The Devil's Feather - Minette Walters [109]
“I don’t think so.”
I absorbed as much nicotine in one shot as I could, then blew the smoke in Bagley’s direction. “Is that a bloke thing, Inspector? The fact that you’re willing to believe a man, but not a woman?”
He took it in good part. “Ms. Derbyshire heard Dr. Coleman’s car come back. She says there was a few seconds’ time lapse between that and his shouting. I haven’t ruled out that he did what you suggest but it seems unlikely. He didn’t have a knife on him when we searched him, and he’d have needed one to cut through the duct tape.”
“Perhaps MacKenzie took it off him.”
“Did Dr. Coleman look as if he’d been in a fight?”
“No…but if he had any sense he’d have relinquished the knife and run out the front door before he got slashed with it.”
“Leaving MacKenzie to collect his bag and disappear through the office window? Is that what you’re saying happened?”
“Why not? It’s what you’re suggesting Jess and I did, isn’t it?”
“We think he left through the front door…and, from the impressions on the floor, he appears to have been on bare feet.” Bagley smiled slightly. “We have a lot of bare feet, Ms. Burns. It’s quite confusing.”
“All different sizes…and with different toeprints.”
“Prints don’t register well on stone. There was a lot of skating done through the blood. It’s hard to say who went where when.”
“Only in the hall. Have you found MacKenzie’s prints anywhere else?”
He wasn’t going to answer my questions. “One line we’re pursuing is that he managed to ease his shoes off in order to slip out of the duct tape round his ankles. You told us you wrapped the tape round the bottom of his trousers. Do you recall how many turns you made and whether he was wearing socks?”
I thought back. “Not really. About four, perhaps. I just wound it till it seemed tight enough. I don’t remember seeing socks.”
“What sort of trousers were they?”
“Denims.”
“Do you remember Dr. Coleman undoing the fly to help him breathe?”
I nodded.
“So all MacKenzie had to do was slide out of the trousers to free himself?”
I saw criticism immediately. “I’m damned if I’ll take the blame for that,” I said indignantly. “It wasn’t me who unbuttoned his stupid trousers. Blame Peter. He could have worked it out just as well as I could.”
“I’m not blaming you, Ms. Burns, I’m pointing out what might have happened. Did you bind his hands in the same way? Was the duct tape over his cuffs or against his skin?”
I was very tempted to say it was over his cuffs but it wouldn’t have been true. “Against his skin. The cuffs were rolled back.”
He’d obviously been told the same by Peter because he nodded. “He had more opportunities once his feet were free, of course. Do you remember what happened to the flick knife?”
“I kicked it away from him. As far as I remember, it went under the stairs.”
“We haven’t found it.”
I shrugged, suspecting another trap. By his twisted logic, victims were probably required to retrieve all pieces of evidence and line them up for inspection when the police arrived.
“A flick knife would have been easier to manipulate than Ms. Derbyshire’s Leatherman…but, in either event, he seems to have taken them with him. We haven’t found the Leatherman either.”
I drew in a lungful of smoke. “Why didn’t you tell me this at the beginning? Why accuse me of murder if you’ve known all along how he freed himself?”
“No one’s accusing you of murder, Ms. Burns.”
“Well, it feels like it,” I said. “The only difference between you and one of Mugabe’s henchman is that I still have some fingernails left.”
He lost patience with me. “Interviewing witnesses is a necessary part of any criminal inquiry, and it’s not police policy to exempt women. I agree it can be a stressful experience…however, given your views, I’m surprised you feel unequal to it.”
I grinned. “Ouch!”
He took an irritated breath. “Did you or Ms. Derbyshire move MacKenzie’s canvas bag from the office to the hall, Ms. Burns?”
“My bag,” I corrected. “He stole it from me in Baghdad.”
“Did you move it?