‘I’ll say what I like. I’m the mother, and I’m sad, even if you’re not. You two made Sal’s life hell, even when she was younger, and now look at what’s happened. Snatched away from me, the only one who cared, and who’s going to look after me now?’
‘Mrs Maynard, if we could come back to your daughter,’ Isaac said. He could empathise with the uniform outside. This was clearly a fractious family who not only gave the police trouble but would not have been liked in the area. He was sure that if they enquired they would find few that would speak kindly of the family in flat 923.
‘What do you want?’
‘Your daughter’s movements. She was in Kensington. Did she go there often?’
‘Sal liked to look in the shop windows. She was obsessed with those who had money and fame. I don’t know why as she wasn’t much to look at. When I was her age, I was a looker, mark my words.’
‘You’re a liar,’ Harry Maynard said. ‘Our old man, before you nagged him to death, said you were selling yourself not far from here. That’s where he met you, said you were cheap, and not too fancy even back then. At least Sal didn’t do that, not that she did much else.’
‘Sal helped out at the supermarket for two or three days a week. Casual, so they didn’t have to pay her much,’ Alex said. He was on his third whisky since Isaac and Wendy had arrived in the flat.
‘We’re certain that she was at the murder scene because Guy Hendry was there.’
‘He’d not fancy her. Apart from working sometimes, she’d sit in front of that television and read those magazines. She was keen on Hendry, not that I could see much in him. And as for that Gillian Dickenson, skinny as a rake.’
‘She died, as well,’ Wendy said.
‘It’s been on the news. No mention of Sal, only that an unidentified female had also died. They mentioned Hendry and the tart he was with, but nothing about my Sal.’
‘The names are not revealed until the next of kin are informed. You must know that,’ Isaac said.
‘Of course I do. But it’s not right. My Sal was a good girl, and they report it as if she was a nobody, whereas the suntan and the teeth, and his fancy woman, get their pictures splashed across the television. And what about Sal, nothing, not even a mention of what she meant to me.’
‘Mum, stop talking nonsense. You didn’t care for her, any more than you do for us,’ Alex said, his words slurring.
Isaac and Wendy were glad when they left the flat. On the face of it, there was no more to be gained at the Maynards’, but Isaac knew that with the most inconsequential, the most unlikely piece of information, they could be back there. Sal Maynard may have been of little consequence, at least at the murder scene, but she could have seen something, heard something at another time, which could have required her death. Nothing and nobody could be regarded as trivial.
***
Larry Hill left the crime scene at Briganti’s salon and headed into the area’s criminal underbelly. He knew that Alphonso Abano’s death would ensure that the criminal community was on edge and they would be closing ranks.
The first stop, the Wellington Arms in Bayswater. Inside, one of his informers, a man of moderate height and intellect, yet taciturn, and very careful in what he said.
‘Seamus, a pint?’ Larry said to the man, who was sitting to one side of the main bar.
‘I thought you’d be in,’ Seamus said.
‘What’s the mood on the street?’
‘Just talk, nothing more. Abano’s not a great loss, and no one believes they were after him.’
‘Any names?’
‘Not for the killing. Abano was not a major player, even if he fancied that he was,’ Seamus said, his Irish accent still noticeable even though he had lived in London, on and off, for over twenty-five years. He was dressed casually: a pair of faded jeans, a white tee-shirt, his receding hair parted to one side, the grey starting to show in the shoulder-length hair.
Seamus Gaffney was not a criminal, although he skirted on the edge of legality. Apart from running errands for an illegal gambling syndicate, and the occasional favour for some of the criminals in the area, he was clean. He’d spent three months in prison as a youth in Ireland for passing false cheques; he had even managed to purchase a car with one of them, only to have it break down after fifty miles, and when he had returned to take umbrage with the man who had sold him the dud, he was up and gone.
Gaffney had put it down to one dud in exchange for another.
‘I’d agree,’ Larry said. ‘Who could have been the target at Briganti’s?’
‘Nobody knows, and that’s the truth. Maybe they're careful not to speak in case they end up dead, but on this one, Inspector Hill, you’ll need to look further afield. It could be someone brought in from overseas for the one job, and then shipped out.’
‘We’ve considered that possibility. Whoever it was, they dumped the rifle and pistol in a bin as they left.’
‘No fingerprints?’
‘Nothing. We’ve got Interpol onto it, but no details.’
‘The villains don’t like someone coming in here and causing trouble. It makes it more difficult for everyone.’
‘A downturn in crime for a few days, some small benefit,’ Larry said.
‘Briganti was a decent man, kept to himself, and Hendry doesn’t seem likely.’
‘Did you know either?’
‘Briganti in passing. He’d sometimes have a glass of wine of a Saturday in here. Hendry I know from a long time back, before he became the big star.’
