Making A Killing (The Romney and Marsh Files Book 2) (24 page)

‘How is it?’ she said.

‘How do you think?’

In the privacy of his office, Romney risked extracting the cotton wool. He rang up to Falkner’s office asking for an audience and was told to go up.

Falkner was alone. He stood at the window of his office which overlooked the street looking pensive and under strain. As Romney entered, Falkner pushed aside his own concerns to sympathise with his subordinate. They discussed the events of the kebab shop and Romney’s injury, as they had to, but Falkner clearly had more pressing matters on his mind.

They sat and Romney got to the reason for his visit. ‘While I was at the hospital I took the opportunity of speaking to Wilkie.’

‘Was that wise?’ said Falkner. ‘They told us to stay away from him.’

‘I don’t think he’ll be telling them.’

Romney had toyed with the idea of presenting Falkner with Marsh’s damning audio recording but in the end decided against it. He hoped they could achieve what Falkner had suggested the previous evening without dragging Marsh into it. She had shown herself to be a loyal officer and was shaping up to be a good one. Romney had no desire to rope her into what was going on – to tar her with the brush of failure.

Romney outlined what he had suggested to Wilkie, omitting the business with Marsh and the threats he had made. He told Falkner that after speaking to Wilkie
, he understood the man recognised he had been under enormous pressure in his home and professional life – Romney skated around the term nervous breakdown, but it was strongly implied and inferred – and that if the service could be encouraged to treat him sympathetically, he would cooperate with the internal affairs investigation to the extent that he would do anything that they said.

This seemed good news indeed to Falkner. If he harboured suspicions regarding how satisfactorily things were shaping up t
o turn out he didn’t voice them, although he was too long in the tooth to believe it had been that simple and neat. The same experience kept him from pressing Romney for greater detail regarding his coup. Besides, what he didn’t know remained deniable and couldn’t come back to bite him. Now all he had to do was sell it to Professional Standards.

As Romney was leaving, Falkner said, ‘What made you change your mind about him? You didn’t seem that keen last night.’

‘I told you, sir. I just needed to speak with him first.’

As Romney shut the door after him, Falkner was left wondering what could have passed between the men to hav
e brought about such a change over his DI.

*

‘Hello again, Dorothy,’ said Marsh, as she and Grimes approached the counter of the shoe-shop.

The woman who had displayed a distinct defensive arrogance
, both in person and on the phone, now stared anxiously at them. Trying to inject some confidence into her tone she said, ‘What do you want?’

‘A chat,’ said Marsh.

‘You’d better come through to the back then.’

‘Not this time, Dorothy. I’m afraid we’ve gone beyond that. No doubt you’ve spoken to your mother and you must have seen us arrest your boyfriend earlier. You could be in a lot of trouble. Being an accomplice to a murder is a very serious business. You’re coming to the station. Collect your things.’ Marsh’s calculated tough approach appeared to have the desired effect on the bottle-blonde. The colour drained from her ruddy cheeks and she brought a hand up to her throat. Marsh turned the screw. ‘Do we need to use these?’ she said, dangling her handcuffs in front of her.

Dorothy Mann shook her head, unable to speak as tears filled her eyes.

Marsh had briefed Grimes on the way to the shoe-shop that she had no intention of arresting or char
ging Dorothy Mann with anything so he was just to play along, preferably dumbly, and not derail or undermine her performance. Grimes seemed a little hurt by the suggestion that he would have.

Once the
y were in the car, Grimes drove as instructed, slowly and the long way, back to the station. Marsh attempted to turn the screw tighter still in the few minutes they had and kept her fingers crossed that Grimes would obey her instructions and shut up.

Marsh swivelled around in the front seat to get in the face of Dorothy Mann. ‘We know that Arda was at your ex-husband’s home around the time he was murdered,’ she said. ‘We have a witness and he very carelessly left his finger prints for us to find. We’ll be throwing the book at him. I have to say Dorothy
, he has mentioned your name several times already.’ This was the first outright lie Marsh had told. ‘Personally, I’m very disappointed you weren’t honest with me when you had the chance. That will look bad for you in my report. It’ll look like you’ve got something to hide. My governor thinks it too. Mind you, he’s desperate to top the county rankings for arrests this month, so he was glad to hear that we were bringing in someone who might turn out to be an accomplice to a murder. The more the merrier, he says.’

‘I didn’t know anything about it,’ blurted Dorothy Mann, wringing her hands.

Marsh looked out of the window distractedly and pushed her luck ‘You might as well save it for your defence lawyer, Dorothy.’

‘I swear on my mum’s life. I had no idea he might hurt Duncan. He was so bloody jealous of him. You have to believe me. He’s a psychopath. I’m terrified of him.’

Marsh did her best to sound sceptical. ‘Is that why you told him where Duncan lived? Because you were afraid of him?’

‘I didn’t tell him, he found it on my divorce correspondence.’

Bingo. Marsh turned back to the woman and leaning over so that the top pocket of her jacket was as close as she could get it to Dorothy Mann’s mouth said, ‘Say that again.’

‘Arda got Duncan’s address from my divorce papers. I thought he was just going to speak to him, frighten him a bit into giving me more money after our divorce. I had no idea he was going to kill him.’

Marsh could have kissed her. ‘But you knew in the end that he had?’

The woman was crying now. She wouldn’t be a lot more use, but she did have one thing left to do. ‘No. When I found out Duncan had been killed I asked Arda if it was him. He said it was nothing to do with him. But I didn’t believe him. He was different. He told me to forget it and never to talk about it again.’

*

Marsh checked which holding cell Arda was being kept in. She didn’t want to make a mistake. With a light grip on Dorothy Mann’s elbow they followed the custody officer down the narrow corridor of iron-fronted rooms. Dorothy Mann was trembling and snivelling loudly believing this was her final destination.

The uniformed sergeant unlocked number six and opened the heavy door wide. Marsh ushered the woman forwards and then noticed the small windowless room was occupied by a dark-skinned man with bandaging across the bridge of his nose. She gave them both long enough to register each others’ presence before pulling Dorothy Mann backwards. The door was shut quickly and locked again.

‘Ooops,’ said Marsh. ‘Sorry, Dorothy. Wrong one.’ Now that Mann had served her final purpose
, Marsh said, ‘I’ll tell you what, why don’t we go straight upstairs to an interview room. I’ll take your statement now and you can get off home.’ Marsh led the disorientated and distressed woman back down the corridor. Thanking the sergeant with a wink, she led Dorothy Mann away to incriminate her boyfriend in print.

*

Romney was back in his office when Marsh returned from seeing Dorothy Mann off the premises. She appraised him of her progress. Romney listened as he looked through Dorothy Mann’s statement.

When she had finished
, he said, ‘It seems you were right about Emerson’s and Smart’s deaths being unrelated. I suppose sometimes it doesn’t pay to think logically.’

‘Oh, I thought logically, sir. My logic was just different to yours
, that’s all. With no clear motive for Smart’s murder, no burglary, nothing missing, I thought I’d explore domestic violence as a possibility. It might not be Christmas, but domestic violence still accounts for the lion’s share of sudden deaths. This just turned out to be domestic violence by proxy. I think she must have stirred him up good and proper and his Mediterranean macho temperament couldn’t cope with it, but we’ll never be able to prove that.’

‘What now then, Sergeant?’

‘I hoped we could interview Arda together, catch him while he’s still reeling from everything. He knows that Dorothy Mann has been in to help us with our enquiries. He must be shitting himself.’

‘How does he know?’

‘I accidentally walked her into his cell.’

Romney snorted out a laugh and was then forced to clutch at his nose with the pain that followed.

Like a complicated play script Marsh sketched out her ideas for interviewing Arda. Romney approved, accepted the minor role he’d been cast in and admired her thinking, particularly its devious nature. When the court appointed solicitor arrived the carefully choreographed performance could begin.

Arda was taken from his cell in handcuffs by the biggest, meanest looking uniform on duty, who was instructed to leave his naturally friendly nature in the locker r
oom. Marsh joined Arda and the constable. Romney was delaying the solicitor with small talk.

Marsh put Dorothy Mann’s statement on the table between her and the prisoner. Next to it she put her digital recording device. She folded her arms, rested her elbows on the table and began. ‘How’s your English, Arda?’

‘I understand what I need to.’

She smiled at him. ‘Good because you need to understand what I’m going to say to you. You must know you’re in a great deal of trouble. Premeditated murder, assaulting a police of
ficer – by the way, do you know: the higher the rank of the officer the longer the sentence for assault. What is it for a detective inspector?’ she said to the constable.

He made a face
that suggested thought and said, ‘I’d have to look it up. We haven’t had an assault on anyone above sergeant for a long time.’ His delivery was convincing, if a little wooden, but Marsh hadn’t had time for auditions.

‘I never killed anyone and I never meant to hit him with the drink. It was accident. You can’t prove anything.’

A challenge, thought Marsh. She made a show of looking at her watch. ‘Have it your way, Arda. They’ll be here any minute. We can discuss it then with the tape on. You know that when the tape starts it’s legally court admissible evidence. Be careful what you say when that’s running.’ She looked at her watch again and waited a full minute before turning to the constable and saying, as rehearsed, ‘Could you find out where they’ve got to, please?’ He nodded and left them alone. ‘Sadly, this isn’t admissible in court,’ Marsh said, as the door closed, ‘but you might as well hear it anyway. It seems a shame to waste it.’ She pushed the play button of her digital recorder.

‘Arda got Duncan’s address from my divorce papers. I thought he was just going to speak to him, frighten him a bit into giving me more money after our divorce. I had no idea he was going to kill him.’

She rewound it a little more.

‘I swear on my mum’s life. I had no idea that he might hurt Duncan. He was so bloody jealous of him. You have to believe me. He’s a psychopath. I’m terrified of him.’

Arda listened impassively. His large dark eyes assumed a sad remoteness.

Marsh hurried on, kicking the man while he was down. ‘This, however, is accepted by the court.’ She held up Dorothy Mann’s statement. ‘Dorothy was very helpful. Do you know that you frighten her? I got the feeling she wouldn’t be sorry to see the back of you. The longer the better. Between ourselves
, I’m not convinced she’s the type to be waiting for you when you get out.’ He still didn’t speak, but his body language was very communicative. ‘Let me tell you what else we have. A witness who will testify to seeing you hanging around outside the dead man’s home the day before he was killed and, your biggest carelessness, cast your mind back, Arda, remember that drink can you threw in Smart’s next door neighbour’s garden? Guess what? I’ve got it. And the prints taken from it are a perfect match to the ones taken off the can you assaulted my DI with.’ Marsh could almost hear the wheels of his mind grinding down his options. That’s all she needed. ‘My DI has very generously authorised me to make a deal with you. He’s not too bothered about how long you spend in prison. A long time and you rot. When you come out you get deported back to Turkey. A shorter time inside and when you get out you’ll be deported back to Turkey. Either way, he gets his conviction and he never has to worry about seeing you again on his patch.’

‘What’s the deal?’ said Arda.

‘Cooperate. Confess to the killing of Duncan Smart. We’re not particularly bothered about why you did it – whether it was a premeditated act, or an argument that got out of hand. And tell us where we can find the murder weapon.’ Marsh was lying again. She was bothered about whether the man had killed with malice-aforethought, as she believed. She would like to have seen him get a long life sentence. However, she was also a realist. As such, she was fully aware that getting a conviction on a charge of murder would be almost impossible with no independent witnesses and only the Turk’s word for what actually happened. No need to let him know all that now though. Let him think they really had something to trade for his cooperation.