Alex Gray - Five ways to kill a man

Daniel Jackson had uncrossed his legs and was now sitting stiffly, his arms around his body as though to control a sudden fit of shivering.

‘I really don’t know. Dad… there were people in his past.. I don’t know much about it, but…’ He bit his lip then let a huge sigh escape from his throat. ‘My father was a good man, Superintendent. A well-respected man. But, like every human being on the planet, he’d made mistakes. Some of these were matters of misjudgement.’

Lorimer listened as Daniel Jackson spoke clearly and slowly as if weighing every word. He was being careful now, eyeing the policeman with a new wariness in his manner. Lorimer nodded encouragingly as if expecting more.

‘There were men who occasionally cropped up from these days. You could always tell.’ He shrugged.

‘I’m afraid you have the advantage over me there, Mr Jackson. You’ll have to describe them for me,’ Lorimer told him, trying to keep any trace of sarcasm from his tone.

‘Oh, yes, of course.’ Daniel frowned, looking vague for a moment as though he had lost his own train of thought. Suddenly Lorimer could see a resemblance between this man and his sister. How would he describe it if he were being cynical; the ability to dissemble, perhaps?

‘They were always from overseas. South American, I think. Tannock might be able to tell you more about them. Dad never let me join in any of their discussions but I do remember one thing.’ He looked up, his face alight with the sudden memory. ‘Dad was always in a real temper for days after any of these visits.’

‘And when was the last time any of these visits took place?’

‘Oh,’ Daniel took a deep breath then exhaled, ‘that’s a hard one. Not in the last year to my knowledge.’

Lorimer turned in his chair so that he was facing into the room. He pointed to a glass-fronted cabinet full of lead soldiers, the sort of collectable items that might have been handed down from an older family member. But it was not what was within the cabinet that interested him but the silver-framed photographs on top.

‘That’s your parents?’

Daniel nodded then half-rose from his chair. ‘Would you like to see them? Let me bring them over to the light.’

‘Yes. Thank you,’ Lorimer said. He watched as the man picked up the photographs delicately as though he were handling precious objects and brought them over, placing them on top of a small, polished rosewood table near the window.

‘There,’ he said, setting them down and turning the pictures so that the silver frames glinted in the sunlight. A smile played around Daniel’s lips as he looked at his late mother and father, and Lorimer could only imagine what emotion was going through his mind.

The photographs were seated portraits, each subject on their own but against a similar background that appeared to be a reception hallway of some sort. Lorimer could make out doors behind the posed figures. The Jacksons were dressed in elegant day-clothes as if preparing to go to a function: Sir Ian in his kilt and his wife wearing a formal suit that looked like silk. Lady Jackson was smiling into the camera lens, lips slightly parted as if she had just uttered something amusing. Lorimer saw a pretty, blonde woman of around fifty with hair styled into a sleek bob, and guessed that the photo must have been taken shortly before her death. The detective felt he would have liked this woman with her infectious smile, so like her son’s, he realised.

Sir Ian’s presence dominated his portrait. There was no other word for it. His whole body seemed to fill the frame. He’d been a big man, in more senses than one, thought Lorimer, seeing the large hands grasping the sides of the ornate chair, the muscular legs under the hem of the kilt, feet planted firmly together. Jackson had the look of a man who was only there on sufferance and was preparing to get up and go at any moment. But there was a direct quality in the eyes staring into the camera lens that Lorimer found fascinating. Here was a man of some considerable strength, the sort that would call a spade a spade and not mess about with any niceties. This wasn’t a man who would allow himself to be intimidated, the Superintendent was sure. Lorimer thought of the moodiness Daniel had mentioned, following these visits from South Americans. Ian Jackson’s reputation had been as a man who’d followed his own path fairly ruthlessly, but whose public generosity in recent years had become its own legend.

‘Were these taken in your old home?’ he asked.

‘Yes. Mum and Dad were just off to a wedding and one of the cousins took it, I think. It was on the upstairs landing, just outside their rooms. That’s their bedroom to the left of the pictures.’

Lorimer nodded, seeing the dark varnished wooden door, its brass doorknob above a keyhole, the key protruding from the lock. A vision of flames licking at the edges of the solid door came to him then, and of two people overcome by smoke inhalation, unable to rise from their bed. At least that was the conclusion he’d read in one of the forensic reports.

‘Your sister didn’t appear to have any photographs that I could see,’ Lorimer remarked, recalling the stark emptiness of Serena Jackson’s new flat, so at odds with her brother’s comfortable home.

‘No,’ Daniel told him. ‘All of Serena’s personal things were at home. Destroyed by the fire; sports trophies… everything. It wasn’t just her parents she lost, you know. It was her home, too, until very recently. And now all of her childhood memories have gone as well. Can you begin to imagine what that does to a person like Serena?’ Daniel was still standing, looking down now at Lorimer, shaking his head as if bewildered that the policeman should lack an understanding of what had happened to his sister. ‘Perhaps you can see now why I’m not so happy that she had to see you on her own this morning.’

‘You would have preferred if I’d had her friend DI Martin with me, perhaps?’

Daniel Jackson frowned. ‘Who? Sorry, should I know that name?’

Lorimer shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ But that throwaway remark was interesting. Perhaps Rhoda Martin wasn’t quite as close to this family as she would have him believe.

‘We do offer counselling, though. In fact, I’m sure the family liaison officer will have brought that subject up with your sister,’ he continued smoothly.

Daniel Jackson shook his head. ‘It’s probably exactly what she needed then and still needs now, but d’you know what, Superintendent? These are the only people who might have persuaded her to go down that route.’ He tapped the silver-framed photograph. ‘And they’re not here to take charge of anything in her life any more.’

He had stayed for more than half an hour after that, seeking gently to prise more information about the Jackson parents from a son who had so obviously cared about them. But despite listening to childhood reminiscences and the success of Jackson Tannock, Lorimer found out little more than the dark hints he’d been given about the men from Ian Jackson’s past. If the daughter was stricken with grief and still suffering from shock, then her brother had dealt with his loss in a more controlled and pragmatic way but, oddly enough, Daniel had been the one to display more emotion.

Lady Jackson had not excited anyone’s imagination regarding the fire, he thought. Her high-profile husband was the more likely target of any vicious attack. Yet, why should she be so discounted? After all, crimes had been committed for reasons of passion and she had been a highly attractive woman. Lorimer shook his head. Not a single part of Colin Ray’s investigation had focused on the background of the woman other than as the corporate wife. And in Lorimer’s book making such basic assumptions was always a mistake.