Amanda Patterson seated herself beside Mandel, and slotted a couple of matte-black memox crystals into the twin AV recording deck.
“Interview with Richard Townsend,” Patterson said briskly. “Conducted by myself, Detective Patterson, with the assistance of CID advisory specialist Greg Mandel. Mr. Townsend has elected to have his solicitor present.”
“I did not kill Byrne Tyler,” Richard said. He stared at Mandel. “Is that true?”
“In as far as it goes,” Mandel said.
“Thank you!” he sat back and fixed Patterson with a belligerent expression.
“However, I think we need to examine the subject in a little more detail before giving you a completely clean slate,” Mandel said.
“If you must.”
Mandel gave Patterson a small nod. She opened her cybofax and studied the display screen. “Are you are a partner in the Firedrake company, Mr. Townsend?” she asked.
“What?”
“A company called Firedrake, do you own half of the shares?”
“Well, yes. One share, fifty percent. But that's nothing to do with Byrne Tyler. It's a venture with a…a business colleague.”
“Who is that?” Mandel asked.
“Not that it's anything to do with you or this murder enquiry, but his name is Alan O'Hagen.”
“Interesting,” Detective Patterson said. “The other listed shareholder in Fire-drake is Newton Holdings.”
“Well, yes, that's O'Hagen's company.”
“No, Mr. Townsend. According to the companies register, Newton Holdings is owned by Byrne Tyler.”
Richard gave Jodie a desperate look. She frowned.
Detective Patterson consulted her cybofax again. “You've been partners for two years, is that right?”
“I…I've been a partner with Mr. O'Hagen for two years, yes.” He couldn't help the way his eyes glanced at Mandel. The psychic was watching him impassively. “Not Byrne Tyler. I've never met him. Never.”
“Really?” Patterson's tone was highly skeptical. “Have you ever visited the Sotheby's office in Stamford?”
Richard hooked a finger around his shirt collar; the air-conditioning wasn't making any impression on the heat suddenly evaporating off his skin. O'Hagen! O'Hagen had scammed him. But how? He wasn't a fool, he hadn't paid O'Hagen any money, quite the opposite. The painting…Which the police obviously knew about. “Yes, I've been there.”
“Recently?”
“Earlier this week actually. I think you know that, though, don't you? I was having an item of mine valued for insurance purposes.”
“Was that item a painting?” Mandel asked.
“Yes.”
“And didn't you also confirm its authenticity while you were there?”
“I suppose so, the assistant had to make sure it was genuine before she valued it. That's standard.”
“And the painting definitely belongs to you?”
“It does.”
Mandel turned to Patterson. “Well, that's true.”
“Of course it is, I was given it some time ago by Mr. O'Hagen,” Richard said. “It was a gift. He will confirm that.”
“I shall be very interested in talking to this Mr. O'Hagen,” Patterson said. “That's if you can ever produce him for us.” She turned her cybofax around so Richard could see the screen, it held the image of View of a Hill and Clouds. “Is this the painting, Mr. Townsend?”
“Yes it is.”
“For the record, View of a Hill and Clouds by Sean McCarthy belongs to Byrne Tyler. The artist was a friend of the deceased. It was stolen from his apartment, presumably at the same time that he was murdered.”
“No,” Richard hissed. “Look, okay, listen. I'd never even heard of Firedrake until this week. Taking me on as a partner was a way of proving its viability to the banks. O'Hagen wanted a loan from them, that was the only way he could get it. We fixed it to look like I'd been a partner for two years.”
“Richard,” Jodie warned.
“I'm being set up,” he yelled at her. “Can't you see?”
“Set up for what?” Patterson asked; she sounded intrigued.
“Byrne Tyler's murder—that's what I'm in here for, isn't it? For Christ's sake. O'Hagen's rigged this so it looks like I was involved.”
“Why would Mr. O'Hagen want to do that to you?”
“I don't fucking know. I've never met him before.”
“Mr. Townsend.”
Mandel's voice made Richard lurch upright. “Yes?”
“You've never killed anyone yourself, but did you ever pay a man to eliminate somebody for you?”
Richard gaped at the psychic. In his head a panicked voice was yelling oh shit oh shit oh shit. Mandel would be able to hear it, to taste the wretched knowledge. His own shock-induced paralysis was twisting the emotion to an excruciating level. He thought his head was going to burst open from the stress.
Mandel gave him a sad, knowing smile and said: “Guilty.”
Two — A Suspicious Fall
Detective Amanda Patterson had never visited Bisbrooke before. It was a tiny village tucked away along the side of a deep valley just outside Uppingham. Unremarkable and uneventful even by Rutland's standards, which made it a contender for dullest place in Europe. Until today, that is, when one of the uniforms had responded to a semi-hysterical call from a cleaning agency operative, and confirmed the existence of a body with associated suspicious circumstances.
The unseasonal rain beat down heavily as she drove over from Oakham, turning the road into a dangerous skid-rink. Then she had almost missed the turning off the A47. As it happened, that was the least of her navigational worries.
“Call him again,” she told Alison Weston. The probationary detective was sitting in the passenger seat beside her, squinting through the fogged-up wind screen trying to locate some landmark.
“No way. Uniform will crap themselves laughing at us if I ask for directions,” Alison complained. “It's got to be here somewhere. There can't be more than five buildings in the whole godforsaken village.”
Amanda let it go. Hailstones were falling with the rain now, their impacts making clacking sounds on the car's bodywork. She braked at yet another T-junction.
Bisbrooke was woven together by a lace work of roads barely wide enough for a single vehicle. They all curved sharply, making her nervous about oncoming cars, and they were all sunk into earthen gullies topped with hedges of thick bamboo that had been planted to replace the long-dead privet and hawthorn of the previous century. With the rain and hail pummeling the wind screen, it was perilously close to driving blind. The only clue they were even in the village was the occasional glimpse of ancient stone cottages and brick bungalows huddled at the end of gravelled drives.
“You must be able to see the church,” she said. The address they had been given was in Church Lane.
Alison scanned the swaying tops of the bamboo shoots. “No.” She gave her cybofax an instruction, and it produced a satnav map with their location given as a small pink dot. “Okay, try that one, down there on the left.”
Amanda edged the car cautiously along the short stretch of road where Alison was pointing. The tarmac was reduced to a pair of tire tracks separated by a rich swathe of emerald moss.
“Finally!” The junction ahead had a small street sign for Church Lane; a white-painted iron rectangle almost overgrown by a flamboyant purple clematis. This road was even narrower. It led them past the village church, a squat building made from rust-colored stone that had long since been converted into accommodation units for refugee families.