Dark Mirror
Page 26
‘God, we didn’t have a thing to eat, did we? But I’m going to make it up to you, with breakfast for a start. Bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms . . .’
Suzanne shook her head vigorously, the motion making her feel even more nauseous. ‘No, really, Angela. A bit of toast and coffee will be just fine for me.’
But Angela had made up her mind, and Suzanne sat at the kitchen table, trying not to retch, as her friend attacked the sizzling frying pan.
‘So you met Dougie Warrender again! What’s he like? As charming as ever?’
‘Yes, just the same.’ She was about to say ‘much older, of course’, but wisely decided to avoid that tack. ‘Very rich. He’s a merchant banker or something. And the houses, yours and theirs, are immaculate. Have you been back there recently?’
‘No, not since we moved, ages ago. And you say that dragon of a mother of his is still there too? You had a real thing for Dougie, didn’t you? Did you have sex?’
‘No, of course not! I was only thirteen.’
‘I did, with his cousin Jack. But maybe that was the next year. Didn’t I tell you?’
‘No, I don’t think so. You were sent off to boarding school.’
‘Yes. In fact that’s why I was sent off to boarding school.’ She giggled. ‘He was ever so gentle, and afterwards he told me all the family secrets. I wonder what he’s doing now. I might get in touch.’
‘I’m afraid he’s dead, Angela. Dougie told me. Heart attack, ten years ago.’
‘Oh God.’
Suzanne saw Angela’s shoulders slump, and rapidly tried to head off a change of mood. ‘What family secrets?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I can’t remember. We should have champagne and orange juice for our celebratory breakfast.’
‘Oh no, I couldn’t, Angela.’
‘You’ll feel much better if you do. Hair of the dog.’
‘No, really.’
‘Oh well. Here we go.’
She placed a plate of heaped fried stuff under Suzanne’s nose, then sat down with her own and began to tuck in.
‘In India,’ she said suddenly. ‘What Dougie got up to in India, that’s what Jack’s secrets were all about.’
‘Really? What did he get up to? He didn’t tell me much, as far as I can remember. In fact I can hardly remember him saying anything at all. He just stood around or hit a ball in the gardens, looking sultry and gorgeous. Any time he actually spoke to me I was reduced to a jelly.’
‘It was about a girl . . . What do they call them in India, is it amah or ayah? A nanny or housekeeper?’
‘Dougie had a love affair with his nanny?’
‘No.’ Angela giggled. ‘With his ayah’s daughter, I think. I can’t remember much, except that it ended tragically somehow. Come on, eat up.’
‘How tragically?’
‘Oh, I don’t know, doomed teenage romance, I suppose, class and race, that sort of thing. Are you sure about the champagne? I think I will.’
Suzanne managed to escape before lunch, when the first gin and tonic appeared, pleading a crisis at the shop.
‘You have a shop!’ Angela beamed. ‘How marvellous! I’ve often thought of starting up a little business, you know—a little hobby, really. Perhaps we could go into partnership together. Maybe something organic, beauty products or something. What does your shop sell?’
‘Antiques.’
‘Oh.’ Angela’s face dropped, and Suzanne made for the car.
•
Brock too had woken with a hangover that morning—mild, but enough to make him feel grumpy as he shuffled about the kitchen, making coffee and toast. It wasn’t just the hangover; he had woken with the clear conviction that Suzanne had been lying to him. It was such an ugly and improbable thought that he’d tried to dismiss it, but it wouldn’t go away. Yesterday he had been merely exasperated by her contacting the Warrenders during his murder investigation, but now her secretiveness and evasive explanations seemed to cast that intrusion in a murkier light. Why hadn’t she told him she was coming up to London last Wednesday? And who was the nameless, genderless friend from the past that she’d had to spend the night with?
He stewed on this for a while, then swore and tried to immerse himself in the paperwork he’d brought home. After a couple of hours of that he put on an overcoat and set off down the lane that ran along the railway embankment to the house of a neighbour, whose dog he sometimes took to the park. When they reached it, he recalled that the last time he’d done this was with Suzanne’s grandchildren, Stewart and Miranda. It occurred to him how much he would miss them all, if things fell apart with Suzanne again.
•
The shop was busy when Suzanne returned to Battle, the spring weather bringing people out for a drive down to the coast. Her assistant Ginny was barely coping with the press of customers in the crowded rooms, and Suzanne immediately hung up her coat and got to work. It remained like that all day.
She’d had no time for a lunch break, and was feeling weary on her feet when the Dutch couple, who had been in earlier, returned for another look at the Georgian silver. She was showing them a tray of spoons when she became aware of a figure standing behind them and to one side. She glanced at him, then blinked. ‘Oh! Hello.’
‘Hello,’ Brock said. ‘I wonder if you could tell me if this is Pre-Raphaelite?’ He pointed to a silver locket in the cabinet beside them.
Suzanne smiled, feeling rattled by his sudden presence, but answered deadpan. ‘Oh no, a bit later. Art Nouveau, probably around 1900.’
She took it out of the cabinet and placed it on the counter, and the Dutch couple turned to peer at it.
‘I like it,’ said the Dutch woman. ‘Are you going to buy it?’
‘I think I may. For a colleague at work. She’s getting engaged.’ Brock turned back to Suzanne. ‘I’ve caught you at a busy time.’
‘Yes.’ She looked at the grandfather clocks ticking against the far wall. ‘I’ll be closing in half an hour.’
‘Why don’t I go across to the King’s Head and wait for you there?’
The Dutch couple exchanged a glance, eyebrows raised.
‘Good idea. I’ll wrap your locket and bring it over.’
In the event it was an hour before she appeared.
‘Sorry. Couldn’t get away.’ She thought how serious he looked, stooped over his pint, and felt anxious suddenly, aware of a cold space between them. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Fine. Your G and T may be a bit warm. Want me to get you another?’
‘No, this will do very well. Cheers.’ She took a gulp then began to blurt out how glad she was he’d come, but he spoke at the same time, head still bowed.
‘So how was your friend?’
‘Rather sad. She got divorced recently and she’s not coping very well. She’s taken to the bottle in a big way. I wished I hadn’t gone. It doesn’t work sometimes, renewing old friendships. We’re not the same people.’
He looked up at her, as if trying to work something out, and she added, ‘I would much rather have gone to the Old Pheasant with you. You were upset, weren’t you?’
He hesitated a moment, then reached out his hand and stroked hers. ‘Just feeling a bit fraught. It’s been a heavy few weeks.’
‘I know.’ She squeezed his fingers. ‘Who’s getting engaged?’ She nodded at the gift-wrapped locket she’d brought.
‘No one yet, but there’s a rumour going around that Kathy’s got herself a new man.’
‘That is good news. Let’s hope he’s better than the last one. How’s she getting on with her murder case?’
‘The poisoning?’ She heard the reserve in Brock’s voice. ‘I think we’re getting there.’
‘I’m sorry I blundered in like that, David. I had no idea the situation was so sensitive. There’s no suggestion that Douglas Warrender was involved, is there?’
He waited a couple of beats, then said, ‘Warrender? I don’t think so. Why?’
‘I’d just hate to think . . . after me getting tan
gled with them again . . . you know.’
‘But you’re not, are you?’
‘What?’
‘Tangled with them—are you?’
‘No! Of course not. I just feel embarrassed about the whole business.’
‘Well, don’t be. I’m sure your old flame is in the clear.’
‘Oh good.’
‘Let’s forget all about it.’
‘I will. That’s a promise. Shall I ring the Old Pheasant?’
‘Already done,’ he said.
•
The next morning, long after Brock had driven off back to London for his Monday morning briefing, Suzanne got a call from Angela Crick.
‘You got home all right then, Suzanne? I felt so guilty about making you miss your dinner on Saturday. Why don’t we do it again next weekend and I’ll make it up to you?’
‘Oh, that would be nice, Angela, but it’s so busy here in the shop at the moment. I was rushed off my feet when I got back. Maybe we could leave it for a while.’
‘Oh well. I had something else to tell you about Dougie Warrender.’
‘Really? What was that?’
‘I remembered more about the girl in India, the nurse’s daughter. It’s funny how things come back to you when you’re doing something else. I was putting the bottles out in the recycling bin. They come today, you see . . . Anyway, I noticed this little green bottle, and it just triggered this memory. It all came flooding back. Poor Jack.’ She sighed.
‘What memory, Angela?’
‘Don’t you want to save it till we get together again? It is rather juicy.’
‘No, please, tell me now.’
Angela giggled. ‘You are interested in him, aren’t you? Well, according to Jack . . .’ Angela’s voice dropped to a whisper, as if telling a children’s ghost story, ‘Dougie got her pregnant and then murdered her, with poison, from a little green bottle.’
The line went silent. Finally Suzanne said, ‘I don’t believe it.’
Angela laughed again. ‘No, of course not. I’m sure it was all rubbish, but according to Jack it’s what people said at the time. Mind you, Jack was always trying to shock me with outlandish stories.’
‘But what did he say happened, exactly?’
‘He claimed Dougie told him that the Warrenders had to hush it all up and leave India and come back to the UK, like me being packed off to boarding school. Notting Hill must have been a bit of a shock for them, in those days, after India. No wonder Dougie made up whopping tales.’
Suzanne felt a tight pain in her chest, and realised she was holding her breath. ‘What kind of poison was it? Do you remember?’
‘What kind? I haven’t the faintest. What does it matter? It was just gossip and scandal-mongering, that’s all.’
Angela went on for some time, but Suzanne didn’t take in much of what she said. When she finally hung up she sank into a chair, wondering what on earth she should do. Then the bell on the shop door tinkled and the Dutch couple came in. ‘All right now,’ the man said, ‘we’ve finally made up our minds.’
twenty-six
My darling, it’s five days since you left and already it seems forever. I console myself with our secret knowledge. Every day I feel it growing inside me, a part of you, feeding on me. But I am lost without you. Yesterday was miserable. Tony spotted me in the university library and threatened to make a fuss about my scholarship unless I agreed to a tutorial. Loathsome man. I had to go to his room where he demanded to know what I was working on. I fudged and he hectored, oh how he hectored, a dreary repetitive rant about how I am on the wrong track. Little does he know! He demanded to see my Cornell paper, but I said it wasn’t written yet, though I don’t think he believed me. He made the foulest cup of coffee I’ve ever tasted, and afterwards I was very sick. I had to go home and lie down. It wasn’t like the usual morning sickness, much worse. I’m sorry to sound miserable. I just miss you so.
Your M.
‘Two days later she miscarried,’ Kathy said, as Brock looked up from the printout. ‘There are lots more like that, as well as copies of her work documents.’
‘Can we be sure it’s genuine?’
‘That’s the thing, isn’t it? He handed the memory stick over to me, knowing we’d read this. I’ve sent it to the lab, to see if they can establish when the text was written or amended.’
‘But you felt Warrender was on the level?’
Kathy hesitated. ‘He sounded very plausible, but there were things he said, as if he knew exactly what I knew, and how far he had to go. It seemed to me that there was only one way he could do that.’ And finally Kathy told him about Guy Hamilton, and confronting him at the airport. ‘If Warrender had spoken to me an hour later I wouldn’t have been able to see Guy before he left, and I’d never have been sure.’
Brock gave an angry growl, his eyes narrowing. ‘That’s very disturbing, Kathy. Is it really possible? How could Warrender have set it up? How could he have possibly known you were planning to go to Prague?’
‘That’s what I’ve been trying to work out. I think it must have happened after we arrested Keith Rafferty. My guess is that it was Warrender who arranged for Julian Fenwick to represent Rafferty and Crouch. From them he’d have learned that I was investigating Marion’s death, and could have got my mobile number, which I gave to Sheena Rafferty.’
‘You think they were listening in to your phone calls?’
‘It’s possible. Or they might have had someone following me when I met Nicole Palmer that Friday evening and overheard me get the information about our trip from her. Guy said Warrender only approached him at the last moment, on that Friday night before we left.’
‘Either way, it’s too damn personal, Kathy. I don’t like this at all.’
‘Yes.’
‘How did Bren get on with Rafferty? Did he make any headway?’
‘Not really.’ Bren had phoned in that morning, struck down by the flu. Kathy had spoken to him and he’d been apologetic. There had been so many other things demanding his attention. She was sympathetic, but angry all the same. Her anger had been growing over the weekend, as she’d tried to work out the machinations that had allowed Warrender to follow her moves. And now, the memory of Guy at the airport gave her heart another wrench.
Brock saw it, the anger burning inside her. He leaned forward, eyes on her, and said, a note of caution in his voice, ‘But if that letter is genuine, Kathy, it sounds as if da Silva was making an earlier attempt to poison Marion, doesn’t it?’
‘Not with arsenic. Sundeep established she hadn’t previously taken it. But it could have been something else.’ What it reminded her of, in fact, was the diary entries of Emile L’Angelier complaining about feeling sick after visiting Madeleine Smith. And of course Marion would have been very familiar with those.
‘All right,’ Brock went on, sounding brisk, wanting to rouse Kathy from her introspection. Clearly she had been fond of this Guy, he thought, and was understandably upset, but they had work to do. ‘Da Silva is our prime suspect. How do we nail him?’
‘He’s been careful. We haven’t been able to find him on cameras at the critical scenes, except the British Library.’
‘We’re saying he murdered Marion to prevent her from presenting her paper at Cornell that would destroy his life’s work, is that right? Is that credible?’
‘He certainly sounded pretty desperate about it.’
‘Then why kill Tina?’
‘Because she’d followed the same trail as Marion and found the same source.’
‘How would he know that?’
‘She must have told him when she came to his house the night before she died. Donald Fotheringham told me that he, Tina and Emily had been investigating the archives of the Havelock family in the India Office Records at the library.’
‘Yes,’ Brock said, ‘the woman who found Tina at the library, Lily Cribb, told me that she’d first met Tina trying to find the India Office Records. It seemed odd.’
Brock said, ‘And the following day he would have been tracking her, trying to find out where the diary was.’
‘Yes. The trail will be there in the record of the books that Tina called up at the British Library. If we can show that she had found the Haverlock diary before she went to see da Silva, that would then put her in the same situation as Marion before she died.’
Brock nodded. ‘Circumstantial, but it might just be conclusive.’
Kathy returned to her desk and called over Pip Gallagher, who was working for her again now.
‘You okay, boss?’ Pip asked. ‘You seem a bit down.’
‘No,’ Kathy said, too abruptly. ‘I’m fine, Pip. I just wish I knew where the hell da Silva might have got arsenic from, if it wasn’t from the laboratory.’
‘How about Rafferty? Da Silva admitted paying him money. Maybe it wasn’t just for the key to Marion’s house.’
‘That is a thought. Look, I want you to drop what you’re doing and go over to the British Library and get them to give you a list of all the documents Tina requested in the week before she died. I’m particularly interested in a diary written by someone called Haverlock, which we think is held in this archive in the India Office Records.’ She handed Pip a note of the references. ‘Find out if she requested it, okay?’
‘Sure. I was never that hot as a reader, but I’ll give it a go.’
It felt like a penance, Kathy thought, as she worked through the day, poring over the details dredged up by her team, cross-checking the witness statements.