Echoes of the Dead (12 page)

‘Is there anything else you can tell me about Fred?' Woodend asked.

And he was thinking, Please give me one thing – just one little thing – that will help to put him back in the frame.

Sid Smart gently fingered his bruised jaw. ‘Well, let me see. He got married sometime in the early thirties, an' has one daughter, Elizabeth her name is, who must be sixteen or seventeen now. He was called up by the army early in the war – but he didn't serve long. Got invalided out with a stomach complaint – an' we both know how easy
that
is to fake – so while you an' me were getting' shot at by the Jerries, he was havin' a cushy time as a fire warden back in Whitebridge.'

It was no good, Woodend thought – none of it was
any good
.

‘What else?' Smart continued. ‘Oh yes – he lives with his wife an' daughter on Mafeking Street, and, as far as I know—

‘Hang about,' Woodend said, experiencing a sudden flicker of curiosity. ‘Did you say he lived on
Mafeking Street
?'

‘That's right.'

‘But that's just a terraced row, like the one my mam an' dad live in, isn't it?'

‘It is.'

‘That doesn't seem the sort of place I'd expect a man whose father runs a chain of shops to live in.'

‘Ah, but you see, Fred's sort of workin' his passage back,' Sid Smart explained.

‘What do you mean?'

‘Arthur Howerd's not only a big man in the business community, he's a big man in the local Catholic church as well. He takes his religion very seriously – an' he's not the sort of feller who likes havin' a black sheep in the family.'

‘So?

‘So, for a number of years he wouldn't have anythin' at all to do with his youngest son, an' Fred had to get by as best he could. But then the old man had a heart attack, an' decided it was time to accept the lost sheep back into the fold, while he still had the chance.'

‘Accept him – but not exactly welcome him with open arms,' Woodend guessed.

‘You've got it,' Sid Smart agreed. ‘Before he could reclaim his birthright, he had to prove he was worthy of it. An' the
way
he had to prove it was by startin' at the bottom of the business an' workin' his way back up.'

Pointless, Woodend thought miserably. All this is
pointless
.

‘So while Arthur bought his elder brother Robert a nice detached house on the edge of town, Fred had to continue living in Mafeking Street,' Sid Smart said. ‘An' while Robert swanned around as assistant general manager—'

‘Fred was stuck behind the counter, as a humble assistant,' Woodend interrupted, just to show he was still listening.

‘Well, it wasn't quite as bad as that,' Sid Smart told him. ‘Fred was allowed to have his own little business, but, you must admit, runnin' a stall doesn't really compare to runnin' a shop, does it?'

‘Runnin' a what?' Woodend exploded.

‘Runnin' a stall,' Sid Smart repeated. ‘Didn't I say? I thought I'd already mentioned that he was given a stall on Whitebridge covered market.'

The house on Mafeking Street was three doors down from Fred Howerd's home. Woodend had had no real reason for selecting it over any of the others on the street, except that while the rest had their front doors and window frames painted in chocolate brown or sombre black, the owner of this one had – intriguingly – plumped for a pale lilac.

His knock was answered by a slim man in his early thirties, who was wearing a shirt which almost matched the colour of his paintwork, and a pair of trousers which seemed – to Woodend, at least – to be uncomfortably tight.

‘Yes?' he said.

Woodend produced his warrant card. ‘Police, sir,' he announced. ‘DCI Woodend.'

The man in the doorway blanched, and then made a visible effort to recover himself.

‘But I haven't done anything wrong!' he said.

‘It never occurred to me, even for a moment, that you had, sir,' Woodend replied. ‘By the way, I don't think I quite caught your name.'

‘It's Harper,' the man said, in what might almost have been called a guilty mumble. ‘Ronald Harper.'

‘I'd like to ask you a few questions, Mr Harper,' Woodend said. ‘Would it be all right if I came inside?'

Harper shrugged. ‘I suppose so,' he said, reluctantly.

There was no hallway, because the downstairs of the house had been converted into a single large room. There was a kitchenette in the left-hand corner at the back, and a dining table in the right-hand corner. The remaining space was dominated by the largest sofa that Woodend had ever seen, and sitting on the sofa was a second man, wearing trousers that were almost identical to Harper's, and a yellow shirt.

The man jumped to his feet when he saw Woodend.

‘I . . . er . . .' he began.

‘This is Mr Bell, my tenant,' Harper said hastily. ‘He lives upstairs, and,' he added with emphasis, ‘
I
live down here.'

So where did Harper sleep? Woodend wondered.

‘The sofa converts into a bed at night,' Harper told him, reading his mind. He turned to the other man. ‘I have made a note of your complaint, Mr Bell, and will instruct my builder to call on you and make the necessary repairs,' he said, woodenly. ‘And now, perhaps, you'd like to return to your own apartment.'

‘I think I'd prefer Mr Bell to stay,' Woodend said.

‘We're not doing any harm. Why can't you just leave us alone?' Bell asked – and looked as if he were about to burst into tears.

It would have been comical if they hadn't both been so worried, Woodend thought.

‘The best mate I had in the army was called Tommy Jenkins,' he said. ‘He was a homosexual, though not many people knew that, an' he was one of the bravest men I ever met. The night he was killed, I cried, an' sometimes just the thought of him is enough to set me off again.'

‘What is this?' Harper demanded. ‘Some kind of trick?'

‘No trick,' Woodend replied. ‘What people do behind their own closed doors is no business of mine. I'm only here because I'm investigatin' a murder, an' I thought you might be able to help.'

The two men looked at each other questioningly, and then Harper, taking the lead, nodded and said, ‘What do you want to know?'

‘You can start by tellin' if you have a view of the pigeon loft that's on the field behind this house,' Woodend said.

‘Not from down here,' Harper told him, ‘but you get a pretty good view of it from our bed—from the back bedroom upstairs.' He giggled. ‘Tinker spends half his time gazing out of that window.'

‘I like to watch the rabbits playing in the grass,' Bell said defensively. ‘Nothing wrong with that, is there?'

‘Nothin' at all,' Woodend agreed. ‘So you'll often see Mr Howerd, when he's comin' and goin' from the loft, will you, Mr Bell?'

‘If he happens to be coming and going when I happen to be looking out of the window,' Bell said cautiously.

‘Is he usually alone?'

‘Yes,' Bell replied, and this time he spoke far too quickly.

‘But you've seen him take someone else there?'

‘Once in a while.'

‘What about a week last Friday?' Woodend pressed. ‘Did you see anybody then?'

The look on Bell's face told Woodend that he was trying to make up his mind between telling a complete lie and a half-truth.

‘He . . . went there with his daughter,' Bell said, opting for the latter course.

Harper giggled again. ‘Oh, really, you're such a scatterbrain, Tinker,' he said.

‘Please, Ronnie, don't say any more,' Bell begged.

‘The lovely Elizabeth wasn't even here a week last Friday,' Harper said, ignoring him. ‘She was away! On her honeymoon! Don't you remember?'

‘Then . . . then it must have been some other day,' Bell mumbled.

‘Or some other
female
!' Woodend said.

‘No, I . . .' Bell whined.

‘Or some other female,' Woodend persisted.

A tear appeared in the corner of Bell's right eye. ‘I don't want to go to prison,' he said.

‘Who mentioned anythin' about prison?' Woodend wondered.

‘If there's a trial, and I have to give evidence, it will come out that I've been . . . that Ronnie and I have been . . . And then they'll lock me away – because that's what they do to homos.'

‘Hang on a minute!' Harper said. ‘Do you think Fred Howerd killed that poor little girl, Chief Inspector?'

It was not a question he was supposed to answer, Woodend thought – but bugger that.

‘Yes, Mr Harper,' he said. ‘I think it's very likely that he did.'

Harper crossed the room and placed his hands on his friend's shoulders. ‘You can't shield a murderer, Tinker,' he said softly. ‘Whatever it costs us, you have to tell the chief inspector what you know.'

‘I . . . I did see him go the loft that Friday night,' Bell said, almost in a sob. ‘It was just as it was going dark. He had a girl with him, and once they were inside, he lit the lantern.'

‘Was it the girl who was killed?' Woodend asked. ‘Was it Lilly Dawson?'

‘I couldn't say,' Bell told him. He looked at his partner. ‘Honestly, Ronnie, I really couldn't say.'

‘But it was definitely a girl – rather than a woman?' Woodend asked.

‘Oh yes,' Bell admitted. ‘It was a girl, all right.'

TEN

I
t was the middle of the afternoon. Much had already happened that day, and much more might happen yet, Woodend thought, as he and Bannerman walked across the field to Fred Howerd's pigeon loft.

‘Did you
know
I'd be wasting my time re-interviewing all the usual suspects, sir?' Bannerman asked, with a hint of resentment in his voice.

‘It was what you wanted to do,' Woodend replied.

‘You haven't answered my question, sir,' Bannerman persisted.

‘I
suspected
it was probably a waste of time,' Woodend said frankly, ‘but I didn't actually
know
. In this kind of investigation you
never
know until all the pieces finally slot together.'

And they
did
all slot together, he told himself. Lilly had been desperate to make friends with older men, and, working on the market, Howerd would have had ample opportunity to learn that. Lilly loved all kinds of dumb creatures, and Howerd had a pigeon loft, which was the perfect bait. There had been a Sheffield tippler feather snagged in Lilly's stocking, and another in the shed where she had been murdered. And – to cap it all – ‘Tinker' Bell had seen Howerd take a girl to his pigeon loft the night before she was abducted.

It all added up. It really
did
. Each bit of evidence dovetailed so neatly into all the other bits that he just
had to be
right.

Why then, Woodend wondered, did he still – even at this stage – have qualms?

It's because this is your first major case, lad, he told himself. You're
bound
to be a
little
worried that, somewhere along the line, you've made a mistake.

They had reached the loft. There was a heavy padlock on the door, but they had come well prepared, with a search warrant in Woodend's pocket and a set of bolt cutters in Bannerman's hand.

‘Shall I break the lock, sir?' Bannerman asked.

‘That's what we're here for,' Woodend told him.

Bannerman cut through the shackle, and the lock fell to the ground, hitting the soft earth with a slight thud.

Woodend pulled on the hasp, and the door swung open.

They were in!

It was gloomy in the loft, but once Woodend had drawn back the bolts and opened the shutters, the light from the outside flooded in.

The caged pigeons, surprised by this unexpected visitation, ruffled their feathers and cooed worriedly.

‘You're all right, lads,' Woodend said softly. ‘I've never been a big fan of pigeon pie, myself, so you've really nothin' to worry about.'

Apart from the pigeon cages, there was not much to see. Two battered armchairs stood at the opposite end of the loft from the door, and a small rickety table had been placed next to them. There was an oil lamp on the table – the lamp which, presumably, ‘Tinker' Bell had seen Howerd light the night he had taken the girl to the loft. And on the floor next to the chairs were several empty brown ale bottles and a half-full bottle of lemonade.

Woodend crouched down, so that he could take a closer look at the bottles. They were all covered with a thin layer of dust, which suggested to him that they had been standing there for some time.

He straightened up again.

‘It's significant that there's no sign of any glasses, don't you think, Sergeant?' he asked.

‘Is it, sir?' Bannerman replied, puzzled. ‘Why?'

‘Because that means that nobody's been drinkin'
shandy
in here,' Woodend said.

‘I'm still not following you,' Bannerman admitted.

‘Most men, when they're drinkin' beer, will do it straight from the bottle,' Woodend explained. ‘Well, it saves washin' up, doesn't it?'

‘Yes, I suppose so,' Bannerman said dubiously.

‘But if they're goin' to drink shandy, which is a
mixture
of beer an' lemonade, they need a glass to do the mixin' in. An' like I said, there are no glasses here.'