Not Dead Enough

asked.
    ‘Pardon? What do you mean?’
    Branson looked at his notes. ‘One of our team spoke yesterday to a Mrs Diane Rand. We understand from her that she was one of your wife’s best friends, is that correct?’
    ‘They spoke to each other about four times a day. God knows what they had to say to each other!’
    ‘Plenty, I think,’ Branson responded humourlessly. ‘Mrs Rand told our officer, a WPC, that your wife had been expressing concerns recently over your increasingly kinky sexual demands on her. Would you like to elaborate on this?’
    Leighton Lloyd interjected quickly and firmly. ‘No, my client would not.’
    ‘I have one significant question on this issue,’ Branson said, addressing the lawyer. Lloyd gestured for him to ask it.
    ‘Mr Bishop,’ Branson said, ‘do you possess a replica Second World War gas mask?’
    ‘What is the relevance of that question?’ Lloyd asked the DS.
    ‘It’s extremely relevant, sir,’ Branson said.
    Grace watched Bishop’s eyes intently. They shot to the right. ‘Yes,’ he said.
    ‘Is it something you and Mrs Bishop used in your sex life?’
    ‘I’m not allowing my client to answer.’
    Bishop raised a pacifying hand at his solicitor. ‘It’s OK. Yes, I bought it.’ He shrugged, blushing. ‘We were experimenting. I – I read a book about how to keep your love life going – you know? It sort of flags after a while between two people, when the initial excitement – novelty of the relationship – is over. I got stuff for us to try out.’ His face was the colour of beetroot.
    Branson turned his focus on to Bishop’s dinner with his financial adviser, Phil Taylor. ‘Mr Bishop, it’s correct, isn’t it, that one of the cars you own is a Bentley Continental, in a dark red colour?’
    ‘Umbrian red, yes.’
    ‘Registration number Lima Juliet Zero Four November Whiskey Sierra?’
    Unused to the phonetic alphabet, Bishop had to think for a moment. Then he nodded.
    ‘At eleven forty-seven last Thursday night, this vehicle was photographed by an Automatic Number Plate Recognition camera, on the south-bound carriageway of the M23 motorway, in the vicinity of Gatwick airport. Can you explain why it was there and who was driving it?’
    Bishop looked at his solicitor.
    ‘Do you have the photograph?’ Leighton Lloyd asked.
    ‘No, but I can let you have a copy,’ Branson said.
    Lloyd made a note in his book.
    ‘There’s a mistake,’ Bishop said. ‘There must be.’
    ‘Did you lend your car to anyone that evening?’ Branson asked.
    ‘I never lend it. I had it in London that night because I needed to drive down to the golf club in the morning.’
    ‘Could anyone have borrowed it without your permission – or your knowledge?’
    ‘No. Well, I don’t think so. It’s extremely unlikely.’
    ‘Who else has keys to the vehicle, apart from you, sir?’
    ‘No one. We’ve had some problems in the underground car park – beneath my flat. Some cars broken into.’
    ‘Could joyriders have taken it out for a spin?’ Leighton Lloyd interjected.
    ‘It’s possible,’ Bishop said.
    ‘When joyriders take a car they don’t usually bring it back,’ Grace said. He watched Lloyd making a note in his book. The lawyer would have a field day with that.
    Next, Glenn Branson said, ‘Mr Bishop, we have already mentioned to you that during the course of a search of your house at 97 Dyke Road Avenue, a life insurance policy with the Southern Star Assurance Company was found. The policy is on your wife’s life, with a value of three million pounds. You are named as the sole beneficiary.’
    Grace swung his eyes from Bishop to the lawyer. Lloyd’s expression barely changed, but his shoulders sank a little. Brian Bishop’s eyes were all over the place and his composure seemed suddenly to have deserted him.
    ‘Look, I told you – I – I already told you – I know nothing about this! Absolutely nothing!’
    ‘Do you think your wife took this policy out herself, secretly, from the goodness of her heart?’ Branson pressed him.
    Grace smiled at this, proud of the way his colleague, to whom he had given so much guidance over the past few years, because he adored him and believed in him, was really growing in stature.
    Bishop raised his hands, then let them flop down on to the table. His eyes were all over the place still. ‘Please believe me, I don’t know anything about this.’
    ‘On three million pounds, I imagine there’d be a hefty premium,’