Peter James - Not Dead Enough

All three of them looked at him expectantly.

‘Bishop’s alibi. His evening meal at the Wolseley restaurant in London with this Phil Taylor character. That’s the elephant in the room.’

‘Surely the DNA result kicks his alibi into touch,’ Nicholl said.

‘I’m thinking about a jury,’ Grace replied. ‘Depends how credible this Taylor man is. You can be sure Bishop’s going to have a top brief. He’ll milk the alibi for all it’s worth. An honest citizen versus the vagaries of science? Probably with evidence from British Telecom, showing the time Bishop booked his alarm call, to back his timeframe up?’

‘I think we should be able to nail Bishop in this third interview, Roy,’ Jane Paxton said. ‘We’ve got a lot to hit him with.’

Grace nodded, thinking hard, not yet convinced they had everything they needed.

They started again shortly after two. Roy Grace was conscious, as he sat back down in the slightly unstable chair in the observation room, that they had just six hours left before they would have to release Brian Bishop, unless they applied for an extension or charged him. They could of course go to court for a Warrant of Further Detention, but Grace did not want to do that unless it was absolutely necessary.

Alison Vosper had already rung him to find out how close they were to charging Bishop. When he related the facts to date to her, she sounded pleased. Still in sweet mode.

The fact that a man had been arrested so quickly after Katie Bishop’s murder was making the force look good in the eyes of the media, and it was reassuring for the citizens of Brighton and Hove. Now they needed to charge him. That, of course, would do Grace’s career prospects no harm at all. And with the positive DNA results, they had sufficient evidence to secure consent from the Crown Prosecution Service to charge Bishop. But it wasn’t just charging the man that Grace needed. He needed to ensure a conviction.

He knew he should be elated at the way it was all going, but something was worrying him, and he couldn’t put his finger on what it was.

Suddenly, Glenn Branson’s voice sounded loud and clear, followed an instant later by the image of the four men in the interview room appearing back on the monitor. Brian Bishop was sipping a glass of water, looking sick as a parrot.

‘It is three minutes past two p.m., Tuesday 8 August,’ Branson was saying. ‘Present at this interview, interview number 3, are Mr Brian Bishop, Mr Leighton Lloyd, DC Nicholl and myself, DS Branson.’ He then looked directly at Bishop.

‘Mr Bishop,’ he said. ‘You’ve told us that you and your wife were happily married and that you made a great team. Were you aware that Mrs Bishop was having an affair? A sexual relationship with another man?’

Grace watched Bishop’s eyes intently. They moved to the left. From his memory of last watching Bishop, this was to truth mode.

Bishop shot a glance at his lawyer, as if wondering whether he should say anything, then looked back at Branson.

‘You’re not obliged to answer,’ Lloyd said.

Bishop was pensive for some moments. Then he spoke, the words coming out heavily. ‘I suspected she might have been. Was it this artist fellow in Lewes?’

Branson nodded, giving Bishop a sympathetic smile, aware the man was hurting.

Bishop sank his face into his hands and was silent.

‘Do you want to take a break?’ his solicitor asked.

Bishop shook his head, then removed his hands. He was crying. ‘I’m OK. I’m OK. Let’s just get on with all this bloody stuff. Jesus.’ He shrugged, staring miserably down at the table, dabbing his tears with the back of his hand. ‘Katie was the loveliest person but there was something inside driving her. Like a demon that always made her dissatisfied with everything. I thought I could give her what she wanted.’ He started crying again.

‘I think we should take a break, gentlemen,’ Leighton Lloyd said.

They all stepped out, leaving Bishop alone, then resumed the interview after ten minutes. Nick Nicholl, playing good cop , asked the first question.

‘Mr Bishop, could you tell us how you felt when you first suspected your wife was being unfaithful?’

Bishop looked at the DC sardonically. ‘Do you mean, did I want to kill her?’

‘You said that, sir, not us,’ Branson slammed in.

Grace was interested to see Bishop’s display of emotion. Perhaps they were just crocodile tears for the benefit of the interviewing team.

In a faltering voice Bishop said, ‘I loved her, I never wanted to kill her. People have affairs, it’s the way of the world. When Katie and I first met, we were both married to other people. We had an affair. I think I knew in my heart then that if we did marry, she would probably end up doing the same to me.’

‘Is that why you were unfaithful to her?’ Nicholl asked.

Bishop took his time to respond. ‘Are you referring to Sophie Harrington?’

‘I am.’

His eyes moved left again. ‘We’d been having a flirtation. Nice for my ego, but that’s as far as it’s gone. I never slept with her, although she seems – seemed,’ he corrected, ‘to enjoy fantasizing that it had happened.’

‘You have never slept with Miss Harrington? Not once?’

Grace watched the man’s eyes intently. They went left again.

‘Absolutely. Never.’ Bishop smiled nervously. ‘I’m not saying I wouldn’t have liked to. But I have a moral code. I was stupid, I was flattered by her interest in me, enjoyed her company – but you have to remember, I’ve been down that road before. You sleep with someone and if you’re lucky, it’s a crap experience. But if you are unlucky, it’s a gosh-wow experience and you are smitten. And then you are in big trouble. That’s what happened to Katie and me – we were smitten with each other.’

‘So you never slept with Ms Harrington?’ Glenn Branson pressed.

‘Never. I wanted to try to make my marriage work.’

‘So you thought kinky sex might be a way to achieve that?’ Branson asked.

‘Pardon? What do you mean?’

Branson looked at his notes. ‘One of our team spoke yesterday to a Mrs Diane Rand. We understand from her that she was one of your wife’s best friends, is that correct?’

‘They spoke to each other about four times a day. God knows what they had to say to each other!’

‘Plenty, I think,’ Branson responded humourlessly. ‘Mrs Rand told our officer, a WPC, that your wife had been expressing concerns recently over your increasingly kinky sexual demands on her. Would you like to elaborate on this?’

Leighton Lloyd interjected quickly and firmly. ‘No, my client would not.’

‘I have one significant question on this issue,’ Branson said, addressing the lawyer. Lloyd gestured for him to ask it.

‘Mr Bishop,’ Branson said, ‘do you possess a replica Second World War gas mask?’

‘What is the relevance of that question?’ Lloyd asked the DS.

‘It’s extremely relevant, sir,’ Branson said.

Grace watched Bishop’s eyes intently. They shot to the right. ‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Is it something you and Mrs Bishop used in your sex life?’

‘I’m not allowing my client to answer.’

Bishop raised a pacifying hand at his solicitor. ‘It’s OK. Yes, I bought it.’ He shrugged, blushing. ‘We were experimenting. I – I read a book about how to keep your love life going – you know? It sort of flags after a while between two people, when the initial excitement – novelty of the relationship – is over. I got stuff for us to try out.’ His face was the colour of beetroot.

Branson turned his focus on to Bishop’s dinner with his financial adviser, Phil Taylor. ‘Mr Bishop, it’s correct, isn’t it, that one of the cars you own is a Bentley Continental, in a dark red colour?’