‘It’s true, Cynthia. Why else d’you think Freda Graham is sent round here to keep pressing you?’
‘She isn’t sent, you stupid creature.’
‘No.’
‘It’s nothing official.’
‘Ah! I see. You’re telling me you did drive to the lay-by. Freda Graham saw you, and comes here for money…’
‘You crazy bitch!’ Cynthia shouted into her face, spittle flying. ‘It’s because of Freda that Charlie went away.’ Then her face crumpled, and the rest came out as a whimper. ‘Because of Freda he left me.’
She fumbled blindly for a chair. Harry pounced forward, and with one hand whipped the one she had used over the table and banged it down behind her. His other hand, on her shoulder, eased her on to it.
Virginia looked up at him. She pursed her lips and shook her head. Cynthia put her elbows on the table and her head in her hands. Her shoulders were motionless but her fingers moved in her hair.
Virginia said softly: ‘Harry told me. He didn’t know, but it was there. The first time he met you, it was at a disco. You’d gone there with a woman friend. He brought you home, and Charlie didn’t seem concerned that a man was with you. Perhaps if it’d been a woman he’d have been worried. That was Freda you’d gone with, wasn’t it? And that was three years before Charlie disappeared. Time for the affair to have progressed, Cynthia.’
Slowly Cynthia’s head was lifted from her hands. Her eyes were calm, but the life had gone from them. It seemed that she was relieved to share it, though her voice was dull when she spoke.
‘It wasn’t an affair.’ Not a denial. A statement.
‘Then what was it?’
‘She’d have liked it to be an affair. She called it that. She was proud. She told me that Charlie was no good for me. That she…that he couldn’t do the things she could…that my life had been empty before she came…that she loved me and would cherish me, like he couldn’t.’
Virginia was aware that Harry was shaking with the effort to remain silent. She did not glance away from Cynthia.
‘And could she?’ she asked, very gently and with infinite understanding.
‘She won’t leave me alone.’
‘Could she provide more for you than Charlie did?’
‘No.’
‘But she tried?’
‘Drop it,’ Cynthia whispered. ‘I told her I never wanted to see her again.’ She put thumb and fingers to her brow and squeezed.
‘When did you tell her that?’
‘When Charlie…w-went.’
‘But she’s persisted?’
‘Won’t leave me alone!’ The last word came out almost hysterically.
‘After four years?’
‘She’s obsessed.’
‘She must feel very strongly about you.’
Cynthia’s lips twisted in disgust, but she said nothing.
‘But not you for her?’
‘I hate her. It was all a mistake. A mistake. I didn’t realize…’
‘Then why didn’t you go away?’
Cynthia looked startled. ‘But Charlie might come back.’
Virginia bit her lip. It was difficult to go on, but at any moment Harry was going to burst in with God knew what nonsense, so that she didn’t even dare to pause for breath.
‘So it’s come to the point where you’re ready to shoot her?’
‘I’ll do that.’ Cynthia nodded. ‘If I have to.’
‘She’s a stubborn woman. Obviously. Though of course, if she had something she could use as a lever, some knowledge…’ She paused. Cynthia’s eyes had flickered. ‘Perhaps she did see you at the lay-by…’
‘I told you I was here!’ Cynthia’s voice broke.
‘Or something else.’
This time there was no reaction. Cynthia simply drew in her lips and stared fury at Virginia, until there seemed nothing to do but to slap her palms on the table with an air of finality.
‘Perhaps I’d better go and ask her, then.’
Still there was no reaction, simply a dull acceptance.
‘Though perhaps,’ said Virginia, ‘you’ll phone her and warn her.’
Cynthia gave a short bark of cynical laugher. ‘If you were taking her a dose of poison, I wouldn’t warn her.’
‘I’m not sure poison would touch her. Coming, Harry?’
At last she looked at him. Harry was standing as though in shock, one hand hovering towards Cynthia and his eyes blurred with pain.
‘Harry!’ she said softly.
He blundered after her to the car. She backed up and took it out on to the road. ‘Don’t say anything, Harry.’
‘I don’t know anything to say.’
‘These things happen. Two women. Two men…’
‘In prison…yes…I know.’
‘But in prison, is there love?’
‘Love!’ he said in disgust.
‘For it to have lasted so long…oh Harry, please! I can feel you quivering there. When we get to Freda’s, you’ve got to let me handle it. You’d rush in like a bull, and I can’t have that. Promise you’ll behave.’
‘Me behave? Good Christ!’
She glanced sideways with gentle affection. Freda had hurt Cynthia. That was about all he understood, and he was in a mood to pick Freda Graham to pieces and toss her out of the window. It would not occur to him (he wouldn’t understand if she explained) that perhaps Cynthia had hurt Freda.
‘It’s a woman’s work.’
‘I never get a chance to say a word,’ he complained, but all the same he settled his shoulders into the seat back. He wouldn’t have known what word to use.
Chapter Thirteen
Her own car was in the parking area. That seemed to confirm that she had, as Cynthia had said, been on her way to sign off. But when she opened the door she was still in uniform, less the hat. Virginia thought she had possibly expected this visit, and needed the authoritative support of the uniform. She said: ‘Oh, it’s you,’ and backed away from the door.
‘Cynthia said you might be home.’
‘So it was you. I thought I knew the car.’ Freda’s face seemed puffy. It was normally plump, as though there was no solid skull inside, so the indications had to be sought for. She was moving stiffly, every muscle tight with opposition. No offer of seats was made, and she was too restless herself to sit. Virginia deliberately lowered herself into an easy chair.
‘How…how was she?’ Freda asked at last, Virginia appearing to be waiting for her lead. The angry gesture of Freda’s hand, whipping hair from her eyes, was intended to convey indifference.
‘Upset,’ Virginia said, one eye on Harry as he moved restlessly. ‘As you’d expect. As she always is, I suppose.’
Freda seemed to make up her mind. One hand flapped at her breast pocket. Another second and her notebook would appear. ‘I let you come in here because I want to get something settled. Something you’d better get clear, then I needn’t set eyes on you again. It’s this, and just you damned well take note. I had to answer you before. I was told to, and God knows what influence you’ve got. But I’m not…I am not…having you sticking your nose into my private life. Do you get that? Do you understand, or shall I say it again?’
‘I understand perfectly. But you make it difficult. I’m permitted to speak about your official duties, but not your private affairs. The snag is, where does one end and the other begin?’
Virginia was polite about it, and was surprised at the flush of anger she provoked. ‘I warned you…’
‘No, Freda. I’m doing the warning. You’ve allowed your private life to slip into your duties, that’s what makes you vulnerable.’
‘Get out of here!’ But there was no spirit in it.
‘As Cynthia has been vulnerable,’ said Virginia calmly.
The dark blue skirt swirled, the regulation shoes stamped into the carpet. Freda headed for the door.
‘Cynthia hates you, you know,’ Virginia went on. ‘Really hates.’
‘That’
s not true.’ On an indrawn breath. ‘She’s unsettled and confused.’ But she released the doorknob.
‘Then she’s been like that for four years. Since Charlie went. Since your affair with her drove him away.’
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Oh yes, I do. Only too well. It might have been wonderful at the time, but for Cynthia it was an interlude, call it an experiment, and then it was over. Over, Freda. Finished. Done.’
‘You’re not to say that,’ she whispered.
‘But surely Cynthia’s been saying exactly that for a long, long while. And you wouldn’t listen.’
‘She’ll come round. If she’ll only talk it out! I can explain…’
Harry moved. Virginia gestured — a command to Harry with one hand, a reproving one for Freda with the other.
‘She doesn’t want to see you again.’ It was said with sadness.
‘After all I’ve done for her!’ It was a muted wail. Freda stared at her palms, willing herself not to cover her face.
‘And that’s where your official duties overlapped with your private…affairs.’
Virginia gave her time. Freda was looking round distractedly. Virginia wished she would sit. On her feet, the bulky policewoman looked as though she could be dangerous, and Harry wouldn’t need much provocation to become active. It was words Virginia wanted, not violence.
‘Why don’t you sit down?’ she asked quietly.
Freda allowed her knees to give way. The seat she’d chosen, and which just happened to be there, was a dining room chair, allowing her to sit primly with her knees together, and gather herself into one perched, defensive mechanism.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said stolidly, staring at the wall opposite.
‘I believe the official overlapped the private when you saw something that day — the day Angela died. Perhaps it was Cynthia, in her car, in the area. You didn’t report it. You drove away, not wishing to observe any more, and later…’
‘This is complete nonsense.’
‘You saw Cynthia close to the lay-by…’
‘I saw nothing and nobody.’ The response was not energetic. Freda was gaining confidence, and Virginia realized she was on the wrong tack.
‘After all you’d done for her. That was what you said.’
‘All the love!’ Freda shouted. ‘All the understanding, the emotional support!’
Harry groaned softly.
‘But if you didn’t see her there — if you didn’t have some reason to believe she killed that young woman — then what else did you suppress from your superiors?’
Freda’s face was disintegrating. Her eyes were puffed with suppressed tears, her mouth moving with protest, with anger…
‘She hates you now, Freda,’ said Virginia in a flat, unemotional voice. ‘If you don’t, she’ll tell me. I think we’d better try that, Harry.’ She glanced over her shoulder to Harry, who looked as though he’d try anything to get out of there.
‘No!’ Freda threw out the word.
‘She’s been rejecting you for four years,’ Virginia said with confidence. ‘The way she spoke, she must have told you herself that she hated you. So you must have had something you could pressure her with, something she would not like to be known, something you could wave in her face and keep saying, over and over, this is what I’ve done for you, Cynthia. This is what I’ve done…risked my career doing…and all because I love you and can’t let you go…’
‘Shut up!’ she screamed.
‘Then what was it, Freda?’
At last she clamped her hands to her face, and now the uniform did nothing for her, except to accentuate the contrast between its stolid authority and her quivering collapse. Virginia waited. She glanced at Harry and nodded towards the door. Harry crossed quickly and stood with his back to it. It gave him something to do.
Freda choked a few words into her cupped hands.
‘I didn’t hear that.’
The red, collapsed face was raised. ‘I phoned her,’ said Freda.
‘You phoned her when? And from where?’
‘I was…’ Freda lifted her chin and sniffed heavily. The voice was throaty. ‘I was on patrol in Porchester. I got a message to drive to the phone box by the lay-by and pick up a young woman. Instead, I went to a phone in Porchester and called Cynthia.’
It was said in a colourless monotone. Harry’s shoulders went back against the door. ‘And told her what?’ Virginia asked crisply.
‘That Charlie’s fancy piece was stranded at the lay-by.’
‘And why did you do that?’
Freda stared at her with contempt. ‘So that she could see for herself.’
‘I see.’ She did not see, but assumed it would all emerge. ‘Then you drove there yourself?’
‘Yes.’
‘And saw what?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You’re telling us all this, after a great deal of reluctance, and now you say you saw nothing?’
‘I’d…sort of…delayed. To give Cynthia time to have it out with Charlie’s fancy piece.’
‘To give her time…’
‘And I saw nothing.’
‘You’re telling me you gave her time to kill Angela, and when you saw nothing you assumed she’d done just that?’
‘No, no! Oh, let me say it. Why do you keep putting words into my mouth?’
‘Say it, then. Start with how you knew this was Charlie Braine’s fancy piece, as you called her.’
Freda licked her lips, looked round wildly until she spotted her packet of cigarettes, swooped a hand for it, and fumbled one out.
‘I’d been listening on the car radio. All the messages coming in, about the jeweller’s and the bank robbery, and of course I knew that was Charlie…oh, don’t you raise your fancy eyebrows at me…I knew all about Charlie and what he was doing in that shed of his. But my source of information made it impossible to reveal…’
She stopped, apparently aware that she’d fallen into a misplaced formality.
‘You knew from Cynthia?’
‘There was talk.’
‘Of course.’
Freda was now anxious to have it said, so that they would leave. ‘I knew about Charlie, and I knew about his young woman.’
‘And how would you know that?’
‘If you’ll let me say!’
‘Sorry.’
Freda lit her cigarette with a match. She held it like a man, between first finger and thumb, and flicked the match across the room, throwing up her chin as she drew in the smoke.
‘I knew about them because they used the lay-by for their meetings. Nothing new to me. Courting couples there every night. But I knew Charlie. I took the number of her car. I had Records dig it out for me. Her name and address. I knew everything about her — messing about with Charlie while she was living with another feller! Disgusting.’
‘You told Cynthia about it?’
‘Certainly. She didn’t believe me.’
‘Your duties took you into town then?’
‘What?’ She drew in smoke, and expelled it with encapsulated words. ‘Oh, I see. In my spare time. I traced her to that stinking basement they were living in.’
Virginia nodded. Freda had worked hard at it.
‘So…’ Freda cocked an eyebrow, awaiting another interruption, then went on. ‘So I knew, listening to the car radio, that Charlie was involved. That stupid two-coloured car! And when they gave me the number of the car that somebody…’ She jerked her cigarette towards Harry. ‘…that oaf over there had taken, I knew who was waiting there in that lay-by. So I phoned Cynthia.’
‘And gave her time to get at her and kill her?’
‘So that she could see for herself! She hadn’t believed me,’ explained Freda with heavy condescension.
‘And that was what you had to offer her?’ asked Virginia. ‘To prove how much she meant to you. A phone call you’d kept secret, just for her, when you wouldn’t have been abl
e to reveal it to your superiors anyway.’ Virginia was contemptuous.
The smoke must have affected Freda’s throat. ‘I thought she’d killed her,’ she admitted hoarsely.
‘Oh, I see. That was a better offer. I can see that. Cynthia, I know you killed Angela Reed, but I’m risking my career to keep it secret. So why can’t you be nicer to me…as it was before…’
‘It was not like that.’
‘Perhaps I missed something.’
‘I really thought she’d killed her. She’s wild enough. I’d phoned…I only wanted her to see…to see how she couldn’t trust Charlie. I swear. And it was my phone call that did it. I thought she’d killed her, and we…we sort of shared it. It brought us closer.’
‘But you’re lying, aren’t you?’
‘I don’t…I can’t…why won’t you believe me?’
‘Because you’re in the force, Freda. You’d know. After a few days, the news would filter through. You’d know that Angela Reed didn’t die for an hour — more than that — after Cynthia would have reached the lay-by. Even if she’d gone there…’
‘But I didn’t know then!’ Freda screamed, in fury at Virginia’s lack of understanding.
‘You didn’t know, at the time you found Angela’s body in the grit bin, that she’d died very shortly before?’
‘Yes! For Christ’s sake, yes!’
‘But I don’t see how that affects what you told Cynthia later — later the same day I assume. What…oh, I think I see.’ She was drawing out the words, trying to clarify for herself a wayward thought. ‘When you found the body, you thought Cynthia was responsible. At that time you thought she was. So that affected your actions…your thoughts… Something happened! You did something to protect her…oh, dear Lord!’
Freda saw the realization burst on Virginia’s face, and was on her feet. ‘I’ve had enough of this!’
‘Harry,’ said Virginia deliberately, ‘have you been following this?’
‘I dunno.’ Harry levered his shoulders from the door.
‘I want you to search the flat.’
‘You will not!’ Freda shouted.
‘Whaffor?’ asked Harry.
‘If you’d been following it, you should know. Just search it, Harry. You’ll know, I’m sure.’
The Second Jeopardy Page 15