Beside a Narrow Stream (13 page)

‘I don’t suppose you saw the woman enter Wayne’s cottage?’

‘No,’ Sylvia said, and sighed. ‘But I did see her leave.’

Gemma smiled. ‘And can you describe her please?’

Sylvia screwed up her eyes in effort, then opened them again and gave a shrug. ‘Well she was about my size. Not overly tall, you know. And she had short red hair. She had on a rather bright kaftan thing – it looked expensive. That’s about all I can tell you.’

Gemma smiled radiantly.

It was enough.

‘And the description was a dead ringer for Denise Collier?’ Hillary Green said, half an hour later, as she listened to her sergeant’s report.

‘Right, guv,’ Gemma said, having read Barrington’s account of the interview with her, which had included a fairly comprehensive physical description of the witness. ‘Given what other people have already said about Denise Collier being more possessive and jealous than the rest, it all fits.’

Hillary nodded. Indeed it did. ‘And Ms Collier was very careful not to tell us about it when we interviewed her, wasn’t she?’ she glanced across at Barrington, and smiled. ‘OK, you and Keith go and bring her in.’

She glanced across at Frank Ross’s empty desk, and sighed. ‘Call in at Frank’s place on the way. If he’s there, roust him out of bed and take him as well. I want you to go in mob handed and rattle her a bit.’ Besides, it was the only way of being sure of getting some work out of the lazy sod.

‘Right, guv,’ Gemma said with a smile. She was rather looking forward to this.

At the window of a downstairs kitchenette, George Davies was making himself a mug of tea. The window overlooked the car park, and as he raised his mug to his lips, he saw the striking blonde woman again.

He blew on his piping hot tea thoughtfully.

It wasn’t here that he saw her. Not in Kidlington. Of that he was suddenly certain. And it wasn’t on a case either. He had a
pretty good memory for suspects and witnesses alike – a facility he’d used to good effect on the beat.

So he must have seen her in some sort of a social setting. Or at least, in some kind of situation where he hadn’t felt the particular need to memorize her face. But where?

He sighed, and took his mug through to the duty room to check the roster. It’d come back to him sooner or later.

Denise Collier was not happy. She wasn’t happy to be taken from her home at nine o’clock in the morning, before she’d got her face on. She wasn’t happy to be put into the back of a car by three near-strangers, in full view of all her curious, bitchy, gossiping neighbours. And she sure as hell wasn’t happy to be taken to a police station, and shown into some dreary little room.

The moment Hillary Greene walked in, she said snappily, ‘I want to see a solicitor.’

Hillary Greene smiled, and turned around again. ‘All right, Ms Collier. Do you have his phone number? Or would you like me to arrange the duty solicitor to see you?’

‘Certainly not! A man from Cummings, Lester and Bolt sees to all my legal needs. Please call them and ask for Mr Milton Lester.’

Hillary smiled again and left, indicating Frank to stay with her. So it was going to be one of those days, was it? Well, she was probably due one. Beside her, Barrington and Fordham glanced at each other uneasily. It was always a complication when a witness asked for a brief.

‘OK, Keith, get on it,’ Hillary said. ‘Gemma, while we’re waiting, I want you to take a look at the progress the men have made so far on Heyford Sudbury. See what you can add to it.’

Gemma nodded. ‘And, guv, there’s no history of stalking or mental illness in Collier’s past that I’ve been able to find.’

Hillary sighed in acceptance.

Outside, the first cloud in days, or so it seemed, passed
across the sun and threw the day into welcome shade. The weather forecasters, however, hadn’t predicted any break in the heatwave.

Milton Lester was a tall, thin, seventy-something, who looked very uneasy to be in a police interview room. No doubt Denise Collier had used him for her divorce and the buying of her house, but he looked the sort who’d run a mile at the mention of the word ‘criminal’. Hillary also doubted that he’d seen the inside of a courtroom for years, but she was not about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

She introduced herself to the tape, added that DS Ross, Mr Milton Lester, solicitor, and a PC Davies, were also present. She gave the interview tape number, and then Denise Collier’s name.

Then she looked across at Denise and said softly, ‘Lying to the police in the course of a murder investigation is most unwise, Ms Collier. If nothing else, it can lead to charges such as wilful obstruction of police officers in the course of their duties, and attempting to pervert the course of justice.’

She saw Milton Lester tug on one cufflink uneasily.

Denise Collier shrugged graphically. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

‘You told us that on the evening Wayne Sutton was murdered, you stayed at home all the afternoon, evening and night, and never went out.’

‘That’s right. I did.’

‘That wasn’t true,’ Hillary said flatly.

‘Yes, it was!’

Hillary sighed. ‘I’m giving you the opportunity to change your testimony, Ms Collier. I strongly advise that you take it.’

‘My client has already answered your question, Inspector Greene,’ Milton Lester piped up.

Hillary sighed and stood up. ‘Very well.’ She terminated the interview for the tape, and a look of vast relief crossed Denise Collier’s face.

‘I can go?’ she asked, making to rise.

‘No, Ms Collier, you can’t,’ Hillary said flatly. ‘You will stay here whilst I organize an identity parade.’

Denise stared at her, then looked uncertainly across at her solicitor. ‘Can they do that?’ she asked faintly.

Milton Lester nodded miserably to indicate that, indeed, they could. For a moment, Hillary thought that Denise was going to give in. Then she got a hard, tight, mean look on her face and shrugged graphically, obviously deciding to take her chances.

Hillary shrugged and left them to it. Frank Ross, arms folded across his chest, continued to stare at her insolently. Milton Lester fiddled with his cufflinks.

Outside, Hillary nodded to Gemma, who was watching from the observation room. ‘Go and get Mrs Mulberry.’

Gemma hurried out.

Hillary reached for her mobile and called upstairs. ‘DC Barrington,’ the familiar male voice answered.

‘Keith, we’re doing an identity parade. Go out and round up five women for me – shortish, reddish hair. You’ll find a few WPC’s who fit the description, but make sure they change into civvies. And ask Super O’Gorman’s secretary – she fits, oh, and the dinner lady, Vera. It’ll give her a laugh. You should have enough with that lot.’

‘Right, guv.’

Syliva Mulberry didn’t look very happy when she walked into the observation room, but she seemed co-operative enough.

After introducing her to DI Greene, Gemma took her through it carefully. ‘It’s very simple, Mrs Mulberry. In a moment, six women, all carrying a numbered card, will walk in through the door and line up. They can’t see you, and will not be told your name. All you have to do is look at them carefully, and tell us if you see the woman you saw leaving Wayne Sutton’s cottage on the afternoon of the thirtieth April. If you
want a closer look at one of them, just call the number of the one you want, and we’ll ask her to step closer to the window,’ she added, mindful of the witness’s myopia.

‘All right. But what if I don’t see her there?’ Sylvia asked.

‘Just say so, Mrs Mulberry,’ Hillary said calmly, and the other women nodded, and straightened her shoulders slightly, as if prepared to do an onerous duty. Hillary, satisfied, nodded to Gemma, who pressed a buzzer. A moment later, six women, and a male PC, walked into the room.

Hillary ran her eye over them and nodded. All six women were of a muchness. Nothing there for a defence barrister to cry foul over.

Denise Collier, looking pale and defiant, was number two.

As always, when giving an identity parade, Hillary felt the tension build in her shoulders. It was always the same. There was something intrinsically dramatic about proceedings like this.

‘It’s number two,’ Sylvia Mulberry said firmly.

Gemma smiled triumphantly, and Hillary thanked her.

‘Will I have to go to court and say as much again?’ Sylvia asked, and Hillary spread her hands in a so-so gesture.

‘It’s hard to say at this point, Mrs Mulberry. Why? Would it be a problem for you?’

‘No,’ Sylvia said at last. ‘It’s her all right. But I don’t want to get tied up in any court case. I’m a busy woman. I’m not sure I can get time off work.’

Hillary nodded, but was largely uninterested in her woes. ‘The WPC outside will drive you back, Mrs Mulberry.’

Denise Collier glanced up when Hillary came in to the interview room for the second time. Once again, Hillary went through the routine for the tape.

‘Well, Ms Collier, you were picked out of the line-up,’ Hillary began briskly, facing her across the table once more. ‘The witness who both saw and heard you arguing with Wayne
Sutton just hours before he was murdered was quite firm and adamant in her identification. Now, given that, are you prepared to tell us the truth?’

Milton Lester leaned forward and whispered in her ear. Denise Collier scowled. Milton whispered something else, and she sighed heavily.

‘Oh all right,’ she said petulantly. ‘I went to Wayne’s cottage that day. It was about four o’clock.’

Hillary coughed gently. ‘Our witness puts it closer to
half-five
, six o’clock.’

Denise scowled. ‘Nosy old bat! I suppose it was one of those gossiping old biddies who lived around there? Fine, perhaps it was later. But after we argued, I left, and that’s that. I never went back, and I never saw Wayne alive again.’

Suddenly, she burst into tears.

Milton Lester looked appalled.

Hillary sighed and reached for the tissues.

D
enise Collier dried her eyes, and sniffed hard. She shot Hillary Greene an ‘it’s-all-your-fault’ look and dabbed her eyes again.

‘I keep telling you people.
I
was the only one Wayne
truly
loved.
I’m
the only one who’s got a right to mourn him.’

Hillary nodded gravely, and asked flatly, ‘What did you do when you left his place?’

‘I went straight home, of course,’ Denise said, sounding surprised. ‘I needed a drink and a shower. And before you ask, I stayed home all the rest of the night.’

Hillary nodded, and reached into her case to bring out the red paper heart found on the body. It was now encased in a see-through evidence bag. There had, of course, been no fingerprints found on it. ‘Do you recognize this, Ms Collier?’ she asked, watching the other woman closely. She didn’t think Denise Collier was the sort of woman to have a poker face, and Hillary was fairly confident that if the suspect did in fact recognize it, then it would be evident. But the only emotions she could see on the redhead’s face were a faint scowl of belligerence, followed by a touch of puzzlement.

‘No. Why should I? What is it?’ she leaned forward for a better look as Hillary held it up and turned it around, the better to display it. ‘It’s just a cut-out, red paper heart,’ Denise said, as if wondering what the trick was.

Hillary nodded. ‘Yes. Somebody gave it to Wayne Sutton,’ she said, with masterly understatement.

Denise Collier laughed spitefully. ‘I dare say one of his dozy old women gave it to him,’ she said scornfully.

‘Are you sure you didn’t?’ Hillary asked mildly, and again Denise Collier laughed.

‘Don’t be daft!
I’m
the one who receives valentines, not gives them out. I expect my men to pay court to me – not the other way round. I wouldn’t be caught dead doing something so … yucky!’ And she shuddered. ‘Wayne must have laughed himself sick at whichever silly cow gave him that.’

Hillary very much doubted that Wayne Sutton had been alive to do any laughing at the time he was given this particular valentine. She sighed, gave the usual customary warnings about not leaving the area without notifying the police, and let her go.

Milton Lester looked even more relieved than his client.

‘You don’t like her for it, guv,’ Barrington said, as they all trooped back to the office.

‘You saw and heard what I did,’ Hillary countered. ‘What do you think?’

Barrington nodded. ‘She might be a very good actress though.’

‘Always a thought to keep in the back of your mind, Constable, when interviewing witnesses,’ Hillary advised.

Back at their desks, Gemma Fordham picked up the Heyford Sudbury file. ‘Guv, I’d like to follow up on some things for this. You need me in the office for a few hours?’

Hillary shook her head. ‘No. Keep on it,’ she said, and watched as her sergeant collected her gear and left. She was sure, if anybody could find whatever needle in the haystack she was looking for at the Cotswold village, it would probably be Gemma Fordham.

Hillary yawned and reached for the first file in her in-tray,
but when the phone rang, she moved the direction of her hand towards that instead.

‘Hello, can I speak to DI Hillary Greene please?’ The voice was one she vaguely remembered hearing before, and belonged to one of the many white-coated, scientific boffins who inhabited the forensic science laboratories.

‘Speaking.’

‘Case file …’ Hillary rapidly wrote down the digits and letters quoted to her, immediately recognizing it as belonging to her murder case. ‘Yes, the Wayne Sutton inquiry,’ she acknowledged, thus letting the boffin on the other end know that
she
knew the case number as well.

‘Fine. It concerns the victim’s car.’

Hillary felt herself being taken by surprise – something she was not particularly used to. Since the victim’s car had been parked in the garage throughout the investigation, it had been obvious that Wayne Sutton had walked to his rendezvous with death. Consequently, she hadn’t given his car a second thought. Why should she? It couldn’t possibly have any bearing on the case.

No doubt its low-priority status was the reason why a forensic report was only now coming in on it.

‘Yes?’ she asked, curious and wary. Had she missed something? Had she (every cop’s nightmare) made a serious, gaping mistake?

‘It’s basically clean. Plenty of DNA traces, fibres, fingerprints, etc., nearly all the vic’s. Evidence of other-people usage, of course, but nothing to ring any alarm bells. But my supervisor thought you might like to know that we’ve lifted a very recent set of prints from the passenger door. Very recent. They superimpose all others, so were the last fingers to touch the door before we impounded it. They don’t fit any member of the deceased’s family or, ah, close circle of friends.’

Hillary knew that the uniforms would have arranged for all
the vic’s nearest and dearest to be printed – including all his ‘women’. It was routine.

‘Now that’s interesting,’ she said. A stranger? The mysterious Annie, perhaps? Had they, at last, got some tangible proof of her existence?

‘But they do match up with the victim’s girlfriend’s father. A Mr Victor Freeman.’

Hillary blinked, and immediately focused her mind on the nurseryman. The last time she’d seen him, she’d been interviewing him at his garden centre, shortly after breaking the news of Wayne’s death to his girlfriend. And, as she recalled, Victor Freeman had made no real secret of the fact that he’d thought his daughter could do a whole lot better.

In fact, she’d come away with the distinct impression that he wouldn’t give Wayne Sutton the time of day. So what were his fresh prints doing on the victim’s car?

‘Now that
is
interesting,’ she said softly, thanked him, and hung up.

Outside, Gemma Fordham walked briskly to her car. She had no intention of going to Heyford Sudbury, or the library. She had only one destination in mind, and it was not five minutes drive down the street.

Also in the car park, George Davies was just starting up his patrol car when he spotted her. ‘There she is!’ he said, sounding like a twitcher who’d just spotted a Dartford Warbler.

His long-time partner, Ian Gill, jumped. ‘What? Who?’

‘The leggy blonde, over there. Remember, I told you about her,’ George reminded him. ‘She keeps ringing a bell in the old brainbox but I just can’t place her. I told you about it yesterday.’

Ian, like George, was on the edge of retirement and just as glad of it, and now he stared across the parked cars and gave a slow, appreciative wolf whistle. ‘Very nice. Legs right up to her bum. Bit skinny for my taste though.’

‘Let your Jenny hear you say that,’ George warned with a laugh. ‘So she doesn’t ring any bells with you?’

‘No. Well, I know she’s DI Greene’s new sergeant. Bit of
ball-breaker
they say. Does all those kung-fu moves, you know? Half the station’s drooling over her, but she looks like one to stay clear of to me.’ Thus having given his verdict, Ian turned around to pull on his seat belt, wondering when he’d be clocking off that night.

George Davies, however, still had his mind firmly on the blonde. ‘DI Greene. You mean Hillary Greene?’ he asked. And the moment he said the DI’s full name, in a flash, he remembered where he’d seen the mysterious blonde before.

Of course. Of course! With Ronnie bloody Greene. That wanker.

‘Yeah, that’s right,’ Ian confirmed, oblivious to his partner’s revelation. ‘Well, she needed someone after her old DS married Mel Mallow. And let’s face it, Frank Ross is a waste of space, so she’s been coping with only a DC. And he’s that Barrington fellah from London. The one who decked his old sergeant.’ Ian shook his head. ‘You ask me, she could do with all the help she can get.’

George, for once, was disinclined to gossip, or pull the wings off CID butterflies. Like most men in uniform, he had an ambivalent relationship with plain clothes, but now he was too busy thinking of other things.

Shit. Hillary Greene. She couldn’t know about her new DS, could she? And then he swore under his breath even more graphically. And neither could the top brass. They sure as hell would never have assigned the leggy blonde to Hillary’s team if they knew she’d been Ronnie Greene’s one time squeeze.

He felt himself begin to sweat. What the hell should he do? With only a few weeks to go before his retirement, his first instinct was to forget about it. A man in his position didn’t need to rock any boats. And that went even more for boats that swam in the same lake as the likes of DCI Paul Danvers, that
toady from York, or Mel Mallow. Or Detective Chief Superintendent Donleavy for that matter.

The sweat began to itch between his shoulder blades. No, he should just forget about it and walk away. And yet. Like the rest of the station house, George Davies both liked and admired Hillary Greene. She’d weathered the internal investigation into her bent husband, and herself, with grim dignity. She’d always had a rep for being fair. And lately, she’d handled a few good murder inquiries. Then she’d got that medal for taking a bullet for Mel Mallow. A genuine heroine, no question about it.

Turning his back on her just didn’t sit right. Damn it, if
he
were in her place,
he’d
want to know about it.

It was all coming back to him now. There’d been a bad case over in Reading – a kiddie had been kidnapped. A similar case in the same city, three years ago, had resulted in a child’s body being found in a large area of waste-ground and scrub, on the city outskirts. The brass there had asked for, and got, large numbers of uniformed manpower from neighbouring forces to help with the finger-tip search of the area. George and about twenty others from Thames Valley had been roped in.

DI Ronnie Greene had also been around for about a week, since he’d handled a similar missing kiddie case from his own patch, that they thought might match up. As he recalled, neither the kiddie, nor a body, had ever been found.

But Ronnie Greene, billeted away from home, had run true to form, and had quickly found himself a woman – the usual young, blonde crumpet. George could even remember the DI boasting in the pub they’d all used to congregate in of an evening, that this one was a student at the Uni. Which made her a bit more brainy than he usually liked them, but what the hell.

George could see them together now, drinking at a corner table, heads close together, the girl looking smitten. Yeah, it had been her all right.

And surely Hillary Greene had a right to know her latest DS’s history?

But then he thought about just what it was he’d have to do in order to tell her, and the sweat migrated from his armpit and forehead and broke out all over his face. He could almost feel himself heating up.

Embarrassing or what?

What exactly was he supposed to do? Just walk up to her, and say, ‘Hey, DI Greene, ma’am. Did you know that blonde sergeant of yours was once a floozy of your late husband?’

‘What we doing still sitting here then, George?’ Ian asked, sounding amused. And with a start, George realized he’d been sat there like a lemon, staring out of the windscreen for the past few minutes. Gemma Fordham had already started her car and was long gone.

With an amiable swear word, George Davies started the patrol car, and headed out of HQ, still with no idea what he was going to do about his new-found and deeply unwanted knowledge.

Keith Barrington drove to Banbury in near silence. He was very much aware of his DI sitting beside him, but Hillary Greene didn’t seem in the mood to chat.

Perhaps the memory of the telling-off she’d given him was still too clear in both their minds.

In fact, Hillary Greene was thinking about red paper hearts. There was something about it that just didn’t sit right with her but she couldn’t, for the life of her, put her finger on what it was.

It hadn’t got wet, so the killer must have put it on Wayne’s corpse after dragging his head and shoulders from the stream. Too carefully planned? Too pedantic and neat? Would a woman, presumably heart-broken and in a rage, be so precise?

Well, possibly, yes. A woman could have killed in a cold
rage. The death was almost certainly premeditated, after all. First with the note luring him there, and the paper heart properly clinched it. Nobody went for a walk in the meadows with a red paper heart already cut out, did they? Not unless they already had a use for it all planned out. No, the killer had meant to kill Wayne,
did
kill Wayne, and left her message. The red heart.

So it wasn’t that that was niggling her.

She sighed heavily and shook her head. She could drive herself crazy trying to figure it out. Perhaps she should just be grateful that no more young men had turned up dead and adorned with the bloody things. Aserial killer on the loose was the last thing anyone wanted.

‘We bringing Freeman in, guv?’ Barrington asked, taking her heavy sigh as an invitation to talk.

‘No, I don’t think so,’ Hillary said. She still couldn’t see the car as being all that important. There’d been no signs of it parked near the crime scene, and no one had seen their vic driving it just prior to his death. ‘It’ll probably turn out to be just something we need to clear up, that’s all.’

Gemma Fordham turned into the narrow lane that lead to the hamlet of Thrupp. Here, the hedges grew thick and close to the road, shutting out the bright sun and making her feel just slightly claustrophobic. Within seconds, however, she saw the cheerful, khaki glitter of sunlight on the Oxford Canal, and the road opened out, revealing a pub called The Boat. She parked in its car park but didn’t go inside for a much-needed long cold drink.

Instead, she got out and walked to the tow-path, glancing both ways down the canal – to her right, leading further into Kidlington itself. Left, and more open countryside. There was a long line of moored craft in either direction, far more than she’d expected.

Guessing that Hillary Greene wouldn’t be moored too far
from the road, she turned right and began walking, checking the names of the boats as she went.