gas, electricity, Council Tax and water. It was difficult to see any variations to the standard pattern which might be of interest to the police in the sheets of computer-printed figures.
Unless you went back over three or four years, which Rushton diligently did. George Taylor watched him with patient interest, wondering how long it would be before this man who seemed as diligent as he was himself came up with the query. It took a little time, of course, for a detective inspector could not be expected to be as swift in isolating the significant pointer as a bank manager. Taylor watched the neatly cut dark hair of the head bent over the paper as indulgently as if he was testing a protégé, and was almost as pleased when the DI found the significant figures.
‘He’s accruing money,’ said Rushton. ‘When you look at his year-end balances, he’s a modest few hundred in the black at the year end until about two years ago, with income just about outstripping his outings. In these last two years, he’s accrued ten thousand pounds.’
‘Yes. I suggested to him only a month ago that he should be thinking about investments if he had no plans to spend his balance.’
‘Where did the extra come from? Did he get a big salary increase?’
‘No. The salary increments in the last two years are barely ahead of inflation. You need to look in a little more detail at those last two years.’
Lambert and most other policemen would have demanded brusquely that the manager stopped playing games and told him the secrets he plainly already understood. But Rushton pored obediently over the sheets of the last months of Ted Giles’s financial life, enjoying the puzzle. After little more than a minute, he looked up at his mentor’s amused, indulgent face, a pupil who had found the answer and expected to be praised. ‘He’s stopped withdrawing money for everyday expenses,’ he said. ‘The incomings from his salary and the outgoings on his standard orders have risen a little in tandem, but in the last two years he has almost ceased to withdraw money for his own purposes from the account.’
‘Correct,’ said George Taylor delightedly.
‘Why?’
The bank manager’s face fell. ‘That is not my concern. It is — was — Mr Giles’s own business.’
‘Well, it’s our concern,’ said Rushton. ‘Got to be, now. He had to be getting money from somewhere. Another account, do you think?’
George Taylor looked pained. He was white-haired, immaculate, nearing retirement. It still pained him to think of his customers using other channels for their finance, even though it might be the rule rather than the exception nowadays. ‘That’s always possible, of course. Or he might be receiving cash payments from somewhere and spending them directly, rather than putting them into the bank. But that’s rare among professional men like Mr Giles. Market traders do it — they spend to dodge tax rather than depositing the money in a bank.’ Despite himself, he couldn’t prevent a tinge of old-fashioned class disapproval in his voice as he mentioned the market traders and their dubious financial practice.
Chris Rushton had enjoyed the formalities of his little rallies across the banking net with George Taylor, but he was in the end more detective inspector than financial conformist. He relished the abnormality in the dealings of the late Ted Giles; he had established another missing piece in this jigsaw where they had to discover the pieces for themselves. ‘We shall have to find where this extra income was coming from,’ he said with satisfaction.
***
It was not DI Rushton but a humble WPC who revealed the secret. A routine trawl of the list of depositors at local banks and building societies revealed a savings account in the name of the late Edward Giles at the Ross-on-Wye branch of the Halifax Building Society. It had been opened exactly two years before his death.
The young woman who ran the desk in the small Oldford branch of
Unless you went back over three or four years, which Rushton diligently did. George Taylor watched him with patient interest, wondering how long it would be before this man who seemed as diligent as he was himself came up with the query. It took a little time, of course, for a detective inspector could not be expected to be as swift in isolating the significant pointer as a bank manager. Taylor watched the neatly cut dark hair of the head bent over the paper as indulgently as if he was testing a protégé, and was almost as pleased when the DI found the significant figures.
‘He’s accruing money,’ said Rushton. ‘When you look at his year-end balances, he’s a modest few hundred in the black at the year end until about two years ago, with income just about outstripping his outings. In these last two years, he’s accrued ten thousand pounds.’
‘Yes. I suggested to him only a month ago that he should be thinking about investments if he had no plans to spend his balance.’
‘Where did the extra come from? Did he get a big salary increase?’
‘No. The salary increments in the last two years are barely ahead of inflation. You need to look in a little more detail at those last two years.’
Lambert and most other policemen would have demanded brusquely that the manager stopped playing games and told him the secrets he plainly already understood. But Rushton pored obediently over the sheets of the last months of Ted Giles’s financial life, enjoying the puzzle. After little more than a minute, he looked up at his mentor’s amused, indulgent face, a pupil who had found the answer and expected to be praised. ‘He’s stopped withdrawing money for everyday expenses,’ he said. ‘The incomings from his salary and the outgoings on his standard orders have risen a little in tandem, but in the last two years he has almost ceased to withdraw money for his own purposes from the account.’
‘Correct,’ said George Taylor delightedly.
‘Why?’
The bank manager’s face fell. ‘That is not my concern. It is — was — Mr Giles’s own business.’
‘Well, it’s our concern,’ said Rushton. ‘Got to be, now. He had to be getting money from somewhere. Another account, do you think?’
George Taylor looked pained. He was white-haired, immaculate, nearing retirement. It still pained him to think of his customers using other channels for their finance, even though it might be the rule rather than the exception nowadays. ‘That’s always possible, of course. Or he might be receiving cash payments from somewhere and spending them directly, rather than putting them into the bank. But that’s rare among professional men like Mr Giles. Market traders do it — they spend to dodge tax rather than depositing the money in a bank.’ Despite himself, he couldn’t prevent a tinge of old-fashioned class disapproval in his voice as he mentioned the market traders and their dubious financial practice.
Chris Rushton had enjoyed the formalities of his little rallies across the banking net with George Taylor, but he was in the end more detective inspector than financial conformist. He relished the abnormality in the dealings of the late Ted Giles; he had established another missing piece in this jigsaw where they had to discover the pieces for themselves. ‘We shall have to find where this extra income was coming from,’ he said with satisfaction.
***
It was not DI Rushton but a humble WPC who revealed the secret. A routine trawl of the list of depositors at local banks and building societies revealed a savings account in the name of the late Edward Giles at the Ross-on-Wye branch of the Halifax Building Society. It had been opened exactly two years before his death.
The young woman who ran the desk in the small Oldford branch of
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