‘I can’t object, as long as you stay within the law and tell me what you find,’ Gowrie said.
‘You ask Munro,’ Keith said. ‘He’ll tell you that, provided I’m not buggered about, I’ll play fair. Give me most of tomorrow to ask questions and you can meet me at Boswell Court late in the afternoon and I’ll tell you what I’ve got. Munro told Mrs Hendrickson that I could have copies of the statements you took from the residents. Bring them up to me and I can look for discrepancies from what they’ve told me.’
Gowrie was looking unhappy. ‘I can’t make late afternoon,’ he said. ‘I’ll come up around noon and see how you’ve got on. You may even learn something useful. But I think you’re wasting your time and Mrs Hendrickson’s money. We’ve passed the stage where a skilled amateur has a chance of putting his finger on the crucial fact.’
‘It isn’t only Mrs Hendrickson’s money,’ Keith said. ‘The union has agreed to pay half, and if I need to speak to their members they’ll talk freely. I met Hughie, yesterday. And you were right, his name’s Reynolds. He’s bodyguarding for me today. Leave him alone while Molly tries to coax the name of his former client out of him.’
‘Twenty-four hours,’ Gowrie said slowly. ‘After that, I want to talk to him. You know, you may not be wasting your time after all. I’ll give you a list of things you could try to find out for me about the union.’
‘Get knotted,’ Keith said.
*
The real rush of business came just before closing-time as those with sporting engagements over the weekend called after work to stock up with cartridges or fishing tackle.
There were three customers in the shop when, out of the corner of his eye, Keith saw a man of late middle-age enter. The newcomer took up a waiting position by the gun-rack, and even when a last-minute customer dashed in for a packet of swivels he did not assert his right to be served but waited patiently until he could get Keith’s undivided attention. Then he stepped forward and offered his business card.
The card was of a major insurance company, and bore the name of B.Strathling.
‘I’m pleased to meet you at last, Mr Strathling,’ Keith said. ‘I’ve seen you in the distance. Are you here as a customer?’
‘I called primarily about your insurance.’
‘Then I’ll shut up shop before we talk.’ Keith locked up and put the CLOSED sign in the door. Ben Strathling, he noticed, was a tall man, balding, neatly but inexpensively dressed. He had cold eyes and his mouth was too wide for his narrow head, giving him a fish-like look. Keith decided not to hold that against him. Some of his best friends reminded him of fish or fowl, or of dogs.
‘I was going through my papers,’ Strathling said as Keith turned back to him, ‘and I noticed that your insured value hadn’t been increased for two years. With inflation running the way it is, I thought I’d ask whether you weren’t under-insured. It can work to your disadvantage in the event of a claim.’
‘You’ll have to speak to my partner about that,’ Keith said. ‘He’s the money-man. But we took stock only a month ago. If you haven’t heard from him, either our insurance is adequate or Wal hasn’t got around to it yet. He doesn’t forget such things. I’ll have him write to you. He’ll be back on Monday.’
‘No need for that,’ Strathling said cheerfully. His wide mouth could produce a warm smile although his eyes remained cold. ‘I’ll call in on Monday.’
‘Do you go round all your clients personally?’ Keith asked curiously.
‘Only the bigger local ones. It’s often easier to deal face-to-face. I was manager of the Newton Lauder office until we closed it several years ago,’ Strathling explained, ‘and now the locals tend to feel cut off from personal attention. I became manager for south-east Scotland, and I’m responsible for Kelso as well as Edinburgh and several other offices, so it was handy enough to go on living here and be able to give some continuity of service.’
‘I understand,’ Keith said. ‘Well, Wallace James is your man.’
‘I’d another reason for calling in,’ Strathling said. ‘Mrs Hendrickson has been asking her neighbours to co-operate with you. She says that you’re trying to clear up any remaining mystery about Sam Hendrickson’s death.’ He frowned at something above Keith’s head. ‘Just what further clarification is needed, I must admit, evades me. I’d have thought that more than enough unpleasantness had been generated already. A suicide doesn’t do a neighbourhood any good.’
‘I don’t suppose it’ll affect property values,’ Keith said.
Strathling pretended not to hear. ‘But she’s the widow, poor lady, and if she’s not satisfied I suppose we’d all better help you to set her mind at rest. The thing is, I understand that you may be doing the rounds tomorrow. I’m expecting a phone-message which might call me away. So, in case I missed you, I came in to see you now. Mostly, I’m afraid, to tell you that I can’t tell you anything. I was doing some homework while watching the racing on television – I like my little flutter on the gee-gees, it helps to keep me sane.’ Strathling gave a little giggle. ‘And my wife was out shopping.’
‘Did she walk over the canal footbridge?’ Keith asked.
‘She took my car. She likes to do the whole week’s shopping in one go.’ Strathling paused. Keith’s interruption had broken his train of thought. ‘I . . . I wasn’t looking out and, what with the noise of the telly, I didn’t even hear the shot. Sorry.’
‘So what was the first you knew about it?’
‘I heard Jenny Hendrickson let out a yelp when she found him. Not surprising, really, when you remember the state he was in. At first I thought it was on the television, or kids playing. But I decided to pop round – I was always anxious about poor old Sam. Jenny and the milkman were already there.’
Keith was still leaning against the door. Strathling, satisfied that he had had his say, moved towards it but Keith frustrated him simply by remaining where he was. ‘It was good of you to come in,’ Keith said, forcing a little extra warmth into his voice. ‘Let’s not waste the journey. You weren’t stuck in front of the goggle-box the whole morning.’
Strathling nodded. ‘No more I was,’ he said. ‘My apologies! I went over to see Ian Albany about something when the racing gave way to gymnastics – I’m not enough of a voyeur to sit and watch young girls doing the splits. Ian and his wife were both at home. But that must have been some time before the shot.’
‘Not by the time you returned home,’ Keith said. ‘The milkman called at the Albanys’ for his money while you were there. He moved straight on to Mrs Hendrickson and was talking to her when the shot was heard.’
‘Is that so?’ Strathling produced a twisted smile. ‘But then, he’s the worst gossip in the town and she’s almost as big a chatterbox. If they got on to the subject of some local scandal, they could have been talking for any given period.’
‘Perhaps,’ Keith said. ‘Who else did you see?’
‘Not a soul, to remember. I think the window-cleaner was at Ian’s house when I arrived. He was doing the front of mine when I went home.’
‘You crossed straight over and back?’
Keith had asked his question as casually as he could but Strathling looked at him sharply. ‘More or less.’ He hesitated. ‘I’d quite forgotten. I meant to look in on poor Sam Hendrickson. See if he was all right and try to cheer him up a bit. So, when there was a break in the racing, instead of going out by the front door I went out of the French windows. I paused at the gap in the hedge. But I could hear a man’s voice – you can hear quite well if there’s a window open – so I decided that he wouldn’t want to be bothered.’
‘Was that coming or going?’ Keith asked.
Strathling hesitated again. ‘I don’t know,’ he said at last. ‘I just don’t remember. I was thinking about other matters. I’d no cause to make a mental note about it at the time. I just have a recollection of sticking my head through the gap in the hedge and hearing a voice.’
‘A man’s voice?’
‘Did it sound like a conversation? Or a talk? Or did it sound excited, like a sports commentator?’
‘I didn’t hang around long enough to hear more than a word or two.’
‘You said, “If there’s a window open”. Was there an open window when you arrived on the scene?’ An open window would have cleared the smell of smoke more quickly. But Hendrickson had felt the cold after his stroke. Keith was sure that the police photographs had shown the windows to be closed.
Strathling frowned. ‘I don’t remember. Anyway, the door could have been open.’
‘If . . .’ Keith began, ‘if I told you that the voice belonged to one of your neighbours, who would you think it was?’
‘In that event, I’d say that it belonged to that grocer chap, Kechnie. I wondered at the time. I didn’t want to see him – can’t stand the man – so I turned back.’ Strathling glanced at Keith with a hint of malice. ‘You could ask him why he crossed the road that morning, before the shot.’
‘You saw him cross? Or did somebody tell you?’
‘Neither. Something else I’d forgotten. That scene in the summerhouse drove it out of my mind. When I heard Jenny Hendrickson squeal and I came out of my French windows, I glanced around because I wasn’t sure where the noise had come from. I glimpsed his head over a low point of the hedge. He was in my neighbours’ garden. The Beechers.’
‘Have you let the police know about this?’
‘I told you,’ Strathling said irritably. ‘I’d quite forgotten about it. I’ll go and tell them now.’
‘Don’t bother,’ Keith said. ‘I’ll pass the word along.’
Strathling chose to take offence. ‘Now, you look here,’ he said. ‘You’ve no official status in this and I think you’re taking too much on yourself. I can carry my own messages to the police. Are you suggesting that I’m not to be trusted to go and make a statement? Well?’
‘Do by all means go and tell them yourself,’ Keith said. ‘They may be better able to jog your memory.’ He stood aside.
Strathling walked out without another word and headed across the Square, but half-way across he curved aside from the direction of the police headquarters and got into his Jaguar. Keith shrugged. Strathling might well have decided to phone from home. He was the sort of man who would stand on his dignity and expect the police to come to him.
Chapter Ten
As they shared the family meal that evening Keith, who had arrived home barely in time to wash his hands and sit down, asked Molly, ‘So who was the client?’
‘What makes you so sure that he’d talk to me?’
‘You could trick a Trappist into spilling the secrets of the confessional,’ Keith said. ‘You bring out the chatterbox in people.’
‘Oh. Well, I did find out. Hughie’s rather a sweet person.’
The right man had certainly turned up. Keith remembered meeting Hughie at the road-end. ‘Hughie is?’
‘Yes. He’s big and tough and not very bright, so he gets used for the rough stuff, but inside he’s just a softie.’
‘So who—?’
‘He sat very quietly in the car until we were most of the way there and then he explained, very shyly, that he’d taken on the job of warning you off but that he wouldn’t have laid a finger on Debbie or me.’
‘That’s a comfort to know,’ Deborah said.
‘Did you know that he has a little girl of his own?’ Molly asked.
‘No,’ Keith said. ‘I didn’t. Who did he—?’
‘Well, he has,’ Molly said firmly. ‘But when I asked him who’d hired him, he’d only say, “A mannie who was feared the polis would fin’ o’er muckle”.’ Molly’s accent was a perfect imitation of Hughie’s although she could not manage the deeper voice.
‘Who—?’
‘Anyway, it was just as well he was with me because when we arrived Aunt was having one of her turns. And you know what a weight she is. I couldn’t have managed her on my own, but Hughie picked her up very gently and carried her up the stairs as if she was no more than a pillow. He wanted to go out of the room while I got her to bed, but she was still woozy and I couldn’t lift her on my own, so he stayed and helped me but with his eyes tight shut, and by the time the doctor and the district nurse got there she was quite respectable and rather pleased with herself. She’d been forgetting to take her tablets, silly old thing. But she still refuses to go into hospital.
‘I made us some lunch and Hughie helped me to clean the place through. He’s good about the house,’ Molly said. ‘Much better than you are. And that seemed to break the ice a bit, because on the way back he was very apologetic. He’d been engaged to do a job, and part of the service was confidentiality. And I said that he was being paid to keep me safe but we didn’t know who to look out for when he wasn’t around.’
‘That got him talking?’
‘Not just then, but when we got back and I’d paid him what you said, he was just getting into his van when he paused and said something about the client who paid being worth more than the one who didn’t. Then he looked at me very seriously and warned me, sounding just like a fortune-teller with a crystal ball, that I should never trust a bald-headed man with green eyes and a ginger moustache.’
‘Mr Beecher!’ Deborah said.
‘Is that so?’ Keith said. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever laid eyes on the man. First thing in the morning, I’d better try to find out where he goes on these so-called fishing-trips. Wal says that he never buys any tackle from the shop.’
‘He could buy it somewhere else,’ Molly said.
‘Do you want my help tomorrow, Dad?’ Deborah asked.
‘Depends. Your mother said she’d mind the shop if Wal and Janet aren’t back in time. I could use some help and I don’t want you running around where somebody could get at you, but I’d hate to have you think I couldn’t manage without you. Aren’t you supposed to be trapping for the gun club?’
Deborah smiled broadly. ‘At that rate of pay,’ she said, ‘which would you expect me to prefer? I’ll phone and cancel. Their whip-round for the trapper’s hardly worth having. About two quid and a toffee-apple.’
‘She’s her daddy’s girl all right,’ Molly said. ‘Mercenary. You shouldn’t let people down like that.’
‘I won’t be leaving them stuck,’ Deborah said. ‘There’ll be other volunteers. Anyway, I think Mr Albany may be rather relieved. He never wins anything when I’m trapping. I see to that. And I’ll go on seeing to it until he treats me like a grown-up person. If I’m old enough to have my bottom pinched I’m too old for a sort of adolescent version of baby-talk.’
‘Does he do that?’ Molly asked in ominous tones.
‘It was only once and I think he’d been drinking that lunch-time.’
Keith knew that Deborah could look after herself – if only she wanted to. He was more interested in an earlier remark. He was usually either shooting or coaching and had never given much thought to the trapper’s part in competitive shooting. ‘How could you make sure that he didn’t win anything?’
‘That’s easy,’ Deborah said. ‘You get to recognise most of their voices when they call for their first bird. Then there’s all sorts of ways of making it fly off at an angle, or making pairs fly apart. And with most traps you can speed them up slightly, or slow them down. If it’s somebody I like, I can almost make the clay hang over his head.’
‘I’ve had some damned difficult birds when you’ve been trapping!’
‘You’d probably annoyed me,’ Deborah said blandly.
Molly decided that a change of subject was overdue. ‘What are you going to spend all that lovely money on?’ she asked her daughter.
‘Clothes.’
‘But we buy all your clothes,’ Keith said.
Deborah humphed. ‘These aren’t clothes,’ she said. ‘They’re coverings for my nakedness. I don’t want to be a schoolgirl
all my life.’
‘We wouldn’t expect it,’ Molly said.
‘Maybe not, but I can’t see you buying me the sort of clothes I could show off in a disco or at a pop concert. One of these days, I’ll want to do a tour of the boutiques.’
‘Being a swinging chick comes expensive,’ Keith said after a pause.
‘That’s why I’m trying to build up a kitty of my own.’
‘I think she does have a sort of a point,’ Molly said. ‘Not a lot, but some.’
Keith pushed away an image of Deborah in punk gear with a Mohican hair-style in fluorescent colours. ‘Come through to the study,’ he said, ‘and we’ll put what we know into the word-processor.’
‘Help me with the washing-up first,’ Molly said. ‘I want to sit in with you. Jenny Hendrickson’s still my friend, even if I’ve hardly seen her for umpty years.’
‘How many years?’ Deborah asked.
‘Never you mind. Keith, do you have enough information to put together yet? I thought you’d be going off on one of your tours, seeing hundreds of Sam Hendrickson’s old contacts all over the place.’
‘I thought so too,’ Keith said. ‘But when I came to think a little more, I decided that Detective Inspector Gowrie was only making life difficult for himself, worrying about how some outsider arrived in Boswell Court. The signs, all but one, are that you and Deb were right all along and that there was no outsider. And chasing around for motives never pays dividends, because the motive often turns out to be the last thing you’d have thought of or else it’s too trivial to have been believed. So we concentrate on the time around the shot and we tabulate who saw or heard whom or what where and when and we go on asking questions until discrepancies show up. And then we go on asking more questions until we’ve explained them.’
‘And if that doesn’t work?’ Deborah asked. ‘Are we up the creek without the proverbial paddle?’
‘Not necessarily. Either we’ve satisfied ourselves that it was a local job or we haven’t. Come on, let’s get the washing-up over.’ He began to stack dirty dishes.
The Worried Widow Page 16