Paul Gitsham: The Last Straw

“It’s Alicia Washington, Welwyn CID. PayPal just got back to us with the owner of the credit card that paid for the website you’ve been investigating. You aren’t going to believe this.”

“Try me.” Warren managed to keep his tone even, resisting the urge to scream, ‘Tell me, damn it!’ down the phone.

“The website was paid for by a Professor Alan Tunbridge.”

* * *

Karen felt her heart begin to pound and her breath caught. Reaching into her pocket, she withdrew some latex gloves. Not bothering to put them on — a little difficult to explain if she was caught — she used the edges of the gloves to slide the computer manuals fully out of the way, revealing the black organiser. The outside of the organiser was still spotted with what must be dried blood, although some effort had been made to clean the worst off. Next to the binder was a similarly stained USB memory stick.

Outside the den she could hear Simon’s voice saying something to his mother, then her voice, louder and clearer, “Take your father’s car — the keys are on the side. I may need mine later.”

Time to call in the cavalry, Karen decided. Taking her phone from her handbag, she pressed the home key. Nothing. Oh, no, not now! The phone had turned itself off again. Swearing under her breath, Karen depressed the on button firmly. The screen lit up. Outside the small room she heard the front door open and a shout of farewell from Simon, followed by the clash of it closing again.

Although she knew it was far too soon, she glanced at the phone’s screen again. It was still showing the phone manufacturer’s logo. It could be another thirty seconds or more until the phone finally finished loading up its operating system then found a network signal. Assuming of course that was even possible in this little room underneath the stairs.

With that in mind, Karen turned to leave the room. Suddenly the door opened, making her jump. An attractive, middle-aged woman stood in the doorway.

“Well, what have we here?”

* * *

Tunbridge paid for the website? That hardly made sense. Why would he pay for this fake website that was then used to lure him to his death? Warren scratched his head thoughtfully. Looking around, he cast his eyes across the various pieces of paper that he’d spread out across his desk. His mind was whirring. The clue was here somewhere; he could feel it in his gut. But where? What piece of the puzzle was he missing? His gaze fell on the call list for the anonymous SIM card that they believed belonged to Clara Hemmingway. In amongst the numbers that they had identified as Tom Spencer’s and Crawley’s anonymous SIM cards and Severino’s mobile phone was another number, again linked only to an anonymous SIM card. The call list for that SIM card showed that it had only received and sent calls to Hemmingway and Crawley’s SIM card.

Who was this fourth person and what was their role in the affair? The SIM card was of course un-registered and the unique IMEI code of the handset that used the SIM was not listed on the database. If only Warren could link the number to a phone he might get somewhere. More in hope than expectation, he picked up Spencer’s call log. A quick glance showed that unsurprisingly the code for his smartphone was different. Why would he have a second anonymous SIM?

Next Severino’s handset. Again, no match. Then Crawley’s. Nothing. Then he had a sudden thought — the IMEI code was known to be assigned to a BlackBerry smartphone. Didn’t Alan Tunbridge have a BlackBerry? Warren’s heart started to pound. Maybe the killers contacted Tunbridge directly? What would it mean if that had happened? His mind spun; surely that would make no sense. He riffled quickly through Tunbridge’s phone records until he found the sixteen digit code.

No match.

Of course there wasn’t a match, he berated himself. The records showed that the phone had been called at 22:30 by Mark Crawley and answered in a conversation that lasted two minutes. At this time the scene would have been swarming with police and paramedics. Tunbridge’s phone was in his trouser pocket; there was no way it could have been answered and a two-minute conversation held.

Holding Tunbridge’s phone record in his hand, he noted how thick the stapled pile of papers was. A memory tickled the back of his mind. Simon Tunbridge talking about his father’s planner and how they’d bought him the new phone at Christmas. A family plan, he’d said… Almost without conscious thought, Warren flicked the pages over to reveal the second set of calls listed; linked to her husband through a shared call plan, Mrs Annabel Tunbridge.

The numbers matched.

* * *

Karen swallowed hard, hoping her voice would sound normal. “Mrs Tunbridge, I presume?”

“Yes, my son tells me that you have some paperwork for me to sign for the return of Alan’s laptop?”

“That’s right. It won’t take a moment.” Karen’s mind spun furiously; she needed to get out of the house immediately and call for back-up.

“Unfortunately, I’ve just realised that I left one of the sheets in the car. I’ll be back in just a second.” It sounded weak to Karen’s ears, yet amazingly the other woman moved to the side to let her out of the room. As she did so she glanced into the den. Her sharp intake of breath showed that she realised Karen’s error at the same time Karen did. With all of the fussing over her phone, Karen hadn’t remembered to slide the computer manuals back to where they concealed the diary and memory stick.

Without a second thought, Karen pushed the older woman away and sprinted for the front door.

“Stop her!” bellowed Tunbridge, her voice a mixture of fear and fury. Reaching the door, Karen fumbled with the unfamiliar locks. Finally she yanked the door open and stumbled out into the daylight.

The blow to the side of her head was like an explosion. The world flared an impossibly bright white, before fading to black.

Jones burst out of his office. “It was his wife all along.”

Sutton spun on his chair. “Sorry?” He’d clearly been deep in thought and was struggling to change direction.

Jones cleared a space on Sutton’s overflowing desktop and spread out the call-log sheets. By now, the other members of the task squad who were still present had gathered around the table, sensing a breakthrough.

“The unknown fourth SIM card that Hemmingway called on the night of the attack? The handset ID matched Annabel Tunbridge’s BlackBerry smartphone. Not only that, the PayPal account that was used to pay for the fake website was paid for on Professor Tunbridge’s own credit card — who else would have access to his credit card?”

Sutton was now fully up to speed, his agile mind piecing together the jigsaw puzzle and drawing conclusions almost as fast as Warren was revealing them.

“So Mrs Tunbridge decided to kill her husband before he divorced her. Spencer was the hired gun, whilst Hemmingway acted as an accomplice and set up Severino-” his face darkened “-but I still don’t see what she has to gain from this. Any life insurance would now have to be split three ways — her, Spencer and Hemmingway.”

“You’re forgetting Crawley. We know he didn’t commit suicide and his anonymous SIM card sits right in the middle of this little network of contacts. What if the original plan was for Crawley and Annabel Tunbridge to take over the research group and form a company to exploit Tunbridge’s breakthrough? Hell, maybe she’s the one that Mrs Turnbull suspected he was having an affair with? What if he started to get cold feet and was considering going to the police? Spencer and Hemmingway were in it up to their necks, but if he gave up everyone else and cut a deal, he might be able to get a conspiracy to murder charge and a sympathetic judge.”