Final Account

by Peter Robinson

  “Interesting,” Banks said. “I’ve got one of those plastic cards, the ones you use to get money at the hole in the wall. I keep the number written in my address book disguised as part of a telephone number in case I forget it.”

  “Exactly,” said Richmond.

  “Short of trying every name and number in Rothwell’s address book,” Gristhorpe said, “is there any quick way of doing this?”

  “I don’t think so, sir,” Richmond said. “But often the password is a name the user has strong affinities with.”

  “‘Rosebud’?” Banks suggested.

  “Right,” said Richmond. “That sort of thing. Maybe something from his childhood.”

  “‘Woodbines,’” said Banks. “Sorry, Phil, just thinking out loud.”

  “But it could be anything. The name of a family member, for example. Or a random arrangement of letters, spaces, numbers and punctuation marks. It doesn’t have to make any sense at all.”

  “Bloody hell.” Gristhorpe ran his hand through his unruly thatch of grey hair.

  “All I can say is leave it with me, sir. I’ll do what I can. And I’ll ask the software distributor to put a rush on it.”

  “All right. Susan? Anything from Hatchard and Pratt?”

  Susan leaned forward to make herself heard. Just as she was about to start, Cyril called out their food number, and Richmond and Banks went through to bring back the trays. After a few mouthfuls, Susan started again. “Yes,” she said, dabbing at the side of her mouth with a napkin. “As it turns out, Rothwell was asked to leave the firm.”

  “Asked to leave?” Gristhorpe echoed. “Does that mean fired?”

  “Not exactly, sir. He was a partner. You can’t just fire partners. He was also married to the boss’s daughter. Mary Rothwell’s maiden name is Hatchard. He was asked to resign. They didn’t want a fuss.”

  “Interesting,” said Gristhorpe. “What was it all about, then?”

  Susan ate another mouthful of her Cornish pasty, then washed it down with a sip of Britvic orange and pushed her plate aside. “Laurence Pratt was reluctant to tell me about it,” she said, “but I think he knew he’d be in more trouble if we found out some other way. It seems Rothwell was caught padding the time sheets. It’s not a rare fiddle, according to Pratt. And he doesn’t regard it as strictly illegal, but it is unethical, and it’s bad luck for anyone who gets caught. Rothwell got off lucky.”

  “What happened?” asked Gristhorpe.

  “This was about five years ago. Rothwell was doing a lot of work for a large company. Pratt wouldn’t tell me who it was, but I don’t think that really matters. The point is that Pratt’s father was looking over the billings and noticed that Rothwell had doubled up on his hours here and there, at times he couldn’t have been working on their account because he’d been on another job, or out of town.”

  “What did he do? Isn’t there some regulatory board he should have been reported to?”

  “Yes, sir, there is. But, remember, Rothwell was married to Hatchard’s daughter, Mary. They’d been together nearly sixteen years by then, had two kids. Old man Hatchard would hardly want his son-in-law struck off and his family name dragged through the mud, which is probably what would have happened if Rothwell had been reported. I also got the impression that it might have been Mary’s demands that set Rothwell padding his accounts in the first place. Nothing was directly stated, you understand, sir, just hinted. Imagine the headlines: ‘Accountant fired for padding books to keep boss’s daughter in the manner to which she was accustomed.’ Hardly bears thinking about, does it? Anyway, Laurence Pratt and Rothwell were quite close friends then, so Pratt interceded and stuck up for him. Rothwell was lucky. He had a lot going for him. And there’s another reason they didn’t want a hue and cry.”

  “Which is?”

  “Confidence and confidentiality, sir. If it got out to the large company that Rothwell was fiddling, then it would put the partnership in an awkward position. Much better they don’t find out and Rothwell simply decides to move on. Keep it in the family. They’d never question the bills, or miss the money.”

  “I see.” Gristhorpe rubbed his whiskery chin.

  “It’s something that could have led to a motive, isn’t it, sir? Greed, dishonesty.”

  “Aye,” said Gristhorpe. “It is that. Which makes me think even more that these secret files might prove interesting reading.” He tapped the table-top. “Good work, Susan. Let’s make Rothwell’s business affairs a major line of enquiry. I’ll get in touch with the Fraud Squad. I’ve heard from the anti-terrorist squad, by the way, and they’ve come up with nothing so far. They want to be kept up to date, of course, but I think we can rule out Rothwell dealing arms or money to the IRA. Anything to add, Alan?”

  “I think we should follow up on the wadding. There could be a porn connection.”

  “Rothwell in the porn business?”

  “It’s possible. After all, he had plenty of money, didn’t he? He must have got it from somewhere. I’m not suggesting he was a front player, one who got his hands dirty. Maybe he just made some investments or handled finances. Take the lid off that can of worms—video nasties, prostitution and the like—and it wouldn’t surprise me to find murder. Perhaps the wadding was a kind of signature, a symbol.”

  “It sounds a bit too fanciful to me,” said Gristhorpe, “but I take your point. It’s all tied together, anyway, isn’t it? If he was in the porn business, then that makes porn part of his business affairs. We’ll follow up on it.”

  “DS Hatchley’s coming back on Monday,” said Banks. “I think he’d be a good man for the job. Remember he spent a while working on the Vice Squad for West Yorkshire? Besides, he’d enjoy it.”

  Gristhorpe snorted. “I suppose he would. But keep him on a tight leash. He’s like a bloody bull in a china shop.”

  Banks grinned. He knew that Gristhorpe and Hatchley didn’t get along. Jim Hatchley was a big, bluff, burly, boozy, roast-beef sort of Yorkshireman, a rugby prop forward until cigarettes and drink took their toll. More at home playing darts in the public bar than chatting in the lounge, he was the kind of person everyone underestimated, and that often worked to the advantage of the Eastvale CID. And he also had a valuable, county-wide network of low-life, quasi-criminal informers that nobody had been able to penetrate.

  “The Rothwells are an interesting family,” Banks went on after a sip of Theakston’s. “Mrs Rothwell assured me everything was fine and dandy on the domestic front, but methought the lady did protest too much. I wonder how much communication there really was between them all. It’s nothing I can put my finger on, but there’s something bothering me. I think the son, Tom, might have something to do with it.”

  “I got that impression, too,” said Susan. “It all looks fine on the surface, but I’d like to know what life at Arkbeck Farm was like. After I’d talked to Laurence Pratt, I got to thinking that if Tom was the reason Keith and Mary Rothwell had to get married, and Rothwell was unhappy in his marriage, then he might blame Tom. Irrational, of course, but things happen like that.”

  “I’d leave the psychology to Jenny Fuller,” said Gristhorpe.

  Susan reddened.

  “Susan’s right,” said Banks. “The sooner we find Tom Rothwell, the better.”

  Gristhorpe shrugged. “It’s up to the Florida police now. We’ve passed on all the information we’ve got. Come on, Alan, surely you don’t think the wife and daughter had anything to do with it?”

  “It would be hard to believe, wouldn’t it? On the other hand, we’ve only their word for what happened. Nobody else saw the two men in black. What if Alison and her mother did want rid of Rothwell for some reason?”

  “Next you’ll be telling me the wife and daughter were making porno films for Rothwell. You talked to Alison. You could see the lass was upset.”

  “Alison might not have had anything to do with it.”

  “You mean Mrs Rothwell? Wasn’t she in shock?”

  “So I
’m told. I didn’t get to see her until late this morning. That gave her plenty of time to compose herself, work up an act.”

  “But the SOC team went through the place as thoroughly as they usually do, hayloft and all. They couldn’t find any traces of a weapon.”

  “I’m not saying she shot him.”

  “What then? She hired a couple of killers to do it for her?”

  “I don’t know. She could certainly afford it. I suppose I’m playing devil’s advocate, trying to look at it from all angles. I still maintain they’re an odd family. Alison was genuinely terrified, I know that. But there’s something not quite right about them all, and I’d like to know what that is. I knew when I drove away from Arkbeck Farm that something I’d seen there was bothering me, nagging away, but I didn’t know what it was until a short while ago.”

  “And?” asked Gristhorpe.

  “It was Tom’s postcard from California. It was addressed to Alison—he called her Ali—and at the end he wrote, ‘Love to Mum.’ There was no mention of his father.”

  “Hmm,” said Gristhorpe. “It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

  “Maybe not. But that’s not all. When I looked through Rothwell’s wallet a while back, I found photos of Mary and Alison, but none of Tom. Not one.”

  FOUR

  I

  A good night’s sleep is supposed to refresh you, not make you feel as if you’re recovering from a bloody anaesthetic, thought Banks miserably on Saturday morning.

  Never a morning person at the best of times, he sat over his second cup of black coffee and a slice of wholewheat toast and Seville marmalade, newspaper propped up in front of him, trying to muster enough energy to get going. As a background to the radio traffic reports, he could hear Sandra having a shower upstairs. Banks hated the contraption—he always seemed to get a lukewarm dribble rather than a hot shower—but Sandra and Tracy swore by it. Banks preferred a long, hot bath with a little quiet background music and a good book.

  After catching up with paperwork, he hadn’t got home until almost eleven the previous night. He wished Sandra had been angry that they’d had to miss the claret, the Chopin and the candlelight, but she hadn’t seemed to care. He didn’t know whether she was pretending or she really didn’t care. In fact, she said she’d just got back from a reception at the community centre herself. It was getting to be par for the course. They had seen so little of one another lately that they were fast becoming strangers. It seemed to Banks that what had been a strength in their relationship—their natural independence—was quickly becoming a threat.

  And while Sandra had slept like a log, Banks had tossed and turned all night beside her, worried about the Rothwell case, with only brief, fitful periods of sleep full of shifting images: the pornographic wadding, the headless corpse. Now it was eight-thirty the next morning, and his eyes felt like sandpaper, his brain stuffed with cotton wool.

  The national dailies and radio news carried stories on the Keith Rothwell killing—sandwiched between a bloodthirsty put-down of riots on a Caribbean island, where another dictator was nearing the end of his reign of terror, and a male Member of Parliament caught in flagrante delicto with a sixteen-year-old rent-boy on Clapham Common. It probably wouldn’t have even made the papers if it had happened somewhere a bit more up-market, like Hampstead Heath, Banks thought.

  The Rothwell murder would be on television too, no doubt, amidst all the speculation on that afternoon’s Cup Final, but Banks had never been able to bring himself to turn the thing on during daylight hours.

  Now, hints were appearing in the media that the killing was more than a run-of-the-mill domestic disagreement or a burglary gone wrong. According to the radio, Scotland Yard, Interpol and the FBI had been called in. That, Banks reflected, was a slight exaggeration. The Americans had been asked to help trace Tom Rothwell, though as far as Banks knew it was the Florida State Police, not the FBI. Interpol was something the reporters always threw in for good measure, these days, and Scotland Yard was an outright lie.

  Banks scanned the Yorkshire Post and The Independent reports to see if either newspaper knew more than the police. Sometimes they did, and it could be damned embarrassing all round. Not this time, though. To them, Rothwell was as much the “quiet, unassuming local accountant and businessman” as he was to the rest of the world.

  “More coffee?”

  Banks looked up to see Sandra standing at the machine in her navy-blue bathrobe, wet hair hanging over the terry-cloth at her shoulders. He hadn’t heard her come down.

  “Please.” He held his cup out.

  Sandra poured, then put some bread in the toaster and picked up the Yorkshire Post. After she had read about Rothwell, she whistled. “Is this what kept you out so late last night?”

  “Hmm,” murmured Banks.

  The toast popped up. Sandra put the paper down and went to see to it. “I’ve met her a couple of times, you know,” she said over her shoulder, buttering toast.

  Banks folded The Independent and looked at Sandra’s profile. When it was wet, her hair looked darker, of course, but one of the things Banks found attractive about her was the contrast between her blonde hair and black eyebrows. This time, when he looked at her, he felt an ache deep inside. “Who?” he asked.

  “Mrs Rothwell. Mary Rothwell.”

  “How on earth did you come across her?”

  “At the gallery.”

  Sandra ran the local gallery in the Eastvale community centre, where she organized art and photography exhibitions.

  “I didn’t know she was the artistic type.”

  “She’s not really. I think for her it was just the thing to do. Women’s Institute sort of stuff, you know, organize cultural outings.” Sandra sat down with her toast and wrinkled her nose.

  Banks laughed, sensing a definite thaw in the cold war. “Snob.”

  “What! Me?” She hit him lightly with the folded newspaper.

  “Anyway,” Banks said, “the poor woman’s on tranquillizers. Both she and her daughter saw Rothwell’s body before they called us, and you can take my word for it, that’s enough to give anyone the heebie-jeebies.”

  “How’s the daughter?”

  “Alison? Not quite so bad, at least not on the surface.” Banks shrugged. “More resilient, maybe, or she could just be repressing it more. Tina Smithies says she’s worried they’re both losing touch.” He looked at his watch. “I’d better go.”

  Sandra followed him to the door and leaned against the bannister. She nibbled her toast as she watched him put on his light grey sports jacket and pick up his briefcase. “I can’t say I know her well enough to get any kind of impression,” she said, holding her dressing-gown at the collar when Banks opened the door, “but I did sense that she’s the kind who … well, she puts on a few airs and graces. Not so much as to be a complete pseud, but you can tell there’s a touch of the Lady Muck about her. Imperious. And she likes people to know she’s not short of a bob or two. You know, she flashes her rings, jewellery, stuff like that. She also struck me as being a very cold woman, I don’t know why. All sharp edges, like a drawer full of kitchen knives.”

  Banks leaned against the door jamb. “It’s a bloody strange family altogether,” he said.

  Sandra shrugged. “Just thought I’d put in my two penn’orth. I don’t suppose you know when you’ll be back?”

  “No. Sorry, got to dash.” Banks risked a quick kiss on the lips. They tasted of strawberry jam.

  “Can you leave me the car, today?” Sandra called after him. “There’s a water-colour exhibition I want to see in Ripon. One of our locals is exhibiting. I don’t know when I’ll be back, either.”

  “Okay,” said Banks, wincing at the barb. He could always sign a car out of the pool if he needed one. It wouldn’t have a cassette deck, but then this was hardly the best of all possible worlds, was it? At least it should have a radio. He set off determined, after a miserable night, not to let things get him down.

  It was a beau
tiful morning. Calendar weather. May, as he knew it, had finally arrived. The sky was a cloudless blue, apart from a few high milky swirls, and even this early in the morning the temperature seemed to have risen a few notches since yesterday. Banks wouldn’t be surprised if it were shirtsleeves weather before the day was out.

  As he walked, he plugged in his earphones and switched on the Walkman in his briefcase. The tape started at the jazzy “Forlane” section of Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin. Not bad for a walk to work on a fine spring morning.

  It was only about a mile to the station along Market Street, and Banks liked the way the townscape changed almost yard by yard as he walked. At his end of town, the road was broad, and the area was much like the outer part of any town centre: the main road with its garage, supermarket, school, zebra crossings and roundabouts, surrounded by residential streets of tall Victorian houses, most of them converted to student flats, all with names like Mafeking Avenue, Sebastopol Terrace, Crimea Close and Waterloo Road, and a strong smell of petrol and diesel fumes pervading the air.

  But the closer Market Street got to the actual market-place, the more it narrowed and turned into a tourist attraction with its overhanging first-floor bays, where people could almost shake hands with someone across the street; the magnifying-glass windows of twee souvenir shops; an expensive walkers’ gear shop with orange Gore-tex clothing hanging by the doorway and a stand of walking-sticks out on the pavement; a Waterstone’s Bookshop, the street’s most recent addition; the mingled aromas from Hambleton’s Tea and Coffee Emporium and Farleigh’s bakery across the street; an Oddbins wine shop; the Golden Grill café; and a newsagent’s with a rack of newspapers out front, some of them folded over at Rothwell’s grainy photograph, and a display of local guides and Ordnance Survey maps in the window. This narrow part of Market Street was always jammed with honking traffic, too—mostly visitors and delivery vans.

  Halfway through the “Menuet” section, Banks arrived at the station, a three-storey, Tudor-fronted building facing the market square. First he called in at the Murder Room and talked to Phil Richmond. The Florida State Police had tracked down the car rental company Tom Rothwell had used at Tampa airport. At least it was a start. Now the police had a licence number to look for among the millions of cars parked at the thousands of Florida hotels, motels and beach clubs.