A Death Left Hanging (6 page)

‘So you're sayin' that Eric Sharpe framed your mother just to get himself elected? That would make him––'

‘That would make him a murderer himself,' Jane Hartley interrupted. ‘Is that so incredible? You must have known a lot of murderers in your time, Chief Inspector. Can you honestly say that any of their motives would have been enough to make
you
kill?'

‘I like to think that, apart from protecting my daughter, there's
no
motive that would make me kill,' Woodend said.

But he knew what she meant. Over the years he had met any number of murderers whose explanations of the motives which had driven them to kill had seemed so totally trivial that he'd been tempted to believe that they were nothing more than a shield behind which to hide the real motive. But rarely had that turned out to be the case – because however pathetic the reasons had seemed to him, they had been truly compelling in the eyes of the killer.

‘Besides, I'm not saying that Sharpe actually ever saw things in such stark terms,' Jane Hartley continued. ‘He probably convinced himself that my mother really was the murderer and that tinkering with the evidence was necessary, if justice was to be served.' She looked straight into Woodend's eyes. ‘We can convince ourselves of anything if we really want to, can't we?'

‘Aye, we can,' Woodend agreed, meeting her gaze with his own. ‘We can convince ourselves that we're different to all the other people who've lived through the same sort of experience that we have. We can convince ourselves that the police, and the prosecutor an' the judge an' the jury were all wrong – an' that only we are right.'

Jane Hartley did not even blink. ‘Perhaps that's true,' she said. ‘Perhaps my mother really did kill her second husband. But if that is the case, it shouldn't be too difficult to prove, should it?'

‘Shouldn't be too difficult to prove? After
thirty years
?' Woodend asked. ‘It should be bloody near impossible. Besides, are you really sure that you want me to
prove
anythin'? As things stand, you can remember your mother as a victim of mistaken justice. That's tragic enough – but it's probably a lot easier than knowin' for a fact that she was a cold-blooded killer who murdered her own husband for his money.'

‘Perhaps she was cold-blooded, but she certainly wasn't stupid,' Jane Hartley said. ‘She'd won a scholarship to Oxford. She'd been a teacher, and had run Mr Earnshaw's office practically single-handed. If she really had wanted to kill Fred Dodds, don't you think she would have contrived to do it in such a way that she wouldn't automatically become the prime suspect?'

She had a point, Woodend decided, and realized that the same thought had been nagging away in the back of
his
mind ever since that morning outside Strangeways Prison. Still, Jane Hartley was taking a big gamble in opening up the whole can of worms again.

‘Are you certain you want to know the truth?' he asked. ‘Are you sure you're strong enough?'

‘I'm sure!' Jane Hartley said.

Then you're an exceptional case, Woodend thought – because in your place I don't think
I'd
have the courage.

T
he landlord of the Drum and Monkey glanced into the public bar and saw that the corner table was occupied by Paniatowski and Woodend. A moment later a third person joined them, the youthful inspector who always looked as if he should be a company director rather than a bobby.

So the old firm was back in business, the landlord thought. Well, he'd known they couldn't be kept down for ever.

He signalled to his new barman to come over to him. ‘See them three buggers sittin' in the corner?' he said.

‘Yes, Mr Roberts?'

‘Well, they'll be wantin' a pint of best bitter, a half of bitter an' a vodka as soon as you can. An' take'em a repeat order every twenty minutes, whether they ask for it or not.'

The barman looked dubious. ‘You sure about that? What if they feel like a change from their usual drinks? People do, you know.'

‘Then the age of miracles will truly have to come to pass before my very eyes,' the landlord said.

‘Beg your pardon?'

‘Listen lad, the Beatles may eventually stop having hits, the sky may fall down on us, the government may even start listenin' to the ordinary feller in the street one day – but whatever happens, that table over there will still want a pint of best bitter, a half of bitter an' a vodka.'

‘You know best, Mr Roberts,' the barman said.

‘You're bloody right I do,' the landlord agreed. ‘That's why I'm the one standin' behind the bar an' you're the one waitin' on tables.'

Woodend looked at his team. ‘We're out on a limb with this one,' he said.

‘Well, that'll certainly be no novelty for us, will it?' Detective Inspector Bob Rutter replied.

‘The best solution all round would be if we could prove that Margaret Dodds really
did
kill her husband,' Woodend said. ‘That would certainly let Lord Sharpe off the hook. An' while Jane Hartley might not
like
our findings, she'd have no grounds for causin' any more trouble or holdin' a grudge against us. The problem is, there's a lot to be said for Miss Hartley's argument that her mother would have had to be incredibly stupid to think she could kill her husband in that manner an' hope to get away with it. So where does that leave us?'

‘With the assumption that Margaret Dodds was telling the truth,' Paniatowski said. ‘That she was out of the house, taking a walk, when her husband was murdered.'

‘Was the murderer hopin' that she'd take the blame?' Woodend asked.

‘Perhaps,' Rutter said. ‘Then again, it might never have entered his head that she would be arrested – but once she
was
arrested, he certainly wasn't going to stick his own neck in the noose just to keep hers out of it.'

‘
He?
' Woodend said. ‘What makes you think it was a man?'

Rutter picked up his leather briefcase, and flicked open the catch. ‘
These
are what made me think it,' he said, laying a number of photographs out on the table. ‘I found them in the investigation file.'

Woodend looked down at the pictures of the dead man and then whistled softly. ‘Bloody hell fire, Bob!' he said. ‘Fred Dodds wasn't so much attacked as
mashed
!'

It was hardly an exaggeration. What they were looking at was only identifiable as a face by the fact that it had hair on top and was attached to the rest of the body by a neck. Though it was impossible to say exactly how
many
blows had been struck with the hammer, the assault appeared to have been both sustained and relentless.

‘So the reason you assume the attacker must have been a man is that you don't think a woman would have had the strength?' Woodend asked Rutter. ‘Is that right?'

‘Yes.'

‘I disagree,' Paniatowski said.

Rutter shot her a look that carried with it not only his customary dislike of her but also the implication that the
only
reason she disagreed was because the suggestion had come from him.

Woodend sighed. He still harboured some small hope that Rutter and Paniatowski would eventually learn to get on, but the longer they worked together, the less likely that seemed. Rutter saw Paniatowski's approach to policing as slapdash and buccaneer, Paniatowski saw Rutter's as clerical and bureaucratic. Neither was fair to the other – though there was a grain of truth in both their criticisms – and neither seemed willing to grasp the point that it was the very diversity of the team which made it so effective. They disliked each other, and that was that. And they would all have to learn to live with it as best they could.

‘What makes you think it
could
have been a woman, Monika?' Woodend asked, returning to the immediate problem.

‘Dodds must have been dead long before he ended up in that state,' Paniatowski said. ‘And even the murderer – if he or she had stopped to think about it – should have realized that.'

‘So?'

‘The fact that the murderer
didn't
stop to think shows it was a
frenzied
attack. And when people lose control like this killer obviously did, they can summon up reserves of strength they didn't even know they had.'

‘Bob?' Woodend asked.

‘I suppose it's possible,' Rutter conceded.

‘So we're lookin' for a man or a woman who really
hated
Dodds,' Woodend said. ‘Of course, that could point the finger straight back at his missus.'

‘But it doesn't have to,' Paniatowski countered.

‘No,' Woodend agreed. ‘It doesn't have to. Did you find anythin' besides the photographs in the investigation file, Bob?'

‘A surprising amount,' Rutter said. ‘I've not had time to go through the whole thing yet, but I thought you might find this interesting.'

The ‘this' he referred to was a transcript of Margaret Dodds' interview with Chief Inspector Eric Sharpe. Holding it so Paniatowski could read it as well, Woodend ran his eyes over the sheet of typewritten paper.

DCI Sharpe: Before we begin, can you confirm that you've been cautioned and advised that you have the right to have a lawyer present?

Margaret Dodds: Yes, I can confirm that.

DCI: Would you please tell me where you were between the hours of seven thirty and nine o'clock this evening.

MD: I went for a walk.

DCI: Where did you go?

MD: I don't know. I was deep in thought. I didn't notice where I was going.

DCI: What were you thinking about?

MD: Personal matters.

DCI: What personal matters?

MD: I'd prefer not to say.

DCI: You do realize you've been charged with
murder
, don't you?

MD: Yes, I do. But I'd still prefer not to say.

DCI: Did anybody see you on this ‘walk' of yours?

MD: I have no idea.

DCI: What happened when you got home?

MD: I found my husband dead on the lounge floor.

DCI: Found him dead? You didn't kill him yourself?

MD: No.

DCI: You didn't pick up the hammer and smash his skull in?

MD: I've already said I didn't kill him.

DCI: There was blood all over your dress. We found your prints on the hammer!

MD: I didn't kill him. And it doesn't matter how many questions you ask me, or how often you ask them, that's the only answer you'll get from me. I
didn'
t
kill him
.

‘What do you make of that, Monika?' Woodend asked.

‘I think DCI Sharpe certainly wasn't doing his job as it should have been done.'

‘How'd you mean?'

‘He was far too blunt. Far too direct. He was supposed to be building a case. He should have been trying to make his suspect open up to him – getting her to give him all the information she could, so he could tie up the loose ends. And he simply wasn't doing that.'

‘The printed word always looks cold and heartless,' Woodend pointed out. ‘Maybe if you'd been there yourself – heard the tone of his voice – seen the look on his face––'

‘No interrogation that
you've
ever conducted would read anything like that,' Paniatowski interrupted.

‘The sergeant's right,' Rutter agreed reluctantly. ‘Based on the evidence of this transcript, I'd have to say that Sharpe wasn't looking for answers.'

‘Then what
was
he doin'?'

‘The very opposite. He was trying to make Margaret Dodds retreat into herself.'

‘An' why would he want to do that?'

‘Because he didn't want his nice neat case spoiled by the accused opening her mouth too much and starting to sound innocent?'

Woodend nodded gloomily.

‘It's looking less and less likely that we're goin' to find the
convenient
solution to this case, isn't it, sir?' Paniatowski asked.

‘Aye,' Woodend agreed. ‘What's lookin'
most
likely is that we'll end up with the worst of both worlds – provin' that Sharpe didn't do his job, but not havin' a clue as to what really
did
happen that night.' He took a long swig of his pint. ‘Still, we'll have to soldier on as best we can,' he continued stoically.

‘And how big is our army?' Rutter asked.

Woodend grinned, slightly awkwardly. ‘You're lookin' at it, lad.'

‘Just us!'

‘That's right.'

‘But this is a murder inquiry!' Rutter protested.

‘So they tell me. But we've cracked murders before usin' just the three of us.'

‘Yes, but they've been
recent
murders. This one's thirty years old. The trail's so cold that––'

‘That you could use it to chill Monika's vodka,' Woodend interrupted. ‘I know. An' believe me, if I thought they'd give me any more men, I'd ask for them. But Mr Marlowe's as likely to give me a bigger team as he is to nominate me for Pope. So you'll just have to double up – take on two or three jobs each.'

Paniatowski and Rutter exchanged glances that could almost have been called mutually sympathetic, but Woodend had no illusions that common adversity would keep them united for long.

‘The main thrust of all our investigations will be into Fred Dodds' background,' the Chief Inspector continued. ‘If there's anybody out there who would have taken a special pleasure in his death, we need to know about them. Now the additional tasks. Bob, I want you to go through the records of the police investigation an' the trial with a fine-toothed comb. I want to know which of the witnesses we should be questionin' again . . .'