Echoes of the Dead (21 page)

‘For God's sake, Fred protested his innocence – in what was almost his dying breath – to a priest,' Robert Howerd said.

‘And, given those circumstances, what he said must be taken very seriously indeed,' Baxter agreed, ‘but it's still not evidence.'

‘My family has been going through hell for the past twenty-two years,' Howerd said. ‘And it's
continuing
to go through hell – in fact, it feels worse than ever – because even though you have Father O'Brien's statement, your incompetent, corrupt police force is
still
dragging its heels.'

‘Incompetent?' Baxter said, gripping the corner of his desk tightly. ‘Corrupt?
My
police force?'

‘That's what I said, and I stick by it,' Howerd told him.

‘Oh, do you?' Baxter asked, as he felt an anger at least as strong as Howerd's begin to bubble to the surface. ‘I wouldn't go making that kind of accusation if I was you. And I certainly wouldn't use my family's distress as an argument for wanting to see things done.'

‘And why not?'

‘Because, as I understand it, you'd already pretty much cut Fred adrift at the time of his arrest.'

‘That's not true!' Robert Howerd protested.

‘Oh, come on! Have you forgotten what it was like? There was you and your father, wandering around your big impressive shop on the High Street – fingering your watch chains and looking important – and what was Fred doing? Fred was slaving away at a tatty little stall in the covered market!'

Robert Howerd swallowed. ‘My father did that to teach him a lesson,' he said. ‘Fred had been rather wild in his youth, and Father felt that by denying him some of the privileges which went with our position, it might lead him to see the error of his ways. But it was always his intention to welcome Fred back into the bosom of the family. He had always planned to make Fred joint managing director when he himself retired. And that's just what
would have
happened, if your bungling policemen hadn't arrested him – on practically no evidence at all.'

‘What a cosy family picture it is that you're painting for me,' Baxter said sceptically. ‘And, do you know, it might even be a convincing one – if I wasn't aware of the
complete
picture, with all its blemishes.'

‘Blemishes?'

‘You didn't make much of a song and dance about Fred being innocent when he was first arrested for the murder, did you? And why didn't you? Because – along with the rest of Whitebridge – you firmly believed that he'd done it – that he'd raped and killed that little girl. Am I wrong?'

‘We . . . we made a mistake,' Robert Howerd admitted.

‘And there was another way in which you and your father were like the rest of Whitebridge, too – you didn't want to have anything at all to do with his immediate family!'

‘You're quite wrong about that. We paid his wife's and daughter's expenses from the moment he went to prison – and we're still paying Elizabeth's to this day.'

‘That's only
money
!' Baxter said, contemptuously.

‘I beg your pardon!'

‘It's easy to be free with your money – especially when you've got plenty of it. But did you make any
real
effort with his family? Did you show them any of the warmth or compassion they must so desperately have needed? Did you, for example, invite them round on Christmas Day?'

‘No, we didn't actually . . .'

‘And what about the way that you treated your brother himself? Did you ever visit him while he was in prison? Did you even bother to call on him when he was dying?'

‘Well, no,' Howerd admitted, awkwardly.

‘Because you still thought he was a murderer. But now, when it turns out there's a chance he
didn't
kill Lilly, you're starting to feel guilty about the way you've behaved towards him and his family,' Baxter pressed on. ‘And instead of taking responsibility for that guilt yourself – as a real man would, as a
Christian
would – you're trying to pass it on to someone else. You want me to crucify each and every officer involved in the case – and you want me to do it even before my investigation is completed. Well, let me tell you here and now, Mr Howerd, I simply won't do it.'

‘I think you're being highly impertinent!' Howerd blustered.

‘I'm afraid you're wrong about that, sir,' Baxter said. ‘An ordinary constable may perhaps be impertinent, but I'm the
chief
constable, and I'm just being as bloody rude to you as you've been to me.'

‘I . . . I . . .' Howerd choked.

‘If there is a case to answer, then it will be answered,' Baxter promised. ‘If I find that your brother is entitled to a posthumous pardon, then I will work unceasingly to see he gets one. But what I will
not
do is just sit here while you tell me how to run my police force.' Baxter looked down at his watch. ‘I think we've said all there is to say to each other, so I'll wish you good day,' he continued.

Robert Howerd stood up, and stormed over to the door. Only when he was already in the corridor did he turn round and say, ‘Let me assure you, you've not heard the last of this.'

No, he probably hadn't, Baxter thought – because when a man wouldn't face his own guilt, there was no telling
what
he might do next.

Howerd disappeared from the doorway, and the space was immediately filled by Lucy, the chief constable's secretary.

‘Now
that
certainly didn't sound like one of your more successful meetings, sir,' she said.

‘One of these fine days, they'll finally give me a secretary who knows how to mind her own business,' Baxter said. He grinned. ‘Are you
just
here to gloat, Lucy, or was there something you actually wanted?'

Lucy smiled back at him. ‘I've got Chief Inspector Hall in my office, sir. He says he knows he hasn't booked an appointment, but if you could just spare him a few minutes, there's something rather urgent he needs to discuss with you.'

‘Is Chief Inspector Paniatowski with him?' Baxter asked.

‘No, sir, she isn't.'

‘Now that is strange,' Baxter said, almost to himself. ‘They're supposed to working together – and if it
is
really important, then I'm surprised Monika hasn't come too.'

‘Do you want me to send him away with a flea in his ear, sir?' Lucy asked innocently.

Baxter sighed. ‘No, now that he's here, I suppose I'd better see him,' he said.

It was not the first time that Paniatowski had had to face an angry George Baxter. During their stormy on–off relationship, he had frequently lost his temper over her unwillingness – or inability – either to commit fully or to put an end to it altogether. And since then – since she had been a DCI and he had been her boss – there had been arguments over the way she conducted her investigations. So Baxter's anger was not new to her – but she didn't think she had ever seen him quite so angry before.

‘I've been trying to get in touch with you for over two hours – but nobody knew where you were!' Baxter said. ‘In fact, Chief Inspector, nobody had seen you for
two days
! Now why was that?'

‘I've been to Spain,' Paniatowski said.

And from the look on his face, she could see that not only had he already guessed that, but that the visit was the source of his anger.

‘Been to Spain,' Baxter repeated. ‘Without my permission!'

‘I was following up on a lead in the
unofficial
investigation which you'd kindly foisted on me, and I wasn't aware I needed your permission to do that,' Paniatowski countered.

‘Following up on a lead?' Baxter repeated incredulously. ‘What you mean is that you've been to see your old mate Charlie Woodend.'

‘That's correct, sir,' Paniatowski agreed. ‘My old mate Charlie Woodend
was
the lead.'

Baxter shook his head slowly from side to side, and she could see the anger draining away from him and being replaced by something much closer to worry.

‘If you won't work
with
me, Monika, then I can't protect you,' he said.

And, as so often happened, she was unsure whether he was now the chief constable (talking to one of his senior officers), or gingery George Baxter (in whose muscular arms she'd once lain).

‘Why should I need protecting?' she asked.

‘Because, while you've been away, the course of the investigation has taken a turn for the worse,' Baxter said gravely.

How
could it
have taken a turn for the worse? Paniatowski wondered.

What could possibly be worse for the investigation than the discovery that Charlie had probably sent the wrong man to prison for twenty-two years?

‘Go on,' she said.

‘While you were away on your little Spanish jaunt, DCI Hall went to see Elsie Dawson – Lilly's mother.'

‘Why?'

‘Why do you think? To see if he could throw any new light on the case.'

Paniatowski felt her stomach somersault. ‘And did he?'

‘Yes, I'm afraid he did.'

‘
Afraid
he did?'

‘In Charlie Woodend's report on the case, it is clearly stated that he found one of Lilly Dawson's coloured pencils in Fred Howerd's pigeon loft. You remember reading that, don't you?'

‘Yes.'

‘The assumption at the time was that Lilly had dropped it there herself, on the Friday night before she disappeared.'

‘And it's a perfectly sound assumption. She was only there once, so that
must have been
when she dropped it.'

‘Did
you
own a set of Lakeland coloured pencils when you were a child, Monika?' Baxter asked.

‘Yes, I did.'

‘And how did you feel about them?'

Paniatowski found her mind travelling back to a different time – a time when kids couldn't have all they wanted just when they wanted, when pennies had to be counted and gifts were treasured.

‘Well, aren't you going to open it?' her mother asks – and there is a hint of sadness in her voice which suggests she
does
know.

Sitting in Baxter's office, more than thirty years later, the memory was enough to bring a smile to her face, despite the unease she was still feeling.

‘How did you feel about them?' the chief constable repeated.

‘I thought they were most wonderful things that there'd ever been,' she admitted.

‘And did your mother ever let you take them out of the house?' Baxter asked, deceptively innocently.

Paniatowski laughed. ‘Of course not! They were far too valuable for that. I kept them in my bedroom and—'

Oh my God, she thought. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God . . .

‘DCI Hall asked Mrs Dawson if Lilly was allowed to take her pencils out of the house, and she said, no, she wasn't,' Baxter told her. ‘And you know what that means, don't you, Monika?'

She did!

She bloody did!

But she didn't want to admit it.

‘Perhaps you'd better explain it to me, sir,' she said.

‘If Lilly didn't leave the pencil in the pigeon loft, then someone else did – someone who'd been into her bedroom and picked it up. And that someone could only have been Charlie Woodend.'

‘Or Bannerman!' Paniatowski said fiercely.

‘Woodend left Bannerman downstairs while he went to search Lilly's bedroom.'

‘I don't believe it,' Paniatowski said flatly.

‘You mean, you don't
want
to believe it,' Baxter countered.

‘If what Mrs Dawson
now
says is true, why has she kept quiet about it all this time?' Paniatowski asked. ‘Why didn't she mention the fact that the pencils were never allowed to leave the room at the trial?'

‘The question of the pencil never came up at the trial,' Baxter said. ‘There was no need to enter it into the evidence, because Howerd had already confessed to the crime.'

‘I need to talk to DCI Hall,' Paniatowski said frantically. ‘Where is he?'

‘Gone.'

‘Gone?'

‘He was here to establish whether or not Howerd was guilty as charged – and he considers that he's done that, so he's returning to London.'