Echoes of the Dead (17 page)

‘If you don't give him an alibi, he is very
likely
to be convicted,' Trypp says. ‘But that is the price he's prepared to pay to keep you out of prison.'

Fred Howerd is a mate, but he's not
that much
of a mate. In fact,
nobody
is that much of a mate. There can't be any other man in the whole of Whitebridge who would be prepared to go to prison for thirty or forty years, just to save his friend from being put away for two or three.

What matters – the
only
thing that matters – is that he himself is now off the hook!

‘And that's the story you're sticking with, is it?' Hall asked sceptically. ‘You're saying the only reason you didn't come forward is because Howerd – through his solicitor – asked you not to?'

‘It's the truth,' Clegg said. ‘I swear to you it is.'

‘You can go,' Paniatowski told him.

‘Now just a minute, Monika,' Hall said. ‘I'm not sure that I've finished questioning—'

‘You've finished,' Paniatowski interrupted him. She turned to Clegg again. ‘Go on – piss off!'

Clegg edged his way along the parapet, and when he was a fair distance away from Hall, he turned and ran towards the exit.

Paniatowski watched him until he'd disappeared down the stairwell, then swung round to face Hall.

‘Just what the bloody hell did you think you were doing?' she demanded angrily.

‘You said you wanted to keep him off-balance. I was just following your plan,' Hall told her.

‘He wasn't just off-balance, you bastard!' Paniatowski said. ‘He was bloody
petrified
!'

‘You're right, Monika,' Hall agreed contritely. ‘You're quite right. I misjudged it, and I'm very sorry. But I really did think that by putting a bit of pressure on him, I might get him to tell us the truth.'

‘And he
did
tell us the truth,' Paniatowski said, still in a blazing rage, ‘but after the way you got that truth out of him, we'll never be able to use it in court.'

‘Use it in court?' Hall repeated, mystified. ‘Why would we
want
to use it in court? You surely don't
believe
any of that rubbish, do you?'

‘Don't you?' Paniatowski asked, incredulously.

‘Not for a second. Come on, Monika, the man simply spewed out the first story that came into his head.'

Her rage bubbling over, Paniatowski realized, for the first time in her life, what people meant when they said they could see red. She felt an almost overwhelming urge to do to Hall what he had been suggesting he might do to Clegg. He was a strong man – he'd shown that by the way that he had manhandled the butcher – but she had a Judo black belt, and she was prepared to take her chances.

The madness passed, and she turned and walked towards the exit.

‘Where are you going?' Hall called after her.

‘Away from you – before I do something I might enjoy,' she said, over her shoulder.

Colin Beresford took a deep swig from his pint glass, then said, ‘So where's DCI Hall now, boss?'

‘I don't know, and I don't bloody care!' Paniatowski replied. ‘Right up until we went to the top of the car park, I thought he was my kind of bobby. But he's not. The way he handled Clegg was a disgrace. It was almost as if he was trying to sabotage the investigation.'

‘Maybe that's just the way they
do
things down in London,' Beresford suggested.

‘Well, it's not the way we do things up here,' Paniatowski said. ‘And this is
my
patch.'

‘Putting aside how the statement was obtained for the moment, am I right in thinking that you believe what Clegg said?' Beresford asked.

‘Yes, I do believe him,' Paniatowski admitted. ‘I don't want to, Colin – but I do.'

‘Then if he
is
telling the truth, why did Fred Howerd decide to confess to killing Lilly Dawson? Why didn't he just say where he'd been that afternoon?'

‘Because he was afraid to,' Paniatowski said dully. She took her notebook out of her pocket, and flicked it open. ‘When I asked Elizabeth Eccles what you've just asked me, she said, “He told me it wasn't as simple as that. He said that after what the policeman told him, he didn't
dare
produce his alibi.”'

‘Which policeman is she talking about?' Beresford asked. ‘Was she referring to Mr Woodend? Or did he mean Sergeant Bannerman?'

‘It could be either of them, couldn't it?' Paniatowski said.

‘And what exactly
was it
that this policeman – whoever he was – told him?' Beresford wondered.

‘I haven't got a bloody clue.' Paniatowski said dispiritedly. She drained the last of her vodka. ‘And there's only one way that I can find out, isn't there? I'll have to ask.'

‘Ask who?' Beresford said. ‘If what DCI Hall told you about Bannerman is even halfway true, there's not a chance he'll run the risk of saying anything that might besmirch his precious reputation.'

‘You're right,' Paniatowski said. ‘So if Bannerman won't cooperate, who does that leave us with?'

‘It leaves us with Charlie Woodend,' Beresford said.

FOURTEEN

‘
A
nother afternoon in paradise,' Charlie Woodend thought, looking down from his terrace at the fruit trees in his garden.

And he meant it, he told himself. He really didn't miss the cold winters and the wet summers. He was managing very well without the Drum and Monkey. He was even – and this took a
little
more self-persuasion – quite happy not to be investigating murders any more.

He heard a roaring noise in the distance, and, looking down the winding, single-track road which ran down the hill to the sea, saw that a car was approaching.

‘I wonder who that bugger is,' he said aloud.

‘What bugger?' asked Paco Ruiz, who managed to find a reason to drop in on Woodend most afternoons.

‘Him,' Woodend said, pointing to the vehicle. ‘It's a new car – and there's not many of them round here. And whoever's drivin' it isn't used to this road. You can tell that from the cautious way he's approachin' the bends.'

Paco laughed. ‘Always the detective,' he said.

Woodend grinned, self-consciously. ‘Well, there are some habits which
are
a bit hard to break,' he admitted.

The car turned another bend in the road, and was now close enough for them to see the driver.

‘It's a woman!' Woodend said, surprised. ‘A blonde!'

‘Perhaps it is your old friend, Sergeant Monika Paniatowski, come to pay you a visit,' Paco suggested.

‘Can't be,' Woodend said, ‘because that would mean she was takin' a holiday – an' Monika
never
takes a holiday.'

And yet, despite his words – and the logic which undoubtedly lay behind them – Woodend felt a slight surge of hope that perhaps it was Monika, after all.

The car pulled up in front of the house, and Monika Paniatowski climbed out. Woodend was by her side immediately, flinging his arms around her and hugging her to him.

‘By, but it's grand to see you, Monika,' he gushed.

‘It's grand to see you, too, Charlie,' Paniatowski said.

And maybe she
did
think it was grand, Woodend thought, as he felt a slight disappointment stab into him – but from the hint of restraint in her voice, she certainly didn't seem quite as enthusiastic about it as he was.

He led her on to the terrace of his little palace.

‘How's that for a view?' he asked, sweeping his hand grandly across the panorama.

‘It's lovely, Charlie,' Paniatowski replied.

But again he detected that something was missing – that Monika was not quite herself.

‘This is my good friend, Paco Ruiz,' he pressed on. ‘I may have mentioned him to you, once or twice.'

‘It was a lot more than once or twice,' Paniatowski told Ruiz, as they shook hands, ‘and once he
did
start talking about you, he found it very hard to stop.'

‘It is the same with me – when he talks about you,' Ruiz said.

Something's wrong, Woodend's instinct told him. Something's
very
wrong.

‘Where's Joan?' Paniatowski asked, with a casualness that sounded just a little
too
casual.

‘She's gone over to England to spend a couple of weeks with our Annie,' Woodend said.

And he could not fail to see the look of relief which came to Paniatowski's face.

‘What's this all about, Monika?' he asked.

‘Trouble, Charlie,' Paniatowski said bluntly.

‘Trouble?' Woodend repeated worriedly. ‘For you?'

‘I wish it was, Charlie,' Paniatowski replied. ‘I think I could handle that easier. But it's you who's in trouble this time.'

The sun still shone benevolently down, the sea glistened just as it had done half an hour earlier, but the magic had been sucked out of Woodend's day, and it might as well have been the bleakest midwinter.

He sat with Ruiz and Paniatowski on the terrace, and listened, almost without interruption, while Paniatowski told her tale.

‘An', in your opinion, this Terry Clegg feller is tellin' the truth?' he asked when she'd finished.

Paniatowski nodded. ‘I've rarely been surer of anything in my life.'

Woodend shook his head slowly from side to side. ‘You're wrong,' he said finally. ‘The alibi's a fake.'

‘Why would Clegg
want
to fake the alibi, after all this time?' Paniatowski asked. ‘He can't have done it to help Fred Howerd – Fred Howerd's dead. And, by providing it, he's only building up grief for himself, because if there's an official inquiry, everybody he knows will learn that their friendly neighbourhood butcher used to visit under-age prostitutes.'

‘Do you think that there
will be
an official inquiry?' Woodend asked anxiously.

‘When you put Clegg's alibi together with Howerd's dying declaration, I don't see how it can be avoided,' Paniatowski said.

‘But I was there, remember,' Woodend protested. ‘I was in that interview room with him, and I
know
he was guilty.'

‘It was early days. You'd just been made up to chief inspector,' Paniatowski said softly.

‘And what's that supposed to mean?' Woodend demanded.

‘It means, Charlie, that you hadn't had the experience you'd gained by the time that I started working with you. It means that you're going to have to come to terms with the fact that, just that once, you might have been wrong.'

‘I wasn't wrong!' Woodend told her. ‘If Howerd had an alibi – a real alibi, one that would have stood up in court
back then
– why didn't he produce it?'

Paniatowski sighed. ‘I've already explained that. There was something that either you or Bannerman said which made him afraid to.'

‘So you're seriously askin' me to accept that he was more scared by somethin' we
said
than he was of the thought of goin' to prison for
life
?'

‘We've started going round in circles, Charlie,' Paniatowski said. ‘Why don't we approach the whole thing from another angle?'

‘What other angle?'

‘I want you to go through that whole interrogation for me. I know it was a long time ago, but you need to tell me as much of what was said and what was done as you can remember – however little that may be.'

‘I remember a lot,' Woodend said. ‘In fact, I remember the whole bloody thing.'

Paniatowski looked at him almost pityingly. ‘I understand that this is important to you, Charlie, but it won't help us if you're not brutally honest about what you do remember and what you don't.'

‘I remember the whole bloody thing,' Woodend repeated firmly. ‘Because it wasn't just
any
case, it was my
first
case as a DCI,' he prodded his forehead with his big index finger, ‘and it's all up here.'

‘Let's hear it then,' Paniatowski said.