Dave Slater Mystery Novels Box Set Three

by P. F. Ford

  ‘It’s not a story, it’s true,’ said Amy.

  ‘And you believe that, do you?’ asked Slater.

  ‘Why shouldn’t I believe it? It’s the truth. Why on earth would you have reason to doubt it?’

  ‘I’m just going to get to that,’ said Slater. ‘But first, why don’t we let Mr Linden explain why he paid a guy called Rhodri Evans a hundred grand to say he’d seen Steve Harris’s car at the caravan site the night Julie Harris died?’

  ‘Rubbish!’ said Linden.

  ‘We’ve got a copy of your bank statement that says it isn’t,’ said Norman.

  ‘How on earth did you get that?’

  Harkness looked aghast. ‘You used your own bank account?’ he blurted out. ‘You bloody idiot!’

  ‘I did as you asked,’ said Linden.

  ‘I didn’t tell you to use your own bloody bank account!’

  Norman beamed a big smile at the two men. ‘Oh, wow, I didn’t expect a team that’s been practising for ten years to start falling apart quite so quickly.’

  Amy Pritchard was weeping quietly.

  ‘Come on, Amy. There’s a poor guy in prison who hasn’t just served ten years – he lost a wife he loved as well. Don’t you think that’s enough punishment for an innocent man? What did he ever do to you four?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s what I don’t understand,’ said Slater. ‘Why pick on the poor guy?’

  Amy bowed her head as tears slowly rolled down her cheeks.

  ‘That was Sandra’s idea,’ she said, finally. ‘I felt I had no choice but to agree, you see.’

  Slater and Norman exchanged a glance. They would let Amy talk in her own time. There was no need to say anything.

  ‘John had always been such a sad man. He suffered from depression. I suppose I should have seen it coming, but I thought he had everything under control. The birdwatching seemed to help him relax, and work was going well. I knew he had a soft spot for Julie, but I had no idea it had gone beyond that.’

  Slater looked at Norman and raised his eyebrows. Norman shrugged. This wasn’t quite what they were expecting to hear, but it made interesting listening.

  ‘When they told me what John had done, I couldn’t believe it. And the business was doing so well. We had to keep that going, so we decided I shouldn’t rock the boat, and I mustn’t challenge John about it. I agreed because I was frightened it would push him over the edge, or that he might even turn on me.’

  Norman couldn’t let this go any further without speaking. ‘Are you saying your husband, John Pritchard, killed Julie Harris?’

  She looked up at him, her eyes wide. ‘Yes, of course. That’s why he killed himself. He couldn’t live with the guilt any longer, but he couldn’t confess or the whole business could have come tumbling down.’

  ‘Shut up, you silly cow,’ snapped Sandra. ‘They don’t know anything.’

  ‘Don’t you talk to me like that, you stupid little tart! It’s alright for you two. I’ve had enough of all these lies.’

  ‘Think of the business,’ said Harkness. ‘That’s what this is really about.’

  ‘Oh, damn your bloody business!’ said Amy. ‘It’s not about the business. It’s about that poor man who’s been in prison for ten years. I can’t live with it any longer.’

  ‘Go ahead, Mrs Pritchard,’ said Norman. ‘What is it you want to tell us?’

  ‘Steve Harris didn’t kill Julie. It was my husband, John. We told everyone he had been birdwatching at the lodge in Scotland, but he wasn’t. The cover-up is all my fault. I begged the others to help.’

  ‘We thought John was in Scotland that weekend,’ said Slater.

  Amy shook her head. ‘We agreed to say he was in Scotland, but he wasn’t really.’

  ‘So, you’re saying John wasn’t in Scotland at all, and the rumours about him and Julie going to the caravan that weekend are true, is that right?’ asked Norman.

  She nodded sadly. ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘Where did these rumours come from?’ asked Slater.

  ‘Apparently they were going around the office. James told me about them.’

  ‘But you didn’t hear them yourself?’

  ‘I didn’t work here. How could I have heard them?’

  ‘I think even if you had been working here, you wouldn’t have heard them, Mrs Pritchard,’ said Slater. ‘You wouldn’t have heard them because those rumours never existed.’

  ‘What? I don’t understand,’ she stammered. ‘In his suicide note he said he couldn’t cope with the guilt any more. I told you I thought he felt guilty about the way he treated me, but really he was guilty about Julie.’

  Sandra Harkness had gone very quiet and was studying the table.

  ‘What do you think, Sandra?’ asked Slater.

  ‘What?’ she asked, looking up at him.

  ‘What do you think John was feeling guilty about?’

  ‘John was a decent man. I can’t imagine he killed Julie on purpose, but I’m sure his guilt would have got the better of him.’

  ‘You think so?’ asked Slater. ‘I wonder what Robbie McGregor would think.’

  Sandra’s face had been pale already, but now she turned an almost translucent white. Then, as Slater and Norman stared at her, she began to turn redder and redder. She tried to speak, but no words came out, and Slater was reminded of a fish out of water gulping for air.

  ‘Who on earth is Robbie McGregor?’ asked Amy.

  She looked at Harkness and Linden. Linden seemed equally confused, but Harkness wouldn’t look at her.

  ‘Sandra knows Robbie, don’t you, Sandra?’ said Slater. ‘She pays him two hundred quid every month to keep his mouth shut.’

  Slater watched James Harkness slump back in his chair and raise his eyes skywards. Amy was looking increasingly puzzled.

  ‘You’ve always claimed John was in Scotland, haven’t you, Amy?’ asked Slater.

  ‘That’s what we agreed,’ she said. ‘If anyone asked, we would say he was in Scotland.’

  ‘But you didn’t know for sure if he was or he wasn’t?’

  ‘He can’t have been in Scotland if he was with Julie in Wales, can he?’

  ‘Why don’t we ask Sandra?’ Slater said.

  ‘What do you mean? Sandra knows the same as me.’

  Norman looked sympathetically at Amy. ‘You really don’t know, do you, Amy?’

  ‘Know what?’

  ‘Are you going to tell her Sandra? Or shall I?’

  Sandra looked daggers at Norman but said nothing.

  Norman sighed. ‘Okay. I’ll do it.’ He looked at Amy as if trying to decide how best to break the news. ‘Amy, you’ve always thought John was a good man, who made a big mistake with Julie and died of a guilty conscience, am I right?’

  She nodded, still confused.

  ‘Then you’re probably going to find this hard to believe,’ continued Norman. ‘You see, I don’t think he wrote his suicide note because he was feeling guilty about you, nor was he feeling guilty about killing Julie. He was feeling guilty about the way he had betrayed you, and because he knew who Julie’s killer was.’

  ‘But John killed Julie, didn’t he?’ asked Amy

  ‘I’ve had enough of this!’ roared Harkness. ‘I want you two out of here now, or—’

  ‘Or what?’ asked Slater, lifting his eyebrows.

  ‘I’ll call the police. I’ll have you thrown out.’

  ‘I don’t think so, do you?’ Slater wasn’t what anyone would call big and hard, but he was much fitter and stronger than Harkness. The older man backed down.

  ‘Sit there and shut up,’ said Slater. ‘You’ll get your chance to speak later.’

  He nodded to Norman to continue.

  ‘Now, where was I? Oh yes, I was going to explain.’

  ‘Explain what?’ asked Amy, who was struggling to keep up with what was going on.

  ‘Why did you accept John was in Wales with Julie?’ Norman asked her.

  ‘I told you – becaus
e James and Sandra told me.’

  ‘Right, but didn’t you ever ask John?’

  ‘He would never speak about it. Not that we ever spoke much about anything after that.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t he speak about it?’

  ‘Because I had agreed with James and Sandra that it might push him over the edge. Mind you, I made it clear I didn’t like the idea of harbouring a murderer, and that I was only doing it to save the business.’

  ‘So, in effect, you threw your lot in with James and Sandra against your own husband? The man you say you loved.’

  ‘I protected my husband. We all protected him by agreeing to say he was in Scotland. I’ve had to live with that lie for ten years.’

  ‘But it wasn’t a lie,’ said Norman, gently. ‘He was in Scotland. Ask Sandra. She knows he was there.’

  ‘How could she ... How do you know this is true?’

  ‘I went up to Scotland and had a little chat with a man called Robbie McGregor,’ explained Slater. ‘He looks after the lodges. He knew nothing about the murder, but he did know John had been with Sandra that weekend. Sandra has been paying him every month since then to keep quiet about it.’

  ‘She knows now, Sandra,’ said Slater. ‘So why don’t you tell Amy what really happened that weekend.’

  Sandra looked from Slater to Norman, then bowed her head as she spoke. ‘We’d never done it before,’ she began. ‘We’d thought about going away for a weekend together a couple of times, but Amy used to watch him like a hawk, so it was difficult. But my husband’ – she spat those two words out through gritted teeth – ‘was behaving like a complete bastard at that time. I just wanted to spend a couple of days with someone who would be nice to me and treat me like a lady.’

  ‘Scotland’s a long way to go for a weekend,’ said Slater.

  ‘I went for a week, Wednesday to Wednesday. We thought it would be more convincing if I went for a week. John came up to join me for a long weekend.’

  ‘He wasn’t birdwatching?’

  ‘He brought all his gear, but it was just for show.’

  ‘And this was the weekend Julie Harris died?’

  ‘Yes, it was.’

  Amy’s mouth had dropped open, and she stared hard at Sandra, as if unable to make sense of what she was hearing.

  Sandra was quiet for a moment, then spoke again. ‘I’ve always regretted that weekend, we both did.’

  ‘But why?’ asked Norman.

  ‘Poor John was so sure he wanted to cheat on Amy, and then when it came to it, he couldn’t.’ She turned to Amy. ‘He really did love you, you know. I told him it didn’t matter, and he should forget about me and go back home, but he was devastated. He could never look me in the face again after that. I felt terrible for him.’

  In Amy’s head, the dots had apparently just all connected. ‘But if John was with you, he couldn’t have been in Wales.’

  Sandra said nothing but gave the tiniest shrug.

  ‘James?’ said Amy. ‘You told me it was John who had killed Julie. I trusted you. What have you done to me? And what about poor John?’

  ‘Poor John, my arse,’ said Harkness, thumping the table. ‘He was a bloody waste of space. He was holding this company back, and don’t tell me it’s not true. Look at how much money we’ve made since he’s been gone!’

  ‘Wait a minute,’ said Amy. ‘If that little tart was in Scotland with John, she couldn’t have been at home with you. You were the one in Wales with Julie!’

  Harkness ignored her accusing stare.

  ‘Yeah, well worked out, Amy,’ said Slater. ‘And that’s why the creepy Mr Linden here paid Rhodri Evans a hundred thousand pounds. You see, Rhodri lived on site, and we think he had seen James with Julie that weekend. When the murder was discovered, he quickly put two and two together and realised he knew who had murdered her. That’s when he came up with the idea of asking James to pay him to keep his mouth shut.’

  ‘That’s rubbish,’ said Harkness. ‘You can’t prove anything, and I know nothing about any payments made by Linden.’

  ‘Oh, yes, you bloody well do,’ snapped Linden. ‘You’re the one going down for murder, not me. Don’t think you’re going to leave me in the bloody lurch.’

  ‘John needn’t have killed himself,’ said Amy. ‘I would have forgiven him for almost cheating on me. He had no reason to feel guilty.’

  ‘I hate to disappoint you, Amy, but I can think of a couple more reasons,’ said Norman. ‘He must have known about the bribe that was paid to Rhodri Evans to lie about Steve Harris, and he probably knew who really killed Julie Harris. That’s a terrible amount of guilt for a decent man to have to carry around.’

  ‘We’re pretty sure John would have known James had killed Julie,’ said Slater, ‘but maybe Sandra and James had told him they would blame him if spoke up.’

  ‘That’s terrible. Poor John. I knew he couldn’t have killed Julie.’

  ‘Just a minute, Amy. Before you fill your sails with righteous indignation, I think you should remember you were convinced enough to have been part of this conspiracy for the last ten years.’

  ‘But I’ve done nothing wro—’

  ‘You believed John had killed Julie.’

  ‘But you just said he didn’t!’ she cried.

  ‘Don’t you try to play the innocent victim, you old witch,’ snarled Sandra. ‘You were as happy to frame Steve Harris as the rest of us, as long as it meant keeping the money rolling in!’

  ‘Why did you choose Steve Harris?’ asked Slater.

  ‘That was Sandra’s idea,’ said Amy.

  Slater looked at Sandra. He was sure he could read her face. ‘Let me guess. He wasn’t interested in you, was he? You chose him because he rejected you.’

  ‘We chose him,’ interrupted James Harkness, ‘because it was common knowledge he mistreated Julie.’

  ‘You see?’ said Amy. ‘These two planned the whole thing. I was never a willing party to this conspiracy. I had no choice.’

  ‘There’s always a choice, Amy,’ said Slater. ‘You chose to accept John was guilty, and you were happy to keep it a secret. You knew Steve Harris had been framed, and I’m sure you must have known about the first payment to Rhodri Evans. I can’t believe you didn’t know about the monthly payments after he got greedy, either.’

  ‘I didn’t know he was being paid to keep quiet about James!’

  ‘No, you thought he had been paid because he had seen John, but it makes no difference. You still knew he was being paid to lie in court and convict an innocent man.’

  ‘I know nothing about that.’

  ‘Yeah, right. You can put it in your statement to the police.’ Slater pulled a police radio from his pocket.

  ‘Police? You’re not the police,’ snapped Harkness.

  ‘You’re right, we’re not the police, but we know a detective inspector who’s more than happy to step in and take over from us. She’s outside now, waiting for me to call her.’

  He pressed the button and put the radio to his ear. ‘Did you get all that?’ he said into the radio. ‘Yeah. Good. Oh, they’re all here, very eager to talk to you.’

  * * *

  ‘I suppose we’re going to have to tell Debbie we’ve proved her brother is innocent,’ said Slater, later. ‘It’s funny she hasn’t been chasing us for information.’

  ‘Actually, I thought you might prefer it if I handled that, so I’ve been keeping her up to date,’ said Norman.

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Is that a problem?’ asked Norman.

  Slater thought about it. Then he gave Norman a sad little smile.

  ‘No, Norm, it’s not a problem. To be honest, I’m not sure I want to see her.’

  ‘I can understand that. I’m sure I’d be the same. I’m happy to go tell her what’s happened.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘We’re partners, right? That means we share the load. I’ve got this, okay?’

  Chapter 38

  It was just
before 5 p.m. on Thursday afternoon. Slater was sitting at home, wondering what he was going to do now the case was closed, when his phone started to ring.

  ‘It’s Robbins,’ said the now familiar voice. ‘I thought you’d like an update on our progress.’

  ‘Have they all confessed?’

  ‘That pompous oaf Harkness is claiming Sandra and Linden are framing him, but they’re both adamant he confessed to murdering Julie Harris, and that’s why they paid Rhodri Evans to keep quiet.’

  ‘But why did he kill her?’

  ‘Honestly? I think Julie got down there and had second thoughts,’ said Robbins. ‘That would be enough for a man with an ego the size of his.’

  ‘D’you think you can make it stick?’ asked Slater.

  ‘I think so. There’s too much evidence for him to get away with it, and the others will be charged with conspiracy at the very least. We’re actually going to work with your friend DI Williams down in Wales, as it was their case originally.’

  I suppose that seems only fair,’ said Slater.

  ‘There seems to be some evidence missing, though.’

  ‘Oh yeah, what’s that?’

  ‘Bank statements from Rhodri Evans, Sandra Harkness, and Joe Linden.’

  Slater felt a twinge of guilt, but only a tiny twinge.

  ‘That’s funny,’ he said. ‘They were all together. I’m sure we gave them to you.’

  ‘Funny how they should all have gone missing, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s pretty weird. I’ll have a look around the office, see if I can find them.’

  There was a brief silence, but Slater knew she was fishing, and he resisted the temptation to say any more.

  ‘Don’t worry, it’s not a big deal,’ said Robbins. ‘We’ll be going through all of their accounts anyway. It was lucky they happened to be lying around so conveniently for you, just when you needed them.’

  ‘I guess we were lucky.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, doubtfully. ‘You were, weren’t you?’

  Slater kept his mouth firmly closed.

  ‘Anyway,’ she continued, when it was clear he wasn’t going to fill in any of the blanks for her, ‘that’s the good news.’