by J M Gregson
Birch was tall, with dark, closely curled hair, which had only the beginnings of grey at the temples. Hook checked his copy of the Secretary’s list of his Committee to confirm that the Vice-Captain was only thirty-nine. He looked a little older than this, but very fit. There were more lines around eyes and forehead than would be normal for someone on the right side of forty, and Hook thought he detected already the first traces of the stoop which bedevils so many tall men as the years advance. He was dressed in a well-cut grey suit, but formal clothes did not sit easily on him; either he had scant use for fashion or he felt happy in more casual apparel. But his brown shoes were highly polished: this and the neat, small knot in his tie gave him a slightly old-fashioned air, as if, determined on rectitude, he had donned a few extra years with this correct attire.
‘I came straight from work,’ he said. ‘Am I the last of your suspects, John?’ Rushton and Hook noted the Christian name, as in their world of ranks and protocol they could not fail to do. But it was free and unforced in Birch, not an attempt to assert the privilege of friendship where it might give some small advantage. Bert Hook remembered his Superintendent’s passing remark that he would like Birch much more than Michael Taylor, and determined to be objective.
‘Are you still game for a few holes, Bill?’ said Lambert.
‘If you are,’ said Birch, looking uncertainly at the two other men in the room. ‘It hardly seems the place to be cross-examined, but —’
‘Barristers cross-examine. We never do anything so vigorous,’ smiled Lambert. ‘Yes, no doubt it’s highly irregular, but I need to blow a few cobwebs away. I’ve been interviewing people, here or elsewhere, for the last six hours, with one small break for lunch.’ And on the course, he thought ruefully, I shall watch him like a hawk to see if he casts any glances towards the burnt-out cottage in the woods. Murder more than other crimes made one a truant to friendship. Or was he just rationalizing his desertion of the murder room?
Before his resolve could weaken, he led Birch towards the men’s locker-room, studiously failing to notice both Rushton’s disapproval and Hook’s disappointment. ‘Of course, we shall probably need you to make and sign a formal statement later,’ was all the mollification he floated back to his juniors from the corridor.
When Birch and he presently stood in cotton trousers and short-sleeved shirts on the first tee, he congratulated himself anew upon his decision. Besides them, the rhododendrons were in full pink glory and the thrushes sang a full-throated welcome. A deserted first fairway opened its wide green bosom; the yellow flag on the green hung limp and distant in the heat. And there was a strategy in his actions that was not wholly selfish.
He knew Bill Birch better than any other of his suspects. They had served together on the Greens Committee for three years now, and played both against each other and as partners in club competitions. If it was not yet a close friendship, each respected the other and was willing to make it closer than it was. Lambert knew enough of his Vice-Captain to think him a private man, who would unbend more easily — and thus be more forthcoming — in a situation as confidential and informal as the unusual circumstances would allow.
Birch was a 6-handicapper against Lambert’s 12: the Superintendent would need to concentrate if he was to provide a reasonable game for a powerful opponent, despite the advantage his handicap would give him. He was relieved to get a good drive away from the first tee, bouncing straight and long past the fairway bunker which always threatened to gather in his slice. He did not hit the green with his second, but he was only just off on the right. Whilst Birch was playing his second, Lambert looked back at the clubhouse and took in the scene of peace and privilege. The stream glinted bright under the high sun as it skirted the clubhouse and the eighteenth green. The mellow russet tiles of the pleasantly asymmetrical roof blended perfectly with the lush green of new growth on beech and oak. Massive candelabras of chestnut flower stretched away to the left of the clubhouse. To the right, the trio of weeping willows the club had planted by the bridge over the stream arched gracefully against the backdrop of a massive copper beech, planted by some yeoman of the ancient estate a century before anyone thought of playing golf here.
Incomparable late spring in fertile England, nature burgeoning yet controlled, even in places manicured: very Home Counties! Only two details suggested that in this quiet place there had been unnatural death. One was the club flag, hanging motionless and green halfway up the gleaming white pole at the edge of the practice putting green, in memory of the late Chairman. The other was Bert Hook, standing beneath the verandah of the clubhouse with a large mug of tea and staring in recrimination after his eccentric Superintendent, who had snatched this last of the suspects from his Sergeant’s searching gaze, to be interviewed in private on those green acres. Lambert grinned back a little guiltily at Hook’s static, accusing presence. In stressing the need for individuality and initiative in senior officers, he always counselled the necessity to say ‘Bugger you!’ to normal procedures when circumstances called for an individual response. He waved loftily to the stolid figure, whose expression was too far away for him to read. ‘Bugger you!’ he muttered with relish, and turned to watch his opponent’s ball descend in a graceful parabola to finish ten feet from the hole.
Lambert chipped on to the green quite well and holed a tricky five-footer for his four. It gave him a half. It was his last success, however. From the second tee onwards, he began to play more and more raggedly. Bill Birch, on the other hand, showed all his normal consistency, even though Lambert did not open the real business of the meeting until they had played two full holes, testing his opponent for the nervousness he expected in one about to be questioned about a murder. The Vice-Captain was almost ten years younger than him, and, Lambert decided ruefully, at least that decade more supple. He was a left-hander, whose slight natural fade on the longer shots was suited to the course, which had a number of dog-leg holes. His swing was easy and uncomplicated, his iron shots in particular having a crisp accuracy that would have been the envy of better players than John Lambert.
They were halfway up the third fairway, out of sight of the clubhouse, and indeed of any human eye, when he broached this most informal of interviews. ‘Well, Bill,’ he said. ‘You know how James Shepherd died?’ Birch nodded, almost eagerly, as if relieved at last to come to grips with the real reason for their meeting.
‘It’s thrown the factory into some confusion, I can tell you.’
For a moment Lambert was puzzled; then he remembered that Birch worked for Shepherd, in some senior capacity. ‘For a start, Bill, can you tell me exactly what the business is and what you do there?’
It was just to fill in background and get Birch talking, but it threw the Vice-Captain a little: he had been waiting all day to talk about murder and last night’s meeting. ‘Small engineering of various kinds. Originally, we were a toolmaking company, and that’s still the basis of the business. We have a plastic mouldings plant, and we like to think we’re pretty versatile. We’ve had to be over the last few years,’ he said ruefully.
‘And your role in all this, Bill?’
‘Works Manager,’ said Birch, just failing to keep the pride out of his voice.
‘And that involves …?’ Pride could make a man as vulnerable as envy; Lambert followed up instinctively into an area he had not intended to probe.
‘Just about everything in a small company. Of course, Shepherd had other irons in the fire as well as our factory: he was a very rich man, especially from his financial services business. That’s been one of the few growth areas over the last few years and Shepherd was an expert.’ In his voice there was the contempt of the man who makes things for those who make money simply by moving money around. More significantly, Lambert noted the terse use of Shepherd’s surname where he would have expected ‘Mr Shepherd’ or ‘James’, depending on the degree of formality in this particular working relationship. He glanced sharply sideways at Birch, but the Vice-Captain seemed uncons
cious of anything irregular. He swung a 4-iron away with a long, enviably slow swing. Lambert watched the white ball soar against the azure sky, plummet to the edge of the third green, and roll gently to within five feet of the hole. His own riposte was savagely topped; it skidded in a low, ugly curve to the right and found with precision the middle of the bunker it had been destined for from the moment of leaving the club.
‘And your job is concerned with what?’ he said, trying not to sound aggressive as he banged the offending club back into his bag.
‘Almost everything on the factory floor. Work schedules, order deadlines, labour relations. We’ve brought in a lot of modern technology in the last five years, despite the recession in engineering generally. With nothing other than a few voluntary redundancies. We haven’t had a strike, or even a serious labour dispute, since I took over this job seven years ago.’ This time he gave up any attempt to keep the pride out of his voice. Lambert got his ball out of the bunker reasonably close to the flag, but Birch holed his five-footer with total security and they sauntered to the next tee.
The heat in this sheltered spot beat on them relentlessly, so that they were glad to get their drives away and move down the fairway, where the gentlest of breezes gave them a little relief. Birch, looking at the tree-tops high to their left, sniffed the air and said, ‘It may sound silly without a cloud in sight, but I think a change is on the way before long.’ The topmost branches of the beeches rustled a little quite suddenly, as if they had heard and were agreeing. Despite his northern accent, Birch was a farmer’s son; he looked a countryman now as he eyed sky and woods.
When presently they stood by the side of the fifth green, out of sight of the clubhouse and any human presence, Lambert had begun to concentrate his questions on the previous night’s events. Birch’s account of the meeting and its ending tallied with those of the other Committee members who had been present. So far Lambert felt no need for the notebook he had forsaken to conduct the interview in this unorthodox setting, though he missed Bert Hook’s observant presence at his side.
‘Can you recall as exactly as possible your movements immediately after the meeting?’ Birch looked at him with the faintest trace of a smile, which manifested itself in the dark brown eyes rather than in any movement of the broad, mobile mouth. Then he addressed his ball calmly, concentrated for two seconds, and stroked a long, downhill putt from the edge of the green to within five inches of the hole, as if demonstrating the steady nerve allowed him by a free conscience.
As they moved towards the next tee, he said, ‘Look, John, I’m finding this as bizarre as I hope you are. I’m grateful I’m not being grilled in a police station, or even your murder room at the club. If anyone has to “help the police with their inquiries”, I can recommend this setting.’ He paused and looked down the deserted, tree-fringed sixth fairway. ‘But I don’t think I can really play golf and concentrate on your questions. Any more than you can play golf and frame them!’
Lambert grinned ruefully. ‘If that’s a comment on my play over the last five holes, I accept the excuse gratefully, as most golfers would. I’m afraid I can play as badly as that with nothing on my mind, so we’ll never know. But you’re right, of course. It was ridiculous to think we could have a serious exchange while playing golf. What say we leave our trolleys and stroll ahead without them? I’m still reluctant to move indoors and leave this weather outside, especially if you think it may not last.’
Birch looked at him a little curiously, as if he suspected an ulterior motive. Then he grinned, the wide, conspiratorial grin which retains in some men the schoolboy they thought had disappeared. They set off together without their clubs, towards the spot where a green woodpecker tapped its insistent tattoo in the woods.
‘At the end of the meeting we all gathered up our papers. I left almost immediately. So did most of the others. Mary Hartford and Debbie Hall went off together, presumably to the ladies’ locker-room. Michael Taylor and I went straight through to the men’s locker-room and the toilets. With some relief, I may tell you, since we’d had a pint before the meeting.’
Lambert neither checked his stride nor altered his expression. He looked straight ahead as he said, ‘You’re quite sure of this, Bill?’
The Vice-Captain took his time before answering steadily, ‘About those few facts, yes. Of course, it’s surmise about the two women.’
‘It’s what you say about Michael Taylor that interests me. It doesn’t quite tally with his recollection of the order of events.’
‘Michael Taylor wouldn’t have killed Shepherd. He hasn’t the nerve.’
‘But Bill Birch might have?’ As the Vice-Captain turned towards him, his long, sallow face suddenly flushed and excited, Lambert hastened to elaborate. ‘Be thankful, Bill, that investigations don’t revolve round such presumptions about character. My experience is that anyone has the nerve for murder if pushed to emotional extremes. I’ve already had the view that David Parsons is much too nice a chap and Debbie Hall too compassionate a lady to have committed murder. For what it’s worth — which is precisely nothing — none of you looks a murderer to me. But one of the five of you almost certainly is.’ Birch nodded as he recognized the logic, but his face looked set and sullen. He was not going to find it easy to talk about the other suspects. He was a very different man from Michael Taylor. Where the Captain had collapsed under steady interviewing pressure from Lambert and Hook, his Vice-Captain was likely to prove reserved and uncommunicative. Lambert was finding it difficult to play this fish, finding the pressure of previous friendship interfering with the interview strategy more than with any of the previous four. He decided on a degree of confidence most of his colleagues would have regarded as unprofessional, in an attempt to keep the atmosphere he wanted.
‘Look, Bill, it may be something or it may be nothing. Michael Taylor told us he went straight to the bar after the meeting. That he went to the locker-room after, not before, you’d had a drink and been joined by the ladies.’
‘No.’ Birch’s voice was steady, even reluctant, but definite. ‘We went after the meeting. I told you, we were a bit desperate.’
‘That makes sense,’ said Lambert with a grim little smile. He thought of the words from Mary Hartford which had mildly shocked him: ‘The men rushed to empty straining bladders, the women to repair the ravages of a humid evening.’ For whatever reason, it seemed Michael Taylor had lied when he said he did not go to the locker-room until after the group in the bar broke up.
Beside him, Bill Birch ran a hand through his thick, curly hair as Lambert watched him from the corner of his eye, Had he been sweating earlier? It was possible: the day was as hot as ever. But Lambert was not imagining the strain he saw in the profile beside him. Birch had had a broken nose many years earlier; Lambert wondered inconsequentially why he had never noticed it before, for despite competent repair it was clearly visible from this angle. The draining of the blood from Birch’s face had etched the tension on his features; the skin was tightly drawn over the high cheek bones and determined chin.
They walked another forty yards in silence before the Vice-Captain said, ‘It might be no more than a mistake on Mike’s part.’
‘Indeed. But it would be a curious one. Few things are more imperative than men’s bladders at the end of a longish meeting, as you indicated yourself, Bill.’
‘But why would he deceive you? The fact that he was with me gives him a clear alibi right up to the end of drinks, when we left, surely?’ A pause. Then, with a dawning horror scarcely muted by the nervous giggle which followed it, he said slowly, ‘If you believe me, of course.’
Somewhere behind them, a jay peeled off its harsh descending cackle, as if in mocking parody of Birch’s involuntary giggle of tension. He said, ‘Shouldn’t you say something like “It’s my job to disbelieve everybody at this stage, sir,” like a detective in a play?’
Lambert, who had met the idea often enough before, smiled at him. ‘I rather think I prefer to believe every
one until some other piece of evidence suggests otherwise,’ he said, as if genuinely curious about his own methods. ‘You’re right of course about Michael Taylor. It’s curious he should leave himself without an alibi for the time he was with you. But it seems he didn’t leave the club immediately after you all left the bar. Mary Hartford thinks she heard his car leave the car park a little while later.’ As he spoke, Lambert wondered for the first time how much reliance could be placed on the evidence of a woman whose prints were on the murder weapon. Fortunately, the man beside him could not know that.
‘That’s true,’ said Birch slowly. ‘I saw him go as I came out. Or saw his tail lights and his number plate.’
‘So you were there after him. Was anyone else?’
‘Mary Hartford. We called good night to each other through the darkness. I think everyone else had gone. David Parsons certainly had — his parking space was empty. The Chairman’s Rolls was still there of course.’
‘That didn’t strike you as odd?’ It had troubled Lambert throughout: none of the witnesses seemed surprised that the Chairman should still be around, unseen, in the club.
‘No. With any of the others, it probably would have. But Shepherd was a … a secretive man.’ Lambert noted the search for the diplomatic word, but said nothing. ‘He was always in a corner somewhere with someone. I thought he might be with the Steward, or even alone in the Committee Room. We’d been discussing finance, and that was his field. Especially if anything irregular could be discovered.’ The bitterness was unmistakable. Lambert, though he would come back to it, ignored it for the moment.