A Time to Kill Read online

  It had the desired effect.

  Fiona maintained her eye contact with Sara. ‘I visited my mother; she lives near Bangor. I left here about five o’clock and called into the supermarket on the way to buy a lasagne ready meal she likes. I probably arrived a little after six.’ Fiona ran out of energy as though the momentum of recalling her movements drained her.

  Sara finished jotting notes, and cast Drake a quick glance; he nodded his encouragement for her to continue. ‘What time did you leave your mum’s?’

  ‘I don’t know exactly,’ she stammered. ‘But I was back home by about ten.’

  Sara smiled again. ‘Thank you, Mrs Jones. You’ve been very helpful.’

  The sound of the doorbell took Fiona’s attention. ‘That’ll be Ceri.’

  Drake was the first to his feet. ‘I’ll answer that.’

  Sara heard the brief exchange between Drake and Fiona’s sister. Ceri entered the room moments later, ashen-faced, and hugged her sister tightly as both women wept. Drake motioned to Sara that they should leave. Neither Fiona nor Ceri paid them any attention.

  Outside Drake called operational support, instructing them to find him the name and contact details for the local parish council. He turned to Sara. ‘Let’s call at his shop.’

  * * *

  Padarn Antiques occupied an old building on three storeys and as they walked down the side street Drake caught sight of the lake that gave the business its name. He hoped the crime scene investigators were making progress; he dipped a hand into his jacket pocket and found his mobile.

  Foulds answered after a couple of rings. ‘Anything to report?’ Drake said.

  ‘Still too early, Ian. But it looks as though he was shot – one bullet.’

  ‘Close range?’

  ‘I think so, but the post-mortem will tell you definitively.’

  ‘Has the pathologist been?’

  ‘He should be here any minute.’

  Drake finished the call, wondering if Harry Jones’s killer had got lucky with a single shot or whether it was a professional kill. He looked up at the building in front of him. The wooden windows had recently been painted, the external rendering a rich but neutral cream colour. The sign above the entrance door and shop window advertising Padarn Antiques in simple gold letters gave it a prosperous appearance.

  He pushed open the door and Sara followed him inside.

  The sound of a radio drifted from the rear and Drake followed a narrow path between the chests of drawers, grandfather clocks, shelving units and cupboards stacked with blue-and-white striped crockery. Delicate labels were attached with red ribbon to each but Drake didn’t bother checking the prices.

  In a makeshift office space butted to the rear, a man in his thirties, ponytail and trainee beard, was playing patience on a computer as the radio blasted out a Walter Trout song.

  ‘Are you Michael?’ Drake said.

  ‘How can I help?’ He gave his best customer-friendly smile and reached over to silence the radio.

  Drake produced his warrant card. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Drake. This is Detective Sergeant Morgan. Your boss Harry Jones was killed this morning.’

  The smile disappeared instantly. Michael frowned, his mouth fell open. ‘I… can’t believe it.’

  ‘Does Harry have an office here?’

  Michael nodded as he scrambled to his feet. Drake continued. ‘Please lock the premises before you show us his office.’ Michael fumbled to find a set of keys from a drawer in the desk. He scampered off and Drake heard him struggling with the key; he scrutinised Michael’s workspace – calendar, hole puncher, stapler and card machine, probably the most important part. Michael returned and gestured to the rear. ‘It’s this way.’

  He led them through a stockroom piled to the ceiling with boxes and books and wooden crates.

  ‘All this stuff needs to be sorted out,’ Michael said.

  He unlocked the room at the end. It smelled musty as though fresh air hadn’t circulated for days. A lamp with a moss-green shade sat on a pedestal desk pushed into one corner.

  ‘This desk was his pride and joy. HP said it was worth a mint.’

  Drake surveyed the room – two filing cabinets, a small table with a kettle, various mugs, a jar of instant coffee and a packet of sugar. Despite the antique desk and lamp there were no domestic refinements for Harry Jones.

  ‘Why did you call him HP?’

  ‘It’s his initials, Harry Paul.’ Michael snorted. ‘His nickname was ‘hotpoint’, after his initials.’ Michael glanced at Sara and back to Drake. ‘He liked the ladies: that’s why everyone calls him ‘hotpoint’.’

  ‘But he’s married.’ Drake knew as soon as he made the remark that it sounded lame.

  ‘It didn’t stop hotpoint.’

  Sara made her first contribution. ‘We’ll need your contact details.’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’

  ‘Do you know anyone with a grudge against Harry Jones?’ Drake noticed that Sara emphasised his surname.

  Michael shook his head. A message reached Drake’s mobile and he read the name and number for the secretary of the parish council as Sara continued.

  ‘What was he like to work with?’

  ‘He was all right, I suppose. But I never knew what he was doing. He kept all these filing cabinets locked. He could disappear during the day. I didn’t know where he went and some days he’d stay here until late. I’ve seen people call here late at night. And you should check out the lock-up he’s got. He tried to keep it secret; he thought nobody knew about it. Everybody knows everybody else’s business around here. Especially when hotpoint is up to his old tricks.’

  ‘I’d like to know exactly where this lock-up is,’ Drake said.

  Chapter 5

  Drake peered out of the windscreen of his Mondeo after he and Sara had locked the premises. Michael scurried away down the street. Drake presumed he’d go straight to his local pub ready to share the news with his friends. Llanberis was a tight-knit community, like many rural villages and towns in North Wales, so Harry’s death would be the topic of every conversation. The hours were slipping by after the discovery of the body. Searching Harry’s lock-up and discovering whether he was as much of a philanderer as Michael made out could wait. Establishing Harry’s movements before he was killed was the priority.

  Drake called the contact name on his mobile and spoke to a man with an elderly voice who sounded shocked. Eventually he agreed to call the other councillors and arrange for them to meet Drake later that afternoon at the community centre in the village.

  He turned to Sara. ‘We’re seeing the councillors who were at the meeting last night.’

  Sara nodded.

  ‘Before that let’s visit Fiona again.’

  For the third time that day Drake stood outside Fiona Jones’ front door; the sound of movement seeped through it. Footsteps on the tiled hallway, muted voices. The business of grieving and extending condolences was well underway. Drake recalled the activity at his parents’ home when his father had died. It had exhausted his mother. Small communities had a habit of wrapping themselves around people’s grief, well-meaning but tiring nevertheless.

  He glanced over at Sara standing by his side, pleased that her contribution to the second interview with Fiona Jones had helped. His initial irritation at being allocated the missing person inquiry had been ill judged.

  Alison Faulkner, a family liaison officer Drake recognised, opened the door.

  ‘Good morning, sir.’

  Drake and Sara entered. ‘How’s Mrs Jones been?’ Drake said.

  Faulkner gave a world-weary shrug. ‘As you’d expect.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘She’s in the kitchen.’ Faulkner tipped her head towards a door at the end of the hallway.

  Fiona sat at a table staring blankly at a piece of toast on a plate in front of her. Her sister was busying herself, finding things to do, stacking mugs into cupboards, clearing the draining board.

  �
�We need to speak to Fiona again,’ Drake announced. Ceri nodded and left the room, as Drake and Sara sat down opposite Fiona Jones. Drake took a moment to gather his thoughts.

  ‘We’ve been to the shop and spoken with Michael. There are several locked filing cabinets. Do you know where the keys are kept?’

  Fiona raised her gaze to Drake and gave him a puzzled frown.

  ‘And he mentioned Harry owned a lock-up. We need to establish everything about your husband’s background. Do you know where we can find keys to the lock-up?’

  ‘Upstairs,’ Fiona croaked. ‘He’s got an office in one of the bedrooms.’

  Did she know anything about her husband’s affairs, or his ‘hotpoint’ nickname? Until Drake had concrete evidence and not idle gossip, questioning Fiona about Harry’s alleged infidelities could wait. Someone must have shared with her the details about her husband even if Fiona hadn’t been able to sense it herself.

  ‘He’s got lots of keys in the drawers of his desk.’

  Fiona wrapped her fingers around the half-empty mug of tea. Her gaze drifted back to the uneaten toast and then out through the window of the kitchen and into the far distance.

  It occurred to Drake he needed more background information about her marriage, the antiques business and their life together. Somewhere they would find someone with a motive for his murder. He stared over at Fiona, wondering if she might be that person. After all, people known to the victim commit most murders and the level of domestic violence was shocking. Fiona’s visit to her mother’s home was hardly an alibi. It only explained the early part of the evening until she returned home.

  The sound of the doorbell rang through the ground floor.

  Fiona continued to stare into a space only she could see. Drake heard the exchange of conversation between Ceri and at least two other people. The intensity of the voices changed; Drake guessed Faulkner had ushered them into the sitting room. The family liaison officer would know not to interrupt him. But he was finished with Fiona for now and he nodded at Sara and they left.

  ‘We’ll be upstairs in Harry’s office,’ Drake said to Faulkner, who was waiting for him in the hallway.

  ‘There are two neighbours come to pay their condolences,’ Faulkner said.

  ‘I’ll need a list of everybody who calls.’

  Faulkner began. ‘I don’t—’

  Drake gave her a sharp look and she said no more. He was paid to be suspicious, about everyone.

  The balustrades and handrail of the imposing staircase were a deep mahogany and at the top a burgundy carpet covered the landing. Drake tried the first door, which opened into a bedroom with a double bed and heavy furniture. He turned on his heels and noticed Sara examining intently one of the paintings hanging on the wall.

  ‘I’m sure this is a Donald McIntyre,’ Sara said. ‘My grandmother collected him.’

  ‘I suppose it’s to be expected from an antiques dealer.’

  ‘And there was a Kyffin Williams downstairs.’

  Drake stood and gazed at the oil painting. It was of an old farm in dark greens and blues and browns.

  ‘Harry must have been loaded,’ Sara said.

  The second room was a bathroom, so Drake closed the door and turned his attention to the next two rooms. One was the master bedroom with the lived-in feel he’d expected. An electronic e-reader was charging on one bedside table, which Drake assumed belonged to Fiona, and on the other lay a hardback copy of the latest Ian Rankin novel sat alongside a cordless telephone.

  The final room was large enough to be a double bedroom.

  ‘I wonder if they have any family,’ Sara said.

  ‘The place doesn’t have the feel of young children.’

  ‘They might have already left home by now.’

  Harry had a fondness for knee-hole desks and the second Drake had seen that morning was a more substantial version of the one in Padarn Antiques. It had fewer scratches, the brass handles glistened, and a pot of pencils and a stack of Post It notes were arranged neatly in one corner near a telephone. A faint smell of furniture polish hung in the air and Drake’s immediate reaction was to approve of the order in the room.

  Drake got to work on the drawers while Sara rummaged through the filing cabinets.

  Various boxes storing paper clips, elastic bands of varying sizes and bits of stationery segmented each drawer. Drake’s priority was to find a set of keys but before he started, he called Mike Foulds.

  ‘What’s the latest, Mike?’

  ‘Give me a minute, Ian.’ Foulds fumbled with the mobile as he shouted at somebody. ‘Sorry, about that. We’ve had lots of rubberneckers, walking up into the woods taking photographs.’

  ‘Have you found any keys with the body?’

  ‘Nothing as yet.’

  ‘Has the pathologist been?’

  ‘He was complaining like mad because he’s going on holiday tomorrow. And he’s whingeing about hospital cutbacks making his life a misery. He’s going to do the PM tonight.’

  ‘What!’ Drake could ill afford the time to be present at the post-mortem. They needed an exact timeline for Harry’s movements for the night before, to build some sort of picture of his life, coordinate the local enquiries and hope they wouldn’t miss anything in the vital first few hours. Now he faced spending two hours at the mortuary. The pathologist would have to wait until Drake was available later that evening. He tapped a message telling the pathologist to expect him by nine p.m.

  ‘Anything wrong, boss?’ Sara said.

  ‘The pathologist wants to do the post-mortem tonight.’

  ‘Do you need me there?’

  Drake shook his head, much to Sara’s relief. Drake returned to the drawers in the desk and after examining each one turned to Sara. ‘Any keys for a filing cabinet?’ She shook her head.

  Drake turned his attention to a cupboard in one corner. Inside were various lever-arch files with neatly printed labels identifying the contents to be bank statements, letters from insurance companies and other investments. On the bottom shelf was a small safe, securely locked. It seemed unlikely Fiona knew the combination from her reaction to his previous questions.

  He sat back in the upholstered leather chair. ‘We haven’t got time for this,’ Drake said.

  Forensics could break it open in due course. They retraced their steps back downstairs as the family liaison officer was seeing an elderly couple to the door.

  Fiona perched on the edge of a sofa in the sitting room, having visibly aged since first thing that morning. The white wisps of hair were more pronounced and her cheeks looked more sunken. It wasn’t easily faked, Drake thought.

  ‘We found a safe in his office. Do you know the combination?’

  Slowly Fiona shook her head.

  * * *

  Drake and Sara reached the mobile incident room installed at the far end of the car park near the entrance to the slate museum after a long session interviewing all the councillors gathered in the community centre. Drake had insisted on seeing them all in turn so that Sara could record an individual version of the events of the night before. He needn’t have bothered; every version was similar.

  A presentation by a company developing the site of an old quarry, used as a bomb storage facility during the Second World War, had started promptly. All the councillors were supporting the venture. It would develop a badly neglected area and create a handful of jobs. A councillor in his seventies with silvery hair was the only one who could confirm that the meeting had broken up by eight p.m. as he had wanted to return home to watch a gardening programme on television.

  Mike Foulds stood with Drake and Sara in the mobile incident room. He gave them a detailed analysis of the immediate crime scene as the investigators in his team packed away their equipment and cameras.

  ‘Do you want a full search completed of the area?’

  Drake looked over Foulds’ shoulder. The wooded escarpment behind the track leading up to the Quarryman’s Hospital would be thick with vegetation,
shrubbery and trees. Casually discarding the weapon used to kill Jones so close to the crime scene would be improbable. But there might be some other fragment of evidence, a piece of clothing snagged on a gorse bush or a shard of litter accidentally dropped.

  Foulds would know the answer to his question. He was looking for confirmation from Drake.

  Drake nodded. ‘I’ll make certain you get all the resources you need. Do a full sweep of the slate museum and as far as practical through the woods.’

  Foulds stood and listened as Drake called operational support. He made clear he required every available officer to assist with the forensic search of the area. Drake looked at Foulds and noted the matter-of-fact determination on his face masked by the reality that finding valuable evidence was remote.

  Drake finished the call and said to Foulds. ‘Keep me up to date.’

  * * *

  Drake parked outside the mortuary a little before eight-thirty p.m. and sat in the car listening to his stomach growling. He picked up a message from Sian, his soon-to-be ex-wife, telling him she wanted to speak to him urgently, warning she would call first thing in the morning. Since their separation the routine of speaking to her on the telephone and collecting his daughters at prearranged times had developed too easily. His hope for reconciliation was proving more and more unlikely. He contemplated calling her but the prospect of a frosty conversation at the end of a tiring day filled him with dread.

  Instead he walked briskly over the empty car park towards the mortuary. The usual insolent assistant had left for the evening and Drake made his way into the main corridor following the sound of classical music.

  He pushed open the door. Dr Lee Kings waved his hands in the air, pretending to conduct an orchestra. As soon as he registered Drake the pathologist changed his smooth circular movements to a gesture of welcome.

  ‘Good, you’re punctual. I’m going on holiday tomorrow and can’t bloody wait to get out of this place.’

  Drake hadn’t heard Lee Kings complain before. The pathologist struck him as a man dedicated to his work, passionate about dissecting dead people. Within a couple of hours Kings’ work would be finished whereas Drake’s was only beginning.