‘To kill her.’
‘No! Tae talk to her. To ask her what the fuck she was doing wi’ the boy, making a fool of herself.’
‘Nobody else saw it that way. His parents were happy enough to let them go to France together.’ Stallings paused then frowned at him. ‘That wasn’t news to you, Weekes, was it? You knew about that, didn’t you?’
‘No.’›
‘I think you did. Let me put something to you. Your meeting with Sugar in the Gyle centre, the one you told Mr McGuire and Mr McIlhenney about. I don’t think you arranged that at all, as you said you did.’ She kept her eyes fixed on his, leaning closer. ‘I think you were following Sugar, but you made a mistake, as you did with Mae Grey once, and she saw you. So you had to front it up. You had to talk to her. And I think that when you did, she told you that she had a new boyfriend and that she was going to France with him at the end of the term. That’s what happened, wasn’t it?’
‘No,’ he muttered.
‘Yes,’ she countered firmly. ‘This is not the time to be lying to us. I’m right; that’s what happened. And after it, you kept on following her, until you saw Davis Colledge. Come on. It’s the truth, isn’t it?’
‘Okay, okay, okay, it’s the truth. But I still didn’t kill her.’
‘So, tell us, what happened?’
Weekes drew a deep breath, trying to compose himself. ‘I waited for her, like I said. But she never came. I waited until after she should have reached where I was, but she never came. So I started to walk the other way, towards where she should have been coming from, along the path. And then I found her.’
‘But she was hidden away in a copse,’ McGurk told him. ‘You couldn’t have found her there.’
‘I never. I found her lying just off the path.’
‘Describe her.’
‘She was on her back, looking up at the trees, with her hands by her side. Her dress was all spread out. . it was long, no’ one of her minis … like she’d lain doon. She was almost smiling, ken. I never knew she was dead. I thought she was. .’ He gulped. ‘For a minute I thought she’d seen me and was lying there waiting for me. I said, “What’s the game, Sugar?” but she never moved. Then I thought she must be ill, have fainted or something. I knelt beside her, and put my hand behind her head, to lift her up. And then I felt the blood, and looked in her eyes, and I could see that she wasn’t playing at anything.’
‘And at that point, PC Weekes,’ said Stallings, ‘you did what any serving officer would do, on or off duty, you got your mobile out and called for back-up. Only you didn’t. You left her there. Or, rather, having killed her, you hid her body and left her there.’
‘I never killed her!’ Weekes’s voice rose to a scream. Frankie Birtles grabbed his arm once more, and held it until he was calm. But she said nothing, simply waited until he was ready to take up his story once more.
‘I panicked,’ he said. ‘There was I and there was Sugar, dead. If I’d called it in, the whole thing would have come out, about me and her, and about me and Varley’s wife. Mae would have found out, Lisanne would have found out, and I’d have been booted off the force. So I hid her, okay? I dragged her into the bushes, I arranged her nice like, smoothed her hair, closed her eyes, and then I got the fuck out of there.’
‘And kept quiet as a mouse, even after her body was found?’
Weekes nodded.
‘An audible reply, please,’ Stallings snapped.
‘Yes.’
‘But the necklet, Theo,’ McGurk said. ‘Why the hell did you take the necklet?’
‘To remind me of her. I gave it to her, after all.’
‘So why did you give it to Lisanne?’
‘So it wouldnae just be stuck away in one of my drawers, so I’d see it all the time on her, and so that when I looked at Lisanne I’d think of Sugar as well.’
The sergeant whistled. ‘Weekes, you are one sick man.’
‘So that’s your client’s story, is it?’ Stallings asked Birtles.
‘Yes,’ she confirmed, ‘and he’s going to be sticking to it. So charge him with murder, if you think you’ve got the evidence, which I for one doubt, or release him.’
‘I don’t need to charge him with murder,’ the inspector replied. ‘Not yet. I’m going to charge him with everything he’s admitted in this room. We’ll begin with attempting to pervert the course of justice, and leaving the scene of a crime, add in concealing a body, and round it off with theft. That’s more than enough to hold him overnight, pending a court appearance. Who knows what else we’ll have on him by then?’
Forty-two
Aileen walked in from the terrace to the living area, towelling herself off after a swim in the pool. Bob smiled when he saw that she was wearing a bikini. ‘Want a coffee?’ he asked.
‘Let’s go out for one.’
‘That’s what I meant.’
‘Then wait a minute till I put some clothes on and dry my hair. Where will we go? Into the old town?’
He wrinkled his nose. ‘Nah, it was crawling with people when I went down for the croissants and papers, and that was just after nine. Let’s walk along to the Hostal Empuries.’
‘Is that the place right on the beach? The one we can see from the terrace?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘Yes, I fancy that. I won’t be a minute.’ She ran off towards the stairs.
Bob glanced down at his shirt and saw patches of sweat under the arms. Heading off after Aileen, he started to unbutton it, tossing it into the laundry basket as he reached the bedroom. Looking for a fresh replacement, he took a cream-coloured T-shirt from his drawer and slipped it on. The letters ‘FBI’ were emblazoned on the front and back in big black letters. It looked like one of a few million sold on souvenir stalls across America, but his was different, a gift from the deputy director at the end of a visit to Quantico. He grinned at himself in the mirror, remembering the trip.
The sound of a hairdryer came from the bathroom. Idly, Bob picked up a pair of binoculars that had been left on the dressing-table and stepped out on to the sun terrace. He put the glasses to his eyes, and focused on the Hostal Empuries, which lay across the bay. He could see people on the terrace, but several empty tables also. He hoped that one would still be free when he and Aileen arrived.
He tracked down to the small curving bay, with its mushroom-shaped parasols and blue sun-loungers; it was packed, thronged with sun-worshippers of all ages, shapes and sizes. He made a mental note not to join them. He swung the binoculars to the right, following the line of the path that led to L’Escala, and then picking up the sea, as it washed gently up on to the rocks. A woman lay there, on a gentle slope away from the rest of the sunbathers; she was on her back, arms by her sides, wearing only a pair of black pants. Bob guessed that she was local, someone who knew where the quiet spots were, even in summer. He moved on, and was scanning the larger beach that led up to the road when he felt a hand tug his elbow gently.
‘I’m ready.’
He turned. Aileen was dressed in blue shorts and a matching shirt, tied below the third button, to leave her midriff exposed. She smiled at his T-shirt. ‘You look like my bodyguard.’
‘I am your bodyguard, love, duly authorised by the Mossos d’Esquadra, the Catalan police force, to carry a firearm for your protection while we’re in this country.’
The smile became a frown. ‘Are you serious?’
He nodded. ‘Oh, yes.’
‘You don’t have a gun, though.’
‘They offered me one.’
‘You didn’t take it, did you?’
‘No. If I had we’d have argued about it.’
‘Yes, we would, sure as hell. I don’t need an armed guard, not even you.’
‘My darling, you’re a head of government. If you didn’t live with me, you’d have full-time protection officers.’
‘No, I bloody wouldn’t. I don’t believe in them. Look at that man Colledge, carrying a gun. A fat lot of good that’ll do him against a suicide bomber.’
‘They tend not to go after individuals. . No, but a man with a knife, that’s different. If someone gets close enough to you with a blade, a gun’s pretty much useless. You haven’t got room to get it out.’