The Kill Call

proved guilty?’
    ‘And you still say you didn’t intend to kill Patrick Rawson?’ asked Fry.
    ‘No. It was an accident.’
    Her tone carried a hint of regret. And it was probably that which finally convinced Fry she was telling the truth.
       
    Rick Widdowson had recovered from the humiliation of his arrest very quickly. He walked into Interview Room Two with a strut, swinging his shoulders, his head tilted to spread a smirk around the room.
    ‘Have you been informed of your rights?’ asked Fry. ‘Offered facilities and refreshments while you’ve been waiting?’
    ‘Good cop, bad cop – never goes out of fashion, does it?’ he said.
    ‘This is good cop, good cop. You haven’t even seen the bad one yet.’
    ‘You don’t have anything on me,’ said Widdowson, sitting confidently at the table opposite Fry. ‘If you did, there’d be a solicitor here, and the tape recorders running.’
    That was the trouble with regular customers – they knew too much. Rick was right, of course. She had no evidence to implicate him in the death of Patrick Rawson. Not yet.
    ‘So why did you try to escape when we visited your home?’ said Fry.
    He smiled. ‘I was going for help. I thought we had burglars.’
    Fry sighed. ‘You know your sister is in trouble. Wouldn’t you like to help her?’
    ‘’Course I would. Only too keen to help.’
    If that was so, his loyalty might only be one way, thought Fry.
    ‘You can start by telling me where you were on Tuesday morning.’
    ‘I don’t have anything to say.’
    ‘You might as well go, then.’
    Widdowson made a move to get up, then froze. Fry could see the calculation going through his mind, and she guessed what he was thinking.
    ‘Yes, you’re free to leave at any time, Mr Widdowson. You can get up and walk out. But that would be a strange thing to do if, as you claim, you want to help your sister. “Only too keen to help” – wasn’t that your phrase? And I believe you, of course.’
    Widdowson continued to hesitate, glancing at the door instead of at Fry.
    ‘But if you walk out now, sir, I’d probably have to stop believing you.’
    With a deep sigh, Widdowson sat back down and stared at his hands.
    ‘I do want to help her.’ He paused, seeming to realize that what he’d said didn’t sound enough. ‘I’m her brother, after all.’
    ‘That’s good. I was starting to get the opposite impression.’
    ‘It’s just … Well, I know what you lot are like. If you haven’t got anyone else in your sights, you’ll fix it on the nearest person you can find.’
    Fry raised an eyebrow. A little too dramatically, perhaps. But an interview room was a stage of a kind. You had to make your gestures understood by the dimmest suspect sitting at the back of the intellectual stalls.
    ‘You’re suggesting that we were going to accuse you of being involved in Patrick Rawson’s death? Where did you get that idea from, Mr Widdowson? I’m sure I didn’t say anything to give you that impression, did I?’
    ‘Well, not exactly.’
    ‘Was it something one of my colleagues said? Did they give you that impression?’
    Widdowson frowned. ‘I don’t know what made me think that,’ he said. ‘It was nothing.’
    ‘Oh, well.’ Fry gave a hint of a shrug, and smiled. ‘Perhaps it was just something in your own mind, sir? It happens sometimes, doesn’t it? We hear what we’re expecting to hear, rather than what someone actually says.’
    With an effort, Widdowson squared his shoulders and met Fry’s stare. ‘I’m here to help. Like I said. If you tell me what you want from me, I’ll do my best. Otherwise, we’re all wasting our time, aren’t we?’
    Fry looked down at her notes. Her scrawl was illegible, even to her. To Widdowson, it must have looked like an indecipherable code.
    ‘It would be helpful, sir, if you could just go over the events of Tuesday morning. Who knows what it might produce?’
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘It could be something really useful,’ said Fry. ‘Something that might help us –’
    ‘Yes, I know: Help you to catch the killer.’
    ‘Right. I’m glad we’re all singing from the same hymn sheet at last, Mr Widdowson.’
    He looked at her with a puzzled frown. ‘Tuesday morning, I was at home doing a bit of rip and burn on some CDs I’d borrowed.’
    ‘Any witnesses who can confirm that?’
    ‘Not unless Bill Gates has managed to sneak some spyware into Windows Media Player.’
    ‘You didn’t make or receive any phone