Dark Room

The scowl returned. 'Miranda Jones, I suppose. If women stuck to what they're good at instead of muscling in on the male preserves, the world would be a better place.' He flicked a lazy glance at the young sergeant's prudish face. 'You'd agree with that, wouldn't you, Sean?' he goaded him, knowing that Fraser hadn't got the balls to contradict a superior officer.

Fraser stared at a spot on the wall above the Inspector's head and toyed briefly with the idea of thumping the bastard. He really hated Maddocks. He suspected the man's misogyny was pathological and put it down to the fact that Maddocks was in the middle of his third divorce. But it was no excuse, any more than it was an excuse for his apparent willingness to abandon the six children he had had along the way. 'She's better than some of the men they send, Gov.'

'Okay, let's take a look at him,' said Maddocks, abandoning his sport to push his chair back and stand up. 'No chance he's our murderer, I suppose?'

Fraser stood aside to let him pass. 'I wouldn't think so, Gov. According to Ted Garrety, he has a reputation for liking little girls. A thirteen-year-old accused him of rape a couple of years back, but no charges were ever brought because her mother removed her very speedily when it emerged how many other boys her daughter had slept with. The view is that Franklyn has all the makings of a pedophile, and give it another two to three years and we'll be banging the little sod up on a regular basis for child molestation. A type like that is deeply inadequate, so he'd probably rob two mature dead adults without a qualm, but I doubt very much he'd have the bottle to abduct them while they were alive.'

Which was a fair summary, thought Maddocks, as he examined the depressingly low-grade young man in the interview room, who couldn't open his mouth without uttering obscenities and who fingered his crotch from beginning to end of the interview, apparently unaware he was doing it. He appeared unhealthy and unwashed, with pinched, sharp features, eyes that looked anywhere but at the person he was talking to, and a sullen cast to his mouth. At such times, the fascist in Gareth Maddocks wondered why society tolerated weasels like this within its midst.

'We have something of a problem here,' he murmured after Franklyn had replied 'No fucking comment' to the first three questions. 'I'm going to deal this one straight, Bobby, so that you know where I'm coming from. I think, then, you might decide to give me some answers. I'm not interested in your credit card fraud. As far as I'm concerned, that's a separate issue. What I am interested in are the two people named on the cards, Mr. Leo Wallader and Miss M. S. Harris, and the reason I'm interested is because I have two corpses I can't identify, who were found in Ardingly Woods yesterday afternoon. Now, guesswork tells DS Fraser and myself that our couple could very well be Mr. Wallader and Miss Harris, and it would save us a great deal of time and effort if you could confirm that for us, Bobby. We think the chances are you stumbled on the bodies a week or so ago and did what any normal red-blooded male would do, and removed their wallets.' He smiled amiably. 'What the hell, eh? They were dead-not by your hand, no question about that-but they weren't going to need their credit cards anymore, were they? How about giving us a break on this one? It really would help us to know who they are.'

'Sod off,' said Bobby. 'No fucking comment.'

Maddocks glanced towards the young solicitor. 'What say the Sergeant and I leave the room for five minutes and you discuss options with your client? It's worth pointing out, I think, that we might very well decide to bring additional charges against Mr. Franklyn if and when we identify our dead couple as Wallader and Harris, and I should add that perverting the course of justice will be the least of them.'

Fraser watched Bobby's involuntary masturbation with marked distaste. 'If we're forced to go house to house on the Hawtree Estate, I wonder if we'll turn up someone else, a young girl perhaps, who was in the woods with Bobby.'

'There weren't no one with me,' said Franklyn in a rush, ignoring his solicitor's warning hand on his arm. Shit, if they ever found out he'd screwed a twelve-year-old. 'Okay, okay, so I did find them two bodies, and Jesus, they were sodding 'orrible. Smashed bloody faces and bluebottles everywhere, but I was on my own. D'you fink I'd 'ave been able to lift them cards if I'd 'ad someone wiv me. Use yer fucking brains. They'd 'ave wanted an in on the goods, wouldn't they? But it was like you said, them two was dead and they wasn't gonna use their sodding cards again. Couldn't see no 'arm in taking them and doin' a bit of business.'

'You had a duty to report it, Bobby,' said Maddocks mildly, his habitual aggression cloaked in an encouraging smile which said: Don't worry about it lad, we're men of the world, you and I, and we both know rules are made to be broken.

'Fuck that! It weren't none of my business. If I were a bit keener on you lot, then maybe, but you've never done me no favors, so why should I do one for you? They was so bloody dead you wouldn't believe. Couldn't see what difference it'd make to them if they was found a week ago or if they was found today. They'd still be dead, wouldn't they?'

Maddocks couldn't argue with that. 'Are you sure you were on your own, Bobby? If you had a girl with you we need to know now. It is important.' He was thinking of the skid marks on the bank, made by a woman's heel.

'Yeah, I'm sure.' He pondered for a moment. 'I'll tell you this for free. If a girl 'ad seen what I saw, she'd still be puking all over the sodding shop. I'm not thinking about it too much myself.' His skin grew even more unhealthy- looking. 'I 'ad to 'old my breath to search them. It was that bloody disgusting. Reckon there was a million bluebottles in that ditch. You gonna charge me? It weren't me what did them in. I don't do that kind of stuff.'

Maddocks glanced at Fraser, who shrugged. The lad's story certainly had the ring of truth. 'No,' said the DI, standing up. 'At the moment I don't intend to add any charges to those you're already facing, but we will want to talk to you again, Bobby, so I advise you very strongly to make yourself available. Neither DS Fraser nor I want the trouble of having to look for you.' He paused at the door. 'Just one last thing. Had there been any attempt made to bury the bodies?''

'You mean in a grave?'

'No, I mean had they been covered over with anything?'

'Only wiv leaves.'

'Well covered?'

'Yeah. Pretty well.'

'Then how did you know they were there?'

Franklyn's sharp little eyes shifted nervously. 'Because some-think 'ad been at the guy,' he said, 'a fox maybe. The 'ead and top 'alf of 'is body 'ad been dug out, least that's what it looked like. I didn't know the woman was there till I started taking the leaves off 'im and found 'er 'ead beside 'is sodding legs. To tell you the truth,' he said, 'I wish I'd never seen them now.' He wiped his hands on his trousers. 'It's got me in a bother and I'm not sure I