Under Mary's Oak

by Tanya Carlysle

  ‘Same as me, deliveries.’

  ‘So why did he end up dead?’

  ‘He was more curious than me. He found out what he was delivering and went to Andy asking for a bigger cut.’

  ‘What was he delivering?’

  Banks hesitated. If he told them they would know what he had been doing as well, but he still had his escape plan. And he was doing this for Richard.

  ‘It was diamonds.’

  Jenkins hadn’t expected that. He had been almost sure it would be drugs.

  ‘And then what happened?’ he asked.

  ‘He came into Sparkle late one night. Not long before Easter, a Thursday I think. I was talking to Andy and a couple of the other guys were there. Jason had had a few drinks, Dutch courage I suppose.’

  Jenkins smiled as he linked Dutch courage to Amsterdam, knowing that Banks hadn’t intended the pun.

  ‘Jason came over to our table and said ‘I know what I’ve just delivered and it’s worth more than the grand you paid me’. Andy told me and the others to disappear and Jason sat down with him. They were obviously having a go at each other, you could tell that but I couldn’t hear any more. Then Andy called Jock over.’

  ‘Who’s Jock?’

  ‘He’s worked for Andy for years. He drives for him. I suppose you might call him his bodyguard.’

  Or just a thug, thought Jenkins. ‘And then what?’

  ‘Well, it looked as though Logan and Jason were going somewhere, so I decided to follow.’

  ‘That was a bit risky, wasn’t it? What did you think was going to happen?’

  ‘I didn’t know, but I knew Jason was doing the same job as me, and I wanted to know what was going on. I went out and got into my car and waited. A few minutes later, Jock brings Logan’s BMW to the front of Sparkle and Jason and Logan got in.’

  ‘Did Burton look anxious? Was he being manhandled?’

  ‘No, he looked fine. It was just as though they were going for a ride together.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘I followed. They turned left out of The Arcade and then went towards North Shields. They turned down Tanners Bank towards the fish quay. It was late at night and no-one was about and I switched off my car lights so I could follow without being seen. They went past Caley’s and then turned left towards the car park on the water’s edge and then carried on towards the old warehouses.

  When I saw their brake lights, I stopped. I was a couple of hundred yards behind them. They pulled in and all three got out. Logan and Jason went first and Jock got something out of the boot, and then followed.’

  ‘Did you see what it was?’

  ‘Well, I saw later that it was a baseball bat. I moved a bit closer to see if I could hear what they were saying. There’s a big stone wall and I could keep out of sight by keeping close to it. Logan and Jason started to argue. Then Logan pushed Jason and he fell over. Jason turned over onto his knees to try and get up and Jock started to swing the bat, but Logan took it from him. Logan swung the bat and hit Jason, and he went down and didn’t get up again.’

  Banks paused.

  ‘And then what?’ prompted Jenkins.

  ‘Logan and Jock went back to the car. Logan gave the baseball bat to Jock and he put it back in the boot, and then they drove off. I waited for a while and then went across to see if Jason was alive, but it was obvious he wasn’t. So I just got out o’ there.’

  ‘And you’re sure they didn’t see you?’

  ‘I don’t think I’d still be around if they did. Anyway they drove off the other way, towards Shields.’

  ‘And you’re prepared to say all of this?’

  ‘Even better, I’ve got it on film,’ said Banks and pushed his mobile phone over the desk. ‘I’ve been keeping it as security.’

  ‘Or withholding evidence,’ said Jenkins grimly. ‘Let’s take a few minutes break while we look at the video then. Todd, get someone to bring Mr Banks a cup of tea.’

  Banks reflected on how things were going. Although Jenkins had thrown in that comment about withholding evidence, he didn’t think it was too bad. He hoped they got on with it. He wanted to catch the afternoon ferry.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Todd joined Jenkins in the incident room a few minutes later. Jenkins was sitting beside the murder board staring into space.

  ‘Sir?’ prompted Todd.

  ‘I was just thinking, Todd. I think we’ve got him. I’ve asked Sally to get the video onto her computer so we can all have a look at it. If it’s any good it’ll nail Logan good and proper.’

  ‘Did she manage to speak to Bob Pickard?’

  ‘No, he wasn’t there last night. Maybe we shan’t need his input, after all,’ replied Jenkins.

  Nugent and Spense entered the incident room. Having spent the night outside Banks’s house they had showered then grabbed a quick breakfast in the canteen whilst Jenkins and Todd interviewed Banks.

  ‘Did Banks go anywhere last night?’ asked Jenkins.

  ‘No, guv,’ replied Nugent. ‘He didn’t go anywhere and nobody visited him. It was all very peaceful.’

  Sally Walker called them over. ‘I’ve got it ready, guv.’

  ‘What’s this?’ asked Jaqui Spense.

  ‘This is what we hope is going to nail Logan,’ said Jenkins with a smile.

  As they gathered round Sally’s monitor, Jenkins felt large butterflies beating their wings against the wall of his stomach. Was it really going to be this simple?

  As the video began to play, Jenkins could make out three characters, two of them obviously arguing with violent gesticulations. The third was standing alongside with what appeared to be a long stick in his hand. One of the two went down to the ground, pushed by the other and the third lifted the stick. But the other grabbed the stick from him and swung it down on the head of the man on the ground. The audio was very poor and nothing sensible could be made of it.

  ‘This is no good,’ he said with obvious disappointment in his voice. ‘We can’t make out who they are at all. It could be anyone.’

  The two shadowy characters began to walk towards the camera, obviously heading back to their car. As they did so, the one who had wielded the stick gave it to the other man, and as he turned towards him the camera caught his face in the moonlight.

  ‘Freeze it there, Walker,’ shouted Jenkins.

  They all peered at the screen.

  ‘That’s Logan,’ said Todd excitedly. ‘I’m sure of it.’

  ‘I think you’re right,’ said Jenkins. ‘Walker, see if the techies can improve the image at all.’

  Sally Walker set the video to continue playing and Jenkins whistled as he drew air in over his teeth.

  ‘You crafty beggar, Banks,’ he said, as the camera moved to record the registration number of the car as the boot was lifted and the stick was put in.

  Jenkins and his team looked at each other not able to fully comprehend the enormity of what they had just witnessed. Andy Logan, who had proved so elusive for so long, had been caught on camera laying into a man who was later found dead at the scene!

  ‘I think I’d better go and see the Chief,’ said Jenkins as calmly as he could.

  He didn’t feel calm. He wanted to punch the air. He wanted to jump up and down. He wanted to pinch himself to be sure he wasn’t dreaming. This was the best day of his life.

  ***

  Mollie smiled at Jenkins as he entered her office.

  ‘Is he in?’ Jenkins asked.

  Ten minutes later Jenkins had brought his boss up to date and the two police officers were sitting looking at each other hardly daring to believe the news.

  ‘Right,’ said DCI Manton. ‘We need to co-ordinate this. If we alert Logan he might be able to hide evidence. We’ve got diamond smuggling and Jason Burton’s murder. We suspect Harry Westbury and Richard Hart are connected. We might have links to dodgy goings on at The Crazy Lady
. And who knows what else we might find.

  Let’s get warrants and hit them all at the same time. We go in to Sparkle, The Crazy Lady and the beauty salon at the same time as you pick up Logan, but given the problems we’ve had before we need to keep it close to the chest till the last minute. You sort the warrants, and get one for the car whilst you’re at it. I’ll make sure we’ve got the manpower to deal with it all. We’ll get Logan in on suspicion of a connection to Richard Hart, as that’s our case, and then I’ll take great pleasure in informing North Tyneside that we’ve solved their Jason Burton murder for them.

  And well done, Jenkins.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Back in the incident room, Dave Jenkins brought the rest of the team up to date.

  ‘We’ve got a busy few hours ahead of us,’ he said. ‘Todd, get started on the warrants while I go back to Banks. We need to go in there this afternoon before the nightclub and the casino get busy. You can come with me, Walker.’

  ‘What are you doing with Banks?’ asked Todd.

  ‘Well, we need to get his statement and then I suppose we can let him go for the time being. I’ll hang on to his mobile phone so that we’ve got the original video. I think he’ll want to lie low until we’ve got Logan in custody.’

  ‘Do you want us to follow him?’ asked Jaqui Spense.

  ‘No,’ said Jenkins. ‘We need everyone on this now.’

  Chapter Twenty Four

  While Jenkins was busy, Laura was working on her own problems. She decided Arthur could wait. Luckily there had been no repercussions from the parents following his indiscretion yesterday. She would make sure he did not come into school today.

  Shirley had turned up for work, but was very fragile.

  ‘Are you sure you want to be here?’ Laura asked.

  ‘No, I’m not sure of anything, but I wouldn’t be any better at home, would I? If you can put up with me I’d rather be here,’ answered Shirley. Her eyes were red from crying and she looked exhausted.

  ‘Well, let me know if there’s anything I can do,’ Laura said. ‘And if it gets too much for you, just say.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Shirley. ‘Everyone has been so kind.’

  ‘How’s Josh?’ asked Laura.

  ‘He’s really quite upset,’ replied Shirley. ‘He’s stayed off school today. He says he’ll do some revision.’

  ‘Well, I gather he and Richard were quite close,’ said Laura. ‘He’ll miss him.’

  ‘Yes, we both will,’ Shirley replied and Laura kicked herself for making such a stupid comment.

  ‘You must have been very relieved when he turned up.’

  ‘Yes, I was,’ agreed Shirley. ‘I knew he couldn’t have had anything to do with it but you still worry, don’t you? And someone had killed Richard, so they might have killed Josh, too.’

  Laura had to admit she hadn’t thought of that scenario. Shirley must have really been worried sick. An idea was starting to form in her mind of how she might talk to Josh.

  ‘I’m just going for a walk round,’ Laura said to Josie.

  Josie knew this was code for ‘I need to think.’ Laura often wandered round the grounds taking the opportunity for fresh air and a bit of exercise. And when she needed to sort out a problem it was good to get away from her office, although she did take her mobile with her in case Josie needed to be in touch.

  It was another lovely day. April had been cold and showery, much as expected really. She recalled the saying ‘April showers bring forth May flowers’ and that was certainly true this year. The school had an internal quadrangle with a lovely garden in the centre of which was a massive flowering cherry tree. It was in full bloom at the moment and looked magnificent. The pink blooms were complemented by a couple of pink camellias and some Montana clematis trailed over the door frames. As she walked past she reminded herself how fortunate she was to work in such a pleasant environment and how lucky the girls were to attend a school such as this.

  She exited the school buildings on the north side and wandered towards the cottages. With a bit of luck Josh would have emerged from his bed and be revising as his mother thought. She knocked on the door of number three.

  After a few minutes, the door opened slightly and Josh peered round.

  ‘Hi, Josh,’ Laura said brightly. ‘I thought I’d just drop in and see how you were. I’m doing my daily walk round.’

  Laura knew Josh quite well. For the last four or five years he had spent much of his school holidays in the IT department, initially getting under their feet but latterly proving himself invaluable in dealing with problems they encountered. He really was very talented and Laura knew he would go far.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Jessop,’ he replied.

  As he didn’t ask her in, Laura took the lead. ‘Can I come in for a few minutes?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, yes. Sure,’ he replied and stood aside to open the door wide.

  ‘Your mum is very brave coming into school today,’ Laura continued. ‘It can’t have been easy for her.’

  ‘No,’ he agreed. ‘But she likes to keep herself busy.’

  ‘It can’t have been easy for you either, coming home and reading about it in the paper.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I understand you were in London at a gig.’

  ‘Well, it was this festival. They have different bands at several venues. You just wander round really.’

  ‘Was it good?’

  ‘Yes, it was great,’ with very little emotion in his voice.

  Laura could see Josh was struggling and the last thing he wanted to do was to talk to her, but she had come this far and she really needed to carry on.

  ‘So, how are you doing, Josh? Your mum said you weren’t going into school today.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You and Richard had become very close, hadn’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He was very proud of you. He used to tell everyone how good you were with computers.’

  Josh didn’t answer, but Laura noticed a single tear start to make its way down Josh’s cheek. She steeled herself and continued.

  ‘I expect you could teach us all a thing or two,’ she said trying to find the words to ask the questions she needed to ask. She was looking for a clue that she was on the right lines before she plunged in.

  A second tear joined the first, and Josh brushed it away as it tickled his cheek.

  ‘I was reading the other day about that teenager in America who hacked into the banking system and caused havoc. Did you see it?’

  Josh nodded.

  ‘You’d wonder how a teenager could cause so much trouble. Is it easy to hack?’

  Josh didn’t answer, but the tears were flowing freely now. Laura remained silent and waited. Her patience was rewarded.

  ‘It’s all my fault,’ he said finally.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘How can it be your fault?’

  Josh hesitated.

  ‘Richard showed me a picture of Miss Carstairs,’ he said. ‘One of his mates was going to London. He’d had a big win on the horses and wanted a night to remember, so he was looking for a friend to share it with. He found this escort agency and he and Richard were looking at it to choose which girl he should pick. Richard recognised Miss Carstairs.’

  ‘You mean she was one of the escorts?’ asked Laura.

  ‘No,’ said Josh. ‘Well, I mean I don’t know. It was just a photo of her. Anyway, Richard was laughing about it and said he bet she wouldn’t want anyone to know she was a.. a hooker.’

  Josh was embarrassed to use the word to Mrs Jessop, but that was what Richard had said. He seemed to be gaining some relief from talking about what had happened.

  ‘Go on,’ said Laura encouragingly.

  ‘Well, that was that for a while, and then he asked me to help him.’

  ‘Help him how?’

  ‘He said there must be other people on the staff with things to hide. He said
I must be able to find out their secrets because everything was on the internet. And he knew I was coming in to school over the Christmas holidays so he said I could get into the school records. He made it sound like a game, and he was sort of challenging me to see how good I was. He said he bet in a staff of nearly two hundred people there must be lots of secrets.’

  ‘And did you take him up on his challenge?’

  ‘Yes, I did,’ said Josh looking embarrassed. ‘I started with the school records, and then I widened my search on the internet. It’s amazing what you can discover and it all sort of snowballed. But I didn’t know what he was going to do, and then when I found out it was too late.’

  ‘What was he going to do?’ asked Laura.

  ‘After I found out a couple of things he told me Miss Carstairs was paying him to keep quiet. And he said the others would pay as well, and that he could make a lot of money.’

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I was a bit shocked,’ admitted Josh. ‘It had all seemed like a bit of fun. I didn’t know he was going to use the information to blackmail people. I tried to tell him it was wrong, but he just laughed at me. And he said I was involved as well, so I couldn’t tell anyone.’

  ‘But you could have done, at that point,’ Laura said gently. ‘You didn’t know you were doing anything wrong at the time.’

  ‘No, but he said if I told anyone he could go to prison, and mum would never forgive me.’

  More like, Shirley would never forgive Richard, thought Laura. Oh dear, what a mess!

  ‘Do you think Richard was killed because of this?’ Josh asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Laura admitted. ‘It’s possible, although the police have other leads as well.’

  ‘What do I do?’ Josh asked. He looked frightened and a lot younger than his eighteen years. ‘If I hadn’t helped him he might still be alive.’

  ‘Well, I think we shall have to tell the police,’ Laura replied. ‘Do you think you could bear to tell me everything first. If some of my staff are affected I’d like to be prepared to deal with it.’

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Josh was reluctant to share all the information and to admit the extent of his wrongdoing. Laura knew that he might well have to suffer the consequences, but he had come this far. She gradually persuaded him to continue.

  In addition to Stella and the other two staff she knew about, Josh had uncovered three more secrets. Philip Johnson, a member of the mathematics department had a conviction for shoplifting. Laura already knew this as Philip had come to tell her about it at the time. He was a bachelor who lived with his mother and he had been very badly affected by her death a couple of years before. He was prescribed medication for depression and Laura believed that this had been responsible for his behaviour which was so totally out of character. Philip had driven to Carlisle and walked out of Debenhams, the department store, with a duvet cover and two fitted sheets. He told Laura that he didn’t need new bedding and he didn’t know why he had picked them up. He had admitted his crime immediately but had not mentioned his medication preferring just to take his punishment and put it all behind him. He was mortified when he spoke with Laura, and she had admired his courage. To the best of her knowledge no-one else knew of the incident apart from Arthur, with whom she had felt the need to share.