by Ray Clark
“As it turned out, Robert had been called to the hospital on an emergency, which had taken him through the night and into the next morning. He was about to leave the hospital sometime around six-thirty, when Adam’s body had been taken into the mortuary. The attending pathologist had recognised Robert’s son, and called him immediately.”
“Stupid question time: how did he take the death of his son?”
“Like his father said, he just seemed to withdraw, block everything out. Within a couple of days he was back at work, and completely refused to talk about it. His father knew that he was thinking about it, and that it was weighing heavily on his mind, because he was so obsessed with blocking it out. As if, because he wasn’t thinking about it or acknowledging it, the whole thing had never happened.”
“Jesus Christ!” said Reilly. “I wouldn’t like to be there when he finally does.”
“I have a feeling we will be,” replied Gardener.
Silence filled the room. Gardener needed to plan a course of action for his officers.
Steve Fenton the CSM barged in. He’d removed his white paper suit, and was dressed casually in jeans and a T-shirt.
“Bit more on Graham Johnson for you, sir. The cell sites put him in Bursley Bridge at the time that he called the solicitor, Ronson. The best we can narrow it down to is a postcode, which could very well put him at Sinclair’s house.”
“So either of them could have made the call,” said Reilly.
“Assuming he was at Sinclair’s house,” said Gardener, “But I don’t think he could have been anywhere else.”
Gardener turned to Sergeant Williams. “David, will you call Sinclair, see if he’s at home? You’ll probably end up speaking to his housekeeper. Just tell her your investigating something that’s happened to Graham Johnson, and you’re trying to piece together his movements for the morning. Ask her if he was there.”
Williams nodded and left the room.
“Anything else?” asked Gardener.
“I think it’s safe to assume he will have been,” said Fenton. “Just before the crash, Johnson received a phone call from Sinclair. That might have had something to do with his death.”
Gardener turned to Cragg. “Maurice, anything on a medical history for Johnson?”
“Not yet, sir.”
“I could do to know whether or not Johnson has had any operations recently. Judging what we’ve learned about Sinclair today, I wouldn’t put it past him to have a little insurance policy on everyone involved. If the heat in the kitchen became too much, he could simply pull the plug on them all.”
“I’ll get onto it, sir.”
“That leaves us with another problem,” said Thornton. “If Gary is involved, has Sinclair taken out an insurance policy on him? After all, he was the one who fixed Gary’s leg.”
“Maybe that’s why he isn’t answering his phone?” added Anderson.
The situation was growing worse. Gardener sincerely hoped not. He liked Gary Close. But bent coppers were no good to anyone. When and if they found the evidence to support it, he would love to know what had driven the young PC. The only conclusion Gardener could come to was his mother Christine.
Gardener’s mobile rang. He recognised the number as Andrew Jackson’s.
“Dr Jackson?” he answered.
“Mr Gardener. I’m just calling about the computers at the hospital. I’m afraid I have no good news for you.”
“I’d still like to hear it.”
“Well, it seems that our machines have been tampered with in some way. The IT guys are still trying to get to the bottom of it. But at the moment, I cannot give you a definite answer as to who performed the surgery on Mr Ronson.”
Gardener was not about to play his hand and let Jackson know that he probably knew already.
“Okay, keep trying. I appreciate what you’re doing.”
The call ended.
Mike Sands, the officer in charge of HOLMES, entered the room.
“Mike?” said Gardener.
He had a piece of paper in his hand. “Something here you might want to see that HOLMES has just thrown out. It’s a receipt from the shop that shows Robert Sinclair bought a stack of wood, fixings, and tools from Armitage about five weeks ago.”
Chapter Forty-nine
Albert Armitage and his wife lived in a dormer bungalow out on the old Bramfield Road, halfway between Bramfield and Bursley Bridge. Gardener and Reilly had to negotiate a tree-lined drive, which eventually led to a double garage before they saw the place. To their left was a well-maintained garden with a colourful display of flowers and shrubs. Each window of the bungalow had blinds, and Gardener suspected that being in the business, he would see a lot of Armitage’s handiwork inside.
The old man opened the front door and greeted them. He was dressed in a plain blue shirt, paisley patterned jumper, and a pair of cream trousers.
“Mr Gardener, Mr Reilly. Come on through, the wife and me were just having us afternoon glass of wine in the conservatory.”
They followed him through the house and, as Gardener had suspected, unique, hand-crafted furniture was evident in each of the rooms. They were offered a seat on cane furniture, and the view from the conservatory was pleasant: another large garden full of shrubs and flowers and, at the back, apple and pear trees.
Mrs Armitage nodded and poured them both a cold soft drink whether they wanted it or not and left the room, informing her husband she was going to put the dinner on.
“Lovely place, Mr Armitage,” said Gardener. “I can see it’s very well kept.”
Armitage sipped his wine, and then sat back and folded his arms.
“Any nearer to catching the killer? It’s not that Lance bloke, is it?” he said.
“We are following a number of leads, one of which has brought us here.”
“And what might that be?” asked Armitage.
“The last time we spoke to you, one of the questions we asked was whether or not you’d had any people asking for strange or unusual tools.”
“I remember you asking, but like I said, I hadn’t. There’s that many tools on the market these days that are strange and unusual in their design, but at the end of the day, they’re made that way for a reason. What are you getting at?”
Gardener passed over a copy of the receipt he’d taken from Mike Sands of the HOLMES team. Everything was itemized, and the list ranged from basic screws and nuts and bolts, to all manner of fancy brackets and hinges. There was a lot of wood, and a number of power tools. The final figure came to a little under seven hundred and fifty pounds.
Armitage studied it and then handed it back.
“I do remember that.”
“Do you remember who purchased it all?”
“Mr Sinclair.”
“Did you not think it unusual for a doctor to ask for such stuff?” asked Reilly.
“I wouldn’t have thought so. Perhaps he had a DIY hobby. Why do you ask?”
“Doctors are pretty rich by most standards, surely they could just employ other people to do that kind of work for them?” offered Gardener.
“I think you’ll find junior doctors disagreeing with you, Mr Gardener.”
“Did you ask him what it was for?”
“Well, as a matter of fact, I did, a big order like that.”
“What did he tell you?” asked Reilly.
“It was for a patient of his who suffered chronic back pain. He’d had it for years. Most of the national health doctors couldn’t be bothered to spend the time to really find out what it was. Going private was beyond his pockets, but someone suggested Sinclair.”
“He volunteered all this information? Did he give you the patient’s name?”
“No. And I didn’t ask. You know what they’re like, all this patient confidentiality claptrap. I can understand that for a lot of things. I wouldn’t have thought he’d be giving away any secrets. I might even have known the bloke, but I couldn’t think of anyone local who fitted the bill.
“He showed you drawings?”
“Yes. He told me how it worked and how it was designed, and he wanted my opinion, wanted to know if I could spot anything that he’d missed.”
“And could you?”
“Not really. But I’m not a doctor. As far as I could see it was well designed and would probably do what he wanted.”
“What did it look like?” asked Gardener.
“A bloody great frame. Looked to me like you stood up in it. There was nothing to lay down on, so I don’t really see how it could help someone with back pain. But, like I said, I’m not a doctor, and a mind like his is something you can’t argue with.”
Gardener wouldn’t disagree. “Did he say where he was taking it, once it was finished?”
“No, but it was probably his private clinic. It didn’t look the sort of thing to me that you could have in your house. Not in a normal house, anyway.”
Armitage had made a good point. The clinic was one obvious place, but then again so was Sinclair’s house. A number of people had indicated how big it was. If it had a big cellar, then that might be the perfect place to keep someone. Especially if they were trussed up in a frame.
Lance Hobson came to mind. Gardener figured it was a logical conclusion now to think that Sinclair was their murderer, and that he had Hobson, who’d probably had nothing to do with the death of Knight, Wilson, or Ronson.
“Thank you, Mr Armitage, you’ve been most helpful.”
Both detectives rose to leave, and Armitage showed them to the front door.
Gardener turned. “Just one more question. Did you deliver the material, or did he have it collected?”
“He had it collected, Mr Gardener.”
“Did he collect it himself?”
“No. A friend of his, white van, big enough for everything in one go. I remember saying to Alex at the time to be careful with it all.”
How ironic, thought Gardener. Alex had even helped with his own demise.
“Thank you, Mr Armitage. We know where to find you if we need anything else.”
“Before you go, it’s my turn for one more question. Do you really think Sinclair is behind my nephew’s death?”
“Right now, Mr Armitage, he’s just helping us with our inquiries.”
Gardener and Reilly left the shopkeeper at his front door and jumped in the car. Within ten minutes they were back at the station.
* * *
Cragg and Williams were sitting together in the incident room, each holding a cup of tea in one hand, and a sandwich in the other. Both men were chewing in silence, probably thinking about everything that had happened in the space of two days.
Gardener’s team had also chosen to take five minutes. He noticed Thornton and Anderson outside, both smoking. The rest had succumbed to the afternoon cup of tea ritual. But he couldn’t blame them. Once again, he realized he had not eaten since breakfast. It’s funny how he could go about his daily business without a thought for food, until he saw someone else eating.
“Mr Gardener,” said Cragg. “Come and help yourself, sir.”
He pointed to a tray of tea with one or two remaining sandwiches. “I know your sergeant won’t need telling twice.”
Gardener did as he was asked. The tea was only warm at best, but the sandwich was roast beef and top quality, judging by the taste.
Gardener told them what Armitage had to say. He then asked what they had come up with.
David Williams went first. “Graham Johnson had stayed the night at Sinclair’s house. But the housekeeper thinks they parted on bad terms. She heard raised voices, a slamming door, and a few minutes later, his van start up. When she next saw Robert Sinclair, he had a nasty bruise on the side of his face. She thought better than to ask.”
“Another piece of evidence,” said Gardener, enjoying the sandwich. “Johnson spending the night with Sinclair goes some way to proving that they were in it together, as far as I’m concerned.”
“It certainly looks like it,” said Williams. “As far as I can see, Graham Johnson was the electrical genius, and Robert Sinclair the medical man. Both had a motive to kill. One had lost a sister, and the other a wife.”
“And when you put Adam’s death into the equation,” said Cragg, taking a gulp of his tea, “both of them had lost another family member.”
“Both had the knowledge and could help each other out,” added Williams.
“The only unusual thing about that was Sinclair allowing Johnson to help,” said Gardener.
“What makes you say that?” asked Williams.
“If you consider everything that’s happened, in my opinion, it would take a true psychopath to invest the time and the money in research and development to kidnap and operate on potential targets.”
“And if anyone had the time, the money, and everything he needed, it was Sinclair,” said Reilly.
“Maurice? Phone calls?” he asked, changing the subject.
“Yes. We’ve pulled out all the stops.” He consulted his notes. “The one that Gary got at three o’clock came from Armitage’s landline in the shop.”
“That pretty much seals it for me.”
“It will when I play you these.”
“Play me what?”
Cragg moved over to an ancient tape recorder. It was an old mono ITT machine like Gardener used to have when he was a child. Very basic, but it did the job.
“Armitage had an answering machine installed. It took some time to find because it wasn’t next to the phone. It was hidden in one of the cupboards in that bloody great unit across the back wall.”
Cragg switched on the machine. The first voice they heard was Sinclair, informing Gary Close that it had all been taken care of, and Gary could start the ball rolling. They heard Gary’s part of the conversation when he was asking three hours to what, and demanding to know who was calling him.
He’d acted well. Each man in the room seemed as gutted as Gardener.
“The second conversation is when Gary called Sinclair from the landline in the shop, while he was investigating. That was around 3:40 in the morning.”
They listened to Gary Close informing Sinclair that he’d done his part.
The writing was on the wall. The evidence was all there for them.
“SOCO found that tape recorder and brought it straight here, just after you’d left to go and see Armitage. I called him myself a few minutes ago. You two were on your way back. He told me he’d installed the machine so as he didn’t miss any calls, but also so as he could listen back in case of discrepancies. It was just a better way of keeping the customer happy, he reckoned.”
“Good old Armitage,” said Gardener.
Thornton and Anderson had returned to the incident room, a slight smell of cigarettes enshrouding them. He had Cragg play the tape again for their benefit.
He had all the team together. “Full steam ahead lads. We need to find Gary Close and Robert Sinclair. Who knows, we might even find Lance Hobson in the middle of all this mess.”
Chapter Fifty
“I want a word with you!”
Gary Close had spent three hours at the Foundation. He’d been in terrible shock when he’d first heard the news that his mother had actually died. Guilt followed. He’d begun to wonder whether or not he could have done more himself. Had he let her down? Even if he hadn’t let her down, he had certainly been let down by the one man who’d said he could save her.
Anger now replaced any other emotion.
The staff had been terrific with him, but he’d told them about an hour ago that he would like to go home. What he had done instead was sit in his car in the car park and wait for Robert Sinclair, the man who’d led him to believe that everything would be okay. He’d known the surgeon would return at some point, and he’d been prepared to wait all
night if necessary. The longer he’d waited, the more infuriated he’d become.
After he stepped out and locked his car, Sinclair turned to meet Gary’s intense stare.
“Gary. I’m sorry.”
Gary Close thought he must have been hearing things. His mother had died yesterday – not today, but last night – and no attempt had been made to inform him of that. And all Sinclair could say was sorry. That didn’t cut any ice with Gary.
In fact, the man hadn’t even called and asked him to make a mercy dash so he could be at his dying mother’s bedside, like any normal surgeon in any other hospital would have done. He’d told Gary that she was still asleep, and there would be no point in visitors. How bad, not to mention unethical, was that?
While Gary’s thoughts had festered in his mind, he failed to notice that Sinclair had walked towards the building.
Gary followed him. “Hey, I’m talking to you.”
Sinclair stopped and faced him. “Then have the common decency to do so inside.”
“And you’d know all about decency, wouldn’t you? My mother dies, and you don’t tell me till the day after. In fact, come to think of it, you never told me at all. Still want to preach about common decency?”
Sinclair kept walking, leaving Gary to talk to his back. Gary stopped and stared as Sinclair kept walking through the front door, closing it on Gary behind him.
What the fuck is he on, thought Gary. But then, what could he expect?
The young PC followed Sinclair all the way down the corridor, past glaring, disbelieving staff, into the surgeon’s office. Sinclair laid his suitcase on his desk before turning to face Close.
“Don’t you dare walk away from me anymore!” shouted Gary.
“And don’t raise your voice to me, Mr Close.”
Gary noted the change immediately. The surgeon had not used his first name. Suddenly, it was Mr Close. Now he had what he wanted.
Gary took a step towards the desk.
“Didn’t you hear me? My mother died. Do you have anything to say for yourself?”
“Should I?” replied Sinclair.
That sentence stopped Gary’s thought processes. If he didn’t know any better, he’d say that he had been taken over by some alien life force. He was a totally different man.
