Pauline Rowson - In for the Kill

‘I’ll just fetch myself one then.’

I scanned the small café on the ground floor.

A group of four young people, two girls and two boys, sat hunched over their mobile phones; a scruffy-looking middle-aged man, the frayed ends of his trousers hanging over his scuffed shoes, was reading the Independent ; a large man, the colour of coal, wearing sunglasses that were too small for his bullet-shaped head, was listening to music on his headphones, and two women in colourful saris were chattering nineteen to the dozen, whilst their four children played at their feet. Then there was Joy who didn’t live up to her name as she stared down into her coffee cup.

‘It’s good of you to meet me.’ I placed my coffee on the table and took the seat opposite her.

‘Miles said it was important. That it might have something to do with Joe’s … death.’

‘I’m sorry about Joe,’ I said gently. ‘You must be very upset.’

She took a deep breath. ‘I shall miss him.’ She spoke with a slight lisp but her voice though sad was steady and I recognised a sensible woman when I saw one.

‘Was Joe working on something connected to me?’

‘The police asked me that.’

I felt a tightening in my gut but was confident that my expression hadn’t betrayed my tension.

Prison had taught me how to hide or disguise emotion. ‘A well built man with a Homburg and huge macintosh?’

‘Yes.’

‘When?’

‘Yesterday morning.’

So the fat man was on to me even before I arrived at Clipton’s funeral. ‘What did you tell him?’

‘The same as I’m going to tell you: Joe dropped your case ages ago.’

A couple of women entered laughing. Joy glared at them as if they had personally insulted her. I knew what she was thinking: how could they be so happy when she felt so miserable over the death of her boss?

‘Why did he drop my case?’

‘He said he would never be able to find Andover unless he decided to return to England.’

‘Joe knew he’d left the country?’ I asked, surprised.

‘He must have done. He said case closed, dead end.’

After a moment I said, ‘Did Joe believe I was innocent?’

‘Oh yes.’

‘And you?’

‘If Joe said you were then you are. His word is… was good enough for me.’

Had Joe known I was innocent and that was why he had convinced Joy?

‘Joy, do you know where Clive Westnam lives or works?’

She looked puzzled for a moment until I jogged her mind about who he was.

Her expression cleared. ‘No. The last I heard he’d been ousted from his position as chief executive of Manover Plastics. It was in the newspapers but I can’t recall reading anything about where he went from there.’

‘Do you know why he got the elbow?’

‘Perhaps the results weren’t good enough for the shareholders.’

‘What about Roger Brookes? Does he still live in Gloucestershire?’

‘Haven’t you heard? He’s dead.’

‘Dead!’ That shook me. It also made my heart sink with the thought that another of Andover’s victims had taken the secret of why he was being blackmailed to his grave. That only left Westnam, and for all I knew, and from what I’d discovered so far, he too could be dead. Andover seemed to be wiping the trail clean. I felt despair beginning to settle in. Was my search hopeless?

Joy said, ‘Roger Brookes committed suicide about a year ago.’

Another surprise. ‘Why suicide?’ I voiced my thoughts aloud.

Joy shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. Joe was surprised too.’ Her face clouded over again at the memory of her boss. Why hadn’t Joe, or even Miles, told me about Brookes? Perhaps Miles didn’t know.

My mind was racing. Why had Roger Brookes killed himself? Had Andover got to him again and demanded more money? Had Andover threatened to expose what he knew about Brookes? Had it really been suicide? I needed to speak to Brookes’ wife.

‘Does his widow still live in Gloucestershire?’

‘I don’t know. Sorry.’

I’d find out. It meant going there to check. I could hire a car. Having made my decision I returned to the subject of Joe’s death.

‘What cases was Joe working on?’ I asked, hoping that her answer might give me a reason as to why Joe was killed, which didn’t have anything to do with Andover or me. I was probably clutching at straws.

I could see Joy running through the files in her mind. After a moment she said, ‘There were a couple of divorces, a suspected business fraud and a child abduction case – the father has taken the little boy back to Germany and the mother wants him here in England.’

‘Anything that might have upset someone enough to kill him?’

She flinched at my choice of words; her freckled face lost its colour. ‘The police asked me that. I told them, there wasn’t. They were all the usual.’ Which, along with me showing up on the morning of Joe’s murder, would have left Crowder with the assumption that Joe’s death was connected with me. It didn’t need the brains of a professor to work that one out.

The noisy women took the table next to us and started talking about a joint acquaintance, who by all accounts, had really got up their nose by finding herself a very rich husband not six months after the old one had been laid to rest.

‘Do you mind if we get a breath of fresh air?’

Joy suddenly declared, standing up.

I was all for that. We turned out of the museum and headed east. The sun put in a fleeting appearance between racing white clouds and when it did it felt quite hot, with the promise of summer in its rays. Someone had recently cut the grass in the university grounds opposite. I breathed in the tangy smell thinking that if I could have bottled this and sold it in prison I would have made a fortune, or at least enough to have kept the weirdos and sadists off my back.

To me the smell, like that of the sand and sea, represented freedom.

‘Who found Joe?’ I asked.

‘I did, when I arrived for work.’

I snatched a glance at her. She was staring at the pavement.

‘He was lying on his back on the floor. His face was blue and there was blood around his mouth. His hands were clenched.’

A minute or so of silence followed. The traffic roared and screeched around us. We turned the corner and headed towards the seafront. ‘What was the office like?’

‘It had been ransacked, but as far as I could tell nothing was missing.’

‘What about my file?’ I held my breath.

‘That had already been archived.’

‘Where?’

‘In the big storage warehouse on the Rodney Road industrial estate.’

‘And it’s still there?’

‘I assume so.’

‘Did the police ask you about it?’

She shook her head.

Was that because they already knew what it contained? Could Joe have copied it for them?

‘Could I see it?’ My heart was pounding; what if she said no? How could I gain access to it without her permission?

She said, ‘I’ll give them a call and tell them you’re coming.’

‘Thanks,’ I said gratefully. ‘I’d like to collect it straight away.’

She pulled out her mobile. As she made the call I watched a little boy playing with his father on the common. They were trying to get a kite up. It reminded me of all the times I had played with my sons. I wanted to howl, but instead sought refuge in my anger. I pushed aside all thoughts and feelings of love and replaced them with hatred.

‘You can collect it when you’re ready,’ Joy said, signing off.

I was impatient to get my hands on it. ‘Is it all right if I go now?’

‘Of course. I think I’ll go for a walk along the seafront, clear my head a bit.’

I watched her forlorn figure stroll past a balding, scruffily dressed man who was sitting on a bench under the trees. He rose and folded his newspaper. Not another of Crowder’s men following me, I thought with exasperation.