Guilty Not Guilty

by Felix Francis

‘Comes to all of us in the end, I suppose. Always too soon.’

  It certainly was for Amelia.

  ‘I hear you had some friends from Weybridge come to see you,’ I said, getting straight to the point of my visit. ‘That was nice.’

  ‘Jim and Gladys,’ she agreed, nodding. ‘They lived next door to Reg and me for nearly thirty years. They’re a lovely couple. Our best friends.’

  ‘Have I ever met them?’ I asked.

  ‘You may have. I’m sure they would have been invited to your wedding up in Wales. But maybe they didn’t come. I can’t really remember. Don’t seem to remember much these days.’

  ‘What’s their surname?’ I asked.

  ‘Wilson,’ she said, remembering that with ease. ‘Jim and Gladys Wilson. He was a stockbroker, same as Reg. But he’s been retired a long time now.’

  Mary poured hot water into two cups containing instant coffee and handed one to me. ‘Milk and sugar?’

  ‘Just a little milk.’

  She poured it from a plastic bottle and gave the mixture a stir. We both sat down at the kitchen table.

  ‘What did you and the Wilsons talk about?’ I asked.

  ‘Our ailments mostly,’ she said with a hollow laugh. ‘We’ve all got so much wrong with us that it’s a miracle we’re still here.’

  ‘Anything else?’ I asked, pushing hard.

  ‘Old neighbours and friends and how so many of them have recently dropped off the perch.’

  ‘Do they get on well with the people who bought your house?’ I asked.

  ‘They seem to. Gladys said they are not as nice as neighbours as we were but I think she’s just being kind. They’re much younger than we were, of course. A new generation.’

  Try as I might, I couldn’t get Mary to speak any more about what the Wilsons had said about the sale of her house. Maybe she hadn’t heard or perhaps she had forgotten. Probably the latter.

  She sighed and looked at me. ‘Don’t get old, Bill. It’s not much fun.’

  Amelia would never get old. Just like James Dean and Marilyn Monroe. And neither of those two would have retained their fascination and glamour for such a long time if they were now in their dotage, confined to a nursing home, doubly incontinent and with senile dementia. Maybe there was some advantage in dying young, but not for those of us left behind.

  I drank some more of my coffee and we sat in silence for a while.

  ‘I miss her terribly, you know,’ Mary said unhappily.

  ‘So do I.’

  Tears rolled down Mary’s cheeks and dripped onto her scrubbed pine kitchen table. It was as much as I could do not to cry with her.

  And straight into this tableau of misery walked Joe Bradbury.

  ‘Hi, Mum, it’s only me,’ he called as he walked through the front door. ‘What is Amelia’s car doing outside?’

  He came into the kitchen and saw me.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ he shouted. ‘Get out of here at once.’

  ‘I’ll leave only if your mother asks me to.’

  He turned to her. ‘Tell him to get out,’ he demanded.

  ‘Now, now, dear,’ Mary said. ‘Why can’t you two be friends?’

  ‘Friends?’ he screamed. ‘With him? Don’t be stupid. He killed your daughter.’

  ‘I did not,’ I said. ‘And you know it.’

  ‘Get out,’ he shouted at me again.

  I remained exactly where I was. I was fed up with always taking the course of least resistance, of not antagonising him in order to have a quiet life. It was time to stand up to his bullyboy tactics and face him down. But what I hadn’t expected was for him to grab a large carving knife from the block beside the cooker.

  ‘Now, get out,’ he said, brandishing the eight-inch blade in my direction. ‘I won’t ask you again.’

  My heart was racing faster than a filly’s in the Nunthorpe Stakes, but still I didn’t stand up.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ I asked in as level a tone as I could manage. ‘Kill me too?’

  ‘Joe, put the knife down,’ Mary said, but he took absolutely no notice of her and it suddenly dawned on me that he might use it. Perhaps it was time to heed the old adage that he who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.

  ‘Okay, okay,’ I said, standing up. ‘I’m going.’

  I backed my way into the hall, never taking my eyes off the knife. Joe followed me.

  ‘Bye, Mary,’ I shouted past him.

  ‘Bye, Bill dear,’ she replied, seemingly totally unaware of the seriousness of the situation.

  That seemed to make Joe even more angry.

  ‘You leave my mother alone, do you hear,’ he hissed. ‘Come here again and I’ll kill you.’

  ‘Developed a taste for killing people, have you, Joe?’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘I just wondered if you enjoyed strangling your own sister?’

  ‘I didn’t kill her,’ he said, his lips drawn back in a frightening grimace of hate. ‘You did that. You’d been killing her for years, cutting her off from her true family and driving her crazy. I loathe you. In fact, I’d be doing everyone a favour by killing you. Everyone knows you’re a murderer. They’ll say you got your just deserts.’

  I now became genuinely worried. He was demented and, perhaps for the first time, I thought he was truly mad. And mad people act impulsively and to hell with the consequences.

  The time for goading him was past. Now, I had to concentrate on getting out of this alive.

  I continued to back across the hall until I could feel the front door behind me. He followed, getting ever closer, the knife held out in front, his manic staring eyes clearly visible behind his glasses.

  ‘Come on, Joe,’ I said in as consolatory a tone as I could muster under the circumstances. ‘Don’t do anything silly. Put the knife down.’

  Try as I might, I couldn’t keep the fear out of my voice, and Joe liked it.

  He smiled at me. ‘Frightened, are you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’m frightened how your mother will cope for her last few months on her own, without both her daughter and her son. Amelia is dead and you’ll be in prison for murder.’

  ‘I’ll claim self-defence,’ he said. ‘Protecting myself from a murderer.’

  ‘The police know that I didn’t murder Amelia. I can prove I was in Birmingham all night.’

  He took no notice, advancing to within a couple of feet. I pressed my back up against the door, and, to open it, I would have to move towards him.

  I didn’t.

  ‘You’re lying,’ he barked. ‘Everyone knows you’re a killer. Read the papers. It even says so on your garage door.’

  So had it been he who had painted that? I suppose I should be grateful he hadn’t burned the whole place down while he was at it.

  I felt around behind me with my hands, searching for some sort of weapon or at least something to shield me from the stabbing thrust that I knew was coming. But there was nothing.

  He smiled again. He was enjoying himself.

  His arm went back.

  ‘Joseph!’ snapped his mother from the kitchen door. ‘Stop it! Stop it right now.’

  He hesitated, just for an instant, glancing over his shoulder towards her.

  I needed no second invitation. I lurched forward, pushed him away and was out through the front door quicker than a greyhound leaving the starting traps.

  I ran to Amelia’s car and jumped in, locking the doors from the inside.

  Joe had parked his black Nissan immediately behind the Fiat so I couldn’t reverse out. Instead I engaged forward gear, gunned the engine, and drove sharply left, bouncing over the front lawn and then out through the gate onto the road. Amelia would have been horrified at how I treated her beloved 500.

  But I was shaking so much that I had to stop in order to avoid hitting something, all the while keeping my eyes firmly fixed on the rear-view mirror, just in case Joe had decided to follow. Thankfully, he hadn’t,
and the road behind remained clear.

  Gradually, I recovered my composure and I drove to Banbury without mishap, pulling up in front of the police station.

  I went in to report the incident.

  DS Dowdeswell came out to the lobby to see me.

  ‘Ah, Mr Gordon-Russell,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you’ve come in. I was about to come looking for you.’

  ‘Why is that?’ I asked with rising trepidation.

  ‘We’ve just had an emergency call from Mr Joseph Bradbury. He’s accused you of threatening him with a carving knife.’

  22

  I found myself back in the same interview room as before, this time questioned under caution on suspicion of engaging in threatening behaviour with a bladed weapon.

  ‘It’s not true,’ I said. ‘In fact, quite the reverse is the case. He threatened me with a carving knife and, what’s more, he said he’d kill me if I ever went to see his mother again.’

  ‘So you admit that you’ve been there this morning, then?’ said the DS.

  ‘Yes, of course. I went to visit Mary Bradbury.’

  ‘Why was that?’ he asked.

  In the cold light of day, it seemed like a very good question. Why, indeed, had I gone there? I could have phoned her for the information about the Wilsons.

  ‘Why shouldn’t I go and see my mother-in-law?’ I said. ‘The poor woman has just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Amelia and I were a huge part of her life for so many years, that was until Joe Bradbury convinced her that I’m the devil incarnate.’

  I was getting quite worked up. To coin one of Joe Bradbury’s favourite phrases: How could he? How could he accuse me when it had all been his doing?

  I made a conscious effort to relax, as being angry wouldn’t help my current predicament one bit.

  ‘Have you spoken to Mary Bradbury?’ I asked calmly. ‘I am sure she will corroborate everything I’ve said. I’m in no doubt that it was only her intervention that enabled me to get out of her house alive.’

  ‘Mr Bradbury claims you verbally abused his mother in a highly aggressive manner and he says that she is too upset by the incident to be interviewed at the present time.’

  ‘And you believe him?’ I asked incredulously. ‘Have you learned nothing? The man is a pathological liar.’

  ‘That’s precisely what he says about you.’

  ‘I will tell you exactly what happened.’

  I went through everything, leaving out only the conversation I’d had with Mary about the Wilsons. I felt, right now, that it would simply confuse matters and I wanted to investigate what Nancy Fadeley had said a little more before I made any accusations to the authorities. It certainly wouldn’t help my cause if the police investigated and it turned out to be all a pile of tosh.

  ‘Get your forensic team over to Mary Bradbury’s house,’ I said. ‘You won’t find my fingerprints on any of her knives. I never touched them.’

  He waved a dismissive hand, suggesting that his forensic team had far more important things to be dealing with.

  ‘So,’ I said. ‘Are you going to charge me or not? I have other things I need to be getting on with, like fixing the lock on my back door.’

  ‘Wait here,’ he said, and he went out, no doubt to confer with his superiors.

  I just couldn’t believe what was happening.

  How did Joe Bradbury have the nerve?

  He must have worked out that I would go straight to the police and hence he’d decided to get his accusation in first. What I couldn’t understand was why they believed him. It was a clear demonstration of how much they didn’t trust me.

  The detective sergeant returned.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘You’re free to go for the time being. But we will continue to investigate this incident.’

  ‘You just do that,’ I said. ‘It will prove what I’m saying is the truth.’

  I started to walk out but I turned back.

  ‘And when are you going to stop treating me as a suspect for my wife’s murder? You must realise by now that I couldn’t have done it.’

  ‘Releasing you from the investigation would have to be a decision of DCI Priestly.’

  ‘So where is he?’

  ‘What? Now?’

  ‘Yes. Right now,’ I said. ‘I want to speak to him.’

  ‘But it’s Saturday,’ he said.

  ‘So? You’re working, aren’t you?’ Which I had to admit was a bit of a surprise. ‘Get him on the phone.’

  ‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible,’ said the detective. ‘Yes, I am working, but he is not. He has the weekend off.’

  I thought I could detect a slight touch of envy in his voice, as if weekends off during a murder investigation were the exclusive domain only of senior officers.

  ‘Well, first thing on Monday morning, you tell him from me that I should no longer be under arrest or considered as a suspect. And I also demand a statement be made by the police to the press confirming that fact.’

  He gave me a look, which implied that that was not going to happen.

  ‘Otherwise,’ I went on, ‘I will lodge a lawsuit with the courts citing wrongful arrest and police harassment. You have no evidence against me, you never have had, and you know it. It is absolutely disgraceful the way I’ve been treated both by you and the media. I am one of the victims here. My darling wife has been murdered.’

  ‘We did have reasonable grounds for arresting you,’ the DS protested.

  ‘What reasonable grounds? Accusations by Joe Bradbury and a life insurance policy? Don’t make me laugh. That’s not evidence. It’s Joe Bradbury you should be arresting, both for killing his sister and for threatening to kill me.’

  I didn’t want to argue the point with him any further. I’d need to speak to a lawyer. So I marched out of the police station and climbed back into the Fiat.

  Needless to say, I didn’t go home and fix the lock on my back door.

  I went to Weybridge instead.

  *

  I parked on Elgin Crescent, on St George’s Hill, in front of the house that Reginald and Mary Bradbury had once lived in.

  I had been to this address many times, both during the years I had courted their daughter and after we were married. Sunday lunches of roast beef plus all the trimmings had always been a favourite.

  I got out of the car and stood looking at it through its wrought-iron gates.

  Set back behind an evergreen yew hedge, the property had changed little in the three years since Mary had left, but I had forgotten how big it was. I suppose it would have had to be big to have been sold for more than three million quid. Such was the opulence of exclusive developments in London’s leafy Surrey suburbs.

  I walked up and down the road looking at the houses on either side, trying to see which of them was a likely candidate as a home for the Wilsons. The one on the right was undergoing some work with a concrete mixer and a stack of breeze blocks visible on the drive.

  I decided to try the other side first, on the grounds that a mature couple might not bother with renovations after such a long time in the property. Also, it had no locked gates with an intercom button, as the others did. It was all too easy to tell someone standing at the gate to get lost via a disembodied speaker. Less so when they were face to face at the front door.

  I pushed the bell and waited.

  Nothing happened.

  I pushed the bell again, longer this time, and I could faintly hear a ringing deep in the premises.

  I was about to go when I heard a bolt being drawn back. Then the door opened about four inches, brought up short by a sturdy-looking security chain.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said a male voice through the crack. ‘We don’t want to buy anything. Please go away.’

  ‘That’s all right then,’ I replied jauntily. ‘Because I’m not selling. Are you Mr Wilson?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right,’ said the voice with a hint of surprise.

  ‘Mr Jim Wilson,’ I said. ‘Married to Gladys?’
>
  ‘Who are you?’ asked the voice, the door still open just four inches against the chain.

  ‘I’m Mary Bradbury’s son-in-law.’

  The door closed briefly and I could hear the chain being removed. When it reopened wide I could see a small grey-haired man I took to be in his late seventies standing there.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ he said. ‘Have you come to tell us bad news? We saw Mary two weeks ago and she didn’t look at all well then.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘No bad news. I was with her earlier this morning.’

  ‘Oh, good,’ Jim Wilson said, now smiling. ‘I’m so pleased. Gladys and I are very fond of Mary. But I do fear she won’t be with us for much longer.’

  ‘I’m afraid that you’re right,’ I said. ‘She’s had rather a bad diagnosis.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said gloomily. ‘She told us.’

  It was my turn to be surprised. If Mary had told the Wilsons two weeks ago that she had cancer, then why hadn’t Amelia known about it?

  Mr Wilson looked at me.

  ‘So how can I help you?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s a bit delicate to talk about out here,’ I said. ‘Could I come in?’

  He hesitated, clearly debating with himself whether it was wise. He decided that it was, and he stepped to one side and waved me in.

  ‘Come through to the kitchen,’ he said. ‘Gladys and I are just having a spot of breakfast.’ He laughed. ‘We tend not to get up very early these days so we never have breakfast before eleven, and then we have our lunch in the middle of the afternoon.’

  ‘Very sensible,’ I said. ‘I hate getting up early. All those cold dark mornings are best avoided.’

  He smiled at me and I wondered if he thought I was taking the mickey.

  Because I was.

  But I found I liked Jim Wilson, and Gladys turned out to be a treat as well.

  They were having smoked salmon and cream cheese on toasted bagels. Quite a breakfast.

  ‘Would you like one?’ Gladys said. ‘I have plenty more in the fridge.’

  ‘That would be lovely,’ I said, realising that I’d also had nothing to eat so far today.

  Gladys fetched another bagel, cut it in two and put the halves in the toaster.

  ‘Poor dear Mary,’ Gladys said. ‘First she hears about the cancer and then her sweet Amelia gets killed. We saw Amelia very recently, you know. She was with Mary when we went to visit. What a dreadful business. I just can’t bear it that such a lovely girl was murdered. And in her own house, too. I hope that horrid husband of hers gets what’s coming to him.’