DCI Isaac Cook Box Set 1, стр. 355
‘What do you do here?’ Isaac asked.
‘We’re a small government-funded research department.’
‘What type of research?’
‘Some of it’s classified, but what’s this got to do with Malcolm?’
‘He’s still alive,’ Isaac said.
‘Impossible,’ Barrow said, standing up from his chair.
‘We have proof.’
‘How?’
‘He murdered George Arbuthnot and Harold Hutton. You do know both of these men?’
‘Well, yes. But why? And how do you know he’s alive? We’ve all believed him to be dead for years.’
‘Fingerprints.’
‘They can be faked, can’t they?’
‘You’re the scientist, you tell us,’ Isaac said.
‘I suppose so, but why?’
‘The evidence pointing to this department is indisputable. Whatever the reason for Arbuthnot and Hutton, whatever the reason for Woolston returning, the answers lie here.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. This is all too much for me to take in.’
‘We came here first. Woolston’s wife and daughter need to be told.’
‘Please, not yet. You can imagine the effect this will have on them. It may be best if I tell them.’
‘That is your prerogative, but we will need to talk to your wife soon.’
‘Give me two days.’
‘Coming back to Malcolm Woolston,’ Isaac said. ‘Why did he disappear?’
‘What do you know about the man?’ Barrow asked.
‘At this present moment, not a lot. We’re compiling a dossier. We know he was brilliant, with many academic papers to his name, and engineering and mathematics doctorates.’
‘The man was impressive. He was the smartest man I knew, and I’ve met a few over the years.’
‘Anything more?’
‘You’ll find this out soon enough.’
‘What?’
‘Malcolm Woolston was brilliant, and as with all brilliant men, he was subject to eccentricity.’
‘What sort of eccentricity?’
‘He was a genius level intellect bordering on madness. He’d been hospitalised a few times in the past. You’ll find that out if you check. He had a persecution complex, and he could be violent.’
‘Any instances here?’
‘He tried it on me once; suspected me of strangling his research budget.’
‘Were you?’
‘The department was being subjected to another financial audit. I had to clamp down on expenditure to make the books balance. It wasn’t aimed at Malcolm, although he saw it that way.’
‘What was he researching?’
‘Classified. Way above your level.’
‘I could get clearance,’ Isaac said.
‘You must understand, I’m subject to the Official Secrets Act. It would be a criminal offence for me to reveal what he was working on.’
Isaac did not believe the man, but he had been forced to sign the Official Secrets Act, as had Larry, when they had been looking for a missing woman in a previous case.
However, Malcolm Woolston did not appear to be involved with the security organisations, but was purely a man out for revenge, and if he had killed Arbuthnot and Hutton for that reason, then Barrow was a clear target as well.
The first thing that Isaac intended to resolve was to get the necessary security clearance. He was sure he would be back in Barrow’s office after that, and as for his wife, he would not wait for Barrow to inform her that she had two husbands, both alive and well.
Isaac knew he’d take Wendy on that occasion.
Outside in the street, Larry asked, ‘What do you reckon?’
‘Scientific research, an arms dealer. What do you think?’
‘I’d say they were researching advanced weaponry. That would explain the security rating.’
‘Maybe,’ Isaac said. ‘These people all tend to be neurotic.’
‘Ed Barrow?’
‘Until he’s been checked out, he remains suspect. Whatever happens, he’s a prime target.’
Inside the building, Barrow picked up his phone. Sue Christie was sitting alongside him. ‘The police have identified Malcolm Woolston.’
‘We’ll implement damage control. You were right to doubt his disappearance all those years ago, but, where was he?’
‘The question is not where he was; the question is where he is now,’ Barrow said.
He hung up the phone and turned to Sue Christie. ‘This is going to get dirty. Are you prepared for the flak?’
‘I’m prepared,’ she said as she leant over and kissed him firmly on the lips.
Chapter 16
Malcolm Woolston, no longer using the name of Big Greg, realised that he was navigating a tricky path. On one side, the need to protect the results of his research and to extract his revenge. On the other, the need to be with his family again. He knew why he had killed Robertson; he had had enough of living a lie, hiding in the shadows, pretending to be someone he was not.
A methodical man, he laid out the plan on his laptop. He had dealt with those who had tortured him, and he had lined up his wife’s second husband as another person who had to die. He assumed that the man, callous as he knew him to be, would not have told Gwen, that her first husband, Malcolm, was alive and well, and close by.
He had given the police a warning, not that he had ever expected them to take heed. He had seen the black police inspector with the woman from the hostel that he had spoken to on the bench. Very friendly he had thought when he had seen them, but then, he knew her history, had seen her selling herself.
It was strange, he thought, that when he had been disreputable and on the street the thought of the soft touch of a woman had not entered his mind, although it did now, but it was always the same woman: his wife. And she was safely ensconced with Ed Barrow, one of the men he had decided to kill. Maybe if he explained all that had happened, all that must occur, then she would transfer her affections back to him.
He knew that was unlikely. Too much water under