She pulled the telephone nearer her and pressed in Jag’s number.
‘Hi, it’s me,’ she said when he answered.
‘Hi. How are you? You sound cross again.’
‘Do I? It’s not cross exactly. And anyway the only person I’m annoyed with is myself. I don’t seem to be getting anywhere and I must. Willow’s doing such a lot…’ Hearing overtones of resentment, Emma reminded herself that Willow’s initiative in talking to Susie had produced infinitely more than she herself had managed to discover. ‘Willow’s doing such a lot for me on this Lutterworth business that I have to do my share. I just don’t know what to do next.’
‘Want to come over and play for a while instead?’ Jag asked casually. ‘You’ll think better once you’re relaxed.’
‘I’d like that,’ she said automatically and then realised it was true. She was glad that she had resisted an impulse to ring Hal again after she had read his note. ‘But can I ask you for something first? I don’t want—’
‘Anyone could tell your mother’s a lady,’ he said, laughing out loud. ‘Too well brought up, that’s your trouble. It’s OK, I’m not going to assume you’re offering me your body in return for material help. What can I do for you?’
‘I just wondered,’ she said, trying to stop herself sounding like a wheedler, ‘whether you might be prepared to help Willow…’
‘Me?’ The word came down the line as a kind of yelp. ‘What does she want my help for? You have to be joking, Emma.’
‘No. It’s not she who… Oh, sod it! Look, Jag: Tom—her husband—hates her getting involved with violent criminals, but she won’t let him stop her. And now she says she’s going to find Terry Lepe so that she can interrogate him about the crash, and I’m afraid he could turn nasty. I can’t stop her going, but I think she ought to have some protection. I’d go with her myself, but I don’t think I’d be any good at it, even if she’d let me come.’
‘Whereas a bloke like me—over six foot and strong—I might be enough to satisfy even the great Tom Worth, eh?’ To Emma’s relief, Jag sounded yet more amused. She could not think why she had ever doubted her feelings for him and remembered clearly why she liked him so much.
‘I’ll go with her if you want, but I’d have thought another bloke might be the worst possible thing.’
‘Would you? Why?’
‘More men hit other men than hit women,’ said Jag drily.
‘Oh. But I’m not sure that would apply to Terry. Look what he did to Susie. He sounds just the sort to pick on a woman; you know, much less likely to hit back.’
‘You could be right It’s impossible to tell without knowing more about him.’
‘Exactly. Look, I know I can’t stop Willow going and if anything happened to her, Tom would never forgive me. I’d never forgive myself either.’ Emma thought for a second and then hastily added, ‘Or if you got hurt, Jag, but then I know you can take care of yourself. If the sight of you in your leathers doesn’t scare him into doing exactly what you want, you can always thump him.’
Jag laughed. ‘Tell me about it. But what does Willow think she’ll get out of him?’
‘God knows,’ said Emma, letting out some of her exasperation. ‘But she’s so damn stubborn. For some reason she thinks he knows something important about Lutterworth.’
‘Hm. Maybe she’s right. But why don’t you let me do it on my own? If it’s only him and me, we can either fight it out or be blokeish together and slag off slappers like that Susie of his. Willow would only get in the way.’
‘You’re catching up well with your British slang, aren’t you?’ said Emma admiringly, diverted for the moment.
‘I’m a good little researcher, you see. I like some of it now that I can join in,’ said Jag, lightly. ‘OK, you let me know when you’ve found Terry and I’ll see what I can make him tell me. Now, much more important: are you coming here or am I coming to you?’
‘To play?’ said Emma, struggling for the right kind of cheerfulness. ‘Why don’t I come to you? Your room’s so much nicer than mine. It’ll take me about half an hour to sort myself out. Can I come after that?’
‘Sure. And then we can go to Wright’s lecture straight from here.’
‘I can’t think why I keep forgetting them. What’s he doing this week?’
‘Language as Threat.’
‘But that’s your title,’ she protested. ‘He can’t do that.’
‘He’s already done it,’ said Jag. ‘And I need to make sure I’m not covering the same ground as him before I go any further.’
Remembering with shame that she was not the only one with hard and urgent work to do, Emma apologised and rang off. She tidied her papers, wrote herself a list of things to do, which made her feel almost as though she had done some of them, and then telephoned Willow.
‘How’s it going?’ Willow asked at once.
‘It isn’t really. I’m still not sure what you think you can get out of Terry, but I’m beginning to think you might be right in saying he’s the only hope we’ve got at the moment.’
‘I’m sure he is,’ said Willow cheerfully. ‘But don’t worry about it. I’m going to talk to him. In fact, in defiance of your orders, I’ve made plans to go up to Leeds tomorrow.’
‘Oh, Willow, as though I’d ever give you orders. You make me sound like a dreadful bully.’
‘What a thought!’ she said, laughing. ‘No, don’t worry; it was a joke. I’ll let you know if I get anything useful out of him.’
‘But, Willow, what will Tom say?’ said Emma. ‘I mean Terry could be dangerous, perhaps even worse than that woman who half killed you in hospital two years ago. After all, she was only mad. From everything you heard from Susie, it sounds as though Terry’s a real thug. If anything happened, Tom would—’
‘There is that,’ said Willow with a coldness that Emma did not understand. She struggled to make good whatever mistake it was she had made.
‘I’ve been wondering if you’d…I mean, it’s not that I’m trying to interfere or anything…’
‘Now what’s coming? You haven’t gone and talked to Tom about this already, have you?’
‘No, of course not. Would I? Behind your back? Willow, honestly! I just wondered whether you’d be prepared to take Jag with you,’ Emma said in a great hurry, adding breathlessly, ‘After all, he’s a big lad, quite big enough to make anyone think twice about going for you. He’s good company and intelligent, too, and aware and perceptive and all that. He could be useful.’
‘But would be come?’ asked Willow, sounding as though she was controlling impatience with difficulty. ‘Would he have time?’
‘He says he will, if you’ll have him. I know I’m being tiresome and clucky, but I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you. Please, Willow?’
‘He must be a remarkably generous bloke if he’s prepared to waste a whole day babysitting one of your friends.’
‘He is. And so are you. Not a bloke, I mean. Oh, you know what I mean.’
‘Yes, I do.’ The smile was back in Willow’s voice. ‘And I’m glad. I’ve been feeling awful about that night when you came here and I sent you away without any help at all. I’ve been wanting to make up for it ever since.’
‘Oh, Willow, you mustn’t,’ said Emma in quick distress. ‘That was ages ago, and you were so worried about Lucinda. I shouldn’t have come without warning in any case. It was my fault. Anyway, it wasn’t exactly help I was after; it was comfort of the sort I ought not to need nowadays. I’m far too old and tough to need my hand holding.’
‘I don’t think any of us are ever that. Or not all the time anyway. Try not to worry so much, Emma. I’ll take Jag with me if he’s really prepared to come. Do you know if he’s likely to be free tomorrow?’
‘I don’t know, but I can ask. Why Leeds, by the way?’
‘That’s where Terry’s working,’ said Willow, clearly pleased with herself. ‘Having discovered how to lean on George Tedsmore, I thought it was wort
h having another go at him. After some persuasion, he told me he’d occasionally heard Terry talking about mates in Leeds. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to track him down because it’s astonishingly easy these days to change one’s name and disappear, but Terry doesn’t seem to have bothered. He’s working for a security firm, as I assumed he would be. I just rang them all until one lot said he was out on a job but that I could leave a message.’
‘You are wonderful, Willow,’ said Emma, who had not known that it was any easier to acquire a new identity than it had once been or how anyone would go about it. Deciding to ask for details at some less pressured moment, she added, ‘I don’t know where I’d be without you. Shall I ask Jag about tomorrow and get him to ring you to make arrangements?’
‘Please. I’ll have to go up and back in the day, which I hope won’t bother him. The trains are very good now. Oh, and I’ll pay. I’m not sure what his resources are, but don’t let him worry about getting a ticket. I’ll buy them.’
‘I’m not sure if…I mean, couldn’t I do that?’
‘Don’t be silly, Em. I’ve got much more cash than I need. You haven’t at the moment. When my royalties have dried up and you’re the world’s living expert on polygraphs you can pay for things for me.’
‘If it ever happens, of course I will,’ said Emma after a struggle to contain her irrational feeling of once more having been relegated to the status of a child or an employee. ‘You are the most generous person. Thank you. But, look, you won’t go and do anything like getting first-class tickets, will you? That would seriously worry me.’
Willow laughed, but she agreed to the condition.
‘Good. And will you give my love to Tom? That is if he’s not so cross with me for involving you in all this that he can’t bear the sound of my name?’
‘He doesn’t blame you for any of it, and of course I’ll give him your love. I’ll be in touch.’
Not at all sure that she would ever earn anything and absolutely certain that Willow’s royalties would never dry up, Emma packed everything she would need for the lecture in her haversack and swung it over her shoulder. The sun was shining as she let herself out of the building and strode across the landscaped grounds towards the bus stop. Seeing several people she knew, all of whom waved at her, she began to feel almost at home in St Albans and, when Ben Wrexham stopped to speak to her, she smiled at him as though he were an old friend.
‘I ran into DI Podley when I was in London last weekend and he asked after you,’ he said.
‘Did he? How odd! I didn’t think he liked me at all.’
‘I’m not sure he did,’ said Ben, laughing. ‘But he’s curious about what you might have discovered about this con you’ve been interviewing. How’s it going?’
‘Not well,’ said Emma, salving her conscience with the excuse that until she knew why Lutterworth had falsely confessed to DI Podley there was no point in worrying him with the news that someone quite different had been driving the car when it crashed. ‘I got a weird result from the first polygraph I did on him and went back for another go and got up his nose so badly that he threw me out and now he won’t talk to me, and my most fruitful-looking case is dead on its feet.’
‘I’m not sure that’s quite the right phrase,’ said Ben, laughing again. ‘But I get your drift.’
‘How’s your thesis going?’
‘Slightly better than yours sounds, but I’ve still got a way to go. You sometimes do Wright’s lectures, don’t you? Are you going this afternoon?’
‘Yes. I thought I might.’
‘What about a drink after?’
‘Oh, that is kind. Yes, I’d like that. And I’m sure Jag would, too. We’re going to the lecture together.’
‘Is that the bloke with the Yamaha?’
‘Yes. I think you’d like him,’ said Emma. ‘That reminds me, I’m late. I’ll catch you later.’
‘Sure.’
She found herself thinking quite affectionately of Ben as she walked on towards the bus and could hardly remember why she had once found him so daunting.
Jag was waiting for her at the stop near his room and walked her back there, with his arm heavily around her shoulders. Having locked the door behind them, he took her bag of books away and set about undressing her with all the gentle, teasing skill that had always given her enough security in which to feel pleasure. By the time he was ready to take off his own clothes, she could hardly restrain herself from tearing at the buttons and zips and had to exercise supreme self-control not to grab him when he eventually laid his long, beautiful body down on the narrow bed beside hers.
And he was beautiful. She realised that she had never properly looked at him before, but as she stroked her fingers up and down his smoothly muscled torso, kissing him at intervals, talking, letting her fingers teach her about his reactions and his wants, she realised that he was glorious to look at—and to touch. He allowed her to take the lead, and even give him orders, which both of them found quite extraordinarily exciting, although there were moments when they could not stop laughing so much that they had to go back to the beginning and do it all over again more seriously.
They slept later and woke only just in time to shower and dress respectably for the lecture.
It was as Emma was sitting half asleep and failing to concentrate on Wright’s intricate argument about the emotional violence implicit in the imposition of private language and slang on people who were unaccustomed to it that she had what felt like her first useful thought about the Lutterworth case. She could not wait to get back to her room to check her memory of the interview tapes. Terrified that she would fall properly asleep and forget, she pulled out her notebook and scribbled a few words.
Jag, whose black eyes were alight with interest in the lecture, half turned to smile approvingly at her industry. He glanced down at her note and then raised his eyebrows. Emma had written:
‘Why was Lutterworth so worried about the forensic scientists tearing his car apart that he was prepared to confess to stop them?’
She smiled at Jag to pacify him and hoped she had not distracted him too much from what was undoubtedly an interesting lecture. When it was over she did not wait for him to ask any questions, but quickly said, ‘I’ve got to go and check something. I told Ben Wrexham we’d have a drink with him in the Bear, but I can’t stop. He must be somewhere about here, but you’ll easily recognise him if you go to the pub. I’ll nip back to my room and join you afterwards. OK? ’Bye.’
With her book bag slung over her shoulder and bumping against her back, Emma ran towards her building. Up in her room, she dropped the heavy load on the floor and started scuffling through the towers of paper on her desk until she found the interview transcript. Several other heaps of paper slithered on to the floor, and the vase containing Hal’s freesias wobbled dangerously, but she paid no attention, simply riffling through the bound report until she came to DI Podley’s threat.
As he had explained in the South Kensington pub, he had told Lutterworth that there was no point trying to pull the wool over his eyes, that he might well have washed and changed, but that the forensic scientists had hardly started their work. He warned Lutterworth that they would take his car and flat apart looking for evidence. It was, as she had thought, at precisely that point that Lutterworth had caved in.
Emma could not understand why she had not seen the significance sooner. It seemed perfectly obvious that there must have been something in either the car or the flat that he needed to keep hidden. From his reactions to her own questions, she was prepared to take quite a large bet that it was the car that worried him.
Unfortunately she could not think of anything to suggest what he thought they might find. Remembering the way Willow had used her novelist’s imagination whenever she had investigated a crime, Emma set to work to invent stories of her own that might explain Lutterworth’s fear of the forensic scientists. She knew that if the stories were to be at all useful, they would have to have some basis in the f
acts she had discovered and she set about marshalling them in her mind.
Hal had talked about a possible mistress, but he did not know anything for sure. On the other hand, Annie Frome had said that Lutterworth had wandering hands, which added weight to Hal’s suggestion.
Emma herself had discovered that Lutterworth was subject to sudden bursts of temper and she knew that he was very strong. She shuddered as she remembered the tightness of his grip around her wrist and the look in his face when he told her he would not talk about Pipp’s death.
She shook her head suddenly and ran both hands through her short dark hair as she told herself a tale of Andrew and his girlfriend having a ferocious row in his car. In her mind Emma could picture them so vividly that it was not at all hard to imagine Andrew braking suddenly and turning to hit the woman as well as shouting at her. He could have smashed her head against the window, perhaps, or even strangled her. He could easily have killed her.
It was only a fantasy, but for a moment it seemed wholly credible. Running through it again, Emma imagined Andrew noticing the woman’s stillness, testing her pulse, holding up something hard and shiny to her lips to see whether her breath misted it. It would have been a terrible moment when he realised he had killed her and was faced with having to get rid of her body.
The best thing would have been to go straight to a hospital or police station to report what had happened, but would he have had the guts? Wouldn’t most men have been much more likely to go somewhere unpopulated—a wood, a moor, even a field that was not overlooked by any houses—and dig a grave? Perhaps Andrew, not being particularly large or strong, would have taken an easier way and sunk the body in a flooded gravel pit or a river, with stones in the pockets of the clothes to weight the body down.
If he had done it at night, in some place he had never been before and was never likely to revisit, he would have felt reasonably safe. His car would have left tyre tracks, but if no one knew the body was there, who would be interested enough even to look at them, let alone measure them or try to match them up with those on any car?
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