“I’m DI Ianthe Seymour of Sussex Police and this is DC John Ryan. I’m afraid we’re here on an inquiry into the murder of one of your employees.”
Mr Bates blanched visibly.
“Murder? First thing I hear about it. One of our people has been murdered you say?”
“Indeed. Mr Bert Devos unfortunately was murdered in Brighton last Monday night. We understand that he was one of your employees, working most of the time from home.”
Conor Bates frowned.
“Bert Devos? The name sounds familiar, but I can’t say I personally know him. That doesn’t mean anything of course,” he added hastily. “We have close to five hundred people working for Nokia in the UK and most of these never even come to the office. So, unless he’s been working on a critical project, there would have been no need for us to get acquainted. Do you mind if I call our HR person to come over and perhaps bring his file?”
Without waiting for a response, he picked up a desk phone and pushed a speed dial button.
“Hey Clarisse, it’s Conor. I’m in meeting room ‘Mars’ with two police offers who have some questions regarding our Mr Bert Devos. Can you please join us here and bring his file?” He waited for the answer, then frowned. “Yes, Devos, Bert Devos. I’m certain about the name. Just come down here.”
He put down the phone.
“Now that is a little weird, but Clarisse will explain.”
Just a few seconds later, a young lady in a black business suit entered carrying a file.
“This is Clarisse Harrigan, our HR person. Clarisse, these are the two police officers I was talking about. Please tell them what you know.”
“This is a bit special I must say. You wanted to know about Bert Devos?” she nervously said.
They nodded.
“Well, I’m afraid we don’t have a Bert Devos with Nokia UK.”
Seeing their surprise, she added: “That is to say, not any longer. We used to have a Bert Devos with us, but he was made redundant a while ago already.”
“When was that?” Ianthe wanted to know.
She consulted her file.
“That was already about two years ago, I see. Bert Devos from Lewes, Sussex.”
“Can I see that file please?” she asked.
She hesitated, looking at Conor Bates, who nodded, then handed the file to Ianthe, who looked at the picture stapled to the first page.
“It’s him all right. As you say, ‘special’ does not even cover it. All right. Can you tell us anything about him? Why was he let go? Was there any bad blood between him and anyone at the company that you are aware of?”
“Nothing worth knowing,” Clarisse answered. “He was made redundant as part of the restructuring we did at the time which was imposed on Nokia UK by international management out of Finland. There is absolutely nothing negative or even worth mentioning in his file that I see. A plain vanilla employee.”
“Did you any of you know him personally?” John added.
“No? Can we speak to someone who did know him personally or was his entire department let go?”
“He was mainly working in an international environment. His manager was based in the US. Unfortunately, he was let go at the same time. But give me a few minutes and I will try find someone who used to be in that department and might remember him. I will ask reception to bring you some tea while you wait.”
They both went out. Ianthe and John looked at each other in astonishment. What had been going on with Bert Devos?
*
They were sipping their tea when Conor Bates and Clarisse Harrigan returned with a Steven Murphy and someone who introduced himself as being in the Nokia legal department. Mr Murphy had known Bert Devos and even had been a close colleague of his, but there was absolutely nothing he could add that they had not been aware of yet. Bert Devos had obviously been a very ordinary employee, with a well-known passion for sailing. He had never been in any trouble with the company or one of its employees. He had been on the occasional business trip to the continent, but very rarely. He had been let go with a sizeable package as he had been with the company for over twenty years, but nothing even approaching the kind of money that would be required for the house he was living in now.
“What do we do now, guv’,” John asked when they were walking back to her car.
“I think Mrs Devos has some more explaining to do. We’ll go there first.”
*
At two thirty-nine she parked on the kerb of the road in front of Josephine Devos’s house. They walked up to the front door. Josephine Devos answered almost instantly.
“I’m afraid we have some more questions for you, Josephine,” Ianthe said. “Can we please come in?”
They were led into the lounge again.
“Can I offer you a cup of tea?” Josephine asked.
“Yes please,” Ianthe answered. “Earl Grey if you happen to have it, no sugar but a wee bit of milk please.”
“I’ll take mine black,” John added.
While Josephine was in the kitchen preparing tea, Ianthe took her time looking at the pictures on the sideboard and on the walls. They were mainly pictures of Bert, Josephine and their two children. There was one picture of the family on Polaris, at sea. When she was looking at that one, Josephine returned with the tea.
“I see you sometimes went sailing with your husband and children,” Ianthe remarked.
“Hardly ever,” she answered. “That picture was on the one trip we went on together to Cowes. A year or so ago. But Helen, our daughter, was sick almost the whole trip. You can see it even in the picture. She does look a bit peevish, doesn’t she?”
“You’re all four in it. Who took the picture?”
“It was just the four of us. Bert used one of those selfie sticks.”
They settled on the white leather designer couch again.
“Right. Josephine, were you aware of the fact that Bert had been let go by Nokia?”
Josephine looked back at her incomprehensively.
“What do you mean ‘let go’, inspector?”
“He has been made redundant almost two years ago.”
“He was fired, ma’am,” John offered more bluntly.
It finally dawned on her.
“That … that’s impossible! He never told me anything like that. He was promoted two years ago!”
“We just went to Reading and spoke with his manager, Josephine,” Ianthe added.
“He has not been working for Nokia for almost two years. Can you think of any reason why he wouldn’t have told you? I’m sorry that I need to ask but was everything going well in your marriage?”
“We had the issues every couple has I think, but it was all right. He loved his children, he loved me. We were planning to go on a holiday to the Maldives together this summer!”
Ianthe knew all about ‘issues’ she thought, but it did sound genuine.
“Do you know if he had something going on on the side? A second job perhaps he didn’t want to tell you about?”
Josephine shook her head.
“Then where would you say he got his money from?”
“I have absolutely no idea, inspector. I’m as baffled as you must be. This is all completely new to me. Bert took care of our finances and I just assumed it was all fine and good. It was he who suggested to buy this house, the cars and all this, not I.”
Ianthe saw she would not get anywhere further here. They got up.
“All right, Josephine. You have my number if anything comes to mind. We’ll be in touch as soon as we have more information.”
*
The sun was out at last when they were walking back to the car, the elm trees in front casting their gloomy shadow over Josephine Devos’s Jag.
“Do you believe her, John,” Ianthe asked.
“It did sound genuine to me,” he answered. “But it’s more than a bit funny he could have made all this money to buy this house, those cars, maintain a boat without her ever questioning his newfound
wealth.”
“Indeed. She either is lying, or she never questioned him about his job, his promotion. He was on his boat like all the time, according to the harbour master. How can she not have wondered what sort of job would allow him to do that? Or she was incredibly naïve.”
Ianthe’s phone rang. It was Ben. Ajanta and he were back at Malling House starting to go through CCTV. The canvassing in Prince Edward’s Road had generated no results at all. All the neighbours had confirmed the picture of Bert Devos as a nice middle-aged gentleman, a soft spoken and hardworking professional.
“We’ll go back to Malling House then to think it all through. We see each other at five. Please don’t be late.”
“I won’t,” John answered. “I’ll give Ben and Ajanta a hand with the CCTV if there is time.”
They drove back chatting about Brighton, Sussex and motorcycles. John found he actually started to like DI Ianthe Seymour. Vik had never treated him as an equal, always insisting John called him ‘Inspector’. And he was annoyingly patronizing whereas Ianthe obviously appreciated his participation in interviews. John also respected the direct, uncompromising and yet considerate way she held herself in meetings. And he found her quite attractive, too, he had to admit, despite the rather dull way she dressed. Yes, John did like Ianthe Seymour.
CHAPTER 10
“It is now five pm on Wednesday 15 May and this is our second briefing for Operation Blackbird,” Ianthe started. “Our inquiry into the murder of Bert Devos on his boat in Brighton Marina last Monday night. We now know that Bert Devos had been fired by his employer two years ago and it is a mystery how he got the necessary funds for his family’s sort of lifestyle. His widow Josephine was not aware of this, or so she says. She claims Bert did all the family’s finances. Ajanta, can you please look into their finances asap? You may need a warrant for that.” She nodded and made a note on her pad. Using an in-character red mont-blanc rollerball pen, of course, Ianthe smiled.
“Ben, anything from your side?”
“Nothing beyond what I told you on the phone, boss. Mr Devos spent a lot of time on his boat, either in the marina or on the water. He went sailing commonly during the week, including regular overnight trips. Infrequently took guests, who might or might not have been paying, but definitely insufficient to explain his affluence. By all and sundry considered a nice bloke who didn’t offer a lot of information about himself. I also spoke with Laverne just before the briefing. Nothing came up there either.”
“As you asked, Ianthe,” Ajanta continued, “we did some canvassing of the Devos’s neighbourhood in Lewes. The picture that Ben just described was confirmed by all their neighbours. Obviously, they had not been living for awfully long in that area, but everyone we spoke to considered them a nice family, quite unremarkable in fact. Everyone seemed shocked at what had happened. We left our cards with them but I very much doubt anyone will be calling us. We made a start on the CCTV that is available, working backwards from Monday. So far nothing interesting has come up. There is a lot of information from the weekend though, and I’m afraid we may miss something valuable.”
“Understood,” Ianthe replied. “The super has sanctioned the CCTV to be analysed as well by the face recognition software of the Met. Let’s hope they will be able to come up with something meaningful. I’m not too optimistic however. Geoff, anything new from forensics?” she asked Geoff Simmons, the SOCO senior officer who had also joined.
“Absolutely,” he said. Everyone sat up in their chair to pay extra attention.
“You remember there was an exceptionally large sample of fibres, hairs and fingerprints to be examined. The bad news is that disappointingly none of the fingerprints came back with a hit from our database. But what is extremely interesting is that we found traces of a controlled substance, cocaine to be exact.”
“A significant enough quantity to think of drug smuggling?” Ianthe wanted to know.
“Well it was not an exceptionally large amount, but the location was interesting. Traces were found in the bilges, exactly where one would want to hide stuff from a cursory investigation. If it were recreational use of cocaine, I would have thought to have found them on the table in the saloon or on the chart table, perhaps in the bedrooms, too. So, yes, we must be thinking of drug smuggling.”
“That would of course explain the money. And give us a potential motive,” Ianthe added. “But it leaves a lot of questions to be answered. Anything else there?”
“Not really. The hairs we have examined so far are all from different individuals from a lot of backgrounds.”
“What do you mean by that exactly?”
“There are hairs from all types of people: Caucasian, black people, Asian, far eastern, you name it. But that may not be significant at all with us being in Brighton. It has always been a bit of a melting pot of cultures here.”
“Be that as it may,” John added unexpectedly, “In my experience sailing is a white man’s hobby.”
“That is so totally true,” Ajanta agreed. I don’t know any Asian that sails. And black people generally don’t either, I think,” she said, looking at Ben, who nodded.
“Good thinking, John,” Ianthe said. “That gives us another complication though. If we may assume Bert Devos earned his money smuggling drugs, he must have had accomplices. They might of course be of all racial denominations. Let’s hope the face recognition software may help us there. In any case, I think we have more than sufficient information to search the Devos residence. I’m seeing the bear after we finish here and will ask him to get us a warrant. We’ll better do it at first light. It will be too dark soon. That ok with you Geoff?”
He nodded.
“OK then. Any luck with Mr Devos’s phone records, Ajanta?”
“Not really, guv. I had a look at them but didn’t get anything helpful out of them. There were quite a few calls to and from unknown numbers, probably burner phones, which would be completely in line with the direction our investigation appears to be taking. Beside those, calls and texts to his family mainly. Nothing at all suspicious. The only thing his phone records seem to indicate is that our victim was indeed involved in some unsavoury business. But we assumed as much already.”
“Let’s meet at the Devos residence tomorrow morning at seven. Ben, can you please get the necessary uniforms to help do the search? And get a canine involved as well. Ajanta, as soon as we go in, I want you to take Josephine Devos down here for an official interview. I think we should treat her as a suspect. Make sure there is someone at hand to take care of the children. Agreed? Let’s do it then.”
*
While Ianthe went on her way looking for the superintendent, Geoff took his leave to go inform his team of the impending search. Ben, Ajanta and John remained in the room to continue watching the CCTV.
“So, John,” Ajanta smiled. “Were you on time this morning for your meeting with Ianthe?”
John rolled his eyes at that question.
“No, I thought I was just a wee bit late. It appeared that I was exactly four minutes and twenty-five seconds late. She gave me a piece of her mind! I thought she was going to fire me on the spot. You might have done well to warn me!” John complained.
Ben and Ajanta started laughing.
“Never mind, man,” Ben said. “We’ve all been there. It’s just how she is. She’s got this incredible timepiece that gets the time off a satellite to the nanosecond. That woman is the least patient person I have ever met. I bought myself a radio-controlled watch just to be on the safe side.”
“Mind you,” Ajanta added. “She may be a bit obsessive about it, but she’s not wrong. If everyone would be on time for meetings, life would be easier. And if you want to catch villains, I guess it might come down to a few seconds once in a while.”
“True enough,” Ben commented. “Remember Operation Cello where she found that abducted little girl less than a minute before she would have drowned?”
“Indeed. Better try to be on time to stay on he
r good side. And watch it if she starts this trick with her eyebrows.”
“Eyebrows?” John asked rather baffled.
“She does this little trick where she lifts only one eyebrow, usually her left one. If you see that, it is never good news!”
*
“Drug smuggling, huh?” Detective Superintendent Norman Stokes said thoughtfully.
“So far there are only traces of cocaine found on the boat, but in my opinion, there is sufficient probable cause to warrant a search of the Devos residence to see if we can come up with more. And we need to have a closer look at the family’s finances.”
“I agree. But I’m wondering if we don’t need to involve the Met on this one, Ianthe.”
“I don’t think so, sir,” Ianthe protested. “We don’t really have proof yet that we are dealing with a big drug smuggling ring here. If drugs are involved, it may very well just be a local altercation between criminals. We just have some indications that need further investigation.”
“True. We don’t want to involve the big boys to find out later that this is just some small-time drug business. Let’s do the search tomorrow and have a peek at their finances, as you said, then we see tomorrow or Friday latest if we have cause to involve more people on this. What about the press?”
“Well, I have had a call from Joyce Rindell from the Argus, and I promised to keep her posted. I was planning to return her call after our meeting, just to inform her that we are treating this as a suspicious death, but nothing more than that.”
“All right. It is important to remain on good terms with the press, in particular the Argus, I agree. Joyce is not a bad sort. Duncan has arranged for the press conference tomorrow morning at ten. Your search will be over by then, I presume?”
Ianthe nodded.
“Good. Then we can announce it may or may not be drug related to give them something to think about,” he grinned. “And ask everyone who has seen anything suspicious at Brighton marina, or who has ever sailed with Bert Devos to come forward.”
*
After her meeting with Norman, Ianthe called Joyce to give her an update, making certain she did not mention the drugs at all, nor the fact that hair samples from so many different people had been found on board.
Dead in the Water Page 7
