by Ann Cleeves
‘So he opened a new account in the Grace Darling’s name?’
She nodded. ‘ With the Wallsend and Hallowgate Building Society. We paid in money that didn’t go through the books—small cash donations given by the public, money raised by the kids in informal fund-raising events, that sort of thing. It was used on projects which the trustees might not have approved of. For instance last summer we hired a mime artist to run a workshop and paid him from the account. I suppose it wasn’t strictly honest but there was nothing illegal going on.’
‘You were joint signatory on that account too?’
‘Yes. The banks and building societies insist on two signatures for charitable accounts.’
‘Did you always watch Mr Lynch write the cheque before signing it?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Of course not. You know what it’s like. It’s always a mad house there, always busy. He rushes into my office waving the cheque book. “Sign a couple of cheques for me pet. I’m just on my way into town.” So I sign them.’
‘Without asking what they’re for?’
‘Sometimes,’ she admitted, ‘ if it’s really hectic. Usually he tells me what they’re for—costume hire or transport or to take some supporters for a meal.’
‘You never check?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Of course not.’
‘The building society must send you a statement every six months.’
She shrugged. ‘I suppose so. I’ve never seen it.’
‘Who opens your mail? A secretary?’
‘Oh,’ she said, ‘the trustees don’t believe in paying proper secretaries. We’ve had a series of YTS trainees who leave us just as they’re getting competent.’ She paused. ‘You think Gus was making out the cheques I’d signed to himself?’
‘More probably for cash. That would be less easy to trace.’
‘How much did he get away with then?’ she asked cheerfully. ‘Fifty quid? A hundred? There could never have been much more than that in the account.’
‘Oh, considerably more than that,’ he said. ‘I believe that Mr Lynch paid some sponsorship money into the account. A firm called Northumbria Computing donated ten thousand pounds to the Grace Darling about three years ago.’
‘And you believe he took all that?’ She was astounded.
‘Not all at once,’ Ramsay said. ‘I think he withdrew it in cash. Over a period.’
‘And I signed the bloody cheques,’ she said. ‘What a bastard!’
There was a silence. In her room Anna was playing lyrical and sentimental music. Prue took a knife and a board from a drawer and began violently to chop an onion.
‘It isn’t the theft itself which is of most concern at the moment,’ Ramsay said. ‘It provides a motive, you see, for Mrs Wood’s murder.’
‘You think she found out about it?’ Prue stood, poised for a moment with the knife in her hand. ‘ Do you think that’s why he decided to look for another job?’
‘I think it’s almost certain that she suspected he’d been stealing,’ Ramsay said, almost to himself. ‘She’d have heard from her husband that he wanted to buy the flat in Chandler’s Court. She might even have been on the bench when Lynch was charged with non-payment of the community charge. So she went through the bank statement herself to check. But it all happened years ago. If she’d wanted to get rid of him she’d have done it before now.’
‘But she wouldn’t have wanted to get rid of him!’ Prue was suddenly excited, caught up in the investigation despite herself. ‘Don’t you see, he was the best thing that had ever happened to the Grace Darling. He was a famous actor. Even better, a local famous actor. It meant that we got all the publicity we could handle. It meant that the Grace Darling was successful when other similar projects were closing down. It would be worth ten grand to her to keep him.’
‘So you’re saying that she used the information that he’d been stealing to put pressure on him to stay? A sort of blackmail?’
She nodded.
‘It’s certainly very significant that he only decided to announce his resignation on the day after she died,’ Ramsay said.
‘Does that mean,’ Prue said incredulously, ‘ that you think he killed her?’
‘There’s no evidence,’ he said slowly. ‘ We need more than motive.’ He knew this was all a mistake. He had no right to discuss the case with Prue. He had never been so unprofessional, but he was certain he could trust her discretion. She had information he needed, and he continued: ‘Besides, there’s Gabriella Paston. Where could she fit into all this? Is there any way, do you think, that she could have discovered the fraud?’
‘I don’t know,’ Prue said. ‘I think Gus gave her a contribution towards her RADA audition expenses from the building society account but she’d surely have no way of knowing where it came from. Unless…’ she hesitated.
‘Yes?’
‘Unless Ellen told her. Ellen Paston. She’s a dreadful snoop. I’ve even caught her going through the mail on my desk. It would be hard to keep anything in that place secret from her.’
‘And we know that Gabby met Ellen regularly. It’s marked in her diary.’ It’s all coming together, he thought. At last. Gabby and Ellen met for a gossip. Of course Ellen would pass on her suspicions. There was no more juicy gossip than dishonesty of a famous man. And then Gabby must have acted on it. Surely the contribution towards audition expenses wasn’t all she received from Lynch. There was the five hundred pounds which started her savings account. It couldn’t be coincidence that both murder victims had blackmailed the director.
‘All the same,’ Prue said. ‘I can’t believe it of Gus Lynch. He wouldn’t have the guts.’
She stood up and rinsed mushrooms under the tap, then returned to the board to slice them.
‘You do understand,’ he said awkwardly, ‘that this is all confidential. I’m sorry. I’ve put you in an unfair position. You have to work with the man. But I must ask you to keep it secret.’
‘Oh,’ she said lightly. ‘I’ve always been good at secrets. Are you going home? To your cottage in Heppleburn? I should like to see it some time.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Back to the police station. There’s still work to do. It won’t be long, I hope, now.’ He touched her shoulder clumsily, but there was no invitation to his cottage and she thought she had made a fool of herself. He was only interested in her as a means of clearing up his case.
Back at Hallowgate police station Ramsay wondered why he had not asked Prue to come to Heppleburn. He would like to have shown her the cottage. He was busy but he could have made some vague, friendly gesture. He decided that a sort of superstition had prevented him. He did not have a good record in protecting the women he came close to in murder cases. He wanted to keep her safe and when the investigation was over he would make his move.
The telephone rang. It was Hunter reporting on the surveillance operation outside the Pastons’ house. He had called it off now, he said. The van would cause suspicion if it were parked there after dark. Especially if it was there in the morning with all the wheels still on.
‘How did it go?’ Ramsay asked. He thought his interest now was academic. Gus Lynch must be his most likely suspect.
‘It was like St James’s Park on Derby match day, kids in and out all afternoon. And one of the visitors might interest you.’
‘Who was it?’ He tried to sound excited to humour Hunter.
‘John Powell. Now what do you make of that?’
Chapter Fifteen
By the next morning the weather had changed. The wind had gone westerly and was mild and damp, carrying squalls of rain. In Hallowgate police station Ramsay and Hunter had a meeting with the superintendent. From his office at the front of the building they saw the bright splash of colour of the yellow oilskins worn by the men driving fork-lift trucks on the Fish Quay against the grey of the river. Ramsay stared out at the scene below him and found it hard to concentrate.
‘So,’ the superintendent said, ‘what are we goin
g to do about Gus Lynch?’
‘I’m not sure.’ Ramsay knew he must appear indecisive and tried to gather his thoughts. ‘I’m tempted to bring him in for questioning on suspicion of fraud but technically that’s awkward because the Grace Darling trustees have never reported a crime. The matter’s complicated of course by his high profile.’
‘You’ve not got enough to charge him with murder?’
Ramsay shook his head. ‘ There’s nothing to put him in Martin’s Dene on the evening of Amelia Wood’s death. We had his car and so far no one’s come forward to say that they gave him a lift. Of course someone might be protecting him. But until we have something more substantial than motive to link him to the murders it would be too risky to bring him in.’
They all knew the problem: once the PACE clock started ticking there was only a limited time before a decision had to be made whether to charge or release a suspect. And if Lynch was released after questioning Ramsay would have shown his hand and given the actor the opportunity to cover his tracks. That’s why he hadn’t asked to see the slush account records.
‘Of course we do have substantial evidence to implicate Lynch in the Paston murder,’ the superintendent said. ‘ Her body was found in the boot of his car.’
‘Yes.’ But Ramsay’s voice was uncertain. Paradoxically it was only the body in the car which made him question their case against Lynch. An intelligent man would have found somewhere to dump it. But perhaps it was all an elaborate counterbluff. Or the result of the sort of panic which leads to inaction.
‘There’s nothing we can do without more evidence,’ he said, taking a decision at last. ‘We can’t even talk to him informally about the missing funds without giving too much away. We need proof that he was in Martin’s Dene on Monday lunch time and Tuesday evening. Either a witness or forensic evidence. He’s well known. You’d think he’d be recognized. We’ve taken the clothes he was wearing on Tuesday for testing but there’s no result yet.’
‘I presume you’ve checked his alibi that he was in the pub in Anchor Street on Monday lunch time?’ The superintendent spoke apologetically, implying he was sure they had checked, but they must realize that he had to ask.
‘Yes,’ Hunter said. ‘He was definitely there. But the barmaid thought it was early, about twelve, and we know from Ellen Paston that Gabby was still in Hallowgate then. She was seen running through the market.’
‘She might have been killed somewhere in Hallowgate, of course,’ Ramsay said almost to himself. ‘We know she never reached the Holly Tree. It’s only supposition that she got to Martin’s Dene. We’ve had no response from the press campaign asking for witnesses and you’d think someone would have noticed her if she were waiting outside the restaurant. It’s a busy road…’
‘So we’re agreed then,’ the superintendent said, ‘that we make no move to question Lynch, at least over the weekend. We can re-assess the situation on Monday. We should have something back from forensic by then.’ He looked up at them. ‘What about this other business on the Starling Farm?’ he asked. ‘Is that relevant to the murder enquiry or is it just something you’ve turned up in the course of the investigation?’
‘It’s hard to say at this stage, sir,’ Hunter said. ‘But I’d like to get a search warrant to find out what is happening in the Pastons’ bungalow. There’s something going on in that place. There were kids running in and out all day. If you ask me it’s a right Fagin’s den.’
The superintendent raised his eyebrows.
‘You have evidence for that?’
‘Look,’ Hunter leaned forward earnestly. ‘I’ve been asking around the station, talking to officers who know the patch. They’ve suspected for ages that someone was organizing these car thefts, getting rid of the stuff stolen for them from the kids who nick it. Twelve lads went to that house during the course of our surveillance yesterday. Some were carrying boxes and bags. And they weren’t all collecting for bob a job.’
‘But two single ladies. They wouldn’t know how to go about it.’ Ramsay was sceptical.
‘Why not?’ Hunter demanded. ‘ Robbie must have carried out a similar business from the same premises.’
Ramsay was silent. He thought Hunter’s Fagin analogy was a good one. There was something Dickensian and grotesque about Alma Paston. ‘ I suppose it would be an excellent cover,’ he said. ‘Who would suspect them?’
‘You do realize how sensitive this could be?’ the superintendent said. ‘It’s not only that the estate’s so tense at the moment, and any heavy-handed police operation could provoke worse violence. It’s the Pastons. Memories on the Starling Farm go back a long way. They all remember Robbie Paston. They thought he was a bastard when he was alive but his death turned him into a folk hero. If news gets out that we’ve been harassing Robbie Paston’s defenceless mother and sister the whole place’ll go up. We’ll have to tolerate a bit of unlawful receiving until the mood there improves. There’s no way I can authorize a search.’
‘But there could be more to it than unlawful receiving!’ Hunter said. ‘We’ve been looking all along for a link between Gabriella Paston and Amelia Wood, something more than their involvement with the Grace Darling. Perhaps this is it. If the Pastons were dealing in stolen goods Gabby must have known. Perhaps that’s why she left home. She didn’t want to be involved any more. She knew she had too much to lose. And on the day of her death Amelia Wood convicted Tommy Shiels, a bloke from the estate who was selling nicked car radios. He wouldn’t tell Evan Powell who was organizing the racket but perhaps he said something in court which gave Mrs Wood an idea what was going on.’
‘I don’t know,’ Ramsay said. ‘That’s not very likely. What would Amelia Wood know about it?’
‘All right,’ Hunter said, unabashed. ‘Perhaps not. But there’s the John Powell connection. That must be significant.’
‘Powell?’ The superintendent looked up sharply. ‘ Evan’s boy?’
Ramsay nodded. ‘He was one of the teenagers who visited the place yesterday.’
‘This would explain why John Powell kept Gabby Paston at arm’s length,’ Hunter said. ‘Everyone said she fancied him but he pretended not to be interested. He wouldn’t want her tagging along, talking to his mates. If she knew what was going on at the bungalow she could soon put two and two together.’
‘And if she did,’ Ramsay said slowly, ‘we’ve got another motive for murder.’
‘We have to get into that bungalow,’ Hunter said excitedly. ‘See what’s going on there.’
‘No,’ the superintendent said sharply. ‘And certainly not today at the start of the weekend when all the wild boys on the Starling Farm will be tanked up and ready for trouble. I’ll not take the risk. You can continue making discreet enquiries. We’ll see how the mood is on the estate at the beginning of next week. I’ll reconsider my decision then.’
Hunter opened his mouth to argue but the superintendent interrupted him. ‘I’m sorry. It isn’t up for discussion. Besides anything else there’s the weekend overtime to consider. We’re already over budget!’ He smiled but it was only half a joke. ‘Have a break,’ he said. ‘You could both do with a rest. You’ll come back to it fresh on Monday.’
They stood to leave and Hunter was already out of the room when he called Ramsay back. ‘Stephen,’ he said. ‘I’d like a few words. On our own.’
Ramsay shut the door and returned to his seat.
‘I’m worried about young Powell’s part in all this,’ the superintendent said. ‘You must see that it has wider implications. If he’s on the fringe of some teenage gang stealing cars that’s one thing. Of course we prosecute. Charge him with all the others. It’ll be embarrassing for Evan but there’s no alternative. It’s happened before…’
He paused.
‘What are the wider implications?’ Ramsay asked, to help him out.
‘The possibility that Evan Powell is in some way involved. That’s the nightmare. Either personally or by covering up for the lad.’
<
br /> ‘Why should he be involved personally?’
‘I don’t know. He took a lot of stick from the Paston family and the community after Robbie’s death. At the time I thought he handled it well but perhaps it affected him more than we realized. Then there’s the possibility that all the facts of Robbie Paston’s accident didn’t come out at the enquiry. If he’s been hiding something for all this time he could be dangerous.’
‘Yes,’ Ramsay said. ‘ I see. What do you want me to do about it?’
‘Talk to him. Talk to the boy. Try to get a picture of what’s going on there.’
‘And if I find out that Evan or his son is involved?’
‘We deal with it. Out in the open. There’s no other course to take.’
It was still raining when Ramsay went to the Powells’ house at six o’clock. He had found out that Evan had finished work at five. He hoped to catch the whole family in, to get at least an impression of the relationships between them. He thought that the superintendent was expecting too much of him and there would be little else he could achieve. Evan opened the door to him.
‘Come in, man,’ Evan said. ‘ Have some tea. You’ll drown out there.’
‘I was hoping to speak to John,’ Ramsay said. It was almost true.
‘He’s not here yet. He’ll be in the library revising. He’s got ‘A’ levels this year and he’s dead keen. But now you’re here you’ll come in all the same.’
‘Well,’ Ramsay said, ‘if Mrs Powell won’t mind.’
Inside the house he stopped, awkwardly, hesitating at the expanse of grey carpet in the living room. He wondered if he should take off his shoes but in the end dried them carefully on the door mat and followed Evan through to the kitchen.
‘We’ve got a visitor,’ Evan said cheerfully. ‘ I don’t think you’ve met my wife, Stephen. Jackie, this is Stephen Ramsay, a colleague. Put the kettle on, love, and make some tea.’
