The conference table was long and made of glass an inch thick. Dixon waited with Louise, while the uniformed officers, Sarah and Mark, had a look around outside. He could see Mark from the first-floor window, marvelling at the acres of orchards stretching away to the far horizon. Half a chance and Mark would be nipping in the shop.
‘He’s on his way,’ said the uncle. ‘It’s quite a sight, isn’t it.’
Lines and lines of trees, all of them pruned to the same size, the same distance apart, a dusting of snow on the ground.
‘We buy in a lot of apples too,’ continued the uncle.
‘Why haven’t I seen your cider in a pub?’ asked Dixon.
‘We export most of it. The farm’s been in the family for five generations and we’re sort of hoping it’ll stay that way. Anyway, do let me know if you need anything.’
‘Thank you,’ replied Dixon, turning back to the window just in time to see Mark walking back to his car with a carrier bag in his hand.
He recognised the solicitor before the glass door opened, the same one who had been advising Diana Hope-Bruce – not terribly well, as it happened – and had sat in on her police interview.
‘Here we go,’ said Louise, sitting down at the conference table, notebook at the ready.
The solicitor waited until Jos had closed the door behind them. ‘I have advised my client not to answer any of your questions at the present time,’ he said.
Dixon watched Jos sit down at the head of the table and fold his arms.
‘He is not prepared to give a DNA sample, nor will he give his fingerprints or a handprint, for that matter.’ The solicitor was watching Dixon closely. ‘I know what you’re thinking, Superintendent, but there is no conflict of interest that prevents me from acting for both Diana and Jos. If a conflict does arise, then Jos understands that I will have to decline to act for him further. Now, do you have any evidence of wrongdoing on his part?’
‘I am investigating the murders of four members of the bridge team from whom Diana Hope-Bruce abducted your client as a baby. Three of those victims had key safes on their front doors. They were telephoned in the days before their murders, presumably to get their key codes. The calls were made from mobile phones, and mast data places those calls as having been made from the vicinity of this farm.’ It was the best Dixon could do. He knew what was coming and braced himself.
‘Do you have any evidence that those calls were made by my client?’
Bollocks.
‘No.’
‘Then they could have been made by anybody.’
Time to light the fuse and retreat to a safe distance. ‘Diana Hope-Bruce has confessed to abducting your client from the bridge team and I am seeking a DNA sample merely to establish whether or not that is true.’
‘Jos has already made it clear to you, has he not, that he will not assist you, in any way, to build a case against his mother?’
‘It’s important for Jos to know sooner rather than later,’ said Dixon. ‘Because it’s entirely possible that he’s in or has had a romantic relationship with his sister, Freya.’
‘Freya is my sister?’ Jos jumped up from the table. ‘No way, that can’t be right.’
‘Are you the father of her child?’ asked Dixon, tightening the screw a little.
‘No, I’m not. She was with someone else to begin with. This just can’t be fucking right. I loved her, for fuck’s sake, and she loved me!’
‘If what Diana says is true, then it is right, Jos.’ Dixon was shifting from one foot to the other. ‘But what concerns me more than that, frankly, is that someone is murdering elderly people in their own homes in the most brutal fashion imaginable. Up close and personal.’
‘That is no concern of my client,’ said the solicitor. ‘Sit down, Jos, if you will.’
Jos was typing a message on his phone, holding it in both hands, his thumbs moving at speed across the screen. ‘We met at a college disco. I was at boarding school and hated it, so my mother took me out and I went to Richard Huish Sixth Form College. Freya was in the year above me, but there was a connection . . .’ His voice was running out of steam. ‘What are the fucking chances of that?’ He was still typing, trembling, the phone shaking; deleting and retyping the message, hissing under his breath.
‘Your client is a suspect, and if he refuses to cooperate you will no doubt tell him what conclusion we are likely to draw.’
‘The only conclusion I draw from his refusal to cooperate is that he is being properly advised.’
‘We’ll have a look around on the way out, if that’s all right,’ said Dixon, stalking towards the door.
‘There’s a tour starting at eleven,’ said the solicitor, with a smirk. ‘Tickets are fifteen pounds each.’
Chapter Thirty-Two
‘Do you think he ever sells any of these hot tubs?’ asked Louise.
‘Not in February, no,’ replied Dixon. ‘Did we get the company search back?’
‘Small company accounts, so they tell you bugger all, really. It’s owned by William and his wife, Sally. She’s the company secretary as well.’
The hot tub on the grass outside the showroom was on, steam rising into the cold and miserable winter morning. Lights were on inside, a lone figure sitting at a desk.
‘We still haven’t had a DNA test to confirm it,’ said Louise, the palm of her hand on the door.
‘We’re not likely to get it now, are we?’ Dixon gritted his teeth. ‘We’ve got her confession, so that’ll have to do.’
‘You again,’ said Hudson, when Louise pushed open the door. ‘Let me lock up. We shut at one on a Saturday anyway.’ He locked the door and then flicked a switch on the wall, turning off the hot tub outside. ‘I’ll put the cover on it on the way out.’
‘I’m pleased to tell you, Sir, that we’ve made an arrest for the abduction of Patrick.’
‘Who?’ Hudson spun round, eyes wide.
