THE DARING NIGHT

by Robert McCracken

  ‘I’m not talking about Harbinson’s. Our enquiry is focussed upon your husband.’

  ‘But this is ridiculous! Toby would not be involved in anything like this.’

  ‘Can you tell me where he is right now?’

  Ewing’s face grew even paler, her eyes darting with nerves.

  ‘At work, I suppose… but…?’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Ewing. Some of our officers will be here later. They will have a warrant to search this property.’

  ‘I don’t understand. You must be wrong about this, Inspector.’

  ‘Please remain here until your house has been searched. If you are in contact with your husband, please suggest to him that he calls us.’

  Tara and Murray left the woman dealing with news she could never have imagined. She watched through her window as the detectives drove away.

  ‘Seems like she hadn’t a clue what her husband was up to,’ said Murray.

  ‘Yes, but I don’t think that will stop her from trying to warn him off. Although I expect he is already out of the country by now.’

  CHAPTER 55

  DC Wilson showed Tara through the CCTV footage they had isolated that pointed to Toby Ewing as the main suspect for the poisoning of food in several supermarkets around the city. The young detective, however, had still not produced a clear image of the man pictured, apparently spiking food with the deadly toxin. The evidence was more circumstantial. They had recordings of a man, unidentified, acting suspiciously in several stores. They had a clear image of a 1972 Triumph Stag, its licence plate linked to Toby Ewing and the vehicle recorded in the car parks of the same stores around the time the man had spiked the food. They could not say unequivocally that the culprit was Toby Ewing. Considering, however, his attack on Tara, it left the police in little doubt over who was responsible.

  Tara, of course, was desperate to establish why Maggie Hull and Jez Riordan had been killed. She still suspected that Jez had had some involvement in the scheme. Jez’s career history suggested that she would have been the person who had supplied the toxin to Ewing. While the search continued for Toby, the CEO of Harbinson Fine Foods, Edward Harbinson had been brought to St Anne Street. Tara hoped that he would now be prepared to explain a lot more about the affair than he had so far revealed.

  When Tara and Murray entered the interview room, a seething Edward Harbinson was seated next to his solicitor, Geoffrey Forbes, a man of similar age and stature to his client but with a shiny face and bald head. For some reason, he had cause to smile at Tara when she sat opposite him. She assumed he was bemused by her battered appearance. She did not return the smile; she was hardly ecstatic at how she looked or felt.

  ‘This had better be worth my while, Inspector,’ said Harbinson. ‘Merseyside Police have caused enough trouble for me and my company. I need this mess cleared up as soon as possible.’

  In consultation with Tweedy, Tara had decided that Harbinson should be interviewed under caution. She smiled weakly then explained to both men what was to happen. To her surprise, Harbinson did not offer any further protest although his face maintained a pained expression.

  Tara did not exactly feel full of the joys. She was dealing with a deeply depressing situation, the murder of six people, and she had been lucky to survive an attack by the chief suspect in the whole affair. It was still morning, but she felt she’d been on the go for days without rest or sleep. Before entering the interview room, she had taken two paracetamol to fight off yet another headache. She had little patience for antics. Harbinson would answer her questions, or she would drag him screaming and shouting all the way to the bloody cleaners.

  ‘Mr Harbinson,’ she began, ‘how long was it after you employed Jez Riordan before you realised that she was plotting against your company?’

  Harbinson looked in horror at his solicitor, while Murray gazed at Tara. The question seemed to have startled everyone.

  ‘How long, Mr Harbinson?’ Tara was not prepared to wait for any hesitation. She wanted an answer in order to move on. She watched the company chairman as he looked for guidance from his solicitor.

  ‘I’m not sure I can answer that question,’ Harbinson replied.

  ‘OK. Let me re-phrase it for you. Did you know that Jez Riordan was intending to harm your company’s reputation?’

  Again, the man looked for guidance from Forbes.

  ‘No comment.’

  Tara winced. She felt a pain in her lower back from the scuffle with Ewing, but she also fought to suppress her anger.

  ‘What were your thoughts when the poison was linked to your food products?’

  The man shrugged. Tara, once again, felt like slapping him.

  ‘Did you not think it strange? It seemed that someone had targeted your food products.’

  ‘My company was found not to be the source of the poison, as you know, Inspector.’

  ‘Perhaps not, but by then you already knew the identity of the perpetrator, didn’t you?’

  Harbinson made no reply. He and Tara stared at each other, neither one prepared to relent.

  ‘Why did you not report to police that one of your employees was missing?’

  ‘I told you last time, Inspector. I didn’t know that Jez was missing.’

  ‘You didn’t attend Jez’s funeral, why was that?’

  ‘I had a prior engagement.’

  ‘Did you kill her, Mr Harbinson?’

  ‘What? That’s ludicrous! Of course I didn’t kill her.’

  Geoffrey Forbes spoke up.

  ‘If that’s all you have, Inspector Grogan, I suggest you end it here and let my client get back to running his business. After all, this entire affair has not been of his making.’

  Tara drew a long breath but it didn’t soothe her temper.

  ‘That is where you and I must disagree, Mr Forbes. And before your client walks out of here today, I will have the truth! Six people are dead, several others seriously ill. One of Harbinson’s executives is currently on the run and is the main suspect for these murders. Your client knows much more than he has so far revealed to us. When eventually we bring Toby Ewing to book for these crimes, I promise you I will come after your client and have him for attempting to pervert the course of justice!’

  Tara was on her feet, spitting the words into Edward Harbinson’s face. Suddenly, he looked to be a man staring at an entirely different reality. His face paled and he became agitated.

  ‘Toby? What do you mean, Toby is a suspect? This has nothing to do with him, surely?’

  Murray discretely tugged on Tara’s blouse and she resumed her seat. She took the tissue he offered her and used it to wipe her mouth and nose. There was hardly a spot on her face that didn’t ache or wasn’t bruised. While Tara composed herself, Murray supplied some information to the gentlemen sitting across the table.

  ‘Mr Ewing is currently being sought in connection with the act of contaminating food at several stores in Liverpool. We have CCTV evidence to support the charge. He also attacked Detective Inspector Grogan at her home yesterday evening and attempted to poison her by forcing her to eat contaminated food. It is likely also that he is implicated in the murders of your employees, Jez Riordan and Maggie Hull.’

  Harbinson looked drained of any resistance. His eyes settled on the battered face of the woman who had, a moment earlier, threatened to charge him over his involvement in the murders. Geoffrey Forbes attempted to respond to Murray’s revelation, but Harbinson stopped him.

  ‘Please, believe me, I knew nothing about Toby. His father is one of my best friends. Jimmy isn’t in good health; this news will kill him. I’m sorry for your trouble, Inspector, really I am. I promise I’ll help you in whatever way I can.’

  CHAPTER 56

  Murray brought in some tea in paper cups. Harbinson had loosened his tie, while both Tara and Forbes waited for the man to reveal all that he knew. Tara, for now, desisted from asking questions. She hoped that maybe Harbinson had, at last, come to his senses.

  ‘
When Jez started working for us I had no idea that she was Paul Gibson’s daughter. She was simply a new employee, a stunningly attractive new employee. It was close to Christmas when she joined us, and I first met her at our Christmas party. You know how some of these things go. We got chatting over a few drinks, and before I knew it we were alone in a quieter place. One thing led to another…’

  Harbinson looked at Tara, as if hoping for sympathy or understanding, but Tara concentrated on writing notes despite the voice recorder capturing every word.

  ‘I’m married, Inspector. I am hoping that this will not get back to my wife. I have a young family.’

  Tara offered nothing by way of reassurance. At this stage, she already knew that Harbinson was on his third wife: a forty-year-old named Elise, who had given him two young sons. Nicole Andrews was his daughter from his first marriage.

  ‘After that Christmas, I continued to see Jez,’ said Harbinson. ‘At this point, she was not yet my secretary. We used to meet in my office, or at her place and on one occasion she accompanied me on a business trip. It was shortly after that trip to London that she told me who she was. I had no concerns, even then. We were enjoying each other’s company, or so I believed. In a way, I thought it quite sweet that she should choose to come and work for me. I told her stories about her father when we played together in The Moondreams that she claimed not to know, and our affair continued. A couple of months later, she suggested that she should work directly for me. She wanted to be my secretary. It was difficult to say no to her, and it was equally as hard to move Maggie on to Toby. Maggie was the backbone of my company. She’d been my secretary for years. I relied on her. But Jez told me not to worry, that she could handle Maggie, and so I relented and Jez became my secretary. For a few weeks, it was wonderful; I saw her every hour of the day. We worked late, we ate together and we went on a couple more business trips, one of them to Amsterdam. To be honest, Inspector, I was nearing the point where I was going to leave Elise for Jez.’

  ‘What happened that you didn’t?’ Tara asked him matter-of-factly, as if she’d just enquired about the weather. She had the man’s co-operation, but he would never have her respect. Tara remained untouched by the emotion gradually overtaking the man’s speech.

  ‘One morning, she came right out and told me exactly what she thought of me. Can you believe that? We were staying in a hotel outside Edinburgh, getting dressed in our room. “Are you going to leave Elise?” she asked me. I said that I was thinking about it. She then said she had something that might speed up the process. I hadn’t a clue what she meant. She switched on her laptop and showed me a recording of the two of us in bed together at her house. “Perhaps, you should show her this,” she said. I was horrified, but all she did was laugh. “I’m only joking,” she said, but suddenly I felt so ashamed. I realised that Jez had no real feelings for me. She had been playing games. When we got back to Liverpool I asked her why she had recorded us in bed together. “Why do you think, Eddie darling?” she said. “I am going to destroy you, your family and your fucking company.” I asked her why, and then she spouted all this vitriol about how I had ruined her father’s life and her mother’s. She told me that if it hadn’t been for me her father would have been a star, a successful musician. Because I had ruined the lives of her parents, I had also ruined hers. I tried to explain what happened between Paul and me – what had happened to The Moondreams. She wouldn’t listen. She walked out of my office laughing. The next morning, she came in as if nothing had happened, although that was an end to our affair.’

  CHAPTER 57

  ‘Poor Richard,’ said Harbinson, sniffing back his tears.

  By this point, Tara could see that Harbinson was a broken man. She even wondered if he might get around to confessing to the murder of his former lover. He certainly had a motive. So far, she could not determine what motive Toby Ewing possessed for killing Jez.

  ‘You mean your son-in-law, Richard Andrews?’

  ‘Yes. At first, I didn’t know about it, his affair with her, but then she came and told me everything. “You might want to warn your daughter,” she told me. “Richard is going to leave her.” I didn’t know what to do. I was at my wit’s end. I prayed that Jez would just clear off and leave us alone. But she didn’t. Then Richard left Nicole and his children and moved in with her. Jez would come into the office every morning and tell me in great detail exactly what they had done together the night before. My God, she even tried to come on to me again. One day, I lost it completely and slapped her across the face. She just laughed. Within the month, though, she told me proudly that she’d thrown Richard out and that she wanted me back. First, of course, she insisted that I make sure that Richard was sacked.’

  Harbinson broke into sobs. Murray was again the one to supply the tissues. Tara was now thinking she had never heard a story so fantastical, so absurd and yet tragic, in her life. That Jez could put together such a contrived agenda to ruin people she had never really known and all because of what she believed had been her father’s misfortune. At that point, Tara would have liked Anne Gibson to be present. The woman had never alluded to such hatred existing within her family, all of it stretching back fifty years. Tara wondered if Anne Gibson was aware of the vendetta and whether she also had been a part of it. Had she, albeit unwittingly, helped to foster a need for vengeance in her niece?

  ‘I’m sure you can put together the rest of it, Inspector. Once the blame for the poisonings was aimed at us, I realised that Jez was behind it. When I checked on her past I found out that she had been a scientist working with food contaminants. But you must believe me, I knew nothing about Toby.’

  ‘Did you kill Jez Riordan, Mr Harbinson?’ Tara asked again. He certainly had motive, she was thinking.

  ‘No!’ he cried before collapsing into heavy sobs. ‘When she disappeared I thought I would go to her house to retrieve her laptop with the recording of the two of us in bed. But there was someone else in the house. I ran off. Anyway, I didn’t find a laptop.’

  ‘That someone was me, Mr Harbinson. I shouted a warning that I was the police. You chose to ignore it!’ She raised her finger and pointed to her still bruised and swollen eye. Harbinson dropped his head.

  Tara wasn’t finished with the CEO. Surely, he could tell her what it was that had happened so long ago that caused Paul Gibson to feel so much resentment, a hatred that Gibson had also instilled in Jez.

  CHAPTER 58

  ‘Just before the release of our LP, The Food of Love, Skip suggested that we go back home and play The Cavern one last time before we became superstars. I was surprised when Paul and Roddy agreed to it because I believed that they had already forgotten their roots. As you are aware, Inspector, Roddy died the weekend we came back to Liverpool. None of us felt that we wanted to continue with The Moondreams after that, and Paul became very resentful towards the rest of us. We parted company with him calling us for everything. I’d lost all interest in being a musician and after a few months off, I went back to work for my father and I invited Skip and Jimmy to join me. Paul continued on his own for a few years, trying to make it big with various bands. His drinking and drug-taking meant that no one was prepared to invest in him. We never spoke or met again, but I know he blamed me for breaking up the band. I suppose, considering what has happened recently, he cultivated that resentment in his daughter Jez.’

  At that moment, the door of the interview room opened and Wilson was there. He asked to speak with Tara outside.

  ‘What’s up, John?’

  ‘Ma’am, we just got word. Big Beryl has been shot.’

  CHAPTER 59

  She left Murray to continue the interview with Harbinson. There were still a few answers she would like to extract from the company director. For instance, what had happened to Roddy Craig? Or was that a mystery that could never be solved?

  On the way to Aintree Hospital, Wilson filled her in on the details of the shooting. The previous night, around ten o’clock, Big Beryl had been t
aken from his home at gunpoint by three masked men. According to Big Beryl himself, who had already been interviewed by uniformed officers, he had been forced into a car and driven near to Goodison Park where he was shoved onto the road. Before driving off, one of the men got out, pointed a pistol at Big Beryl’s legs and fired a single shot. The bullet passed through his right leg just below the knee. Fortunately, for him, he was discovered within a few minutes by a courting couple on their way home from the pub.

  A uniformed officer was seated outside the private room in a ward on the third floor of the hospital. Tara introduced herself and Wilson to the constable and, without knocking, proceeded into the room. There were two female visitors at Beryl’s bedside. One of the women, looking worried, middle-aged with the countenance of someone who’d experienced an unhealthy share of life’s troubles, rose from her seat when the two detectives entered.

  ‘You’re all right, love,’ said Tara. ‘We’re from Merseyside Police, we just want to ask a few questions.’

  At that, the woman resumed her seat.

  ‘I’m his mam,’ she whined. ‘I hope to hell you get the bastards that did this.’

  Tara nodded some acknowledgement, falling some way short of being charmed by such blunt language.

  The second woman, large like Big Beryl, with a shy expression, was holding his hand.

  ‘And you must be?’ Tara inquired.

  ‘I’m his wife,’ she replied with an indignant twitch of her shoulder to emphasise the response.

  Big Beryl, covered only in a blue patterned theatre gown, head propped up, his right leg sporting a huge square of thick gauze to cover his wound, had a sorry look on his chubby face. His tight eyes craved sympathy and not the barrage of awkward questions that Tara was about to fire his way.

  ‘I never did nothin’. I swear ta fuck, Inspector,’ he said, pitifully for such a big man.

  ‘That’s all right, Beryl, but you know that I’m going to ask you who did it?’