‘Amazing, the racket it makes,’ he said. ‘I can feel the heat from here.’
‘We’d better get out of the way, anyway – clear the space for the experts. Hop in, Tam.’
He hesitated. ‘Hang on,’ he said, taking a couple of paces nearer the building. He turned, his eyes wide in shock. ‘There’s someone in there! Hit it again!’
He leapt back from the car as Fleming slammed it into gear and accelerated. Someone in there – if they were close by, the falling door might kill them anyway. But anything was better than burning alive.
This time, they heard it coming. They were able to dodge to the left where the fire had already done its worst, and the inner door came in with the outer, crashing harmlessly to the floor.
Tongues of flame surged forward. The car backed up, out of reach, and Macdonald and Hepburn stumbled through the opening, out into the blessed fresh air.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Ballinbreck House was in darkness when Fleming and MacNee arrived, shaken, tired, and very, very angry at two in the morning.
The fire engines and ambulance had arrived with impressive speed and Andy Macdonald and Louise Hepburn were in hospital suffering from smoke inhalation, with concussion in Macdonald’s case and burns in Hepburn’s, but the outlook was good. Randall Lindsay, on the other hand, was fighting for his life.
‘It’s going to be hard keeping calm, dealing with this one,’ MacNee said. ‘I just want to get her by the throat. The woman’s a monster.’
Fleming agreed. ‘Nothing mattered more than her selfish interests – even her own son.’
‘And a couple of random police officers, but I can see they wouldn’t count,’ MacNee said with considered irony. ‘What’s she going to say now?’
‘She’ll deny everything. Have we got uniforms around the house, though, just in case she makes a run for it?’
MacNee nodded. ‘I did that whenever the lads arrived at the warehouse – though I was only assuming she would go straight home. I don’t think she knew I saw her.’
‘Well, we’re going to find out now,’ Fleming said grimly. She rang the bell, keeping it pressed even after a light came on in an upstairs room, watching other lights appear until the door opened and Philippa Lindsay stood there.
She was wearing a green silk dressing gown, cinched so tightly round her waist that it looked as if she was girded for battle. Her face was flushed.
‘What is the meaning of this?’ she demanded.
MacNee pushed past her into the house. ‘In there,’ he said, pushing her roughly towards the sitting room.
‘How dare you!’ she shouted. ‘Take your hands off me, you disgusting little man!’
Fleming spoke from behind him. ‘Philippa Lindsay, I am arresting you on suspicion of attempted murder. You are not obliged to say anything but anything you do say will be noted down and may be used in evidence. Do you understand?’
Shock showed in her face. ‘I-I don’t know what you mean.’
MacNee had his notebook out. Provocatively, he repeated, ‘I – don’t – know – what – you – mean,’ as he wrote it down.
‘Do you understand?’ Fleming said again.
Philippa stood very still. When she spoke, her tone was different. ‘Yes, of course I understand. I’m sorry for my reaction – it’s just that it’s really such a ridiculous accusation I couldn’t believe it.
‘Look, let’s sit down, talk this through. There must be some silly misunderstanding.’ She gave an unsteady laugh as she went to sit down, waving her hand for the officers to do the same.
They didn’t move. ‘Do you wish to make a statement?’ Fleming said. ‘You are entitled to representation from a solicitor before you do.’
‘I don’t want this to become official when I can probably give you a simple explanation.’ Her face, flushed before, had become deathly pale. ‘What can I tell you, to show you that you’ve got this all wrong?’
‘For a start, you can tell us where you were tonight,’ Fleming said.
‘Here,’ Philippa said confidently. ‘I went up to have a bath and get an early night. My husband can bear me out.’
‘He can’t, you know.’ Charles Lindsay had come quietly into the room. ‘You didn’t.’
She turned her head and gave him a look of purest rage. ‘Of course I did, don’t be stupid!’
‘I’d be rather stupid to back up your story, since these officers came round to speak to you while you were out, doing whatever it is you’ve done this time.’
He seemed, Fleming thought, to be taking a quiet satisfaction in saying it, and then in watching his wife crumple. She bent forward, putting her hands over her face as if overcome, but when she looked up again there were no signs of tears or despair.
‘Oh God, it’s about the warehouse, isn’t it? I knew I’d be the first suspect, I knew it was wrong. But it was the only way I could rescue anything from the wreck of the business. I’m hardly the first to do that – to take on the robber barons who have us over a barrel for insurance and make their profits out of our losses.’
She was wringing her hands quite artistically and anguished guilt was beautifully depicted. ‘Is that a confession?’ Fleming said as MacNee scribbled earnestly.
‘Oh, I’ll put my hand up to that, Inspector – but the rest – I can’t think what you’re talking about.’ Her hands fluttered helplessly but her eyes were pebble-hard.
‘And I suppose you didn’t know that your son and two police officers were in there at the time?’
Philippa’s hand went to her throat this time. ‘Oh – oh no!’ she cried. ‘You mean – you mean there was someone – someone inside? Not – not Randall! My boy – he’d have had the keys, he should have told me if he was hiding there!’
She collapsed into her chair and there were sobbing noises, but Fleming was ready to bet that her eyes were dry. She turned, a little anxiously, to look at Charles; this was a brutal way to break the news about his son.
Charles seemed oddly unmoved. ‘Dead?’ he asked her.
‘In hospital. Critical.’
Philippa’s head came up. She was dry-eyed and when she said, ‘Critical?’ Fleming had little doubt that this was unwelcome news.
‘You haven’t asked about the police officers,’ she said. She was going to enjoy this next bit. ‘Fortunately, they are in slightly better shape than your son and were able to give us perfectly coherent statements detailing your part in tonight’s events. We have another eyewitness in the form of my sergeant here to your presence at the crime scene.’
MacNee gave Philippa a little mocking bow as Fleming went on, ‘We will also be questioning you about the murders of Eleanor Margrave and William Stewart. At the police station, where we are taking you now.’
She could see the shock hitting her but when Philippa stood up her posture was rigid and her face a mask of contempt. ‘I have nothing to say to you. I want a lawyer now. I assume I can change my clothes?’
Fleming gave MacNee a nod and he went out, returning with a policewoman ready to escort her upstairs.
Charles Lindsay stood silently aside in the doorway. His wife passed him without a word or even a glance.
MacNee put away his notebook, then burst out, ‘Are you not wanting to go to your son? He’s in a bad way.’
Charles raised his eyebrows. ‘My son? Well, he may be or he may not. I’ve never really cared to find out. But she’s been unfaithful to me from the start. Good business head, though.’
He walked out, leaving Fleming and MacNee staring after him.
It seemed a very long drive back to Kirkluce. Fleming and MacNee were both yawning.
‘Talk to me, Tam,’ she said. ‘If you don’t get a reply, I’ve fallen asleep.’
‘At least we don’t need to interview her tonight. If she’d been prepared to talk it would have had to be sensational to keep me awake.’
‘If she’d told the truth, it would have been. But she’ll be set to deny everything now.’
/> ‘You didn’t mention Julia or the attack on Louise. Deliberate?’
‘Don’t think we’ve a chance of fingering her for Louise – not a scrap of evidence, though Philippa may have been worried that she’d remember something. Julia …’ She shrugged. ‘Now she’s got rid of Will Stewart, there’s no one to say she was in possession of Ecstasy that night, let alone that Julia didn’t take it herself when it was offered.’
‘Unless Randall knows different.’
‘If he makes it.’ Fleming sighed. ‘And even so he’s not likely to tell us – he’ll be in the dock too, on Louise’s evidence about him restraining her while Philippa lit the fire.’
‘So we’re pinning our hopes on forensics for the other two?’
‘I suppose so. They’re looking for traces of DNA from Eleanor’s body and I suppose there may even be fingerprints we can identify once they take Philippa’s. But she’ll fight every step of the way, that’s for sure.’
It was half past three when Marjory Fleming crept into bed, moving gingerly so as not to disturb her sleeping husband.
But a voice spoke. ‘And what time do you call this to be coming home, young lady?’
She laughed and snuggled into his arms. ‘The only assignation I had was with a woman. Unless you count Tam MacNee.’
‘I’ve always worried about his charismatic charm,’ Bill muttered sleepily, kissed her and turned over.
A moment later she heard him snoring gently and smiled. Sometimes the best way to make up a row was just to say nothing and forget about it, she thought as she fell into exhausted sleep herself.
Everything hurt. Her face hurt, her shoulder hurt, her hands hurt, her chest hurt when she breathed and the nauseating smell of singed hair was all about her. She felt disgusting with the layers of greasy gunk they had put all over her face and across her split lips; it tasted disgusting too.
Louise Hepburn was trying to be grateful that she was still alive to experience all this pain and discomfort but it was easier to acknowledge that in theory than it was in practice.
Almost worse was the sense of guilt. With her arrogant contempt for Randall Lindsay she’d not only walked into deadly danger herself, she’d dragged Andy in as well. It was only luck that had saved his life.
She heard someone come into the room – a nurse to carry out the exquisitely painful process of changing the dressings, probably. She opened her eyes reluctantly.
Instead, it was Andy’s mother, May, who was looking down at her.
‘I didn’t mean to wake you,’ she said. ‘Oh, you poor wee soul!’
A huge wave of guilt swept over Louise. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry!’ she cried.
May sat down on the chair beside the bed, looking puzzled. ‘What for, dear?’
‘If it wasn’t for me, Andy wouldn’t have gone there. I nearly got him killed.’
‘Well, that’s not what he said. He said you saved his life. After that woman hit him, he saw her all ready to hit him again, and you taking the blow to stop her, before he lost consciousness.’
‘He wouldn’t have been there at all if it wasn’t for me,’ Louise muttered.
‘I don’t know about that. He’s a big lad now, you know, and he makes his own decisions. All Andy said was that it’s just the job – don’t know why you want to do it, myself.’ May shook her head. ‘But if you hadn’t been there the other poor laddie whose own mother was going to kill him would just have been burnt to death.’
‘Is there any word of how he is this morning?’
‘Andy didn’t know. But he’s going to be fine, anyway, and he sent me along to tell you he’s got to wait to see the doctor but that whenever they discharge him he’ll be round to see you at once.’
Louise’s hand went up to shield her face. ‘Oh no!’ she said.
May laughed. ‘From the way he was speaking about you, I doubt if you need to worry what you’re looking like.’ She got up.
‘You need your rest. I’m not going to stay any longer. I just wanted to say that when they let you out you’re coming home to me. You’ll be needing a wee bit extra TLC and I’ll just love having a daughter to spoil – you’ve no idea what it’s like living in a household of menfolk.’
She winked and departed.
Louise settled back against her pillows, trying to blink away the tears – it was too painful to cry. She should really have corrected May when she said ‘daughter’ – but remembering how she had felt when she’d thought Andy was dead, she wasn’t absolutely sure that one day it mightn’t be right.
When Fleming and MacNee were at last admitted on Friday after a very long, tense wait there was oxygen by Randall Lindsay’s bedside but he was not only able to talk, but keen. He had waved aside his solicitor’s advice to say nothing.
‘I want her locked up for the rest of her life,’ was the first thing he said, and he was in a good position to make sure she would be. While flatly denying all knowledge of the murders of Eleanor Margrave and Will Stewart, he was able to quote his mother on Julia Margrave when she learnt that Randall’s job was on the line: ‘“She’s a druggie anyway – she’s doomed, and if she’s going to die it might as well be sooner as later.”’ He insisted he hadn’t thought she really meant anything by it, at the time, though now, of course …
And it had been entirely Philippa’s idea to bring Louise to the warehouse – he had, of course, no idea she planned to set it on fire, obviously, and as for his restraining Louise – well, she was attacking his mother and he didn’t know what had got into her. He hadn’t seen anything happening to the other policeman – just thought he’d fallen or something.
It was difficult not to go in hard and challenge every lying word, but this wasn’t the time or place. Fleming had to let it ride; no doubt there would be horse-trading over evidence provided and charges laid between his brief and the procurator fiscal but that wasn’t her business.
‘He’s a thoroughly disgusting creature,’ Fleming said as she and MacNee drove away from the hospital. ‘But what can you expect if you have the sort of mother who’d be happy to burn you alive if it suited her business interests?’
‘Right enough. And a father who couldn’t be bothered to find out whether you were his son or not.’
‘I still doubt if we can make the charge of murdering Julia stick, but his cooperation is a definite bonus. There’s probably more circumstantial stuff we can get from him too, once he’s fit for formal questioning.’
And there was better to come. The SOCOs had spent the day before taking apart Philippa Lindsay’s car and there were bloodstains on the back seat that they could prove were from Will Stewart’s body. The forensic team working on Eleanor Margrave had managed to lift a DNA contact from her skin, and though it would take some time to analyse it, there was reason to hope that the link with Philippa would be firmly established too.
Detective Superintendent Christine Rowley was ecstatic. ‘You know, even the chief constable has sent a message congratulating me.’ She named him in the tones a religious person might adopt to name the deity. ‘He’s very pleased with me.’
‘That’s good,’ Fleming said hollowly, but she did say to MacNee afterwards that at least it might take Hyacinth a step nearer promotion, away from Galloway.
‘Don’t know if that’s a good thing,’ he pointed out. ‘We were happy enough to see Donald Bailey retire as super and look what we got instead.’
Fleming groaned. ‘Always the cock-eyed optimist. Thanks a lot.’
‘Never mind. You weren’t daft enough to expect a pat on the back, were you? And we’ve got Philippa bang to rights, anyway,’ MacNee consoled her.
‘She’s a thoroughly evil woman. And she thought she would get away with it, you know. Did you see the fire chief’s report? There was an ashtray full of stubs close to where she started the fire – presumably we were meant to conclude that Randall had been careless with a cigarette and it was all an accident.’
MacNee was impressed. ‘Here, she wasn’t
daft, was she? If he got burnt to death it would be kinna hard for the insurers to claim it was just a scam.’
‘And his evidence linking her to Julia’s murder, and any threat Louise might present, would die with them. The best of all possible worlds, in her twisted universe.’ Fleming sighed. ‘I do wonder what made Philippa such a warped person.’
MacNee snorted. ‘Easy! Money, money, money, if you ask me – if it hadn’t been for that, there’d be three people still alive – four if you count Julia, though she’d probably have killed herself, given time.’
‘It wasn’t only down to her, Tam,’ Fleming said slowly. ‘It was Jen Wilson’s obsession about Connell Kane that set the whole thing in motion.’
‘Won’t admit it, though, that one. Smug as you like.’
‘No,’ Fleming agreed. ‘I think she’s been able to convince herself that the sort of person she is would never cause anything like that, so she didn’t. That’s all.
‘Now it’s only the paperwork, really. You’d better let me get on with it.’
It had been a successful operation but as always at the ending of a case, Marjory Fleming was in sombre mood as she drove home, feeling low and depressed. So much damage, so much grief, so much pain.
But as she turned in at the track to Mains of Craigie, up to the farmhouse that she always thought looked like a child’s drawing – a window on either side of the front door, three windows above – her mood lifted. Cat was coming home tonight, Cat by herself. She’d phoned Marjory the day before to tell her and when her mother had asked, sounding as upbeat as possible, ‘And is Nick coming?’ there had been an awkward pause.
At last, ‘No, he isn’t,’ Cat had said. Then, in a sudden rush, she’d gone on, ‘Actually, Mum, I dumped him after last weekend. He spent the whole time needling you and taking the piss out of Dad and what really finished it was that Dad didn’t even realise and Nick thought it was funny. Don’t tell Dad, though, will you?’
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