THE PRICE OF MURDER a totally gripping British crime mystery

by BRIAN BATTISON

  ‘You don’t drink?’ He emphasised each word with incredulity. ‘Well, I’ll pour one for Jim. By God, he’s earned it.’

  He was doing this when Ashworth came back. ‘A drink, Jim,’ he said. ‘I take it they found the money just as you thought they would.’

  Ashworth took the drink from him. ‘No, they didn’t.’ He took a sip. ‘Thanks for this. No, what they found buried in Warren’s garden were six briefcases made of Moroccan leather — worth about four hundred pounds apiece, I believe. Seems he’s been siphoning them off from the factory for a couple of years. He doesn’t see it as stealing, more as redistribution of wealth. The poor devil thought the ten-pound note was tied up in an investigation into their theft.’

  Paine looked confused. ‘I don’t understand any of this.’

  ‘Don’t you?’ Ashworth asked cordially. ‘It’s simple really. Poor old Len Warren has been a thorn in my side. I knew he was hiding something, but until I could establish what it was I couldn’t eliminate him, so I decided to use him.’

  ‘You’re saying he didn’t kill Simon?’

  ‘Of course he didn’t . . . you did,’ Ashworth said quietly. ‘And your sister too, I believe, by administering a large overdose.’

  Paine laughed. ‘You’re mad, Ashworth,’ he exclaimed. ‘Why on earth should I do that?’

  ‘Simply because they were taking a lot of money from the business. With them out of the way the factory is all yours, and you inherit this house.’

  At the door Josh shook his head in disagreement.

  Paine seemed to regain a little of his composure. He returned to the sofa and sat down. ‘And how have you reached this absurd conclusion?’

  Ashworth felt the first twinge of doubt, but he confidently said, ‘I’ve suspected you from the first. It seemed odd to me that you were the only one who knew of the business trip Edwards was going on the day he disappeared. You collected his overnight bag. You made all the arrangements.’

  ‘Yes, that’s correct. So you’re suggesting I kidnapped Simon.’

  ‘No, I’m not. What I’m saying is, I believe you struck him a blow on the head and then pushed him into the river.’

  ‘Fascinating,’ Paine observed. ‘And then arranged for someone to write letters and make phone calls demanding money.’

  ‘No, you did that. It didn’t escape my notice that on the night of the last ransom drop you were the only person to speak to the kidnapper.’

  ‘What a flight of fancy,’ Paine mocked. ‘Pray tell me, why should I go to all that trouble when — if what you’re saying is correct — I could have just let Simon’s body turn up in the river? No one would have suspected me. Why the charade of a kidnap?’

  Warning bells were ringing inside Ashworth’s head; so much of his case depended on bluff and Paine seemed too confident. Nevertheless, he pushed on. ‘Now, this is guesswork . . .’

  He saw Paine’s eyebrows rise.

  ‘. . . but I believe you panicked because you knew if the body turned up too soon it would be apparent that Edwards had received a blow on the head. When I told you, just before the freeze was supposed to be setting in, that we would be searching the waterways, you dreamed up the kidnap to delay the body being found. You wanted it to be buffeted about in the river for a few weeks.’

  ‘Bravo.’ Paine clapped his hands. ‘And then planted the ten-pound note on Warren to incriminate him.’

  ‘Yes.’ Ashworth was finding it difficult to keep his voice firm. ‘When I told you we’d taken the serial numbers I guessed you’d plant money in either Warren’s or the Frenches’ pay packets.’

  ‘You should really be writing detective stories, Ashworth. Now, before I ask you to leave, tell me how you’re going to prove all this.’

  ‘Simple . . .’ Ashworth paused before playing his trump card. ‘. . . I intend to search this house and your own, and I’m certain I’ll find the balance of the ransom money.’

  Paine threw back his head and laughed loudly. ‘Ashworth, I thought you were just lacking in intelligence — now I believe you’re mad.’

  The man’s words and attitude lashed at Ashworth and, if he needed confirmation that he had made an horrendous mistake, Paine’s next statement provided it.

  ‘I’ll co-operate with you in every way possible, of course. You won’t need a search warrant — but I do insist that the press are present.’

  Ashworth realised that his mouth was hanging open as he watched Paine walk to the telephone and begin dialling.

  The front doorbell rang. As if in a trance, Ashworth went into the hall. Josh had preceded him and the door was already open, revealing Holly and Whitworth.

  ‘Guv, there’s been a cock-up,’ Whitworth told him.

  Ashworth did not need any more bad news just at that moment and as he listened to what Whitworth had to say he felt despair flooding over him.

  ‘We’ve found the rest of the ransom money at Warren’s. It was in a case hidden underneath the shed. We’d have missed it, but the thing’s rotten and one of the lads put his foot through the floor.’

  Ashworth’s first inclination was to shoot the messenger; instead he rounded on Josh, irritated as he was by the slight smile playing on the Detective Constable’s lips. ‘You find something funny about this, Abraham — something that makes you want to laugh?’ His tone was acidulous.

  Most people would have visibly flinched at the onset of one of Ashworth’s onslaughts but it brought no such reaction from Josh; not even the gaze of his steady grey eyes wavered, but before his lips could deliver the answer which was formulating in his mind, Paine’s voice interrupted them from the lounge.

  ‘Ashworth,’ he called, ‘the press want to have a word with you, just to make sure this isn’t some kind of hoax.’

  ‘I’ll take it,’ Josh said coolly.

  All three watched in amazement as Josh strode back into the lounge and took the proffered telephone receiver from Paine. ‘Yes? This is DC Abraham speaking. That’s quite right, if you’d like to do as Mr Paine advised, the police will have a statement to issue shortly.’

  Ashworth was finding it difficult not to forcibly remove Josh from the room, or even from the face of the earth.

  ‘Now, Mr Paine,’ Josh began confidently, ‘you certainly out-thought us with the money. We didn’t think you’d plant all of it on Warren, but that doesn’t really matter, we have all the evidence we need.’

  ‘Ashworth, control this imbecile,’ Paine ordered.

  But the Chief Inspector, standing at the doorway in front of Holly and Whitworth, found that he was incapable of speech.

  ‘We have all the evidence we need, Mr Paine,’ Josh repeated, ‘so shall we stop playing games?’

  ‘Yes, let’s do that, young man.’ Paine sat down, nursing his glass of scotch. ‘Tell me what this proof is that you’ve got.’

  ‘This first part is conjecture, but bear with me.’ Josh sat in an armchair to face Paine. ‘As you know, members of a police team work very closely together, collectively sifting through all the information that comes in . . .’ He turned and smiled sweetly at Ashworth. ‘Now, I don’t know if Jim misunderstood me when I was telling him about you and your sister, or perhaps I didn’t make it plain, but either way he’s got the facts jumbled. You don’t own any part of the factory, or you didn’t until you murdered the two people who did own it.’

  Paine’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Josh.

  ‘Simon and Barbara Edwards were joint owners,’ Josh continued. ‘Five years ago your sister’s drug addiction began to affect her judgement and that’s when you were called in. At that time I believe you were a travel courier in Spain.

  ‘You became a director of the company, but on a salaried basis. You did not own any part of the company. True, because of your forceful personality you took over as managing director, and Edwards was more than willing to let you do most of the work, but that’s where it started to go wrong: because of your sister’s and Edwards’s blasé attitude towards the compa
ny, and the excesses in their private lives, the factory began to go downhill. So there you were, working fourteen hours a day and not even being able to afford your own house.’ Josh smiled. ‘See, we’ve even found that out. And that’s why you decided to murder them.’

  ‘It’s a different version,’ Paine said, doing his best to appear nonchalant, ‘but it sounds like the same fairy tale to me.’

  Josh laughed. ‘Yes, but you see when we collect information we use every method at our disposal . . .’ Again he glanced over his shoulder at Ashworth. ‘. . . to unearth some proof, which is what we’ve done in this case.’

  From his pocket he took his small tape recorder, placed it on the coffee table and pressed the ‘on’ switch. Immediately Paine’s booming voice filled the room. Paine stared at the machine, mesmerised.

  ‘I recorded that the night the ransom was picked up.’ Josh switched the machine off. ‘Now, this is the kidnapper’s call to the house.’ The muffled sound of the kidnapper jumped from the machine.

  ‘So?’ Paine asked.

  Josh silenced the tape recorder and leant forward. ‘Have you heard of voice prints? No? Well, basically, the chance that two individuals could have the same patterns of speech — use of the tongue, teeth, lips, etc., to form sounds — is so remote that it isn’t even worth considering. Can you follow that, Mr Paine? However the voice is disguised, the voice pattern remains unique.’ He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket. ‘Here’s a report on your voice and the kidnapper’s. You’ll see they’re one and the same.’ He passed the paper to Paine. ‘And that proves that you killed Simon Edwards.’

  Paine studied the report. ‘I didn’t kill Babs,’ he blurted out, bowing to the inevitability of one murder charge and trying to find a loophole to escape the second.

  No?’ Josh said quietly. ‘The suicide note will tell us more about that. Technology is a wonderful thing, Mr Paine.’ He stood up. ‘Holly, if you’d like to caution Mr Paine while I have a word with Jim . . .’

  ‘Yes.’ So powerful had his performance been that she almost called him ‘sir’.

  Josh closed the door to face Ashworth in the hall.

  ‘What the hell are you doing, Abraham?’ Ashworth demanded.

  ‘Solving a murder case.’

  ‘I’ll have your job for this,’ Ashworth growled. ‘You’ve made a fool of me.’

  ‘No, you won’t — I’m leaving anyway.’

  ‘Where did you get all that information about Paine’s private affairs?’ The guttural sound of Ashworth’s voice was harsh on the ear.

  ‘From the bank manager who handles the factory’s affairs. His son was parked in Poacher’s Wood, having it off with his girlfriend, if you remember. Well, I told him that if he didn’t come across with the information I wanted, we’d do his son. I was quite forceful — poofs can be when they have to.’

  ‘You deliberately withheld the information of the voice prints.’

  ‘I did not,’ Josh replied coolly. ‘You’d have brushed it aside if I’d told you.’

  ‘I’d have been forced to act on it.’

  ‘No, you wouldn’t.’ Josh was becoming heated. ‘God, why don’t you just stop bollocking me up hill and down dale and think. It was you who told me that one of the attributes a good detective needs is the ability to bluff. Well, that’s what I’ve been doing.’

  Ashworth managed to look both confused and angry. ‘None of this voice print thing is true?’

  ‘Every word, but it’s not admissible in a British court of law. So, instead of tearing into me, it would be wise to get Paine to the station before he comes out of shock and starts demanding a solicitor, because if he does that before we take a statement, our case collapses.’

  Whitworth stepped in. ‘That makes sense, guv.’

  ‘Yes,’ Ashworth said heavily.

  * * *

  It was eleven thirty that same evening.

  Ashworth sat alone in the darkened CID office. Paine had made a full confession to the murder of Simon Edwards, although still proclaiming his innocence to the second murder charge, but Ashworth knew it was only a matter of time before that second confession would be forthcoming.

  Whitworth had told him of his decision to return to Manchester which had saddened him.

  He had attempted to make his peace with Josh but the words had come out all wrong, so he had decided to leave it until another day. Apologies to Holly had been in order for not mentioning the death of her mother-in-law, so he had made them.

  Now, physically and mentally exhausted, he could not at this point allow himself to think of the battle which would ensue when he informed Ken Savage that he had no intention of taking up the Home Office appointment. He had decided that for the sake of his marriage he would stay well away from Gwen Anthony’s web.

  He picked up the telephone and so familiar was his home number he was able to punch it out in the dark. When Sarah answered, all the sounds that were home came to his ear: a good woman’s voice, the barking of a dog, the low drone of the television. He could almost smell malt whisky, could almost feel a comfortable chair wrapped around him.

  ‘Jim, are you coming home?’

  ‘Yes, Sarah, it’s all over. I’m on my way.’

  ‘Are you all right, Jim? You sound funny.’

  ‘I’m a little older, and a good deal wiser, but all right.’

  ‘Hurry home, Jim.’

  After the call he donned his waxed cotton jacket, stood looking out of the glass wall at the bright lights of the town, and for some reason he remembered an American television series he had watched some years ago.

  Through gritted teeth, and with a fairly good American accent, he said, ‘Jim Ashworth — I’m a cop, and that’s my town out there.’

  He looked out for several seconds before he spoke again, this time using his normal voice. ‘Yes, it is,’ he said with a warm smile.

  Then he went home.

  THE END

  ALSO BY BRIAN BATTISON

  DETECTIVE JIM ASHWORTH SERIES

  Book 1: TIED TO MURDER

  Book 2: THE PRICE OF MURDER

  MORE BOOKS IN THE SERIES COMING SOON!

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