Hard Going (7 page)

‘How long have you known Mr Bygod?’

‘Oh, it must be ten or eleven years now.’ He looked to see if Slider wanted more, and seeing his receptive look, went on conversationally: ‘We first met at a Residents’ Association meeting. He’d just moved into the area. We got talking, and took a liking to each other. He said he wanted to busy himself with useful things now he’d retired, so I persuaded him to volunteer for the Home Visit Club – it’s a charity I’m involved with. You visit housebound people and read to them, or talk, or do little errands, whatever they want. He helped with the office work, too. And it went on from there. He got himself involved in local campaigns, and charity things. Various committees. We’re both collectors for the Royal British Legion. I suppose there isn’t much charitable or volunteer work around the area that he
isn’t
involved in. He’s that kind of man – a genuine pillar of the community.’

In his enthusiasm he had slipped back into the present tense, and his face was relaxed and happy. He’d forgotten why he was talking about Bygod, here and now.

‘You haven’t mentioned a wife. Was he married?’

‘No – well, never since I’ve known him. I don’t know much about his life before that. He didn’t talk about himself, really. But he never mentioned a wife.’

‘What about family?’

Plumptre shook his head. ‘I never knew he had any. He never mentioned anyone.’

‘So you can’t help us with who his next of kin might be?’

‘Oh dear, I’m afraid not.’ He put a hand to his cheek. ‘It hadn’t occurred to me – of course you would want to … but I really don’t know. I could ask some of our other friends if they know. Perhaps he might have mentioned someone at some time.’

Slider digested this. Men were, in any case, deeply incurious about each other’s private lives, and probably the older you got the more entrenched the habit became. It might not even be remarkable that Plumptre didn’t know whether Bygod had ever had children.

He moved on. ‘So was he already retired when you first met him?’

‘Yes – we had both retired early, which was another bond between us, I suppose. I worked in the salaries department at Beecham’s on the Great West Road. I was there before the SmithKline takeover, but when Glaxo took over the lot, I was eased out, so I took an early pension.’

‘And what did Mr Bygod do before he retired?’

‘I believe he was a solicitor. I don’t know why he retired early – as I said, he didn’t really talk about himself. Perhaps he’d just had enough. He seemed very happy with his life the way it was.’

‘You knew about his habit of giving advice to people who came in off the street?’

‘It wasn’t quite like that,’ Plumptre said. ‘They were people he’d met elsewhere, or who were introduced by other people he knew. Word got round, of course, but he didn’t let complete strangers in.’

‘What sort of advice?’

‘Legal and practical – how to deal with the local council, what your rights were in disputes, faulty goods, that sort of thing. Who to go to and where to find information – rather like the Citizen’s Advice Bureau. Not lonely hearts stuff,’ he added, permitting himself a small smile. ‘He wasn’t an agony aunt.’

‘Talking of lonely hearts,’ Slider said, ‘did he have any women friends?’

‘Oh, there are women in our group all right – of course there are. But if you mean in the romantic sense – I don’t think so. I never saw him with anyone.’

‘Your group?’ Slider queried.

‘Of friends,’ Plumptre said with a clear look. ‘We’re on committees together and meet for drinks and meals and go out sometimes. It’s a very nice circle. Of course, we’ve all known each other for years. Everyone was so kind and supportive when my wife died.’

Slider was feeling his way towards an idea he couldn’t yet see. ‘Have you met any of Mr Bygod’s friends from outside that circle? Maybe people he knew before you met him?’

Plumptre considered, and a little frown pulled down his brows. ‘Well – no. Now you come to mention it. He does like to entertain, and he gives wonderful parties, but whenever we go to his house, it’s all the same people – my friends, and friends of theirs. Someone from before?’ He pondered again, apparently fruitlessly, for he concluded, ‘I think he said that he lived in Islington.’

Islington. Famous place, squire
, Slider thought. London was not one place but a series of villages, and Islington was a long way, at least in spirit, from Hammersmith.

‘Of course,’ Plumptre said, with an air of being satisfied by the conclusion, ‘he might have seen his old friends separately. No reason we should know everything he did.’

‘Of course,’ Slider agreed. And it was true – he wouldn’t be the only person to have separate circles of friends which didn’t intersect. He might even have gone back to Islington to see his Islington friends. But it was, at the lowest reckoning, odd that there should have been no mingling of the groups, if groups there were, at social gatherings he initiated. When you asked people to your house for a party, would you segregate so rigidly?

He wasn’t sure where the thought was leading, so he left it to mash at the back of the stove, and asked, ‘The people that he gave advice to: were there any – how should I put it – suspicious characters among them? People you felt he should be wary of? Criminals out on bail, or ex-convicts on parole?’

‘I couldn’t really say,’ said Plumptre. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised, given that he knew about the law, but I don’t know for a fact that there were. Although, wait …’ He thought of something. ‘I don’t know if it’s relevant, but the only time I knew him to turn down voluntary work was when one of our friends, Molly Shepherd, asked him to get involved in prison counselling with her.’ He looked at Slider. ‘I don’t know if you can draw any conclusions from that. After all, I imagine most people would hesitate about going into that environment. But he turned her down flat. Molly was a bit miffed, but we all thought afterwards that he had so much on his plate, he probably didn’t have the time.’

‘And when did that happen?’

‘Oh, a long time ago. Must be – I don’t know, at least four years, maybe more. They’re the best of friends now,’ he added gaily, ‘so it didn’t leave any lasting coolness.’ And then it struck him. He faltered. ‘I mean – I suppose I should say they
were
the best of friends. Oh dear.’ He fumbled out his handkerchief and blew his nose. ‘Do you have any idea who did this ghastly thing?’ he asked.

‘We have some leads to follow up,’ he said. Never tell them you haven’t the foggiest. ‘I can’t say more than that at present – you understand.’

‘Of course, of course,’ Plumptre said obligingly.

Slider rewarded him for his compliance by saying, ‘You’ve been the greatest help to us. Thank you for coming in,’ and Plumptre went away happy in the knowledge that he had done his duty.

When Atherton came back from seeing him out, he found Slider staring at the wall, deep in thought. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘What d’you make of that?’

Slider came to. ‘I’m wary of making too much of it,’ he said, ‘but there’s a suggestion of a break in Bygod’s life when he moved to Hammersmith. It’s odd for a friend – if Plumptre was a friend – not to know anything at all about one’s previous life. I suppose,’ he added with a sigh, ‘we’ll have to ask some of his other friends as well, in case Plumptre was just the sort you don’t tell things to.’

‘Well, at least, if Bygod was a solicitor it’ll be easy to follow that up. No next-of-kin is a bummer.’

‘We’ll have to hope there’s something in that document safe, when we get to look at the contents,’ Slider said.

Atherton sat on Slider’s windowsill, musing, arms folded. Slider, with his keenly-trained professional eye, couldn’t help noticing that he appeared to be wearing the same clothes as yesterday. Slider didn’t know what, if anything, to make of that, especially as he knew Emily was in the States, covering the election campaign for an article. Before Emily, Atherton had tomcatted so dedicatedly he had been named Posturepedic Man of the Year three years running. Surely the new dog couldn’t be up to old tricks?
Not my business
, he told himself firmly.

Atherton stirred at last. ‘Am I beginning to see a pattern here?’ he asked.

Slider said, ‘I’ve always wondered, what is the point of rhetorical questions?’

Atherton let that opportunity pass. He enumerated on his fingers. ‘Lionel Bygod lived alone. Had no girlfriends. Plumptre talked about his “partner”.’

‘Bridge partner,’ Slider reminded him. ‘He was clear about that.’

‘Doesn’t mean he wasn’t some other sort of partner as well. Work with me.’ He marked off another finger. ‘The restaurant bod said he was very helpful to a young male waiter.’

‘He was married,’ Slider countered with a finger of his own.

‘Even if he was, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything, as we both know. There are many with rings on their fingers who dance the other way. And in fact, nobody seems to know anything about this putative wife, so we don’t know for certain that he ever
was
married.’

‘We do now,’ Hollis said, appearing in the doorway in time to catch the last exchange. He waved some folded papers. ‘Contents of the safe, guv. These were on top – marriage certificate and birth certificate, together in an envelope.’

Slider took them. ‘Well, that’s clear enough. He married a Miss June Alexandra Bromwich at All Saint’s church, Stamford, in 1975. You might see if you can trace her.’

‘Right, guv.’

‘And the birth certificate … Oh, look at this. Father was Sir Ernest Bygod, occupation given as barrister. Address Beaufort Hall, Colleyweston.’

‘Beaufort Hall? Sounds like a community centre,’ Atherton objected.

‘Sounds posh to me,’ Hollis countered.

‘And where’s Colleyweston when it’s at home?’

‘Lincolnshire,’ Slider said. ‘Round the back of Burghley where the horse trials are held. Very Shire.’ Points to Hollis – posh it was. ‘So it sounds as though he came from a moneyed background. He may have had a private income, or had money left him.’

‘Strange he should live in a flat above a shop in Shepherd’s Bush, then,’ Atherton said. ‘Even a large flat. Some sort of a kink in the straight line of his personal history, I wouldn’t mind betting.’ He gave Slider a significant look, which Slider resisted.

‘What else is in the document safe?’ Slider asked. ‘A will would be nice, for the next of kin.’

‘No will, guv. It’s all just papers, like the housekeeper said. These, his passport, exam certificates and legal qualifications, deeds to the flat, and the rest are financial – share certificates and bonds and that sort o’ thing,’ said Hollis. ‘I’ve given ’em to Swilley, since she’s doing the financial stuff. But there looks to be a lot of ’em. Looks as if he might have been well off.’

‘Nothing it would do anyone any good to steal, though,’ Slider said. ‘Unless, of course, something else
was
in there, and is no longer.’

‘Which brings us back to Mrs Kroll,’ Atherton said, ‘who was the most likely one to know. And we’ve only her word for it that he never locked the safe.’

‘Check that with Mr Plumptre,’ Slider told him. ‘Who’s looking into his other friends?’

‘Nobody yet,’ said Atherton.

‘Well, put Connolly on to it, and make that one of the questions she asks: what was in the safe, and did he lock it? And who was his next of kin?’ he added in a slightly fractious tone. ‘Why hasn’t anyone come asking for him?’

Gascoyne came in, with McLaren lingering at his shoulder. It was getting crowded in here. ‘I’ve got the first of the fingerprint results, sir. The marks you were interested in on the study door come back without a match.’

‘That’s disappointing,’ Slider said. ‘But not unexpected.’

‘Marks on the desk were the victim’s, and only his, same on the document safe,’ Gascoyne went on. ‘Housekeeper’s are all over the place, as you’d expect, except in the bathroom, so it sounds as if she might have been telling the truth about not wearing gloves.’

‘Also disappointing,’ said Slider.

‘Don’t you hate it when people are caught out telling the truth?’ Atherton said.

‘And the mass of prints up the stairs I’ve still to go through,’ Gascoyne concluded.

McLaren intervened. ‘I might have something for you to work on, Phil,’ he said, squeezing past to get Slider’s attention. ‘I been looking into the Krolls, like you asked, put ’em into Crimint.’ This was the Met’s intelligence data base. ‘The old man’s come up flagged all over the place.’ He grinned happily. ‘Must be the only crooked Polish builder in London. No criminal record – yet – but he’s been tugged plenty of times.’ He spread out some sheets on Slider’s desk. ‘This is him, Jacek “Jack” Kroll. Lives Eastman Road, Acton Vale – got a yard behind his house backs on to Acton Park Industrial Estate. Got a son, Mark, age nineteen, works with him. No previous.’

‘Is that the one that lives at home?’ Slider asked.

‘Yeah. Doesn’t stop him claiming social security, though. Older son, Stefan, twenty-six, he does have a record, possession and handling stolen goods and a lot o’ driving offences, going back to joyriding age twelve. Nothing on the daughter, Judy, twenty-four. She’s on welfare an’ all, got two kids, living with a bloke in Birmingham, according to Terry Cleaver at Ealing.’ Acton came under the Ealing Borough command.

‘So what has Jack Kroll been up to?’ Atherton asked for them all.

‘They’ve tugged him several times on suspicion of illegal dumping,’ said McLaren. ‘Dun’t sound like much, but it can be big business. Also he’s a bit too close to a bloke that owns a scrap metal yard, who they think is behind a load o’ lead thefts in West London, going all the way out to Hounslow. Cleaver says he thinks Kroll is shifting the stuff on his lorry, may even be knocking it off under cover of doing building jobs.’

‘Well, he certainly sounds tasty,’ Slider agreed. ‘None of that gives a connection to Lionel Bygod, however.’

‘Except his wife,’ said Atherton. ‘Anything on her?’

‘No, she’s clean,’ said McLaren, ‘but Acton’s been keeping an eye on her, anyway. She’s seen hanging around with the female her son Stefan lives with, by the name of Mirela, or Mary, Dudnic. This Dudnic’s got form as long as your arm for drugs and prostitution, and she’s coming up in court on a charge of dealing next month.’