Cold Relations

by Gerald Hammond

  Five hellish miles later, when sleet had increased the difficulty of driving, the phone sounded. She expected the call to be from Ian but Superintendent Blackhouse was on the line. He had received his copy of her report by email and was loud in congratulations. The baker’s van had reached Edinburgh and the proceeds of the robbery seemed to be complete and intact. She had better come in to HQ and attend while the QC identified both the lady and the loot. She could then complete the formal charges.

  She was entering Edinburgh by way of Gilmerton when Ian called back. He sounded as tired and fed up as she felt. Although any crime could be presumed to have taken place outside his territory, the body had been found well within it. Any questions of territorial boundaries were resolved, because Detective Superintendent Blackhouse, who knew no boundaries, had nominal charge of the case; but it was the super’s habit to delegate any tasks requiring hard work or deep thought to selected underlings. His own participation tended to consist of administration, at which he was good; interference, for which he had a special talent; and usurping any credit at the end of the day. At that last, he was a genius.

  The bulk of the interviews had been left to Ian, who had divided most of the day between the three brothers and their housekeeper, without obtaining any significant admissions from any of them. Whether any of the house searches had proved worthwhile would not be known until the results of forensic reports and DNA tests were delivered.

  ‘I’m on the way in,’ she said. ‘I’ll see you in about fifteen minutes.’

  First she called at home, to deliver Pippa to June with instructions to feed her. At the thought of food, even dogfood, she was overcome by the hunger that was to be expected after a long day of hard work with only a partial lunch. Her favourite carryout was almost on the route. She decided on one of her occasional lapses from the dietary regimen that, along with her perfect metabolism, accounted for her continued slenderness. She phoned ahead and a polystyrene box of scampi and chips awaited her at the shop. She ate while she drove, her eyes watering with pleasure, and cleaned her fingers on a paper towel from the glove compartment.

  When she arrived in the small office that had been put temporarily at Ian’s disposal she was neat and presentable and bearing some papers and two cups of coffee. DS Wylie, dapper as ever, was closeted with Ian but she let him fetch his own coffee.

  While the sergeant was out of the room she asked Ian, ‘How do you get on with him?’

  Ian sat up and stretched. He was comfortably dressed in slacks, an open shirt and a loose sweater and his hair was tousled. Honey usually preferred tidy men but she was tired of the sergeant; Ian’s informal appearance topped by his square-jawed face and fair but unruly hair was more to her taste. ‘He’s good,’ Ian said, ‘but not as good as he thinks he is. All in all, he’s a pain in the bum. He thinks he should be the inspector, not me.’

  ‘And you have the advantage of being a man. He thinks a woman’s place is in the home. Try to keep him out of my hair. How’s the interrogation going?’

  ‘We’ve seen the housekeeper twice and each of the brothers once without extracting any admissions. Just a lot of no comments alternating with flat denials. I’ll let you read the transcripts when they’re produced but you won’t be much the wiser.’

  Sergeant Wylie returned and seated himself. He had moved his chair a little closer to Ian’s as if to align himself with a fellow male against the intrusive woman.

  The papers in her hands she had collected from her own desk on the way by. She scanned them quickly while she spoke. ‘One thing puzzles me,’ she said. ‘How did his dentist come to identify the body? How long had the imposter been going to that dentist?’

  Ian sifted through his own papers. ‘If it gives a date here, I can’t find it.’

  ‘I thought the sergeant was going to find out,’ Honey said.

  DS Wylie nodded. ‘I’ll enquire in the morning.’

  She narrowed her eyes. ‘You’ll do it now.’

  He looked at his watch. ‘But —’

  ‘Do it,’ Ian said. His voice, usually calm and measured, had suddenly developed barbs. ‘And get on with it. If he changed his dentist within the last seven years we want to know who his previous dentist was and we want his dental charts from that time. We want to know who is his more recent dentist and we want those charts. We also want to know who gave us the outdated name of his dentist. Was it an innocent mistake or deliberate deception?’ The DS looked at his watch again. ‘Do it now,’ Ian snapped. ‘Dentists will be heading home soon and we need that information first thing.’

  The DS got to his feet and left the room, every inch of his back registering wounded dignity.

  ‘I could have dealt with him,’ Honey said.

  Ian smiled and nodded. ‘I know you could. I saved you the bother. We have the brothers and their housekeeper in the cells and we can hold them until tomorrow without any difficulty. Where do we go from here?’

  Honey yawned and gave half a shrug. ‘I haven’t got my thoughts sorted out yet. All I have is a host of discombobulated hunches. I keep thinking that timing is at the root of the whole thing. Why did the body make its appearance just when it did? Why did my least favourite QC get robbed at about the same time? Are the two things associated or is it a coincidence? The robbery must have been in planning for weeks or months, so what triggered it? When is he coming in, by the way?’

  ‘He’s here now,’ Ian said. ‘He came straight from court. I’d arranged for somebody to show him the recovered items for identification. Mr Blackhouse was collecting suitable females for an identity parade. If he picks her out —’

  ‘He will,’ Honey said. ‘No question about it. At least, I’m assuming that he looked at her face. And then we’d better question her while she’s off balance.’

  ‘We’ll have to get a formal statement from Mr Blakelove.’

  ‘You can do that,’ Honey said. ‘It will be your chance to ask him how we got onto her in the first place.’

  Ian brightened. ‘I could certainly do that. And the kennels owner is on the way, bringing the two spaniels with him.’

  ‘While we’re waiting,’ Honey said, ‘you could ring Deborah. I see that the sleet’s turned to serious snow and it’ll be worse over the Lammermuirs. By the time we’re through here it will be late and we’ll need an early start in the morning. Tell Deborah that we’ll give you a bed for the night, as a repayment of your hospitality to me. While you’re doing that, I’ll send another email to my friend Poppy. I want to know when she’s putting Andrew and Jackie on a plane home.’

  *

  Honey returned to her own desk while Ian saw the QC; and there the two spaniels duly arrived, climbing all over her as an old friend. The man from the kennels was elderly and stooped. He wore thick-lensed glasses, but nevertheless Honey was soon delighted to hear that he had picked out Leo from a line-up of red-headed men as the client who had deposited the spaniels with him. She made a fuss of them before depositing them in the care of the dog unit.

  She found a note on her desk when she returned, to say that Ian and Mr Blakelove were waiting for her in Ian’s temporary office. There had been another successful identity parade and Gemma Kendal had been recognised.

  The QC still wore the black jacket and formal attire of his profession and his jowls bulged over the starched collar. Now that he was well slept and had recovered the missing goodies without his delicate secret being flaunted to the world, he was loud in his praises. He insisted on shaking her hand although without troubling himself to stand up. ‘Such a clever young lady,’ he said. ‘I knew that she’d be the one to pull it off if anybody could.’ He seemed to be congratulating himself on his reading of people and prediction of the future. ‘And,’ he added, ‘I like to think that my own powers of observation made a contribution.’

  Honey had no intention of being patronised by the elderly and fat. ‘And did you tell Inspector Fellowes just what you observed in such meticulous detail?’ she enquired.


  The QC turned red and made a strangled sound for which his stiff collar may have been partly to blame. Before he could find his voice Ian chipped in. ‘No, he said nothing about it. Perhaps now would be a good time to let me know just what was the subject of your feat of memory and description.’

  Mr Blakelove coloured more dramatically. ‘I have your promise,’ he said.

  ‘You have,’ Honey confirmed. ‘But you must see that, unless we get a confession, it may be necessary to transfer the young lady from the dock to the witness box and let the jury see her just as you saw her. If you were defending her, you would certainly want to enquire into the validity of your identification of her in the recent identity parade. Such matters as how her hair was dressed, how she herself was dressed and what makeup she was wearing would all be highly relevant.’

  Honey’s tongue was firmly in her cheek but Mr Blakelove, being overly sensitive on the subject, missed it. There could be no doubt that he took her point, nor that the picture of Miss Kendal parading in court just as he had seen her, and of himself being invited by hostile counsel to explain exactly which features of her attire had enabled him to set the police on her track, held no appeal. He heaved himself to his feet. ‘I look to you,’ he said, ‘to avert any such event by obtaining a confession. Don’t bother to see me out. I know my way around this building, have done for years.’

  Ian had also risen. ‘But rules are rules,’ he said. He led the QC out but returned in a few minutes. ‘The old fool wouldn’t say a word. I’ll get it out of you, one of these days. Come along. Miss Kendal’s on her way to an interview room. It was your collar so you take the lead.’

  Gemma Kendal was waiting in an impersonal interview room under the cold eye of a woman sergeant. The fluffy sex-kitten was looking older and considerably subdued. Any sexual allure that she possessed was not noticeable. Honey and Ian took seats across the table from her. Gemma wanted to speak but Honey waved her to silence. ‘Your turn comes in a minute,’ she said. She started the video and two audio recorders and recited the date and time and the names and ranks of those present. Then she said, ‘You have already received the statutory warning. Would you like to hear it again?’ Gemma shook her head. ‘Very well, then. I am about to charge you with complicity in the robbery of Julian Blakelove QC on the 23rd of October last. Have you anything to say?’

  As realisation of her predicament sank in, Gemma’s manner had become less vitriolic and more wooden. ‘I don’t even know what you’re talking about,’ she said coldly.

  Honey was beginning to enjoy herself. She was waking up. Now that she was on firm ground she could relish aping the manner of an advocate in court. She adopted her pompous voice. ‘Then I shall enlighten you. Mr Blakelove has just identified you as the lady who begged a lift from him on the pretext that her car had broken down and was then in the process of seducing him when a man entered on your heels. Was the seduction completed, by the way, or was it frustrated by the intervention of your accomplice?’

  ‘None of your damn business.’

  Honey looked at her but decided that the words did not quite constitute an admission. ‘Mr Blakelove was threatened with a shotgun. He was tied to a chair while you two opened his safe with his own keys and made off with the contents of the safe and two valuable paintings from his walls. That haul has now been recovered and identified. It was hidden in the van driven by your partner, Patrick Kerr, who is also now in custody. Does that refresh your memory?’

  ‘It doesn’t ring any bells.’

  ‘Then let’s see if we can’t start any bells chiming. You were given a meal on arrival here and the mug and utensils that you used have been sent to the laboratory. We expect to recover samples of your DNA. We have the car that was stolen and which you were using when you entrapped Mr Blakelove and we have also recovered the very fancy underwear that you wore on that occasion. Your DNA will probably be detectable on the car seats. It and that of Mr Blakelove will certainly be detectable on the underwear.’

  Gemma Kendal produced a creditable sneer. ‘Don’t hold your breath,’ she said. ‘The stuff’s been through the washing machine since then.’

  Honey matched the sneer with a smile. ‘Since when?’

  Gemma could be seen to be thinking hard. She must have realised that her words had turned a difficult position into a hopeless one. ‘I’ll tell you this much,’ she said. ‘I was driving the car. A friend had lent it to me. I’m not going to tell you his name and I didn’t know that it had been stolen. It broke down in the rain and Mr Blakelove was kind enough to give me a lift to his house while I waited for the garage to send help. He rather fancied me and I was grateful to him. We were just beginning to have sex when a man followed us in with a gun and anything I did after that was under duress. If Mr Blakelove tells it differently it must be because he was under stress and getting muddled. I was scared that I’d be implicated so that’s why I didn’t go to the police. I’m not saying another word until I have a solicitor present, except,’ she added spitefully, ‘that sex with him turned out to be like being raped by an overweight and sweaty warthog and you can quote me on that.’

  ‘Oh I will,’ Honey said. ‘Don’t for a moment think that I won’t. Now tell me the name of the garage that was supposed to be sending you help.’

  ‘After I’ve seen my solicitor.’

  ‘It would carry more weight if you told me now.’ Miss Kendal shook her head in silence. ‘Very well,’ Honey said. ‘And would you care to explain the message that you left on Patrick Kerr’s answering machine? It is recognisably in your voice and I expect a voice print to give confirmation sufficient for a court of law.’

  When they had left the prisoner to the care of the custody officer, Ian said, ‘So that’s what the fuss was about.’

  Honey pretended to peep coyly from behind the papers in her hand. ‘He’s a bit sensitive about the fact that he could describe so precisely what she was wearing underneath. He only agreed to cooperate after I promised to be as discreet as circumstances allowed. It was the accuracy of his description that gave her away. There’s one thing I don’t understand. Once he was sure of having his property returned, why didn’t he just say that Gemma Kendal wasn’t the woman at all? She’d have got off and he’d have lost nothing except revenge.’

  ‘I think he was going to,’ Ian said. ‘He hesitated and then spoke up almost defiantly. Spitefully too. Once he was tied to that chair, I think she may have said or done something to him that was so totally beyond the pale that he was ready to risk humiliation rather than let her get off.’

  ‘You’re probably right.’ They covered the length of the severe corridor while Honey thought it over. ‘We’ll see if her story can stand up when we’ve interviewed Pat Kerr,’ she said at last. ‘My bet is that it doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell, but we’ll see how Kerr shapes up. I can’t see them having had the forethought to rehearse a story in which she’s acting under duress. I just can’t imagine Kerr going out of his way to prepare an escape for her that would only be needed if he got trapped. He doesn’t have that much altruism.’ She yawned. Tiredness was returning, coming over her in waves. ‘Is Hannah Phillipson still here?’

  ‘I think so. She made and signed her statement. Now she’s waiting for a lift home.’

  ‘From you?’

  Ian had been infected by Honey’s yawn. ‘She’ll be out of luck if she is,’ he said when his own yawn had relented. ‘No, I think there’s a traffic car going south shortly, if it can make it. Otherwise we’ll have to arrange accommodation for her.’

  ‘Was she asked specifically about Gemma Kendal’s evening absences during the period before the robbery, the times she got dolled up? And did they only happen on rainy evenings?’

  Ian frowned. ‘I think that that question was only raised implicitly.’

  ‘I think it’s an important point. Let’s find her and quiz her about it. Then I suggest that we leave the whole boiling lot to stew in custody until morning.’

 
‘I can’t quarrel with that.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  Following her scampi and chips supper, Honey was not in the mood for another meal at home. She pleaded exhaustion and took to her bed, leaving Ian and Sandy to shoptalk downstairs. She slept like the dead, totally unaware of anything at a conscious level; but her subconscious must have remained hard at work because she awoke before dawn to find that, among all the facts and suppositions of her current cases, a dozen or so seemed illuminated like pinpricks of light in a black night. In her dozing state they seemed to arrange themselves, clustering together as if revealing small streets and hamlets. Small, half-seen patterns merged at the edges . . .

  Suddenly she was wide-awake and the activity in her mind made further sleep unthinkable. She slipped out of bed and began to dress. The intuitive reaction that grows between perfect partners told her that she was being observed. She looked round. Sandy was watching her with one eye; the other still buried in the duvet. He made a small sound expressing both admiration and lust. She smoothed down her dress, stooped and kissed him on the ear. ‘Tonight,’ she said. ‘I promise.’

  ‘I shall enjoy –’ Sandy began. He was asleep again before he could finish the sentence.

  She was scribbling a note for June while bolting her cornflakes when Ian slipped into the room. ‘I heard you start moving around,’ he said softly. ‘If you’re going back to HQ, I’m coming along.’

  She nodded and smiled. The right words were refusing to come. ‘Help yourself,’ she said. ‘There’s tea in the pot. Just don’t talk about the case yet until my hunches have sorted themselves out.’

  Half an hour later, they were parking in adjacent slots. There had been a light snowfall and the snowploughs and gritters had left most of their route crisply white. All too soon the street verges would be stained by soot and grit but for the moment it was pristine. Before dawn on a Saturday there was very little other traffic. The Range Rover took the slippery streets without difficulty but in her mirror she could see Ian’s hatchback wagging its tail. She slowed until he caught up. They walked up to Ian’s temporary office together. It was cramped but at least they had more privacy than would have been the case in Honey’s shared space.