‘Is it? In what way?’
‘For you it’s a jigsaw puzzle with no picture on it. Flat and cold and with missing pieces. Puzzles drive you mad. Men are like that.’
‘Not only puzzles.’
She put a hand on mine, just as I was changing gear. ‘I was teasing, Richard.’
‘I know you were, my dear.’
She patted my hand. I changed gear again, just to leave it there. ‘Now tell me,’ she said, ‘what pieces you still can’t fit.’
‘I can’t see that either of your friends at Mansfield Park could have been blackmailing Mark. I can’t see that Mark could’ve been blackmailing either Philip or Olivia for murder. Neither of those possibilities fits, emotionally or psychologically. I could enlarge on that —’
‘All right. Touché.’
‘I also cannot understand Mark’s reaction, if he’d hired Harvey Cole to get those pictures for him. I don’t think Mark was acting. He’s too hair-triggered with his anger to be able to fake it convincingly.’
I glanced at her. She was considering me purse-lipped, but with a devil of amusement in her eyes.
‘Anything else?’ she asked.
‘Yes. I don’t understand the reaction of Inspector Poole in dismissing what I showed her, not the way she did it. She’s sufficiently controlled to be able to put on a convincing act. But she was furious. And make no mistake, my dear, from what we’ve heard — and which I’m sure she knows very well — she must be very suspicious about Nancy’s death.’
‘You think she’s up to something?’
‘She’s leading us on. She’s using me. She can’t continue with an investigation officially, so she’s hoping I’ll drop on something.’
She laughed lightly. ‘I don’t think she’d expect to hear it from you, even if you did.’
‘She’ll think of a way.’
I pulled the car into the side of the road, and stopped. ‘What now?’ she asked.
‘Where’s the map? In some way, I think Harvey Cole fooled me completely. I want to look up the shortest way to Happisburgh.’
‘He’s clever. He’s smooth. You’ll never get anything out of him.’
I bent over the map. ‘No? With my fingers round his throat, he could well change his mind.’
8
We approached Happisburgh by way of Horning, and because of this we found ourselves negotiating the minor road in which Harvey Cole’s cottage was located in the opposite direction to before.
We couldn’t have timed it more accurately. We observed him leaving, without being in time to stop him. As he turned out of his drive ahead of us, I was close enough to read the legend on the tailgate of his car, BMW 528i. I knew, then, that I had no chance of catching him, though I tried. There was just a chance that superior driving ability would smooth out the inequalities between the performances of the two cars. But he not only had the faster car, he had the better driving ability. On the winding side roads I managed to keep him in sight, but once he hit the coast road and turned right he was away.
After a few miles I gave it up, and slowed. There was no point. My guess was that he was on his way to the nearest airport, from which he would flit off — first class, on my money — to the Cap d’Antibes or the Cote d’Azure, or wherever his wife was awaiting him. There was, in my mind, no longer any doubt that he had cheated me.
At least, I now knew that. The trouble was that I didn’t know in what way.
‘He took those photos himself,’ Amelia suggested.
‘No, no. He couldn’t possibly have been involved in Nancy’s death. It’s not our harmless Harvey. Whoever took them was a person who must have been. In a very close way.’
‘A very close way? Aren’t you jumping to conclusions there?’
She knows that when I’m annoyed my mind races away, sometimes in the wrong direction.
‘All right, then. But whoever found her and stuck the sticker on —’
‘Or removed it,’ she cut in. ‘I’m still not happy about your reasoning, there.’
‘All right!’ You can see my anger was still lingering. ‘Put it like this, then. Whoever took the photographs did something with that Wildlife sticker. So they had a close interest in her death. A personal one. It wasn’t just a matter of doing that, it was also taking pictures to prove it was done.’
‘That’s better. Which eliminates Harvey, you think?’
‘I think he came into it exactly as he said, to steal those pictures from Olivia’s house. But now — from Mark’s reaction — I can’t help thinking that Harvey had already handed the haul over, and been paid for it.’
‘And what he gave you?’
‘Gave! I paid him three hundred pounds! He’d had time, and I think he’d had copies made. There’re top-class people who can make perfect copies of prints.’ I reached in my pocket, produced the yellow envelope, and glanced at it. ‘There. You see. Pro-Labs, it says. Some specialist firm. He simply kept two copies, guessing some gullible idiot would turn up.’
‘And that was you?’
‘It was me. I could kill him.’ And, I recalled, I’d forgotten to ask him how he would get in through a thatched roof.
‘You can always stop the cheque,’ she told me.
‘So I can!’ And perhaps have him visit us in the night? I thought I might enjoy that.
Somewhat eased by the thought of getting a belated laugh on Harvey, I stopped the car, and we had a look at the map.
The chase of Harvey had absorbed more miles that I had realized. We were not far short of Winterton, so we decided to go there, locate somewhere we would get a pot of tea later, and in the meantime stretch our legs. It was almost like being on holiday, searching for some way to absorb the empty hours. There was a café, which was open, but it was early for food so we left the car and went for a walk. There wasn’t much to be seen, and the road was quite a way from the sea, but we were able to benefit from the refreshing, freezing wind, which had encountered no resistance before it reached us.
Enlivened, we returned to the café. It was nearly sunset. We ate jam and cream scones and drank weak, very hot tea. All this irregular eating was upsetting my stomach. One time it was lunch in the middle of the day and dinner late in the evening, the next it was dinner around midday and tea in the early evening.
It was dark when we emerged from there. For three hours, not one word had been spoken relating to the death of Nancy Ruston.
‘What now?’ asked Amelia, when we were moving again.
‘Back to the hotel, I suppose. We’ll phone Mary and tell her the situation, and then. . . well, I’d like to have a quiet word with young Larry Carter. I wonder if Malcolm would be suspicious if I asked him for Larry’s address.’
‘I would, if I were him.’
‘We’ll see.’
When I drove into the hotel’s courtyard there were a number of cars already there, and from the lighted windows I could tell that the bar was open. In the summer you’d get the clattering jar of the Black Country accent in there, but now, with only the locals keeping the bar ticking over, it would be the burr of the Norfolk voice that prevailed. This was a pleasant prospect. I could allow the sound to flow past and not make the effort to understand.
Amelia noticed the direction of my interest. ‘I’ll just pop upstairs and tidy up,’ she said, ‘and phone Mary. Then I’ll see you in the bar. All right?’
‘Fine.’
She had disappeared into the passageway before I’d locked the car, and before I’d become aware of a shadow moving from a corner of the wall. I was at once alert, aware that I now carried photos which could well be dangerous to somebody. But this person took his time, moving quietly. A tall figure, the glow of a cigarette in his fingers. There was a soft laugh from him.
‘Relax, Richard. It’s only me.’
The last time I had seen Tony Brason he’d been sitting, soaking wet, inside Chief Inspector Donaldson’s car, solving his case for him. Tony and I had stood in the pouring rain, arguing it
out between us, he furiously. But he still worked the same patch. He was 200 miles from it.
‘Tony! Whatever...Good Lord, man, it’s good to see you.’ We shook hands. I grinned at him, he smiled at me, for him the meeting being expected.
In the poor light I could detect that he was looking relaxed, better than he’d been when tension and fury had been tearing him apart. The lines had gone from his face. He was genuinely pleased to see me, and Tony was never one for disguising his feelings. Direct and guileless, that’s how I thought of him.
Then what the hell was he doing here?
‘Come inside to the bar,’ I said, ‘where we can talk. Are you staying here?’
‘Yes. For now. I’m using a bit of leave that’s mounted up.’
I put a hand on his shoulder and steered him towards the bar.
Partly, this was to reassure myself that it was really him. ‘Amelia will be delighted —’
‘I saw her, Richard. I didn’t speak to her, just let her go ahead. We’ve got to talk, you know.’
‘There’re no secrets from Amelia.’
He didn’t reply. I thrust open the door. The old fireplace roared with heaped logs, and provided most of the light. The bar was half empty and hummed with relaxed voices. Got to talk, had we? Did I need more than one guess to decide the subject?
‘What’ll you have?’ I asked.
‘Whatever they call beer around here.’
We stood at the bar, waiting patiently.
‘You made Sergeant, then?’ I asked.
‘It was partly that case, and Ken Latchett put in a few words for me.’
‘I’d have thought it’d be Donaldson who’d do that.’
‘He tried to take all the credit. There was a bit of a row, and soon after Donaldson had to go. He accepted a transfer.’
‘Had to?’
‘So the rumour goes.’
Our beer arrived. I looked round for somewhere quiet to sit. Tony was too relaxed, too chatty. He was covering up, and wasn’t happy about it. I knew what had happened. Melanie Poole had phoned him. He’d come along to sort me out. And he would hate that, caught between a certain loyalty to me, and a closeness to Inspector Poole at which I could only guess.
I’d have liked to help him out, but I wasn’t sure how much of him was on my side of the fence. I felt rotten about it, and could only allow him to lead into what he wanted from me. So we needed a quiet table, and they were all occupied. The only one least cluttered had one young man sitting there, a corner table as though he’d seized it early and held on to it proprietorially. If there’d been a likelihood that he would shortly leave, then that would have been fine. But I thought not. He’d been waiting for me, and I didn’t dare lose him now. It was Larry Carter.
He had spotted me the moment I entered the bar, of that much I was certain. Now he was viewing our approach with his head bent over his glass, looking up huntedly from beneath his eyebrows. He would speak to me alone. Or with Amelia there. With a stranger present, I’d not get one word out of him.
This was dreadful. I didn’t yet know if I dared to allow Tony to hear what Larry had to say, and the thought undermined me. And I had only a few seconds to make a decision as to my approach.
Larry sat over a half pint glass he’d probably been nursing since the bar opened. When we came close his nerve failed him, and he stumbled halfway to his feet.
‘Larry,’ I said. ‘Hello.’ I reached out my free hand, putting down my glass with the other, and detained him. The pressure of my fingers was meant to imply that I wanted him there, wanted time to get him alone.
He subsided. ‘Get you a drink?’ I asked.
‘I’m all right,’ he mumbled.
‘Fine.’
Tony and I sat facing him. Larry must have felt trapped. Tony’s size, alone, would have seemed overwhelming. ‘This is a friend of mine. Tony Brason,’ I told him. ‘Tony, this is Larry Carter, who works at one of the boatyards around here. I met him this morning.’
Tony smiled at him. ‘Interesting work, is it?’
‘Oh yes.’ Larry was still suspicious. ‘Interesting. It’s just a job, though.’
‘He’s a lucky bloke who can earn his bread doing something he really wants to do.’
‘I could be chucking it up.’ Larry tried a half smile, encouraged by Tony’s friendly interest. ‘Nothing for me there, now.’ He shrugged, his eyes fell. He wanted to talk about Nancy, and he couldn’t.
Tony turned to me. ‘Melanie phoned. She said you were giving her a right runaround.’
‘Did she? She exaggerates.’ I prayed he wouldn’t mention who Melanie was.
‘She thought I might be able to handle you. Now there’s a laugh for you, Richard. Who’s ever managed that? Except Amelia, of course.’
‘You can but try.’
Larry had his ears cocked to all this. I could almost see them quivering.
‘I thought,’ Tony observed thoughtfully, ‘that I might just be able to maintain the peace between you.’
‘Melanie’s a strong-willed woman.’ I told him, partly as a warning.
‘You never said a truer word.’ He sounded complacent, and I looked at him sharply, detecting a note of pride. ‘Here she is now,’ he added.
‘Who?’ I thought he meant Melanie.
‘Your wife, Richard.’ He got to his feet, I followed, and Larry didn’t seem to know what to do, and settled for inertia.
‘Well, well,’ Tony said. ‘How are you, Amelia?’ He took her shoulders and kissed her on the cheek.
Her eyes darted from one to the other of us. ‘But Tony...you here...’
‘He’d got a bit of leave coming.’ I explained, though it explained nothing.
She tucked her skirt under her and sat at the table, noticing Larry at last. ‘And Larry! Well, fancy meeting you here. Has my husband introduced you?’
‘Yes,’ he mumbled. He was poised for flight, totally outnumbered and finding himself in a tight group of friends, which excluded himself. ‘I was just going. If you wanted to...’ He thrust back his glass, his intention clear.
‘No, no.’ Amelia was emphatic. ‘Don’t go. I wanted a private word with Tony, anyway. Richard, you wouldn’t mind, would you, if we leave you for a while? This is woman talk. You wouldn’t understand. Tony, is there another table...’
He lifted himself to his toes. ‘Over there. A couple of seats. I’ll take my beer...and what are you drinking, Amelia? Isn’t it gin and lime?’
‘Gin and ginger ale, I think.’ She smiled at Larry, smiled at me. ‘If you’d just entertain my husband for a few minutes, Larry...You’re not in a hurry, I hope.’
And, Tony’s hand at her elbow, she left us. She was already chattering away to him and conveying the impression she’d aimed for, of close and particular friends who had secrets of their own that excluded her husband. Woman talk, indeed!
Larry still wasn’t certain about the way things stood. ‘What was that about?’
‘My wife’s quite a clever woman, Larry. She knew I wanted a quiet word with you, so she dragged him away.’
‘Uhuh?’
‘She also guessed you wanted a word with me.’
‘She couldn’t be that clever.’
‘Oh come on, Larry. She was there, at the Rustons’. It was quite obvious that Nancy meant more to you than just the daughter of your employer. We turned up, obviously also interested in Nancy. It seems to me we might swap ideas and thoughts to our mutual advantage.’
He looked up at me, his blue eyes shadowed with suspicion, but his expression one of hope. There was something he would very much like to load on to somebody. Perhaps I was that somebody.
‘There’s no reason to suppose that Nancy and me...’ He stopped, and had to swallow.
‘No?’ I quoted: ‘“Nancy was the water-girl, Nancy was the dream.”‘ I tilted my head at him. ‘What does that mean?’
‘I didn’t think you’d heard.’
Now, washed and clean and clothed for an ev
ening out, there was nothing about him that suggested the welder. No basic strength to him. Only a square jaw that hinted at stubbornness.
‘Of course I heard,’ I said. ‘You intended me to. Any more of it?’
‘It was something I wrote in her birthday card. Her eighteenth. A special one, that was.’ He was becoming more animated, a flush on his cheeks.
I nodded encouragingly. ‘Her majority. Her life her own from then on.’ I’d perhaps expressed that badly, but he didn’t notice. ‘How does it go, this bit of verse of yours?’
‘Oh...’ He moved his glass in embarrassment and spoke to it, quietly, sharing it now with a third person. ‘It was in the present tense then, of course. “Nancy is the water-girl, Nancy is the dream. Oh, for love of Nancy in the soft and breathless twilight and the murmur of the stream.” That’s all.’ Then he blushed furiously, realizing he’d confided far too much to a stranger. Yet to whom could he confide anything so personal but a stranger?
‘You’re a bit of a poet,’ I said, in pleased discovery.
‘A bit of.’ He seemed to realize, then, that he was handing out all the information, and me none. ‘Who are you, anyway?’ he asked ‘Why should I tell you anything?’
I’d already realized that it was necessary to confide in him. It might be a risk, but I had to take it, and it would have to be the truth. I might need to hold some of it back, but what I said would have to be untarnished, or he would detect its worthlessness. He had a poet’s ear and perception.
‘I’m an ex-Detective Inspector of police,’ I told him, keeping my voice even and unemphatic. ‘Now married and settled down. My wife had an appeal from an old college friend, who’d had a break-in. The idea was that I might help. Advice, that was all. But one thing’s led to another, and in the end I heard of Nancy’s death, and with what I already knew it seemed to me to be very suspicious. The police are willing to accept it was an accident. I’m not so sure. Somehow, I don’t think you believe that, either.’
His eyes were on me steadily, a shock of blond hair fallen over his eyes. ‘Is that the truth?’
I lifted my shoulders. ‘Not all of it. If I told you everything, I might be revealing confidences. Life is full of loyalties you don’t care to betray. Don’t you find that?’
Death of an Innocent (Richard and Amelia Patton) Page 10