The Burden of Doubt (18 page)

Swift found Busfield’s house empty. He went straight to Tina’s place of work and without preamble knocked smartly on the door the receptionist had pointed out to him. Tina opened it, her face already pinched with anxiety. Behind, a woman lay stretched out on what looked like a doctor’s couch. She had white paste all over her face and slices of cucumber covering her eyes.

‘Where’s Shaun?’ Swift asked.

‘She’s with that journalist, Georgie.’

‘At the newspaper offices?’

‘I think so.’

‘Thank you.’ He turned away.

‘He’s not in trouble again?’ Tina called after him.

He did not turn back. He raised a hand in farewell.

Sitting in a tiny office adjacent to the main news room at the Echo Shaun was in the mood for giving everyone in his orbit a hard time. Having grudgingly agreed to go ahead with the lie detector test he was now sulky and uncooperative, like a truculent four year old who couldn’t make up his mind what he wanted.

The polygraphist whom Georgie had hired from a privately run security service was a young man with round-framed glasses and a serious demeanour. He appeared unruffled by Shaun’s brooding hostility and patiently explained the procedure to him, encouraging him to handle the sensors that were to be attached to his fingers and the cuff that would be placed around his upper arm.

‘There ain’t no electric currents going through there, are there?’ Shaun demanded.

‘No. What we’re doing is simply recording your body’s reaction to the questions we’re going to ask.’ He indicated a small winking monitor which he’d set on the desk. ‘The results will appear up there, like a chart.’

Shaun sat silent and glowering.

‘It’s a process involving bio-feedback,’ the polygraphist
elaborated
.

‘Talk English,’ Shaun grunted.

‘We’re measuring the reactions of your autonomic nervous system,’ the polygraphist told him. ‘Which basically means we’re recording the reactions in your nerve fibres when we ask these questions. Reactions that are automatic reflexes, things neither you nor I have any control over.’

‘Like if you hit my kneecap with a little rubber hammer, my leg’d shoot out in front of me, even if I tried to stop it.’

‘That’s exactly it.’ The young man permitted himself a smile. ‘You’ve obviously experienced that.’

‘Oh, aye,’ Shaun agreed. ‘I’ve had a few quacks going over me in my time.’

‘Right. Now, Miss Tyson and I have drawn up a set of ten simple questions to ask you. Some are just general questions with no relevance to Mrs Farrell’s murder—’

‘And the others aren’t?’

‘Correct. All you have to do, Shaun, is listen to each question, think about it and then answer yes, or no.’

Shaun’s face creased with conflict. He levelled a beady glance at Georgie. ‘Tell me this isn’t going to land me in the shit again.’

‘I’m on your side, Shaun,’ she said.

He was not reassured. He looked at the polygraphist and the equipment he had brought with him. He looked again at Georgie. ‘I don’t know, I just don’t know.’

‘If you’re innocent of Moira Farrell’s murder,’ Georgie said quietly, ‘this test will prove it once and for all. And I’ll make sure that proof is in every newspaper across Britain.’

Shaun beat a tattoo on the desk. ‘All right, then,’ he said, addressing the polygraphist. ‘Let’s get it over with.’

The technician stepped forward and placed two flat discs on Shaun’s fingers. He bent down, checking that the placing was accurate. ‘Relax,’ he told Shaun. ‘I promise you this is not going to be painful. No electric currents, no shocks.’ He bound a grey cuff around Shaun’s upper arm and checked the attachments to the monitor. His movements were unhurried and confident. Eventually he was satisfied that everything was in place. He looked down at Shaun. ‘Are you comfortable?’

There was something about the other man’s air of quiet competence that soothed and reassured Shaun, gave him a renewed belief in the possibility that other people might just wish to help rather than harm him. He felt himself move towards a decision. He swallowed. He glanced towards Georgie, edgy again and mutinous. ‘I’m not doing it while you’re here,’ he told her. ‘I just want him. You wait outside.’

Georgie shrugged. ‘That’s fine.’ She got up. ‘See you later.’

Shaun waited until the door closed behind her. ‘Go on then,’ he told the polygraphist, who had been waiting patiently. The
sheet of questions lay beside him on the desk. He pulled it towards him.

The first question was easy. It was to confirm Shaun’s name and his age. There was no difficulty in saying yes. And the second was laughably simple too. ‘Does milk come from cows?’

And then things got a bit nearer the bone.

Doug settled himself into an armchair in Pat Bainbridge’s sittingroom. She made him hot strong coffee and offered a variety of small iced cakes.

Her sitting-room was small and cosily warm. It was furnished with plump chairs filled with brightly coloured cushions. Two fluffy white dogs slept by the gas fire. Doug noticed that all of the fabric surfaces in the room were covered in white hairs. Maybe Pat was so fed up with cleaning other folks’ houses, she had little inclination to bother with her own.

‘So, how can I help you?’ she asked, her face curious but also guarded.

‘We’re just going over old ground,’ he said. ‘It can happen as time goes by that things you didn’t think of before come to mind. Human memory’s an amazing thing.’

Pat did not disagree. ‘This chap you’ve had in for questioning,’ she said. ‘Shaun Busfield.’

Doug put down the piece of cake he was about to put in his mouth. ‘Yes?’ he said encouragingly.

‘I think I might have seen him at Mrs Farrell’s house.’

Doug abandoned all thoughts of the cake. ‘When was this, Mrs Bainbridge?’

‘Quite a few weeks back. Maybe October last. I’m not absolutely sure it was him, don’t run away with that idea.’ She reached for her cup of tea, frowning in concentration. ‘When I saw the pictures of him on the TV a few days ago, I had a vague feeling I might have seen him before. But – well, basically I forgot all about it, because I’ve been having a lot of trouble to do with my daughter. Well, to be honest it’s her husband who’s causing the problems. He’s a right cheating bastard.’ She seemed on the point of elaborating.

‘To get back to Shaun Busfield,’ Doug prompted gently, ‘if we assume it was him you saw at Mrs Farrell’s house, can you remember what he was doing there?’

‘I think he was doing something in the garden. Well, whoever it was, this guy was putting in some rose trees. In the back garden. That was definitely what he was doing. Digging a new bed at one end of the lawn and planting rose bushes. But I’m not one hundred per cent sure it was the man you were questioning.’

‘Can you remember what he looked like? I’m talking about what he looked like in the flesh. Try to forget the picture they showed on TV.’

‘Let me think.’ She pressed her lips tightly together. ‘He was medium height, on the skinny side. But he was pretty handy with a spade. Strong and sinewy. Some smaller men are like that, aren’t they, much tougher than the big bulky ones?’

‘Can you remember his face?’

She considered, then shook her head. ‘No, I didn’t really see him close up. What I’m remembering is the picture on the TV. Which isn’t really much good to you, is it?’

‘Anything you can tell us is useful, Mrs Bainbridge,’ Doug said encouragingly. ‘Did he have a vehicle?’

She shook her head and looked regretful. ‘Sorry, can’t help there. If he had a car or a van and he’d parked it around the side of the house like we do, I wouldn’t have seen it from the kitchen. And that’s where I saw him, from the kitchen window.’

‘Did you ever see him with Mrs Farrell?’

‘No, I don’t think so.’ She pondered. ‘No. Sorry.’ She looked at him curiously. ‘You let him go though. So presumably you don’t think he did it.’

‘We have to work on evidence, Mrs Bainbridge. Facts. And if we don’t have enough of those, we can’t go ahead with a charge.’

‘Yes, I see. Right.’ Her eyes gleamed with speculation. ‘So basically you might have released a murderer into the community,’ she commented, before biting into the bright pink icing of a little round cake.

Doug didn’t reply. ‘Is there anything else you remember, that you didn’t mention when we spoke to you before?’

She gave herself time to swallow her chunk of cake. ‘No, I don’t think so. But there’s something I’d like to ask you.’

‘Go ahead.’

‘Was Mrs Farrell pregnant?’

‘We can’t give out detailed information until the body is released to Dr Patel,’ Doug told her, switching into formal non-disclosure mode.

‘Which means she was,’ Pat said with satisfaction. ‘I told Meg. I told her Mrs F was expecting. I’ve got a nose for that kind of thing.’ She patted her stomach. ‘A gut feeling.’

It struck Doug that Pat Bainbridge was like someone in a soap opera, with a tendency to fill their lives with drama. ‘You’ve been very helpful, Mrs Bainbridge,’ he told her dutifully, rising to his feet.

She followed him to the door and opened it to let him through. ‘Whoever that bloke was who was putting in the roses,’ she said in thoughtful tones, ‘he left his trainers in the utility room. They could only have been his. They were there after he finished the job, and they stayed there for weeks.’

Doug swivelled around, giving her his full attention. ‘And?’

‘Well, they’re not there now.’

‘Do you know when they were moved?’

‘I’d say sometime around the time Mrs Farrell was killed. But I couldn’t be more specific than that. Meg and I were so upset by what happened, we were all at sea. Well, I still feel pretty shocked when I think about it.’

‘Mrs Bainbridge,’ he said with some urgency, ‘was there anyone else in or around the house and garden on the day Mrs Farrell was killed? Did you see anyone or anything unusual?’

‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘Like I said before, we didn’t see anyone. Until all you lot arrived.’

By the time Swift entered the premises of the Echo, accompanied by a backup of three uniforms, Shaun had completed his test. He was still sitting in the little office close to the newsroom and was drinking the tea Georgie had rustled up for him. The polygraphist had printed out the responses from the monitor and been through them with Shaun, explaining the implications of the answers he had given. And then he had packed up his equipment and left.

Shaun had felt sick. He cursed himself for being persuaded to take place in this charade. He knew the police would get to see the results of the test. He didn’t know how much trust they put in lie detectors, but he knew that, for him, the results were not nearly as clear as he had hoped. If only he’d kept his mouth shut, or simply kept on saying no to Georgie’s mad idea. She had said the test had gone fine. But then she would, wouldn’t she? She’d got her story and she was just saying anything she thought he wanted to hear. She was the sort of person who’d fall in the shit and come up with a ten pound note. Whereas he’d just sink deeper and deeper.

He’d thought of making a run for it before the police caught up with him again. But then he’d just be digging himself into an even deeper hole, making himself look more and more guilty. He folded his arms on the desk and laid his head on them.

The door opened and DCI Swift walked in. ‘Hello, Shaun.’

Shaun looked up. He felt a sense of relief. Anything was better than just waiting. ‘I suppose you’ve come to take me in again.’

Swift sat down. He could see that Shaun Busfield was
exhausted, that the spirit was slowly seeping out of him. ‘I’d like to ask you some more questions. And I’d prefer to do it at the station. But I’m not arresting you.’

‘What? You’re having me on.’ He glanced furtively around him, his eyes coming to rest on the door of the office. ‘Are you on your own?’

‘I’ve got a backup team with me. But I won’t be asking them to do anything.’

Shaun got to his feet: he knew when he was beaten. ‘What choice have I got?’ He paused at the door. ‘Is she coming with us? That journalist.’

‘I’ve had a talk with her about the lie detector test. And I’ve suggested she stays away from the station for the time being.’

‘Will she do as she’s told?’

‘Oh, yes.’

Shaun had the feeling the DCI meant what he said.

At the station Swift took Shaun into interview-room two. Doug joined them, bringing Busfield’s steadily fattening file of notes and tape transcripts with him.

‘You’re not under caution,’ Swift told him. ‘But we will be taping the interview. Do you want your solicitor?’

‘No.’ Shaun went so far as to offer a tight smile. ‘Give the lad the night off.’

‘I’ve been talking to Mrs Pat Bainbridge,’ Doug said.

Shaun shrugged. ‘Don’t know her.’

‘She works as a cleaner at Moira Farrell’s house.’

Shaun shifted from side to side on his chair. ‘I said already – I don’t know her.’

‘You probably don’t,’ Doug agreed. ‘But she reports that she saw you in the grounds of the house. That you were doing some gardening for Mrs Farrell. Sometime last autumn.’

‘I’ll kill that bloody Georgie Tyson,’ Shaun exclaimed. ‘If it hadn’t been for that lie detector test—’

‘I’m not interested in what’s emerged from a lie detector test commissioned and set up by an amateur,’ Swift told him. ‘The evidence we’re questioning you about came to our notice through Mrs Bainbridge in conversation with Constable Wilson.’

‘Was it you, Shaun?’ Doug asked. ‘At Mrs Farrell’s house?’

Shaun closed his eyes for a few moments. ‘Yes. All right, yes it was me. I did a bit of gardening for her.’

‘And you lied to us about not knowing her.’

‘Wouldn’t you have?’ Shaun demanded. ‘If you’d been me, under arrest and told your trainers had been dug up from the victim’s garden. With her blood on them. Well, wouldn’t you?’

Swift leaned forward. ‘Shaun, there’s a lot to be said for the truth.’

Shaun leaned his chin on his hands and closed his eyes.

‘When did you first meet Moira Farrell?’ Doug asked.

‘Back in October, last year. I delivered a new pump for the boiler to her house. She was in the garden as I came down the drive. Digging away, she was. She came to meet me to show me where to put the pump. We kind of got talking about the garden. She mentioned that their gardener was off sick and that digging was back-breaking work, and I said I’d help out with the roses, if she liked.’

‘OK. And how many times did you help out?’

‘A couple of Sundays. It brought in a nice bit of extra money.’ He paused. ‘And I enjoyed the work. She was good to work for. Friendly, but didn’t interfere.’

‘Did you meet her husband?’

‘No. I never saw him.’

‘Tell us about the trainers.’ Doug said. ‘The ones with the mud and Mrs Farrell’s blood on them.’

Shaun winced. ‘I must have left them there, after I finished the job.’

‘Come on, you can do better than that,’ Swift said. ‘You must have been thinking about it, Shaun. Crucial evidence that could have got you charged, maybe convicted.’

‘Yeah, yeah. I’ve thought about it. I remember changing out of them, before I got in to drive the van on the last day I was there. I’d worn them to drive in before and the mud got all over the place.’

‘So what happened to them, Shaun?’

‘I just don’t remember. Maybe I put them on the roof whilst I
put the other trainers on, and they dropped off when I set off. Or maybe I left them on the drive.’

‘So what happened to them after that?’

‘Dunno.’

‘What’s your guess?’

‘Someone must have found them and picked them up, I suppose.’

‘Who?’

‘Well, Mrs Farrell, most likely. She’d have gone out to look at the work I’d done after I’d gone, the punters always do that. She’d have seen them, wouldn’t she?’

‘And what would have happened then?’

‘I’m not a bloody psychic,’ Shaun snapped, becoming rattled and irritated.

‘If Mrs Farrell had found your trainers,’ Swift persisted, ‘what would she have done with them?’

Shaun frowned, looking cornered and edgy. Imagination wasn’t his strong point.

‘Would she have left them on the drive?’ Swift asked.

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘She seemed like a careful sort.’

‘So?’ Swift wasn’t letting him off the hook.

‘She’d have picked them up and put them somewhere safe.’

‘Like where?’

‘Somewhere inside where they wouldn’t get wet.’

‘Did you go inside the house?’

‘No.’ The answer came without hesitation. Shaun recalled that it was one of the questions he had been given in the lie detector test. One of the easier ones.

Swift leaned back, letting his arms hang loosely by his side. ‘That’s fine, Shaun.’

Shaun frowned. ‘What?’

‘You’re free to go.’

‘Is that it?’ Disbelief blazed from his eyes.

‘For now, yes.’

‘Right.’ He stood up, a pale, insignificant looking man,
stooping as though he had the world on his shoulders. He started to head for the door.

‘Stay around where we can contact you, Shaun,’ Swift said.

Shaun grimaced. ‘Don’t worry, once I get my head down on the pillow I won’t be going anywhere at all.’

‘Well, well,’ Doug said, as the door closed behind their former prime suspect.

‘What are you thinking?’ Swift asked, gathering up his notes.

‘I’m thinking, do we have anyone in the frame at all now? I’m thinking, what will Ice Man say when he hears what’s been going on today. And I’m wondering what you’re thinking.’ Doug thought some more. ‘And by the way, am I right in thinking you put some store by the information from the lie detector?’

‘From what I’ve gathered, respondents can’t fool the lie detector as it were. But they can block it by deliberately creating some kind of pseudo emotional response to each question.’

‘Like?’

‘Like clenching toes or anal muscles.’

Doug made a grimace of distaste.

‘They could create the same effect by clenching something more obviously visible, but that would rather give the game away,’ Swift elaborated. ‘The main thing is that by creating tension in the body they can cause a measurable response to show on the monitor. And if it they do that in response to every question then no differences will be registered between any of the responses. That would suggest that the respondents are either equally upset by all the questions – which is unlikely, given that a proportion of them are in no way contentious – or they’re lying every time.’

‘So basically the test would be invalid.’

‘That’s right. Now, on Shaun’s response sheet, the detector shows very little nervous activity for any of the questions except that of ever having visited Moira Farrell’s premises, and of previously knowing her prior to the meeting in the hospital. Both of which he had previously lied about. But when asked directly if he had killed her his answer was given instantly and the line on the monitor remained steady, no jumps or even a tremor.’

‘You’re convinced?’ Doug asked. ‘Convinced Busfield isn’t our man?’

Swift squared the collected papers and aligned them against the desk top. ‘Convinced is one of those worrying words like never.’

‘Almost convinced,’ Doug said, holding the door open for his boss.

‘That’s probably more like it. Although I should be praying I’m right, because by the time the
Echo
next goes to press the rest of the county and probably far beyond are going to believe that Shaun Busfield is innocent.’

‘And we could be looking pretty red-faced to have let him go for a second time.’ Doug closed the door with a gentle click.

Laura pulled her car up at the address printed on Jayne Arnold’s business card. Her home turned out to be an apartment on the second floor of a high Georgian house just a stone’s throw from the town centre of Ilkley. From the large windows facing the street there were glimpses over the tree tops to the sky above. Like Laura’s own flat the main room combined kitchen and sitting/dining areas, but the proportions of the room were twice those of Laura’s and the décor had a style and individuality which had Laura drawing in a tiny breath of envy. Cylindrical cushions with tassels, Buddha sculptures, a round mirror with a huge gilded sunburst frame.

‘I like to mix periods and style,’ Jayne said, bringing mugs of tea from the kitchen and observing Laura’s interested inspection of her pad.

She sat down and smiled at Laura. Today she was wearing a tiny grey skirt and a chunky grey cardigan with black leather trimming. Her legs and feet were bare, tanned to a gentle gold which Laura guessed had not come from the Yorkshire winter sun. ‘What do you want to know?’ she asked pleasantly.

Laura snapped herself back into full detective mode. ‘I’d like to check on the time of your flight from Prague on the day Moira died.’ She consulted her notebook. ‘On the first occasion I spoke with you and your mother you said that you got a flight as soon as your mother telephoned with the news.’

‘Yes,’ Jayne said slowly.

‘When did your mother phone with the news?’

‘Mid morning. Shortly after the police had visited to tell her about Moira’s death.’

‘The airline’s records show that you cancelled your original booking to return the following day, and booked a flight for that afternoon.’

Jayne moved her hips slightly and then crossed her legs. She nodded agreement.

‘But the boarding list in the flight manifests doesn’t show you on that flight,’ Laura said. ‘Although if we go back to the day before, January 15th, your name does appear on the boarding list for the afternoon flight. And we know that you went through passport control at Leeds-Bradford in the evening. The day before Moira died.’

‘Oh dear.’ Jayne said, her expression one of wistful remorse. She looked across at Laura. ‘Don’t look so forbidding.’

‘Why did you need to lie, Jayne?’

‘It was actually my mother who told you I was in Prague when Moira died,’ Jayne pointed out politely.

‘She did. But you freely confirmed that later on when we were talking on our own outside.’

Jayne sighed. ‘I’m really sorry about this. Let me explain. I was on a hot weekend with a boyfriend whilst I was in Prague. My mother really liked this guy and she thought things might be getting serious between us. Unfortunately he and I had a big row and I decided to come home early. I didn’t contact my mother or tell her about the break up, and then when Moira was killed, it just didn’t seem important to tell her …’

‘So your mother was under the impression that you didn’t come back to England until later on in the day when Moira died.’

‘That’s right.’

‘And is she still under that illusion?’

‘Yes. I know it’s not very good to keep things from her, but I’ll get around to telling her when the time’s right. She’s still very upset about Moira.’

‘Will your boyfriend corroborate what you’ve told me?’ Laura asked.

‘Oh, yes, of course.’ She picked up a notepad from the coffee and table and wrote on it briefly. ‘There, that’s the number of his firm.’

In her car Laura called the number Jayne had given her.

There was an instant and crisp response, ‘Lamming and Strong.’

Having verified that Liam Strong was in his office Laura drove around to his premises on the east side of the town. The board outside told Laura that Lamming and Strong were a firm of accountants. From his prominent place on the list of personnel she assumed Liam must be a partner.

He met her at the door of his office, a man in his thirties with sandy-coloured hair and craggy features. On a scale of 1 to 10, Laura gave him an 8 for good looks. He gave her ID a cursory glance, smiled at her and invited her to sit down.

Laura explained that her team were investigating the murder of Mrs Moira Farrell. That she wanted to ask him some routine questions.

He seemed unperturbed. ‘Fire away.’

‘I believe you’re a friend of Jayne Arnold,’ Laura said.

His pale-blue eyes sharpened with interest. ‘Friend,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure friendship describes what Jayne and I had together. But whatever it was we had, it’s over. She dumped me.’ He gave a rueful smile: desolation at the end of the relationship did not seem to be on his agenda.