One Dead Witness (40 page)

‘
Can I help?’ asked the lady with them.

She was in her fifties with a ruddy complexion, a large
aquiline nose and sharp, angular face. Danny knew instantly it was
not Joe Lilton’s former wife. She sighed inwardly, knowing she’d
been a bit optimistic to hope to still find her here.

‘
I’m looking for an old friend,’ Danny said, thinking that
introducing herself as a cop might complicate matters. ‘She lived
here, ooh, a good fifteen years ago. We lost touch when I moved
south. Her married name was Lilton.’

The woman considered the information, then shook her head.
‘No, doesn’t ring a bell. We’ve been here five years; bought the
place from a family called Rice. I think the house had been through
several hands before that. Sorry.’

‘
Okay, thanks. It was a long shot.’

Danny drove away and pulled up under some trees in a country
lane. Even for a cop, finding someone fifteen years on is not
necessarily easy. She thought for a few minutes, then had a
brainwave. She used the mobile phone Henry had made her take (bless
him) and dialled Lancashire Police HQ and asked to be put through
to the pensions department in Human Resources.

She explained who she was and what it was she
wanted.

Less than five minutes later, the woman gave Danny the
information she required: Robert Neville, Police Constable, had
retired eleven years ago. She gave Danny his address and telephone
number. Danny was pleased to discover he still lived in
Blackburn.

Neville was the officer who had regularly worked the mobile
beat covering Osbaldeston fifteen years before - the beat Danny had
been allocated for that one day when he had been off
sick.

It
took Myrna two hours to contact
Karl Donaldson at the FBI
office in London.
He had been in a breakfast meeting with the Commissioner of the
Metropolitan Police and the head of the Maltese Police, discussing
a particular drugs problem involving an American gang.

When he returned to his office, he had skimmed through his
messages, saw the one from Myrna timed at 8 a.m. and was
immediately interested. He put her message to the top of the pile,
then went to get a coffee. First things first.

‘
It was really nice to see you after all these years,’ Robert
Neville said with a wave. ‘Sorry I couldn’t help you.’

‘
That’s fine,’ Danny said, trying to mask her disappointment.
It
had been a wasted journey because
Neville had no idea where the first Mrs Lilton had gone after she
moved away from Osbaldeston. He had just been glad she had
gone.

Danny walked away from Neville’s house towards the CID car,
giving a quick backward glance and saying, ‘It was nice to see you
too, Bob.’

‘
There is one thing that might help, actually ... it’s just
come to me.’

Danny tried not to let her shoulders droop. It
had been an effort to get away from this man who
had been divorced about six years, seemed to be leading a fairly
solitary existence, and was reluctant to let the sight of a skirt
leave his house without giving it a good long ogle. She turned,
firmly believing this to be a delaying tactic.

‘
Yeah, there is one thing. I seem to remember that when the
Liltons split up, she got a fair percentage of the business. They
had a few of those shops that sell everything dirt cheap -
toiletries and stationery, stuff like that. They had five shops and
I think she got two of them, one in Accrington and one in Burnley.
She had to change the name of them, though.’

‘
Can you remember what they were called?’ Danny smiled
sweetly.

Neville wracked his brains. ‘Something like, “Everything You
Need” or “Just the Ticket” or “Cheep ‘n’ Cheerful”. I’m not sure,
sorry. Something tacky. I think the shops are still there. The one
in Accrington is on Broadway, I think.’

At five-fifteen in the morning it could only be one person
calling the office. Myrna lunged for the phone on her desk and
picked it up before the first chirp had been completed. Tracey
moved, disturbed by the noise. She did not wake.

‘
Karl?’

‘
Yeah, it’s me, Myrna. How ya doin’?’ came the voice from 3000
miles away, loud and clear.

‘
Good,’ she whispered into the mouthpiece. ‘Can you hear me
okay?’

‘
Yeah - but you sound like you don’t want anyone else to
hear.’

‘
I don’t. Just hold the line while I transfer you.’

She put the call through to Steve Kruger’s office and slipped
across the hallway, closing the door behind her. It was a strange
sensation to sit in Kruger’s chair, but she felt comfortable and
warm doing so, almost as if he was still there and she was sitting
on his knee. She picked up the phone. ‘That’s better. Now I can
talk.’

‘
What can I do for you, Myrna? I passed on that last piece of
information you gave me to a detective I know in Lancashire
Police.’

‘
Thanks, Karl. This is about him again, Charlie
Gilbert.’

Donaldson did a quick calculation in his head re time-zones.
‘In that case this must be important if you’re phoning at this time
of day.’

‘
It is, I think. I want to get something moving, only I’m not
sure how. I reckon I need your knowledge.’

‘
I’m flattered. Shoot.’

‘
The cops in Lancashire have dug up a body, young girl, maybe a
week ago now, I’m not sure. It made national headlines because it
was found by a man and a woman having sex.’

‘
I read about it.’

‘
I got some information which points to Gilbert as the
perp.’

Ahh, the word ‘perp’ made him smile nostalgically. ‘Offender’,
which they used in England, was just so . . . dull.

‘
Gilbert? How good is the information?’ Donaldson wanted to
know. ‘I don’t want to bother the cops with gossip.’

‘
It’s better than information, Karl.’ Myrna declared her hand.
‘It’s a witness. I’ve got one here who says she knows for sure it
was Gilbert. I believe her, and from what I know of Gilbert I’d
believe he’d easily be capable of murder. I just don’t know how to
take this forwards ... and there is a further
complication.’

‘
Yep?’ He tried to sound positive.

‘
The girl will only talk to one person. It’s a cop she met a
few years ago, some guy called Danny Furness.’

And that ‘guy’, Danny Furness, was at that very moment
strolling through the rather grimy streets of Accrington, an East
Lancashire town with great tradition but little else to show the
modern world. Broadway was the main shopping street, now
pedestrianised with the open market on one side and shops on the
other.

The one Danny was looking for was at the end of a row of
shops. Its huge plate-glass window was garishly covered in brightly
lettered words which declared brashly,
Everything-U-want
-
under 1
roof
and that everything was
permanently reduced.
Danny went in
and walked directly to the first member of staff she could
identify. She flashed her badge and warrant card and asked to speak
to the manager. She was led to the back stairs and up through an
assault course of stock boxes to a first-floor office, where she
was introduced to a woman who she immediately recognised as the
former Mrs Joe Lilton.

The woman looked like Danny felt. She was a mess. Her stringy
bleached hair was pulled back into a pony tail; her blotchy skin,
puffed up around the cheeks, looked like too much alcohol had taken
its toll; the smell of booze was one of the things Danny recalled
from her previous encounter with this woman. She had a mouth which
was permanently turned down at the corners and the skin around her
thin lips was corrugated with age.

‘
You probably don’t remember me,’ Danny said, presenting her
warrant card which the woman peered at suspiciously.

‘
No, you’re right. I don’t.’

‘
Look.’ Danny glanced quickly round the room. ‘I’m really sorry
to barge in on you unexpectedly, but I’d like to talk to you. I
need about half an hour of your time, but I don’t think talking in
here is appropriate.’ She indicated the office. It was no place to
sit and talk, particularly as Danny knew it would be a conversation
of great delicacy. The room was a complete mess of papers, invoices
and more stacked-up stock. And there was only one chair and a phone
which rang constantly.

‘
I’m busy,’ the woman barked sharply.

Danny held her hands up placatingly. ‘I know you are, but so
am I; I’m here doing some enquiries about the murder of a young
girl in Blackpool. Her name is Claire Lilton. Her stepfather is
your ex-husband, Joe Lilton.’

‘
I won’t make any apologies for this. He was a complete, utter,
fucking bastard.’ She leaned over her cup of tea and hissed the
words across to Danny. They were sitting in a cafe in the shopping
centre, facing each other at a corner table. Danny had learned that
since her divorce from Joe, the woman had reverted to her maiden
name, Turner.

‘
In what way, Jackie?’

‘
Used to really slap me about. I should’ve got out years
before, but the money was good. . . y’know?’ she admitted. ‘The
money was hellish good.’ She sniffed.

‘
Why did you split up?’

Jackie Turner shifted uncomfortably, did not reply.

Danny saw she had struck some sort of chord. ‘What happened
after the divorce?’

‘
He was a right bastard, but I screwed him as best I could.’
She lit a cigarette and Danny took a light from the match. ‘We had
six shops then, all selling rubbish, mind, but little gold mines
they were. He made sure I got the two least profitable ones and I
even had to change the trading name, f’God’s sake. I sold one
immediately, and ploughed the money into this one which has turned
into a real good ‘un; I also got the house, but I couldn’t afford
to keep it on, so I sold that and got myself a bungalow instead -
in Wilpshire. Nice ‘n’ snobby ... haven’t managed to find a bloke
with much money yet, but I do all right.’ She gave a wistful smile.
Danny warmed to her.

‘
And the kids?’

A shadow crossed her face momentarily, then cleared. ‘Kid - my
daughter Julie.’ Danny’s eyes narrowed at the mention of the name.
Then: ‘She’s twenty-four, married, got two kids of her own now, but
it’s a marriage made in hell, if you know what I mean?’

Danny considered the woman sitting opposite and was quite
impressed. She was obviously a fighter and a survivor. Danny hoped
she would turn out to be the same.

Jackie Turner’s eyebrows rose, what was left of them, that is.
They had been plucked almost to oblivion, replaced by an unsure
line
.
‘What do you
want from me?’

‘
Because it’s a murder investigation, we follow up all sorts of
leads, so don’t think it’s unusual to be asked a few questions.
Joe’s not a suspect, but we like to know as much as possible about
families, backgrounds, all that kind of stuff.’

‘
I’d suspect the bastard,’ Jackie said vehemently. ‘He could be
really violent.’

‘
Even with kids?’

Jackie clamped her mouth shut tight, accentuating her
corrugated lips.

‘
Jackie, when I came to see you all those years ago, you and
Joe were having a real humdinger.’

‘
Yeah, I remember now.’

‘
What was it about?’

She shrugged. ‘The usual shite. Drink played its part. I’m not
sure what sparked it.’

Danny looked directly into her eyes. Jackie’s dropped and she
inspected her smouldering cigarette end.

‘
I don’t think it was the usual, was it, Jackie?’

‘
I don’t know what you mean.’

The detective’s eyes closed briefly in an expression which
told Jackie that Danny thought she was a lying bitch. ‘It’s only
just come back to me, Jackie. Literally only last night, but I
think I’ve put two and two together. When I turned up at your
house, I wasn’t really listening to the words of your ding-dong,
but they must have sunk into my thick head.’ She tapped her skull.
‘And only now have they come out the other side.’ Danny opened her
shoulder bag and took out the scrap of paper she had written on in
the early hours after that vivid dream. She glanced at Jackie, who
looked very unhappy.

‘
Joe said, “I never touched her”,’ Danny read out. ‘You said,
“You did, you bastard. You had it off with her. She told
me”.’

Jackie stared past Danny’s shoulders, her jaw set tight. Her
eyes were moist. Danny was aware of the other woman tapping the
floor with her feet.

‘
“
I never, as God is my witness”, or something like
that, is what Joe then said. And you said, “You got into bed
and...”’ Danny’s voice swooped to a whisper, ‘ “fucked Julie”.
That’s what I remember, Jackie. What was all that
about?’