‘Where the current would take it out to sea. The Arun is one of the fastest flowing rivers in Britain. Six knots. Did you know that? I’ve done my research.’
‘We do now we’ve heard it from you,’ Georgina said.
‘You don’t have to look at me like that. If I was the killer, I wouldn’t be driving to Chichester with the stiff, would I? I’d have tipped it in the river.’
‘We’ve only got your word you were driving there.’
‘No.’ He frowned. ‘You’ve got the word of the cops who stopped me.’
‘It doesn’t mean you were planning to go to Chichester. You could have been on your way to some isolated place where a body could be disposed of.’
‘That’s what they said in court, but it’s not true. I was on my way to Stew to get the plates changed.’
‘And then what? Drive on to your chosen place of disposal?’
‘Fucking hell.’ Danny Stapleton slapped his hand on the table between them. ‘I’m here to tell you what happened, not listen to your crap theories.’
The prison officer grabbed Danny’s arms and forced him against the chair.
‘OK, OK,’ the prisoner said.
‘Do you want him cuffed, ma’am, or shall we end it there?’
Georgina had lost the thread. It was a long time since she’d interviewed a hostile suspect, so Diamond took over, flapped his hand at the warder and said, ‘Let’s get back to the facts. You were arrested that night and taken to where — Chichester police station?’
Released from the restraint, Danny picked up his story as if nothing had happened. ‘They questioned me for hours, wouldn’t believe what I was saying. Fair play, I’d made some of it up, about the money. It was in my pockets. My prints were all over it. I had to say something, didn’t I? I made up the stuff about the car and where I was headed that night. But after I’d had the night to think it over, I came clean. I told them exactly what I’ve been telling you.’
‘Which you can’t prove.’
‘Don’t I know it? They called me a killer and all sorts. I didn’t even know who the bloody victim was. That’s how innocent I was.’
‘You found out later.’
‘They’re not generous with their information, your lot.’
‘So who was he?’
‘For crying out loud, are you telling me you don’t know and you’re my best hope of getting out of here? I give up.’
Georgina started speaking again, more to Diamond than Danny. ‘He was Joe Rigden, a self-employed gardener from near Slindon, one of the local villages. Shot through the head.’
‘I’ve never owned a gun,’ Danny said at once. ‘Never heard of Rigden before they told me his name. Never met him.’
Georgina added more details she must have got from her old college friend. ‘Rigden lived alone in an isolated cottage. He had a van and took jobs over quite a wide area, visiting people about twice a month. Because his garden visits were irregular, governed by the weather, it was a couple of weeks before he was reported missing.’
‘Living in a one-bedroom flat I didn’t even have a windowbox, let alone a garden,’ Danny said.
‘You weren’t charged with first degree murder,’ Georgina said. ‘There wasn’t the evidence to convict you of that.’
‘No, but they kept on at me for days, telling me I was in the frame.’
‘Of course you were, and rightly so. You were the only suspect. You were found with the body. And you told the police a pack of lies.’
‘Only when I thought I was being done for nicking the car. When it got serious next morning I told them everything I knew, but I wasn’t believed. They decided they’d got their man. Talk about the third degree. It was brainwashing. I was having nightmares, dreaming I did it. I still get them. I’m psychologically damaged. When I get out of here I’m going to sue you lot.’
‘Come on,’ Georgina said. ‘There were strong grounds for believing you did it. You were convicted of being an accessory.’
‘A mandatory life stretch with a minimum of ten years before they even consider me for release. That’s not funny.’
‘The judge took the view that if you didn’t carry out the murder yourself, you must have known who did it and were guilty of obstructing justice as well.’
‘The judge was an arsehole.’
‘Statements like that won’t help your cause one bit. Do you know the identity of the murderer?’
‘How could I?’
‘Are you afraid of what might happen when you get out?’
‘Bollocks.’
‘I can easily terminate this, Mr Stapleton. You don’t seem to realise you’re ruining your chances. I was told you’re well behaved, doing your best to get remission. It doesn’t sound like it.’ Georgina, fully restored, in headmistress mode — and for once Peter Diamond wasn’t on the receiving end.
‘I’m stressed,’ Danny said. ‘I shouldn’t be here. They never went after the young guy. He was the killer and he’s still at liberty.’
‘Yes, you’re under stress. Prison does that to people. Every inmate has a grievance. A lot of what you hear has no basis in reality.’
He leaned forward, gripping the table. ‘There’s more, isn’t there? What’s all this interest all of a sudden? Something’s happened. Someone’s been talking. I was left to rot until a week ago. Now I’m getting pulled out of my cell every other day to talk to coppers.’
‘We’ll end it there,’ Georgina said. ‘Your case is under review, Mr Stapleton. Be grateful for that. If anything of importance emerges, you will certainly be informed. Meanwhile, if you think of any detail of the case that wasn’t aired in court, let the governor know, and we’ll get to hear of it.’
8
The car left the prison and headed along a deserted road towards the ferry. Georgina was still acting as if they were dealing in state secrets.
‘Are you going to fill me in?’ Diamond said.
‘First, tell me what you made of him.’
‘Pathetic. No different from the thousand other small-time crooks I’ve come across.’
‘But convincing?’
‘He tells a good story. He’s had plenty of time to work on it.’
‘You didn’t believe him?’
Staring out of the window at the bleak fields, he said, ‘I haven’t been told enough to form an opinion.’
‘You don’t have to sound so deprived, Peter. I’ll brief you fully in a moment. To be fair to Danny Stapleton, what he said to us is no different from what he was saying when he was first interviewed. He insists he’s a car thief and not a murderer. He seems to have made a living from it until the manufacturers went electronic with their security.’
‘The man Stew, the plates man — does he exist?’
‘Chichester police don’t have any record of him, but of course if he was any good they wouldn’t. The crooks in the stolen car business are very elusive.’
‘He was Stapleton’s best hope. Surely his lawyers would have pulled out all the stops to find him.’
‘I’m sure they did. And I’m sure Stew moved on and covered his tracks as soon as he heard about the arrest. He’d know it would be the end of his activities.’ Georgina seemed willing to swallow everything they’d been told in the prison.
‘Wasn’t the call Stapleton made traceable from the phone?’
‘No phone was found.’
He gave a soft laugh.
She said, ‘I expect he got rid of it when he was arrested. It was dark, remember.’
‘They searched him.’
‘He got rid of it earlier, then, at the time he made the call.’
‘But after the arrest he needed to prove he was just a car thief and not a murderer. The phone was his best hope. If he’d slung it into a field he could have told his lawyers where to look for it. That’s if he really made this call and if Stew the plates man wasn’t invented just to enrich his story.’