by Rob Ashman
‘Okay, I’m tied up at the hospital until Duncan arrives. Drag Marshall down to the station and I will meet you there.’ She hung up and turned to the ward sister. ‘Sorry about that. I need you to–’ Kray doubled over again, holding her side. ‘Fuck. That hurts.’
Marshall checked his watch – ten minutes to eleven. He went to the kitchen, made himself a black coffee and returned to his office, closing the door. He sat behind his desk and waited. On the strike of eleven o’clock the phone rang.
‘Hello.’
‘Mr Marshall, Mr Eddie Marshall?’
‘Yes, who is this?’
‘That is not of consequence, Mr Marshall. What I want to know is – do I have your attention?’
‘I received your package.’
‘That is not what I asked – do I have your attention?’
‘Yes, you do. What do you want?’
‘That’s what I like, a man who gets straight down to business.’
‘I’m a busy man, Mr…?’
‘You can call me Mr Jackal. Like in the book. I do enjoy a good book, don’t you, Eddie?’
‘Do I know you?’
‘No, we’ve never met.’
‘Do you want to tell me what this is about, Mr Jackal?’
‘Of course. I am in the market to purchase some merchandise. Merchandise I know you stock on your shelves from time to time. Now, I am well aware there are procedures and protocols to follow to be able to make such a purchase, but you see, Eddie, I’m in a rush.’
‘I’m not sure I know what merchandise you are referring to.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
‘I believe you were careless enough to lose one the other night. Such a shame to waste such a precious resource. Does that help to jog your memory?’
‘Look, Mr Jackal. I don’t know what you’re alluding to but–’
‘I have a client who’s willing to pay over the odds for your product. In return for a FastPass to the game. And he is, shall we say, very insistent.’
‘Insistent?’
‘My client is used to getting his way. You know how those people can be.’
‘And what if I say no?’
‘Mr Marshall, I am trying my best to make it easy for you to say, “yes”. But in the event that you won’t let my client play we will be forced to… well, let’s just say the Paragon club will be looking for a new head of security. But we would much rather that didn’t happen and you accept our goodwill gesture instead. What d’you say?’
Marshall picked up the nearest brick of notes from his desk. ‘Is there more to this “goodwill gesture” than meets the eye?’
‘There’s plenty more.’
‘Then I think we can do business, Mr Jackal.’
‘Good.’
‘How do I get in touch with you?’
‘You don’t. You will notice that the newspaper is taken from yesterday’s edition of The Gazette. I regularly pass your club, that’s how I knew what time you got into work. Stick a Post-it note to the inside of the glass on the front door and I will call you.’
‘I can do that.’
‘My client is impatient and would like to know the rough date of the next game.’
‘Tell your client, soon. Goodbye, Mr Jackal.’
Marshall disconnected the call and immediately dialled 1471. The voice came back to tell him that the caller had withheld their number.
‘Shit,’ Marshall muttered to himself. He sat back in his chair and mulled over the conversation. This was certainly unusual and completely against every protocol their business had put in place. But on this occasion, he reckoned he could make an exception.
The goodwill gesture sitting on his desk would go a long way to salve his conscience.
Yes, that will do nicely.
Chapter 30
Kray had made it back to the station just in time to see Marshall sitting in the interview room with a face like a smacked arse. Chapman was sitting opposite, both of them cradling cups of coffee.
Kray took a seat and kicked off the proceedings. ‘Just to reiterate, Mr Marshall, you are helping us with our enquiries and you’re free to leave at any time. You can have a solicitor present if you wish?’
Marshall shook his head. ‘No, that won’t be necessary.’
‘What happened to your cheek?’ Kray noticed the abrasion under his eye.
‘Oh nothing, it comes with the territory.’
‘We have a couple of points which we are hoping you can help us with.’
‘That’s what she said.’ Marshall cocked his head in the direction of Chapman. ‘And while we’re on the subject of being helpful… I don’t find it helpful for this woman to enter my premises and commandeer my CCTV. It was not acceptable.’
‘Do you want to make a formal complaint regarding the conduct of DC Chapman?’
Marshall thought for a moment. ‘No, I don’t.’
‘Okay, then we’ll press on. There are a number of aspects about the death of Tommy Weir that are bugging me, and one of them is cars.’
‘Cars! Christ, I would have thought him being stabbed was more of an issue. But you’re the copper, you know best.’
Kray ignored the gibe. ‘Let’s start with these…’ Kray pushed a bunch of keys, encased in a plastic evidence pouch, across the table. ‘Tommy’s car keys were in his bag, do you remember?’
‘Err, yes, I suppose so.’
‘And Tommy’s car was parked outside the back of the club.’
‘Yes, so what?’
‘The thing that’s been bugging me is, if his car was at the club, how did he get to Spencer Street?’
‘I don’t know. All I know is he buggered off and left us short-handed. Maybe he got a lift or took a taxi?’
‘We checked every taxi company and none of them have any record of dropping off a fare around that area.’
‘Maybe he walked.’
‘If he walked from the club it’s fifteen miles, so that’s unlikely.’
‘He got a lift, then?’
‘He could have. The other possibility is he took one of your pool cars.’ Kray motioned to Chapman who slid a photograph across the desk showing four vehicles in the club compound. ‘This was taken at 7pm on the night Weir was killed. You have a white Transit van, a small hatchback, an estate car and a saloon car all parked at your premises.’
‘Yeah, so what? We make a lot of trips, run a lot of errands.’
‘We checked, and all these vehicles are registered to the business, that’s right isn’t it, Mr Marshall?’
‘They might be, I don’t know.’
‘HMRC requires the business to keep a log of when employees use a pool car. You know the type of thing – who is driving the vehicle, how many miles.’
‘I called at your premises today, Mr Marshall,’ said Chapman. ‘And asked to see the log.’
‘Woah! Why wasn’t I informed of this?’ said Marshall.
‘Your employee showed me the log and it was blank for the night Tommy was killed. So, according to your records no one used any of the company vehicles that night.’
‘I don’t know. So, if none of the cars were used then Tommy must have got a lift from someone.’
‘I suppose he could have,’ said Kray.
Chapman placed another photograph on the table. ‘This picture shows the small hatchback travelling south on Windsor Road at 9.45pm. It was taken at the junction with Sycamore Street. Which is one and half miles from where Weir’s body was discovered.’ Marshall stared at the grainy image. ‘What was the car doing there?’
He pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘Don’t know. I run a club not a valet parking service.’
‘Who was driving it?’
‘How the hell should I know?’ Marshall was going red in the face.
‘I believe Tommy was driving this car. And if he was driving a company car that tells me he was on company business. Was Tommy running an errand for you, Mr Marshall?’
‘No! He ju
st up and left. I was furious.’
‘We’ve looked through the footage from the camera on the junction and there is no record of it travelling back the same way.’
‘I can’t help you. It was a busy night and when Tommy did his disappearing act it was all hands to the pump. I didn’t have time to keep track of pool cars.’
‘It’s very convenient that your CCTV at the club is corrupted at the very time this hatchback left the club and returned sometime afterwards.’
‘I told you we had a fault.’
‘But it would appear the fault hasn’t affected any of the other footage. I know because I watched it,’ Chapman said.
‘What can I say, it’s an intermittent fault.’
‘So, you have no idea how this car came to be here?’ Chapman said, pointing to the picture.
‘Can’t help you. I’m sorry.’
‘When Tommy left you short-handed did you try to contact him?’
‘Umm, yes, I think I did.’
‘Here is a copy of the call history taken from his mobile. Do you recognise this number?’ Kray pointed to an eleven-digit number on the printout. Marshall shook his head. ‘Let me help you, Mr Marshall. This is your number. You called Tommy four times. Do you remember doing that?’
‘Not especially, I was pissed off and wanted to know what he was playing at.’
‘Four calls made between ten past eleven and half past eleven. Four calls in the space of twenty minutes. That’s a bit excessive, wouldn’t you say?’
‘I was annoyed, I wanted to tear a strip off him.’
‘And yet you didn’t call him once between 9.45 and 11.10. Why was that?’
‘I don’t know, I was busy.’
‘Then you receive a call from this number at 11:55. It’s from one of your employees, isn’t it? This number belongs to Josh Adams, the guy who works behind the bar. What did Adams say to you to make you stop calling Tommy Weir?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Did he tell you he’d found Tommy in the alleyway?’
‘That’s absurd.’
‘Is it? He told you something that made you stop calling. By your own admission you were mad as hell and wanted to tear a strip off Tommy. So why stop after four calls, why not make it five or six?’
‘I got bored.’
‘Bored…? If you say so.’
‘I’ve had enough of this.’ Marshall stood up.
‘If you could stay a little longer, Mr Marshall? I have a couple more questions.’ Marshall slumped back into his seat.
‘This photograph was pulled from your CCTV at 7pm and this is a picture nine hours later when the system repaired itself.’ Chapman pushed two photographs towards Marshall, each showing the back compound of the club. ‘What do you notice?’
‘Erm, nothing.’
‘This is like one of those “spot the difference” pictures. The same scene with the same four vehicles. Only in the later picture the vehicles are in different positions. Any idea why?’
‘They were moved at some point during the evening. As I said it was a busy shift.’
‘That’s right, you did. And that’s what made me wonder… if it was such a busy shift, how come all the cars were moved? Surely with Tommy going AWOL you needed people in the club, not moving cars around.’
Marshall shrugged his shoulders.
‘Do you know what ANPR is, Mr Marshall?’ asked Kray.
‘What is this now, twenty questions?’
‘It stands for Automatic Number Plate Recognition and it’s a very cool piece of kit. It tracks vehicle movements on key roads. Do you know what we found?’
‘Surprise me.’
‘All bar one of your vehicles made the trip in convoy across the M55, down the M6 and across the A580 to Liverpool. The car that didn’t make that journey was the small hatchback. What were you doing travelling en masse to Liverpool, Mr Marshall?’
‘We had a team get-together at one of Mr Cross’s casinos. You know, as a bit of a thank you to the boys.’
‘In Liverpool?’
‘Yup, we didn’t stay long.’
‘According to the ANPR you stayed just over an hour. Not much of an outing for the boys, was it?’ Marshall shrugged his shoulders again.
‘What’s the casino called?’
‘The Majestic.’
‘And I have no doubt there are people who could verify you were at the casino?’
‘Of course. Can I go now?’
‘Just to be clear, Mr Marshall. You were pissed off because Weir left you short-handed at the club and yet you organised a works outing to a casino in Liverpool. Is that what you expect us to believe?’
‘You can’t be hard on the boys all the time. Good management is all about carrot and stick.’
Kray looked across at Chapman.
‘That’s all for now. I’m sure we will need to talk with you again, Mr Marshall. Thank you for your time,’ said Kray.
‘It’s been a pleasure.’ Marshall rose from his chair.
‘Oh, one more question. Do you sail?’ asked Kray.
‘What?’
‘Do you sail? You know, do you go on boats?’
‘First you have a problem with cars and now you want to know about boats?’
‘Well?’
‘No, I wouldn’t be seen dead on a boat. I hate them. Is that okay?’
‘Thank you.’
Chapman ushered Marshall into the corridor. She returned a few minutes later.
‘That was good work,’ Kray said, sliding the photographs across the table.
‘He’s a slippery character. What do you think?’
‘He’s a lying bastard, that’s what he is.’
‘I think we rattled his cage, though. We need to keep tabs on him and see where he runs.’
‘Interview his team from the Paragon, see if they corroborate his story, and pay the Majestic a visit.’
‘Will do, Roz.’
Kray’s phone buzzed. ‘Kray.’
‘I have a woman in reception wants to speak with you. She won’t give her name.’ It was Sybil Moore on the line, the Rottweiler who ran the reception desk with the efficiency of a FTSE 100 company.
‘Oh, come on, Sybil, tell her this is not a place to play a game of “Who am I?” I’m tied up at the moment, find out her name and call me back.’
‘Roz, I’ve been doing this a long time. If I can’t get her name the first time, it’s because the woman isn’t going to give it if I ask a second. She seems agitated and insisted she would only speak with you. I’ve put her in an office.’
Fuck!
‘Okay, Sybil, I’ll be right down.’ Kray ran down the stairs to the front of the building. Sybil stared at her over the top of her half-moon glasses and nodded in the direction of an office on the left. Kray acknowledged with a raised hand.
She punched down the door handle and strode into the small room, which was furnished with a round table and two chairs. One of them was occupied.
‘Hello, Roz.’
‘Shit!’
Chapter 31
‘You need to talk to a man called William Ellwood, or at least that’s his real name. What he goes by now is anyone’s guess.’ The diminutive figure of Miriam Ellwood sat with her hands clasped together in her lap, her thumb boring into the palm of her left hand.
‘Who’s he?’ asked Kray.
‘My husband’s brother.’
‘That name came up on our search but we’ve not yet interviewed him.’
‘Yeah, well good luck with that. First you’ve got to find him.’
‘Why would–’
‘I told Michael he was dangerous, I said he should stay the hell away from him. I told him not to go!’ Ellwood slammed her hand down onto the tabletop. ‘But oh no, would he listen? Would he fuck! And now he’s dead. I told him… I fucking told him…’ She clasped her hands tight to her face and rocked back and forth, sobbing.
‘Can I get you some water?’
‘No, I don
’t want bloody water! I want you to find that shitbag brother-in-law and bring him to me so I can cut his balls off and ram them down his throat. Then… then…’ She collapsed forwards with her head on the desk, crying hard.
Kray placed her hand on her shoulder. ‘Miriam, take your time.’
Sybil appeared at the window in the door, having heard the commotion. She mouthed, ‘Are you all right?’ Kray nodded and brought her hand to her lips in the universal sign for a drink. Sybil nodded and beetled off. Time ticked by and Ellwood didn’t move.
‘I’m sorry.’ She straightened up, wiping her face with her hands. ‘Sorry… that keeps happening. One minute I’m okay and the next I’m behaving like a crazy person.’
‘That’s all right, let me know when you want to continue.’
‘I’m fine.’ Ellwood ran her hands through her hair and let out a deep breath. ‘Now, where was I? Oh, yes, I need to apologise for the other day. I told you a pack of lies.’
‘I know. Why don’t you start again and tell me about William Ellwood?’
‘Everyone calls him Billy. He and my husband were close, even though their lives went in different directions. They wouldn’t speak for months, sometimes years, and then when they got together it was as though they had seen each other yesterday. They seemed to have this special bond between them, it was infuriating.’ Ellwood seemed to drift off to a place where life no longer hurt. Kray waited patiently. ‘That day, Michael travelled to Blackpool to meet up with Billy.’
‘Why did he do that?’
‘To be honest, I don’t know. As far as I’m aware they just sat and chatted. I never asked Michael directly because I didn’t want to know. When Billy got in touch I pleaded with him not to go, I begged him to stay clear. But he wouldn’t listen, it was as though when Billy clicked his fingers Michael came running.’
‘Had they done this before?’
‘Yes, many times. For years we had no contact whatsoever, then bam! Billy got in touch out of the blue and he was back in our lives.’
‘I don’t understand, what’s the connection with Blackpool?’
‘I don’t know that either. All I know is a couple of times a year Michael would tell me he was going to meet with Billy. There was nothing I could say to stop him. He’d simply disappear for the day and come back in the evening. We never spoke about what they did, or what was said – he didn’t want to tell me and I didn’t want to know. That man is poison and I didn’t want him anywhere near us.’
