A Carriage of Misjustice Read online

Andy placed his finger on the diagram. “Greg went down here, five metres in from the far touchline, roughly on the twenty-two that’s farthest from the tunnel. The bar end. When I took Dave off to talk him down from the ledge, we came over to the grandstand, to get him away.”

  Robin was impressed. Both the map and the explanation were clear and concise. Here was a witness you could put into the box and a jury would believe him.

  “I guess you were all pretty distracted at that point?” Pru asked. “Could anyone have got in or out of the tunnel then? Or the bar?”

  “The bar’s kept locked, so unless they had the keys, they’d have no chance. We might not have seen them, though. When you’re under the lights everything off the pitch is rather fuzzy.”

  “And the tunnel?”

  “Nobody could have sneaked in or out after Dave and I went and stood by where we’d all left our kit. I know that for a fact. It’s possible they might have done previously, given that we were preoccupied what with training and then the accident. I’ve had a think, since, and I’m pretty sure I can account for me, Dave, Coach, and Greg from the moment we went out to practice until the point Dave found the body. Nick’s body, although we didn’t know that at the time. I couldn’t swear to where any of the others were, though. Coach would have noticed if they were skiving off training, but once Greg went down, everyone’s attention was focussed on him.”

  Apart from the killer’s, presumably. Shame that the medical report couldn’t tie the time of death down to a more specific window than between seven and eight o’clock, give or take a few minutes either way—although there was corroborative evidence concerning when the changing room had been empty. Vacated by seven and occupied by around a quarter past eight, all of which Robin would double-check now.

  “I’d like to get the timescale clear. What time was the last person out of the changing room and onto the pitch for practice?”

  “Seven o’clock, on the dot.” Andy grinned. “I know because it was Big Dave and he got the traditional fine for being tail-end Charlie. And before you ask, there was nobody in the loos before the rest of us came out.”

  “Okay. At what time did Greg have his accident?”

  Andy’s brow wrinkled. “Somewhere around eight o’clock, I guess.”

  That chimed with the 999 call that had been logged a few minutes after then. As suspected, something like an hour’s window for both victim and murderer to get into the changing rooms.

  “I have to ask,” Pru said, “why do you call him Big Dave?”

  “He’s been my mate since primary school. I used to get picked on, but then he moved into the area and we became besties. He was built like the side of a barn even then—hence the nickname—so nobody was going to be stupid enough to get on the wrong side of him, although he’s actually as easy-going as they come. Gentle giant.”

  Robin had his own gentle giant at home. Campbell might have been large and imposing, but he was soft as a goose feather.

  Andy frowned. “You know, I’ve been kicking myself. Thinking about what we know now that we didn’t then, things might have turned out different, because we almost went back into the changing rooms earlier. I’d grabbed Dave’s arm and said it was no use freezing our ball— backsides off hanging about, but he wasn’t having it. He wanted to stay until the paramedics arrived, because he was determined to tell them exactly what happened. Said he knew Greg would have wanted him to wait there. Daft sod, but there was no moving him. I got us our track suits from where we’d left them by the side of the pitch, and we put them on. Then the paramedics arrived.”

  “Did Dave go and talk to them?”

  “No, I managed to stop him from going and describing the tackle in detail. Joe was already miming the impact, demonstrating where and how Greg’s head had been hit. Dave nearly fainted when he saw that. I asked him if he wanted me to get the paramedics to check him over too, but he said he was fine. Simply a jolt to his shoulder.”

  Last out of the changing room, reluctant to go back in there: Dave’s actions might have been entirely innocent, but they’d bear further investigation. Was it possible that his coming over faint at the reconstruction of the accident was less about the tackle than the fact he’d bashed someone over the head earlier that evening?

  Pru’s thoughts were clearly going down the same lines. “I know he’s your mate, so this is going to seem a pretty harsh thing to ask, but did you believe him? I mean, did anything strike you as suspicious about how he was acting? Or anyone else was acting,” she added, hastily, as Andy’s face had turned thunderous.

  “You lay off Dave. I’ve known him long enough to realise he’s no actor. What you see is what you get. And what I saw was him wanting to go in the ambulance with Greg because he reckoned he needed somebody with him until Dawn got there. It was only when Dave said that we realised nobody might have rung her, yet.”

  Was that an honest assessment of the situation or a neat sidestep of the real question?

  “Did Dave want to make the call?” Robin asked.

  “You’ve got him sussed. Yep, insisted he should be the one to relay the bad news, but he was in no state to ring anyone. I decided to ask Coach if Dawn had been contacted.”

  Robin glanced at the diagram Andy had drawn. “Did Dave stay by the grandstand?”

  “Nah. He tagged behind. Short of tying him to one of the railings, I couldn’t stop him.”

  “Who rang the girlfriend?”

  “Coach. He’s got the knack with these things.”

  “Which means?” Pru asked.

  “If there’s a shitty job to do, he steps up to the plate and does it better than any of us would. He gets on with all the partners—female or male. Coach bats for the same team as me, see, and while he’s never said anything much about his private life, we all know that his lodger, Steve, isn’t only his lodger.” Andy rolled his eyes. “Shame that generation didn’t have the same freedom to come out as we do.”

  “Same applies to some people in this generation. You don’t have to be in a third-world country to risk everything by admitting what you are.” Robin halted, aware that he was preaching to a pair of people who least needed it. Also aware that he was at risk of coming out himself and that wasn’t relevant to the situation.

  “You’re right. I don’t know what pressures Coach has on him.”

  Pru gently brought them back to the matter in hand. “Mr. Preese rang Dawn? Given what we now know, it’s important we have all the details.”

  “Yes, he rang her. He walked off a few yards, so that Dawn wouldn’t hear all the hoo-hah, which means I don’t know precisely what was said. He just told us she’d be going to the hospital as soon as she could. That she’d been having a couple of glasses of wine at a mate’s house and didn’t want to drive until she’d got some coffee into her and no longer risked being over the limit.”

  Again, that could all be true or it could be part of an elaborately constructed alibi for Melanie. Robin asked, “What happened then?”

  “Coach got to work on Dave. Persuaded him not to go driving off after the ambulance as he’d be another accident waiting to happen. Asked me to run the bloke to the hospital.” Andy frowned.

  “Ye-es? Is there a problem?”

  “I was trying to relive what happened next. I remember suggesting we go and have a shower, and Dave insisting that we should go to the hospital straight away. Coach put his foot down and said he’d make sure one of the players went with Greg in the ambulance. He also told me to get the smelly bugger—his words, meaning Dave—to have a shower and get changed before we went.”

  Again, Dave not wanting to go into the changing room. And he’d wanted to be the one to ring Dawn: evidence of collusion or evidence of the workings of Robin’s oversuspicious mind?

  “Okay, to clarify, again, Mr. Preese was the one who persuaded him to go and clean up first?”

  Andy nodded. “The rest of us were being pretty useless apart from Joe and his first aid. Anyway, Coach said that the ac
cident and emergency department staff wouldn’t appreciate having a muddy, sweaty lump of lard hanging around trailing grass across their nice clean waiting area.”

  Robin grinned, imagining some of the rugby coaches he’d known saying the same thing. He nodded for Andy to continue.

  “I took Dave off to the dressing room where we had a quick shower, then changed back into our normal clobber. Before we left, Dave said he wanted to use the loo. I wondered if that was an excuse, if he needed some time to pull himself together before we went to the hospital. I got a hell of a shock when he screamed, because I immediately assumed he was having a nervous breakdown or something. I hared in there, asking if he was okay, which is when I saw it too. Saw him, I mean.”

  The body sitting slumped on a cubicle seat: Robin had seen the pictures from the crime scene. No wonder Dave had screamed when he’d swung the door open. “Can you do me another diagram? One of the changing rooms and where the showers and loos are?”

  “Yep.” Andy took the paper again, sketching it out. The tunnel took a sharp bend to the right, with a door into the changing area. Right turn from there into a small area for cleaning boots and storage. Straight ahead had you facing the entrance to the showers, with the changing area on the left, occupying the long part of the room. The toilets were at the far left, two cubicles needing a right turn to get to them. The door to the bar was at that end too. “We try to keep all the mud and muck up one end, but it doesn’t always work. You can’t see into either the showers or the loos from the changing area itself, which is why we didn’t see . . . him . . . until we went in there.”

  “That’s different from when I was playing.”

  “We got a lottery grant to update the facility a few years back, and one of the considerations was ensuring privacy if people wanted it.”

  “And where does the opposition change?” Pru asked.

  Andy pointed at an area just to the right of the tunnel entrance. “Their changing room and showers are here. There’s a door almost by the tunnel entrance. Home and away teams separate for the rugby, male and female for the athletics.”

  Robin was starting to get a clearer picture. Plenty of places for somebody to hide in if they had the right keys. “What did you do when you found the body?”

  “Manhandled Dave out of the toilet area, for a start, before he puked on the crime scene. Then I got my phone to ring 999 while I sent Dave out to warn the others. I hovered at the entrance to the changing rooms, making sure nobody went in, then Coach came up the tunnel and told us not to move anything until the police gave us permission. He always knows what to do. I thought it was lucky that I’d brought mine and Dave’s bags out already.”

  A case of either luck or good thinking. Robin hoped the officers on the scene hadn’t let the pair swan off without having those bags checked.

  “Did you recognise the victim?” Pru asked.

  “No, although I’ve got to admit I didn’t take a proper look. I’m rather squeamish when it comes to blood and gore and when I saw his bashed-in skull, that was it. Couldn’t get away quick enough.” Andy gave Pru a sheepish grin. “Typical rugby player. All brawn, but a big, wet lettuce with it.”

  “What did you notice near the body?”

  “Nothing. They asked about that before. Seemed to be searching for a phone, but I didn’t see that.” Andy shrugged.

  “What happened then?” Pru asked.

  “The police arrived. Good timing, because we almost had a riot on our hands. The paramedics had got Greg into the ambulance and the other players wanted to get changed. Even Coach was struggling to control them. We could have opened the other changing room, but that would have been no good without people having their gear.” Andy shrugged. “Then Dave and I showed the police the dead bloke and they took a brief statement from us about how and when we’d found him. Then they went into a conflab with Coach about how to get the mutiny quelled.”

  “Not an easy task.” Robin recalled dealing with a similar situation when he was a junior officer. Taking a list of names and addresses, doing a quick search of bags to make sure no weapons were being sneaked off the premises. The most galling part was the fact it had been a bunch of old ladies who’d caused the most trouble and had complained the loudest.

  “I didn’t envy them it. I only had Dave moaning at me, wanting to get to the hospital and find out what was happening with Greg. They had best part of forty blokes causing a fuss.”

  Robin hoped that the officers in charge had been effective in managing the situation—he’d get Pru to delve into that little matter—so nobody had slipped through the net or managed to conceal something. Although only the most stupid of murderers would have left an incriminating article in the changing room when the dead body was so easily discoverable and a clampdown on the site would inevitably follow. Didn’t most people have a good idea of what happened at crime scenes given how often they were depicted on the telly?

  “You definitely didn’t know the dead man?” he asked.

  “Nope.” Andy peered at the diagram again, as though the answer might be found there. “Mind you, there have been so many pictures of him in the media since then, I’ve begun to doubt myself. I might have met him once, but his face didn’t ring a bell at the time we found him.”

  “But he was connected to your group of friends, surely?” Pru said, with surprising determination. “Through Greg and Dawn.”

  “Yeah, well, that was a shock. We had no idea. He doesn’t—didn’t—hang around with us. Melanie didn’t, either. She was Dawn’s pal, not Greg’s.”

  There didn’t seem to be much further to be gained from the interview. Robin concluded it with the usual reminder that if Andy remembered anything else that might be significant, he was to get in touch.

  “I’ll do that.” Andy made a sheepish grin. “Look, I know this is being cheeky, but can I give you a flyer? We’re fundraising for Greg and Dawn, and I thought maybe you could put this up in the station canteen, if there is one?”

  “I’ve no idea if there is or not. We’ve not been there yet. But I’ll take it.” Robin cast a glance at the sheet, which listed the range of activities planned to raise money. He passed it to Pru, who raised an eyebrow, then carefully filed the flyer in her briefcase.

  Back in the car, Pru had barely started the engine when she said, “What did you think of that? Is it me or did that interview raise a heap of questions?”

  “It’s not only you—I’ve got half a dozen. I’ve been wondering whether it’s possible to plan a rugby accident. Seems rather an extreme way either to create a diversion, or delay the body being discovered, though.”

  “Callous, as well.”

  “Unless Greg was faking it, although that would make the fundraising a smokescreen too.” Robin gazed out of the window, watching the unfamiliar buildings go by. “We’re probably running before we can walk, but I’ve a list of things I want checked. Greg’s condition. What happened at the scene on the night, and whether Dave’s and Andy’s bags got checked properly.”

  Adam would have called that his rozzer’s nose twitching. Robin had told him it was experience, the subtle signs you had to keep an eye out for, like Adam would be aware of what signals children gave off when they were up to no good.

  “There certainly seems something odd about Dave not wanting to go into the changing rooms and Coach insisting he did so.”

  “Derek Preese, not Coach. You’re showing your natural leaning towards the rugby crowd.” Robin chuckled.

  Pru deftly manoeuvred a tricky roundabout, showing an expertise in her driving that Robin’s previous sergeant had never managed. “Dave was last out of the changing rooms too. And what about Mr. Preese himself, worrying about a spot of mud being dragged into the hospital? They’ve seen it all in casualty, so a bit of dirt wouldn’t bother them. Why was he so insistent Dave and Andy went to clean themselves up?”

  “Maybe he was thinking of Greg. If Dave was fussing like an old biddy, he might have thought it better he
had time to calm down before travelling. Not that I haven’t wondered if he meant them to find the body.” Always knew what to do and always in charge. “Here, is that the rugby ground?”

  “I didn’t notice. Eyes on the road.” Pru snorted. “Want me to do a one eighty at the roundabout ahead?”

  “Please.” Best to get a clear view of the crime scene in their mind. “I thought I saw somebody cutting the pitch, so we might get a look around.”

  They did better than a look around. The groundsman had driven his mower over at their approach, wearing a face like thunder, although as soon as they’d flashed their warrant cards and made an introduction, his attitude had transformed.

  “I thought you were the press. If you were, I’d have chased you off.” He held out his hand. “Call me Tom, everybody does. I hear you’ve taken over because the other officer is unwell.”

  “Yes. Word spreads here, doesn’t it?”

  “Blame Derek, the rugby coach. He knows everything. Want a tour of this place?”

  “Just a quick once-over,” Robin said. “Have you had much trouble with the media, then?”

  “On and off. I caught one of them—he’d nipped over the gate—trying to get into the clubhouse so he could take pictures of where that poor bugger was found, but I saw him off. Whacking great bruise on his leg with it.” Tom gave Pru a pleading smile. “You won’t do me for assault?”

  “Not if he hasn’t complained. Only don’t do it again.” Pru flashed him a smile and they set off.

  Andy’s sketch had been spot-on, so they got their bearings quickly. It also became apparent why the house-to-house enquiries locally had yielded nothing. The only nearby residential properties were behind the sports ground left of the clubhouse and would only have had a view from their upstairs windows, given the high conifer hedge that ran along the boundary of the site. The wrong side to see anyone getting in and out of the bar area. Roads on another two sides and an industrial estate on the fourth, which was likely empty in the evening.

  As he, Pru, and the groundsman entered the tunnel, Robin asked, “How many people have keys to here?”