‘It’s a few years back now. I signed up out of school, a fervour of patriotism, although in truth, the economy wasn’t so good, not around here it wasn’t. I’ve never wanted to leave, and most of us out of school ended up at Downings.’
‘Downings?’ Wendy asked.
‘They made car parts for all the major car manufacturers in England. But it was the time of the Japanese invasion of the country with their Toyotas and Datsuns. Downings was an old-fashioned company, been around for over one hundred years, and then the place is boarded up. Not many of the old-timers still around.’
‘You came back here, though,’ Isaac said.
‘I did. For a few years, I scraped a living, the odd job here and there. I had the house, so I didn’t have to worry about somewhere to live. I met Gwen soon after I got back from the Army.’
‘I was in admin for a car dealer, dealt with the finance, the payroll. That’s where I met Fred,’ Gwen Wilkinson said.
‘You were buying a car?’ Isaac said, directing his conversation to her husband.
‘A Toyota, even after all I’d said about them. It wasn’t new, but it did the job.’
‘Did you find a job eventually?’
‘A small company making furniture, good quality too, not like the rubbish you see for sale now. It’s still there, getting by.’
‘You’ve retired?’
‘I stayed as long as I could, and as I said, the house never cost me anything. Gwen and I, we’re not rich, never wanted to be, but we’re comfortable.’
‘You’ve known Hamish McIntyre since you were a child.’
‘He lived four doors down, our mothers were sisters.’
‘How do you feel about him?’
‘The man went his way, I went mine.’
‘He’s a criminal, you know that?’
‘He was a friend as a child; that’s who I remember. What caused him to do what he has, I don’t know. I prefer not to dwell on him, no more than I have to.’
‘It’s not so easy now, is it? What with Marcus Matthews and his wife, Jacob Wolfenden, the Palmers. Do you remember a Charles Bailey?’
‘The name doesn’t ring a bell.’
‘He lived next door, your mother and his used to talk over the garden fence, your sister used to babysit him when he was young.’
‘She might know, but she’s fourteen years older than me, not in good health.’
‘You know Samantha Matthews, though.’
Gwen Wilkinson fussed around, clearing the plates from the table, topping up the cups of tea. She acted as though she wasn’t listening, but Wendy could see she was.
‘Samantha lived not far from here. She used to go in the Stag occasionally, and if we saw her on the street, we’d have a chat. That’s all.’
‘Yet you knew what her father was.’
‘You can’t blame the sins of the father on the child, can you? That’d be uncharitable.’
‘Charles Bailey moved away when he was nine or ten. He changed his name, became an eminent person.’
‘A criminal?’
‘He became a Queen’s Counsel, a judge.’
‘And he lived next door?’
‘His father was in the Merchant Navy.’
‘I can’t remember much back that far,’ Wilkinson said. ‘Too busy running around the neighbourhood.’
‘Mrs Wilkinson?’ Wendy said.
‘Don’t ask me. I grew up thirty miles from here. If it hadn’t been for a job here, I’d still be back there.’
Isaac struggled with Wilkinson’s answer. The man wasn’t senile, far from it, and even if it had been almost sixty years, the man should have remembered something of the past.
‘Marcus Matthews, you knew him?’
‘I knew that he was with Hamish. I couldn’t forgive him for that, but he was a decent enough person.’
‘Did he hate his father-in-law?’
‘I don’t think we spoke about him. He liked a pint, the same as I do. I didn’t pry.’
‘You were indiscreet with Inspector Hill, told him about Bob Palmer, what he was asking, who he was looking for.’
‘Maybe I’d had a few drinks, the alcohol talking.’
‘You knew what you were saying, certain that your relationship to McIntyre gave you some immunity.’
‘I don’t like the man, what’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing. Were you helping us to make a case against your cousin? Would you have been pleased if he had been arrested?’
‘The man’s corrosive. His daughter, who had never harboured an evil thought, commits murder. It’s in the man’s blood; he destroys those who are close to him.’
‘You’ve not answered the question.’
‘Lock him up, throw away the key. That’d be too good for him.’
‘Marcus, we believe, wanted to do the same. Do you remember Stephen Palmer?’
‘Where’s this heading?’
‘Marcus killed Stephen Palmer.’
‘Not Marcus? A crook he may have been, but murder, that’s another thing.’
‘Hamish McIntyre forced him to kill Palmer. We know that now. Your time in the Army, did you kill a man?’
‘I was a soldier in Northern Ireland, elsewhere.’
‘Is that a yes or a no.’
‘Gwen doesn’t like me talking about it. She thinks that war is cancer, that we should love our neighbour, turn the other cheek.’
‘Did you kill?’
‘I did my duty, the same as any other soldier would.’
‘The answer’s yes, isn’t it?’
‘War’s a dirty game, sometimes it’s unavoidable.’
***
Larry returned to Challis Street at one in the afternoon, not long after Isaac and Wendy. His face was flushed, his breath heavy with the smell of beer.
‘You can give me the lecture later,’ he said to Isaac. ‘And besides, I kept it to two pints, no more.’
Isaac didn’t believe the two pints, but he’d let it pass for now. He’d done all he could with his inspector. If the man wanted to head down the slippery slope to recurring alcoholism, that was between him and
