The Fifth Suspect

by Robert McNeil

  Watson laughed derisively and looked at Upson while pointing an accusing finger at Temple. ‘She’s totally out of order, sir. I’ve been a policeman for twenty-six years. I’ve served with distinction and never had a blot on my career. And now… now she’s accusing me of arranging an assault, corruption, and possibly murder.’

  Temple glared at Watson. ‘I’m simply pointing out to you that we have statements that need to be fully investigated. The outcome of those enquiries could place you in a somewhat awkward position in relation to Damien Potts and Ronnie Nielson.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘Look, Bill, you’re not under arrest and so you don’t have to answer my question, but it would help us if you did.’

  Watson slumped in his chair, shaking his head. ‘I don’t believe this is happening,’ he said, then added in a resigned voice, ‘I was at home with Frank Jardine having a drink. He can confirm that.’

  Temple glanced at Upson who nodded imperceptibly. ‘All right, Bill, thank you. You do know that due to the seriousness of these allegations, I have to suspend you from duty with immediate effect. There will be a full enquiry of course. That’s all.’

  Watson drew a sharp breath. ‘It’ll be a complete waste of time, believe me.’

  Later at home, Watson poured himself a large whisky. He took a big gulp and slumped into his armchair. His head was spinning. Christ, he really was in it up to his neck.

  71

  Fleming had received a call from Liz Temple requesting his attendance at a meeting with her and the chief constable at the new Kidlington South HQ. She hadn’t said why. Just that he’d better be on time and on his best behaviour.

  They were using the small meeting room next to Upson’s office. Temple sat next to him. Fleming sat on the other side of the table. Upson closed the file in front of him and glowered at Fleming. ‘I’m not at all happy with the way things are going,’ Upson finally said. ‘I had you suspended because you were suspected of being behind an assault on Jimmy Calder. You disobeyed a direct order by going to see Charles Trenchard again, and then I received a complaint of harassment from him.’

  Fleming made to speak but Upson held up a hand to stop him. ‘However, I now find myself in a position where I need to postpone the misconduct proceedings against you for the time being.’

  Fleming sighed with relief. ‘Thank you, sir.’

  ‘This is not a reprieve, Fleming. It’s just a temporary change of circumstances,’ Upson warned.

  ‘I understand, sir.’

  Upson grunted. ‘I’ve been a police officer for thirty-five years and I’m due to retire soon. I want to retire with my head held high. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved, but I now have Cecil Daubney on my back on an almost-daily basis. I do not need a situation where I have to answer to him for the lack of integrity in some of my officers. Do you understand, Fleming?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I’m sorry–’

  Upson cut him off before he could say any more. ‘As regards the Calder issue, we have a statement from one of the assailants who claims it was DCI Watson who was behind the assault. I have therefore suspended him, pending a full enquiry. On top of that, I now have allegations that he was a bent cop.’ Upson shook his head as though in disbelief. ‘You and Watson have caused me a great deal of grief, Fleming.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir.’

  Upson ignored the apology. ‘The Charles Trenchard fiasco is now over, no thanks to you. I managed to placate him by offering a profuse apology and by promising him you’ll not bother him again. Is that clear, Fleming?’

  ‘Perfectly, sir.’

  ‘Good. I want you to return to duty and take charge of the Nielson murder case again.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  ‘But let’s get this straight,’ Upson continued, ‘I do not want any more complaints from Charles Trenchard. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Think yourself lucky that you have a second chance, Fleming. Do not mess it up,’ Upson warned. ‘That’s all.’

  On his way back to the office, Fleming wasn’t convinced he was lucky. He somehow felt things were about to get worse.

  72

  The MCU was buzzing. DCI Fleming was back. Word had spread about Bill Watson and Frank Jardine’s suspension. The chief constable had called a meeting with Liz Temple and Fleming. Rumour had it that Cecil Daubney was after Upson’s blood. Press speculation over Upson’s position was rife. There was a real sense of crisis in the air.

  Fleming had received a warm welcome back and had held a briefing meeting to get up to speed on the Nielson case. There had been attempts by some to fish for information on what was going on, but Fleming kept things to himself. He’d said they would find out all in good time.

  After the briefing meeting, Fleming asked Logan and Anderson to join him in his office. He motioned for them to find a chair as he sat on the edge of his desk. ‘Okay, to recap: Anthony Hayden is off the radar, Potts is dead, and forensics found no prints or DNA to put him on Nielson’s boat.’

  ‘Running out of suspects,’ Logan observed.

  ‘We still have Rainer,’ Anderson said.

  ‘True,’ Logan admitted. ‘But we’ve had him under surveillance. There’s no sign he’s about to do a runner. And… we haven’t found the murder weapon yet.’

  ‘You were sure he was our man weren’t you, Sarge?’ Anderson said.

  ‘I was,’ Logan agreed, ‘but the boss here isn’t so sure, are you, boss?’

  Fleming shook his head. ‘You may well be right yet, Harry. We could charge him, but I feel there isn’t enough to secure a conviction. Things could change if we find the murder weapon.’

  ‘Looking a bit thin after all this time,’ Logan pointed out.

  ‘We do have two other possible suspects,’ Fleming said.

  ‘Oh no… please don’t tell me one of them is Charles Trenchard,’ Logan groaned.

  Fleming smiled. ‘I’m afraid we can’t rule him out yet. He lied about knowing Ronnie Nielson. He also said he couldn’t remember Giles Bonner, one of the men in Nielson’s army photograph. But Bonner remembered him. Trenchard commanded Nielson’s platoon in Afghanistan. Bonner reckoned they didn’t see eye to eye with each other… and Trenchard seems to be very reluctant to talk about his time there. Bonner reckons something happened.’

  ‘Not much on which to suspect the man of murder though, is it?’ Logan argued.

  ‘He also lied about where he was on the night Nielson was killed.’

  ‘That could just have been a mix up in diary arrangements.’

  ‘Maybe. But I can’t go and quiz Leo Miller or Trenchard about what they were doing that night. The chief constable has warned me off. There’ll need to be some pretty damning evidence before he’ll agree to me speaking to either of them.’

  ‘Has the leadership election been held yet?’ Anderson asked.

  ‘Not yet,’ Fleming confirmed. ‘I think it might be next week.’

  Logan groaned again. ‘That’s all we need. Trenchard wins and becomes prime minister and then we might find evidence to incriminate him. Great!’

  ‘You said there were two other possible suspects,’ Anderson said. ‘Who’s the other one?’

  Fleming pushed himself up from his desk and walked over to the window that looked out over the open-plan office outside. Everyone other than him, Logan and Anderson had gone. Fleming turned. ‘This has to stay within these four walls. Understood?’

  ‘Of course,’ Anderson said.

  Fleming took a deep breath. ‘Bill Watson was suspended because he arranged for Jimmy Calder to be assaulted.’

  ‘But what’s that got to do with Ronnie Nielson?’ Anderson asked, frowning.

  ‘And,’ Fleming continued, ‘he and Frank Jardine are suspected of being bent cops. Anthony Hayden as well.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ Anderson exclaimed, then quickly apologised. ‘Oh… sorry, sir!’

  Logan laughed. ‘DC Anderson, you swore!’

  Anderson smiled and gave a playful
nudge against Logan’s shoulder.

  ‘The thing is,’ Fleming went on, ‘Emma Hayden claims that Ronnie Nielson had threatened to blow the whistle on Watson.’

  Realisation dawned on Anderson’s face. ‘So, Watson could have killed him! Bloody hell!’

  Logan tut-tutted and shook his head. ‘This swearing is becoming a habit, Naomi.’

  She stuck her tongue out at Logan.

  ‘Liz Temple is the investigating officer for the allegations of corruption made against Watson and Jardine,’ Fleming continued with a smile. ‘She’ll be getting their telephones, mobile accounts, computers and bank accounts checked. She’ll also get their houses searched, and she’ll need to question McBain over times and dates when Watson allegedly met Nielson. I’ll leave all of that to her. The last thing I want to do is tread on her toes.’

  ‘So, what’s the plan, boss?’ Logan asked.

  ‘I want to have another look at Nielson’s house. Maybe we missed something. We need to find out if there’s anything that can link Watson to him. Maybe Nielson was blackmailing him.’

  Logan looked at Anderson who seemed to be in shock. ‘Never a dull moment, eh?’

  73

  ‘Bad idea,’ Logan muttered. He was driving one of the unmarked cars from the MCU pool down the M40. It was early and the morning traffic heading towards London was heavy.

  ‘We’ve got all day,’ Fleming said. ‘Relax.’

  Logan grunted and concentrated on his driving.

  Twenty minutes later, Logan left the crawling traffic on the motorway and headed south towards Marlow then east to Bourne End. ‘Bill Watson is certainly in it up to his neck,’ he said, breaking the silence.

  ‘It could get much worse,’ Fleming said. ‘Calder’s in a bad way. He could die.’

  Logan nodded. ‘Then Watson’s really in the shit.’

  Fleming looked thoughtful and stayed silent for a while, watching the first drops of rain hit the windscreen. Eventually he spoke. ‘Damien Potts goes to the press, claiming there were corrupt detectives on the force, and then he turns up dead…’

  Logan looked sharply across at Fleming. ‘You think Watson and Jardine may have been behind that as well, boss?’

  Fleming shrugged. ‘Could be. Maybe they couldn’t take the chance that Potts knew they were involved.’

  ‘This is getting hard to believe. I mean, where does it all end?’

  Fleming shrugged again. ‘Badly for Bill Watson?’

  Logan nodded. ‘He could also be Nielson’s killer, or he may have paid someone to do it for him. He could go down for being involved in three murders at this rate. And how far is Jardine involved in all this, I wonder?’

  ‘Anybody’s guess at this stage,’ Fleming said as Logan pulled the car up outside Nielson’s house. He switched off the screeching windscreen wipers, killed the engine and grabbed the house keys which they’d picked up from the police station at Marlow. He dashed to the front door to escape the rain.

  Nielson’s house felt cold even though it was mid-summer. It was pretty much as Fleming remembered it. ‘You have a look down here. I’ll look upstairs.’

  ‘What exactly are we looking for, boss?’

  ‘Any evidence that might link Watson to Nielson and, if we’re lucky, something that suggests Nielson may have been blackmailing him.’

  Logan nodded his understanding. ‘Okay, let’s make a start.’

  Fleming made his way upstairs. He went into what appeared to be the master bedroom first. He knew the SOCOs would have been through everything, but he went through all the drawers and cupboards anyway. There were no wallets, papers or documents. There was an old leather briefcase tucked into the back of the built-in cupboards, but it was empty. Fleming found a suitcase under the bed, but it too was empty. He felt the lining to see if anything was concealed inside. Nothing.

  There was a clatter of pans and a curse. Logan shouted upstairs. ‘Sorry, boss. Little accident in the kitchen!’

  Fleming smiled and carried on his search. He looked in the other two bedrooms, opening drawers and wardrobes but found nothing of interest.

  Doors were slamming downstairs. He sensed Logan’s frustration and was beginning to think this had been a waste of time. Why did he think they could possibly find something the SOCOs had missed? The bedroom Nielson had used as an office had to be the best bet.

  The computer had gone. The SOCOs would have taken that away for forensic examination. There was nothing on the top of the antique desk apart from an old paper knife. Fleming opened the drawers one by one. The papers he’d looked at before were all still there: bills, bank statements, utility and insurance documents. He was sure the SOCOs would have been through them all, but he went through them again anyway. There was nothing to suggest a link to Watson.

  Fleming heard footsteps on the stairs. Logan joined him and shrugged. ‘Bugger all. How about you?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘You pulled out all the drawers?’ Logan nodded at the desk. ‘Something may have fallen down the back,’ he added hopefully.

  ‘No… no, I didn’t,’ Fleming said thoughtfully as he pulled out one drawer. He took one side of the desk and Logan took the other. There was nothing.

  ‘Oh well,’ Logan said. ‘Worth a try, eh?’

  Fleming was pushing the last drawer back in place when he exclaimed, ‘Hang on!’

  Logan looked at him expectantly. ‘What?’

  ‘All these drawer fronts are the same size.’

  Logan shrugged again. ‘So?’

  ‘So how come this bottom side drawer isn’t as deep as the others?’

  Logan looked over Fleming’s shoulder. ‘I see what you mean.’

  Fleming pulled out the contents and threw them onto the top of the desk. He grabbed the paper knife and slipped the point of the blade into a small gap at the front of the base. It stuck for a moment, but then suddenly gave way, revealing a narrow space under a false bottom.

  ‘Wow!’ Logan exclaimed. ‘Bet you’re glad I came up here.’

  Fleming smiled and pulled out an external hard drive from the hidden compartment. ‘This could be promising,’ he said, turning to Logan. ‘Remember you found a laptop case on Nielson’s boat, but there wasn’t a laptop there or here in the house. Could be the killer took it.’

  ‘What? Bit much to kill a man for a laptop.’

  ‘No. I was thinking that the killer maybe took it because he thought there was something on it that might incriminate him. If there was, Nielson would certainly have kept a copy.’ Fleming waved the device at Logan.

  Logan nodded. ‘Pity the desktop hasn’t been returned. We could have checked it out here.’

  ‘We’ll do it back at the office,’ Fleming said, pulling out an address book that had been under the external hard drive. He flicked open the pages and found the telephone numbers for Bill Watson, Frank Jardine, Anthony Hayden, Emma Hayden, and Charles Trenchard. A folded newspaper cutting was slotted in at the back of the book. Fleming took it out and carefully unfolded it.

  ‘What is it?’ Logan asked excitedly.

  ‘An article about Charles Trenchard, would you believe,’ Fleming said.

  He showed it to Logan. The headline read:

  WEALTHY FOREIGN SECRETARY RUMOURED TO BE PREPARING LEADERSHIP BID.

  Nielson had circled a photograph of Trenchard with a red pen and had underlined the first word.

  ‘I wonder why Nielson had that,’ Logan said, ‘and how come the SOCOs missed all this?’

  Fleming shook his head. ‘Not thorough enough, but I can make a decent guess why Nielson had this,’ he said, waving the newspaper cutting.

  Fleming was deep in thought on the way back to the office. He recalled his conversation with Bonner: Something must have happened in Afghanistan. Trenchard was Nielson’s platoon commander and they didn’t get on…

  Back at Long Hanborough, Fleming plugged the external hard drive into his computer while Logan looked anxiously over Fleming’s shoulder. Fleming
clicked on the external drive icon and opened Word. There was nothing of note in the documents. At least nothing to suggest Nielson was blackmailing anyone.

  Fleming clicked on the calendar and found the day Ronnie Nielson was killed.

  Fleming whistled. ‘Trenchard! He had a meeting with Trenchard!’

  ‘It’s him!’ Logan exclaimed. ‘It has to be!’

  Fleming clicked on Videos and found a folder headed Kabul. He clicked again and the video started. The camera was shaky. A man in uniform sprang into view. The quality of the video wasn’t brilliant, but there was no mistaking the man waving a pistol and shouting. The younger Charles Trenchard that Fleming had found in Nielson’s old army photograph. He was swaying on his feet. Four Afghan civilians cowered in a quiet alleyway. Fleming turned up the volume.

  ‘You’re all Taliban. I know you are!’ Trenchard was screaming hysterically.

  ‘No… no!’ the men shouted in unison. They held their hands up, pleading. ‘We’re just market traders… shopkeepers. We hate the Taliban!’ The camera focused in on frightened faces, eyes wide open in terror as Trenchard waved the gun at them.

  ‘Liars! You’re all the same. You plant roadside bombs. You kill our soldiers–’

  ‘No… no!’ the men shouted.

  ‘I’ve had enough, do you hear? Enough!’ Trenchard pointed the gun at the first man and pulled the trigger.

  Fleming and Logan flinched as the shot rang out. The man fell backwards against a wall and sank to the ground, smearing blood on the wall behind him.

  Whoever was holding the camera shouted. ‘Fuck, sir, let’s get out of here!’

  Trenchard laughed as he let off a stream of shots, mowing down the other three men. Blood was everywhere. Bodies twitched on the ground. The video swayed, and then the screen went blank.