Alex Warren Murder Mysteries Collection

Chapter 5

Alex made for his own car, a four-year-old Hyundai Santa Fe which he obsessively maintained in excellent condition and polished until he risked lifting the paint. He called Detective Constable Donald McAvoy to join him. McAvoy shuffled along to the car and, not wishing to incite his Boss"s wrath, carefully stamped any sleet or mud from his footwear before climbing up and into the SUV.

The journey was only a short distance but the traffic was heavy on Byres Road. The road was broad and lined with shops, cafés and bars, most with tenement flats above. The whole area had a cosmopolitan flavour with restaurants offering the fares from a multitude of European and Asian countries and this was more than matched by a varied mix of patrons. Most of the properties they passed on the Byres Road and on the adjacent thoroughfares were brightly lit and well maintained. Some were recently built while others looked centuries old, interspersed were a few dilapidated buildings, some on the verge of collapse. The overall effect was most strange. The pavements were crowded with shoppers and students milling around and wandering in and out of the retail premises. They had to crawl along at a snail"s pace. Frequently, jaywalkers squeezed between the stopped or slow-moving vehicles and the trip seemed to take them forever. The tailback from the lights at University Avenue alone held them back for the best part of half an hour. They travelled mainly in silence before pulling into the station"s car park. Once there they arranged to see Findlay straight away.

Alex walked into the interview room and McAvoy followed him in while he started the recording equipment, noting the time and those present.

The room was small, about eight feet square in size. It was stark and contrasted sharply with the opulence of the antique shop they had recently left. The ceiling was covered in speckled, polystyrene, acoustic tiles. Other than grease and coffee marks, the walls were plain, painted green and reminiscent of the décor traditionally used for public lavatories in Glasgow. The floor was covered in grey linoleum giving a tiled effect. It was of an age and style that no matter how well it was scrubbed it never looked clean. The only furniture was a melamine-covered, rectangular table positioned against the wall and bolted to the floor. On each side were two stacking-style, metal-framed plastic chairs. The recording equipment was mounted on the wall above the table. There was a mild aroma of watered down disinfectant lingering from the last time the room had been cleaned but it barely disguised the resident smell of cigarettes and stale BO. Although smoking was no longer permitted, the pungency lingered from the years before the ban was introduced and this was topped up by the occasional breaches of regulations together with the carryings off the clothes and skins of its many guests.

One of the chairs was occupied by a young man who had the archetypal look of a student. He was tall and scrawny with shoulder-length, ginger hair and an incongruously short, well-manicured beard. His face was acne scarred and gold-coloured, wire-framed spectacles covered his watery grey eyes which perfectly matched the floor covering. He was wearing blue corduroy trousers, an open-necked, denim shirt and a loose-fitting jacket which had overstretched pockets from being stuffed with Coke cans and bottles.

He jumped to his feet when Alex entered the room, “Can I go home now?” he enquired.

“Not quite yet, I"m afraid,” Alex replied. “Please sit down. We just need to hear what you have to tell us and get you to sign a formal statement.”

“Not again,” came the reply. “I"ve been through it twice already and I just want to go home.”

“You must realise this is a very serious matter. It doesn"t get more serious than murder. You found the body and we need to find out exactly what you know before you leave.”

Findlay resignedly collapsed back into the chair. “But I don"t know a thing. I just came back and found Mr Stevenson lying there, dead. I"ve already said.”

“We need to take this one stage at a time. Please speak clearly into the microphone and we"ll get this out of the way as quickly as we can. First of all, for the record, please state your full name and address.”

In a tired voice Findlay replied, “My name"s Stuart Findlay and I stay at flat 2/2, 42 Oakfield Avenue. I"ve got a share of a student flat. Out of term time I still live with my parents. That"s at number fourteen Skean Crescent, Galashields.”

“I believe you worked for Scott Stevenson in his shop, "Odds and Ends." How long have you worked there and what do you do?”

“It"s only part-time. I"m a student at Glasgow Uni. I"m studying "History of Art." I thought it would complement my studies to work in an antique shop. Mr Stevenson thought so too. That"s why he gave me the job. That and "cause he gets away with paying me next to nothing.”

“So he didn"t treat you well?”

Findlay became a little bit more animated. “Christ no! He treated me like s**t. He took me on to sell in the shop because I knew a bit about antiques and about history. But once I"d started, he wanted me to be a general skivvy. He had me cleaning the toilets and everything. He paid me minimum wage, not even that as he had me working extra hours and wouldn"t pay for it. I know I shouldn"t speak ill of the dead, but the guy was a real bastard.”

“So you didn"t really get on. How seriously did you fight?”

Findlay chewed his lip for a second before answering, “We didn"t fight at all. He was a bully and I accepted it.”

“Did you have any arguments with him?”

“No, not really. I once tried answering back and claiming my rights but he just told me that if I didn"t like it, I could f**k off. He wasn"t really into Human Relations Management in any way. I"d have gone too, but I didn"t see too much chance of another job, not with my hand,” he said, holding up his left hand and showing it was weak and wasted. “My arm was scalded when I was a toddler and it never grew properly. There"s no chance I could get a job in a bar or a restaurant the way it is. That"s why I was happy to take the job with Stevenson even with the little he paid me. He knew I didn"t have any options and he took advantage.”

“Have you been doing it for long?”

“It must be about eight months ago I started. It was in the spring. At first it was just a Saturday job but during the summer, when I wasn"t away, I got extra hours and it became more like full-time. When Uni restarted, he wanted me to keep working extra days, but I had to fit it around my lectures, or occasionally have to miss them. He even asked me to miss my exams on one occasion. On Thursdays, there aren"t any lectures but sometimes I have a tutorial. I should have had one today at twelve o"clock and that"s when I planned to take my lunch break, but Stevenson said he needed me to stay until after one. He said he had someone coming to see him about one and he"d let me go then as he"d be there to look after things.”

“So what time did you actually leave?”

“It must have been about ten past one.

“Had his guest arrived by then?”

“No, he chased me out before he arrived. There was no one else in the shop.”

“You said "He"?”

“I don"t know for sure. I was just guessing it"d be a man.”

“Did anything unusual take place in the morning?”

“No, there"d been hardly a soul in and the phone had been quiet too?”

“Were you aware of Mr Stevenson having any fights or making any enemies in the recent past”

“Mr Stevenson seemed to upset a lot of people. He was always having arguments and there was often shouting. But there was nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Where did you go when you went out for lunch?”

“I went up to the Uni. I wanted to see Dr Wilson, my tutor. I wanted to explain why I"d missed the tutorial and pick up any papers or guidance that I"d missed.”

“So will he be able to confirm that?”

“I"m afraid not. He wasn"t there. He"d gone to lunch. But I saw his secretary, Mrs Burns. She can tell you I was there.”

“Where is his office?

“It"s in University Gardens, just along from the QM, sorry, the Queen Margaret Union.”

“How long did it take you to walk?

“It"s about ten to fifteen minutes each way. I had packed some sandwiches this morning and I took them with me. When I didn"t get to see Dr Wilson, I detoured to Kelvingrove Park and sat on a bench to eat them.”

“Was it not a bit cold for that?”

“Yeh, I suppose so, but I needed some fresh air.”

“And you came back at two o"clock?”

“It must have been just after that. When I got back, the door was locked and I"d to use my key to let myself in. I thought that was strange "cause the shop was meant to be open. Then I found Mr Stevenson. I could tell right away that he was dead. I came straight out of the door and used my mobile to call 999.”

“You didn"t touch anything?”

“No, I don"t think so. I just came straight out.”

“Okay, that will be all for now. Sit out in the waiting area and we"ll get your statement written up for you to sign, then you can get off home. It"s very important that you tell no one about the details of the murder and you can"t speak to the press for now. I want no leaks or I"ll know where to look,” Alex added menacingly. “Leave your shop keys with us and we"ll be back in touch. If you think of anything else, let us know. Here"s my card”

Once Findlay had left, Alex asked McAvoy for his opinion.

“He seemed pretty genuine, I guess. If he did go to the Uni during his lunch break, I don"t see he"d of had much time for any mischief. That said, I don"t buy the story about eating his lunch in the park. He clearly didn"t like Stevenson, but I doubt he had the guts to do anything about it and judging from the body, it would have taken both hands or else someone a hell of a lot stronger to stab him the way it was done. As Findlay"s not able to use one of his hands, I can"t see it being him. I think he may have some more information that he"s not telling us though.”

“Pretty much my thinking,” Alex replied. “Also he said he called 999 from his mobile, but earlier Sandra told me he"d said he phoned from the office. I didn"t pick him up on that just now. I wanted to first check out what actually happened.”

“Okay, next stage is to check Stevenson"s car and his house. See if that gives us any clues. Did he have the keys on him?”

“Dunno, Boss. I didn"t check. Maybe Sandra did. I"ll give her a bell.” McAvoy pressed the fast dial and was connected in seconds.

Although only hearing one side of the conversation, Alex didn"t need to use his detective skills to follow the thread.

“Hi, Sandra, did you pick up Stevenson"s keys? … Nope, were they in the office or on the stiff? …… Not in the office. You didn"t want to touch the body until Connor had finished. Gonna ask him to check his pockets? … Aye, I"ll hang on …………… You"ve got his car keys and shop keys and they"ve already dusted them so we can have them, but there aren"t any house keys. That"s strange. Right oh. You"ll check out the car. It"s a Beamer five series if I remember right. We"ll head over to the house. No, wait, the Boss is saying we"ll check the car and maybe see if the house keys are there. We"ll be up there in a few minutes, maybe less the way he drives.”

If McAvoy had made a career out of fortune telling instead of the police then his family would never have had bread on their table. The journey back to Great Western Road was even more tortuous than the one coming down. Sandra was waiting with the car keys and the three of them quickly found the BMW parked a couple of hundred yards from the shop, not too surprisingly illegally sitting in a "disabled only" bay.

Being a grey, damp, November afternoon, daylight had already faded and they used powerful hand-held torches for their search. They all put on gloves and Alex clicked the remote. Within minutes, they had thoroughly checked the interior of the car and found nothing suspicious and nothing of interest. The car was only a few months old and seemed to have been freshly valeted. They could still smell the detergent coming from the seats. They opened the engine compartment and the eight-cylinder, V8, twin turbo looked polished and clean enough to eat your dinner off. They had no better luck in the boot; inside was a complete Callaway set of golf clubs and equipment, appearing never to have been used, but there was nothing else there and only golfing paraphernalia in the pockets of the bag. Either Stevenson didn"t carry his own house keys or someone had taken them.