Page 49 of The Dead Come to Stay
“Meaning the murder is UNESCO and Interpol territory. Okay, next?”
“Two: Burnhope and Foley are in it together. Foley was his heavy, the dark horse to his golden boy, and the York property was a place to warehouse artifacts before distribution,” Green finished, but MacAdams wagged a finger.
“ Except Burnhope knew that the York property was behind schedule and had been called by the Lord Mayor of all people. Ashok said
they could have lost the property if the right strings were pulled; that’s no place to keep secrets.”
“Maybe he’s just that brash?” Green asked.
MacAdams stared at the photos pinned to the board. Burnhope, with his hooded eyes, smooth manners, important friends. Foley,
with his faux black hair, his habit of bullying men and wooing women and his propensity to bug out when things got hot.
“No. Burnhope is bold. He’s cool under pressure. But not brash. I don’t think he knew the artifacts were in York. If he had,
and he was part of the deal, he would have cleaned the place out immediately, not three days after Foley’s death. But that’s
not all.” MacAdams drummed the table. “Burnhope said it himself, in a way. Foley did the dirty work, the hands-on business
of dealing with contractors. If Burnhope is in on the trade, Foley is the middleman. And Burnhope himself doesn’t want that
job.”
Green drew her brows together, thinking.
“Did you just clear Burnhope of murder?” she asked.
“No. But now you see why I don’t think the motive has to do with the artifact trade.”
“Okay, then what about Foley corrupting Dmytro?” Green suggested. “That’s a motive for Burnhope and Sophie. And what about
Gerald Standish? He’s a sponsor or whatever, but isn’t he still a likely buyer for the butty van art?”
MacAdams set his coffee mug aside. “Okay, now that makes sense. Small-time operation, that would be the sort of thing that works local. Granted, he still has plausible deniability.
He could say he didn’t know the back-of-van objects were illegal.”
“Yes but only because Foley is dead. He can’t plea-bargain and spill it. But he can’t be our murderer, either,” Green said, returning to the computer terminal. “He’s right here on the tapes... and he never even leaves the bar.”
The alibis were really starting to gall. Green restarted the video and MacAdams peered over her shoulder. Ava had entered
the frame. She wore a gown of shimmering silver, her platinum hair wound up in a complicated braid. The piano had been largely
obscured by milling humans; now a spotlight shone upon it, and Ava took her place at the keys.
“You know, I may have had a mild crush on her,” she mused. “Back in Newcastle. She was a joy to watch, even if not exactly
my type.”
There it was again: type. He found himself thinking of Arianna—and her taunts about leaving town.
“Do you miss it here in Newcastle?” he asked.
Green lifted her head and smiled faintly. “Sometimes,” she said. “But I left for Rachel.”
On the screen, Sophie had announced the silent auction—and Ava began to play. The long, willowy arms seemed to float above
dancing fingers. They had the sound off, but it was captivating anyway.
Green leaned on her hand. “Rachel was seeing someone else when we met. Arianna Templeton. Don’t look at me like that—you knew I’d tell you eventually.”
“I made no assumptions,” MacAdams protested.
“Well, the split was messy. And when we got together, Arianna was furious. At me, not Rachel.”
“Because you replaced her?”
“Because I’m a cop . The queer community isn’t exactly police friendly, and I don’t blame us for it. But that wasn’t it. She said I’d doomed
Rachel to a life of worry and pain and looking out windows wondering if I’d come home again.” Green’s smile faded. “ Then I lost my partner to a bad call-out. So I left Newcastle because I didn’t want to make Rachel a widow.”
MacAdams noted the gut punch of irony—to leave danger ous city cases only to end up where you started with trafficking and a murder on the side.
“Rachel’s lucky to have you,” he said. Then, after a pause: “So am I.”
Green didn’t reply; he didn’t expect her to. But he was glad he’d said it. On the screen, Ava played on, hands weaving a spell
rather than playing music. The light glanced off her pale skin, pearlescent, translucent. Her eyes, he noticed, appeared half-closed;
a face of concentration, a face of rapture.
“She’s beautiful to watch, isn’t she?” Green asked. “Wait till you hear her.” She increased the volume and notes spilled out
of the speakers .
“Complicated piece.”
“No shite. That’s Piano Concerto No. 3 by Sergei Rachmaninoff,” Green told him. “It’s her showpiece—one of the most difficult
to play. She stopped touring five years ago; this would have been a big draw to this crowd.”
MacAdams wasn’t familiar with classical music, but agreed her performance was incredible.
It was also distracting . All eyes were upon Ava—including their own. MacAdams forced himself to search the crowd.
“Where’s Burnhope?” he asked.
“He steps out of frame at nine-twelve, remember?”
“Right before a signature performance his wife hasn’t given in years?” MacAdams paused and scrolled back, then forward. Stanley
Burnhope left; he didn’t come back. “This is the only camera angle?”
“Yes. Unless you count CCTV; we collected it from the parking lot, and from the rear hall. It’s loading and storage for the
booze. Expensive shipments with bottles that tend to walk away if you aren’t watching.”
MacAdams was still scrolling forward, partygoers speeding along in jerky treble time. Sophie glinted in and out, Ava too—dancing
at one point with her father. No Stanley.
“Queue up CCTV on the second monitor,” he said.
Green scrolled to a secondary jump drive. The first view offered a parking lot with nothing but sheets of diagonal rain.
“Switch to the rear door.”
“Whew. Lots going on here,” Green said.
The camera had given them a gray-and-white view of the hall behind the annex kitchen. Crates stood on the floor, stacked double.
Three uniformed staff members were busily unloading—a fourth slipped by precariously with a tray of glasses. She disappeared
to the right, and in her place appeared a man in a mackintosh.
“Hold! Stop it there,” MacAdams said. Frozen, the image was less distinct, but here was a man with his collar up and an umbrella
in his left hand. “It’s Burnhope. It must be.”
“But we know he’s back on stage to give the farewell address.”
“That’s half past midnight.” MacAdams checked the coordinates on his phone. “You can make it from here to Abington in an hour
and ten. Faster if you’re really pushing it.”
“Okay, but saying he left at nine-twelve, he’d not get to town till almost ten thirty. Foley was at Jo’s by then, and she’s
with him till just after eleven.”
“Burnhope could still make it back to give the speech,” he said. “By quarter past midnight at the latest.”
“Boss, you’re counting from 11:00 p.m. Think about it. First he has to lure Foley out, then kill him, wrap him in ice for some reason, drive to the back
road and dump him. That takes time. Like, a lot of time.”
Dammit. She was right; he’d got caught up in the minutiae. MacAdams slumped back into his chair, pressed both palms (gingerly) to
his eyes and heaved a sigh.
“Sheila. I hate this case,” he said. “Nothing adds up.”
“I know.” Green put down her coffee and fished around in the bag at her feet. She emerged with assorted biscuits from Tesco—what Jo called cookies—and offered him one. “This would be a lot easier if Jo last saw Foley an hour or so earlier.”
“You’re telling me.” He accepted her offering; his stomach had been making noises of protest for an hour.
“Well. Here’s a thought, boss. What if Jo is wrong ?”
MacAdams gave her what he hoped was a look of incredulity.
“Jo Jones, who details the minutiae of absolutely everything and can cite chapter and verse?” he asked.
Green swallowed biscuit and chased it with now-cold coffee.
“Nobody’s right all the time,” she said. “Even Struthers was gonna put time of death earlier, remember?”
“Only because he can’t be more precise. None of the other tests were conclusive—” MacAdams stopped midsentence. The other tests. He dug out his phone and speed-dialed the pathologist.
Green watched him, sharp eyed. “What—what have we missed?” she asked.
“Scroll to Burnhope’s last speech and zoom in,” he said.
“Struthers here ,” came the voice on the other end of the line.
MacAdams watched the footage. Burnhope stepped onto the stage at twelve thirty-two. Now that he was looking for the right
thing, it was hard to miss.
“Eric, we’ve got a problem.”
“What sort of problem?” Struthers asked.
MacAdams lifted the biscuit until it was eye level, a little round shortbread with a sticky, jam middle.
“Jammie Dodgers,” he said.