The Dark Room

by Minette Walters

  ‘How could I? I’ve only just thought of it. Look,’ she said again, ‘I know it seems odd, but when something that awful happens to you, you block it out as soon as you can or you go mad. Before my breakdown I never had time to think it through properly, there was the police, the funeral, the miscarriage . . .’ She faltered slightly. ‘And then when I came out of the hospital, I made up my mind to shut it away and never, never get it out again. It’s only since my accident that it’s started to come back. The nightmares, seeing Russell on the floor, the blood . . .’ She faltered again but this time didn’t go on.

  Maddocks had listened to the exchange with growing scepticism but he spoke gently enough. ‘The police weren’t wedded to a contract killer, Miss Kingsley. They always recognized that your father might have wielded the sledgehammer himself. Let’s say he went to the gallery, and he and Russell had a row. Do you think he’d care then whether you found the body or not? He’d be saving his own skin, and high-tailing it out as fast as he could.’

  Jinx turned to look at him. ‘You can’t expect to have it both ways, Inspector. If Adam is the organized criminal you all claim him to be, then he would have arranged for the mess to be cleared up. And he wouldn’t have left Russell alive.’ She pressed her palm to her temple. ‘He doesn’t make mistakes, Inspector.’

  ‘He beat a negro half to death,’ said Maddocks idly, ‘who went on to become your uncle. Perhaps that was another mistake. Perhaps he meant to kill him, too.’

  Jinx dropped her hand into her lap and clasped it tightly over the other. She was feeling extremely unwell but knew Maddocks would exploit it if she said anything. She concentrated on Fraser, willing him to respond.

  ‘Let’s say you’re right, Miss Kingsley,’ the Sergeant said after a moment, ‘and that there’s another link between the three murders. Have you any idea what – or who – it might be?’

  ‘The only one I can think of is Meg,’ she told him gravely. ‘She was as close to Russell and Leo as I was.’

  Maddocks stirred again. ‘Closer,’ he said bluntly. ‘According to some letters and diaries found in Leo’s house, your friend Meg Harris was having an affair with your husband at the time of his death and also jumped in and out of bed regularly with your fiancé. One of them – and it’s clear from entries in her diary that she didn’t know which – was the father of a child she aborted shortly after Landy was murdered.’

  There was a brief silence before colour flared in Jinx’s cheeks. ‘No wonder she was so upset when I lost my baby,’ she said slowly.

  Maddocks frowned. ‘You don’t seem very surprised about the affair.’

  ‘I knew about that,’ she said, ‘but I didn’t know she’d had an abortion. Poor Meg. She must have felt guilty if she thought hers had been Russell’s child as well.’

  ‘So this is something else you withheld from the London police?’

  She held his gaze for a moment. ‘How could I tell them something I didn’t know? It was long after Russell was dead that I found out about the affair.’

  ‘Ah,’ he murmured, ‘I think I could have predicted that. Did Miss Harris tell you?’

  ‘No.’ She repeated what she’d told Alan Protheroe, about the letters in the attic and her reluctance to reopen old wounds. ‘But perhaps if I had said something, Meg and Leo would still be alive,’ she finished bleakly. ‘It’s so much easier to be wise after the event.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Maddocks thoughtfully. ‘Things do seem to take a very long time to germinate in your mind, don’t they? Who else knew about this affair?’

  ‘I don’t think anyone did. I told you, they were very discreet.’

  ‘Did you tell your father about it?’

  ‘When I found out, you mean?’ He nodded. ‘There was no point.’

  ‘Anybody else?’

  She shook her head. ‘Only Dr Protheroe. I told him this morning.’

  Maddocks nodded. ‘Did you and Miss Harris ever discuss Landy’s murder?’

  ‘Once or twice, before I went into hospital,’ she said unevenly. ‘We discussed it before, but never afterwards.’

  ‘Did she say who she thought might have done it?’

  She rested her cheek against her hand and tried to picture scenes in her mind. ‘It’s so long ago,’ she said, ‘and neither of us was very inclined to dwell on it, but I think she went along with the initial police view because that was the only one that was reported in the papers. A robbery that went wrong. As far as I know, that’s what most people still believe.’

  ‘So she never knew that both you and your father were under suspicion?’

  She pretended to think about that. Everyone knew, you bastard . . . every damn friend I ever had knew . . . why the hell do you think I’ve been so fucking lonely for the last ten years? . . . ‘I had to supply the police with a list of our friends, most of whom were Russell’s, but Meg was on it as a friend of mine, and I do remember her telling me that the police were asking about the relationship between Russell and Adam.’ She frowned suddenly. ‘You know, I remember now. She did make one rather odd comment. She said: “They will keep asking for information but I’m sure it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie. There’s been so much pain caused already.”’

  ‘What did she mean by that?’

  ‘At the time, I probably thought she was talking about Russell and Adam’s relationship, saying she couldn’t see the need to supply any more details. But now I think she might have been referring to her affair with Russell. I know the police dug very hard for evidence of something like that, on the principle he might have been killed by a jealous husband.’ She paused for a moment. ‘But she knew I didn’t know about the affair, so perhaps she didn’t want to hurt me unnecessarily by revealing it to the police.’

  ‘It must have upset you when you finally found out about it,’ said Fraser.

  She turned to him with visible relief. ‘I know it sounds callous, but in fact it made me feel better. Russell and I hadn’t been getting on for months before he died, and I’d always felt guilty about it. It’s awful to have someone die on you when you know you’ve made them unhappy. I kept thinking, if only I’d done this, or if only I’d done that’ – she gave a troubled smile – ‘and then I was let off the hook by a couple of love letters.’

  Maddocks watched her performance with cynical objectivity. The story was too pat and too well polished and he saw Dr Protheroe’s hand at work behind the scenes. ‘So let me get this straight, Miss Kingsley,’ he said acidly. ‘Number one: at the time of Russell Landy’s death, you and he were not getting on but you told the London police you were. Number two: you believed your father was capable of putting out a contract on your husband but defended him anyway. Number three: Russell and your best friend were having an affair but you knew nothing about it, and she did not reveal it to the police. Number four: she aborted the child she had conceived either by your then husband or the man who later became your fiancé, but neither you nor the London police were ever told about it. Number five: when you discovered your friend and your husband had been having an affair, you kept the information to yourself. Number six: your best friend, who’d had an affair with your husband and knew that your husband had been murdered, nevertheless proceeded to resurrect an old affair with your fiancé and so persuade him to abandon you for her. Number seven: he and she were subsequently murdered in an identical fashion, though in a different location, to the way your husband was murdered.’ He arched his eyebrows. ‘Is that a fair summary of what you’ve told us?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jinx honestly. ‘To my knowledge, that is accurate. Assuming the abortion and the way Meg and Leo were murdered to be true. Those are the only two things I didn’t know.’

  He nodded. ‘All right, then I have one last question on the Landy murder before we talk about Wallader and Harris. According to the reports we have, you were ruled out of direct involvement because you had a cast-iron alibi. Who gave you the alibi?’

  ‘It was Meg,’ she said. ‘I spent the af
ternoon and early evening with her and then she drove me to the restaurant for seven-thirty. I waited there about an hour and, when Russell didn’t show, I took a taxi to the gallery. Isn’t that in the report?’

  Maddocks ignored the question. ‘Wouldn’t it have been simpler to phone the gallery?’

  ‘I did. There was no answer. So I phoned home but there was no answer there either.’

  ‘Then why assume he was at the gallery? Why bother to take a taxi there?’

  ‘Because it was on the way home.’

  ‘But you paid off the taxi before you went inside.’

  ‘It was nine o’clock at night and the driver wouldn’t let me leave the cab without paying. I think he was afraid I was planning to leg it down the nearest alleyway. He said he’d wait five minutes and if I wasn’t back by then, he’d go. As it was, I was back within two, screaming my head off. The driver dialled nine-nine-nine while I sat with Russell, then he waited outside till the ambulance arrived. That’s why the police had no trouble tracing him afterwards to support my story.’

  Maddocks chuckled softly. ‘You have an answer for everything, don’t you?’

  She studied him with a remarkably cool gaze. ‘All I’m doing is telling you the truth, Inspector.’

  ‘And let’s face it, girl, you’ve had ten whole years to get it right.’

  One of the security staff at the clinic, Harry Elphick, after learning about the assault on Dr Protheroe, made a detour on his departure to check the outhouses near the staff parking places. He remembered some weeks back seeing a sledgehammer in one of them, and it occurred to him that it might be worth a second look. He reasoned, quite logically, that the most likely person to take a swipe at Dr Protheroe was one of the more aggressive junkies in his care, and he went on to reason that, because the Nightingale was not a prison, then any observant patient had the same opportunities as he to notice the sledgehammer. Harry would have considered it naïve rubbish to assume that none of them would bother to attack Dr Protheroe because they knew he didn’t carry drugs in his car. Harry, ex-Army and past his middle years, had little time for the sort of over-privileged dregs that Dr Protheroe treated, and it was with some satisfaction that he opened an outhouse door and, after a cursory search, found a sledgehammer with red Wolseley paintwork ground into its head.

  ‘When did you first discover that Leo and Meg were having an affair?’

  Jinx stared at her hands for a moment before reaching for her cigarette packet. ‘When I came round a few days ago. My stepmother told me.’

  Maddocks frowned. ‘Are you saying that’s the first you knew about it?’

  She leaned back in her chair to light a cigarette. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I can’t remember anything much from before the accident.’

  ‘What do you remember?’

  She stared at the ceiling. ‘I remember saying goodbye to Leo at breakfast on the morning of June the fourth. I was coming down to Hampshire to stay with my parents for a few days.’

  ‘That’s a very precise memory.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When did you find out they were dead, Miss Kingsley?’

  She toyed with another lie, then thought better of it. She was too fond of Dean to drop him in this bastard’s shit. ‘Sunday,’ she said. ‘I knew you were lying about what had happened to them so I asked a friend to phone the Walladers. Anthony told him they were dead and the friend rang me back to tell me.’

  ‘Which friend?’

  ‘Is that important?’

  ‘It depends whether you want me to believe you or not. This friend might confirm that you were genuinely shocked when you heard the news. Otherwise I’m having some difficulty trying to understand how a woman whose best friend and fiancé have been brutally butchered can retain such extraordinary composure.’

  ‘My number two at the studio, Dean Jarrett.’

  ‘Thank you. Were you upset when your stepmother told you Leo had left you for Meg?’

  She shook her head. ‘Not particularly. I was more relieved than upset. I think I made it clear to you on Sunday that I had severe doubts about Leo. I am sure in my own mind that I had no intention of marrying him, irrespective of whether he was having an affair with Meg.’

  ‘Then why did you try to kill yourself?’

  ‘I wish I knew.’ She smiled suddenly. ‘It seems very out of character for someone with extraordinary composure.’ She flicked ash from her cigarette. ‘So out of character that I don’t think I did.’

  ‘You were drunk and you drove your car at full speed towards the only structure of any substance on a deserted airfield. What other explanation is there?’

  ‘But I didn’t kill myself,’ she pointed out.

  ‘Because you were lucky. You were thrown clear.’

  ‘Perhaps I threw myself clear,’ she said. ‘Perhaps I didn’t want to die.’

  ‘Meaning what, precisely?’

  Her eyelashes grew damp but she held the tears in check. ‘I don’t know, but I’ve had far more time to think about this than I have about Leo and Meg, and it seems to me that if I wasn’t trying to kill myself, then the only other explanation is that someone else was trying to kill me.’ She abandoned any attempt to persuade Maddocks and turned instead to Fraser’s more open face. ‘It would be so easy. My car was an automatic. All anyone would have to do was aim it at the post, put it into Drive, wedge the accelerator at full throttle and then release the handbrake. If I was unconscious and belted in, I’d have been crushed in the wreckage. That might have happened, don’t you think? It’s a possibility, isn’t it?’

  ‘If you’d been belted in, how could you have been thrown clear?’

  ‘Then maybe I wasn’t belted in,’ she said eagerly. ‘Maybe the idea was to have me go through the windscreen. Or maybe I came round in time and released myself.’

  He would have liked to believe her, but he couldn’t. ‘Then this hypothetical murderer would have seen what had happened and finished you off. He couldn’t afford to leave you alive if he’d just tried to kill you.’

  From her pocket she took the newspaper clipping that Betty had given her and pressed it into his hands. ‘According to this I was found by a young couple. He wouldn’t have had time to finish me off if he saw them coming.’

  ‘Look, Miss Kingsley,’ said Maddocks, ‘I hate to be cruel, but facts are facts. According to your neighbours in Richmond, this wasn’t the first time. Your first attempt was on the Sunday. Whether you like it or not, indeed whether you remember it or not – and by your own admission you have a habit of blocking out anything that disturbs you – something so terrible happened that you primed yourself with Dutch courage and then had a second go at finishing it all.’

  Something terrible happened . . . ‘I’ve never been drunk in my life,’ she said stubbornly. ‘I’ve never wanted to be drunk.’

  ‘There’s always a first time.’

  She shrugged. ‘Not as far as I’m concerned, Inspector.’

  ‘You had consumed the equivalent of two bottles of wine when you had your accident, Miss Kingsley. The bottles were found on the floor of your car. Are you telling me you can absorb that amount of alcohol without being what the rest of us would term drunk?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m saying I would never have wanted to drink that much.’

  ‘Not even if you had done something you were ashamed off?’

  She fixed him with her steady gaze. ‘Like what?’

  ‘Been party to a murder perhaps?’

  She shook her head. ‘Do you not see how illogical that argument is? As I understand it, Meg and Leo’s bodies were found near Winchester, which means that whoever murdered them must have worked out some fairly complicated logistics. I can’t find out from the newspapers whether they were killed in the wood or taken there after they were dead but, whichever it was, someone went to a great deal of trouble to get them there. But why would anyone go to those lengths if they were so ashamed of what they’d done that they then tried to
kill themselves? It doesn’t make sense. On the one hand, you’re describing a very calculating personality who set out to get rid of two people; on the other, you’re describing a weak personality who may have struck out in a moment of anger but was then so appalled by what he’d done that he tried to make amends by killing himself.’

  ‘You really have given this a lot of thought, haven’t you?’

  The huge black eyes filled again. ‘As you would have done, if you were in my place. I’m not a fool, Inspector.’

  Maddocks surprised her by acknowledging this with a nod. It was on the tip of his tongue to say, ‘Point taken,’ but he checked himself in time. ‘There’s no logic to murder, Miss Kingsley, not in my experience anyway. It’s usually the last people you’d expect who do it. Some of them show remorse early, some of them show it when they’re convicted, and some of them never show it at all. Believe me, it is not uncommon for a calculating individual to plan a murder, carry it out, dispose of the body, and then have an attack of conscience. We see it over and over again. There’s no reason why this case should be any different.’

  ‘Then you might as well clap the handcuffs on me now,’ she said, ‘because I can’t defend myself.’

  Nothing would give me more pleasure, sweetheart. ‘There’s no question of that,’ he said affably. ‘As Sergeant Fraser said, we are pursuing various lines of enquiry, and this is just one of them. However, I’m sure you realize how important it is that you give us some indication of what went on in the two weeks prior to your accident and the deaths of Leo and Meg. Unfortunately, you seem to be the only person left who can shed any light on the matter.’

  She drew on her cigarette with a worried frown. ‘What about Meg’s friends? Have you spoken to any of them? Surely they can tell you something.’

  ‘Acting on the information you gave us, we spoke to Josh Hennessey yesterday. He told us that the first he knew about Leo and Meg getting together was a phone call from Meg on Saturday, June the eleventh. She told him your wedding was off, that she and Leo were leaving for France but that she would pop into the office before she left to bring him up to date with her side of the operation. She never showed and he never heard from her again. He also gave us the names of some of Meg’s close friends. We spoke to a couple of them, Fay Avonalli and Marian Harding, and they told us the same story.’