Not Dead Yet

79

The bloody woman was pestering him again. Angela McNeill was managing to find an excuse to come into Eric Whiteley’s office almost every lunchtime now, on some pretext or other. He tried ignoring her, but she was not the kind of person who would even notice she was being ignored.

Today she was holding a clutch of bound annual accounts for Stonery Farm, which had been returned by a Sussex Police financial investigator called Emily Curtis, wanting to replace them in their correct filing cabinet. There was no urgency on this, Eric knew, she could have done it at any time, but she chose his lunch hour. Deliberately.

Angela McNeill stood over him, looking down at the tuna mayo sandwich, Twix bar, apple and bottle of sparkling water. ‘My, you’re a real creature of habit, aren’t you, Eric Whiteley?’

He concentrated on reading the Argus newspaper, open in front of him. They had conveniently printed the entire production shooting schedule, so that the public could know where to go and watch. The production was still appealing for more extras for some crowd scenes.

They had asked him to turn up this morning, but of course he couldn’t, not today, not during a weekday, except in his holidays. But the next days off he had booked were not until September.

‘You always have exactly the same lunch.’

He wasn’t sure whether it was a question or just a comment. Either way he didn’t care and it was none of her business. He didn’t like her voice, it was a charmless, flat monotone. He didn’t care for the way she smelled either. She wore a scent that smelled like toilet air freshener. He hated the way she stood over him, watching him feed like he was some creature in a zoo. He could imagine her being the kind of woman a husband would want to murder.

‘It’s what I like,’ he mumbled without looking up at her, and realized he had now re-read the same sentence three times.

‘It’s important to vary your diet, you know, Eric. There’s a lot of mercury in fish. Too much fish is bad for you.’

‘I’m a bit of a fishy character!’

‘Oooh, you’ve got a wicked sense of humour, haven’t you? I can tell!’

He wished he’d kept his mouth shut. Then he silently prayed that if he were ever in his life unfortunate enough to get stuck in a lift with someone, it wouldn’t be her.

His phone rang.

Saved by the bell, he thought, picking it up.

It was the receptionist. Her voice sounded strange. ‘Eric, there’s a gentleman and a lady who’d like to speak to you in the Conference Room.’

‘Really? What about? I don’t have any appointments today.’

In fact, he very rarely had appointments. He mostly worked alone, crunching numbers; it was other people in this firm who regularly dealt with the clients. The only meetings he ever had were the occasional ones with inspectors from the HM Revenue and Customs probing into the finances of clients, and when he was auditing.

‘They are police officers – detectives. They’re interviewing everyone in the firm.’

‘Ah.’ He frowned. ‘Shall I come down?’

‘Right away, if you could, please.’

‘Yes, good, right.’ He stood up and put on his jacket. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said to Angela McNeill. ‘I – my appointment’s here – I have to go to the Conference Room.’

‘Aren’t you going to finish your lunch first?’

‘I’ll have it afterwards.’

‘Would you like me to put your sandwich in the fridge? You shouldn’t leave it out, you could get salmonella.’

‘A bit of salmonella would go rather nicely with tuna,’ he said, and escaped from the room, leaving Angela to laugh at his joke.

As he walked along the corridor he wondered what this could be about. Had they found the bicycle he’d had stolen two years ago? Somehow he didn’t think they’d be interviewing everyone in the firm about that.

He entered the small Conference Room, with its eight-seater table, with a breezy smile but feeling nervous. A tall black man in a flashy suit and even flashier tie stood there. Next to him was a rather plain-looking woman in her mid-thirties, with tangled brown hair, wearing a white blouse, black trousers and utilitarian black shoes.

‘Good afternoon!’ he said. He could feel beads of sweat popping on his brow. Police always had that effect on him. He noticed the male officer peering down at his feet for a moment.

‘Eric Whiteley?’ The man produced a warrant card. ‘I’m Acting Detective Inspector Branson and this is my colleague, Detective Sergeant Moy. Thank you for taking the time to talk to us.’

Eric studied his warrant card for some moments because he felt he should, to look like he was taking this meeting seriously. Then he said, expansively, ‘Please have a seat. Can I offer you any refreshments?’

‘Thank you,’ the Acting DI said. ‘We’ve already been looked after.’

‘Good!’ Eric said. ‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it!’

He noticed a quick exchange of glances between the two officers. The two detectives sat on one side of the table, with their backs to the window with its view out across the Pavilion grounds, and he sat opposite them. Immediately he realized he was in a bad position, because the strong afternoon light from the brilliant blue sky was directly behind them, making it hard to see their faces clearly.

He felt intimidated. Like sitting in front of two school bullies. ‘Erm, I don’t suppose you’ve come about my bicycle?’

Both of them looked at him strangely. ‘Bicycle?’ the woman said.

‘I had it stolen from outside – a long time ago now. The bastards cut through the padlock.’

‘No, I’m sorry,’ Branson said. ‘That would be local uniform or CID – we’re from the Major Crime Branch.’

‘Ah.’ Eric nodded approvingly.

The detective was staring very hard at his face, eyeball to eyeball, which made Eric feel even more uncomfortable. As if at any moment he was about to say Ubu! Useless, Boring, Ugly! Instead he said, ‘Mr Whiteley, we’re making enquiries regarding the murder of an as yet unidentified body. The torso which was found at-’

‘Stonery Farm?’ Eric interrupted.

‘Yes,’ Bella Moy said.

‘Correct,’ Branson confirmed. ‘There were also body parts which belong to this same body recovered from the West Sussex Piscatorial Society trout lake near Henfield.’

Eric nodded. ‘Yes, yes, I thought you’d be getting round to me eventually!’ He gave a nervous laugh, but neither detective smiled.

‘How long have you worked here, Mr Whiteley?’ Glenn Branson asked.

He thought for a moment. ‘At Feline Bradley-Hamilton? Twenty-two years. Well, it will be twenty-three in November.’

‘And what exactly is your role here?’

‘I do company audits, mostly.’

The detective was still eyeballing him, without blinking. ‘Would I be correct in saying you carried out the audits this year on Stonery Farm and on the West Sussex Piscatorial Society?’

‘Something fishy about the West Sussex Piscatorial Society, is there, Detective?’ He giggled nervously at his joke.

Neither of them smiled, which made him even more nervous.

‘Nothing fishy at all, Mr Whiteley,’ he replied, levelly. ‘Could you tell us how long you have been auditing these two?’

Whiteley thought for some moments. ‘Well, some years.’ He looked down. He was feeling increasingly intimidated. ‘Yes. Ten years, at least. I can check if you would like? With Stonery Farm I could tell you egg-zactly!’ He giggled again, and was met with stony glares.

‘We’re investigating a murder, Mr Whiteley,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘I’m afraid we don’t quite share your humour on this. Have you ever been to the premises of Stonery Farm, Mr Whiteley?’

‘Every year. I do some of the accounts work on site.’

‘And you’ve been to the West Sussex Piscatorial Society trout lake?’

‘Only once, just to familiarize myself with the location – it’s the club’s main asset. But I carry out the audit work for the club here – it’s very straightforward.’

‘Does anyone else from this firm accompany you when you audit Stonery Farm?’

He shook his head. ‘No, I get on very well with Mr Winter, the owner; it’s a job for one person, really.’ His armpits were damp. He was sweating profusely now and still could not see their faces clearly. He wanted to get back to his office, to his solitude and his lunch and his newspaper. ‘This murder is a terrible thing,’ he went on. ‘I mean, there could be a bad impact on Stonery Farm’s business. I mean, would you want to eat free-range eggs from hens that had been feeding in an area where there was a corpse? I’m not sure I would.’

‘Or eat fish that had been feeding where human body parts were found?’ the woman detective asked.

Whiteley nodded. ‘Very creepy, if you ask me.’ He giggled again, then looked at the two faces glaring at him. At the two bullies. Two unsmiling bullies. ‘I’m very careful what I put in my mouth – what I eat. My body is my temple.’

‘Kramer vs. Kramer,’ Branson said.

‘Pardon me?’

‘Dustin Hoffman said that in the movie.’

‘Ah, right.’

There was a brief silence, which Eric Whiteley found increasingly awkward. The two detectives stared at him as if he were a book they were reading. Clearing his throat he said, ‘Um, so how do you feel that I can – you know – assist in your enquiries?’ He grinned again, from nerves.

‘Well,’ Glenn Branson said, ‘it might help if you stopped finding this so funny, Mr Whiteley.’

‘Sorry.’ Eric ran his fingers across his lips. ‘Zipped!’

There was a long silence again. He felt the two detectives just simply staring at him. As if their eyes were full of unasked questions. He squirmed in his chair. He was hungry. He wished he had eaten his sandwich now. And the Twix. But at the same time, his stomach was feeling unsettled. He glanced at his watch. His lunch hour was running out. Ten minutes left.

‘Got a bus to catch?’ Glenn Branson asked. ‘Or a train?’

‘I’m sorry, I’m not with you.’

‘You keep looking at your watch.’

‘Yes, well, I am a bit worried about salmonella. You see, you need to be careful with sandwiches in this heat.’

Once more he clocked the two detectives exchanging a glance. Like some secret code.

Like school bullies.

Branson looked directly at him again, staring into his eyes. ‘Does the name Myles Royce mean anything to you?’

He did not like the bullying stare from the detective and looked down at the table. ‘Myles Royce? No, I don’t think so, why?’

‘You don’t think so?’ Glenn Branson asked. ‘You don’t think so or are you certain?’

The detective’s manner was making him agitated. He was feeling flushed again, his face getting hot. He wanted to be out of this room and back in the sanctuary of his own office. ‘How certain can any of us be of anything in life?’ Eric replied, eyes still fixed on the table. ‘I don’t want to give you a wrong answer. This firm deals with lots of clients and each of them in turn employs lots of people. The name doesn’t mean anything to me today, but I can’t guarantee I’ve never met someone of that name. I wouldn’t want to be accused of misleading you.’

‘I’m not exactly clear,’ Glenn said, speaking very slowly and firmly. ‘Are you saying you’ve never met someone by the name of Myles Royce? Myles Terence Royce?’

Eric closed his eyes for some moments. He was shaking. Then he glared defiantly back at Branson. ‘I will not be bullied. Do I make myself clear?’