Meet at 2 Veg.
“Chas, I am certain that this fellow Guy Sanders has killed, murdered, call it what you will, his partner Bob Haymer. I will bet my life on it! But he’s got a cast iron alibi and the smug bastard is laughing at us all the way.”
“I’ve looked at all the evidence Arthur and you’re right it does seem fishy but the forensics back him up. I want to talk to him Arthur and see what I make of him.”
“Being a celebrity, he is the obnoxious one of the pair but since we arrested him and kept him in custody, he has been most cooperative and as good as gold. See what you can dig up? A new face may just throw him although he has stuck strictly to his story in all interviews. He feels so powerful and secure in there that he hasn’t bothered with any legal aid. He says it is unnecessary in his case and we should let him go. Here’s the interview room. There’s my Sergeant and Detective Inspector Harrison in there with him. I’ll let you in there alone Chas. See what you can get out of him?”
“Chief Inspector Romney and Detective Inspector Connolly have entered the room. The time is fourteen thirty-seven.”
“Thank you, Sergeant. Chief Inspector Romney will continue with the interview. Sergeant Spencer and Detective Inspector Connolly are leaving the room. Time fourteen thirty-eight.”
“So, they are bringing the big guns out on parade.”
“Sorry Mr. Sanders but I will have to start from the very beginning. I’ve studied the transcripts and I’m not very happy about your tale so far.”
“You can call me Guy, Inspector and I’ll call you Charles if I may and what don’t you like about my story, my part of the evidence set out before you there?”
“Let’s keep this on a formal footing Mr. Sanders and please address me as Chief Inspector. Now I’d like to start from the very beginning and would you tell me how you first met Bob Haymer?”
“As you wish Chief but it’s all in front of you in the notes and my ‘tale’ as you call it hasn’t deviated in all the interviews. I met Bob as students at a Catering College in Huddersfield some sixteen years ago and on graduating, if you can call it that, we went our separate ways. Bob went to work in a slaughterhouse and later became a first-class butcher. I ponced around the world honing my vegetarian knowledge and recipes. I later worked in various high-end restaurants, mainly as a pastry chef since there is little call for vegetarian dishes in gourmet joints.”
“OK. How did you meet up again?”
“We both entered the BBC Master Chef competition at the same time. I got through a few rounds and so did Bob. He was about to publish a recipe book on meat and I had just published a book on vegetarian dishes. Both books were well received and we got further TV work.”
“Yes, but how did you start working together?”
“Patience Chief Inspector. I was coming to that. After the competition we formed a partnership, a joint Company to set up our own restaurant.”
“Meat and Two Veg.”
“Sorry Chief Inspector. It catches them all out. It was called ‘Meet, at, Two, Veg,’ the former name was already registered. A play on words as you say. We set up a very successful restaurant where Bob provided the meat expertise and the punters could have an exquisite vegetarian accompaniment rather than the usual boring two boiled veg.”
“You now run six successful restaurants so why the recent disagreement between you?”
“A number of things Chief Inspector. We were minor celebrities with big egos. That didn’t help with menus and the future planning. I wanted to either buy him out as per the legal agreement or him buy me out. Bob refused. This infuriated me particularly.”
“So, you made public death threats against your partner.”
“I did on many occasions and it became a catch phrase on TV.”
“But you meant it didn’t you?”
“Just like a mother does to her son if he’s done something awful, ‘I’ll kill him!’ she says. Does she mean it? Really?”
“But there was some further antagonism?”
“There was Chief. He stole my girlfriend. Even though we were a couple of puffters, we swung both ways.”
“But you lived together.”
“On and off Chief Inspector. As you are aware, we had separate apartments. I had the top one and for the past year we didn’t socialise together.”
“Now let’s get onto the incident of that day.”
“Which incident Chief Inspector. Are you trying to trip me up? There were two incidents that day of note as you know. At four o’clock I knocked on Bob’s door and pushed my way in when he opened it. I wanted to raise the total sale of our business to a third party with him, both of us relinquishing the restaurants as a way out of our problem. He laughed at me and told me to leave in a rude way. I punched him, caught him a nice one on the nose, blood everywhere. I left immediately.”
“You were due at the studio at four fifteen?”
“I caught a cab and was there some ten minutes late. You will find the exact time in your notes and I left at eight minutes past seven precisely according to the CCTV records. The whole of the crew can vouch that I didn’t leave the studio during that time.”
“You arrived at your block at seven thirty-one as per the CCTV and what did you do then? Murder Bob Haymer and waited two hours to inform the police?”
“You should go on TV Chief Inspector. You’d make a good sleuth. I was quite elated. The session had gone particularly well. I went straight up to my apartment and had a glass of good wine.”
“Why didn’t you want to follow up your earlier discussion with Bob?”
“Discussion? Where did you get that from Inspector? It was a full-blown argument with fists flying as I described earlier. Why should I want to confront the bastard again? I wanted to continue in my good mood and not be depressed.”
“So, what made you go down to see Bob later?”
“I made myself a quick meal which I ate in the kitchen and caught up on the daily papers. It must have been after nine when I went into the lounge and noticed that Bob had turned up his music. He does this to annoy me. The chap below complains regularly. He must have been away that day.”
“So, you went down to remonstrate and kill him?”
“I’ll ignore that last remark Chief Inspector, uncalled for! I wasn’t going to let him get away with it so I went down but he wouldn’t answer the door, so I used my key to enter the flat. I thought it was another of his ways to annoy me.”
“So, you went in, had an argument and murdered him, didn’t you Mr. Sanders?”
“I went in, called out and immediately went into the lounge and turned off his amplifier. I thought that would bring him out from wherever he was lurking. It was only then that I noticed him lying by the kitchen door in a pile of congealed blood.”
“You killed him with a blunt instrument earlier and waited a couple of hours to inform the police, didn’t you Mr. Sanders?”
“For God’s sake man, look at your forensics. He was ice cold when I touched him. Dead for at least four hours and no more than five, it’s there in black and white!”
“You had every motive to kill your partner. You, Mr. Sanders benefited from his death.”
“Not if I was to be incarcerated for twenty years or more.”
“Your apartment was searched thoroughly.”
“Yes, and they didn’t find any blunt instrument covered in blood either.”
“You could have disposed of it?”
“How? Thrown it out of the window?”
“We found a loaded pistol hidden in your wardrobe. Was that to shoot Bob Haymer?”
“I told your people the story of that. It was found in an air vent in one of our restaurant’s toilets. Instead of handing it in and causing all kinds of disruption to our business I took it away telling the staff I was handing it to the proper authorities.”
“But you used it, why?”
“I was intrigued by it so took it out to the countryside on a stormy night but couldn’t make it fire.”
“So, you had the intention of using it at a future date?”
“It did cross my mind but it wouldn’t fire so I hid it again. I shifted the safety catch but to no avail.”
“It was half cocked Mr. Sanders, just like your story, that’s why it wouldn’t fire.”
“When are you going to let me go Chief Inspector? You can’t hold me. You have no evidence. Go and spend your time more usefully catching the proper criminal.”
“I would advise you Mr. Sanders to get yourself a lawyer and plead guilty to manslaughter and you will receive a lighter sentence.”
“Chief Inspector, why should I do that? Just to improve your statistics I presume.”
“The interview is complete. The time is fifteen ten.”
“What did you get out of him Chas? Anything new?”
“Well, he did blurt out something that pointed to his guilt in a way. Get the forensic team back in there again. He alluded to the fact that the body was ‘ice’ cold. Bob Haymer being a butcher has a huge walk-in freezer in his apartment for keeping his meat. I saw it when I was there and thought nothing of it.”
“So, you think he moved the body into the freezer for an hour or so, so that it would cool down to fool the forensics.”
“Here is what I think happened. On his way back from the studio he wanted to confront Bob again being on a high and barged into his apartment either knocking on the door or just letting himself in with his own key. They had another argument and Guy pushed Bob who hit his head on some sharp surface. Get forensics to check all low sharp surfaces in the apartment. That’s why we couldn’t find the murder weapon.”
“So cleverly, he drags his partner into his own freezer and leaves him there for an hour or so. But how does he reposition the body so accurately by the kitchen door?”
“We need to check his mobile phone. I bet he had the sense to take a picture or two so that he could lay the body out correctly in the freezer and then back in the room. The TV programmes spend an awful long time on the settling of body fluids on death so he must have been extra careful on that score.”
“Do you think this was premeditated Chas?”
“I doubt it but Guy just made the best use of the local circumstances at the time to cover his deed.”
“I go along with that Chas. I think we have got him even if it’s on a lesser charge.”
