Constable Evans 03: Evanly Choirs

by Rhys Bowen

  Justin went over and put his arm around her. “It’s going to be alright, Chrissy,” he said. “I promise you it’s going to be alright.”

  * * *

  Evan was just coming out of police headquarters, where he had delivered Christine and Justin, when Sergeant Watkins drove up.

  “I think we’re onto something,” he yelled to Evan. “Finally we’ve got some evidence.” He waved a large manila envelope as he got out of the car. “I’ve just got the photos from the computer center and you’ll never guess what’s shown up.”

  He stepped into the shelter of the porch and pulled a stack of photos out of the envelope. “Take a look at this,” he said, handing one to Evan. It was a poorly lit shot of the village street with Mrs. Llewellyn walking toward the Powell-Joneses’ driveway.

  “Yes? What about it?” Evan asked. “Isn’t this when she arrived home to find us there?”

  “Right,” Watkins said. “And she said she took a taxi, remember?”

  “And?”

  “No taxi in the picture, but right down here, in the corner, you can just see the front bumper of a car?”

  Evan nodded.

  “With computer enhancement we can read the license plate. It’s a green Jaguar belonging to James Norton—Mrs. Llewellyn’s boyfriend.”

  Evan whistled. “So he was in the village after all, at least around eight-thirty.”

  “And there’s more,” Watkins went on excitedly. “I’ve taken a look at the statements from people who were in Pool Street when Gladys had her accident. Several of them mention seeing a green Jaguar.”

  “Very interesting,” Evan said. “Did you go and interview him this afternoon?”

  “Yes I did and I can tell you, the gentleman was very nervous. Sweating buckets. And he had no alibi from the moment they checked out of the hotel at four o’clock until he arrived home after ten.” He grinned at Evan. “He tried to deny the whole thing to start with. He claimed he just happened to bump into Mrs. L. at the hotel, where he was staying on business. Surprised and delighted to see an old friend, ha ha. It will be interesting to see what he says this time.”

  “Are you going back there now?” Evan asked.

  “I’m going to show this lot to the D.I. and then I imagine he’ll want James Norton brought in. What’s the betting they planned it between them—him and Mrs. Llewellyn? And I think we’ve got a good chance of getting the truth out of him. He’ll be easier to crack than she was.” He pushed open the door. “Come on. Where are you off to?”

  “Home,” Evan said. “I’ve been patted on the back and sent back to Llanfair.”

  “Oh come on,” Watkins said. “Can’t you find an excuse to hang around and be in at the kill?”

  “I’d like to but the D.I. made it pretty clear. He thanked me for my invaluable help as chauffeur today and said he wouldn’t be needing my services any longer.”

  “The man’s a fool,” Watkins said. “He knows as well as I do that—”

  “Let it be, Sarge,” Evan said. “He’s right. It is none of my business. And it’s my day off. I’m going to try and enjoy some of it.”

  “I’ll call you and let you know how it went,” Watkins said.

  “Be careful, won’t you,” Evan called after him. “If he’s already killed once, he won’t hesitate to do it again.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not stupid. I’m not going back alone,” Watkins said. He gave Evan a friendly wave as he went into the building.

  * * *

  As Evan drove home, he tried not to feel annoyed that he had been dismissed, just when things were beginning to get interesting. He had to face the fact that he was only the village bobby and it was none of his business. But he would have liked to be in that interview room when James Norton broke down and told the truth. And he would have liked to see Mrs. Llewellyn’s face when they confronted her with it.

  They had to have been in on it together. She was probably the one who planned it—she was certainly cool and calculating enough … except that it didn’t seem like a planned killing. Hitting someone over the head was a risky way of dispatching them. What if they had missed, or the first blow wasn’t hard enough, or it turned into a fight? A giant of a man like Ifor was very likely to win. No, anyone planning to kill Ifor would have used a more guaranteed method, like a bullet.

  Which had to mean that it wasn’t planned at all. Evan considered a new scenario. What if they had intended to talk to Ifor civilly, begging him not to make a fuss and give Mrs. Llewellyn the divorce she wanted? What if Ifor had then lost his temper and become violent? Might one of them have struck him in self-defense? But then why not admit it?

  Oh well, there was no more point in speculating tonight. He’d know more when Watkins called and in the meantime it was his day off.

  The rain had stopped as he drove back up the pass. A watery sun was making hedgerows steam and dotting sheep’s wool with diamonds. Streamlets danced down both sides of the road. The fresh smell of green things after rain came in powerfully through the car windows.

  He’d go and see Bronwen, he decided. He hadn’t even had a chance to tell her about Maggie Pole. Bronwen deserved to know the truth. He wanted to tell Bronwen the truth. It had been like a gnawing wound he had kept to himself for a couple of years now.

  He tapped on Bronwen’s door. No answer. As he turned away he saw two little boys hanging from the climbing frame in the school playground. “Teacher’s not here, Mr. Efans!” one of them called. “She’s gone down to the eisteddfod again. She took some of the girls to see the finals of the dancing.”

  The other made vomiting noises, to show what he thought about girls and dancing.

  “Thanks, Aled,” Evan said. “Maybe I’ll go on down there myself.”

  He went home and changed out of his uniform, then he drove down to Harlech.

  The main car park was full and he had to park in the nearby housing estate and walk. Progress was slow and difficult in the main eisteddfod field as the mass of spectators had to pick their way around puddles and through mud. Some of the outer booths, not fully enclosed from the weather, were now a sorry sight, with torn and dripping signs and sagging tarpaulins. He found that he was wandering past the beer tent, maybe with the subconscious hope of finding Maggie there. He didn’t want her to think that he had stood her up last night. Funny that he still didn’t want her to think badly of him, after the way she had behaved!

  As he was passing the tent, he decided that a pint might not be such a bad idea for someone who had had to subsist on tea and buns all day. He went inside and was greeted by Evans-the-Meat.

  “Well, look who’s here! Finished your crime solving for the day, have you, Evan bach?”

  “What are you lads doing here?” Evan asked, as he joined a circle of Llanfair men. “Come down for a dose of culture?”

  “We thought we ought to come and cheer for Mr. Parry Davies and Mr. Powell-Jones,” Roberts-the-Pump said.

  “I didn’t know the bard’s competition took place in the beer tent.” Evan raised an eyebrow.

  “Ah well, the chairing of the bard is the last event tonight, so we thought we had time for a quick pint first,” Evans-the-Milk explained. “What are you having, Evans-the-Law?”

  “I wouldn’t say no to a pint of Brains, thanks.” He held up his glass to them. “Iachyd da,” he said raising his glass to them before taking a long drink.

  “Poor old Austin Mostyn is here, too. He’s putting himself through agony, listening to the winning choirs give their command performances,” Evans-the-Meat said.

  “He came so close this time,” Roberts-the-Pump said. “He’ll never get that chance again.”

  “If only we’d had time to think, we should have used a tape of Ifor and got one of us to lip-synch, like the pop stars do,” Barry-the-Bucket joked.

  “We could have done that, man,” Evans-the-Milk exclaimed, giving him a hearty slap. “He had loads of tapes of himself, didn’t he? And he always recorded all his rehearsals, too
.”

  “Drink up, man,” Evans-the-Meat nudged Evan. “I’ve never seen you so slow with a pint before.

  Evan put down the glass. “Look, I’ve got to go,” he said. “I’ll see you all later. Something just came up.”

  Then he ran out into the twilight. He found a phone in the first aid tent and made a call to HQ.

  “Look, I know there’s only you on duty, Dai,” he said impatiently to the young constable at the desk, “but this is an emergency. I need to have a detailed list of everything in that drawing room right away. Tell the sergeant it’s very important that I get it now.”

  It seemed to take forever. If he didn’t get it soon it would be too late and he didn’t want to have to act without it, just on his suspicions.

  “Sorry about that,” the young constable said at last. “Sarge didn’t want to give me the file because you’re not officially on the case—so I just sneaked it out when he wasn’t looking. Don’t tell him, will you?”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

  “Now what was it you wanted?”

  “A list of everything found in the room where the murder took place.”

  The young constable started reading. Evan interrupted him halfway. “On the window sill, you say? Great. Perfect. Thanks, Dai. You’ve just helped catch your first murderer. Tell the duty sergeant I may just be calling him for help soon. I’ll see how things go here. I’m at the eisteddfod.”

  He hung up the phone and stood for a moment, collecting his racing thoughts in the brisk night air. Finally he saw how it had been done. It hadn’t seemed possible before but now he saw that it had been cleverly orchestrated.

  Chapter 22

  Evan made his way across the muddy field to one of the three big pavilions. The rich sound of a Côr Meibion was overpowering the lesser sounds of piano and poetry in the other tents. Evan stood at the back of the tent, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. The Ffestiniog choir was on stage, giving a rousing version of “Sauspan Fach.”

  Then Evan spotted him, sitting alone in one of the back rows, staring intently at the stage, his glasses glinting in the reflected stage lights. Evan slid into a seat beside him.

  “’Ello Mostyn. They said you’d be here, listening to the other choirs.”

  Mostyn nodded. “They’re not as good as we could have been,” he said. “We could have won.”

  Evan put his arm on Mostyn’s sleeve. “You and I have to talk, Mostyn. Let’s go outside.”

  “Not now. I’m listening to this.”

  Evan tightened his grip. “Yes now, Mostyn. It’s important.”

  “Oh, very well.” Mostyn gave a sigh of annoyance, picked up his shabby briefcase, and got to his feet. It was now almost dark. Lights reflected from puddles. The crowd had thinned out. The sound of clapping and cheering came from the pavilion next door.

  “Now what is it, Mr. Evans?” Mostyn asked. “I really want to get back there to hear the choir from Rhondda Vale. They’re truly excellent.”

  “So why did you do it, Mostyn?”

  “Do what?”

  “Kill the goose that laid the golden egg?” Evan said gently. “Kill Ifor before he had a chance to win you the first prize.”

  “What are you talking about, man?” Mostyn demanded. “Have you lost your mind? How could I have killed Ifor? I was down here, waiting for the rest of you when he was still alive. Everyone heard him, didn’t they?”

  “They heard a tape of him, Mostyn. One of those tapes of himself he had lying everywhere around the house. I checked with HQ a few minutes ago. There had been a tape recorder on the window sill behind the curtains, but no tape in it. There was no tape anywhere in the room. That’s why you went straight over to the window, didn’t you? It wasn’t to see if the radiator was on, it was to take the tape out of the machine while I was examining the body.”

  Mostyn said nothing so Evan went on, “And you turned the radiators on, too, didn’t you—so that the body would take longer to stiffen up and we’d put the time of death later than it really was? Then you fed me that nonsense about Ifor feeling the cold. He hated stuffy rooms. He always had the windows open, even in winter … didn’t you remember that about him from the days when you roomed together? Funny how criminals always slip up on the little things.”

  “I am not a criminal!” Mostyn blurted out. “And you’ve no proof at all. I wiped everything clean.”

  “Did you now. Thanks very much for telling me. What I can’t understand is why. Why then? Why not wait until you’d won your first prize?”

  “Because he made me, that’s why,” Mostyn said flatly. “I never meant to kill him, but he goaded me. You know how he was, Constable Evans. He kept on and on until something snapped.”

  Evan did know how it was. He remembered Mrs. Powell-Jones saying the same thing. She had been pushed until something snapped. If it was possible for a stable, unemotional person like Mrs. Powell-Jones, how much more possible for someone like Mostyn Phillips.

  “I went to the house that evening,” Mostyn said slowly. “I was going to drive him myself to make sure he was on time for once. He said he wasn’t riding in my little tin can of a car. That upset me to start with. It’s a good little car, isn’t it? Plenty of power still.”

  Evan nodded.

  “I told him what I thought of him and the way he treated his wife. She used to be my girl once, you know.” He looked up at Evan with despair in his eyes. “She came to visit me at college. Ifor and I were sharing a room. He took one look at her and … and he took her away from me. The only girl I ever loved, Mr. Evans. He took everything away from me. Whatever I did, he did it better. I would have won the outstanding student prize if Ifor hadn’t been there. I worked harder. I deserved it more. But he won it. He had the damned trophy sitting there on the sideboard—Polymnia, the muse of harmony, carved on a base of Italian marble.

  “He laughed at me. Meeting him was the best thing that ever happened to Margaret, he said. He told me what she thought about me—that she laughed about me and how … inadequate I was. I couldn’t stand it any longer. He turned away to pour himself a drink, still talking and laughing, telling me what a miserable failure I had been. I grabbed the trophy, the one that should have been mine, and I hit him over the head with it. I don’t know what I meant to do—not kill him—just make him stop.”

  Mostyn shut his eyes and a shudder went through his body. “I did make him stop. He fell to the ground. I saw the blood. I tried to pull myself together. I thought I’d go and tell the police exactly what had happened. They’d understand. Then I thought, what if they didn’t—what if they locked me up for life?

  “That’s when it came to me that I could make it look like an accident. I moved him across to the fireplace so that it would look as if he hit his head on that fender. It was hard work because he was so heavy. But I did it. There were blood spatters on the carpet. I moved the desk to cover them. Then I splashed whiskey around to make it look as if he’d been drinking and had fallen over blind drunk.

  “Then I realized I had to give myself an alibi. For the first time in my life I was making full use of my brain—the fine brain I had been given and never had a proper chance to use.

  “I knew he always recorded himself, every time he sang, vain bastard. I found a warm-up tape. I hid a tape recorder out of sight on the window ledge and I turned it on at full volume. That would give me half an hour to get safely away. That’s when I saw the radiator. I remembered reading that bodies didn’t stiffen up as quickly in a hot room. I went and switched on the central heating and turned the radiators in the room on full.

  “Then I went into the kitchen to wash my hands. I’d been very careful but I’d got some blood on them when I moved him. I was just coming down the hall again about to leave when I heard someone knocking on the front door. And then it opened. I hid in the hall closet. It was a girl. She found Ifor and she ran out. I can tell you, Mr. Evans, that my heart nearly stopped beating with fright. I was sure she’d gone to get t
he police and I’d be trapped. I slipped out and then I found that she’d dropped her shoe. I picked it up with my handkerchief, so I wouldn’t leave fingerprints and tossed it back into the house, outside the living room door. That would give the police something else to think about.

  “My car was parked over at the pub. Nobody was around when I got in and drove away … and anyway, if someone had seen me, they’d swear that Ifor was still alive. It was a perfect alibi … if you hadn’t stuck your nose in and ruined it for me.”

  “What did you do with the murder weapon, Mostyn?” Evan asked.

  “It’s on my mantlepiece, where it belongs,” he said. “I gave it a good going-over. You won’t find a trace of blood on it. You won’t find anything to incriminate me. I was meticulous. I wiped away every trace.”

  “And Gladys?” Evan asked. “Did you have anything to do with Gladys?”

  Mostyn sighed. “How was I to know she was still in the house, silly woman? I knew it was only a matter of time before she recognized the voice was mine.”

  “So you pushed her under a car.”

  “It wasn’t hard. I followed her and waited for the right moment. It’s funny how easy it is to kill someone.” He looked up at Evan and smiled. “But all this is just between you and me, Constable. I think you might have a hard time proving it.”

  “Do you think you’re the only one who uses tape recorders, Mostyn?” Evan said.

  “You mean you’ve recorded this conversation?” Mostyn asked indignantly. “That’s very underhanded of you, Constable Evans.”

  “I’m afraid the police have to be underhanded sometimes, Mostyn,” Evan said. “Now we ought to take a ride to headquarters, don’t you think? It’s good to get the truth out, isn’t it? It would only have preyed on your mind and haunted you.”

  “Do you think it hasn’t already?” Mostyn asked in a broken voice. “Sitting in there, listening to those other choirs … do you think I haven’t regretted my reckless act over and over. I would do anything in the world to undo it, Constable. I might have hated him, but I would never have wished him dead. He was … the greatest living tenor. I deprived the world of that talent. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”