Blood on the Cowley Road Read online

  ‘Thank you, yes, Dr Pointer,’ Wilson replied gratefully, and remembering his previous meeting with the pathologist. ‘I am sure that will be fine.’

  ‘The nearest branch is in Headington, by the way,’ she continued.

  ‘Thank you,’ Wilson said again.

  ‘I bank there myself.’

  ‘Right. Well, thank you for your help.’

  ‘Is that what DI Holden expects?’ Pointer said.

  The question, not surprisingly, threw Wilson. A pause was followed by an ‘Um, er’, and only after another brief silence did Wilson come up with a coherent response. ‘I’m not sure I know what you mean, Dr Pointer.’

  At the other end of the phone line, a laugh rang out. ‘Does she expect you to say thank you all the time? Because you’ve said it three times to me already!’ And she laughed again.

  A wave of embarrassment swept over Wilson. He felt himself flush, and ridiculously had the thought that Dr Pointer could detect this even down a phone line. Desperately, he tried to think of something to say in defence of his own boss, but he could think of nothing. In the end, all he was able to utter was the rather feeble ‘DI Holden treats me very well’, which in turn provoked another distant burst of savage laughter. Wilson felt very small and inadequate, and was glad that this conversation was all happening over the phone.

  ‘You’re beginning to sound like her lapdog,’ Pointer concluded viciously. And with that parting shot, she hung up.

  ‘Are you all right?’ It was ten minutes later, and it was Lawson who was speaking. By this time they were already halfway to Headington, travelling smoothly along the Slade after a slow, stop-start procession along Holloway. Lawson had been notably silent so far, and Wilson, after the sharpness of Pointer’s tongue, would have preferred anything – even her joking about his virginity, in fact especially her joking about his virginity – to silence.

  ‘Yes,’ he said automatically. The car in front pulled to a halt as a mother and pram waited to cross at the pedestrian crossing. ‘Actually, what I mean is, no! Dr Pointer gave me a bit of an earful.’

  ‘Ah!’ Lawson said. Wilson waited in vain for her to say something more. The car in front moved forward again, and he in turn followed.

  ‘I’m not sure she likes the Guv,’ Wilson said.

  Lawson, as Pointer had at the other end of the phone line, laughed, but it was a harmless, tinkling laugh. ‘Haven’t you heard the rumours?’

  ‘Rumours?’

  ‘You’ve not heard, have you?’ Lawson continued with delight.

  ‘No,’ admitted Wilson.

  ‘Well, the story is,’ she said with another giggle of pleasure, ‘the story is that Pointer hit on Holden the first time they met, and Holden freaked out and—’

  ‘I don’t think we should be gossiping about the Guv,’ Wilson said prissily.

  ‘OK,’ Lawson replied casually, but ignored his admonishment nonetheless. ‘I’ll gossip. You stay quiet. Anyway, the story is that Pointer put her hand on the Guv’s arse, and Holden slapped her round the face.’ She laughed again. ‘I wish I’d been there to see it. Imagine!’

  Wilson, despite his best intentions, smiled. He looked across at the profile of WPC Lawson, who was now looking forward. He noticed that the right-hand corner of her mouth was twitching, in response no doubt to her imaginings. He turned his eyes back to the road in front, and frowned as the sun suddenly emerged from behind the clouds and forced him to squint against the intense change of light. But inside, his smile remained.

  ‘You going to do the talking?’ Lawson said as they approached the door of the National Exchange bank.

  ‘I could do,’ Wilson said uncertainly.

  ‘I’ll act the dumb blonde,’ running her hand through the back of her neat bleached hair.

  ‘Is that a threat or a promise?’ he replied.

  It is amazing what a police uniform can do. Even before Wilson had displayed his ID card, the sight of Lawson brought immediate attention from behind the glass security panels. They were ushered through to a small office, where the manager, a Mr Ronald Knight, greeted them, rising anxiously from his seat.

  ‘How can I help you?’ he said, holding his hands up in a feebly melodramatic gesture. ‘I hope you haven’t come to arrest me!’ he joked.

  Wilson ignored the opportunity to respond in kind. ‘We want to check out a withdrawal by one of your customers. A Martin Mace. We believe he may have withdrawn £500 in cash in the last few days.’

  ‘Can I ask why?’ Knight said. ‘We do have rules of confidentiality.’

  ‘He’s dead,’ Wilson said firmly. ‘So he’s not going to object. And we wouldn’t have trailed up here unless it was important for our investigations.’

  ‘Of course,’ Knight replied. ‘It may take a few minutes. Please sit down.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Lawson said for both of them, and flashing one of her brightest smiles at Knight. ‘That’s very kind of you. And if Mr Mace came and collected his money in person, perhaps we could talk to whoever it was gave him the money?’

  ‘Of course,’ Knight said again.

  ‘And coffee for three?’

  ‘Yes, sorry, I should have offered you some.’

  ‘Bless you,’ Lawson smiled again.

  ‘Bless you!’ Wilson said after Knight had scurried out of the room. ‘I don’t remember that in my training course.’

  ‘I learnt in from my Dad,’ she grinned. ‘It’s very effective.’

  ‘Is he a vicar?’

  ‘Now, that would be telling,’ she teased.

  Ronald Knight returned a couple of minutes later with a tray of coffee in his hands and a young, nervous-looking woman at his back. She was dressed in black trousers and white blouse, with a fine gold chain round her neck, and a tiny gold stud through her left-hand nostril.

  ‘This is Sunita,’ he said. ‘It was she who served Mr Mace with the £500.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Knight!’ Wilson said warmly, rising from his chair. ‘Please sit down, Sunita,’ he continued, gesturing to a chair and at the same time so positioning himself that Knight knew that his own presence was not needed. ‘We’ll give you a shout, Mr Knight, when we are finished.’

  ‘How do you like your coffee, Sunita,’ Lawson was saying as Wilson shut the door. ‘Milk? Sugar?’

  ‘Just milk,’ she said. Her hands were clasped tightly in front of her, Lawson noted as she poured some milk into each of their cups. She realized that she didn’t know if Wilson took milk, but frankly now wasn’t the time to ask him. He’d have to like it or lump it.

  ‘I like the stud,’ said Lawson.

  ‘Thank you,’ came the reply.

  ‘I really do. I wish I could wear one, but my boss would never approve.’

  ‘Oh!’ Sunita said, and glanced across at Wilson, who was doing his best to be the proverbial fly on the wall.

  ‘Oh, not him!’ Lawson giggled. ‘He’s just my driver!’

  Sunita giggled in return, while Wilson stiffened slightly, feeling that WPC Lawson was overdoing it.

  ‘Can I be very personal?’ Lawson said, leaning forward conspiratorily. ‘You’ve got a really lovely complexion. What do you use?’ The conversation continued like this for some time. Wilson was reminded of his sister and her friend Mandy’s after-school discussions. As he sipped his coffee, he allowed his memory to float to times gone by, to sitting in front of the TV while the two girls chattered on and rubbed apricot-smelling moisturiser into each other’s faces, while he pretended not to listen.

  ‘So,’ Lawson was saying with great reluctance, ‘I suppose we’d better talk about the 500 pounds. Otherwise your Mr Knight is going to wonder why it’s all taking so long.’

  ‘He’s probably counting the minutes on his watch,’ Sunita said with a grin. ‘He’s very strict on our coffee breaks, you know. Fifteen minutes maximum.’

  ‘In that case, we’d better get down to it,’ Lawson replied. ‘First of all, when did Mr Mace take out the money?’

&nb
sp; ‘Yesterday afternoon. Round about 2.15, 2.30.’

  ‘So, you remember serving him?’ Lawson asked off-handedly.

  ‘Oh, yes! He comes in quite often. Usually to pay money in. He’s got his own business. Drives a lorry, I think he said once.’

  ‘And do you remember how he was?’

  ‘Oh yes!’ she said again. ‘He was in a foul mood. Really foul. I knew that as soon as he opened his mouth. Normally he’s very cheerful. “Hello darling!” he’d say. Or “Hello duck,” sometimes. I remember the first time he said it, I said to him what did he mean, because I was no duck, and I didn’t take kindly to being called one. And he was very apologetic, and he said calling someone duck was, like, friendly. His mum was always calling people duck, and he had just picked up the habit. And then he had winked at me, and asked me what was wrong with being called duck because he always thought ducks were the nicest of all birds. And I said well in that case I didn’t really mind. Anyway, he didn’t call me duck this time, and he didn’t call me darling or anything. He just handed over his chequebook with a cheque made out for £500 and said he needed cash. “Going off on holiday, are you?” I said, or something like that, but he just said “Get on with it”. So I did.’

  She paused, looking up at Lawson as if for approval. Lawson nodded encouragingly. ‘So he was quite aggressive then?’

  Sunita pursed her lips – rather attractively Wilson thought – as she considered this. ‘I’m not sure aggressive is quite right. Anxious perhaps. Very anxious. Edgy.’

  ‘That’s very helpful,’ Lawson said. ‘Thank you.’

  They lapsed into amiable silence. Sunita, holding her mug in both of her delicate hands, was temporarily oblivious of the situation. Like Wilson only a few minutes earlier, she had slipped back into childhood: she was a little girl again, savouring the slightly naughty thrill of a few minutes out of class. A wistful smile spread imperceptibly over her face. Finally, Wilson leant forward.

  ‘Sunita,’ he asked quietly, as if unwilling to break into her reverie, ‘was he on his own?’

  She turned towards the previously silent detective. Her brow furrowed slightly as she tried to recall. ‘I think so,’ she said eventually. ‘I mean there wasn’t anyone standing with him when I gave him the money. But there were several people behind him. It’s a small foyer, so maybe one of them had come in with him. I don’t know.’ Sunita gave a sudden shout – ‘Oh!’ – which she strangled as soon as she made it. Her hand came up, as if trying to attract the attention of the teacher in class. ‘He got a phone call!’ she squeaked excitedly. ‘While he was queuing. I’d just finished with one customer and I looked up to beckon him forward, and his mobile rang. I thought he’d turn it off, but he answered it straight away.’

  ‘Could you hear what he said?’ Wilson asked eagerly, a young hound scenting a fresh trail.

  ‘Oh, yes!’ Sunita said, excited by her own remembering. ‘He said something like, “I thought you were someone else,” and then he said something rather odd. Only, I didn’t think it was odd at the time, but of course it was.’ She paused, as if to get her breath back, and then turned towards Lawson, as if she was happier confiding in someone of her own sex. ‘The person who rang him must have asked him what he was doing, because he said he was paying money into his bank. But then of course, he came up to me and asked to withdraw some money. Now that’s pretty odd, isn’t it?’

  ‘You need someone to talk to, you know.’ Jane Holden dropped her pearl of wisdom casually as she placed a cup of black coffee in front of her daughter, and sat down opposite, with her own half-filled cup.

  ‘Since when have you been a fan of therapists?’ Susan said incredulously.

  ‘Therapists?’ came the wide-eyed, innocent’s response. ‘Whoever said anything about therapists? When I say someone to talk to, I just mean a friend. You know, someone you can pour out your day to – good, bad, or indifferent. Though of course it’s most important when you’ve had a bad day.’

  ‘I’ll keep it in mind,’ Susan said uneasily, suspicious of the way the conversation was heading.

  ‘A nice man, for example,’ Jane added.

  ‘Mother!’ Even though she was half expecting it, Susan Holden couldn’t help screeching her response.

  ‘Or a nice girl friend,’ Jane Holden continued calmly. She paused. Then recommenced even more casually. ‘If, that is, men are off the agenda for now!’

  ‘Stop!’ Susan held her left hand up to emphasize the word. ‘Stop right there!’

  Her mother shrugged, said nothing, and took a sip from her coffee. The two women sat in a distinctly non-cosy silence for perhaps a minute, though to Jane it seemed a lot longer. Susan was glad of the peace, but her mother, then as so often, was uncomfortable with silence.

  ‘Well,’ she said abruptly, ‘What sort of day have you had? Because to judge from your mood, I assume it’s not been a good one?’

  Her daughter shrugged.

  ‘For goodness sake,’ her mother said, exasperation evident in every syllable. ‘Why don’t you tell me about it? You obviously need to talk to someone, and right now the only person available is me. Pretend I’m not your mother. Pretend I’m Robin Williams, or Freud, or whoever you’d rather I was. Only don’t just sit there bottling it all up.’

  Susan Holden exhaled an exaggerated sigh, and gave her mother her long, hard look. ‘Didn’t you see today’s Oxford Mail?’ she asked irritably.

  ‘No,’ her mother said defensively, before continuing untruthfully: ‘I have to economize somewhere.’

  ‘Did you watch the local news?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Or listen to the Radio Oxford news?’

  ‘Did I miss something?’

  ‘A man called Martin Mace was murdered. He had been tied up and burnt to death in his allotment shed.’

  Jane Holden gulped. ‘How horrible!’ she said. But her horror would not have registered high on any Richter Scale for such things. And indeed it was quickly engulfed by curiosity. ‘Is it connected to the other deaths?’

  ‘They knew each other. Mace was a lorry driver, but he had been attending anger management sessions at the day centre. Arnold was one of the facilitators.’

  ‘Gosh!’ Jane Holden said, as she tried to weigh up all this new information. ‘And I take it from your less than ecstatic mood that you haven’t arrested anyone yet?’

  Susan responded by getting up from her armchair and walking over to the window where she looked out into the fading light. Grandpont Grange had been built with a deferential nod to the quadrangles beloved by Oxford colleges. Her mother’s flat was on the first floor of the southern side, near the eastern corner, and as she stood there looking diagonally across to the opposite corner, she pretended briefly that she was a student in college. Two old men were walking uncertainly towards her along the path that diagonally traversed the grass square, like two senior dons stumbling back towards their rooms after a large dinner and several glasses of port from the cellar.

  ‘No prime suspect even?’ Like her daughter, Jane Holden was not someone who gave up a line of questioning until she had exhausted it.

  Her daughter turned and faced her, but stayed silhouetted against the window as she began to answer the question obliquely. She made no mention of the fruitless interviews with Ratcliffe and Anne Johnson, preferring instead to talk about what had happened since, for it was these more recent events that were dominating her thought processes as she struggled to derive some clear sense of direction out of them.

  ‘We went to visit Martin Mace’s house. In Bedford Street. A rather nice three-bedroomed terraced house. Well, that’s how an estate agent would describe it, though the third bedroom was very small and had been turned into an office-cum-shrine.’

  ‘A shrine?’ her mother said.

  ‘To Oxford United. Photos of players all over the walls. And scarves and football shirts displayed as if they were pieces of art. Or at least they had been. Only someone had been in and ripped a lot of it dow
n from the walls, and the drawers of the desk had been tipped upside down, and paper was scattered everywhere. Whoever it was had been round the whole house. Clothes were all over the bedroom floor, and the living-room was a right mess.’

  ‘Do you know what the intruder was looking for?’

  Susan Holden uttered a sound that was somewhere between a screech and a laugh. ‘For God’s sake, Mother, if I knew that then the chances are that I would know who the killer was and I’d have arrested him – or her – and I bloody well wouldn’t be prowling round here like a cat on a hot tin roof.’

  Jane Holden, untypically, went silent, stunned by the ferocity of her daughter’s onslaught. Susan, perhaps embarrassed by her own tirade, turned away and again looked out of the window.

  ‘Stupid question,’ her mother said apologetically. ‘Stupid, stupid question.’

  ‘Anyway,’ Susan said emphatically, now in control again, ‘after that we went round to Jake Arnold’s flat. I guess we should have done that before, but there always seemed to be more pressing matters to attend to, and of course it too had been turned over. Only the kitchen had survived largely unscathed, but elsewhere the floors were covered with clothes, papers and God know’s what. So, as you can see, it’s been a pretty bloody day.’

  Mrs Holden smiled in sympathy at her daughter, and racked her brain for something positive and practical she could say. ‘Well,’ she said cautiously, ‘I suppose that does at least prove one thing.’

  Her daughter looked at her sharply. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The two men’s homes have been searched. That as good as proves that their death’s are connected, in fact that they were killed by the same person.’

  ‘Or persons,’ Susan corrected.

  ‘Quite,’ she replied meekly, and waited for her daughter to say something else.

  Susan turned back to the window and pulled the curtains across. ‘I need a whisky,’ she said, and began to walk over to the kitchen without waiting for permission.