Killing Time, page 19
“I got nothing from Paul, not that I wanted it. Maybe Daniel had more than he should have. I simply didn’t ask.”
It made sense. She had learned quickly that Paul was in bed with some bad people, but while the bills were being paid and Paul was either stable or happy she turned a blind eye.
Nicky and Jack let her talk as she continued to tell her story. They listened intently as she talked more of her limited exposure to what she came to learn was a criminal gang, and not just her husband’s ‘friends’. She volunteered that Paul knew William from a local cricket club. Both had played briefly and they’d lived nearer to one another at that point, with the two men sharing a beer from time to time.
Jack asked her casually how Paul had met Charlie and Joe. He dropped it into the conversation seamlessly and left it hanging in the room. Elizabeth pondered, thought about it, then with a furrowed brow said she didn’t know, but thought that it was something to do with William.
“Paul had never met them and got involved through William. I’m sure that’s how they got Paul involved. I trusted William, quite liked him, but he got in with the wrong crowd, and then got Paul mixed up in it too. He owed them for something, I’m not sure what, and they used it to get William involved with what they were doing. Paul knew William and was probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Elizabeth smiled, knowing she probably just looked like a weak-minded housewife making excuses for what her husband did. Irrespective of his mental state and his illness, he knew what he was doing. Knew it was wrong. So did she.
Nicky looked happy. She felt that she’d just learned some of the links that until now were only tenuous or suspected, or not known at all. That digging would carry on outside of these four walls.
“Do you know what he owed, Elizabeth? Or who he owed it to?”
“No I don’t, sorry. I think it was to Joe but I’m not sure. The way Paul described it was that Joe pulled William’s strings and Charlie did most of the overall planning for the jobs.”
With the interview at a stable point and with Elizabeth Warren unlikely to flee the country, Jack looked at Nicky, who nodded, ready for the tape to be paused.
“The one I really didn’t like was Alan Reynolds.”
Elizabeth dropped it in like an afterthought. An FYI. She wasn’t aware of the bomb she’d just laid on the table. Nicky struggled to keep her usual poker face straight.
“Sorry, how do you mean?”
“Well, William brought him round to the house a couple of times, no more than that, but he was a little shit.” Elizabeth was a well-spoken woman of ageing years, but she spoke the words with an edge and more than a hint of malice. “He was a teenager but he was a horrible child. Vile. He went bad long before his dad; he was just horrible and fitted in with the worst of them more than his dad ever did. William either brought him as he was lumbered with him, or he felt that Alan wasn’t out of place amongst them.”
Nicky was still struggling, the incredulity written large across her face.
“So he was in on it? The plan? The robberies?”
“I don’t know as I tended to disappear out of the way quickly, especially if Joe or Charlie were about, but he was there so I guess he was involved, or certainly had knowledge of what they were planning. I recall asking Paul once as I thought it was odd. He said Joe didn’t want Alan to have anything to do with it; he was young and far too petulant, but William was indebted to him so he just hung around. Paul said that William was always apprehensive and didn’t say much, he just listened and did as he was told largely, and there were times when they had to physically remove Alan, who had more to say than a young man of his age should have, especially in that company. Crazy, really, to think that Alan wanted in and William wanted out.”
Chapter 40
“So William Reynolds and Paul Harris were cricket buddies.”
Rob sounded surprised. It was sometimes difficult to envisage somebody you only knew after death or as a younger man, let alone an athlete or a sportsman. It was always difficult to picture an ageing criminal in poor health running about, carefree. Especially with the time lapse.
The same was true of Paul Harris. Jen still held sympathy for a man only brought to life from prison and court documents, and a few old photographs. A man whose life had been challenging from a number of perspectives. His psychological demons and mental illness during a period of low social tolerance; of low understanding, and during periods of recession and high unemployment. Not to mention that the people who would become his friends ultimately led him down a path of no return.
Jen found contentment with a picture of a young Paul Harris running around a cricket field on a Saturday afternoon. Part of a team. A proper one. Running around in the sun. Enjoying himself. Free.
Rob got the marker pen out. He loved adding their learnings to the board, lines to show the progress with the links displayed visually.
“I don’t think there’s any value in pursuing the initial links between Charlie and Joe. They were criminals. They were in each other’s circle and would have been robbing and pillaging in the same places and at the same time. Could have been a natural meet between two like-minded men.”
Nicky, Jen and Jack all nodded their approval. A thick black line was etched between Charlie’s and Joe’s names and their mugshots. Rob then added a similar line between Paul Harris and William Reynolds, along with the word ‘cricket’ above it. He then added a third line, albeit a dotted one, between William Reynolds and Joe Davies. On that line he added the word ‘DEBT?’ in capital letters.
“So the bits we don’t know are what William Reynolds ‘owed’ Joe Davies for to get himself involved in the underworld, and at what point this man joined the fray.” Rob stabbed at Daniel Mortimer’s name, adding several large black blobs to the board in the process. “He was another outsider, and if he was a criminal he wasn’t of the same ilk as Charlie or Joe, so how did he get roped in? Did he owe one of them too? Or was he a more willing accomplice?”
The phone on Rob’s desk started to ring. Rob looked at Jack, who picked up the phone on the hot desk and intercepted the call.
Nicky and Jen were already getting up. Getting ready. They had been looking forward to this moment.
“Alan Reynolds is downstairs, Gov. Just been booked for obstruction.”
Rob and Jack would continue their lines of inquiry while Nicky and Jen had another dig with Alan Reynolds. He’d already requested the duty solicitor and with his abrupt arrest half an hour ago, he knew he wasn’t back here for a friendly chat. Rob had the live link on and Jack would hover near enough to enjoy the stream of questions and the ‘sport’ of what was about to ensue downstairs in a sterile interview room.
Jack was sifting through documents pertaining to Daniel Mortimer’s time in Gartree. The degree, the training. Useful skills. Skills he wouldn’t be able to use or claim under a different name. Jack continued to ponder how he could live a life under an assumed name, but with a range of qualifications and training under his birth name.
Downstairs, Nicky opened up pleasantly enough, asking Alan if he’d ever donned his whites and joined his dad at the local cricket club. Alan looked surprised at the line of questioning, and after looking at his brief, who shrugged at him, decided to play along. Entertain them.
“Once or twice,” came the irreverent reply, followed with, “wasn’t really my thing, though.”
“What was your thing then, Alan?” asked Jen.
“You know. This and that,”
The small-talk tennis continued before Nicky’s boredom quickly set in.
“Does that include robbery planning with your dad and his mates, Alan?”
Alan’s facial expression quickly changed and he opted to ignore the question.
“We know you were present when your dad met with the rest of the gang to plan the heists. Only Joe Davies wasn’t too happy about it, because you weren’t his cup of tea, were you?”
Alan swallowed hard and looked guilty.
“Your dad and Paul were cricket mates. That’s nice. But we’re not sure why your dad felt compelled to join the gang.” It wasn’t really a question, more of an invitation. Nicky and Jen weren’t sure if he’d take it.
Silence.
“Your dad owed Joe Davies. Enough to agree to carry out two robberies with him. For him. Now he’s dead, and I think you know why.”
Silence.
“Who are you protecting, Alan? Yourself? It isn’t your dad. Way too late for him. The men most likely to have wanted him dead have also been brutally murdered. Slowly, and painfully murdered. Somebody doesn’t like what they did, Alan. What you did, and I think you know who it might be.”
Alan Reynolds squirmed in the chair. Nicky and Jen relished the moment as a bead of sweat formed on his forehead.
“And worse for you, Alan, we think the killer knows who you are.”
He continued to look heavily uncomfortable. He wanted to talk. His brief raised a hand but Alan had started to spill out the words, “I don’t know who it is. I really don’t.”
“Do you feel safe at night, Alan?” Jen asked quickly, enjoying the look of fear on his face. “Do you feel responsible?”
He looked shell-shocked. Like a boxer who was taking a pounding but was still on his feet.
“What were you digging for on the allotment?” The question followed quickly and was like a punch to the head.
Alan held a hand up, temporarily stopping the fight. He took a swig of his coffee and pondered his response, palpably considering whether to share what he knew, or some of what he knew, with the two women in front of him, or take his chances with whatever the bigger picture was. Whoever it was.
His solicitor leant in to offer some advice, but Alan Reynolds wasn’t listening.
“I was looking for a stash of watches.”
Nicky took a sip of her coffee. Waited patiently.
“I knew what was happening, and I know how the robberies were planned. Joe and Charlie planned them well, really well, and they went down well too. It was afterwards that got messy. The spoils weren’t split cleanly and Joe realised he’d stitched himself up, but by that point Daniel had a load of cash, and Dad had a shitload of watches that turned out to be more valuable than anyone knew.”
It was the first admission of discontent amongst the gang. The valuables hadn’t been a straight cut, and the inequality caused a rift.
“So what did you do with them, Alan?”
“Dad was scared. He was in deep and it wasn’t his thing. I suggested he hide them at the allotment in case Joe came knocking, which he did. We managed to sell a few, but then Dad buried a stash of them at some point to hide them further, and all was forgotten. Until you came knocking, anyway, and raked all this up. Then I remembered where I thought they were and realised if they were in good nick they could still be worth a few quid. They were nice watches.”
Nicky and Jen were satisfied enough with the response, without showing it. Nicky reminded Alan that he was a teenager at the time and wasn’t directly involved, and that any accusation against him on the robberies had long since been beaten by the statute of limitations. They were on his side. The mood had softened. Alan was talking.
“How did your dad get involved, Alan? Why did your dad get involved?”
Alan swallowed hard again. But he’d started talking and almost looked relieved to finally be sharing a secret his father had taken to his grave.
“I got involved with the wrong crowd at a young age. I was dealing by the time I got to secondary school. Small time stuff at first, just some skunk, bit of weed. Y’know, the normal. But it escalated and I was dealing LSD and ecstasy within a year or two.”
There were no surprises in the revelation, and the caution on Alan’s criminal record for selling drugs as a thirteen year old was already in the domain of the team.
“I sold drugs to one lad who reacted badly. He ended up in hospital. His name was Chris Davies. He was in my class and he started fitting and blacked out.”
“Chris Davies?” Nicky said loudly and clearly.
She’d met Chris Davies after his dad had been murdered. Only briefly, to notify him as the next of kin. Now married, living fifty miles away and with a crystal-clear alibi for the night that his own father had been murdered, as well as the other victims. A man who was well clear of his father’s murky shadow; married and decent. Honest. Employed and working nights. He’d been on CCTV at his workplace, a warehouse in Nottingham at the time, and with no apparent motive or means had been excluded almost immediately as a suspect or a potential victim. He had no reason to be involved in his fathers death, and from the conversation Nicky had had with him, he’d got as far away as possible at a young age to build his own life. The apple had fallen a long way from the tree.
Alan continued to talk. “I took a kicking for it. Not sure who from but I could hazard a pretty good guess. But then they wanted to know who I was getting the gear from. I thought at first they wanted me to deal for them too. Joe was looking at scaling down the violence of the robberies; they were getting too much attention. It was the late punk era heading into the nineties; everybody wanted new drugs and I had them. It was an easier way to make cash than to keep holding up jewellers, and we could have all scaled up.”
Jen wasn’t sure if Alan Reynolds had been this honest in decades, even to himself.
“I agreed, but Dad had got involved. He threatened me, but I think even then he knew it was fruitless. I was arrested for supplying the drugs to Chris, but his name was withheld and Dad gave me an alibi, so it was dropped. He really didn’t want to, but he was trying to keep me on the straight and narrow. He hadn’t given up by that point. Joe held it over my dad and said he’d either make our family pay or make sure that we suffered for what I’d done to Chris.”
Nicky was pleased with where this was going. The duty brief had been shit again, which had helped, plus they’d got Alan on the right day. She offered him another coffee and even asked if he wanted to take a break. He accepted the coffee.
“It seemed ok at first. I ran some errands for Joe, but then they started planning the robberies and they told dad he needed to do it to clean his slate with them. Dad really didn’t want to do it. He shouldn’t have done it. I wanted to be in the gang and wanted to keep dad out, but he fitted the bill. Joe was the sort of character who enjoyed punishing people and loved having people who owed him so he could manipulate them. Dad resisted and tried everything to not do it, but they needed a driver. The compromise was that he didn’t have to enter any of the buildings. There was no CCTV at the time so he thought that if he did it and kept his head down he’d be ok.”
The interview reached a natural lull. Nicky and Jen let it sit, allowed Alan to catch his breath. He didn’t look done and Nicky and Jen weren’t either. Then, as Elizabeth Warren had done twenty-four hours earlier, he spilled the last of his secrets.
“There was a third robbery. A plan for a fourth, too, but that never happened. Another jewellers in the city went down after the second one but before they all got nicked. The third robbery was lower key, and they were starting to split by that point. The police could never prove it was them. It was different, smaller. Only three of them went to that raid and your lot didn’t know who to charge for it, or link it well enough to get anything to stick. The deal in the end was for them to plead guilty to the two robberies and the charges would be dropped for the third.”
“Was your dad involved in the third robbery, Alan?”
“He said he wasn’t, and I believed him. I think him and Paul were shut out by that point, but I couldn’t say for definite.”
“Alan, do you know where the third robbery took place?”
“No, I don’t know.”He looked genuine.
“Ok, do you know when the third robbery took place?”
The look on his face told Nicky and Jen that he might do. He decided to chance his arm.
“So could we drop the obstruction charges now, then?”
Chapter 41
Rob couldn’t hide a tinge of disappointment from the team. He’d become convinced that Daniel Mortimer was heavily involved in the case, perhaps entirely, but as a bare minimum he had a plethora of questions to answer.
After a positive twenty-four hours, which had seen Elizabeth Warren questioned and acknowledge the existence of Daniel Mortimer, and Alan Reynolds being re-questioned and sharing new information, Rob had hoped for something quicker. He was under pressure. Nicky was happier with their position, and knew the leads could be picked at. She knew progress was happening in real time and was keeping an upbeat front to Jen, Jack and the wider team.
Alan Reynolds had given as detailed a description of Daniel Mortimer as he could remember, along with several character traits that seemed to align with Elizabeth Warren’s recollection of him. He’d stated categorically that he didn’t know who he was, didn’t know how he’d got involved and hadn’t heard from him since one night at Paul Harris’ house several decades ago. The team’s initial reaction was to believe his version of events. He’d been honest on everything else, and given that Daniel Mortimer was currently the person most likely to be trying to hunt down the gang and their associates, Alan had a powerful motivator to share information if he had it; to save his own skin.
Rob was continuing to harass the team, who were currently digging into the online life of Elizabeth Warren. His impatience failed to appreciate the level of skill and effort required to isolate the required metadata, to separate the bits that may be useful from the Amazon orders for cutlery. To clear the wood from the trees, and then dig into the specifics of the interesting bits.
