Death Bed Read online

  ‘Hello.’

  She smiled at them readily.

  ‘Are you collecting the clothes for the old folk? I’ve got a bag put by, hang on a sec.’

  ‘Mrs Kingsley? We’re not collecting clothes.’

  Geraldine showed her warrant card.

  ‘It is Mrs Kingsley?’

  ‘Yes. You’ll be wanting Bill?’

  A man appeared in the hallway, tall and lean, with light gingery hair and moustache.

  ‘Who is it, Denise?’

  ‘It’s the police,’ his wife said.

  William Kingsley frowned.

  ‘What is it? Only I’ve had a long day and I’m knackered.’

  ‘Mr Kingsley, you own a black BMW - ’

  ‘Used to. I sold it a couple of weeks ago.’

  ‘It’s registered in your name.’

  He looked startled.

  ‘Oh shit, did I forget to send the slip off to the DVLA?’

  ‘Oh Bill,’ his wife said. ‘You promised you’d do it.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘How could you forget? Now we’re in trouble.’

  ‘Don’t look at me like that. And stop being stupid. The police haven’t come here chasing my DVLA form.’

  ‘You said you sold the BMW?’ Geraldine checked.

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘Who did you sell it to?’

  William Kingsley pulled thoughtfully at his chin.

  ‘I don’t really know who he was. Just some bloke.’

  ‘Some bloke. I see. Where did you meet him?’

  ‘I didn’t. That is, he came round. He’d seen the ad I put in Exchange and Mart and called up and came over to take a look. Actually, he hardly looked at the car at all, just listened to me start the engine and said straight away he’d take it. I mean, the car was only five years old and it was in great shape. I looked after it.’

  ‘What was his name?’

  ‘I never asked. He paid in cash and that was it really. Is it important then?’

  ‘Yes. We need to speak to the man who bought your BMW.’

  Kingsley cleared his throat nervously.

  ‘He looked well-off.’

  ‘It would help if you could tell us everything you can remember about him, and then we’d like you to go along to the local police station and see if you can pick him out in an identity parade.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘I’m sorry, but it was a few weeks ago now, and I only saw the guy for a few minutes.’

  He frowned in an effort to recollect and then shook his head. ‘No, I can’t remember him at all, I’m afraid. I’m really not good with faces. My wife thinks I’ve got that condition, what do you call it Denise?’

  ‘It’s got some funny name. It’s basically face blindness,’ Mrs Kingsley explained. ‘Prosonosa or something.’

  ‘Prosopagnosia.’

  ‘Yes. That’s the one. Anyway, he’s terrible with faces.’ Geraldine turned back to the electrician.

  ‘Please try to remember, Mr Kingsley. Was he white or black? Fair or dark haired?’

  ‘Well, he was white with dark hair, I think, and - ’

  He paused, struggling to summon up an image of the man.

  ‘You said he gave the impression of being well-off. What made you think that?’

  ‘Well, I suppose he had a posh voice and was well-dressed. He might’ve been wearing an expensive coat. I can’t remember what he was wearing, to be honest, that’s just the impression he gave, so I felt I could trust him. I mean, it didn’t occur to me to suspect his money was dodgy. If it had, I wouldn’t have touched it.’

  ‘Was he tall or short? Anything you can remember might be helpful.’

  ‘I think he was tall, about my height, though I couldn’t swear to it exactly.’

  Geraldine frowned, thinking about Robert Stafford, tall and dark-haired but speaking with a distinct Northern accent.

  ‘Think carefully, please, Mr Kingsley. Can you remember anything else about this man, anything distinctive? His hairstyle, perhaps?’

  The electrician shook his head helplessly.

  ‘Where’s the money now?’

  William Kingsley frowned.

  ‘Well, some of it went on the bike. I had to get it fixed. And the rest - ’

  He glanced at his wife.

  ‘Don’t look at me,’ she protested. ‘We’ve got to eat, haven’t we?’

  ‘Did he say anything else at all?’

  William Kingsley shook his head.

  ‘If you remember anything else about this man, anything at all, please let me know, and in the meantime we’d appreciate your help in seeing if you can pick this man out at an identity parade. You never know, you might recognise him.’

  He shook his head again.

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘Well we’d like you to try anyway, and apart from work, please don’t leave home for the time being, and if you have to go away, make sure you let me know. We’ll expect you at the local police station tomorrow then.’

  Despite his professed poor memory for faces, there had to be a chance he might recognise Stafford as the man who had bought his car. He might remember his voice.

  ‘I’m sorry to take up your time like this,’ she went on, seeing William Kingsley’s expression, ‘but I’m sure you want to help us in our enquiry into a serious crime - ’

  ‘What? Is it a murder or something?’

  ‘Yes, what’s this all about?’ his wife asked.

  ‘I’m afraid we can’t tell you.’

  ‘So you want me to go to the police station and look at a line-up, is that it? How long will it take then? What about my work?’

  ‘I’m afraid it will take as long as it takes, Mr Kingsley. I’m sure you want to co-operate with us.’

  ‘Oh William,’ his wife interrupted.

  She turned to Geraldine.

  ‘Of course he’ll be there, Inspector. He’ll go down straight after work, won’t you?’

  ‘We should have the identity parade ready mid-morning, so we’ll expect you about ten-thirty. We want to get this done as soon as possible. One more thing, Mr Kingsley. Where were you on the night of Saturday the twenty-first of August?’

  ‘We always go out on a Saturday night,’ he replied.

  ‘The girl from next door babysits and we meet my sister and our friends in the pub,’ his wife chimed in. ‘It’s karaoke night.’

  ‘And after the pub closes?’

  Mrs Kingsley looked puzzled.

  ‘We all go home.’

  ‘Does your husband ever get called out to work at night?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘What do you think? Did Robert Stafford buy the BMW from him? Or is Kingsley himself the man we’re looking for?’ Sam asked, when they were back in the car.

  ‘I honestly don’t know.’

  ‘He says he sold his car but there’s no record of any kind.’

  ‘I don’t think Kingsley’s lying,’ Geraldine replied. ‘There’s nothing to connect him with Jessica Palmer and his wife seemed quite clear he was with her.’

  Circumstances might point to William Kingsley but much as she wanted to believe they had found the killer, she didn’t think the electrician was their man.

  ‘So it’s back to Stafford,’ Sam said firmly. ‘Kingsley sold the car to a tall, dark-haired man.’

  ‘Who was expensively dressed and spoke with an educated accent.’

  ‘He could have remembered wrongly. Like he said, he sees a lot of people over the course of a week.’

  ‘Just our luck to have an eye-witness who can’t remember meeting the killer,’ Geraldine muttered.

  ‘Whatever. Lots of people are useless at remembering faces. But the rest of it could fit with what Kingsley and Hopkins told us.’

  ‘I don’t see Stafford in expensive clothes.’

  ‘Anyone can buy something that looks expensive. That’s neither here nor there. And as for the accent, didn’t Evelyn Stafford say her husband
did impressions? He could have put on a false voice to hide his Northern accent.’

  Geraldine had to admit the idea wasn’t utterly implausible, but it still didn’t feel right.

  36

  CROSSING THE LINE

  ‘So it’s looking like Stafford’s our man after all,’ Sam said brightly as she drove back to the station.

  ‘I still don’t think he’s the one we want.’

  ‘But he could have bought William Kingsley’s car. You admitted as much yourself.’

  Geraldine sighed, wishing Sam wasn’t pursuing Stafford quite so eagerly. He was their only suspect, but that didn’t mean he was guilty. She flicked through her notebook.

  ‘A tall dark-haired man wearing a long coat and expensive shoes, and speaking with an educated accent, who gives the impression he has plenty of money. Douggie Hopkins and William Kingsley are describing the same man, aren’t they? As far as we know, he bought a car for cash, leaving no paper trail, a car in which Jessica Palmer dropped the pendant she always wore, a car this man paid Douggie Hopkins to dispose of in a hurry.’

  She broke off, frustrated. They had been given an elusive glimpse of the man who had killed Jessica Palmer, but he didn’t sound like the Northerner who had visited the massage parlour.

  ‘I just don’t think Robert Stafford’s our man,’ she concluded bleakly.

  ‘Because - ?’

  ‘Well, for a start this is a meticulously planned operation. It’s not the work of someone who booked into a massage parlour under his own name before bumping off his regular masseuse. I think the man we’re looking for is more devious than that. He paid Douggie Hopkins to torch his car without revealing his identity, if we believe Hopkins, which I do. I don’t think Hopkins knows who this man is any more than we do. What are we missing, Sam?’

  ‘I don’t know. But I do know that Hopkins is scum. I daresay he knows more than he’s letting on. If you ask me, we ought to pull him in, not let him off in exchange for giving us information.’

  ‘You know as well as I do that we depend on scum like Douggie Hopkins to give us information. Sometimes that’s all we have.’

  ‘That doesn’t justify it. We shouldn’t turn a blind eye because he knows something we don’t.’

  ‘So what would you do then? Lock up all the petty criminals, the snouts and the messenger boys, ones we can mop up easily – and give up trying to catch the bigger fish?’

  ‘Without foot soldiers carrying out their instructions the ones behind it all would have nothing. They’d be nothing. Lock up all the petty criminals and the game’s over for whoever’s running them.’

  ‘We’re talking about men who stay out of sight pocketing the profits. They’re loaded, some of them. They’ll always find people to do their dirty work for them.’

  ‘Yes, I know. Of course you’re right, in practice. But if something’s wrong, it’s wrong,’ Sam protested. ‘We shouldn’t have to make allowances for scum like Hopkins, that’s all I’m saying.’

  Geraldine shrugged.

  ‘Well, you’re right too, in theory. But we have to be practical. If a small-time crook can help us put a murderer behind bars, it’s got to be a good thing. It all depends on where you draw the line about what you’re prepared to tolerate and why.’

  ‘There should only be one line,’ Sam insisted. ‘And that line is the law. It has to be upheld, regardless. It’s not our job to decide when the rules can be bent.’

  ‘Sometimes the means have to justify the ends or we’d never be able to protect the majority of people, and that’s our job too. Keeping the public safe.’

  ‘So according to you, if a murderer gives us information that leads to the arrest of a serial killer, the murderer should be rewarded? And how about if the serial killer then helps us find a sociopath?’

  Geraldine shook her head, smiling.

  ‘Now that would be crossing the line.’

  ‘Oh come on. People pay – what is it now? – sixty quid for parking in the wrong place, or driving a few miles over the speed limit, and here we are, condoning someone torching a car that could have led us to Jessica Palmer’s killer. We let him off scot free for telling us about it when he was the one who destroyed the evidence in the first place.’

  ‘Letting Hopkins off for destroying evidence isn’t the point. The evidence has gone - ’

  ‘Thanks to Hopkins,’ Sam interjected.

  ‘All we can do now is salvage what we can from the situation. And if that means striking a bargain with Hopkins for information, so we can try and discover who used that car to abduct Jessica Palmer and kill her, so be it. However you look at it, you can’t put torching a car in the same category as murder.’

  ‘Yes, but - ’

  ‘It’s all well and good arguing, and maybe you can make an ethical case, but here in the real world we have to work with what we’ve got even if that means ignoring moral absolutes. Now come on, this isn’t a philosophy class. What do we know?’

  ‘We know enough to suspect Stafford’s the man we’re after,’ Sam replied, crotchety. ‘What makes you so sure he’s not guilty?’

  ‘What makes you so sure he is?’

  ‘Think about it, Geraldine. He knew her. He stopped going to the massage parlour just after she was killed, and he was a member of the National Front.’

  ‘For six months, when he was a teenager.’

  ‘Alright, he’s a National Front sympathiser then.’

  ‘Possibly. But we don’t know that. If he’s a racist, why would he ask for Jessica Palmer to do his massage? It doesn’t make sense. Surely he wouldn’t want her touching him.’

  ‘Maybe he liked humiliating her, seeing her in a subservient role. Perhaps he wanted to control his victims - chaining Jessica up could be an extension of her services in the massage parlour where he saw himself as some sort of high and mighty white boss, with black women as his captives, like his slaves. Maybe that’s what he enjoyed.’

  ‘And killing his victims would be the ultimate power trip,’ Geraldine added. ‘Well, I can see how what we know about Stafford could fit what little we actually think we know about Jessica Palmer’s killer but what’s his connection to Donna Henry? No, something’s not right.’

  ‘You can say that again. The whole thing stinks. A massage wasn’t all he was after for a start.’

  ‘We don’t know that, Sam. And even if there were other services on offer - ’

  ‘If there were!’

  ‘That still doesn’t mean he killed Jessica, or that he’s done anything illegal, unsavoury though the whole thing might be.’

  ‘It means he’s a disgusting liar.’

  ‘You might well be right, but even if he was cheating on his wife, that’s not a crime. And we don’t know there was anything like that going on. He might just be the type to go to a massage parlour like that when he was really only after a massage. His story about a rugby injury sounds convincing enough.’

  ‘But it all fits,’ Sam replied doggedly. ‘The same night we let him go, Donna Henry was killed. It had to be him. Why make things more complicated than they really are?’

  ‘I just want to be confident we’re going after the right man.’

  Sam shook her head.

  ‘I can’t see the problem.’

  ‘Doesn’t it bother you that he booked into the massage parlour under his own name when he could easily have used a false one?’

  ‘Presumably he wasn’t planning on killing her when he started going there.’

  ‘We’ll bear it in mind as a possibility, but we can’t go jumping to conclusions.’

  Geraldine couldn’t give a satisfactory explanation as to why she didn’t believe Stafford was a killer, but her instincts told her the man they wanted was altogether more cunning than the Northerner who had patronised the massage parlour.

  Tired and dispirited, all she wanted to do was go home and sleep, but her day wasn’t over. After work it was time for her to set off on the drive to Kent where her sister, Celi
a, was expecting her for supper. Although she welcomed the break, she couldn’t put the investigation out of her mind. Despite what she had said to Sam, she wasn’t ready to disregard Robert Stafford completely. Sam might be right to suspect Robert Stafford had bought William Kingsley’s car for cash, putting on a false voice. Geraldine had come across less likely scenarios in previous cases. In any event, they needed to find out more about Stafford and his associates. They knew he had been a member of the National Front as a teenager. He claimed he no longer associated with them and accepting a massage from a black woman certainly seemed to confirm that he had moved away from the views he’d held in his youth. But such prejudices ran deep. Maybe Stafford was cleverer than she thought.

  As she left London behind, the investigation slowly began to drift away from her. It seemed strange driving back along familiar roads. It was only a few weeks since she had left the area but it felt as though she was stepping back in time. When she reached Celia’s house, time concertinaed as though she had never left at all.

  ‘You’ve grown up!’ she said, smiling at Chloe who grinned at her.

  ‘Are we going shopping, Aunty Geraldine?’

  ‘You know perfectly well it’s too late for shopping, young lady,’ Celia replied. ‘It’s supper and then bed for you. School in the morning.’

  ‘Oh mum.’

  ‘I’ll take you shopping next time I come,’ Geraldine said.

  ‘Do you promise?’

  ‘Promise.’

  ‘You’ll have to come round earlier next time then,’ Chloe told her. ‘Come on Saturday and we can spend all day shopping.’

  ‘Don’t be bossy, Chloe,’ Celia remonstrated. ‘You know Aunty Geraldine’s busy. Eight going on eighteen,’ she added, turning to Geraldine.

  Behind her mother’s back, Chloe stuck her tongue out.

  ‘Isn’t this nice?’ Celia said when she had finished serving the food. ‘Three girls together. We should do this more often when daddy’s out.’

  Chloe chattered about school and insisted on telling Geraldine all about her best friend, Emma. Preoccupied and tired, Geraldine did her best to appear interested. As soon as they finished eating Chloe stood up.