‘Why should I?’ said Inspector Johnson. ‘Looks like a pretty straightforward suicide. Done us a favour if you ask me.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked.
‘Couldn’t bear the thought of going to prison for murder. Saved us all the time and money.’
‘Are you sure it’s suicide?’
‘Forensics will find out. We’re waiting for them now.’
‘Just make sure they check that he did fire the gun,’ I said. ‘Residue on the hands and all that.’
‘Everyone’s a bloody detective these days,’ he said. ‘You’ve been watching too much television, sir.’
‘Ask them to check all the same.’
‘I’m sure they will.’
He had made up his mind that Bill had killed himself and I wasn’t going to convince him otherwise at the moment. I hoped forensics might do so in due course.
I went to see Chief Inspector Carlisle in Cheltenham. I had phoned first to see if he would be there and he met me in the police station reception.
‘Morning, Mr Halley.’ It felt like afternoon but my watch showed that it was still only nine thirty.
‘Morning, Chief Inspector,’ I replied. ‘Can I borrow some of your time?’
‘As long as it’s not a waste.’ He smiled. ‘Wasting police time is an offence, you know. Shall we go through to an interview room?’
‘I’d rather go out for a coffee,’ I said. ‘I’ve haven’t had breakfast yet.’
He appeared to consult his inner self and decided that it would be acceptable for him to have coffee with a ‘public’ and agreed to let me drive us the short distance down to the Queen’s Hotel in my car. The previous week, this hotel would have been heaving with the masses from across the Irish Sea, here for the racing festival. Now it was tranquil and calm. We found a quiet corner of the restaurant and ordered not only coffee, but toast and marmalade as well.
‘Now, what do you want to see me about?’
‘You are aware, I presume, that Bill Burton was discovered dead this morning.’
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘Thames Valley rang me.’ He made Thames Valley sound like a person not a police force. ‘But how do
‘I arrived at the house just after he had been found by Juliet Burns.’
‘You’re making a bit of a habit of being around at critical moments.’
‘Coincidence,’ I said, and remembered that Bill had been told he could go down for coincidence. ‘Do you think Bill Burton killed himself?’
‘Why do you ask?’ he said.
‘Because I don’t.’
‘Ah,’ he said, ‘the loyal friend who believes his pal is innocent of all charges in spite of a load of evidence to the contrary.’
‘Don’t mock me.’
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘You’re the last person I should mock. You’ve probably solved more cases than I have.’
I raised a quizzical eyebrow.
‘Word gets round, you know. Never mind a criminal records check, most employers these days would like their staff passed by you. “Okayed by Halley” has become slang for reliable and honest.’
‘Well then, don’t mock me when I say that I don’t believe that Bill Burton killed himself.’
We waited in silence as a waiter put the coffee and toast down on the table.
‘Tell me why you don’t believe he killed himself.’
‘He had no reason to do so. When I spoke to him last night he was positive and determined. Suicide was the last thing on his mind. He was hardly likely to ask me to come and ride out this morning if he was contemplating doing himself in.’
‘Maybe something happened overnight,’ he said.
‘It did. His wife agreed to return home.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I’ve spoken to her. I went to tell her that Bill was dead. I thought it was better coming from a friend. I told her mother, too. They can both confirm that Kate was going to go home this morning. So he had every reason to live.’
‘You’re telling me he was murdered?’
‘Yes.’
‘Who by?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Almost certainly the same person who murdered Huw Walker.’
‘But why? What’s the motive?’
‘To stop the police hunt for the real killer. If the police’s prime suspect is found with his head blown off, with the same gun as that used for the first murder grasped in his hand, the obvious conclusion is that he had been overcome with guilt for his actions and done the honourable thing.’
‘Seems a reasonable conclusion to me,’ he said.
‘Bit too convenient, don’t you think? And where was the gun? You failed to find it when you searched his house?’ I was guessing, but it had to be so.
‘True,’ he said, ‘but we didn’t take the whole place apart brick by brick, and it may have been somewhere in the stables.’
‘Nevertheless, I’m convinced he didn’t kill himself — and, even if he did, he wouldn’t have done it in the house for his wife to find — or, for heaven’s sake, his children.’
‘He might have done if he wanted his revenge on her for talking to the police about Huw Walker.’
The waiter came over and politely asked that, as breakfast was now finished, did we mind moving to the lounge so he could set up for lunch.
‘I have something for you to listen to,’ I said. ‘Can we go out to my car instead?’
We went and sat in my car in the hotel car park.
I slotted the tape from my answering machine into the car tape player and let it run to the end of Huw’s second message. Carlisle pushed the rewind button and listened to it all through again.
‘You should have given this to me sooner,’ he said.
‘I only found it this morning.’ He looked at me in disbelief, which I suppose was fair enough.
‘Funny,’ he said, ‘I’d forgotten that he was Welsh. Makes him more of a man rather than just a body, if you know what I mean.’
I nodded.
Carlisle pushed the rewind button a second time and played the tape once more. I didn’t need to hear Huw’s voice. By now, I knew those messages by heart.
‘Hi, Sid. Bugger! I wish you were there. Anyway, I need to talk to you. I’m in a bit of trouble and I… I know this sounds daft but I’m frightened. Actually, Sid, no kidding, I’m really frightened. Someone called me on the phone and threatened to kill me. I thought they were bloody joking so I told them to eff off and put the phone down. But they rang back and it’s given me the willies. I thought it was all a bit of a lark but now I find that it ain’t. I need your bloody help this time, mate, and no mistake. Call me back. Please call me back.’
And the second one
‘Where are you when I need you, you bugger? Come on, pick up the bloody phone, you bastard! Can’t you tell when a mate’s in trouble? Just a few losers, they says, for a few hundred in readies, they says. OK, I says, but make it a few grand. Do as we tell you, they says, or the only grand you’ll see is the drop from the top of the effing grandstand. Should have bloody listened, shouldn’t I?’
‘When did he leave these messages?’ asked Carlisle.
‘I’m not absolutely sure,’ I said.
‘Didn’t your answering machine tell you?’ he asked.
‘No, it came out of the ark,’ I said, ‘but, as you heard, there was another message between the two from Huw. I found out from that caller that he telephoned just before eight in the evening the day before Huw died. So one of Huw’s calls was before eight p.m. and the other after.’
