The year ten photograph listed all the pupils in alphabetical order, so he had no way of knowing who was who on the picture. He scanned the names and saw both Lorraine’s and Tina’s, along with Kenneth West. Tina had obviously not married, or at least hadn’t changed her name, and was listed as Tina Jackson; he thanked the Lord that Lorraine had had a fairly unusual Christian name. She was there. Lorraine Roberts.
He heard his office door open and he looked up, a smile instantly appearing.
‘Afternoon, boss,’ Holly said, and he beckoned her in.
‘We’ve got the school photos from Kenny. I’ve no idea how they can help us, but it’s building the bigger picture. It appears that Tina Jackson and Lorraine West were in the same year.’
Holly reached across and took them from him, and while casually looking at the photograph said, ‘Would you like to come round for a meal tonight?’
He leaned across his desk and pointed at what he could tell was the picture of Lorraine, and said, ‘Definitely.’
Holly smiled. ‘Seven?’
‘Yes.’
‘So this is Lorraine? You can tell, can’t you. She was pretty; no wonder Kenny fell for her. Last time I saw him he was saying they’d been together for ever.’ Holly turned the picture over and scanned the names. ‘So they were in the same year, Kenny and Lorraine.’
Tom nodded. ‘Yes, but I can’t pick him out. All the lads look the same. Luckily Lorraine had blonde hair at school, so that was fairly easy, but I’ve no idea which one is Kenny.’
Holly finally sat down and pulled the photo closer to her. It wasn’t only the blonde hair; Lorraine’s face had changed little. ‘So pretty, wasn’t she, even at this age. I think Kenny could be the lad two rows back, and almost immediately behind her. I can’t tell at all which one is Tina Jackson. Think facial recognition could help?’
‘We can try, but maybe Kenny can help. He’s on the damn photo, surely he can remember most, if not all of them.’
‘Shall I send Diane back with the photo and ask her to go through it with him and link as many names to faces as we can?’
Tom grinned. ‘I think not. Maybe we’ll take this one. Two heads are better than one, so we’ll go tomorrow morning. And tonight I’ll tell you a story about how you can accidentally sleep with somebody.’
Holly stood and picked up the file of photographs. ‘I’ll get these copied and enlarged, then we can take the originals back when we go to see Kenny. Something’s pecking at me. Lorraine Roberts.’
Holly paused in the doorway with a frown. ‘It’ll come to me,’ and she pulled the door closed. It opened again immediately. ‘Roberts! Malc Roberts! The feller who tumbled down the stairs while Kenny and Graham were robbing him.’
15
They looked through the old file on the closed case, and saw mention of a daughter-in-law, Shirley Roberts, who had been married to Malc Roberts’ son, Lawrence. Lawrence had died two years earlier than his father, and Shirley had taken on the care of her father-in-law, checking on him every day because he lived alone. She had been the one who had found him at the bottom of the stairs. He had left everything to her, with a small sum of five hundred pounds for his only grandchild, Lorraine.
Shirley had died three years later, leaving Lorraine with a tidy inheritance from the sale of her home.
‘I can’t get my head around this,’ Holly said.
‘What specifically?’
‘Kenny West was living with Lorraine at the time of this crime, and he would definitely have known Malcolm Roberts was her grandfather. What kind of man does something like that? And Kenny would have gone through the whole funeral thing supporting her, standing by her, and all the time he’d been in that house robbing the poor chap, who probably fell down the stairs because he heard Andrews and West.’
Tom nodded. ‘Kenny’ll pay for it, I promise you, but he’s no idea we know anything about this, so let’s keep it like that.’ He reached across to answer the strident ring of his phone.
‘DI Fowler.’ Tom frowned. ‘Put him in room one. I’ll be down in ten minutes. Give him a coffee, or something.’ He replaced the receiver and looked at Holly. ‘Graham Andrews is downstairs. Wants to see us. Think he’s come to confess?’
‘Hardly,’ she laughed. ‘He definitely didn’t pull that trigger, he’d been left minding the kids, remember?’
Tom’s face was grim. ‘Doesn’t mean he didn’t order it to happen.’
Graham had drunk his coffee by the time the two police officers arrived at the Moss Way interview room.
‘Graham.’ Tom Fowler held out his hand. Graham shook it. ‘How can we help you?’
‘I have something to tell you that was irrelevant in Carla and Lorraine’s deaths, but now isn’t, so I thought I’d better pop in and see you.’
‘Oh?’
‘It concerns Tina Jackson. I’d been having an affair of sorts with her.’
There was a momentary silence, and then Holly spoke. ‘An affair of sorts? What does that mean?’
‘I was seeing her.’
‘Did your wife know?’
Graham shook his head. ‘No, she didn’t. It was never serious on my part, and when I realised how involved Tina was becoming, I called it off. But Tina’s dead, so I can’t keep quiet about it.’
‘You killed her?’ Holly raised her eyebrows as she asked the question.
‘No, of course I didn’t.’
‘You know who did?’
‘Certainly not. You might cast an eye over her partner though. Charlie Linwood.’
‘Charlie Linwood was locked up in our cells when Tina was killed. You want to come up with another name? What about Kenny West? Or, heaven forbid, Graham Andrews.’
‘Now you’re being ridiculous. Of course it wasn’t either of us.’
Tom stood, and Holly followed. ‘We’ll need a statement from you, Mr Andrews. Don’t leave anything out. We want chapter and verse on this affair: who knew about it, how long it’s been over. I’ll send one of our PCs down to take it, then we’ll discuss whether you can go home or not.’
They walked out of the room, leaving an open-mouthed Graham speechless.
The betting shop’s cleaner, Janice Marshall, handed Tom and Holly a glass of water each, ice cubes tinkling to cool it down even further than her fridge had.
She sat down at her kitchen table, nursing a coffee. ‘How can I help?’
‘Simply by answering a few questions really. We need to get timelines in order, find out routines, stuff like that.’ Holly smiled at her, putting her at ease immediately.
Janice nodded and waited.
Holly opened her notebook. ‘How long have you worked at the betting shop?’
‘About five years, same as…’ There was a pause as Janice took in a breath. ‘Same as Lorraine. She got me the job.’
‘And how many days a week do you work?’
‘Six. Monday to Saturday. Sundays it gets a bit of a lick around by whoever is managing the shop, then Monday I give it a good doing.’