by Bud Craig
He drank from a mug of coffee.
“Whatever. So what do you want today?”
I wondered when we’d get round to my reason for interrupting Will’s breakfast.
“I talked to Francine Ingleby the other day,” I said.
“Fran?”
“Did you know she’s on bail?”
He stared at me open-mouthed, almost spilling his coffee as he put the mug back down.
“Bail,” he said, “you’re kidding! What’s she been charged with?”
He took another mouthful of toast, making a loud crunching sound as he bit into it.
“Fraud, burglary...”
“Heavy stuff,” he said.
He looked quizzically at me, picking up his mug again as I told him about the probation hostel.
“I must go and see her.”
“She’s your cousin, isn’t she?”
“Third cousin, I think, something like that. What’s this all about anyway?”
“I was asked to look for Vicky Monroe,” I began. “I found her in the Scilly Isles, where she has been since March.”
“So that’s where she is.”
“I’d already worked out that the “Vicky Monroe’ who attended a job interview in April at Ordsall Tower was an impostor.”
Will did not respond to this.
“The obvious candidate was Francine Ingleby,” I went on.
“What are you on about?”
I told him about the letter that had come for Vicky while Francine was staying with him.
“Francine decided to go to the interview, claiming to be Vicky. She got the job.”
He chuckled quietly to himself.
“Only Fran would have thought of that. Only Fran would have got away with it.”
“So you didn’t know about it?”
He shrugged.
“Nobody tells me anything. How do you know about Francine?”
Again I pondered what kind of an answer to give him.
“Contacts,” I said. “It’s amazing what you can find out if you know the right people.”
“I dare say.”
Will went quiet for a while, looking as if he were trying to solve some complex puzzle.
“I’m just trying to work out what actually happened here,” he continued. “Someone has masqueraded as a social worker, gone to an interview and actually got the job. Surely Social Services would want to keep that quiet.”
That was exactly what they did want. Maybe I shouldn’t have told Will about it, but I needed to know whether he was involved in Francine’s little plot and couldn’t take her word for it. I still had a feeling there was a connection between Tim’s murder and Francine going to that interview. I could be wrong; I probably was wrong.
“An interesting lady, Francine,” he continued. “Quite fanciable too.”
So Will had the hots for Francine Ingleby, did he? Dismissing this thought, I moved onto another topic.
“She was also involved in a scam that involved online dating.”
Was Will complicit in this, I asked myself? Surely he couldn’t be as innocent as he looked?
“Really?”
I explained what I meant, before telling him about surprising Francine in the restaurant where she was meeting Danny. Will gave another shrug, not interested, it seemed. Now was a good time to introduce Tim’s death into the conversation. That was what I was most interested in.
“Do you think any of this has a link to Tim Greenhoff’s murder?”
“You must think so, Gus. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
“Interesting, isn’t it,” I said, “Francine has a connection with Tim; you were a friend of his; you know Francine.”
“I once met David Cameron,” said Will, “which is about as relevant as what you’re going on about. It has nothing to do with the murder. Jimmy Gallagher will soon be doing life for it.”
I paused for thought.
“Maybe. But supposing he didn’t do it?”
“Unlikely, I would have thought. You’re biased of course. I happen to know James Gallagher is a friend of yours. Maybe you should choose your friends more carefully.”
If Jimmy wasn’t my friend, would I still believe in his innocence? I didn’t have time to answer hypothetical questions.
“Let’s stick to the point,” I said, “Francine went to Mangall Court not long before Tim was murdered – as did you – and gave him some very valuable jewellery.”
He poured himself more coffee.
“Jewellery? Why on earth should she...”
I cut in.
“Did Tim say anything to you about it?”
He shook his head.
“Time to go, I think,” I said, getting up.
Will opened the front door to let me out.
“I see you’ve sold the house,” I said, indicating the SOLD sign in the garden.
“At last,” he said, “be nice to have a few spare quid. Now I can sort my life out.”
“Good.”
“I hope you’re not going to bother Andrea again,” he said.
“Difficult to say,” I replied.
“I would suggest you leave her alone,” he said, an edge in his voice I had never heard before. “She’s had enough to put up with.”
“I may not need to see her,” I said. “Depends.”
I did not say what it depended on because I didn’t know.
“I thought she might be, I don’t know...”
He stopped in mid-sentence as if reluctant to put into words what he was about to say. He sighed before saying any more.
“I know they say never speak ill of the dead and all that and Tim was my friend, but you must have worked out by now he was a lousy husband.”
I looked him in the eye.
“He was always boasting about his conquests, you know. And Andrea would complain long and hard about Tim. I did what I could to console her. I just wasn’t comfortable with the whole thing.”
Poor old Will, I thought, stuck in the middle of a flawed marriage.
“I thought she might even be...”
Again he couldn’t say the word.
“Relieved that he’s not around anymore,” I suggested.
He nodded.
“You seem to be saying she wasn’t relieved,” I said. “In spite of Tim being a less than perfect partner.”
“She’s taken it badly, been off work for a while. I just want to protect her.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I drove home from Will’s house, wondering about all the different strands of the investigation and whether they made sense. Acknowledging gloomily that they didn’t, I tried to work out what to do next. It was difficult to think straight as I was distracted by the rattling from the car’s engine, which had returned with a vengeance. As I approached the traffic lights on Trafford Road, the noise stopped. So did the car. Like its owner, it was knackered.
At least, I told myself, I was not far from Salford Quays. Even so I only got home an hour later, having called out Green Flag, who towed it to a garage. More expense, I thought, as I sat with a cup of tea in my living room. There was nothing for it but to get another car now. Could I afford it? Did I have any choice? I couldn’t do either of my jobs without a car. Nor could I get to see my family easily.
Forgetting about the car, I played over in my mind what Will had said about expecting Andrea to be relieved at Tim’s death. Digging a little deeper, I wondered if he meant he suspected she had had something to do with the murder? I couldn’t get away from the idea that Tim’s wife had several motives for killing her husband. Reminding myself she was on her way to work while her husband was being killed led me to another question. If it wasn’t Andrea, who did kill him? I was no nearer finding that out than I was when I started. Names ran through my mind: Andrea, Wayne Dickens, Caitlin, Francine, Jimmy, Will Trader, even the real Vicky Monroe. They were all characters in a drama; all linked by this young man who had been killed.
What were the connections
, I asked myself? Sex and money were the main ones. They were Tim’s twin obsessions, but they didn’t apply to Dickens. He was concerned only with revenge for having his kids taken into care. Sex, though, was the obvious motive, given that Tim was strangled with the scarf he used in his erotic games. I couldn’t say why but I wasn’t convinced by that argument. It was too obvious. So many people involved in this, especially Tim himself, were out to make a fast buck. Was money behind it? Speculation, Gus, I said to myself, mind games you don’t have time for.
I continued to turn everything over in my head. Ed Richards’ accusations had succeeded only in confusing me even more than I had been before. Time for another list, I thought, going into the spare room. I tapped a pen against the desk top, then I began to write. Three or four minutes later I crossed out what I had written. Now I couldn’t even manage a bloody list. Bugger.
* * *
That afternoon while I waited at the Salford Quays tram stop, a dark car pulled up.
“Hi, Gus,” said Caitlin Gallagher, “can I give you a lift anywhere?”
“I’m going to Bolton,” I said more in hope than expectation. “Getting the train from Victoria.”
“Jump in,” she said. “I’m off to Darwen but I can take the scenic route through Bolton.”
“Thanks.”
I jumped in, grateful that Caitlin was willing to go out of her way.
“I’ve just been to a meeting at Ordsall Tower,” she said as I did up my seat belt. “Somewhat tedious but it’s got to be done.”
She shot off at great speed, forcing me back in my seat and making me wonder if I really was grateful. At least I wouldn’t be late, I said to myself, though the old saying ‘better late than never’ sprang to mind.
“How’s the investigation going?” she asked.
She accelerated again, reminding me of another car ride about four years ago. On that occasion the driver had been a teenage girl in great distress, but she had been careful compared with this supposedly mature woman.
‘OK,” I said, “I think I’m beginning to get somewhere.”
Caitlin’s mad driving also brought to mind the car that had shot out of the Mangall Court car park on the morning Tim had died, but it couldn’t have been her in that car, could it?
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
Not a completely honest reply, but whoever said honesty was the best policy was wrong. I looked over to her.
“You sound surprised,” I said.
She smiled.
“I am. You know, Gus, I’ve thought about this a lot. I have this terrible feeling Jimmy did it.”
Now it was my turn to be surprised.
“What?”
“Oh, I know he’s protesting his innocence,” she said, “and it’s hard to imagine Jimmy losing control.”
It certainly was, I thought.
“I’ve lived with Jimmy for a long time,” she explained as if speaking to a child, “and he’s so...uptight, keeps everything bottled up.”
I vaguely recalled hearing that about somebody else, but who it was I couldn’t have said. Surely we all do that, I said to myself. If we didn’t keep things bottled up we’d be prey to anger, lust, greed, all sorts of things. Some people were, I told myself, including the killer of Tim Greenhoff.
“I’m afraid my relationship with Tim became Jimmy’s obsession and might have tipped him over the edge.”
All perfectly possible but to hear his wife saying these things shocked me profoundly. Shouldn’t she find it a bit harder to believe this of her husband? Or was that a bit Stand By Your Man?
“Poor old Jimmy can scarcely cope with a predictable routine let alone anything in the least unexpected,” she added. “That’s why those wretched beer mats mean so much to him. They offer an escape from reality.”
She roared onto the M602, immediately heading for the fast lane and staying there. She alarmed me even more by removing her left hand from the wheel and brushing it through her hair. This revealed a wire going into her left ear.
“I didn’t realise you wore hearing aids,” I said.
“You weren’t supposed to see that,” she said, smiling to hide her embarrassment. “I only got them last week. It’s a hereditary problem from my mother. It makes me feel old.”
It was something I associated with people over the age of seventy but I didn’t tell her that.
“So anyway, Gus,” said Caitlin, “you intend to continue trying to clear Jimmy’s name.”
“Yes.”
I only hoped she wasn’t about to ask me how the hell I was going to manage it.
“It’s good for him to have a friend like you,” she said, “even in a lost cause.”
As if being scared shitless by her dicing with death on the motorway wasn’t enough, I had to listen to her casting doubts on my chance of success. What was Caitlin’s motivation in telling me her views about the investigation? If Jimmy was sent to prison for life how would she react?
At last the helter-skelter ride was over and Caitlin dropped me off at Bolton Children’s Services. I’d have to get the train back, but that suited me fine. It would take longer but I had more chance of getting home in one piece.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
On the following Monday I picked up my post and yawned as I sat down at the kitchen table and went through the junk mail. Stuck in the middle of the pile was a postcard with a picture of Sydney Harbour. Turning it over I read:
Hi Gus
I’ve decided to go travelling again. Fetched up here yesterday. 23 degrees and it’s supposed to be winter! I’ll be off to Tasmania next week, then New Zealand for a while. After that who knows? Maybe I’ll get my head straight one of these days! I hope you’re OK, looking forward to seeing you when I get back.
Love Louise xxx.
Brad might be reading his card at this moment, I said to myself. That should keep him quiet for a while. I looked at the clock on the wall opposite. Nearly half nine. Time to go.
* * *
“What happened with Ed Richards?” Marti asked from behind her desk at Pym and Sigson. “I read your report of course, but we’ve not had a chance to talk about it.”
That statement showed how little we had seen of one another lately. I couldn’t remember when we last got together socially. It had taken a while to organize this meeting, even though it was essential to my investigation. I explained Ed’s allegations against Caitlin without much enthusiasm. I still couldn’t work out what good seeing him had done.
“A bit far-fetched, isn’t it?” asked Marti. “Caitlin killing her husband and Tim Greenhoff.”
“Yeah. Apart from anything else, Caitlin was in Blackburn around the time Tim was killed.”
“Ah, well,” she said resignedly, “it was worth a try.”
I started thinking about what else I had to tell Marti about the investigation when my phone rang. Pulling it from my pocket, I apologised. Seeing the caller was Louise, I pressed the red button, reluctant to speak to my ex-wife while Marti was there. I was about to put the phone away then stopped and looked at it for several seconds. It was significant in some way. Gradually the idea surfaced from the back of my mind. I looked at Marti.
“Mobile phones,” I said.
“What about them?”
I sat up, suddenly alert.
“I’ve been making the assumption that Caitlin was in Blackburn around the time of Tim’s death,” I went on.
“Yes, but...”
“Jimmy told us she rang him from there.”
“Did he?”
“Yes, when we went to see him in prison that time,” I reminded her. “So we only have his word for it, don’t we?”
She sat up too.
“I suppose so but why would he lie?”
I could see I’d have to make myself clearer.
“No, it’s not a question of Jimmy lying. She told him she was at her friend’s house, but if she used her mobile she could have been anywhere.”
Sh
e looked thoughtful for a moment.
“Yeah, suppose so.”
Thinking furiously, I tried to create an alternative scenario. Caitlin could have got up early and made her way to Salford to see Tim, surprise him. Maybe he wasn’t pleased to see her. He could have been expecting Francine to pay a return visit. I put this to Marti.
“Come on, Gus, you’re not starting to take Ed Richards seriously, are you? Caitlin could have used her friend’s phone, which would show she really was in Blackburn.”
That was certainly feasible, I had to admit.
“Do people ask to use their friend’s phone these days when everyone has a mobile?”
“Maybe there was no mobile signal.”
“That’s possible, but there’s no point in speculating any more,” I said. “Would you have a list of calls Jimmy received on the morning of the murder in your file?”
“I can check,” she said, before picking up the phone on her desk.
She had a short conversation with her secretary, who promised to ring back in a couple of minutes. I was in the middle of telling Marti about the rest of the investigation when her desk phone rang.
“Caitlin definitely used her mobile to call Jimmy,” said Marti as she put the phone down.
“Right.”
We looked at one another as if uncertain what to say.
“So, is this good news or bad?” asked Marti.
“I’m not sure,” I replied. “Probably neither.”
How could we draw any conclusions until we found out where Caitlin was at the time? She could still, for all I knew, have been in Blackburn. Marti broke into my thoughts.
“You’ll have to ask Caitlin.”
“Suppose so,” I agreed.
But if she said she was nowhere near Salford when Tim was strangled, there was no way of proving whether she was telling the truth. I knew I would have to see Caitlin again, but was reluctant to have any contact with her. Why was that, I asked myself? It wasn’t for any reason that could be explained. I’d just have to get on with it.
“Actually, Gus, there was something else I wanted to talk about,” said Marti.
“What’s that?”
“Well, you know the album we’re doing? It’s going really well. Ellen say she likes it a lot.”