Know No Evil

by Hampton Graeme

  ‘You’re convinced the bloke she shared the taxi with is our killer?’ asked Kinsella.

  McKenna’s words from yesterday bounced round Denning’s brain: what if there’s another person involved? It was something he didn’t want to think about, not unless he had to…

  He ended the briefing and returned to his desk. He was about to check for any new emails before heading out the door with Neeraj, when he was distracted by the sight of Trudi Bell sauntering towards his desk.

  ‘Could I have a quick word, boss?’

  He indicated for her to sit down, and she perched half a buttock on the edge of his desk. He could smell her perfume: Jezebel, he thought; it had been Claire’s favourite.

  ‘What is it, Trudi?’

  She shot him a warm smile. ‘I’ve got some good news about the Transit van, boss. We’ve got a partial reading from the number plate. Can’t quite make out if the first letter is an R or a B, but we’ve got something to work with. I’m going to do a Vehicle Online Description Search on the PNC in a minute and see if it throws anything up.’

  ‘Good. Well done.’ He looked blankly at her, not sure why she hadn’t brought this useful gem of information up during the briefing. ‘Is there something else?’

  She leaned in close, her cleavage inches from his face. ‘Look, I know this is probably slightly against the rules, boss, but there’s a detective constable with CID, Molly Fisher. She’s been keeping obs on Gregor Kane for a while now; she’s familiar with his movements, his contacts…’

  ‘OK, Trudi, thanks for telling me, but I’m not sure why I need to know this.’

  ‘She could be useful.’

  Denning pursed his lips. ‘To be honest with you, Trudi, unless she has any evidence that can directly link Gregor Kane to the murder of Leanne Wyatt, I can’t see what use she could be.’

  Trudi lowered her voice. ‘I accept this is asking you to go out on a limb, boss. But I know Molly: she’s a good officer, and to be blunt, she’s wasted in CID.’

  The aroma of Jezebel was boring a hole in his sinuses. ‘Sorry, but I don’t see what any of this has got to do with me.’

  ‘She wants to join MIT. This might go in her favour next time she puts in an application.’

  ‘You mean she’s already been turned down?’

  Trudi shrugged. ‘A bit of mutual back-scratching, sir, that’s all I’m saying.’

  Denning sighed. The last thing he needed right now was to humour some wannabe raw recruit to MIT. But she might, just might have something useful to offer. If nothing else, she could rule Kane out of their inquiry, if she had any evidence that even indirectly supported his alibi. Christ, there wasn’t much else to go on at the moment, and Kane had yet to be officially stood down as a suspect.

  He made a note of her name and told Trudi he’d think about it.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The taxi driver was enjoying a bacon sandwich when Denning and Neeraj walked into the office flashing their ID.

  He was a fat, balding man in his fifties, with at least a couple of days’ growth round his double chin. He barely looked up from a copy of The Sun when he saw the two officers standing in the doorway.

  ‘Barry Haynes?’ Denning asked. It was hot and stuffy in the pokey cab office: little ventilation and no air conditioning meant the room smelt of stale tobacco and bacon.

  ‘Not you lot again. I went over everything with Gunga Din yesterday.’ He nodded at Neeraj.

  ‘I’d like you to go over everything again,’ Denning said. ‘But this time I’d like you to tell us the truth.’

  Haynes folded the newspaper and threw it on the desk. He stuffed the remainder of the bacon sandwich in his mouth. ‘If it’s still about that girl that was murdered: I’ve told you where I dropped her and the bloke off. As for what happened after that, I can’t help you.’ He spoke through mouthfuls of bacon sandwich. Denning noted the look of disgust on Neeraj’s face. There was something unpleasant about Barry Haynes, and Denning would have been quite happy to drag him down the station for questioning if that’s what it took.

  ‘Perhaps you could tell us exactly where you dropped them?’ he said coldly. ‘The elderly gentleman who lives at the address you gave my colleague knows nothing about any couple being dropped off on the evening in question.’

  Hayes swallowed the last of the sandwich. He rubbed a hand over his front, smearing bacon fat and butter over his grubby shirt.

  ‘What is this? The fucking Spanish Inquisition? I didn’t do that kid in.’ He picked up his newspaper and opened it. ‘Why are you giving me a hard time?’

  Denning grabbed the newspaper and threw it on the table. ‘Could you just answer the question, Mr Haynes? Rather than continuing to waste our time. I need you to give me the exact address where you dropped them off.’

  There was a sudden pause, with only the chattering from the other end of a two-way radio filling the silence.

  ‘OK, maybe I was a bit vague when he asked the other day. I’d been busy that night. Look, I was tired and my shift was due to finish at midnight. They wanted me to do another job. They’re always short-staffed here.’

  Denning could feel his limited patience wearing thin. He cast a disparaging eye round the shabby cab office, with its hard, plastic seating and wood-chipped walls. ‘Could you come to the point, Mr Haynes. Otherwise we’ll continue this conversation back at the station.’

  Hayes looked at a spot on the floor. ‘The bloke asked me to drop them at the end of the street. By the junction with Highgate Road. That suited me as this other job had just come in back in Islington.’

  ‘So it could have been Highgate Road, Hadley Drive, or any one of the half dozen or so streets in that area?’ Denning struggled to keep the anger from his voice. Thanks to the laziness or sheer stupidity of Barry Haynes, the murder location could be just about anywhere in north London. He could feel his shoulders tense. ‘Can you give me a description of the man?’

  He shrugged. ‘Like I told your mate yesterday: tall, smart, well-spoken but not posh. He certainly wasn’t short of cash.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘When he opened his wallet it was stuffed with twenties.’ Haynes rediscovered his fascination with the spot on the floor. ‘He gave me a twenty as a tip,’ he said sheepishly.

  Denning suspected the generous tip was intended as an incentive for being deliberately evasive should the police come asking questions. He showed Haynes a photo of Daryl Bailey. ‘Was this the man?’

  Haynes stared at the picture for a few seconds, before offering another shrug. ‘I dunno. I suppose it could be. To be honest with you, I didn’t really take that much notice of him. I was more interested in her: she was a looker.’ He glanced back at the scrunched-up copy of The Sun. ‘Real shame what happened to her. If he’s the bastard responsible, then I hope you catch him.’

  ‘Well, with help from people like yourself, Mr Haynes, hopefully we’ll do just that.’

  The sarcasm seemed to be lost on Haynes.

  Once they were back outside Neeraj said, ‘You still want it to be Bailey, don’t you, boss?’

  Denning was about to reply when his phone rang: it was Ryan Cormack. He answered it, nodded, sighed, then turned to Neeraj.

  ‘Problem, boss?’

  ‘Another body’s been found.’

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Molly had struggled to find Derek Rodman. He didn’t use social media, and an internet search failed to throw up anything useful.

  She’d told her boss she had a hospital appointment that morning and wouldn’t be in until lunchtime. It was another fib. She was getting very good at lying, something that concerned her. Usually she was honest to the point of virtue, but somehow she’d turned into someone who could bend the truth whenever it suited.

  She remembered Jon’s words from the previous evening, accusing her of being obsessed with Anthony Ferguson. Maybe he was right, perhaps this was becoming an obsession, albeit not for the reasons Jon thought.

&
nbsp; The Ferguson case files included an out-of-date address for a bedsit in a house in Camberwell long since converted into luxury apartments. None of the neighbours recognised the name Derek Rodman, and the estate agents had no idea what had happened to the previous occupants prior to the conversion two years previously. She’d asked in a nearby pub, but had no luck there either. It was only when she popped into a convenience store on the next street to buy twenty Silk Cut that she thought it might be worth asking the elderly shopkeeper if he’d remembered anyone called Derek Rodman. He’d scratched his greying beard and mentioned a part-remembered conversation with someone who’d told him she’d bumped into Derek a year ago, and that he was off the booze and working in a community centre somewhere in Kilburn.

  It had taken her the best part of an hour to phone round all the community centres listed in Kilburn and the surrounding area before she eventually struck gold. The Hazel Kerr Day Centre on Brondesbury Park Road catered for children and adults with behavioural problems. Derek Rodman was one of the support staff.

  She’d been expecting some life-ravaged ex-alky with halitosis and attitude, but instead was introduced to a polite and softly spoken man in his early fifties. He was dressed in mustard-coloured shorts and a faded blue t-shirt. Both his face and arms were tanned, and apart from a few broken veins on his cheeks, there was nothing to suggest this was someone who had once struggled with the demon drink. He smiled when she introduced herself, offering her a warm handshake.

  ‘How can I help you, miss?’ The room was painted in bright primary colours, and the walls were adorned with prints of animals and flowers. An avalanche of children’s toys poured out of a cupboard at one end of the room. Derek Rodman gestured towards a couple of padded armchairs next to a wide window which overlooked Brondesbury Park. She declined his offer of tea or coffee, knowing it would just mean she would have to stop off somewhere for a wee later.

  ‘I’d like to talk to you about Anthony Ferguson.’ She caught a look of unease twitch itself around his face. ‘Don’t worry,’ she reassured him, ‘this isn’t in any official capacity.’

  He seemed to relax at this and tried hard to smile. ‘It was all a very long time ago,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure I can add anything beyond what I told the police twelve years ago.’

  ‘Ferguson claimed he was with you on the evening of the last murder. That would have been the 21st of July. It was a Friday evening. Can you confirm that?’

  He scrunched his face up and slowly nodded. ‘I told the police this at the time. They didn’t believe me then, I don’t see any reason why they would believe me now.’

  ‘But you definitely told them Anthony Ferguson was with you on the evening of twenty-first July twelve years ago?’

  He nodded again. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m sorry to sound pushy, Mr Rodman, but can you be sure?’

  Derek Rodman blinked and slowly nodded his head. ‘You mean because I was an alcoholic and couldn’t have told you if it was Christmas or rice pudding most days…?’ His voice was deep and calming; he spoke without any emotion, just stating facts. ‘I accept I was in a bad place back then.’ He sighed. ‘I would start the day with a can of strong cider, then work my way through several more before lunchtime. Evenings, it would be spirits – whisky preferably, but I was never fussy. I can understand why the prosecution found it so easy to discredit me.’ He looked directly at her, not aggressively but with a mix of sorrow and repentance. ‘But I got myself sorted out.’ He opened his mouth to speak again, but no words came out. He closed his eyes, shook his head, and started again. ‘I had a heart attack a week before my forty-fifth birthday. I should have died, but they managed to save me. It was enough to convince me to give up the booze for good. With a lot of help and support, I managed it. I turned my life around. I’ve been dry for nearly eight years now.’

  Molly was sympathetic. Sometimes it was possible for people to sort their lives out before they disappeared forever beneath the cracks in society. Sometimes people were saved from self-destruction by fate or luck or the kindness of strangers. And she knew all about that.

  ‘To answer your question, miss: yes, I’m sure Anthony Ferguson was with me that night.’ He lowered his voice as a couple of children appeared. ‘Tony was a strange character, difficult to like; he didn’t have many friends. I suppose I felt sorry for him. His gran and my old mum had been friends for years, and I kind of took him under my wing.’ He dropped his gaze for a moment and looked at the floor, searching his brain for a half-forgotten memory. ‘Tony came round to my bedsit around ten that evening. I’d had flu so I hadn’t been drinking as much as usual. I got the impression he wanted to talk. He didn’t say so, but he clearly had something on his mind. I thought maybe it was something to do with his gran, but whatever it was, he kept it to himself. We ended up playing cards and drinking into the small hours. He slept on the floor and left early the next morning. He was working on a building site at the time. Apparently the boss had it in for him and was looking for any excuse to give him the boot, so he had to make sure he got to work on time every day. The next thing I knew, he’d been arrested for murder. I have to admit, I was shocked.’

  ‘You don’t think he did it?’

  He looked at her, grey eyes twinkling, happy to feel he was being useful. ‘Well, yes and no.’ A child came over to him and handed him a toy aeroplane with a one of the wings broken off. Rodman slotted the wing back into place and handed the toy back to the child. ‘There you go, Billy. Just be careful with it now.’ The child ran off laughing. Rodman turned back to Molly, keeping his soft voice low, ensuring no one – especially young ears – could overhear what he had to say. ‘In a way I wasn’t that surprised he killed someone. I mean, there was a viscous, nasty side to him, and he had some serious issues with women.’ He shook his head. ‘I suppose he never forgave his mum for abandoning him. And well, to put it bluntly, he wasn’t exactly a looker. Women tended to give him a wide berth. Even so…’

  Molly wanted to shake him, insist he came to the point. Instead, she just smiled. ‘Go on, Mr Rodman.’

  Rodman sighed and shook his head again. ‘Whatever the case, and irrespective of what you might think about him, I promise you, miss, Tony Ferguson was with me the night of that last murder.’

  Molly couldn’t avoid the thought that if they were wrong about the last murder, could they have been wrong about all of them?

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  ‘Body of a female, around mid-to-late thirties. Victim of a prolonged and particularly brutal assault.’

  They were standing in a car park behind a fast-food restaurant at the far end of Dalston Way, less than a mile from where Leanne Wyatt had been found. Blue police tape had already been wound round the crime scene, hanging heavy in the limpid air. Uniformed officers and crime scene investigators busied themselves. A white forensic tent was in the process of being erected behind two industrial-sized rubbish bins. The rancid smell from the overflowing bins was almost overpowering.

  ‘What have we got?’ he asked.

  A red-faced man in his sixties came over to join them. He was dressed in a pair of heavy-duty blue coveralls.

  Gorton introduced them; ‘This is Dr Ian Bevan. Home Office pathologist.’

  Denning shook the older man’s gloved hand. Bevan dropped his face mask and began to remove the blue coverall. He was grey-haired, with a full beard and jowly cheeks. He wore a pair a pair of old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses, and seemed to have trouble breathing.

  ‘Mid-to-late thirties?’

  Bevan nodded. ‘At this stage we’ve only done a preliminary examination, but I would say no older than forty. Obviously we’ll know for certain after the post-mortem.’ He took a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and loudly blew his nose. ‘Sorry, he said, ‘hay fever. I’m a martyr to it this time of the year.’

  Denning smiled politely. ‘When was the body found?’

  ‘Earlier this morning,’ Gorton said. ‘A couple of homeless guys were scaven
ging for food.’ He jerked his head in the direction of the two giant metal rubbish bins in the far corner of the car park. ‘They spotted her lying behind one of the bins. At first they thought she was a shop window dummy.’

  ‘Where are they now?’

  ‘Being interviewed by two uniformed officers in the restaurant,’ Gorton said. ‘We thought it only fair to offer them something to eat. They’ve had a shock.’

  Denning could see Neeraj itching to ask the obvious question.

  ‘Was she killed here?’ Denning asked.

  Bevan sneezed and followed it up with a cough. ‘Early indications would suggest that’s the case. Blood splatter has been found in the alleyway that leads onto Dalston Way, and there are signs of a scuffle. The body was dumped by the bins, presumably in an attempt to conceal it. The clothing doesn’t look like it’s been disturbed, so at this stage we can likely rule out sexual assault. The post-mortem will confirm it one way or another.’

  ‘Approximate time of death?’

  Bevan sneezed again. ‘At this stage it would only be a guess. It was another warm evening, so the heat would have speeded up rigor mortis, but probably not by a lot: it’s still in its fairly early stages.’ He wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. ‘I’d say between ten and twelve hours.’

  ‘So, around midnight…?’

  ‘Or an hour or so either side.’

  ‘What was she doing here?’ Neeraj asked.

  Denning thought about this. ‘Good question.’ He turned to Neeraj, ‘Speak to the restaurant staff: find out what time the place shuts, and who was on duty last night. Get uniform onto that. And get hold of any CCTV.’

  Neeraj nodded. He opened his mouth to say something else, then changed his mind. Denning already knew what Neeraj was thinking. There were some similarities between this and Leanne Wyatt’s death that couldn’t be ignored, but Denning wasn’t going to jump to conclusions, at least not yet.