‘Yeah, and what’s that bollocks about her having another date? I can’t buy that. He’s just trying to make us think there was someone else with her later – the “mysterious stranger” who offed her. That’s feeble.’
‘Yes,’ Slider said, deep in thought. ‘But at least he didn’t hint who it might be. At least he didn’t try to drop anyone else in it.’
‘Only because he couldn’t think of anyone,’ Mackay said robustly.
FOURTEEN
Salmon-Chanted Evening
Hart and McLaren went up to the canteen and came down with a couple of trays of teas and coffees and a selection of buns, and everyone piled in for a discussion. Missing were Hollis, still with Oates, and Atherton, who was on the computer in what he now fondly thought of as Emily’s Room. When they had been investigating the murder of her father, they had set up a desk and computer for her in the photocopy room so that she could do research for the case, and it had proved so useful to have a quiet place for internet surfing they had made it permanent.
While the mugs were being distributed, Mackay recounted the interview with Carmichael.
‘Nah, I don’t buy it,’ Hart said, slipping her delectable bottom on to the edge of her own desk. ‘It’s a load of carp.’
‘Carp?’ Slider wasn’t sure he had heard correctly.
‘A fishy story. Look, if she had a date with someone else, why did she need Biker Boy to pick her up?’
‘Maybe the date didn’t have a car,’ said Fathom.
‘She could have gone by bus or tube, or taxi even. What sort of girl gets an old boyfriend to pick her up just for that? “Sorry, love, I’m off with someone else, ta for the lift”? I don’t think so. Especially when she knows he’s got a temper. He’s trying to cover for himself and making a pathetic job of it. The worst load of rubbish I’ve heard in a long time.’
‘And going off to Brighton looks like running away,’ Fathom said.
‘If that’s where he went,’ Slider said. ‘I shall have to use precious manpower checking his alibi – the friend in Brighton whose sofa he slept on; trying to find one Chinese takeaway in a road thick with them.’
‘Yeah, funny he don’t remember which one it was,’ McLaren said cynically.
‘You’d remember,’ Hart said, but it wasn’t approval.
‘Still, it means we can keep him in while we do it,’ Slider said. ‘I wonder who did initiate the date. He says he never phoned Zellah because her father might pick up the phone, but he could be lying.’
Connolly started. ‘Oh, Jaysus, I forgot – we got the dump from Zellah’s mobile, sir. I meant to tell you. It just slipped my mind.’
‘You’re not allowed to forget anything in this job,’ McLaren said indistinctly through a mouthful of bun. ‘You have to train your memory if you want to stay. I did.’
‘Go on, Maurice,’ Hart urged. ‘Recite “My one thousand most memorable curries”. It’s a classic.’
‘Tell me about the mobile record,’ Slider interrupted.
‘Well, sir,’ Connolly said, ‘she didn’t use it much. She wasn’t one of these obsessive texters. And the calls were to the people you’d expect. The only one she made on the Sunday was to Mike Carmichael, which sort of confirms that she made the date with him at the last minute, like he said.’
‘What, no long chat with her mate Sophy that she was going to visit?’ Mackay said with ironic surprise.
‘She could have rung her on the house phone,’ Connolly pointed out.
‘True,’ said Hart. ‘But I bet if she did it’d be a short one.’
‘Who else did she ring?’ Slider prompted.
‘Well, in the days before it was only Sophy and Chloë, and going back further it was mostly them and another girl they mentioned, Frieda Mossman. Otherwise just a sprinkling of calls you might expect – the home number, the ballet school, the art-master Markov, Oliver Paulson’s flat, Domino’s Pizza, a What’s On in London information line, the central library at Hammersmith, that sort of thing.’
‘What about Carmichael?’ Hart said.
‘Before Sunday, the last previous call she made to him on her mobile was the beginning of June.’
‘So that rather confirms what he said,’ Slider mused. ‘That they hadn’t been seeing each other recently.’
‘If she did make a date with another bloke,’ Hart said, ‘how did she do it? Not on her mobile. Not on her dad’s phone for obvious reasons. So how?’
‘Maybe Sophy or Chloë made it for her,’ Connolly suggested.
‘But they didn’t know about it, or who it was,’ Slider reminded her. ‘I suppose she could have made the date face to face at some point.’
‘Or it could be that Biker Boy’s story is the load of Tottenham we know it to be,’ Hart finished.
‘Yeah, that gets my vote,’ said McLaren.
‘There’s a lot about Carmichael that bothers me,’ Slider said, ‘but there’s also a lot about him as a suspect that bothers me – mainly a motive.’
‘Fit of temper,’ Mackay said. ‘Why not?’
‘Because of the tights,’ Slider answered. ‘The tights make it premeditated, which requires a motive, and I can’t see what motive he had – apart from annoyance over the second date, which we don’t believe in anyway.’
‘And we’re forgetting Ronnie Oates,’ McLaren said, just as Hollis appeared in the doorway. ‘How’s it goin’, Col?’
‘Got it all down,’ Hollis said. ‘He’s signed it and now he’s cheery and comfortable, tucked up for the night. They’re getting him shepherd’s pie and beans for his tea. You never saw such a happy felon. Good job he’s got an unhappy solicitor to make up the balance.’
‘Which one was it?’ Mackay asked with professional interest.
‘That Jane Dormer,’ Hollis said. ‘She was next on the list. Came in with a face like a boot, and it just got longer.’
‘Didn’t Atherton go out with her once?’ McLaren said.
‘More than once,’ said Hart. ‘I remember Swilley bollocking him about it. “You’ve got to stop doinking the enemy, Jim,” she said.’
‘The enemy? He doesn’t go out with criminals, does he?’ Connolly said, shocked.
‘The legal profession,’ Hart clarified.
Hollis went on. ‘Anyway, La Dormer was not happy that we’d questioned Ronnie without her, and very suspicious about him waiving his right to her divine presence, but there was nothing she could do about it, because he repeated it all in front of her, and she could see he wasn’t cowed and didn’t have any bruises or missing teeth. Well, no more missing teeth than usual. He couldn’t wait to do his confession all over again, with no prompting from me. Loving the whole thing. So she was stymied. All she could do was give me a lecture about oppressing minorities and trampling on civil liberties, etcetera, etcetera.’
‘That’s something, coming from her,’ McLaren said. ‘It was her got that Dave Gammel, the Pensioner Mugger, off on a technicality. Wasn’t worried about the civil liberties of his victims, was she?’
‘The main thing,’ Slider recaptured the thread, ‘is that he repeated his confession – is that right?’
Hollis nodded, but made a wry face. ‘Trouble is, he wasn’t very good on the details of the actual murder. Nice and circumstantial about going to the fair and watching her and following her at a distance across the Scrubs. Then it starts to fall apart. He seems to have lost sight of her for a bit. Says he watched a couple snogging by the changing rooms, but that doesn’t seem to have been Zellah and her feller. Then he says Zellah was asleep when he first saw her.’
‘Which is what he told you from the beginning,’ Slider said uneasily.
‘Yes, then he contradicts that and says she came on to him. And when he comes to the murder itself, he seems to be mixing it up with Wanda Lempowski. Says she asked for money and said he could do what he liked, so he started strangling her, but she started screaming so he pulled tighter to stop her, and the next thing she was dead. Said he didn’t mean to. Begged us not to tell his mum.’