by Paul Charles
“No point of you going through all this stuff twice, old son,” said Castle. “I’ll sit at the back and you won’t even notice I’m there.” And he left Kennedy and Flynn together as the Desk Sergeant tried to track Irvine down.
“He’s by the coffee machine, apparently,” Flynn advised Kennedy in his soft southern (Irish) tones. “It appears he’s trying to find a way of lying under its tap and swimming upstream. Apparently he’s been quoting Oscar Wilde to anyone who’ll listen.”
“Really?” Despite his urgency Kennedy afforded himself a wry smile.
“Yes, well he does that a bit, you know, after a night of… recreation.” Flynn brushed his hand back over his head, straightening the memory of some hair, once brown and thick, now white and thinning.
“Aha.”
“I believe one of his favourites is, ‘Love is about deceit: we start off deceiving ourselves and we end up deceiving our lovers.’”
Kennedy smiled, not one of been-there-done-that, for he hadn’t. A glass or three of wine was his maximum and even then it might be only every other week or maybe once a week at a push. He craved the state of clear-headedness and he couldn’t (ever) work out why people wanted to blemish this mood. “Poor Irvine,” he said quietly to no one in particular.
Poor Irvine had his wits about him enough to give Kennedy a concise recall of the Kevin Burroughs conversation. Forty minutes - and three more cups of coffee for Irvine, two cups of tea and four fingers of shortbread for Kennedy - later, they all arrived in the conference room.
The conference room, unlike the rest of the building, was a sanctuary of a space polluted by neither posters, newsletters, want-ads, union reports, dirty tea cups, ashtrays, files, boxes, desks, various sizes and colours of chairs, noise, nor natural light; it was in fact the mirror image of the canteen, only at the northern end of the basement. A simple brown carpet covered the floor. The walls and ceiling were painted white and Castle, unable to raise a budget for one large central table, had placed together ten eight foot by four metal tables. He had the adjoining legs fixed together firmly using the plastic restrainers now used sometimes instead of handcuffs. Around this creation were placed twenty-four matching armless chairs. On the wall towards the natural (northern) head of the table was a painting of a well-remembered Camden Police Chief, Commander P. R. Fenn.
“Okay, let’s see exactly where we are on this one,” shouted Kennedy above the hum created by those present, who included Superintendent Castle, DS Irvine, WPC Coles, Dr Forsythe (looking as fresh as a daisy and as alert as a Camden Market trader), PC Allaway, PC Gaul, WPC Franklin, PC Tony Essex and a few other DSs and PCs. There was no real need for Forsythe to be present, but Kennedy traditionally invited Dr Taylor to these briefings, so he was happy for the man’s stand-in to be present. There was always the chance of a useful lead from this source.
“It seems to me that what we know is that two nights ago John B. Stone spent several hours drinking in the Spread Eagle.” At the word “drinking” Irvine and Forsythe stole a glance at each other and exchanged smiles.
“Arnold Cooper, his boss; June Oddie and William Boatend, his work colleagues, were with him and left him, apparently in that order. He then met up with Hugh Anderson.” Kennedy’s delivery was interrupted at this point by a grunt from Castle at the opposite end of the table, a grunt which implied, “Oh him, if he’s involved that’s the case solved then, I can leave the tidying up to the team.” Kennedy and Castle’s eyes met and Castle shrugged an apology.
“The last time Stone was seen he was drinking at the bar of the Spread Eagle with Anderson. Anderson claims Stone was making a property pitch to him. He further claims that as they left the Spread Eagle he went down Parkway while Stone went up it towards Regent’s Park.” Kennedy paused to check his notes.
“Now Stone apparently didn’t make it very far because he was met by person or persons unknown who gave him a serious beating, and as a result of injuries caused by this beating John B. Stone died around about thirty minutes past midnight. For a case so new there is no shortage of suspects.”
“What?” said Castle, “You mean as well as that thug Anderson? I always said we should have locked him away in the sixties and thrown away the key. We tried, I’ll tell you we tried. Bloody do-gooding meddlers with all their ‘He’s no longer a menace to society, he’s paid the price for his crime,’ blah, blah, bleeding blah.” Castle’s heated commentary raised smiles from several quarters.
Kennedy waited until he was sure Castle had completed his diatribe. “Yes, sir. As well as Hugh Anderson we have, let’s see:
“One, William Boatend, business colleague who stood to gain Stone’s cash business in his absence.
“Two, Kevin Burroughs, from Northern Properties. We still have to find out more about the Primrose Hill deal that went pearshaped.
“Three, Stone’s younger brother Brian. There is mega bad blood in the family. None of them, the two brothers and a sister, were talking to John B. at the time of his death but most of the hate would seem to lie between John B. and the older brother. However, we’ll come to that shortly. Brian Stone seemed totally unperturbed at the loss of his brother and he gave a false alibi for the time of death. Which brings us to
“Four, the older brother, Stephen, whom I’m going to see after we finish here. Apparently he was away somewhere yesterday but is due in his office this morning. From what we can gather there was a bit of competition between John B. and Stephen for the woman who eventually became Stephen’s wife. Then there was this incident, people keep talking about it, at their mother’s funeral. And finally,
“Five: person or persons unknown.” “And Hugh Anderson,” added Castle. “And Hugh Anderson.” “But surely if Anderson is involved it would be on behalf of someoneelse, wouldn’t it?” WPC Coles asked carefully.
“Good point!” Irvine said, testing his voice.
Kennedy took up Coles” theme and developed it. “In which case he would be acting on behalf of any one of the people on our suspect list. Which means the motive is going to be extremely important. A true professional criminal is not going to give up a name to us, is he?”
“Listen, another question I have for you.” Castle took a pencil from his top pocket and twiddled it around as he spoke. “This Neil Burton chap who was found the previous night on the other side of the bridge from John B. Stone - have you thought about the possibility of that being murder as well?”
“Not possible,” said Forsythe. “Mr Burton definitely died as a result of his arteries being severed by the teeth of a dog.” She was sitting on the same side of the table as Irvine, something both of them were happy about.
“Yes, yes,” said Castle, “I know about that, but what if our madman, Hugh Anderson, our one man bleeding Camden Town crime wave, what if he had a rotweiler, or whatever, and he set the animal on Burton? That could be the connection between Burton and Stone. I think that’s a line of investigation I’d like to see you follow.” So much for the Super’s “you won’t even know that I’m there” promise.
“Yep, good point,” a bemused Kennedy replied, because it was indeed, and furthermore it was one Kennedy hadn’t even considered.
The flow of conversation was interrupted with a knock on the door and Sergeant Flynn let himself into the conference room, announcing his arrival with a polite, “this just came through, sir.” He made his way across the room to Kennedy, “And Forensic said you should be given the information as soon as possible.”
Kennedy unfolded the crisp piece of white paper, the sound was not unlike wind rustling through leaves - very loudly in Irvine’s ears.
The former native of Portrush smiled as he read aloud: “The teeth marks in the apple found close to the body of John B. Stone have been positively identified as the teeth marks of one Mr Hugh Anderson.
A certain Superintendent beamed from ear to ear.
Before dismissing everyone Kennedy gave instructions as to the activities he wanted his team to undertake during the next few hours
. He wanted more information on the property deals Camden Bus Estate Agents were involved in, particularly the ones worked on by John B. Stone on behalf of Northern Properties. He required more information on Northern Properties. And a check through the files to see exactly what Hugh Anderson had been up to for the past ten years. He also wanted more background information on John B. Stone.
“And check if Anderson has a dog,” Castle ordered. “Yes, sir,” Kennedy agreed. “If he does have a dog, do you think the new pathologist - what’s hername?” Castle inquired after the briefing had broken up and he and Kennedy were walking back to their offices.
“Bella Forsythe, sir.”
“Yes, Forsythe - do you think she could match Anderson’s dog to the marks made on Burton’s body?”
“If he has a dog, sir. No, I doubt it; the body was in too bad a shape. I’m convinced no such identification could be made,” Kennedy replied firmly.
“Shame.”
“But perhaps something can be done with DNA testing. They might be able to get a match there,” Kennedy offered.
“Good, let’s hope so, shall we? Still, I’ve got to tell you Kennedy, I thoroughly enjoyed this morning. Great fun, much more invigorating than this thing with five traffic wardens lifted on a drugs raid. What’s that all about, Kennedy? And then this GLR Radio hijack. What’s happening out there, old son?”
Before Kennedy could reply, Castle had reached his office, and quicker than you could say “Pauley Valentini” he was inside, leaving Kennedy saying “I don’t know” to a closed door.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Stephen Stone was waiting for Kennedy as Kennedy knew he would. No doubt the surviving Stone brothers would have spoken the previous evening. Would they have compared notes? Would there, in fact, have been notes to compare? Would they, could they, have been guilty of fratricide? Brian’s alibi was at best shaky and as Kennedy and Coles entered the elder brother’s office, a travel agency above a toy shop halfway up the west side of busy Kentish Town Road, Kennedy speculated on the alibi he was undoubtedly about to hear.
Total Travel, the brass plaque on the door proudly proclaimed. Kennedy and Coles were buzzed through and made their way up the narrow staircase to the first floor and through to a large open plan office. The walls were covered with posters of French skiing holidays, weeks in Barbados, fun in the sun in Belfast, no rain in Spain, weekends in Dublin and a month in the Highlands. Bikini clad (barely) nymphs were seen enticing blotchy pink-skinned males into joining them in deep blue swimming pools to sample the sun, water, drinks and maybe even more. But as 90 per cent of family holidays were surely booked by the female partner, these enticing worlds would probably be avoided in favour of religious trips to Palestine and tours of Cornish tin mines.
“Mr Stone is waiting for you in his office, one more floor up,” said one of the staff, a young girl beautiful enough to be prancing around one of the poster beaches.
“Good morning. I am Stephen Stone and I’ve been expecting you.” The owner of a very firm handshake greeted them on their arrival on the next floor.
“Good morning,” Kennedy replied, “I’m Detective Inspector Christy Kennedy and this is WPC Anne Coles, and we’d like to talk to you about your brother John B., who I’m sure you’ve…”
“Yes, Brian reached me yesterday evening with the sad news.” The elder Stone seemed polite and was well spoken like Brian, but unlike the latter he was betraying some (apparent) grief at the loss of a brother. He led them through to his cluttered office where more posters adorned the walls, this time all of Italy.
The desk was littered with various brochures, a notepad containing neat handwriting, two telephones, a clock and a photo of his wife, who was also a partner in the travel business. Kennedy had gained this information by reading one of the Total Travel’s letterheads on the noticeboard downstairs. Stephen looked like he was in his mid-forties. He had short, well-attended brown hair and an equally well kept short beard. He wore a bottle green shirt with a red tie (knot and top button of shirt undone), tan Chinos and brown moccasins (obviously bought on one of his many free trips abroad). He sported lightweight, silver-framed glasses.
“Look, we keep hearing that you and your brother weren’t exactly the best of friends, and…” Kennedy began.
“That’s an understatement if ever I heard one.” Stephen Stone laughed. “Let me ask you a question, Inspector. How would you feel about a man who raped your wife?”
Kennedy and Coles both looked (and were) stunned. In this game of poker faces the golden rule was to give nothing away, a rule they had just broken.
Before either of them could comment, Stone continued, “And before you answer me let me further ask you how you would feel if your brother raped your wife at your mother’s funeral.”
So that’s what happened, Kennedy thought, no wonder all this open warfare in the family. He found himself saying, “Were charges brought, sir?”
“What? No. No of course not. I mean it would have been just too big a scandal for any family to take, let alone ours, which has always been a bit shaky at the best of times. Listen, my wife, Jean, she and my brother dated years ago before we were married. He was in love with her. She was not in love with him. Jean and I fell in love. It was awkward, of course. She was still seeing John when we started. She broke up with him. We waited years before getting married in the hope that the fuss would die down.” Stone went silent and doodled on a clean page with his fountain pen. Neither Coles nor Kennedy spoke and eventually Stone spoke again.
“But it didn’t die down, it never could with him. So we all kept well away from each other, and the funeral was the first time we’d all been in the same room in years. Everyone had a few drinks and loosened up a bit, and Jean and John were talking quite a bit and seemed to be getting on, so I left them to it. I was happy that it was all going to end, but sad that it had taken the death of our mother to bring us all together again. I’d had enough of it by that point, and if it hadn’t been for our mother’s death I could quite happily have spent the rest of my life without seeing him. Anyway, they were last seen heading in the direction of the garden, we’d lots of trees and bushes, and he took her into the bushes, and he raped her and left her crying on the ground. He didn’t even have the decency to help her fix her clothes and cover her up. She was found by my aunt. By my mother’s sister on the day of her sister’s funeral, can you imagine that, finding your nephew’s wife lying in the garden crying with her pants and tights around her ankles, having just been raped by another of your nephews.” Stone started to draw larger and larger concentric circles around a point in the centre of the page. Soon the circles filled the entire page.
“So you see, if we had called the police there would have been all The, ‘but weren’t you lovers?’ or, ‘Are you sure you weren’t really giving him the come-on signs?’ and ‘Come on, you really wanted one more fling with him for old times’ sake,’ etcetera etcetera. Inspector, I’m being perfectly candid with you now because I want you to know that I have nothing to hide. I am well aware that because of all this I’m bound to be a suspect. I have to tell you that I did not murder my brother. I could admit to you that, at times, I wanted him dead or at least out of our lives. But, I did not, and could not, murder him.”
“Would you have any idea who may have wanted to murder him?” WPC Coles asked.
“Well, you know what, I immediately thought, ‘Oh shit, it’s Brian. He’s gone and done it, he’s gone and topped that shit and so now, even from beyond the grave he’s going to be the ruination of all our lives.’”
“How can you be sure it wasn’t Brian?” said Coles.
“I just know, that’s all. But other suspects? Well, let’s see. He dabbled a bit in drugs, but I’m sure you already know a bit about that, and it was only socially so I’m not sure he’d be a target for anyone. From what I’ve heard John was making a bob or two so I’m sure he could well afford his vices.” Stephen paused for a moment, then said, “let’s see, I
’ve been thinking about this a lot because I knew you’d ask me about it. Maybe a property deal gone wrong? Hey, who knows? Maybe he was caught with someone else’s wife or girlfriend, only this time he didn’t get off so lucky?”
“Didn’t get off at all, sir.” Kennedy added.
“Yes, I see what you mean, but I really don’t know. I’m sorry but I have no other direction to point you in. I would like to have because each one would point away from me, so I’m going to help you as much as possible, aren’t I?”
“Before all this happened, you know when John B. first started dating Jean, were you all a tight family?” inquired Kennedy, intrigued by this man’s apparent honesty.
“Well, our dad died when we were all young and so it was hard for our mum. But we got by, she did us proud, we never lacked for food or clothes or coal on the fire. But no, we were never a Christmas card kind of family. I think you need both parents for that, don’t you? A dad to hold it all together and lay down the law and a mum to provide all the love and gentleness. I’ve never really thought about it before but you need your dad to give the family direction and your mum to bond it all together.”
All three pondered Stephen’s final statement and its accidental wisdom.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“So what do you think of that, then?” Kennedy asked his WPC. They were in the car heading towards their second interview of the morning, this time with Jean Stone, current wife of Stephen Stone, the brother and chief suspect of murder victim John B. Stone, himself a former lover of Jean Stone.
“I mean to say, can it get any worse than that? Raped by your husband’s brother at your mother-in-law’s funeral. This John B. Stone must have been a bad piece of work. How could anyone do that?” Coles shivered in disgust.
“Perhaps he felt he’d been wronged in his life. Wronged by a father who’d left him when he was too young, wronged by his mother because she couldn’t provide him with all the things, toys, games, sweets, clothes, that his friends had. Wronged by all his relatives who didn’t think he was special because he had neither the cuteness of being the youngest nor the wisdom of being the oldest nor the uniqueness of being the only daughter and was consequently the last in line for love and affection. And then ultimately wronged by his brother, who took away the only person he loved, Jean, and whom he felt was the only person in his life who had loved him for himself,” Kennedy answered, trying it out on himself as he went along.
