Faraday 02 Network Virus (25 page)

“
Do you buy cigarettes?”

“
Sometimes. Mainly to offer round.”

“
What brands do you buy?”

“
Oh, usually something likely to be generally acceptable - Marlborough or something like that. Now, look here, Inspector, am I being accused of something?”

“
Do you ever buy Gauloises?”

“
What?”

“
Gauloises. They’re a French brand. Do you like strongly flavoured cigarettes?”

“
No I don’t. I think cigars are more subtle, much more pleasant to smoke.” He wagged a finger at Paulson, “Now - I’m not going to answer any more questions until you tell me what this is all about.”

The inspector paused for a moment, collecting his thoughts. “Very well, Mr Hillman. I can tell you that evidence has come to light that suggested Joanne de Billiere was entertaining some man on the
Sarah Jane
the afternoon or early evening before she died and we believe that man was a smoker of Gauloises cigarettes.”

“
Entertaining some man! You’re making Jo out to be some sort of -,” he blustered, “Some sort of easy lay. Let me tell you that she did not entertain all sorts of men on the
Sarah Jane
as you are suggesting.”

“
She entertained you.”

“
Yes, and I was the
only
one.” He sighed when he realised what he had said. “Yes, all right. I might as well admit it. Jo and I had been seeing a lot of each other and we were talking about marriage. After all, I was alone, as you pointed out, and she was virtually on her own. She hardly ever saw her husband and she’d got evidence that he was carrying on with his PA. Neither of us had any close family who would object. So we thought we fitted together very well. We decided we might as well approach our retirement together, rather than remain separated and lonely. Don’t you think that was reasonable?”

“
So were you on the
Sarah Jane
with her on the afternoon or the early evening when the boat put to sea and she ended up drowned?”

“
No, I wasn’t. I had to suddenly go up to London and stay overnight. I expect, if you look back through the hotel records, you’ll be able to find proof of that.”

“
All right,” said Paulson. “We’ll come back to you if we think that’s important. So when did you first find out that Joanne had gone missing?”

“
I don’t know exactly. I remember I’d tried to ring her from London. We were in fairly frequent telephone contact with each other at that time. But I couldn’t get through to her. She wasn’t answering her mobile but that wasn’t unusual. She often forgot to take it with her or else it was in her handbag and she didn’t hear the ring.” He paused to reminisce. “I think it was soon after I got back that I realised something awful had happened. I couldn’t get in touch with her at her home. She hadn’t left any messages. So I went down to the marina that afternoon and the boat wasn’t there. When I went up to the office they told me the story about the
Sarah Jane
being found beached on Slapton Sands. And Joanne just seemed to have disappeared.”

He shook his head. “By then I was going frantic with worry. I rang her husband and he said it was the first he’d heard about it. He said he couldn’t come down to look for her for a few days because he was very busy. I thought it was a bit cold-blooded of him. However he did send down a private enquiry agent. This bloke and I spent the next two weeks looking everywhere we could think of, searching for her.” He fell silent.

“
It must have been a difficult time for you.”

“
Then her body was found washed up in Pudcombe Cove. I was the one who first identified her, although Alfred had to come down the next day to formally do it.”

“
I take it you already knew Alfred de Billiere?”

“
Yes.”

Hillman’s face had closed as if he intended to say nothing more, but for Stafford Paulson it was just getting interesting.

“
How long had you known him?”

The man shrugged. “Oh, for years. We’d met as couples with our wives a number of times at major events in Torquay. And when I was mayor he made sure he kept in touch at regular intervals. We also had a number of joint business contacts.”

“
Did you meet him when he came down to identify the body?”

“
Yes,”

“
What did you say to him?”

“
I don’t remember.” He looked at the inspector sharply. “What do you mean?”

“
Mr Hillman, you knew Joanne was planning to divorce her husband and marry you. Did Alfred de Billiere know about this?”

“
I - er - I don’t know.” He hesitated. “I think perhaps he did.”

“
You bet he did, Mr Hillman. Why do you think he sent down an enquiry agent to accompany you when you were looking for the body? A very wily bird is our Alfred. You can be sure he knew all about her intention to divorce him. And my bet is that he wouldn’t have been happy about it. He’d already paid a fortune to stop her going ahead with the two earlier divorce petitions. Now he was going to have to do it all over again. Isn’t that correct?”

Hillman said nothing.

“
And,” continued Paulson, “it was going to be even more difficult this time because she’d got another chap in her sights - you.” He pointed at him. “Did she tell you how much she was going to claim as a divorce settlement?”

The other man nodded. “Fifty million.”

“
What I want to know is how did Alfred find out how much she was going to claim? Hugo Farmer told Joanne that she mustn’t say anything to her husband until the petition was filed because he would immediately start to move his assets out of her reach and I think she was canny enough to follow his advice.” Paulson leaned forward. “So I want to know who told de Billiere that the petition was pending. The solicitor would never have released that information. So it must have been someone she told in confidence - somebody close to her, like you.”

There was a bitter smile on Hillman’s face. “You’ve got it all worked out, haven’t you?”

“
So was it you?”

He nodded.

“
But why, for goodness sake? You would have benefitted from the fifty million, wouldn’t you?”

“
Yes, but only indirectly. Joanne was sharp enough not to have given me control over any of it.” He pushed his chair back from the desk as though to distance himself from the inspector’s accusatory stare. “Besides, I didn’t have any choice.”

“
What does that mean?”

“
Well, the reason I was in London when Jo died was because Alfred had sent for me.” His arm swept round, indicating the splendid offices and showrooms. “You see, when I took over this business after my father’s death none of this was here. The whole business was fading fast. He had been ill for the last ten years of his life and virtually left the company to run itself while cutting me out from any control. The two car manufacturers we were agents for were both threatening to move their agencies elsewhere. Too much cash had been taken out of the business and there was no capital left for the new developments which were essential if we were to recover. In the current economic situation the banks weren’t prepared to loan anything. So I had to find a private backer.”

“
Do you mean Alfred de Billiere?”

“
That’s right.” He looked appealingly at Paulson. “I’d known Alfred and his wife for a number of years. At that time, about three and a half years ago, I was still married and hadn’t had any personal contact with Joanne. I approached Alfred and offered him a shareholding in the company if he’d give me the cash to redevelop this site. He agreed but insisted that I give him a fifty-five percent controlling shareholding in return for him providing finance of up to five million at a competitive interest rate. It was the best offer I could find, so I accepted.”

He took a breath and continued, “We built these new showrooms and improved the company’s image hugely. We retained our agencies with the manufacturers.” He shook his head. “But recent times have been hard, especially in the motor trade. Margins have been squeezed. Profits have been low, and not enough to pay all the interest on Alfred’s loan.”

“
You mean you owed Alfred more than when you started?”

“
Correct. By the time Alfred contacted me the debt was five-point-three million. He wanted to talk to me about various things so I went up to his headquarters in Canary Wharf. When I got there he told me that he’d had a private enquiry agent watching Joanne and they’d reported to him about her developing relationship with me. They’d also seen her visit her solicitors on a number of occasions. It didn’t take long for a clever operator like Alfred to come to the right conclusions. The only thing he didn’t know was the details.”

“
So was he warning you off?”

“
Oh no. He just wanted to know what she was looking for. When I told him, he said the fifty million was ridiculous, and I must admit I didn’t think it was a realistic figure myself. He said he was happy to agree to a divorce. In fact he was willing to offer Jo what he considered was a reasonable settlement. She could have the house and the boat and he would give her two million which, as he said, if it was sensibly invested, would bring her in a very decent personal income - possibly a hundred thousand a year.”

“
And what about you?”

Hillman took a breath. “Well, if I could get her to agree to this he was prepared to reduce the business debt by two million and give me back half his shareholding. That would mean I would recover control of my company and interest would be reduced to a point where I would stand a chance of paying the balance off within ten years. Then he would release the rest of his shares to me.”

“
I see,” said Paulson. “I take it that seemed a very good package to you.”

“
Too right it was. Everybody appeared to get what they wanted out of it.” He smiled briefly. “Alfred was so certain that I’d agree that he’d had a formal agreement drawn up which he handed to me there and then. He had also arranged for a large legal practice which didn’t deal with his affairs to give me advice before I signed. I went to them the next morning and they could see nothing wrong with the form, so I signed it and returned it to him. All I had to do then was to get Joanne to agree and he would return his signed copy to me.”

“
But before you could talk to her she disappeared.”

Hillman nodded bleakly.

Paulson looked directly at the man. “How did you feel about that?”

“
I was shattered. Of course, like you, I blamed him at first for arranging her death in some way. But he didn’t refuse to see me or anything like that. When we met he promised me it was just a tragic accident. He pointed out that it had happened too soon after our discussion - that very same night, in fact - for it to have been arranged by him.” He grimaced. “And I - well, I at least half-believed him. So I agreed to wait until her body had been found and then to see what the coroner’s verdict was before I took any further action.”

“
But what about your personal agreement?”

“
Well.” Hillman shook his head. “That was the sweetener, I suppose. If the coroner found that the death was accidental or due to misadventure, he said he would honour the agreement.”

“
Hah! So your silence was being bought.”

“
I can see that you would look at it like that now,” agreed Hillman. “But then I didn’t see it like that. I was mourning the loss of my future wife. My negotiations with Alfred had been friendly. The fellow seemed to be making a reasonable offer and we all wanted to go on with our lives as best we could.”

“
You didn’t consider,” asked Paulson, “that this convenient death was saving him the best part of fifty million.”

Lionel Hillman shook his head, “I said I never thought that was a realistic claim. He said, that although he and Joanne had drifted apart, he was still upset by her disappearance. You must realise that we thought there was still a chance in those first few days that she was still alive. She might have been picked up by someone or simply got off the boat when it was beached and wandered off for some reason. It was only gradually that hopes of her surviving faded.”

“
You said nothing about any doubts you might have had - not even to the coroner?”

He shook his head.

“
So you got your agreement?”

“
Yes.”

“
And has it worked well for you?”

He nodded. “The business has been steadily improving during the last two years.”

“
Is there another prospective Mrs Hillman?”

“
Oh no. Jo would have been an ideal partner. People seemed to think the worst of her because she was always friendly towards everyone, but that was just on the surface. I found that underneath she was a much deeper person. Alfred had never given her enough of his time to get the best out of her. I was planning to offer her a partnership in this business and I think she would have made a success of it. I have missed her sadly.”

Paulson stood up. “Well, I’m going to need a formal statement from you. I will get what you’ve told me written up, send you a copy, and then I’ll ask you to come down to the station in a few days and sign your agreement that this is a true record of your evidence. You can bring a solicitor with you if you wish.”

“
What will happen to de Billiere now?”

“
I don’t know yet. I don’t think we’ve got enough to nail him with yet.” He pursed his lips. “But I’m gathering a dossier together. Sooner or later we’ll get a breakthrough. Why? Are you worried about what he might do to you?”