The Scent of Death--A Sukey Reyholds British police procedural (17 page)

‘That's not true. I never went near the van from the time he arrived to the time he left,' said Freeman, in response to a glance from Nugent.

‘You were later threatened with exposure by one of the waiters, Reg Law, who had also stumbled on the truth,' Rathbone continued, ‘so you disposed of him as well.'

‘That's absolute rubbish.'

‘Inspector,' said Nugent, ‘unless you can produce evidence to back any of your allegations I must insist you release my client immediately.'

Rathbone stood up. Sukey could sense his feeling of frustration as he said, ‘Wait here. I'll be back in a moment.' He signalled to Vicky and Sukey to remain seated and went out, slamming the door behind him. Five minutes passed, during which no one said a word. Then Rathbone returned and switched off the recording. ‘All right, Mr Freeman,' he said, ‘on condition that you are willing to let us take your fingerprints and a DNA sample you are free to go for now, but we may want to talk to you again so please keep us informed of your movements.'

‘What a load of poppycock!' Rathbone snorted the moment the door closed behind Freeman and Nugent.

‘You reckon he pulled that story out of the air, Guv,' said Vicky.

‘Of course he did – and you have to hand it to him, it's not bad for something cooked up at short notice and under pressure. But ask yourselves why, having got Freeman over a barrel, would Rainbird demand nothing in return for his silence but a bit of business for his firm? DCI Leach agrees with me – he's our man all right but he's as slippery as an eel and so far we haven't been able to pin him down.'

Faced with a sudden mental image of Rathbone in hot pursuit of an eel with a giant pin in one hand, Sukey had difficulty in keeping a straight face as she said, ‘Maybe it wasn't quite as simple as that, Guv.'

‘Meaning?'

‘There's been quite a lot in the media lately about firms exploiting loopholes in the tax laws for wealthy clients to save them huge sums of money that should have gone to HM Revenue and Customs.'

‘I suppose that's a point,' Rathbone conceded. ‘But a small outfit like Freeman's could hardly be expected to generate megabucks. It could,' he went on after a moment's thought, ‘enable Rainbird to put in his back pocket fees that should have gone to his firm, which would explain all the hush-hush business. But no, whichever way you look at it, it smells like something Freeman has cobbled together in a desperate attempt to hide the truth. And think for a moment about how Reg Law died – strangled. Did you notice Freeman's hands? They'd have had no trouble choking the life out of a slightly built young man like Law, who might well have overheard something incriminating. Remember what he said to his mate, Gunn? No,' he insisted, ‘Freeman's our man – he had means, motive and opportunity; all we need is …' He stopped short, having momentarily run out of breath.

‘Evidence, Guv?' said Vicky.

‘Exactly. So bloody well get busy and find me some! I'll see you back here first thing in the morning.'

‘What do you reckon?' said Sukey when she and Vicky returned to the CID office. ‘Do you really think he did it?'

‘Of course. Don't you?'

‘I'm not sure. I know that story about tax evasion and so on is feasible, but from what we know about Rainbird – which admittedly isn't much – blackmail wouldn't seem to be his line. But of course, you never know what people are capable of. Maybe forensics will come up with something.'

‘Which will take forever,' Vicky commented.

‘Maybe Mr Leach will manage to pull some strings and get the tests fast-tracked,' said Sukey, ‘and in the meantime perhaps we'd better start by having a word with Mr Ashman. He knew Rainbird personally so maybe he can shed some light on his character.'

‘I guess that's our best bet to start with it,' Vicky agreed. ‘He said he was staying at the hotel until today, so he's probably gone back to London by now. We'll have to call him at his office in the morning.'

‘He may have decided to stay another day. Why not check with the hotel?'

‘I suppose it's worth a try.' Vicky picked up the phone and punched in the number. ‘Good evening, is Mr Ashman still in the hotel, please? He is? May I speak to him? Thank you.' There was a pause before she said, ‘This is DS Armstrong speaking, Mr Ashman. I understand you're staying at the hotel until tomorrow and we'd like a word with you before you leave … yes … that's splendid, thank you so much. Good night.' She ended the call and gave a thumbs-up sign. ‘We're seeing him at half past nine tomorrow. At the hotel. Meet me here at eight thirty as usual.'

‘Fine,' said Sukey. ‘At least we can show Sir that we're being proactive.'

When they arrived, Ashman was waiting in reception with his suitcase beside him.

‘Good morning, please sit down,' he said. ‘I was glad to get your call; as a matter of fact I've been on the point of calling you, but decided it would probably be a waste of your time.'

‘Why should you think that, sir?' asked Vicky.

‘I told myself you'd probably already thought of what I was going to say.'

‘That's possible, sir, but let's have it anyway.'

Ashman took off his glasses and polished them with a handkerchief. It seemed to Sukey that it was more to hide discomfiture than of necessity. He put them back on his nose and cleared his throat. ‘I've spent a lot of time walking round the grounds,' he said. ‘Lance had been twice before and was looking forward to coming again. I suppose I was trying to … how shall I put it … imagine what it was about the place that appealed to him. Of course, parts of the grounds are still taped off by your officers so I could only observe from a distance the actual place where his body was found, but one thing I did notice and that was a great heap of timber close by. It occurred to me that a lump of that in the wrong hands could be used to attack someone. I do understand, of course, you still don't know the exact cause of death, but …'

‘Mr Ashman,' Vicky broke in, ‘I can assure you that in addition to various other features of the crime scene we are aware of that pile of timber. Is there anything else you want to draw to our attention?'

Ashman fiddled with the handle of his suitcase. ‘I've been talking to a member of the staff. I bore in mind Inspector Rathbone's reminder that they had all been interviewed by the police, but as a matter of fact this young man approached me. He's a waiter but he wants to be a journalist – particularly a crime reporter.'

‘Yes, we know about him and we've taken a full statement from him,' said Vicky.

‘Oh yes, he told me, but he'd become aware that Lance is a friend of mine and he asked me if I could tell him something about him, something personal, that might be of interest to a potential reader. He went on to assure me that what he was writing wasn't for publication – he had a friend, a professional journalist, who promised to help him.'

‘And what did you tell him?' asked Sukey.

‘I made it very clear that I wasn't prepared to answer that kind of question to a journalist, but I've been giving it some thought and I wondered if I should tell the police. That's why I was thinking of calling you and the fact that you've approached me has made up my mind.' He took a deep breath and said, ‘Lance had many fine qualities and as far as his professional life was concerned I'd be prepared to vouch for his integrity, but he could be rather difficult on one particular subject – religion.'

‘Are you saying he was a deeply religious man?'

‘On the contrary – he was almost fanatically against any form of religion, especially Catholicism. It's one of the few subjects, apart from music, on which he expressed any strong opinion … or any opinion at all for that matter. Most of the time he kept his head down and got on with his work, but mention religion and it was like waving the proverbial red rag in front of a bull. Unfortunately it was the cause of an unpleasant incident in our firm; one of the staff in his department is a devout Christian and on one occasion he accused Lance of blasphemy. According to reports, it seemed for a moment that they were about to come to blows, but then the accuser backed down and mumbled something about how the persecuted are blessed and the kingdom of heaven is theirs. I seem to remember hearing something like that at Sunday school,' he added, ‘but of course that was a long time ago.'

‘It comes from a passage in the Bible known as the Sermon on the Mount,' said Sukey in response to an enquiring glance from Vicky. ‘Did Lance ever tell you why he felt such antipathy towards religion?' she asked Ashman.

‘Not really, except that it had something to do with an experience he had as a child.'

‘We know that his father died when he and his brother were quite small,' said Vicky. ‘Their mother had to work as a teacher to support them so she sent them to a boarding school run by some religious order.'

Ashman nodded. ‘That could account for it; I'm told some of these people are very strict disciplinarians. Maybe he had one caning too many.'

‘Or some of the teaching may have had a profound effect on him psychologically,' Sukey suggested.

‘Whatever the reason, you've given us another avenue to explore, so thank you for your time, sir,' said Vicky. ‘Would you be kind enough to give us the name and address of the person who had the confrontation with Mr Rainbird?'

‘I'll have to check his address when I get back to the office. I have a feeling he's on some kind of compassionate leave at present on account of a bereavement in his family. His name is Luke Grayson.'

‘H
ow about that?' Vicky exclaimed as they returned to the car park after saying goodbye to Ashman. ‘Coincidence or what?'

‘It has to be Romeo's brother,' said Sukey. ‘There can't be two people with that name who work for the same firm as Rainbird and have recently suffered bereavement.'

‘So Rainbird was a devout atheist,' said Vicky, after mulling over this new piece of information for a moment, ‘who once said something which infuriated Luke Grayson, who according to Ashman is an equally devout – and somewhat militant – Christian.'

‘We know that the Grayson brothers had Christian parents who named them after the evangelists and took them regularly to church and so on,' said Sukey, ‘but apart from that Luke never mentioned religion to us, or showed any sign of militancy either. He expressed shock when we told him about Rainbird's death, and it's odd that he didn't mention the fact that they worked for the same firm – or that he'd had a disagreement with him. Maybe that was because he was so upset about the accident to his brother,' she added as an afterthought.

‘Perhaps he was being extra clever,' Vicky suggested.

‘How do you mean?'

‘Let's suppose for a moment that Luke Grayson is a total fruitcake who regarded Rainbird as an instrument of Satan because of his atheism. Rainbird said something that he regarded as particularly outrageous and almost led to a stand-up fight. And suppose he knew Rainbird was coming here and followed him with the intention of killing him.'

Sukey shook her head. ‘That doesn't add up. If he managed to contain his anger and show a Christian attitude after the scene in the office over what he regarded as blasphemy, he's hardly likely to pursue the man to Dallington Manor at a later date to exact some kind of atonement. From what Ashman said he's a man of pretty high principles; don't forget he was horrified at the thought of his brother John having contemplated blackmail. That would have been avarice – one of the seven deadly sins.'

‘It doesn't sound rational,' Vicky agreed, ‘but maybe we're not dealing with a rational person.'

‘You mean “some kind of psychopath”, as Freeman put it? In which case, what DI Rathbone calls Freeman's cock and bull story would have to be true.'

‘He's not going to give up on Freeman without a struggle and neither is DCI Leach,' said Vicky, ‘but we'll have to tell them what Ashman said.'

They drove back to headquarters and went straight to Rathbone's office. ‘It's sure to be a red herring,' was his immediate reaction, ‘but I agree, it's an odd coincidence.'

‘Grayson might be able to tell us something more about Rainbird's character, sir,' said Sukey. ‘He might have suspected him of having been guilty of another of the seven deadly sins.'

‘Besides blasphemy, you mean?'

‘Well, yes – although I'm not sure which of the sins that comes under,' she admitted. ‘Pride, perhaps.'

‘Anyway, you'd better have another talk to Grayson,' said Rathbone. ‘We don't want to leave any loose ends.'

‘Will do, sir.'

Back in the CID office, Vicky rang the headquarters of Ashman, Lee and Edwards and asked to speak to Luke Grayson. When she put down the phone she said, ‘He's quite willing to talk to us but naturally wants to know what it's about. As you heard me say, we want to know why he never mentioned the scene between him and Rainbird. He refused to discuss it over the phone but he's invited us to his office so that we can talk in private. He's given us an appointment for tomorrow afternoon.'

‘That's nice; it's a long time since I had a trip to London,' said Sukey. ‘By the way, I've just had another idea. Why don't we ask Justin Freeman if Rainbird ever expressed any particular opinion about sacred music during any of his events?'

‘That's a thought,' Vicky agreed. ‘I believe he lives near Reading. With luck we might be able to call on him tomorrow morning on our way to see Grayson.'

 

Freeman lived in a flat in a small development on the London side of Reading. ‘I've spoken to Nugent,' he said when they arrived, ‘and he advised me to find out what you want to talk to me about but not to answer any further questions about my own movements without him being present. I might add,' he went on as he ushered them into a comfortably furnished sitting room with a view over the river, ‘that I found DI Rathbone's manner somewhat overaggressive, but having had time to cool down I can understand why I'm still a suspect and as I'm totally innocent I'm as anxious as anyone to establish the truth. Please sit down –' he indicated two armchairs – ‘I've got coffee on the go; would you like some?'