The Murders of Mrs. Austin and Mrs. Beale

by Jill McGown

  He smiled. Rosemary had read that someone was trying to get it legalised. She had had a fit. Legalising it wouldn’t make it acceptable. She preferred things the way they were. Her husband ran clubs, where the tired businessman could relax to live entertainment, and buy expensive drinks. If people suspected that the rooms upstairs were probably put to some less visible use, that was fine. But they mustn’t know. That way she could keep what she imagined was her respectability. Massage parlours, health studios, gymnasia – she was very strong on the Latin plural, was Rosemary – even a nice detached house in suburbia. Business ventures. Beale (Brothels) Ltd just wasn’t the sort of business venture she wanted people to know for a fact she was in. She saw it as a social service. They just wanted their ration of whatever sort of thing they went in for, then it would be back on with their business suits and off home to the missus, who presumably did not go in for that sort of thing.

  The other side of it, keeping Rosemary amused, was, if anything, becoming even more boring. And last night, with Lennie, he had discovered his self-respect. He was no better than the girls Beale employed to revive the tired businessmen; it wasn’t even his prowess that qualified him for the job. It was simply his proximity, and the trust that Beale had mistakenly placed in him.

  He thumbed through a girlie magazine as he lay there, waiting for the phone to ring, but the combination of thoughts of Lennie and the girlie magazine weren’t doing him any good; he pulled a car magazine over the table and looked through it instead.

  Now, he could imagine driving one of them. Unlike one of Rosemary’s newly acquired lorries. He’d got an HGV licence; he had mistakenly told her that, and he was being targeted. She would make sure he got the job.

  Thanks a lot, Rosemary. Driving through every kind of weather condition imaginable from foggy motorways to desert roads, harried by customs officials and police, never getting any sleep. Trying to communicate with excitable foreigners who couldn’t speak English. Rolling on and off ferries, getting stuck in jams at the docks. Getting caught in some outlandish country and hanged.

  Still it paid well, Very well. He might even be able to afford one of these jobs. Right now, he couldn’t afford a fifteen-year-old van. He’d looked at it the other day; almost bought it. But he’d have had to have got the money from Rosemary, so he didn’t. Was that the beginning of his self-respect asserting itself?

  He wished he had bought it now. If he’d had a van last night, Lennie would have been in it with him, no danger.

  He looked up as a shadow fell across the window, blocking the bright sunlight, and heard the doorbell ring. He didn’t pay much attention, until Mrs Sweeney knocked on his door.

  ‘Mr Tasker,’ she said, disapproval in every line of her face, ‘there are two gentlemen to see you.’

  The problem was, as ever, producing enough evidence to give the lie to what had been said. On his way to Malworth, Lloyd perceived that one possibility was to arrange for a reconstruction of Mrs Beale’s walk home from the Riverside Inn. He stopped at the traffic lights just before the bridge, waiting to turn left along the river bank, and looked at the terrain.

  There would have been some traffic and people on the main road which crossed the river; the pub had been about to close. But her walk alongside the river would have been lonely. A children’s play park on one side, closed shops and studios on the other. Someone sitting unnecessarily at the traffic lights, with nothing to do but wait for them to change, may have seen something: a car, another pedestrian, someone hanging about by the river, or in the phone-box. A reconstruction, a woman walking home alone late in the evening, might just jog someone’s memory.

  He pulled into the parking area, and pressed the pad beneath Beale’s name.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘DCI Lloyd, Stansfield, Mr Beale.’ Lloyd looked into the eye of the camera. ‘I’m enquiring into the death of Mrs Leonora Austin.’

  ‘What’s that got to do with me?’

  ‘Nothing, sir. But we think she may have been in this area last night’

  ‘My wife was killed last night!’

  Lloyd nodded. ‘I know, sir. I’m very sorry. We think the two deaths may be connected.’

  It was odd, talking to a camera and having a wall answer. Lloyd rather wished he had been around in the days of hansom cabs and Sherlock Holmes. He could have called the Great Detective in, and gone to the south of France with Judy while he sorted it all out.

  ‘Come up,’ said Beale, and the door buzzed, and clicked. The Great Detective would have had his work cut out getting into the bloody building, never mind sorting out what had gone on there.

  Lloyd saw what Judy meant about the reception area. She was sitting amid the potted plants, smoking.

  ‘I’ve been listening to some interesting stuff,’ she said.

  Lloyd listened to a potted version of her talk with Mrs Pearce. ‘Shouldn’t be too hard to trace Tasker,’ he said. ‘It wasn’t just hash if he’s only just got out of prison.’

  ‘I’ve put the wheels in motion,’ she said. ‘But I don’t have a description – it might not have been him that Mickey saw.’

  ‘Surely Mrs Pearce knows what he looks like?’

  ‘She says she never met him. I think she’s quite strait-laced – she said Mrs Austin knew that she wouldn’t have approved. She stopped seeing her altogether after Tasker was arrested, because every time she went round there there was a police car outside, and she didn’t want to get involved in that sort of thing.’ She smiled tiredly. ‘She’s involved with us now whether she likes it or not,’ she said.

  ‘So she disapproved of Mrs Austin’s lifestyle,’ said Lloyd thoughtfully. ‘ But her husband fancied her?’

  ‘So she says. He’d known her practically all her life – Pauline thinks he only married her because Jonathan Austin got the first prize.’

  Lloyd sat down. ‘ That doesn’t sound too healthy,’ he said.

  ‘No. And I’m not keen on Tasker, despite his pedigree.’

  ‘Why not? Drake’s had him down for it all along. If it was him he saw, which seems more than likely.’

  ‘She had a lot of ex-boyfriends,’ warned Judy.

  ‘Did you ever meet any of them?’

  ‘No,’ said Judy. ‘She was just about to marry Austin when I met her.’ She paused. ‘ I’m not happy about him, Lloyd.’

  ‘I know. But why would he tell us he’d gone for the car if he hadn’t?’

  ‘Because he didn’t want us to know where he had been, and that was the first thing that came into his head. He said it wasn’t there because he had to explain why he hadn’t got it.’

  He looked at her. ‘You are getting like him,’ he said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Drake. He’s an obsessive. He’s at the station now, going through piles of paperwork instead of going home.’

  ‘I’m not obsessed! Neither is he – he’s just trying to make up for showing himself up last night. And he likes his desk to be as clear as possible. You’re the only one who likes it piled to the sky with rubbish.’

  ‘He might not be obsessive, but you are. Don’t keep trying to prove it was Austin, Judy. It may have been, but it may not. You’ll blind yourself to all the other possibilities.’

  ‘Jonathan Austin is deadly serious, Lloyd. He intends to be prime minister one day, believe me he does. Anything that endangers that could make him angry enough – frightened enough – to kill without even thinking of the consequences.’

  Lloyd stood up. ‘Speculation isn’t a very good idea,’ he said, seeing the irritation sweeping over Judy’s face as he spoke. ‘Let’s go and talk to Beale.’

  Frank Beale was waiting at the door; Lloyd apologised for the delay.

  ‘Do you feel up to a few questions?’ Judy asked.

  ‘I don’t see how I can help you,’ he said. ‘I was in the police station all night.’

  ‘Yes, I know, Mr Beale,’ said Judy. ‘I’d like to know about the trouble at the Riverside Inn.’

&n
bsp; His mouth opened. ‘My wife gets murdered, and you want to ask me about a bit of a fight in a pub?’ he said.

  ‘No, Mr Beale. I want to know if your wife was involved in that in any way.’

  He subsided. ‘Oh, I see. Yes – well, not involved in the fight, you understand. But someone insulted her.’

  ‘The man who was taken into custody with you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Something about her playing a home match. Meaning she was in the habit of playing away from home,’ said Beale.

  ‘Was she?’

  Beale’s face grew dark. ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘And what did your wife do when you made a fuss?’

  ‘She said she was going home. Legged it’

  ‘What time was this?’

  ‘Just after the police arrived, I think. Once she knew they were involved, anyway.’

  He hardly seemed to have noticed that she had been strangled; Lloyd took the same hard line.

  ‘We’ve heard rumours, Mr Beale,’ he said. ‘About your wife and Jonathan Austin.’

  Beale began to cry. There was something much worse about someone like him giving in to his emotions; someone who was always in control, someone who regarded violence as a way of life, a means to an end, or just retribution. But the violence that had taken his wife wasn’t the same. It was more bewildering, more horrifying than it would have been to someone else, and Lloyd wanted to shoot himself. Judy, he rather gathered from the look he got, would have cheerfully saved him the trouble.

  When he had got himself under control, he wiped the tears. ‘My wife was not having an affair,’ he said defiantly, and blew his nose.

  Too defiantly; Judy didn’t want Malworth to become too exciting, Lloyd was sure. If Beale suspected someone, they had better find out who that was.

  ‘Mr Beale,’ said Judy. ‘When I came here last night, the front door was open. It looked closed, but it just opened when I touched it. Would you know why it was like that?’

  He nodded. ‘Rosemary took my keys,’ he said. ‘Quick as a flash, as soon as the cops were called.’ He smiled. ‘Just as well she didn’t go in for picking pockets,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know what she was doing, but I realised later when your colleagues tried to have me breathalysed.’

  So, thought Lloyd, Rosemary Beale had foiled the police once again in a last act of defiance. That would give Beale some quiet satisfaction, once the shock had worn off.

  ‘She didn’t know what time they’d let me go, and my door key is on the same ring. So she would leave the door on the latch. But these doors only close if you lock them.’ Tears were back in his eyes. ‘ She’d be going to go to bed,’ he said. ‘She was annoyed with me for starting trouble. She’d think she was safe,’ he said, his voice anguished. ‘This bloody place – you pay the earth for all the security, and then someone can just walk in and—’ He stood up, and turned away from them.

  The security certainly didn’t seem to have helped. They had looked at the videos automatically made when the cameras switched on; the visitors to the flats had been few, and were accounted for. The cameras came on when the door phone was answered, so residents using their cards were not on video. The conclusion was that someone with a card had murdered Rosemary Beale, or that she had brought someone home with her, which seemed unlikely, in the circumstances.

  ‘Why didn’t she take the car?’ asked Judy.

  ‘She doesn’t drive. I got her a driver to take her round the clubs.’

  Judy tried not to look irritated as Lloyd interrupted her. ‘Could I have the driver’s name, Mr Beale?’

  Beale frowned. ‘What for?’

  ‘We need to know of anyone who had contact with your wife.’

  ‘He just drove her around. Tasker. Steve Tasker.’

  Lloyd and Judy manfully avoided looking at one another; it took Lloyd a moment to ask his next question.

  ‘Do you have an address?’

  ‘Not on me,’ said Beale. ‘ It’s at the office.’

  It was clearly untrue; Lloyd just had to hope that they had got to Tasker first.

  ‘Mr Beale,’ said Lloyd, ‘you gave Mrs Austin a lift home yesterday evening.’

  Beale turned. ‘Yeah.’ He sighed. ‘I was downstairs in her studio. She had to get home in a hurry. I said I’d run her there.’

  ‘And you drove the car yourself?’

  ‘Yes.’ Beale frowned. ‘Tasker only drove my wife,’ he said. ‘If that’s what you’re getting at.’

  ‘What time did you and Mrs Beale go out last night?’ asked Judy.

  He shrugged. ‘Late. Half nine, something like that.’

  ‘Would you have noticed if there had been someone in Mrs Austin’s studio?’

  ‘The light was on. I just thought she had left it on, though, earlier. I remember her putting it on just before we left. It got dark because of the rain. There didn’t seem to be anyone in there.’

  ‘You didn’t see anyone … hanging round, maybe?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘And you didn’t try the studio door, did you?’

  ‘No.’

  They took their leave of Mr Beale, and neither of them spoke until the lift doors were firmly closed.

  ‘Well,’ Lloyd said. ‘The outsider’s coming up on the rails.’

  ‘Fast,’ said Judy. ‘Tasker. Does the name mean anything to you?’

  ‘No,’ said Lloyd. ‘ But the court case was probably just before I came back to Stansfield. Jack’ll know.’ He sighed. ‘Let’s hope we’ve traced him – I’d rather we got to him before Beale does.’

  Outside, he surveyed the car park. ‘ Where’s your car?’ he asked.

  ‘Parked halfway down the road,’ she said. ‘Some woman went on at me about it being in her husband’s space and he’d be home from work soon.’

  ‘Leave it there,’ he said. ‘You shouldn’t be driving. You’re too tired.’

  She didn’t argue; she just got in to his car like a lamb. She must be tired.

  ‘So what now?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m taking you home.’

  ‘What about Tasker?’

  Lloyd sighed deeply. ‘Judy, there are a great many more people working on this besides you and me.’

  ‘Shouldn’t that be you and I?’

  ‘No, it should not. And you have got them looking for Tasker. They will have traced him, and spoken to him.’

  ‘They won’t have arrested him,’ she said. ‘And Beale’s after him.’

  ‘You couldn’t arrest him either. All we know is that he works for Beale and he may or may not be the man Drake saw.’

  ‘If he is,’ Judy said slowly, ‘then he couldn’t have had anything to do with Mrs Beale’s murder. He was in Stansfield at ten past eleven.’

  Lloyd raised his eyebrows. ‘True,’ he said. ‘Curiouser and curiouser. And another good reason for your not arresting him.’

  ‘He’s not the one I want to arrest.’

  Lloyd sighed again, more deeply, more loudly.

  ‘Mrs Austin probably wasn’t at the studio at all,’ said Judy.

  ‘Drake’s wife left him,’ Lloyd said, conversationally.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Drake’s wife left him,’ he repeated. ‘ Because when he decided to knuckle down and get on with it, she never saw him. She left him. He became obsessed.’

  Judy nodded. ‘And you’re going to leave me, are you?’

  ‘If you don’t take time off.’ He smiled.

  ‘And if she wasn’t in the studio, then Austin is lying about the car.’

  Lloyd shook his head. ‘ Totally illogical,’ he said. ‘ Not like you at all. Now – I’m banning work as a topic. Shall I tell you more about my French grandmother?’

  ‘What was her name?’ asked Judy suddenly, clearly determined to catch him out if he was making it up.

  ‘Françoise,’ he said immediately.

  Judy’s eyebrows rose slightly.

  Lloy
d lifted his shoulders in a Gallic shrug as he turned on to the Stansfield Road. ‘That was her name,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry her parents couldn’t be more imaginative.’

  ‘I almost believe you,’ said Judy. ‘You would have been more imaginative.’

  He smiled again. ‘Ifor met Françoise. He was twenty-two, she was eighteen, and they fell in love.’

  ‘Mm,’ she said, leaning back in the seat, getting herself more comfortable.

  ‘No emotions stirring there? Beautiful young girl in the devastated battlefield that had once been the peaceful countryside surrounding her home …’

  The evening sun flickered through the branches of the trees, dazzling him; he pulled down the visor.

  ‘Lonely, frightened young man hurtled into trench warfare by English generals who had apparently thought that a good cavalry charge would sort the Hun out by Christmas? Meeting fleetingly in a brief, uncomfortable respite from the fighting …’

  He glanced at her, and smiled. She was sound asleep.

  Chapter Five

  His landlady had thought it was the police. He had thought it was the police, until he had seen them, and then it had been too late. The police, he could have coped with. But the two gentlemen were anything but; if the police were sometimes less than gentle, that was nothing compared to Beale’s heavies. Not that they’d done anything yet except bundle him into Beale’s Rolls and drive him to the middle of nowhere, but that was quite enough to be going on with. They hadn’t spoken, not even to indicate who had sent them. Steve hardly needed telling. They just sat there, large, brainless, young and fit, one either side of him, in the back of Beale’s Rolls, hidden from view behind a derelict barn. Twenty, thirty years younger than him.

  The man who had driven them was just as silent and still, but looked as though he had more brain than brawn. He was older, but Steve was still giving him fifteen years at least. Beale wouldn’t entrust the driving of the Rolls to just anyone. Not even Steve had been allowed behind the wheel. And Steve had been a trusted employee; a good enough driver to have Rosemary’s safety in his hands, and sharp enough to be given the job of spotting any irregularities in her behaviour.