by Simon Brett
He and Frankie looked at each other intently. Jude reckoned they were assessing which one of them would take on the role of ‘public-spirited local resident’.
But Frankie hadn’t yet finished with her condemnation. She looked firmly at Jude, as if she had already won Carole round to her way of thinking. ‘And do you know why I’m sure that Malee arranged Bill’s death?’
‘No. And I would like to know, because all the arguments you’ve come up with so far have been—’
‘I’ll tell you why I know,’ Frankie interrupted.
‘Why?’
‘Because, when she saw Bill’s body in the workshop … she didn’t shed a single tear.’
TWELVE
‘Who is this?’
Since she’d phoned Adrian’s mobile, she’d expected him to answer it, so was surprised to hear a female voice.
‘Oh, is that Gwyneth?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s Carole Seddon.’
Was there a slight hesitation before the ‘Hello’?
‘I wanted to speak to Adrian.’
‘Yes, of course. Well, he’s not here at the moment. He’s doing some shopping for me. And left his phone at home again. I’m afraid Adrian has never really bonded properly with mobiles.’
‘They still don’t feel entirely natural to our generation, do they?’
‘Certainly not to his generation.’ There was a sharpness in the response. Gwyneth’s disability had blinded Carole to the age difference, but when she thought about it, she realized that Adrian could be as much as fifteen years older than his wife.
‘Well, if you could just ask him to give me a call …’
‘Of course.’
‘On the landline would be best. He’s got both my numbers.’
‘I’m sure he has,’ said Gwyneth.
Which, after she’d finished the call, Carole thought was rather an odd thing to say.
Adrian didn’t get back to her that day, and her going to Starbucks the following morning had, she told herself firmly, nothing to do with the possibility of seeing him. She was, nonetheless, quite gratified when he did appear at the table where, only a few minutes before, she’d sat down with her Americano.
‘Hello, stranger,’ he said. ‘May I join you?’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘And less of the “Hello, stranger”. You’re the one who’s been proving elusive.’
His brow furrowed in puzzlement. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean you didn’t return my call.’
‘What call?’
‘Oh? Didn’t Gwyneth tell you?’
‘You rang Gwyneth? On the landline?’
‘No, I rang your mobile and she answered it.’
‘Ah,’ he said. And then, as if it wasn’t important, ‘Oh well, she must just have forgotten to pass on the message.’ But Carole got the feeling it might have been important to him.
‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘the reason I wanted to talk to you was to pick your brains about matters car-related.’
‘I might be able to help there. What is it?’
‘You remember telling me that the car that killed Bill Shefford was a Triumph?’
‘Yes. A Tr6.’
‘I wondered how easy it would be to remove the gearbox.’
‘Ah. So what they say is true.’
‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Adrian grinned. ‘I’m discovering there’s lots of gossip in a place like Fethering.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘Just like Ilkley, in fact.’
‘And what gossip have you heard about me?’ asked Carole defensively.
‘That you and your friend Jude have a bit of a reputation locally as amateur sleuths.’
‘Oh. Well, as you know, most gossip is ill-informed and inaccurate.’
‘Hm.’ He gave her a look of amused scepticism. ‘So, it’s just out of general curiosity that you want to know how easy it is to sabotage the gearbox of a Triumph Tr6?’
‘Yes.’
‘From your well-known fascination with 1970s Triumphs?’
‘Of course.’
Her defiant response made Adrian’s grin spread wider. Carole looked away, or she would have found herself grinning too. Which would have been most unlike her.
‘All right,’ said Adrian. ‘How technical do you want me to be?’
‘As untechnical as possible, please. Pretend you’re talking to someone who knows nothing about cars and has no interest in them.’
‘“Pretend”?’ he echoed, and Carole could suppress her grin no longer. He continued, ‘All right, here we go. There would be slight differences according to the spec of the vehicle but I’m assuming you’re not particularly interested in that.’
‘You assume correctly.’
‘OK. One end of the gearbox is bolted on to the engine with six or maybe eight heavy-duty bolts. If those had all been removed, there’s no way someone in an inspection pit or under the vehicle on a ramp wouldn’t notice. So, I think it’s unlikely that would be the way it was done … if we are acting on the assumption that someone had sabotaged the car.’
‘For the purposes of this exercise, we are.’
‘Right. Now at the other end of the gearbox, which would probably have an overdrive attached, it’s held in place by two heavy-duty bolts, which also go through a rubber plate which acts as a kind of shock-absorber. Removing it under normal circumstances would involve setting up some harness or a small hydraulic lift to take the weight, undoing those two bolts, as well as the ones attaching it to the engine, and lowering the gearbox from the vehicle.
‘But, if I was thinking like a cold-blooded killer, wanting to booby-trap the car and use it as a murder weapon …’
‘Please think like that, Adrian.’
‘Very well. Then I would loosen one of those bolts – the ones that go through the rubber plate – completely, and the other one almost completely, so that the minute it’s touched, this whole heavy mass of metal comes crashing down on whoever is unfortunate enough to be underneath it.’ Adrian looked at her with a lopsided grin. ‘Is that too technical for you, Carole?’
‘No,’ she breathed with satisfaction. ‘It’s perfect. And would it require a lot of strength or advanced mechanical knowledge to do that?’
‘Not a lot of strength if you’ve got the right tools, which a garage like Shefford’s definitely would have. And not much advanced mechanical knowledge. Anyone who’d spent time working around cars would know how to do it.’
‘Ah.’
‘That was a very profound, sleuth-like “Ah”, Carole.’
‘I wouldn’t say that.’
‘I would. So now, I suppose, from my minimal reading of crime fiction, you make a list of suspects who might have had the technical expertise … and opportunity … to sabotage the Triumph Tr6 on top of Bill Shefford’s inspection pit.’
Carole felt a little taken aback. She was used to having such conversations with Jude and not with anyone else. And yet the idea of discussing the ‘case’ (as she found herself thinking of it) with Adrian Greenford was not without its attraction. Like her friendship with him, it felt exciting and slightly daring.
‘Well, I suppose we could do that,’ she conceded. ‘You start.’
‘I don’t know much about the opportunity side of it, who would have access to the garage, who’d have keys, so that they could set up the booby-trap when the premises were closed … which I guess is the way it would have been done.’
‘If it were done,’ Carole cautioned him.
‘If it were done,’ he repeated piously. ‘My guide in these matters is what I hear in the Crown and Anchor.’
‘A very unreliable source of information.’
‘I’m sure it is, Carole.’
‘In fact, for the engendering of fake news, Barney Poulton and his cronies could give both the Russian and American intelligence services a run for their money.’
‘Right.’
Adrian grinned. ‘From this very unreliable source then, two names emerge. One is obviously Billy Shefford. It’s common knowledge that he had had conflicts in the past with his father over the future of the garage. He sounded off in public on many occasions about how the old man was dragging his feet about making the changes that were needed in the business. Also – and this was from Barney Poulton, so is doubly suspect – there is a suggestion that Billy wanted his father out of the way before he had time to change his will in favour of his second wife.’
‘And do we know that was the case? What the provisions of his former will were and whether he had yet changed it?’
‘No, of course we don’t. As I said, the source of this suggestion is Barney Poulton, none of whose theories are ever backed up by the thinnest wisp of research. But let me say that, though there is a kind of logic that fingers Billy as chief suspect, it is not a suggestion that finds much support in the Crown and Anchor.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because Billy’s a regular there. All the other regulars are his mates. And they’re not going to grass up one of their own. Besides, and this is a slightly more compelling argument, he’s been so public about his criticism of his father. Everyone in the Crown and Anchor has heard him whingeing on about the old boy. The general view is that someone planning to commit murder would be a little less vocal about the shortcomings of his proposed victim.’
‘That’s quite a good point. And the Crown and Anchor’s second suspect?’ Carole knew the answer, but she didn’t want to volunteer more names until she had heard in full the wisdom of the pub’s regulars.
‘Well, of course, it’s the new wife, isn’t it? Malee.’
‘Have you met her?’
‘Yes, I have. Yes. Very briefly.’ He seemed about to say more but changed his mind. ‘I’m afraid with someone like her, you don’t see the attitudes of an English country village at their best. From what I’ve observed, Fethering seems to distrust newcomers, even if they’ve only come from as far away as Fedborough. So, when you’ve got someone all the way from Thailand … and that someone marries a well-loved local, whose first wife Valerie was very popular in the village … Did you ever meet her, by the way, Carole?’
‘No. I think she must have died before I started living down here full-time.’
‘Ah. Well, anyway, in the Crown and Anchor’s favourite scenario, Bill Shefford had changed his will, leaving everything to Malee.’
‘This is based on the same amount of knowledge of the facts as supported the thesis that he hadn’t yet changed it?’
‘Identical. And that meant, of course, that she had the perfect motive to kill her husband … so that she would inherit everything … which was the only reason she married him in the first place.’
‘I see.’
‘But making Malee the prime suspect is not just racism and distrust of the outsider, though there’s plenty of that. The clincher for the Crown and Anchor Major Incident Team is that she had apparently been taking evening classes in car maintenance. I don’t know if that’s true …?’
‘It is.’
‘Ah. Case proved then. Why would Malee want to take evening classes in car maintenance except to learn how to sabotage a Triumph Tr6 so that its gearbox falls and kills her husband?’
‘I can think of a good few reasons.’
‘So can I. But we are perhaps a little less blinkered than the Crown and Anchor Major Incident Team. So far as they’re concerned, Malee did it and should be instantly arrested. End of story.’
‘Hm.’ Carole took a sip of her Americano. It had gone cold during their recent conversation. ‘And the Crown and Anchor aren’t considering any other suspects?’
‘Should they be? You probably know more than I do. You were actually at Shefford’s when it happened. Anyone else you’d put in the frame?’
‘Well … Don’t let this go any further …’ Even as she said the words, she knew it was a pretty stupid thing to say in Fethering. But that didn’t stop her continuing. ‘Billy’s wife Shannon is very protective of him. She’d have the same motives as he would, I suppose, protecting their inheritance. And the garage had been the centre of his life right through their marriage, so she might have been round there enough to have picked up some mechanical knowledge.’
‘Possible,’ said Adrian.
‘Then again, Frankie – you know, in the office at Shefford’s – she must have absorbed quite a lot of mechanical knowhow over the years she’s been there.’
‘Mm.’
‘And Jude sort of wondered whether Frankie might have been holding a candle for Bill for some years and had her nose put out of joint when he married someone else.’
‘Does she have any proof for that?’
‘No. But Jude’s a pretty shrewd judge of people.’ Carole wondered why she was praising her neighbour to Adrian. And then again, why it should worry her that she was praising her neighbour to Adrian?
‘So …’ he asked, ‘is that it? Or are there any other suspects?’
Carole was about to mention Tom Kendrick, the fact that he was the owner of the Triumph Tr6 and the fact that there had been bad blood between him and Bill Shefford.
But, for some reason, she didn’t.
When, later that day, Carole went through the potential suspects with Jude, she didn’t mention that it was the second time she had done the exercise. A slight element of mystery about her relationship with Adrian Greenford still seemed appropriate. This time she did, however, add Tom Kendrick’s name to the list.
‘Yes,’ said Jude thoughtfully. ‘I must somehow arrange to talk to him again.’
‘What – so you’ve changed your mind about his condition, have you? Think he does need healing, after all?’
‘No.’ Jude sounded almost testy. ‘I wouldn’t do that.’ She hadn’t the energy to go through the arguments again with Carole about her attitudes to healing. ‘I’ll find a way to contact him. And I’d better do it before the weekend.’
‘Oh?’
‘I’m going up to Leeds on Friday morning.’
Carole would rather have pretended not to be interested, but she couldn’t stop herself from asking, ‘What for?’
‘A conference.’
‘And what’s it called?’ asked Carole with exaggerated patience.
‘“Healing Is in the Head”,’ Jude admitted.
No words could have been as expressive as Carole’s snort of derision. It was exactly the reaction Jude had imagined when she mentioned the conference to Jeremiah. Then, from Carole, ‘You’re not speaking at it, are you?’
‘No. A couple of my friends are.’
‘Oh?’
‘Karen and Chrissie. Their subject is: “Healing in the LGBT Community”.’
‘Oh, my goodness. Does that mean they’re …?’
‘A lesbian couple, yes.’
‘Oh.’
Jude giggled. ‘Just like a lot of people in Fethering think we are.’
Carole’s face was a study in unamusement.
THIRTEEN
‘He’s upstairs. I’ll get him.’
As the line went quiet, Jude wondered whether Natalie Kendrick always answered the phone when it rang in Troubadours. Was she acting as some kind of gatekeeper for Tom? Then she rationalized that he probably had a mobile on which he conducted all his personal calls. But she was still intrigued by who held the power in that particular mother/son relationship.
She hadn’t completely prepared the approach she would take when he came on the phone. She certainly wouldn’t pretend her call had anything to do with healing, as Carole had suggested. When it came to her work, Jude had a strict code of ethics. Healing was not to be messed with.
‘Hi,’ Tom said languorously. ‘Changed your mind, have you? Think you can heal my non-existent ailment?’
‘No.’ She decided, as she often did, that the truth might be as good an approach as any other. ‘I wanted to talk to you about what happened with your car.’
; ‘Ah. The Triumph Tr6. Or, as it is better known currently around Fethering, “The Murder Weapon”.’
‘That’s the one.’
‘And why do you want to talk to me about it? Presumably because of that? Because of its role in Bill Shefford’s death?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, at least you’re honest.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘I mean lots of the Fethering gossips are muttering behind their hands about me. At least you’re coming straight out and saying that you think I had something to do with topping the poor bugger.’
‘I’m not saying that.’
‘No? Then why do you want to talk to me about it?’
‘Straightforward curiosity. A desire to find out what actually happened.’
‘Honest again. But give me one good reason why I should talk to you?’
Jude was thrown by the question and improvised madly. ‘Erm, because you are getting sick of … as you say, “lots of the Fethering gossips muttering behind their hands” about you. Because, if we found out what actually did happen that morning at the garage, they’d all get off your back.’
‘Hm. Yes, I do share your curiosity about that. Incidentally, were you the one who was in Shefford’s when it happened?’
‘No.’
‘Oh, it must’ve been your partner then. People always talk about you two together.’
Jude grinned inwardly, remembering their recent conversation. ‘It was Carole Seddon, my neighbour.’
‘Right. So, she might actually have some hard facts to contribute to the discussion?’
‘I’m sure she will have.’
‘OK then. I don’t mind seeing the two of you together.’
‘Good.’ Jude was delighted. And she knew Carole would be too. ‘Where do you want to meet? We’d be happy to come to your place.’
‘No.’
‘The Crown and Anchor?’
‘God, no. That’d be like poking a stick straight into the gossips’ wasps’ nest. No, we need to meet somewhere more private.’
Tom Kendrick’s idea of ‘somewhere more private’ was a pub in The Lanes in Brighton. Carole complained about this, because parking in the city was always difficult. But when they got there, the setting was so markedly different from anything in Fethering that they understood his logic.