Destruction of Evidence (31 page)

‘We won’t know until he gets to hospital.’

‘I’m sorry this isn’t a good time.’ Ken backed away. ‘I’ll come back later.’

‘If it’s important, you can tell me,’ Peter suggested.

‘It might be nothing. It’s just that working with Alun – he used to allow me to take some things home.’

‘Like?’

‘Waste paper. I use it to make bricks.’

‘Bricks.’ Peter’s head was spinning. He leaned against the wall.

‘To burn in the fire. I have a machine – you wet the papers, make a brick let it dry and then–’

‘I get it,’ Peter cut in sharply. ‘You’ve found something in the waste paper?’

‘As I said, it’s probably nothing. But it’s a will. Mrs Harville’s will. Dated thirty years back around the time her husband died. It’s signed by two witnesses…’

‘Didn’t I hear that she died intestate?’ Peter took the envelope from Ken.

‘That’s what everyone said. But this is quite specific. She left everything to Mary Wells or in the event of Mary Wells’ death, Mary’s family.’

‘Who’s Mary Wells?’

‘She was the Harvilles’ cleaner for years and years.’

‘Is she dead?’

‘Yes, but her daughter Annie isn’t and neither is her granddaughter, Pamela George. Look, can I leave this with you…’

‘You most certainly can.’ Peter slipped the envelope into his inside pocket. An oversight, or proof that Alun Pitcher was in no way as squeaky clean as the image of him that the town wanted to project. He wasn’t quite sure where exactly it fitted in with Pitcher case. But it was another piece of the puzzle. And one that didn’t throw too good a light on the town’s “honest” antique dealer.

‘That’s the ambulance. I’ll be on my way.’ Ken turned awkwardly.

‘Ken, can you give me a couple of hours before telling anyone about this. Just until Trevor comes round?’

‘As long as you like,’ Ken stammered.

‘Tomorrow morning the whole town will know about this. I promise you.’

‘Know about what?’ Tim asked as he passed the front door and saw Ken crossing the road and entering his own house.

Peter said the first thing that came into his head. ‘Something about the man Ken saw on the fire escape. He wants to add to the description he made in his statement.’

The paramedics entered the house and Peter followed, deliberately closing the door in Tim’s face.

Chris Brookes drove under the arch into the yard of the Angel just after the paramedics had loaded and closed the doors on Trevor.

‘You’re taking him to the local hospital?’ Peter asked the paramedic.

‘Initially, the doctor may move him after assessment.’

‘I’ll follow you in my car.’ Peter waited until they had driven away before walking over to Chris’s car. He opened the door on the passenger side.

‘We’re supposed to be undercover,’ Sarah hissed.

‘Trevor’s in that ambulance…’

‘I knew it.’ Sarah stepped out of the car. ‘You’re always putting him at risk. I told you something had happened to him. I knew it…’

Peter was taken aback by the tears in her eyes. He realised that Trevor was far more popular than him in their station but he had no idea that Trevor commanded this much respect – or affection – from their colleagues.

‘He’s been drugged. Patrick says he’ll probably be fine.…’

‘Patrick O’Kelly the pathologist?’

Peter nodded.’

‘What would he know about a live patient…’

‘We’re here to do a job, Sarah,’ Chris reminded her as she continued to round on Peter.

‘Trevor has USB pens he wants me to work on?’ Sarah looked expectantly at Peter as if she expected him to produce them immediately.

‘When he was drugged they were stolen along with his computer.’

‘Then there’s nothing for me to do?’

Peter thought for a moment. ‘There might be. Trevor tried the disks in the owner’s computer. He’s missing but I know where the key is to his house.’

‘It’s worth a try,’ Sarah agreed.

‘Follow my car. Chris you stay with Sarah; if anyone questions you, show your badge and give them my mobile number. After I’ve set you up I’ll go on to the hospital. Just wait five minutes. I’ve a call to make.’

Peter sat in his car and punched in a number. ‘Carol? Take Tim Pryce in for questioning and keep him in the station as long as you can… now immediately… ask him about brown paper… yes… the brown paper the Pitchers were wrapped in… if you don’t think it’s enough use your imagination… tell him a witness saw him planting water bottles and pizzas in our cottage… that’s not helpful. I can’t ask Trevor if he put them there when he’s unconscious can I… I’ll be in the station as soon as I know what’s happening with Trevor.’

He ended the call, waved to Chris through the window and gunned the ignition.

Peter saw Trevor’s eyelids flicker and moved his chair closer to the bed.

‘Sleeping beauty waking up?’

Trevor tried to sit up, fell back on the pillows and groaned. ‘What the hell happened?’

‘According to Patrick and the duty doctor here, it was some kind of date-rape drug. Works in ten to twenty minutes. Someone fed you something, probably in a bottle of water?’

Trevor blinked hard and moved to a more comfortable position. ‘My laptop… the disks…’

‘Were taken.’

‘I know.’

‘Did you see who took them?’

‘Hands wearing white latex gloves.’

‘Given the number of people and officers working in the Pitcher house that rules in at least seventy people.’

‘As well as the catering staff in the pub. They wear gloves as well,’ Trevor reminded him. ‘I feel weird,’ he complained.

Peter was never one to mince words. ‘You look weird.’

‘Update me?’ Trevor sat up, rose gingerly to his feet and left the bed.

‘I found the brown paper. It’s used to wrap linen. Tim Pryce must have had a lot of it. He bought a hundred and twenty yards of material to refurbish the bedrooms in the pub. I asked Carol to take him in for questioning.’

‘Good move.’

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ Peter grabbed Trevor as he swayed precariously towards the sink.

‘Sticking my head under a cold tap. I need to think.’

‘The way you’re carrying on you’re likely to fall and hit your head on the sink. Then you won’t be capable of any thought for some time.’

Trevor ignored him, turned the mixer tap to cold, and splashed his face.

‘Reggie’s searching the Angel for your computer.’

‘Tell her to stop and interview the blond Einstein instead.’

‘On what basis.’

‘Photograph on one of Dai Smith’s USB pens. Gay porn. Damian Howell and Lee Pitcher on the bed. There was a mirror on the wall behind them. Dai Smith was filming them.’

‘So, who cares about gays these days?’

‘No one where we live. But if Dai Smith’s and Damian Howell’s wives found out, they might be put out.’

‘Enough to leave their husbands,’ Peter mused.

‘Or enough to batter Lee Pitcher for cuckolding them.’

‘You sure you haven’t seen Tim?’ Carol demanded of Tim’s chef.

‘I’m his employee, not his bloody keeper,’ the man retorted. ‘Now, if there’s nothing else I’ve fifty chicken breasts to stuff with mushrooms and garlic butter.’

Carol returned to the yard. She looked up and down, then she heard a scream. Phyllis Lloyd ran out into the road. There was screech of brakes, a bang and she was flung headlong over the bonnet of a mail van.

Carol dialled the emergency services as she dashed towards her.

Phyllis’s eyes were open. She pointed back to the house and murmured, ‘Ken.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Carol March left Phyllis with Reggie and went into Ken’s house with Jim Murphy. Tim Pryce was sitting on the top of the steps that led down to the cellar. Ken was lying at the bottom, his neck at an angle it could never have achieved in life. Mars was whining piteously and licking Ken’s hand.

‘I tried to grab Ken when he slipped but he just carried on falling … I couldn’t hold him. Phyllis came to the cellar door, saw Ken lying there, panicked and ran. I heard a bang and the sound of brakes. She’s not badly hurt, is she?’ Tim looked from Carol to Jim.

‘She’s dead,’ Carol answered.

‘I’m sorry. As a neighbour and wife to Ken she was a pain … but poor Ken …’

‘You have to come with me to the station, Tim.’ Carol took his arm.

‘You can interview me in the pub …’

‘In the station, Tim,’ Carol said firmly. ‘You have to give a full statement, starting with the night of the fire. It’s so obvious. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before,’ Carol declared. ‘You were the first on the scene …’

‘I live next door,’ Tim protested. ‘I heard the window blowing out.’

Carol recalled the telephone conversation she’d had with Peter. ‘Sergeant Collins asked me to mention brown paper.’

‘Now it’s an offence to have brown paper in your house?’ Tim rose slowly to his feet.

‘It is when it’s used to wrap corpses up in before they’re set alight,’ Carol said.

‘I need a solicitor.’

‘I’ll send for Judy,’ Jim Murphy offered.

‘Not Judy, one of the others,’ Tim said sharply.

‘Why?’

‘I don’t want her to hear what I have to say.’

‘About Ken?’ Carol questioned. ‘This is Ken’s house. He was used to climbing up and down the cellar steps. He was fit, healthy. There’s no reason for him to slip and fall.’

‘I told you, he slipped …’

‘On what?’ Carol looked around the top step.

‘I don’t know on what,’ Tim countered testily. ‘He just slipped …’

‘Jim, get a photographer and scenes of crime in here, and the pathologist,’ Carol ordered. ‘We’ll need a PM as soon as possible. And, while they’re working, you and I are going to have a little talk in an interview room, Tim.’

‘It wasn’t murder.’ Tim leaned back against the wall. ‘I didn’t want to hurt Ken, but Sergeant Collins told me that Ken was going to add a description to his statement.’

‘What statement?’ Carol removed her notebook from her pocket.

‘The statement Ken made about seeing someone on the fire escape at the back of the Pitchers’ house just after the fire had been lit. I confronted Ken but he denied he was going to change it. Lied to my face. Said he’d spoken to Sergeant Collins about something else. I didn’t believe him …’

‘And for that you killed him?’

‘I told you I didn’t mean to hurt him,’ Tim reiterated insistently. He was so damned stubborn. I got angry. We were standing here …’

‘You pushed him?’ Carol questioned.

Tim stared at her and the look of utter despair in his eyes froze her blood. ‘I didn’t have any option. Don’t you understand? It was me on the Pitchers’ fire escape. I was leaving after I set the fires.’

Peter and Trevor went straight to Reggie’s office when they returned from the hospital.

‘You shouldn’t be here,’ Reggie admonished Trevor, who was swaying on his feet.

‘I’m the investigating officer,’ he reminded her, ‘and this case is almost ready to wrap.’

‘Tim’s made a full confession.’ She held up the disc. ‘He killed the Pitchers, cleaned the house, set the fires and burned the bodies. He had the knowledge from his time in the Met. He’s also confessed to pushing Ken down his cellar steps. A fall that killed him. Because of something you said to him about Ken’s statement, Sergeant Collins?’ She looked to Peter.

Peter blanched. ‘That was something I made up. I didn’t want him to know what Ken had said. He found a will, signed by Mrs Harville leaving everything to her cleaner, Pamela George’s grandmother. I thought it could have been connected in some way with the Pitcher’s murders …’

‘A will?’ Reggie interrupted.

Peter reached into his coat pocket and handed it to her.

Weak, Trevor sank into a chair. ‘The will can wait. Did Tim say why he killed the Pitchers?’

‘Jewellery. Lee was working on several sets. Tim planted one on Larry, who he incidentally carried through the yard of the Angel and dumped in the outbuilding at the back of the Pitchers’. Pocketed the other sets and sold them.’

‘Sold them where?’

‘He wouldn’t say.’

‘I bet he wouldn’t,’ Trevor commented scathingly. ‘Did he say why he needed the money?’

‘No.’

‘That’s not surprising because there was no other jewellery. Let’s try again.’ Trevor suggested. ‘Bring in Damian and Judy Howell and put them into an interview room.’

‘Judy and Damian …’

‘They’ll need a solicitor as well. And put Tim Pryce in the viewing room. This is one interview I want him to see.’

Trevor and Peter sat down in front of Damian and Judy. Trevor’s head was burning, he felt groggy and as though he were moving through a thick fog, but he’d primed Peter and Peter took control.