Alternatively, he might have had a sense of triumph. Suspicion and dislike had not been enough to bring in Gifford, but persistent questioning had paid off; with luck, he was going to be able to wrap this case up inside a day, and that would be a personal record.
But Quantrill felt neither anger nor triumph. He felt tired; dispirited by the years he had spent in trying to clear up the dirt, the follies and greeds and overflowing emotions, the sickness of humanity. What saddened him most was that, ultimately, it was not only the victims of murder who suffered but the innocents on the periphery of every case: the ones who were left to manage as best they could, the wives, the husbands, the children, the parents, not only of the victim but of the criminal. Old Mrs Gifford, for example, unsuspectingly singing hymns as she made them all a bed-time drink …
‘Get your coat on, Roddy,’ he said wearily. ‘Your mother won’t want you to catch cold.’
At fourteen minutes past ten, as Quantrill was driving through the dark towards Breckham Market, with Rodney Gifford dumb and tense on the back seat beside a uniformed constable, he was called up on the radio.
‘Chief Inspector Quantrill? You wife is trying to get in touch with you, sir. Could you ring home as soon as possible?’
He answered impatiently, ‘I’m bringing someone in for questioning. Tell my wife I’ll call her as soon as I get back to Breckham – about twenty minutes.’
‘Mrs Quantrill said that it was urgent, sir. She sounded very distressed. Something to do with your daughter.’
He jammed on the brakes outside a telephone call-box in the next village he passed through. The directories had been rumpled and torn, the floor was littered with cigarette ends and worse, and the receiver was sticky; but at least the telephone worked.
‘Molly – it’s me. Is Alison all right?’
His wife’s voice was so thick with tears that he could barely understand her. He had to ask her to repeat her words.
‘I don’t know. I don’t know how or where she is. Oh Douggie – she’s gone. She’s run away.’
Chapter Nineteen
‘There’s no point in panicking. Let’s take this calmly,’ said Quantrill, pacing up and down like an expectant father in a Laurel and Hardy film.
‘I’m not panicking,’ protested Molly tearfully. She stood in the doorway of the sitting-room, biting her lower lip. She might have been said to be wringing her hands, except that the action was clearly involuntary; her hands wrung themselves, kneading and plucking at each other without her knowledge or intent. ‘I’m sorry I had to bother you when you’re working, I know you hate me to do that, but I was at my wits’end.’
He sat down, trying to ease the tension. ‘Yes, of course – you did the right thing. There’s no problem, Martin Tait’s keeping my suspect warm for me. Now, let’s consider this bit by bit. When did you last see or hear Alison?’
‘About a quarter past seven. She wanted me to leave her alone, so I did. I’ve been so worried about her all day, and I kept popping in and out to see how she was. But from a quarter past seven I did as she asked, and sat in here watching television. Then I went upstairs just before ten to see if she wanted anything, and she was gone.’
‘What about Peter? Did he hear her when he went up to bed? Have you asked him?’
‘Yes, but he said not. I told him to be quiet – you know how noisy he usually is, running taps and banging doors – so as not to disturb her. He said he couldn’t hear her transistor, so he thought she must be asleep.’
Quantrill went out of the room and up the stairs to Alison’s bedroom, his wife following. The girl had made her bed, and had left the room tidy. If it were not for the absence of the teenage animal collection that she had left behind when she went to London, and the redecorating she had recently done, it would have looked as though she had never returned home.
‘What did she take with her?’ he asked.
‘Not very much. At first I didn’t realize that she’d taken anything. She’d said during the evening that she thought she might go for a walk, you see, and I assumed that was what had happened.’
‘At this time of night?’
‘Oh, but she was in a very odd mood, Douggie. Very distressed and restless and angry; and her stomach was upset, too.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ said Quantrill. ‘Good grief, it was a hell of an ordeal the poor girl went through, seeing – well, never mind. Go on.’
‘Well, I looked in the bathroom, just to make sure she wasn’t there, and then I saw that her toothbrush had gone. So I went through her room and it looks as though she’s taken her small suitcase and a few clothes. Just enough for a day or two.’
‘Hmm. And you say you rang round some of her Breckham friends?’
‘She didn’t have many. I mean, she hadn’t bothered to get in touch with many of them since she’d been back – she was too taken up with her new job. I checked that her bicycle was still in the garage, and then I rang the railway station. Jack Collins is the booking clerk tonight, and he knows her of course, but he said he hadn’t seen her either. After that, I had to ring you. I mean, you do hear of such things …’
Quantrill patted his wife’s shoulder absently. ‘You did right, Molly. Now, you’re sure she didn’t leave a note anywhere?’
‘Peter helped me look. We couldn’t find a thing.’ She hesitated blushing a little. ‘I couldn’t find any letters she’d received, either; I searched, while I was waiting for you. I mean, I thought perhaps she had another boy-friend somewhere and that she might have gone to him, but there were only a couple of letters she’d had from Jennifer.’
‘That’s where she’s most likely to go, now that Jennifer’s moved out of the nurses’ home into a flat,’ said Quantrill, with more confidence than he felt; his daughters had never been very close to each other. ‘Look, what we have to remember is that Alison’s nineteen. She’s an adult. We had no idea what she got up to while she was in London, and after eighteen months there she should be capable of looking after herself. But I do need to talk to her – and after the shock she had this morning she’d be better at home than travelling. She was in an odd mood, you say?’
Molly nodded wretchedly. She sat on the edge of the empty bed, still twisting her hands together. ‘It was partly my fault, I suppose. I wanted to help her, and that made her impatient and cross – she’s a lot like you in that way, you know; I try to do my best for all of you—’ She choked into silence, wiping tears from beneath her soft brown eyes with her fingers.
Her husband sat down beside her, suppressing a sigh. ‘Anyway,’ Molly went on, her voice high and uncertain, ‘when she said she might go for a walk I told her that you wouldn’t want her to. There was a reporter hanging about earlier, trying to ask about the murder, but I sent him off. I told her that you’d want to talk to her yourself as soon as you could, and that was what really upset her. She said she wouldn’t talk to anyone. She was so angry, I’ve never seen her like it – she shouted and swore and told me to leave her alone. For God’s sake leave me alone, she said, and that’s the last thing she said to me—’
Molly pressed both hands against her face and sobbed. Quantrill put his arm affectionately round her shoulders, a simple gesture that he had not made for a long time. ‘Come on, Molly, don’t upset yourself, it’s understandable that she doesn’t want to talk about the murder. She didn’t mean to be angry with you, she was just overwrought. That’s how it is with me sometimes when I’m worried about the job, I take things out on you – but you know I don’t really meant it.’
He patted her shoulder briskly. ‘Now look, let’s be sensible. Alison has simply gone off to stay with Jennifer, or with a friend somewhere, and as soon as she gets there she’ll ring us. There’s nothing at all to worry about. But I’d like you to find me a photograph of her, and write down a description of what you think she was wearing, so that I can get the boys to find out whether she’s been seen in Breckham tonight. It’ll be a useful exercise for them. All right?’
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Quantrill kissed her temple, and stood up. His wife gave a childish, surprisingly endearing sniff and a hiccup. Then she shook her head, refusing to be fobbed off.
‘No, it’s not all right, Douggie. I know why you want to talk to Alison – it’s because you think she may know something that will put you on to the murderer. And meanwhile he’s on the loose—’
‘You’re wrong there. I’ve just taken him in for questioning.’
Her frown lightened. ‘Have you arrested him?’
‘Ah, well – not yet, we do have to be absolutely sure—’
‘You mean, the man who did it may still be on the loose while you’re questioning someone else?’ She began to panic. ‘But Douggie, don’t you see? Alison may be in danger. The murderer could have been watching for her, waiting for a chance to – to—’
‘I never heard such squit in all my life, woman!’ protested her husband. ‘You’ve been watching too much television, that’s your trouble. Of course Alison’s not in any danger! If you’ve got nothing better to do than worry your head about that—’ Molly’s tension slackened a little. ‘You’re not worried about her, then? Truly?’
‘Of course I’m not!’
Chief Inspector Quantrill was lying again.
Chapter Twenty
In an interview room at Breckham Market police station, watched impassively by a grey-haired constable who had seen it all before, Rodney Gifford was, literally, sweating. The air of the small room was sharp with his nervous emanation.
Chief Inspector Quantrill was tense too. Usually he liked to make the soft approach at an interview, to offer tea and cigarettes, to be so kindly that his suspect failed to see that a verbal trap was being set for him. But this time, Quantrill had too much at stake to go softly. For Alison’s sake, for his own and his wife’s peace of mind, he wanted confirmation that it was Gifford who was the murderer; and he wanted it quickly.
He slammed the door behind him. ‘Right, Mr Gifford,’ he snapped.
The man, sitting at a table with his hands clenched in front of him, raised his large head. There was a line of sweat on his upper lip and he brushed it away with the knuckle of his forefinger, first from one side and then from the other, as though he were brushing up a moustache. He blinked his pale ginger eyelashes nervously, but said nothing.
‘Where were you yesterday evening?’ Quantrill demanded, leaning his hands on the table and glaring at Gifford from under his heavy eyebrows. ‘And don’t give me any of that stuff about watching television, because I know you weren’t. Where were you?’
Gifford’s tongue flicked across his lips. ‘I’m not saying anything,’ he said, ‘except that I had nothing to do with my cousin Jasmine’s death.’ His voice cracked. ‘What possible reason could I have for killing her? I shan’t inherit anything from her. Why don’t you badger her sister’s husband, Paul Pardoe, about it? He’s got far more to gain from her death than I have.’
‘Come off it,’ said Quantrill curtly, pulling out a chair and sitting down opposite him. ‘Whoever killed Jasmine Woods made away with her collection of jade and netsuke; he’s hoping to make a small fortune, whether or not he stands to inherit anything from her estate. You had a very strong financial motive, Mr Gifford – quite apart from the personal one.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Gifford sourly.
‘No? Don’t forget, I saw and heard you at your cousin’s party, being bitter about her success and your own lack of money. And other people heard you too,’ Quantrill asserted, without regard for fact. ‘You had more than one motive for killing her, and you had plenty of opportunity while your mother was asleep. What did you give the poor old dear, incidentally – sleeping pills?’
Rodney Gifford reddened to the far-flung tips of his ears and muttered something fiercely unintelligible. Quantrill let that pass.
‘So,’ he continued, ‘you put your mother safely to sleep yesterday evening, and then sneaked out of the house. What transport did you use, I wonder? Did you hire a car? Or steal one?’
Gifford glowered. ‘I’m saying nothing – except that I wasn’t anywhere near Thirling last night, and I didn’t kill my cousin.’
‘Prove it to me,’ said Quantrill.
‘I don’t have to prove anything! If you think I killed Jasmine, you’ll have to prove it – and you can’t because you haven’t any evidence.’
‘It won’t be difficult to get,’ claimed Quantrill recklessly. ‘We can easily check hired cars, and go over stolen and abandoned cars for fingerprints, or fibres from your clothes. And we can enquire round your friends and neighbours, to see if you borrowed a car yesterday evening. Would you like us to do that, Mr Gifford? Would your mother like it?’
The man stirred uneasily.
‘And then,’ Quantrill continued, putting on pressure, ‘we’ll search your house and garden. We probably wouldn’t find anything as obvious as the stolen netsuke or bloodstained clothing, but it’s surprising how even tiny things can give a murderer away. For instance, Jasmine Woods’s murderer almost certainly has some fragments of ivory from a smashed netsuke on the sole of one of his shoes. So we’ll go through your house and clothes with a nit-comb, Mr Gifford—’
‘You couldn’t do that,’ protested the man, ‘not without a search warrant!’
‘You’re right. But remember, I heard what you said about your cousin at her party. That’s enough for me to be able to get a warrant without any trouble at all.’ It wasn’t true. Getting a warrant wasn’t easy, but hopefully Gifford did not know that; hopefully he would prefer to make a confession. ‘It’ll upset your mother of course,’ went on Quantrill. ‘Break her heart, poor old soul, I shouldn’t wonder. But if you won’t co-operate, we’ll have no alternative.’
‘No – wait!’ Gifford licked his lips nervously. ‘I want to protect my mother, that’s the whole point … Look, I went into Yarchester yesterday evening. I – I went to the cinema.’
Quantrill raised a disbelieving eyebrow. ‘I see … With someone? A woman friend? Someone you didn’t want your mother to know about? But you’ll have to tell me who it was, if you expect me to believe you.’
‘I wasn’t with anyone.’ Gifford began to speak in a rush. ‘I went alone. I didn’t want to pretend to my mother that I went with anyone else because – well, I haven’t many friends. I very rarely go out, and she would have been inquisitive if I’d suddenly said that I was going with someone to the cinema. And if I’d told her I was going alone, she would have wanted to come with me.’
‘Hmm. And you’re going to tell me that the film wasn’t suitable for an old Clark Gable fan, I suppose? Porn, was it?’
Gifford twitched. He lowered his large head and wiped his upper lip again with his forefinger. ‘It’s not pornography,’ he muttered. ‘It’s perfectly legitimate cinema, only it has an X certificate. I saw it reviewed in the Observer. It’s rather – artistic; beautifully photographed. But it’s just too explicit for my mother.’
‘I can believe that. And I suppose, if I ask, you can give me enough detail about the film to convince me that you really did see it?’
Gifford looked up eagerly. ‘Yes – yes, of course …’
‘Yes, I bet you can. Once those films come to the city they’re on for weeks. You probably saw it the previous Sunday, partly to enjoy it and partly to get the details in your head so that you could offer it as an alibi for last night. But your alibi won’t work, Mr Gifford. An unsupported claim that you were alone in a Yarchester cinema last night isn’t good enough. So unless you start telling the truth, I’ll have to come and take your house apart round your poor old mother’s ears—’
‘But I am telling the truth!’ Gifford’s forefinger had become insufficient, and he wiped his sweating face with the back of his hand. ‘You can search as much as you like, but you won’t find anything. And my claim isn’t unsupported, anyway. I – as a matter of fact, I’ve been to see that film several times. Every Sunday evening for the past four weeks. The g
irl at the box office recognizes me. She said to me last night, “Hallo, you again?” The bitch.’
Quantrill had felt increasingly sure that he had the right man, but now for the first time he wavered. ‘She recognizes you – out of all those customers?’
Gifford held his head up, and his ears blazed through his hair. ‘I do tend to be recognizable,’ he said, half arrogant, half sour. ‘Why don’t you ask her?’
‘You could have gone in, and slipped out again after the film started,’ argued Quantrill with diminishing confidence.
‘But I didn’t. I left at the end of the film, just after ten. And as I passed the box office she said, “Cheerio, see you again next week.”’ His jaw tightened at the memory. ‘God, if I could get her alone just for five minutes—’
His lips were drawn back from his sharp teeth, his eyes had a sadistic glitter. For a moment, sober as he was, Gifford looked as vicious as he had looked at Jasmine Woods’s party.
Quantrill leaned forward. ‘Yes, Roddy?’ he said softly. ‘If you could get her alone, what would you do?’
Gifford turned his head slowly to look at the Chief Inspector. He blinked, and began to relax: his eyes faded, his facial muscles slackened. Then he sighed, and made a wry confession.
‘Nothing at all,’ he said. ‘That’s my trouble. I can think of a lot of things I’d like to do to them, but I’ve never had the courage. I never do anything, except write and dream. That’s been my trouble all my life.’
Chapter Twenty One
Chief Inspector Quantrill swore, and thumped the wall of his office with the side of his fist.
‘I thought I had him, Martin – I really thought I had him. Almost as soon as I heard that Jasmine Woods had been murdered. I thought that Gifford was likely. And now he reckons he can prove that he spent the whole of yesterday evening in Yarchester, watching a sexy film … there ought to be a law against it.’
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