A Cold Case Read online

  ‘Really?’ Mundy’s jaw dropped slightly. ‘That is interesting.’

  ‘It is in the gentleman’s statement, Maurice.’ Tom Ingram turned to Mundy.

  ‘Ah … sorry.’ Mundy smiled sheepishly. ‘I must have missed that.’

  ‘Well, yes,’ Golightly continued, ‘he seemed to be holding something down in this manner,’ Golightly leaned forward and extended both arms between his knees and towards the floor, ‘as if he was pressing down on someone who was struggling to get up. The car went by in a flash and, as I say, it was dark and raining heavily, but I’m certain of what I saw.’

  ‘Did either of the men see you as they drove by?’ Ingram asked.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Golightly replied quickly. ‘The geezer in the back didn’t see me and the driver didn’t glance at me … the waterproof clothing I am wearing, remember, does not reflect in car headlights.’

  ‘Ah, yes … you said,’ Mundy replied.

  ‘So I told the police everything, including the description of the car.’ Golightly sat back in his chair.

  ‘Does that mean that there was something unique about it?’ Mundy glanced at Golightly.

  ‘Yes,’ Golightly replied, ‘it had a new side door which was of a darker colour to the rest of the car.’

  ‘Really?’ Ingram sat forward. ‘That would narrow the field down considerably.’

  ‘It would.’ Golightly spoke with clear certainty. ‘The car seemed to be of a greyish colour … possibly a light shade of blue but the door was darker, like a red or a brown … or a black. It was as if the original door had been damaged somehow and the owner had obtained a replacement door from an identical car but of a different colour and he wasn’t at all bothered about the mismatching colours. Oh, and there was no light over the rear number plate. I noticed that because I once got a fixed penalty notice for not having a light over my rear number plate. I was annoyed at the time – I thought the police must have better things to do – but I was just eighteen and driving a real wreck of a car that probably looked a bit iffy, so the coppers pulled me over and gave me notice to present my documents at the police station within five days. Dare say I would have done the same if I was a police officer and saw a youth driving a car without proper lights showing. Driving without insurance is not big and it’s not clever, yet the youth do it all the time.’

  ‘Indeed.’ Ingram smiled. ‘Indeed.’

  ‘But you know, I still see that car from time to time,’ Golightly added quietly.

  ‘You do!’ Mundy gasped. ‘Is that really the case?’

  ‘Yes, very rarely, but yes, I do,’ Golightly replied. ‘Very, very rarely.’

  ‘You didn’t report it to the police?’ Mundy raised his voice slightly.

  ‘Not the first time …’ Golightly replied calmly.

  ‘Why not?’ Ingram asked.

  ‘Because the first time I saw the car again I saw the near side and noticed a brown door on a pale blue Saab and I thought another owner of a Saab has had one of his doors replaced. I thought that because the driver was a blonde-haired woman, so I thought it was a different car. Then, later – weeks later – I realized that the owner of the Saab had had both doors replaced and that he had subsequently sold the car … or was letting a female friend or relative have use of it.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ Mundy slowly tapped his notepad with his ballpoint. ‘You say that you have seen it on other occasions?’

  ‘Very rarely, but yes, I have … it’s a solid old car, still going strong.’ Golightly beamed. ‘It’s a winner, all right. Some cars are. They just go on for ever. Others are Friday afternoon jobs but that Saab is a clear winner.’

  ‘Where do you see it?’ Ingram asked.

  ‘All over … all over East Anglia,’ Golightly replied. ‘I’m a salesman. You see, I sell agricultural fertiliser and animal feed so I get all over East Anglia. I’m winding down now though, I’ll be pushing ye pen soon … The company says it’s a reward for many years of loyal service. Taking me off the road is a reward, but that’s all so much codswallop.’

  ‘You think?’ Ingram smiled briefly.

  ‘Of course it is. You see, if you’re a salesman you have to look the part, you’ve got to have the right appearance and part of that required appearance is youth. People just won’t buy things from an old man, especially when the old man is tired and worn out and the young man is full of enthusiasm, so desk job, here I come.’ Golightly smiled and shrugged his shoulders. ‘Mind you, it suits me. Frankly, I am getting a bit jaded with it all, which is why you have caught me at home. I’ve phoned in sick … I am “throwing a sickie”, as my brother in Australia would say. He emigrated there when he was a young man. He did all right, got a good standard of living, but I wouldn’t settle in Australia … too much sun for me.’

  ‘So, tell us … where exactly have you seen the Saab with the odd-coloured doors?’ Mundy pressed.

  ‘Where? Well … the first time was in Harlow New Town. I saw it when it was parked in a car park. It caught my eye as I drove past. The second time was up in King’s Lynn … that’s a damn weird town if you ask me, but then they all are up there in north Norfolk. You know, when I’m up that way I always get the same feeling that I get whenever I have visited small towns in the Irish Republic – it’s like all the locals know something that strangers and visitors are not permitted to be privy to. It’s all the same up there, and Fakenham … that is one odd little town. I mean, where else would you get planning permission to build a cinema in the middle of a traffic roundabout? It’s madness … sheer madness—’

  ‘All right, all right,’ Mundy held up his hand, ‘we’ll take your word for it, Mr Golightly. So, Janet Laws was murdered ten years ago and since then you might possibly have seen the car in question twice, once in Harlow and then later in King’s Lynn?’

  ‘Yes. It was in King’s Lynn that I saw a young blonde woman behind the wheel and I also saw that the driver’s side door was brown … and there might have been a third sighting in Newmarket.’

  ‘So the car has been seen widely over East Anglia?’ Mundy observed.

  ‘Yes … but once a car achieves classic status buyers will come from far and wide to look at it and possibly purchase it,’ Golightly explained. ‘And folk want Saabs now … they don’t make them any more, like I said, so folk want good, used models. They’re an investment now. A good Saab 90 is worth hanging on to.’

  ‘Yes.’ Mundy once again held up his hand. ‘Let’s keep this focused, if we can. So the last sighting was in Newmarket. How long ago was that?’

  ‘Quite recently. It is November now, so … I’d say about this time last year.’

  ‘Quite recent?’ Mundy pursed his lips. ‘Was it being driven by the blonde woman?’

  ‘No,’ Golightly smiled, ‘it wasn’t being driven at all, it was on a ramp in a garage – that is to say a service station, rather than petrol filling station – having its exhaust welded up. I had a close look at it and saw that I was right about the doors … both were brown on a car which was pale blue … if it was the same car.’

  ‘Do you recall the name of the garage?’ Mundy asked.

  ‘The Swinton Garage … I was driving past with a recently blown exhaust. I stopped and asked if they could get me out of trouble. All I wanted was a quick weld to get me back on the road. They said yes, just as soon as we’ve welded up the Saab’s exhaust we’ll put your car on the ramp and weld your exhaust.’

  ‘The Swinton Garage,’ Mundy wrote on his notepad.

  ‘Yes,’ Golightly confirmed, ‘the Swinton Garage in Newmarket.’

  Walking away from Golightly’s house, Mundy asked, ‘Do you mind if we go to Newmarket tomorrow?’

  ‘No, but we have time today, though.’ Ingram fished in his coat pocket for his car keys. ‘Still plenty of daylight left.’

  ‘Yes, but there’s something I need to do,’ Mundy pleaded. ‘It’s really quite important.’

  ‘If you like. Ten years on …’ Ingram shr
ugged, ‘… I dare say that half a day isn’t going to make a huge deal of difference. We’re not under any time pressure.’

  ‘Thanks, I appreciate it.’ Mundy smiled. ‘I owe you one, Tom.’

  THREE

  ‘So you’re not a proper copper?’ Joshua Derbyshire smiled briefly. ‘Sort of part-time and keeping your old hand in sort of copper …?’

  ‘Part-time, keeping my hand in? Yes … yes, you could say that.’ Mundy nodded. ‘But a proper copper all right, Joshua. Once a copper always a copper. That’s just the way of it. So, I am a proper copper, which is why we are in here, not the visiting area. It’s like …’ Mundy glanced up at the white-tiled walls. ‘It’s a bit like that I have been taken off the active service list but I’m still on the team … look at it that way.’

  ‘OK, I can understand that.’ Joshua Derbyshire was a softly spoken man, so Mundy found, slightly built, and Mundy was interested in an alertness he noticed in his eyes. ‘I was a bit lost but I can understand that,’ Derbyshire added.

  ‘You’ll be wondering why I’m here.’ Mundy held eye contact with the man, who was dressed in a blue striped shirt and blue denims.

  ‘Yes … sort of curious.’ Derbyshire nodded. ‘Sort of.’

  Mundy had to concede that Derbyshire looked very young and healthy for his forty-five years but that, he thought, is prison life, especially twenty-eight years of it. ‘It’s about your conviction. The elderly lady you murdered.’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’ Derbyshire remained calm. ‘I have always said that and I’ll always say it. I’ll do my little three score and ten before I will admit to something I didn’t do. I mean, if I did it, I’d admit it. I might even be out by now … if I had admitted it.’

  ‘You’re in denial of murder.’ Mundy continued to hold eye contact with Derbyshire.

  ‘Yes. And I always will be.’ Derbyshire continued to smile. ‘I always will be.’

  ‘You admitted it,’ Mundy pressed. ‘You confessed to the murder.’

  ‘I was tired. I was confused. I was seventeen years old. The solicitor I had wasn’t interested,’ Derbyshire replied defensively. ‘It was like he wanted to go home as soon as he could. He told me that if I pleaded guilty it would be easier for me – easier for him, more like. So I pleaded guilty then decided not to.’

  ‘It still reads like a solid case. I read it just this morning.’ Mundy leaned forward and folded his arms in front of him. ‘You were obsessed with your victim. You had photographs of her in your flat. You visited her on a daily basis, entering and leaving her home at will.’

  ‘And …? What does that prove?’ Derbyshire also leaned forward. ‘I carried her shopping for her, I did odd jobs for her … worked on her garden … worked on her car … I took out the refuse bags … all that sort of thing I did for her.’

  ‘So why the obsession?’ Mundy asked. ‘What did you find special about her?’

  ‘Because she treated me like I was a human being. Simple as that,’ Derbyshire replied. ‘It’s as plain and simple as that. I am not very bright. I went to a special school but I have a brain … I do … a bit of a brain. I have three O-levels … I took them in here. I went to classes here in “the villa” and I got three O-levels. And I read. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stephenson.’

  ‘Good story.’ Mundy smiled. ‘A good adventure story. I read it myself many years ago.’

  ‘I started to read it at school,’ Derbyshire explained. ‘I was making progress with it, I was getting there, and then a teacher took it from me. She said, “You can’t possibly read that, Joshua, so stop pretending you can”, and took it from me and gave me an Enid Blyton book to read.’

  Mundy groaned. ‘How old were you when that happened?’

  ‘Fifteen or sixteen,’ Derbyshire replied. ‘Something like that, but I got hold of a copy here in the prison library and read it. I managed one chapter a day and I got through it. I read of Long John Silver and his parrot Captain Flint and Ben Gunn … He got fed up with it.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The author – he got fed up with the book,’ Derbyshire argued. ‘It reads like he did anyway.’

  Mundy smiled approvingly. ‘Why do you say that, Josh?’

  ‘He begins two paragraphs in the last chapter with the word “well” like he’s anxious to get to the end of the tale. Long John Silver takes his share of the dosh. He steals his fair share and vanishes into the night … like a thief in the night. Ben Gunn loses his share of the treasure within three days of returning to Bristol but we never know what the other folk did with their share … Jim Hawkins and the doctor … and how did they manage to hire a crew in the West Indies to sail the Hispaniola back to England without the crew finding out the ship was full of treasure? Especially since Long John Silver had broken down the bulkhead to get to where the treasure was stored, leaving the rest of the treasure in plain sight. I mean, the treasure was there for the taking, wasn’t it? They would have taken over the ship and kept the treasure.’

  ‘Good point.’ Mundy nodded. ‘I don’t recall seeing that issue … well spotted.’

  ‘I reckon he should have taken a week’s holiday … even two weeks … then written the last chapter.’ Derbyshire spoke with a strong London accent. ‘But, see, Miss Tweedale, she wouldn’t have done that. If Miss Tweedale saw me reading Treasure Island she would have encouraged me to carry on reading it. She wouldn’t have taken it from me and given me a book for a five-year-old. Not Miss Tweedale …’

  ‘No, that was bad,’ Mundy said quietly. ‘That should not have happened to you. That was very bad of the teacher to do that … very bad … but I can well believe what you say – schoolteachers can be like that.’

  ‘Yes,’ Joshua Derbyshire nodded briefly, ‘and when I went to the special school the other kids would laugh at me, call me “soft Josh”. That was my name, my nickname – “soft in the head Joshua” or “Joshie the softy”.’

  Mundy glanced up at the massive slab of opaque glass set high in the wall which was the room’s only source of natural light. ‘That shouldn’t have happened either but children can be like that. I’m afraid that that is life … that is the way of it, sadly. Often the only thing that children learn in their secondary school is their survival techniques, so you probably didn’t miss much.’

  ‘I’ll never know, will I?’ Joshua Derbyshire forced a weak smile. ‘But Miss Tweedale, she was good to me. She knew who I was because we lived in the same street, and she knew what the other children were doing. One day she stopped her car and picked me up because she saw I was walking towards a gang of thugs who were going to bully and tease me … so she stopped and picked me up. She had a lovely old Rolls-Royce and she stopped, took me into it and drove past them as she drove me home.’

  ‘Is that how you met?’ Mundy smiled. He was warming to Joshua Derbyshire.

  ‘I reckon it was. We knew each other to see each other … if you know what I mean, but we never spoke to each other until the day she stopped and picked me up.’

  ‘By sight?’ Mundy assisted. ‘You knew each other by sight?’

  ‘Yes, by sight … I remember that day … and it happened again. She stopped and gave me a lift past the gang of boys, and then she said to call round on her on Saturday because she might have a job for me. So I went round the next Saturday morning and she gave me a shopping list. I went to the shops for her and I got everything on the list.’

  ‘Good for you,’ Maurice Mundy said approvingly.

  ‘I didn’t miss anything … and I went round again and I washed the lovely old car. It was built in 1957, so she told me. Inside it smelled lovely … all that leather … and I dug her garden, weeded it, and I mowed her lawn. We’d sit and talk and she told me all about herself. She’d been an actress and she gave me a photograph of herself when she was younger. I got my big sister to look Miss Tweedale up on the computer and copy all the photographs of her … and when I got my own little flat I put her pictures on the wall.’ Derbyshire paused. ‘She was
really good to me. I liked her so much. I liked her a whole lot. I couldn’t get a job so I’d go round to her house and be a good boy for her. Anything she wanted me to do, I’d do it. She was like a mum to me. I wouldn’t hurt her … no way … I couldn’t … I just couldn’t hurt her.’

  ‘But the jewellery that was stolen was found in the drawer of your bedside cabinet in your little council flat. The murder weapon with Miss Tweedale’s blood on it was also found in your flat.’ Mundy slowly leaned backwards in his chair. ‘And her blood on your clothing in the wicker laundry basket in your bathroom. You must admit, Joshua, it looked bad … it still does, in fact. It still reads like a safe conviction.’

  ‘You know a lot about it all?’ Derbyshire replied.

  ‘I read your file earlier today,’ Mundy advised. ‘I told you … remember?’

  ‘Why, though?’ Derbyshire pressed. ‘Why the interest?’

  Mundy paused. ‘Let’s just leave it that I am interested. Let’s just say that for now. Fair enough?’

  ‘OK.’ Derbyshire shrugged his shoulders. ‘If you say so.’

  ‘Is your family keeping in touch?’

  ‘Just my sisters … one more than the other, it’s mainly our Jane … good old Jane. It was Jane that used her computer to copy photographs of Miss Tweedale for me. She always used to stand up for me, even when I was little, and she stood by me all this time. I get a letter from her each week. She sends a postcard to me when she goes away from home and she visits when she can, but it’s the weekly letter which keeps me going. Every Sunday evening she sits down and writes me a letter and I receive it every Tuesday. It always arrives … every Tuesday for twenty-eight years. I have kept them all … over a thousand now, and also the postcards. I saved everything she sent me.’ Derbyshire smiled. ‘Our Jane, she never believed I did it. She never believed I murdered Miss Tweedale. Never. Not ever. She’s golden, my sister Jane. She’s pure gold.’