Scene of Crime (20 page)

“I went to see Carl this morning,” she said. “Actually, he’s staying with his partner, but he was at the house.”

Oh, dear. Carl was being investigated by Marianne. Much scarier than being investigated by the police.

Marianne, who claimed clairvoyance, correctly guessed, or simply knew what she was thinking, and looked offended. “I just wanted to see if he was all right,” she said. “Anyway, I had to go to the bathroom while I was there, and I couldn’t help seeing the bedroom—the door was open and the bed wasn’t made, so it caught my eye, because
the house always looks immaculate. There were no pillows on the bed—any of the beds, come to that—is that significant?”

Judy didn’t reply. Her sole was growing cold; Marianne was eating hers.

“And I saw Estelle’s diary on the bedside table,” she said. “I recognized it from the pattern on the cover. It was a real diary, not an appointment diary. I’d seen her with it lots of times.”

Judy felt as cold as her sole. “And?”

“And I went in and had a look at it.”

“Oh, Marianne,” groaned Judy.

“It wasn’t like on the telly, darling. They didn’t have the room closed up—there wasn’t any of that crime-scene ribbon over the door or anything—I wouldn’t have gone in if there had been.”

That was reassuring. Marianne finished eating and put her knife and fork together before continuing, leaving Judy in a state of near panic.

“I looked at the entry for the previous Monday night—I told you her Mondays were important to her, and I doubted that it was some writer’s circle that got her so excited. Sure enough, she had been writing about this man, and I thought—well, it could be evidence. And since the police hadn’t removed it, and anyone could go into that room—well, someone else
could
have removed it. Someone who wouldn’t have brought it to you.” She dipped into her bag and produced the diary, placing it on the table, then gave a little shrug. “So I took it first.”

Judy closed her eyes.

“I mean, if Carl knew about the affair, well—it could be evidence, couldn’t it, as I said?”

It seemed unlikely to Judy that it was evidence; Carl
would hardly have left it lying on the bedside table if he’d known it could incriminate him.

“Is that stealing?”

Marianne was looking theatrically perplexed, but Judy was used to Lloyd, who could look any way he chose, and she wasn’t fooled. Marianne had known exactly what she was doing when she took that diary.

“Well, it belongs to Carl,” Judy said. “And you had no right to remove it, so—technically, yes.”

“But I’ve brought it to you, darling. You’re the police.”

“And what am I supposed to do with it?”

Judy hadn’t opened it. Hadn’t touched it. She wished Marianne’s supernatural powers could transport it back to where it came from, beside Estelle Bignall’s bed. But, a little voice at the back of her head was asking,
why
was it beside her bed? Surely Estelle hadn’t kept it there? Had Carl Bignall found it and confronted her with it? Judy picked it up and put it in her own bag; it could indeed be evidence. But she couldn’t invent some story to account for its now being in the possession of the police, which was clearly what Marianne wanted her to do.

“Marianne,” she said, in what Lloyd called her nanny voice, “if it is evidence, we have to say how it was obtained. I have to give it to the investigating officers, and I have to tell them how I got it. Which means I have to tell them how you got it.”

Marianne thought about that, then flicked one of her scarves over her shoulder. “Oh, well,” she said, and smiled. “All I could think when I saw it was that it shouldn’t be left there for just anyone to pick up. If they clap me in irons, at least it’ll be a new experience, and I love new experiences.”

Ryan, alone in a cell, was only too aware of the seriousness of his position; he hadn’t needed the evening paper to tell him, though that was obviously why Sergeant Finch had so thoughtfully provided it. A woman had died, and the police thought he, Ryan, had brought about her death. They were doing everything in their power to find evidence to charge him with manslaughter. And, possibly for the first time in his life, he had thrown himself on their mercy and told the truth.

But Dexter hadn’t. What had he been doing there in the first place? Surely he wasn’t involved in something like this? And he’d lied to them about what he’d seen. Why? He’d never asked Dex to lie for him, never once. Contrary to what his mother apparently thought, he had never involved Dexter in anything. But what Dexter had said had made it look as though he’d made everything up.

When the interview had been abruptly suspended, he’d begged Stan to get Dexter to tell the truth, but Stan said it would do no good; the police would say he’d told Dexter what to say. He couldn’t interfere with a witness, and he didn’t represent Dexter.

So Ryan was reduced to trying to send a telepathic message to his brother. Please, please, Dex, tell the truth. There was no way Dex was involved in anything like that, and whatever he was doing there, it wasn’t because he was burgling the Bignalls’ house, so there was no reason for him to lie except to protect him. All Dex had to do was tell the truth—naturally, the police still wouldn’t believe him, but they would have to take it into account.

But he knew his little brother. Lying didn’t come easily to him, so once he’d made up his mind to lie, that’s what he’d do. With all the conviction that a good actor had at his disposal. If Dex had decided he didn’t see Ryan
breaking into a car, then that’s what he would say. For the rest of his life, if he had to. And by the time he realized that he wasn’t helping, it would be too late to change his story.

Ryan picked up the evening paper again. How the hell could he convince them that he had had nothing to do with it? He turned the pages, trying to take his mind off it, and found himself reading something that brought his eyebrows together in a frown of concentration.

By the time the interview began again, Ryan couldn’t wait to talk. Stan had called to say he’d been held up in court and would be there as soon as he could get away, and Ryan waived his right to have him present. He didn’t need him present.

“Look,” said Ryan, as soon as Finch had finished all the messing about with the tapes and the caution. He jabbed a finger at the paper. “That traffic jam. I was in it.” He looked at Lloyd, and pushed the paper across to him. “Read it,” he said. “The lights came back at 8:28, and I was there when they did. And the traffic was at a standstill for ten minutes before that. So I couldn’t have been burgling a house out in the sticks at eight-fifteen, could I?”

Finch read it and looked up, his face amused. “Nice try, Ryan,” he said.

Ryan’s heart plunged. “What? What do you mean?”

“You read about a traffic jam and suddenly remember you were in it? Do me a favor. You didn’t nick the car until half past. Twenty-five past at the earliest. That’s how long it was there. And we know you’ve been telling us porkies, Ryan.”

“What about?” said Ryan.

“About seeing a Saab. About sending Baz home.”

“I did see a Saab! I tried to break into it.”

“Not according to Baz,” said Finch. “I’ve just been talking to him. He had no idea what I was talking about.”

“Oh, come on—you know he would say that!”

“And his van was seen, Ryan. At twenty past eight. He was seen, running back to it. You and he were there to burgle the Bignalls’ house, weren’t you?”

“No!”

“Well, he didn’t drop you off and leave, did he?”

Oh God. Ryan took a deep breath. “No—all right, he was waiting to make sure I got the Saab. Only that never happened. And when I found myself with all this stuff in the sack, I rang him to come and pick me up, but he didn’t answer. That’s why I legged it through the wood and nicked the car. And then I did get hold of him. And that’s when I told him to go home. He’d been out of the van for a pee—that’s why he was running back to it.”

Finch was grinning.

“It’s true! And I was in that traffic jam!” He looked at Lloyd. “I was, I swear it. I was in it for the whole ten minutes—that’s the God’s honest truth. There were kids singing Christmas carols—I can even tell you which ones they sang!”

“Did anyone see you?” asked Lloyd.

Ryan stared at him. He had never been in this position before. He had always told lies or said nothing whenever he’d been brought to a police station for questioning. Somehow, he’d thought the truth would do the trick, but it wouldn’t. It couldn’t. He didn’t have any proof. Then he remembered.

“Yes!” he said. “Someone did see me.”

“Oh, yeah?” Finch, of course. “Who?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh, this gets better.”

“No, I mean I didn’t know who she was, but she knew me. She spoke to me.”

Finch sighed. “All right, Ryan, I’ll buy it. What did she look like?”

And that was when Ryan realized he had no chance. No chance at all. He closed his eyes.

“Come on, Ryan. It’s not a difficult question. If you say someone saw you, I’m prepared to try and find her. What did she look like?”

“The Pink Panther,” said Ryan miserably, his eyes still closed, and sighed. “She looked like the Pink sodding Panther.”

“Are you going to check it out?”

“Oh, come on, guv—he must think we’re idiots! I should never have left him the paper.”

“Probably not,” said Lloyd. “But you never know—Ryan could be covering up for someone. You thought that yourself at one point. At least, it was one of the answers you offered him to choose from.”

“But you said that Dexter would never have broken into Estelle Bignall’s house, and I agree with you—he thought far too much of her to do anything like that.”

“But Baz Martin didn’t. He’s Dexter’s cousin, remember—Dexter might accidentally have given him the information that the house would be empty. And Ryan could be covering for him.”

Tom thought about that. Baz was certainly stupid enough to have bound and gagged someone for no reason, but he had never been violent in his life. If Ryan was unlikely, Baz was even more so.

“Perhaps Ryan wasn’t there at all,” Lloyd went on. “It’s Dexter and Baz who were seen there, not Ryan. And if he really did get caught in that traffic jam—” Lloyd sat down on the edge of Tom’s desk. “—then eliminating him could point us in the right direction.”

Tom wasn’t sure what to do with a senior officer who had a fixation. “Carl Bignall’s direction, would that be?” he asked.

“No,” Lloyd said. “Unlike you, Sergeant Finch, I’m keeping an open mind.”

Tom gasped. “Since when?”

Lloyd grinned. “Since you told me Watson confirmed that Bignall did leave his house at half past seven—though that doesn’t mean that Bignall didn’t go
back
again, of course.”

“No—it means that Ryan Chester was lying,” Tom said, doggedly determined. “I reckon it’s just the way it looks.” He hit the newspaper. “This is just a story he’s concocted after reading this.”

“But we can’t place Ryan in the house or the garden, and what happened in there just isn’t his style—especially not if she was sexually assaulted, which she might well have been.”

“Baz is even less likely, guv. He’s got no record of violence at all—at least Ryan’s been known to take a pop at someone in his time.”

“But if Ryan’s lying about Bignall’s car being there, he might be lying about being there himself. And he might be telling the truth about the traffic jam.”

“How?” said Tom, perplexed. “He didn’t take Hutchinson’s car until half past eight—the traffic lights had come back on by then.”

“What if he didn’t take Hutchinson’s car at all? What if he was doing what he says he was doing? Stealing an upmarket car to order? Couldn’t
that
have been what he was driving when he got caught in the traffic jam?”

Tom tried to hang in there.

“Just suppose,” Lloyd said, “that while Ryan’s peaceably
going about his business, stealing a car from wherever, his cousin Baz is going in for a spot of private enterprise with someone else—that would explain why we’ve got two sets of footprints that don’t belong to anyone we know of yet. And what if the one he teams up with is both stupid and violent? Dexter realizes what they’re up to and tries to stop them. The language used was
about
Mrs. Bignall, not to her.”

This was beginning to make sense, Tom thought, and carried Lloyd’s hypothesis further. “Dexter’s no match for the violent one,” he said. “He gets a beating, runs as soon as they’re busy breaking the window. They go in, and are interrupted by Mrs. Bignall. The other one assaults her, Baz realizes it’s all getting too heavy for him, takes fright, and runs back to his van. The other one leaves with what he’s got and runs through the wood.
He
takes Hutchinson’s car.”

Lloyd nodded. “And then Baz rings his cousin Ryan, tells him they’ve got a stolen car full of stolen goods, and will Ryan help them out? Naturally, he doesn’t tell him they’re the proceeds of an aggravated burglary, or Ryan wouldn’t have taken anything to do with it. Ryan goes to meet him, getting caught in the traffic jam, and once he’s free, drives to where Baz has the car, and goes to his mum’s lock-up garage in it—leaving his fingerprints—and hides the booty. Then he drives the car to the car park where it was found, and he and Baz go to the Starland club to sell some of the stolen goods.”