Bad Penny Blues

by Barrie Roberts

‘I suppose in this antiquated country it’s only reasonable that even the maniacs use medieval weapons,’ she said.

  John was turning the bag in his hands. The light kept catching the weapon’s point, which had evidently been ground sharp.

  ‘Don’t mock,’ he said. ‘These things are as dangerous as a firearm. Your army used them in Vietnam and our army trained yours to use them. They used to go through armour in the old days.’

  ‘A bit specialised, aren’t they?’ I said.

  He shook his head. ‘You can buy them by mail order if you know where to look. A longbow — like Robin Hood and the Welsh bowmen at Agincourt used — takes practice, but crossbows are much easier. They’re like pistols, a little bit of practice and you can become reasonably accurate.’

  ‘It’s a big thing to sneak about with,’ Sheila commented. ‘If anybody saw him he’d be a bit stuck for an explanation, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘Probably used one of those little ones with a pistol grip,’ he said. ‘They’re small enough to hide under a coat.’

  ‘Is it any help?’ I asked. ‘In tracing him, I mean.’

  ‘We can find out who made this bolt. It’s obviously a commercial job, though someone’s sharpened it up. I imagine that the same people who make the bows make the quarrels, so we might know who made his weapon and we just might be able to track where it was bought, but I wouldn’t bet on it.’

  He turned to his detective. ‘Anything else?’ he asked.

  The man shook his head. ‘Only the broken glass. That shows more or less where the window broke and gives a rough trajectory of the shot. I’d say he was in the far corner of the garden, towards the gate. I’ve told the lads to be careful and not go trampling all over it in the dark. We’ll see things better in daylight.’

  John nodded and pulled his phone from the pouch pocket on the belly of his tracksuit. He pressed buttons and spoke.

  ‘Peter? Have you done yet? Right, come through to the kitchen when you get here.’

  He switched off. ‘That’s my boy who’s been watching this street. He’s finished annoying your neighbours for the time being and he’s coming in to report.’

  Sheila poured more coffee and added another mug when another plain-clothes officer turned up.

  ‘This is DC Harden,’ John said. ‘Anyone seen anything or heard anything?’

  He shook his head. ‘Very little,’ he said. He took out a notebook and flipped through it. ‘There’s an old boy who lodges down on the far side — you know, sir, the one who walks his dog along here every night? I had high hopes of him, but he was in a state of meltdown. Seems he was in the road with Fido and heard the window go. He panicked — thought it was the hooligans who rough-housed him recently — and wanted to get home a bit smart, but Fido went barking crazy and tried to run off and catch himself a villain.’

  ‘Pity he didn’t get the chance,’ Sheila remarked. ‘I wouldn’t have minded you identifying him by the pieces bitten off his bum!’

  DC Harden grinned. ‘No such luck,’ he said. ‘The old man tugged his pooch home and collapsed in his landlady’s sitting-room.’

  ‘What? Literally?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, no, not really. Fell into an armchair wheezing and panting and twitching. Scared witless, he was. She gave him so much booze he was nearly kali’d by the time we got to him. Still, at least he gave us the time.’

  ‘And he was outside but he didn’t see anyone come out of the gully?’ John asked.

  ‘No, that’s what he was scared of.’

  ‘Then our man must have gone along the lane between the garden and the brass-foundry,’ I said.

  ‘Where were you when it happened, Peter?’ John asked.

  ‘Up the other end, unfortunately, near the main road.’

  The uniformed sergeant and one of his constables joined us. The constable was carrying a small sheet of cardboard with a coloured object laid on it.

  ‘Inspector,’ the Sergeant said, ‘we’ve done the best we can in the dark. We’ve been carefully over the lawn with lamps and along the path, but we’ve left the area around the shrubs till daylight. We found this on the path, just in front of the gate.’

  He took the sheet of cardboard from his constable and laid it on the table. On top of it lay a small circular tin, about three and a half inches in diameter. The lid was printed with a colourful design of two parrots, one with a biscuit in its beak, and the name ‘McClones Water Biscuits’.

  ‘Victorian repro,’ I said. ‘The old biscuit firms made these little tins to hold samples. Now they make cheap repros out East and you can buy them in fancy goods shops and discount stores.’

  ‘Seen it before, either of you?’ John asked.

  ‘Not that one,’ I said, and Sheila shook her head.

  John looked carefully at the tin, then beckoned the Scene of Crime man to have a look. ‘Any prints on it?’ he asked.

  ‘No, sir. It would take a print well on that shiny metal, but there’s none there. Still, I’d have to dust it to be certain.’

  John lifted the cardboard and weighed it in his hand. ‘There’s something in it,’ he said. ‘It’s dry and clean so it mustn’t have been there long. You two don’t recognise it. I reckon our friend may have left us a clue at last.’

  Chapter 26

  Then there was Sawney. It didn’t make any difference that a psychopath armed with a medieval weapon was lurking in my shrubbery seeking to maim or kill the woman I loved — there was still Sawney, and his case was about to go into court.

  I suppose I could have wriggled out of it. I could have told Alasdair that I was so traumatised by the attack on Sheila that I wasn’t fit to appear in court. He’d have done it for me, but deep down I’d never have forgiven myself. Nor would Sawney. He expected personal service from me. So I gritted my teeth and ambled across the square to the Guildhall.

  He was waiting for me on the steps. He wore a blazer with the badge of some athletic association which I’m sure he never graced and his thinning hair — which varied between bright red and deep auburn had settled for a medium ginger. No greeting, just a torrent of complaints as soon as I walked up.

  ‘Do you know which court we’re in? We’re in Number One! That’s Billingham’s court, isn’t it? I’m not going to be tried by him! He’s tried me before. He’ll be prejudiced.’

  I tried suggesting that magistrates see an awful lot of defendants and they probably don’t remember many of them.

  ‘He’ll remember me,’ he declared. ‘He threatened to sentence me for contempt.’

  Major Billingham is a personification of all the traditional English virtues. I know this because he goes to some trouble to make it plain. In fact he was both stupid and bigoted. I know that because I know that he regarded me as a dangerous radical. Personally I sympathised with Sawney’s desire not to be tried by the Major’s Bench, but I wasn’t sure we could get out of it.

  ‘I’ll speak to the usher,’ I said.

  ‘Batman’ the usher — so-called because of the long black gown that he whipped about him as he strode around the lobby — buttonholed me inside the door.

  ‘Morning, Mr Tyroll. Here for Sawney, are you?’ and he jotted a note on his clipboard.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but there’s a problem.’

  ‘Problem?’ he said. ‘Problem? What problem’s that, sir?’

  ‘My client says that his case is listed before the Major’s Bench.’

  ‘That’s right, sir. Number One.’

  ‘Ah, well, you see he says that he’s been up in front of the Major before and says he was threatened with contempt.’

  The usher stared at me from behind his horn-rimmed glasses for a long moment. Then the penny dropped.

  ‘Is he suggesting that he won’t get a fair trial in front of the Major, sir?’ he said, as though the very idea was a sin against the Holy Ghost.

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘that’s what he seems to think,’ as though nothing was further from my own ideas.

  Batm
an scanned his clipboard with a disapproving frown.

  ‘Nothing can be done,’ he announced at last. ‘Number Two is taking only guilty pleas and yours is a trial. I can’t shift it over. It’d upset everything.’

  ‘What about an adjournment? If I ask for an adjournment, could we get it in front of someone else soon?’

  He delved in the papers at the back of his clipboard and a smile dawned.

  ‘We could indeed, sir. If it went over till Wednesday, we’ve got an extra court sitting Wednesday. The chairman will be Mr Birtle.’

  ‘I thought he’d retired.’

  ‘He did, sir, but he’s still commissioned and he sits now and then when we’re busy.’

  Birtle was a cadaverous old clown who was both stupid and rude. If there was a worse choice than Billingham it was Birtle.

  ‘I’ll speak to my client,’ I said. ‘I’m sure we can sort something out.’

  Sawney was by the tea and coffee machine. ‘Have you changed it?’ he demanded.

  I poked cash in the machine and drew myself a lemon tea. I smiled at him. ‘There’s no problem,’ I said. ‘We can get your case adjourned till Wednesday.’

  He looked suspicious. ‘They don’t normally take trials on Wednesdays,’ he said. ‘Who’s the chairman on Wednesday?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I lied. ‘But it won’t be Major Billingham. Ask the usher.’

  Sawney strode across the lobby and accosted Batman. Seconds later he was back, looking pale and stunned.

  ‘They’ve brought Birtle out on Wednesday!’ he exclaimed. ‘I’m not going in front of him! He committed me to Crown Court for sentence last time. Said I was a hardened offender who needed a lesson. I’m not going in front of him!’

  ‘So what do we do?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘I’ve told the usher I’ll be tried today.’

  While he got himself another drink I settled down on a bench and smiled to myself behind my Independent. At least I’d won the first round. Then I stopped smiling — I’d still got the Major to contend with.

  Sawney’s case was called after an hour or so. Once in the courtroom I could see that it wasn’t just Billingham I’d have to contend with. His two colleagues were an over-painted lady with a wide hat, whose name I have never known, and a little man in a blue suit who has sat for twelve years and never, to my knowledge, said a word.

  Sawney’s co-accused had already pleaded guilty and her case had been adjourned to await the outcome of Sawney’s trial. If he got convicted her advocate would be able to say that it was all Sawney’s fault, that he led her astray. She would get less and Sawney would get more.

  The Crown Prosecutor launched his evidence. I didn’t have a great deal to do at first, because there wasn’t anything I could do. We couldn’t deny that the radio/cassette was stolen, nor who it was stolen from, nor that it fetched up with the girl, so the first few witnesses passed quickly. Then we got to Sawney’s arrest and arrival at the police station. The first of the two arresting officers was in the witness box. According to him it had all gone like clockwork. Once in custody, Sawney had freely admitted his part in the crime and made a voluntary statement, which he now produced.

  I rose to cross-examine.

  ‘Sergeant, when you and PC Allen first spoke to Mr Sawney and made him aware of the nature of your enquiry, what did he say to you?’

  ‘He said, “She’s a liar. I don’t know anything about it.”‘

  ‘And that was after PC Allen cautioned him, so that remark is evidence, is it not?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Thank you. Now, you took him to the police station and put him in front of the custody sergeant. I’m sure you know that it is one of the custody sergeant’s duties to ensure that a proposed detainee is fit to be held in custody?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And was my client fit — in your opinion?’

  ‘He’d been shaking a bit in the car, sir, but people often do. I didn’t think he was unwell.’

  ‘You told the custody sergeant that you’d arrested my client on suspicion of theft and wished to keep him in custody in order to question him, is that right?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And my client said something to the sergeant?’

  ‘Yes, sir. He said that he felt dizzy.’

  ‘He felt dizzy,’ I repeated. ‘And what did the custody sergeant do?’

  ‘He placed him in a cell and phoned for the divisional surgeon.’

  ‘And were you still present when the surgeon arrived?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was waiting with PC Allen to interview if the doctor passed him as fit.’

  ‘Yes. Now, before he was placed in a cell, his property was taken from him, I believe?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Including two bottles of pills or capsules?’

  ‘I think there was two, sir. It’ll be on the Person In Custody form.’

  ‘Yes, we’ll come to that later, no doubt. Did my client say anything when the pills were taken from him?’

  ‘Yes, sir. He said that they were his medication and that he needed them for his dizziness.’

  ‘And what did the sergeant do?’

  ‘He said that he might have them back if the doctor said it was all right.’

  ‘So, he complains of feeling dizzy, his pills are taken from him and he is put in a cell to await the doctor. The doctor, we know, subsequently passed him as fit for interview and you and PC Allen conducted that interview, did you not?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Why was that interview not tape-recorded? Surely it has been the practice of the Central Midlands force to tape interviews for a good many years now, or even to video them if they are complex. Why was this one not recorded?’

  ‘I believe that it is perfectly within the law to make a written contemporaneous record of an interview, sir.’

  ‘So it is, sergeant, and I was not seeking advice on the law. I was asking why this particular interview was conducted differently.’

  ‘My recollection is that the station was very busy. The drugs squad had brought a number of people in from a raid and there was a queue for the two interview rooms.’

  ‘So you decided to use the old procedure?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Well, PC Allen suggested it and we asked Sergeant Grey if it was legal. He said it was and we took the accused to an office for the interview.’

  ‘I see. Now, when you had finished that interview you charged him and bailed him, yes?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘So he was not, in your opinion and that of the custody sergeant, a potential bail absconder?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Then, with all this queuing for interview rooms, and the fact that my client had complained of feeling dizzy, might it not have been better to have bailed him back to the station at a time when recording facilities would be available and interviewed him then?’

  ‘With hindsight, sir, it might have been, but we had seen the girl and we wanted to finish the job if we could.’

  ‘Ah, yes. You wanted a confession if you could possibly obtain one.’

  ‘Mr Tyroll,’ the Major interrupted. ‘Are you suggesting that there was something improper in the procedure at the interview? The old process is still legal, is it not?’ he added to his clerk.

  ‘Certainly, Your Worship.’

  ‘I am not suggesting,’ I said, ‘that the use of the old procedure was illegal. As to whether the interview was in any way improper, we have not got that far, but I am exploring the fact that the use of the written statement was unusual and that there was a reasonable alternative,’

  ‘But not illegal,’ remarked the Major.

  ‘No, sir. Merely unusual,’ I countered. He snorted.

  ‘Mr Tyroll,’ said the clerk, ‘you have been pursuing your client’s state of health at the time. Will you be calling medical evidence?’

  This was my one piece of good luck. I had extracted a report from Sawney�
��s family doctor, who was most anxious not to appear in court. As a result I had cast his report in the form of what’s called a ‘Section Nine statement’. You send these to the other side and ask them to accept it in writing to avoid calling the witness. The Crown Prosecution Service showers defence lawyers with them, but when they get one served on them they go paranoid. They automatically assume that you’re trying to slip something past them and they refuse to accept the written statement. Well, they usually do. This time they’d missed the deadline for objecting, so I had a right to use the written report.

  ‘I shall not be calling a medical witness,’ I said, smoothly. ‘But, to avoid wasting the court’s time, I have agreed a medical report with the Crown Prosecution Service and — ’

  The Prosecutor was on his feet, objecting as fast as an American. ‘It is not the case, Your Worships, that we have agreed the Defence medical report. The fact is that a report was sent to our office in the Section Nine format and that, through an oversight, I admit, we failed to object within the limit.’

  ‘What would you say to that, Mr Tyroll?’ the clerk asked.

  ‘Merely that the rules of this process are more than thirty years old, older indeed than the Crown Prosecution Service, and that they are incorporated in the text of the documents served, so that there need be no mistake. If the Prosecutor has failed to take the advantage which the law gives — whether through carelessness or any other reason — he must, I would argue, abide by the fruits of his carelessness.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Tyroll. Mr Patterson, I’m afraid I agree with Mr Tyroll and must advise Their Worships that the doctor’s statement will be admissible.’

  That was my second piece of luck.

  I returned to the witness. ‘So the surgeon having passed my client fit to be interviewed, you commenced an interview. I believe you asked the questions and PC Allen recorded the answers?’

  ‘That’s right, sir.’

  ‘And, bearing in mind that, when first told the nature of your enquiries, my client had uttered a complete denial, was he at all reluctant to answer?’

  ‘He wouldn’t answer some questions at first, sir, but he became more co-operative.’