Fatal Legacy (28 page)

‘Go and find Jenny; she’ll be skulking in her room. Take her out for that drink.’

Jenny received his invitation for a drink with more pleasure than he’d expected, and they left within minutes.

The pub was dimly lit and smoky. Alexander had found a quiet corner table far enough away to provide a degree of privacy. Even so, he’d nearly finished his drink before she uttered a word.

‘Why? I just don’t understand why. I’ve been over and over it and yet …’ Tears choked her voice and she had to stop.

‘Would you like another?’

She nodded, and downed the rest of her drink in one gulp.

The pub had grown busy during their silent first drink, so there was a long wait at the bar, and when he returned to their table she was staring out of the rain-spattered window at the poorly lit car park.

‘There’s a man out there watching us, I’m sure of it.’

He looked at her, startled.

‘I know you think I’ve got paranoid delusions, but I’m convinced we’re being watched. When we left the Hall a car pulled out behind us, a Saab, and I’m sure it’s parked there in the shadows, look.’

Alexander wanted to dismiss her fears as nonsense, but they echoed too much of his own concern. He suddenly found himself talking as if he couldn’t stop: of Sally’s original suspicions about the company finances; of his pain at Graham’s death; and finally of his long-standing worry that his uncle’s death might have been suspicious too.

Jenny listened with acute interest, interrupting only to clarify an occasional point. At the end of his long monologue she stood up and went to the bar. Either the queue was shorter or she received preferential service, because she was back within moments. She put a whisky in front of Alexander and took a long, considered swallow of her own gin and tonic.

‘So do you believe Graham was murdered?’ Alexander asked.
He was regretting his own monologue and didn’t want any questions about it.

‘Yes … no … I don’t know any more, Alex. I’ve no idea what to think. But suicide? It doesn’t fit, no matter how scared he was. He’d hired a private investigator, you know.’

‘I agree. Do you think he found out something from this investigator?’

‘Yes, I’m sure of it.’

‘What was it he’d asked him to look into?’

Jenny gazed at him with an open pity so stark that even he noticed.

‘What? Why’re you looking at me like that?’

Jenny shook her head sadly, and squeezed his arm
compassionately
.

‘He didn’t trust Sally.’

‘Why not? Go on, tell me.’

But Jenny clammed up and refused to answer, retreating instead into her watching from the window. After a long moment in which neither of them touched their drinks she spoke again.

‘I think Graham was killed, and so was his father. The question is, by whom. You’re the obvious suspect, you’ve benefited from both deaths, but somehow I don’t think it’s you.’ She laughed, an awful sound without hope or care. ‘Which could be the biggest error of judgement I’m likely to make.’

‘I didn’t kill them, Jenny.’

‘I believe you.’ The words were a whisper, but the ones that followed were quieter still. ‘But what about Sally? Can you be as sure about your wife?’

Alexander’s mouth dropped open in shock.

‘That’s a terrible thing to say, Jenny. Such an accusation …’

‘You’ve just told me that she stopped you going to the police about your uncle and the finances of the firm, for heaven’s sake.’ Her voice was rising, and a couple of people nearby turned around.

He realised that they had both had enough to drink.

‘Come on, let’s go home.’

He had to steady her as they crossed the uneven tarmac of the parking lot in the pouring rain. They were both soaked by
the time they reached his car, and the windows misted up immediately. Their journey was completed in silence along twisting country roads, the only sound the thump of the windscreen wipers as they beat out double time, and the swish of the occasional car passing in the opposite direction. From time to time a pair of headlights appeared brightly in his
rear-view
mirror, only to disappear as the road dipped or twisted away.

‘It’s the Saab,’ said Jenny as they neared the gloomy outline of the Hall. ‘They know where we’re going so they don’t need to keep close.’

Sally was already in bed when Alexander and Jenny returned, even though it wasn’t yet eleven o’clock. Alexander put the guard in front of the fire and went to make some tea. Jenny joined him in the kitchen.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be. You were upset. Tea?’

‘Yeah.’ Her voice was husky with unshed tears.

‘Hey, come on. It’s OK.’

She started crying then, long, terrible sobs that went on and on. He gathered her in his arms, felt her skinny little body shake and quiver and the tears soak his shirt, then his skin. He rested his head on top of hers and rocked her slowly to and fro. She cried herself hoarse and then kept on crying, making herself sick with the effort. As he steadied her over the sink, holding her whilst she retched, a dry terrible sound, he realised for the first time the awful depth of her grief.

‘You really, really loved him, didn’t you?’

‘Oh God, Alex, he was my life. He was all I wanted. I didn’t care about the money, just him.’

She was shivering now, and he sat her down next to the Aga and found an old blanket in the airing cupboard. He remade their tea, feeling a terrible sadness that he refused to analyse. Once she’d drunk it, with much coaxing, he wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and guided her upstairs and to her room.

In his own room the double bed was crisply made and his side was turned down – not that there was a his or hers side any
more, as Sally never came to him now. A note had been propped against the lamp; it was from his wife.

That was it. No good night, not even an ‘x’. He slipped between the finely laundered cotton sheets, in the largest bedroom in his mansion. With a deep, resigned sigh he set his alarm for six o’clock and switched off the light. It was a long time before he fell asleep.

Miles Cator’s attachment to the National Task Force into
money-laundering
had many advantages, not least a large modern office, the use of two dedicated research assistants and full computer support. Cator saw Fenwick’s envious glance and cut into his thoughts.

‘You’d hate the politics, believe me.’

Fenwick was sure he would, and returned his concentration to briefing the Commander on the Wainwright case. He desperately needed the man’s cooperation. At the end of half an hour he’d shared everything he knew. Copies of Wainwright’s ownership structure, report and accounts lay scattered on the coffee table, mixed incongruously with colour photographs of the various murder and death scenes and the personal account book that he had found in Fish’s safe. Cator said nothing, but sat with his eyes screwed tight shut, fingertips drumming both temples. Then, without a word, he reached for a phone and summoned an assistant.

‘Get me Weatherspoon in Jersey.’ He glanced at his watch then turned to Fenwick. ‘Leave this with me. Can you come back in two hours? I’ll have an idea by then whether this is worth our involvement.’

With only six days left to prove to the ACC that Wainwright’s had a case to answer, Fenwick had no choice. It was a glorious day in London, and he found his way to some gardens on the Embankment overlooking the Thames, where he drank a superb takeaway coffee and phoned every senior investigating officer on his team, one after the other.

He broke the last connection and sat back in shirt sleeves to watch the world pass by around him. He let his mind drift,
empty of all conscious thought. The threads that he had confidently been following had become twisted. Dreams of tangled ivy haunted his sleep, waking him every morning at three. He knew there were connections but he was tormented by the idea that he kept making the wrong ones, whilst more glaring clues went unrecognised.

Fenwick thought long and hard, staring into the middle distance of the gardens with enough intensity to worry
passersby
and cause an old lady opposite him to change benches. He forced himself to set his theory out logically. First, he believed that all three deaths could be connected. In both Alan and Graham Wainwright’s case, the main beneficiaries were Alexander and Sally. Of the two, he still considered Sally the more likely killer – it was gut feeling unsupported by any logic, but her behaviour since Graham’s death was erratic and suspicious. If she was the killer, and if the killings were all linked, she had to have a motive for killing Arthur Fish. That was a real stumbling block in his argument. There was nothing to connect Sally with Fish, whereas Alexander had worked with the accountant for years.

He scratched his head absent-mindedly and frowned. Was it worth asking DS Gould to try and find a connection between Sally and Fish? Perhaps, but he decided to wait until Nightingale had finished her investigation into Sally’s past, in case she found a link there. Then there was the fact that Fish had known Amanda Bennett. If her murder was linked to his, then the web of deaths extended even further. He told himself it would be logical to drop his insistence on a connection, but even as his mind was convincing him, his instincts were screaming at him to give it one last shot. He would have to decide soon, as he was already under pressure to allocate DS Gould and his team to the Wainwright case. He decided to let the parallel inquiries run for another forty-eight hours, and turned his thoughts to the means of death.

The killings had been designed to look unconnected, and two had been set up as suicides, which meant that they were premeditated and well planned. Only eight days separated Arthur and Graham’s murders, which suggested panic or an urgency that he could not understand. Graham’s ‘suicide’ had
been clumsy, and had they not had a poor post-mortem it would have been treated as murder at once. It felt rushed – why? If only he could find a way to link Sally to Arthur and a reason for the speed of Graham’s killing, he would be able to sustain the combined investigation.

‘She’s as guilty as hell on all three, I can sense it,’ he said to himself, unaware that he was speaking aloud. ‘There’s just one link that I’m missing. She had nothing to gain financially from Fish’s death, so in what way did he threaten her? Find that and I find motive.’

A determination filled him, so fierce that it made him clench his fists and hardened his face into an expression that startled a courting couple as they passed by and finally caused the little old lady on the far bench to leave the gardens altogether. Somewhere a clock chimed, reminding him that he was due back to meet with Cator.

The Commander agreed to help, but he cautioned Fenwick to be patient.

‘Six days isn’t really long enough to do anything, Chief Inspector. In Jersey, where the owners of Wainwright’s have their interests registered, the authorities are always very helpful. Their islands are legitimate financial centres and they want them to be seen as such, so they will do all they can to cooperate, but the trusts involved all appear above board; they are
longstanding
and the trustees are very well connected. As for the Wainwright development in the Caribbean,’ he paused to sip his cooling tea, ‘it’s backed by a bank that is old school and has never caused any problems.

‘It’s Wainwright’s here in the UK that we’ll need to
concentrate
on. I’ve had somebody look at the accounts you retrieved from Fish’s safe, and he described them as “bizarre”. They certainly intrigued him, and he’s the best forensic accountant I know. The personal ledger you found particularly excites him. He thinks it’s some sort of record of potential anomalous payments that have passed through Wainwright’s. He’s going to do his best by the end of Monday – that’s when your time’s up, isn’t it?’ Fenwick nodded. ‘At most, all we will be able to do is confirm the need for a thorough investigation, which should be enough to persuade your ACC to maintain a tough attitude
towards Neil Yarrell. Don’t rely on us for any early convictions though. This could take years.’

Fenwick had always known that it would, and he was delighted that Cator had agreed to become involved. ‘If you can find out anything that helps me to persuade the ACC to keep Wainwright’s at bay, I’d appreciate it.’

Cator smiled, and Fenwick realised with surprise that there was no love lost between the two men.

‘This will pass out of his jurisdiction soon enough if what you suspect is true. You’ll have to cope with the fall-out when he realises that you’ve handed these papers over to me, but now that I have them, he’ll find it hard to get them back without going way over my head, and I doubt he’ll want to do that. You don’t realise it yet, but you’ve put yourself in a very difficult position with your boss.’

Fenwick remembered his promise to the ACC not to part with the Fish papers. He would be accused of insubordination and would have no defence at all.

Outside, the weather had changed and blustery south-westerly gusts brought a hint of rain into the late afternoon. A storm was forecast for the end of the week, and already the windspeeds had risen as if in anticipation.

Fenwick hailed a taxi to take him back to Victoria station and checked his answering service. There was a message from Harper-Brown, asking him to meet him at his golf club that evening at seven. Fenwick completed a quick calculation and realised that he would barely make it, even if he did catch the 17.03 from Victoria. He leant forward and rapped on the glass partition that separated him from the cabby.

‘Could you step on it, please, it’s essential that I catch a train at five o’clock.’

The taxi driver gave him a look that clearly said,
If I had a fiver for every time I’ve been asked that, I’d be a millionaire by now
!

Fenwick intercepted the expression, interpreted it correctly and immediately turned it to his advantage.

‘There’s a tenner in it for you if we make it.’

Amazingly, they did.

The Harlden Golf Club, to which the ACC belonged, was the best in the county. An air of rarefied calm wrapped itself around Fenwick as he walked into the flagstoned entrance hall.

‘Can I help you, sir?’ The man in front of Fenwick had a proprietorial air.

‘I’m meeting a member, Mr Harper-Brown.’

‘Ah, yes, the Assistant Chief Constable. He’s in the visitors’ side of the bar, to your right.’

Fenwick spotted the ACC straight away, standing next to a bay window with two other men. As soon as Harper-Brown saw him he left them and walked to an empty pair of seats in the quietest corner. Sporting prints and photographs of various trophies and cups being presented to beaming, self-satisfied people filled the walls. The atmosphere of self-assurance and superiority was almost palpable, and Fenwick understood why Harper-Brown prized his membership so highly.

‘Chief Inspector.’ The ACC gestured for Fenwick to sit down. ‘What can I get you to drink?’

‘Whisky and water, thank you, sir, no ice.’

The ACC returned with a glass of whisky, and water in a little jug. There was ice in the glass.

‘Cheers.’

‘Cheers.’

There was an uncomfortable silence, in which both men sipped their drinks and Fenwick tried not to grimace. Harper-Brown spoke first.

‘I asked to meet you here because I wanted to make sure that we had an appropriate opportunity to discuss progress on the case without unnecessary interruptions.’

‘Well, things are starting to come together, sir. The
circumstances
surrounding Fish’s murder suggest a motive beyond a straightforward mugging gone wrong. It still looks more like a case of a contract killing, and the connection with Amanda Bennett’s death is being actively pursued.’

The ACC was not pleased.

‘Both the Wainwright-Smiths remain under twenty-four-hour watch, and when Mr Yarrell, the finance director, became perturbed about our finding papers at Fish’s house, we offered him police protection.’

‘You don’t need to remind me who Neil Yarrell is, Fenwick; we regularly share a round. And you should have approached me before you offered him protection. Really!’

‘Yes, sir.’ It had been a deliberately calculated move, and Fenwick had had no intention of checking with the ACC in advance, he knew what the answer would have been. He had offered Yarrell protection to see his reaction and had enjoyed hearing the shock of the offer for once disturb the man’s practised calm.

‘Now, what’s all this about the delays you experienced in receiving the full PM report on Graham Wainwright?’

It never ceased to amaze Fenwick how well informed the ACC was. He explained about Pendlebury’s illness and
confirmed
that he wouldn’t be making a formal complaint although the matter had obviously been logged. Harper-Brown sniffed, a dry, disapproving sound, that suggested that Fenwick had exercised his judgement in a way with which he didn’t agree, but that it was beneath him to comment. He took a sip of his drink and changed the subject.

‘Still, I’m very pleased with the progress DI Blite has made. He really has taken the case forward.’

Fenwick took a swallow of his drink in order to mask his anger. Blite hadn’t called him since early in the morning, despite the fact that he had left two messages for him to do so. Yet it appeared that he had found the time to brief the ACC.

‘It must have been sheer inspiration that made him research the shareholders of Wainwright Enterprises like that, real detective work.’

‘Indeed.’ There was no way that Fenwick was going to let Harper-Brown know that he was completely in the dark.

‘He had to probe behind those structures in Jersey – great work that – and to make the connection to James FitzGerald was brilliant.’ The ACC lowered his voice confidentially. ‘I never trusted that man. Between you and me, I opposed his membership here, but Neil Yarrell talked me round. I knew I was right.’

‘How large was the shareholding again, sir? I’ve forgotten.’

‘No, you’ve not forgotten. They don’t know yet. The trust structure is very complicated and will take quite a bit of
unravelling. They only traced FitzGerald because his name appears in some of the paperwork – it’s the only one. Still, I’m sure more will come out now. How was the trip to London?’

Fenwick told the ACC about his day, his anger at Blite making him less than subtle. When he drew breath and glanced at Harper-Brown’s face he was glad that they were in such a public place. He watched it first turn purple, then white with
suppressed
rage. He continued quickly.

‘As soon as Commander Cator said that the papers were suspicious, I knew that you would have urged me to cooperate fully, sir, so I did. I realised that you respected Cator, because you sent me to his seminar, so you would be comfortable with his close involvement. I do hope I did the right thing, sir.’

Fenwick’s quiet voice had a rare hint of supplication in it that threw the ACC off guard. He was being offered a clear choice: to bawl Fenwick out, which would make him feel better but would result in loss of face because the papers had already been handed over in an action that clearly countermanded his express instructions; or to pretend that he agreed with, had even implicitly encouraged, Fenwick’s show of initiative that had led to Cator’s involvement, by invitation, in a case that was outside his jurisdiction. He took a large gulp of his drink through livid lips.

‘I can see that you think you took an understandable decision in the circumstances, Chief Inspector, but next time, call me. There is a fine line between initiative and insubordination, and you can be sure that I know precisely where it is drawn, particularly where you are concerned.’ He locked eyes with Fenwick, and the look they exchanged expressed a complete and mutual understanding of what had just taken place.

Fenwick drained his whisky. It was far too diluted by stale melt-water to be palatable, but he thought that leaving it would have been interpreted as a further insult, and that was the last thing he needed. He made to stand up, but the ACC put out a hand to stop him.

‘If there is evidence of a money-laundering operation in Harlden, Fenwick, I must be kept fully advised. We are in dangerous territory. The men who may be implicated are all
highly respectable citizens, some of the most influential in the county. I don’t know how this alleged arrangement was set up, but if you are right, there is no knowing how far the corruption might have reached. Legitimate businessmen could have been drawn in without any knowledge of what was really happening. Investment opportunities in local businesses come up all the time; ten thousand pounds here, fifty thousand there.’