Michael Fowler - Secret of the Dead

He followed her back in the direction of the surgical ward, but before they got there the corridor branched off and took on a detour towards the admissions ward.

Pauline pointed out where Alan was and left Hunter at the door.

Darbyshire was propped up in his bed, hooked up to a beeping monitor. He looked surprisingly well, given that he’d had a heart attack only twelve hours earlier.

“Gave us quite a scare there Alan,” he opened.

“They’ve said it was a warning for me to change my lifestyle, blah,blah,blah. You know, the usual routine. A couple of days and I’ll be out of here and back in your cell.” He gave a reluctant smile.

Hunter really wanted to say ‘It’s only what you deserve.’ Instead he said, “Pauline told me you wanted a word?”

Alan Darbyshire gesticulated for Hunter to sit down. “If you wouldn’t mind.”

Hunter sank into a high backed chair. “What can I do for you?”

“Look, I know from yesterday’s interview that you’ve got enough on me for perjury, but I think I should explain how things are.”

“You can do that when we interview you once you get out of here.”

“Oh come off it Hunter. You’ll get the version I want to give you in interview. Don’t you really want to know what went off?”

Hunter eyed him curiously for a few seconds. Then he said, “I’m listening.”

Alan Darbyshire stared back. “I’m not as bad as you think, you know. Sure, I’ve strayed a little, but that’s what we all did back in the seventies and eighties. Dodging and weaving with a job ran with the territory. I include Jeff in that as well. It was just how we worked as a team.” His look hardened. “But Jeff didn’t deserve this. This has gone beyond what I thought would happen.” He paused and took in a deep breath.

“I’m still listening.”

“Look, I was never into Peter Blake-Hall for anything, neither was Jeff. We were not on the take, like you’re maybe thinking. True, Jeff and I got a new car, and a holiday at Peter’s place in Benidorm, but we paid for those. We got them at cost, that’s all.” He blinked and dabbed a finger at the corner of each eye. “You probably know that Peter was my snout. I came across him as a young man, just setting up his own mechanic’s business. He knew who was into ringing motors and doing bits of handling and he helped me put a few villains away. It was a good little number I had going with him. It helped me get promoted and stay in CID, and in return I helped him out when he got that club. I advised him how to run it and how not to get caught out, especially with it being a strip club. I mean he wasn’t doing any harm, was he? Just that it was a different climate back then.” He chewed his bottom lip and said, “Getting round to Lucy, Peter rang me that day when she went missing. Jeff and I went to see him and we really did believe what he told us. We really did all those enquiries that are on the file and from what the people said we genuinely thought at first we’d find her at Daniel Weaver’s house. Of course when we saw those scratches to his face and no sign of Lucy we thought he’d harmed her. Finding Lucy’s bag in his shed just sealed it for us.”

“You really found that bag in the shed then?”

“On my honour yes, I promise. Jeff and I firmly believed Danny had done something to Lucy. Especially when we found out he’d been having an affair with her over the past six months and that she was pregnant with his child. We just assumed he’d flipped that Friday night and killed her, and Jeff and I wanted to find what he’d done to her. As you know he didn’t confess. But we were absolutely convinced he’d done it, given the argument in the market place, and then her unexplained disappearance and so that’s why we did those extra notes.” His eyes glassed over again. He shook his head. “When he was found guilty, we still believed we’d got our man. Jeff and I visited him in prison with the aim of finding out where he’d buried Lucy, and even when he continued with the innocent act, we thought it was just a show.”

“When did everything change?”

“They didn’t, at first. Then we started to get a few whispers about Peter and his mate Ronnie Fisher bringing in drugs. And then there was that accident where the undercover officer got killed in that reporter’s car. Which, as you know, was covered up by crime squad. I saw him, you know, at Peter’s club, but I didn’t know he was an undercover cop. In fact I was with Peter on the night he got killed, so I knew he wasn’t involved in that.”

“And Ronnie.”

“Now he’s a different kettle of fish. Ronnie is a nasty piece of work. I believe it was Ronnie who did Jeff and it wouldn’t surprise me if he’d been involved in running that reporter’s car off the road that night. Nothing would surprise me about that man.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I’ve got to know him these past dozen or so years. I’ve seen what he’s done to a few who’ve upset him at the club. Ronnie is a psycho.”

“So what happened before Jeff got killed? Did he tell you about the notes he had kept of Daniel’s interview?”

“He didn’t say he had the notes. In fact, I thought those were long gone. I watched him burn them, or at least I thought so. I never knew he’d kept them all these years. He just told me he had kept evidence.”

“So what happened?”

“A couple of weeks before he was killed, right out of the blue, he rang me one night. He said it had been preying on his mind about what we’d done to Danny Weaver, and that maybe Peter had really killed Lucy. I told him he was just feeling low.” Alan broke off and licked his lips. Then he continued, “He’d told me about his cancer and that he’d not got long to live, so I just said ‘Jeff what’s done is done.’ And he told me he wanted to make amends and was just letting me know he’d kept some evidence to help Danny get his conviction overturned. I told him to think about what he was doing — meaning the consequences for me but he just repeated he’d thought about it a long time. He thought Peter was responsible for Lucy’s death and maybe a new investigation would prove it. I asked him again to seriously think about what he was doing. Then he hung up on me.”

“And you told Peter.”

Alan slunk low on his pillow, he looked defeated. He nodded back. “Yes, those are what those photos are all about. I didn’t know of course that the reporter had been sniffing around Peter’s club. I didn’t know about them until you showed them to me yesterday. I’d phoned Peter and told him that I needed to see him urgently. I went to his club and told him exactly what Jeff had said to me. And I asked him straight out if he’d killed Lucy.”

“And what did he say?”

“He denied it of course. But like you DS Kerr, I’ve been a detective a long time and I could tell when I looked him square in the face that he’d done it, or at least knew something about it. And by that I’m thinking Ronnie. He was the one who kept saying I needed to do something about it. Make sure the evidence disappeared. I’ll never forget what his face was like when he told me that either I sort it or he’d sort it for me. I’m telling you, I think Ronnie killed Jeff.”

Hunter wasn’t about to tell him that post-mortem findings indicated that the likelihood was that two people had been involved in his ex-colleague’s murder. He asked, “And what about the girl Jodie Marie Jenkinson?”

“I didn’t know about that. It was Peter who rang me and told me that a reporter was bugging him, and asked me if I’d said anything to anyone. I told him I wasn’t that stupid. Then he told me that this Guy whatever his name was knew an awful lot, and that if it wasn’t me then someone had to have overheard our conversation. The only two people in the club that morning besides me, Peter and Ronnie, were the bar manager and a girl stocking up the bar. I told him not to do anything stupid.”