Bishop raised a pacifying hand at his solicitor. ‘It’s OK. Yes, I bought it.’ He shrugged, blushing. ‘We were experimenting. I – I read a book about how to keep your love life going – you know? It sort of flags after a while between two people, when the initial excitement – novelty of the relationship – is over. I got stuff for us to try out.’ His face was the colour of beetroot.
Branson turned his focus on to Bishop’s dinner with his financial adviser, Phil Taylor. ‘Mr Bishop, it’s correct, isn’t it, that one of the cars you own is a Bentley Continental, in a dark red colour?’
‘Umbrian red, yes.’
‘Registration number Lima Juliet Zero Four November Whiskey Sierra?’
Unused to the phonetic alphabet, Bishop had to think for a moment. Then he nodded.
‘At eleven forty-seven last Thursday night, this vehicle was photographed by an Automatic Number Plate Recognition camera, on the south-bound carriageway of the M23 motorway, in the vicinity of Gatwick airport. Can you explain why it was there and who was driving it?’
Bishop looked at his solicitor.
‘Do you have the photograph?’ Leighton Lloyd asked.
‘No, but I can let you have a copy,’ Branson said.
Lloyd made a note in his book.
‘There’s a mistake,’ Bishop said. ‘There must be.’
‘Did you lend your car to anyone that evening?’ Branson asked.
‘I never lend it. I had it in London that night because I needed to drive down to the golf club in the morning.’
‘Could anyone have borrowed it without your permission – or your knowledge?’
‘No. Well, I don’t think so. It’s extremely unlikely.’
‘Who else has keys to the vehicle, apart from you, sir?’
‘No one. We’ve had some problems in the underground car park – beneath my flat. Some cars broken into.’
‘Could joyriders have taken it out for a spin?’ Leighton Lloyd interjected.
‘It’s possible,’ Bishop said.
‘When joyriders take a car they don’t usually bring it back,’ Grace said. He watched Lloyd making a note in his book. The lawyer would have a field day with that.
Next, Glenn Branson said, ‘Mr Bishop, we have already mentioned to you that during the course of a search of your house at 97 Dyke Road Avenue, a life insurance policy with the Southern Star Assurance Company was found. The policy is on your wife’s life, with a value of three million pounds. You are named as the sole beneficiary.’
Grace swung his eyes from Bishop to the lawyer. Lloyd’s expression barely changed, but his shoulders sank a little. Brian Bishop’s eyes were all over the place and his composure seemed suddenly to have deserted him.
‘Look, I told you – I – I already told you – I know nothing about this! Absolutely nothing!’
‘Do you think your wife took this policy out herself, secretly, from the goodness of her heart?’ Branson pressed him.
Grace smiled at this, proud of the way his colleague, to whom he had given so much guidance over the past few years, because he adored him and believed in him, was really growing in stature.
Bishop raised his hands, then let them flop down on to the table. His eyes were all over the place still. ‘Please believe me, I don’t know anything about this.’
‘On three million pounds, I imagine there’d be a hefty premium,’ Branson said. ‘Presumably we’d be able to see from your bank account – or indeed Mrs Bishop’s – how this was paid? Or perhaps you have a mystery benefactor?’
Leighton Lloyd was now scribbling fast in his book, his expression continuing to give nothing away. He turned to Bishop. ‘You don’t have to answer that unless you want to.’
‘I don’t know anything about it.’ Bishop’s tone had become imploring. Heartfelt. ‘I really don’t!’
‘We seem to be stacking up quite a few things you claim not to know anything about, Mr Bishop,’ Glenn Branson continued. ‘You don’t know anything about your car being driven towards Brighton shortly before your wife was murdered. You don’t know anything about a three-million-pound life insurance policy, taken out on your wife just six months before she was murdered.’ He paused, checked his own notes, then drank some water. ‘In your account last night, you said that the last time you and your wife had sexual intercourse was on the morning of Sunday 30 July. Have I got that correct?’
Bishop nodded, looking a little embarrassed.
‘Then can you explain the presence of a quantity of your semen that was found in Mrs Bishop’s vagina during her post-mortem on the morning of Friday 4 August?’
‘There’s no way!’ Bishop said. ‘Absolutely not possible!’
‘Are you saying, sir, that you did not have sexual intercourse with Mrs Bishop on the night of Thursday 3 August?’
Bishop’s eyes swung resolutely left. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what I am saying. I was in London, for God’s sake!’ He turned to look at his solicitor. ‘It isn’t possible! It isn’t bloody possible!’
Roy Grace had seen many solicitors’ expressions over the years, as one client after another had clearly told yet another barefaced lie to them. Leighton Lloyd’s face remained inscrutable. The man would make a good poker player, he thought.
At ten past five, after Glenn Branson had gone doggedly back over Bishop’s statement from last night’s interview, the questions that had been put to him in the second interview, this morning, and challenged virtually every single word that Bishop had said, he judged that they had got as much from the man as they were going to get at this stage.
Bishop was not budging on the three key elements: his London alibi, the life insurance policy and the last time he had had sex with his wife. But Branson was satisfied – and more than a little drained.
Bishop was led back to his cell, leaving the solicitor alone with the two police officers.
Lloyd pointedly looked at his watch, then addressed the two men. ‘I presume you are aware that you will have to release my client in just under three hours’ time, unless you are planning to charge him.’
‘Where are you going to be?’ Branson asked him.
‘I’m going to my office.’
‘We’ll call you.’
Then the detectives went back over to Sussex House, up to Roy Grace’s office, and sat at the round table.
‘Well done, Glenn, you did well,’ Grace said again.
‘Extremely well,’ Nick Nicholl added.
Jane Paxton looked pensive. She wasn’t one for handing out praise. ‘So we need to consider our next step.’
Then the door opened and Eleanor Hodgson came in, holding a thin wodge of papers, clipped together. Addressing Grace, she said, ‘Excuse me interrupting, Roy, I thought you would want to see this – it just came back from the Huntington lab.’
It was two DNA analysis reports. One was on the semen that had been found present in Sophie Harrington’s vagina; the other was on the minute fleck of what had looked like human flesh that Nadiuska De Sancha had removed from under the dead woman’s toenail.
Both were a complete match with Brian Bishop’s DNA.
95
Cleo Morey left the mortuary, together with Darren, just before five thirty. Closing the front door and standing in the brilliant, warm sunlight, she said, ‘What are you doing tonight?’
‘Was going to take her to the cinema, but it’s too hot,’ he said, squinting back at his boss with the sun in his eyes. ‘We’re going to go down the Marina, have a few drinks. There’s a cool new place I’m going to check out, Rehab.’
She looked at him dubiously. Twenty years old, spiky black hair, a cheery face sporting some designer stubble, he could have so easily, with just a brief turn in his life, have ended up like so many of the no-hoper youngsters draped along the pavements and doorways of this city every night, strung out, dossing, begging, mugging. But he’d clearly been born with a spirited streak in him. He worked hard, he was pleasant company, he was going to do OK in life. ‘Rehab?’