The Bodies at Westgrave Hall

by Nick Louth

  ‘Who is Yelena?’ Zoe asked Wolf.

  ‘Volkov’s ex-wife, and now Talin’s partner,’ Wolf said. ‘A royal pain in bum.’ He shook his head.

  ‘Okay. I’ve got to go and let my colleague in,’ Zoe said. ‘Please stay away from the bodies, don’t touch anything else.’ She made her way carefully downstairs, stepped over the body on the stairs, and saw a great press of police uniforms by the door.

  She pressed the exit button, releasing the door lock.

  * * *

  Even blue-lighting it from home it took Gillard an hour to reach Westgrave Hall. The tiny lanes were lined with parked cars from onlookers who had presumably arrived to watch the fireworks or had heard about the shooting. Despite the sirens, it took him a few minutes to weave past the steady stream of high-end vehicles that were leaving the hall.

  He made his way up the main drive, outflanking those coming the other way by driving on the bumpy snow-covered pastures. There were some very expensive-looking cars leaving the place: Bentleys, Ferraris, Aston Martins, and several more sober vehicles with diplomatic plates. Parking almost in front of the grand porticoed entrance, next to four patrol cars, he left the blues on to make it clear whose car it was, and then headed off into a mêlée of guests. Uniforms had set up a couple of trestle tables by the edge of the ice rink, to take initial details of all the guests who were present. Two hundred yards further on, beyond the alabaster bridge, a crime-scene tent had been erected around the entrance to the library. A CSI transit van had somehow made its way across the moat and reversed up to be close to the tent.

  Gillard was delighted to see Yaz Quoroshi, CSI chief, directing operations. ‘I understand it’s a bit of a mess in there, Yaz.’

  ‘To put it mildly. Gory footprints all over the place. PC Butterfield did a superb job getting some pictures, but it’s going to be the devil’s own job untangling who trod where and when. We’ve found two handguns and a good two dozen cartridge cases. It does seem the deceased all died from gunshot wounds.’

  ‘I’ve woken Dr Delahaye up,’ Gillard said. ‘Not happy about being dragged out on Christmas morning. Really quite grumpy about it, which is unlike him.’

  ‘I sympathise,’ Quoroshi replied ‘Who wants to be dragged out at Christmas? Not me, certainly.’

  Gillard was a little surprised, knowing that Yaz was Iraqi-born and of Shia Muslim descent. The CSI chief seemed to read the expression on his face. ‘It’s the kids, Craig. They are nine and six. Christmas is a big thing to them, we have a big vegetarian lunch, watch some films. They expect presents just like their friends at school.’

  ‘I can imagine the expectations,’ Gillard replied.

  ‘Looking at this lot, I don’t expect I shall see them opening their gifts today. Third year in a row, unfortunately.’

  The DCI thought of all the Christmases he and Sam had missed over the years. She’d been angelic about the disappointments, but there was no denying that his job made it very hard to be sure he could ever get the time off he needed.

  ‘I’m planning to move one of the bodies immediately,’ Quoroshi said. ‘There seems to be someone trapped in a panic room, and the door can’t be opened because of a body.’

  ‘That’s fine if you’re happy with the photographic evidence. Delahaye won’t be here for two or three hours and, as he reminded me, he is no ballistics expert. He said that if we want to move the bodies that’s up to us.’

  ‘Given that it’s a Russian oligarch all I can say is thank God it wasn’t poison,’ Yaz said. ‘I was dragooned into the Salisbury investigation when they ran short of CSI staff. Quite the most frustrating and difficult operation I’ve ever been involved in. Give me a good old-fashioned shooting any day.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Gillard said. ‘At least you know right from the outset who is dead and who is alive.’ The poisoning by nerve agent of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in March 2018 was the first known act of chemical warfare on British soil and led to the death of an innocent bystander. Russian agents had been identified as the assailants, but the Kremlin had denied all involvement. No one had been arrested. Gillard was determined that a failure like that wasn’t going to be replicated on his watch.

  * * *

  Once Gillard had donned his Tyvek suit, gloves and booties, he went in to take a look. The first person he saw was PC Butterfield, sitting on a chair by a ground floor window, drinking a coffee. She looked exhausted and was staring at the floor. She wasn’t wearing any shoes and had a large stack of sealed evidence bags next to her.

  He crouched down. ‘How are you doing, Zoe?’

  She blew a huge sigh. ‘Not so bad, considering. We’ve got three dead bodies, gunshot wounds. No other injuries and a very messy crime scene. These bags here contain the footwear of everyone who came in, but we still need to get the victims’ shoes—’

  ‘Whoa, it’s okay. Take it easy. Quoroshi has already briefed me. From what I’ve heard, you’ve done a great job, and we’ll take it from here.’

  ‘There is someone trapped in the panic room.’

  ‘Yes, I heard,’ he said gently. ‘The best thing you did was to keep everyone else out. That makes our job so much easier.’

  ‘Yaz Quoroshi has got my phone. I’ve taken hundreds of pictures.’

  ‘Good work.’ Gillard took a quick look upstairs at the crime scene then stood aside to let CSI do their work. He shrugged his way out of his Tyvek, left it in the CSI tent, then retreated into the main house where key witnesses had been corralled in the ballroom after making their initial statements. Needless to say many of them, tired and in some cases tipsy, were not happy about it. They wanted to leave, to go home, to get away from the mayhem.

  As the senior investigating officer, Gillard realised gathering evidence rapidly was his most important task. Managing the logistical complexity of doing so and ensuring that witnesses stayed around was going to be a great challenge. It was clear from the denuded car park that hundreds of guests had already left. He had however detained the four people who were closest to what had happened. Wolf, the head of security, was sitting at the grand piano in the hall, constantly on the phone. Sophie Cawkwell, wrapped in a borrowed coat, was lying full length on a golden settee in the East Lounge, her wavy blonde hair dangling over one end, her tanned and shapely legs over the other. She was wearing sunglasses and had a glass of ice held to her forehead. She looked like a film starlet from another era, right down to the two male admirers, one holding her hand, the other stroking her cheek. A rather weary Lord Fein and his effervescent wife Natasha were still giving their statements in the marquee. Waiters continued to ply their trade, offering coffee and warming borscht to the remaining guests.

  The detective was just reading the statement taken from the head of security when his phone trilled. It was Yaz Quoroshi. ‘We’ve just rescued a woman called Yelena Yalinsky from the panic room. She was in quite a state and had been trying to get out for an hour.’

  ‘Good work. Let’s get her over here to give a statement.’

  ‘We’ve now found over forty cartridge cases, and six bullets embedded in walls,’ Quoroshi said. ‘Four shots seem to have hit windows. There are others in the bookcases and floor.’

  ‘Sounds a bit like the gunfight at the OK Corral.’

  ‘We’ve retrieved two handguns from the deceased: one on Maxim Talin and one from the bodyguard Bryn Howell.’

  ‘Nothing on Alexander Volkov?’

  ‘No. Nothing on the lady found in the panic room, either.’

  ‘Did she see anything?’

  ‘She says not. She just dived for safety when she heard shooting begin.’

  ‘The only survivor,’ Gillard said. ‘She’s going to be important.’

  ‘Absolutely, but she’s not coherent yet.’

  ‘I noticed the skylight above was open. Did you do that?’

  ‘No. I hadn’t noticed it, to be honest. Thought it was cold in there.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be an easy
escape route. Must be a thirty-foot sheer climb from the gallery,’ Gillard said.

  ‘None of it is easy in that place.’ Quoroshi described how it had taken forty-five minutes to get the two bodies out from the upper floor. They were each put into body bags in situ and then lowered over the balcony to gurneys on the ground floor. ‘We minimised the disturbance to the bloodstained hardwood floors,’ he said.

  It was only then that Gillard realised there was one urgent piece of work to be done outside before morning. He had already been told that the only way into or out of the high security library was through the main door. But if anyone had tried to force their way in there might well be footprints in the snow. He had to take a look before it melted. That applied to the roof, too. If the skylight was a possible exit, then there would be prints on the gently pitched roof.

  Leaving a uniformed sergeant in charge of the witnesses, the detective shrugged on his coat and made his way down through the three terraces back towards the stone bridge. The high arc lights were now back on at his request. Though the snow still looked pristine, slushy footpaths were beginning to show through. It was half past three, and though not exactly warm, he reckoned the melt was progressing pretty fast. Grass would be showing through before morning. The library sat upon a knoll, surrounded by its own shallow grassy ditch, and could only be reached easily via the stone bridge. He circled the library on the embankment which encircled the moat. Though the footpath was slushy, the deep snow in the cut was largely undisturbed, only thinning where a stream ran underneath the western edge. He took plenty of photographs, and after circumnavigating the library was satisfied that no one had gone in or out except on the bridge. And for that he had four witnesses to say there was just one: the bodyguard, who entered after the shooting began.

  Chapter Five

  Gillard made his way back into the ballroom. Dozens of guests were standing around in groups, urgently discussing the night’s events, many of them clearly in a state of shock. Others were on the phone, and at least a couple of the male guests seemed to be on two phones at once, as if they were city traders seizing some great market opportunity. A tall, pale young woman was sobbing on the shoulder of a grizzled pot-bellied man of Middle Eastern appearance, who stroked her back with one hand and texted with the other, his thumb playing a single digit concerto across the screen of his phone. Two enormous dogs, bigger and hairier even than Irish wolfhounds, stared with sad eyes at the crowd. A gaggle of young children, the boys in mini tuxedos and slicked-down hair, the girls in sparkly dresses, seemed to be playing hide-and-seek amongst the grandiose furniture, as if nothing had happened. A single cherubic toddler sat alone under a piano stool, wide-eyed at all the activity, sucking his thumb and holding a small teddy to his cheek.

  The detective threaded his way through to the biggest crowd, past the TV crew where the reporter was doing a piece to camera, and into the East Lounge. At the centre of it all, Yelena Yalinsky was sharing a sofa with Sophie Cawkwell, who was now in a different dress. Black and backless, it was as if she’d packed for the possibility of death. They were surrounded by a press of well-wishers, some crouching, clearly offering kind words and condolences. The two women held each other’s hands and wept. The detective eased his way through the crowd, watched as they embraced, Sophie stroking the long, dark, wavy hair of the other woman. He waited until they released each other, and then introduced himself.

  Yelena was partially hidden by a silk handkerchief she was holding to her tear-streaked face, but above it her kohl-lined eyes surveyed him from beneath heavy eyebrows. She looked to be in her late forties. ‘Ah, the man in charge,’ she said. More petite than Sophie and barely five feet tall, she was resplendent in a red silk dress and matching shoes. Yalinsky was the daughter of the finance minister of Kazakhstan and her mother was a white Russian émigré of royal lineage going back to the Romanovs. Gillard recalled her face, which had rarely been out of the papers because of a long-running divorce case with Volkov, fought out in London’s High Court. The tabloids had listed her extravagances: shoes, handbags, private jets, perfume and, most notoriously, the 500-litre tank of bottled Evian water at her Paris apartment kept constantly replenished for bathing. Things had got nasty in court. Volkov testified that she was brutal with staff. When a kitchen porter was found to have incomplete papers, she reported him to the immigration authorities in France. He was later deported back to Mali and died in prison there. Her allegations against Volkov were equally sweeping: a litany of affairs, neglect of their children, and an ingrained habit of bribery.

  Gillard wasn’t there to judge, but to get to the truth.

  ‘My condolences on the death of your partner,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve lost everything,’ she wailed, her huge brown eyes filled with tears. ‘Maxim, the love of my life. And Sasha, the father of my children.’

  ‘You’re lucky to be alive,’ Gillard pointed out.

  She shrugged. ‘Maybe it would have been better had I been killed too.’ She began to sob, and she reached for a fresh handkerchief from her red velvet handbag.

  Gillard knew from long experience the discomfort he would feel asking his next questions. ‘I know it might seem like indecent haste, but in order to solve this crime we need to act immediately. So I was wondering if you could spare fifteen minutes for me to take a statement, Ms Yalinsky.’ He indicated a rather grand door off to the left. ‘We have the drawing room reserved for some privacy.’

  ‘Can’t it wait until tomorrow? I’ve had a terrible shock.’

  ‘No, I’m afraid it can’t.’

  ‘I’ve already told Mr Quoroshi what little I saw.’

  ‘It won’t take long.’ Gillard guided her through to the palatial grandness of the drawing room, decked with tapestries and with what looked like a harpsichord at its centre. Incongruously, at one edge of the room three stackable plastic chairs had been grouped around a coffee table.

  Yelena sat down in a rustle of silk and wiped her eyes while Gillard got out his digital recorder and notebook.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to describe to me what you saw.’

  Yelena blew her nose and pocketed her handkerchief. ‘I don’t know what there is I can tell you. The whole thing is a tragedy. I’d flown over from LA with Maxim. I was invited to the party by Sasha to seal the peace between me and him. We were married for ten years, have two kids together, but have been fighting for seven years since the marriage broke down. We have had a long-running divorce litigation here in London, which just seems to go on and on, guzzling millions and simply generating hatred. And in the last few months we had finally agreed a settlement, helped by David Fein as a go-between. Maxim came over because he wanted to be supportive to me.’

  ‘What time did you arrive?’

  ‘At nine, I think. You can check that with the driver. Yes, nine. I think the library was locked for most of the evening, but Sasha wanted to give us a private tour. We went in just before midnight. Sophie, Sasha, Maxim and me.’

  ‘To see the fossil?’

  ‘Yes, in its full glory. Utterly magnificent, but I think it should have remained in my country. We’d looked around, been shown some of the rare books, and peeked into the panic room. Sasha was always very careful after what happened to Berezovsky. He knew him well and was upset that it was ruled a suicide.’

  ‘Understandable.’ As a detective inspector at the time, Gillard had been peripherally involved in the investigation of Boris Berezovsky’s death in 2013. He had always believed the killing of the oligarch was murder, but he wasn’t SIO and it wasn’t his decision.

  ‘Anyway, we had just come up from being shown the panic room when the shooting began.’

  ‘But Sophie wasn’t with you, was she?’

  ‘Sophie? No, I’m sorry, I forgot. She had gone out for a cigarette break a few minutes before, so there were just the three of us. Anyway, Maxim was first out, and was walking towards the middle of the balcony. I think that’s when we heard the first shot.’

 
; ‘Where did it come from?’

  She hesitated for a long time, starting to say something, then stopped. ‘Actually, I have no idea. Sasha helped me into the panic room and said he would follow.’

  Gillard knew she was lying. It was patently obvious in the hesitation, captured in full on the recorder. ‘What happened then?’

  ‘I went into the panic room and ran down the stairs, but he didn’t follow. There were more shots.’

  ‘How many did you hear?’

  ‘I don’t know how many, sorry. The next thing I knew the door slammed shut, so I assumed Sasha was inside, but when I looked up the spiral staircase, I could see no one.’

  ‘Did you see Mr Volkov or Talin pull a gun?’

  ‘No. I don’t think either of them had one.’

  ‘We found one on Talin’s body.’

  ‘Really? I am surprised. I knew Maxim could shoot, but I didn’t think he’d carry one in this country.’

  ‘Had the two men fallen out, to your knowledge?’

  ‘Well, they had been enemies for a long time.’

  ‘Because of you?’

  She inspected the ceiling, far above, her eyes still damp. ‘Yes, partly. Business, too, and other things. But all that was over.’ She turned her gaze on Gillard. Even in grief, this was a face that could mesmerise any man. ‘You see, they had made up in the last two years, and Sasha and I had arranged a deal on the divorce, and tonight we had papers to sign. It’s absurd to think they might fight now, when they were about to do some important business together. Kazakh Minerals owns considerable deposits of lithium, which is what Maxim needed for his battery technology. It’s what’s called a win-win situation. So the whole idea of one shooting the other is crazy.’

  ‘What do you think happened, then?’ Gillard asked.

  ‘I don’t know. I was stuck in a room. No one else came in. I didn’t see the bodyguard. Maybe someone else was hiding there before we came in? What other answer is there? I didn’t shoot them.’