by Graham Ison
‘Too late,’ said Shona, throwing herself into a chair and hooking one leg over the arm. ‘When that policewoman came upstairs she asked me if I was here that night, and I told her I was at work. Well, they check on these things, don’t they?’
‘You did what? You silly little cow. Now they’ll think I was mixed up in Sharon’s murder.’
‘Where were you, then, Gordon?’ asked Shona.
‘None of your damned business. But when they start probing they might uncover things that I don’t want uncovered. Now get yourself up to the bedroom. It seems to me that it’s the only place where you know what you’re doing.’
‘What did you make of that, Liz?’ I asked, as we drove out of Glenn Road.
‘As I went into the hall, Shona shot upstairs. She’d obviously been standing in the hall listening to our chat with Harrison. Anyway, I cornered her in the bedroom and asked her about the night Sharon Gregory was murdered. She said she wasn’t here at all that evening. Her full name’s Shona Grant and she claimed to be employed as a West End nightclub hostess most evenings, including the twenty-ninth of July. Personally I think she’s a stripper in this nightclub, but I’ll check it out. I thought that Harrison came up with what he was doing that night just a bit too glibly, sir; it’s bound to be untrue.’
‘I thought so too, but we’ll need a lot more evidence before we can think about arresting Harrison. It’s just possible that he had another bird with him. But if that was the case, why not say so?’
‘Perhaps he got confused.’ Lizanne laughed, and without taking her eyes off the road, took a small plastic envelope from her jacket pocket and handed it to me. ‘This might help,’ she said. ‘I took a couple of hair samples from his comb when I used his bathroom. The boffins should be able to get a DNA sample from those.’
‘And if it matches the DNA from the fetus that Doctor Mortlock found when he did the post-mortem on Sharon, we might be getting somewhere.’
‘But you said that Harrison had admitted having sex with her, sir.’
‘Yes, he did.’
‘And from what we know about her, so did a hell of a lot of other men. So that doesn’t necessarily make Harrison her killer, does it, sir?’
Frank Digby lived in what was known as a chalet bungalow in a quiet road in Chalfont St Giles. Predominantly white, the house had brown windows and doors, and decorative brown shutters that were fixed permanently to the walls.
It was half past midday when Dave pulled up on the drive next to a Ford Galaxy, and he and Kate Ebdon alighted.
Kate rang the bell and waited for some two or three minutes. She was on the point of giving up when a man opened the door. A good-looking thirty-something, he was tall and muscular, and had a clipboard in one hand and a pen lodged behind an ear.
‘Good morning.’ The man glanced at his watch. ‘Or, should I say, good afternoon.’
‘Mr Frank Digby?’
‘Yes, I’m Frank Digby. Sorry to have kept you waiting, I was dealing with an order on my computer. How can I help?’ Digby smiled at Kate and rapidly appraised her figure, his glance travelling from head to toe and back again.
‘We’re police officers, Mr Digby. I’m Detective Inspector Ebdon and this is Detective Sergeant Poole.’
‘Oh! I was hoping you’d come to buy some wine.’ Digby laughed nervously. ‘But if it’s about the licences, I can assure you that all the paperwork is in order.’
‘I take it you’re a wine merchant, Mr Digby.’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘It’s not about wine or the relevant paperwork; that’s nothing to do with us. We’re from Scotland Yard and we’d like to speak to you concerning another matter.’
‘This is all very mysterious. You’d better come in,’ said Digby, as he showed the two detectives into a living room at the front of the house. A young woman in a plain cream dress was reclining on a sofa, her feet tucked up beneath her. She put down the magazine she was reading, lowered her feet and pushed them into a pair of mules. ‘The police have come to see us, Fi.’ He turned to Kate. ‘Fiona Douglas is my partner. And my business partner.’
‘How d’you do?’ said Fiona.
‘Ripper, thanks,’ said Kate.
‘Ah, you’re Australian,’ said Digby, as he recognized the accent and the colloquial response. Kate, as she always did, had mistaken the customary English greeting for a question. Brock thought she did it on purpose. ‘You have some fascinating wines Down Under. There’s quite a market for them here these days.’
‘Yes, I’m sure there is, but as I said just now, we haven’t come here to talk about wine.’ Kate shot a glance in Fiona Douglas’s direction. ‘D’you travel to Miami very often, Mr Digby?’
‘Occasionally,’ said Digby, but the response was guarded, hesitant almost. It was a loaded question and he recognized it as such. ‘I more often go to California. The New World wines have become increasingly popular over here. But what’s with Miami? I think I’ve only been there two or three times.’ As if sensing what was coming next, he glanced at his partner. ‘Be a pet, Fi, and check on the orders and send them to the warehouse. Practically all our wine business is online, Inspector,’ he explained, as his partner left the room. ‘If we don’t keep up with the orders, it quickly gets out of hand. Now, then, what’s this interest in Miami?’
‘Sharon Gregory, a cabin attendant on the Heathrow to Miami service,’ said Kate bluntly.
‘Oh God!’ exclaimed Digby with a hunted look. He pushed a hand through his hair. ‘What about her?’
‘We understand from our enquiries that you and she were rather close.’
Digby glanced at the door. ‘Yes, I’ve met her a couple of times. Why?’
‘I was also told that you and she had a sexual relationship,’ said Dave, hazarding a guess at the reason Digby’s phone number was on Sharon’s mobile phone list of contacts.
‘Now look here,’ said Digby, displaying a hint of steel. ‘I don’t see that this has anything to do with the police. Is adultery a criminal offence all of a sudden?’ he asked sarcastically.
‘Not any more,’ said Dave. ‘But it might reach the divorce courts if you’re actually married to your business partner.’
‘I’m not,’ snapped Digby.
‘You admit to having sex with Sharon Gregory, then,’ said Kate, getting none too subtly to the nub of the matter.
‘I’m not admitting anything. I have nothing further to say and I’d be grateful if you left. Now! If you come back again, you’d better have a warrant.’
‘I think you’ve touched a nerve, ma’am,’ commented Dave quietly.
‘Where were you on the twenty-ninth of July, Mr Digby?’ Kate ignored Digby’s request to leave, and her Australian accent became a little sharper. ‘That was last Monday.’
‘I don’t have to answer that.’
‘In that case,’ said Dave, ‘we will come back with a warrant and we’ll turn this place upside down. And we might just bring Revenue and Customs with us. They’re always interested in online businesses.’
‘Fiona and I went to the Royal Opera House to see Swan Lake.’ Digby caved in.
‘Really? My wife is in that,’ said Dave quietly.
‘Doing what?’
‘She’s a principal dancer,’ said Dave.
‘Oh!’ said Digby. Unaware that Dave’s wife was white, he was obviously trying to recall whether he had ever seen a black ballet dancer. ‘But you still haven’t told me what’s so important about last Monday.’
‘It’s the night that Sharon Gregory was murdered. Two days after her husband was murdered,’ said Kate, and was pleased to see the shocked expression on Digby’s face. But, being the cynic she was, she was uncertain whether it was shock at the death of someone he had slept with, or the fact that the victim had been married, or that the police had arrived at his front door in connection with the woman’s murder. Or even that of her husband.
‘That’s terrible,’ said Digby. But there was no sign of guilt,
just transparent insincerity.
‘I’ll ask you again,’ said Kate. ‘Did you have sex with Sharon Gregory?’
‘Yes, a couple of times in Miami. We met on a flight and she made it fairly clear that she was—’
Kate held up a hand. ‘We get the picture, Mr Digby. As a matter of fact, we’ve heard it all before. From the numerous other men she slept with.’
‘Good God!’ exclaimed Digby. ‘There were others?’ he asked, rather naively.
‘Oh yes, there were dozens,’ said Dave. ‘Do you still have the ticket stubs for your visit to Covent Garden?’ he asked. ‘Or perhaps you’d rather we checked with Miss Douglas.’
‘I’d prefer that you didn’t speak to Fiona, Sergeant,’ said Digby hurriedly. ‘But I’m afraid I don’t have the ticket stubs any more.’
‘Did you throw them away?’ Kate posed the question innocently, but she didn’t believe that Digby had been to the ballet at all.
‘Not exactly, Inspector,’ said Digby. ‘Fiona has them. She keeps a scrapbook and pastes them in. Do you really have to talk to her about it?’ he implored.
‘There is a way round that, Mr Digby,’ said Dave.
‘Yes? Anything,’ pleaded Digby.
‘You can give us a DNA sample.’
‘Certainly, if that means you don’t have to speak to Fiona.’
Dave produced a DNA kit from his briefcase and took a swab from inside Digby’s mouth. It would have no evidential value without the authorization of a superintendent, but it may help to eliminate Digby from their enquiries.
‘Oh, you’re still here.’ Fiona Douglas came back into the room just as Dave was putting the kit back into his briefcase.
‘We were just leaving, Miss Douglas.’ Kate turned to Digby. ‘Thank you for your help,’ she said. ‘We’ll see ourselves out.’
Fiona Douglas stood at the window and watched as the police car pulled off the drive. ‘What did they want, Frank?’ She turned to face Digby, her arms folded and a suspicious expression on her face. ‘Have you been out kerb-crawling again?’
‘Certainly not. And you know that that was a case of mistaken identity. The police were collecting car numbers that night. Everybody’s car number. But you’ll never let me forget it, will you?’
‘What did they want, then?’
Digby paused before answering. ‘Er, they wanted to know if we’d seen a hit-and-run accident in Bow Street outside the Royal Opera House last Monday,’ he said eventually. ‘But I told them we hadn’t seen a thing.’
‘What the hell made them think we were at Covent Garden last Monday? Is there something you’re not telling me? What have you been up to, Frank?’
‘Nothing, darling, and I don’t know why they thought that,’ said Digby lamely. ‘I suppose the police have access to all sorts of records these days. They’re probably interviewing everyone who had tickets to Swan Lake. After all, I did book them online.’
‘What, all two thousand of them?’ asked Fiona sarcastically. ‘But I don’t suppose you mentioned to them that we didn’t see it anyway. Or that you cancelled at the last minute because you told me that you had to see someone who wanted to place a large wine order for their restaurant. An order that didn’t materialize. So, where the hell were you?’
‘Well, I was—’
‘O what a tangled web we weave, when first we practise to deceive!’ quoted Fiona, and turned on her heel. ‘I’m going to take a shower. Alone!’
It wasn’t until Dave had steered the car on to the A413 that Kate mentioned the interview with Frank Digby.
‘What d’you reckon, Dave?’
‘Same problem as with all the others, guv. If his DNA shows that he’s the father of Sharon’s unborn child, it merely means he joins the merry band of men who had sex with her. It doesn’t mean he murdered her.’
‘Did you notice the perfume that Fiona was wearing?’
‘I’m no good at identifying perfumes. All I know is that they cost an arm and a leg.’
‘It was Lancôme Trésor.’
‘Is that important, guv?’
‘It’s the perfume that Sharon Gregory was wearing when she was found at the Dickin Hotel.’
‘A coincidence?’ asked Dave.
‘Could be. Anyway, we’ll see what Max Riley has to say,’ said Kate. ‘And he’s the last of the names on Sharon’s contact list. I don’t know where the hell the guv’nor will go after that.’
‘He’ll think of something,’ said Dave, and accelerated to overtake a dithering pensioner wearing a flat cap and doing twenty-five.
FOURTEEN
After Kate and Dave had left to interview more of our ‘suspects’, I spent some time going over the statements we had accrued so far.
I hadn’t been at it long before I was interrupted by the arrival of a detective inspector from the Serious Organized Crime Agency.
‘Good morning, sir. I’m DI Ken Sullivan from SOCA.’
‘Take a seat,’ I said, pushing aside the pile of statements, ‘and tell me what I can do for SOCA.’
‘Gordon Harrison, boss.’ Sullivan was obviously from a northern force where ‘boss’ was an informal alternative to ‘guv’.
‘You’ve got my interest. What about him?’
‘I picked up that you’d put his name on the PNC, and I’m interested to know whether it has any relevance to the current enquiries my agency is making.’
I explained briefly how we had come to interview Harrison, but were still undecided about whether he had been involved in the murder of Sharon Gregory, or indeed had been her accomplice on the night of Clifford Gregory’s murder.
‘But what is SOCA’s interest in him?’ I asked.
‘Drug smuggling,’ said Sullivan. ‘He has a Romanian girlfriend called Krisztina Comaneci.’
‘Yes, that much he told us, Ken. He actually said that she was his partner.’
‘In more ways than one,’ said Sullivan. ‘We believe her to be a courier, taking heroin into Romania from the Czech Republic. All we’ve learned so far is that Harrison imports antique statuary from Romania, and we’re pretty sure that those items contain the drugs that Comaneci obtains. The story is that she legitimately buys these so-called artefacts and brings them back to the UK.’
‘But hasn’t customs examined them at the point of entry?’ I asked.
‘Oh, sure. Discreetly, of course, but Harrison’s a smart guy and the statues don’t always contain drugs. So far, customs haven’t struck lucky. But they have to be careful because we’d like to know the origin and where those statues containing drugs go once they’re in this country.’
‘He told us that he planned holidays for tired executives who wanted to get away with their girlfriends. He also told us that in furtherance of that business, he travels quite often to the States. Florida and California mainly.’
‘That’s interesting,’ said Sullivan, ‘and will be of even greater interest to the FBI or the DEA. If he’s taking drugs into America, that is. On the other hand, that might be a smokescreen for his drug activities.’
‘We called on him this morning,’ I said, ‘for the second time, but that was strictly in connection with the murder of Sharon Gregory. He knew her and had had sex with her on several occasions in Miami. There was a young black girl there by the name of Shona Grant. He told us that he was with her, at home, at the time of the murder. But when my sergeant spoke to her alone, she claimed that she was at work as a hostess in a nightclub. I’m having one of my officers checking her story.’
‘I’d rather you didn’t, boss,’ said Sullivan. ‘A number of possibilities open up here. We know about Shona Grant and it’s possible that she might be another of his couriers.’ He paused. ‘D’you think it’s possible that Sharon Gregory was involved in his drug-smuggling activities and that’s what got her killed?’
‘I don’t know, Ken,’ I said, ‘but we’ve scientific evidence that leads us to believe that one of her many male friends, and there were quite a few, might have be
en responsible. The best I can offer is to keep you informed of anything we find out.’
‘I’m grateful, boss,’ said Sullivan. ‘And if I find anything that points to her killer being tied up in our enquiries, I’ll let you know.’
Sullivan departed, leaving me to ponder yet another twist in the murder of Sharon Gregory.
It was forty miles from Chalfont St Giles to Guildford, and it was nearing five o’clock before Kate and Dave arrived at Max Riley’s top-floor apartment not far from the ruins of the eleventh-century Guildford Castle.
‘Hello. I hope you’re not selling something.’ The woman who came to the door had smooth black skin and softened her statement with a radiant smile. She was about forty, tall, and dressed in a tight-fitting red woollen dress that accentuated every contour of her shapely figure. Her black hair was flecked with grey and cropped very short. Higher-than-usual cheekbones lent a diamond-shaped, almost sculpted appearance to her face. Most men would doubtless find her sexually compelling, but she could not be described as a beauty.
‘We’re police officers,’ said Kate. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Ebdon and this is Detective Sergeant Poole. We’d like to have a word with Mr Max Riley if he’s at home.’
The woman threw back her head and burst out laughing. It was an infectious, bubbly sort of laugh. ‘I’m Max Riley,’ she said. ‘Actually, my name’s Maxine, but I’ve only ever used Max and that’s what everyone calls me. There is no Mr Riley. Anyway, you’d better come in and explain why you wanted to talk to this fictitious Mr Riley.’ She spoke with mellifluously rounded, educated tones.
The two detectives followed Maxine into a large airy studio at the back of the apartment. It had a picture window running almost the length of the room, and close to it, where it would receive the maximum light, was an easel on which was a canvas covered with a cotton sheet. A nearby paint-spattered bench bore a number of paint pots, several palettes, a maulstick and a jar of brushes. And a dirty coffee cup. A painter’s smock had been thrown carelessly over a stack of canvases leaning against the wall on the far side of the studio.