Chapter 29

Expectations

The following morning, sitting subdued in his office, Thurstan decided to confront his suspect.

He knew all the problems with his case. A dead witness, another possibly dying; not the sort of thing to attract the enthusiasm of the Crown Prosecution Service. Besides, he’d have to submit a report to them, and he was pretty sure it wouldn’t be long before word got out in certain circles.

He had to do something now, whilst he still had the threat and potential of a witness who was willing and able to give evidence.

The phone rang and he indolently answered it. A summons to the Chief Constable’s office.

On entering Fantasy Island’s premier suite, the secretary picked up the phone. “He’s here now, Sir.” Brief silence followed by: “Leave your phone here and go in.”

He closed the door behind him. Devilliers sat in his overlarge, real leather, high-backed swivel chair.

“Thurstan. Thank you for coming at such short notice,” he began, affably. “Take a seat. I trust you’re finding the central Property Office to your liking. However, as much as you may enjoy it, I’m going to offer you the post of the DCI over on the Wirral. It’ll be more challenging for you, back where you belong and has the added benefit of being closer to home. What do you think?” The Chief was now smiling, seemingly gracious.

Thurstan remained standing. The time was not of his choosing but in a split second, he made his decision. “It was you, wasn’t it? You fitted a young man up for a crime you committed, and you let him die in the shit hole that was Risley.”

The pleasant smile, which had been straining the Chief, disappeared. “Have you taken leave of your senses?”

Calm and composed, Thurstan replied, “No, and you know I haven’t. How’s things, Reg? Quite a climb up the greasy pole. I have to admire you. Not a lot though. You know exactly what I’m talking about. Lennie Turner, Freddy Walsh, Robbie Doyle, the Drug Squad. They must ring bells?”

Devilliers should have shifted awkwardly in his seat, but he didn’t. A snort preceded a short scathing laugh. “I’d be interested to hear your evidence,” he said, then halted Thurstan with a hand gesture. “But, I don’t need to because I’m going to tell you. Let me see ... you’ve a recording of Freddy Walsh confessing he was present at the scene of an alleged murder. A dying man, Freddy, who obviously wanted to clear his conscience but at the same time, as people do, he wanted to shift the responsibility for the crime onto someone else, so he chose me. Why? Well, just before I left the squad, we’d fallen out badly because I’d discovered he was corrupt. I said I was going to report it if he didn’t stop. I knew nothing about the other members of ...”

“But you didn’t report him, did you?” Thurstan interjected.

“No, I didn’t, but that was simply because he enlightened me to the extent of corruption within the squad and warned me what would happen to me if I pursued the thought. It was then I decided to get out, but before I did, who do you think anonymously alerted the complaints people to the situation?”

“And, conveniently, you’re saying it was you?”

“Conveniently or not, they were told.” he replied before continuing, scornfully. “So, what else have you got? Oh, that’s right. Tim Beck.” He saw Thurstan’s expression. “Yes, I know who your witness is. He came to us on an attachment with a view to being posted. He wasn’t very good at all. A classic case of his previous supervision bulling him up just so they could get rid of him. He was struggling with the hours and seemed to have something on his mind most of the time. I think he was having marital issues. He was generally crap. We endured him as long as we could.”

He leaned forward in emphasis. “What you don’t know is, it was an act of charity on my part but ... in the end, I had to recommend he be sent back to uniform. Now, he was very angry about that and caused such a scene we had to forcibly take him outside to calm him down.” He sipped from a glass of water next to him and explained, “He’s obviously borne a grudge against me ever since. He used to phone up every now and again just to shout obscenities at me.” He slowly shook his head from side to side in feigned sadness. “Of course, I didn’t do anything about it, because it was clear to me, he was under pressure from a nagging wife. I did my best to look after him and that’s how he treated me. However, I bear him no ill will. In fact, I hear he’s currently not very well. Apparently, the prognosis is not good, not good at all. Very sad. You’re not very lucky with witnesses are you. What else have you got?”

Thurstan was starting to get flustered. He’d expected Devilliers to be defensive, but this confidence was distracting.  “The records office fire. Just before your transfer to Essex. Oddly fortuitous and advantageous?”

“A chance happening, I assure you. It was very inconvenient. So, now you infer I’m an arsonist? Have your enquiries shown you I was on a week’s holiday at the time? I thought not. I was hillwalking in Scotland, if I remember correctly. It was a long time ago. It could have equally been Wales.”

He smiled and spoke quietly, “No, you’ve nothing there either. Mere supposition. I can assure you I did not set fire to the records office.” Then he added, sarcastically, “But let’s see if I can help you. I’m pretty sure the Fire Brigade investigated it. I seem to recall it was due to an electrical fault. Hang on! Why don’t you get the investigation report, and if you think it was suspicious, start an enquiry to find out why nothing was done.”

He laughed. “Oh, wait a minute. You can’t even do that because it’ll have been routinely destroyed by the Fire chappies.” Hesitating, so he could enjoy the look of disappointment on his adversary’s face, he said.   “So, what else have you got? Not much, as far as I can see.” He was up and walking to the large window which looked out onto the Albert Dock.

Thurstan could only come up with: “Why did you change your name?”

The Chief guffawed. “It’s not illegal. Anyone can do it. In my case, I wanted to honour my late grandmother’s surname and I’d never liked the name Reginald, so old-fashioned and common-sounding, don’t you think? I’d always wanted to be a Toby and now I am. I’ve never hidden my change of name. Granted, I’ve never advertised it but then again, I’m not required to. I’m sure there’ll be a copy of the deed poll in my personal file.”

He stabbed a finger across the room at his increasingly stunned foe. “Do you know why I never liked you? I knew on our first meeting you were the only other alpha male in the room. The rest? A bunch of chancers, opportunists and sycophants; all overambitious with average job-related talent and a propensity for laziness. I can manipulate these sort of people. I have a knack for it. But you? You’re a stubborn, over-curious, irritatingly knowledgeable smart-arse and I knew, instantly, you were never going to be persuadable. Too much pride and determination. It made you dangerous.” He sauntered back to his chair.

Thurstan heard none of this, he stood in dazed silence. He’d seen the mouth moving, heard a buzzing like several very large bumble bees trying to escape an inescapable window, but he’d missed the actual words, the compliments and the insults.

The significance of the listening device in the smoke alarm back at Sutton Box was only now evident. It had never been put there by PSD to catch Gandalph out. Devilliers had someone place it there to monitor the DCI himself. Slowly, he refocused on what was being said.

A seated Devilliers continued. “It’s all very interesting, Thurstan. But you’ve no records of any significance to rely on. The destruction policies of the individual agencies have seen to that. You and I both know what you’ve got amounts to nothing. You only have supposition and the accusations of people with an axe to grind against me.  But ... just in case you don’t realise, I’ll spell it out for you.” He leaned back and casually twirled a pen in his fingers.

“If the CPS take on board what you’ve presently got, and I can’t see you getting much more, if anything at all, then ... should poor Tim pass on, you’ll be stuck with two bits of so-called evidence which are essentially hearsay. I know there are steps the CPS can take to try to remedy things, but getting a result there is an awfully long way from being guaranteed. Personally, I don’t think they’ll be too keen at all on these wild accusations you’re making against a Chief Constable.”

He leaned forward, pointing the pen. “Innocent until proven guilty, Thurstan. Two witnesses who bear grudges against me, both with no corroboration. Then there’s yourself. Who’s going to believe your motives are pure? You clearly believe I shafted you with the posting out of MIT whilst the truth is I merely disciplined you for gross impudence. No, it’s an interesting story but it’s not really going anywhere. Unlike you.”

He shuffled through some papers on the blotter in front of him, quickly scrawling a signature. Without looking up he added, “It’s best to resign, Thurstan, come out of all this with some dignity. I want it on my desk by tomorrow midday and I’ll give you a glowing reference. You won’t enjoy the alternative. Now, if you don’t mind, I have a lot to do so, unless you’re going to challenge me to a duel, I think we’re done.”