The Maggie Bainbridge Box Set

by Rob Wyllie

Jimmy nodded. 'Aye, I know she was very secretive about it. All she said to me was pillow talk. Do you have any idea what she meant by that?’

  'It was to do with Belinda Milner. Liz had found out that she had been having an affair, and she thinks that's maybe how the news about the mine's problems leaked out.'

  'Pillow talk? Aye, now that makes sense. And this affair, how much did she know about it? Did she know who Belinda was having an affair with?'

  She shook her head. 'That was the last thing she was working on. She guessed that her husband must have found out and maybe that's why she had killed herself. She'd arranged a meeting with him and I think that's what she meant when she said she was just waiting for a few things to fall into place.'

  'Do you know where they live? The Milner family I mean.'

  'Yes, over near Wastwater. I know where it is, but I don't have a phone number or email or anything.'

  'Of course, it's on the lake isn't it? Where she drowned. Liz told me about it.'

  Ruthie nodded. 'Yes it is. Wasdale House. It's up for sale. It must be terrible for them, looking out and remembering what happened.'

  He glanced at his watch. Just past three o clock. He knew vaguely where it was, over on the western side of the National Park, sitting in the shadow of mighty Scafell Pike. Quite a trek from where they were, an hour and a half's drive at least. And Ruthie was in no fit state to drive him. But if he knew one thing, it was that Belinda Milner was the reason Liz Donahue was murdered. So he had get in front of her husband, and there was no time to lose. He ran out into the yard where he found Helen loading bags of feed into the back of an all-terrain pick-up. He gestured towards the Subaru.

  'I know it's a lot to ask Helen, but can I borrow your car?'

  ◆◆◆

  Wasdale House was notable enough to get itself named on the Ordinance Survey map. According to his copy, it was tucked away between the narrow road and the lakeside, on a little peninsular that jutted out just where the Nether Beck tumbled into the lake. The journey had taken nearly two hours, the distance clocking up at fifty-three miles. He knew you couldn't get anywhere fast in this neck of the woods, but even still it had been a slow and tedious drive, the unforecast rain conspiring to negate the beauty of the landscape through which he'd passed.

  It was now pitch black, and he was lucky that his headlights picked out the For Sale sign as he rounded a narrow bend. And then a red board that had been pinned below it. Sold. He hoped the family hadn't already upped and gone. Finding the entrance gates open, he swung the Subaru into the driveway, crunching over the gravel and pulling up at the front of the house, alongside a gunmetal Range Rover. Promising. His entrance triggered a trio of bright security lights, and he could see that the place was stunning, constructed in a honey sandstone under a red pantile roof with decorative leaded-glass windows. He was no student of architecture, but he guessed it was late Victorian or early twentieth century, probably built by some industrialist from the North-West who had made his money in the cotton trade or in shipping. He got out the car and wandered across to the entrance. The solid oak front door, sheltered beneath an arched porch, was equipped with a sturdy brass knocker. He gave it two sharp raps then waited. Nothing. After a minute or so, he tried again, but still there was no response.

  'Mr Milner?' He thrust his hands in his pockets and walked to the side of the house, where he had spotted a gate in the white picket fence, presumably leading into the garden. He released the latch and went through, closing it behind him.

  'Mr Milner?'

  The garden sloped away to the lakeside, about a hundred and fifty feet away, barely visible under a watery moon. It was here just a few weeks earlier where Belinda Milner had decided to end it all and as he surveyed the scene, he found himself wondering how any human being could take that ultimate step. How deep did the depth of despair have to be and what if anything could drive you to it? In the darkness, he could just about pick out the shadowy outline of a man standing by the lakeside. The man who might be able to explain it.

  'Mr Milner?'

  The man spun round but didn't move, as if he was unsure how to react to this unexpected visitor. And then he made up his mind.

  'Who the hell are you?' he shouted, with unmasked aggression. 'Get off my property or I'll call the police.' It wasn't an unreasonable reaction but Jimmy hadn't come all this way to be disappointed.

  'I'm not here to cause any trouble, Mr Milner.' As he got closer, Jimmy recognised the pain and loss etched on his face, the same pain and loss as he had seen on Ruthie only two hours earlier. 'I think you'll find we're on the same side. But it's your call, naturally. A minute, that's all I need to explain what I need from you, and if you can't help, or don't want to, then that's ok, and of course I'll leave you in peace.' He realised he'd not actually answered Milner's question and it wasn't an easy one to answer. Just who the hell was he, and why was he here? Nominally, he was working for Hugo Morgan, but the matter had gone way beyond that. Now he was looking for justice for Liz Donahue, and by extension, maybe for Belinda Milner too. He decided that honesty was the best policy.

  'My friend Liz Donahue died under the wheels of a train two days ago. I think she was murdered and I think the reason was connected in some way to your wife. And to Greenway Mining.'

  'What are you, a policeman?'

  'No, I'm not the police. I'm a private investigator, but I'm working in a personal capacity. As I said, Liz was a friend and I'm anxious to find out what happened to her.'

  The man held out his hand, his aggression disappearing as quickly as it had arrived. 'I'm Rod. Rod Milner.'

  Jimmy shook it warmly. 'Jimmy. Jimmy Stewart. Good to meet you Rod.'

  'Come inside,' Milner said. 'I could do with a drink, what about you?'

  Jimmy shot him a smile. 'Sure, I don't like to see a man drink on his own.'

  'I've done a lot of that in the last few weeks believe me. It's only April that's stopped me following my wife into the lake to be honest. She's my daughter. Off with her grandparents at the moment whilst I sort out the house.'

  They went into the house through a back door which led to a small room that Jimmy imagined was called a boot room or something similar, then onwards to the kitchen. It had the same farmhouse feel as Helen's, but a lot grander, as if it had stepped out of the pages of an upmarket homes and gardens magazine. Which it probably had.

  'Malt?' Milner asked. 'I seem to keep a bottle in every room these days. This one's hiding in the wine rack.' He slipped it out of its receptacle and placed it on the large oak kitchen table.

  'Brilliant,' Jimmy said. 'Can't ever go wrong with a nice single malt can you?'

  Gesturing towards the table, Milner said. 'Please, take a seat.' He took a couple of glasses from a cupboard and poured a generous measure into each. Jimmy took his and lifted it in silent toast.

  'Cheers Rod. So just for some background, I work for a wee investigations firm and we were originally engaged by Hugo Morgan to find out who was behind the Justice for Greenway stuff. He was getting some harassment from them and I know Belinda was a target too.'

  He nodded. 'Yes, it was quite disturbing and of course it upset Belinda a lot. They vandalised our Range Rover and there were some nasty threatening letters posted through our door. Your friend Donahue wrote all about it in that paper she worked for.'

  'I'm sorry to ask,' Jimmy said, 'but do you think it contributed to Belinda... to her taking her own life?'

  He dropped his head, staring at the table, saying nothing. For a moment Jimmy wondered if he had heard him, until Milner, his voice barely a whisper, said, 'It wasn't that.'

  'Sorry?'

  'I said it wasn't that.' Jimmy saw that his hand was shaking as he drained his glass and reached over to refill it.

  'I can understand how hard this must be for you Rod. You know, I can come back another time if it's any easier.' That was the last thing he wanted to do, but he knew from his army days that when you were dealing with someone who had suffered a
great trauma, you were walking on eggshells.

  'I guess it must have been hard for her,' he said. 'All the problems with the mine and everything.'

  Milner gave a bitter laugh. 'You think? She didn't give a shit about that actually. Teflon Milner, that's what the Financial Times called her. Nothing ever stuck on her.' For the first time, Jimmy wondered about the state of the Milner marriage. He wasn't faking his distress over her death, of that he was sure, but there was something else going on between them, definitely. And then out of the blue, he told him what it was.

  'She was having an affair.'

  Pillow talk. Now it was all beginning to make sense.

  Milner threw back his whisky and for the third time reached across for the bottle. Jimmy adopted what he thought was a sympathetic look, but said nothing, content for the story to unfurl at its own speed.

  'She had a string of the bloody things of course. Non-executive directorships I mean. It always made me laugh, because she knew bugger all about any of them. That never stopped her of course. You see, it helped these big companies tick the box for gender diversity on their boards. She was a very attractive woman and she always looked good in the annual report.'

  Jimmy nodded. 'Aye, I understand what you're saying.'

  'Of course, the job up here with Greenway should have been enough for anyone, and god knows it needed a CEO who could give it their full attention. But they needed someone with a City reputation to raise the finance so they were prepared to accept that she knew two thirds of shit-all about mining.'

  Again Jimmy nodded, but said nothing.

  'But she started being away almost every week, getting an afternoon train down to London and not coming back to late the following evening. At first, I thought nothing of it, until one evening we were sitting at home when she got a message alert on her phone, which was lying on the coffee table. Absent-mindedly I stretched over to pick it up but she got there before me and snatched it away. That's what made me suspicious.'

  Jimmy knew what that felt like. Except it had been him who had been the cheater, and he'd regretted it every day since. But now wasn't the time to dredge all that back up again. Instead he gave what he hoped was an understanding smile.

  'So I followed her one day,' Milner said. 'Pathetic really. I got on the same train, then followed her out of Euston, down Southampton Row. When I saw the route she was taking, I knew exactly where she was going of course. I saw her go into their offices, and then hung around for over two hours, just waiting. As I said, pathetic.'

  'It's not pathetic,' Jimmy said. 'I'd have done exactly the same thing in your situation.'

  'And then I saw them come out. They weren't holding hands or anything like that but I knew. You can tell can't you, just looking at a couple. The body language just gives it away. It made me sick to see it, even although I already knew in my gut she was cheating on me. You see, when I saw them together, I knew then this wasn't some cheap affair, it was so much more than that. I knew at that point that my marriage was over.'

  Jimmy gave him a puzzled look. 'Why do you say that? What was so special about this man?'

  'Special?' Milner said bitterly. 'He was half her age. That was what was so bloody special about him.'

  ◆◆◆

  And then it all came out, and with each revelation, another piece in the jigsaw fell into place. The affair had started at one of these organisations where Belinda was a non-executive director. Alexia Life. A place that Jimmy remembered Frank mentioning in connection with his Aphrodite investigation. The other man was young with stand-out good looks, causing his wife to quite lose her head. They'd tried to keep it a secret but someone had been watching and saw the signs. Then reported it to the trustees whom, after a cursory investigation, had asked the other man to leave. Two days later, he threw himself under the wheels of an underground train. Not long after Belinda Milner, consumed with guilt and heartache, took her last swim, following her lover to the grave.

  Pillow talk. It was odds on that Milner would have shared the troubles of the Greenway Mine with her young lover, as certain as it was that he would have shared that secret with those that were employing him for just that purpose.

  The same secret that Liz Donahue had uncovered, and that led to her death. The question was, who knew, and who cared enough to have her killed?

  Chapter 24

  Frank had been down the canteen grabbing a bacon roll when his brother had called with news that had caused him to pump his fists and shout Yes at the top of his voice. Because now that he knew all about Belinda Milner and Luke Brown, everything was falling nicely into place. The only problem was, he didn't have a shred of credible evidence. That didn't mean that there wouldn't be any evidence, it was just that with the death of the two interns having been officially classified as suicides, nobody had been looking very hard.

  Now, he nearly had the ammunition to change that. Just one more wee task to complete and then he'd be able to get in front of DCI Jill Smart, and it wouldn't take more than five minutes to persuade her to open a murder enquiry. Instead of just him and Frenchie, there'd be a team of fifty or more, with boots on the ground, and profilers and forensics and analysts, the lot. Soon they'd be swarming all over the CCTV and interviewing everybody who knew them and eventually something would come out. But first, a wee trip up to Oxford.

  ◆◆◆

  It had been Frenchie's idea to go in hard, giving it the full works as he called it, with the objective of scaring the living shit out of her, and so maximising the chances of a confession if one was to be had. Frank, though harbouring reservations that centred mainly around the amount of paperwork that would be needed to authorise the operation, had decided to go along with it. Aided and abetted by the fact that Ronnie had a mate in the Thames Valley armed response squad who told him they hadn't mounted a raid for over fifteen months and accordingly were itching for some action. But what had clinched it was that the Thames Valley lads had agreed to fill out the paperwork themselves. Result.

  The commander of the squad, an over-promoted fast-track graduate on his first live op, was nervously talking into his walkie-talkie. 'Red squad in place, red squad in place. Confirm please. Over.'

  Having evidently received satisfactory acknowledgement, he strode over to Frank, who was leaning against his car, chewing gum and appearing totally relaxed.

  'So you're sure there's not going to be any shooting then Inspector?' the commander asked.

  'No,' Frank said, shaking his head. 'It's not the bloody mafia, they're only a wee employment agency. That's why it said no guns on the form. We're just here because we don't want anyone trying to destroy evidence and folks always take it more seriously when we come dressed for the part.'

  It was quarter to eight in the morning, and the staff of the Oxbridge Agency were now arriving in dribs and drabs for their day's work. Frank had stationed his small raiding party round a corner and out of sight, eight brawny coppers in full riot gear squeezed into the back of an unmarked white Transit. Ronnie French had been assigned to loiter in the car park at the front of the building and give the signal when Sophie Fitzwilliam arrived.

  She had recognised him immediately as she swept her Range Rover into her designated parking space a few yards from the front door, giving him a puzzled look that was mixed with haughty disgust. He shot her a lewd smile then drawled a few words into his radio.

  Around the corner, the commander roared his response, simultaneously banging on the side of the van, then rushed round to the back to open the doors. 'Right guys, go!' The raiding party poured out into the street and followed him through the car park at pace. Altogether more languidly, Frank spat out his chewing gum and strolled around to join them. Fitzwilliam had reached her office's reception area when the squad flooded in.

  'Right, nobody move,' the commander barked. 'Spread out guys and make sure everyone knows not to touch anything. Anybody goes near a keyboard, you grab them, got it?' A few seconds later Frank wandered in, smiling.

&nb
sp; 'Morning Mrs Fitzwilliam,' he said amicably, 'Maybe we can have a wee word in your office please?' It wasn't hard to tell she was angry, her eyes burning and an almost demented expression on her face. But behind it all, Frank detected fear.

  'What the hell is this?' she screamed, 'You'll pay for this, believe me you will.'

  'Now now, let's just calm down shall we? Your office please.' He took her arm and with some force, led her through, glancing over his shoulder and indicating to French that he should join them.

  'You remember my colleague Detective Constable French I'm guessing. He interviewed you a few days ago about Chardonnay Clarke. When you denied that your firm had any involvement in the large salary she was being paid. I'm guessing you remember that conversation, don't you?'

  She wore a defiant expression, but then they all did that when they'd been found out. Now it would be interesting to see if she tried to deny it. Generally they all did that as well, a natural reaction but practical too, because maybe the police might just be bluffing, or might not have any hard evidence.

  'I remember,' she said, her composure beginning to return. 'A ludicrous accusation, and I'm sure you don't have a shred of proof.'

  Frank smiled to himself. That was always the dead giveaway. First deny it, then ask to see the evidence. Hedge your bets. But before he could answer, the commander stuck his head round the door.

  'Place is all secure now Inspector. And we've found a bank of filing cabinets in the basement. That's all secure too.'

  'Good boy,' Frank said, smiling when he saw French stifling a laugh. 'Now Mrs Fitzwilliam, I have a warrant here that allows me to take away and examine all your financial records, but I'm hoping we won't have to go to all that trouble. You see, we know all about Semaphore Trust, your subsidiary company.'

  She looked at him sharply. Admit it or deny it, he could see she was weighing up which path to take. So he decided to help her with her dilemma. He took a sheet of paper from an inside pocket, unfolded it and began to read aloud.