by D. S. Butler
‘Good idea. Maybe he’s thought of something that could help us.’
DI Morgan was probably right, Karen thought as she hung up. William Grant could have remembered something relevant to their investigation and decided to call while it was fresh in his mind. Ten p.m. wasn’t that late really, and she had left him her card and told him to call at any time.
Despite that, Karen couldn’t shake her sense of unease as she drove towards North Greetwell.
When she pulled up outside William’s bungalow, Karen saw his car in the driveway. The curtains were open, but there were no lights on.
She locked the car and walked towards the bungalow slowly. As she got closer to the front door, she saw it was slightly ajar.
Her skin tingled, and she felt a spike of adrenaline run through her body.
This wasn’t good.
She looked around, taking in her surroundings, and then pushed open the door. The hallway looked exactly the same as it had when they’d first visited. The telephone table sat in the same position, and all the photographs were still hanging on the wall. Nothing looked out of the ordinary.
Karen called out, ‘Mr Grant? This is DS Hart, Lincolnshire Police.’
There was no answer.
She looked around the sleepy collection of bungalows surrounding William’s, but there was no one to be seen. She typed a quick message to DI Morgan and said she was going inside. She wasn’t averse to taking risks, but it made sense to let someone on the team know what she was doing.
She took a deep breath and stepped over the threshold before pausing in the hall and listening for any sounds of life.
‘Mr Grant? Is everything okay?’ Karen tried again, but was met with the same silence.
She moved forward methodically, checking each room as she passed and looking for any signs of a struggle. But everything seemed neat and tidy, and there was nothing to indicate anything untoward had taken place.
She checked both the bedrooms last, and was greeted by the sight of neatly made beds.
Where had he gone? It was only seven thirty. People just didn’t wander off and leave their doors open these days.
She walked back towards the front door, and as she approached, a shadow fell across the driveway.
Karen’s heart jumped, and then she let out a sigh of relief when she saw it was William Grant. He was holding two tubs of brightly coloured pansies and looking at her in amazement.
‘What are you doing in there?’ he asked. He didn’t sound put out or annoyed, just surprised.
‘Mr Grant, you called me last night. I tried to return your call this morning but got no answer. When I arrived, your front door was open, and I thought you might be in trouble.’
‘Oh, I see. I just popped round to the back garden to bring these out to the front.’ He held up the pots of pansies.
Karen felt oddly light-headed and shaky now that the adrenaline was leaving her system. ‘Right, well, since I’m here, perhaps you could tell me why you called me last night?’
William set the pots of pansies down next to the flowerbed and brushed his hands together.
He nodded firmly, but his face looked sad. ‘Yes, I needed to talk to you. Come through to the kitchen. There’s something I need to show you.’
She followed William to the small kitchen at the back of the bungalow. From a letter rack, he plucked a sheet of paper that had been folded in half and held it out to Karen.
Before she touched it, she saw the message.
‘Can you put the letter down on the kitchen counter please, Mr Grant?’
She didn’t want her fingerprints contaminating the evidence. The letter was typed, and it was identical to the one they’d found at Albert Johnson’s house.
It’s time to pay for your crime.
‘When did you get this?’
‘Six months ago.’
‘Why didn’t you tell us about this when we came to visit?’
William linked his hands together and stared contritely down at his feet.
Karen didn’t understand. Surely receiving a letter like this would be one of the first things to tell the police?
‘I should have told you, I’m sorry. It’s just Albert . . .’ He trailed off, rubbing a hand over his forehead.
Karen bit her lip. He probably hadn’t yet heard the news about his friend. Despite her frustration with him for not mentioning the letter, it was up to her to break it to him as gently as she could.
‘I’m very sorry to tell you the news like this, William, but Albert died yesterday,’ Karen said.
William didn’t look up. His shoulders were slumped as he replied, ‘I know.’
Karen couldn’t help feeling sorry for him when she saw his eyes were glistening with tears. ‘I need to take this letter to the station. It’s important evidence, William. I’ll get my kit from the car.’
Karen turned, preparing to go back to her car to grab a pair of gloves and an evidence bag for the letter, and William muttered something so quietly she couldn’t make it out.
‘What was that?’
William looked up. His eyelashes were wet as he blinked at her. ‘I didn’t tell you because it was our secret. Albert never wanted anyone to know, but now he’s dead.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I need to talk to my solicitor. I want to do this officially down at the station.’
After Karen had William Grant settled in interview room three with a cup of tea, she went to the main office to update the rest of the team. William’s solicitor was on her way, which was a good thing because, despite Karen’s many questions, William was refusing to talk until his lawyer arrived.
‘So he received the same letter as Albert Johnson?’ DI Morgan asked, looking as puzzled as Karen felt.
She nodded. ‘Yes, I’ve just admitted it to evidence, but it looks exactly the same to me. Same wording. It’s time to pay for your crime.’
‘What did William say on the drive to the station?’ Sophie asked.
‘Not a lot. He said something about it not being his secret to share, but now that Albert was dead he’s ready to talk.’
‘Very mysterious,’ Rick said.
‘He was a teacher at Greenhill Secondary School when Albert was the headmaster. It’s possible they found out what Oliver Fox was up to, had an altercation with him and then tried to cover up what happened.’
DI Morgan looked at his watch. ‘I hope the solicitor hurries up. It’s hard to plan an interview strategy when you have no idea what he’s going to say.’
‘I agree,’ Karen said. ‘I think we should keep an open mind going in, let him get whatever it is off his chest and then break for a bit to plan our next move.’
‘I think that’s our only option,’ DI Morgan said.
The phone on Karen’s desk rang, and she picked it up. It was the desk sergeant telling her that William Grant’s solicitor had arrived.
‘The solicitor’s here,’ Karen said after hanging up. ‘I’ll go downstairs and bring her up.’
‘Great, I’ll get things started in the interview room,’ DI Morgan said, and then turned to Rick and Sophie. ‘You two concentrate on tracking down the other students in Oliver Fox’s classes, particularly focusing on any who also attended football training. Hopefully, William Grant is about to give us some answers, but if not, we’re going to need student testimony to fall back on.’
Waiting for Karen downstairs was William Grant’s solicitor, a middle-aged woman with tanned skin and a slightly startled expression. She introduced herself as Megan Evans. As she shook her hand, Karen wondered how much she’d been told about the case.
‘Can I ask what this is about?’ she asked as Karen led her up the stairs to the interview room.
‘Mr Grant would like to make a statement.’ Karen said.
From the anxious questions the solicitor shot at her as they went, Karen realised her client hadn’t told her anything yet.
Megan blinked a couple of times and opened her mouth to ask another question, but before she c
ould, Karen opened the door to interview room three.
William sat on one side of the table, his hands wrapped around a paper cup filled with what must now be stone-cold tea. He half-stood as Karen and the solicitor entered the room.
‘Thank you for coming, Megan,’ he said, adding, ‘Megan is the daughter of one of my old friends.’
The solicitor took the seat beside William, and Karen sat opposite them, beside DI Morgan. They started the recording, and once formalities were out of the way, Karen said, ‘You wanted to make a statement, William?’
William was trembling, looking like he’d made the worst mistake of his life. ‘I don’t really know where to begin,’ he said in a quiet voice.
‘Perhaps you could tell us about the letter,’ DI Morgan said.
William clasped his shaking hands. ‘Right. I got my letter at the same time as Bert, about six months ago. It scared the life out of us. I don’t mind telling you that. We weren’t expecting it, you see. It had been so long since it happened . . . It didn’t seem real, in a way.’
William’s face was pale, and he twisted his fingers together as he rested his hands on the table in front of him.
‘Do you know who sent the letters?’
William shook his head, and his bloodshot eyes lifted to meet Karen’s. ‘I’ve no idea. Bert and I talked about it, but it was a mystery. We couldn’t work out who sent them. The only explanation we came up with was that after all this time, someone had uncovered our secret.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
William Grant rubbed his face with his hands. ‘When you came to talk to me, I knew you’d found the body.’ He took a deep breath. ‘We’d kept him in Bert’s loft for the past eight years. Before that, he was kept under the floor of the outbuilding in his garden. We’d thought it would be safe out there, and it was for years, but someone pinched some garden equipment so Bert decided to move the body inside. His wife had died by then, so we thought it would be safe.’
William raked a hand through his thin, grey hair. ‘I suppose you must have looked in Bert’s loft and found the body in the suitcase . . . I’m right, aren’t I? That’s why you came to talk to me about Oliver Fox.’
He had it half-right. They’d found the body in Albert’s home, although it had been in the spare room, not the loft. Perhaps Albert had decided to move the case, and the exertion was what caused his fall. The crime scene team had reported evidence that some items in the loft had been moved recently.
Neither Karen nor DI Morgan said anything, so William continued. ‘It happened so long ago, so when we got the letters, it was a shock. Bert said it was some silly joke, but I was nervous. The letters were bad enough, but then a few weeks ago Bert started to get phone calls. When he answered, no one spoke, but he could hear the sound of someone breathing, and I was convinced it was linked to the letters. Eventually I persuaded him we needed to move the body again. So I hired a boat. The idea was to dump the case out at sea somewhere.’ William raised his eyes to the ceiling and said, ‘We weren’t criminal masterminds, but after the phone calls, we felt like we didn’t have a choice. I was supposed to be going round to help him, but my granddaughter was taken ill – appendicitis – and I didn’t expect him to try to move the body alone. The next day, I heard Bert had been rushed to hospital.’
‘How did Oliver Fox’s body get into the suitcase in the first place?’ Karen asked, feeling thoroughly confused. She wished he’d started at the beginning of the story.
William’s whole body began to shake, and his solicitor put her hand on his arm. ‘Are you okay to continue, William?’
Karen poured him a drink from the bottle of mineral water on the bench behind them. She pushed the plastic cup across the table to him.
He took it gratefully. ‘Thank you. It happened thirty years ago, so my memory is not the best. I’ll try to tell you everything, though. I think it was 1987 that I first heard whispers about Oliver Fox. At first, I thought they were just malicious, unsubstantiated rumours. He was a funny man and kept to himself, and people did like to gossip if they felt others didn’t fit in. It was a tight-knit village in those days, and outsiders were always viewed with suspicion. He’d lived in Skellingthorpe for years, but didn’t get too involved in village life, which was unusual for a teacher in those days.
‘I first realised people were taking the rumours seriously when Bert, who was the headmaster at the time, asked me to go along to the football training sessions after school on Thursdays. I got the distinct impression he wanted somebody to keep an eye on Oliver. That was in May 1987, I think.
‘I did my best. But I had my own family and I couldn’t make it every Thursday, and he never did anything untoward when I was around, so I started to think the rumours had been wrong. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, I suppose. Something I’d later regret.
‘It was just after Easter in 1988 when it happened. I’d stayed late to mark some homework and prepare my lessons for the next week, when three young boys came into the classroom. I was about to tell them off because they weren’t allowed to be wandering around the school after hours, but then I saw the blood. The first boy, James, was covered in it. It was even in his hair, and the other two had it all over their hands and shirts. They were in shock, babbling incoherently, so I took them along to the headmaster.
‘When I realised what had happened, I wanted to go straight to the police, but Bert took charge. He told me we wouldn’t be going to the police. I have to admit I lost my temper with him. I thought he was trying to protect the school’s reputation or something daft like that, but then he explained there was a strong possibility the boys would get the blame and no one would listen to their side of the story because nobody had believed a similar allegation made the year before.
‘That’s when I remembered the officer who’d come round asking questions a year before. He’d wanted to know all about Oliver Fox and his relationship with the students. I’d been as honest as I could be with him, but I’d never seen Oliver do anything to make any of the boys uncomfortable, and they’d never come to me with any problems.’
His voice broke, and he took another sip of water. The events may have happened thirty years ago, but William Grant’s emotions were still raw.
‘Bert told me that Oliver Fox’s brother was in the police force, and he’d quashed the last investigation. It knocked me for six. I’d known about Mark Bell’s suicide, of course, but I hadn’t known what was behind it. I suppose I was in shock. We went into the changing room and found Oliver Fox’s body just lying there. His blood was all over the floor. Bert checked for a pulse and couldn’t find one. I found the boys some clothes from lost property and told them to get changed after washing off the blood. I said they must tell their families that they’d managed to spill paint on their clothes and they were ruined. I burned the uniforms later.
‘While I was doing that, Bert managed to get Oliver’s body on to a mat from the games hall and rolled him up in it.’ William shuddered. ‘There was so much blood. Bert and I loaded the body into the back of his old Volvo. Then we sent the boys home, instructing them not to tell anyone what had happened, and Bert and I moved the body into the outbuilding in his garden.
‘I still can’t believe we got away with it. His wife was in the kitchen. We told her Bert was going to store some gardening things in the outbuilding for me. She didn’t suspect anything. She didn’t even look out of the window. Some blood had soaked into the carpet in the boot of the car, so we took it back to the school and gave the fabric a good scrub. Then we went home as if nothing had happened, and tried to behave as though it was a normal evening.’
When William stopped talking, there was heavy silence in the room, and Karen guessed DI Morgan, like her, was struggling to process the information.
‘So you found Oliver Fox’s body in the changing room?’ Karen asked, wanting to clarify the scene of the crime.
‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘And he was dead when you found him?’
William lowered his head and took a deep breath. ‘Yes, Bert spent quite some time looking for a pulse and checked if he was breathing. There was no doubt about it. Oliver was definitely dead when we got there.’
‘And you think the boys attacked him?’ DI Morgan asked. ‘You assume they were fighting back?’
William nodded slowly. ‘They were only thirteen. So young, and they were terrified. One of the lads wouldn’t stop crying, and one boy didn’t speak at all. It was the third boy, James Hunter, who managed to lead me to the changing room, to Oliver’s body.’
‘Which one of the boys killed Oliver? Was it an accident?’
William took a deep breath and then said, ‘I never asked. I know that sounds silly, but it wouldn’t change anything, and the boys were so upset. We told them that we would deal with everything, but they couldn’t mention what had happened to anyone. As far as I know, they never did.’
‘Can you give us the full names of all three boys please, Mr Grant?’ DI Morgan asked.
He blinked and put his palms flat on the table. ‘Yes, James Hunter, Michael Simpson and Stuart Bennett. All three boys were thirteen. Whatever happened, it wasn’t their fault.’
‘And they were all part of this football club?’
‘Yes.’ He rubbed the back of his neck. ‘I did wonder if Oliver was on his best behaviour when he knew he was being watched, and made arrangements to see the boys later, when no one else was around.’
DI Morgan asked a few more questions, pinning down the date and time of the murder. He asked for the registration number of Albert Johnson’s car at the time, but William understandably had no idea. They’d need to contact the DVLA to find out what vehicles had been registered to Albert Johnson in 1988. It was a long shot, but if the car hadn’t been scrapped, they could examine it for evidence. With advanced DNA technology, it seemed anything was possible these days.
‘I think we’ll pause here, William,’ Karen said. She wanted to get the names of the boys to Rick and Sophie so they could track them down as soon as possible.
She also wanted to discuss with DI Morgan how they were going to proceed, because while William Grant may not have killed Oliver Fox, he’d still concealed the body, and that was a crime.
