Implant (DI Gardener 3)

“What did you think of Sinclair, sir?” asked Cragg.

“Seemed okay to me, Maurice,” replied Gardener. “A bit of a control freak, maybe.”

“And a bit of OCD, if you ask me,” said Reilly. “Did you notice the light switches?”

Everyone roared with laughter. “Fuck me, Reilly,” said Anderson. “Only you could go and interview someone and come out with a statement like that.”

“That’s ’cause I pay attention.”

Even Gardener was laughing. “Go on, then, Sean. What’s with the light switches?”

“They were all the same way up, including the double and triple switches. Have you any idea how hard it is to control light switches so that they all face the same way?”

“Tried, have you?” laughed Thornton. “Wouldn’t surprise me, it’s obviously another sign of madness, and they don’t come any madder than you.”

Another roar of laughter erupted.

“You mark my words,” shouted Reilly to Thornton. “Something will come of it.”

As the laughter subsided, Gardener continued. “Anyway, Sinclair felt that he recognised the game cards: figured that they may have been from a game released in the Seventies but couldn’t tell us a great deal more.”

He glanced at PC Close. “Gary, did you find out anything on Walker Brothers? I’m not after a chequered history, just someone we can talk to.”

“Yes, sir,” said Close. “This game called Murder was developed and distributed in 1968. The man you want to talk to is Simon Walker, the founder’s grandson. He had a seat on the board from 1980, until it was sold to Hasbro in 1994. Anyway, he lives in Shipston, west side of Leeds going towards Bradford. Said he’d be happy to speak to you tomorrow morning, if you have the time.”

“Isn’t that where Ronson lives?” Reilly asked. “We can probably kill two birds with one stone.”

“You’re right, Sean.”

Gardener turned back to PC Close. “Excellent work, Gary. I’ve been meaning to ask, how’s your mum?”

“Comfortable, according to Sinclair. He reckons I should be able to go and see her tomorrow morning. She’s heavily sedated at the moment.”

“That’s good to hear.” Gardener did not want to tell him anything about his meeting with Sinclair, and the fact that he had also asked about Gary’s mother. He didn’t particularly want to betray client confidentiality.

“And your leg?”

“Improving, sir. Now you’ve made me take the tablets.”

Gardener smiled. He turned to Rawson. “Dave, anything on Ross, did you manage to speak to him?”

“Yes, sir. But not for long.”

“How come?”

“He sounds just like Sinclair from what you’ve described, a bit of a control freak but I didn’t check his light switches.”

Another roar of laughter erupted before Patrick Edwards took over. “We went to see him, had to speak to his wife first. She said he followed his morning rituals quite closely: another one with OCD.”

“One of his rituals was the Times crossword,” said Rawson. “Anyway, I remember seeing a film with Roger Moore once. He was doing the Times crossword, and someone asked if he could do it in ten minutes, and he replied, I have never taken ten minutes. Which was exactly what Ross said when he came out of his study as I was asking his wife.”

“Everything about him reeks of money,” said Edwards, “posh house, fancy car, a watch that probably cost more than I earn in a yea

r… not that I’m complaining about my salary.”

“To cut a long story short, sir,” said Rawson, “he told us pretty much the same story you got from Sinclair. He reckoned you have to know what the hell you were doing to get away with what the killer did to Sonia Knight: more importantly, you would have to have somewhere accommodating to carry it out. It wasn’t an afternoon fix – something like that takes time.”

“They certainly had the time if she’s been missing a month,” said Cragg.