‘Because he knows my reputation as a total bastard, I expect, Chief Inspector.’
‘Or perhaps your record of violent crime, Mr Finn.’
Finn laughed. ‘Well, I don’t think that Quentin knows about any imaginary “record of violent crime”, though no doubt if he did it would only go tae enhance my professional reputation.’
‘ “Imaginary”? Theft, assault and attempted murder don’t sound too imaginary, Mr Finn.’
‘Chief Inspector, no young lad with any gumption came out of the Gorbals in my day without a record. When I was fourteen I had a nice wee business supplying plumbing materials tae a builder’s supply yard. At night me an’ my pal would climb over the wall and pinch the pipes, and next day we’d take them back an’ sell them tae them again.’ He chuckled at the memory. ‘I was a budding entrepreneur, that’s all. A Thatcherite ahead of my time. Later on I got in a bad fight in a pub, an’ that was where the GBH an’ resistin’ arrest came from. It was all a long time ago.’
‘What about the assault on the tourist ten years ago?’
‘Och!’ Finn ran a gnarled hand through the unruly tuft of thinning hair that stuck out of his scalp. ‘Ten years ago I was made redundant for about the fifth time. We were up north and I had a young family. I was a trained chippie, but there was no work for carpenters there. I was made redundant that last time on Christmas Eve. Have you ever been sacked on Christmas Eve yourself, lassie? No, well…’ He looked perplexed for a moment as he thought he caught the faintest trace of a smirk on Kathy’s face. ‘Well, anyway, I got a job sweeping the service roads underneath one of the shopping malls in the town. Part of the job was to stick a label on the windscreen of anyone who parked illegally down there, telling them they’d be prosecuted if they did it again. One day this big car parked, and I stuck on the label. Next thing, the driver, some foreign character, starts abusing me. I didn’t like the way he talked tae me, as if, because I was sweeping roads, I was no better than dirt myself. He told me tae get the label off his windscreen, so I said all right, Jimmy, if that’s what ye want, an’ I put my broom through the bloody windscreen.’
He shrugged. ‘I felt better, I can tell ye, but of course, next thing he’s got the centre manager down there insisting they call the police, and swearing I’d tried tae kill him, which of course was all a load of nonsense. The centre manager didn’t know what tae do, and he got on tae Mr Slade, whose company owns the centre. They paid off the tourist, an’ once he’d gone back home the charges against me were dropped. They had tae sack me of course, but the next time Mr Slade was up north he asked tae see me. We got on like a house on fire, an’ the end of it was that he offered me a job down here in London.’
‘What about Terence Winter?’ Brock persisted. ‘What did you discuss with him?’
‘He came into the office one day. He saw Mr Slade, who couldn’t do much except tae sympathize with Winter’s predicament. Then Winter asked for me. He said he’d heard from Gilroy that I could get things done. I thought he was jokin’, an’ I told him about the tricks we used tae play when I was a lad, terrorizing old ladies in the street, like tying the door knockers on opposite sides of the close together with string, then knocking one, an’ when they opened their door they’d cause another knocker tae go, an’ then that one would get another going, an’ so on until the whole close was in an uproar. As I say, I thought he was jokin’. I had no idea he’d actually try tae get them tae leave that way.’
After Finn had left, a WPC passed on a message to Brock from Sergeant Griffiths, who had been sent to bring in Geraldine McArthur, Winter’s former mistress. McArthur had not been seen since leaving work the previous afternoon. The WPC added that a Dr Naismith and her solicitor were waiting to see him.
Brock asked her to show them up to his office, rather than the interview room at the back, because it was warmer and he wanted Judith Naismith to see the grisly photographs of Eleanor Harper’s corpse pinned up on the wall. But if she saw them as she came in, she showed no sign of it. Her face was set with determination as she and her solicitor, an elegantly dressed man in his late thirties, sat facing Brock and Kathy.
‘It is essential for reasons of her work that my client return immediately to the United States, Chief Inspector. Unless you can provide some very convincing reasons for continuing to hold on to it, we must insist that you return her passport to her and allow her to leave the country forthwith. She has made a booking for a flight this afternoon, and she intends to catch it.’
‘I see.’ Brock scratched his beard. ‘I take it then that Dr Naismith now intends to answer my questions?’
‘She does. Indeed she would have done so last night if you and your officers had been more, what shall we say, considerate in your treatment of her.’
‘Well then, tell us about your contacts with Meredith Winterbottom, Miss Naismith.’
She told them, in a clear, measured tone, without any unnecessary words or gestures, of the two meetings she and Bob Jones had arranged with Meredith, confirming his account of both.
‘You had no contact with her independently of Mr Jones?’
She shook her head.
‘And what about Eleanor Harper?’
‘I met her briefly on that first occasion. Otherwise I’ve had no contact with her.’
‘Really?’
She stared back at him steadily. ‘That’s correct.’
‘Tell us about the books you saw in Eleanor’s flat-the older books that interested you particularly.’
‘They were a few first editions, and some books with dedications written apparently by Karl Marx.’
‘How valuable, would you say?’
‘I couldn’t say. I’m not a book dealer. But certainly of interest to a historian like myself.’
‘Interesting enough to make a special trip across the Atlantic.’
‘Oh, come, that’s not such a big deal. It’s very cheap. A pleasant weekend trip, that’s all. And I had other business in London.’
‘What about other documents?’
‘Mrs Winterbottom gave me a couple of handwritten pages. One was a letter, the other a piece of text of some kind. She was unclear as to whether there was any more, and on their own they didn’t amount to much.’
‘Has anyone been in touch with you recently, offering you the books or other material?’
‘No.’
‘And did you make any attempt to contact the two sisters in the last few days, by phone or in person?’
‘No.’
‘When did you first learn that Eleanor Harper had been murdered?’
‘When my solicitor here told me this morning.’
‘And where were you on the night of Tuesday last, the 31st?’
‘In my hotel. The Connaught, in Kensington High Street.’
Brock became silent, staring at the papers in front of him.
‘All right, Chief Inspector? All in order? Can we be on our way?’ The solicitor eased forward in his chair as if to stand up.
‘Yes, you may as well.’ Brock’s voice was flat, his face tired. ‘And perhaps you would advise your client not to bother coming back to waste my time until she’s decided to be honest with me.’
After a second’s pause, Judith and her solicitor both began to protest at Brock’s bowed head. When they had finished, he looked up and fixed Judith in the eye.
‘I find it inconceivable that you would come all the way to London to buy documents from someone and then go home empty-handed without making any subsequent attempt to contact the owner of those books. I don’t believe that you are being honest with us about the significance of the documents. And your hotel tells us that you did not return to your room on the night of the 31st of March. Now, please go away and consider this matter a little more seriously. This is a murder inquiry. You will remain in this country until I consider that we are getting your full cooperation.’
Judith had become even paler than usual. She turned to her solicitor, who said hurriedly, ‘I’d like to have a few private words with my client, Chief Inspector.’
‘Be my guest.’ Brock flapped his hand at the interview room across the landing. Kathy noticed that the weary droop to his shoulders lifted as soon as they left the room, and a little smile came into his face.
After a few minutes they returned, and the solicitor spoke. ‘It appears, Chief Inspector, that Dr Naismith had personal reasons for concealing her whereabouts on Tuesday night. She did indeed not return to her hotel room that night. In fact she spent the evening and the night in the company of a close friend. The friend is married as it happens, and Dr Naismith feels that it would cause considerable unnecessary distress if the family became involved
