CXVI The Beginning of the End (Book 1): A Gripping Murder Mystery and Suspense Thriller (CXVI BOOK 1) by Angie Smith

the awkward task of explaining
to his Chief Inspector why Woods was reopening the investigation into Hussain’s
death.
    “I thought it strange that Hussain suddenly decides
to drive up to the dam and commit suicide, when he’s heading to collect his
son,” Barnes said, changing the subject.
    “I know; that’s when my alarm bells started ringing.
Even if his mind was in turmoil, why didn’t he collect his son, drop him off at
home, make an excuse about going out and then head up to the dam?”
    “And the sequence of events at the dam appeared
strange.”
    “I agree; he arrives, switches off his phone and
then there’s a gap of just over one hour forty minutes. Did he drive somewhere
else and then return to the dam?”
    “But that question remains even if he was forcibly
taken there.”
    Woods nodded. “I know it does, but Hussain composing
a lucid suicide e-mail, and adding a puzzle at the end? Come off it, and then
sending it to his mistress, not his wife or family who he’s leaving after
thirty years, his mistress who he’d been seeing for six months. It stretches
the imagination.”
    “And why torch the car?”
    Woods was nodding. “Vehicles are usually only burnt
out to destroy evidence,” he observed.
    “And why — when he could have driven there — walk
two and a half miles to the bridge, in complete darkness, carrying an extremely
heavy 18mm rope?”
    “Exactly. And he’d risk someone on the motorway
spotting the fire and telephoning the fire brigade, who’d most likely turn up
before he’d even reached the bridge.”
    “There’s another problem too, with the timeline,”
Barnes said. “He sent the e-mail at 11.16 switching the phone off one minute
later; he torched the car and supposedly walked to the bridge. Let’s say it
took him three minutes to set the car alight and thirty-five to walk to the
bridge, which makes it around 11.55. He then tied a six loop hangman’s knot in
the rope, not a slip knot or a noose knot, a six loop hangman’s knot, that must
have taken him at least five minutes, making it midnight - the time the
pathologist said he died. He virtually jumped straight off once he’d secured
the rope. He didn’t sit on the edge having doubts or plucking up courage; he
jumped.”
    “I know the knot’s usually a giveaway,” Woods
conceded, “but, to be honest, if I was planning to hang myself I’d use a proper
hangman’s knot, you only have to look on the internet to find out how to tie
one.”
    “What’s your version of events then?” Barnes asked,
her gaze becoming intense.
    Woods was silent for a moment. “I think at some
stage on his journey to Slaithwaite he was stopped, perhaps flagged down by a
hitchhiker. I did at one point consider there may have been an accomplice or
perhaps a few of them in a separate vehicle, but if that was the case there’d
be no need for the stun gun; manpower alone would have been sufficient. So I
think our man was working alone; he overpowered Hussain, zapping him with the
gun, bundled him into the passenger seat and drove up to the dam, where he
seized the Blackberry and switched off.”
    “Where did the rope and petrol come from?”
    “The hitchhiker’s vehicle in the car park.”
    “Okay, I’ll go with that, but why was Hussain held
there so long?”
    “I don’t know the answer to that yet. Maybe, as I
said, he was driven elsewhere and then brought back. Anyway, then at 11.12 the
hitchhiker composed the e-mail and sent it four minutes later. He waited
thirty, thirty-five minutes and drove to the bridge, stunned Hussain again, put
the noose around his neck, tightening it in an attempt to mask the stun marks,
tied it to the bridge, made sure Hussain’s fingerprints were on the rail and
threw him off. He then drove back to the car park, burnt the car, destroying
any evidence, and drove off in his own vehicle.”
    “Sounds plausible,” Barnes said. “But he must also
have incapacitated Hussain; otherwise he’d have been