Stuart Pawson - Chill Factor

“Will there be anything else, sir?” she asked.

I studied the chalked-up menu. “Yes, please. We’d like to order some food. Is it still two for one?”

The young woman looked at the clock. “Yes sir. Which table are you at?”

As we’d just walked in and were standing at the bar, I wasn’t sure of the answer to that one. Dave came to the rescue. “Over by the window,” he said, pointing, and the girl said it was table number twelve.

“Twelve,” I repeated. “Remember that, Dave. Number twelve.”

“Twelve,” he said. “Right. Twelve.” “What would you like, Sir,” she asked, still smiling.

“Er, I think the gammon and pineapple,” I said, “with a jacket potato, and, um, the half a chicken, again with a jacket potato.”

She tapped the order into the till. They don’t have numbers on the keys, these days. Instead it says: chicken and chips, egg and chips, ham and chips, ham eggs and chips, and so on.

“Is that everything?” she asked, her finger poised over the give them the bill key.

“No,” Sparky interjected. “I’d like some food, too. I’ll have the steak and kidney pie and…oh, half a chicken, both with chips.”

It’s hungry work, being a cop, and we’re growing lads.

Saturday morning we told Silkstone that we’d be interviewing him again on Monday, so come prepared. I had long conversations with Mr Wood and Les Isles and they both agreed with what I was doing. Les wanted to be present, but we haven’t worked together since we were constables and I gave it the thumbs down. Besides, I wanted Dave with me. Dave and I go together like rhubarb crumble and custard, or mince pies and Wensleydale cheese. Mmm! There’s none of this nice and nasty routine with us; we’re both our normal, charming selves, most of the time. In the file I found an advert for Silkstone’s company, Trans Global Finance, clipped from the Gazette. It said: Can’t get a mortgage? Low earnings? County court judgements? No problem! Secured loans available on all types of property. Send for an application form. Now! More or less what I’d expected.

Sunday I went through it all, over and over again. Sometimes in my mind, sometimes scrawling on an A4 pad. I don’t have hunches; I don’t follow lines of enquiry. Not to start with. I gather information, everything I can, without judgement, as if I were picking up the shattered pieces of an ancient amphora, scattered on the floor of a tomb. Some bits might link together, others might be from a completely different puzzle. When I’ve gathered them all in I join up the obvious ones, like the rim and the handles, and then try to fill in the gaps until I have something that might hold water. Ideally, when I have a possible scenario in mind, it would be possible to put it to the test, devise an experiment, like a scientist would. But liars and murderers are not as constant as the laws of physics, and it’s not always possible. Instead, we turn up the heat and hope that something cracks.

“Did you know, Mr Silkstone,” I said as Dave and I breezed into interview room number one, ten o’clock Monday morning, “that you have very good water pressure at Mountain Meadows?”

Prendergast looked up from the pad where he was adding to his already copious notes, shook his head and continued writing. Silkstone, sitting next to him, looked bewildered and reached for his cigarettes.

Dave removed the cellophane from two cassettes and placed them in the machine, watching them until the leader tape had passed through and nodding to me to say we were in business. I sat diagonally across from Silkstone and did the introductions, reminding him of his rights and informing him that he was still under caution. When prompted, Prendergast said that they understood.

“Let’s talk about Margaret, your late wife,” I began. “Word has it that you quarrelled a lot. Is that so?”

Silkstone drew on his cigarette and sent a cloud of smoke curling across the table. “No,” he replied. “We had an occasional argument — what married couple doesn’t? — but that was all.”

“What, no vicious slanging matches? No slinging your clothes out of the bedroom window?”

“Inspector,” Prendergast interrupted. “This sounds like hearsay to me.”

“Of course it’s hearsay,” I agreed. “We talked to the neighbours: they heard it and they said it. It’s a simple enough question, let Mr Silkstone answer.”

Silkstone sucked his cheeks in and licked his lips. “That was nearly two years ago,” he replied. “It only happened once, like that.”

“What was it about?”

“Money.”

“You were having problems?”

“No, not really. We just had to be a bit more careful than Margaret was used to.”

“But it’s true to say that you stand to prosper by Margaret’s death, is it not?”

Prendergast shook his head vigorously and banged his hands on the table. “That’s a preposterous thing to say, Inspector,” he exclaimed. “My client did not profit in any way from his wife’s untimely death.”

Addressing Silkstone, I said: “But your mortgage will be paid off to the tune of a hundred and fifty thousand pounds, won’t it?”

“Yes,” he hissed, “but that’s perfectly normal practice.”

“Indeed it is,” his solicitor affirmed. “My own mortgage is covered by a joint life, first death policy, as is anyone else’s if they have any sense. You can’t call that evidence.”

“No,” I agreed, “but we can call it motive.”

“In that case, we all have motives to murder our spouses, and they us.” He sat back in triumph.

“Would you say, Mr Silkstone,” I asked, “that you and Margaret had a normal sexual relationship?”

He looked straight at me, then said: “I don’t know, Inspector. How would you define a normal sexual relationship?”

“OK, let me put it another way. Were you and Peter Latham having joint sessions with your wife, three in a bed, that sort of stuff?”

“No.”

“You married sisters, didn’t you? And you shared girlfriends, in the past. Latham had known your wife as long as you had. Was he the one who used to pull the birds, and you always ended up with the friend? Were you sharing her — Margaret — with him?”

“No,” he said, and crushed his cigarette stub into the ashtray.

Prendergast leaned forward, saying: “This sounds like pure conjecture on your part, Inspector. Have you any evidence to corroborate these suggestions?”

“Evidence?” I replied, shaking my head. “No. Not a shred.” I pulled the report that the lab scientist had done for me from its envelope, pretended to read the introduction, then pushed it back inside.

“No,” I repeated. “We don’t think you were having a three-in-a-bed sex romp that went wrong. It was a theory, but we have no evidence to support it.” I glanced sideways at the big NEAL recorder on the wall, seeing the tapes inside relentlessly revolving, making a copy of the words that passed between us. I’m a student of human behaviour, body language. When people lie they resort to using certain gestures: hands fidget and often cover the face; legs are restless; brief expressions are quickly suppressed. But Silkstone was chain smoking, and that has a language all of its own, disguising his real expressions. I was relying on the tape to unmask him.

“We have another theory now,” I began. “And this time we do have some evidence. This one says that Peter Latham wasn’t present when Margaret died. He’d left, shortly before. This one says that you, Anthony Silkstone, killed her all by yourself.” They were both silent, stunned by the new accusation, wondering what the evidence could be. Sadly, it wasn’t much. Prendergast shifted in his chair, about to come out with some double-speak, but I beat him to it. “Let’s go back a week,” I continued, “To when you came home and found Latham and Margaret together. You are on record as saying that you went straight upstairs to the bathroom. Is that correct?”