The Good Partner

Contents  

The Good Partner

1

T
HE LOWERING SKY
was black as a tax inspector's heart when Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks pulled up outside 17 Oakley Crescent at eight o'clock one mid-­November evening. An icy wind whipped up the leaves and set them skittering around his feet as he walked up the path to the glass-­paneled door.

Detective Constable Susan Gay was waiting for him inside, and Peter Darby, the police photographer, was busy with his new video recorder. Between the glass coffee table and the brick fireplace lay the woman's body, blood matting the hair around her left temple. Banks put on his latex gloves, then bent and picked up the object beside her. The bronze plaque read, “Eastvale Golf Club, 1991 Tournament. Winner: David Fosse.” There was blood on the base of the trophy. The man Banks assumed to be David Fosse sat on the sofa staring into space.

A pile of photographs lay on the table. Banks picked them up and flipped through them. Each was dated 11/13/93 across the bottom. The first few showed group scenes—red-­eyed people eating, drinking and dancing at a banquet of some kind—but the last ones told a different story. Two showed a handsome young man in a navy blue suit, white shirt and garish tie, smiling lecherously at the photographer from behind a glass of whisky. Then the scene shifted to a hotel room, where the man had loosened his tie. None of the other diners were to be seen. In the last picture, he had also taken off his jacket. The date had changed to 11/14/93.

Banks turned to the man on the sofa. “Are you David Fosse?” he asked.

There was a pause while the man seemed to return from a great distance. “Yes,” he said finally.

“Can you identify the victim?”

“It's my wife, Kim.”

“What happened?”

“I . . . I was out taking the dog for a walk. When I got back I found . . .” He gestured towards the floor.

“When did you go out?”

“Quarter to seven, as usual. I got back about half past and found her like this.”

“Was your wife in when you left?”

“Yes.”

“Was she expecting any visitors?”

He shook his head.

Banks held out the photos. “Have you seen these?”

Fosse turned away and grunted.

“Who took them? What do they mean?”

Fosse stared at the Axminster.

“Mr. Fosse?”

“I don't know.”

“This date, November 13. Last Saturday. Is that significant?”

“My wife was at a business convention in London last weekend. I assume they're the pictures she took.”

“What kind of convention?”

“She's involved in servicing home offices and small businesses.
Servicing,
” he sneered. “Now there's an apt term.”

Banks singled out the man in the gaudy tie. “Do you know who this is?”

“No.” Fosse's face darkened and both his hands curled into fists. “No, but if I ever get hold of him—­”

“Mr. Fosse, did you argue with your wife about the man in these photographs?”

Fosse's mouth dropped. “They weren't here when I left.”

“How do you explain their presence now?”

“I don't know. She must have got them out while I was taking Jasper for a walk.”

Banks looked around the room and saw a camera on the sideboard, a Canon. It looked like an expensive autofocus model. He picked it up carefully and put it in a plastic bag. “Is this yours?” he asked Fosse.

Fosse looked at the camera. “It's my wife's. I bought it for her birthday. Why? What are you doing with it?”

“It may be evidence,” said Banks, pointing at the exposure indicator. “Seven pictures have been taken on a new film. I have to ask you again, Mr. Fosse, did you argue with your wife about the man in these photos?”

“And I'll tell you again. How could I? They weren't there when I went out, and she was dead when I got back.”

The dog barked from the kitchen. The front door opened and Dr. Glendenning walked in, a tall, imposing figure with white hair and a nicotine-­stained moustache.

Glendenning glanced sourly at Banks and Susan and complained about being dragged out on such a night. Banks apologized. Though Glendenning was a Home Office pathologist, and a lowly police surgeon could pronounce death, Banks knew that Glendenning would never have forgiven them had they not called him.

As the Scene-­of-­Crime team arrived, Banks turned to David Fosse and said, “I think we'd better carry on with this down at headquarters.”

Fosse shrugged and stood up to get his coat. As they left, Banks heard Glendenning mutter, “A golf trophy. A bloody golf trophy! Sacrilege.”

2

“
D
O YOU THINK
he did it, sir?” Susan Gay asked Banks.

Banks swirled the inch of Theakston's XB at the bottom of his glass and watched the patterns it made. “I don't know. He certainly had means, motive and opportunity. But something about it makes me uneasy.”

It was almost closing time, and Banks and Susan sat in the warm glow of the Queen's Arms having a late dinner of microwaved steak and kidney pie, courtesy of Cyril, the landlord, who was used to their unsociable hours. Outside, rain lashed against the red and amber window panes.

Banks pushed his plate away and lit a cigarette. He was tired. The Fosse call had come in just as he was about to go home after a long day of paperwork and boring meetings.

They had learned little more during a two-­hour interrogation at the station. Kim Fosse had left for London on Friday and returned on Monday with her business partner, Norma Cheverel. The convention had been held at the Ludbridge Hotel in Kensington.

David Fosse maintained his innocence, but sexual jealousy made a strong motive, and now he was languishing in the cells under Eastvale Divisional Headquarters.
Languish
was perhaps too strong a word, as the cells were as comfortable as many bed and breakfasts, and the food and ser­vice much better. The only problem was that you couldn't open the door and go for a walk in the Yorkshire Dales when you felt like it.

They learned from the house-­to-­house that Fosse
did
walk the dog—several ­people had seen him—and not even Dr. Glendenning could pinpoint time of death to within the forty-­five minutes he was out of the house. Fosse could have murdered his wife before he left or when he got home. He could also have nipped back around the rear, where a path ran by the river, got into the house unseen the back way, then resumed his walk.

“Time, ladies and gentlemen please,” called Cyril, ringing his bell behind the bar. “And that includes coppers.”

Banks smiled and finished his beer. “There's not a lot more we can do tonight, anyway,” he said. “I think I'll go home and get some sleep.”

“I'll do the same.” Susan reached for her overcoat.

“First thing in the morning,” said Banks, “we'll have a word with Norma Cheverel, see if she can throw any light on what happened in London last weekend.”

3

N
ORMA
C
HEVEREL WAS
an attractive woman in her early thirties with a tousled mane of red hair, a high freckled forehead and the greenest eyes Banks had ever seen. Contact lenses, he decided uncharitably, perhaps to diminish the sense of sexual energy he felt emanate from her.

She sat behind her desk in the large carpeted office, swiveling occasionally in her executive chair. After her assistant had brought coffee, Norma pulled out a long cigarette and lit up. “One of the pleasures of being the boss,” she said. “The buggers can't make you stop smoking.”

“You've heard about Kim Fosse, I take it?” Banks asked.

“On the local news last night. Poor Kim.” She shook her head.

“We're puzzled about a few things. Maybe you can help us?”

“I'll try.”

“Did you notice her taking many photographs at the convention?”

Norma Cheverel frowned. “I can't say as I did, really, but there were quite a few ­people taking photographs there, especially at the banquet. You know how ­people get silly at conventions. I never could understand this mania for capturing the moment. Can you, Chief Inspector?”

Banks, whose wife, Sandra, was a photographer, could understand it only too well, though he would have quibbled with “capturing the moment.” A good photographer, a
real
photographer, Sandra had often said, did much more than that; she transformed the moment. But he let the aesthetics lie.

Norma Cheverel was right about the photo mania, though. Banks had also noticed that since the advent of cheap, idiot-­proof cameras every Tom, Dick and Harry had started taking photos indoors. He had been half blinded a number of times by a group of tourists “capturing the moment” in some pub or restaurant. It was almost as bad as the mobile-­phone craze, though not quite.

“Did Kim Fosse share this mania?” he asked.

“She had a fancy new camera. She took it with her. That's all I can say, really. Look, I don't—­”

“Bear with me, Ms. Cheverel.”

“Norma, please.”

Banks, who reserved the familiarity of first-­name terms to exercise power over suspects, not to interview witnesses, went on. “Do you know if she had affairs?”

This time Norma Cheverel let the silence stretch. Banks could hear the fan cooling the microchip in her computer. She stubbed out her long cigarette, careful to make sure it wasn't still smoldering, sipped some coffee, swiveled a little, and said, “Yes. Yes, she did. Though I wouldn't really describe them as affairs.”

“How would you describe them?”

“Just little flings, really. Nothing that really
meant
anything to her.”

“Who with?”

“She didn't usually mention names.”

“Did she have a fling in London last weekend?”

“Yes. She told me about it on the way home. Look, Chief Inspector, Kim wasn't a bad person. She just needed something David couldn't give her.”

Banks took a photograph of the man in the navy blue suit from his briefcase and slid it across the desk. “Know him?”

“It's Michael Bannister. He's with an office-­furnishings company in Preston.”

“And did Kim Fosse have a fling with him that weekend?”

Norma swiveled and bit her lip. “She didn't tell me it was him.”

“Surprised?”

She shrugged. “He's married. Not that that means much these days. I've heard he's very much in love with his wife, but she's not very strong. Heart condition, or something.” She sniffled, then sneezed and reached for a tissue.

“What did Kim tell you about last weekend?”

Norma Cheverel smiled an odd, twisted little smile from the corner of her lips. “Oh, Chief Inspector, do you really want all the details? Girl talk about sex is so much
dirtier
than men's, you know.”

Though he felt himself reddening a little, Banks said, “So I've been told. Did she ever express concern about her husband finding out?”

“Oh, yes. She told me under no circumstances to tell David. As if I would. He's very jealous and he has a temper.”

“Was he ever violent towards her?”

“Just once. It was the last time we went to a convention, as a matter of fact. Apparently he tried to phone her in her room after midnight—some emergency to do with the dog—and she wasn't there. When she got home he lost his temper, called her a whore and hit her.”

“How long had they been married?”

Norma sniffled again and blew her nose. “Four years.”

“How long have you and Kim Fosse been in business together?”

“Six years. We started when she was still Kim Church. She'd just got her MBA.”

“How did the partnership work?”

“Very well. I'm on the financial side and Kim dealt with sales and marketing.”

“Are you married?”

“I don't see that it's any of your business, Chief Inspector, but no, I'm not. I guess Mr. Right just hasn't turned up yet,” she said coldly, then looked at her gold wristwatch. “Are there any more questions?”

Banks stood up. “No, that's all for now. Thank you very much for your time.”

She stood up and walked around the desk to show him to the door. Her handshake on leaving was a little brisker and cooler than it had been when he arrived.

4

“
S
O
K
IM
F
OSSE
was discreet, but she took photographs,” said Susan when they met up in Banks's office later that morning. “Kinky?”

“Could be. Or just careless. They're pretty harmless, really.” The seven photographs from the film they had found inside the camera showed the same man in the hotel room on the same date, 11/14/93.

“Michael Bannister,” Susan read from her notes. “Sales director for Office Comforts Ltd. based in Preston, Lancashire. Lives in Blackpool with his wife, Lucy. No children. His wife suffers from a congenital heart condition, needs constant pills and medicines, lots of attention. His workmates tell me he's devoted to her.”

“A momentary lapse, then?” Banks suggested. He walked over to his broken Venetian blind and looked out on the rainswept market square. Only two cars were parked there today. The gold hands on the blue face of the church clock stood at eleven thirty-­nine.

“It happens, sir. Maybe more often than we think.”

“I know. Reckon we'd better go easy approaching him?”

“No sense endangering the wife's health, is there?”

“You're right. See if you can arrange to see him at his office.” Banks looked out of the window and shivered. “I don't much fancy a trip to the seaside in this miserable weather anyway.”

5

T
HE DRIVE ACROSS
the Pennines was a nightmare. All the way along the A59 they seemed to be stuck behind one lorry or another churning up gallons of filthy spray. Around Clitheroe, visibility was so poor that traffic slowed to a crawl. The hulking whale-­shapes of the hills that flanked the road were reduced to faint grey outlines in the rain-­haze. Banks played his Miles Davis
Birth of the Cool
tape, which Susan seemed to enjoy. At least, she didn't complain.