showed little interest in knowing when the funeral might be. Eventually we asked a neighbour, Mrs Watson, who was friendly with him, and she positively identified him.”
“Any other next of kin?” I asked.
“His mother in Chippenham, if she’s still alive. She vacated her last known address to move into a nursing home, but we’re trying to find her.”
“Thanks Gareth. We might as well do the other one now,” I said. “Any volunteers?”
A uniformed constable raised his hand and uncoiled from his chair. He’d taken Mr Silkstone to the mortuary at the General Hospital, he told us, where Silkstone had positively identified the body of a woman as being that of his wife, Margaret. I thanked him and he sat down.
“Was he suitably grief stricken?” I asked him.
“Yes sir.”
Gareth Adey rose to his feet, saying: “Point of order, Mr Priest.”
I was expecting it. Asking a murderer to identify an associated body was a trifle unusual, if not bizarre. “Yes, Gareth,” I said.
“Do you not think, Mr Priest,” he waffled, “that we might be leaving ourselves open to criticism by inviting the accused to ID a body allegedly murdered by the victim of his revenge killing?”
“Good point, Gareth,” I told him. “We need a second opinion. Could I leave that with you, and I’d be grateful if you’d do the usual with next of kin.”
He smiled contentedly and sat down.
“Cause of death,” I said, pointing to Annette.
She was wearing jeans and a white blouse, her jacket draped over the back of the chair. She stood up, unsmiling, and brushed her hair off her face. “Peter Latham was killed by a single knife-wound to the heart,” she told us. “The knife found in him would be identical to the one missing from the set in his kitchen. The blade entered his chest between the fifth and sixth ribs on an upward trajectory, puncturing the left ventricle. This indicates an underhand blow from someone of approximately the same height. Latham was only a hundred and sixty-eight centimetres tall. That’s five feet six inches. The blade missed the ribs and unusual force would not be required.”
“Time of death?” I asked.
“Between three and six p.m.,” Annette replied.
“We can narrow that down,” I declared. “Silkstone rang nine-double-nine at seventeen ten hours, saying he’d done it. Let’s call it between three and five.” Doc Evans had said between four and five, I remembered, and he was on the scene quite quickly. The professor was working from a cold cadaver, sixteen hours after the event. “On second thoughts, make it between four and five,” I told them. Sometimes, knowing the precise time of death can be crucial.
Annette had taken her seat again, but I said: “Go on, Annette, you might as well tell us about the other one.”
She rose, brushing the offending hair aside, and launched straight into it. She was a young attractive woman, one of only four in a room with thirty men, and I wondered if I’d been fair, sending her to the post-mortems. She said: “Margaret Silkstone died as a result of strangulation. There was a pair of tights knotted around her throat but there was also bruising caused by manual strangulation, apparently from behind. She’d recently had anal and vaginal intercourse, and semen samples have been recovered and sent for analysis.”
“How recently,” I asked.
“At about the time of death,” she replied. “The professor’s preliminary conclusions are that vaginal intercourse took place before death, and anal possibly after, but he wants to do a more considered examination.”
“And when was the time of death?”
“Between two and six p.m.”
“Right. Thanks for doing the gory stuff, Annette,” I told her. “I appreciate it.”
She gave me the briefest of smiles and sat down. After that I invited the team to let us know what they had discovered about the background of the deceased.
They all came from Gloucestershire. Silkstone had been a big wheel in a company based in Burdon Manor, variously known as Burdon Home Improvements, Burdon Engineering and Burdon Developments; and Latham was one of his salesmen. Back in 1975 they’d married two sisters but neither marriage had lasted. When the receiver finally pulled the plug on Burdons, Silkstone went to work for the now-defunct Oriental Bank of Commerce, or OBC, a name that sent a chill up the spine of every financial manager in the world. Now he was Northern big-cheese for a company called Trans Global Finance, and had been married to the late Margaret for ten years. Silkstone had five speeding convictions and two for careless driving. Latham had one for OPL and Margaret was clean.
“So now,” I told the throng of eager, upturned faces, “you know all about them. Any questions?”
“Yes Sir,” someone said. “Will you have the DNA results tomorrow?”
“No. Saturday,” I replied.
There was nothing else, so I terminated the meeting. Someone brewed up in the big office and I carried a mug of tea into my little den in the corner. I opened an A2 drawing pad and divided the sheet into several boxes. Dave came in, followed by Annette. In Box 1 I wrote:
Silkstone telling truth. Latham killed Margaret, then Silkstone killed Latham, in a rage.
“What next?” I asked.
“Three in a bed romp,” Dave suggested. In Box 2 I wrote:
Sex game gone wrong. Latham and Silkstone killed
Margaret. Silkstone killed Latham to cover his tracks.
“Hmm, that’s interesting,” Annette said.
“Charlie’s idea,” Dave told her. “I don’t know about such things. What next?”
In Box 3 I wrote:
Margaret and Latham having an affair.
Silkstone killed them both in a jealous rage.
Dave said: “I reckon that’s the obvious explanation.”
“It’s the favourite,” I agreed, “but how about this?” I wrote:
All a plot by Silkstone and numbered it Box 4.
“What, like, cold blooded?” Dave asked. “You think he planned it all?”
“I don’t think that. We just have to consider it. What if Silkstone killed Margaret for personal reasons and threw the blame on Latham? The whole thing might be a pack of lies. We need to know if he gains financially in any way.” I turned to Annette. “That’s a little job for you, Annette. Find out if he had her insured. How much do they owe on the house and will the insurance company pay out for her death, if you follow me?”
“You mean, if they had a joint life policy,” she replied.
“Do I?”
“She’s a clever girl,” Dave said.
Annette picked up her still steaming mug of tea and walked out. I gazed at the door she’d closed behind her and said to it: “I didn’t mean right now!”
I wrote M, O and F in each box, meaning motive, opportunity and forensic, and ticked them where appropriate. I didn’t bother with W for witnesses, because the only one we had was Silkstone himself. “That’s as far as we can go, Sunshine,” I declared, “until we get some results from the lab and find out who spread his seed all over the crime scene.” The phone rang before I could put cornices on all the capital letters and generally titivate the chart. It was the professor, replying to the message I’d left for him earlier in the day.
“It’s The Garth, Mountain Meadows,” I told him.
“What, no number?”
“No, but there’s only seven houses.”
“Pretentious twats. I’ll see you there at five. You can have half an hour.”
“Great, Prof. I appreciate it.”
Annette came in as I was replacing the phone. I looked at her, bemused by the rapid departure and return. She said: “Silkstone paid nearly two hundred thousand for the house, and still owes over a hundred and fifty K on it. And yes, the mortgage is insured joint life, first death, so if he didn’t kill Margaret himself they’ll have to pay out.”
It took me a few seconds to speak. Eventually I asked: “How did you find all this so quickly?”
“I went down and asked him,” she replied, smiling. “Took him a cup of tea. It’s not secret information. As he said, joint life is fairly standard practice, not necessarily sinister, but yes, he does come in for a handy payout.”
“Told you she was a clever girl,” Dave declared. He drained his mug, adding: “I’ll leave you to it; there’s work to be done.”
When he’d gone Annette said: “And I’ve had a word with the Met. Asked them to contact the head office of Trans Global Finance just to confirm things.”
“Brilliant, we’ll make a detective of you yet.” I told her about the call from the prof., and as Dave had vanished I suggested she come along with me to hear what he had to say. She seemed pleased to be asked, and went off to do her paperwork.
At twenty to five I gathered up a set of photographs of the Mountain Meadows crime scene, plus my new chart of possible scenarios, and let Annette drive us there in her yellow Fiat. The professor arrived at about five past. He greeted Annette like a long-lost relative, then said: “Right, let’s get on with it.”
I laid out a set of photographs on the worktop in the kitchen, telling him what we’d found but not passing any opinions nor making any speculations. The professor nodded and sniffed a few times, peering at the photos through his half-spectacles, and asked to be shown the bedroom.
The bed was made up with a duvet in a floral pattern, but still bore the impression of the action that had taken place there, highlighted by the SOCO’s little arrows. In the twenty-four hours since the killing the smell of neglect had pervaded the room. The cocktail of perfumes: her make-up, somebody’s sweat and other fluids, flowed uneasily through the nostrils. I breathed through my mouth to avoid it. We had a preliminary report from the scientific boys, saying what had been found where, but no definitive DNA evidence to say from whom it all came. The professor examined the sites marked by the arrows, checking with the report after each one.
“We’ll leave you to it,” I said, and led Annette downstairs. It was the first time she’d been in the house and her eyes scanned everything, sweeping over the furniture, pausing to examine the decorations more closely. Partly, I supposed, from the professional point of view, partly as a woman in another woman’s house. “Have a good look round,” I invited, seating myself on a leather settee that was as hard as a park bench.
A coffee table book about Jaguar cars was propped in an alcove adjoining the fireplace. I reached for it and flipped through until I found the E-type. They’d photographed a red one, same as mine, from low down at the front. I’m not a car person, but the E-type was special and I felt a pang of regret for selling it.
“I had one like that,” I said to Annette as she returned, holding the double-page spread open for her to see.
“What? An E-type?” she exclaimed, smiling wider than I’d ever seen her.
“Mmm.”
“Cor! I wish I’d known you then.”
“Everybody said it was a good bird-puller.”
“And was it?”
I smiled at the memories. “I suppose so. My dad bought it as a pile of scrap and restored it. When he died it came to me.”
“I’m sorry,” Annette said, sitting in an easy chair.
“Sorry?”
“About your dad. He was a policeman, wasn’t he?”
“That’s right. A sergeant at Heckley. He was a nice man.”
“Yes, I can imagine.” She stood up abruptly and walked over to the window. I watched her, wanting to join her there. It would have been the most natural thing in the world to slip my hand around her waist and stand with her, looking out over the garden. It might also have earned me a knee in the groin. Her hair was tied in a wild bundle behind her head. Difficult to manage, I thought, and smiled. “What’s the verdict on the house?” I asked.
Annette turned to face me. Her cheeks were pink. “This house?”
“Mmm.”
“The house is OK. Not sure about the occupants.”
“I really meant the occupants.”
“Right. The place speaks volumes about them. I’d say they were well off, but lacking in taste. He’s a control freak, hasn’t grown up yet. What sort of man…”
The professor was clomping down the stairs and Annette stopped speaking. He came into the room with a worried expression on his face, which meant nothing because his features were set that way. Anybody’s would be, with his job. He pulled his spectacles off, wiped his eyes with a big white handkerchief, and flopped onto the other Chesterfield. It flinched slightly and creaked under his weight.
“Fancy a coffee, Prof.?” I asked.
Annette said: “I’ll make us…”
“No, no,” the professor insisted, flapping a hand. “Kind of you, but I’d rather not. Too busy.”
“Right. So what can you tell us?”
“Not a great deal,” he began. “Without the DNA results we’re barking into the dark somewhat. She was killed on the bed, either during or just after sexual intercourse; and that’s about it. You can definitely rule out her being killed elsewhere.”
“One man or two?”
“Dunno. The lab should be able to tell us, though.”
“Up to the point of death, was she a willing participant?”
“Good question. Apparently so, or to put it another way, she wasn’t dragged kicking and screaming into the room. That doesn’t mean that there wasn’t some duress applied.”
“Like, at knifepoint, for example?”
“Yes. Precisely.”
I turned to my new partner. She was definitely more attractive than Sparky, but I didn’t know how she’d be in a fistfight. “Anything, Annette?” I asked.
“Yes,” she began. “From your earlier examinations, Professor, and what you’ve seen here, could you say if any violence was used during the acts of intercourse?”
“The actual penetration, you mean?”
“Er, yes.”
“Difficult to interpret. Yes, entry was quite violent, but one man’s — or woman’s — violence is another’s big turn-on. It was rough intercourse, but I cannot interpret the victim’s feelings about that.”
“How rough?” I asked.
“Some damage to the mucous membranes, but not excessively so.”
“Both ends?”
“More so in the anus, but that’s quite usual.”
I spread my chart on the arm of the settee and explained it to the professor. We all agreed that what he had determined at the house fitted perfectly with Silkstone’s story but I argued that it could also support the sex romp theory.
“Did you find any other supportive evidence?” the professor asked.
“Such as?”
“Well, for instance, did you find any pornography? Sex aids? Bondage paraphernalia? That sort of thing.”
“No,” I reluctantly admitted.
“Then I’d say it was unlikely.”
My pet theory had just prised the bars open and escaped. “Unless the DNA tests show that they were both there,” I argued.
“I suppose so,” the professor said, in a tone that suggested I shouldn’t hold my breath.
“How about Silkstone killing them both in a jealous rage?” I suggested, tapping Box 3 with the blunt end of my pen. “That’s probably what we would have concluded had it not been for his admissions.”
“Ye-es, I’d wondered about that,” the professor replied, “but I’m not sure that what I’ve seen validates it. Force was undoubtedly used against Mrs Silkstone, but she wasn’t knocked about and there are few signs of a struggle. There’s no bruising to her face, but her arms bear evidence of being tightly gripped. It was a controlled force, in my opinion, by someone who knew exactly what he was doing.”
“Was she a willing partner, in the sex?”
“Willing? Probably not. Reluctant, I’d say. She certainly didn’t fight for her life until she had no chance.”
“Are you suggesting that the motive for the assault was rape, pure and simple,” I asked, “and killing her was an afterthought?”
“It’s a possibility,” he agreed, “although I’m not sure about the pure and simple. Assaults of this nature are not necessarily for sexual gratification — they’re about inflicting humiliation on the victim. Which, I suppose, when you think about it, enhances the gratification. He’s a control freak, likes to dominate — that’s what stimulates him. I’m rambling a bit, Charlie. That side of it is not my field, thank goodness, I’m just the plumber.”
I pointed to the fourth box on my chart. “And then there’s the possibility that Silkstone orchestrated the whole thing,” I said. “He killed them both but put the blame for Margaret on to Latham. That way he comes out of it with a fairly hefty financial gain.”
The professor pursed his lips, deep in thought. He has a face like a dessicated cowpat, but always looks as fresh and clean as a newly bathed baby. His talcum smelled of roses or some other garden flowers. “It’d be a bugger to prove, Charlie,” he concluded. “Let’s wait and see what the DNA says, eh?”
We thanked the prof. and drove away in silence. I wasn’t equipped to have a meaningful conversation with an attractive woman about the merits of rough sex, so I kept my thoughts to myself, but Annette had no such inhibitions. “Why do men — some men — want to do that?” she asked.
“Um, do what?” I enquired.
“Inflict humiliation. Why isn’t the sex act enough in itself?”
“Good question,” I said, stalling for time. “It’s probably something deep in our psyche, in our genes.”
“You mean all men are like that?”
“Well, um, I wouldn’t say all men. I don’t know, perhaps we are. At a very subconscious level. Most of us have never recognised it in ourselves, but it’s probably in there, somewhere.”
“Really?” She twisted in her seat to face me and nearly drove into the kerb.
“Put it like this,” I said, checking my seatbelt. “Most men, I’m sure you know, find a woman in her underwear sexier than a woman in a bikini. Why do you think that is?”
“No idea. It’s a mystery to me.”
“Well, most men wouldn’t know, either, if you asked them. But it could be because a woman in her underwear is at a disadvantage. You’ve caught her partially dressed. However, the same woman in a bikini is fully dressed and completely in charge of the situation.”
“Gosh! I’d never have thought of that.”
“Whereas most men,” I pronounced, holding my hands aloft, “rarely think of anything else.”
There was a pub called the Anglers Rest about half a mile down the road, with an A-board outside saying that they did two-for-the-price-of-one meals before six o’ clock. We’d missed that, but it reminded me that I was starving.
“Are you hungry?” I asked.
“Ravishing,” Annette replied, and giggled.
“I can see that,” I told her. “I asked if you were hungry.”
“Mmm. Quite.”
“Fancy a Chinese?”
She looked across at me. “Yes. That sounds like a good idea.” Her cheeks were pink again.
“Take us to the Bamboo Curtain then, please,” I suggested, and settled back into the seat feeling uncommonly content. Things were moving along quite nicely, and the enquiry wasn’t going too badly, either.
I ate with chopsticks, to show how sophisticated I am, and we drank Czech beer, which I insisted in pouring into glasses. A glass is essential if you want to experience the full flavour of the drink. Itsy-bitsy sips from the bottle are a waste of time. I insisted on Annette doing several comparisons, and she politely conceded that I might have had a point. Drinking from the bottle, I told her, is an affectation encouraged by the brewing industry to save them the trouble and expense of washing glasses, that’s all. Apart from that, the bottles have been stored for months outside some warehouse, and the security man’s dog probably cocked its leg over them several times each night as they did their rounds. She smiled and humoured me.
Women in the police have a hard time. Be one of the lads and you get a reputation as a slapper; stay aloof from all that and you’re a lesbian. Times are changing and a new breed of intelligent, confident women are coming into the service, but old attitudes take a long time to be pensioned off. I like working with women, and they make good detectives. Traditionally we’ve always given them the jobs with an emotional content — child abuse, rape, that sort of thing — but they can be surprisingly hard at times. Harder than a man. Stereotypes and prejudices, I thought. The more you work at them, the deeper the hole you dig for yourself.
As far as anyone knew Annette had never been out with another copper, so the inevitable whispers had gone round the locker room. I’m as guilty as all the rest, and wouldn’t have been surprised to learn they were true. Disappointed, but not surprised. We talked about the case, the job and the E-type, but steered clear of personal chat. We’d both considered teaching when we were younger. I had a degree in Art and she had one in Physics.
“A proper degree,” I declared, sharing out the last of the beer.
“That’s right,” she agreed across the top of her glass, holding my gaze.
Mr Ho, the proprietor, brought me the customary pot of green tea, on the house, and I asked him for the bill. Annette produced a tenner and slid it across to me.
“Is that enough?” she asked.
“It’s OK,” I said. “I’ll get these.”
“No, I’d rather pay my way,” she insisted. Men handle these things much better than women. Any of the male DCs would have said: “Cheers, I’ll get them next time,” but they wouldn’t have spent all evening analysing my every word, waiting for the boss to proposition them.
“I’ll arm wrestle you for it,” I said.
“Please?”
“If you insist.” I reached for the note and put another with it. “That’s a one pound sixty tip,” I said. “Alright with you?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
It was a short drive back to the station, where my car was parked. No opportunity for an invitation in for coffee there. She parked the Fiat behind my Ford, without stopping the engine. Eyes would be upon us from within the building.
“That was very pleasant, Annette,” I told her, opening the door.
“Yes, it was. Thank you,” she replied.
They say the moon was formed when another planet strayed close to the fledgling Earth and its gravity tore a great chunk from us. I know the feeling. The car door was open, beckoning, and this beautiful lady was eighteen inches away, her face turned to me, her perfume playing havoc with my senses. I felt lost, pulled apart. Salome was dancing, but was it for me or was I in for the chop?
Just a kiss. That’s all I wanted. Just a kiss. A simple token of affection after a harrowing day. No harm in that, is there? The scientists don’t know it, but there’s one force out there in the universe far more powerful than gravity. It’s called rejection. I wrenched myself away, saying: “See you in the morning.”
“Yes,” she replied. “See you in the morning. Boss.”