Element of Doubt

by Dorothy Simpson

  Tarrant shook his head.

  ‘Or drugs of any kind, in fact?’

  Thanet hoped he had slipped that particular question tactfully in, but Tarrant reacted strongly.

  ‘Drugs? What do you mean? What are you implying?’ But he didn’t wait for a reply. ‘Oh, I see … Now look here, Inspector, just because Damon had a spot of trouble over cannabis, it doesn’t mean that this is a household of junkies. My God, you never miss a trick, do you?’

  ‘I only meant …’

  ‘I know damn well what you meant, and you’re wrong. If Damon had been dabbling in the hard stuff, believe me, I’d know. I’ve been keeping a pretty close eye on him for any symptoms, I assure you, and as for Nerine … The idea is ludicrous …’

  ‘Very well. I’m sorry. But I had to ask, you must see that.’

  Tarrant glared at him for a moment or two longer, then sank back into his chair, his expression softening. ‘Oh, I suppose so. But you must see …’

  ‘Believe me, I do. And I don’t like asking these questions any more than you like answering them.’

  Tarrant gave him an assessing look. ‘Then perhaps it’s my turn to apologise …’ He rubbed the back of his hand over his forehead. ‘I don’t usually lose my temper like that.’

  ‘These are not usual circumstances.’

  ‘No, thank God. Anyway, carry on, will you? I’d like to get this over with.’

  ‘Right. Well, if we could go back a little … You spent the day at the hospital?’

  ‘Sturrenden General, yes.’

  ‘And you left at what time?’

  ‘At around 5.15.’

  ‘And you got home at about 5.40, you say?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Did anyone see you arrive?’

  ‘Not to my knowledge.’

  Was there a hint of reservation there?

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Well I didn’t see anyone myself. But with several other people living here I can’t speak for them, naturally.’

  ‘Apart from your mother, Miss Barnes and her son, does anyone else live in the house?’ A reasonable question, in the circumstances. Nerine Tarrant could scarcely have run an establishment of this size without help.

  ‘We have a housekeeper who comes in from eight in the morning until four in the afternoon. And a woman who comes in to clean three mornings a week.’

  Their names were duly noted by Lineham.

  ‘And your wife’s sister lives, I gather, in the coach house. Where is that? I’m afraid I haven’t had time to look around yet.’

  ‘At the back of the house, near the garages. Yes, she bought it some years ago, when their father died. Daphne had lived with him until then, but it was a large house, much too big for one, and the coach house was empty … We offered it to her rent free, but she preferred to buy.’

  ‘And Mrs Haywood …?’

  ‘Ah, yes. Well, Daphne is unmarried, but she was engaged, once. Her fiancé was killed in a car crash and she kept in touch with his mother, Mrs Haywood, who was at the time living in a rented house. When that was pulled down for a motorway project she had nowhere to go and Daphne suggested she come and live with her.’ Tarrant shrugged. ‘I must admit I wasn’t too keen on the idea. I could see Daphne being saddled with an ageing woman who was strictly speaking no relation of hers, but she was very set on it and Mrs Haywood moved in. They’ve lived together – quite harmoniously, I might add – for some years now. Mrs Haywood runs the house, and with Daphne working full-time it seems to have worked out very well for both of them.’

  ‘Fine. Well, I think that apart from one more question, that’s about it for the moment, Mr Tarrant. Thank you for being so cooperative.’

  ‘You’re wrong, you know,’ said Tarrant. ‘Thinking that my wife might have been …’ He steeled himself to say it. ‘might have been … killed, deliberately.’

  ‘I didn’t say I thought that. I said, if you remember, that it is a possibility we have to take into account. But it does in a way lead on to my final question. And I apologise in advance for causing you pain by asking it.’

  ‘What?’ said Tarrant, warily.

  ‘Your wife …’ Hell, there was no way to cushion the impact. ‘Did you have any reason to believe that she was not faithful to you?’

  Tarrant stared at Thanet for a moment, his expression unreadable. Then he said quietly, ‘I see that I was mistaken, Inspector. I thought that, contrary to my expectations, you were a reasonably civilised human being.’ His voice rose. ‘Get out, will you?’ He made a violent, dismissive gesture. ‘Just get out!’

  Without another word, they left.

  THREE

  Outside the study door Thanet and Lineham grimaced at each other.

  ‘You’d no option. You had to ask,’ said Lineham.

  ‘Yes, I know. Especially after what Doc Mallard told me about Mrs Tarrant.’ Briefly, Thanet filled Lineham in.

  ‘Ah, so you’re saying that Dr Tarrant’s reaction …’

  ‘Mr.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘Up to consultant status, doctors are “Dr”. After that, they’re “Mr”.’

  ‘But why? They’re still doctors, aren’t they?’

  Thanet shrugged. ‘No idea. I’ve always assumed it’s because when they become consultants they’re so obviously important that they don’t need a special form of address.’

  ‘Stupid sort of system, if you ask me.’

  ‘Anyway, what were you going to say, Mike?’

  ‘I can’t remember now.’

  ‘Something about Mr Tarrant’s reaction.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Are you suggesting, then, that he reacted as strongly as he did not because he considered your question an insult to his wife but because you’d hit the nail on the head and he hated to admit it?’

  ‘The thought had crossed my mind. Ah, here we are.’

  They had arrived at a green baize door.

  ‘I’ve only ever seen these in stately homes,’ said Lineham. ‘I didn’t know they had them in houses like this.’

  ‘Any house where there were lots of servants, I imagine. To cut off noise and cooking smells … and I suppose also to draw a symbolic line between upstairs and downstairs.’

  ‘Just as a matter of interest, where exactly are we going?’

  ‘To see Mrs Haywood. And Mrs Tarrant’s sister too, of course. I imagine she’s home from work by now. Come to think of it, she should have been home from work some time ago …’

  ‘That’s a point. I wonder why she wasn’t the one to rush over and give Mr Tarrant moral support.’

  ‘Too upset, perhaps? Anyway, I just thought it would be interesting to go out the back way, see a bit more of the terrain.’

  They were now in a short passage with doors along one side. Thanet glanced in: storeroom, flower room with sink and shelves of vases, and finally a large square kitchen. This was a sight to gladden any woman’s heart, with custom-made pine units, acres of work surface and cupboard space and every imaginable gadget. It was immaculately tidy and spotlessly clean. On the pine table was a note, weighted down by a salt cellar. Lineham picked it up and they read it together. ‘THURS: chicken mayonnaise, potato salad, green salad, strawberries and cream, all in fridge’.

  ‘Note from the housekeeper?’ said Lineham. ‘Tonight’s supper, I presume. Very nice, too. Just the job for a warm summer evening.’

  ‘Mmm … Mike, I’ve just realised … When we get back from seeing Mrs Haywood I want to take a look at Mrs Tarrant’s bedroom, but presumably it’s still locked. Go and tell one of the men to get hold of a key in the next half an hour or so, will you? I’ll wait for you outside.’

  Thanet saw the coach house as soon as he stepped out of the back door, some fifty yards away on the far side of a gravelled yard. A sleek Porsche was parked in front. Daphne’s, he presumed. He didn’t know her surname, he realised. The nursery must be doing well.

  He could understand her wanting to own this place rath
er than live in it by grace and favour. Solidly built of stone, with a steeply pitched slate roof and dormer windows, it was an attractive little property by any standards. Ideally situated, too, away from the road and surrounded by the extensive gardens of High Gables. Over to the right were the garages for the main house, obviously converted from another outbuilding. Room for three cars, Thanet noted. One of the spaces was empty.

  Lineham appeared around the corner of the house, predictably gazing in the direction of the garage. ‘A Mercedes and a Jaguar XJS!’ he said. ‘And a Porsche 844! Not exactly short of a penny, are they?’

  ‘I don’t suppose that’s much consolation to Mr Tarrant now.’

  Lineham pulled a face. ‘True. Bentley’s going to track down the key, sir. Oh, and one interesting thing I noticed. There’s a path which goes in the direction of the garden boundary, leading off the terrace where the body was found.’

  ‘And there are french windows downstairs … So anyone wanting to get in unobserved …’

  ‘Exactly, sir.’

  Beatrix Haywood must have been watching for them; as they approached the front door, it opened.

  She put a finger across her lips, adjuring silence. ‘Come in,’ she whispered. ‘This way.’

  She led them through a narrow hall into a large square sitting room and closed the door behind them. ‘That’s better,’ she said, in a normal voice. ‘I didn’t want to disturb Daphne – Miss Linacre. She has a migraine … Sit down, won’t you?’

  She perched on the edge of a hard-backed chair.

  She was getting on for seventy, Thanet estimated, and it was scarcely surprising that she was still looking upset. A sudden brush with violent death is liable to shake the hardiest of constitutions.

  ‘Thank you. I’m sorry to hear that. Miserable things, migraines, aren’t they? She suffers them regularly?’

  ‘Oh yes, as far back as I can remember.’

  ‘Brought on in this instance, I suppose, by the shock of her sister’s death?’

  ‘Oh no. That’s just made it ten times worse. She came home from work early with it this afternoon, and went straight to bed.’

  ‘What time would that have been?’

  ‘Around twenty to five, I suppose.’

  During this brief conversation he had been glancing around the room. It was comfortably and conventionally furnished with fitted carpet, chintz curtains and chair covers. On a small table near the fireplace pride of place was given to the photograph of a young man with a weak, rather effeminate mouth and a quantity of untidy brown shoulder-length hair. Mrs Haywood’s dead son? he wondered. But the most striking feature of the room was the number of pictures, which covered every available inch of wall space.

  ‘Yours?’ he said.

  ‘No, my son’s.’

  He had been looking for a way to put her more at ease and the pride in her voice told him he might have found it.

  ‘He was an artist?’ A somewhat fatuous question, in the circumstances, but it would serve. The tense he had used, however, made her frown.

  ‘How did you know he was dead?’

  ‘Mr Tarrant told me of his accident. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yes.’ Mrs Haywood shook her head and sighed. ‘It was a tragedy, as you can see.’ And she waved her hand at the paintings, which she evidently considered a mute testimony to her son’s talent. ‘Such a waste. It was said, you know, that if only he’d had the opportunity to fulfil his potential, he could have been one of the world’s great artists.’

  That, Thanet thought, was a matter of opinion. Personally, he couldn’t see that Haywood’s work had an ounce of originality in it, in terms of composition, execution, or use of colour. Not that he was an expert, of course, but still … ‘He was very prolific.’

  ‘Jocelyn was devoted to his work.’ She was warming to her subject. ‘Absolutely devoted to it. How different things would have been, if he had lived to marry Daphne … She understood him, you see, recognised his genius. She would have allowed him to dedicate himself entirely to his work, instead of being forced to prostitute his talents …’

  Thanet’s look of mild enquiry was enough to encourage her to continue. This was clearly her favourite theme, the subject nearest her heart, and her natural diffidence and hesitant manner fell away as she became engrossed in talking about her son. Listening to the enthusiasm in her voice and noting the sparkle in her eyes, the mounting flush on those pale cheeks, Thanet reflected that it must be rare for her to have so rapt an audience. Most of the people she knew must long ago have grown tired of listening to these exaggerated claims of his genius. His attention sharpened as she began to talk about his romance with Daphne.

  He had met her, it seemed, when he had been commissioned to design a cover for the 1969 catalogue for Linacre Nurseries. Daphne was then nineteen. After leaving school she had done a business studies course and had gone straight into the office at the nurseries. Listening carefully to what was not said, Thanet deduced that by the time she met Jocelyn it was already obvious that one day she would be taking over the business.

  ‘It was love at first sight,’ sighed Mrs Haywood. ‘Daphne has never even looked at another man. Not like …’ The flow of information broke off abruptly and she looked embarrassed, the temporary spell broken.

  ‘What were you going to say, Mrs Haywood?’ said Thanet gently.

  Pause.

  ‘Mrs Haywood?’

  Again he waited for a reply, but she merely shook her head.

  ‘Not like her sister, perhaps?’ said Thanet, softly.

  Another shake of the head, lips compressed.

  Thanet rose, began to wander around, studying the paintings. A closer view did nothing to alter his opinion of them. ‘Perhaps I should tell you, Mrs Haywood, that there does seem to be some question as to whether or not Mrs Tarrant’s death was an accident.’

  Her head snapped around, eyes stretched wide. ‘Not … not an accident? What … what do you mean?’

  Thanet did not reply and she was forced to break the silence.

  ‘You don’t … You can’t … You’re surely not implying that … someone killed her, deliberately?’

  ‘It’s a possibility we have to take into consideration.’

  ‘But why? She fell … From the balcony … I always did say that rail was dangerously low …’

  ‘But perhaps not low enough for an accidental fall …’ Thanet returned to his chair and sat down. ‘I’m sorry, this has obviously been a shock to you. And I must stress that we haven’t made up our minds, yet. But you must see that if there is even the remotest possibility that Mrs Tarrant was murdered, we can’t waste time by assuming that her death was an accident. If, later on, it is proved to be otherwise, well and good, but at the moment we have no choice but to proceed as if this were a murder investigation.’

  Silence. Mrs Haywood’s hands were clasped tightly together in her lap as she considered what had just been said.

  ‘Yes,’ she said at last, hesitantly. ‘Yes, I see that … But why are you saying all this to me?’

  ‘Because we need your help. Unlike Mr Tarrant and Miss Linacre, you are here all day. Even though you don’t live in the house, you overlook the garages. You must know a lot more about Mrs Tarrant’s movements than they do.’

  Mrs Haywood chewed at her lower lip. Clearly, she was trying to reach some decision.

  ‘We really would be grateful for any information you could give us.’

  She sighed and shook her head. ‘There’s no point in pretending I had much time for Nerine … But it seems so wrong, to gossip about the dead.’

  ‘We are not gossiping, Mrs Haywood. Far from it. We are merely seeking the truth, trying to find out who killed her – if indeed she was killed. I can understand your not wanting to discuss her when she can no longer defend herself, but try to look at it this way. Could you come to terms with your conscience if you refused to help bring a murderer to justice?’

  He was laying it on a bit thick, Thanet kne
w, but you had to adapt your approach to the personality of the witness concerned.

  And he had struck just the right note. He could see the lines of indecision in her face already beginning to harden into conviction.

  ‘I suppose you’re right,’ she said at last. ‘Of course you are … What is it you want to know?’

  But there was still a reservation in her voice.

  ‘Perhaps we could begin by going back to the point at which you broke off. You were going to say, “Not like her sister”, weren’t you?’

  A reluctant nod.

  ‘Perhaps you could explain what you meant?’

  Mrs Haywood pulled one of the floating scarves from her neck into her lap and began to tug it, twist it around one hand.

  Did she know, Thanet wondered, how revealing these movements were? She could not have mirrored the conflict in her mind more clearly if she had tried.

  As if she had read his thoughts she laid the scarf down, smoothing it out across her knees, and raised her head to look Thanet straight in the eye. ‘She was not a good woman. She … It was upsetting, the way she carried on.’

  ‘Carried on?’ echoed Thanet.

  She lowered her eyes and murmured, almost inaudibly, ‘With men.’

  ‘You’re saying that she was often unfaithful to her husband?’

  She nodded, lips compressed.

  ‘And at present?’

  She glanced up at him quickly from beneath lowered eyelids, and shook her head.

  ‘Mrs Haywood, please … This could be very important, you must realise that.’

  She hesitated a moment longer and then mumbled something.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch that.’

  She sighed again, and raised her head, capitulating. ‘Speed,’ she said. ‘Lance Speed.’

  ‘He’s local?’

  She nodded. ‘He runs the garage – in the village.’

  ‘And this has been going on for … how long?’

  ‘A few months.’ And then, in an uncharacteristic outburst, added bitterly, ‘Judging by her past record, I should say that any minute now Mr Speed would have found himself supplanted.’

  ‘Was this affair general knowledge?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ She gave him a shamefaced look and said, ‘I’m afraid Nerine’s affairs always were. She never took the slightest trouble to hide them from anybody.’