The Case Has Altered

by Martha Grimes

29

  Chief Inspector Bannen, would you kindly tell the court what you found when you arrived at the scene—” Here, Oliver Stant turned to a segment of a blowup of the Wash and another of that section where Verna Dunn’s body was found.

  The air outside Lincoln Castle where the court convened had the softness of a near-spring day, which contrasted with the building’s bleak and cold interior. The place took its emotional coloring from the tensions, frustrations, sadness of the beleaguered whose business was conducted there. Melrose had begun to feel a sadness emanating from the corridors as soon as he’d walked in.

  Bannen nodded. “We found the body of a woman lying in the saltings in that part of the Wash called ‘Fosdyke Wash.’ It’s the area nearest the village of Fosdyke. The ‘Wash’—as it’s commonly known—is a shallow bay on the Lincolnshire and Norfolk coastline. Technically, a ‘wash’ is the area between water and bank which permits an inrushing of water, and in this way prevents flooding, or tries to. The body was found on the sand, lying facedown in a small pool of water. She’d been shot in the chest.”

  “The weapon was—?”

  “A rifle, twenty-two caliber.”

  “And you deduced the victim, Verna Dunn, had got there—?”

  “By car, her own car, a Porsche. We found tread marks up beyond the seawall, back some distance. The killer left the body there and then, presumably, drove the car back to Fengate. At least”—Bannen hastened to add before Apted was fully on his feet—“that same car was seen back at the bottom of the drive around twelve-thirty. It had been moved, according to the gardener, moved, that is, from its original position.”

  “And would it have been possible to make this trip, murder the victim, return to Fengate within, say, fifty minutes?”

  “Yes.”

  “An unlikely place to choose for murder, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yes. That’s what makes me wonder—”

  Oliver Stant was quick to cut this line off. “Could one explanation be that—?”

  Pete Apted got to his feet: “We’d prefer to hear any explanation come from the witness alone, Your Honor, rather than from the prosecution.”

  His Lordship agreed.

  Stant put the statement as a question. “Why might this place have been chosen?”

  “I’d say because of the tides and the shifting sands. The tide would certainly have carried the body out to sea, or the sands prevented its ever being discovered. Neither happened.”

  “Now, the defendant has claimed that after leaving Verna Dunn outside in the drive, she took the public footpath which runs past Fengate to a pub called the Case Has Altered.”

  Bannen nodded. Anticipating the next question, he said: “The pub is somewhat under a mile from Fengate, about seventh-eighths of a mile.”

  “The defendant claimed that, in order to ‘walk off her anger,’ she took the footpath, intending to stop in at the pub. Would you consider that reasonable?”

  Bannen permitted himself a ghost of a smile. “It’s not totally unreasonable. The hour was late, though, and the pub would have been closing before she got to it.”

  “You say the Case Has Altered is approximately a mile—”

  “A little less, seven-eighths,” said Bannen with a trace of impatience. Hadn’t he been exact?

  Oliver Stant nodded. “Now, could you tell us how far the Wash is from Fengate?”

  “Perhaps three miles.”

  The prosecutor continued: “Mr. Bannen, had Jennifer Kennington ever walked this public footpath before?”

  “Oh, yes. Twice, I believe she said, with the Owens. The second time had been that very afternoon. After lunch, she—Lady Kennington, that is—told me. The Owens confirmed this.”

  “So the defendant knew how far it was and how much time it would take to get there?”

  “Presumably. As to time, that is. Walking at a not-too-energetic pace, twenty minutes, or so. It’s impossible to gauge with any precision how long it would take a certain person to walk it.”

  Melrose listened as Bannen recounted the events of that night, a methodical retelling of the actions undertaken by police. An ideal witness. Calm, methodical, unimpressed by his surroundings or himself. Melrose had an idea that the only thing that did impress Bannen was the moment when he came upon the truth of a matter. Something told Melrose that the chief inspector, in this case, wasn’t certain he had stumbled upon it yet. Melrose turned his attention to Jenny, seated in the dock. He felt an absence, her absence. She was there but not there. As if she had come and gone, said hello and good-bye all in an instant.

  “—so that time it took to walk to the pub and back would have been only a little less than the amount of time it would take to drive to the Wash and return to Fengate. And, in between, to shoot the victim.”

  “Yes.”

  “Mr. Bannen, what particular circumstances led you to charge Jennifer Kennington with this crime?” Here, Oliver Stant turned, rather dramatically, to look at Jenny.

  “Well, of course the evidence isn’t conclusive—”

  Apted rose quickly. “Isn’t material, don’t you mean?”

  This time the judge was sincerely aggrieved and Oliver Stant made the most of Apted’s interruption. Bannen, however, smiled and answered the charge. “Inconclusive evidence is almost necessarily not material. It’s circumstantial. I didn’t think I needed to say that the circumstantial evidence is inconclusive. That’s a bit redundant.”

  Melrose’s heart sank. Bannen was as cool a customer as Apted.

  “Continue, please,” said Stant.

  “Jennifer Kennington had opportunity, had motive—the only one with motive, insofar as we know—and was the last person we know of to see Verna Dunn alive, and witnesses—the Owens—can tell us they were having quite a heated quarrel. I felt this sufficient evidence to charge the defendant with Verna Dunn’s murder.”

  “Now, Chief Inspector: since Mr. Apted has raised this point, perhaps we can address it: the matter of ‘circumstantial’ evidence and its dependability. What is it that circumstantial evidence neglects to provide? What does it fail to bring forth?”

  “It doesn’t provide for an eyewitness.”

  “Roughly, what percentage of your murder cases do involve an eyewitness?”

  Bannen gave this some thought and said, “Seventy percent perhaps.”

  This wasn’t the answer Stant wanted, or expected. Here was a classic example of what might happen if you didn’t know the answer to a question you’d asked. “But, of course, not all seventy percent of those cases are comparable to the case to hand?”

  “That’s correct, as most murders are not planned out. You’ve got your armed robberies in which the perpetrators planned the robbery, but not the murder of some bystander; you’ve got your crimes of passion; you’ve got your domestic violence cases. All of these make up most of the murders I have to deal with. They’re witnessed, or if not that, the perpetrator is still on the scene—husband, say, who’s just finished off the argument with his wife by means of a bullet or a knife. He’s there, sobbing his heart out. But the premeditated, planned killing is, by comparison, relatively rare. I’m omitting, obviously, terrorism and political murder.”

  “Let me rephrase this, if you don’t mind, just so that we all understand: this particular murder is not characteristic of that large percentage of murder cases you’ve been involved in.”

  “That’s right.”

  Stant then asked a number of incidental questions to prepare the ground for Jenny’s having withheld the fact of her early painful relationship with Verna Dunn. This was perhaps as incriminating as the establishment of opportunity and motive (neither of which was entirely certain). In the course of this questioning, Jenny’s telling Jury about the relationship came up. “Didn’t you feel that Superintendent Jury was withholding evidence?”

  “No. Mr. Jury wasn’t officially on this case. He was under no—”

  Quickly, Stant interrupted, not wanting Bannen’s lack of p
rofessional jealousy (which Stant was hoping for) to make a point with the jury. “Yes, of course. In time, though, you did discover the relationship between the defendant and the deceased, Verna Dunn?”

  “Well, it wasn’t at all difficult. A simple inquiry into Lady Kennington’s background turned up the fact they were cousins.”

  Here a rash of whispers broke out in the courtroom. The judge demanded silence.

  “Were you surprised to discover this, Chief Inspector?”

  “Why, naturally. She’d made no mention of it. To anyone, apparently, except later, to Mr. Jury.”

  “Then Max Owen, when he was married to Verna Dunn, didn’t know of her relationship to Jennifer Kennington—”

  Apted was on his feet again. “Objection, Your Honor. There is no way the witness can know what Max Owen knew.”

  The judge agreed.

  Stant said, “I’m trying to get at the fact that the defendant made no mention of the relationship, nor even of knowing Ms. Dunn, even though this was the first occasion for their meeting in a dozen years.”

  Although Apted gave the impression of lazily rising, he was up in a second. “Is there a question buried in this somewhere?”

  The judge instructed Oliver Stant to get to it.

  “Wasn’t there a long history of enmity—?” Again he was interrupted by Apted’s calling “Hearsay.”

  The point, however, was made: Jenny had kept the relationship, acrimonious at least, a deep secret.

  “This enmity you took to make up a large part of her motive? Fired perhaps by the argument that night—”

  From his seat, Apted said, “I prefer that the conclusion be reached by the chief inspector himself, Your Honor, rather than the prosecution.”

  The judge turned to Oliver Stant. “Mr. Stant, if you wish to ask a question, ask it. If you wish to hear the witness’s conclusion, don’t give it yourself. That at least I should think a rather obvious point.” The judge shook his head and returned to his note-taking. Wayward boys. No sense at all.

  “Would you kindly tell the court what you concluded from the defendant’s secretiveness?”

  “I took all of this to mean that the defendant had a motive.”

  “A motive for murder?”

  Bannen did not answer immediately. When he did, Stant was less than happy. “For something, certainly.”

  To cover his disappointment in the weakening of his point, Stant said, “It’s quite all right for you to reach a conclusion by yourself, Chief Inspector.” He smiled widely to indicate that was the only reason for the answer.

  Bannen wanted to say something: “But I—”

  “Chief Inspector, we greatly appreciate the honesty and fairness of your testimony. That will be all, and thank you very much.”

  Pleased with his recovery of the point about motive, Stant sat down, laced his hands behind his head.

  • • •

  Let me ask you this, Chief Inspector,” said Pete Apted. “In the two weeks following the first murder, Jennifer Kennington was in Stratford. Isn’t that so?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Why was it that you didn’t simply arrest her following the Verna Dunn murder? Why did you permit her to go home?”

  “We couldn’t detain her for more than twenty-four hours.”

  “But you did indeed detain her for forty-eight hours, didn’t you?”

  “Yes. We got the magistrate’s permission to do that.”

  “Then why not for longer than that? Another twenty-four hours.”

  “We couldn’t get permission for that.”

  “Why?”

  Bannen hesitated. He had no choice but to say it: “Lack of evidence.”

  “You had nothing with which to charge her, isn’t that right?”

  “Subsequently, we—”

  “Thank you, Chief Inspector.”

  • • •

  Grace Owen was asked few questions by Oliver Stant, who relied on her only to confirm his previous point about Jenny Kennington’s “secretiveness.” Grace had not, she said, had any notion of their relationship. Oliver Stant handed her over to Pete Apted.

  Apted rose and smiled. “Mrs. Owen, you were in the living room with the others on the night of February first?”

  “Yes. I was.”

  “You’ve told us that you and your guests left the table and went into the living room at about ten. In what order did your guests leave, after that?”

  “Well, of course, the first ones were Jennifer Kennington and Verna Dunn. Then, at about ten-fifteen or twenty, Jack—Jack Price—who went out to his studio; after him, Major Parker at eleven.”

  “Mr. Price went to his studio, you say?”

  “Yes. It’s really a converted barn; it’s his living quarters, really. He needs a lot of room for—”

  Apted did not precisely choke off her words with his upheld hand, but the gesture did stop what might have been more than he wanted to hear. “Thank you. And Major Parker left at eleven. Did anyone else leave?”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “You’ve said that the defendant and Verna Dunn, neither by words nor actions before or during dinner, suggested that they were having a dispute. By the same token did they do or say anything that would tell you of their former association?”

  “No, no. Nothing.”

  “You were then extremely surprised when you learned of it?”

  “Very surprised, yes.”

  “Mrs. Owen, didn’t you resent your husband’s first wife being present?”

  “No. Actually, I was the one who suggested he invite Verna.”

  “You were?” Apted said it as if he hadn’t heard of this invitation. “But—why?” He shrugged and looked round the room as if he were baffled.

  “Because I thought it would be convenient for Max—for my husband—as he had business dealings with her and things to talk about. Verna lives—lived—in London, and Max has to go so often to London on business . . . ” Her voice trailed away as if she had started a statement she didn’t know how to finish.

  “What sort of business dealings did he have with Verna Dunn?”

  She hesitated. “Verna was interested in a new play in which she was to appear. The producers needed financial backers. Max was interested in putting money in it. An investment.” Her tempo picked up; her fingers gripped the railing of the box. “You should understand that my husband and Verna Dunn had an amicable divorce.”

  It sounded to Melrose as if the taste of pennies must have flooded her mouth with this remark.

  Pete Apted’s smile suggested he shared Melrose’s belief. “Is there such a thing?”

  Stant was on his feet before the question was out. “Is this question being put to the witness or to the world at large, Your Honor?”

  The judge looked down over the tops of his narrow glasses. “Frankly, I fail to see where this is leading, Mr. Apted.”

  “If you’ll bear with me a moment longer,” said Apted. “Mr. Price was the next to leave, is that right?”

  Grace said, “Yes. He said he was going to bed.”

  “I believe you testified that you saw him taking the path at the rear that leads to this studio.” When she said yes to this, Apted asked, “But there are no windows in the living room that face out over the rear garden. So, how did you see him?”

  She hesitated, looked surprised. “It must have been out of the upstairs window, then, in my room.”

  “So you yourself also left, did you not?”

  “But—well, yes. But it was only for a moment. And I didn’t really leave, not in that sense—”

  Apted said cheerily, “In what sense, then, did you ‘leave’?”

  “I only meant—I didn’t leave the house. I dashed upstairs to find a wrap. It was chilly in the living room.”

  “I see. Tell me, Mrs. Owen, when did they discuss this play?”

  “Wha—?”

  “Your husband and Verna Dunn.”

  She looked perfectly blank. />
  “When did they have these talks?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You said you invited the deceased because it would enable your husband to talk with her so that he wouldn’t have to go up to London, although he made frequent trips there. I just wondered when all of this talk took place.”

  “I—”

  Melrose saw that she was clearly flustered and he wondered why.

  “Yes, Mrs. Owen?” Apted prompted, smiling.

  “I don’t know.”

  “There’d have been little opportunity for them to talk, as they were, either one or the other of them, entirely in your company, or others’. If that was the only reason for asking her to Fengate, why did no opportunity arise?”

  Again, Grace said nothing, and into this silence Apted asked, “Could you have had another reason for inviting Verna Dunn?”

  Grace looked completely bewildered. Her confused denial made no difference; the question itself was enough to plant doubt in the jurors’ minds about the investigation.

  “Mrs. Owen, I’d like to go back some years to another incident and I apologize in advance for bringing up this painful subject—”

  She flinched. She already knew what the subject was.

  “—of your son’s death. Would you be kind enough to tell the court what happened at Fengate on that particular day?”

  Oliver Stant was on his feet. “Objection: I see no relevance—”

  “Your Honor, it is relevant insofar as concerns motive.” The judge allowed him a little leeway, and Apted turned again to Grace.

  Obviously, she did not want to talk about Toby. Melrose felt a great sympathy for her as she haltingly described the accident that had occurred. “Toby—that’s my son—liked to ride, and he was riding on a bridle path not far from our home. He’d promised me not to try anything foolish—hazardous, I mean—like galloping the horse on uncertain ground—the thing was, Toby was a hemophiliac, and he had to be very careful. Well . . . he wasn’t careful enough that day; the horse stumbled and threw him. It wasn’t the sort of accident that would be serious for others, but for Toby—” She looked down at the hands gripping the ledge of the witness box. She didn’t finish the sentence.

  “How old was he at the time of this accident?”