Dark Room

by Minette Walters

  "Rather too subtle for you to understand," she said curtly before returning to her previous point. "If you're willing to be objective, then why were you so dismissive of everything I told you yesterday?"

  His smile didn't reach his eyes. "I don't recall being dismissive. I do recall challenging some of the statements you made. But then you're a suspect in this case, too," he pointed out, "which means that anything you say will be subject to scrutiny. Is that unreasonable, do you think?"

  "No, but I'd be interested to know if you've pursued any of the suggestions I made to you. For example, have you looked for another link between the three murders? Have you examined the possibility that someone was trying to kill me on the day of my accident?"

  "These things take time," he said. "We can't work miracles, Miss Kingsley."

  "But are you even trying, Inspector?" She turned to Cheever. "Is anyone?"

  The Superintendent, who was ignorant of both suggestions because they had not been relayed to him, answered honestly. "Not to my knowledge, no, but if you can persuade me they are worth pursuing, then I shall certainly do so. Why do you think someone was trying to kill you?"

  She glanced towards Protheroe, seeking support, but he was staring at the floor. "Because of a series of negatives," she said flatly. "I'm not the type to kill myself. I didn't want to marry Leo. I never get drunk. I didn't kill Russell, so I can't imagine I'd have killed Leo or Meg either. And the car crash clearly wasn't an accident. I can't think of another explanation for what happened to me bar attempted murder. And I keep thinking, what if I had died? Would you have looked for anyone else in connection with Leo's and Meg's deaths? Wouldn't you all just have said to yourselves: 'That explains everything, she must have killed Russell as well'?"

  "Do you remember anything at all about the crash, Miss Kingsley?"

  She looked away. "No," she said, her face devoid of expression.

  He studied her for a moment, unsure if he believed her. "Well, I'm quite happy to go through all the documents relating to it to see if there's anything we've missed, but I should warn you I'm not very optimistic. Even if you're right, I don't see how we'll ever be able to prove it."

  "I realize that, but the important thing is that you don't dismiss it as a possibility. You must see what a different light it sheds on the whole thing. I keep coming back and back to it in my mind. If someone tried to kill me, then that means I"-she pressed her hands to her chest-"must know who murdered Leo and Meg, even though I can't remember it. And it also means that that someone is the missing link, because whoever the person is probably murdered all three." She regarded him anxiously. "Do you follow?"

  "Oh, yes," he said, "I follow very well. It's an interesting hypothesis, but it doesn't help us very much unless you can suggest a name."

  And if I suggest a name. What then?-Do you have any proof, Miss Kingsley? "What good is a name if I can't give you any evidence?''

  The Superintendent shrugged. "It would give us a starting point."

  But she was only interested in the endgame and she doubted whether the police could ever deliver a result. Truth is a disturbingly elusive phenomenon ... Presumably you can't prove that ... Policemen accumulate the available facts and weigh them in the balance ... What was your revenge, Miss Kingsley?

  "Yesterday," Maddocks reminded her, "you argued that it was Meg who linked the three murders."

  "And I still believe that's right," she said, turning back from long corridors that led nowhere. "Look, I spent all last night thinking about it." She drew on her cigarette before stubbing it out in the ashtray. "I haven't been sleeping too well," she explained. "I don't blame you for seeing my relationship with Russell and Leo as the focus for what's happened, but Meg's relationship with them was just as strong. Last night, I kept coming back to the thinking at the time of Russell's murder, which was that my father killed him because he didn't like him. I remember one of the policemen saying to me that whoever killed him hated him, because it was done with such rage. And that set me wondering if the rage was jealous rage." She gave her troubled smile. "But not jealousy over me," she said. "Jealousy over Meg."

  There was a short silence.

  "We've read her diaries," said Frank Cheever. "At a rough estimate, she slept with fifty different men in the last ten years. Even by today's standards, she would be described as promiscuous."

  "Only because she had a very hedonistic view of sex. Why say no, if you both want to do it? In some ways she had a very masculine approach to life. She could love them and leave them and never turn a hair while she did it."

  "But surely you must see the flaw in your argument? If someone was so jealous that they were prepared to kill her lovers, then we should have fifty corpses on our hands instead of two."

  It was Alan Protheroe who answered. He had stood with bowed head, listening intently to Jinx's reasoning, but now he looked up. ' 'Because Russell and Leo were the only two lovers she really cared for," he pointed out. "By the sound of it, the rest meant nothing at all. Jinx told me the letters Meg wrote to Russell were very moving, and the newspapers talk about an eleven-year relationship between her and Leo. If someone else was in love with her, then it's those two men who represented the threat, not the fifty or so others who came and went as regularly as clockwork."

  "Why kill Meg as well?"

  "For the same reason jealous husbands kill their wives when they find them in flagrante delicto with other men. On the face of it, it's illogical. If you love a woman enough to be jealous, then how can you summon the hate required to kill her? But emotions are never logical."

  "Then why wasn't she killed when Russell was killed? Why only kill her over Leo?''

  Alan shrugged. "For any one of twenty reasons, I should think. A desire to give her a second chance. A belief that Russell was a sort of Svengali who'd influenced her against her will. Simple logistics-she wasn't with him the day of the murder. Myself, I'd probably pick the Svengali option because that would explain why she had to die this time. If she'd known Leo for eleven years, then it must have been clear to anyone who knew them both that she was an equal party to all decisions made. You need to find out who else knew about the affair with Russell. Isn't that the key?"

  DI Maddocks cleared his throat. "I could almost buy this theory if it wasn't for one small snag. Like Superintendent Cheever says, we've read her diaries, or what there is of them, and nowhere is there a mention of another man who lasted longer than three or four months. So who is this mysterious lover? You knew her better than anyone else, Miss Kingsley. Do you know who it is?"

  "No," she said, "I don't."

  Maddocks was watching her carefully. ' 'So give us a handful of likely candidates, and leave us to ferret out what we can."

  "Ask Josh," she said, evading the question. "He knew her men friends far better than I did."

  "We'll do that. Did he also know her women friends better?"

  "Probably."

  "Did she have many?"

  Jinx frowned, unsure where he was leading. "A few close ones, like me."

  "That's what I thought."

  She flicked him a puzzled glance. "Why is it important?"

  He quoted her own words back at her. " 'Why say no, if you both want to do it? Meg had a masculine approach to life.' " He held her gaze. "I wonder if this jealous lover was a woman, Miss Kingsley."

  CANNING ROAD POLICE STATION, SALISBURY-3:30 P.M.

  Blake showed Miles into an interview room. "You can wait here till the solicitor comes, although I may have to move you if the room's needed by someone else."

  "How long are you planning to keep me here?"

  "As long as it takes. First we wait for the solicitor, then we ask you questions. It could be several hours."

  "I don't have several hours," he muttered, glancing at his watch. "I need to be out of here by five at the latest."

  "Are you saying you don't want to wait for the solicitor, Mr. Kingsley?"

  He thought rapidly. "Yes, that's what I'm saying
. Let's get on with it."

  THE NIGHTINGALE CLINIC-3:30 P.M.

  "Which way?" asked Maddocks as he turned out of the clinic gates. "Salisbury CID or back to Winchester?"

  "Stoney Bassett airfield," grunted the Superintendent. "Young Blake will keep Miles on ice till we get there. Let's face it, he's not going anywhere in a hurry."

  HELLINGDON HALL, NEAR FORDINGBRIDGE-3:30 P.M.

  Betty put down the extension in her bedroom and dragged herself to her dressing table stool, pools of sweat gathering under her arms and drenching her corset at the back. She thrust her fat face at the mirror and desperately applied powder in an attempt to repair the ravages of time and her husband's neglect. She listened for his footsteps on the stairs, knowing that it was over. This time there would be no reprieve for her or the boys. As usual, she turned her resentment on the first Mrs. Kingsley whose ghost had defied every attempt she had ever made to lay it. It wasn't fair, she told herself. Okay, so no one had ever promised her a rose garden, but no one had warned her that marriage to Adam would be a bed of thorns, either. "Hello, Daddy," she said with desperate gaiety as the door was flung open, "it's been a bugger of a day one way and another, hasn't it?"

  STONEY BASSETT AIRFIELD, NEW FOREST, HAMPSHIRE-4:15 P.M.

  They stood on the bleak, heather-strewn plain where broken tarmac runways, covered in weeds, were all that remained of the wartime airfield. "What are we looking for?" asked Maddocks, careful to keep his tone neutral. He could happily have kicked his boss from here to eternity. Like Fraser yesterday, a few clever words and a troubled smile had made him doubt the girl's guilt, and for the life of him, Maddocks couldn't see how she did it.

  Frank pointed to the concrete stanchion which reared up like a single broken tooth some yards from where they were standing. "We'll start there," he said. "Presumably, that's what she drove at. How wide would you say it was?"

  "Nine feet square," guessed Maddocks.

  "Interesting, don't you think?" murmured Frank.

  "Why?"

  "I thought it was much narrower. You've seen the photographs. The car appeared to be wrapped around it like a metal fist." He cocked his head from side to side, studying different angles. "It must have impacted on one of the corners and the arc lights threw everything else into shadow." He moved forward to prowl around the structure.

  "What difference does its size make?" asked Maddocks, following him.

  The Superintendent squatted down to examine an area of gouged and heavily scarred concrete on both faces of one corner. "If you were driving at a nine-feet-wide wall with the intention of smashing into it, wouldn't you head straight for the middle? Why aim for one end?"

  There was shattered glass from the windshield still littering the ground, and intermittent tire traces to a point fifty meters back where the car had obviously been sitting until, at maximum revs, she had released the brake to hurl it and herself at the concrete structure. Frank spent ten minutes walking back and forth across a broad expanse of area around the stanchion; then he returned to stand and gaze at the burnt-rubber marks where the tires had spun before biting into the tarmac. He crouched down and followed the line the car had taken. "She was absolutely square to the middle of that wall when she set off," he said, "so how come she ended up wrapped around the right-hand corner?''

  "Hit a pothole and lost control," suggested Maddocks.

  "Except there isn't anything big enough, not on this stretch. That's what I was checking for. She could have driven at any of the three sides that face onto the tarmac but she chose the one with the best approach. If she was intent on killing herself, then there was nothing to stop her driving in a dead straight line."

  "She changed her mind at the last minute," said Maddocks. "Didn't fancy it so much when she saw the wall rushing towards her and tried to pull out of it."

  "Yes, that's a possibility." He turned with his back to the wall and surveyed the area that would have been behind the car. "Why didn't she start farther off and use the greater distance to build up her speed? Why sit here and rev up the engine?''

  "Because it was dark and she needed to see the wall."

  "It was ten o'clock on one of the longest days in the year. She could have seen that thing two, three hundred yards away."

  "All right, then she parked herself here, sat staring at the wall while she drank herself stupid, then suddenly made up her mind to do it. Look, sir, I know what you're getting at. You're saying that attempted murder isn't out of the question. Someone got her drunk-though I have to say that's a mystery in itself-picked the best piece of ground for the car to stay in a straight line, made it near enough to the stanchion to preclude too much divergence from the track, stuck her unconscious in the driving seat, put the car into drive, wedged the accelerator flat down with one of the empty bottles, and released the brake. At which point, brave Miss Kingsley comes out of her drunken stupor, sees what's happening, tries to steer clear, realizes she can't make it so throws herself out of the open door." He gave a sour smile. "Apart from the fact that you'd do yourself a hell of a lot of damage leaning in to release the hand brake of a car on full throttle, why on earth didn't he finish her off when she threw herself out?"

  "You wouldn't use the hand brake," said Frank. "You'd use the foot brake with some sort of brace-a piece of two by four maybe, a sledgehammer, even"-he lifted a teasing eyebrow-"between the metal frame of the seat and the pedal, with a rope attached. Then you'd wedge your throttle and use the rope to yank the brace away. The other alternative would be to chock the tires and not use the brakes at all." He gestured towards the ground. "But I think it'd be obvious if chocks had been used."

  "And the fact that he didn't bother to finish her off?" muttered Maddocks sarcastically.

  "Perhaps he thought he had," said the Superintendent mildly, "or perhaps he didn't have time to check." He was silent for a moment. "Would you care to explain to me why this little exercise is making you so angry?"

  "Because she's guilty as hell, sir. The whole thing was a setup to get her old man's sympathy. I can't see it makes a blind bit of difference which approach she chose, how far away she was when she started, whether chocks were used, or when she was found. She was in control of the car from the moment she set off."

  Frank scuffed his foot over the broken surface of the tarmac. "She could have torn the skin off her face throwing herself out of a speeding car onto this. Why not choose something less painful?"

  "Because she likes drama," said Maddocks dismissively. "Anyway, she didn't tear the skin off her face. She's not going to be permanently disfigured once her hair grows and the bruises fade. All things considered, she came off very lightly. Too lightly for attempted murder or genuine suicide, wouldn't you say?"

  CANNING ROAD POLICE STATION-4:45 P.M.

  "Look," said Miles angrily to the two police officers sitting opposite him, "how many times do I have to tell you? I've never been to a prostitute in my life. Why would I need to? Jesus, I had my first lay when I was fifteen." He banged his fist on the table. "I don't know any Flossie Hale and I don't know any Samantha Garrison, and if I wanted to shaft a forty-six-year-old, which I bloody well don't, I could shaft Dad's housekeeper for free. She'd probably pay me if I asked her. She's had the hots for me for years."

  "You have a very high opinion of yourself, Miles," said the Sergeant.

  "Why shouldn't I?"

  "No reason except that men who talk big tend to be better in theory than they are in practice."

  "What do you expect me to do? Burst into tears and say I'm so fucking inadequate I need to pay some old slag to give me a good time? Do me a favor."

  "Is that what you'd do if you felt you were inadequate?" asked Blake.

  Miles shrugged and lit a cigarette.

  She turned to the tape recorder on the table. "Mr. Kingsley's response was a shrug."

  "Like hell it was," said Miles furiously. "Mr. Kingsley's response is, I'm not fucking inadequate so I wouldn't fucking well know what I'd fucking do
if I was." He yelled into the microphone. "HAVE YOU FUCKING WELL GOT THAT?"

  "Calm down, Miles," said the Sergeant wearily. "You'll break the machine if you keep shouting at it. Why don't you just tell us where you were and what you were doing on the night of the twenty-second?"

  "You've asked me that same sodding question a hundred times and I've given the same sodding answer a hundred times. I was at home till eight-thirty, when I left to visit Jinx."

  "And we don't believe you. Tell me, will the randy housekeeper lie for you, the way you claim your mother and brother will?"

  "I never said they'd be lying." He looked at his watch. "Oh God! Look, I've got to get out of here. Are you going to charge me or not? Because if you're not, then I want out."

  "Why? What's happening at five o'clock that's so important?"

  "I owe money, you moron," said Miles through gritted teeth, "and I need to buy a bit more time. That's what's happening at five o'clock. Why the hell do you think I went to see Jinxy. Okay, so we shout at each other a bit, but she's always come through in the past."

  There was a tap on the door and a second WPC looked in. "I've got a Mr. Kennedy out here, Sarge. He says Mr. Kingsley's his client."

  "Okay, show him in. Tape stopped at four fifty-one p.m."

  Kennedy looked at Miles with dislike, refused the chair that was offered him, and instead placed two photographs on the table. The first showed Miles entering a hotel foyer, the second showed him getting into his Porsche. "My client's sister informs me that you are inquiring into an assault on a prostitute in Lansing Road, Salisbury, at around eight o'clock on Wednesday, June the twenty-second. Is that correct?"

  "Yes," agreed Blake.

  Kennedy tapped the photographs, indicating the printed times and date in the bottom right-hand corners. "My client, Miles Kingsley, entered the Regal Hotel, Salisbury, at five-thirty p.m. on Wednesday, June the twenty-second. He returned to his car at eight forty-five p.m. that same evening and drove to the Nightingale Clinic to visit his sister. While at the Regal he spent three and a quarter hours in room number four-three-one, leaving it only once to meet a man in the lobby." He placed another photograph on the table, of Miles, head down, talking to someone whose back was to the camera. "That was at seven o'clock. He remained with this man for three minutes before visiting the gentlemen's lavatory in the lobby. He returned to room four-three-one at seven-fifteen. He was followed, photographed, and watched from midday until midnight on June the twenty-second by one Paul Deacon, who can be contacted on this number and at this address." He placed a card beside the photographs. "I trust this clears my client of any suspicion in connection with the assault in Lansing Road."