“I can vouch for the tumour in the stomach,” Amos responded. “I’ve seen it for myself. The big question is, had Austin told Knowles the MRI results?”
“It doesn’t look like it,” Burnside said readily. “At least not about what showed up in the scan. Knowles had not had an appointment between the scan results coming back and his death on Saturday. Unless, of course, Austin told him privately. But it seems unlikely. She has recorded everything meticulously and there is definitely no mention of Knowles being told.
“I chatted up the receptionist and persuaded her to show me the appointment book and Knowles was booked in for Monday morning, presumably to learn his fate.”
“Except fate intervened first,” Amos said drily. “The trouble is, it knocks our one and only genuine suspect out of the frame. Why bother to kill him and face a lengthy jail sentence when she knew he would die very soon anyway?”
Chapter 35
Amos, Swift and Burns wandered despondently though to the incident room.
“Any news yet on Knowles’s daughter Beccy?” Amos asked the detective who had been deputed to track her down in Australia.
“Sorry, no sir,” the detective stammered.
Amos looked at him accusingly.
“We’re not getting much cooperation from the Australian police and the time difference doesn’t help,” the young man protested feebly. “She and her husband have moved from the address we had and no-one seems to have a forwarding address for her.
“They think she has moved into an area where forest fires are raging and the fires are top priority for the police who are trying to prevent looting. Our missing person is small beer at the moment. I keep trying,” the unhappy detective tailed off lamely.
A colleague came to the rescue by distracting Amos.
“There are some new leads, Sir,” one of the detective constables fielding phone calls at Boston police station said. “I’m afraid they’re anonymous but they are quite specific.”
The officer handed Amos three sheets of paper. He took them and read out the gist of each aloud.
“Ask Jonas Tomlinson about his son – he borrowed money from Simeon Knowles. Ask Rebecca Dyson what her real name is. Ask Dr Austin if she was poisoning him.”
“They sound remarkably similar in style,” Swift commented. “Could they have come from the same person?”
“Two of them definitely didn’t, because I took the calls,” the constable replied. “One sounded elderly and the other much younger. I didn’t take the third call so we can’t be sure.”
“Male or female?” Amos asked.
“All three female.”
“I think we can discount the third call,” Amos said. “We’ve just written off Dr Austin and there’s no evidence that Knowles was poisoned. He certainly didn’t die of poisoning. Come on, Juliet, let’s take Tomlinson first, he’s nearest and the reference is more enigmatic.”
Swift needed no further summoning, for Burnside was edging uncomfortably close to her. She and Amos were soon in the car and heading back to see a man who, until now, did not even have a son as far as they knew.
Jonas Tomlinson was not on the telephone so there was no means of checking in advance but, as they expected, he was at home. He had said himself that he rarely went out much apart from to church on Sunday.
The man seemed surprised to see them again so soon but he welcomed them into his home nonetheless. At least they were company.
“Mr Tomlinson,” Amos got straight to the point, “you didn’t mention that you have a son.”
“Had,” Tomlinson said tersely.
Amos and Swift were taken aback.
“What happened to him?” Amos asked, rather less aggressively than he had posed his first question.
“He’s dead. It’s been five years now, but it seems like yesterday.”
“Did he work for Simeon Knowles?” Swift guessed.
Tomlinson shook his head. “No, at least he was spared that.”
“There has to be some connection between him and Knowles,” Amos persisted. “You might as well tells us what it is, Mr Tomlinson. We shall find out sooner or later and you can save us a lot of time. If he died five years ago I assume he was an adult. What did your son do for a living?”
“He was a farmer, down on the Fens.”
“How did he die? Was it an accident?”
“It was no accident. They said it was suicide but I don’t believe James would have taken his own life. It’s a mortal sin.”
“How was Simeon Knowles involved?”
“He wasn’t,” Tomlinson said truculently. “It was nothing to do with him.”
“Did Knowles lend him money?” Amos guessed. It seemed the most likely connection.
“I’m not saying any more,” Tomlinson said. “Why should I help you to find Knowles’s killer? No-one helped me when James died. Knowles got what he deserved. Good luck to whoever did it.”
Chapter 36
“I assume Mrs Dyson, or whatever her real name is, will be at work,” Amos said as they left Tomlinson’s home little the wiser than when they arrived. “Perhaps she’ll be more helpful if she thinks her colleagues will find out about her private life if she doesn’t cooperate.”
However, Rebecca Dyson’s employer, the head of a firm of solicitors in Boston where she worked as a secretary, chose to be discreet and sent Dyson off to have a coffee break in the café across the road. The cafe was long and narrow so, with the lunch break not yet started and most tables empty, Dyson was able to steer them to the far end of the room where they could not be overheard.
“When did your husband die, Mrs Dyson?” Amos asked as nonchalantly as he could. At least the unexpected question threw Dyson for a moment.
“Two years ago,” she blurted out. “But what’s that got to do with anything?”
“Bear with me,” Amos said reassuringly. “How did he die?”
Dyson looked dubious but eventually she answered: “Peritonitis. They rushed him to the Pilgrim Hospital but it was too late. Was that all?”
So this was one untimely death that could not be blamed on Simeon Knowles, Amos thought, assuming she was telling the truth about her past life. He decided to play her along a little before raising the question of her name.
“Did you and your husband know Mr Knowles back then?”
Dyson was noticeably relaxing. This line of questioning was obviously going nowhere.
“Of course not. He was way out of our league. We didn’t go to the sort of places he did. I bumped into him when he came to the office about eighteen months ago. I was working on reception then. I’d only just joined and was trying to rebuild my life.
“Simeon wanted some legal advice and I booked him an appointment. We weren’t his usual solicitors but he insisted he wanted independent advice on a stand-alone matter. Afterwards, when I left the office to go home he was waiting outside.
“I turned him down at first because I still hadn’t got over Rob but I saw him again in Boston and we went for a drink. He was a perfect gentleman and didn’t rush me but we started going out together.”
“And did he dump Dr Austin for you?”
“No it was …”
Dyson stopped too late in mid-sentence. She took a gulp of coffee.
“Well, it wasn’t actually anyone,” she continued. “Not properly. Some woman called Rose turned up at my house one day and accused me of stealing Simeon from her. She accused me of going out with him while he was still seeing her.
“It wasn’t like that at all. I didn’t even know she existed. And when I told Simeon later he said she was a bit neurotic and it had been hard to tell her about him seeing me. He’d not told her straight away because he was worried how she would take it so he had to pick his moment. We hardly overlapped at all.”
“Pick his moment or play you both along while it suited,” Amos asked. “After all, he started to see Dr Austin before he finished with you.”
Swift isn’t the only one who can make
great leaps of guesswork and hope for the best, he thought to himself.
Dyson was suitably disconcerted.
“Simeon was confused,” she stammered. “He needed space. Dr Austin was more outgoing than me. But he didn’t have an affair with her.”
“Who told you he didn’t?”
“Simeon told me himself. He said Dr Austin couldn’t have an affair with a patient and he was on her roll.”
“And you believed him?” Swift asked.
“Yes, of course. He did have a fling with her before he met me but he wasn’t her patient then. He was quite open about it. He was cheating on his wife, not me, but his relationship had broken down by then. If he told me the truth about that, why would he lie now?”
Believe that and you believe anything, Amos thought. Surely Dyson was not so naïve? However, that was her story and she would surely stick to it, either because she did not want to admit to having a motive or because she did not want to admit to reality.
“Is Rebecca Dyson your real name?” Amos asked, suddenly and bluntly.
The woman sitting opposite was completely thrown. She had just taken a mouthful of coffee which she spluttered over the table, grabbing a paper napkin and clasping it to her mouth to minimise the damage.
“Of course it’s my real name,” she eventually stammered. “What do you think it is?”
“You tell me,” Amos responded unhelpfully.
“Well I can’t tell you,” Dyson snapped. “Unless you’re talking about my maiden name, and you don’t sound as if you are, I’ve no idea what you are on about.”
With that, Dyson extracted herself from her plastic seat and flounced out of the café.
Chapter 37
“I want to call on the Masons again,” Amos told Swift as they stood on the pavement watching Rebecca Dyson return to her place of employment across the road. “I know we’re trailing around a lot and not getting much further forwards but the Masons, I believe, are the only ones who have no apparent motive and are likely to give us reliable information.”
Swift couldn’t argue with that so she drove in silence up the stretch of A16 that they were getting to know so well.
This time Mr Mason was at home with his wife. He looked alarmed when he spotted Amos and Swift on his doorstep but the inspector smiled and held up his hand in a reassuring gesture.
“Please don’t be alarmed, either of you,” he said quietly. “We need some background information and you are our best bet. Please be assured that anything you say to us this afternoon is entirely between ourselves.”
Mason seemed mollified and Mrs Mason was only too happy to be the centre of attention. Once more they entered the farmhouse’s front room and made themselves comfortable. Mrs Mason offered to brew tea but Amos assured her that he wanted to speak to both of them together, which pleased her but disconcerted her husband again.
“Are either of you acquainted with Rebecca Dyson?” Amos began.
The Masons looked at each other, unsure what the inspector was getting at and concerned that they might land an innocent person in trouble unintentionally.
“We hardly knew her at all,” Mr Mason finally said. “I don’t think she had been around these parts for long. Not much more than a year.”
“She must have been here at least a couple of years,” Amos said. “Her husband died in the Pilgrim Hospital two years ago.”
“Simeon told us they had only just arrived when it happened. He thought it was the strain of moving that killed him,” Mr Mason said.
“Do you know where they came from?”
“No idea,” Mr Mason said. “We hardly knew her, as I said. We just saw her and Simeon Knowles at one or two farmers’ events.”
“Were they an item?”
This time Mrs Mason answered with a light laugh.
“Of course not. Simeon just liked to have a pretty girl on his arm – usually a few years younger than himself. But there was never anything in it. Oh, he was very fond of her, everyone could see that. But it was purely platonic.”
“Mrs Mason,” Amos switched subjects, “you mentioned to me when we last spoke that Simeon Knowles helped several farmers financially but there was one he couldn’t save. Who was that farmer?”
Mrs Mason hesitated but her husband said hurriedly: “I don’t think it matters now, love. Did you mean James Tomlinson, Jonas’s son?”
His wife nodded. “Should I not have mentioned him?” she asked doubtfully.
“It was perfectly fine,” Amos said soothingly. “You’ve done no harm and we have spoken to Mr Tomlinson but he is naturally reluctant to talk about his son’s tragic suicide and we were reluctant to press him too hard as he obviously has taken it pretty badly.”
Amos hoped that was not stretching the truth too far. In reality he would have been only too keen to question Jonas Tomlinson further had he thought he would get anywhere.
“Of course,” Mrs Mason said in a motherly tone. “You did quite right. Jonas was dreadfully upset and Simeon’s death would have brought it all back. It was Simeon who tried to save James.”
“By lending him money?”
“No, no. Well, yes, Simeon did bail him out but I didn’t mean that. I meant when James shot himself. Simeon tried to talk him out of it.”
“Simeon Knowles was there when he died?” Amos asked in astonishment.
“Yes,” Mrs Mason went on. “It was just awful. Simeon had done so much to help him. He’d actually gone round to see how things were going. James was in the barn with a gun. He said he was shooting rats but he suddenly turned the gun on himself.”
“Were there any witnesses apart from Mr Knowles?”
“No, there was only Simeon there. James wasn’t married. He lived on the farm on his own.”
“So that version of events was Knowles’s?”
“Yes, of course. He was the only person there. At least James didn’t die alone.”
Mrs Mason looked puzzled, unable to grasp the implication of Amos’s question, that the suicide might not have been as Knowles described it, that Knowles might have been in some way responsible for what happened.
Her husband had been sitting quietly, struggling over what if anything he should contribute. Finally, he made up his mind.
“I’m sorry, Irene,” he said in a quiet, matter-of-fact way, “but it’s time for the truth. Simeon Knowles wasn’t the saint you and some other people seem to think he was.”
Mason held up his hand as his wife opened her mouth to protest.
“Hear me out. It’s true that Knowles helped us out in our hour of need but it wasn’t done for altruistic reasons. He charged a very high price for his help. I didn’t tell you at the time because I wanted to spare you from more worry. It was why we had to sell that piece of land.
“It’s all right. We came through it, we’re clear of debt now and we don’t owe Knowles anything. Others weren’t so lucky. And one of the unlucky ones was James Tomlinson.
“James got into trouble during the same bad harvest we did. Knowles was the only source of cash and he could dictate terms. James didn’t own his farm so he couldn’t do what we did and sell off some land. He struggled to pay off Knowles but with interest the loan kept getting bigger. Finally James was working purely for Knowles and making nothing for himself to live on.
“It was pointless. James had no dependents and no reason to go on. When Knowles called once more for his pound of flesh James ended it all. You bet Knowles tried to talk him out of it. Once James was dead he had no means of recovering his loan. Not that he did too badly out of it. The interest payments more than covered the original amount of the loan, plus a bit on top.”
“How do you know all this, Mr Mason,” Amos asked.
“Knowles told me himself. He wasn’t averse to boasting of his achievements and driving someone to suicide was quite an achievement. He thought it would impress me how he could stand the loss of the loan, especially as he knew the struggle we had had to drag ourselves out of the mire. I
have absolutely no doubt that Knowles was telling the truth. He was that kind of man.”
Chapter 38
David, the Chief Constable’s nerve-ridden press secretary and general dogsbody, was bouncing up and down as Amos entered the Lincolnshire Constabulary’s headquarters in Nettleham, just to the east of Lincoln, the following morning.
“Sir Robert wants to see you right away,” David told Amos. “And by right away he means right away. No sneaking off through the car park.”
Amos, in fact, followed David willingly though with a little trepidation. Had the Chief Constable suddenly decided to take an interest in the case again? If he was hoping that Amos had got nowhere with the inquiry, he would not be disappointed.
However, the meeting was just as likely to be about the anti-drugs campaign that was Sir Robert’s latest pet project. The quarterly meeting of the East Midlands chief constables was looming and it was Lincoln’s turn to play host.
Amos preferred it when the meeting was elsewhere and Fletcher was removed from headquarters for most of the day.
It was not, however, about the anti-drug campaign. It was very much about Simeon Knowles and Fletcher was very much interested, for he even remembered Knowles’s name, which was a rarity as far as murder victims was concerned.
To make matters worse, Brian Slater was already in the Chief Constable’s office, looking sheepish.
“Where were you yesterday afternoon?” Fletcher demanded. “Were you working on the Simeon Knowles case?”
Amos looked at him in astonishment.
“Of course I was, Sir. You put me in charge, remember?”
“Don’t be impertinent, inspector.”
That was not good. Fletcher called Amos by his rank, rather than by his surname, only when he was really narked about something.
“And where were you working on the case?”
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