by David Barry
After her shower, unable to make up her mind what to wear, she tried on three different sets of clothes, and finally decided to wear the first thing she thought of, a peppermint low cut top and white denims. She was admiring herself in the mirror when the doorbell rang. She glanced at her watch and frowned. Jason wasn’t due for another hour. Panicking, she hurriedly brushed her hair and sprayed perfume on her neck. Then, as the doorbell ran again insistently, she rushed downstairs.
She was surprised to find two of them standing in the porch, holding up their identification, as if this was a scene from some television crime drama. The older of the two, although he couldn’t have been more than thirty-something, enquired, ‘Nicola Ingbarton?’
Puzzled, she nodded dumbly, wondering if this was something to do with her date.
‘I’m Detective Sergeant Ryland, and this is Detective Constable Swade. I wonder if we could have a word with you?’
‘Yes, of course,’ she said, in a small frightened voice. She took them into the living room and they both sat next to each other on the two-seater sofa. The older one sat leaning slightly forward, while the younger of the two leaned back and produced a notebook and pen from his suit pocket. She sat in an armchair immediately opposite them. The detective sergeant cleared his throat before speaking.
‘Do you work for Instant First Insurance?’
Nicky nodded. ‘Yes, I’ve been there about eighteen months. What’s this all about?’
‘And how well do you know your work colleague Savita Kapoor?’
Nicky hesitated, sensing there was something very wrong. ‘I ... er ... I know her quite well. We’re friends at work. We often have lunch together. Why? What’s wrong?’
The sergeant exchanged a brief look with his colleague before answering. ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Miss Kapoor was found dead on Tunbridge Wells common this morning.’
Nicky felt something awful stirring inside her, like a hand clutching at her heart. ‘But when ... I mean how....’ she began, uncertain of how she could express herself.
Realising she was at a loss, the detective decided he could be open with her. After all, she was hardly a suspect, just someone who could help with their enquiries.
‘We think she was murdered. It looks like she was strangled.’
Nicky could contain herself no longer, and she choked back the tears, apologising to them for her reaction.
‘It’s OK,’ the detective told her, as he watched the tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘I’m just sorry to be the bearer of such news. But we need to move quickly on this one. Do you know her boyfriend by any chance?’
Nicky nodded. ‘Does he know?’
‘Yes. Apparently he works for a travel company, and he had left for the middle east, probably some time after she was murdered.’
Horrified, Nicky wiped away the tears with the back of her hand, and said, ‘You don’t think he had anything to do with it?’
‘We’ve managed to get in touch with him and he’s on his way back. How well did you know Miss Kapoor. Her background and history, I mean?’
Nicky shrugged. ‘Well, I think she and her parents were born in this country....’
‘But her boyfriend wasn’t Asian, was he?’
Nicky shook her head.
‘So was she on good terms with her family over her relationship with him?’
Suddenly, Nicky realised what the detective was driving at, and said, ‘I don’t think her family would have objected to the relationship, if that’s what you mean.’
‘Were they Muslim?’
‘No, I think they were Catholic.’
‘Well, was there anyone else, in your opinion, that might have wanted her dead?’
Nicky hesitated, and in her mind she could see Malcolm’s face looming like a hideous beast of prey.
‘Miss Ingbarton?’ prompted the detective.
Then she told them about Malcolm. And when she got to the bit about them setting up their boss to make him think they were going to have a threesome, she could feel herself colouring, and she couldn’t look at either of the detectives. She felt their eyes boring into her and the atmosphere was electric. After a brief pause while they digested this information, and she could hear the DC scribbling on his notepad, the sergeant said:
‘What happened? Did she carry out her threat and expose her boss?’
Tearfully, Nicky explained, ‘I didn’t want her to. Neither did Philip. And Philip thought it was dangerous, destroying his career and his marriage. He thought Malcolm would have nothing left to lose.’
The detective sergeant rose hurriedly, as did his colleague, snapping shut his notebook.
‘Look, thanks for your help. We’d like you to be of further assistance, but for now....’ He took out his mobile as he moved towards the door. ‘We need to get over to your ex boss’s house.’
***
Two squad cars and the detective inspector in charge of the case screeched to a halt outside Malcolm’s house in Southborough. After an urgent, insistent ringing of the doorbell, his wife opened the door. When she saw the police, her eyes widened in disbelief.
‘Mrs. Ellison. Is your husband home?’
‘He left, and he hasn’t come back. I told him to go. Filthy animal. What’s happened to him? Nothing too trivial I hope.’
‘Any idea where he might have gone?’
She shook her head, and as she did, she noticed something a little way down the street. ‘That’s his car. He’s parked it a little way down the street. Probably hoping I wouldn’t notice. He’s probably spent the night in his bolthole.’
‘His bolthole?’
‘Yes, he built his outhouse from masses of old pallets. Often, if we had an argument, he’d spend the night there.’
‘Mind if we take a look?’
‘Of course not.’
They traipsed through the house, out through the kitchen, and into the long, narrow back garden. At the end of the lawn were some apple trees, and behind these stood a large timber building with several windows. As they neared the shed, they could see the outline of a human form, a dark shadow through the glass.
As the detective threw open the door, he said, ‘You’d better not come in Mrs. Ellison. Quickly. Someone find a knife and cut him down.’
But they could all see that it was useless trying to revive him. The boss from hell was dead.
Sixty - Five
Forensic evidence revealed that Savita Kapoor was raped and strangled on Tunbridge Wells Common, and the DNA tests proved that the perpetrator was Malcolm Ellison, as if anyone could have had any doubt about his guilt.
The daily papers and the Sundays carried front page stories of the murder, and for days Tunbridge Wells swarmed with reporters and paparazzi trying to milk as much as they could from the story. Sheila Ellison, much to her children’s disgust, sold her exclusive story to one of the tabloids, exaggerating her husband’s animal lusts and habits between the sheets, thus justifying the hefty sum the tabloid was paying her.
Savita’s funeral service was held at a Catholic church in Wembley. Nicky took the day off work to attend, but was worried about meeting Savita’s parents and relatives, since all the newspapers ran the picture and story of the way Malcolm had been set up when he anticipated a threesome. At the last minute, she changed her mind about going, and went instead to St. Augustine’s Catholic Church in Crescent Road, where she knelt and said a prayer for her friend and colleague, and lit a candle for her. Feeling slightly guilty for her cowardice, she walked aimlessly through Calverley Park, then sat on a bench and toyed with her mobile. She sent Jason a text message, telling him she missed him. He had his own business, as a central heating engineer, and she thought he was probably at work and wouldn’t respond quickly. But he responded in less than three minutes. His text message
said:
Like 2 cheer u up babe
cum 2 my place 2nite &
b my lover. all u have 2
say is yes. luv Jason xx
She deliberated for less than a minute, then sent him a text in the affirmative. The die was cast. She was committed. She put the recent events behind her, brushed them away like so many niggling doubts and troubling thoughts. Now life was moving on.
***
As Tunbridge Wells shopping centre teems with shoppers going in and out of the Victoria Centre, anyone watching the monitors of the CCTV security cameras will see nothing more than another uneventful, typical Saturday afternoon, pretty much like the previous one, and the one before that; people going about their business and spending money. However, keen observers of body language might notice Nigel and Jackie, standing outside Argos, having a quarrel over something as trivial as the empty yoghurt pot Jackie had abandoned on the coffee table in Nigel’s house because she didn’t want to miss the start of an episode of Silent Witness. Nigel was peeved to discover that Jackie, who had implied that she watched little television, was in fact quite addicted to many programmes, and the strain of the impending marriage is beginning to take its toll.
Do CCTV cameras single out Dave Whitby, who stands outside Superdrug? He looks like a man loitering with intent. But the reason for his shifty demeanour is the recent argument he’s had with Mary over his intention to do a six week summer season in Blackpool. Now she is part of his life, she has objected to him leaving her to cope on her own. ‘Tough!’ he said. ‘It’s what I do for a living.’ And this had erupted into a major scene, followed by sulks, and a refusal to follow her and her sons into Superdrug. He shuffles about, like a man with something to hide, hands deep in pockets, head sunk low, unaware that we can all be seen by the myriad cameras in our shopping centres, and without the Big Brother element of sound, our demeanours are open to any interpretation.
But no CCTV observer would have been suspicious of Nicky and her new boyfriend, as they stop outside HMV in the Victoria Centre. They look like many a young couple in love as they exchange lingering kisses. Now that their relationship has been consummated, not only are they blissfully unaware of the Big Brother presence of shopping mall security cameras, they don’t even notice the people around them as they hold each other close, lost inside their own sensual world.
Because there are so many shoppers milling about in the centre, no camera can actually single out Vanessa. Unless it is with an imaginary telephoto lens of a feature film camera zooming in on her as she heads towards HMV where she is bound to bump into the young lovers. She stops and the camera goes in tight on her face. This female Cain, who has no boyfriend at the moment, is consumed with jealousy as she watches her younger sister kissing the rather good looking Jason.
Avoiding them, she dashes into Marks and Spencer’s, hurries through the store and out the other side, then goes round to Criminal Records, where she can probably by the latest Coldplay album a few pounds cheaper anyway.
On her way through the precinct, she doesn’t notice the middle-aged couple gazing into the window of Mothercare. Anyone focusing a camera on Ted and Marjorie couldn’t fail to notice his hangdog look, sharply contrasted with her assertive body language as she discusses her plans, and it is obvious as he nods absently that his mind is elsewhere. Perhaps it is in an antique shop in the Pantiles, where Donald is giving a potential customer his best price on a china teapot.
Any camera able to pan across from Mothercare over to Starbucks, would pass Maggie and Craig, sitting on stools in the window, heavily discussing their plans to sell Craig’s fish and chip shop. Like Ted, he nods while Maggie does most of the talking. He is reluctant to join his sister in this venture, but feels he has no choice.
If the same camera were to track on a dolly, rounding the corner from the precinct into Monson Road, it would pick up on Claire and Mike, standing outside a travel agent’s. Naturally, he is unaware that his ex-lover is less than a hundred yards away, drinking a medium cappuccino. But now he is reconciled with his wife, and they have just exited the travel agent, having booked a fortnight in Crete. He holds his plastered right hand up in front of her and grins, asking her to be gentle with him. She kisses him briefly and lightly on the lips, and he reflects on his dissatisfaction with life in general, and is now also reconciled with the realisation that he has returned to the ordinariness of his life, which is perhaps as it should be. His plastered hand is a reminder that he now wants his life to be uneventful.
But the man responsible for his recent pain is not far away, standing in the queue by the checkout at Tesco Metro. Having wrapped the few groceries he is buying, he hands the checkout girl a ten pound note. As soon as she opens the till, he leans over and snatches the notes, then - abandoning the groceries - he legs it out of the supermarket and across the road. Squeal of tyres and the blast of a car horn. He runs round the back of Meadow Road. Nobody pursues him. He walks up to the fifth floor of the car park, picks up his Renault, and drives back to Tonbridge. And it’s that simple. No CCTV cameras have got a clear image of Tony Rice as he dashed head down towards the car park. He has got away with it. Less than a hundred and fifty quid, but at least he has his beer money for the rest of the weekend.
Back on his own manor, strutting towards his local, he knows he won’t be pursued for such a petty crime, and he has become just one of the many ordinary people going about their business on a Saturday afternoon.
Also Available
