Laughing Boy (7 page)

“Right,” I sighed, composing myself for something that no amount of training or experience can prepare you for. “Right. What is she called?”

“Mrs Jones.”

“OK. Put her through.” I covered the mouthpiece and whispered: “This could be it,” to the super. After a click and a silence I said: “Mrs Jones?”

“Yes,” a quavery voice replied.

“I’m Detective Inspector Priest, Mrs Jones. You told the sergeant that your daughter hasn’t come home from work.”

“That’s right.”

“Could you give me your address, please.” I wrote it down. “And what is your daughter called, Mrs Jones?”

“Colinette.”

“And what time were you expecting her?”

“About ten past seven. She rang me at half past six to say she was finishing at seven, but she never came home.”

“And how old is Colinette?”

“Twenty-two. It was her birthday on Sunday.”

“And where did she work?”

At a nearby corner shop. It wasn’t a proper job, just something to pass time until she went to college. No, she’d never done anything like this before. Her supper was ruined
and she didn’t have a boyfriend. I wrote the responses down, trying to ignore the knot that was tying itself in my groin. “She’s dead!” I wanted to scream. “Your lovely daughter, the best daughter anybody ever had, is dead.”

“Is there a Mr Jones?” I asked.

“No, Inspector. I lost my husband four years ago.”

“I’m sorry.”

“He was killed in an industrial accident. That’s why…”

“Why what?”

“That’s why Colinette wouldn’t do anything like this unless…unless…”

“I’ll have to come round and take a statement from you, Mrs Jones,” I interrupted, cutting her off from speculation about her daughter’s fate. The truth would be far more
horrifying
. “I’ll be about…twenty minutes, half an hour. I’ll…take a statement.”

I replaced the phone and looked at Mr Wood. “Colinette Jones,” I told him. “Aged twenty-two. What time is it?”

“Twenty-five to eleven.”

“Maggie won’t be in bed yet. I’ll take her.”

“Tell her I’ll pick her up,” he said. “I’ll break the news to Mrs Jones, Charlie.
Noblesse oblige
, and all that balderdash. You get yourself home.”

I dialled Maggie’s number and didn’t argue with him.

Colinette had phoned her mother at about six thirty, and left the shop a couple of minutes after seven. The three-nines call for an ambulance was timed at seven fifty-two and the body was found five miles from the corner shop. Around midnight Mrs Jones confirmed that it was her daughter.

We sent the team out, bright and early, knocking on doors, talking to concern. Mr Naseen at the corner shop confirmed that Colinette left on time and expressed his
concern
for her mother. Later that morning we spoke to a
couple
of Colinette’s friends who were not too complimentary about her employer, so we brought him in.

“How long had Colinette worked for you, Mr Naseen?” I asked, as we sat in interview room number one. Dave was with me but the tape wasn’t running.

“She didn’t work for me.”

“So what was she doing at your shop?”

“She just helped out, sometimes.”

“That’s not what her mother says.”

“I don’t know what she has told her mother, Inspector.”

“Her mother says she has worked for you for over a year.”

“No, it is not true.”

“She just helps out?”

“Yes, Inspector, as I said.”

“You call eight hours a day and four on Saturdays just helping out?”

“It is nothing like that Inspector. My wife assists me, and Colinette sometimes calls in to help her with the children. Perhaps my wife pays her for that. I don’t know.”

We’d come up against the Rice Curtain. It’s an
occupational
hazard in this part of the world. I leaned forward over the little table until I was as close to his face as I could get. He’d had curry the night before, but I didn’t mind – so had I. “Mr Naseen,” I began. “We are investigating a murder. The fact that you employed Colinette Jones on a casual basis, paying no National Insurance fees on her behalf, or
deducting
no Pay As You Earn, is irrelevant to this enquiry.
At the moment
.” I loaded the last sentence with meaning, to show that we’d keep it on the file if he didn’t cooperate. “We’ve also spoken to two girls who had the job before Colinette did. Two girls who didn’t stay with you for too long. Now, Mr Naseen, can we start again? How long did Colinette work for you?”

The expression on his face indicated that he’d got the message. “As Mrs Jones told you,” he replied, very softly, “Colinette had assisted in my shop for about one year. You must realise, Inspector, that the shop is in a very poor area.
My turnover does not allow me to employ full-time
assistance
and I have a wife and four very young children to
support
.”

“Not to mention a Series Seven BMW,” I added.

After that he began to cooperate. He confirmed that she’d left just after seven, in the rain, and told us what she’d been wearing.

“Was she carrying a handbag?” I asked.

“No, Inspector, an umbrella.”

“But no handbag?”

“No. She very rarely carried one, unless she was going straight out with her friends.”

“Did you fancy her?”

“What do you mean by that, Inspector?”

“I mean, Mr Naseen, did it ever enter your head that a more intimate relationship, even a sexual one, with Colinette would be very desirable?”

He sat back in his chair, one arm extended, resting on the table, almost as if he were enjoying himself. “She was a
modern
young woman, Inspector. Had lots of boyfriends like western girls of her age do. She was attractive and dressed in a very provocative way. Yes, I fancied her, as you put it. I
fancied
her to distraction, but I never did anything about it. I’m a middle-aged man, as you are, and feelings like these are part of the growing old process, I’m sure you’ll agree.”

“That’s not what the other two girls say.”

“What do they say?”

“They say you propositioned them constantly, until they had to leave.”

“They were not very nice girls, Inspector. I caught them stealing. It is only natural that they would try to blacken my character.”

“So where were you between seven and seven thirty last night?”

“In my shop.”

“Can anyone support you in that?”

“I would imagine so, Inspector. I had a steady stream of customers and a couple of them paid their newspaper bills. I can furnish you with their names and the till receipts, which will bear the exact time that they paid. Will that be
sufficient
?”

I glanced across at Dave, who looked as if his
strangulated
hernia were playing up. “Yes Mr Naseen,” I replied. “That should be quite sufficient.”

“Bugger!” I exclaimed when we were back in my office.

“He’s not exactly love’s young dream, is he,” Dave said.

“No, and I bet he runs close to the edge of the sexual harassment laws, but he’s in the clear, if his story checks out.”

“It will do.”

“Mmm, I think you’re right.”

“Do you want a coffee?”

“No, we haven’t time. I wonder how long Maggie will be?” I’d asked Maggie Maddison to attend the post-mortem because she’d be liaising with Mrs Jones throughout the enquiry, and there might be a flake of comfort for Colinette’s mother in knowing that a female officer was present when they cut her open.

“A while yet,” Dave replied. “They weren’t starting until nine.”

“OK. So you go round to Mr Naseen’s and check his story. I’ll report upstairs then see how the fingertip boys are doing.”

The task force do the fingertip searches. Shoulder to shoulder, down on their knees, they miss nothing. It was nearly half a mile from the corner shop to 44 Burntcastle Avenue, where Colinette had lived. Ten minutes maximum, although she was wearing high heels. A long stretch of her route was on an unlit road past a recreation ground, and that’s where we had started the search.

Usually it’s a weapon we’re looking for. If anyone finds
anything they raise a hand and the line comes to a halt. The sergeant in charge has a look and assesses the find. He might decide to photograph it
in situ
or just make a note of the place and bag it for later examination. When I arrived the sergeant was lying on his stomach, peering at something, and the rest of the line were sitting back on their heels. “What is it?” I asked as I crouched down beside him. The grass was wet and they were all wearing wellies and
waterproof
trousers.

“Hello, Boss,” he said, pushing himself upright and extending his hand towards me. “A ring, possibly
engagement
.”

I studied it without taking it from him. It was a thin gold band with a tiny diamond between two even smaller rubies, but it would have cost somebody all they had to offer,
financially
and emotionally. “Mmm,” I mumbled, not knowing what else to say.

“Been here a while, unfortunately,” the sergeant told me. “Grass growing through it. Nothing to do with us, I’m afraid.”

“Right,” I said. If you keep quiet somebody always jumps in with an answer. “Anything else?”

“Not really. Usual rubbish, but no handbag. We’ve had a good look right along her route, but haven’t found it.”

“Um, no,” I began. “We’ve been told by her employer that she wasn’t carrying one, but I’ll check with her mother. She was carrying an umbrella, though.”

He shook his head. “Sorry, no umbrella.”

“So what happened to it?” I wondered aloud. I pointed at the ring. “Put that in an exhibit bag, please, and I’ll take it with me. It’ll make an icebreaker. God knows, I’ll need one.”

“Rather you than me, Charlie,” he replied, reaching inside his overalls for a bag.

I’d been told that 44 was on the right-hand side, the
second
one of a pair of semis. In reality it was the one with all the cars outside and a floral cross hanging on the door. As I
approached I saw faces inside turn towards me, so I just waited on the step, without knocking. A middle-aged man came and invited me in after I’d introduced myself. Two women buttering scones in the kitchen squeezed to one side as I passed through. One of them told me she’d just made another brew and asked if I’d like a cup.

The front room was crowded and smoke-filled. Mrs Jones thanked me for coming and someone pulled an upright chair from under the dining table for me. I sat down and told everybody how sorry I was.

The consensus of opinion was that hanging was too good for the bastard who did it. I let them bounce their anger off me, hardly listening to the hard words as they ricocheted around the room without concern for any distress their assumptions might cause Mrs Jones. The names of
murderers
living in luxury at the tax-payers’ expense were bandied around along with rapists and child molesters who were free to walk the streets. I nodded, when required, and made
feeble
attempts to point out that we didn’t know what had
happened
to Colinette. I didn’t want to reveal that at that very moment she was on the table in the PM room, spilling forth her secrets. My tea arrived and I sipped it gratefully. It was in a china cup and good and strong. A panacea for all ills.

There were three photographs on the sideboard. A
handsome
man in a Triumph Motorcycles T-shirt grinned from the large one in the middle; to the right he had a little girl on his shoulders and in the other he was snuggling up close to a young version of Mrs Jones in what could have been a Spanish bar. There’d have to be a new addition to the gallery, I thought, and wondered how she would arrange them. I
finished
my tea and as I looked for somewhere to put the cup and saucer a hand reached out and took it from me.

“Would you like a refill, Inspector?”

I shook my head. “No, but that was most welcome, thank you.” I turned to Mrs Jones and told her that I’d be sending Maggie Madison to spend some time with her. “The
newspapers
will descend on you, I’m afraid, when they hear about this, but she’ll deal with them.” She nodded vacantly, as if I were explaining why the milkman was late. “I’d like to ask you a couple of questions,” I continued, now that I had her attention. “About Colinette, if you don’t mind.”

The room fell silent. “He’d like to ask you a few
questions
, about Colinette,” the big woman sitting next to her on the settee explained.

“Yes, I heard,” Mrs Jones replied with a nod.

“Was your daughter carrying a handbag, do you know?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No, she hardly ever carried one.”

“I don’t know where they keep stuff, these days,” the other woman stated.

“Right. Thank you. What about an umbrella?”

“I’m not sure. She had two or three, and I think she kept one at the shop.”

“What sort were they?”

“Those roll-up ones that come down very small.”

“I never know how to fold them,” the woman
complained
.

“Joan, shut up,” a man sitting near the window snapped. “Let the inspector ask his questions.”

“That’s all right,” I said. “And what colour would they be?”

“Black. And I think she had a blue one.”

“If I can speak,” the woman said triumphantly, “if I can speak, the blue one’s in the hall. I’ve seen it, just now.”

“Thank you. So she probably had a black, telescopic umbrella with her?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Good. That’s all for now, Mrs Jones. I’ll get back to the station and Maggie Madison will be with you as soon as
possible
.” I rose to my feet and felt for the plastic bag in my pocket. “There is just one other thing,” I said as I unfolded it. “Have you ever seen this ring before?” I was fairly sure
that it was irrelevant, but it added to the illusion that we were doing everything we could, following every avenue in our attempts to find her daughter’s killer.

Mrs Jones took it from me and studied it for several
seconds
. Tears were welling up in her eyes when she looked at me again. “Yes,” she whispered. “It was Colinette’s.”