by Roy Lewis
Dai Davies looked at him rather doubtfully, offered him a cigarette and then, when Crow declined, lit one for himself and for Skene.
‘They’ll be getting the jury sworn in soon,’ Crow said.
‘Aye. The sooner the bloody better,’ Teddy Skene said angrily. ‘I got a living to earn.’
‘Me too,’ Davies agreed.
‘You two know each other — apart from this case, I mean?’
Dai Davies looked quickly at Skene, half grinned, and shrugged his shoulders.
‘Well, yes and no, like. I mean, I didn’t know Teddy first time we crossed paths in the magistrates’ hearing, but later I got to thinking and sure enough, when he got time to have a chat later we discovered that we did know each other from way back. Teddy here, he went to school in the Rhondda ;like I did. Didn’t you, boy?’
Skene nodded, scratched his thinning hair and grinned.
‘That’s right. Me and Dai here we used to mitch from the junior school in the afternoon, looking for fag ends in the gutter. Stuck a matchstick in them, tried to smoke them. Not very successfully. Hey, long time ago now, Dai.’
‘Aye, it is that.’
‘You lived in Treorchy, Mr Skene?’ Crow asked.
‘Treherbert. Only as a kid, though. Never came back to the valley after I spent my time, National Service, in the Army. Settled down in Cardiff I did, but you heard about my—’
‘Antecedents, yes, at the preliminary hearing. I heard the evidence you gave.’ Crow turned almost casually to Dai Davies. ‘I wasn’t there to hear your evidence, though.’
Dai Davies opened his eyes wider in affected surprise.
‘Don’t suppose you needed to, did you? After all, there was my statement to go on, the one I made to the police. And you interviewed me personal, anyway.’
‘Ah, yes, that’s so. But the trouble is, I understand you changed your story somewhat under cross-examination by counsel for the defence.’
‘That twisty bastard!’ Davies looked suddenly glum. ‘He was a right one, that man wasn’t he? And I suppose he’s on again for this hearing as well. Don’t like him, don’t mind telling you that. He was rough with me. Same with you as well, wasn’t he Teddy?’
‘You can say that again,’ Skene replied and glanced at Crow. ‘But what’s the problem, Inspector? You want us both to go over our statements again with you?’
Crow smiled and shook his head.
‘It’s not that. I’m just interested in the fact that Mr Warlock seemed to shake Mr Davies here, more than a little, over the question of dates. Perhaps you can explain that to me, Mr Davies?’
Dai Davies could, but he didn’t want to. He lowered his eyes, considered the matter silently for a few seconds. He began to chew nervously at his lip. Regret rustled in his voice as he said, ‘He got me to say . . . well, he just caught me on the hop, that’s all. Won’t catch me the second time, I tell you that.’
‘Catch you? How did he catch you, Mr Davies?’ Crow asked, with concern in his voice.
Doubtfully, Davies looked at him to discover whether the concern was genuine. He glanced at Skene for assistance, but none was forthcoming; Skene merely seemed puzzled, and somewhat indifferent. Davies sighed.
‘Well, he just got me confused, that’s all.’
‘Over the dates?’
‘That’s right. Over the dates. In my statement I said I saw that woman on the hill, about ten in the evening of June 6th. That barrister, he chased me up on that one. Got me confused.’
‘But you were clear enough in your statement,’ Crow said wonderingly. ‘You stated you could easily verify the date, because it was a Tuesday and that accounted for your not being in the shop, but out on the hill, on the way back from the Club or wherever.’
‘That’s so. That’s the way it was,’ Davies said with a hint of aggression in his tones.
‘So how did Mr Warlock disturb you, confuse you?’
When Davies shrugged, looked uncomfortable, Crow went on, ‘He suggested that you might be wrong about the dates, didn’t he? He pointed out that according to information he had received your shop was open only on the Monday of the week in question, that it was closed for the rest of the time that week and so it was possible that it was not the 6th of June on which you saw Donna Stark, but the 7th, or the 8th or—’
‘If you know what he suggested, why do you ask me now?’ Davies demanded belligerently.
‘Because I know you’ve been lying right from the beginning about Donna Stark,’ Crow said.
Skene swivelled his head in surprise to stare at Crow and the movement caught the attention of Jack Scales near the far window. He looked towards the small group at the table and he frowned. But Dai Davies sat rigid, his eyes glaring, his mouth open but seemingly petrified. The colour had faded from his face, leaving his skin grey, dead-looking.
‘Wha . . . what the hell do you mean by that?’
Crow smiled, and shook his head.
‘Come on, Mr Davies, it’s a bit late to put on that sort of act. You know and I know that your story about Donna Stark has never rung true. We never followed it up because it fitted well enough with the facts we knew then, but since more information has come to light—’
‘What information?’ Skene asked wonderingly.
‘I’ll come to that in a moment,’ Crow said. ‘But first of all, you did lie didn’t you, Mr Davies?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Dai Chippo said sullenly.
‘You know exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve testified you saw Mrs Stark on the sixth, and support it by reference to the Tuesday closing. But Warlock showed you could be mistaken . . . I suspect you were . . . or otherwise you were deliberately misstating the situation.’
‘The ticket in her pocket—’
‘Forget the ticket in her pocket. What about the brooch she wore? You said you recognized it down in the shaft—if so, you must have seen it at close quarters! And why did it make such an impression on you for you to remember it, months later? Before you say anything more, let me warn you, if we press matters, I’m pretty sure we’ll be able to find out what you were doing on the Tuesday night. What I want to know is, when did you see Donna Stark and in what circumstances?’
Dai Chippo was silent for a while. He stared vacantly at Teddy Skene but he did not see him; his eyes were glazed as though he were looking inward at himself, and not liking very much what he saw.
‘I suppose that chap Warlock will be questioning me on this anyway,’ he said reluctantly. ‘So I might as well get it over with, now, with you. But you got to understand my . . . my motives.’
‘I’m listening,’ Crow said calmly.
‘It’s Margaret, really, my wife you know. Ask anyone, she makes my life hell. Or would, if she could entirely, but she’s got to have her off times too, so she goes to Ponty market and so on, Tuesdays. That’s when I’m able to get some free time . . .’ He hesitated, considering whether to continue, but decided to put a brave face on it. ‘If you was to ask around I suppose there’d be some snoopy devils who’d tell you about a couple of women in Ton . . . but the thing is, I had to break out once in a while, you know? And they was always willin’ we used to fix it up when they came into the shop. Funny that, women customers is pushovers to a chap in a shop . . . Anyway, that particular week I wasn’t able to go to this woman on Tuesday—’
‘Her name?’
‘Aw, come on . . .’ Dar Chippo hesitated, then shrugged his shoulders, grinned at Skene in a half-hearted fashion, pulled a diary out of his pocket and scribbled a name on a sheet, tore it out and passed it to Crow.
‘You understand, Teddy.’
Skene grinned slyly, in a conspiratorial fashion.
‘Only making sure you can go back there and don’t warm her sheets before I find time to get back to her.’
‘Go on,’ said Crow, reading the name.
‘Thing was, on the Tuesday I had to visit Margaret at Church Village Hospital: she was in having h
er foot done—bloody tight shoes, you know what women are like—and then I went to the Club but come Thursday I’d fixed up to go around to this bird whose name you got there. I went down about seven and, damn me, her husband wasn’t off on the night shift after all but was home with his feet up. I tell you, I was annoyed, damn frustrated, I’d been looking forward to it all week, so I . . . well, I went and got canned.’
He frowned, bit at the skin of his right thumb, spat out a small piece of grey skin.
‘You got to remember, it’s what accounts for it, I never done nothing like this before.’
‘Like what?’
‘Well . . . I came out of the Red Lion about ten, pretty well under. I was still boiling for Sal — that woman, and I was randy as hell. The shop was closed, no one home, a cold bed waiting and I was like an old ram. Then I saw this woman walking down the hill.’
He looked up, protestingly, to Crow. ‘Now believe me, I never done anything like it before. I told you, customers come into the shop, you chat them up, bit of sly dirty talk and you’re away, I tell you. So I never had the need before. But there I was, randy as hell, there she was, a stranger, walking alone down the hill—’
‘You accosted her?’ Crow asked coldly.
Dai Chippo nodded miserably.
‘That’s it. Walked up, put my arm around her – you could see how drunk I was — asked her straight out. Stupid, I was. Finesse, hell! But she swore at me, you know, gave me a right mouthful. I was surprised. She seemed smart, a nice piece, but the language she used I only heard before among the pit lads—and not even much of that. Made me angry in a way, so I jeered at her, stayed with her as she walked down the hill, and then when we came near the lamps at the bottom there, up above the Square, I saw her face. She had a swelling under her left eye. Somebody’d given her a real thump.’
He glanced at Skene and then back to Crow.
‘Not me, I swear. But someone had thumped her, and she was shaking, either because I was trying to chat her up or because the thump had shaken her up, I don’t know. But I saw that, and I saw the brooch; I sort of stared at the brooch to avoid seeing that swelling, you know, after the first moment? I said she seemed to need a feller to look after her, but she wasn’t taking that line, and I got mad, grabbed at her and shook her — I know, it was a rotten thing to do — and she started to cry. I left her alone then, swearing at me. I went back up the hill, she went to the Square. That was it.’
‘You didn’t see her again?’
‘Not till I saw her in the shaft.’ Dai Chippo rubbed a nervous hand across his mouth. ‘But that brooch . The thing was, you remember what it was like? Oval, lightning bolt through it. I tell you, I was pretty tight that night and next day I didn’t remember much but that bloody brooch kept coming back to me at night when I was dreaming, you know? I knew I’d done something wrong, uncharacteristic like, but it took me a long time to get the pieces in place, but that’s the whole story. But that brooch, bloody phallic symbol like, it was like it kept coming back into my mind to reproach me. . .and then, damn me, there it was glittering at me in the shaft! I could have been sick right there, because it brought it back, and I never approached a woman like that before, tried to force myself on her, but I was drunk . . .’
‘Why did you still stick to the story about seeing her on the sixth?’
‘Easiest thing to do,’ Dai Davies replied, ‘I mean, at first I wasn’t sure anyway, and then there was the ticket in her pocket, and later Evans said he done her in on the sixth, so what was the odds? Should I rock the boat, say I saw her alive on the eighth and then have Margaret asking what the hell I was doing accosting women while she was in hospital for a minor op on her bloody big toe? Not likely! So I went along with things. But I don’t see it’s important anyway.’
‘I do,’ Crow said.
Skene hitched forward in his chair. ‘How so? If Evans says he killed her and is wrong about the date, so what? Unless . . . unless he’s withdrawn his confession?’
Crow shook his head.
‘He’s not done that, not yet anyway, and his counsel wouldn’t let me question him further on the matter of dates, in case more damaging information would come out.’
‘So what’s the problem?’ Skene said, leaning back and smiling expansively. He looked up, grinned at Jack Scales as the man approached slowly. ‘Nothing’s changed, really.’
‘But it has,’ Crow said. He looked at Skene, Scales and Dai Chippo. ‘The problem all along has been to get valley people to talk freely, but the most tight-lipped of all has talked at last. Mrs Lily Jenkins.’
Dai Chippo grinned.
‘Lily Jenkins Secrets? What the hell has she got to do with this?’
‘A great deal,’ Crow said calmly. ‘After all, she as good as told me who killed Donna Stark.’
* * *
The three men stared at him in shock. It was Jack Scales who spoke first. He stepped forward, glared at Crow, his handsome face marked with anger.
‘It’s Martin Evans who killed her. He’s bloody well confessed to it!’
‘Ah, yes, but why did he confess? Get the answer to that and immediately the validity of that confession becomes suspect. You see, Martin Evans is a bigamist and also contracted an incestuous marriage—’
‘He what?’ Dai Chippo gasped.
Crow stared at him with massive calm. Slowly and coldly he said, ‘I would not discuss the matter with you but for the fact that it’s bound to come out now, it’ll have to be made public in the circumstances. But the facts, briefly, are these. Martin Evans, or Stark as he was then known, married Ceinwen Williams, his half-sister. Her grandmother told them the truth; they parted, Evans later married Donna, and then they also broke up.’
‘Ceinwen Williams?’ Dai Chippo shook his head. ‘That little mouse? I don’t believe it.’
Crow grimaced.
‘Didn’t the gossips in your shop ever wonder about their relationship, working together, never seeing each other at other times, a bachelor in Ton, a spinster in—’
‘I just thought he was queer,’ Dai Chippo protested.
Teddy Skene laughed.
‘Twisted mind, you got,’ he said. ‘But this Lily Jenkins nonsense—’
‘No nonsense,’ Crow said. ‘Serious, and important. Martin Evans received a blackmail letter which asked for money, or threatened to expose his relationship with Ceinwen. That was at the end of May. On the 6th of June Donna went to the valley. Martin Evans says he killed her then. I don’t believe he did. He said that just to protect Ceinwen. Now, I think he’ll say she came asking him for money, that he mentioned the letter, that she went away in a hurry, and returned two days later, this time making the same demands the letter made. Because in the meanwhile she had learned about Ceinwen, too. Her first visit had been one to threaten him with gossip about the fraud in Newcastle or to persuade him to take her back, but her second visit was made after she had spoken to the other person who knew about Ceinwen, the one who had originally sent the blackmail letter.’
‘Another person?’ Teddy Skene looked puzzled, glanced around the room at Dai Chippo, Jack Scales and James Klein, still standing near the window, trying to listen to the discussion but attempting to appear otherwise.
‘I don’t get it. All this about Evans and this first marriage . . . two people knew about it?’
‘Donna,’ Crow said, ‘and the man who killed her. The same man who put the fear of death into Lily Jenkins.’
‘Lily Jenkins again,’ Scales exclaimed in exasperation. ‘Where the hell does she fit in? You keep talking of her and yet—’
‘Lily Jenkins is an old woman who lays out, and watches over the dying. She was with Sarah Parry—Ceinwen’s grandmother, when she was dying. And she heard about the old lady’s anxieties, about Ceinwen’s marriage, about her now working for Martin Evans, and the relationship between Ceinwen and Martin was made clear to Lily Jenkins. Mrs Parry knew the secret was safe; Lily Jenkins was not named Secrets for nothing. She had a
lways kept quiet.’
‘But she talked to you, I suppose,’ Skene said sarcastically.
‘She talked to me, and to a man from the Council.’
‘The what?’ Dai Chippo said, grinning.
‘Everyone has an Achilles’ heel,’ Crow said grimly. ‘And it’s never funny when someone finds out where you are vulnerable. You see, Lily Jenkins had lived in that house ever since she was a young woman—’
‘If that was ever!’ Dai Chippo said.
Crow ignored the interruption.
‘She is getting old, she has spent her life there, she loves that house, it is her security and her haven, her pride, for she used to keep it spick and span. And she had her job — laying-out. Until one day the man who said he was from the Council came to see her. He told her that the lease of that house had never been formally made over to her and the freehold was vested in the Crawshaw estate which had been taken over by the Council. He told her that he was empowered to recommend to the Council that old ladies like herself should be taken to the Old People’s Hospital at Llwynypia, to make the house available for letting to young families. He said he would have to make the recommendation, and would do so . . . unless he was able to obtain some information from her.’
Crow paused, looked around at the three men listening to him.
‘You three will appreciate what this would mean to an old lady like Mrs Jenkins — accustomed to living in the closed Treherbert community, same faces, same friends, same enemies, and now to be forced down the valley to live out her days in strange surroundings, among strange people. She could not bear it. So she told the man from the Council what he wanted to know and he went away and she has heard nothing since. But she has declined: she no longer goes out to sit with the dying, she no longer cleans her house with pride, she no longer sees her neighbours. Instead, she cowers, half starved, in her bedroom, waiting for the knock on the door that will herald her worst fears becoming realised . . . removal from her house, imprisonment in an old people’s home.’
‘But this is nonsense,’ Skene said hotly. He rubbed his sleeve across his brow and his thinning hair fell forward untidily. ‘She could have gone to any lawyer and he’d have told her—’