Tara quickly ran through her line of questions regarding Maggie Hull. It soon transpired that McIntyre also thought highly of her concerning her work and her long service at Harbinson Fine Foods. Tara, however, was conscious of a pattern emerging. Everyone they had interviewed so far was in wholehearted agreement that Maggie Hull had been a cherished employee, one which any company would be privileged to have on their payroll. Strangely, though, not one of them seemed to know or even care very much about her personal life – her life beyond the office door. She had worked at the company for a very long time, but it seemed that she was part of the furniture to leave behind at the end of the working day.
‘She left about ten to six,’ said McIntyre in reply to Tara’s question. ‘I shared the lift with her.’
‘That was a bit late for her,’ said Murray. ‘Mr Ewing reckoned that she usually finished shortly after five?’
‘Yes, he would,’ said McIntyre, frowning. ‘Since Maggie became his secretary, about a year ago, she never left the office before five-thirty. Most days it was closer to six. Toby wouldn’t notice that sort of thing. He’s a bit of an idiot. That’s why she became his secretary in the first place. Edward believes that Toby needs to be taken by the hand.’
‘And what do you think?’ inquired Tara.
‘Me? As I said, Inspector, he’s a complete disaster. If it were up to me, he wouldn’t be here. But daddy keeps an eye out for him. Toby and Richard were supposed to be the future of this company. The rest of us are a bit long in the tooth. Now that Richard is gone, I can’t see Toby taking control by himself.’
‘Daddy?’
‘Yes, Jimmy Ewing is a retired partner of the firm or a sleeping partner you might say. Young Toby is the apple of his eye.’
Tara quickly realised that she wasn’t going to get much more information on Maggie Hull from this particular company director. The man seemed to have a rather hefty chip on his shoulder regarding his business partners. Perhaps within such an attitude there lurked a motive for murder. But why kill Maggie Hull, a much-loved servant of the company? They left McIntyre to get on with his work, although of all the executives they had met this morning, he appeared the least busy.
‘They’re a strange bunch,’ said Murray on the drive back to St Anne Street.
‘What do you mean?’
‘To be directors in a big company – they don’t strike you as high-powered businessmen.’
‘Harbinson seems business-like.’
‘But the other two: Ewing is only there because of daddy, and McIntyre looks as though he’d rather be at Glastonbury.’
CHAPTER 19
Tara could not recall ever feeling such relief to have made it to the weekend. Having made it, she wondered why she had been looking forward to it in the first place. She had no plans. Continuing to regard herself as having been sidelined at work concerning the ongoing poisoning scandal, she did not expect to have anything to do with policing until Monday. At the counter in the kitchen area of her flat, she sat over a chicken korma ready meal and wondered if it had originated from Harbinson Fine Foods. Most of the company’s product was not sold under the Harbinson name but rather appeared as home brands by all the major food supermarkets in the country.
As she ate and tried to get into a paperback novel about lost love in the eighteenth century that she thought she should be reading, she pondered her options for the weekend. A visit to her parents was long overdue, but she decided that if it was going to happen she would leave it until Sunday afternoon. It was more likely that on Saturday her mother would be lunching with friends and her father playing golf. Sunday was the best time to find them both at home, and also she could invite herself for lunch. Only a few months ago, she would have been under pressure to free up her time to be out on a Friday and Saturday night. It had been even longer since she’d been on a date with a man, and she could scarcely remember the last time she had sex.
The prospect for this Friday evening was to sit in front of the telly and wonder about the terrifying events taking place in the city. The belief now was that the incidents of poisoning were not as they had been in Salisbury. The victims seemed random and no specific target had been identified. The use of chemical nerve agents like Novichok had been ruled out, although the toxin responsible for the deaths had still not been identified. None of these developments could rule out the actions of terrorists or of an individual acting alone. No motive had been established for the deaths of four innocent and unconnected members of the public.
Her appetite remained poor and she gave up on the korma with rice and scraped what was left on her plate into the bin. Automatically, it seemed, she reached into the fridge and removed a bottle of white wine, twisting off the cap and filling a stemmed glass. She retired to her sofa and scrolled through her mobile. There were no texts, there were no WhatsApp messages from Kate in reply to her cinema suggestion and there were no missed calls. At the end of the news on TV, the weather forecast for the weekend sounded promising – late autumn sunshine and no rain. A rare opportunity to be out and about.
A sudden notion came into her head, and she went immediately to fetch her notebook from her handbag. On a fresh page, she had jotted down a telephone number. When she had made the call, she sat back in the sofa and contentedly sipped her wine and selected a movie from Netflix. Her weekend was looking up.
* * *
‘Right, you can open your eyes now,’ said Tara.
‘Oh my word, it’s beautiful,’ said Jez. ‘But I certainly didn’t do it justice. Look at the colours of the trees.’
‘It’s autumn. You painted a scene of early summer.’
Tara had parked her car by the side of the road and led her companion along a narrow path before climbing on to a rocky outcrop that stood above Llyn Padarn. Jez struggled with the climb, unprepared for walking on rough ground, wearing heeled boots. Tara had less trouble in flat shoes, and her excitement to be at this place where her father had often brought her as a child, quickened her step. Soon though, they stood on the rock known as Craig yr Undeb, or the Union Rock, and gazed over the lake towards Llanberis. It was the vista that Tara had seen among Jez’s paintings.
‘I thought you might like to see the place,’ said Tara.
‘Wonderful, thank you.’
The pair sat down on the rock with their legs outstretched. The air was cool but there was little wind and the clouds were absent, leaving a milky-blue sky. For a time they sat in silence admiring the view. Tara, when she had left home that morning, had no motive in her mind other than to bring Jez to this spot. Now, however, she couldn’t help her thoughts drifting towards the investigation of Maggie Hull’s murder. She realised she still had to quiz Jez over what she knew about her late colleague. Worse still, she was well aware that if Jez was considered a person of interest in the murder case then she was breaking every rule in the book by socialising with the woman. If Tweedy were to find out he would bounce her out of his squad in a flash. But Tara’s mindset lately was to care little for protocol and even less for her well-being.
‘I take it you’ve heard the news about Maggie Hull?’
Jez flashed a look of irritation. She was not expecting to be questioned at this time. She continued to gaze into the distance.
Tara had the chance to study her face more closely. She saw that Jez’s eyes were puffy as if she’d been crying but she’d made some effort to perk herself up again, perhaps in anticipation of their outing.
‘Maggie and I were very close, very close indeed. She took me under her wing when I started working at Harbinson’s. I learned most things about the company from her.’ Jez did not look at Tara as she explained but continued to absorb the scenery. ‘We got on well together; we became great friends. She was Edward’s secretary when I arrived, but after a few months, with her excellent teaching, I took over and she moved along the corridor to look after Toby.’
‘Was she happy with that arrangement?’ Tara asked.
‘I think so. We
didn’t discuss it in those terms, but Maggie, as I’m sure you’ve already heard, was not one for complaining. She just put her head down and got on with the job.’
‘Did you see each other outside of working hours?’
‘Oh yes, we spent a lot of time together. I had just moved back to Liverpool and I’d lost contact with all my old chums. Maggie and I became soulmates, I suppose.’
‘Can you think of any reason for her being murdered?’
For a moment, the question went unanswered. The frankness of it seemed to induce some tears. Jez wiped her eyes and then blew her nose.
‘I’m sorry,’ she cried. ‘It’s just so terrible. I can’t believe that anyone would want to hurt Maggie.’
‘Do you know anything about her personal affairs?’ Tara asked.
‘No, not really. The only problem she ever seemed to have was money. She was always in debt. She didn’t seem to care how much something cost. If she wanted it, she bought it.’
Tara’s mind glanced over the scene in Maggie Hull’s home: the expensive furniture, the huge collection of CDs, crystal glassware and the vast wardrobe of clothing.
‘When I first met her,’ Jez continued, ‘she was spending a lot more than she was earning. She showed me some of the things she was buying: not just clothes and jewellery but silly things, too, like joining wine clubs and ordering special edition porcelain – things that she didn’t need. I tried telling her to be more careful, but she told me that it made her happy. “What good is money if you don’t spend it?” she used to say. I tried to steer her towards things that would at least give her some lasting enjoyment, a social life even. We went to the theatre and the cinema together and several concerts. I enjoy painting, so I suggested that she attempted a hobby.’
‘And how did that turn out?’ asked Tara who, although listening intently to Jez’s softly spoken tones, was irked by the fact that Jez had taken over Maggie’s role in the company.
‘Oh, she attempted to paint and went to a few evening classes. I gave her a few tips as well. Last year we went on an artists’ weekend to the Lake District. She did all the things I suggested and more, but she remained as carefree as ever with her money.’
‘And her debts were mounting?’ said Tara.
‘Absolutely dreadful. I found out that over a year ago she’d been refused a debit card by her bank. I advised her to throw away her credit cards. She had at least fifteen that I knew of: Visa, MasterCard, American Express, store cards like Marks and Spencer. She did it too, I watched her cut them up one day during lunch. I offered her some money to help pay off some of the bills until she got back on her feet but she wouldn’t accept it, not at first anyway.’
‘She changed her mind?’
‘I changed it for her. I found her one morning, about four months ago, crying in the ladies. She refused to tell me anything at first until I noticed the bruises. She’d taken a beating from someone who had lent her money. She hadn’t been able to pay them back, so they’d turned nasty. She’d been kicked in the ribs. I told her to go to the police, but she wouldn’t hear of it. I gave her the money to pay them off – nine hundred pounds – she’d only borrowed three hundred! Can you believe those people? That was the last time she involved me in her problems. I asked on several occasions how things were, but she always shrugged it off and said that she had learned her lesson. It’s strange because after that incident we were never really close again. I think it must have embarrassed her deeply.’
‘How did she seem when you last saw her?’ Tara asked.
Jez thought for a moment, her face losing some of its colour.
‘It was one day last week, I suppose, before a board meeting, but as I said we were no longer very close. Apart from discussing work, we hadn’t spoken for months.’
She gazed directly at Tara as if searching for an ounce of comfort.
* * *
Jez insisted on paying for lunch when they stopped at a pub in Llanberis.
‘It’s my treat,’ she said. ‘You were kind enough to bring me here. It was really sweet.’
Tara smiled coyly. She had enjoyed the time spent in this woman’s company, a world of difference from the empty times at home brooding.
‘Better than Elgar?’ said Tara.
Jez laughed. ‘If you like.’
After lunch, they started immediately on the drive back to Liverpool. They didn’t chat much. Tara played the radio, and at one point Jez dozed off. When she awoke, she was suddenly all biz about what they could do together: another concert, a visit to the theatre, dinner in mid-week and a proposed trip to London for early Christmas shopping. As she pulled up outside the house, Tara felt strange. Her tummy tightened and she was suddenly tingling with nerves.
‘Would you like to come in?’ Jez asked her. ‘We could order Chinese and watch TV?’
‘Oh thanks, Jez, it sounds great but I really must be getting back.’ Her reaction was instinctive and defensive. She couldn’t think why; it was an innocent proposal, but already she’d gone too far in her association with a woman who might well be considered a suspect in a murder. She felt uncomfortable suddenly with Jez staring at her.
‘Well maybe some other time,’ said Jez with a smile.
‘Definitely.’
‘Thank you for a lovely day, Tara.’
In a flash, she moved closer and kissed her as she had done on the previous occasion. It was intended to be a long and passionate kiss, but Tara snapped her head back. She knew it was too much, too much for her to understand and yet it did not feel unpleasant. Certainly, it was a step further than the last time. Jez smiled devilishly and searched Tara’s eyes. Tara knew she had to leave.
‘I’d better go, Jez.’
‘I’m sorry, I went too far…’
‘It’s fine. I just have to go.’
Jez climbed from the car, and Tara roared away from the curb. She fought to see the road beyond her floods of tears. The only mechanism she had to deal with her confused emotions was to think of murder and death and the case of Maggie Hull. Had Jez and Maggie been lovers? Is that the reason they had stopped being friends? The idea fought the logic. Jez had been in a relationship with Richard Andrews – she wasn’t gay. Why was she reading so much into a kiss? Maybe Jez was simply an over-affectionate woman. But there was mischief in the look she had after the kiss. Tara had no idea what to think.
At least Jez had provided a possible lead in the case.
CHAPTER 20
Murray was sitting alone at a table in the canteen as Tara entered. He was feasting on a full English accompanied by a mug of strong and sweet tea. Tara didn’t know how he managed it. She had left her flat with nothing more than a cereal bar in her hand, and by the time she’d reached the station two-thirds of it remained. After ordering a filter coffee, she joined him at the table.
‘I don’t know where you put it.’
‘Hollow legs.’
‘So, how was your weekend?’ she asked him.
‘Great,’ he managed between mouthfuls of sausage and fried bread. ‘How about you?’
‘Fine, I suppose.’ She couldn’t erase the image of Jez kissing her, and worse still could not work out exactly how she felt about it. ‘I went out for a drive on Saturday with that secretary from Harbinson Fine Foods.’
Murray looked puzzled. Tara suddenly remembered that Murray was not with her that first time she had met Jez. He hadn’t a clue what she was talking about.
‘Jez Riordan – she had an affair with Richard Andrews – the suicide?’
‘OK.’
‘We have a few things in common, and she is a friendly type.’
‘You do realise since she works for Harbinson’s that she could be considered a suspect for killing Maggie Hull,’ said Murray.
‘I know.’
‘Tweedy would go nuts if he found out, Tara.’
‘He’s not going to find out, is he, Alan?’ Tara gazed sternly at her colleague. On this occasion, she excused him calling her Tara.
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Murray looked exasperated.
‘I hope you know what you’re doing, that’s all.’
‘Yes, I can manage perfectly well, thank you. Besides, she gave me a possible lead concerning Maggie Hull. It seems that the woman was prone to running up large debts. How much do you know about loan sharks in Liverpool?’
‘Not much, but I know of someone who does. Joe Melling.’
‘Is he a loan shark?’
‘A loan shark? Definitely. Heavy-handed with bad debtors? Might be. A murderer? Not likely.’
When they entered the operations room, Murray went directly to a filing cabinet. Unsuccessful in locating the file he wanted, he sat down at his computer and ran a search through the police database until he came across several cases relating to recent incidents of theft in the Bootle, Walton and Aintree districts. Somewhere, within the files, was an address for Joe Melling. He was the go-to for information on petty criminal activity in those areas of the city.
* * *
To look at the house from the outside, anyone would find it difficult to believe that a man capable of lending money, hefty sums at that, could wish to live there. It was a three-storey, mid-terrace house, but well overdue its demolition order in a street not far from Anfield Stadium. Several of the houses in the same row were already bricked up, a sign that the rest would not be too far behind.
The curtains on the upstairs windows were open. Hopefully, the people inside were up and about. It was only eight-fifteen in the morning. Children hurried past Murray’s car on their way to school. A miserable bloody day to be going to school, Tara thought. The clear skies of the weekend had succumbed to a thick, billowing grey mass, unleashing its store of rain that pelted against the windscreen.
Scurrying to the solid, brown door with its peeling paint, she gave the knocker four definite clouts, stood back and waited. Murray, from his time spent in CID, knew Joe Melling by reputation only. Included on Joe’s record were three convictions for theft, the reason being that when he struggled to collect debts from clients he tended to collect in kind by carrying away the family television, the mother’s wedding and engagement rings, the baby’s pram and, on one occasion it was rumoured, the family Labrador. Joe Melling was the local moneylender and, assisted by a couple of young louts, the district bailiff rolled into one.
THE DARING NIGHT Page 8