by Janet Neel
Sir Richard Brown, McLeish noted with respect, had effectively effaced himself from this scene. He was a slight man in his fifties, narrow-faced, with mousy brown hair, sitting placidly in an uncomfortable hospital chair. For all his stillness, though, it was like having a nest of machine-guns trained on you.
‘I did not tell you the truth in one particular, Chief Inspector.’ Tears came to Dorothy Vernon’s eyes but she pressed on. ‘It was Bill, not Michael Hamilton, whom I saw coming away from the site offices that evening.’ She looked at his unmoved face. ‘You knew that?’
‘I knew you weren’t telling the truth. What was Bill doing?’
‘He was walking very fast, pulling at his face. I recognized him then – he walks with his toes turned in, it’s very easy to pick out. Then I saw his face clear under the site lights.’
‘You didn’t speak to him?’
‘No. He was looking frightened and angry. So I left it and walked to Clarendon Road and had a drink in the pub there before dinner.’ She pressed her hands together and the diamonds in the rings glittered in the light from the window. ‘He told me, when we were talking yesterday, that he had attacked Nigel but that he hadn’t meant to kill him, he’d just been terrified. He didn’t mean to kill me either, you know.’
McLeish quickly took her through her conversation with Bill, conscious all the time of Sir Richard, who, however, intervened only once, laying the groundwork of his prospective defence by ensuring that McLeish had logged Bill’s reported statement that he had been on his way to telephone for an ambulance for Makin.
She reached the end, obviously exhausted, and McLeish rose to go, saying over her head to Sir Richard that a typed statement would follow, for signature.
‘You’ll convey my apologies to Michael Hamilton,’ Dorothy said, with a recovered gleam of authority. He smiled at her and removed himself and Davidson to the corridor, finding that Sir Richard had followed them out.
‘Will you be charging my client, William Vernon, in connection with the assault on Mr Makin?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I imagine so, when we have Mrs Vernon’s statement signed. You’ll want to be present when I interview him, I take it?’
‘Yes. I wonder, might I have copies of any statements he has made so far?’
‘Certainly.’ McLeish had been ready for this one, and Sir Richard nodded. ‘I understand from Roy Butterworth that you also have a Michael Hamilton in custody, charged with the assault on Mr Makin?’
McLeish was momentarily gravelled, but then it came to him: Sir Richard would undoubtedly have been the first choice for Mickey Hamilton’s well-connected father, but he had been booked for Bill Vernon by the time the phone call came.
‘Yes,’ he confirmed stolidly, and waited, fixing his eye on a cupboard to the right of Sir Richard’s head.
‘Are you considering charges against my client in connection with any other offence?’
‘Considering charges, yes.’ McLeish found himself feeling very young and inexperienced against the formidable presence, and fell back on his training. ‘I’m sorry, I can tell you nothing more at the moment.’
To his enormous relief he became aware of activity in the passage and Bruce Davidson was fidgeting at his side. ‘Excuse me, Sir Richard,’ he said thankfully, and turned to find the uniformed constable indicating that he was urgently required on the phone.
‘Yes?’ he said into the phone which was placed on the Sister’s desk. ‘You haven’t? Oh, well done. Is she sure? What’s she like – all right, is she? How old? Well, she would be older, wouldn’t she, because the kids in shops don’t look at you. Fantastic. Get hold of her – we’ll fix an ID parade at the Scrubs. I’ll speak to the manager. She is the manager? Better yet … Don’t lose her.’
He stuck his head into the corridor and shouted for Bruce Davidson, noticing thankfully that Sir Richard had either rejoined his clients or vanished into thin air. They made for Scotland Yard.
* * *
Across in St Mary’s Hospital, Nigel Makin was out of bed, gingerly testing his ability to walk, when Sally arrived. He kissed her, and felt his head starting to ache again.
‘Sally, how is your mum? I’ve to wait here till I see the consultant.’
‘Recovering.’
She looked pale and drawn, all the colour gone from her face.
‘I know I look awful.’
‘No, you don’t, just a bit tired. What about Bill?’
‘He’s been charged with the attack on Mum. This upmarket lawyer Dad has brought in says he’ll be charged with the attack on you, too. Apparently they haven’t charged him with killing Alan.’ She was watching him carefully. ‘They haven’t charged anyone else either.’
Nigel bit his lip. ‘Sal, it must have been Bill. I know Fraser was in that scam, and if Bill was, too – there’s your motive. I’m sorry, it’s bad for you all.’
‘Dad says the lawyer reckons John McLeish isn’t sure about it.’
‘Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he? Two assaults are bad enough, but it must be better if he can keep Bill off a murder charge.’ He sat down on the bed, looking for the bell, as his headache became suddenly worse, then said abruptly: ‘Jesus, they don’t suspect you, do they, Sal?’
‘I don’t know what John thinks. He is clever, just as Francesca said. She’s not rung me up, you know.’
‘Well, she can’t really, can she? She can’t interfere with the boyfriend’s work.’ He watched her anxiously as she sat picking at her nails. ‘Or is it me they suspect?’
Her head came up and she blushed. ‘I really don’t know, Nigel, but Dad’s arranged with our new lawyer that you should use someone else in another firm.’
‘I didn’t do it.’ Nigel was outraged. ‘I could willingly have killed Alan, but I didn’t.’ He hesitated. ‘I’d still like to marry you,’ he said to his counterpane, and looked up to find her weeping. ‘Oh, Sal. Don’t. It’ll be all right.’
‘Wait until you’re better, Nigel.’ Sally wouldn’t look at him and he withdrew his hand.
‘Sorry, I’d better go and see Mum. I’ll be back later.’ She hesitated but did not kiss him, and he watched her go through a headache that seemed to have taken over his whole body.
Half an hour away, at the Scrubs, the elaborate preparations for an identity parade were being made.
‘No, I must have both of them,’ John McLeish was trying hard to control acute anxiety. ‘If he isn’t well enough today, we’ll have to postpone it. What’s the lawyer say?’
‘Well, he isn’t keen, but I think he’ll play. John, could you come and have a look at the other people we’ve got lined up? It’s not the easiest specification, but we’ve got two of the uniformed branch, one at the CID here, and we’re borrowing two from up the road.’
McLeish plunged into the perennial problem of all identity parades, which is how to secure enough people of at least superficial resemblance to the accused to constitute a parade.
‘I hate these things,’ Davidson confided moodily. ‘Particularly with two high-priced lawyers here, shouting the odds.’
‘They’re both here?’
‘Yes. Engaging in polite legal chit-chat, weighing each other up. Asking for you.’
‘OK. Get the uniformed lads into civvies. The cars are on their way. I’ll go and have a word with the briefs.’ He took a deep breath and plunged into the waiting room to greet Sir Richard and the smaller, plumper Roy Butterworth, who was younger and noisier but no less formidable. He took them both to another room where they could observe the parade and sat there beside them, leaving Davidson to do the organizing. Hardly breathing, he watched as the parade formed up, his eyes on the man he was certain in his own mind had succeeded, at his second attempt, in getting rid of the threat to his future represented by Alan Fraser.
Davidson shepherded in Mrs Sylvia Williams, who was a tall woman, big-boned, black-haired and nicely dressed, and stood back to let her go down the line. McLeish, who had met her earlier and thought s
he would make a good witness, sat absolutely still and prayed. She went down the line of eight men, all six foot or more, all dark, all in their late twenties or early thirties, and he observed with one part of his mind that Davidson had done well, even if one of the policemen did appear to be standing to attention. Sylvia Williams was stopping in front of each man, taking a careful look as she had been instructed. McLeish stopped breathing as she took an extra few seconds or so in front of Bill Vernon, but she passed on steadily and finished the row.
McLeish shot out of the room, nodding to the lawyers, and arrived in the little room to which Sylvia Williams had been taken.
‘Did you recognize anyone?’ he asked.
‘I was just telling the sergeant here … I knew him straight away, but I looked carefully at everyone, just as you asked.’
‘Thank you very much.’ McLeish smiled down at her and she smiled back at him hopefully, pink with excitement. ‘You’ve been a tremendous help. We’ll ask you to sign a statement now, and then it’s over until the case comes to court.’
He sent her off with Davidson and stood for a moment, feeling literally sick with rage. He waited until he had himself in hand, then walked back to the little room where both lawyers were waiting, both silent now.
‘Mr Butterworth, could I have a word?’ He held the door for the smaller man and took him to a next-door office. ‘Mrs Williams has identified your client as the person who bought a blue-and-white thermos flask on the morning of Alan Fraser’s death.’
‘Thank you, Chief Inspector.’ Butterworth had understood immediately but was far too experienced to give away any points. ‘I had understood from Sir Richard that the existing charges against my client in connection with the attack on Nigel Makin would be dropped.’
‘That is correct. It is in connection with the death of Alan Fraser that I expect to be making a charge. You can see your client, but we will oppose any application for his release. He has not been told yet, of course, that he was identified by Mrs Williams.’
But Mickey Hamilton had known, McLeish thought murderously; he had flinched when he saw her, he’d remembered who she was.
He arranged for both lawyers to see their customers, feeling less than satisfied. ‘Difficult in court, these ID parades. You could see the briefs working out how to rubbish it.’ Bruce Davidson sounded just like the voice inside McLeish’s own head.
They both looked up, startled, as an apparition in black oilskins appeared in the doorway. The figure peeled off a motor-cycling helmet to reveal himself as DC Woolner, who wordlessly held out a plastic bag containing a blue-and-white thermos.
‘Bottom of the skip at the back of the site offices, sir. We did the prints straightaway – Alan Fraser’s and Michael Hamilton’s!’
‘Oh, good man, well done!’ He took the package from him, sniffed the air thoughtfully, and Woolner stepped back.
‘All sorts of rubbish in that skip, sir.’
‘Honest dirt. Go and have a shower, and well done.’ He waited till Woolner had left before he and Davidson grinned at each other briefly. ‘I want that one, Bruce. We’ll have him at the Yard, even though they’ll hate my guts at Edgware Road.’ He paused. ‘It’s there, isn’t it? Even with a good brief?’
Davidson chewed the inside of his cheeks. ‘There or thereabouts, John. I’d like something a bit more.’
‘If it takes me the rest of my life,’ McLeish said calmly.
‘So Bill has been charged with both attacks?’
Francesca and John McLeish were eating lunch in the tiny café opposite the entrance to New Scotland Yard, just Over twenty-four hours later. Bill Vernon had appeared that morning in front of magistrates on a second charge: attempted murder of Nigel Makin. He had been remanded in custody because of the seriousness of the charge.
‘Yes. Makin is coming out of hospital tomorrow, and will be back with the firm after a rest, to be chief executive. Sally’s going with him on his convalescence.’
Francesca stopped eating, and gaped at him. ‘But she was in love with Alan Fraser.’
‘Who didn’t want to marry her.’
Francesca opened her mouth to speak, and closed it again, her sequence of thought written all over her face.
‘Makin hadn’t got round to suspecting Bill Vernon of the fiddle at all, interestingly, because he was looking so hard for traces of Alan Fraser.’
‘Of whom he was, reasonably, very jealous.’
‘Yes, and for whom he had considerable respect. He said to me that Alan was a good tradesman as well as a good climber, though an arrogant bastard. He didn’t reckon much to Bill Vernon at all.’
‘Neither did I,’ Francesca said soberly. ‘But I suppose he only wanted one thing – his farm in Scotland.’ She looked at him, anxiously, wondering how to go on, and decided to be brave. ‘And are you getting any closer to pinning Mr Hamilton down?’
‘We know what happened. He decided in Scotland to have a go at Alan, probably on impulse, and took the first jacket at hand to disguise himself a bit. He ditched the jacket because he had seen us below and guessed, quite correctly, that you had seen him. He’d left about half a fingerprint on a piece of paper inside it. He loved Alan, who didn’t love him in the same way. And he was bitterly jealous.’
‘Because Alan was the better climber?’
‘And, as we now know, because he was the more effective organizer. Alan was the one who got the book written, he set up the fiddle on the sites and he got the lion’s share of the cash.’
‘He knew what he wanted, did Alan,’ Francesca said, reflectively, ‘and was prepared to hustle to get it. He really didn’t believe the world owed him a living, whereas Mickey did – does.’
‘Then Mickey made another, successful attempt in London. He thought, quite correctly, that I was coming to warn Alan. There must have been a leak from Scotland.’
‘You can hear it, can’t you?’ Francesca agreed. ‘Everyone within twenty-five miles knows everything up there and Mickey only needed to have rung up for a gossip to get it all. Not your fault, darling; I don’t see how you could have avoided that. Even if you hadn’t been known to be coming to the site, Mickey would still have had another go. Alan was still in his way.’
‘I think that’s right.’ McLeish sounded calm, and she held his hand, relieved. ‘No, I made myself miserable for a few days there, but he was quite obsessed and he was going to try again, anyway.’
‘Will you get a conviction without a confession?’
‘Maybe. We’ve got a lot of good circumstantial evidence. But I’d prefer a confession. The prison doc says he’s in an anxiety state, so he can stay in a small room with a West Indian nutter till he tells us.’
Francesca blinked, but decided not to comment. ‘Meanwhile you have to go to Scotland and explain?’
‘Yes. Can you come too? I’ll have to spend a day in Glasgow, and half a day in Carrbrae, but we could go on to Culdaig afterwards, if you don’t mind the driving?’
‘Of course I’ll come – you won’t like it on your own.’
Epilogue
John McLeish stood at the entrance to the VIP lounge at Heathrow Airport, Bruce Davidson at his shoulder, contemplating the tableau presented to him. Francesca, Perry and Tristram were standing, their attention fixed on the television which hung from the ceiling in the centre of the vast room, Perry’s arm round his sister’s shoulders and Francesca’s left hand tucked into the crook of Tristram’s elbow. Most of the lounge was watching them, but the trio was unconscious of any scrutiny, totally absorbed in the screen. They looked ridiculously like each other and utterly selfcontained, Perry’s bodyguard-cum-driver waiting behind them. McLeish, knowing it could only be music that was holding their attention, moved quietly to see what it was.
‘Handel or near offer,’ Perry observed to his siblings, without taking his eyes off the screen on which someone in knee-breeches and a frock-coat was, confusingly, declaring his love in a high, clear voice to a young woman conventionally clad in a
ball-dress.
‘It is Handel, peasant. An opera called Xerxes,’ Tristram said. ‘The counter-tenor is the king’s brother.’
‘Not very easy,’ Perry observed. ‘And most unfair to tenors.’
‘Not much fun for counter-tenors – I mean, darling, they were castrati,’ his sister pointed out.
‘Ah, there’s his brother, the king.’ McLeish felt Bruce Davidson stir uneasily beside him as another character clad in the same sort of knee-breeches and frock-coat, but blatantly female this time, emerged on to the screen.
‘Now, why isn’t he a counter-tenor?’ Francesca wondered aloud, as the newcomer launched into a declaration of undying love for the same begowned young woman.
‘Oh Frannie, can’t have a king played by someone not quite all there, as it were – or not in those days. Lèse majesté,’ Tristram said, reproachfully.
McLeish, deciding this could go on all day, leaned forward and tapped Francesca on the shoulder. ‘We need to get over to the Glasgow shuttle service.’
‘Sorry, darling, is that the time? Quick, everyone.’
‘Are the boys coming too?’ McLeish sounded openly dismayed and Bruce Davidson managed to turn a giggle into a cough.
‘No, darling, they’re both doing a concert in Berlin tomorrow. I was just keeping them company while they wait for their flight.’
‘Nice to see you, John, however briefly,’ Perry said, punctiliously. He hesitated. ‘I’m glad you got him – the murderer, I mean, but I don’t suppose it’s much consolation. Was it because of the lorry fiddle that Alan was killed? Or can’t you say?’
McLeish looked round carefully, but the Wilsons and their attendants were the only people within earshot. A bold spirit, seeing the Wilsons diverted, had substituted East Enders for Handel, effectively distracting attention from them.
‘No, it was because of K6. Hamilton has now made a statement.’
‘Pure anxiety,’ Tristram volunteered. ‘Mickey saw a chance and thought he would never get it again – or at least not at a time when he so needed it. What I don’t understand is why Alan stole money from Vernons.’
