Dominic Watts was seated at this side of the ACC’s desk, the placatory cup of coffee perched on his knee, as if he was afraid to sully the polished magnificence of the desk. He was a small man, neatly dressed in a shiny suit. Shiny all over, not just at the backside and elbows, like mine. His briefcase was on the floor beside him, with a leather trilby hat balanced on it. His expression indicated that it was unlikely we’d end up swapping funny stories and fishing in our wallets for family snapshots.
‘Sit down, Priest,’ the ACC said. I pulled the chair back from the desk to make room for my legs and sat down, placing the envelope and the carefully folded carrier bag on the desk.
‘I don’t believe you two have met,’ he went on. ‘DI Priest, this is Mr Watts. Mr Watts, this is DI Priest.’
Watts barely nodded at me. I said, ‘Hello.’
‘Mr Priest,’ Partridge continued, ‘Mr Watts approached me yesterday, as I am standing in for the chief constable, with some serious allegations about a…’
‘They are not allegations,’ Watts interrupted. ‘They are definite charges, with many witnesses who will confirm…’ He had a clipped, precise way of speaking, every word carefully enunciated, the result of having a better primary education than you get here.
Partridge held up a hand. ‘Mr Watts, please. At this moment in time I am just trying to establish the ground rules. I’ll give you every opportunity to air your grievances in a while, if you’ll bear with me.’
So, we were having ground rules, were we? I’d tell him a few rules of my own, if he’d bear with me, at this or any other moment in time.
‘As I was saying. Serious allegations about a raid Heckley CID made on the home of Mr Watts’s son, Michael Angelo, who happens to live next door to Mr Watts.’
In a house with bars on the doors and six inches of reinforced concrete over the manhole covers, I thought.
Partridge went on. ‘Now, Mr Watts has kindly agreed that this meeting, and any subsequent action, will be off the record. I assume you have no objection to that, eh, Priest?’
Subsequent action meant disciplinary action. I did object, actually, but it was a finer point of the rules of the game, and above all I wanted to get on with it. ‘No, sir,’ I said.
‘Right. Good. So what I propose is that you, Priest, explain what you were playing at yesterday morning, and then Mr Watts will have an opportunity to state his case. That way, hopefully, we’ll be able to iron out this problem to everyone’s satisfaction. Is that understood?’
Fat chance, I thought, as I nodded.
‘Yes, Assistant Chief Constable,’ Watts replied. ‘It is perfectly understood.’ His precise constructions reminded me of Enoch Powell, and I almost smiled.
‘Very well.’ Partridge turned to me. ‘So what was the purpose of this raid, Priest?’
‘Thank you. First of all, sir, can I say that we were not playing. We were acting on information that Michael Angelo Watts’ home is used as a safe house for the distribution of class A and class B narcotics. In other words, he is a…’
‘What is your evidence for this?’ Watts demanded, rising from his chair. ‘These are scurrilous allegations, completely without foundation. I demand to know where…?’ A fleck of saliva landed on the polished mahogany and the leather hat rolled off the briefcase.
‘Please! Please!’ The ACC jumped to his feet. ‘Mr Watts, you will be given every opportunity to respond, in due course. If you will only let Mr Priest finish.’
‘I demand to know what evidence he acted upon!’ Watts insisted.
‘Right. Right. Mr Priest, could you answer that specific point before you continue?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Evidence about the movements of drugs is obtained at great danger to the officers and others concerned, and I cannot risk lives or prejudice enquiries by giving that information.’
‘Just as I thought!’ Watts insisted. ‘There is no information. This attack on my son and his young family, which took place early in the morning when they were all in bed, was nothing more than blatant racial harassment by a police force where racism is…’
‘Mr Watts!’ Partridge shouted, shutting him up. ‘These outbursts will get us nowhere. Let Mr Priest continue.’
‘Ask him if he had a warrant,’ Watts demanded.
‘Well, Priest?’
‘We didn’t need a warrant. We knew we couldn’t obtain access to the house until it would have been too late, so we didn’t try.’
Partridge shook his head. ‘If you didn’t have a warrant, why did you go there?’ he asked.
Watts jumped in first. ‘To inflict more suffering on my son and to terrorise his family — that is why they went, so early in the morning,’ he claimed.
I said, ‘We regret that any children were involved, but the total responsibility for any stress imposed on them must lie with Michael Angelo Watts and his lifestyle.’
‘What do you mean, his lifestyle?’ Watts demanded.
‘The lifestyle of a drugs dealer,’ I replied.
‘Where is your evidence?’ he shrieked, saliva spotting the desk like the first flurry of a snowstorm. I eased away from him.
‘Yes, Priest,’ Partridge said. ‘These are very serious allegations you’re making. I hope you’ve some evidence to back them up.’
I pulled the envelope from under the carrier. ‘It’s all here, sir. If I may…?’
Watts wiped his mouth and retrieved his hat. The ACC lounged back in his big chair, rotating a silver propelling pencil in his fingers. It looked as if the stage was all mine.
I said, ‘It is well established that pushers and dealers flush drugs down the toilet when they think they are in danger of being discovered. So we lift the cover of the manhole outside and try to catch whatever comes through the drains. The next step in the game is that they cover the manhole with concrete and reinforce the fall-pipe so we can’t break into it. Our progress is further impeded by iron grilles over the windows and steel barred gates outside the doors. The house at Sylvan Fields belonging to Michael Angelo Watts has all these modifications.’
‘Because of the crime rate in the area!’ Watts told us. ‘Why do you not address that problem, instead of harassing honest citizens? Tell me that.’
I ignored him. ‘I decided to make a mock raid on the house, acting on information that heroin from the Continent was being distributed from there.’ Watts waved his arms, but stayed silent. ‘We posted a team from the Wetherton laboratory at the next drain down the circuit, with other people at all the stench pipes coming from the block of houses where the Wattses live, and the next block of houses down the line. When we knocked on his door there was a flurry of action inside, accompanied by much flushing of the toilets both there and next door, where you live, Mr Watts.’
‘This is ridiculous,’ he said. ‘Fanciful nonsense. It is obvious to me, Mr Partridge, that by listening to this you are as prejudiced as he is. This is a waste of my time.’ He jammed the hat firmly on his head and rose to his feet.
‘Sit down, Mr Watts!’ Partridge insisted. ‘This meeting was called at your request. Please have the courtesy to hear us out.’ He inclined his head towards me, the signal to continue.
I pulled the report from the envelope, and studied it for a few seconds. ‘In a nutshell,’ I told them, ‘somewhere between one hundred and one hundred and fifty litres of water came from the two houses. None came from the other four drains that fed into that manhole. Samples were taken and checked for specific gravity, and then the water was boiled off and the residue analysed. The laboratory have given us low and high estimates which indicate that between six and twenty kilograms of substance were in solution in the water that came from the Wattses’ households. That substance, gentlemen, was fifty per cent pure heroin. Working on the lowest figures, it would have a street value of approximately a quarter of a million pounds,’
‘Lies, lies, lies!’ Watts shouted at me. ‘All lies. If any drugs were found it is because they were planted, by you.’ He reinforced his words by stabbing a finger at me. ‘Twice before my son has been falsely incriminated. Now he is not allowed to sleep in the safety of his own home without being persecuted by you. This is not over yet, Mr Partridge. I will take this up with my MP.’ He jammed the hat on his head again and grabbed the briefcase. His parting shot was, ‘This whole sad story has been motivated by jealousy and racism, purely and simply, but I will stamp it out. Believe me, I will.’
Before he reached the door I said, ‘I understand you have a shop in Lockwood Road, Mr Watts.’
He turned and took a pace back towards me.
‘Yes, I have. Are you now about to tell me that I am charged with peddling drugs from there, too?’
I pulled the T-shirt from the carrier and held it up for Partridge to see. ‘Make my day, kill a pig,’ I read from it. ‘A young friend of mine bought this, earlier today. A black friend, from your shop. Printed on your machines, no doubt. He’s as disgusted with it as I am.’ I hurled the T-shirt at him. ‘Take it back where it came from, Mr Watts, and never dare accuse me or my men of racial prejudice again.’ It draped itself across his shoulder, then fell slowly to the floor.
He yanked the door open. ‘You will be hearing from the Council for Civil Liberties about this!’ he shrieked at me.
‘And you will be hearing from the Crown Prosecution Service!’ I shouted after him.
Partridge had his head in his hands. As silence fell in his office he removed them and peered at me.
‘He’s gone,’ I confirmed.
He let out a long sigh. ‘You’d, er, better leave me a copy of that report,’ he said.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And, er, before you embark on anything like this again, er, have a word with someone, eh?’
‘We took at least six kilograms of heroin out of circulation, sir. Probably a lot more. At a conservative estimate it cost them a hundred thousand pounds, so they’ll be hurting. It’s called pro-active policing, sir.’ The ACC is big on proactive policing. He wrote a paper on it. He’s written papers on most things.
‘Quite,’ he said.
I sat there, feeling awkward, wondering if that was it, and I was dismissed from his presence. He didn’t exactly smile, but the frown slowly slipped from his face, like the shadow of a cloud passing from shrubbery.
‘I, er, might have a little job for you,’ he said, and nodded slowly and repeatedly, as if congratulating himself on finding just the sucker he’d been looking for.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘Ye-es.’ He opened a drawer and pulled a big envelope from it. ‘In fact, you’re just the man. Next Friday — week tomorrow — I’m supposed to be delivering a lecture at Bramshill to a bunch of…a party of overseas officers. Unfortunately I can’t make it. I rang them and they said, “That’s OK. Just send someone else.” It’ll be a nice day out for you. You can have my first class rail warrant, too. How about it, eh, Charlie?’
Suddenly it was Charlie again. I thought about offering to wash his car every week for two years, but he didn’t look in the mood for bartering. I said, ‘Fine, sir. What’s the lecture about?’
‘Ethics. Here you are.’ He passed the envelope over.
‘Ethics?’
‘Yes. What do you know about them?’
‘They beat Yorkshire by ten wickets, didn’t they?’
I was still a policeman when I left his office, which was a surprise. I popped my head round a few doors, looking for Sergeant Kim Limbert, only to be confronted by shiny faces that I’d never seen before. She wasn’t in, so I missed out on a coffee and sympathy. I walked out of the building with my car keys in my hand, then realised I needed a lift. A friendly panda took me back to Heckley, and as we drove past the municipal sewage works I looked into the sky and watched the huge flock of seagulls that scavenge a living there. They were looping the loop and practising their barrel rolls.
I needed to unwind. Nigel had a date and Sparky shook his head when I suggested going for a drink.
‘Sorry, Chas,’ he said. ‘Going out with Shirley.’
‘Oh. Anywhere special?’
‘No. Just…out.’ He was uncomfortable, almost blushing. This was a rare event, like a visit from Halley’s comet, or Mrs Thatcher contemplating that she might have made a mistake.
‘Whaddya mean, out?’ I demanded.
‘Out. Just…out. That’s all.’
‘Why all the secrecy?’
‘It’s not secrecy. We’re just going…’
‘Out.’
‘Yes. Out.’
‘Why don’t you tell me to mind my own business?’
‘Because I’m too polite.’
‘Since when?’
‘There’s a first time for everything.’
‘But you’re thinking it.’
‘Yes!’
‘Right I will.’
I went home, showered, and walked down to the pub about half a mile away; the nearest thing I have to a local. I only go there as a last resort.
Nothing had changed since my last visit. The landlord resented my interrupting his conversation with the three cronies who occupied their permanent positions at the little bar, and checked the tenner I handed over by holding it up to the light. I did the same with the fiver he gave me in my change. The regulars were local businessmen of the upstart variety. Their Pringle jumpers had crossed golf clubs on the breast, and they fell silent while I was being served. I ordered a home-made chicken pie and chips and found a table away from the door.
The food was reasonable. No, fair’s fair, it was good. I enjoyed it, and a second pint relaxed me. Long time ago I started hitting the booze hard, but not any more. It’s an occupational hazard, an antidote to the long hours and the stress of the job. I saw where it was leading me and looked for a different strategy. I decided it was all a matter of attitude.
A third was tempting, but I decided to stick to my two-pint limit. As I placed my empty glass on the bar one of the cronies said, ‘You’re the policeman, aren’t you?’ making it sound like an accusation. He had a Zapata moustache that made him look much older than he probably was, and would have been horrified to learn that in some circles it was a badge of homosexuality.
‘That’s how I earn my living,’ I confessed.
He elbowed his way round his colleagues. ‘I’ve just been done for speeding,’ he declared, which was more-or-less what I’d expected. ‘Said I was doing fifty-five on the by-pass, and I wasn’t doing an inch over forty-eight. Bloody diabolical, I call it. When somebody had a go at the wife’s Clio you didn’t do a thing about it.’
‘It’s a forty limit on the by-pass,’ I said. ‘And three people have been killed on it so far this year.’
‘One of them was in a stolen car.’
Presumably that didn’t count. I smiled at him. ‘Just regard it as payment for all the times that you weren’t caught,’ I suggested, turning to leave.
‘It’s all right for you, though, isn’t it?’ one of the others said.
‘What is?’
He nodded at the glasses on the bar. ‘This job.’
‘You mean drinking and driving?’
‘That’s right. It’s all right for you.’
‘No,’ I told him. ‘It’s the same for me as it is for anyone. Possibly even worse. That’s why I walked here tonight.’ This time I made it out of the door before they could reply.
As soon as I arrived home I rang Sparky’s number. ‘Hello, Sophie,’ I said when she answered. ‘It’s Uncle Charlie. Can I have a word with your dad, please?’
‘Hello, Uncle Charlie. They’re not in. Did you see our picture in the Gazette?’
‘Yes, it’s good, isn’t it? Are you sending for a copy?’
‘Mum said she would, and one for you, too.’
‘That’s kind of her. Where have they gone?’
‘Urn, I can’t tell you.’
‘Oh, why not?’
‘Because Dad said that if you rang to ask where they’d gone, he’d kill us both if we told you.’
‘Honestly?’
‘He meant it.’
‘Right. Put Daniel on.’
He was right there. ‘Hi, Uncle Charlie,’ he said. ‘Did you watch the match?’
‘Never mind that. If you don’t tell me where your dad is I’m coming straight round and I’ll dig your kidneys out with a chair leg. Understood?’
‘He made us promise, Uncle Charlie.’
‘Right! And I’ll wear my flared jeans with budgie bells on the bottom and play a Bob Dylan tape while I’m doing it!’
‘Whaaa! Anything but that! I’ll tell you.’
‘Go on…’
‘They’ve gone line dancing.’
‘Line dancing!’
‘I never said a word!’
‘Right, Daniel. Let’s just call it our little secret. See you sometime.’
Line dancing! I’d struck pay dirt. This could run for weeks and weeks.
I had one shoe off when the phone rang. I clip-slopped over to it, smiling like a toyshop, willing Annabelle to be on the other end.
‘Priest,’ I growled, in my pretend officious tone.
It was Heckley control room. ‘Hi, Mr Priest,’ the duty sergeant said. ‘Sorry to disturb you, but a woman’s been asking for you. Said she’s called Lisa Davis. Do you know her?’
‘Hardly. Interviewed her husband sometime last week. Did she say what it was about?’
‘No. Wanted to speak to you and you alone. She sounded ferret and skunk to me. I’ll give you the number…’
I wrote it on the pad. ‘Cheers. I’ll give her a ring.’
‘Please yourself, Charlie, but I said I’d pass it on. One of your many fans, I expect.’
‘Work, Arthur,’ I told him. ‘You know how it is: CID never sleeps.’
I flipped the cradle and dialled the number he’d given me. She must have been sitting right by the phone.
‘Hello,’ a husky little voice greeted me.
‘It’s Charlie Priest, Lisa. You wanted me to ring you.’
After a hesitation she drawled, ‘Hello, Charlie. I didn’t think you would.’
‘Why ever not?’
‘I’m not sure. I just didn’t. Nobody seems to want to talk to me, tonight. I don’t know why.’
‘I’ll talk to you, Lisa. What can I do for you?’
‘Thank you. I could tell you were kind. I bet you’re a Virgo, aren’t you? That man at Heckley police station wasn’t very polite.’
‘Wasn’t he, by jove! I’ll have a word with him, first thing in the morning.’
She gave a little laugh. ‘You don’t mind me ringing the station, do you? I hope I haven’t got anybody into trouble.’
‘Of course not, Lisa. So what’s it all about?’
‘Oh, you know, I’m feeling a bit fed up. And lonely.’
‘Has Justin gone?’
‘Yes. Is Annabelle there with you?’
The message coming through was that Lisa Davis could be bad news. I remembered the warning Annabelle had given me. ‘No, she’s not here at the moment,’ I replied. No need to say she was two hundred miles away.
‘So you’re on your own, like me,’ she observed.
‘That’s right.’ I didn’t feel like playing counsellor to a spoilt bitch, which was what I suspected her to be. I needed some TLC myself, but not from her.
‘Do you get lonely, Charlie?’
‘Yeah, sometimes.’ I reached down and unlaced the other shoe. ‘Everybody gets lonely sometimes, Lisa. It’s all part of life. When do you go out to Australia?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I might not go.’
‘I think you should. Justin will be disappointed if you don’t go.’
‘Him!’ she sniffed.
There was an awkward silence. She broke it, saying, ‘I’m frightened, Charlie.’
‘Frightened? What of?’
‘This house. It’s spooky up here, when you’re alone.’
‘There’s nothing to be frightened of. Why don’t you have a nice warm bath, a cup of cocoa, and go to bed, eh? Then you’ll feel a lot better.’ She had a point. I think I’d have been scared, living up there on my own, with the wind howling round the eaves like Heathcliffe on Carlsberg Special.
‘Why don’t you come up and go to bed with me?’ she replied. ‘That would make me feel better.’
No doubt about it, bits of me wanted to. I said, ‘Er, no, Lisa. I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
She sounded disappointed. Offended, probably. ‘Don’t you like me?’ she sniffed.
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘You’re a very attractive woman, but I think we’d both regret it, afterwards.’
‘I wouldn’t,’ she declared, sounding as if she spoke with the confidence of experience.
‘Well, I would. How much have you had to drink?’
‘Just a little bit.’
She was as tight as a screw top. A thousand gallons is a little bit, when you’re talking about leaking tankers. ‘What a pity,’ I said. ‘It’s an offence for a policeman to take advantage of an intoxicated woman. Didn’t you know that?’
‘Is it?’
‘Mmm.’ I decided to change the subject. ‘How’s the parrot?’ I asked.
‘He’s lovely, but he’s not very cuddly.’
I had an idea. ‘Why don’t you stay with Justin’s parents?’ I suggested. ‘They have a big enough house.’
‘Are you joking?’ she exclaimed.
‘No. What’s so funny?’
‘Ruth wouldn’t have me anywhere near. That’s what.’
‘Oh, why?’
‘It’s a long story.’
Good, I thought. We were moving on to safer territory. ‘I’m all ears,’ I said. ‘Tell me about it.’
‘She hates me.’
‘Why? For marrying her precious son and taking him away from her?’
‘Mmm. Partly.’
‘And what’s the other part?’
‘Oh, me and K. Tom, you know.’
‘No, I’m sorry, but you’ve lost me.’ I made myself comfortable, sitting on the floor with my back against a radiator.
‘Well, let’s say I knew K. Tom a long time before I knew Justin. That’s all.’
‘In the biblical sense?’ I risked asking.
She laughed. ‘What do you think?’ she replied. ‘He didn’t insult me like you did.’
‘I’m sorry about that. It’s nothing personal. I just don’t like too many complications.’
‘It needn’t be complicated, Charlie,’ she assured me.
The last thing I needed was convincing that it wouldn’t be complicated. ‘So how did you meet Justin?’ I asked.
‘Through K. Tom. I worked as a temp for him and he was good to me. Helped me start up on my own. When Ruth became suspicious he introduced me to his stepson.’
The ultimate revenge. It sounded damn complicated to me.
‘Does Justin know about you and K. Tom?’ I asked.
‘No! Of course not,’ she exclaimed.
‘So why have they fallen out?’
‘Ah! Wouldn’t you like to know?’
‘Yes. Are you going to tell me?’
‘Why should I?’
‘It’s just conversation, Lisa. Like you said, we’re both on our own, and I like talking to you.’
‘Do you really?’
‘Of course.’
‘That’s nice.’
‘Wait a minute,’ I told her. ‘I’ve got cramp.’ I stretched my legs and adjusted my position. ‘I’m sitting on the floor and it’s a bit hard.’
‘Ooh!’ she cooed. ‘Tell me more!’
‘Lisa Davis, you’re a wicked lady,’ I reprimanded her. ‘Ah, that’s better. Now, you were telling me why Justin and his dad fell out.’
‘Oh, you know, it was because K. Tom asked Justin to do him a favour, and Justin refused.’
‘That doesn’t sound like Justin. He must have had a good reason. What sort of a favour was it?’
‘He wanted him to bring something into the country. Or take something out of it. I’m not sure.’
‘You mean…smuggling?’
‘I suppose you could call it that.’
‘Well, I’m not surprised Justin wouldn’t do it. There’s big penalties for smuggling drugs these days. It’s just not worth the risk. So what happened?’
‘It wasn’t drugs!’ she protested, jumping to her father-in-law, and lover’s, defence. ‘What made you think it was drugs? K. Tom wouldn’t have anything to do with drugs.’
‘What was it, then?’
‘I…I can’t say.’
‘Money!’ I announced. ‘Bet it was money.’
‘Money? Why would anybody want to smuggle money?’
‘Good question,’ I replied. ‘It does sound silly, but people do it, I’m told. Suppose you get a better exchange rate, that way. Hardly sounds worth bothering.’ I paused for a few seconds, then, as if realisation had at last dawned, I proclaimed, ‘Oh, it’d be the gold. I’d forgotten about the gold.’
‘W-What gold?’ she stuttered.
‘Never mind. No more questions. How are you feeling, now?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘What did you have for your dinner?’
‘Ah! Do you really want me to tell you?’
‘I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.’
‘I had yoghurt, banana and a small jacket potato.’
‘It sounds horrible.’
‘No, it wasn’t. It was quite nice.’ She’d resorted to her little girlie voice. ‘Charlie…’
‘Mmm.’
‘Will you come and see me, sometime?’
I’d be seeing her, sometime, no doubt about it. I just wasn’t sure about the circumstances.
‘No, I don’t think so, Lisa,’ I said.
‘I thought you said you liked me.’
‘I do, Lisa. I think you’re terrific’
‘Tomorrow?’
‘I can’t make it, tomorrow.’
‘Saturday?’
‘No. I’ll be seeing Annabelle over the weekend.’
‘Then it will have to be tomorrow.’
‘I’m busy, tomorrow.’
‘I thought you wanted to know all about K. Tom. And the…you know…the stuff.’
‘You mean the gold?’
‘I might do.’
‘I don’t believe you know anything about it,’ I teased.
‘You’d be surprised what I know,’ she claimed. ‘But I’m not saying anything on the phone. Why don’t you come and see me in the morning, about ten o’clock?’
‘That’s a very tempting offer.’
‘So you’ll come?’
‘I might.’
‘Good. And if you’re a very good boy, Aunty Lisa might tell you all about…you know…it.’
‘Right,’ I replied, my voice coming from somewhere down in my bowels. ‘I’ll do that. Ten it is.’
I let Gareth Adey run the morning meeting. Soon as it ended I strode into the CID office and said, ‘You, you and you. Inner sanctum.’ I was in a good mood. I’d changed my normal route to work in order to drive past the local pub again. Two posh limos were standing forlornly in the car park, their windows opaque with morning dew for the first time in their lives. After my visit the silly prats at the bar had shared a taxi home.
Nigel, Sparky and Maggie followed me into my corner. ‘First of all,’ I told them, ‘I’m giving a lecture a week today at Bramshill. It’s on ethics.’ I turned to Nigel. ‘Could you have a little think about it?’ I asked him. ‘Write down a few ideas for me, if you don’t mind.’
He nodded.
Sparky gasped. ‘Ethics! You!’
‘What’s so funny?’ I demanded.
‘It’s like asking Genghis Khan to talk on road safety.’
‘Right,’ I said, pointedly ignoring him. ‘The enquiry into Goodrich’s death is over. Where are we with the Jones boys?’
‘You mean the suspect bank accounts?’ Maggie said.
‘Yep.’
‘It’s all in the reports, just like you insist.’
‘I know, but let’s hear it in the spoken word.’
Nigel said, ‘Maud and Brian reconciled three of the Jones’ lists of money in Goodrich’s book with real accounts in local banks.’
‘And where did it go from there?’
‘About half went to IGI, for diamonds. The other half went on a variety of things: one cheque of eighteen grand to Heckley Motors, presumably for a car; some went into legitimate investments.’
‘Goodrich was a big wheel in second-hand endowment policies,’ Maggie told us.
I pulled the flip chart from the corner and handed a pen to Sparky. ‘You can be teacher, this morning, Dave,’ I told him. ‘Good night, last night?’
He grimaced at me and stood up. ‘No, bloody awful,’ he admitted, turning over the pages until he reached a blank one.
‘Sorry, Maggie,’ I said. ‘You were telling us about second-hand…endowment policies, did you say? What are they?’
‘Maud explained it to me. If someone takes out an endowment policy, then finds out that they are dying, say of AIDS, they want the money now, not after the event. The insurance company will pay them a surrender value, based on the number of payments they’ve made, but another option is to sell the policy to a third party for a lot more money. This third party then takes over the payments, and draws the full amount when the original holder pops it.’
‘And that’s legit?’ I gasped.
She shrugged. ‘Everybody benefits, Charlie. It’s a brutal world out there.’
‘The insurance companies benefit, Maggie. Why can’t they pay the full amount early, minus payments? They’d have to, eventually, if some poor sod didn’t need the money.’
Nigel said, ‘We’re not the morality police, Boss. If it’s legal, it’s legal.’
‘OK. So what next?’
‘Michael Angelo Watts knew Goodrich,’ Sparky told us, writing the information on his chart.
‘And,’ I said, pausing for effect, ‘he also knows K. Tom Davis.’ They looked at me, inviting an explanation. ‘I had a ride round there, Wednesday afternoon,’ I went on. ‘Did a little spying. Saw him pay them a visit.’
‘That’s interesting,’ Nigel said.
‘And he’s a drugs dealer,’ Maggie added.
‘Allegedly,’ I said, smiling. ‘Go on.’
‘IGI go bust,’ from Nigel.
‘Right.’
‘Michael Angelo Watts very annoyed,’ Sparky suggested.
‘I’d bet he was,’ I said. ‘The surprising thing is that we found Goodrich dead in his chair and not standing on the riverbed with his feet in a concrete block. So how did he sweet-talk Watts into leaving him be?’
‘Blame IGI — K. Tom Davis — for the failure?’ Nigel wondered.
‘Can’t see Watts falling for that,’ Sparky said.
‘Nor me,’ I confirmed.
‘How about an alternative method of payment?’ Maggie proposed.
‘Such as?’
‘Well, what’s this about the gold?’
‘Right,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you what we know. Mr Smart Arse Caton said right from the beginning that the drugs dealers would prefer payment in gold, because they’re awash with cash, but, on the other hand, anybody holding gold would welcome the opportunity to convert some of it into cash.’
‘Jack Spratt and his wife,’ Sparky said.
‘Precisely. It’s a marriage made in heaven. And now there are rumours that K. Tom was involved in the Hartog-Praat bullion robbery. Only rumours, sadly, but the fact is that someone, somewhere out there, is sitting on a ton and a half of a very desirable metal.’
‘So what’s next?’ Sparky asked.
‘Next,’ I replied, ‘is that I am going to interview K. Tom’s daughter-in-law, Lisa Davis, later this morning. She reckons to know something, but I’m not sure. Then, when I have the time, I want to talk to a man called Jimmy the Fish, in Bridlington. Hopefully, they’ll put some flesh on the rumours. Have you all got plenty to be going on with?’
They always say they have. I turned to Dave. ‘I’m seeing Lisa Davis at ten, so I’d better be off. I want you to give me a ring on my mobile at ten thirty, no later. In fact, better make it twenty past. Say there’s been a murder, and I’m urgently needed. OK?’
‘Will do, Chas,’ he replied.
We were on our way to the door when Nigel said, ‘Have we time for a quicky?’ He meant a joke, not sex. Nigel tries, bless him, but his timing lets him down. We all stopped.
He turned to DC Maddison. ‘Maggie, how many menopausal women does it take to change a light bulb?’
‘I don’t know, Nigel. Please tell me.’
‘Three.’
‘How do you work that out?’
‘No, you’re supposed to say? “Why three?”’
‘Oh, sorry. Why three?’
‘BECAUSE I SAY SO!’ he yelled.
I smiled — it wasn’t bad, for him — but I was alone.
‘Very funny,’ Maggie stated. ‘Tell me, how many menopausal men would it take to change the same light bulb?’
‘I don’t know,’ he obligingly replied.
‘Ten.’
‘Why ten?’
‘It’s just a fact of life, Nigel. Just a fact of life.’
Sparky decided to join in. ‘I don’t understand all these silly jokes about light bulbs,’ he told us. ‘About a year ago I was in Sainsbury’s and I saw a man with one arm changing a light bulb with no trouble at all.’
‘You mean…single-handed?’ I said.
‘Exactly. No trouble at all.’
‘How did he manage that?’ Nigel wondered.
The merest twitch of a mouth corner betrayed Sparky’s triumph. He said, ‘He just showed them his receipt, same as anybody else would.’