Averting his eyes from the windows of the Lodge, he set off up the drive with Marshbanks at his heels. Discreet signposts pointed the way to the statuary, the maze, the folly. Ignoring them, Webb strode on to the top of the drive, where, circling the House and the walled garden, they at last came to the greenhouses. An elderly man in a frayed cardigan and stained flannels was just emerging from them, a large bunch of freesias in his hand. Webb eyed him suspiciously.
“Is Mrs. Barlow in there?”
“Yes. Yes, she is.” His mouth twitched. “I assure you I have her permission to take these.”
Webb grunted. No point in telling the old codger it wasn’t up to her to give permission. Anyway, he’d more important things on his mind. He pushed open the door and the warm, damp atmosphere flowed over him. Mrs. Barlow was doing her afternoon watering, but she set down the hose and came towards them, rubbing her hands down the sides of her trousers. There was no need to ask if she’d heard of Carey’s death.
“I haven’t been to the Lodge,” she greeted them. “I didn’t want to intrude. We just couldn’t believe it, Joe and me. Stunned, we were. It just doesn’t seem possible.”
“Mrs. Barlow, did you ever see Mr. Carey with anyone other than Mrs. Dexter? A man, for instance?”
She stared at him uncomprehendingly. “How do you mean?”
“We’re wondering if he had a connection with someone that no one knew about.”
“Someone who could have killed him?” she asked, round-eyed.
“That’s it.”
He waited hopefully for a minute or two, then she shook her head. “He knew everyone in the village, of course, but they don’t count.”
“Why not?”
She looked surprised. “Well, no one here would have killed him, would they?”
“Or Mrs. Dexter?”
“Of course not.” She stopped, a soil-encrusted hand going to her throat. “You’re not trying to say it was someone from the village? Someone we all know?”
“I’m saying it might have been. But the only known connection between Mrs. Dexter and Mr. Carey, apart from the graffiti and the fact they’ve both been killed, is the afternoon they went to Lethbridge and you saw them in the car.” He paused. “Unless you’d seen them together another time?” Wordlessly she shook her head, her eyes still fixed on his. “Or anyone else with either of them, someone you mightn’t have expected?” Another shake.
Webb wiped his hand across his face and unbuttoned his mac. The heat in here was stifling. “I gather from your son that your family used to live at Coppins?”
“You went to see Darren?” She paled, her face glistening under its film of moisture. “Why?”
“Mrs. Barlow,” he said patiently, “in a murder investigation, we go to see everyone.”
“Oh. Yes, I see.”
“About Coppins—”
But she wasn’t interested in Coppins. “That was years ago,” she said dismissively. “Even before Joe and I started courting.”
Webb returned perforce to the matter in hand. “Did Mrs. Carey ever speak about her husband? Mention his friends, and so on?”
“No.”
It was not being a profitable interview, and the sudden heat had brought home to Webb how tired he was. Four hours’ sleep last night had not done much for him. Turning to go, his eyes fell on a bunch of freesias lying on the side.
“Nice of you to let that old chap have some,” he commented.
“Old—?” Hazel giggled, looking suddenly years younger. “That ‘old chap’,” she said, “happened to be His Grace the Duke of Hampshire.”
CHAPTER 12
Webb recounted his cavalier treatment of the Duke to Han-nah that evening. “So if you hear I’ve been thrown into the Tower, you’ll know why!” he ended, stretching out his feet to the fire.
“‘Off with his head!’ and all that.” She replenished his drink. “I’m sorry you’ve been landed with a second murder. I caught the news headlines when I got in.”
“Yep. And the devil of it is I can’t decide if we’re after one killer or two.”
“In a place the size of Beckworth?”
“Perhaps it’s infectious. Both victims had head injuries inflicted before death, though in the woman’s case it could have been accidental—caused by a fall, for instance. But the blow didn’t kill either of them: one died by drowning, the other from a slit throat.”
Hannah shuddered. “I don’t envy you your job.”
“There are times when I don’t envy myself,” Webb rejoined, sipping his whisky. “Forgive me if I fall asleep at some point; I didn’t get to bed till three this morning.”
“Did this second victim know the first?”
“Yes, but as far as I can judge not well. He gave her a lift in his car on Easter Saturday.”
“Easter Saturday,” Hannah repeated reflectively. “That was the day I was in Beckworth. I never thought it would become the scene of two murders. Who’s been killed this time? I didn’t catch the name.”
“A man called Neil Carey.”
“Neil... ” Hannah creased her brow. “Where did I... ?” Then her eyes widened. “David! He didn’t live at the Lodge, did he?”
Webb stared at her. “Yes, he did. His wife’s booking manager for Beckworth House. Hannah, what is it? Did you know him?”
“No, but I overheard a conversation—at the reception. Gwen and I were round the corner in the ladies’ room, and they didn’t realize we were there.”
“Who didn’t?”
“Mrs.—Carey, did you say? It must have been her—and one of the guests. I don’t know who she was.”
“Go on.”
“Well, Mrs. Carey must have come into the room, and this woman knew her. She said she hadn’t seen her at the church, and Mrs. Carey said she wasn’t a guest, she worked there and lived at the Lodge. But then—it was rather awful really—the woman asked about ‘Neil’—did she ever hear of him.”
“Hear of him?”
“Yes. And when Mrs. Carey said he was working in personnel, she made some snide comment about probably being up to his old tricks.”
Webb straightened slowly in his chair.
“You see,” Hannah continued, the words falling over themselves in her excitement, “she thought that after ‘the scandal,’ as she called it, they had divorced. But from the tone of her voice, Mrs. Carey knew nothing about it.”
“Ye gods!”
“So then of course the woman hastily back-tracked, apologized for being tactless and beat a hasty retreat. And a moment later we heard Mrs. Carey go out, too. Thank goodness neither realized we were there.”
Webb whistled softly. “Think carefully, love. Can you remember any details the woman let slip before she realized her faux pas?”
“I don’t think there was anything else, just ‘up to his old tricks’. Which could have been anything, I suppose, from chasing someone round the filing cabinets to blackmail.”
“What was that about scandal?”
Hannah frowned, thinking back. “Only that after the scandal and his sudden dismissal she’d assumed they’d separated.”
“It must have been pretty serious, then.”
“Yes.” Hannah sat down slowly opposite him. “David, could Mrs. Carey have killed the Dexter woman? If she found out she’d been with her husband?”
“An interesting suggestion, but she was at a point-to-point with her daughter on Easter Monday. I had her husband on the suspect list, though, and depending on what his ‘tricks’ were, I could still be right. The fact that he’s been killed himself doesn’t mean he didn’t top Carol Dexter.”
“Then”—Hannah’s voice shook a little—“if his wife found out what his ‘old tricks’ were, could she have killed him?
Webb said slowly, “I suppose it’s possible. Sally Pierce said she was in shock when she heard of his death. But if she’d killed him herself she would have been, wouldn’t she? We’ll certainly check her again. The thing is, though, while I acce
pt she might have stuck a knife into him on the spur of the moment, that murder was premeditated. Someone took a knife to the woods with the express purpose of killing Neil Carey, and somehow I don’t think that person was his wife. I grant we could all be murderers under sufficient provocation, but I doubt if all of us could plan it in advance.”
“Good,” Hannah said quietly. The ginger cat came into the room, tail sticking up like a stalk, and, taking permission for granted, leapt lightly on to her knee. Her fingers caressed it absent-mindedly. “Have you seen her since his death?”
“No, I left her to female ministrations, first Sally, then Nina. But according to their statements, she never mentioned his dismissal. She told me herself he’d been out of work when they first went to Beckworth, then he got a job in Reading.” He sighed. “It seems hard to drag all this up now, but there’s no option. What happened three years ago, or whatever, might be very relevant indeed to what happened yesterday.”
***
When Webb and Jackson were shown into the small living-room at the Lodge the next morning, there was a tall young man standing by the window. Alison Carey, calm and con-trolled, introduced him as her son Jonathan. It took only a few seemingly innocuous questions to elicit the fact that he had undeniably been at his agricultural college in Wiltshire on Monday evening.
The daughter Philippa was also present, lounging listlessly on the sofa. Webb cleared his throat.
“Mrs. Carey, I’m sorry to trouble you with more questions, but I’m afraid there are still several to be answered. And I think it would be better if we could ask them privately.”
The two young people looked up—indignantly? Protectively?—but when their mother nodded towards the door, they left the room without protest.
Webb turned from watching them to see her looking steadily at him. “Well, Chief Inspector? What is it that my children can’t hear?”
“I’m sorry to have to bring this up, but it could be important. I understand your husband was dismissed from his last job?”
Whatever she’d been expecting, it was not that. Colour flooded her face, then receded, leaving her very pale. “Daphne Warrender?” she asked after a moment.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Was that where you got the information?”
“Possibly, indirectly. You were overheard talking at the Harwood reception.”
She raised her eyebrows. “I find that hard to believe. We were alone at the time.”
“Some people were round the corner of the cloakroom. The eavesdropping was unintentional.”
“But useful,” Alison said bitterly.
“If it traces who killed your husband.”
That startled her. “You think it might?”
“My informant had the impression you hadn’t known of the so-called scandal.”
“No,” she admitted quietly.
“No doubt you asked your husband that evening for an explanation?”
There was a long pause. Then, without looking at him, she said again, “No.”
Webb stared at her. “Mrs. Carey, let me get this straight. Are you telling me that you discovered your husband had been involved in some scandal which resulted in his dismissal, and you didn’t tax him with it?”
She raised her head then, her hazel eyes meeting his defiantly. “That’s certainly what I’m telling you, Chief Inspector. Whether you believe it or not is up to you.”
“But why did you keep silent?”
She spread her hands in a helpless little gesture. “It didn’t seem worth all the hassle. I guessed it was to do with women; Neil always had a weakness for them. There’d been rows before, plenty of them, and I just couldn’t face another. In any case, it’s ancient history now.”
“But didn’t it alter your feelings for him?”
She gave a twisted smile. “Not to the extent of killing him. Actually,” she went on, “I thought long and hard about it all, and I realized that without being aware of it, I’d stopped loving him. He wanted us to move, you know; nearer to Reading and his job. We’d discussed it a few days earlier, but I didn’t want to go. So I decided to leave things as they were unless he tried to put pressure on me. If he did, I’d suggest we separated and I stayed where I was. And I’d a good enough reason to give for my decision.”
“What did he tell you, when he was suddenly out of a job?” Webb asked curiously.
“That he’d been made redundant. That was what hurt most last week, remembering how I’d done all I could to keep his spirits up and support him.”
“It was then you came here?”
She nodded. “With Neil out of work, our rather hefty mortgage was an increasing burden. So when I was offered this job and the house to go with it, we sold up and put the money in the bank.”
“And you still don’t know why he really left?”
“No, but I’m sure Daphne does.”
“Who exactly is she?”
“The wife of the managing director of Stanley Marcus. We used to go to dinner at each other’s houses but it was only business entertaining; I never cared for them. He was pompous and stuffy and she was, well—bitchy, to be honest. I don’t doubt she had a field day when she got home from the wedding, ringing up all her friends and telling them that fool Alison was still with Neil.”
Webb glanced at Jackson, writing industriously in his pocket-book. “Could we have her name and address, then?”
They lived in Buckinghamshire, which at least, Webb thought thankfully, was reasonably accessible. He took his leave of Mrs. Carey, but not before ascertaining that on Monday afternoon she had been showing prospective clients over the House. It was conceivable that she could have reached the woods in time to kill her husband, but it would have been a close thing. Personally, Webb was inclined to think she hadn’t.
***
The Warrenders lived in a large, mock-Colonial house in several acres of ground. As Jackson drew up in the semi-circular drive, there was hysterical barking from a pair of black Labradors fortunately confined behind an ornamental side gate. He had the impression that if loosed, they’d have gone straight for the throat.
They were admitted by a uniformed maid and shown into the library while “madam” was advised of their arrival.
“Shades of Noel Coward,” Webb said, looking about him at the panelled walls.
Jackson grinned. “Isn’t this where they were always finding bodies in the good old days?”
Webb grunted. “Unfortunately these days they turn up anywhere.”
The door opened and Daphne Warrender came in. She was a heavily corseted woman in her late fifties, carefully made up and wearing a tweed skirt, twin set and pearls. Briefly, Webb wondered if he had indeed wandered on to a stage-set.
“Yes?” she said graciously, the words “my man” hanging unsaid in the air.
Webb, refraining from tugging his forelock, produced his warrant card instead. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, ma’am, about the death of Mr. Neil Carey?”
Her eyelids fluttered. “Yes, I saw a paragraph in The Times this morning. A dreadful business.”
“I believe you and your husband used to know him?”
“They were business colleagues, yes.” She hesitated. “I think, Chief Inspector, my husband would be more help to you than I.”
“Indeed, ma’am, if he’s at home?”
“He retired last year.” She pulled a silken bell-rope and the maid reappeared.
“Ask Mr. Warrender to join us, please, Sarah.”
The husband was a tall, lugubrious-looking man with sagging cheeks and a regimental tie. Jackson, recalling Mrs. Carey’s comment, conceded that dinner with this pair would hardly be a barrel of laughs.
“Felix, these gentlemen are inquiring about poor Neil.”
“I believe he left your firm under some sort of cloud, sir?”
“Very much so. Unfortunate business.”
“Could you tell me what it was?”
“Well now, don’t like to talk o
ut of turn when the fellow’s dead.”
“It could be important, sir.”
“Very well. I regret to say he was carrying on with my assistant. A most capable young woman she was, too. I’d have thought she had more sense.”
“What happened?”
“I came upon them in flagrante and all that, in the boardroom. What’s more, I had some customers with me at the time. Highly embarrassing.”
“I see. So you felt there was nothing for it but to ask for his resignation?”
“Very much so.”
“And the woman?”
“Gave in her notice at the same time. All she could do, really.”
“What happened to her?”
“Haven’t the slightest idea.”
“How long ago was all this?”
“Must be over three years now.”
Webb turned to Mrs. Warrender, who’d been listening avidly. “You’d be surprised to discover Mr. and Mrs. Carey were still together?”
Her eyes flickered warily. “She mentioned our meeting? Yes, it was a surprise. It hadn’t occurred to me she’d stay with him.”
“Quite an item of gossip for your friends,” he remarked. No response. “I suppose you rang around to tell them?”
“One or two, yes,” she answered stiffly.
And they, doubtless, had passed it on, and among those who heard the news might well be someone who was more than interested to learn where Neil Carey was now living. The girl, for instance. If Carey ran true to form, he’d probably not been in touch since.
“I’d be grateful for the names of those you did contact.”
“I really don’t see—” She broke off, staring at him in sudden horror. “You surely don’t imagine that one of my friends killed Neil?”
“No, no,” he assured her hastily. “But we need to know who they in turn told. You must admit it’s a coincidence that he was killed so soon afterwards.”
She seemed prepared to admit no such thing, but her husband broke in.
“Look here, Chief Inspector, fooling around is unfortunately a way of life nowadays. Hardly punishable by death, what?”
David Webb 8 - Symbols at Your Door Page 15