by Laura Wilson
Even thinking about it like this was dangerous; it made her feel all morbid and just … not right. She’d put the whole thing out of her mind and she wouldn’t look at the magazines any more. She sat up, swung her legs over the side of the bed and looked at her watch: twenty to ten. She’d promised Dad some cocoa, hadn’t she?
But she must do something else first – something ordinary, to put a barrier between her thoughts and going downstairs. If ever Dad, the person she loved and admired more than anyone else in the world, got to know about her problem … No, it was unthinkable. She’d rather be dead.
She must pretend to be normal, even if she wasn’t. Perhaps, if she pretended for long enough, the strange feelings would go away, like the constant and terrible grief she’d felt when her mother had died. No-one need ever know she’d been ‘different’. Glancing round her room, she spotted an old jigsaw. That would do. Grabbing the box, she upended the pieces onto the rug and, kneeling down, began feverishly assembling the picture of a fallow deer in a woodland clearing.
Chapter Seventeen
The following morning, Stratton spent half an hour with Lamb, who, having been away from the station the previous day, needed to be put in the picture before Davies was taken to the magistrates’ court at Marlborough Street. ‘This is more like it,’ said the DCI, when Stratton had taken him through Davies’s statements. He wasn’t quite rubbing his hands together, but Stratton thought he wasn’t far off it. ‘The thing’s open and shut. Get your case straight, and for God’s sake try not to complicate matters in your usual fashion, and we’ll be home and dry. Bring Mr and Mrs Backhouse in here as soon as you can. I’ll ask Grove and Porter to help you with interviews to speed things up. I must say, this man Davies sounds a thoroughly nasty piece of work.’
‘As a matter of fact, sir,’ said Stratton, ‘I thought he was rather pathetic.’
‘Yes, well … as long as you don’t let him fool you. Unusual for you, Stratton,’ – here, Lamb gave a disconcertingly roguish leer – ‘it’s generally the women who pull the wool over your eyes, isn’t it?’ Stratton tried not to wince as one side of his superior’s face screwed itself up in a wink. ‘I know you’ve always been rather susceptible to the ladies …’ This patronising attempt to be chummy, never before seen, was far worse than Lamb’s normally irritable demeanour. Stratton managed to excuse himself before any more gruesome bonhomie came his way and, once in the corridor, shook himself like a dog after a swim to rid himself of what felt like an all-over coating of embarrassment before returning to his office.
Sitting beside Stratton in the back of the car en route to the magistrates’ court, Davies looked smaller than ever. Silent and hunched inside his overcoat, he stared straight ahead for most of the short journey and then, just as the car rounded the corner into Marlborough Street, he turned to Stratton and said, urgently, ‘There’s something I forgot to tell you.’
Automatically, Stratton began to caution him, but Davies, plucking at his sleeve, cut him off. ‘No, I meant to tell you before, and I want to get it off my chest. I took Muriel’s wedding ring and I sold it.’
Staring into his eyes, Stratton saw the same hope of approval one might see on the face of a child and, to his surprise, felt pity for the inadequate little man. He said encouragingly, ‘It’s good that you told me. Was that after you killed her?’
Davies blinked at him for a moment, then nodded. ‘After. I got six shillings for it from a jeweller in Merthyr Tydfil.’
‘Do you remember the name?’
‘No.’ Davies looked crestfallen. ‘It was some shop … I feel bad about it, Mr Stratton. I shouldn’t have taken it off her.’
The car stopped and the driver walked round to open the back door nearest the kerb. They scrambled out, Stratton first and Davies, handcuffed to him, close behind. ‘Here we are,’ said Stratton.
Davies looked up at him. ‘Are you going to stay with me?’
‘For the time being,’ said Stratton. Seeing some flecks of dandruff on Davies’s shoulders, he batted them away with his free hand. ‘Come on. It’s just a few questions this morning.’
‘Questions? But I’ve told you—’
‘Nothing like that. Just your name and occ— your job. That sort of thing. Just remember to speak up when you’re asked.’
Davies looked at him again, the boy eager to please. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Mr Stratton.’
The hearing was over in minutes. Davies was remanded, given a legal aid certificate, then led away to be taken to Pentonville. The last glimpse of him Stratton had was a strained white face, as Davies twisted round to look back at him between the solid, dark-blue shoulders of two burly policemen. Whatever Lamb said, he thought, ‘pathetic’ was the right word for Davies. He’d dealt with people of low intelligence before – plenty of them, including a couple of murderers – but he’d rarely felt moved by them, and certainly not by anyone who’d killed a child. Davies obviously hadn’t understood the consequences of his actions. How anyone could think that if you strangled a baby it might still live was beyond him, and yet Davies’s remarks to Grove on the journey from Wales showed that it was exactly what he had thought. What a sad little family, Stratton thought, and trudged back to West End Central to continue the process of putting a noose around Davies’s neck.
Chapter Eighteen
Sergeant Ballard and Mr Backhouse were waiting for Stratton in the lobby, Backhouse standing up very straight and staring about him with an air of self-important concern. ‘Of course we came at once, Mr Stratton,’ he said. ‘We want to help in any way we can. Edna – Mrs Backhouse – well, she can’t sleep with the worry of it.’
‘Where is she?’ asked Stratton.
‘In the interview room with DI Grove and DS Porter,’ said Ballard, drawing him aside. ‘They’ve taken her to identify the clothes, sir. We thought it made more sense – women tend to notice more what other women wear.’
‘We’ll need to ask Backhouse about the tie, though. Davies said it was his, but we ought to make sure. Right, then,’ Stratton turned to Backhouse. ‘Let’s go through to my office, shall we?’
‘You’ve been most helpful already, Mr Backhouse,’ said Stratton, as they pulled up chairs around his desk.
Backhouse glanced about him with, Stratton thought, some satisfaction, clearly pleased to be taken to Stratton’s own office and not some anonymous interview room. He’d seemed thoroughly at home as they’d walked down the corridor, joking that, despite the circumstances, it was nice to be ‘back in the old place’. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘anything I can do to help you with this …’ he pursed his lips prissily as he deliberated over his choice of word, ‘regrettable matter.’
Stratton thought that, as understatements went, ‘regrettable’ was masterly, and wondered why he couldn’t feel any kinship with the man, even though he was a former special. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘you’ve given us quite a bit of information already, but we need to make sure of the specific details. When was the last time you saw Muriel and Judy Davies?’
The answer came fluently, with no hesitation. ‘I saw Muriel on the Tuesday – that would be the seventh – she was going out to empty some slops. The last time I saw the baby was Monday.’
‘The day before?’
‘That’s correct,’ he said, smartly. Then, wetting his lips with the tip of his tongue and making the strange sideways sucking motion with his mouth, he continued, ‘I did remember, after we spoke before, that Edna and I heard some odd noises on the Tuesday night.’
‘What time was this?’
‘Around midnight, I should think. There was a bump that woke us up. I did wonder if it wasn’t the Davieses arguing again, and I thought I might go upstairs – I’ve had to do that before, on a number of occasions, to ask them to keep the noise down, for the neighbours – but my wife said she thought it sounded like someone moving furniture.’
‘And that was definitely the night of the seventh?’
‘Oh, yes. I remember that becaus
e I’d been to the doctor, and I always go on a Tuesday. For my fibrositis. I’ve had to take rather a lot of time off work recently. I’m afraid to say I’ve been rather troubled by diarrhoea, as well …’ Here Stratton, trying not to grimace at the mental picture this created, stole a glance at Ballard, but his head was firmly down and he was writing busily with the air of one giving total attention to his work. ‘The doctor had given me a compound,’ Backhouse continued, ‘which I took so as not to have to get up during the night and wake Edna.’
‘Of course,’ said Stratton, hastily. ‘What is your occupation, Mr Backhouse?’
‘Ledger clerk. For the British Road Services.’ This was said more quietly than before, and Stratton had to strain to hear it. The whispering and the finicky precision of the voice were beginning to get on his nerves.
‘Would you mind speaking up a bit, Mr Backhouse?’
Again, the tongue moistened the lips. After more sucking and swallowing, Backhouse said, ‘I’m sorry. I have a quiet voice. It’s from being gassed during the war. It affected the larynx.’ He put his hand up and fiddled with the knot of his tie, as if to illustrate this.
‘The last war?’ asked Stratton, incredulously.
‘In nineteen seventeen. I lost my voice entirely for a couple of years, and I’m afraid it still affects me from time to time.’
‘That’s a pity,’ said Stratton, sorry for the man but not liking him any more than before. ‘Did you see Davies on the seventh?’
‘That was when he told us that Muriel had taken the baby to Bristol for a holiday. It was about seven o’clock, I think.’
‘In the evening?’
‘That’s right. He said he was going down later to visit them.’
‘And when did Davies leave?’
‘On the thirteenth, after the van came for the furniture. We’d seen him on the Thursday, too, the ninth, in the evening, and he told me he’d left his job. “Packed it in,” he said. He told me he’d asked for his cards back, and he was going to see about a job in Bristol. I saw him again on the Friday the tenth – I remember telling him to be careful because of the flooring being up in the hall.’
‘That’s what the workmen were doing? Replacing the boards?’
‘Yes. Some of them were quite rotten. They did some repairs in the washhouse, too, and the toilet.’
‘So they would have had no reason to go upstairs?’
‘Oh, no. There was nothing do to up there.’
‘Did Davies say anything else to you on the Friday?’
‘Yes, he told me he was selling his furniture. He said he wouldn’t be able to take it with him to Bristol.’
‘Did you see him again before he left?’
‘On the Monday,’ said Backhouse promptly. ‘He said that the man had given him sixty pounds for the furniture. He had a suitcase with him, and he said he was going to Bristol.’
Interesting, thought Stratton, that Davies had told him he’d got forty pounds for the furniture. He was obviously unable to resist telling lies, even about something as pointless as that. ‘Did you see Davies after that?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I did.’ Backhouse’s voice had descended once more to a whisper. ‘Nine or ten days after, I think. He said that Muriel had left him and taken the baby, and he couldn’t find a job. He said he’d been travelling about a lot and he’d just come from Wales. I told him he should go back there and try and get himself some work. When I said he should find a place to stay and use the sixty pounds from the furniture to tide him over he told me he’d spent most of it.’
‘Did he say how?’
‘Travelling, he said. I took it to mean that he’d been going to public houses, and visiting …’ Backhouse fingered his tie again, ran his tongue round his mouth and added, in an even quieter voice, so that Stratton had almost to read his moist lips, ‘prostitutes.’ He shook his head with an air of pious disgust.
‘Did he tell you that?’ asked Stratton.
Backhouse screwed his mouth to the side once more, and said, ‘Not exactly, but it was of a piece with his previous behaviour. I told him he was being foolish, and he left soon after. I did wonder if he’d gone to see Shirley Morgan. That’s the friend of Muriel’s I told you about. She lives nearby.’
‘That’s not very likely, is it, if he’d threatened to … what was it you said? “Run her over in his van”?’
‘Well … she did come back to the house, you see. On the Monday, I think.’
‘Which Monday?’
‘The sixth. I told her to clear off, because it would only upset Muriel, and there’d been quite enough rowing as it was. My wife and I live very quietly, Inspector. My health is poor, and Edna suffers with her nerves. We didn’t like all the upset.’
‘So she didn’t see Muriel?’
‘Not as far as I know. She’d been up and knocked on the door, and I heard her calling out, but Muriel evidently wasn’t answering.’
‘Was Muriel there at the time?’
‘I don’t know. I think so.’
‘Did you hear the baby at all during that week?’
‘Not that I can remember. Edna used to listen for her, if Muriel was going out, but we thought they were in Bristol.’
‘But you didn’t know that then, did you? You said the last time you’d seen Muriel and the baby was on the seventh, and that Davies told you a few days later that they’d gone away.’
‘Yes …’ Backhouse dropped his voice again. ‘That’s right. But we didn’t hear anything, so we thought all was well and Muriel was up there with her.’
‘So – and I apologise for asking this again, Mr Backhouse, but we need to include it in your statement – you did not, at any time, tell Davies that you could help his wife to get rid of a baby?’
Backhouse blinked and licked his lips. ‘No, I did not.’
‘Davies said you’d showed him a medical book, and said you could help his wife abort her pregnancy.’
‘That’s nonsense,’ said Backhouse firmly. ‘He’s making it up.’
‘Did you ever tell Davies you’d trained as a doctor?’
‘Certainly not. It’s not true.’
‘Did you show him a medical book?’
‘No, Inspector, I did not. As I told you, the only medical book I have is a St John’s Ambulance manual.’ Backhouse shifted in his chair. ‘Would you mind if I stood up for a moment? If I sit too long, it’s a strain on my back.’
‘Of course,’ said Stratton. ‘Please …’
Grimacing, and with great care, Backhouse stood up slowly and rubbed the small of his back. ‘I suppose that Muriel might have spotted the book and told him about it … I really don’t know, Inspector, but that’s all nonsense.’
‘He told the police in Wales that you helped him to carry the body.’
‘Inspector …’ Backhouse rubbed his back once more, ‘that is ridiculous. My fibrositis has been so bad that I have to get on my hands and knees to pick something up from the floor. I certainly couldn’t lift anyone.’ He shook his head, slowly. ‘I don’t understand why John is saying these things about me.’
‘It must be upsetting for you,’ said Stratton. ‘Did you visit the washhouse during the week of the sixth of November?’
Backhouse blinked for a moment, then shook his head. ‘I don’t believe so. I wasn’t at all well …’
‘But you would have visited the washhouse at some time in the following week?’
‘Oh, yes. I remember that, because I went to get some wood to light the fire and I noticed the timber stacked in front of the sink. That was on the Monday – the thirteenth.’
‘What time was that? Do you remember?’
‘Early in the day. About half past seven in the morning, I think.’
‘I see. And did you notice your dog paying particular attention to the washhouse at any time? Nosing around, scrabbling at the door, anything like that?’
‘No, nothing like that. But then, Inspector, I was in bed a lot of the time, because of my bac
k.’
‘I see. Just one more thing, Mr Backhouse, and then you’re free to go. Sergeant Ballard, would you mind fetching the exhibit?’
Ballard was back in under a minute, bearing a tray on which lay the tie that had been found around the baby’s neck. Twisted, it looked like a flat red-and-black-striped snake. All three men eyed it as if it might begin to writhe at any moment.
‘Do you recognise this?’ asked Stratton.
Backhouse’s tongue popped out once more to moisten his lips, which it did with a slow turgidity that repulsed Stratton who noticed, out of the corner of his eye, that Ballard had averted his face from the man.
‘That isn’t mine,’ said Backhouse, finally.
‘Do you know who it belongs to?’
Backhouse cleared his throat. ‘I’m not certain, but I think I’ve seen John wearing a tie very like that one.’
‘Fair enough.’ Stratton stood up. ‘Thank you, Mr Backhouse. You’ve been most helpful.’
‘I’m sure he means well,’ Stratton said to Ballard when he’d returned from seeing Backhouse out, ‘and he is very helpful, but he makes my flesh crawl.’
‘Me too, sir. DI Grove says he’ll be along in a minute. They’ve finished – Mrs Backhouse was waiting in the lobby.’
‘Right. Whatever we think of Backhouse, it looks like an open and shut case.’
‘That’ll please DCI Lamb, sir.’
‘Let’s hope so.’ Stratton rolled his eyes, then sprang up to open the door as a heavy tread, which could belong to nobody except DI Grove, echoed in the corridor. Grove paused on the threshold, chewing his empty pipe thoughtfully.
