Gallows View (27 page)

“Care to tell us the names of your friends, Trevor? Just so we can corroborate your story,” Banks asked.

“No.” Trevor glanced sideways at Hatchley, who leaned against the wall for a moment and cracked his knuckles before turning another page in his notebook.

“Where were you a week last Thursday evening?”

“He was at home with me,” Graham Sharp answered quickly.

“I asked Trevor.”

“Like he says.” Trevor looked at his father.

“Doing what?”

“Watched a bit of telly, read a bit, did some homework.”

“What about Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday?”

“Same thing.”

“Don’t have much of a social life, do you Trevor? When I was a lad I was all over the place. My mother and father couldn’t keep track of me.”

Trevor shrugged.

“Look,” Graham Sharp cut in, eyeing Hatchley, who moved casually away from the wall and back over to the window, “this has gone far enough. What’s it all about? What’s my Trevor supposed to have done?”

“When?”

“What do you mean, ‘when’?”

“I mean that we think Trevor’s done a lot of things. I was asking you which night you meant.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Trevor’s a good kid. He’s doing well at school and he’ll be going on to university. He’s going to make something out of his life.”

Banks shook his head. “He’s not doing so well at school, you know. I’ve checked.”

Sharp’s mouth dropped open, then he pulled himself together. “All right, so he’s having one or two problems at the moment. We all go through difficult phases, Inspector, you must know that?”

“Yes, I know that,” Banks replied evenly. “But I’m afraid that in your Trevor’s case it’s something more serious.”

“What is it?” Sharp pleaded. “What on earth is he supposed to have done?”

Hatchley turned from the window and startled everybody with his gruff voice. He spoke, however, with a quiet intensity that enthralled his audience completely.

“Last Monday,” he said, “two lads broke into a woman’s house. They thought she was out and wouldn’t be back till late. As it happened, she had a fight with her fancy man and came home early. She caught them at it, burgling her house. They tied her up, then one of
them raped her and the other kicked her in the head. We think the crime was committed by the same two youths who also burgled a Mr Maurice Ottershaw’s house, assaulted and robbed four old ladies and, possibly,” he glanced at Banks, who nodded, “killed your neighbour, Alice Matlock.”

“And you’re saying my Trevor had something to do with this?” Sharp cried, getting to his feet. The veins on his temples stood out, throbbing wildly. “You must be insane!” He banged on the flimsy desk. “I want my solicitor here! I want him here now, before you say another word.”

“You’re perfectly at liberty to request that, of course, sir,” Banks said mildly, giving Hatchley the signal to fade into the woodwork again. “But, I must repeat, your son hasn’t been charged with anything yet. He’s simply helping us with our enquiries.”

The cliché seemed to calm Sharp down a little. He eased himself slowly back into his chair and brushed back the hair from his forehead. “I thought your man here just accused my son of rape, burglary, and murder,” he snarled, glaring at Hatchley’s back.

“Nothing of the sort,” Banks assured him. “He simply gave details of the crimes we think your son might be able to help us with.”

Though he no longer linked the robberies with the death of Alice Matlock, Banks knew how to exploit an unsolved killing in his favour. If Trevor thought he was going to get Alice’s murder pinned on him, too, there was a slim chance he might confess to the other offences.

“What makes you think my Trevor knows anything about it?” Sharp asked.

“Because the woman who was raped had just discovered that she had contracted gonorrhoea,” Banks said, directing his words at Trevor, who stared down at his knees. “And your son has just returned from a VD clinic in York, where he was diagnosed as having gonorrhoea. The symptoms show up, so I’m told, anywhere between three and ten days. I’d say that seven days fits into that time scale quite well, wouldn’t you?”

“But surely,” Sharp objected, “there are other people visiting these clinics? If Trevor really did go with a prostitute and catch VD from her as he says—and I believe him—then that’s no crime. It’s just youthful high spirits. I was a bit of a lad myself at his age.”

“Are robbery, rape, assault and murder just youthful high spirits, too?” Banks asked sarcastically.

“Now, look here, you said you weren’t accusing my son of anything.”

“I’m not accusing him, I’m trying to get to the truth. I never said he wasn’t a suspect, though. Are you sure he went to York last Monday?”

“That’s where he said he was going.”

“When did you lose that filling, Trevor?” Banks asked.

“Wednesday,” Trevor replied. But not before his father had said, “Thursday.”

“You see,” Banks went on, “the woman who was raped said she remembered the kid’s front teeth, that there was some decay between them, as if he had a missing filling. She said she’d recognize it again. She said she’d know his voice, too. And,” here he directed his words at Trevor, “she’d know his technique. She said she could tell he was just an inexperienced kid because he shot his load almost as soon as he stuck it in.”

Trevor flushed with anger and grasped the edge of the desk. Graham put a restraining hand on his shoulder.

“We’ll bring her in, Trevor. She’s not afraid to give evidence, you know, despite what your friend did to her. And we’ll question all the prostitutes in York. We’ll talk to the bus drivers and see if any of them remember you, and if you tell us you went by train we’ll talk to the ticket collectors and train crews. We’ll find out who else went to York that night and we’ll ask if any of them saw you and your friends. Seeing as there were a few of you, I should imagine you were quite noisy—youthful high spirits and all that—and someone in whatever pub you were in is bound to remember. So why don’t you make it easier for us, Trevor? Make it easier for everyone. It’s up to you. We’ll nail you in the end anyway.”

“Come on, Trev,” Hatchley piped up, putting a fatherly hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Before it goes too far. It’ll go easier on you this way.”

Trevor shook his hand off.

“I refuse to believe this,” said Sharp. “My son isn’t capable of such actions. He can’t be. I raised him myself after his mother left. Gave him everything he wanted. If he’s done anything wrong—and I don’t
think he has—then he was led on. He was led on by that bloody Mick Webster. It’s him you want, not my Trevor.”

“Shut up, dad!” Trevor snapped. “For God’s sake, shut up!” And he lapsed back into sullen silence.

Banks got to his feet and smiled down at Trevor, who caught his eye before turning away. Both of them knew, in that split second of eye contact, that Banks had won. He had nowhere near enough evidence yet to make a conviction, but if Mick Webster thought that Trevor had snitched on him . . .

“Where does he live, this Webster?” Banks asked Graham.

“On the East Side Estate. That first street, the one that faces The Green.”

“I know it. Number?”

“I don’t know, but it’s the fifth house down after the tobacconist’s. I’ve seen him coming and going a few times when I’ve been picking up stock.”

“Got that?” Banks asked Hatchley, who nodded. “Take Richmond, and hurry up. Bring in Mick Webster.”

After Alan’s phone call, Sandra packed Brian off to the Lifeboys and Tracy to the Guides. They hadn’t been interested in such organizations back in London, but since they’d started school in Eastvale and discovered that many of the other children were members, they decided it would be a good way to make friends. Tracy was still quite happy with it, but Brian was already chafing at the bit. He complained that he didn’t like drill, and that he liked the leader, who spat as he shouted, even less. Sandra, having been a loner as a child, thought the whole network of Scouts, Cubs, Brownies and the rest rather silly, but she would never say anything about that in front of the children.

When they had finally gone, she took a deep breath and looked around the living-room, wondering what to do first. Though she managed to be a fairly efficient housewife, she wasn’t an obsessive cleaner. Alan also helped out on the weekends, taking on jobs she didn’t like, such as Hoovering the staircase and cleaning the bathroom.

It was seven o’clock. She didn’t know when Alan would be back; he’d said he was questioning a suspect. Sandra was trying to decide between doing some dark-room work or settling down with the biography of Alfred Hitchcock she had taken out of Eastvale Library that morning, when there was a knock at the door.

Puzzled, she went to answer it, expecting perhaps Selena Harcourt wanting to borrow a cup of sugar. But it was Robin Allott from the Camera Club.

“You told us you were willing to lend out your slide projector, remember?” he said, standing in the doorway.

“Oh, of course, Robin,” Sandra said. “I’m so sorry, it slipped my mind. I must have looked quite unwelcoming for a moment. Please come in.”

“I hope I’ve not called at an inconvenient time.”

“Not at all. I’ve just sent the children off and I was wondering what to do.”

“Yes, I saw them,” Robin said, smiling. “Lifeboys and Guides. It reminds me of my own childhood.”

He wiped his feet carefully on the doormat and Sandra hung up his navy-blue raincoat in the hall closet, then directed him into the front room, which he admired politely. He unslung his old, heavy Pentax from his shoulder and put it on the table by the front window.

“Silly habit,” he said. “But I always carry it with me. Yo u never know.”

Sandra laughed. “That’s the sign of a true professional. Do sit down, Robin. Can I get you a drink?”

“Yes, please, if it’s no trouble.”

“None at all. Gin or scotch? I’m afraid that’s all we’ve got.”

“Quite all right. Scotch’ll do fine.”

“Water? Ice?”

“No, just as it comes, for me, please.”

Sandra poured his drink, mixed herself a gin and slimline tonic, then sat in the armchair opposite him. He seemed more shy than he usually did in The Mile Post, as if he was embarrassed to be alone with her in the house, so Sandra broke the ice and asked him if he’d done anything interesting over the weekend.

Robin shook his head. “Not really. I did take a ride to the coast on Sunday, but it clouded over there, so I couldn’t get any good shots.”

“What about the evenings?” Sandra asked. “Don’t you go to clubs or concerts?”

“No, I don’t do much of that. Oh, I drop in at the local for the odd jar, but that’s about all.”

“That’s not much of a social life, is it? What about girlfriends? Surely there must be someone?”

“Not really,” Robin answered, looking down into his drink. “Since
my divorce I’ve been, well, a bit of a hermit, really. It wouldn’t feel right going out with anybody else so soon.”

“It’s not as if you’re a widower, you know,” Sandra argued. “When you get divorced it’s all right to go out and have fun if you feel like it. Was it mutual?”

Robin nodded hastily, and Sandra sensed that he felt uncomfortable with the subject. “Anyway,” she said, “you’ll get over it. Don’t worry. I’ll just nip upstairs and fetch the projector.”

“Would you like me to help?” Robin offered awkwardly. “I mean, it must be heavy.”

“No, not at all,” Sandra said, waving him back onto the sofa. “They’re all made of light plastic these days.”

Robin was gazing at the books on the shelves by the fireplace when Sandra came back down with the slide projector.

“Here it is,” she said. “It’s easy to work. Do you know how?”

“I’m not sure,” Robin said. “Outside of cameras I’m not very mechanically minded. Look,” he went on, “I’ve got those slides back, the ones I took at the Camera Club. Would you like to see them? You can show me how to set up the machine.”

“Why not?”

Sandra set up the projector on the table at the far end of the room and fetched the screen from upstairs. She then drew the curtains and placed it in front of the window. Finally, she showed Robin how to switch on the power and fit the slides he gave her into the circular tray.

“It’s automatic,” she explained. “Once you’ve got it all set up you just press this button when you want to move on to the next slide. Or this one if you want to go back. And this is how you focus.” She showed him the controls.

Robin nodded. “Excuse me,” he said. “I think I would like some ice and water with my whisky after all.”

Sandra moved forward to take his glass.

“No, it’s all right,” he said. “I can get it myself. You set up the show.” And he went into the kitchen.

Sandra adjusted the height of the projector and turned off the light. Robin came back with his whisky as the first slide zoomed into focus.

It really was quite remarkable. The model was sitting with her
legs tucked under her, gazing away from the camera. The lines drew the eye right into the composition and Robin had obviously used one of the 81-series filters to bring out the warm flesh tones. What was especially odd about the whole thing was that the model didn’t seem to be posing; she looked as if she were staring into space thinking of a distant memory.

“It’s excellent,” Sandra remarked over the hum of the projector. “I really didn’t think a modelling session like that would work out well on slides, but it’s really amazing. Beautiful.”

She heard the ice tinkling in Robin’s glass. “Thank you,” he said in a far-off voice. “Yes, they did work out well. She’s not as beautiful as you, though.”

Something in the way he said it sent a shiver of fear up Sandra’s spine, and she froze for a moment before turning slowly to look at him. It was too dark to see anything except his silhouette, but in the light that escaped from the edges of the lens, she could see the sharp blade of one of her kitchen knives glinting.

Robin was on his feet, quite close to her. She could hear him breathing quickly. She backed away and found herself between the projector and the screen. The projection of the nude model distorted as it wrapped around her figure like an avant-garde dress design, and she froze again as a transformed Robin moved closer.