Fisher hesitated. Vogel thought he had the look of a man who was considering whether or not to risk a lie. He knew that look. He had seen it often enough over the years.
‘Uh, about six,’ he said. ‘Maybe a little later.’
Vogel nodded and looked pointedly at his watch. It was still only 9 a.m.
‘And where were you in Kent?’ he asked.
‘Just outside Deal,’ said Jim Fisher. ‘Big construction job. Two hundred houses. Everybody’s gambling on the new, high-speed rail link. I’m lucky to have got hired. Months of work. Good money too. I stay up there through the week, get home every other weekend…’
Fisher’s voice tailed off, as if he realised he was rambling.
Vogel inclined his head and assumed his most thoughtful expression, the one that made him look so much more like an old-fashioned school teacher, than a modern policeman.
‘So you got here in under three hours,’ he remarked mildly. ‘You made very good time then.’
‘Yes, I did.’ Fisher looked and sounded extremely uncomfortable. As well he might, thought Vogel. Both he and Jim Fisher knew damned well it was practically impossible to get from Deal to Bristol in under three hours at the best of times. If Fisher really had left Deal soon after six, he would have hit the southern outskirts of London and the M25 as the morning rush hour was beginning to peak.
Vogel glanced at Sarah Fisher. She was still weeping, quite silently now, consumed by her own dreadful misery. She didn’t seem to have noticed the significance of the exchange between Vogel and her husband, let alone reacted to it.
Vogel saw no reason to add to her distress. Not yet, anyway.
‘Mr Fisher, I wonder if you’d be kind enough to step outside with me,’ he said. ‘I need to ask you some more questions and I think your wife would appreciate a little peace and quiet.’
Vogel moved towards the door which led into the hall. He indicated to Dawn Saslow that she should remain with the bereaved woman and the dead girl’s father, who had finally stopped weeping and was perched awkwardly on a hard chair as far away as possible from the sofa his ex-wife and her current husband were sharing. Wordlessly, Jim Fisher stood up and followed Vogel. Sarah Fisher, even though she had been so eager to have her husband home with her, barely seemed to notice that either.
Once in the hall, Vogel confronted Fisher directly. He didn’t bother to point out the impossibility of the logistics of Fisher’s alleged journey. He was pretty sure from the other man’s uneasy demeanour that he didn’t need to.
‘So where were you last night, Mr Fisher?’ Vogel asked. ‘You sure as heck weren’t anywhere near Deal, were you? That much we both know.’
Fisher avoided the DI’s gaze. He looked down at his feet.
‘I was in Bath,’ he muttered, almost inaudibly.
‘And what were you doing in Bath?’ asked Vogel.
‘I was with a friend,’ replied Fisher, still mumbling.
‘A female friend by any chance?’ Vogel enquired.
Fisher nodded.
‘I’m afraid I need a proper answer from you,’ said Vogel. ‘I need to know exactly where you were last night, with whom and what you were doing. That includes the name of your female friend. And will you please speak up? I want to be quite clear on this.’
‘Her name’s Daisy, Daisy Wilkins,’ said Fisher, glancing anxiously towards the living room door and speaking only a little louder than before. ‘I was, well, I was visiting her. I’m working all hours on this job. I have three days off every other weekend: Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. But sometimes I manage to sneak a Friday off, so I can spend Thursday night with Daisy. Then I come back here Friday evening as usual.’
Fisher paused.
‘Look, Mr Vogel, my wife doesn’t have to know, does she? I mean, you saw the state of her. I can’t believe what’s happened. It’ll destroy her, I know it will. I don’t want her even more hurt.’
‘Perhaps you should have thought of that possibility before you spent the night with Daisy Wilkins,’ murmured Vogel. ‘Now, I assume from what you have said that Ms Wilkins is some sort of regular fixture in your life, even though your wife doesn’t know about her. Is that the case?’
‘Yes, but it’s not what it sounds like, Detective Inspector, honestly it isn’t.’
‘And what exactly does it sound like, Mr Fisher, may I ask?’
‘Well, it sounds sort of sordid, doesn’t it? You know, the usual thing. Man having bit on the side, not telling the missus. But you see, Daisy’s a lot more to me than that. Sarah and me, well, we’ve not been happy for years. We never were really, except in the beginning. I’ve been planning to leave her, to do right by Daisy, but it’s never seemed to be the right time. I thought I’d do it when the kids were a bit older, particularly our Petra, she’s only seven. Sarah, she has trouble with her nerves, you see. God knows what she’s going to be like now…’
Vogel was unimpressed. He’d heard it all before.
‘Mr Fisher, it’s not my job to stand in moral judgment. The rights and wrongs of your behaviour are none of my business. What is my business, is that you were not here with your wife and family last night.You’ve admitted that, at the time we think your stepdaughter died, you were actually not at all far from where her body was found. Therefore, I want to know every detail of your exact whereabouts throughout the night.’ Vogel raised his voice slightly as he spoke.
He was aware of the other man taking a step back, eyes wide open as if in disbelief.
‘My God, you think I killed her, don’t you? That’s it, you think I bloody killed our Mel. I loved that kid like she was my own. I’d never have hurt her. You have to believe me.’ There was shock and fear in Jim Fisher’s voice. He was sweating more than ever and his face had turned vividly red.
Vogel did not reply for several seconds. He wanted Fisher to be fully aware of how serious his situation was.
‘We just want to eliminate you from our inquiries, sir,’ the DI said eventually, keeping his voice level. ‘It would help if you’d come with us to the station to be fingerprinted and have a DNA swab taken.’
‘Are you bloody arresting me?’ Jim Fisher almost screamed the question.
In the sitting room, behind the closed door, Sarah Fisher called out. Her voice quavering.
‘Jim? Jim, are you all right?’
Fisher did not respond. He lowered his head into plump, pink hands and began to rock to and fro on the spot.
Vogel assessed the other man’s reactions. Fisher’s histrionic response to his line of questioning did not influence the detective in any particular direction. Vogel, as ever, began with the assumption that Fisher was innocent and would only allow careful assimilation and evaluation of fact to govern his opinion. That was the basis of British law, was it not? Innocent until proven guilty.
‘No, sir, I am not arresting you,’ Vogel replied in the same level tone. ‘I’m asking for your cooperation in order to find your stepdaughter’s murderer and, if you have told us the truth, to eliminate you from our inquiries. I am asking you to come to the station with me to swiftly facilitate that.’
Saul
The first reply I had that interested me was from Sonia. I liked the name. It sounded solid and old-fashioned. It even seemed to go rather well with my name. Saul and Sonia, Sonia and Saul, sounded like a couple straight away, I thought.
At once I began to fantasise about the life Sonia and Saul could have together. I’m inclined to do that. I know I should rein myself in, proceed with caution, refrain from dreaming but I can’t help it. I quickly began to believe that Sonia would prove to be the woman I’d been seeking for so long.