“And did you?” Joe asked. “Sort it out, I mean?”
Rebecca’s face fell. “No. When I got there, everything was all right. The reason I got no answer on the phone was both kids were in bed.” She smiled weakly. “They would be, wouldn’t they?”
“Let me get this straight,” Hoad said, “you’re working nights here and leaving two children home alone?”
“I had no choice. I did ask if I could have days, but they told me no, and I need the money, so I took it. ”
Joe frowned. “What’s Bexley’s angle on this?”
“When I got back, I let him have a couple of hours’ kip.”
Joe leapt upon the admission. “But when you got back, he was already asleep, wasn’t he?”
Rebecca nodded. “I rang the berk from the back gates so he could stop the cameras and let me get in without it registering on tape. He was dopey as hell. Just managed to stop the cameras. I got back in and he was asleep again. I had to start everything up.”
“And that answers the how,” Joe commented. “How you manage to get out and back in without showing up on the surveillance cameras.”
“We pause them,” she confessed. “Fix the view on one end of the garden and hold the house mounted cameras just long enough for me to get back in.”
“If anyone studied those recordings properly, you could have been in serious trouble.”
“Different feeds,” Joe said. “No one would question the rear wall cameras pausing on the same spot because all Driscoll and Bexley had to do was claim they’d seen movement in the woods. And the chances of anyone here rumbling that the house cameras were stopped at the same time would be slim because until Les Tanner demonstrated it earlier, everyone was convinced the place was impregnable.”
“Is that right, Ms Driscoll?” Hoad asked.
The security guard nodded. “It’s just about the way me and Bexley figured it. Look, you don’t get this, do you? We were never put on this gig to stop people getting in. According to the TV bods, that’s impossible anyway. We were here to stop the Housies getting out. That would be a breach of contract. I guarantee no reporter could get into the place, but there was always the danger that one of the Housies had a contact with the press and maybe a mobile phone hidden in the garden.” She raised her hands slightly upwards in a gesture that took in the whole house. “The odds of these muppets winning the big prize are, like eight to one, so the TV company figure that they might wanna shorten the odds by selling stories to the papers. You get it? That’s why we’re here. Nobody in their right mind would wanna break into this gig, but the Housies might wanna break out.”
“Let’s put that aside,” Hoad said. “What time did you leave last night?”
“About half past midnight, I got back at one forty. But Bexley was on the job. No one could have got in… or out.”
Joe shook his head. “Bexley was asleep. I’ll stake a week’s takings on that.”
“Was there anything unusual when you got back?” Hoad asked. “Anything out of the ordinary?”
She shook her head miserably. “Apart from dipstick Bexley being asleep again, no.”
“Was it normal for him to be that sleepy?” Joe demanded.
“No,” Rebecca replied. “He’s a tired old git, granted, but he usually managed to stay awake when he need to.”
“And aside from that, there was nothing?” Joe demanded. “You didn’t see anyone else in or near the hall?”
She shook her head again.
“Right. We’ll speak to Bexley,” Hoad said. “Sergeant Rahman?”
“Sir?”
“Take Ms Driscoll out, and show Bexley in. Then while Mr Murray and I are talking to Bexley, you can take a formal statement from this lady.”
Rebecca clucked. “You’ll get me fired.”
“That’s not my problem,” Hoad replied. “Detective Sergeant Rahman rang you this morning and over the phone you maintained that you never left your station all night. You lied, madam, and that lie could have compromised my investigation were it not for the help of Mr Murray. Your employer may have more to say on the matter, but that’s your lookout. All I need from you is a statement of the truth. And I’ll want your home address and the name of your eldest child so I can confirm all this.”
“Aw, come on, man…”
Hoad held up a hand for silence. “Not interested. Rahman.”
The sergeant led Rebecca out, and Hoad half turned in his seat to face Joe.
“How did you guess?”
“Short of either her or Bexley killing Ursula, it was the only way it could be done,” Joe insisted. “And I did see a security guard at the Victoria Hotel. He was wearing the same uniform as these people here, so presumably works for the same company. He was having a drink in the bar. Dunno whether he was working or not, but I figured if he was, then he was stealing the company’s time.”
Hoad laughed. “You weren’t even in Chester last night.”
Joe grinned by return. “No. It was this lunchtime when I went back for Tanner.” His face became more serious. “The question we have to ask ourselves, Frank, is: did Rebecca Driscoll or Bexley kill the girl? It seems unlikely. Not only would they need access to the TV feeds which they don’t have, but they’d also need to know how to use them. I think that eliminates them. So if not one of them, then it’s a member of the crew, and that, in turn, means it’s someone who knew Rebecca’s number, knew her kids would be in bed and also knew that Rebecca was the kind of mother who would run for it if the kids were in trouble.”
“We’ll know about that when Rahman checks out her statement.”
The door opened and Rahman ushered Bexley in.
He could not be more unlike his partner. Short, tubby, his hair almost gone on top, Joe judged him to be in his early sixties, a man coasting to retirement. Carrying a bottle of water in his dumpy hands, he stared around the room like a man suspecting a trap.
“Sit down, Bexley,” Hoad invited, and while the chubby man took his place and gulped down a mouthful of water, the chief inspector introduced Joe the same way he had introduced him to Driscoll.
“There’s no great pressure,” Joe said at length. “We just want to know how come you fell asleep last night while Ms Driscoll was out attending to her kids.”
“I, er, I don’t know, er, I’m not sure…”
“Before you try to lie your way out of it,” Hoad interrupted, “your colleague has just told us exactly what went on last night. She also told us that you were supposed to keep your eyes open to cover for her, but last night you were asleep again by the time she got from the back gate to the security room.”
“I, er, I dunno. I was tired, I reckon.”
“More tired than…”
Joe interrupted Hoad before he could complete his question.
“What’s your usual routine, Ernie? From coming on duty, I mean.”
Bexley shrugged and drank from his bottle of water. “We come on shift at ten. First job is to sign the production crew off and give them back their mobile phones.”
Hoad suppressed his irritation at Joe’s interruption. “Give them their mobile phones back?”
Bexley nodded. “No one’s allowed a mobile phone while the live feeds are going out with commentary. That’s from seven of a morning until ten at night. Through the night, there’s no commentary and no crew on duty, y’see, so it’s not a problem.”
“So as the crew come in during the day, they hand their mobile phones in to security?”
Bexley nodded and drank more water.
“Once you’ve signed the crew out at ten, what next?” Joe asked.
“We just settle down and watch the monitors. All night. Unless something happens, like. Then we have to deal with it, but nothing ever happens.”
“Boring job?” Joe asked, and taking another swallow of water, Bexley nodded.
“Sleep a lot on duty, do you?” Hoad followed up.
This time Bexley shook his head. “Not really. Look, at my tim
e of life, I get a bit tired during the night. Right? We work a ten-hour shift. On at ten and we don’t get off until eight in the morning. So Rebecca, see, she lets me have an hour’s kip.”
“And last night, she had to call in the debt,” Joe suggested.
“She was panicking,” the security man agreed. “As far as I can see, there was no harm. Like I said, nothing ever happens here during the night… well nothing we can do anything about.”
“But something did happen, Bexley,” Hoad said. “Last night, while your mate was out checking on her brats, and you were sleeping, someone sneaked in, killed that poor lass, and sneaked out again.”
That was the signal for Bexley to take on more water. When he removed the bottle from his lips, he gasped in his breath and shook his head. “Not possible. It can’t be done. The cameras…”
“It can be done,” Hoad interrupted again.
“Do you drink a lot of water, Ernie?” Joe asked.
“Not normally, no. Normally I drink tea.”
“But a lot of it?” Joe insisted.
“Not really. I like a brew but in a ten-hour shift I wouldn’t have more than three or four cups.” He looked down at the bottle and then back at Joe. “Just thirsty, that’s all.”
“Nerves?” Joe asked.
Again Bexley shook his head. “Don’t think so. I think I’m sickening for something. Been thirsty as hell all day.”
“Just like the Housies,” Joe murmured.
“Can we stick to the subject?” Hoad demanded. “What time do you normally take your kip?”
“There’s no fixed time,” Bexley replied. He fiddled again with the bottle as if he were reluctant to take a drink after Joe had questioned him.
“But it’s always when Rebecca is there to cover for you? It’s not, for instance, when she’s in the lavatory, or touring the gardens?” Joe asked.
Bexley nodded. “We don’t tour the gardens or the building.”
“Whatever. Last night it went wrong, didn’t it?” Joe challenged. “You fell asleep while Rebecca was out. You couldn’t keep your eyes open, could you?”
Jitters getting the better of him, Bexley sucked on the bottle again. When he had satisfied his thirst, he pleaded, “I told you. I think I’m sickening for something.”
“And while you were giving out zeds, someone sneaked past you and murdered that girl,” Hoad snapped.
“I tell you, that can’t happen,” the security officer pleaded.
“Leave us to worry about that, Ernie,” Joe said. “Can you say with any certainty what time you nodded off?”
Bexley’s shoulders slumped. For long moments he stared at the floor, his tubby features working, worrying or trying to remember. “The company could fire me for this.”
“Your pal has already said that,” Hoad told him, “and I wasn’t interested. Just answer the question.”
“I felt sleepy not long after we came on shift,” he admitted. “I was struggling to keep my eyes open. Especially after the crew had gone home. You know, when there’s less to do. But I was awake when Rebecca left. I had to be. I had to pause the house and wall cameras so she could get out. She left about half past twelve. I reckon I must have stayed awake for another, I dunno, fifteen, maybe twenty minutes. Next thing I knew was Rebecca ringing me to let her in. That was about twenty to two.”
Hoad looked to Joe who gave the slightest of nods as a signal to the chief inspector that he was through.
“All right. You can leave. You’ll need to give a full statement to Detective Sergeant Rahman before you go home. And you won’t be needed here tonight.”
They watched him leave.
“Well?” Hoad raised his eyebrows at Joe.
“The killer had a forty, maybe fifty-minute window in which to get in, kill Ursula and get out again. It has to be one of the crew.”
Hoad stood up. “If she was murdered.”
Joe tutted and shook his head. “She was murdered, right? The bed and the cord are telling us that.”
“I prefer to rely on the post mortem.” Hoad strode to the window and looked out at the hall. “But I’ll indulge you, Joe. Tell me how it happened.”
“Someone slipped something into Bexley’s tea. Notice he said he’s been thirsty all day? Classic sign of having taken a powerful sleeping pill. Our killer knew plenty about this pair. He gave Bexley the sleeper and then waited until Driscoll left by the back gate. The killer then waited a while longer, until he was sure Bexley was asleep. It wouldn’t matter if he wasn’t. The killer, because he was a member of the crew, would have some excuse ready. Anyway, he’s out there in the woods, waiting. The time’s right. He dodges the cameras the way Les did earlier, comes in through the back door and finds Bexley asleep. He then makes his way to the control room, stops the cameras, goes to the Romping Room where he finds Ursula asleep, probably because she’s doped up to the eyeballs, too, on those painkillers of hers. The post mortem will tell us that. He hangs her, then leaves the same way he came in, using the disparity in camera sweeps to cover his tracks. All up, I’d reckon it would take a fit man, or woman, less than half an hour.”
Hoad said nothing, but continued to stare into space.
While he waited for the chief inspector to speak, Joe concentrated on his netbook and brought his notes up to date. Eventually, he saved the document and shut down the computer.
“Well?” he asked.
“It’s too wild and there are too many unanswered questions,” Hoad replied turning from the window. “I don’t have the post mortem results yet, so I don’t really know that we’re dealing with anything other than suicide.” He pressed on as Joe opened his mouth. “Yes, yes, I know about the bed and the cord, but we both know there are other possible explanations for both. I need more evidence, Joe, before I can call it a murder investigation.”
“What kind of evidence?” Joe demanded, folding the netbook away into its travelling case.
“I don’t know. Signs of a struggle; bruising to indicate she was manhandled; something in her blood. I really don’t know.”
Joe checked his watch. “Almost four o’clock. What time do you expect the post mortem results?”
“Any time now,” the chief inspector said. “Look, Joe, you’ve demonstrated that someone could have got into the house, but there are questions you haven’t answered yet. There are about 150 cameras covering every cubic inch of this house. There are two on the first floor landing to get to the Romping Room, our killer would have to disable those two at least. Possibly more. If that had happened, every nerd following the online streaming would have been up in arms. Our preliminary view of the overnight footage indicates no break in transmission. How are you going to get round that?”
“Stock feeds, I think.” Joe chewed his lip. “Katy gave me a rundown of them when we were out in the garden, but we need to know more. What say we talk to this director, Scott Naughton?”
***
Back in the control room, Joe marvelled once more at the morass of monitors, computer drives and the massed control panel. “How the hell do you sort all this out?” he asked.
“It’s not difficult when you know how,” Naughton replied, with a gesture at the large, single monitor. “This is our master feed. It’s what the viewers see at home. I can switch feeds from any of the cameras at any time.”
He scanned the bank of monitors and homed in on a view of two Housies in the kitchen. Turning to his assistant, he said, “Switch to 33.”
The scene on the large monitor switched from the lounge to the kitchen.
“So that’s what the viewers are seeing at home, right now?” Joe asked.
“No.” Naughton shook his head. “It’s what the viewers would be seeing. We shut down within five minutes of confirming that Ursula was hanging. As far as I’m aware, the channel is now running old John Wayne movies.”
Joe grunted his approval. “Good for them.”
Naughton put on a face of pure agony. “Come on. John Wayne?”
&
nbsp; “I know what you mean,” Joe said, “but he’s still preferable to the garbage you’re putting out.”
“I have a mortgage to pay,” Naughton told him. “I can’t afford altruism.”
“Yeah, right. I know what you mean. Even I buy frozen pies during busy times, too. Katy mentioned something about stock feeds earlier. Tell me, what do you do in the event of a breakdown? I mean, I know this stuff is reliable, but don’t tell me you don’t get technical problems with the cameras now and then.”
“True enough,” the director agreed. He waved again at the monitors. “For each of our cameras, there’s a technical hatch where we can reach in, remove a camera and replace it if it goes on the blink.”
“So I’ve been told,” Joe reported, “but what about your web surfers? They can access any view at any time so I’m told. They’ll see the technician at work, won’t they? And if the Housies are nearby it means they’re having contact with the outside world which is against the rules.”
Again the director shook his head. “That is precisely when we run the stock feeds. If we have a breakdown the Housies are ordered away from the room and we run a stock feed until the camera is swapped.”
“And you have those stock feeds to hand?” Hoad asked.
“They’re a part of our backup recordings.”
“Ah. I wanted to ask about that,” Joe said. “I know you techie guys. You always back everything up. That’s like me putting two Yorkshire puddings in the oven just in case one doesn’t rise.”
Naughton frowned. “I suppose so.” His brow creased further. “Do you do that? Put two Yorkshires in the oven? As a backup?”
“Do I hell as like. My Yorkshires always rise. I was just pointing out the futility of it. You store backups in case something goes wrong, but it’s rare that anything actually goes wrong.” Joe took out his tobacco tin and began to roll a cigarette. “So, how do you store these backups? Videotape or DVD or something.”
Naughton’s face turned to one of sour disdain. “Stick to your Yorkshire puddings, Murray.”
“No, no, I mean it. I want to know.”
“You’re living in the Stone Age,” Naughton told him. “They used Videotape on the Ark and Columbus played with DVDs on the Santa Maria. Everything these days is digital. We store the feeds as digital files.”
The I-Spy Murders Page 13