‘No, ma’am. Things were going full steam ahead with Brian Davis. I had already raised concerns about the nature and the quality of the forensic evidence but things were still going full steam ahead with Brian Davis. If I had then said that I wanted to go back to Abbeyfields because I’d heard that two of the priests had had a row, what would the reaction have been?’
He looked round at them one by one, as if expecting an answer, but none came.
‘Precisely. I didn’t go there expecting to make an arrest, but when this man openly said that he had killed Mark Randall, what other choice did I have? I suppose I could have said to him, would you like the rest of the day to think about this? I’ll pop back in the morning and see if you still want to confess…’
There was an edge in Smith’s voice now, and Allen didn’t seem to want a direct confrontation – instead he came at it another way.
‘But it’s so out of the blue. I assume that you, we, have no evidence against the man except his confession which, as you well know, isn’t always sufficient to gain a conviction. Is he…stable? Sane, even?’
‘I don’t know, sir – not my area. But it isn’t always easy to tell with devout people, is it?’
Nobody seemed to fancy answering that either. Instead, Allen said, ‘Look – we need to step back now and examine this business as a whole. We have two men arrested and one of them charged for the same murder. That isn’t unusual except that in this case they seem to be completely unknown to each other. The one that we have charged we have some good evidence against but he is denying it; the one who is claiming to have done it we have no evidence against. DI Reeve, as the senior investigating officer, how do you intend to proceed?’
To her credit, she appeared to have been prepared for that.
‘The first thing we need to do is to formally interview Jeremy Hayward, to see if he is serious and sane. He needs to give us some proof that he did what he said, and as we haven’t released a number of details about the killing, that shouldn’t be too difficult. He has declined a solicitor, by the way. I will conduct the interview myself, along with DC. Depending on how that goes, we might want to send people out to the friary. We may need to search his rooms and interview the other members of the community.’
She was watching Smith as she spoke, realising with a familiar sinking feeling that the momentary shake of the head meant that there was more to come.
‘DC?’
‘Ma’am. Personally, I think that the interview with Brother Jeremy needs a different focus entirely. We need to be searching for evidence that will enable us to eliminate him from the inquiry.’
Wilson made a slight staggering movement. Afterwards, Smith could not be sure whether it was because he was about to throw a punch at his opposite number or faint, but he made ready to catch him just in case it was the latter. Superintendent Allen’s thin, bloodless lips formed a silent O of their own accord before they managed to shape a distant ‘What?’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but we haven’t got round to this bit yet. I know it’s awkward arresting prominent members of local religious communities but in this case I believe there’s a silver lining. Because I’m pretty sure that he didn’t do it.’
Word had gone around the office, and Waters was enjoying a moment of celebrity; the assembled detectives had all examined their own tallies and agreed that Waters was indeed the only one amongst them to have arrested a priest. No-one else could come up with anything close – not a nun or a verger nor even a parish clerk. Smith’s appearance brought the discussion to an end, and the group dispersed. Waters had seen this before – much of the time Smith was laid back compared to most detectives in authority but sometimes, as now, when he was busy and fixed on an investigation, he could change the atmosphere in a room simply by walking into it. He waved Waters over to their neighbouring desks.
‘Who was the duty sergeant when you took him down?’
‘Brenda Marr.’
‘And how did it go?’
‘She asked him if he was wearing fancy dress.’
‘Good one, Brenda. How was he?’
‘Completely calm and very civilised. She still thinks it’s a wind-up.’
‘Listen, we need to act a bit sharpish. I thought we might get something at the friary but not this. There are probably too many prepositions in what I’m about to say but upstairs this hasn’t gone down too well, as you can imagine. Find out what’s happening with those fibres caught on the handle of the spade – get a phone number from Evidence and follow it up yourself. You can pretend to be me if you want. If it’s going to take much longer, it might be quicker for you to do a PhD in forensic science and analyse it yourself.’
Waters was already halfway to the door when Smith called him back by his first name – something that was still unusual.
‘I might have just made a fool of myself upstairs. We didn’t get a chance to talk in the car with Brother Jeremy in the back seat. What did you make of all that?’
At that moment Wilson came in and without a glance in their direction went across to his own team of detectives. They formed a group around him and he began to explain the latest developments in a voice low and quiet enough not to be heard by anyone but them. Waters watched this, using the time to think about how to answer Smith’s question, which was obviously an important one.
‘I don’t think he intended to say any of what he ended up saying when we first went in. It was something that you said that brought it about.’
‘Go on. What was it?’
‘When you told him that you were going to interview everyone again. He said that he wanted to spare them that indignity. I can see why someone who had done what he claimed to have done might feel that way.’
‘Me, too. But you just said “claimed”. Why?’
Waters knew what Smith was asking him now. Over the past eighteen months he had begun to understand the way in which cases are legally constructed; how, increasingly, detectives must view matters through the logical eyes of the prosecutor in the court case, if there is ever to be one. Ultimately one must have enough evidence to tip the balance of probabilities in the minds of a dozen or so people – evidence is the key to it all and Smith himself, with his long experience of the court system, was a master of this methodology. But sometimes, unnervingly, Smith would suddenly abandon the game of chess, pick up a handful of dice and throw them.
‘Chris – why did you say “claimed”? Did he do it? I promise not to tell anyone what your answer was unless you turn out to be wrong.’
There was a smile on Smith’s face except in the eyes; those had not altered at all and Waters felt the answer being drawn out of him almost against his will.
‘No, I wasn’t convinced that he did.’
‘Thank God for that! Which might turn out to be somewhat inappropriate, all things considered… Never mind. And we both know why he did what he did, don’t we?’
‘Maybe…’
‘Where’s Serena? She needs to be double-checking the backgrounds of many friars. Why are you still here? Fibres, Waters, fibres!’
‘Over the past few years we have suffered a number of such intrusions, and recently it has got worse. I appreciate the difficult position in which you, as police officers, find yourselves but if we cannot establish some sort of peace and order in the countryside, what hope is there for the towns and cities? As I say, it is getting worse – we had even discussed the matter in community, wondering whether we should have some sort of patrol of the grounds. Absurd, isn’t it? Brothers of the Society of Saint Francis becoming vigilantes…’
Alison Reeve had taken the lead in the interview, and Smith understood why. Approaching her office beforehand, he had heard Superintendent Allen reminding her again that she was the senior investigating officer; in as many words he was telling her that he didn’t want Smith running the show. And he had no doubt that the superintendent would be watching the live feed on this one.
Jeremy began again, ‘On the night it happened-’
Reeve said, ‘Monday the 17th of June?’
‘Yes. I decided to go down from the friary and along the river. The kingfishers that I have been studying all year have their nest near the road-bridge. It was early dusk and I wanted to see whether both adult birds were still present. One had been missing for a while and I… I’m not sure how much detail you want from me on all this, inspector.’
‘Just carry on as you are, please.’
She was too business-like, too brusque in Smith’s view; he would have inquired about the birds and found out in that way just how often the guardian had visited them in the preceding days. Reeve had been rattled by her encounters with Allen, and that wasn’t like her.
‘When I drew level with the well-known badger’s sett at the bend in the river, I could see that it was happening again. There were three men present. I stepped off the footpath into the undergrowth and moved a few yards closer – I could see exactly what they were doing.’
‘What were they doing?’
‘One was watching, one had a terrier on a lead and the other was digging out one of the entrances.’
Reeve said, ‘Had you seen any of the men before? Did you know them?’
‘No.’
‘And did they see you?’
‘No. As I said, the light was going, and this robe is surprisingly good camouflage…’
The friar indicated his own brown garment and attempted half a smile.
Smith said, ‘How did you feel at that moment, sir?’
There was a pause before the answer came.
‘I was furious with them and with myself. You will ask – why with yourself? Because my courage failed me. I should have confronted them there and then, shamed them into leaving the creatures alone, but I did not. Such men have no shame these days, and no fear of the law. I was afraid for myself.’
Reeve said, ‘What did you do, then?’
‘I noticed that on the path to the sett they had dropped or put there another shovel, a few feet from where I stood. I picked it up. I’m not sure why. Maybe I thought it would be evidence, or at least they wouldn’t be able to use it if I removed it. Then I retreated back to the main footpath. I was still shaking with emotion. Not fifty yards further on I saw another man using a metal detector on one of our fields. It seemed as if every man of selfish intent had come onto Abbeyfields that night, as if we were under attack. I – I lost control of myself. One hears people say that things happened in a blur, and it is true. I remember looking down at him on the ground and realising that I had done that… I had struck him with the shovel.’
Reeve said, ‘How many times?’
‘Once only.’
‘How did he fall?’
‘Forward onto his front. He never moved at all. I knew that I might have killed him.’
Reeve let those words grow in the silence that followed them.
‘You are admitting that you knew even then that the blow was fatal?’
‘Yes.’
‘What did you do? Did you touch the man to see if he was alive? Did you make any effort to help him?’
‘No.’
Jeremy Hayward still had the book with him. It lay closed on the table, and Smith was able to make out the title on the spine though the gilt of the lettering was faded and worn – ‘The Poems of John Donne’. Sheila had taught those to A Level students for several years, and that was why Brother Jeremy had been invited to her school in the first place. He was some sort of authority, had given up an academic career to serve the same god as the poet – perhaps even because of the poet. And now the same man was in front of him and confessing to one of the most ancient of sins, the murder of a fellow man. Brother indeed… Somewhere in all that, thought Smith, would be a tragic irony if I believed a word of this.
Reeve said, ‘Please tell us what you did next.’
‘I was in a peculiar mental state. It was dark by now. I went on towards the road, the Lowacre road, still carrying the shovel. When I was close to the road-bridge, I went down to the water’s edge and hid the shovel in the vegetation.’
‘Why did you do that? You must have known that the area would be thoroughly searched if you had killed Mark Randall, and you have admitted that you thought you had.’
‘Because I wanted it to be found. I knew that the shovel could incriminate the men from whom I had taken it.’
Reeve thought for a long time before she said, ‘That was a deliberate and calculated action, Mr Hayward. I have to tell you that in a courtroom any attempt to incriminate the innocent is viewed with the strongest disapproval.’
‘I understand that.’
Smith had waited for the account to reach this point, and he did not look at Reeve for her agreement before he spoke.
‘Brother Jeremy – the shovel had been in your hands. It was also going to incriminate you, wasn’t it?’
There was a nod of agreement.
‘I was thinking quite clearly, and we have all watched too many murders on the television, haven’t we? I wiped the handle and the upper part of the shaft, hoping to remove any fingerprints of my own – and hoping that any other prints would be left intact.’
Smith did look at Reeve now. She was shaking her head at the sight of Brother Jeremy putting his own head into a noose, but thankfully her eyes were saying to Smith, if you’ve got something, carry on.
‘Could you explain to me or demonstrate exactly how you wiped the handle, sir?’
‘Pardon?’
Smith reached for his notebook, found a clean page and drew the D-shaped outline of the shovel’s handle – they should have thought to bring in the photographs but never mind.
‘Here’s the handle. Can you show me how you wiped it clean?’
The first moment of uncertainty in what had been up to that point the perfect confession. Then Jeremy Hayward made some half-hearted rubbing motions with his two hands.
‘Where on the handle? All over it? And underneath the bar here, the bit the fingers grip?
‘Yes, sergeant. I was quite thorough.’
‘Good. Thank you.’
Smith sat back, nodding himself now as if he was done, and it was not until Reeve herself began to speak that he said, ‘And what did you use to wipe the handle, sir?’
The friar reached inside the robe and produced a plain white handkerchief.
‘You always carry a handkerchief?’
‘Yes, as a matter of habit, if you can forgive the expression…’
Smith had known a few men, but only a very few, so cool under questioning for the most serious offences that they could carry off such humour. They did, however, appear with alarming frequency in those television series that Brother Jeremy had referred to, and perhaps that was his source of inspiration for this performance.
‘I see. Would that happen to be the actual handkerchief, sir?’
‘Well, I doubt it. And even if it was, it would have been washed by now.’
‘Of course. But your handkerchiefs are all pretty much the same – white handkerchiefs, that sort of thing?’
Jeremy Hayward was a clever man, and sensed something then; he paused and looked back over his answers on the subject of handles and handkerchiefs. But whatever it was that lay behind the detective sergeant’s last question, he, the guardian of Abbeyfields, could not know it, and there was nothing to be read in the man’s face – Brother Jeremy could only make his best guess.
‘Yes, sergeant, my handkerchiefs are white ones.’
Reeve said then, ‘Mr Hayward, the place in which you say you hid the shovel is not the place in which it was subsequently found. How do you account for that?’
‘I moved it.’
‘When?’
‘Last Wednesday night. I went down to the river after dark, found the shovel and placed it somewhere where it would be more visible. I wanted it to be found.’
‘As a part of your plan to incriminate the men that you had seen digging at the badgers’ sett?’ Jeremy Hayward nodded, and Reeve
continued, ‘But surely you knew that we had already made an arrest in the case?’
To her surprise, Smith intervened before the arrested man could answer for himself.
‘I think I can explain, ma’am. When I informed Mr Hayward on Tuesday the 4th that an arrest had been made, he assumed that it would be one of the badger-digging fraternity. That’s correct, isn’t it, sir?’
Another nod from Hayward, but a wary one this time. There was something a little unnerving in the small detective’s manner, an odd sort of space between the friendly voice, the encouraging smile, the quizzically raised eyebrows and the eyes themselves; the eyes that were an unflinching, unchanging, azurite blue.
Smith said then, ‘So when you were told on the Tuesday that some other person had been arrested, you felt a twinge of conscience and moved the evidence so that the right people would be arrested and charged – even though they were still the wrong people, if you see what I mean, sir. Is that what happened?’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘So why didn’t you move the shovel on the Tuesday night?’
‘Pardon? Oh, I…’
‘If you were that concerned about someone other than the badger diggers being arrested, why not go out and move the shovel the same night? Why did you wait until the Wednesday night, sir?’
Reeve’s gaze travelled slowly from Smith to the friar.
‘Because I needed time to reflect on this situation. It had not gone as I had expected.’
‘I see – reflection and prayer, no doubt. Have you at any point told anyone else about what you did?’
‘I have not.’
‘You haven’t been to confession, for example?’
‘No.’
That answer came slowly and guardedly – the two of them were facing each other across the no-man’s-land between their respective professions and their respective philosophies.
Detective Inspector Reeve told Brother Jeremy that they would be taking a short break now, and then she told the recording machine the same thing before switching it off.
The Rags of Time Page 26