At Death's Window (18 page)

S
haw went to the CID room to collect Valentine for their appointment with Clem Whyte, but his chair was empty, a cold cup of canteen tea left on the blotter. The wall behind now held half-a-dozen A3 colour prints of the stained-glass windows damaged in the airgun attacks. They reminded Shaw of Stefan Bedrich’s flat in Greenwood House, where the living-room walls displayed that extraordinary riot of artwork, each page of which had no doubt been created by his wife for her migrant husband, trying to eke out a living for his family in a foreign and unwelcoming land. The style had been subverted Soviet, almost cartoonish, with the added vibrancy of the primary colours which left the rest of the flat’s rooms grey and drab, except for the scarlet Polish doll on the kitchen table.

He found Valentine outside, smoking on the fire escape platform, five storeys above the street. The wind hummed gently through the steel steps. Another fine day threatened, although the Met Office was forecasting storms by evening and an electric finale to the Indian summer. Valentine had been up early, armed with a warrant, to pay Mrs Diane Whyte an unexpected visit at home.

‘Progress,’ he said before Shaw could speak, his thin hair blown into a vertical quiff like a wisp of smoke. ‘On the outside you’d think they were a model couple, the Whytes; they live in a nice semi off the Castle Rising road.’

Shaw knew the spot, a Monkey-puzzle-tree estate of slightly worn thirties villas.

‘She’s a nurse at a care home. She needs the car because it’s off the A10 down at West Winch. Two grown-up kids, both living away, both married. Nothing in the house. Well, nothing you wouldn’t expect. The garage, on the other hand, was packed with white goods: TVs, DVD players, sound boxes – all top of the range, none of it new. Plus a few pictures, mostly picked for the frames is my guess – but nice stuff, mostly originals.’

‘Stolen goods?’

‘Yeah. Mark’s already matched a few items with the inventories we’ve got on file. But I reckon the lot’s lifted.’

‘What does the wife say?’

‘That he told her it was all stuff being recycled from council flats – well, housing associations, whatever they’re called these days. And charitable donations. That was her line, that it was all stuff donated to brighten up the lives of council tenants.’

He let some cigarette smoke seep out of the gaps between his teeth.

‘I think she knew what he was up to. I told her she was talking nonsense, that forty-two-inch smart screen TVs aren’t standard council issue. She said if I didn’t believe her we could take a look for ourselves, because he’d been overseeing a refurbishment at Chaucer House – another old block like Greenwood, but on the riverbank by the cemetery?’

Shaw nodded.

‘There’s a warden on the ground floor and he gave us the keys – Whyte had organized work on two flats, empty, newly decorated, and she’s right, they’re full of the same stuff, state-of-the-art TVs, a couple of nice watercolours on the wall. Posh rugs. One had a digital radio, for God’s sake. Warden said Whyte told him it was all recycled as part of a council initiative to try and get tenants to look after the place better by “investing in their environment” – his words.’

‘Serial numbers?’

‘Yup. No problem – I’ve got Paul organizing a view tomorrow for a few of the owners. But it’s all over, Peter. This is the stuff all right.’

‘A modern-day Robin Hood then …’ said Shaw.

‘Robin Bastard, more like it. I reckon this lot’s his share. It’s still stolen goods, Peter, whatever the intention. And the rest of the gang must have fenced their shares. So that’ll be cash.’

‘Whyte’s council van?’

‘Birley says they’ve got a preliminary match with the tyre marks left at the Old Manor, Burnham Marsh. We’ll know by close of play today. Plus the council’s given us the log for when Whyte had the vehicle out. Matches the burglaries almost to a tee. I’d like to hear him talk his way out of it now, Peter.’

In the distance Shaw’s eye tracked a trawler coming down the Cut towards the docks. He could just make out marker flags flying from the crab and lobster pots on the deck. The prospect of a long interview with their suspect in a windowless room made him feel suddenly claustrophobic.

Valentine launched his cigarette butt into a long descent into St James’ Street. ‘One thing: in his front room, over the fireplace, there was this oil painting: row of cottages, a bit of rough thatch, and a lane leading off down towards marshes, and the sea. Peasants outside – you know the deal, smocks and that. I recognized it – well, I bet the houses don’t look like that now, but I know the place, because you could see the sea wall and it’s definitely Wells – got to be. According to the wife, Whyte was brought up in one of the cottages in the picture. Idyllic, she said. That was his grandfather’s place, but then the old man couldn’t pay the rent and the whole family got the heave-ho. Can’t bear to go back, apparently. Wife says that’s his big problem – he harbours grudges. Can’t forgive, can’t forget.’

T
hey’d put Clem Whyte in the ‘tough cop’ interview room down in the basement: tiled, no windows, with a uniformed PC standing by the door. The interview suites upstairs were modern and bright, painted in pastel colours. This was fifties austerity policing; a match for the cells down the corridor. Valentine brought a cup of coffee for the prisoner down from the canteen with three sachets of sugar, a little plastic tub of fake milk and a useless brittle plastic stirrer.

Whyte didn’t even let them sit down before he made his opening statement: ‘I’ll tell you about what I did, and what Stefan did, but that’s it. I’m not naming any other names. I’m sorry to be unhelpful. I think there’s an important principle at stake.’

Shaw wasn’t surprised by this tactic. He’d only met Whyte once, and they’d probably only swapped a few hundred words in total, but he’d discerned a certain preachy morality. Criminals who claimed they acted in the interests of others were, he found, the most devious. The absence of a sense of guilt also made them particularly dangerous, and arrogant. Whyte’s manifesto of intent made it slightly more likely, in Shaw’s judgment, that it was he who had killed Stefan Bedrich. Or that he knew who had.

The duty solicitor, a young man called Sawyer who was often on call at St James’, sat beside his client and seemed mildly shocked by Whyte’s announcement. He whispered in Whyte’s ear, but the prisoner just shook his head.

Valentine switched on the recorder and voiced the appropriate preamble. Shaw helped himself to a mint from a small dish on the table. He held it on his tongue while he considered
his
tactics.

‘DS Valentine will outline the facts as we see them,’ said Shaw, pushing his chair back so that the metal legs screeched on the concrete floor.

The DS intoned a list of the evidence accumulated so far against Whyte on a specimen charge of burglary under the Theft Act 1968: the stolen goods, the vehicle sightings, the possible tyre mark match at Burnham Marsh. Valentine casually added that the maximum sentence for the offence, when committed in a dwelling, was fourteen years.

‘No cut-rate for second homes, I’m afraid,’ he added.

‘Really, Detective Sergeant. Is that necessary?’ Sawyer made an ostentatious note.

Outside in the corridor they heard a cell open down the corridor, a single foot scuffing the floor, before a door slammed shut.

‘Let’s put that aside,’ said Shaw. ‘At least for this, our first interview. The important question is this: how did Stefan Bedrich die? And why? Did you kill him, Mr Whyte?’

One shake of the head. Nothing more.

Shaw produced a passport shot of Bedrich taken from documents found in the flat at Greenwood House, and set it on the table upside down so that Whyte could get a clear view.

Whyte’s small grey eyes blinked behind his spectacles. That narrow, tortoise-like neck seemed to telescope, allowing his head to move forward, closer to the picture.

‘How did Stefan Bedrich die?’ asked Shaw.

‘I don’t know,’ said Whyte. ‘When we got to the village that night we went our separate ways. I had a plan – marked on an OS map – and we’d divvied the place up. I’d been pretty sure the place was deserted, but you can’t be certain. I knew the pub was closed, that’s what made me look at it in the first place. So we each took a quarter of the village, but approached the properties as if they might be inhabited.’

‘How many of you?’

‘Four. But as I say – no names.’

The solicitor tried for a second whisper but Whyte waved him away.

‘Why did you think the village might be empty?’

‘I didn’t. I knew every house was a second home and it was the third week of October on a Thursday night. And as I said, the pub was closed. We always worked on the assumption someone might be at home. If the place was a ghost town, all the better.’

Valentine handed Shaw a file. He opened it to reveal a closely typed list of addresses.

‘We found this in a desk at your house. Your wife unlocked it for us. It’s the council’s own list of properties claiming relief on their council tax as second homes. Must have made choosing a target a little easier.’

Whyte’s head shifted on his narrow neck as if his collar was too tight.

‘My client has the right to remain silent,’ said the solicitor.

‘It’s about right and wrong,’ said Whyte, ignoring Sawyer, who gently set down his biro and leant back in his seat. ‘And about degrees of right and wrong. I don’t think it’s right for people to have two homes when so many people have none. I think it’s wrong that people can’t grow up in their own homes. We’re a rich society, but we have very little concern for the lives of others.’

‘Great, now speeches,’ said Valentine. ‘Can this get any better?’

Shaw leant forward. ‘Talk us through exactly what you did from the moment you arrived at Burnham Marsh on the night of the seventeenth of October. I presume you were the transport – so four in the van, yes?’

Whyte licked his lips and Shaw guessed he’d been relishing the prospect of a dispute on the ethics of the situation, a conversation he was not going to get.

‘Yes, by the war memorial. I parked the van there. I cut the lights and we briefly double-checked that we all knew what we were doing.’

‘Where did Stefan go?’

‘The quayside down to the old church. I had the quayside and the road out of the village; the others went over the sea wall and did the houses on the old marsh.’

‘Time?’

‘One o’clock. We had to be back at the van by two. Everyone came back but Stefan.’

‘What next?’

‘We had a plan for that. We waited one hour. If there was any sign he’d been caught we’d just have driven off. Sixty minutes, then – only then – we called his mobile. No answer, although it rang. We gave him fifteen more minutes and rang again, same status. So we left.’

‘You just drove away? You expect us to believe that?’

Whyte stirred his coffee.

‘I don’t think any of this adds up,’ said Shaw. ‘You and Stefan Bedrich don’t add up. Tell me how this started.’

Whyte looked at the clock on the wall then shook his head.

The morgue shots of Bedrich, which Shaw had picked up from Dr Kazimeirz, were graphic, showing the deep wound which had almost severed his neck. He put three down on the interview table.

‘God,’ said Whyte. ‘I …’ He held the bridge of his nose, his eyes tightly shut.

‘Sorry, did you think it would be pretty?’ asked Valentine. ‘At Peace. Gone Before. That kind of thing?’

‘Gentlemen …’

Shaw ignored the solicitor. ‘Maybe you should have gone and looked for him, Clem. If not for his sake then maybe for hers?’

An A4 shot, this one in colour, fuzzy from magnification, showing a child with black curls and green eyes.

‘That’s Kasia, the daughter, Clem. The name’s derived from the Polish for “pure”. She’s not going to remember him at all now, is she?’

Shaw rearranged the pictures of the butchered father and the laughing daughter.

Whyte let his eyes slide over both images. He added creamer to the coffee and began to study the strange, galaxy-like swirl of the white in the black.

‘You clearly don’t think we deserve the truth. How about her?’ asked Shaw.

He looked up into Whyte’s impassive face. ‘What really worries me about this is the assortment of motives. We know why you’re in it: political slogans. Plus a pleasant little sideline in top-of-the-range fittings and décor for council tenants. That must have been very satisfying. And presumably arson was next. But I still don’t see how this started.’

Whyte couldn’t stop his hand edging across the table, an extended index finger sliding the girl’s picture over that of her father’s mutilated skull.

Then he pushed both pictures away, as if making a final decision.

‘Stefan’s case file came to my notice,’ he said. ‘The Greenwood House flats are sought after, there’s a waiting list. Stefan’s …’ He searched for the right word. ‘Stefan’s
plight
was acute. The death of his wife was a tragedy. He desperately wanted his child back. He didn’t want to live in Poland. He’d taken night classes in car mechanics in Boston and qualified. The plan was to set up on his own – a garage, I guess, a repair shop. He had nothing.

‘I interviewed him at the council offices. He explained that if he could set up on his own, get six months of company accounts under his belt, he’d be in a position to apply for custody. The problem was cash. He needed fifteen thousand pounds seed corn to start the business. The bank laughed in his face. I asked him why they’d turned him down for credit and he admitted he had a previous conviction for burglary up in Lincolnshire.

‘My normal practice is to visit applicants. So I did. He had a room in the North End, a Rackman landlord, one toilet for sixteen rooms. I’d had time to think. The issue of second homes is very close to my heart. I wanted to do something radical, decisive. Something personal. I wanted to show these people – the Chelsea set – that they weren’t welcome. I wanted the media to focus on the homeless, the people driven out of the villages in which they’d been born and brought up. I said I’d recommend Stefan for the flat if he’d consider a joint enterprise.’

‘Burgling second homes?’

‘Yes. The key was getting in and out, and for that I needed professionals. Stefan was my key. He had friends, not just in Boston, but Lynn too. They’d turned over a few suburban semis. But the cash flow was hardly worth the risk. I said they’d get more out of one second home than fifty semis.’

‘What did you think when the media didn’t get the story?’ asked Shaw.

Whyte shrugged. ‘I thought you lot were sitting on it. Fine. I wasn’t going to stop and it was going to come out eventually – with all the more force if suppressed for so long. I was prepared to be patient. I was close to resorting to fire – very close. Then, maybe, a letter claiming responsibility. There were risks. I wanted to move forward gradually. Steadily.’

‘So you’re in this to fight the good fight for the homeless,’ said Shaw. ‘He’s in it to bank the cash so he can get his daughter back. Saints, the pair of you. But the other two are just thieves. That’s a volatile mixture of motives. Is that what happened – a fight? Did you all fall out over who got what? That’s the danger with the four of you splitting up the stuff – that needs a certain level of trust. Did you trust them? Did you trust Stefan?’

‘Yes. I did, until that night. Now I don’t know.’

‘What did you think happened?’

‘I said that I don’t know. We feared he’d stumbled on a resident and been caught. Or an accident. Trapped in a cellar, perhaps, or injured getting in through a window. Or – yes, maybe he’d found something he didn’t want to share and he’d done a runner. But we’d all agreed, if someone didn’t make it back within an hour of the deadline we’d split. No arguments.’

‘And you expect us to believe that?’ asked Shaw.

‘It’s the truth.’

‘Isn’t it much more likely that when Bedrich didn’t return you sent someone to find him? Or did you go yourself? After all, there was no guarantee that if Bedrich was trapped, or the subject of a citizen’s arrest, that he wouldn’t name names once he was in police custody. That’s the deal I’d have made. A clean passport back to Poland in return for names, details, a statement.’

Whyte bent the little plastic stirrer close to breaking point, then set it aside.

Shaw folded his notebook. ‘We have further questions, Mr Whyte. We’ll be back. Several things are still unclear, and we have forensic results to evaluate. But one thing
is
clear to me. I don’t think you’ve told us the truth. And certainly not the whole truth.’