by Amy Myers
‘Would Liz have wanted to rescue Toby if he had murdered Fanny?’
Georgia snorted. ‘She’d have run screaming in the opposite direction.’
‘It’s happened. Look at briefs who marry their clients in prison.’
Georgia considered this. ‘Accepted.’
‘Let us therefore attack Mr Beamish with gusto . . . where did that word come from, I wonder?’
‘From Latin, and no sidetracks please,’ she commanded. ‘Why would Toby want to murder Fanny Star?’
‘I have a theory,’ Peter said helpfully. ‘What about you?’
Georgia hesitated. ‘Because he slept with her seven years earlier or something else happened between them and he was afraid the story would come out. He was married to Liz by that time.’
‘Weak. In fact, as wobbly as a jelly in a heatwave.’
‘I withdraw it – no, I don’t.’
Peter looked at her expectantly.
‘Remember that song Toby wanted played during the Lady Rosamund re-enactment?’ she asked. ‘It was “The Banks of Allan Water” again.’
‘What of it?’
Georgia ran through the words in her mind. ‘Henry might be the miller in the song,’ she said, ‘but Toby could have been the soldier. He was in the army, or was about to be.’
‘Explain.’
‘The lyrics run, “For his bride a soldier sought her, And a winning tongue had he . . .”. And later: “For the summer grief had brought her, And the soldier false was he”.’
Peter looked at her. ‘You want my opinion, Georgia?’ He didn’t wait for the answer. ‘Neat, but hardly proof.’
‘Even though the same song was quoted on the memorial stone,’ she said obstinately, ‘to which they all subscribed?’
‘Coincidence. Though you might have hit on something by chance.’
‘Thank you,’ she murmured.
‘From all our excursions to Friday Street I have concluded that we still haven’t penetrated that inner core, and that’s Tom. Something still links Toby, Oliver and Michael.’
‘And Josh?’
‘He might be suspect, but he’s on the perimeter, not inside. I put Josh on the side of the angels.’
‘Is that wise?’
‘I think so. The cabal of Tom would be too strong otherwise. Any villainy by Josh would have been made public long ago. No, our secret lies within Tom. Suppose—’
‘That word is supposed to be banned in reconstructions.’
‘I can’t help that,’ Peter said impatiently. ‘Rules can be broken in the interests of the end. Let’s look at the rape from the point of view of Tom. We have a cabal that for some reason scares Fanny, even with Oliver as the middle O. Henry Ludd is already very fond of Fanny, and that, even if Michael didn’t know of their closer relationship, might have given him and even Oliver every reason to dislike Fanny. Suppose “Tom” drew lots to teach her a lesson?’
‘Are you implying a gang rape?’ Georgia was aghast. She couldn’t get her mind round the possibility. The past didn’t always remain tucked away and objective. Sometimes it came up and shook you by the shoulders, throwing you right back there with it, away from the comfort of the present day. Yesterday’s problems were today’s problems, only distanced by time. If Peter was right, no wonder there was unfinished business in Friday Street; no wonder the fingerprints of time had left their mark on Downey Hall.
‘I’m merely setting up a thesis for examination,’ Peter said patiently.
Instinct told her it was wrong, but she at least would play by the rules.
‘Suppose Fanny had the dagger with her,’ Peter began.
That was a googly, and it stopped her in her tracks. ‘Why on earth would she?’
Peter looked complacent. ‘I thought that would shake you. Think about this. Fanny is a lady who has scores to settle with Tom, for whatever reason, and what happened during the day made her decide it was time for action either against Michael or Toby. We’ll leave Oliver out of it for the moment. She’s drunk, grabs the dagger and, knowing she will shortly be with her enemy, is ready to take revenge. Only Toby’s too strong for her.’
Georgia had a vision of those powerful hands chopping trees in the grounds. A soldier’s hands. ‘Hang on,’ she said slowly. ‘That could apply to Michael, if we disregard Henry’s statements, not just Toby. You’ve no proof about either of them, apart from the fact that they scared her. For heavens’ sake, Toby would scare me if I met him in the twilight in the middle of a remote copse of bushes. Moreover, the rape,’ she added, ‘was a family thing – Michael, in other words. Or are you suggesting she deliberately didn’t mention Toby was involved too? If so, why?’
‘I return to where I began. As yet we haven’t reached Tom’s heart.’
‘In that case, my lord, I request an acquittal for the suspect.’
‘Alice Winters didn’t.’
Once more she’d been caught asleep at the switch. If Peter’s outrageous thesis was correct, only the evidence in Alice’s hands could still implicate Tom.
‘Alice decides to make money out of the evidence Brian had collected,’ she said. ‘At eighteen it might have seemed halfway between a bit of a giggle and a bold, bad adventure. She talks to Powell, who duly turns up in Friday Street, and she also— Oh!’
‘Yes, oh,’ Peter said tartly. ‘I believe it was agreed I was in the hot seat, not you. You have neatly jumped into the heffalump pit with great aplomb. Whom does she arrange to talk to? We have to assume Brian had some evidence against Toby and/or Michael, just possibly Josh, and that one of them arranges to meet Alice in the tower. The most likely is obviously Toby. There are discrepancies between what he told the police and what Powell did. So let’s sort him out.’
‘He would know Jake could arrive at any moment,’ Georgia objected.
‘Please let me continue.’ Peter was in lofty mood.
The great brain at work, she thought crossly. This was the disadvantage of being the challenger. One had to wait for one’s opportunity and at this stage she didn’t want to wait.
‘Toby had to take time out of the tour,’ Peter continued, ‘and there is a gap of half an hour in his movements, time to walk to the tower and more if he took the car.’
‘Cadenza would hear the engine.’
‘Cadenza was taking the tour, and whatever Toby did, I think she would be disinclined to query it,’ Peter whipped back smartly. ‘He had the opportunity to kill Alice, whereas Michael Ludd has an alibi. He was with Henry when Alice was killed.’
‘Where did that come from?’ Georgia asked incredulously.
‘Henry. I rang him before you arrived.’
‘And Josh?’
‘In Canterbury, shopping with Hazel.’
That answered that. The chances of Oliver nipping over unseen from North Carolina were slim. It was a clear field for Toby as suspect number one if these alibis stood up. The missing piece was a motive for his killing Fanny. ‘So Toby goes down to the tower, kills Alice, returns to pick up the tourists and arrives to find the body – with Jake now helpfully present. Toby would have to be a pretty strong guy, emotionally as well as physically,’ Georgia pointed out.
‘My impression of creeps, or watchers if you prefer the politer word, is that, far from being weak, they have the self-determination and self-interest of the very strong.’
‘What had he to lose if Alice spoke out?’ Georgia challenged him. ‘There’d be no proof even if he did murder Fanny.’
‘It depends on Brian Winters’ evidence.’
‘And what about Cadenza? She’d know he was in a position to kill Alice.’
‘Cadenza is entrapped in a fairytale of her own, where every step of the path towards her prince means hardship and denial. The question is, can life be a fairytale?’
‘Reasoning please.’
‘She took over the tour that afternoon for Toby. She saw Powell, but thought nothing of it. She wouldn’t know who he was, and had probably taken the tour for Toby
before for perfectly innocent reasons. When Jake Baines was arrested, again she would have no reason to think of Toby, even when the dagger was identified. Toby would have pretended to complain about the missing dagger when he officially came to leave for the tower at four o’clock, but any knife would have served for that. Cadenza would find out soon enough where the missing dagger was.’
‘That night the music is played,’ Georgia said, working the thesis through, ‘to indicate Jake Baines is innocent. Cadenza would have done some hard thinking, but the thought of dear Toby being involved would never have entered her head. Even if her parents had gossiped about the Fanny Star murder years earlier, Toby’s name wouldn’t have come into it. But then we come along, proclaiming that Adam Jones might be innocent. Cadenza is mildly interested, and perhaps after my visit becomes uneasy. She questions Toby . . .’
‘And then Dana comes to dinner, and tells them,’ Peter supplied when Georgia broke off, realizing what lay ahead.
‘Tells them what?’ she asked flatly. Reconstructions were apt to arrive at an unbridgeable gulf, which then had to be covered over with a warning sign until further notice. And in this case the possible source of that further information was in hospital, still in a coma. Thanks to Cadenza? ‘Let me try,’ she suggested.
‘Proceed with caution, Georgia. We’re treading water here.’
‘Something Dana says makes them see her as a danger. And don’t,’ she said firmly, ‘tell me she’d gone to tell Toby he was her father.’
‘It’s a possibility—’
‘No!’ she exploded. ‘If she had, he would hug her, not try to kill her.’
‘I agree. Toby wouldn’t harm her, but Cadenza might, with or without his knowledge. She was in the tea tent. She has a garden, she has the knowledge, she had the opportunity. Short of the poison vehicle being Mr Mulworthy’s sausages, the tea is still the obvious suspect.’
‘I don’t buy it. We’re missing something—’
She was interrupted by the phone. Peter, his eyes on Georgia, picked it up. ‘Mike,’ he mouthed to her, and listened for a few minutes. ‘I’ll be a while,’ he then said to her. ‘Mike wants us to know he’s bringing in Toby and Cadenza Broome for questioning, ostensibly because of the discrepancies in their statements.’
Perhaps Mike would manage to winkle out what Marsh & Daughter were failing to achieve.
Once back home, Georgia found herself prowling restlessly round her empty house. Luke wasn’t here – visiting Dana perhaps. She felt too tired to care. Normally she felt uplifted near the end of a case – and that’s what this looked like, didn’t it? All they needed was a motive for Toby to have killed Fanny, and it would be over to the police. So what was wrong? She couldn’t work out the answer, but something was amiss. Something didn’t fit. Something that had been mentioned today. Oh well, it would come to her. Or, if it didn’t, it couldn’t have been important.
*
Everyone, it seemed, was coming to see Dana. Even Jonathan Powell. She had telephoned him on the spur of the moment. Even though she’d reluctantly excluded him from their thinking as Fanny’s killer, he if anyone might be able to explain her disquiet over Toby Beamish. It still remained with her, for all her attempts to put it to one side.
‘The police have been to see me, Georgia. You know that, of course,’ he had said.
‘Yes.’
‘I gather they wish to speak to me again. I propose to visit Kent to see them, to visit Dana and, if you wish, I will certainly talk to you. Perhaps we could meet at the hospital? That would be convenient.’
Would it? Was it strange or natural that he chose to meet where Fanny’s daughter was fighting for her own life. Was Dana fighting, or was she gently slipping away from them? There had been no more progress. Georgia frequently met Dana’s adoptive parents at the hospital. They had travelled from the north of England to keep a constant vigil. Watching their distress was as agonizing as waiting by the bedside herself. She had also met Dana’s daughter, Sarah. A nice girl. Georgia desperately wanted Dana to recover, for everyone’s sake. Even Luke’s.
She met Jonathan in the hospital café before going to visit Dana. He had already seen her, he told her.
‘Any change?’ she asked.
He shook his head. ‘You find it strange that I came here?’ he asked, as if reading her mind.
‘No.’ She knew the answer to her own question now. It was not odd at all. Fanny and Adam had been at the centre of his life, and it was natural that Dana should now represent them.
‘I thought I should tell you what I told the police earlier today.’
‘About your talk with Alice Winters? Or about your visit to Owlers’ Smoke just before Adam arrived?’
‘Both.’ He didn’t seem fazed by her attack ‘The subject arose at the police station, I’m sure, thanks to you. Don’t think I blame you, however.’
‘Thank you,’ she said drily.
‘I am not capable of murder, whatever I might have said during that quarrel – which was much along the lines you suspected. I didn’t care greatly about Fanny’s career or about mine, or about anything save Adam, both for himself and for his career. I genuinely believed that he was in Fanny’s musical shadow and that he had gifts of his own that might be developed. If only she had not been there. If wishes were horses, beggars might ride, as they say.’
‘It was her choice to go,’ she pointed out. Was this a plea by Jonathan for her understanding? Perhaps, and perhaps she had wrongly withheld it earlier.
‘I agree. I admit I was incensed that evening. I was greatly upset by the quarrel with Adam. He refused to give me an answer as to whether I was still their manager – whether in fact he had chosen Fanny in preference to myself. I decided I had to find Fanny and talk to her. Talk, Georgia – this was before dinner. I could not find her, and asked Brian Winters if he had seen her. He hadn’t but suggested I tried Owlers’ Smoke since many of the gang used to retreat there to sulk – and Fanny often did. I did try it, and did find her there. She told me to get out, that I’d ruined her career, her private life and now her return home. I replied with some similar compliments and left with her still hurling abuse at me. At dinner consequently, as everyone observed, she was not in a good mood. Despite the reason, I was appalled by Fanny’s behaviour at dinner, and the lack of objectivity that a good meal, wine and even the presence of the evening itself can produce drove me to behave abnormally. Just like Fanny, in fact. In the evening one sees, as Shakespeare pointed out, bears where there are only bushes. I didn’t let well alone.
‘While the others were having coffee and liqueurs on the terrace, I buttonholed Adam privately and asked him what he and Fanny had decided. I was none the wiser. Was there still an SFA and was I still its manager? He told me yes, but to watch my Ps and Qs. I was profoundly upset that he had chosen Fanny and not myself, even if he had saved my job for me. Adam said stiffly that he had to take Mr and Mrs Gibb home, and I went for a walk in the gardens, unable to face the other guests. Then I forced myself to my professional duty and went to check that all was well, as I told you, and to make sure Fanny was fit enough for the gig. I couldn’t find her in the house or outside, so I went over to see the sound chaps were doing their job, and asked if they’d seen Fanny. I began to get worried because there was no sign of her there either, or Adam. I thought about Owlers’ Smoke and set off there, but changed my mind. I gather now that Adam saw me leave, and received the wrong impression.
‘He had every reason to believe I had just left her, but my fingerprints naturally were not on the dagger, only Adam’s. I had no blood on my clothes, nothing. Adam had. I couldn’t believe that Adam had killed Fanny; he had no reason to do so, and almost no time. I longed to give evidence, but he would not permit it, thinking I would incriminate myself. He felt guilty because he knew of my love for him, which to some extent he shared. He felt he must have driven me to it. It broke my heart – and I have one, Georgia – when you told me he still believed me guilty. It explain
ed why he was so reluctant for me to visit him in prison. I misled you there.
‘Now,’ he continued briskly, ‘as regards Alice Winters. When I received her pathetic attempt at blackmail, I decided to meet her in the Montash Arms, a public place so that she had no fear of me. She was known there, and she would feel safe with me. I intended to warn her about the dangers she might face.’
‘And what happened?’
‘I asked permission from the publican, Bob I believe, for five minutes of her time. She began by telling me about her grandfather’s statement, but I told her gently she was on a false trail, and there was no evidence against me otherwise. She didn’t seem surprised, and informed me that she had, as she put it grandly, other lines of enquiry. I begged her to go to the police. She said she’d consider it but she had her future to think of.
‘I pointed out that if she had evidence of murder, then she might not have a future. She laughed, and said she could take care of herself. She had the evidence tucked away so safely that no one would find it, and therefore no one would risk killing her. She was wrong, alas.’
‘I take it she gave you no idea who this person was?’
‘No. She said it would all be settled by the end of the day. It was, poor girl. The police wanted to know my movements that afternoon, but fortunately I was picking up Dana from Henry Ludd’s home at the time of the murder. She is, as I’m sure you now know, his granddaughter, and I feel a special concern for her. Shall we visit her together and call it a truce?’
*
When Georgia returned to Haden Shaw she wanted only two things: to forget about Friday Street, and to see Luke. She wasn’t allowed either. Peter called as soon as she had kicked off her shoes. ‘Can you spare a moment?’
‘Of course,’ she muttered. ‘Nothing I’d like more.’ She found Peter in the conservatory, a half finished ice-cream sundae before him – one of his passions, in which Margaret indulged him. Unfortunately today it had obviously not done the trick. The last peach and some melted ice-cream proclaimed its failure.
‘Time for another reconstruction,’ he said grimly. ‘They’ve released Toby Beamish without charge.’
