Роберт Торогуд – The Killing Of Polly Carter (страница 7)
‘Would anyone here mind if Detective Sergeant Bordey now did a search of all your rooms to look for a yellow raincoat?’ Before anyone could answer, Richard continued, ‘Good. Camille, if you would?’
With a nod to her boss, Camille left the room, but Richard only had eyes for the four witnesses. Did any of them look particularly worried at the prospect of their rooms being searched? He had to admit that they didn’t, so Richard turned back to Claire.
‘You see, it strikes me as odd that someone would be wearing a raincoat with the hood up on a boiling hot day when there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky.’
‘Yes, when you put it like that,’ Claire said. ‘It does seem strange. But it’s what I saw.’
‘Then can I ask, if there was a person in a yellow coat on the cliff steps before your sister went down them, who was the next person to go down the steps after Polly?’
‘That was me,’ Sophie said.
‘And how soon afterwards did you follow her?’
‘I don’t know, but it could only have been a minute or two later. When I got to the cliff, Claire was upset, and it was only when we saw the body on the beach that I realised what might have happened.’
‘So you’d already seen Polly’s body on the beach before you went down the cliff?’
‘That’s right. Claire had gone a little way along the cliff’s edge. We were both able to look back at the beach from there.’
‘Then did you see a person in a yellow raincoat anywhere on the beach when you looked down at Polly’s body from the top of the cliff?’
Sophie thought for a moment before answering, ‘I’m sorry, no.’
‘Then perhaps you saw this person in the yellow coat on your way down to the beach?’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t see anyone else on the steps. Or on the beach below. In a yellow raincoat or otherwise. When I got down there, there was just Polly’s body. There wasn’t anyone else.’
‘But that’s not possible,’ Claire said. ‘Because I’m telling you I saw a person in a yellow raincoat go down the steps just beforehand, you must have seen them, Sophie! Did you not see a flash of yellow at all? Maybe only after you got down to the beach?’
‘It’s unlikely,’ Richard said. ‘Even by the time my officers arrived at the scene, the only footprints we could find in the sand led from the steps to the body and nowhere else. So, if there was a “Man in Yellow” who went down the steps beforehand, he didn’t go off and hide anywhere else on the beach.’
‘Then perhaps they managed to hide on the steps themselves, Sophie,’ Claire said.
Richard could see that Sophie was briefly conflicted. But only briefly.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said to Claire. ‘I’m pretty sure there wasn’t anyone hiding on the cliff steps, either. And definitely no one in a yellow coat.’
‘But they must have been,’ Claire said with shrill insistence. ‘I know what I saw!’
Richard made a note that whoever Claire saw on the cliff steps before Polly’s death—assuming, of course, she saw anyone—had somehow managed to vanish into thin air afterwards.
‘Very well,’ Richard said. ‘Then can you tell me, Claire, did Polly have a cut in her forearm at all before she went down the cliff steps?’
The question threw Claire. ‘A cut?’
‘That’s right. A deep cut about six inches long, running from the inside of her elbow down to just above her wrist,’ Richard clarified, indicating on the sleeve of his right arm. ‘It would have been bleeding quite heavily.’
‘No,’ Claire said. ‘She wasn’t bleeding at all. And her dress was sleeveless, I’m sure I’d have seen if she’d cut herself in any way.’
‘Then what about you, Sophie?’ Richard asked, turning to the nurse. ‘You must have seen the cut on Polly’s forearm when you found her on the beach?’
Sophie thought for a moment before answering. ‘No … I’m sorry. I didn’t notice any cut on her arm, either.’
Richard made a note. So there was no independent corroboration that the cut on Polly’s arm had been inflicted before she fell. So when exactly had she cut herself? It couldn’t have been
Richard looked back at Sophie. ‘Okay, so once you’d gone to Polly on the beach, what did you do next?’
‘I established that there was no pulse in Polly’s neck and then I called back up to Claire to phone for an ambulance.’
‘That’s right,’ Claire said, ‘but I didn’t have my mobile phone on me, so I had to go back to the house.’
‘I’m sorry?’ Richard said, surprised.
‘I … I didn’t have my mobile on me, so I pushed myself back to the house and used the landline to call for an ambulance. That’s when I saw Max coming down from upstairs and I told him what had happened.’
‘That’s right,’ Max agreed eagerly. ‘I saw Claire heading back across the garden, so I went down to meet her in the hallway. After she’d explained to me what had happened and was phoning for an ambulance, I went down to the beach and waited with Sophie until the ambulance arrived.’
‘Then how about you, Phil?’ Richard asked. ‘When did you discover that Polly had died?’
‘Well that’s the thing,’ Phil said. ‘After I saw the argument in the garden, I went back to my work. I didn’t want whatever was going on between Claire and Polly to distract me. And I carried on working in my room until I saw an ambulance arrive at the front of the house about half an hour later. That’s when I came downstairs and finally heard the terrible news.’
‘I see,’ Richard said, realising that, putting aside which of the two men Sophie saw at the window when she looked back at the house, Max now had a definite alibi for just before the time of death—when he was seen going up the stairs by Sophie—and just afterwards as well—when he was seen coming down the stairs by Claire. As for Phil, seeing as Sophie’s view of the person at the window just beforehand had been so vague, he didn’t seem to have a definite alibi for before the time of death, or for the minutes immediately afterwards.
‘But I don’t understand why you’re asking where we all were,’ Max said nervously. ‘Or wondering who this man in the yellow coat was. None of it’s relevant, because we know what happened. Polly said she’d end her life, she went down the steps and then she threw herself to her death.’
‘Indeed,’ Richard said. ‘And you raise an important point, so can I ask, how surprised are you all that Polly would end her life like this?’
Richard could see the witnesses exchange glances. He’d struck a nerve.
‘If someone could answer the question,’ Richard asked again.
‘Well maybe I should take this,’ Max said. ‘As her agent. Because, if we’re being honest, Polly’s been depressed for some time. So one minute she was up, up, up, and the next, everything had crashed around her and she’d get destructive. She’d want to hurt you until she felt better.’
‘That’s what I meant when I said it was more that she didn’t get on with me,’ Claire said. ‘She was difficult and wilful at the best of times.’
‘But she didn’t do herself any favours, either,’ Max said. ‘Because you should know, Polly was also a recovering drug addict, and that caused terrible mood swings as well.’
‘And when you say drugs?’ Richard asked.
‘Heroin,’ Claire said. ‘She’d been using for years.’
‘Your sister was a heroin addict?’
‘But she checked herself into rehab earlier this year,’ Phil said loyally. ‘She’s been clean since then.’
‘And when was she in rehab?’
‘It was six months ago,’ Max said. ‘Just after Christmas. She spent three months in a clinic in Los Angeles. And since she came out, she’s been clean. I’m sure we’d have known if she wasn’t.’
Max looked around the room, and no one disagreed with him.
‘The point is,’ Phil said, speaking for all of them, ‘we can all imagine that if Polly wanted to end her life, this is the sort of crazy mad-arse way she might go about doing it. She always loved melodrama.’
Richard looked at the witnesses and realised he’d probably got enough from them for the moment. Although there was one loose end he needed to tie up before he could leave.
‘Then thank you all for your time,’ he said to the room, closing down the topic of Polly’s drug addiction for the moment. ‘But one last question. If you don’t mind? Claire, are you really saying you didn’t have your mobile on you when your sister died?’
‘I’m sorry?’ Claire said.
‘Only, in my experience, people who have issues with mobility
‘Well … that’s true,’ she conceded. ‘I do normally have my mobile with me. I keep it in here.’
Claire indicated a fabric pouch that hung from the armrest of her wheelchair.
‘But your phone wasn’t in your pouch this morning?’
‘I thought it was,’ Claire said, increasingly confused that Richard was following this line of questioning. ‘But when I looked for it on the cliff top, it wasn’t there. It’s why I had to go back to the house to phone for an ambulance. Like I said.’
‘Can you tell me, where is your mobile phone right now?’
‘Really?’
‘If you could just answer the question?’
Claire huffed. ‘Well, as it happens, I’ve not been able to find my mobile since then. To be honest, it’s not been a top priority.’
‘You’re saying it’s still missing?’ Richard asked, unable to keep the eagerness out of his voice.