Also on the phone, Lucy waved to him through the glass.
‘What’ve you been up to?’ he asked Alex. He sat down on the edge of her desk while he waited for Lucy to finish her phone call, and started playing with her pens.
She smacked his hand away. ‘Oh, the usual. Working, clubbing, hanging out with me mates. And you?’
‘The usual. Doing my house up, hanging out with criminals. Nothing much.’
Alex laughed and snatched a pen from his hand. ‘Stop fiddling with my pens.’
Just then Lucy stuck her head out of her door, interrupting their banter. ‘Stop harassing my staff and get in here.’
He jumped down from the desk. ‘Duty calls.’
‘What can I do for you?’ asked Lucy as she closed the door. His aunt wore her usual gold jewellery and an olive-green dress with a square neckline and had piled her hair high in a tidy bouffant. She looked both business-like and stunning, and he could see why Trevor had fallen for her.
Normally Lucy would cross-examine him about his love life, what he was doing, if he was eating properly, in a way which was both endearing and depressing because he’d often wished his own mother would show the same interest. She’d never spoken to him like this before, and she must have guessed this wasn’t a social visit. A new respect for her grew. In some ways she was very like his father, just nicer.
He decided to come straight to the point. ‘Trevor says you may have some information about a public limited company called Ransome & Daughters.’
‘Might do.’ Lucy arched her eyebrows, warning him to tread carefully. ‘What’s it to you? More to the point, what’s it to Trevor?’
‘He’s just trying to help me out with something, that’s all.’ He’d hate to be the cause of ructions between his aunt and uncle, but this was important.
‘Does this by any chance have something to do with Derek?’
In response to his nod, she sighed and turned to a filing cabinet behind her desk.
‘Okay,’ she said when she returned to her desk, ‘I have the information you’re asking about, but before I share it with you, I need to know what you want it for. I know you and Derek don’t always see eye to eye, and I can understand why because he’s a bloody pain in the arse half the time, but he’s my brother. Don’t expect me to be party to anything that’ll harm him, or his business. Are we clear on that?’
‘I’m not going to harm him or the business. Why would I do that?’
Lucy raised her eyebrows, but said nothing.
A flicker of anger stirred in him. ‘If you’re referring to that episode with Cathy, I was over that a long time ago.’
‘Yeah, right,’ she said, but not unkindly. She hesitated for a moment then pushed a ring binder across the desk. ‘This is Derek’s investment portfolio. As you can see, he likes to play it safe. It’s mostly fixed interest products, government bonds, although he does occasionally trade in options or invest in derivatives and hedge funds. The trick to reduce risks is diversification, spreading your investments across a range of products, but I expect you know that.’
Jason opened the folder and skimmed through the information Lucy had summarised. ‘Does he buy stocks and shares?’
‘Next page.’
He turned the page and ran his eyes down the list of companies in which his father owned shares. There, as he’d suspected, was the evidence of his connection to the company Helen worked for, in the form of shares, but whether this represented a small or large share would depend on the total number of shares issued, and Lucy hadn’t provided him with that information.
‘What’s the size of his share in Ransome’s?’ He turned the folder around and pointed to the listing for the auction house.
Lucy gave it a cursory glance, then regarded him thoughtfully. ‘Well, he’s on the board of directors, so I’d say that his interest is more than just an investment.’
‘How long has he been on the board for?’
‘Oh, about twenty years, I’d say. What’s your interest?’
‘I know a girl who works there.’
‘A nice girl?’
‘Very nice. Her mother worked there too.’
‘Worked?’ Lucy pounced on his use of the past tense.
‘She was murdered. Twenty years ago.’
Lucy paled. ‘You’re not suggesting …?’
‘No, I’m not, but Dad’s taking a very keen interest in this girl, and I want to know why.’
‘Well, he would be if you are,’ Lucy observed. ‘You know that.’
Jason shook his head. ‘It’s more than that. I think he knows why this woman was murdered.’
‘Oh, come off it. If he knew, he’d have gone to the police.’
‘Not if money was at stake. You know that.’
Back at work on Friday, Bill fussed over Helen and practically forced her to drink a cup of tea before starting.
‘I heard you were ill. Better now?’
‘Yeah, thanks.’
The tea was strong and milky and with three sugars, which Bill, like Charlie, insisted was the perfect pick-me-up. Helen hated sugar in her tea but didn’t have the heart to tell him.
Besides, it was nice having someone who cared.
‘It wasn’t anything I said, was it, love?’ he asked. ‘You know, all that stuff about your mother?’
‘Of course not. The thing is, I …’
How would Bill react if he knew about her condition? When to confide was always a problem. But she suspected that Bill knew more about what Mimi had been involved in than he was admitting. If she opened up a little, he might do the same.
‘I suffer from epilepsy.’ There, she’d said it. ‘Sometimes I have seizures. No one knows why but in me there’s a connection between that and over-excitement. I have to eat properly too and get enough sleep. Pace myself, if you like.’ She smiled. ‘And I mustn’t forget my medication.’
‘I know, I was around when you were little, remember?’
‘You knew? But you didn’t say anything.’
‘It never made no difference to me, love. We are what we are.’ Bill took her hand. ‘Look, I’m sorry for yelling at you. Life’s been pretty crap for you, hasn’t it, what with you losing your parents, and them lot shunting you from one home to another like you were worthless. And don’t bother defending them. I know all about it. There’s precious few secrets you can keep around here. Especially your gran, that heartless old witch. Fancy treating a child like that.’
‘She had her reasons.’
‘Wanted to get ’er hands on your shares, I wager.’
‘I think she was trying to protect me.’
‘Hah!’
‘No, seriously, think about it. Where was I when my mother died?’ She stared hard at him.
‘You were a witness,’ he said when the penny dropped.
‘Except whoever did it might not have known about my epilepsy. He or she didn’t know that I hadn’t actually seen anything. Because I was out.’
Bill frowned. ‘“He or she” you say, but wasn’t it that woman … sorry, can’t remember her name, but wasn’t it some personal thing? A jealousy drama?’
‘I used to think so.’
‘You think it has to do with something your mother knew?’
‘Yes.’
‘About what went on here back then?’ he continued.
She nodded.
‘Jesus Christ, love!’ He got up abruptly and started pacing the cracked lino floor, running his hand back and forth across his bald pate. ‘If you know what’s good for you, you stop right there.’
‘Names, Bill. Dates, places, overheard conversations. Anything you can think of.’
‘No.’ He scowled at her.
‘Please.’
‘It’ll end in tears,’ he warned.
‘But it won’t be mine.’
‘You don’t know what you’re messing with, love.’ He reached for his mug, then grimaced after a slug of cold tea. ‘Promise you’ll be careful? Not go bargi
ng in and getting a name for yourself in the wrong places?’
‘I promise,’ she lied.
‘Well,’ he sighed, ‘I don’t remember much, but it was around the time the company was going to float that rumours started flying that some of the clients weren’t what you’d call completely kosher.’ He crooked his fingers in the air. ‘Anyway, your mum was furious and looked into it. Then there was that nasty business about that woman who was following her around, and the next thing we hear is that she’s been murdered. It was a shock.’
Helen nodded with a sense of relief. She’d suspected that her mother may have been involved in something illegal, something worse than what Letitia was doing. Hearing that she was a whistle-blower was a relief. ‘Any names?’
‘A few.’ Bill didn’t meet her eyes.
‘Which ones?’
‘You won’t know most of them. Some aren’t around any more.’ Bill rattled off a handful of names, quickly as if he hoped she wasn’t paying attention. He’d been right, she didn’t know any of them. Except one.
Derek Moody. Jason’s father.
Chapter Twenty-One
Convinced that Wilcox would want to know about the dog she’d mentioned last time she saw him, she managed to get another appointment with him. She told Mrs Deakin she wasn’t well enough to be back at work after all and left early. Lost in her own thoughts, she crossed the paved square in front of Scotland Yard and didn’t see the cyclist until she heard the screech of brakes.
‘Why don’t you watch where you’re going?’ he yelled after her, and she made a rude gesture at his retreating back.
Some people.
Wilcox was less pleased to see her this time, but he asked her to sit down, offered her coffee. She said no thanks and watched him slouch in his chair with his hands behind his head.
He was either arrogant or overconfident. Or maybe both. At least she knew where she stood with him.
There was a younger officer in the room with them, a blonde-haired woman with piercing blue eyes. Wilcox introduced them. ‘Detective Inspector Karen Whitehouse. Helen Stephens, a former witness in a murder case.’
The DI just nodded, but her indifference had the same effect on her as Wilcox’s arrogance. Neither of them were going to make this easy for her.
‘What can I help you with this time?’ asked Wilcox.
Helen decided to come straight to the point. ‘Fay Cooper.’
‘Was released from prison earlier this year.’ He opened a file, glanced at it perfunctorily as if he already knew the contents front to back. ‘For good behaviour, no less, but then again she never struck me as a troublemaker. It’s funny how you can tell. What about her?’
‘I’ve met her, and I don’t think she did it.’
His eyebrows rose. ‘I see. And you base her innocence on, what, exactly?’
Oh, no, he wasn’t going to make this easy at all.
‘The knife,’ she replied. ‘Her husband knew she had one like that. I wonder if he might have set her up.’
Wilcox nodded. ‘It occurred to us at the time, yes. But it turned out he had a rock solid alibi. He’d taken their children to visit his sister in the south of France. Besides, if he was trying to set her up, why would he remove the knife from the car?’
‘Maybe he paid someone else to do it.’ Something flitted at the back of her mind, a thought annoyingly just out of reach.
‘That occurred to us as well, but it would have made more sense for him to try to get rid of a troublesome wife rather than kill his lover, wouldn’t it?’
At the word lover, Helen flinched. She still had trouble picturing her mother as a home-wrecker. But she wasn’t giving up. ‘You told me to come back to you if I remembered something. It’s about the dog I mentioned last time. I now know what sort it was. An Airedale Terrier.’
As she said it, the image of it came back to her, stronger than ever before. Brown fur, lolling tongue, long legs dancing with boundless energy.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Positive. I’ve looked into it, and that’s the dog I remember.’
‘Was it there on its own?’ DI Whitehouse spoke for the first time, in a voice soft and husky like a 1940s Hollywood starlet. A hand gesture accompanied her question, and Helen noticed her long pale fingers, nails shiny with a clear varnish, sheer perfection.
‘No, it wasn’t a stray, the owner was there too. He wore a big overcoat with a hood or something, I’m not sure. I wonder if he saw something.’
‘No one came forward, Helen,’ said Wilcox.
‘Maybe we could track them down.’
‘If they didn’t come forward back then, they’re not likely to now, are they? No, I think—’
There was that thought again, and this time she managed to pin it down. ‘Something else has actually just occurred to me. A cyclist nearly ran me over outside this building, that’s what made me think of it. There was a cyclist there that morning. I remember him quite clearly now. He was dressed all in black, with gloves and a hat, and something across the lower half of his face, a scarf perhaps, I don’t know. And his bicycle was one of those racing bikes with curved handle bars, quite low down so you’re sort of crouching over the bike, if you know what I mean.’
Wilcox sighed. ‘If those men were there, why didn’t Fay Cooper mention them? She was facing a murder charge.’
‘She was high, she could’ve forgotten. It’s worth a try, isn’t it?’
He regarded her thoughtfully. She stared back without saying anything, gave him time to process what she’d just said in the hope he would agree it was worth following up on. The only sound in the room was her own breathing which came in short bursts from her excitement at being this close.
Then he frowned and crossed his arms. ‘Are you under the influence of any kind of substance?’
‘No!’ The sudden rage at having her hopes dashed made her clench her fists, and she saw from his smug smile that he’d noticed. Immediately she put a lid on it. Blowing her top at one of Scotland Yard’s finest would get her nowhere. ‘I don’t drink. It interferes with epilepsy medication. That’s a well-known fact. Weed can help, but I’m not doing that either.’ Not any more, but he didn’t have to know.
‘I wasn’t aware of that, but I’m learning all the time.’
He flashed her the smile she remembered from that day at the police station twenty years ago. It was a smile that said ‘I know something you don’t’. Her five-year-old gut instinct didn’t trust it back then, and she didn’t trust it now either. What did he know this time that she didn’t? Had he and the DI discussed her before she came?
She could almost hear them. ‘An interesting case … a child witness, unreliable … making up stories in her head … can’t come to terms with what happened … an epileptic, you know … blah blah blah’. She imagined them laughing at her, and bit down hard on the inside of her mouth.
‘There’s something else. My mother …’ Helen stopped. What could she say? She had no proof that something was going on with the company back then, only what Bill had said which wasn’t much. No proof of Moody’s involvement either. ‘I think my mother might’ve been involved in something which got her killed,’ she said instead. ‘She had a bag with her when she died. With papers and computer discs in it. I’ve mentioned that before as well.’
Wilcox sent her an exasperated smile. ‘You’ve mentioned the bag, yes. You never said anything about any papers or computer discs. And I’ve tried to tell you, there was no bag.’
‘What sort of papers?’ asked Whitehouse.
‘Just papers. I remember finding them boring.’
‘“Just papers”,’ the detective repeated. ‘Can you be more specific? Business documents, leaflets? Closely typed or with lots of pictures?’
‘The company’s logo was on them, but that’s all I know. I was only five.’
‘What company?’
‘The family company that my mother worked for. Ransome & Daughters.’
Assessing
her, Whitehouse said, ‘Why would papers from your mother’s own company make you draw the conclusion that she was involved in anything? It seems, well, tenuous.’
Helen hesitated. ‘In the world of auctioneering …’ she began, then stopped. She felt a certain loyalty to the company, which was unexpected. ‘Well, let me put it this way, not everyone who trades through an auction house has a clear conscience. Sometimes art and antiques are sold without a provenance. There’s usually a good reason for that, like if it’s been in your Auntie Edna’s attic for fifty years, or else it …’ she shrugged.
‘Could be stolen.’ Whitehouse finished the sentence for her.
Helen nodded and realised, stupidly, this was like preaching to the converted. Wilcox and Whitehouse were police officers and knew more about the shady side of business than she did. ‘I think my mother was a whistle-blower.’
‘I see.’ Whitehouse nodded slowly.
Wilcox shook his head. ‘Impressive.’
‘What?’
‘Impressive what the human mind can conjure up when it’s desperate.’
Helen’s rage returned, white-hot and corrosive. ‘I want you to reopen the case of my mother’s murder.’
‘Look,’ said Wilcox, ‘I’ve got terrorists roaming the streets of London. Now, I appreciate this is very real for you, but I can’t justify reopening a case on the grounds of practically nothing. It requires manpower and resources, and most of all, proof that Fay Cooper didn’t kill your mother. If you can provide me with that, I’ll reconsider.’ The latter he added in an undertone which told her he didn’t believe she’d be able to provide any.
And he’d be right. What did she have? Some vague memory of a cyclist and a man with a dog? There were the files on Letitia’s computer, but they proved only a current sideline. What she did have was the uncertainty of a recovered drug addict, a couple of missing knives plus a missing bag and, above all, her own overwhelming sense of loss.
She rose. Wilcox was a busy man with a career to pursue and other people like herself to fob off. He could do nothing more for her. She understood that, but she still hated him for forcing her to face the fact that her mother was long gone. Mimi was dead, and the gap left behind was closing up like a scab over a cut. Scratching it would only make things worse.
The Elephant Girl (Choc Lit) Page 24