by J M Gregson
‘I believe Bond had new material for us on Preston’s wife.’
‘Indeed he did, Chris. With times, places and personnel efficiently detailed. Edwina Preston has a lover, Hugh Whitfield, whom she met on the night of Preston’s death. We already knew that. What we didn’t know and what Bond was able to tell us was that neither she nor Whitfield took dinner in the hotel, as we’d previously thought. Edwina Preston drove out of the hotel at ten past eight and returned at ten twenty-seven. She turned towards home but Bond lost her quite quickly. She says she parked for a long time near Sudeley Castle and considered her future — principally how she was going to divest herself of her husband so that she could marry Whitfield when his mortally ill wife dies in the near future.’
Rushton made a note of the times to add to his computer file on the widow. ‘That leaves her ample time to have driven to her home, dispatched Preston, and returned to the hotel.’
‘Yes. She looked duly shaken when we pointed that out. She agreed that his death was very convenient for her.’
‘Would she have had access to a pistol such as the one that killed Preston?’
‘That is a problem with most of the candidates for this crime. It’s possible of course that Peter Preston kept a weapon like that in his study. It would accord with his taste for secrecy and intrigue. In which case, Edwina Preston would almost certainly have known about it.’
Hook said, ‘We can’t discount the possibility of a contract killer, can we? Marjorie Dooks or Edwina Preston certainly had the money to employ one.’
Lambert grinned at him. The empathy they had built over the years was such that Bert knew immediately that the chief had divined what was behind this reminder: Hook didn’t want Sam Hilton or Ros Barker to be guilty of this. But Lambert didn’t reject the suggestion. He said, ‘We should bear that in mind, and possibly add Sue Charles to that list as well, though I would query whether any of these ladies had the underworld connections to know how to contact a hitman.’
Bert said stubbornly, ‘Marjorie Dooks would soon discover that information, if she put her mind to it. She’s a capable and resourceful woman.’
‘Fair point. And we’ve now got more details of her work record in the Civil Service. As a senior bureaucrat, one of her responsibilities in her last working years was to direct the people involved in the collection and disposal of illegal arms after the Irish agreements at the beginning of the century. It’s quite possible that she acquired an ex-army pistol at that time without there being any record of it.’
‘And Preston was threatening her in a way she’d never had to endure before — threatening the future life of the man she plans to marry in due course. She’s a proud woman, used to controlling her own destiny. She wouldn’t take kindly to being threatened. And her alibi is suspect. She’s admitted that although they were at home together, she and her husband often spend the evenings apart in a big house. She could easily have left the place for an hour or more without his knowledge, as he took some pleasure in revealing to us. Marjorie says that he’s a philanderer and their marriage is over. And over the last nine months, she’s been conducting an affair with an old flame from her Civil Service days who plans to become an MP. Preston had it documented and was trying to blackmail her. Not for money; he simply wanted to take over the literature festival and direct it along his own lines. I’m sure Marjorie didn’t take kindly to his attempts to pressurize her, any more than she welcomed the threatening letter he’d sent to her a few days before he died.’
Rushton said, ‘Marjorie Dooks certainly seems to be the one with the capacity to plan this and the nerve to carry it out. What about Sue Charles? I suppose most people would think that as a crime author she’s made a study of murder and its methods.’
It was Bert Hook’s turn to smile. ‘She’s sixty-eight and widowed. She makes no secret of the fact that her novels are escapist whodunits rather than sordid crime-face stuff. She hasn’t an alibi for the time of the killing, but as she lives alone you wouldn’t expect one. Apart from her writing, her main interests are her cat and her garden. As a murder suspect, she’s hardly convincing.’
Rushton nodded. ‘Sam Hilton?’ He could hardly conceal his eagerness. The DI was a great man for statistics, and the statistics proved that a man caught out in one crime was likely to be guilty of others, once he had embarked on the primrose path to the everlasting bonfire. Chris couldn’t have said where that phrase came from, but it had surfaced from his subconscious and rather appealed to him. Even DIs who spent most of their days in front of a computer were allowed poetic flashes. Bert Hook might now be an Open University BA, but that didn’t allow him a monopoly of these things.
Lambert nodded soberly. ‘Hilton lied to try to give himself an alibi for that night. Fortunately, the girl he tried to use is highly intelligent but basically honest. She did her best to lie for him, but it soon became obvious that she was doing just that. He now admits he was on his own in his bedsit on the evening of the murder. His old Fiesta could have been the car an independent witness saw outside Preston’s house at the time of his death.’
‘The independent witness is a felon who was carrying out a burglary in a neighbouring house, one Wayne Johnson,’ Hook reminded them sturdily.
‘Nevertheless, a man we consider a reliable witness in this matter,’ said Lambert.
‘But Johnson was preoccupied with his own crime at the time. He was never close to the car and he can’t identify it, beyond the fact that it was small and a dark colour. There are a number of other vehicles owned by suspects which would fit the bill equally well. Sam Hilton is a minor drug dealer and has admitted it. He doesn’t have a history of serious violence.’
‘He does not. But then, we may have to accept the fact that this crime was committed by someone without a previous record of violence. The only suspect who has previous as far as we are aware is our painter, Ros Barker. Not with a firearm, but with a knife. Without a good lawyer, she might well have had a conviction for assault with a dangerous weapon.’
Rushton remembered all the details of the artist which he had fed into his computer file. ‘She was also alone on the night of the murder. Her partner was away visiting her family. Whether that was at Ms Barker’s instigation or not, we don’t know. What we do know is that she had a lot at stake if Preston had chosen to mount a campaign against her and her art. She’s just got her first exhibition at Barnard’s Gallery in Cheltenham. She might even have lost that if Preston had chosen to be really malicious. Both she with her paintings and Hilton with his poems seem to be flavour of the month at the moment, but we all know how transient a reputation in the arts can be. And apart from the material considerations, people can be very sensitive when their creative work is attacked. Young versifiers and artists aren’t as thick-skinned as we simple coppers quickly learn to be.’
John Lambert grinned at Chris Rushton’s mention of thick-skinned coppers. Hook and he had enjoyed some fun in the past from taunting an over-serious Rushton, who was never quite sure when the older men were extracting the urine. Chris was more balanced since the entry into his life of Anne Jackson, the lively primary school teacher who was ten years his junior and had been briefly a suspect in a murder investigation. Lambert said patiently, ‘Does that complete your list of major suspects, Chris?’
Rushton looked down at his notes for a moment, though he knew what he was going to say. ‘I don’t think we should rule out Kate Merrick. As far as I can see, she’s devoted to her partner. She’d be very sensitive to any attack on Ros Barker’s integrity as an artist or a person. She’s younger than Ros and very much under her spell. She wouldn’t be objective or balanced in her reactions to any attack on Ros.’
Lambert nodded. He had been awake since five and an idea that had at first seemed preposterous had become increasingly credible over the hours since then. There was a second or two of silence before he said gnomically, ‘I think we shall find that affection for a partner is a major factor in this case.’
It was an agreeable moment in the leafy Oldford suburb. Monday afternoon was a quiet time for cats, with the world back at work and most of the birds resting in hedges and trees after a sunny, song-filled morning. Roland sat on the gatepost and surveyed the warm world through half-closed eyes. The tiger in him was merely quiescent; at the first sign of prey or danger he would be instantly alert.
At two o’clock the sun was high, the day was at its hottest, and Roland’s eyes had closed completely. At one minute past two, his eyes were wide with apprehension and hostility. Bert Hook drove the police Mondeo carefully past him and into the drive of the modest bungalow with the immaculate gardens. Bert eased himself from the driving seat, waited for his chief to rear himself stiffly to his full height on the other side of the vehicle, and looked round appreciatively at the spring-green lawn with its sharply cut edges, the weedless beds with their newly planted bedding plants, and, in the furthest border, the luxuriant pink of the peonies and the thrusting stems of the roses that would follow them into bloom.
‘I wish I could say it was all my own work, but my gardener was here yesterday. He’s a good man.’ Sue Charles was framed by honeysuckle in her front doorway, enjoying Hook’s obvious approval of the work she had done with Brian on Sunday afternoon. She led them into her home, not closing the door until Roland had sprung from his watchtower and followed the trio inside.
‘I’ve made some tea,’ she said, as she ushered them into the cosy sitting room and installed them upon the couch opposite her favourite armchair. ‘I think Brian has left some of my flapjacks for you!’ she called from the kitchen. She bustled back in with a tray containing cups and saucers, a teapot, and a plate with the five remaining flapjacks from her Saturday baking. ‘I’m glad to see people enjoying them. They just sit in the tin when I’m on my own.’
John Lambert, who wished that she had not done this, left Hook to offer the conventional thanks for her bounty.
He did not say anything for a long time, watching Hook bite appreciatively into the flapjack he had himself refused to take. Eventually his gaze settled upon Sue Charles. He studied her for a moment, apparently more in sorrow than in anger, then took a belated sip of his tea. The author was a highly intelligent woman, despite the efforts she sometimes made to disguise the fact; his look had already told her more than many words would have done.
But she might be mistaken. She would keep up the front for as long as it was necessary and worthwhile. ‘I’m always glad to have visitors — the writer’s is essentially a lonely life, especially after she has lost her partner of many years. But I confess I’m surprised to see you again so soon. You must think I am in a position to help your investigation, which surprises me. Or have you come here to tell me that you have made an arrest?’
Her blue eyes were bright and attentive beneath the neatly parted grey hair as she settled herself back into the old-fashioned winged armchair, which might have been designed to house her still supple and agile body. Her head was a little on one side, which they now recognized as one of her mannerisms when asking a question. She looked, Hook thought, like everyone’s favourite aunt, the understanding and encouraging relative, which as a Barnardo’s boy he had never had.
Lambert was as composed as his hostess, but firm beneath his reluctance as he answered her query. ‘We have come here this afternoon not to tell you about an arrest but to make one, Mrs Charles.’
She would play it out until it became hopeless. All might yet be well, she told herself determinedly. She looked at Roland, who had leapt up to his favourite place upon the sunny windowsill. His tale was lashing behind Lambert’s head, almost as if he had understood the words which had come so quietly from that long, grave face. She must make a final effort, if only for his sake. ‘You cannot possibly mean that you think I killed Peter Preston!’
‘That is exactly what I mean.’
‘He didn’t like me and I didn’t particularly care for him. That is hardly reason for murder. Do I strike you as the type of woman who would commit murder because of a few insults to my writing from a man like Preston?’
She addressed her question to Hook, as if turning to a balanced man for a more balanced view. But it was Lambert who answered her. ‘You do not strike either of us as that sort of woman, no. Perhaps that blinded us to things we should have followed up earlier. The fact that you collected the deceased’s wife immediately after she had been informed of his death and brought her here, for a start.’
‘I gave poor Edwina a little tea and sympathy, that’s all. She was sorely in need of both.’
‘I expect you did, yes. But you also informed yourself about when the murder had been discovered and what had been revealed to the widow at that point. It was no coincidence that you were waiting to pick her up that morning. You knew what had happened and hoped to find a distressed Mrs Preston in Oldford. You took care to let us know that she was very shaken, as someone might have been who had committed a serious crime.’
‘Or as someone might have been who had lost a much-loved husband.’
‘Perhaps. Except that you took care to emphasize when we saw you for a second time that Edwina and her husband were living separate lives and that their marriage was probably over.’
‘As a case against me, this is pretty thin stuff, Chief Superintendent. You’d have difficulty proving that I tried to make you believe Edwina was guilty of murder.’
‘You’re probably right about that — it’s just interesting to follow the way your mind was working. Your initial tactic was to try to divert us right away from the people like yourself around Preston. It was you who pointed out that Preston must have made enemies in his earlier and more successful life at the BBC and elsewhere. You pointed out without any real evidence that these were “rich and powerful people, with the money and contacts to employ a hitman”.’
Sue forced a smile. ‘Thin stuff, I say again, Mr Lambert.’
‘I agree; not the stuff on which to base serious charges. You did, however, make one very definite mistake, one which I think would be damning even in a criminal court. You knew how Peter Preston had been killed, which only the killer and our detection team knew at the time.’
She showed no immediate sign of dismay. Lambert was filled with a reluctant admiration for her insouciance. In the same instant, he realized that perhaps she did not much care, that perhaps she had always anticipated that it would come to this in the end. You could never approve of people who took the law into their own hands, but there were rare occasions like this when you felt despite yourself a strange sympathy and understanding for those who did.
Sue Charles stared at him for a long moment before she said, ‘And how exactly did I make this “mistake” which you see as so crucial?’
Lambert nodded at Hook, who flicked open his notebook. He knew the key phrases well enough, but he found it was easier to read them out than to look directly into the face of this most unlikely murderer. ‘You said that you found it difficult to believe that “someone took a pistol to his house and shot him”. You should not have known at that moment the manner of Preston’s death.’
‘I expect Edwina told me when I brought her here after she’d been told of the death.’
‘Mrs Preston was told only that her husband was dead when she arrived back at her house that day. She did not know that he had been shot.’
‘But what possible reason could I have for killing Peter? He’d made a few scathing references to my writing, but I found them pathetic rather than wounding.’
‘I agree with you on that. I think you are too sensible a woman to kill a man because of his opinions of your work, however derogatory they might be. But it was you who pointed out that “few of us are completely objective about our own work”. You were trying to convince us at the time that Preston’s contemptuous dismissal of Sam Hilton’s poetry and Ros Barker’s paintings might have driven them to kill him. You even took the care to point out that “young people seem to react m
ore violently to criticism than my generation”.’
‘I still think that’s true, you know. Perhaps it just reflects a tendency in our present society to resort more quickly to violence.’ She seemed to be weighing his point as if she were engaged only in some complex intellectual argument that interested her.
‘But Preston was a malevolent and unscrupulous man, not just a petty critic. He knew how to hurt you: by revealing the stuff he had grubbed up on your husband.’
‘You told me about that. I didn’t know anything of it until then.’ With the mention of her husband, her face had turned to stone.
‘Oh, I think you did, Mrs Charles. Preston used his material to threaten the other people on the literature festival committee. He was hardly likely to deny you his unwelcome revelations, particularly since he thought of you as the most vulnerable, as he recorded in his notes.’
She said dully, ‘I couldn’t let him attack George like that. I couldn’t let him go around saying and writing these things, as he threatened to do.’
It was her first admission of guilt. Hook made a note of it, though he knew in his heart that it would not be necessary to quote this in court. He referred again to his notes and said gently, ‘You said to us on Saturday, “It doesn’t happen often, but I can be very direct when I’m upset”. You were very upset when he made these accusations about your George, weren’t you?’
It was less an accusation than a helping hand towards the confession they all knew was coming, and she took it as such. ‘It was George’s pistol I used on Peter Preston. That seemed like poetic justice to me.’
‘It was a weapon your husband had retained from his army days, I suppose.’
‘Yes. I always wanted George to get rid of it, but he said he wasn’t going to live in fear of the young ruffians who practised burglary as a hobby. He was rather an old-fashioned man, my husband, but I loved him.’