Fethering 08 (2007) - Death under the Dryer

by Simon Brett

  Jude was afraid that Kelly-Jane might have thought her conversation with Martin odd, but she needn’t have worried. The stylist had gleaned one piece of information though, and that was all she wanted.

  “So it was Connie who did your previous haircut, was it?”

  Jude felt terribly disloyal.

  §

  “I don’t know why I behaved like that. It’s not my usual style.”

  “But did it work?”

  “Not really. I didn’t get any information out of him. I’ve probably just forfeited his goodwill and made him very suspicious of me. If any further investigative approaches need to be made to Martin Rutherford, I think you’d better take them on, Carole.”

  “Right.” She fingered the steel-grey helmet of her hair. “I can’t really pretend this needs doing again.”

  “No, and I think we must find a different sleuthing modus operandi. Having constant haircuts is very expensive, apart from anything else. Martin & Martina was nearly double the price of Connie’s Clip Joint.”

  “Hmm.” There was a silence. Both sipped their Chilean Chardonnays. They’d agreed to meet in the Crown and Anchor when they returned from their respective Saturday morning expeditions. Just for a drink, they’d said, but Ted Crisp’s recommendation of the Cheesy-lopped Fisherman’s Pie had proved too tempting.

  Carole idly flicked through the Martin & Martina promotional brochure that Jude had brought back from the salon. Expensively produced, it featured news from the branches, ideas for hairstyles, a photograph of the Stylist of the Month, and so on. The publication gloried in the company’s achievements. Again Carole was aware of the contrast with the small-scale operation that was Connie’s Clip Joint. At the back of the brochure, portraits of the owners framed a message of welcome to their customers. A good-looking couple, glowing in their shared success.

  “I think I behaved as I did,” Jude said thoughtfully, “because I feel we’re getting nowhere on this case. We’re surrounded by blind alleys. We can’t get anywhere on the Locke side of the case until Nathan is found. Getting in touch with Joe Bartos seems to be impossible.”

  “Did you talk to Wally Grenston again?”

  “I did—gave him a call to thank him for my coffee. He didn’t have any ideas. I think he got rather protective of his friend Joe. The old man’s mourning the death of his daughter. Wally implied that if he doesn’t want to speak to us, that’s his right, and his wishes should be respected.”

  “Which is of course true.”

  “Yes. So I suppose I just wanted to shake things up. I thought maybe being rude to Martin Rutherford, possibly even frightening him with reference to Kyra’s proposed legal action might…I don’t know…make something happen.”

  “Rather a risky strategy,” said Carole primly.

  “Yes.” Jude looked contrite and uncharacteristically down.

  Then their attention was drawn by a raucous shout from the bar. “You owe me a fiver!” roared Ted Crisp. Jude giggled.

  “What is it?”

  “Before you arrived, I was talking to Ted. I told him this way of making money by betting which fingers hairdressers use to hold their scissors.”

  “Really?” Carole looked down at her hand and moved the digits around. “So which fingers are they?”

  “Ah,” said Jude. “That’d be telling.”

  ELEVEN

  There were a lot of dog owners in Fethering, but Carole Seddon prided herself on usually being on the beach with Gulliver before any of them. Waking early was a habit dinned into her all her life, to be ready for her daily train journey to school, and then her commute to the Home Office. During the relatively brief period she took off work after Stephen’s birth, the baby’s imperatives had also ensured early rising and, though in retirement the demands on her time were less, the habit was engrained. For Carole, rising late would have been an unacceptable indulgence, on a par with watching breakfast television. And getting up early on a Sunday, when most of the world was having a lie-in, gave her an even greater sense of being on the moral high ground.

  Besides, Carole liked to be active as soon as she woke up. Lying in bed, being immobile even for a moment, was dangerous. It was at such moments that she could be ambushed by unwelcome thoughts. Her mind was a pressure cooker, whose lid needed to be firmly tightened down.

  Gulliver didn’t care when she got him up, so long as there was a walk involved. He still became puppyishly exuberant at the prospect of being taken out, particularly to Fethering Beach, where the melange of sharp smells and the range of flotsam and jetsam represented a canine nirvana.

  That Sunday dog and owner were on the beach before six o’clock. The early morning air was a cold breath of impending winter. It was hardly light when she had left High Tor and, as September gave way to October, she knew she would have to start her walks later, unless she wanted to set off in total darkness. There’d be a brief respite when Summer Time ended, and then winter would once again inexorably put its squeeze on the early mornings.

  End of October the clocks changed. Carole always remembered details like that. In retirement she needed more than ever to have her year delineated, to have fixed points in the potentially unstructured void of her life. And also by the end of October, she remembered suddenly, Stephen and Gaby’s baby will probably have arrived. I will be a grandmother. The thought filled her with an uneasy mixture of excitement and apprehension.

  Gulliver had the personality of all Labradors, which meant that at times he could be exceptionally soppy. But on Fethering Beach he became a hero. Beleaguered on all sides by potential attacks from waves, stones, swathes of bladderwrack, ends of rope, water-smoothed spars and broken plastic bottles, he triumphed over them all, scampering off in sudden sallies, only to return breathless to his mistress’s side with the gleam of victory in his eye. King Arthur never had a more gallant knight errant than Gulliver on Fethering Beach.

  Carole didn’t always take him on the same route. Like all creatures of habit, she hated to be thought of as a creature of habit. Where the road met the beach, she would sometimes turn left towards the Yacht Club and the mouth of the Fether; other times she would go right, where the dunes stretched as far as the eye could see. Coming back, too, there were alternative routes possible. They could either take the High Street directly to High Tor, or they could walk along the bank of the river and cut back along one of the little roads parallel to the sea. Or then again, if she felt like it, having curtailed Gulliver’s freedom by putting his lead back on, Carole could take him along the little service road which ran behind the High Street shops.

  For no very good reason, this was the route she chose that morning. Though busy with deliveries during the week, the road was virtually unused at weekends because there were no houses there. On one side was an area of scrubland, its surface a mixture of sand and earth, from which the local residents discouraged summer picnickers. And on the other were the backyards of the shops: some double-gated parking bays for major delivery vehicles, others like the ends of gardens, wooden-fenced with small doors. The back of Connie’s Clip Joint was of the second kind, and as Carole led Gulliver along the road that Sunday morning, she saw a man come through the door and hurry to a gleaming new Mini. Something about his movement was furtive. Just before he got into the driver’s seat, he gave a quick look around, and Carole recognized a face whose photograph she’d seen only the day before.

  It was Martin Rutherford.

  TTOELVE

  “Well, what does that suggest? Why was he there, do you think?”

  Jude pinched her upper lip between thumb and forefinger for a moment, then said, “It suggests he’s still got keys to the place.”

  “Connie’s Clip Joint?”

  “Yes.”

  “But Connie said the only spare keys were the ones she gave to Kyra.”

  Jude shrugged. “Maybe Martin copied a set before he handed them back to her…? Maybe he handed over the keys to the front, but hung on to the one for the back d
oor…?”

  “So what would he have been doing there this morning?”

  “I don’t know, but, given the state of armed conflict between Connie and him, I can’t think he was paying a social visit.” A thoughtful smile came over Jude’s features. “Maybe my clumsy approach had some effect…”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Remember I mentioned to him that Kyra had been planning legal action about her dismissal from Martin & Martina in Worthing. Maybe he was checking out Connie’s Clip Joint to see if any incriminating evidence had been left there?”

  “Pretty unlikely that there would have been. And if there were, you’d have thought the police would have found it, and then surely they’d have been on to Martin pretty sharpish to find out what had been going on…The police must’ve spoken to him since the murder, mustn’t they?”

  “Yes. Connie said they did…you know when I went to have my haircut before last. She said the police questioned her and Martin quite extensively for the first couple of days, and then seemed to lose interest in them…well, in her, anyway.”

  “Right.” Carole sipped at her coffee. It was nearly cold. They’d been chatting too much since she arrived at Woodside Cottage. She’d taken Gulliver back to High Tor after his walk and then gone straight next door. It was early, but the news she had to impart couldn’t wait. “Of course,” she went on, “if Martin Rutherford does have keys to Connie’s Clip Joint…”

  “Yes?”

  “…then he could have got in there the night Kyra Bartos died, couldn’t he?”

  “He could.”

  “Because there was no sign of forced entry, was there? So far we’ve been assuming that’s because Kyra invited her killer in to the salon, but if Martin had keys…”

  “Yes.” Jude looked at her watch and picked up the card the hairdresser had given her. “As soon as it’s a reasonable hour, I’m going to ring Connie.”

  §

  The hairdresser did not seem particularly surprised when she answered the call just after ten. But she did sound sleepy, and Jude felt guilty that the phone had probably woken her.

  “I’m sorry to be calling so early.”

  “Don’t worry. I should be up. I overslept.” Connie sounded snugly drowsy. “It’s just I…you know, always wiped out at the end of the week.”

  “Well, as I say, I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “But I thought I ought to ring you, because something’s happened that might have a bearing on the case.”

  “Case?”

  “Kyra’s murder.”

  “Oh yes. Of course.”

  “My friend Carole—you remember her?”

  “Certainly. ‘Same shape, but shorter’.” Again the impersonation was spot on.

  “Yes, her. Anyway, she was taking her dog for a walk on the beach early this morning, and she came back via the service road…you know, behind the shops.”

  “Mmm?” Suddenly Connie was alert, the drowsiness gone from her voice.

  “And she saw your ex-husband leaving from the back gate of Connie’s Clip Joint.”

  “Ah.” There was a long silence. When she broke it, Connie sounded hesitant. “And what’s she going to do about it?”

  “Well, tell the police presumably.”

  “Why? Is it a police matter?”

  “Surely it is? If Martin had keys to the back of Connie’s Clip Joint to get in there this morning, then he probably would have had them if he’d wanted to get in on the night Kyra was killed.”

  “Right.” Now it made sense to Connie. “Sorry, I was half-asleep. Yes, of course, I hadn’t thought of it that way. The police must be told. But, Jude, can you think of any reason why Martin might have been round to Connie’s Clip Joint?”

  “Well, if one were to go to the extreme hypothesis that he was actually the murderer…”

  “Oh, I don’t think so.” Instinctive loyalty for her ex-husband prompted Connie. “I can’t imagine Martin ever doing anything like that.”

  “He had a motive.”

  “Did he? Sorry, I’m being very slow this morning. I’m not properly awake yet.”

  “You told me about it. That Kyra was threatening to sue him for constructive dismissal over the sexual harassment business.”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Well, it could be argued that he therefore had a very good motive to get her out of the way.”

  “I suppose so. Maybe I overstated that, anyway. Kyra wasn’t definitely going to take him to court. It was just an idea we discussed, not entirely serious.”

  Why was she backtracking on that? Jude wondered.

  She’d sounded fairly definite about it when the subject last came up.

  “Anyway,” Connie went on, “I still can’t see Martin killing anyone.”

  “All right. Say he didn’t kill her, but he still knew about the threat of legal action…”

  “I’m not sure whether he did know about that.”

  “Oh, he did.” And Jude was embarrassed to realize that she would have to own up to what she’d said to Martin Rutherford in the Worthing Martin & Martina the day before. She did so, as quickly as possible, with the minimum of apology.

  Connie took the news in slowly. “And how did he react?”

  “He changed the subject and moved on.”

  “Yes, I’m not surprised.”

  “But what I’m saying, Connie, is that, having heard about the potential legal action against him, Martin might have let himself into Connie’s Clip Joint this morning, hoping to find and destroy any evidence…you know, papers Kyra might have got together for her case against him.”

  “Yes.” Connie seemed very relieved to have a possible explanation for her ex-husband’s appearance at the salon. “Yes, that would make very good sense.”

  “But, whatever his reason for being there, I think the police should be told about it. Even if it’s not criminal, it is at the very least rather odd behaviour. I mean, that is assuming that you didn’t know he was going to be there…?”

  “Good heavens, no!” Connie responded vehemently.

  “Well, I suppose Carole could talk to the police. She has got a connection with the case, after all, having been there when the body was discovered. They did give her contact numbers, but…there’s always a danger that the police will treat her as some nosy local crank. Alternatively, you could do it…”

  “That’d make much more sense,” said Connie firmly. “It was my premises he was making an illegal entry into, after all. No, leave it with me, Jude. I’ll speak to the police.”

  And she sounded relieved that that decision had been made.

  THIRTEEN

  “The question is,” said Carole, “do I share this information with the Lockes?”

  “Ah, I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “Rowley asked me to pass on anything I found out that might be relevant to the case…”

  “Yes.”

  “On the other hand, to tell them I saw Martin Rutherford coming out of Connie’s Clip Joint this morning would be tantamount to making an accusation against him.”

  “Which I’m sure the Lockes would seize on. Anything which offered a suspect apart from their precious Nathan.”

  “Hmm. Again, you know, Jude, it struck me as odd yesterday how little Rowley Locke seemed to be worried about Nathan.”

  “Well, I suppose the boy’s not his son. He’s only his nephew.”

  “Yes, but when I met the parents, they were equally unruffled about it.” Even though her own maternal skills might be open to criticism, this still seemed odd to Carole. “Not natural.”

  “People hide their emotions.”

  “Of course they do. But I still have a sneaking suspicion that the reason they’re so calm about it is that they know Nathan’s all right. They’re in contact with him. They know where he is.”

  Jude grinned ruefully. “I don’t think I can help you much in following up on that. You’re the one with an open invitation to the
Lockes’ camp. Maybe you should tell them about seeing Martin this morning. It’d at least maintain the continuity of contact.”

  “Yes.” But Carole felt disinclined to pick up the phone in a hurry. A little of the Lockes, she had found, went a long way. “I won’t do it straight away. See what else develops.”

  “Maybe when Connie tells the police about Martin, that’ll be the breakthrough they’ve needed.”

  “You think he did it?”

  Jude shrugged. “I’ve no idea. But what Connie said about Kyra and the sexual harassment thing does at least give him a motive. Though there’s still something odd about the way she told me that. I still can’t quite put my finger on it. The whole story came out too pat, as though she’d prepared it. I don’t know…Anyway, Connie’s and Martin’s does seem to have been a very bitter divorce.” Out of sensitivity towards Carole, she restrained herself from adding ‘like most divorces’. “Maybe there’s another motive out there of him trying to sabotage the business prospects of Connie’s Clip Joint.”

  “I’m not sure that he needed to do that. From what you were saying, the salon’s not very healthy, anyway.”

  “No.” Jude screwed up her face in puzzlement. “I get the feeling we’re missing something.”

  “I get the feeling we’re missing everything,” said Carole tartly. “Our investigation can’t really be said to be making much headway, can it?”

  “But I’m sure there’s someone else we should be talking to…someone we’ve forgotten about.”

  “Well, there’s Joe Bartos. You’ve tried without success to make contact there.”

  Jude screwed up her eyes and shook her head. Even after two haircuts in a week, there was enough left for her topknot to wobble precariously. “Someone else…Someone who had something to do with the day of the murder…or the day of the discovery of the murder…”