‘He took it bad,’ said Parsons. He’d always been a bit… sensitive. But this sent him over the edge. Gave him a breakdown. Had to leave university. Couldn’t cope. But we looked after him. Cheryl, she was good to him.’
Parsons spoke about his other son without warmth or conviction. Sperring could imagine what it must have been like for the boy. Ron Parsons was the kind of man who regarded a breakdown as a sign of weakness. The same with sensitivity, he reckoned. If the kid had been like that, his upbringing with a father like Ron Parsons would have been hell.
‘Anyway,’ said Parsons, ‘he got better. Or started to. But there was something… not right. He wasn’t the same any more. Like part of him had died along with Ben.’ He looked embarrassed that he had actually said that. He continued. ‘But he wanted to do something, move on. So he set himself up in business.’
‘You didn’t want him to take over your empire?’
‘He wasn’t like that. He… he said some bloke at university, some professor or something that he’d worked with, gave him the idea. Deviant personalities, he said. To be honest, I didn’t have a clue what he was on about. But he said there was money in it. And that I did know about.’
‘What did he mean?’
‘He said he’d been doing his research and found a gap in the market. I mean, he already hung about in some dodgy clubs. Never told me what he got up to, but said it put him in touch with a potential clientele. So he worked from that.’
‘Doing what?’
Parsons frowned. ‘Well… say you want to… I mean, he was dealing with extremes here. Real extremes.’
‘Deviants.’
‘Yeah. Exactly. So. Say you had some fantasy that you wanted to act out. Like, I dunno, kill someone. He’d find someone who wanted to be killed. Put you together.’
‘What?’ said Sperring. His mind was racing. Glenn McGowan and Keith Burkiss running round in his mind. ‘He would put them together?’
‘Yeah. Like some sick internet dating site. That kind of thing. Look, I might think they’re sick and you might think they’re sick, but bottom line? There was money in it. That’s why he started the club. Give them somewhere to meet. Mingle.’
‘So how did he find this clientele? You can’t put an ad in the Birmingham Mail. Where did they come from?’
‘All over the place. He started with the university thing. That professor and his deviant book. He contacted the people he’d interviewed for it, the extreme ones. Asked if they were serious or just all talk. And if they were serious, he told them he could set it up. For a price.’
Sperring thought about Keith Burkiss again, the emails. The payments. He imagined that Glenn McGowan had had a similar arrangement. ‘What about the house for Glenn McGowan?’
Parsons sighed. ‘That was a mistake, but I didn’t find out till afterwards. He used one of our houses. That was dangerous. It could be traced. I tried to cover it up, got Cheryl to make a paper trail. But it didn’t work. Then I tried damage limitation.’ He pointed at Khan, who refused to look at him. ‘But I started too late.’ Another sigh. ‘So now I’m here.’
‘So who killed Glenn McGowan?’ asked Sperring.
Parsons shrugged. ‘Just some wannabe serial killer who fancied himself. Sad little bastard living out his dream.’
‘And this sad little bastard, did you kill him?’
Parsons gave a look of mock-effrontery. ‘What, me? You should know better than to ask me that, Mr Sperring.’
‘OK then,’ said Sperring, hands on the table, attempting a tolerance he wasn’t feeling. ‘Let’s put it hypothetically. Could you imagine why somebody might want to kill him?’
‘Well, speaking hypothetically, Mr Sperring, and this is only guesswork, of course, I would say that because he was a sad little no-hoper and a bit incompetent, he must have messed up.’
‘How?’
‘Well, again hypothetically, if he was given a job to do, like, say, kill some legless bloke, then that’s what he should have done. Left it at that. Not gone berserk and killed his wife as well. Made him unstable. A liability. And with a liability, you have to make an executive decision. Get rid of him.’ He shrugged, a cunning look in his eyes. ‘Hypothetically, of course.’
Sperring stared at him, face professionally impassive. ‘So where’s your son now?’
Parsons shrugged again. ‘No idea. And if I had, I wouldn’t tell you.’
‘Is he at this club?’
‘No idea.’
Sperring stood up. ‘Let’s go and see, shall we?’
Seeing Sperring’s movement, Khan looked up. ‘What… what are we doing?’
‘I don’t know about you,’ said Sperring, ‘but I’m tracking down a killer.’
Khan looked at Parsons, back to Sperring. ‘What about him?’
‘What about him?’
‘If we leave him, he’ll warn his son.’
‘Then we bring him with us,’ said Sperring. ‘Or have him arrested and taken to the station.’
Khan looked away. Sperring understood. ‘Oh, I see. When you said what are we going to do about him, what you really meant was “what are we going to do about me”? Am I right? If I take him in, he’ll stitch you up.’
Khan nodded.
‘Yeah,’ said Sperring, looking at his junior officer with distaste. ‘So. What are we going to do?’