“Cuff him.” DI Thomas’s tone was short and brutish.
Lemkin pulled out a pair of handcuffs. Dakar put his hands in front of him quite willingly, and DC Lemkin snapped the handcuffs on.
“Feel that, Dakar?” DI Thomas.
Dakar stayed silent, a gentle smile on his face. He looked generally happy with how the whole thing was going.
DI Thomas turned back to Sarah-Anne. “Don’t worry, Mrs Mannings, Mr Dakar here – and Mr Scott – won’t be bothering you again. We just came to pick them up personally, but we can’t stay. I’m giving a press conference in twenty minutes. It’ll be public shortly, so I may as well tell you now. We’ve got Graham Donaldson in custody for Daniel’s murder.”
“Graham Donaldson did not murder Daniel Mannings.” Dakar spoke gently, but the words carried around the room.
DI Thomas sighed. “Come on, Dakar.” He walked over to him.
“In fact, he had a strong motive to keep him alive.”
“To keep him alive? When he’d found out that Daniel had taken photos of him having an affair to be used against him in court? Have you lost it, Dakar?” He turned to Sarah-Anne. “I’m sorry, Mrs Mannings. I don’t know if you were aware, but Daniel was taking photographs of Graham Donaldson meeting another woman. In revealing circumstances, if I can put it that way.”
“Graham Donaldson was not having an affair.” Dakar’s voice was gentle but insistent, as DI Thomas reached out and grabbed his arm.
“Yeah? What would you call a married man meeting another woman in a hotel clandestinely? Kissing her outside?” DI Thomas said it with a laugh. “C’mon, time to go.”
“Graham’s business was in trouble. It will soon go under, financially, and there will be a number of creditors making claims on Graham’s personal assets. In order to forestall this, Graham and Martina concocted a sham affair, with Graham at fault, to engineer a divorce. That way, Martina could save half of the assets from the marriage.”
DI Thomas hesitated, one hand gripping Dakar’s arm.
“Of course. Big blonde hair, and those ridiculous heels.” Sarah-Anne was smiling wanly.
“Indeed. The polar opposite of his wife, Martina. I was suspicious, I have to admit, when the photographs showed them meeting outside the hotel so publicly, when there was a large lobby they could have met in. Plus the woman was only ever seen from behind. Once I found out that Graham had booked the rooms under his own name, it seemed more and more like a set-up.”
DI Thomas’s eyes hardened as he looked at Dakar. Even with cuffed hands, Stewart had managed to slide his notebook out and then a pen, and was awkwardly but determinedly scribbling it all down as fast as he could, pad balancing on his knees.
Dakar turned to look at the man holding him. “And it means that Graham Donaldson not only had no motive to kill Daniel, he had a strong motive to keep him alive. Daniel was key to convincing the courts of the authenticity of the sham affair, and thereby saving at least some of their property from creditors.”
DI Thomas shook his head, his fingers pressing tighter around Dakar’s arm. “And what about the message, telling Donaldson the door was open? And his fingerprints all over the study?”
Pause. “Daniel refused to give the photographs to Martina, although he made sure she knew he had them. I presume he was going to blackmail her as well. The burner phone that you found dumped in the house belonged to Martina, not Craig. I don’t think he knows anything about the sham nature of the affair. I imagine that Graham came inside when the fireworks began, after Martina sent him that message and ensured the door was unlocked. To look for the photographs. Graham may even have been in the house while Daniel carried out his game at the window.”
“Or! Or Donaldson killed Daniel in the cellar, then went upstairs and played out the charade himself. Then he hides, and as everyone rushes into the bedroom, he slips downstairs. He puts the suit jacket back on the corpse and escapes out the front door. And his son bolts it behind him.” DI Thomas spoke with the tone of a person who has what they believe is a really good idea.
Pause. “And if he had been seen? You will have to explain to the fiscal that Graham passed back through the house, presumably with Daniel’s blood on him, having stabbed him multiple times.”
A shrug. “It could have happened.”
“Of course, you’ll have to explain how Daniel’s blood came to be in the bedroom.”
DI Thomas’s eyebrows furrowed at this.
“And, my brother, you will have to explain in court why he slit Daniel’s wrist, decided to bandage it afterwards and then cut it off again.”
DI Thomas’s expression darkened.
“Then you will have to discuss why he decided to kill Daniel when he had a powerful motive for keeping him alive.”
DI Thomas looked decidedly stormy now as Dakar continued in his gentle tone.
“And, of course, the killer question. Why, having murdered a man in his own house, managed to hide the body against strong odds, put on and then cut off a bandage, escaped, then cleaned himself up … why did he remain outside until the police arrived? Even after the police arrived? He could not have failed to see the police cars pull up, with sirens screaming. And yet he remained there until the police came out of the house and found him.”
DI Thomas looked back at Dakar, his expression frozen in place. His eyes were wild though.
“You have not made it public yet, my brother? Any charges against Graham Donaldson?”
DI Thomas slowly shook his head. He checked his watch, Stewart automatically doing the same. Quarter to eleven.
Dakar nodded. “I suggest you do not.”
DI Thomas looked at Dakar steadily for a long few seconds, the clock in the kitchen registering each passing second. He closed his eyes, then took a deep breath and let go of Dakar.
“Lemkin, radio HQ. Tell them to let Donaldson go.” Lemkin went to protest, but without opening his eyes, DI Thomas held up a hand. “We can always re-arrest him and charge him later if we get more on him.”
Lemkin’s expression looked both like he was sucking a lemon and bloody furious about it. “And the press conference?”
DI Thomas kept his eyes shut, but one hand came up and began massaging his temple. “Cancel it. I don’t fancy getting eaten alive. I’ll get enough of that from the chief.”
“I wouldn’t cancel the press conference, my brother.”
DI Thomas opened his eyes, glaring directly at Dakar, his jaw clenched so hard Stewart thought he could hear his teeth squeaking. He looked like he was about to hit him.
“You love knocking shit down, don’t you? What the hell would I tell the press? ‘Yes, we had a suspect, but we’ve just figured out now that actually he didn’t do it. And no, now you mention it, we don’t have another one’. For Christ’s sake, Seb.”
Dakar turned slowly to look at Sarah-Anne.
She took a deep breath. “I murdered my husband.”
DI Thomas looked at her as if she’d just announced her true name was Laetitia and she was the queen of fairyland.
“Excuse me?”
“I murdered my husband.” She repeated the words calmly, standing with her shoulders back, ready.
DI Thomas looked cautiously over at DC Lemkin, who was looking equally shocked. He nodded once, and the other officer hurriedly took his notepad out of his pocket.
DI Thomas looked around the rest of the room. His cautious look didn’t last long. By the time it passed over Stewart and Dakar, he looked like he smelled a trap. His gaze came back to Sarah-Anne.
“Sarah-Anne Mannings, I’m arresting you as a suspect. You have the right to remain silent, and you have the right to legal counsel. You have the right to have a third party informed of your arrest. Would you like to exercise any of those rights?”
“No.”
“Very well. Is there anything you’d like to tell me about the death of your husband Daniel Mannings?”
“Yes. I stabbed him.”
“Why?”
>
Sarah-Anne took a deep breath. Stewart felt the excitement course back through him again, his eyes fixed on the woman. The litmus test.
“It was an accident. Daniel had disappeared at the window, and there was the knife, and blood everywhere. I was all shaken up. Later that night, after the children left, I went to get a bottle of wine from the cellar. I had my back turned, and someone grabbed me in the darkness, turned me around and began screaming in my face. I was carrying a knife and I just struck out, by instinct.”
DI Thomas looked cautiously at her, scrutinising her face. “But how did Daniel get out of the bedroom?”
“He climbed out of the window, and then closed it, balancing on the bricks.” Dakar interrupted gently. “And if someone had happened to stay in the garden in spite of all the drama and seen him then the joke would be ruined, but apart from that … no big deal.” Dakar looked at Stewart. DI Thomas followed his gaze, his glare also landing on Stewart.
Stewart felt himself blush, but in spite of his glow, he still met DI Thomas’s glare. Dakar had raised the same objection when Stewart first laid out his alternate version, and Stewart had given him the same answer, the same words. ‘No big deal.’
DI Thomas’s eyes narrowed as he looked back at Dakar. “You keep quiet.” He turned back to Sarah-Anne, but she was nodding along.
“Yes, he must have climbed out of the window and then shut it behind him. There was no other way for anyone to get in or out of that room in the time it took us to get there. And then he must have gone to the cellar and waited for someone to come down, to scare them.”
“Why were you carrying a knife?”
“I was chopping some more food in the kitchen, just some snacks, when I realised we needed some more wine. I forgot I was carrying it, and just headed down.”
DI Thomas nodded slowly at this, the disbelief still clear in his face. “And what about the blood upstairs? If you stabbed him down there, how’d it get up there? And all the stuff on the floor?”
“I don’t know for sure, but Daniel was a showman. Maybe he slit his wrist and dropped some blood around the place, before he bandaged it again? Same with the things on the floor. To make it look like a fight had taken place.”
“And the bruising on his body, Mrs Mannings?” DI Thomas’s eyes were like slits.
“I kicked out at the person who attacked me as well, Detective Inspector, even after they fell to the floor. I was terrified, just reacting. That’s why I kept stabbing and kicking.”
DI Thomas stared back at her, his eyes considering.
Sarah-Anne took another deep breath, but pressed on. “I had no idea who it was, or what, I just struck out blindly. It was only after I calmed down I realised it was Daniel. But by then he was already dead.”
“And then?”
“I panicked. At first I tried to help him, pick him up from the back and drag him up the stairs. I got some way, but not all that far. But then I realised how it would look. So I dropped him, and his body rolled back down the stairs. I just left him there.”
DI Thomas sniffed. If anything, the disbelief was growing on his face, not decreasing.
“We tested your dress and gloves for blood and didn’t find any. You would have been covered with the stuff, if what you say is true.”
“Yes, but fortunately, I had a second dress, identical to the first. I bought two because I wasn’t sure which one fit better. I ran upstairs and got changed into the other one quickly and washed my face, then I hid the first one in the garden before Tom went to the cellar. I planned to discover the body myself, later, but he went down before me.”
DI Thomas sniffed, and Stewart could see the workings in his eyes. But then they narrowed again. “Then, Mrs Mannings, would you care to explain why you took the bandage off Daniel’s wrist?” There was a touch of triumph in his tone, as he posed his own killer question.
Sarah-Anne took a deep breath. There was silence in the air for a moment. “That’s how souls escape from our bodies.”
DI Thomas’s eyebrows shot up and his eyes almost popped out of his head.
“Excuse me?”
Sarah-Anne made a show of gesturing to the books, her eyes again meeting Stewart’s for a millisecond as she looked over towards the bookcase. “One of the ancient Celtic tribes believed that the soul escaped after death through the wrist. I wanted to make sure that my husband’s soul also escaped.”
DI Thomas looked at her, mouth slightly open, for a few seconds. Then he looked around at the books. Then back to Sarah-Anne.
Stewart smiled a secret smile as the silence in the room grew. Everyone else had protested this part of his proposed explanation, claiming it was too crazy. Stewart knew otherwise. It was the part that would seal the deal. Everyone secretly wanted to believe that murderers were different from them. And any kind of craziness would do.
DI Thomas nodded again slowly, as an accepting expression appeared on his face. He turned to look at Dakar, still a little stunned.
“My brother, this will be your collar. Right down to a confession. And you might take some pleasure in explaining to the press what the word ‘baffled’ truly means.”
DI Thomas closed his mouth again. He stared at Dakar for a few seconds, then pointed to the corridor. “A word. Now.” He headed out into the corridor, Dakar strolling after him in spite of his cuffed hands.
DC Lemkin came over to stand beside Stewart at the doorway, blocking the route into the corridor and shielding Dakar and DI Thomas from the view of those in the living room. He took up an at-ease stance, his hands behind his back. He didn’t say anything. Stewart snuck a look up at him, but he was looking stonily over at the other four people in the room.
“They’re not too tight, are they? The cuffs?” Lemkin continued looking straight ahead, speaking in a low voice that only Stewart could hear.
“Eh, the cuffs? No, no. Thanks. They’re grand.” Lemkin nodded, and settled back into silence.
Stewart heard the voices of DI Thomas and Dakar speaking down the hall.
“You’re sure?”
There was silence behind him, and Stewart recognised the pregnancy of the Dakar pause in action. “Indeed, my brother.”
“And Donaldson isn’t involved? At all?”
Pause. “I believe not.”
There was a pause, from DI Thomas this time, then a big exhalation. “Right.”
The two men re-entered the room, Stewart and DC Lemkin stepping to one side. DI Thomas looked at Sarah-Anne, and nodded. “DC Lemkin.”
Stewart watched DC Lemkin re-read Sarah-Anne her rights and charge her with the murder of her husband. As he went to escort her out, DI Thomas called wearily after him.
“Keys.” DC Lemkin produced a small key and threw it to DI Thomas, who then leaned over and uncuffed Dakar. He then walked over to Stewart and took the cuffs off of his hands as well. Stewart rubbed his wrists.
“Thank you, my brother.”
“Consider yourself unarrested.” He glanced over his shoulder at Stewart. “You as well, Scott. As if it never happened.”
Stewart let out a deep breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. Thank the big man for small mercies.
Chapter 53
Stewart stood outside the house, beside Dakar. The police had taken statements from both of them, and had just left, taking Sarah-Anne with them. Jane stood beside them, watching the cars leave. Sandra and Russell were still in the kitchen, Sandra having refused to move.
“You couldn’t just have left it, could you? Now we’ve lost our mother as well.”
Pause. Dakar turned to meet Jane’s livid look. “If we undertake an action, my sister, it is perhaps well to be ready to pay the price for it. Your mother has paid it for you. A brave woman.”
“She didn’t have to. You could have just not said anything.”
Pause. “Perhaps, my sister.”
Jane’s voice quivered as she spoke, her accusation flung straight at Dakar. “This is your fault.”
P
ause. “I am full of sorrow that you feel that way, my sister.”
“I’m not your sister.”
She glared at Dakar for a second longer, then turned and stomped back into the house. Stewart watched her disappear before he and Dakar began heading for the car.
“Lucky you found that dress and apron in the bin, then. Might have been hard to convince her to confess otherwise.”
Pause. “But I did not. The murder was eleven days ago, and the bins had been emptied by the time I got there. I bought the dress and apron when I was shopping this morning. I don’t know if they were the same as the ones Sarah-Anne had, but it didn’t matter. All that mattered was the colour.”
Stewart stopped and gaped at him, open-mouthed. “You lied!”
Pause. Dakar stopped as well. “By omission, certainly.”
“You said they had Daniel’s blood on them!”
Pause. “I said I was as sure as I could be that they had blood on them, my brother. I never specified whose blood. And indeed they do. I visited a butcher shortly after buying them, and splattered some blood on myself.”
“I … But … Are you allowed to do that?”
Dakar began walking again. “We make our own rules, my brother.”
Stewart nodded. Well. In the name of the wee man. Dakar had been so calm throughout. Wouldn’t fancy playing him at poker.
“And so Craig had nothing to do with it? I really thought that it was him who opened the front door for his dad. What with the anarchist tattoo and everything.”
Pause, a shake of the head. “Anarchist philosophy is not a violent one, my brother. In fact, if true anarchists took power, society would probably be more organised than it is now. And, I believe, a lot fairer.”
“Oh aye? Know a lot about anarchists, do you?”
“I am one.”
Stewart stopped and gaped again, then had to hurry to catch up as Dakar kept on. But Dakar stopped next to his car as another car pulled up. It screamed to a halt, sufficiently sharply for the front of the car to dip and the back to rise slightly, and the driver rocketed out.
The Price to Pay Page 28
