Under Orders (13 page)

‘Oh God!’ she wailed and the tears flowed again. There would be many tears in the days ahead. She sat up and clung to me, her head on my shoulder. I could feel the wet warmth of her tears on my neck.

And I cried with her. I cried in grief for my lost friend.

‘Please tell me what happened,’ she said when at last the sobs eased.

If I had not been there, she would have learned the grisly details soon enough. Just as soon as some caring but clumsy policeman, detailed to inform the next of kin, had arrived to notify her that her husband had put a .38 revolver in his mouth and blown off the back of his head. I had no doubt that the gun in question was the same gun that Chief Inspector Carlisle had been looking for two days ago, the same one that was used to make the holes in Huw Walker’s chest.

‘Kate, my love, I’m afraid Bill didn’t die in a car crash. It seems that he may have shot himself.’ I tried not to make it sound as dreadful as it was.

‘You mean – he committed suicide?’ She had leaned back to look at my face.

‘It appears that he might have.’

‘Oh, my darling. Why?’ Her voice was a-quiver as a fresh round of sobbing sent a shudder through her body.

‘Here, drink your tea.’

She drank the hot sweet liquid. Best cure for shock there is.

‘Why?’ she said again. ‘Why would he? It’s my fault. I should have gone with him last night. Oh God, why didn’t I go with him?’

‘Kate, you mustn’t blame yourself.’ But I could see that she would. ‘You need to be strong for the children.’

‘Oh my God, how will I tell the children?’

‘You’ll find a way,’ I said.

There was a gentle knock at the door and Daphne came in with all four of them, little three-year-old Alice in her arms.

I told Daphne to contact me on my mobile if she needed anything and left them to it. This was a family-only task.

I let myself out of the front door and was walking over to the Audi just as a police car swept up the drive and the same young policeman as before climbed out.

‘Ah, Mr Halley,’ he said, ‘we’ve been wondering where you’d got to.’

‘You only had to call,’ I said, holding up my phone.

‘My inspector’s not pleased with me for letting you and Miss Burns leave the scene.’

‘Tough.’

‘I’ve been sent to inform the next of kin of Mr Burton’s death.’ Punishment for his failing, I thought. ‘Is Mrs Burton here?’

‘Yes, she is. But I’ve saved you the trouble. I told her myself, gently.’

‘Oh.’ He seemed relieved. ‘But I need to make it official so that I can report back.’

‘She’s telling her children now. So don’t interrupt her.’

‘Right,’ he said rather indecisively. ‘I’ll just wait here for a while. I’m expecting a female officer any minute. Please will
you go back to Mr Burton’s house to see Inspector Johnson right now.’

‘OK,’ I said, and drove away.

The posse had made themselves at home in Bill’s kitchen. Four men sat at the table. One of them stood up as I walked in through the back door.

‘Yes, sir,’ he said, ‘can I help you?’

‘I’m Sid Halley,’ I replied.

‘Ah, we’ve been looking for you.’

‘You’ve found me, then.’

‘I’m Inspector Johnson, Thames Valley Police,’ he said. ‘Where is Miss Juliet Burns?’

‘At home in bed.’

At their request, I gave them both Juliet’s address and my own, together with my date of birth. Strange how the police always want to know how old everyone is. They said I was free to go but I should expect to be contacted in due course by the coroner.

‘Don’t you want to interview me?’ I asked.

‘Why should I?’ said Inspector Johnson. ‘Looks like a pretty straightforward suicide. Done us a favour if you ask me.’

‘What do you mean?’ I asked.

‘Couldn’t bear the thought of going to prison for murder. Saved us all the time and money.’

‘Are you sure it’s suicide?’

‘Forensics will find out. We’re waiting for them now.’

‘Just make sure they check that he did fire the gun,’ I said. ‘Residue on the hands and all that.’

‘Everyone’s a bloody detective these days,’ he said. ‘You’ve been watching too much television, sir.’

‘Ask them to check all the same.’

‘I’m sure they will.’

He had made up his mind that Bill had killed himself and I wasn’t going to convince him otherwise at the moment. I hoped forensics might do so in due course.

I went to see Chief Inspector Carlisle in Cheltenham. I had phoned first to see if he would be there and he met me in the police station reception.

‘Morning, Mr Halley.’ It felt like afternoon but my watch showed that it was still only nine thirty.

‘Morning, Chief Inspector,’ I replied. ‘Can I borrow some of your time?’

‘As long as it’s not a waste.’ He smiled. ‘Wasting police time is an offence, you know. Shall we go through to an interview room?’

‘I’d rather go out for a coffee,’ I said. ‘I’ve haven’t had breakfast yet.’

He appeared to consult his inner self and decided that it would be acceptable for him to have coffee with a ‘public’ and agreed to let me drive us the short distance down to the Queen’s Hotel in my car. The previous week, this hotel would have been heaving with the masses from across the Irish Sea, here for the racing festival. Now it was tranquil and calm. We found a quiet corner of the restaurant and ordered not only coffee, but toast and marmalade as well.

‘Now, what do you want to see me about?’

‘You are aware, I presume, that Bill Burton was discovered dead this morning.’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘Thames Valley rang me.’ He made Thames
Valley sound like a person not a police force. ‘But how do
you
know that he’s dead?’

‘I arrived at the house just after he had been found by Juliet Burns.’

‘You’re making a bit of a habit of being around at critical moments.’

‘Coincidence,’ I said, and remembered that Bill had been told he could go down for coincidence. ‘Do you think Bill Burton killed himself?’

‘Why do you ask?’ he said.

‘Because I don’t.’

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘the loyal friend who believes his pal is innocent of all charges in spite of a load of evidence to the contrary.’

‘Don’t mock me.’

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘You’re the last person I should mock. You’ve probably solved more cases than I have.’

I raised a quizzical eyebrow.

‘Word gets round, you know. Never mind a criminal records check, most employers these days would like their staff passed by you. “Okayed by Halley” has become slang for reliable and honest.’

‘Well then, don’t mock me when I say that I don’t believe that Bill Burton killed himself.’

We waited in silence as a waiter put the coffee and toast down on the table.

‘Tell me why you don’t believe he killed himself.’

‘He had no reason to do so. When I spoke to him last night he was positive and determined. Suicide was the last thing on his mind. He was hardly likely to ask me to come and ride out this morning if he was contemplating doing himself in.’

‘Maybe something happened overnight,’ he said.

‘It did. His wife agreed to return home.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I’ve spoken to her. I went to tell her that Bill was dead. I thought it was better coming from a friend. I told her mother, too. They can both confirm that Kate was going to go home this morning. So he had every reason to live.’

‘You’re telling me he was murdered?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who by?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Almost certainly the same person who murdered Huw Walker.’

‘But why? What’s the motive?’

‘To stop the police hunt for the real killer. If the police’s prime suspect is found with his head blown off, with the same gun as that used for the first murder grasped in his hand, the obvious conclusion is that he had been overcome with guilt for his actions and done the honourable thing.’

‘Seems a reasonable conclusion to me,’ he said.

‘Bit too convenient, don’t you think? And where was the gun? You failed to find it when you searched his house?’ I was guessing, but it had to be so.

‘True,’ he said, ‘but we didn’t take the whole place apart brick by brick, and it may have been somewhere in the stables.’

‘Nevertheless, I’m convinced he didn’t kill himself – and, even if he did, he wouldn’t have done it in the house for his wife to find – or, for heaven’s sake, his children.’

‘He might have done if he wanted his revenge on her for talking to the police about Huw Walker.’

The waiter came over and politely asked that, as breakfast was now finished, did we mind moving to the lounge so he could set up for lunch.

‘I have something for you to listen to,’ I said. ‘Can we go out to my car instead?’

We went and sat in my car in the hotel car park.

I slotted the tape from my answering machine into the car tape player and let it run to the end of Huw’s second message. Carlisle pushed the rewind button and listened to it all through again.

‘You should have given this to me sooner,’ he said.

‘I only found it this morning.’ He looked at me in disbelief, which I suppose was fair enough.

‘Funny,’ he said, ‘I’d forgotten that he was Welsh. Makes him more of a man rather than just a body, if you know what I mean.’

I nodded.

Carlisle pushed the rewind button a second time and played the tape once more. I didn’t need to hear Huw’s voice. By now, I knew those messages by heart.

‘Hi, Sid. Bugger! I wish you were there. Anyway, I need to talk to you. I’m in a bit of trouble and I… I know this sounds daft but I’m frightened. Actually, Sid, no kidding, I’m really frightened. Someone called me on the phone and threatened to kill me. I thought they were bloody joking so I told them to eff off and put the phone down. But they rang back and it’s given me the willies. I thought it was all a bit of a lark but now I find that it ain’t. I need your bloody help this time, mate, and no mistake. Call me back. Please call me back.’

And the second one

‘Where are you when I need you, you bugger? Come on, pick up the bloody phone, you bastard! Can’t you tell when a mate’s in trouble? Just a few losers, they says, for a few hundred in readies, they says. OK, I says, but make it a few grand. Do as
we tell you, they says, or the only grand you’ll see is the drop from the top of the effing grandstand. Should have bloody listened, shouldn’t I?’

‘When did he leave these messages?’ asked Carlisle.

‘I’m not absolutely sure,’ I said.

‘Didn’t your answering machine tell you?’ he asked.

‘No, it came out of the ark,’ I said, ‘but, as you heard, there was another message between the two from Huw. I found out from that caller that he telephoned just before eight in the evening the day before Huw died. So one of Huw’s calls was before eight p.m. and the other after.’

‘So you didn’t just find them this morning,’ he said.

‘Well, no, not exactly,’ I said, suitably chastised.

Carlisle ejected the tape and put it in his pocket. ‘I’ll take this, if you don’t mind,’ he said.

I was sure he would take it even if I did mind.

‘I’ll give you a receipt for it when we get back to the station.’

‘Doesn’t sound like someone frightened of being killed by a jilted husband,’ I said. ‘More to do with fixing races.’

‘Burton was arrested for that, too, remember.’

‘Do you have an answer for everything?’ I said.

‘You pays your money and makes your choice.’

I drove back to the police station and pulled up in front of the entrance.

‘Will you do me a favour?’ I asked.

‘Maybe,’ he said.

‘I asked the police inspector at Bill’s house this morning to make sure that his forensic team check whether Bill had actually fired the gun or not – you know, residue on the hands. He seemed convinced that it was suicide and… well, could you check that the test is done?’

He nodded. ‘Standard practice but I will ask.’

‘And will you tell me the result?’

‘Don’t push your luck, Mr Halley.’

Pushing my luck is what I was about to discover I needed.

Impotence is frustrating.

I don’t mean physical impotence, although that too must be exasperating. My current frustration stemmed from my impotence to get on with my investigations into Huw’s death. I needed some Viagra for the mind.

I was also failing in my task for Archie Kirk, having done little to delve into the world of the internet gambler.

Today was now Friday, a whole week since the Gold Cup and two days since I had been to see Carlisle in Cheltenham. And there was still no word from him as to the result of the forensics.

I’d been to Sandown races the previous day and had spent a tedious time asking anyone and everyone why they thought Huw Walker had become a murder victim. Some suggested race fixing as a possible reason, most having seen the antics between Huw and Bill last week either live or on the television and misreading the cause, as I had done. No one had been able to suggest any names other than Bill Burton as the likely murderer, many easily believing that, by killing himself, Bill had as good as confessed. I spent the afternoon sowing seeds of doubt to
this theory and spreading the word that Sid Halley, at least, believed that Bill had been murdered, too.

I sat in the little office in my flat playing with the make-a-wager.com website. Come on, I thought, how could this be a big earner for organised crime? Gambling had always attracted more than its fair share of dodgy characters and internet gambling was sure to be no exception.

There were two obvious ways for a bookmaker to separate honest men from their money fraudulently. First, to fix the result so that he can take bets in the sure knowledge that he cannot lose. And, secondly, to contrive to make people gamble on an event where the result is already known, but only to himself. Nowadays, with television pictures of every race beamed straight to the betting shops and to any home with a satellite dish, there is little scope for the second. In the good old days of the wire services, a couple of minutes’ delay was easy.

The surest way has always been to fix the result. Not such an easy task in a race with plenty of runners, not unless nearly every jockey is in on the fix, which is very doubtful since the penalties for such behaviour are harsh. To be ‘Warned Off Newmarket Heath’ means to lose one’s livelihood and to be banned not only from Newmarket Heath but also from all racecourses and all racing stables. It is quite a deterrent. Fixing races, if done at all, has to be subtle, but just a slight manipulation of the odds can pay huge dividends in the long run.