Killer Cases: A Lambert and Hook Detective Omnibus

by J M Gregson

  Lambert waited to see if she would enlarge upon this generality, but she merely looked at him wryly when he didn’t immediately press on. Perhaps she thought she had pushed herself up the list of suspects by her bitterness about the dead man. He said, ‘How much did Mrs Harrington know of her husband’s activities?’

  ‘As much as she cared to, I think. Marie is highly intelligent and pretty clear-sighted. I told you I think she knew all about our affair, though she chose not to mention it to me. Probably she knew it would run its course, like others before it.’

  ‘How much do you think she resented her husband’s activities?’

  Meg Peters shrugged her beautifully rounded shoulders. ‘Impossible to say. I’ve asked myself that before: I’m not entirely insensitive to the feelings of others. I don’t know what there was left in the marriage, if anything. She doesn’t give much away.’

  Lambert nodded. Just as much as she cares to, he thought, remembering the elegant grey-haired woman who had been so disconcertingly insistent on identifying the body at the scene of the crime. Both she and the woman in front of him would have had the will and the drive to push a man to a mortal fall if the spirit had moved them to it. He said, ‘I hope you will understand that I have to ask this. How serious is your present relationship with Mr Nash?’

  For a moment he thought she was about to erupt. Then she relaxed visibly; how much this came from a conscious effort he was unable to determine. ‘Very serious. We intend to get married in two months’ time.’

  ‘Will your wedding distress anyone?’

  It was curiously phrased, but she understood him readily enough. ‘No. Tony is already separated. I have no other serious commitments. No one will be anything but pleased, now that Harrington is dead.’ She brought the idea in almost as a challenge; her small chin jutted defiantly forward beneath the full lips.

  ‘He didn’t approve of the match?’

  ‘He approved of very little that he hadn’t arranged himself. And Tony was an employee. Guy was like a mediaeval lord of the manor where they were concerned. Thought he should control everything, from their religion to whom they married. Not that he concerned himself much with religion!’ she added as an afterthought.

  ‘Why didn’t he want Tony Nash to marry you?’

  ‘I’ve thought about that a lot over the last few months. I think he couldn’t bear that a former mistress of his, even a discarded one, should bind herself to another man. Not under his nose with one of his senior employees.’

  She looked up at him anxiously, confirming his suspicion that there was more to this business than she had told him. ‘And what else had he against your marriage?’ he prompted gently.

  The green eyes gazed steadily at her high-heeled shoes as she said, ‘I don’t think Guy liked the idea of his sexual preferences being leaked to one of his employees. Actually, Tony and I never speak of him, least of all in our more intimate moments, but Guy wouldn’t have understood that. He was always anxious to dig the dirt on anyone himself.’

  ‘And there were things about himself that he wouldn’t have cared to reveal?’

  ‘There are things about most of us that we wouldn’t care to reveal, Mr Lambert.’ For a moment it was she who was in charge and he the gauche stumbler among things he did not comprehend. She did not exploit it. ‘Guy was like a lot of sexually aggressive men: secretly ashamed of what he asked in the stress of passion. He was into bondage; he was titillated by chains and leather underwear.’

  It was very quiet in a room that now seemed over-warm. Bert Hook, concentrating with all his will upon his slow round handwriting, found this did not blur the vividness of the visions of the opulent Meg Peters which thrust themselves upon his mind’s eye.

  Lambert said, ‘And you think he was afraid you would reveal his preferences to your fiancé?’

  She nodded; a red tress fell over her left eye, and she brushed it impatiently away. ‘I’m certain of it. And he thought Tony would have made use of the knowledge to get some kind of hold over him. He would certainly have done that himself in the same circumstances, and he couldn’t believe anyone else would behave differently.’

  Lambert watched her closely as he said, ‘Harrington is emerging from the various conversations I’ve had as a decidedly unattractive character. A dangerous enemy, perhaps. Had he any means of harming you, beyond what we have already discussed?’

  She looked at him in surprise; above the turquoise of her blouse, he was sure he caught fear in those wide green eyes. For a second she studied him, estimating what he might know. Then she dropped her eyes again and said softly, ‘No. Nothing.’

  He waited, stretching the moment, hoping the tension would draw her into something more revealing. He said with minatory severity, ‘It would be far better to tell us everything now, Miss Peters. You have already been very helpful.’

  ‘Too helpful, it seems.’ She was almost back to her opening hostility. ‘All my frankness has done is to make you press me for information I do not have.’

  There was enough actress in her for her angry disdain to carry some conviction, but she did not meet his eyes as she had done earlier. He was convinced there was something more, but equally certain that he would not extract it now, for her lips had set in a determined line. He wondered if any of the others in the group knew what it was that she was so anxious to conceal. It must be very personal, in view of what she had already revealed.

  He said abruptly, ‘Tell me about the quarrel between Harrington and your fiancé during his last meal.’

  Perhaps he was piqued by her refusal to tell him more, for the question was delivered like a sudden slap across the face. But she showed only relief at the return to an area she had expected to speak about. ‘Tony took exception on my behalf to one of Guy’s insults. He should have known better, but it was sweet of him.’

  ‘What exactly did Harrington say?’

  ‘I’m not sure of the precise words. I don’t think I caught them, even at the time. But in effect, Guy called me a tart.’

  ‘And you reacted angrily?’

  Her smile had a touch of disdain for a man who could think her so predictable. ‘On the contrary, I refused to be drawn. I had seen Guy play his games too often to react in the way he wanted. Unfortunately, Tony felt compelled to defend my honour.’ Her use of the conventional phrase implied derision, but her smile was full of fondness for a headstrong lover who could react with such adolescent outrage.

  ‘I understand he made Harrington apologise for his remarks.’

  ‘He did indeed. I was grateful, but it was unnecessary.’

  ‘Are you sure you can’t recall exactly what those remarks were?’

  She coloured a little as she said, ‘I’m afraid I can’t, Superintendent. Surely the exact words aren’t crucial?’

  He was sure she remembered them perfectly, and her reticence quickened his interest in their importance. No one else had been able to give him the exact words which had provoked Nash’s outburst, or even recall the nature of the insult. If it had been personal to Meg Peters, perhaps only she had understood the sharpness of this particular shaft. And she was keeping the information to herself.

  Lambert said crisply, ‘You will understand on reflection that I must be interested in the last conflict of a man who was murdered four hours later. If you or Mr Nash suddenly recall the words which caused that dispute, no doubt you will convey them to us immediately. Now, would you please give me an account of your movements when the party broke up at the end of the evening?’

  ‘Most of us had drunk quite a lot.’ She was the first one to have admitted that. ‘I went for a pee as soon as we broke up.’ She spoiled whatever effect she intended by glancing up to see if he was shocked. For years he had operated in city slums, where such phrasing might be considered a euphemism; now he did not even acknowledge it. ‘Then I went back to our room. Tony was already there.’

  That was volunteered too readily: she had been determined to say it, as if it offered him
a kind of alibi. And it did not tally with his account: he had said that he had met her at the door. He said, ‘You’re sure of that?’

  ‘Quite sure.’ It came a little too pat, with no pause for thought. Perhaps she had not been a very good actress: with the advantage of her striking looks, she should perhaps have made more of an impact than she had.

  ‘How long was this after the party broke up for the night?’

  This time she did think, or affect to do so. ‘Perhaps twenty minutes. I couldn’t be exact.’

  ‘Of course not. And how was the rest of the time occupied, after you had emptied your bladder?’

  He was more successful in surprising her than she had been with him. She looked at him quickly, then grinned ruefully, as if accepting that she had been outsmarted in a small, irrelevant game. Then she said, resolutely unembarrassed, ‘We unmarried women are a little more careful than wives when we present ourselves to our lovers at night. It was probably no more than vanity, but I spent a little time with my comb and my make-up case in the cloakroom, making myself as presentable as I could to meet Tony in our bedroom.’

  It afforded her no alibi; it was also lame and touching enough for him to consider it might well be true. He nodded and said, ‘Think very carefully, please. Did you see or hear anything after you had left the roof garden which might have any bearing on the death which followed?’

  She hesitated. ‘It’s probably nothing to do with the death.’

  ‘Quite possibly. If so, it will harm no one.’

  She nodded. ‘All right. The cloakroom is only one floor below the roof garden. When I came out, I heard raised voices from the roof where we had all been sitting. It sounded like an argument. To be accurate, it sounded like a hell of a row. I couldn’t hear any words, and I didn’t hang around to try. But I could hear the voices. One of them was Harrington’s.’

  She stopped, needing the prompt to lead her on to the revelation. He could not tell whether her reluctance was natural or simulated. He said, fulfilling his role, ‘And whose was the other voice?’

  ‘Alison Munro’s.’

  Chapter 15

  Superintendents are not supposed to feel guilt. A thick skin is supposed to develop around conscience and other sensibilities as they move up through the ranks.

  Lambert found that he had not developed it to the appropriate pachyderm thickness. Assembling with three murder suspects for an afternoon’s golf, he found himself snatching glances at the wide window of the murder room behind him, wondering what curious eyes and trenchant comments lurked behind it. A Super capable of such eccentric departures must surely invite censure, but the glass stared blankly back at him, like the eye of a monster robot observing and recording his dubious conduct.

  He was not afraid that his seniors might see and reprimand him. If the Chief Constable chose to question his methods, he would be answered dismissively by a man who had decided that he had risen quite high enough in the hierarchy for his tastes. What Lambert found disconcerting was the realisation that he could still be so sensitive about what his subordinates thought of his actions. He was irritatingly relieved to remember that this was the strait-laced Rushton’s day off. The punctilious Inspector would never have approved of this proceeding, he was sure. And of course Lambert would never have stooped to explanations.

  ‘You’ve drawn the short straw I’m afraid, John. You’re playing with me!’ The mellow tones of George Goodman drew him back to matters in hand and told him that for a few hours at least his first name, not his title, would be resolutely used by his companions.

  ‘If you believe that, you’re too credulous for a policeman!’ said Tony Nash, retrieving the balls which had been thrown into the air to determine partners in the four-ball and handing Lambert’s back to him. ‘Thank God I’ve got Sandy with me to provide the steadiness.’

  Munro grinned a tight acknowledgement of this tribute to his skills. He seemed of the three the one most aware of the incongruity of this situation, where hunter was to consort for the afternoon with the hunted, while all of them pretended that amusement was all they sought. His reserve set Lambert wondering what if anything he would learn from this bizarre three hours’ traffic on the golf course. He for one would not be forsaking his calling, and he doubted that any of them expected him to do so.

  He would study his three companions with interest. If one of them was a murderer, he would be intensely wary. But that in itself would be noticeable and significant, since presumably the other two would be freer and more natural in their exchanges. That was the sort of consideration that had made him accept Goodman’s invitation in the first place. He told himself that as he sniffed the warm air and swung his driver at the head of a daisy with anticipatory enthusiasm.

  In fact, the afternoon proceeded more freely than any of them had a right to expect. For the first two holes, their exchanges seemed edgy and artificial. Then the rhythms and challenges of the game began to blunt the edges of embarrassment, and the four of them behaved on the surface at least much as they might have done in a friendly game set in a more normal framework. Lambert was reminded of the occasions when the police video-recorded soccer crowds or city processions. For a few moments, people were intensely self-conscious. Then, surprisingly quickly, they forgot the presence of the cameras and became absorbed in their immediate concerns, even when these were sometimes highly questionable.

  Golf and its handicap system demanded their concentration. Munro was easily the best player, but Goodman at his own level was almost as steady. Receiving several shots from the taciturn and skilful Scot, he was content to play within his limitations and await his opportunities. Lambert and Nash had games which kind commentators might have described as mercurial and more realistic ones as erratic.

  Each was likely to disappear from a hole completely, leaving his partner to salvage what he might, but each was capable of the occasional surprising success.

  Lambert, who described himself as a ‘rather optimistic’ nine handicap, was enjoying one of his better days. The slice which was his natural shot was under control for most of the time, and he took the third hole with a long putt for an unlikely birdie. The May sun seemed suddenly even brighter, the sky an incredible, Mediterranean blue, the air alpine in its freshness. The murder room was out of sight, the investigation for a moment out of mind.

  It could not last, of course. He caught Sandy Munro studying him surreptitiously while Goodman prepared to drive from the next tee, and was instantly back among the questions which remained to be answered about these three. Munro and his wife must surely have compared notes, in which case they must by now be aware of the discrepancy in their stories about the night of the murder. Munro had said that he had found Alison in bed when he had returned from his midnight walk; she had said that he was in bed and asleep when she had returned.

  Munro flighted a two-iron to the edge of the next green as Lambert watched enviously. He could not know yet that he had left fibres from his sweater on the clothing of the murder victim. He was wearing that very sweater now: Lambert made a mental note that they must obtain it as police evidence before much longer. The Scot was a remarkably cool customer, guilty or innocent. No one else got anywhere near that green, into the wind; Munro rolled his long putt to within three inches of his target and took the hole with a minimum of fuss.

  For a murderer, the ability to behave coolly under pressure and assess the odds with accuracy in any situation would be valuable attributes. For a moment, Lambert toyed with the attractive and romantic notion of games as delineators of character. Then experience drove him back to reality. He had seen too many chivalrous games-players who battered their wives to place any reliance on such parallels.

  Nor could he deduce anything useful from the play and bearing of the other two participants in this Kafkaesque exercise. Tony Nash seemed unguarded enough in his responses, preoccupied with the problems of his own game. By his own admission, he was the last man known to have been with Harrington, after the others
had gone their separate ways at the end of that fateful evening, and he had quarrelled with him with startling if transitory violence during the meal. Yet his cheerful string of oaths when he despatched a ball into the river seemed totally unforced, a perfectly natural reaction for a violent man under stress.

  Lambert noted his assumption of a natural violence in this broad-shouldered, powerful man. And how much did Nash know of the background of Meg Peters and her previous relationship with the dead man? How much, for that matter, had she held back about herself and what Harrington knew of her? He was sure she had not told them everything. Yet Nash, concentrating grimly over his iron shot to a par three hole, seemed totally absorbed in the challenges of this infuriating game. But he would not be the first murderer who had successfully compartmentalised the different areas of his life.

  And what was the Superintendent in charge of the case to make of George Goodman, the only one of his three companions he had not yet interviewed? At that moment, Lambert would have liked an opinion on that question from someone else. Bert Hook’s solid presence and sturdy dismissal of human pretensions would have reassured him, even if the Sergeant had been able to be no more definitive than he felt himself about the part in this business of the oldest of the suspects.

  Goodman, leaning on his club at the edge of the green and regarding Nash’s contortions over a six-foot putt with benign amusement, seemed perfectly relaxed. After nine holes, he produced a hip-flask and offered it around the four. Sandy Munro, still watching Lambert rather nervously after completing the first half of the course in only one over par, was the only one who refused the whisky, explaining tersely that spirits did not agree with him.

  Goodman accepted the refusal with a wide smile and a relaxed shrug, as though acknowledging the eccentricities of his flock with good grace. He examined his golf ball meticulously as they prepared to address the second half of the course, holding it in his surprisingly delicate and immaculately manicured hands. Lambert was reminded ridiculously of a priest with the communion host; he wished Goodman’s bent head did not carry such an obviously ecclesiastical hairstyle.