MURDER ON THE OXFORD CANAL

by Faith Martin

  ‘Yes. Police.’ Hillary showed her identity card, and Tommy did the same.

  The woman slowly slid off her stool. Her eyes were wary now.

  ‘We were wondering if you could help us. We’re trying to trace a necklace. We know it’s one of yours. A zodiac pendant. Gemini. Tommy? You saw it best.’

  Tommy described it. He hadn’t even finished when the woman began nodding her head.

  ‘Yes, I remember. Twisted gold wire. I was trying to achieve a cameo-like effect. Didn’t really think I’d succeeded, but I put it on display anyway. It sold almost at once.’ Her wide, generous mouth twisted into a smile. There was, obviously, no accounting for taste.

  ‘Do you remember who bought it? Do you keep records?’

  ‘No, not records. But I remember the man who bought it clearly. He paid cash. Not many customers do that anymore. I remember him bringing out a wallet and peeling off the money.’ The jeweller smiled, obviously recalling the incident with pleasure. ‘As a child we were very poor, you see? Nowadays,’ she said, shrugging graphically, ‘I don’t have to scrimp and scrape so much. But still . . . Something like that sticks in the memory. There’s still something about the look and feel of money that makes me warm all over. So much more beautiful than ugly plastic credit cards.’

  Hillary nodded, not really interested in the woman’s life history. ‘This man, can you describe him?’

  ‘Oh yes. He was old, easily in his sixties. Tallish, gangling, with a big nose.’ She stopped as both Hillary and Tommy gaped at her. ‘Did I say something wrong?’

  Hillary quickly shook her head. Damn, she didn’t have a photo on her.

  But Tommy did. She saw him hand over a mugshot of Alfie Makepeace.

  ‘Is this him?’ he asked.

  The jeweller beamed and nodded enthusiastically. ‘Yes, that’s him.’

  CHAPTER 17

  Just like that. Sometimes it happened that way. Hillary managed to thank the jeweller, then walked out of the shop, negotiating the crowd in the smelly covered market with the careful control of someone drunk.

  ‘Guv, they’ve had to let Makepeace go,’ Tommy said, also in a nice little euphoria of shock. His first big case, and he was there when it was cracked. Surely it would go well on his CV when he took his sergeant’s exams?

  ‘Shit,’ Hillary said. She set off fast, weaving through Cornmarket Street, almost running. Of course, with his long legs Tommy easily — annoyingly easily — kept up with her. To make matters worse, she was beginning to pant.

  ‘Back to the boat,’ she said, careful not to gasp. ‘Last I heard it was still moored up just past Banbury, right?’

  ‘Yes, guv.’

  ‘You drive,’ Hillary said, not trusting herself to keep to the speed limit, or, for that matter, stop them getting killed with her reckless overtaking.

  She wanted this so bad it almost hurt.

  Mike Regis was probably still at the Big House, wrapping up the liaison with Mel, and she desperately wanted to present them with the solution to the case. In her mind’s eye, she was already picturing it. She’d waltz in, sit without waiting, smile, and tell them they had the killer and a full confession waiting for them downstairs in the cells. It would be beautiful.

  * * *

  When they got to the canal, the boat was gone. Hillary could have wept. Beside her, she heard Tommy swearing under his breath.

  Think, dammit, think.

  ‘OK, we know he’s on the boat,’ she said grimly, ‘because if one of Fletcher’s men had been sent to move it, it would have set off all kinds of alarm bells with the Vice people watching him. He’d know that too. Fletcher’s a smart bastard. So odds on, it’s Makepeace that took off in it. And he can’t have got far.’ Hillary smiled, glad, for once, of a narrowboat’s limitations. ‘Hell, four miles an hour, and he wasn’t released more than, what, two hours ago?’

  Tommy’s face split into a wide, white grin. He peered up and down the canal.

  ‘But which way, guv?’ He hoped she wasn’t going to tell him they should split up. He didn’t want her having to face Makepeace alone — he was probably a killer. ‘Perhaps we should call for backup.’ He hated to have to say it, knowing why she was so determined to crack the case without Mel or Regis breathing down her neck. She deserved it, but not if it meant putting her life at risk.

  Hillary was grinning. ‘Constable, the one thing about a narrowboat is that it’s long. Very long. It can only turn round at certain custom-made places along the canal.’

  Confused, Tommy looked at the opposite bank, not more than six or so feet across from him, then realised what she meant. Makepeace couldn’t have turned it around here.

  But which way had it been pointing? He screwed up his eyes, trying to remember which direction the pointed bit had faced when last he’d seen it.

  He couldn’t.

  ‘Come on.’ Hillary was already power-walking away to the north. Tommy fell into step beside her. He trusted her powers of recollection. After all, it was probably why she was a DI and he a humble DC.

  * * *

  They found the boat moored up beside a lock. Of course, Makepeace is alone now, Hillary thought, and negotiating a lock single-handed isn’t to be recommended.

  She walked straight onto the prow, pushed open the door without knocking and went inside. Tommy, scared by her recklessness, while at the same time full of admiration, rushed up fast behind her, ready to throw her to the ground and cover her should Makepeace appear holding an Uzi.

  Alfie Makepeace was sitting in an armchair, drinking a cup of tea and reading the paper.

  ‘Hello, Mr Makepeace.’ Hillary stepped forward and leaned against a wall. The ceiling, barely a few inches above her head, gave her the usual feeling of claustrophobia.

  ‘DI Greene, isn’t it?’ Alfie Makepeace said, ostentatiously folding away the newspaper. He was wearing a knitted beige cardigan, the same kind that her father had favoured. His thinning hair was combed neatly back. He smelt faintly of Old Spice. No doubt he’d showered immediately after getting back from the nick. Most people did.

  It was hard to imagine a less likely-looking murder suspect.

  ‘Your lot have just let me go.’ He glanced down at the paper he’d been reading — three days old, she noticed absently — then tossed it aside.

  Tommy tensed at the sudden movement.

  ‘Yes, I know,’ she said. ‘But that was then. This is now. I’d like you to accompany us back to the station, sir.’

  She’d have to read him his rights. Mel would be furious enough with her jumping the gun without her handing any defence lawyer a golden opportunity to cite overlooked technicalities.

  On the other hand she needed to shake him before she got him back to Kidlington, to be sure he’d give it all up.

  She thought she had it, but how best to play it?

  ‘Aren’t you frightened of your boss at all, Mr Makepeace?’ she asked, raising one eyebrow, and managing to make her tone sound mildly curious. ‘I mean, if I’d conned Luke Fletcher into supplying me with one of his men, just so I could kill him for personal and private reasons, it would make my palms sweat a little.’

  Alfie’s somewhat rheumy eyes squinted at her. Was it her imagination, or had he tensed up?

  ‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said softly. But his fingers were plucking at one of the buttons on his cardigan, the restless, subconscious gesture telling her volumes.

  Yes! She had him on the run.

  ‘Didn’t you know that it was David Pitman, and not Gascoigne, who was raking off a cut for himself?’ She saw him literally jerk in the chair. ‘No, I didn’t think so,’ she said, oozing false sympathy.

  Tommy seemed content to watch, listen and learn. He was no doubt thinking that, some day, he’d be the one doing the questioning, the one wearing the pips and making the decisions.

  ‘You’re lying,’ Alfie said flatly.

  But Hillary was already shaking her head. ‘’Fraid not, Alfie. It was
me that found his stash, not above a day ago, in that outhouse he keeps his bikes in. You know, out Woodstock way? It’s even been fingerprinted. All that lovely money, Luke Fletcher's money, with The Pits’ fingerprints all over it. You know, if I was you, right about now I’d be worrying what Fletcher will do when he realises that not only did he kill the wrong man, but that his trusted old mate Alfie Makepeace has been yanking his chain all along.’

  Alfie’s fingers twisted the button almost off. Then he shrugged. Then smiled.

  ‘No skin off my nose. Nobody’s going to pin any murder on Fletcher.’

  ‘He’s still not going to be pleased with you, though, is he?’ She was trying to keep the edge of anxiety out of her voice, and keep on top of it. But she was losing him.

  He was the toughest of the tough under that nice-old-man exterior.

  Alfie shrugged again. ‘So he’ll be mad. Anyone can make a mistake. Even me. He won’t hold that against me.’

  Hillary snorted. ‘Right. Like Fletcher is known for his forgiving nature.’

  But his eyes looked back at her, and they were hard and old. And suddenly she got it. What did he have to lose? For a second, she thought she’d lost, and all her dreams of a glorious collar sailed out the window.

  Then she realised she’d been on the wrong tack all along.

  She stepped forward and sat down carefully in the chair opposite him, leaning forward.

  She spoke softly. ‘Tell me about Sylvia, Alfie.’ She saw his face tighten. Even his wrinkles seemed to iron out, so hard was his jaw clenched. She heard him take a ragged breath.

  ‘You know,’ she said, ‘what with DNA and blood-typing and stuff, nowadays it wouldn’t take a lab much over a week to prove paternity. Of course, it would mean Sylvia being served with papers forcing her to take a blood test. Her mum, Deirdre, will be upset about that, I daresay. Then, if you still refuse to cooperate, it’ll all be brought out in court. The rape, all the nasty details. Pitman was a bit of an animal, wasn’t he?’

  Tommy shifted his eyes from the old man to the wall. Suddenly he was very glad he wasn’t the one asking the questions. Would he be able to do it? Would he ever be able to do what his guv was doing now? He knew why she’d changed tactics, of course. They had to get Makepeace to confess. With sod all by way of witnesses, and pitiful forensics and no hard evidence, a motive and a confession was all they could hope for.

  So she had to go for the jugular. But as Tommy thought back to the Warrenders, the pitiful, listless Sylvia, and her blowsy mum, defiant but frightened, he felt himself wavering.

  ‘Leave ’em be,’ Makepeace said gruffly.

  Hillary shrugged. ‘I’d be glad to. Personally. But my boss is Superintendent Marcus Donleavy, and he’s looking for promotion. So’s the man who’ll probably replace him. You met him. DCI Mallow. They’ll both be hot to get a conviction in a high-profile murder and drugs case. They won’t think twice about ferreting out every bit of information and dirt they can. About you. And about your family. Well, I call them that, but I don’t suppose many people will count them as such. After all, what did it amount to? A bit of a fling with the local bike, then buggering off to sea when you learned she was up the duff. Hardly the story of your average loving family set-up, is it? Jury won’t be sympathetic at all.’

  ‘It weren’t like that,’ Alfie said, but his voice was tired now, old, and without hope.

  Hillary took a long, steady breath. ‘So what was it like, Alfie?’

  The old man shrugged. ‘I had form. Nothing heavy, mind, but Dee was one of the few who didn’t hold it against me. We were together nearly three months. Then I got offered this job on a Norwegian oil tanker. Nothing skilled, useless pay, long hours. But it was work. And, truth to tell, I fancied the thought of seeing the world. Mid-life crisis or something.’ He laughed. Then he shook his head. ‘Dee never told me she was preggers. Maybe she didn’t know.’

  He looked out of the window. Who knew what memories he saw, rolling out along the canal bank? ‘I never really gave her another thought. Not till I ran into her last year. And she told me about Sylvia.’

  ‘And about the rape,’ Hillary said flatly.

  Makepeace’s face hardened. ‘Yeah. That too. I had a daughter. I never thought of stuff like that. You know. Normal stuff. Stuff that matters. To think I had a little girl. She used to go dancing, her mum told me. Was bright and pretty and funny. Now . . . now she didn’t do nothing. Woke up at night screaming. Popped pills like her mother drank gin. And all because of that scum.’ He spat out the last word with real venom.

  Hillary nodded. ‘And you knew him, didn’t you? That’s what made it so hard, I bet. Made you flip. The fact that you’d worked with him. What, had a drink with him? And all that time, you didn’t know he’d raped your little girl. I bet he even used to brag about his way with the ladies, the rapes he’d got away with. Yeah?’

  Reluctantly, Makepeace nodded.

  Hillary sighed. ‘No wonder you wanted to kill the bastard.’

  ‘And did,’ Makepeace finally said, with so much satisfaction Tommy folded his arms protectively across his chest.

  But he’d not yet confessed back at the Big House, Hillary was thinking, far more concerned with practical matters than matters of conscience. He hadn’t said a word with a tape recorder playing, after being read his rights.

  She bit her lip. Careful now.

  ‘So what happened that night? You threw him off the back of the boat?’

  Makepeace shrugged. ‘Not threw. Just pushed. We were in the lock. I jiggled the starter motor, made out something was jammed. I said maybe the propeller was fouled, and he leant over to look. A quick shove in the back, and he was in.’

  ‘Where was Gascoigne during all this?’

  Makepeace grunted, and it was full of contempt. ‘Him? Drunk, on his bunk. What else? I told Pitman I was gonna have to wake him up to close the lock and flood it. But I never went near him.’

  ‘So Pitman was in the water. And you just, what? Reversed over him?’

  Makepeace shrugged. ‘Weren’t that hard. Locks are narrow. There was nowhere for him to go, was there? No way he could avoid being crushed. I waited until he was trying to climb up the back, and then, when his precious dick was just where I wanted it, I crushed him against the wall. I wanted to castrate the bastard, you see. Dee told me what he did to Sylvie. Her . . . breasts . . . you know. So I thought, right, you bastard, see how you like it.’

  Hillary heard Tommy gulp.

  ‘Yes,’ she said simply. So that was why she’d kept going back to the autopsy reports. Her subconscious had been trying to point out to her that the wounds, all being centred around the genitals, meant something far more than she’d been seeing. Far more than mere coincidence.

  ‘So all this time, while we were faffing about, convinced it was drugs, it had been a plain and simple murder all along. A classic family revenge thing.’ She shook her head. Wouldn’t they be sick back at the Big House when they heard this? Especially Mel, who’d fobbed her off with the “personal” angle to begin with, because he’d been convinced there’d been nothing personal about it.

  Just how wrong could you get?

  ‘I’ve been very dim,’ Hillary said softly. Makepeace looked at her, then shrugged. ‘So what did you tell Gascoigne when he sobered up?’

  Makepeace shrugged again. ‘Just that there’d been an accident. Pitman had fooled around while the boat was in the lock and went overboard. It wasn’t hard. Jake wasn’t particularly bright.’

  ‘And now he’s dead. Because Fletcher believed you when you told him he’d been skimming,’ Hillary’s voice was hard again. ‘But then, why should you care about that?’

  Makepeace leaned back in his chair, his old bones creaking. ‘Exactly. Do you know how many people Gascoigne cut up on Fletcher’s orders? Not that I’ll be repeating that on tape,’ he added quickly.

  Hillary nodded. No, of course he wouldn’t. Any more than he’d admit that he had known Gascoigne
wasn’t skimming. But Fletcher was Mel’s and Mike Regis’s problem. She’d solved her case.

  ‘But you will admit to offing Pitman? For their sake. Deirdre must have guessed it was you that’d done it, the moment she heard Pitman was dead. I always felt as if she was hiding something. Tell me, does Sylvie know you’re her dad?’

  ‘Yeah. Dee told her. On her birthday. I bought her a birthday present. For the first time, I had someone to buy a present for.’ He sounded so happy that Hillary didn’t have the heart to tell him it had been the gift that had nailed him.

  Instead, she repeated her question. ‘So you’ll cop to it? All nice and legal, a signed confession? Save Sylvie and Dee the pain of going through all that again? No courts or cross-examinations for them, huh?’

  Makepeace nodded silently.

  Tommy tried not to notice the tears rolling down the old man’s face.

  Perhaps he shouldn’t be in the police force? If he felt this guilty when nicking a cold-blooded murderer, how would he feel the next time?

  It wasn’t often you had a dream come true, so when Hillary walked into the office later, with Makepeace’s taped confession from the interview room still ringing in her ears, she was determined to make the most of it.

  Frank Ross was at his desk. He scowled at her when she walked in. She beamed and flipped him the finger.

  A nice little bonus, that.

  Then she pushed on to Mel’s office, and again couldn’t believe her luck. Donleavy was there.

  He smiled at her. ‘Hillary, so glad you’re here. I was just telling Mel, the Yorkshire policemen sent to investigate Ronnie’s, er, activities have just told me they no longer consider it likely that you had any involvement with his scam. As of now, they’ve signed off on you.’

  Hillary smiled. Yeah, that was nice, too.

  ‘Sir,’ she said, then looked at Mel.

  ‘I’ve got David Pitman’s killer in the interview room. I’ve read him his rights, he’s waived his right to a solicitor and given a full taped confession. I’ve left him writing up the same confession in longhand. He’ll be signing it about now.’

  Mel blinked.