Stephen Booth - Already Dead

‘So?’

‘Before Prospectus Assurance was bought out it was called Derbyshire Reliance Insurance. I know that, because they provided the insurance cover for the Light House pub.’

Sitting opposite Diane Fry in his own flat, Ben Cooper began to feel that familiar sensation of unreality. The moment he mentioned the Light House, his head swam and he felt the stirrings of that tremor in his hand, the ache in the back of his throat. But they were fainter now, as if they were fighting a losing battle for control of his body. His mind felt clearer than it had for a long time. Though that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

‘Well, despite the takeover,’ he said, ‘many of the staff are still there in some departments. Call handlers come and go, but experienced people tend to stay on. They’re better paid, and they might find it more difficult to get the same level of salary elsewhere. Ralph Edge was working in the side of the business providing financial advice. He’s a fraud analyst. He knows what methods of fraud work, and which bring in the largest amount of money with the least risk. In fact, he was in a position to cover up fraud, if he wanted to. A gamekeeper turned poacher.’

‘How did he get away with that?’ asked Fry.

Cooper smiled. ‘How did people get away with losing billions of pounds for the banks? Well, they get put into positions of trust, where they’re left to handle huge amounts of other people’s money every day. As long as everything seems to be going okay, no one asks any questions. It’s only when it all goes wrong that people start saying there ought to be more regulation. And by then it’s too late.’

‘And poor old Glen Turner? Turner was pretty weird. He lived a strange life. But he was getting money from somewhere.’

‘Yes. From Ralph Edge,’ said Cooper. ‘Turner had been roped into his fraudulent money making schemes somehow.’

Fry nodded. ‘He was probably very willing at first. God knows, Turner had little enough excitement in his life. I can just imagine him hugging that secret to himself, knowing he’d broken away from his mother’s expectations of him. Then he bought her the greenhouse with the money.’

‘He sounds a sly beggar on the quiet.’

‘But still weird,’ said Fry.

‘And then I suppose he must have begun to feel he still wasn’t appreciated. He was still getting pushed around and disrespected at work. I bet he resented that even more when he’d just begun to feel he was a cool, edgy sort of guy underneath.’

‘After the incident at the paintballing session that Sunday, it all changed, though.’

‘That incident would have been the last straw for Mr Turner,’ said Cooper. ‘The final humiliation. Not only was he the butt of the joke yet again, but his humiliation was orchestrated by Ralph Edge, who he thought was his friend. Perhaps his only friend. But everybody has a limit. Even Glen Turner could only be pushed so far. I think he told Edge exactly that on Tuesday.’

‘He stood up for himself,’ said Fry. ‘Finally, the worm turned. He probably felt in a stronger position after he’d been to the solicitor, and believed he could sue Edge and Baird, even get them prosecuted for assault. I bet Mr Turner came away from that consultation with Mr Chadburn feeling happier and more confident than he had for a while.’

‘And he went straight off to confront Edge the next day.’

‘No,’ said Fry. ‘First he went and bought himself a fossil.’

Cooper hadn’t known that. ‘It takes all sorts,’ he said. ‘Some people would have gone a for a drink, or a slap-up meal, or bought themselves a box of chocolates, or whatever.’

‘Are we saying that it was feeling better about himself suddenly that got Glen Turner killed. Is that it?’

‘Pretty much,’ said Cooper. ‘Yes, pretty much. I imagine he went to see Mr Edge on Tuesday and told him he was going to pull the plug on the insurance fraud scheme.’

‘Or he demanded a bigger share of the proceeds,’ suggested Fry. ‘So he could buy his mother more presents.’

‘Possibly. Either way, Edge and his associates must have realised they’d misjudged him. Glen Turner wasn’t to be trusted any more.’

‘So they decided to kill him, to get rid of the problem? There must have been an awful lot of money at stake to justify that solution.’

‘Oh, yes, I think there was,’ said Cooper. ‘When you follow up all the cases they were involved in, I bet you’ll find the total just keeps mounting up and up.’

‘It will be the Major Crime Unit who do that,’ said Fry. ‘In fact, I suppose they’re doing it right now.’

She looked at her mug, and realised she’d drunk her coffee without noticing. She put it down empty on the table.

‘And the Gibson brothers …’ she said.

‘The strong-arm boys of the operation. I’m not sure how much control Ralph Edge, or anyone else, ever had over the Gibsons.’ Cooper shook his head. ‘You know, it’s been very strange these past few months. I told you once that I’d been driving around at night, didn’t I? Often I couldn’t remember where I’d been, or what I’d been doing. But I saw that sign one night. A.J. Morton and Sons . And I remembered Ryan Gibson. He was one of the first suspects I ever dealt with when I joined CID. PC Stanley Walker was the bobby with the local knowledge back then. He still is — except, of course, they’ve retired him. That was lucky from my point of view. Old Stan had become just another member of the public. Like me.’

‘What’s the connection between Ralph Edge and the Gibsons?’

‘Josh Lane is the connection.’

‘Josh Lane. The barman at the Light House.’

‘Yes, Josh Lane. My obsession,’ said Cooper.

He waited for Fry to make a sarcastic comment, but it didn’t come. He noticed the cat slink back into the room and sit watching them curiously, her whiskers twitching as if trying to detect something in the air.

‘According to the intelligence at the time, Lane was involved in the drugs trade on a small scale. He even supplied Ecstasy from behind the bar at the Light House. Selected customers only, of course. But you have to be very careful when you play that game.’

‘You certainly meet some unsavoury characters when you get involved in the drugs business,’ said Fry.

He was glad she understood that, at least. ‘Yes, it’s easy to get yourself in too deep. Those people have no hesitation in putting pressure on you, forcing you to do what they want. You have to go along with them. So you find yourself drawn in deeper and deeper. And then it’s too late. It was too late for Josh Lane. The only wonder is that he’s still out and free.’

‘Obsession,’ said Fry, surprisingly gently.

‘All right. Well, Lane knew the local drug dealers,’ said Cooper. ‘He had no choice but to acknowledge them. Sean Gibson introduced him to Ryan. Now, Ryan Gibson was in the army. He always claimed that he’d been a member of special forces. SAS, you know.’

‘They all claim that.’

‘Ryan either genuinely had been, or he’d mixed with people he learned things from. He was one of those men who was never able to go straight once he was out of the services. He’d learned so much discipline, and taken so many orders. Some men can’t adapt to civilian life, you know. They go to pieces without the discipline and structure, without all their mates around them. They can never hold down regular jobs, because they can’t tolerate taking orders from people they don’t respect, and don’t like dealing with members of the public.’

‘He drove a forklift truck, though.’

‘Yes, out in the yard at the depot, thinking his own thoughts, not having to listen to pointless chatter because of the noise of the truck.’