Quantrill and Hilary, silently deferring to Inspector Tait’s claimed knowledge of men of the computer expert’s calibre, exchanged glances that were almost, but not quite, grins of fellow-feeling. Tait, his long nose in his coffee mug, failed to notice. When he emerged he said, ‘So what led up to Angela Arrowsmith’s death? What happened since you saw her last Saturday?’
The detectives’principal informant had been Gary Hilton, Angela’s son. It was too difficult to communicate with Harold Wilkes, who had taken their written news of his sister’s road death impassively, referring them for any information to her husband. Simon, still at the infirmary with his mother and harrowed by anxiety and sleeplessness, had been reduced by their news to a saturated incoherence; all they could understand from him was that Angela had been a wonderful wife.
But Gary, who had been asleep when they first called, greeted them eagerly when they returned to Tenerife from the hospital. His face was still streaked and puffy with tears; much as he had longed to be free of his mother, grief had caught him unawares when his uncle told him of her death. But now there was a brightness about him, a sense of excitement. He wanted some attention, and with his stepfather away and his uncle necessarily uncommunicative, he was glad to talk to anyone who would listen.
He talked freely about his mother, making no attempt to put her words and actions in a good light. It seemed not to occur to him that any suspicion might attach to her death. When Chief Inspector Quantrill said to him, ‘What about the threat that was made to your mother last Saturday, Gary? Do you think someone could have planned to kill her?’, the boy had shot him a look of alarm. But then he had shaken his head.
‘No. As far as I know she didn’t upset anybody except Simon and Uncle Harold.’ He told the detectives about the conversation he had overheard between his mother and his stepfather when the representative of the finance company had called. ‘But however rotten she was to them, neither Si nor Harold would have hurt her. They’d let her get away with anything.’
The sum of the detectives’information was that Angela Arrowsmith had spent most of her time during the preceding week directing alterations at the old chapel in Breckham Market. She had talked about nothing but her restaurant.
Whenever she went to the premises she took with her some – preferably all – of her menfolk. Simon, who worked from home as a freelance computer programmer, could help her only in the evenings; but Gary – who had left school in July and had been unable to find a job – and his uncle were in attendance on Angela for most of the week.
Harold Wilkes had no vehicle of his own. Having given up driving since his accident, he travelled to and from Breckham in Angela’s car. He claimed to the police that he had been happy at the prospect of working as his sister’s chef, and that he thought the restaurant a good idea. But his real view, according to his nephew, was that the enterprise was bound to fail. Harold had told Gary that Angela had no concept of what running a restaurant involved, and that he himself was too severely handicapped to cope with the work.
There had been several occasions during the week when Angela went to Yarchester on business, but those trips she had made on her own, and always in the daytime. She had told her family nothing of her activities there, apart from throwing them snippets of information about the colour of the wall-to-wall carpeting and the banquette seating she had ordered, and the names of the singer, backing group and entertainer she had booked for the gala opening. Her last visit to Yarchester had been on Wednesday afternoon.
On Thursday, Simon had made his usual early morning visit to his mother Nellie, and had found her unwell. He had called her doctor who, arriving just after Nellie collapsed, diagnosed a heart attack and sent immediately for the ambulance. Simon had followed the ambulance to the infirmary in his own car, first telephoning Angela to tell her what had happened.
Angela was displeased that her husband’s attention had been diverted from her. She insisted that Harold went with her to the restaurant, despite the fact that he had a particularly bad headache. Gary usually made his own way to Breckham on his bicycle, but his mother made him go with her and Harold in her car so that he couldn’t slip away during the day. She was, said Gary, in a very bad temper. When Simon had telephoned her later in the morning to say that he was going to stay at the hospital with Nellie, she had told him that if he wasn’t too busy to spend the day twiddling his thumbs there, he could in future spend more time making himself useful at the restaurant. ‘Mum really gave him an earful, poor old Simon,’ Gary told the detectives.
During the course of the afternoon, Harold’s headache had worsened to such a degree that Angela had finally, crossly, driven him home. While she was away, a fat little man with thick glasses had arrived saying that he was Mr Mutimer, the builder, and that he had come to inspect the work in progress. He waited until Angela returned. She immediately sent Gary into the town to do some shopping for her, and when he brought it, Mr Mutimer had gone.
The carpenters had stayed late, working overtime to finish reconstructing the kitchen area. Angela had loaned them her son as an unpaid mate. By the time the two of them returned to Tenerife, it was after nine o’clock.
They were both hungry, and Angela had roused her brother from his bed to cook them some supper. Simon was still at the infirmary. He telephoned Angela at about ten o’clock to tell her that his mother’s condition was still critical, and that he proposed to stay there all night. That, Simon told the police, was the last time he had spoken to his wife. Angela, who was tired and already in her silk kimono, her face cleansed of make-up, had snapped at her husband and slammed the receiver down. ‘The old woman’s still hanging on,’ she had told her son. ‘If she’s going to die I wish she’d get on with it – that’d be the answer to everything.’
In reply to the Chief Inspector, Gary said that he didn’t know what his mother had meant by that phrase.
After supper, when Harold and Gary had gone to their respective bedrooms, the telephone had rung again. Angela answered it, as she always did. Gary was watching television on his portable set, and heard nothing of the conversation, but presently his mother came into his room, dressed to go out. She had looked excited.
She said that she was meeting someone, and her son knew better than to ask who or where. She told Gary that she had her latchkey, and that she had stuck a message on the inside of the front door warning Harold, if he should happen to get up, not to bolt it. As she left Gary’s room, soon after 11 p.m., she had said to him – as far as he could remember – ‘If this works out, I don’t mind if the old woman does hang on a bit longer.’
Chapter Fifteen
‘Angela was thinking of money, presumably?’ said Tait.
‘What else?’ said Hilary. ‘Her caller must have known that he could tempt her to meet him by offering money. But it would have had to be a big offer – several thousand pounds, at least.’
‘Then assuming that the caller was also her attacker, doesn’t that rule out Simon Arrowsmith? His wife knew that he had nothing left to offer.’
‘Except access to his poor old mother’s money,’ said Quantrill with disapproval, picking up the last of his sandwiches. ‘What Angela said to Gary about the old lady’s death being “the answer to everything” suggests that Mrs Nellie Arrowsmith has a sizeable nest-egg to leave to Simon when she dies. Angela must have been confident – with reason – of getting her own hands on it. Knowing that, Simon could have rung his wife to say that even if his mother were to survive the heart attack, he’d make sure that Angela got the money. That’d interest her.’
‘Plausible,’ said Tait, ‘except that I don’t see Angela agreeing to go out late at night to discuss it with him.’
‘You would, if you’d ever met her. Instant gratification, that was what she demanded. Simon would have known that if he rang her to say that he could get the money she wanted, but that he couldn’t talk about it on the telephone, she wouldn’t have been able to wait to hear more. And if he’d said he could
n’t leave his mother long enough to drive all the way home, Angela would have agreed to meet him half-way.’
‘Very plausible,’ said Hilary. ‘As long as you can believe that Simon Arrowsmith would harm his wife in any way. I can’t.’
‘So you’ve told us,’ said Quantrill. He nearly added ‘several times’, but he wasn’t so convinced of his own hypothesis that he wanted to squelch her. ‘But what about Harold Wilkes? He was at home alone during the early part of yesterday evening. If Simon went home from the infirmary, he and Harold might well have discussed what they were going to do to save themselves from Angela.
‘It would obviously have to be something more drastic than the decapitated cat episode. Perhaps they cooked up a plan that involved Simon making the telephone call, and Harold doing the actual meeting. Gary says that his uncle went back to bed after supper, but their bedrooms are both on the ground floor, on opposite sides of the hall. Harold could easily have climbed out of his window later, without Gary’s knowledge.’
‘Harold hasn’t a car,’ pointed out Hilary. ‘How could he reach the A135?’
‘Perhaps Simon rang his wife from a call-box near Wickford,’ said Quantrill. ‘Then he picked up Harold, drove him to the layby, and left him to deal with Angela. Probably they meant to frighten her badly, rather than to kill her. But the hands on her throat might have alarmed her to such an extent that she ran out on to the road and was knocked down by a hit-and-run driver.’
‘And you think Simon would have left her there? Never!’
‘Someone did. Someone squeezed her neck, and then left her to be spread over the tarmac. If Simon wasn’t involved, who was it? Harold on his own?’
‘It wasn’t necessarily a member of her family,’ Hilary argued. ‘We know that she had some very undesirable acquaintances in the past. Perhaps she was trying to raise some money from one of them. Blackmail?’
Quantrill scoffed. ‘For the kind of money you yourself said that she needed? No chance. If she’d ever known enough to blackmail a big man in the old Black Bull mob, she’d have been got rid of years ago. Wouldn’t she?’
The Chief Inspector and the Sergeant stared at each other crossly. It had been a distressing day, and they were getting nowhere.
‘Look, can we forget the speculation for a bit?’ interrupted Tait. ‘What about forensic evidence?’
Quantrill turned to vent his frustration on the Inspector. ‘What forensic evidence? D’you imagine we’d be sitting here chewing over motive if we had a single scrap of hard evidence to work on? There’s been so much rain on that layby that any tyre or footprints must have been washed away hours before we got there.’
‘Aren’t you still searching?’
‘Of course we’re still searching! Harry Colman’s team is still hard at it.’ He rubbed his chin despondently. ‘I can’t say that I’m hopeful, though.’
Hilary was learning to deal with the Chief Inspector’s changes of mood. She didn’t know what caused his lapses into gloom; respecting his privacy as she wanted him to respect hers, she had no intention of trying to find out. She found his melancholy mood almost endearing, but it was not one that she proposed to encourage. What he needed, she thought, was an injection of optimism. There must be evidence at the scene of the crime, she asserted; and the search team would be sure to find it.
Quantrill brightened immediately.
Not because of what Hilary Lloyd had said. He knew perfectly well how good at their job the searchers were. So why, suddenly, did he feel happier? Puzzled, he began the unfamiliar task of investigating his own emotions and came with pained surprise to the conclusion that it must be because, as she spoke, the girl had smiled at him.
He told himself sharply not to be a fool, but the cheerfulness lingered.
Tait’s nose had twitched at the earlier mention of blackmail.
‘You mentioned a possible connection with my murder case, Hilary. Do you think Angela Arrowsmith was killed because she guessed the identity of the headless corpse?’
‘No,’ said Sergeant Lloyd decisively. ‘No woman in her right mind would agree to a late-night meeting with someone she wanted to blackmail for murder, particularly at a place where she knew the corpse had been found!’
‘Angela wasn’t a local woman,’ said Quantrill. ‘She probably didn’t realise the significance of the layby. That would make it an ideal meeting-place from her assailant’s point of view, quite apart from its natural seclusion; he could use the story of the headless corpse to terrify her.’
‘What makes you so sure it wasn’t the A135 murderer having another go?’ asked Tait.
‘Instinct,’ said Quantrill. ‘Plus the fact that they used completely different methods. And besides, the A135 murder was committed elsewhere.’
‘So where’s the connection between your case and mine?’
‘Ah – it’s only an indirect one, I’m afraid, but you should find it helpful.’ Quantrill had finished the last of his sandwiches. Peckish still, having had no time for lunch, he began to tear the packaging from a Lyons blackcurrant and apple pie that his wife, had she known, would never have allowed him to eat. ‘Tell Martin what you’ve been working on, Hilary,’ he said.
She told Inspector Tait about the dress the headless woman had been wearing, and about the Jayne Edwards mail-order catalogue. ‘I’ve been in touch with the firm and they’ve sent me some very interesting information – it arrived only this morning, so I’ve had no time to follow it up.’
Hilary excavated her in-tray, which had been piled with messages and reports while she was out. ‘Yes, here it is: Jayne Edwards advertised that particular dress in their spring catalogue two years ago. I asked for a list of credit customers who bought the dress in the murdered woman’s size, 14. I also wanted to know if any of those women had not been heard of by the firm – no new orders put in, or payments made – since the end of June this year. The fact that they’ve had no recent transactions with Jayne Edwards doesn’t mean that any one of them has been murdered, of course, but it’s a possible lead. There are thirty of them, nationwide. But what is particularly interesting is that two of them live in Yarchester, and they bought their dresses through Angela Arrowsmith’s agency.’
‘There you are, then, Martin,’ said Quantrill, as proud of his new sergeant as if he’d invented her. ‘That gives us the kind of break we’ve been hoping for. Hilary’s done a sound job, and it’s a great pity she’s too busy to follow it through herself. Still,’ he added, preparing to bite with enjoyment into his juicy pie, ‘we know you’ll be able to wrap it up with your usual efficiency –’
Tait was annoyed. The case of the headless corpse had suddenly lost all interest for him. Following up a list of mail-order agents and interviewing their customers hardly provided a challenge for an inspector from the regional crime squad. It would be much more appropriate if Hilary went round interviewing the women, while he put his mind to the Angela Arrowsmith case. He’d have said so – except that he was no longer a member of Breckham Market CID, and therefore had no say in the matter.
‘You’ve dropped blackcurrant juice on your shirt cuff,’ he pointed out unkindly to the Chief Inspector. He was amused to see that Quantrill’s instant reaction was to glance in embarrassment at Hilary, before mopping his light checked cuff with his white linen handkerchief. ‘Mrs Quantrill won’t like that,’ Tait added. ‘The stains, I mean …’
Hilary took a deep interest in her in-tray. Douglas Quantrill glared at the younger man, knowing perfectly well what he meant. Never missed a thing, blast his sharp blue eyes …
‘Your wife’s well, I hope?’ continued Tait, his humour restored. ‘Do give her my regards. And how’s Alison? I hope she’s coming up from London for the Chief Super’s wedding – please tell her I’m looking forward to seeing her again.’
Quantrill was damned if he’d do anything of the kind. He knew that Martin Tait had, a year ago, been in ardent pursuit of his younger daughter. He had never discovered what had gone on
between them, but he was fairly sure that Alison had not welcomed Tait’s attentions.
‘She may not be able to come,’ he said. ‘She has a very busy social life in London, you know.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Just time for a quick one before we go back on the job. Get your coat, Hilary. Inspector Tait is looking forward to buying us both a drink at the Coney.’
Chapter Sixteen
The Coney and Thistle, an ancient half-timbered building that stood on the corner of Breckham marketplace just opposite the great flint tower of St Botolph’s church, was the Chief Inspector’s favourite pub. This was Hilary’s first visit, and she understood at once why he preferred it.
The Coney was not unlike Quantrill himself, solid, unpretentious, essentially English and not entirely up to date. There was no piped music, no electronic pinging and burbling from space-invader machines. And yet it held some interesting surprises, as Hilary discovered when they went to the bar. The beer was predictably a Suffolk brew, but the lager was best draught Danish, and German and French wines were available by the glass.
When Tait had bought their drinks, Quantrill led the way up two worn stone steps and into the heavily beamed snug. At this time in the evening, it was empty; here, at a table in a corner formed by two high-backed settles, they could talk without being overheard.
They discussed their plans for the evening. Quantrill and Hilary intended first to return to the scene of Angela Arrow-smith’s death. They had set up that morning an almost exact reconstruction of the murder enquiry scene in June, with a mobile information room parked in the layby, and road blocks out on the A135. Now they needed to review the situation with the sergeant in charge of the information room, and with Inspector Colman, the scene-of-crime officer.
Blood on the Happy Highway Page 13