A Killing in the Family

by David W Robinson

  So far, everything Joe had heard made sense. “It must have cost a pretty penny?”

  Rodney shrugged miserably. “I said, Katya dealt with that.”

  “So how did you fake the DNA report?” Driscoll asked.

  “Katya had had a DNA analysis done a couple of months before. I don’t know why. But she had her report which let her set up a fake, blank sheet on her laptop. After that, it was simply a case of a little research and filling in those blanks.”

  “But the blood samples, yours and the old man’s must have gone to this Descant Laboratories,” Joe objected. “The final report would have been sent to Sir Douglas. How did you stop him getting it?”

  “I didn’t. Katya did. The mail always arrives early in this house. Alistair leaves it on the hall table for people to collect their own. Katya is an early riser. She kept an eye open for the envelope. She’d had a test done with this lab, remember, so she knew what it looked like. When it came, she took it. The following morning, she put our fake report on the hall table for the old man to find.” Asquith’s features darkened again. “She told me she’d shredded the original.”

  “She may have done,” Joe said. “The one I found is a photocopy.”

  “So the numbers on both reports—”

  “Faked, I suppose,” Rodney interrupted Driscoll. “Although the one she had may be a copy of the real one. I don’t know. Faking them up isn’t difficult if you know what a real report looks like, and remember, she had had an analysis done so she knew exactly what it would look like. And do you think the old man would see a DNA analysis of his own blood and argue with it? He knows less about it than I do, and I don’t know much. Without asking his doctor, he wouldn’t know the difference, and why would he ask his doctor? He’d already checked out this Descant Laboratories. I mean, would you go to your GP if you’d had a report from a company like that, and it told you what you’d expected to hear?”

  Rodney paused to see if they would answer. When neither man did, he smiled broadly.

  “All Katya had to do was make sure enough of the columns matched, and the names in the summaries fitted the bill: Sir Douglas and me.” His smiling face turned to a mask of anguish. “Why the hell did she keep a copy of the real report?”

  “Because she didn’t entirely trust you, is why,” Joe speculated. “You had a quarter of a million of Sir Douglas’s money, and she wanted to be sure she’d get her share. If not, she’d bubble you.”

  “And drop herself in it?” Rodney retorted. “I don’t think so.”

  It was a problem to which Joe had struggled to find an answer.

  Driscoll chose to ignore it. “You got greedy, though, didn’t you? A quarter of a million wasn’t enough. When Katya told you that you were included in his will, and you’d cop for a few million, you decided it was time to ice him and collect. Didn’t you?”

  “No.” Rodney rammed his fist down theatrically on the chair arm. “I keep telling you, I had nothing to do with Friday night.” He stared at them, willing them to believe him. “I’d had a quarter of a million off him. It was enough. I didn’t want any more. We split it fifty-fifty. I had a hundred and twenty-five grand in the bank, I could go to Europe, and even though the scam would probably have come to light at some point, no one would ever find me. Katya said she would carry on working here and finish the family history, and then she’d disappear too, and if everything came to light in the meantime, she’d plead innocent. She would insist that I’d pulled the wool over her eyes, too. I wasn’t worried because I knew no one would ever find me.”

  “So what went wrong?” Joe demanded. “You’d had your money, why didn’t you leave as you’d planned?”

  Rodney sighed again. “The old man again. He wouldn’t hear of it when I said I had to go back to Birmingham. He insisted I stay for his seventy-fifth birthday. What could I do? I came to him with this story of looking for my long lost father, I’d found him, and when he was celebrating three quarters of a century, I was ready to do a runner again? I had to stay.” His eyes burned into them once more. “But I did not attack him.”

  His pleas received only blank stares by return.

  “I’m not stupid,” he pleaded. “All right, so I was scamming the old boy, but I’m not daft. If Friday night hadn’t happened, would you have twigged all this?”

  Joe ran the idea through his mind and had to agree, but he was not about to say so. “Maybe, maybe not. But you tell us, what would Katya gain out of killing the old man?”

  “She could have pinned it on me,” Rodney yelped. “And she bloody well has, hasn’t she?”

  “But that isn’t going to get her the one hundred and twenty-five grand that’s left in your account, is it?” Joe persisted.

  “True but she’s had her cut and done a runner, hasn’t she? What does she care? And I know why she’s gone.”

  The response brought Joe up short. “What?”

  “You don’t know this family. I tell you, the Spanish Inquisition have nothing on them. I don’t know what happened the other night, but I’m certain she was the one who planted the knife in the old man’s shoulder. She didn’t kill him and that’s why she’s gone. She wasn’t gonna hang around to wait for the Ballantynes to get their claws into her.” Rodney glared at Driscoll. “They’d have left nothing for you to prosecute.” He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m guilty of fraud, deception, whatever you want to call it, but I did not attack Sir Douglas, and it was never a part of my plans. You need to find Katya and speak to her.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sergeant Hollis led Rodney from the room and when the door closed, Joe accepted a round of cynical applause from Driscoll.

  “A skilful bit of lying, Murray.”

  “Lying? Me?” Joe put on a face of pure innocence.

  “When you told him your girlfriend had found the empty office.”

  Joe laughed. “That wasn’t lying. That was second-guessing the truth. If you get onto the West Midlands Police, I’m certain they will find an empty office there. You also need them to talk to Descant Laboratories and find out if they really did run a DNA test on Katya, and if so, who ordered it. Maddy offered to contact them, but—”

  The inspector finished his tea and interrupted. “They wouldn’t tell her.”

  Joe laughed again. “That’s exactly what I said about the Maitland Hotel, and she told me I was underestimating the power of celebrity status.” His smile faded and he chewed anxiously at his lip. “Trouble is, I’ve dragged her into this for nothing. We didn’t really need her research skills.”

  “I don’t know about that. She dragged you off to Manchester, didn’t she? It might have taken us weeks to get round to that hotel receipt.” Now Driscoll laughed. “Take her out to dinner, then give her a good seeing to, and I’m sure she’ll forgive you.”

  His mind filled with memories of the previous night, Joe could not find a sufficiently bland reply, so he left the talking to the inspector.

  “You never brought up the Maitland Hotel,” the inspector pointed out.

  “Didn’t think it was relevant. Chances are, it was Katya using the credit card, not Rodney, and judging by all he said, there was too much he didn’t know about the overall set up. I think she probably met Annabelle Immerman there.”

  “All right. What about Asquith? I’m sure he’s guilty.”

  “I wish I was,” Joe murmured. “This is driving me nuts. I can see ways in which Rodney and Katya may have worked together on the assault, but there’s too much of it which doesn’t make sense.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like the threatening notes for a start off.”

  “They may not be relevant. Maybe someone was playing a sick joke and maybe Katya and Rodney found out about it and used it to their advantage. I told you. Her dabs are on those notes… well, we think they’re hers.”

  “Are Rodney’s?”

  “Not as far as we can tell,” Driscoll replied, “which rather demonstrates my point
, doesn’t it? Katya knew about the notes. She’d seen and handled them.”

  “Maybe she decided to use them to help incriminate Rodney.” Even as he said it Joe knew he was wrong and quickly followed up before Driscoll could point out the flaw in the idea. “No. She’d be implicating herself, too.” He raised his eyebrows at the inspector. “You don’t have a line on her yet?”

  The inspector shook a doleful head. “Not a peep. And when news gets out that we’ve arrested Asquith, you can bet she won’t put her head above water again.”

  “And when she does it’ll be under a different name,” Joe agreed. He got to his feet. “Well, I’ll leave you with that and let you know if Maddy comes up with anything… oh. While I think on. Did you get your guys into the woods again?”

  Driscoll yawned disinterestedly. “They’re out there now. Been there an hour or more. So far, nothing, but they reckon it’s like the Burma jungle in those trees. And those paths you talked about aren’t so clear as you might think.”

  “In that case, Katya could have snagged her clothing or something and left a bit of evidence behind, couldn’t she?”

  “Well, she certainly isn’t camping in there.” Driscoll, too, stood up. “I’d better see about getting Asquith down to the station so I can question him under caution. Thanks, Murray. I still think you’re a pain in the backside, but at least you managed to draw him out.”

  “No problem. Assuming we can’t get anywhere further, we’re away home tomorrow morning. I take it you’ll have no objections?”

  The inspector led the way out of the study. “None at all. We know where to get in touch if we need you in court.”

  Once outside the room, Driscoll locked the door while Joe made his way around the staircase and into the drawing room where he found only Verity, sitting quietly in the background, reading her Bible. Unwilling to get into what he imagined would be a lengthy, and absurdly biased questions and answer session with her, he passed straight through the room and out onto the terrace where Sheila and Brenda were sat with Hermione.

  With a nod of greeting to the eldest Ballantyne daughter, he joined them.

  “Have you made much progress, Mr Murray?” Hermione asked.

  He nodded. “A little. But unfortunately, it’s not in the direction your father asked me to investigate.”

  “You’ve demonstrated that Rodney Asquith is a fake, Joe?”

  Brenda’s question was phrased more like a statement, and it surprised Joe. “As it happens, yes, but how did you know?”

  “The grapevine here is far superior to the Sanford 3rd Age Club.” Sheila chuckled. “Serena asked Sergeant Hollis what was going on and he told her. Hermione has just told us.”

  Joe grunted. “Asquith did compare the Ballantyne family to the Inquisition.” Before Hermione could take offence, he went on, “Where is Serena?”

  “The hospital, with Toby,” Hermione replied. “Father has improved enough to be moved from high dependency to a private room.”

  Joe seized on the information. “Does he have any memory of the attack?”

  “I don’t know. And I shouldn’t think he’ll be in any state to answer questions on it, yet.” Hermione’s stern tones were unmistakably rebuking. “Mr Murray—”

  “You know, there are a couple of things about this whole business which bother me,” he interrupted as rudely as he could. “Those notes. Particularly their reference to Lammas.”

  “You’re trying to infer that I had a hand in them, simply because I am a historian.”

  “If the cap fits.” Joe shrugged and his two companions cringed. When Hermione did not immediately respond, Joe pressed further. “I meanersay, you’re the history buff. You must know all about the Pendle witches and their evil practices.”

  “With every word you speak, you demonstrate your total and utter ignorance,” Hermione chided him. “To enlighten you, Lammas is a Catholic and Anglican feast day… or rather it was. I don’t suppose it’s widely observed these days. It was recognised as the first harvest festival of the year, when parishioners were expected to bring a loaf of bread, baked from the new crop, so that it could be blessed.”

  Joe open his mouth to protest, but Hermione talked right on.

  “Furthermore, I have no interest in its relevance to neo-paganism, but I can tell you that it is not black magic. And for your further information, like everyone else in his area, I am familiar with the legends of Demdike, and Alizon Device and her family. In my private and professional opinion, they are a lot of nonsense, but consistent with most of the nonsense of those puritanical times. However, witchcraft is not my specialist area of study. I concentrate on the War of the Roses, which, I have to say, you seem intent upon starting all over again. Finally, the mere idea that I would threaten my father’s life, is as absurd as the notion that Verity or Toby would do so.” Hermione glowered at him. “If you want to find the author of those notes, Mr Murray, I suggest you look no further than the man Inspector Driscoll has under arrest right now.”

  As the tirade expired, Joe waited to see if she had more to say. When she did not, he launched his counter attack.

  “Forget your history for a minute, and wrap your educated brain around this. Why would a scammer like Rodney send the notes to your father? He’s sneaked his way into your family by the back door, landed himself a quarter of a million quid, and all he has to do is hold his nerve until after today and he’s away a damn sight wealthier than when he turned up. He may be a lot of things, but he is not an idiot, so why would he draw attention to his activities? Huh?”

  Spots of colour came to Hermione’s cheeks. “I have no idea. And quite frankly, I don’t care. It’s enough for me to know that he is guilty and the police have him under arrest.”

  Joe ignored the outrage again. “Tell me about your prescription medicine, Hermione. Am I right in thinking they’re Doselupin and Zolpidem?”

  Hermione was equal to the task. “Jeffrey told me you’d been asking. The answer is yes on both counts. However, before you press any further, let me tell you I am missing none of mine.”

  Joe nodded. “And no one else in the house takes those particular drugs?”

  “To my knowledge, no. But they may need them by the time you’re through. Now, if you will excuse me.” She rose and nodded briefly to Sheila and Brenda before departing the table.

  Brenda watched her leave, then gave her boss a cynical round of applause. “Well done, Joe. I always knew you had it in you. You managed to get so far up her nose, you were picking her brains.”

  “And you think I care? Listen to me; the cops have Rodney banged to rights for trying to scam his way into a huge heap of cash. He’s admitted it and I don’t have a problem with it. But they’re sticking the rest of this business on him, and everyone is just too happy to go along with that, even though it makes no sense.”

  “Oh, what are we going to do with you?” Sheila chuckled. “The reason it makes no sense, Joe, is because you don’t have all the information. When everything comes out in the wash, it will make perfect sense. You wait and see.”

  ***

  Constable Graham Dickson had had better days.

  Joining the police service had been his life’s ambition. At the age of twenty-two, he was still a probationer. He had been in the uniform for a full year, and the job was not like he imagined it would be.

  In his daydreams, he had seen himself as the great detective, the Chief Inspector Morse of the Lancashire Constabulary. He realised, of course, that he had to work his way up to that elevated rank, but his reveries had edited out those years of pounding the beat and learning his craft. They had cast him in at the deep end throwing out orders to his sergeant, organising SOCOs, applying devastating logic to unmask a murderer, even organising a team of uniformed men and women on woodland searches.

  He had never put himself in the position of actually searching a forest for evidence that a missing woman might have passed this way. And yet, here he was fighting his way through what must
be the thickest woodland in this part of the county. He had been in this blasted forest for the better part of three hours, and it was the second time in just over twenty-four hours.

  “This time, you’re looking to follow specific trails through the woods, trails that will lead you to the far retaining wall of the Ballantyne property,” Inspector Driscoll had ordered them. “There is a strong suspicion that Katya Nolan may have made her escape by such a route, so you’re looking for even the tiniest trace of her. Bitta torn clothing, items she may have dropped or discarded on her way. And watch your step. Apparently there’s a stream running through those woods.”

  As it happened, the only thing Dickson had found was the stream, and that was by accident. Like everything else in these damned woods, it was overgrown and practically invisible. He found it when he put his right foot in it, and fell over, soaking his trouser leg.

  Struggling and stumbling his way towards the wall, and then back, his alter-ago, Chief Inspector Dickson mulled the chances of Katya Nolan making her escape this way and came to the obvious conclusion. Battling her way through these woods at night, with or without a torch, classified her as several pennies short of the full pound, and the entire search was a waste of time and manpower.

  Contrary to his daydreams, his time with the police had not been entirely happy. On his very first day at the station, people had greeted him with a salute, a broad grin and the words, ‘Evening all’. Dickson did not understand the joke until he asked his mother and she told him it was related to some TV series from yesteryear. Even she could barely remember Dixon of Dock Green, so he looked it up on the Internet. His complaints that his name was spelled differently only made matters worse, and eventually he had to settle for being the butt of other officers’ ragged sense of humour.

  And it wasn’t just his colleagues. The older lags in the Burnley area remembered the series too, and he suffered the same tortuous ribbing from them.

  Jokes aside, the job was not how it was supposed to be. He’d had a year of pounding beats, twelve months of trying to sort fights between drunks and junkies, listening to little old ladies complaining about tearaways nicking their wheelie bins for street racing, or running in thieves who had helped themselves to overpriced T-shirts, jeans or trainers from the shopping malls. Taking it all round, PC Dickson was not best pleased to be a copper, and struggling his way through thick woodland on a scorching Sunday afternoon had brought him to the point where an alternative career as a security guard at the frozen food plant was looking more and more appealing.