Verdict Unsafe (29 page)

Lloyd nodded. “I’m not sure where to start,” he said. “I’ve got two sets of questions, really. Witness questions, and what-the-hell-do-you-think-you’re-playing-at questions.” He ran his hand over the strip of hair. “Let’s start with the witness questions,” he said. “I suppose the first one has to be did you hear any gunshots in the underpass?”

“Lloyd, it was like the Battle of the Somme.”

“Oh, yes. Of course. Stupid of me—that’s why he or she chose Guy Fawkes night. So no one would notice the shots.” He looked at her. “I don’t know how to do this with you,” he said, looking uncomfortable. “Did Drummond have time to beat Ginny like that before you got there?”

Judy shrugged. “How long does it take?” she asked. “If someone Drummond’s size starts laying in to someone Ginny’s size, it won’t take long to do real damage. Yes, I think he had time to have done it. It didn’t take him three minutes to walk through the underpass, did it? And I definitely saw him go in and I heard someone running out of the other end.”

“But there’s a good chance he never came out the other end,” said Lloyd. “And I thought you thought Lennie had beaten Ginny up.”

Judy sighed. “I’ve never known Lennie to be that violent,” she said. “But then again, whatever happened seems to have happened in their kitchen, and he obviously already knew what state she was in.” She shook her head. “It’s possible my search rattled him, and he just lost control, or something.”

“I don’t know,” said Lloyd. “Drummond rang you about unfinished business. If Ginny did set him up, maybe he went after her. And maybe she defended herself.”

“Where would Ginny get a gun?” asked Judy. “And whose feet did I hear?”

“That’s what’s wrong,” said Lloyd. “I can’t interview you like I would any other witness—you ask questions. You argue.”

“Sorry,” said Judy. “I’ll try not to.”

“This is starting just like the Marilyn Taylor one,” Lloyd said. “You get what sound like really good leads, and they fizzle out.” He shook his head. “Well,” he said, “since I can’t seem to ask you proper witness questions, I’ll move on. What the hell were you playing at, going to see Ginny?”

“I just wanted to ask her face to face about Drummond and Hosier’s Alley,” said Judy.

Lloyd shook his head wearily. “What you did was go to interview a victim in the rape inquiry from which you have been removed.”

Judy bit her lip. “I honestly never gave it a thought,” she said. “It’s quite hard to remember that you’re the subject of a complaint when you haven’t done anything wrong. And it was just for my own satisfaction. I wanted to look her in the eye, and ask her.”

“And did you?”

“Yes,” said Judy. “Literally, bless her. Only one eye would open. And I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that Drummond raped her.” She thought about that. “So I think it’s unlikely that he beat her up last night, really. I mean—either he would have sexually assaulted her again, or he wouldn’t have assaulted her at all, I’d have thought. I think it must have been Lennie—and he definitely didn’t want me to see what was in his van.”

“Mm,” said Lloyd. He leaned his elbows on the desk, his face showing concern. “Judy,” he said. “Be careful, please. I know it’s only a matter of time before this investigation nonsense is over, but Case is … well … on your case. He thinks because you were at Malworth that you can’t be trusted.”

Judy sighed. “I just feel so—so frustrated,” she said.

“It might not be for much longer,” said Lloyd. “Presumably Bobbie Chalmers will tell the truth now.”

Judy should have been pleased about that prospect, but she
wasn’t, not since her visit to Matt. “Meanwhile,” she said, “is there anything being investigated by this police force that I can work on?”

“The burglaries,” said Lloyd, with a grin. “I understand there was yet another one last night—and you might have got your wish. It was reported while it was in progress.”

“Then why haven’t we got the burglar?” asked Judy.

“It and the nine-double-nine came in almost simultaneously, so I understand that resources were stretched,” said Lloyd. “You’ll have to take it up with the uniformed branch. The detective branch had nothing to do with it.” He smiled. “And there’s a GBH,” he said.

“Oh, yes,” said Judy. “The GBH was brought in while I was in casualty with Ginny.” She shook her head. “I’ve had enough blood and guts for one week,” she said. “Bags I the burglary.”

She left Lloyd’s office, and found DC Marshall studying the report of last night’s burglary. The burglar had unlocked the front door of the house, which had caused the solo police officer sent to the scene to open it when he routinely tried it on arrival. The pots, pans, cans of lager, etc., that the intruder had piled against the door had alerted him to someone’s presence, and he had made his escape through the
back
door.

“Cunning stuff, eh, ma’am?” Marshall said.

“Did he see what the burglar got away in?” she asked. “A Transit van, by any chance?”

“Do you still think it was Lennie?”

“I saw him last night,” she said. “He was very anxious that I didn’t see what he had in his van. I think it was the proceeds of that burglary.”

“No, ma’am, it wasn’t. He got interrupted too soon. The stuff was all inside the back door, waiting to be loaded. But nothing was taken.”

“What about the neighbors? Didn’t any of them see anything?”

“No. Whoever rang us said that there was a light moving about inside and the people were on holiday. But he just hung up, and they all denied all knowledge. Did not wish to become involved.”

“I don’t blame them,” said Judy. “Neither do I. Where was it?”

Marshall gave her the address, and she realized that she did want to be involved after all. They were friends of hers. She sent Marshall to the hospital to interview the GBH, and popped in on Lloyd on her way to the burglary.

“Alan Marshall says Lennie couldn’t have had stuff from the burglary in his van, because nothing was taken,” she said.

“I think I’ll get Tom to pay a visit to the Frederickses’ house,” said Lloyd. “With a particular remit to have a look inside that van. It’s probably got nothing to do with Drummond, but at least we might find out what it is.” He got up. “And I’m off to my second postmortem in three days,” he said.

Judy went to the burglary, where the neighbor who had been entrusted with the keys was trying to put things back where they belonged, now that she had been told there was no need to leave them piled up by the back door. “Thank goodness he didn’t take anything,” she said. “I would have felt terrible.”

“It wouldn’t have been your fault,” Judy said.

“No, but you feel responsible,” she said. “And … this is going to sound really silly, but you know the thing that really made me think how awful it must be to have strangers messing about with your things? He pulled the plug on Keith’s serial.”

Keith was like Lloyd; he watched things, recorded things, collected things on tapes. And the burglar had unplugged the video minutes after his program had started.

“I know it sounds silly, when people lose all sorts of valuable things, or personal things, but I don’t know, it just seemed so … unfair.”

“It is unfair,” said Judy. Lloyd was watching it, she was sure. He might have recorded it—she’d ask when she got a moment. But, she thought, she had better not tell him why she wanted to know; producing yet another friend he knew nothing about would not be wise. “You didn’t see anyone hanging around— any vehicle you didn’t recognize?” she asked.

“No, well—I was out most of the evening.”

“You wouldn’t know if Mary and Keith took a taxi to the station, by any chance?”

“Yes, I believe they did. I’m sure that’s what she said they’d be doing. Because it had to come really early, and she was worried that it wouldn’t turn up—if you know her, you know what she’s like.”

“Yes.” Judy smiled. “You wouldn’t know which firm?”

“No.”

She was right about Lennie. She was sure she was. There had been a burglary on Tuesday night, too. The stuff might be kept in the van until he could shift it. If Ginny was telling the truth about being with a punter in the underpass, it could have been because Lennie’s van wasn’t available.

Marshall came back from the hospital not long after she had got back to the station.

“That was a short visit,” she said.

“His name is Monty Evans, he is a local entrepreneur with a big house in Malworth, and interests in various fields. Like vice, dodgy finance, secondhand motors—he’s got a record going back to his teens. It was a short visit.”

Judy smiled. “And?”

“And he fell downstairs. I pointed out to him that he was found on a very flat pavement on a street which was entirely devoid of stairs. He says he has no recollection of how he got there, but that he does remember falling downstairs somewhere. He thinks he must have tried to get to casualty. Thus, he was found around the corner from the hospital.”

“And what did the doctor say?”

“He said that his injuries were more or less consistent with falling downstairs. Or being beaten up. And that memory loss is only to be expected when you’ve been unconscious as long as he was. Or if you don’t want to report a crime.” He shrugged. “He said he was very lucky not to have been more seriously hurt, and to go away and stop bothering him,- basically.”

“Let’s hope this keeps up,” Judy said. “If everyone takes to refusing to report any crime, we can sit with our feet up, can’t we?”

“The first shot killed him,” said Freddie. “It was the one to the back of the head.”

“How can you tell?”

“The muzzle was held close to, but not touching, his head,” said Freddie. “There’s tattooing—tiny lesions on the skin around the entry wound—and it’s brown. That means he was alive when he received the wound. The other wounds have produced tattooing, but it’s yellow—and that means they were inflicted postmortem. That’s a simplification, but it’s the case. There are six wounds in all.”

“Six?” said Lloyd.

“Six. The other five are to the body.”

“We’ve only found five cartridges. Could he have been killed somewhere else, dumped in the underpass, shot again to make it look as though he’d been killed there?”

“It’s possible,” said Freddie. “If he was moved very soon after death. Time of death is definitely around the nine o’clock mark.”

Judy saw him go into the underpass at a minute to nine. So … perhaps he had walked along to the other end, emerged, found someone waiting for him with a gun. “The lab says that there was blood on the phone before the emergency call was made,” said Lloyd.

The forensic lab would be working all weekend; people in high places wanted Drummond’s murderer found, and quickly, in view of the speculation and rumor surrounding the whole business, and the national press coverage.

Lloyd thought about what Freddie had said. “I suppose he could have been shot in the park, tried to get help, staggered into—”

“No, he couldn’t,” said Freddie. “Colin Drummond was no longer with us the moment that bullet hit him. If there was blood on the phone when the call was made, it wasn’t made by Colin Drummond. Unless it’s someone else’s blood, of course,” he added. “And he made it before he was shot.”

They would check that. It might be Ginny’s. If he was beating her up, and she pulled out a gun, held it to his head … he could have used a bloody hand to key 999 in the hope that help would arrive before she pulled the trigger. So—what had
Drummond been doing immediately prior to his being shot? “Are there any other marks on his body?” Lloyd asked.

Freddie looked up. “You mean consistent with his having raped and murdered someone two nights previously?” He shook his head. “I haven’t found any foreign hairs, scratches, anything like that.”

“No, I meant more recent marks. Fists? Had he been hitting anyone?”

“Not in such a way as to damage his hands,” said Freddie.

But he wouldn’t damage his hands. You wouldn’t have to punch someone like Ginny too often in order to render her semiconscious.

“It seems Mr. Drummond is unwilling to leave us clues even to his own murder,” said Freddie.

Lloyd took his leave, and went back to the station, where they now had a full printout of the calls made on Drummond’s phone right up to the 999 call. Judy’s number, several times. Stansfield police station, twice. The Ferrari, several times. Bobbie Chalmers’s home number, once. The last call to Stansfield police station had been immediately before the 999. Had he been trying to talk to Judy again? He rang the switchboard, but no personal call had been received then. Anyone calling had probably gone on to the queuing system, the girl said. The line would have been busy. He put down the phone and saw Tom eagerly coming toward him along the corridor.

“Guv,” he said. “You might have been right.”

“I’m always right,” said Lloyd.

“Oh, yes. I forgot.”

Lloyd smiled. “What was I right about this time?”

“The cartridges? We got a print from one of them.”

“Someone we know, I presume.”

“Bobbie Chalmers.” He grinned. “Was it just an inspired guess?” he asked.

“A guess,” said Lloyd. “Hardly inspired. Think back to why we’ve got her prints, Tom.
And
Drummond raped her. And then he murdered Marilyn. I can think of no other single person with more motive.” He stood up. “Let’s go and talk to her,” he said.

They hit the interminable wait for the bypass traffic. “There
should be a roundabout or lights or something here,” he complained. “How are people expected to make this journey every day, if they have to sit here like lemons for ten minutes?”

“I’m getting used to it,” said Tom. “I sort of think of it as a ten-minute break. I’m thinking of bringing a flask and sandwiches in the future.”

Lloyd always seemed to be surrounded by philosophical people who took life as it came, and didn’t get hot under the collar about things they could do nothing about. He hated it. He wanted them to get angry, like he did.

Bobbie looked pale and hurt, but Lloyd recognized the determined look, the touch of steel that was in her makeup, from last time around, as they sat around a table in the lounge bar. Her attire was more conservative than usual; the landlady had lent her clothes, because she couldn’t face the flat. Nicely dressed, respectable-looking. It wasn’t Judy who had been seen at all, thought Lloyd. His instant theory was coming good.