Liar Liar: DI Helen Grace 4 (A DI Helen Grace Thriller)

by M. J. Arlidge

  Charlie had put on a polo neck jumper and woolly hat and smothered her chin in as much foundation as she dared, but she still looked terrible. The colour had not returned to her face and she looked like death. Was Steve worrying that her appearance would alarm Jessica? Possibly. And who’s to say he was wrong?

  Nevertheless, she had to be here. Being a loving and attentive mum. A good Mum. Lord knows she seldom felt like that, but today she had to at least pretend that things were normal, that she and Steve had a normal life and were making a go of things.

  Steve remained silent as they walked up the pretty, picket-fenced path to the nursery. Truth be told, he didn’t need to say anything – it was clear they were both thinking the same thing.

  Had Charlie made a mistake returning to the Force? And, if so, what were they going to do about it?

  68

  ‘We’ve met before, haven’t we?’

  Helen didn’t believe in soft-soaping suspects and, having consulted with Sanderson, decided to go straight for the jugular. There would be plenty of time later to talk about his unhappy childhood or low self-esteem.

  ‘At Travell’s Timber Yard. We had quite a long chat, didn’t we?’

  Richard Ford looked at her blankly, while his lawyer, Hannah Shapiro, just seemed puzzled, wrong-footed by this opening salvo from Helen.

  ‘I don’t recall,’ Ford finally said, his voice listless and monotone.

  ‘Oh come on, you can do better than that,’ Helen countered. ‘I turned up at Travell’s and you told me to leave.’

  ‘I’m sure my client was just concerned for your safety,’ Shapiro interrupted.

  ‘Too right he was,’ Helen replied. ‘The roof was about to give, he had other fires to be at and he didn’t want my death on his conscience. That’s right, isn’t it, Richard?’

  Ford looked at her suspiciously, then shrugged.

  ‘You seem a bit uncertain,’ Helen continued, keeping the pressure up. ‘But you were very sure of yourself that night. You certainly seemed to know a lot about the fires.’

  ‘Inspector …’ Shapiro intoned, the warning note in her voice clear.

  ‘What was it you said to me? You said to me that the fires weren’t an accident. You seemed sure on that point, despite the fact that, at that stage, you’d only been to one of them. Why was that, Richard? Why were you so sure?’

  Shapiro shot a look at her client and, when it was clear he wasn’t going to reply, waded in on his behalf.

  ‘My client is an extremely experienced firefighter. He has attended numerous scenes of arson in the course of his duties and, besides, it was the assumption of pretty much everyone in Southampton that night that three major fires in under an hour was suspicious.’

  ‘And while we’re reminiscing,’ Helen went on, ignoring Shapiro’s speech, ‘let me remind you of the final words you said to me. You said: “Someone’s been having a bit of fun.” Why do you think you used those words, Richard?’

  ‘Can you prove my client actually said any of this?’ Shapiro interrupted.

  ‘Why, Richard?’

  ‘Because it was obvious. Like she said, three fires in under an hour …’

  ‘Were you supposed to be working that night?’

  A little pause, then Ford answered:

  ‘No.’

  ‘Like many other off-duty firefighters, he volunteered as soon as he became aware of the scale of the problems facing the emergency services that night,’ his lawyer elaborated.

  Helen looked at her blankly, then turned her gaze back to Ford. She really was a piece of work, determined not to let her client speak if she could possibly prevent it. Helen could understand why. Close up he was not an attractive specimen. He had a shaved head, bad skin and teeth that could have done with more regular brushing. But more than his physical appearance, it was his demeanour that was offputting. He refused to look you in the eye, his gaze seeking out the farthest corners of the room – when he wasn’t staring at his feet. He spoke in a gruff whisper and his whole manner was furtive, secretive and suspicious. Had he ever had a girlfriend? Did his mother love him? He gave off the distinct vibe of having turned against the world, having found it not to his liking.

  ‘So according to your watch captain you arrived at Travell’s at just after midnight,’ Helen said. She was pleased to see that Ford flinched at this. Perhaps he’d thought that this was going to be a cosy chat. The fact that Helen had already grilled his boss for the particulars of his movements showed that it would be anything but.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Other volunteers met at the station but you turned up at the scene by yourself in full battle dress. Why was that?’

  ‘Because I live nearby. I had the uniform at home –’

  ‘So you live near to the first fire site? It’s convenient for you?’

  ‘Come off it, Inspector …’ Shapiro interjected.

  ‘It’s a perfectly reasonable question,’ Helen asserted, refusing to be knocked off course.

  Ford thought for a moment, then nodded.

  ‘For the benefit of the tape, Mr Ford is nodding. Let me ask you about your uniform. You’re not supposed to take it home, are you? But you do.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But technically it is breaking the rules?’

  ‘Suppose.’

  ‘Then again, there’s a lot of stuff in your house that you’re not supposed to have, isn’t there?’

  Ford briefly met Helen’s gaze, then resumed staring at his feet.

  ‘How many tours of the fires did you do that night?’

  ‘Just the one.’

  ‘You absolutely sure about that?’

  ‘Course.’

  ‘The fires at both Bertrand’s Emporium and the Simmses’ residence started well before midnight. I would estimate it’s only a fifteen-minute journey back to your house from Millbrook, allowing you plenty of time to change into your uniform and head back to the site of the first fire.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It would have got going nicely by then, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Oh, I think you do, because you caught it on camera.’

  ‘No law against that,’ Ford shot back.

  ‘But it’s not your job, is it? That’s the work of fire investigators. You’re job is to fight the fire. Yet we found footage of your house of all three fires that night. According to the time code on the tapes, this footage was recorded around two thirty a.m., well after you and the other volunteers had left the scene of the fire in Millbrook. The others went home to clean up presumably, but you went back.’

  Ford said nothing.

  ‘So that makes at least two tours of the sites. And I’d like to suggest that actually you made three tours – if you include the one where you set the fires.’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘Do you smoke, Richard?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Which brand?’

  ‘Don’t answer that,’ Shapiro said quickly.

  ‘We’ll come back to that,’ Helen continued.

  ‘I’d like to talk to you a little bit more about that footage, if I may?’ DS Sanderson piped up. It had been pre-agreed that she would wade in at the appropriate point, to keep the opposition on their toes. ‘Can you confirm that the recordings – of all six recent fires – were made by you personally?’

  Ford shrugged.

  ‘Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why did you record the fires?’

  ‘For professional purposes,’ Shapiro intervened.

  ‘I’m asking Mr Ford, not you,’ Sanderson said brusquely.

  ‘It’s my job. I’m interested in it, like.’

  ‘Fire interests you?’

  Ford said nothing.

  ‘I’d say it interests you very much,’ Sanderson suggested, unabashed. ‘I think you spent most of your time in that little room at the top of the house. You wouldn’t believe the amount of newspapers, empty pizza bo
xes, cans and so on we found up there. Have you been living in that room? Do you sleep in that room?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Yet there’s no bed. No TV. No heating except a small stove. There’s very little in the way of home comforts in fact, but … there is your collection, isn’t there?’

  As the words hung in the air, Helen took over.

  ‘We’ve bagged every last item. The books, the DVDs, the clippings, the recordings, everything.’

  Helen watched Ford closely – how would he react to knowing that his precious haul was now in the hands of strangers? And worse than strangers, the police.

  ‘We found a lot of souvenirs, Richard. A fire-damaged sign from Travell’s, a cash box from Bertrand’s, family photos from the Bevois Mount fire. You went back to these sites – returned to the scene of the crime – and took things that didn’t belong to you. Your little trophies …’

  Ford gave Helen a look then dropped his gaze. Was that anger Helen saw?

  ‘You took them because you wanted to revel in your crimes. In the wanton destruction and loss of life that you have caused. And when DC Brooks came to talk to you yesterday, you tried to destroy the evidence.’

  ‘It’s her word against his –’

  ‘Are you kidding me?’ Helen replied angrily. ‘We pulled tapes, clippings and more from that stove. Your client was destroying the evidence because he’s guilty, because he’d been caught red-handed. Two people are dead, two more are grievously injured and I would suggest that unless your client wants to spend the rest of his life behind bars, then he’d better start talking.’

  Helen turned, fixing Ford in the eye.

  ‘So what’s it going to be, Richard? Are you going to play ball or shall I charge you with a double murder here and now?’

  69

  The wheels squeaked noisily as they slid over the tired linoleum floor. Thomas Simms cursed under his breath – he already felt as if the eyes of everyone in the hospital were glued to him and his son. He didn’t need the ancient hospital wheelchair trumpeting their presence to one and all.

  It was a long journey from Luke’s ward to the main exit and each step of the way Thomas questioned the wisdom of what he was doing. He hated being away from Alice and it was convenient to have Luke in the same place, being looked after by the attentive nurses. But his son had begged to be discharged and in the end Thomas had relented. There was little more that the surgeons or doctors could do – Luke’s legs were set in heavy plaster after the operation, his shoulder was in a sling – now there was nothing to do but rest up and wait. And Luke clearly didn’t want to do that here.

  Here he couldn’t hide from the visitors, journalists or prurient well-wishers, so Thomas had arranged that they would go and stay with his sister, Mary, who had a big place in Upper Shirley. They obviously couldn’t go back to their own house – Thomas privately wondered if they would ever return there again – and he couldn’t face staying in a hotel, so Mary’s had seemed a good bet. He and his older sister hadn’t always got on, but it was the best he could do in a no-win situation.

  ‘How you doing, mate? Not hurting you, am I?’

  ‘No, you’re all right,’ his son lied bravely, each bump on their journey clearly going right through him.

  Thomas immediately felt the emotion rise in him once more. His son had been so brave throughout, facing up to his injuries, his grief, his fractured future, with admirable stoicism. When the real reckoning of recent events would finally land on him, Thomas couldn’t tell. He both hoped and feared he would be on hand when it did.

  They had reached the main atrium now and the exit was just ahead of them. The taxi wasn’t due for another ten minutes or so, so Thomas dived into the nearby shop to buy a can of Coke for them both. Karen had never been keen on the kids drinking it, but Luke had developed a taste for it while in hospital and Thomas was happy to indulge him. As he queued to pay, his eye fell on the stack of local papers nearby.

  ‘SUSPECT ARRESTED!’ the headline screamed. And beneath it more details, including the fact that the suspect worked for Hants Fire and Rescue. The paper didn’t reveal his identity, but Thomas knew his name. He knew because he had made a deal with the devil. He had nodded and thanked the FLO who’d come to the hospital to keep him up to date on developments later, failing to admit that he already knew the man in question was Richard Ford. Thanks to his deal with Emilia Garanita – the fruits of which were spread over the centrefold as well as the front six pages – he knew where Ford lived, what his family history was and some details of what the police had found when they’d raided his house.

  Garanita had called him from outside Ford’s house. He had had to stand in a corridor out of view, given the ban on mobile phones in wards, and had listened, speechless, to her summary of developments. She had excitement in her voice as she relayed her news and for a moment Thomas had hated her for that – for enjoying this experience – but as the hours passed afterwards, he’d hated Richard Ford more. Thomas was by nature a peaceful guy, but he felt in himself now an anger that was strange and fierce. That guy, that shaven-headed little shit, had destroyed their lives. Taken his beautiful wife, scarred his daughter and broken his son – all to satisfy his thirst for fire. He had crept into his house, set fire to his stairs and shattered his family.

  The shopkeeper was offering Thomas his change now, but he wandered off without collecting it. He walked back to his son, a rictus smile plastered on his face, but his thoughts were miles away. In a small room across town, his wife’s killer was sitting, safe and well, fighting his corner, while he was here, wheeling his injured son through a lobby, watched every step of the way. Where was the justice in that? Could there ever be justice for something like this?

  Thomas Simms had never wanted to harm anybody before, but suddenly he yearned to be in that room, face to face with Ford. He would show him what he’d done – to Thomas, to his family – and then he would see that justice was done. He knew there and then, with absolute certainty, that if he ever found himself alone with Richard Ford he would kill him.

  70

  ‘My client has protested his innocence – repeatedly – and has said all he’s going to say on the matter. We are going round in circles, Inspector, so can I suggest –’

  ‘We’ll stop when I say so, not before,’ Helen replied sternly. She had had enough of Shapiro’s constant interruptions.

  ‘I’m not sure I like your tone,’ said Hannah Shapiro.

  ‘Then find alternative employment.’

  Shapiro glared at Helen, but said nothing, so Helen resumed.

  ‘I’ve given you the chance to come clean, Richard. To help us to help you. But you’ve refused to cooperate. So we’re going to have to keep going, I’m afraid. It’s six fifteen p.m., so I make it that we have at least another two hours to go.’

  Helen paused to let Ford take this in, before she said:

  ‘We’ve established that you had footage of the six recent fires. But your collection goes back a bit further than that, doesn’t it?’

  A moment’s hesitation, then:

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The labels on the tapes cover pretty much every year since you joined the Fire Service. That’s over fifteen years’ worth of footage. I take it this is all your own work?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ford answered quietly.

  ‘We had a little look at some of them. I recognized the fire at the WestQuay in 2010, the fire at Garton NCP in 2006, even the fire at the Tetherton Ballroom on Millennium night.’

  ‘I’ve already said they were for professional purposes. I wanted to learn how fire behaves –’

  ‘Well then, you must have been a very diligent student, because the tape boxes are covered in your prints and often cracked and the tapes themselves are well worn. You’ve watched them over and over again, haven’t you?’

  ‘We’ve already established that my client has no family to speak of and a limited circle of friends –’

  ‘Spare me the violin
s. I don’t think you watch them because you’re lonely, Richard, I think you watch them because you want to. Because you like fire. Because it turns you on.’

  ‘You’ve got it all wrong,’ Ford responded quickly.

  ‘We found a bin which was overflowing with tissues,’ Sanderson butted in. ‘We’ve had a few of them analysed and guess what. There’s semen on every one. And, hey, I’m no prude. I know what boys get up to. But here’s the thing. There’s no pornographic material in your little attic, no web history of porn surfing either, so exactly what is it that gets you so excited?’

  Silence in the room now. For the first time, Helen thought she saw doubt in Hannah Shapiro’s eyes.

  ‘I was wrong earlier,’ Helen said. ‘You don’t like fire, do you? You love fire.’

  Ford shook his head unconvincingly, so Helen stepped up her attack.

  ‘You like the way it dances, don’t you? What do you think it’s saying to you when it does that? Is it calling to you? Asking you to come closer? Or is it performing for you? Dancing to its master’s tune? Is that what you like? The feeling of power it gives you? The knowledge that all this chaos, all this fear, all this beauty was created by you? I don’t blame you for that. I can see the attraction.’

  Ford closed his eyes.

  ‘I think your curiosity about fire goes way beyond professional interest. I think it’s an obsession. And I think that’s why you started these fires. I don’t know yet if you meant to kill anyone – but I know that you wanted these fires to be big, for people to take notice of them and, through them, you. This was your moment, wasn’t it, the moment you finally became what you were meant to be? But it’s over now, Richard, so for your sake as well as for the sake of your victims, it’s time to tell us what you know.’

  A long, pregnant pause. All eyes were now on Ford. He stared at the ground for what seemed like an eternity, then slowly he looked up. He half turned to Shapiro and shook his head slowly. His lawyer didn’t miss her opportunity.