His only upcoming social engagement was a dinner party at Harriet Weaver’s, his old next-door neighbor in Eastvale, the following Saturday. Informal, Harriet had said, about ten or twelve people; bring a bottle, he would enjoy himself. Her niece Sophia was up from London and might drop by. Every man fell in love with Sophia, Harriet said. Banks thought it would be a very foolish thing to do, in that case, and determined not to. It was all very well for middle-aged writers, artists or rock stars to go around falling in love with younger women, but most irresponsible for a police detective with as much baggage as he was carrying.
Banks hated dinner parties, anyway, and he was only going because he felt guilty about not having kept in touch with Harriet and her husband since he had split up with Sandra. And she had had the good grace to invite him. Well, he’d go, then he’d leave as quickly as he decently could. It shouldn’t be too hard to get Winsome or someone to call his mobile on some pretext or other. It would save him from having to explain the latest crime statistics, or why so many obvious rapists and murderers got off, the usual sort of stuff you get at parties when people know you’re a policeman. One woman had even had the nerve to ask Banks to put a tail on her husband, whom she suspected of having an affair with a local estate agent. After Banks explained that he wasn’t Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe, the woman lost all interest in him and started making eyes at the host.
Banks got up. It was time to have a chat with Joseph Randall, who didn’t seem too happy at being dragged down to Western Area Headquarters that afternoon and left to stew in an interview room accompanied only by a taciturn constable who wouldn’t tell him why he was there. There was no reason for the delay other than to make Randall nervous and angry. In that state, he might make a slip. He had his Activan with him if he needed it, and the constable had been warned to watch out for any signs of a panic attack, so Banks hadn’t been worried on that score.
The interview room was cramped, with one high barred window, a bare bulb covered by a rusty grille, metal table bolted to the floor, three fold-up chairs and the recording equipment. The interview would be videotaped, and as Banks set it up, DC Doug Wilson sat facing a disgruntled Randall, who began by asking for his solicitor.
“You’re not under arrest, Mr. Randall, and you haven’t been charged with anything,” Banks explained, sitting down. “You’re simply here to help us with our inquiries.”
“Then I don’t have to talk to you?”
Banks leaned forward and rested his forearms on the table. “Mr. Randall,” he said. “We’re both reasonable men, I hope. Now this is a serious case. A young girl has been raped and murdered. On your property. I’d think you’d be as interested as I am in getting to the bottom of it, wouldn’t you?”
“Of course I am,” said Randall. “I just don’t understand why you’re picking on me.”
“We’re not picking on you.” Banks turned to DC Wilson. Might as well give the new kid a chance. “Detective Constable Wilson, why don’t you tell Mr. Randall here what you found out from the barmaid at the Duck and Drake?”
Wilson shuffled his papers nervously, played with his glasses and licked his lips. Banks thought he looked rather like a nervous schoolboy about to translate a Latin unseen for the class. The blazer he wore only enhanced the image. “Were you in the Duck and Drake around seven o’clock yesterday evening?” Wilson asked.
“I had a couple of drinks there after I closed the shop, yes,” said Randall. “As far I was aware, that’s not against the law.”
“Not at all, sir,” said Wilson. “It’s just that the victim, Hayley Daniels, was also seen in the pub around the same time.”
“I wouldn’t have recognized her. How could I? I didn’t know her.”
“But you’d remember her now, sir, wouldn’t you?” Wilson went on. “Since you saw her in the storage shed. You’d remember how she looked, what she was wearing, wouldn’t you?”
Randall scratched his forehead. “I can’t say I do, as a matter of fact. There are always a lot of young people in the Duck and Drake at that time on a Saturday. I was reading the paper. And in the shed it was all such a blur.”
“Is it your local, then, the Duck and Drake?”
“No. I don’t have a local, really. I just go where it strikes my fancy if I want a drink after shutting up. It’s not very often I do. Usually I just go home. The drinks are cheaper.”
“Where were you between the hours of midnight and two A.M. last night?” Wilson asked.
“At home.”
“Can anybody corroborate that?”
“I live alone.”
“What time did you go to bed?”
“About a quarter to one, shortly after I’d put the cat out.”
“Anybody see you?”
“I don’t know. The street was quiet. I didn’t see anybody.”
“What were you doing before that?”
“After I left the pub, about eight, I picked up some fish and chips on my way home and watched television.”
“Where did you get the fish and chips?”
“Chippie on the corner. Now, look, this is—”
“Let’s go back to the Duck and Drake, shall we?” Wilson persisted.
Randall crossed his arms and sat in a rigid position, lips set in a hard line.
“Now you’ve had a chance to think back, sir,” Wilson went on, “do you remember seeing Hayley Daniels in the pub?”
“I suppose I might have.”
“Did you or didn’t you?”
“If she was there, I suppose I must have seen her. I just don’t remember her in particular. I wasn’t really interested.”
“Oh, come off it,” said Banks. “A beautiful girl like her. A lonely old pervert like you. You were giving her the eye. Why don’t you admit it? You want us to think you’d never seen her before because you set your sights on her right from the start. I’m right, aren’t I?”
Randall glared at him and turned back to DC Wilson, his ally. Sometimes, Banks thought, good cop, bad cop was that easy. They hadn’t even decided to play it this way; it just worked out as the interview went on. For all the courses he’d done and all the books he’d read on interview techniques over the years, Banks found that a spontaneous approach often worked best. Go in with a general, vague outline and play it by ear. The most revealing questions were often the ones that just came to you as you sat there, not the ones you had worked out in advance. And when there were two of you doing the interviewing, a whole new dynamic sprang up. Sometimes it worked; sometimes it didn’t. Then you ended up with egg on your face. But young Wilson didn’t seem to need telling what his role was, and that was good.
“She was with a group of people about her own age, and they were laughing and talking and drinking at the bar. Is that right?” Wilson went on.
“Yes.”
“Did you see anybody touch her? If she had a special boyfriend, he might touch her on the shoulder, let his hand linger, hold hands, sneak a quick kiss, that sort of thing.”
“I didn’t see anything like that.” Randall glared over at Banks. “But as I’ve been trying to explain, I wasn’t paying much attention.”
“Who left first?”
“They did. One minute they were there, noisy and full of themselves, the next minute they were gone and it was nice and quiet.”
“Full of themselves?” Banks echoed. “What do you mean by that?”
Randall shifted in his chair. “You know what I mean. Preening, showing off for one another, laughing at their own jokes, that sort of thing.”
“Don’t you like young people?”
“I don’t like ruffians.”
“And you think they were ruffians?”