Echoes of the Dead (19 page)

‘You
did
take her to see your pigeons, didn't you?' Woodend says, and though it is phrased as a question, there is no longer anything questioning about it.

‘Well, it certainly
seems
to be bothering you.'

‘Then what
is
it?'

‘He should never have done that,' Paniatowski said.

‘Probably not,' Woodend agreed. ‘But you had to be there, Monika. I think, by that point, Bannerman was gettin' such a buzz from the way the interrogation was goin' that he didn't even think about would he should or shouldn't do – he just acted on instinct.'

‘That doesn't make it right,' Paniatowski said firmly.

‘What do you think, Paco?' Woodend asked.

Ruiz shrugged awkwardly. ‘I saw much worse in my time with the police.'

‘Maybe you did, but that was in Spain before the Civil War, and this was in England in the 1950s – and Bannerman
shouldn't have done it
,' Paniatowski said.

‘What a lot of things you seem not to know,' Woodend ponders. ‘You don't know how Lilly was snatched from the street without anybody noticin'. You don't know whether forensics will find blood on your stall. There are
so many
things you don't know that it would take me all day to list them.' He slams his hand down hard on the table. ‘You're either very stupid or just pretending to be very stupid. It's obvious to us that there's skin under her nails because Lilly scratched her attacker. So what is the attacker to do? And don't you dare say you “don't know”, you bastard!'

‘There comes a moment in any interrogation when you can sense it's all over, bar the shoutin',' Woodend said. ‘Do you know what I mean?'

Paniatowski and Ruiz nodded. On this point, at least, they could agree with him – because they knew
exactly
what he meant.

‘The suspect may keep on protestin' his innocence for hours after that – perhaps even for days – but he knows, just as clearly as you do, that the game's up. An' in that particular interrogation, the moment came when I accused Howerd of cuttin' away the scratch marks. I could
see
him collapse. I could
see
him give up all hope. An' though I didn't expect a confession right away, I was convinced we'd get one in the end.'

‘The government claims that hanging's a painless process, you know, but they have to say that, don't they? And do you know
why
they have to say it? It's because if the ordinary decent people on the street knew what it was
actually
like, they'd demand it was stopped immediately,' Bannerman says.

‘And it seems so unfair that
you
should hang, because I know you didn't mean to do it,' the sergeant says, dropping his voice again, so that now it is almost gently hypnotic.

‘You let Bannerman seize control of the interrogation,' Paniatowski said.

‘I wouldn't exactly say that,' Woodend replied. ‘He'd hit on a good line, and I decided to let him run with it. I've done the same with you, any number of times.'

‘Yes, but I'm not Bannerman,' Paniatowski said, unyieldingly.

‘That's it!' Paniatowski exclaimed.

‘That's what?' Woodend asked.

‘That's what we've been looking for! Up to that point, you see, Howerd had been holding back his alibi – but he'd always been
ready
to produce it, if that should prove necessary.'

‘So what changed?' Paco Ruiz asked.

‘What changed is that Bannerman painted him a picture of what death by hanging was like.'

‘I'm not following you,' Woodend said.

‘The reason he didn't want to say where he'd been that Saturday afternoon was that he knew it would show him in a very bad light. Remember, it was
Howerd
who took
Clegg
to see the young prostitute in Bolton, not the other way round.'

‘So what?'

‘So it probably wasn't the first time he'd used her services – or those of some other girl who was quite like her. And once he'd produced his alibi, that would all come out into the open.'

‘Maybe that's true,' Woodend agreed, ‘but it would have got him off the murder charge.'

‘That's how
you
see things,' Paniatowski said.

‘That's how
anybody
would see things,' Woodend countered.

‘No, it isn't,' Paniatowski argued. ‘Put yourself in Howerd's shoes for a minute. He's convinced that you and Bannerman have him marked down for the murder, and that whatever he says is going to make no difference. So why should he give you more ammunition – why should he reveal to you what a nasty little pervert he really was?'

‘Because it would get him off,' Woodend said stubbornly.

‘But he doesn't
believe
that. He thinks that you'll find some way to discredit the alibi, but still have all the damning information you've collected
as a result of the alibi
at your fingertips.'

‘You can't possibly know what he was thinkin',' Woodend said.

‘He's convinced he's going to be convicted, whatever happens,' Paniatowski pressed on. ‘So he's faced with two choices, isn't he? He can continue to deny he killed Lilly – in which case he'll probably be hanged. Or he can make a false confession, which will mean, according to Bannerman, that he could be released in time to play with his grandchildren. Which of those two alternatives would you choose?'

‘
He told me it wasn't as simple as that
,' Elizabeth Eccles had claimed. ‘
He said that after what the policeman had told him, he didn't dare produce his alibi
.'