‘What do you have to hide, sir?’ asks Carr.
‘Inspector, if I’d killed my wife, which is something you evidently suspect, do you think I’d have hoarded incriminating evidence for over thirteen years, cart it from one home to another, just so you could find it now? No. It’s just that I know what sort of mess your chaps can make, and I don’t want my family to be distressed needlessly.’
‘Did you kill your wife?’ asks Hook.
The question is posed so suddenly and in such a conversational manner that, when Steele grins, it seems perfectly natural.
‘No, superintendent, I did not,’ he replies, meeting his interrogators’ eyes with what seems absolute candour. ‘I tell you, there were times when she’d have tried anyone’s patience to the limit. She provoked me to the point where sometimes … I didn’t know how to cope with her. She was vicious, hurtful — to me and to the children — and unreasonable, but I never so much as raised my hand to her.’
‘You don’t seem particularly sorry that she’s dead,’ comments Carr.
‘Perhaps I’m not. She made our lives an absolute misery for a long time. I’ve always been worried that she’d suddenly reappear on the doorstep, which would’ve caused dreadful distress to everyone. As far as I’m concerned, it’s as if we’d been divorced for the last thirteen years. Whatever love I bore her has died, I suppose.’
‘Can you explain then why the floorboards of what was your bedroom have been saturated with human blood?’ demands Carr.
Coming at what appears to be right at the end of the interview, and with no warning, the question is deeply shocking and the room rings with the silence that follows.
‘Blood?’ whispers Steele, his eyes wide. He disengages as he pauses, his eyes losing focus for a moment. His attention slowly returns to the room and he shakes his head. ‘No, I can’t. We only lived there for, what? Six or seven years I suppose. The house is over a hundred years old.’
‘Did you not see the blood, on the floor, the walls, the ceiling?’
‘Obviously not, or I’d have reported it.’
‘But when you were decorating, you would have taken the carpets up.’
‘No. Someone would have taken the carpets up, but not me. I don’t like that sort of thing, and I have better things to do. Either I or my wife would have employed decorators.’
‘Are you able to give us the names of the people you used?’
Steele shrugs. ‘Possibly, but I doubt it. They were probably locals. I might still have some bills at home, but I expect everything relating to the old house was thrown out when we moved.’
‘So you never stripped off wallpaper in your bedroom, or applied new wallpaper?’
Steele shakes his head.
‘I’m sorry, sir, but may I have a verbal answer?’ asks Carr.
‘The answer is “No”.’
‘You never stained and re-polished the floor in your bedroom?’
‘No.’
‘Did anyone you employed for that job inform you that there were stains on the floorboards?’
‘No.’
Steele leans back in his chair and stretches. ‘You have to understand, gentlemen; I was away on circuit a great deal. My wife, for all her faults, was very house-proud, certainly in the first few years. I would frequently return to find decorations changed, new carpets or curtains, new lights, rooms changed round and so on.’
‘That sounds expensive,’ comments Hook.
‘Not for a barrister with a busy practice,’ says Steele simply. ‘I earned double then what I do now.’
‘Is that so?’ asks Hook with some doubt.
‘Ask anyone in the Lord Chancellor’s department what judges in the Supreme Court earn. I gave up a very good practice.’ Steele watches the Superintendent’s face, and laughs again. ‘Destroyed one of your theories, have I? That I killed her for money?’
‘Not at all, sir,’ replies Hook with great politeness. ‘I didn’t think that. But having a wife such as yours could not have been an advantage when seeking promotion.’
Steele answers more seriously. ‘I really don’t know how the Lord Chancellor views these things. Some of my brother judges have appalling wives, no doubt, while others are angels. What difference that makes to a chap’s ability with the law or in deciding issues of fact, I really don’t know.’
Hook looks at Carr, and then at Jones. Jones nods. ‘I think we should have a short break,’ says Hook.
Jones speaks for the first time. ‘We shall leave you here for a moment, if you don’t mind.’
‘Not at all,’ replies Steele. ‘I would like a fresh cup of tea though. I never got round to drinking this one.’
‘Certainly.’
The three interviewers troop out and enter an adjoining room. Carr picks up a telephone and asks for a cup of tea for Steele.
‘He’s extremely confident,’ says Jones.
‘More than he was,’ replies Carr. ‘You weren’t in at the start, but he was concentrating hard then, very cautious, very careful not to make a slip.’
‘But so what?’ says Hook, impatiently. ‘That could be explained by nervousness, or his training, or both. This isn’t much fun, even if you’re innocent. I’d want to keep a cool head.’
‘Do you have anything else you want to ask now?’ asks Jones of the superintendent. The close-mouthed man shakes his head. ‘You?’ asks Jones, turning to Carr.
Inspector Carr shrugs. ‘I feel like I’m wrestling with one arm behind my back. In all my time in the force, I’ve never been so polite during an interview!’
‘How often have you interviewed one of England’s top judges? OK. Let’s call it a night, let him have a few hours’ sleep, and come back to it fresh. If nothing else occurs to us by then, we’ll thank him for his assistance and get him taken home. I’ll speak to Holborne in the meantime, see if he’s got any ideas.’
They return to the interview room. The judge has been provided with a fresh cup of tea which, this time, he is drinking. He lowers it to address Jones.
‘We’ve not been introduced,’ says the judge, standing formally, and towering over the diminutive solicitor.
‘My name’s Jones. I’m a solicitor employed by the Metropolitan Police.’
The two men shake hands and the judge resumes his seat.
‘Essex, Cumberland and now the Met? Surely the involvement of three forces is hardly an efficient use of resources?’
‘I’m sure you’re right, Sir Anthony,’ replies Jones in his squeaky North American voice. ‘Kent is in the process of creating its own internal prosecution department, but presently has to outsource legal advice from one of its local solicitors. My superiors offered my services to Kent as I’ve been overseeing the case since your wife’s body was discovered.’
Jones resumes his seat and scans the faces in the room. The judge looks the freshest of all of them. No doubt he’s relieved at the way the questions are going — anyone would be relieved at the end of a long interview on a subject as dangerous as this, acknowledges Jones to himself — but he fancies he can detect something beyond relief. Something in the mocking angle of an eyebrow, the slightly too-ready smile and the relaxed posture, speak of triumph.
‘I have decided to adjourn this interview until later this morning,’ says Superintendent Hook. ‘I would like you to have some sleep, and while you do we shall be taking legal advice.’
‘Are you asking me to stay in the police station?’ asks Steele, the smile now as conspicuous by its absence as it was moments earlier by its presence.
‘I am prepared to have you taken home, if that is your wish. However, I want to start again soon, so I doubt you’d get much sleep before being collected again. Alternatively, you can remain here in the interview room. We can find you clean blankets and a pillow,’ replies Hook.
Steele takes a deep breath and looks around him. ‘I’m sure I could manage,’ he says uncertainly. ‘I slept in worse places in the Navy.’
Inspector Carr leans t
owards Hook and whispers.
‘Yes,’ says Hook. ‘Good idea. I’m prepared to authorise the obtaining of an hotel room for the rest of the night. You could have a few hours’ sleep, eat breakfast, and return refreshed when your solicitor is available.’
‘That’s a better solution,’ agrees Steele. ‘Thank you, superintendent. I would appreciate that.’
CHAPTER 10
Charles is again woken by the telephone. At least this time he’s in bed. As he reaches for the receiver, he looks at the alarm clock on the bedside cabinet: 6:50 a.m.
‘Sorry to disturb you so early, Mr Holborne,’ says Jones’s voice, ‘but I didn’t want you to remain on standby.’
‘Not to worry,’ replies Charles, his voice still gravelly from sleep.
‘I didn’t call back last night because we didn’t have the suspect until very late.’
Charles sits up. ‘Did you interview him?’
‘We did. He’s at an hotel at present. His solicitor’s been in touch and will be here at eight. We plan to resume then, although I think we’ve run out of questions. He’ll have been advised not to answer anyway.’
‘What did he have to say?’
Jones repeats quickly the important parts of the judge’s interview. ‘Also,’ he adds, before finishing, ‘some further statements came in yesterday evening. I’m sending copies to chambers but there’s not much to them, just stuff about the plastic sheeting and the blood.’
‘And?’
‘Both dead ends. The blood’s human, but can’t be grouped. It’s too old. We can’t even say with any degree of precision when it was spilled.’
‘Define “precision”.’
‘It might have been there before the deceased died. On the other hand, it might have got there some time afterwards.’
‘So we have a body with no obvious marks of injury which used to live in a house with bloodstains of indeterminate age and source,’ concludes Charles.
‘Yes.’
‘And what’s more, we can’t even prove that the bloodstains occurred before or after the deceased died.’
‘Yes. What do you think?’
‘Bloody hopeless. It’s suspicious, but no more than that. It could be a complete coincidence. If you’re asking me whether I would recommend a prosecution on this evidence, the answer’s definitely “No”. The character of the deceased and her risky behaviour make that a double-no. George Carman would tear it to shreds.’
‘That’s what I expected you to say. We’re going to have to release him.’
‘Probably. Did you pursue a search warrant for his present home?’
‘I decided we’d be unlikely to persuade a magistrate we had enough to issue a warrant. He didn’t move there until a year or so after the wife went missing. As he pointed out, he’s hardly likely to have preserved damning evidence all this time just for us to find.’
‘I agree.’
Jones falls silent for a moment. ‘You know, the two policemen in the interview found him very convincing.’
‘You didn’t?’
‘I don’t know. I have a gut feeling there’s more about it than he’s telling. That doesn’t necessarily mean I think he did it, but … something’s not quite right.’
‘But “Something’s not quite right” won’t persuade any judge or jury.’
‘Exactly. So, I think that’s it. We’ll start looking elsewhere. Maybe there were other boyfriends we can interview. In any case, get your clerk to send in a fee note.’
‘I will. Thank you.’
‘No, thank you, Mr Holborne. Your views have been very helpful. I’m just sorry there’s to be no brief in it at the end of the day.’
He says his farewells and hangs up. Charles thinks about trying to grab another hour’s sleep, but the sun is pouring through the windows, the traffic noise is building and he’s now completely awake. He has a committal starting the following Monday and making an early start on the prep would probably be a good idea. He climbs out of bed and pads to the kitchen to make coffee.
By just after half past seven, Charles is walking under the arch into the Temple and is the first into Chambers. The rooms are unusually quiet and it is almost lunchtime before he hears any other voices on his floor.
Feeling virtuous for having worked solidly for five hours, he decides to treat himself to lunch in Hall and wanders over to Middle Temple. It takes his eyes a few seconds to adjust from the bright afternoon sunshine to the gloom inside the Tudor hall. The long trestle tables gleam with glass and silverware, and the smell of roasting meat makes Charles’s mouth water.
He installs himself on an empty bench at the far end of Hall with his back to the wood panels bearing the coats of arms of distinguished sons of the Inn and gives his order to the waitress. Hall fills with gossiping barristers, many still in court robes grabbing a quick bite during the short adjournment before rushing back to the Royal Courts of Justice. The spaces on the benches next to and opposite Charles are taken by a group of planning barristers all involved in the same case. Charles smiles at a couple whom he knows slightly but other than to pass water, wine and condiments when requested, he doesn’t communicate with the group. He finishes his meal swiftly and returns to Chambers.
By afternoon tea he has finished preparing his brief, and after a quick word with Barbara he slips away.
Two hours later, Charles sits in his battered MG sportscar outside his brother’s home in Hendon. He’s been there for fifteen minutes, not moving from the car. He’s seen his mother through the lounge window and so knows his parents have already arrived. Eventually he takes a deep breath, leans across to the glove box and takes out his yarmulke, the same one in which he was bar mitzvah over twenty years before, reaches behind him for the bunch of flowers to be given to Sonia, and climbs out of the car.
As he walks up the path, the door opens to greet him. David stands on the threshold, grinning.
‘I’d been wondering how long it was going to take you to get out of the car,’ he says. ‘Sonia and I have been laying bets on whether you’d drive off again.’
‘Really?’
‘No, not really. No one but me knows you’ve been lurking.’
‘“Lurking?” I’ve not been lurking,’ protests Charles, laughing.
He hugs his younger brother with warmth and stands back to appraise him.
Charles’s build, olive skin and dark colouring proclaim his Semitic heritage. David, on the other hand, is taller, slimmer and fair-skinned, with grey eyes and light brown hair which, as a boy, had been almost white-blonde. His Aryan looks had even raised eyebrows at the Horowitz’s synagogue when he was first taken in to be shown off. One blabbermouthed woman, no longer welcome in the Horowitz household, had been heard to joke that Millie Horowitz must have been raped by a Cossack, but two of Millie’s uncles had similar colouring, as she swiftly points out to anyone who comments.
‘You look happy,’ says Charles, fishing.
‘Coming in?’ replies David, not taking the bait.
Charles follows David into the kitchen, bypassing the door to the lounge from whence he can hear his father’s voice, and delaying the inevitable meeting a few seconds longer. Sonia, wearing an apron, is loading a tray with food to be taken into the dining room. The room smells of warm bread and freshly fried fish. She turns to greet her brother-in-law.
‘Hello Charles,’ she says softly, and kisses him on both cheeks.
Sonia is more handsome than beautiful, with a full figure, dark hair and soft brown eyes. Charles is envious of his younger brother’s luck. Charles would not have wanted to marry a Jewish girl — he is still too conflicted about his parents’ religion and stifling culture which he long ago rejected — but he sees how perfectly suited are David and Sonia, how comfortable together. When speaking to one another, they frequently have no need to finish their sentences because each knows the other’s mind so well. That’s what happens, thinks Charles ruefully, when you pick someone with the same background, attitudes, e
xpectations and interests.
More than once, particularly after Henrietta’s death and more still after David and Sonia married, Charles had toyed with the idea of looking within his parents’ community for a partner, and each time had rejected the idea. He knew he couldn’t fake an interest in a god and in a religion, especially one with such all-pervasive festivals, customs and rituals. He would have left any committed Jewish wife deeply disappointed and isolated. So all of Millie and Harry’s hopes and expectations for the next generation have shifted from their first-born son to their second. If there are to be joyous Jewish celebrations, high days and holy days, Charles will only ever be a guest, never a celebrant.
Charles hands Sonia the flowers. She inclines her head to the voices of her parents-in-law which can be heard from the adjoining room.
‘Want me to hold your hand?’ she asks, with a wink.
Sonia knew Charles by reputation before the Horowitzes and her parents decided that she and David should meet. The East End Jewish community is small, and everyone knew of the local tough guy who won the DFC in the war flying Spitfires, won a scholarship to Cambridge, and then turned his back on his community. He was the one who had married out — the daughter of a Viscount, no less! — and with whom the family had broken all contact.
It had concerned her; what if the younger brother was the same? But then she met David, who proved to be tall, handsome and kind. He was the gentlest of men and deeply devoted to his family and his religion.
Sonia hadn’t understood at first when people said that Millie Horowitz was scary; she met only a small, upright, well turned-out woman with eyes of flint that missed nothing. However, in the months before the marriage arranged by their parents, she was able to observe for herself the bile directed by Millie Horowitz at her firstborn, even in absentia, and began to understand it all too well. Millie was not a person to whom one could warm easily. Intelligent, articulate and capable of reducing those around her to helpless laughter, she harboured a deep lake of bitterness whose only expression appeared to be disappointment with Charles and all his life choices. She would never let it go; Charles had committed an unforgivable and personal betrayal at which Millie worried and fretted constantly, like a terrier with a rag.
The Waxwork Corpse: A legal thriller with a chilling twist (Charles Holborne Legal Thrillers Book 5) Page 9
