‘Be quiet,’ came the order.
‘I know my rights,’ I said, holding up the code-of-conduct booklet. ‘I demand to be released.’
The hatch shut again and no amount of call-button pushing made it open again. Perhaps they had a way of disconnecting the bell for ‘difficult’ prisoners. And I intended to be ‘difficult’. My detention beyond twenty-four hours, for something I hadn’t done, was an outrage and I was becoming incensed by it.
In frustration, I banged on the metal cell door with my fist, but that did nothing more than give me a sore hand.
In the end, I sat down on the bed and almost cried.
Amelia, my darling, where are you when I need you?
In a mortuary; cold and lifeless.
I rather wished I could join her there.
By the time the cell door was finally opened some considerable time later, I was totally depressed and suicidal. Perhaps it was a good thing there were no hanging points after all.
‘Out,’ said the policeman, jerking his thumb at me.
I was escorted back to the custody-suite lobby and told to stand in front of the high desk, across from the custody sergeant.
‘Why have I been detained for more than twenty-four hours?’ I asked before he had a chance to speak.
‘You haven’t,’ the sergeant replied.
I looked up at the clock on the wall. It indicated half past eleven.
‘I was arrested at nine yesterday morning. I make that twenty-six and a half hours ago.’ I stared at the sergeant with my angry face on.
He ignored it. ‘The relevant time from which the twenty-four hours run is the time you were booked in at the police station, which was...’ He consulted his record. ‘... twelve-thirty yesterday. We are well within the time limit.’
‘So being confined in a police car for three and a half hours wearing handcuffs doesn’t count?’ My voice was full of irony.
‘No, it doesn’t,’ said the sergeant firmly. ‘The twenty-four hours started when I authorised your detention here on your arrival.’
‘But that’s ridiculous,’ I said.
‘It’s the law. Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, section forty-one, subsection two-point-A-one.’
He rattled off the provision without having to look it up and I was sure he must know. He would deal with this many times every day.
But I still wasn’t happy.
‘I wish to see my solicitor.’
The sergeant sighed.
‘As you wish,’ he said, ‘although you have been brought out here now to be processed for release.’
‘Release?’
‘Yes,’ said the sergeant. ‘You are being released under investigation. Sign here.’
He pushed a piece of paper and a pen over the desk towards me.
‘What does “released under investigation” mean?’ I asked.
‘It means exactly what it says. You are being released from custody but the investigation of your involvement in the murder of your wife continues and you may be required to return at some time in the future for further questioning, or to be charged.’
‘So it’s like being on police bail?’ I said.
‘Similar, but there is no fixed date to report to a police station, and no conditions.’ He handed me an envelope. ‘The details are in here.’
‘But I’m free to go now?’
‘As soon as you sign this paper.’
I signed quickly before he changed his mind.
‘How about my stuff?’ I asked.
He passed across the grey plastic tray from yesterday. I put on my watch, shoes and belt, and placed my wallet and handkerchief in my pocket along with the loose change and Douglas’s front-door key.
‘Where’s my phone?’
The sergeant consulted his computer.
‘Your phone is subject to a police evidence seizure notice, as is your car and your computer, so they will be held by us for the time being while forensic investigations continue.’
‘How about my wife’s car?’
‘Where is it?’ asked the sergeant.
‘I assume it’s in the garage at my home but I don’t know. I didn’t check. And where are my house keys, anyway?’
‘You have it. I just gave it to you.’
‘That was my brother’s house key,’ I said. ‘Where are mine?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ said the sergeant. ‘The only key in the inventory of your belongings is the one you’ve already got.’
That would be because the padlock keys hadn’t in fact been my keys in the first place.
‘But there’s a black suitcase and a coat in the store under your name.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘I’ll take those.’
One of his staff appeared with my things and, much to the custody sergeant’s obvious irritation, I lifted my case up onto the top of his desk and opened it.
It had clearly been thoroughly searched, with the pockets of my dinner jacket and trousers pulled inside out to ensure they were empty, but, as far as I could tell, everything I had taken to Wales was still there — other than my dignity, and my wellingtons, which I assumed were still in the boot of the Jaguar.
‘Can you ask DS Dowdeswell for the keys to my house?’
‘Does he have them?’
‘I presume so. They’re the keys to the padlocks that you lot applied.’
A call was made but the outcome was unsatisfactory, at least as far as I was concerned.
‘It seems your house remains a place of interest to the investigation. A second search of the premises is being conducted there even as we speak.’
‘Looking for more dog bones, are you?’ I asked sarcastically, but he didn’t know to what I was referring and my joke fell completely flat. ‘When can I go back there?’
‘Not until the search is complete.’
‘When will that be?’
‘Depends on what they find,’ the custody sergeant said unhelpfully. ‘We’ll let you know.’
‘How?’ I said. ‘You have my phone and my computer.’
‘You’ll have to contact us, then. But I’d give it at least a day or two.’
‘Can I get my wife’s car from the garage in the meantime?’
I don’t know why I bothered to ask. I knew the answer would be no.
‘Not until the search is complete.’
I put on my coat, picked up my suitcase, and was escorted through to the public side and then to the front door. Here, I paused, checking for any sign of more press photographers, but all looked clear so I stepped out into the late-October sunshine.
I stood for a moment looking up at the blue sky and realised how we all took liberty for granted. Only when we were deprived of it, albeit even for a very short period, did our lack of a distant horizon become so significant.
Where to now?
I couldn’t go home to the Old Forge in Hanwell and I had no available car to get to Wales, even though, I suppose, I could have taken a train from Banbury to Wrexham and then asked my father to pick me up from there. But I didn’t have any appetite for going back to the castle, only to have another fight with my elder brother.
I decided that I’d return to Chester Square. Douglas had said I could stay as long as I wanted, so I was sure he wouldn’t mind me sleeping in Philip’s unused bed for another couple of nights.
I walked down through the town to the railway station, stopping off at a mobile-phone shop to buy a pay-as-you-go smartphone.
Instant communication was another thing we took for granted. There are now officially more mobile telephones in the world than there are people, and being disconnected from the network was tantamount to being a non-person, an outcast, a reject from society.
‘Name?’ asked the young man in the shop.
‘Why do you need my name?’ I asked.
‘Regulations.’