The Inspector Walter Darriteau Murder Mysteries - Books 1-4, David Carter [diy ebook reader .txt] 📗

‘Number two is James “Jimmy” Crocker. Aged thirty-six.’

They all stared up at the balding hard-faced figure that insolently stared back through cold eyes.

‘Tell us more,’ said Walter; trying hard to remember if he’d ever met the guy.

‘Long time career criminal, but mainly low key stuff, but then for some reason he imagined he was a hard man and began battering people, sometimes for money, sometimes seemingly because he enjoyed it. He’d racked up a big score of assaults before he was finally sent down.’

‘I remember him,’ said Gibbons. ‘A right prick!’

‘Passed me by,’ said Walter.

‘Me too,’ added Karen.

‘Anyway,’ continued Hector, ‘he got ten years for GBH, and was released after five.’

‘When was that?’ asked Karen.

‘Three weeks ago.’

‘Got an address?’ asked Walter.

‘Sure,’ said Hector. ‘He’s back with his mother at Saltney Ferry. 20 Laburnum Gardens.’

Walter grunted and said, ‘One for you Gibbons, I think. Take Nick with you first thing in the morning. Find out where Crocker was on Friday, and thoroughly check out any alibi.’

‘Thanks a lot, Guv,’ said Gibbons, not really wanting to meet Jimmy Crocker again.

‘And the third one?’ said Walter.

‘The most interesting and promising one, in my opinion,’ said Hector, looking pleased with himself.

‘Let’s hear it.’

‘Michael, Mickey Flanagan. Aged thirty-nine. Went to prison for twelve years for the manslaughter of his wife. Released after seven on licence for good behaviour.’

Everyone looked up at the new picture gazing down on them. Long straggly greasy dark hair parted in the middle. Looked like some refugee from a metal rock band. Hard looking eyes; but weren’t they always when they were photographed under stress in a police station.

‘He has one son who was taken into care. He’ll be twelve now. So far, Michael Flanagan has not been permitted to see his son, and indeed the boy has expressed a wish not to see his father.’

‘When was he released?’

‘Twenty-six days ago,’ said Hector, without hesitation.

‘Where’s he living?’

‘Christleton.’

‘Address?’

Hector coughed it up. Walter memorised it.

Jenny said, ‘Do you want me to check him out, Guv?’

‘Won’t be necessary, Jen, I want to see this guy myself.’

‘That it, Hector?’ asked Karen.

‘Yep, for now.’

‘How did you get on?’ asked Walter, glancing at Jen and Nick.

‘Not a lot in truth,’ said Jenny. ‘We interviewed everyone who was available in Marigold Lane. Two families are away, one on holiday, one away working. Of the others no one heard or saw a thing except for a Mr Duffield.’

Nick Barr took up the story.

‘Mr Duffield is not allowed to smoke in his bungalow.’

Slight tittering filled the briefing room.

‘All right,’ said Walter. ‘Settle down. And?’

Nick grinned and began again.

‘His wife won’t permit it in the house; so just before he went to bed he stepped outside the back of his property onto a large flagged patio and enjoyed a late night fag. While he was doing that he noticed a glow in the sky from the direction of the caravan, but put it down to kids who had been known to go down there at the weekends, and make a fire and drink and stuff. He didn’t think it so unusual. He says he didn’t hear or see anything else, and after his ciggie was done he stepped back inside, not least because it was raining, and thought nothing more of it.

‘Did he see anyone driving up the lane later on?’ asked Karen.

‘Nope. Their room is at the back, so they couldn’t have seen a thing.’

‘Pity,’ said Walter.

‘If someone set fire to the caravan they could have walked up the lane,’ suggested Jenny.

‘Possible,’ said Walter. ‘But why would you?’

‘Avoid tyre tracks, maybe.’

‘Or maybe a local person?’ added Gibbons.

‘Possibly,’ said Walter.

‘Or perhaps,’ said Jenny, ‘they didn’t want Ellie to hear their arrival by car, so they crept down there on foot instead.’

‘And left the car, if they had one, back up on the main road,’ said Karen.

‘All possible, but we want something more concrete than that,’ said Walter.

‘There is a lay-by on the main road, maybe a couple of hundred yards along from Marigold,’ added Gibbons.

‘Someone might have seen it if a car were left there,’ suggested Nick.

‘Again, it’s possible,’ said Walter. ‘Did you turn up anything else, Jen?’

‘No, we tried lots of other further away properties, maybe thirty or forty, but no one saw or heard anything unusual.’

‘That just leaves you, Gibbons,’ said Walter, and everyone turned and stared at Darren. ‘What did you turn up in the pubs?’

‘Plenty of tittle-tattle and interest. Lots of the punters knew of Ellie Wright, though none of them were brave enough to admit to visiting her at home, so to speak.’

‘So there’s quite a few liars in the pubs then?’ said Karen.

‘Clearly,’ said Mrs West. ‘And there’s no point in testing them for DNA because we have nothing left at the possible crime scene to compare it with, and there’s nothing left in the wreckage of the caravan to incriminate anyone. No juicy diary or business records, or appreciative gifts. That would have been nice.’

‘Someone in those pubs must know something,’ said Walter. ‘I think we need to have another go at them.’

‘Is that it for now?’ asked Mrs West, anxious to get on with other work.

‘Looks that way,’ said Walter.

‘Is it a visit to Mickey Flanagan first thing tomorrow?’ asked Karen.

Walter glanced at his watch.

‘It’s only five to six,’ he said. ‘Let’s go and do it now. Never put off till tomorrow, and all that.’

One or two of them smirked at Karen’s annoyance for they knew she had a hot date. She hid it well, you had to give her that.

Seven

They had expected Michael Flanagan’s address to be some kind of down-at-heel boarding house, or an unloved renter, but they could not have been more wrong. He was living in a brand new townhouse, one of three, in a small cul-de-sac off the main A41, south and east of Chester. There were small square gardens at the front, different coloured front doors, red sandstone porches built in the local stone, and they appeared a very nice place to