Skinner's Mission

16

Neil McIlhenney and Dougie ‘the Comedian’ Terry eyed each other up with an odd mixture of animosity and amusement. They had met professionally several times over the years, usually after a robbery, a violent assault or, once or twice, a death.

Each encounter had come after Bob Skinner’s intimidating cross-examination had persuaded, cajoled or simply terrified a suspect into letting slip Terry’s name in connection with the crime for which the subject had been caught red-handed.

Every time, he had been brought in for interview. But the man had his own interview technique, as effective in its way as that of the DCC. Whatever the question, however it was put, be it direct or indirect, softly spoken or shouted, Dougie Terry never answered.

That was not to say that he was silent. Throughout most of his interviews he had told jokes; quick gags, one-liners. ‘What’s the difference between parsley and . . .’, McIlhenney recalled, and had to suppress a smile. Occasionally he would lapse into a Chic Murray role. CID records still had a few interview tapes filled with the faultlessly replicated voice of the late, great, mystical Scottish droll.

Looking across the desk at Terry a memory jumped unbidden into the Sergeant’s thoughts.

‘I was driving past a farmhouse, and I ran over a cockerel. So I rang the doorbell and told the farmer’s wife.

‘“I’m terribly sorry,” I said. “Can I replace it?”

‘“Fair enough,” she said, “the hens are round the back”.’

Involuntarily, a chuckle escaped from McIlhenney’s lips, making Detective Superintendent Donaldson look round sharply.

Eventually the police had given up asking questions. Whenever the Comedian was implicated, detectives would bring him in, put the allegation to him, switch on the recorder and sit back to enjoy the entertainment. When, occasionally, Terry was fresh out of jokes, he had other talents. One of the CID’s most treasured tapes was known simply as ‘Sinatra’, a flawless forty-five minutes of the Maestro’s best loved songs.

Once the performances were over, Dougie Terry was always released. He knew full well, as did the police, that no criminal case can be laid on the basis of an uncorroborated allegation. Once, Sir James Proud had suggested that he might be charged with wasting police time. ‘How could we?’ Bob Skinner, then Detective Chief Superintendent, had replied. ‘His defence would be that it was time well spent!’

Terry’s unshakeable confidence that there was never a case to answer was based on the fact that the police informants were almost invariably men with short memories. They had not forgotten what had happened on earlier occasions to those who had told tales. Two had been stabbed to death in prison, another slashed and scarred for life, and three more simply beaten senseless.

‘What’ll it be today, gentlemen?’ the Comedian asked as the two policemen took seats at the side of his desk, in his small attic office in Stafford Street, and as his secretary closed the door as she left the room. Without warning, he switched to Chic Murray mode.

‘My doctor asked me the other day, “Are you disturbed by improper thoughts during the night?”

‘“Not at all,” I told him. “I enjoy them, actually.”’

‘Now look . . .’ Donaldson began, but before he could go further he was interrupted by Neil McIlhenney, who reached into a pocket of his overcoat and slapped half-a-dozen large photographs on to the desk, under Terry’s nose.

‘I thought we’d give you a laugh for a change, Dougie,’ he said, with a friendly smile. ‘Take a look at those. See that big black thing? That’s Carole Charles. Remember her? Middle-aged, very attractive woman? Jackie’s wife?

‘Some of these were taken in what was left of Jackie’s showroom, after the fire on Wednesday night; the rest at the post mortem, when they had to cut her open to find out whether she was a man, a woman or just leavings from a barbecue. See there? That’s a good close-up of her jawbone. You can see her teeth.

‘I was at the PM yesterday. It was like watching someone dissect a lump of charcoal. I’m sure you’d have sung your way through it, though.’

Dougie Terry stared wide-eyed at the photographs. Beside McIlhenney, Donaldson heaved and turned away. For a second, the Sergeant thought he was going to be sick.

The ghost of Chic Murray had vanished. Terry turned the awful photographs over and pushed them, face-down, away from him. A sudden pallor had fallen across his broad, chiselled features, and his bright eyes had a shaken look, their confidence gone, for the first time that McIlhenney could recall.

‘All right,’ he said in a quiet flat tone. ‘You’ve made your point. Get on with it.’

‘Who did it?’ asked McIlhenney, directly.

The Comedian stared back at him across the desk, and answered, for the first time in the Sergeant’s career. A question with a question. ‘Do you think that if I knew that I’d be sitting here talking to you bastards?’

‘I’ll take that as a “no”, then, will I? Let me try another. Who’s taken the hump at Jackie Charles lately?’

‘How would I know? And why are you asking me, anyway?’

McIlhenney shook his head. ‘Dougie, you’re new to this game. The idea is that we ask the questions and you answer them.

‘Let’s try again. You are Jackie Charles’ Vicar on Earth. While he ponces about as a fashionable merchant of fashionable motors, you are the general manager of all his downmarket businesses, the five John Jackson Bookmaker betting shops and the taxi businesses. Now, to your knowledge has Jackie upset anyone in those businesses, to the point that they would try to kill him? Straight answer, yes or no, and look me in the eye when you give it, please.’

Terry straightened up in his chair, tugging briefly at the lapels of his Hugo Boss suit. He looked McIlhenney hard in the eye. ‘No,’ he said quietly.

‘Is everything in order in those businesses?’

‘Yes, as far as I know.’

‘You don’t have a betting-shop manager who’s been into the till and is about to be rumbled? Or a taxi controller who’s been creaming off the takings?’

‘No.’

McIlhenney looked sideways at Dave Donaldson. The Superintendent, still white-faced, nodded to him to carry on. ‘This is all very new for us too, Dougie,’ he said, ‘your answering questions like this. We’re not used to believing you. So just to be on the safe side, we’d like to have our experts look at the books and records of the businesses you manage for Jackie Charles.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Terry. ‘If Mr Charles agrees.’

‘He will, though. I mean, we’re investigating his wife’s murder.’ McIlhenney paused. ‘When we do that, Dougie, we’re not going to find that you’ve been at it, are we? It wasn’t you that tried to kill Jackie, was it?’

The man’s jaw clenched. He seemed about to explode. ‘Listen you . . .’

McIlhenney held up a hand. ‘I know. I know. You’re going to say that Jackie Charles is like a brother to you, and anyway, you’re an honest businessman with a professional reputation and all that stuff.

‘In that case, we won’t bother to ask you about all the other things that we know you do for Jackie. There’d be no point in asking if somebody was after a share of the big money to be made out of the minicab business, or if somebody else wanted to take a percentage for funding armed robberies.

‘If we did that, you’d just start telling jokes again, wouldn’t you.’

Dougie Terry, his composure recovered, smiled at McIlhenney and sang the first four lines of ‘My Way’.

The Sergeant applauded, silently. ‘Pitch perfect, Dougie. The voice is as good as ever. Sorry we can’t stay for more. We’re off now, but do us a favour, will you? Make sure that all the books and records of Jackie’s businesses are ready for our people by close of play today.

‘Oh aye, and that includes the details of his property investment company, the one that holds those flats he lets out. Rent books and everything, so we can see what’s occupied and what isn’t. You never know. Damp housing can drive tenants to extreme measures!’

The policemen stood and made to leave. Donaldson was at the door when he turned. ‘I wonder if you’ve considered this, Mr Terry. Hypothetically, of course. If Mr Charles did have criminal connections, and some of them were upset with him, you don’t suppose, do you, that if they found they couldn’t get to the organ-grinder, they’d come after the monkey instead?’ He smiled, but in a way that was more threatening than anything else.

‘Do you know the words to “Mack the Knife”?’ he asked. ‘Maybe you should add that to your repertoire.’

With McIlhenney at his heels, he stepped out of the office, leaving the Comedian at a loss for a punchline.