Time and Tide

by Peter Grainger

  Next, the DCI summarised their interview with his aunt earlier that morning, and then she pointed out to Williams the discrepancies, beginning with the most obvious – Julie Shapiro had met Bernard Sokoloff before, in the bar of the very pub in which Mark Williams had claimed Mr Sokoloff had never set foot. And further, Reeve had said, we have evidence to indicate that Sokoloff had actually stayed in The Queens Arms on or around the 17th of July.

  Williams looked down at the item on the table beside Smith – the register had been put into a transparent evidence bag, and Waters had even stuck a handwritten label onto it that said “Exhibit One”. Ludicrous, of course, but Williams didn’t know that. He had no criminal record – that had been double-checked – and therefore all he knew of these procedures had been gained from paperbacks and Police Five on the television.

  Williams had lost most of his pugnaciousness. It had become clear to him now that things had moved on, and that he was in some sort of trouble – he was preoccupied, most likely, with trying to work out just how much trouble.

  He said, ‘Can’t be no evidence in that register.’

  Smith said, ‘No, because you removed it, Mark. But we do have the evidence that you removed the evidence, and when this goes in front of a jury, your brief is going to have to convince them that it’s purely a coincidence that on the date in question, your guest register has been falsified. So make sure you get a good one.’

  Williams shook his head as he said, ‘I’m not going in front of no jury, man!’

  Reeve said, ‘I don’t see what is making you so sure of that, Mr Williams. I was not in this room a couple of days ago when you were first interviewed but I have watched the video of it. Sergeant Smith said then quite clearly that he believed you to be lying, and he gave you opportunities to tell us the truth about what took place between you and Bernard Sokoloff. You refused them, and Sergeant Smith said, after that, “Au revoir, then,” meaning that he knew we would soon be interviewing you again. And here we are.’

  She let him think it over, and then added, ‘I have to tell you, Mr Williams, that in these matters, Sergeant Smith is almost invariably proved correct in the end.’

  For Williams’ benefit, Smith looked a little surprised at the “almost”, but he was sensing now that the fight had gone out of the Welshman, and he could only think of one reason why that might have happened – Williams was implicated in something serious and he did not have the experience of police interviews needed to pretend any longer that he was not. For about the six hundred and thirty fourth time in his career, Smith took the decision to abandon the interview plan that had been agreed.

  ‘Mark, you mustn’t take this personally. We’re not out to get you because you’re you. Our job is only to find out the truth and then pass it on to someone else who will decide what to do with it. We do this all day long, month in, month out, and we’ve got quite good at it.’

  He stopped to make sure that Williams was listening.

  ‘So look at this from our point of view. We’ve now had interviews with two ladies, Marjorie and your aunt – who you obviously care about – and what they have told us doesn’t agree with what you’ve told us. We have to ask ourselves, why would those ladies be lying, if they are at all? We have to ask ourselves, whom are we most likely to believe? Especially, when we get things from you like “I went to see this married woman but I can never tell you who she is”. Really, Mark? You must know we can’t just accept things like that, not now that we know the story about what Julie has been involved in with this Francis Jacobs character.’

  It was a shot to nothing but it scored a direct hit – Williams could not have looked more concerned if Smith had leaned across the table and tried to pinch his cheek between finger and thumb. They had not asked Julie Shapiro how much her nephew knew, but it was clear that he knew much if not all.

  Smith was looking at DCI Reeve as she studied Williams – and Smith was sure that she would see exactly what he was seeing. Then she nodded to him, the nod which meant go on, your play. She was giving him the free hand that Detective Inspector Terek would not, and perhaps could not have done. That was why she had taken the interview herself and brought Smith along with her.

  ‘You see, Mark, we know all that now. We know that Sokoloff was an old friend of Frankie Jacobs. We know about the court case in 2014, the libel case, and we know what the judge in it said. We know about the letter Julie’s lawyers sent to Jacobs’ lawyers in June, and we can be pretty certain that’s why Bernard Sokoloff turned up the first time at the pub on the 17th of July. We know from your aunt that there was some unpleasantness and that you and some of the regulars threw him out. Speaking purely for myself, Mark, I can see why you did – I don’t much like what I’ve heard about Mr Sokoloff.’

  Williams had become very still, making no eye contact with either of them.

  Smith said, ‘And from there, it isn’t too much of a leap for us to guess why Bernard Sokoloff came back to The Queens Arms the weekend before last. I’d say that Julie’s publishers have decided to go ahead, and Mr Jacobs decided to have another go at changing your minds. Sokoloff was, to use a bit of colloquial language, heavy duty in his time, Mark, and perfectly capable of frightening a lot of people, but somebody took him out of the picture. And that is why you are sitting here this afternoon – because we now know that you have a motive – he was threatening your aunt – and that you had the opportunity. Because on the night Bernard Sokoloff was murdered, you cannot explain your whereabouts after just gone eleven o’clock.’

  ‘Alright, then!’

  For a moment, Mark Williams was almost back to his old self; Alison Reeve and Smith waited expectantly to see how much was about to appear in the tray of the slot machine they had been patiently playing for the past half an hour.

  ‘Her name is Pauline Beavan. She lives at 18b in The Old Granary apartments in Holt. And for Christ’s sake be bloody discreet if you go there, man. Her husband’s a copper.’

  Chapter Thirty Three

  ‘It checks out, so far. Craig Beavan is a traffic bod in Norwich, an advanced skills driver, been in the force for twelve years. The same address as Mark Williams just gave us.’

  Smith had looked into it himself. Whenever people in the job get involved, even as indirectly as this, it’s horrible; he didn’t want to land that on anyone in his team, and the fewer officers that knew about this at the moment, the better.

  Reeve said, ‘I was not expecting that, DC. If she looks straight and alibis him for the Saturday night, I’m not sure where that leaves us.’

  ‘Agreed. I was going over it while I waited for those details on Beavan. If Williams now comes up with a story for the 17th of July, someone’s driving him back to Overy again this afternoon. He’s no Moriarty, but he’s probably worked that much out for himself.’

  Most senior officers would call a meeting at this point. Thankfully, Alison Reeve shared Smith’s view that sometimes it’s better to act than to meet and discuss, especially if Superintendent Allen was in the building and got wind of another meeting to attend.

  She said, ‘Alright. I’ll see if Norwich have got any uniform on the road near Holt. If they have, I’ll ask them to check the address and see if she’s at home – we’re due another break on this one now. If she is, I’ll go myself, with Serena Butler. Definitely better as an all-girls interview. It’s about forty five minutes to drive. Can you keep Williams occupied?’

  ‘No need – I’ll just tell him what we’re doing. We’ll talk about the 17th of July in the meantime, and I’ll say that if his girlfriend confirms he was with her the weekend before last, we’ll take him home.’

  Reeve thought it over.

  ‘Fair enough. We could use a look at his mobile, if he has it.’

  ‘Need to arrest him for that, I think. And it would have to be the big charge to override the need for a warrant to search it. We don’t have anywhere near enough for that.’

  She was getting ready to leave him and go in pu
rsuit of the unfortunate Mrs Beavan.

  ‘I know. Sod it! I thought we had him just now. Take Simon back in with you.’

  ‘I think you mean DI Terek, ma’am. And I think he’s taking over from you, rather than me taking him in.’

  ‘Yes, obviously. I’ll see him now before I get on the phone. Of course, if Pauline Beavan isn’t home, it doesn’t matter. Hang on until we know.’

  ‘And it might be worth checking that Craig Beavan was actually working nights on the 10th. Minor detail, maybe, but…’

  ‘Of course, DC. Is there anything else you’d like me to sort out while I’m at it?’

  He made the face that says he’s seriously going to think it over – DCI Reeve didn’t wait for the answer.

  Reeve and Butler left within twenty minutes of that conversation. The lucky break had been that a patrol was parked five minutes from The Old Granary; one of the officers had knocked and said there had been reports of a disturbance, had the lady seen or heard anything? She had not, of course. It was only on the drive to Holt that Reeve wondered whether either of those officers knew she was the wife of Craig Beavan. If so, she might soon be having a more difficult interview than the one she was about to have with the detectives from Kings Lake.

  Before they went back into the interview room, Terek told Smith that he had seen most of what had already taken place on the live feed. He said then, ‘You had him going there. He was on the ropes. Was that all about this married woman?’

  ‘Personally, sir, I don’t think so. I’m still convinced that he knows more than he’s telling us, even if he was thirty five miles away and halfway to paradise.’

  ‘Halfway to paradise? You don’t know this Beavan woman personally, do you?’

  ‘Er, no sir, it was just a figure of speech. I meant…’

  But there seemed to be no point in explaining it. Terek accepted the lapse into silence and they entered the interview room. Smith explained to Mark Williams that they were going to confirm his alibi for the 10th of September right away, so that they need not detain him any longer, and Mark Williams didn’t look particularly grateful.

  ‘Or at least,’ added Smith, ‘we won’t detain you once you’ve told us what took place when Bernard Sokoloff first paid a visit to The Queens Arms. It was on the 17th of July, just in case you’ve forgotten. Your aunt hasn’t. Let’s hope that what you’re about to tell us matches up, Mark.’

  Sokoloff had stayed at The Queens Arms on the night of the 16th of July. A big man on his own and that smartly dressed had been a bit unusual, Williams said, but there had been little conversation with him. He ate breakfast, went out and came back for the evening meal – the booking had been for the following night as well. But before the meal was served, Julie Shapiro had made one of her infrequent appearances in the public bar. She asked for her usual lemonade and lime, and as she stood waiting for it, the man, Sokoloff, came and stood by her side. He leaned down towards her and began to speak quietly, and within seconds Williams had seen the look of fear and shock on his aunt’s face. She moved away from the man as her nephew was moving towards him. When he was between them, he asked Julie what had been said, whether the man, Sokoloff, had made some sort of lewd suggestion but it was worse than that. He had said words to this effect – “Try to publish your book again and you’ll lose more than a court case. An old place like this will burn down in a matter of minutes.”

  For Smith, this at least had the ring of truth. It was there in Sokoloff’s record, the two arson investigations in which he had been a suspect all those years ago. Perhaps he had been chosen for the job with more care than they had realised.

  Terek said, ‘What happened then, Mr Williams?’

  ‘We threw the bastard out, didn’t we? It was obvious he’d just been waitin’ until she appeared so he could say his piece.’

  ‘You threw him out? Please tell us exactly what happened. Who did what? Who said what to whom?’

  Smith already had his own next question ready but he waited then; this was the first time that he had seen Terek at work in an interview room, and it wasn’t bad – the methodical, meticulous approach. There is a world of difference between saying what you did and explaining exactly how you did it. If you are set on telling the truth, it tests your memory; if you are lying, it will test your imagination. How much imagination does a man like Mark Williams have?

  ‘Can’t remember every bloody word! It was months ago!’

  Both detectives were staring back at him and waiting.

  ‘I took her out of the bar and back upstairs. Then I went to his room, stuffed everything into his bag, went back down. I gave him the bag and told him to eff off.’

  Terek said, ‘And are you saying that’s what he did, without making further threats?’

  ‘Yes. He weren’t going to take us all on, was he?’

  ‘And you never saw him again until Saturday the tenth of September?’

  In cricketing terms, it was a full toss. Williams had seen it coming, waited and then struck it for six.

  ‘That was the last I saw of him, that day in July.’

  ‘You had no idea that he was outside your pub on the night of the tenth of September?’

  ‘No. Not that surprising though, is it? Back to make more threats. But whatever he was up to, it went wrong, and I can’t say I’m sorry. Piece of filth. Good riddance!’

  Terek gave Smith the nod he was waiting for.

  ‘Mark – earlier on you said “We threw the bastard out”, and then just now you said, “He weren’t going to take us all on, was he?” Who else was involved in the confrontation with Sokoloff?’

  ‘Some of the regulars. None of them would see any harm done to Julie.’

  ‘I see… But we are going to need some names, Mark. This is a murder investigation. We can’t just leave it at “some of the regulars”, can we?’

  Williams had grown in confidence again during the past few minutes but there was evasiveness in his face again at that; after the luxury of the full toss from Terek, it was time for a bouncer.

  ‘And I must remind you, Mark, that you’ve got a bit of previous as far as lists of names are concerned. You missed a couple off last time. I’ve managed to fill those in for myself since.’

  Smith had a hundred and one ways of making you believe that he knew more than you wanted him to know – whether he actually did so soon became almost irrelevant. Reeve once described it as “mild-mannered menace”, and Mark Williams was staring it in the face now.

  ‘What I mean to say is, Mark, it would be a bit unfortunate if you missed off the same two names again.’

  So, Peter Vince and Johnny Fisher had assisted in the removal of Sokoloff on the 17th of July. Even though the tapes and cameras were running, Smith wrote that down in his notebook, and Williams watched him do so.

  Smith said, ‘Anyone else? What about the chap who’s been propping up your bar every time I’ve paid you a visit? Sits on his own on the bar-stool.’

  Williams laughed as he said, ‘Tally? Tally Crick! Tally couldn’t throw a moth out of the pub toilet! I expect he was there, usually is. Nowhere else to go, has he? Poor sod.’

  It wasn’t the kindest of laughter.

  There was a knock at the door of the interview room, and Waters stepped inside, indicating that he needed to speak to Detective Inspector Terek. The two of them then left the room. Smith made a show of relaxing, smiled and raised his eyebrows towards Williams, as if to say. dear me, what a lot of fuss over one dead heavy.

  He let the quiet grow for maybe thirty seconds before he said, ‘It would have saved a lot of bother if you’d told us all this the first time around. Why didn’t you?’

  ‘She hates any publicity, any of the media poking around. There was too much of that for years on end. She can’t abide it. When we had this to-do with ’im, she said not to involve anyone else, just keep it quiet. We thought that was it, see, thought it was over. When you came asking about ’im, we did the same. Then when you said he was
dead, too late wasn’t it? Stupid. I should ’ave said something straight away.’

  Smith nodded sympathetically, and waited again, long enough for Williams to begin to think it was over.

  ‘And the register? What happened there?’

  The answer came too quickly, definitely one that he had prepared earlier.

  ‘Nothing to do with it. Someone spilled a drink on the bar, and I hadn’t put it away. My own fault. I did put in the fresh page, copied it from the old one.’

  ‘When?’

  Williams didn’t want to hesitate but he had no choice – he was fly enough to see why that was the critical question. To say it had been done after last Wednesday, after he had first been questioned, would be more than the stupidity he had already admitted to – it would be verging on the suicidal. So he had to say that it had happened, this spilling of the drink, much further back, not long after the 17th of July, but he couldn’t say it happened on the very day because he had filled in all the other names after it; if it had happened on the same day – when the register might legitimately have been left open at that page – there would have been no need for the subterfuge, the sticking in of a fake page. Just tear out the spoiled page and begin a new one. Oh, what a tangled web it is, Mr Williams…

  ‘Well, you can’t expect me to remember that exactly. Must have been a few days after we threw him out, I expect.’

  Smith picked up the register and examined it through the clear plastic wallet. Nothing – no sign of a spillage when he looked end on at the closed pages, no stains on the cover. He put it back on the table, looked at Williams and said simply, ‘Alright, then.’

  Terek walked back into the room. His glance told Smith enough, and so there was no surprise when the detective inspector said to Williams, ‘Thank you for your cooperation this morning. I cannot promise that we won’t need to speak to you again, Mr Williams, but someone will drive you back to Overy shortly.’