*
‘It’s suicide, but we’ll never prove it, not with these bloody witnesses adamant that Leng looked perfectly normal just before he fell,’ DI Frank Gregory said in answer to Nick Frobisher’s latest call.
He held the phone away from his head as he heard Nick’s response.
‘Normal? Christ Almighty, the day anybody calls that bugger normal is the day I hang up my boots.’
Frank was tetchy. ‘You don’t need to tell me that. I was probably the last one he spoke to — or rather, the last one he verbally abused. How’s the wife taking it?’
‘How do you think? She’s probably out on a spending spree right now with all the loot she’s about to get. It was no accident, Frank.’
‘You know it and I know it, but we’ll never prove it, so it looks as if she’ll be doing the merry widow act from now on.’
‘And paying Alex Best anything she wants to do her bidding,’ Nick said grimly. ‘Anyway, have you seen her or heard from her? I can’t get hold of her.’
‘Sorry. We’re not her keepers down here, Frobisher. We do have other things to deal with as well as wet-nursing your bit of fluff.’
Nick heard the edge in his voice, and backed off. But he was less than happy about the fact that Alex seemed to have gone to ground. He was bloody uneasy about her, if the truth were told.
Where the hell are you, Alex? He fumed. And whatever else you do, keep out of the way of the black widow.
*
At that moment Jane Leng was creating her latest newspaper letter and preparing to fax it off that afternoon from the little printing office she had discovered that did it so cheaply. Not that cheapness mattered to her any more, or wouldn’t as soon as she got the insurance policies in motion.
For such a nondescript little woman, who never seemed to have much gumption about her, she had done a surprising amount of personal business since hearing about Bob’s demise that morning.
She had phoned her sister and brother-in-law, and listened to their shocked reactions, and then asked them crisply to get in touch with the undertaker’s for her and arrange the funeral to their convenience and then let her know when it would be. There was no point in pretending a grief she didn’t feel, and all she wanted was to get it over and done with, without having to go through all the messy business of dealing with these people.
She had dug out the insurance policies and telephoned the company with the news, promising to send copies of the death certificate as soon as possible. She had had the foresight to discuss it with the police doctor who had accompanied her to the mortuary and pronounced Bob dead. There would have to be an inquest, but he assured her it would be a formality, since there was little doubt that the cause of death was drowning by accident.
Then the death certificate would be issued and she could get copies. Bob was dead and drowned, she reminded herself again, with a jubilation bordering on euphoria. It gave her a sweet sense of satisfaction to know the way it had happened. She knew, and he would have known that it was no accident, even though he had always hated the water. God only knew why he had done it this way, but there was no doubt in her mind that he had done it, of course. Saving her the trouble, anyway, she thought callously.
Steven would want to know. Steven would want to see his father planted. She revised her words on his account. Steven would want to see his father decently buried. Steven would finally turn up once he had seen her letter in the newspaper, which was why she had to get it off straight away and not wait for the post to deliver it.
She read it once more before she faxed it, to make certain she had got everything right. This time it was addressed directly to Steven Leng, via the newspaper letters page.
Steven, your father is dead, so now you must come home, and we can live very comfortably in the new house in Chilworthy. We can do anything we want. We can travel to India like you always wanted, or go all around the world. We’ll have such times together now, Steven. So I want you to contact your Auntie Grace and Uncle Joe for details of the funeral, and I’ll look forward to seeing you there.
She paused, and then signed it, Your loving mother, Jane Leng.
She smiled as she pushed it through the fax machine and imagined the look on the editor’s face when he received it. She had no doubt it would be printed. They always used her letters, and this was an added bit of news as well. She had no intention of sending in an obituary notice to the paper, but no doubt her sister would feel it necessary. Grace was a stickler for convention, even though she knew as well as Jane that Bob had always been a bastard. Grace wouldn’t have used such a word, but she knew it all the same.
Once the fax had gone through and she had reclaimed her original letter, all she had to do was to sit back and wait for Steven to get in touch. She knew he was somewhere near. She felt it as surely as if he was smiling benignly at her now, approving that her life of misery with Bob was over.
And if he wasn’t, Jane thought, with a vicious little aside to whatever gods were listening, then she hoped he’d take his revenge in the Great Upstairs on his ungrateful father for all the torment he’d put his wife through all these years. They’d probably never meet though, since Steven would be Up There, of course, while Bob would assuredly have gone to hell.
*
Alex reached Exeter without any problem — straight down the M5 until junction 30 and then parking in the nearest car-park while she got her bearings. There were two things she needed to do — three, if you counted finding a loo, which she needed pretty fast, she reminded herself. She also needed to find a reasonable B&B, and the local nick.
Thankfully there were toilets at the car-park, and once that essential little visit was over, she was glad to leave the car after the long drive, and take a walk around to stretch her legs. There was a town map in a glass frame at the exit of the car-park, with a large red arrow telling her You Are Here. There was also a list of local points of interest detailed below, including a nearby Tourist Information Office.
Twenty minutes later, she was armed with a small list of B&Bs and several photocopied routes for finding them. She decided that was her next priority, as it was getting late in the afternoon and she needed to find her base. And she wasn’t going to spend the rest of the day searching. The first one that looked decent would do, even it was called Dun Roamin’.
The landlady, just as quaintly named Mrs Dunstable, welcomed her inside, quoted her terms and asked how long she would be staying.
‘Two nights, maybe more. I’m not exactly sure. Is that a problem?’
‘Not at this time of year, my dear,’ the landlady said expansively. ‘You’re welcome to stay as long as you like. You’ll find the beds as comfy as if you were in your own, and you’ll just need to give me a few hours’ notice if you’re staying on longer than a couple of days, so I can prepare a nice evening dinner for you.’
‘Are there any other guests?’ Alex said, hoping she wasn’t the only one to get all this treatment.
‘Just my regulars who like to stay for the winter weeks, dear, but they won’t bother you, so you just come and go as you please.’
Alex fully intended to.
‘On holiday, are you?’ Mrs Dunstable said next, eyeing her holdall and the tote bag with all her working gear in it.
‘Sort of a working holiday. I shall have notes to write up for my job, so I may sometimes have to spend time in my room. I hope that’s not a problem.’
‘Bless you, no. We have lots of working folk down here, students as well. I could tell you were a business person, soon as I saw you.’
She beamed approvingly at her, and Alex was thankful when she left. Landladies were a breed of their own, she reflected: chatty, well-meaning, and sometimes too inquisitive for comfort, but this one seemed well used to students and business persons, so that was all right.
She began to unpack, and the next minute there was a tap on her door. Mrs Dunstable called through it to remind her that dinner was at seven, and she hoped Alex was partial
to beef stew and dumplings, as all her regulars liked homely fare.
Her mouth watered, and the thought of tramping around the city looking for the police station was something that could be delayed until tomorrow. There was no need to hurry, and Jane Leng couldn’t get at her here. She called out that the meal sounded wonderful, decided she had done enough rushing around for one day, and spent a luxurious half-hour in a steaming hot bath before lying full-length on the bed in her red kimono and closing her eyes blissfully.
However, she was unable to keep out the thought of work indefinitely, and by the time she had changed into something casually smart to wear to dinner, she had switched on her mobile phone again. It beeped immediately, telling her there was a text message waiting. She smiled, guessing it would be from Nick, and then the smile faded as she saw that it came from DI Frank Gregory.
‘Wherever you are, Alex, I thought you should know that your mad woman has contacted tonight’s paper. Call me for more details.’
Alex chewed her lip. Why should she care? What was it — some kind of weird obituary for her husband to salve Jane’s conscience or something?
Annoyed at the thought, she punched in Frank’s number and waited for him to respond.
‘Alex Best here, Frank. Sorry I was unavailable earlier.’
‘Never mind. I’m sure you’ll want to know what the crazy Leng woman’s done now.’
‘I gather it’s something that doesn’t please you,’ she said mildly.
‘She’s asking for trouble, that’s what she’s doing. I’ll fax you through her latest letter if you’ll give me a number —’
‘Sorry. Not possible. You’ll have to read it out to me if you think it’s that important.’
He wasn’t getting at her whereabouts that way, either. But when she heard the contents of Jane’s letter, she could see exactly why it was so very important — and so very dangerous. It was more than the letter of a deranged woman. It was an open invitation to every crook in the vicinity to help himself to some of her new-found wealth.
‘I knew she was crazy, but this is sheer stupidity,’ Alex said when he had finished. ‘Is she going to be put under police surveillance?’
‘What for? For shooting off her mouth as if she’s the lady of the manor now? It’s her problem, but I thought you’d want to know.’
‘Thanks. And I’m glad you told me, though there’s not much I can do now, is there? The damage is already done.’
She ended the call as soon as she could, not wanting to prolong it. Jane was a fool, and Frank’s remark about her being the lady of the manor now probably wasn’t far short of the mark. She’d be preening herself at having got all of Bob’s money without having to lift a finger to do it. And writing that impassioned letter to Steven was enough to get all the cranks in the area posing as her long-lost son. It was something Alex hadn’t thought about before, but now that she had, she knew she had to warn Jane about it.
She dialled her number, and Jane’s eager voice answered at once, then immediately lost some of its warmth when she knew who the caller was.
‘Did you think I was going to be somebody else, Jane?’ Alex said.
‘Perhaps,’ she said cautiously.
‘Jane, I know about the letter you’ve put in tonight’s newspaper, and I wanted to warn you,’ Alex went on directly.
‘What about?’
Alex knew she had to go carefully. The woman’s nerves were fragile. She was just as likely to suffer a heart attack if her long-lost son ever turned up, as if she accepted positive proof that he was never going to do so.
‘Jane, it’s possible that someone who isn’t Steven might pretend that he is. You’ve implied that you’re going to have a great deal of money very soon, and there are a lot of villains out there who would dearly like to get their hands on it.’
‘Do you think I won’t know my own son when I see him?’ The voice was decidedly shriller now.
‘Yes, but all your memories are of a young boy from ten years ago, Jane. He would — will — be very different now. Young boys change considerably between the ages of sixteen and twenty-six. Please remember that, and be very careful if someone contacts you, and especially who you arrange to meet.’
She realized she was talking to thin air. The bloody stupid woman had put the phone down on her, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it ... except to call Nick and tell him she had warned Jane, and the response she had got. Dinner must wait.
Chapter 11
After a leisurely breakfast the next morning, during which she was very much the interesting newcomer to the elderly regulars at the B&B, Alex found her way to the local police station.
This one was no different from any other, she thought, as she entered the front door. Even the smell was the same. Police stations were either buzzing with activity or there was a bored sergeant at the front desk and a couple of minions behind him fiddling with some paperwork or staring at a computer screen trying to look busy. This morning it was the latter scenario.
‘Morning, love. Can I help you?’ the desk sergeant said, giving her a fatherly smile.
‘I hope so. Can you give me any information about a group called the Followers? I understand they have a base somewhere in Exeter.’
The guy’s eyes flickered for a moment, and Alex guessed it probably wasn’t a request he heard every day. She could have enquired at the Tourist Office, she thought suddenly, but this seemed the most likely place, especially if the Followers weren’t exactly infra dig in the town.
‘Thinking of joining them, are you, Miss?’ he said next.
Alex laughed. ‘Not really, but I’m trying to trace a relative. Nothing heavy, you understand, it’s just that he’s required at home for personal reasons.’
Why did she get the uncomfortable feeling that this guy didn’t believe a word of it? She thought it sounded feasible enough, and it was better than saying she was a PI going to check them out on account of an old crime that may not even be a crime at all.
‘Those people don’t like us to give out information unless it’s for a genuine reason, so I can’t really do that, Miss, unless I know exactly what the problem is. In any case, they don’t welcome strangers except by personal recommendation,’ he went on, his gaze never leaving her face.
‘But you don’t object to them being in the town, do you?’ Alex said, chancing her luck. ‘I was told I could find them here.’
‘They do no harm,’ he said without expression. ‘But if you’re really keen to get in touch with them, I could contact them on your behalf, if you’ll just give me your name and phone number.’
Before Alex could respond negatively to this, one of the police constables behind him spoke up.
‘The young lady could always find a group of them busking in the town and see if one of them could help, couldn’t she, Sarge? They’re always around at lunchtime and in the afternoons, and some of them will talk to you.’
‘Thank you, Stavely,’ the sergeant turned on him freezingly. ‘When I want your help, I’ll ask for it.’
Alex gave the younger man a winning smile. Thank you, she said silently.
‘Well, I think I’ll leave it for now, anyway. I only called in here on the off-chance. I have some things to do in town, so if I see them, I’ll give one of them a message for my relative. That will save me the bother. Thanks for your help.’
She could almost feel the sergeant’s gaze following her out of the door. But she wasn’t born yesterday. Cult groups had a bad name even if they were totally harmless. As yet, she didn’t know which category the Followers came into. They were obviously tolerated here, but she guessed that any enquiries about them would be noted — and she had no intention of having her name and phone number logged into any police file.
*
‘Pretty girl, Sarge,’ the constable commented nervously, knowing he’d made a boob without really knowing why.
The desk sergeant rounded on him at once, his eyes flashing. ‘If you thought
with your brains instead of your bollocks you’d know when to keep your mouth shut, Stavely,’ he snapped. ‘Stop gawping like a wet fish and find me the memo that came in from that London DCI asking to be informed if anyone started asking questions about the Followers. And then get me his number.’
*
Exeter was an interesting city, Alex decided. Nice and compact, with a beautiful cathedral with plenty of grassy space all around it, and a great shopping centre. She decided to make the most of it, and be a tourist for the morning. If the buskers didn’t come out until the afternoons — presumably starting at lunchtime when there were more shoppers about — then she might as well enjoy herself and forget about work for a short while.
She did the cathedral and the maritime museum, and spent more than she would normally have done on a couple of glittery black tops and leather trousers in an exclusive little boutique.
But what the hell? Jane Leng was paying for it. At the thought, Alex remembered what she was here to do, sobering a little as she went into a small coffee shop in the main shopping street to take a breather, and a cream doughnut to go with her coffee. She was the only customer just now, and the waitress was happy to chat.
‘Not bad weather for the time of year, is it?’ the girl said, nodding to where the breeze just rattled the leaves of the trees in the pavement outside. ‘Haven’t seen you around before.’
‘I’m just here for a few days,’ Alex told her. ‘Looking for a relative, as a matter of fact,’ she added, deciding to continue her alibi.
‘Oh yes?’ the waitress said. ‘Living here, is she?’
‘I’m not sure. It’s a young man, actually, and I think he may have got caught up in some group. I don’t really have much to go on at all.’
She made it sound very vague. It was often a better way to extract information than by going in like a bull at a gate.
Deadly Suspicions (Alexandra Best Investigations Book 3) Page 14