Element of Doubt

by Dorothy Simpson

  ‘Two different witnesses?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Lineham pursed his lips in a silent whistle. ‘Interesting.’

  ‘Also,’ said Thanet, shuffling through the papers for the appropriate report, ‘there’s confirmation that Speed was lying about his movements at lunchtime on the day of the murder. Remember he gave us the impression he hadn’t put a toe outside his car while he was parked in that field? Well we guessed that couldn’t be right for a start. If he’d been watching for Mr Tarrant to leave he wouldn’t have been able to see a thing from there. As you know, the witness who reported seeing the car lives in that little cottage further on around the bend from High Gables. She was away most of yesterday and couldn’t be contacted until evening, but she says that the car was parked from about twenty-five to one to around ten to one that day. About a quarter of an hour, in fact. The reason why she’s so sure is because Speed always parked in that farm gateway when he went to visit Nerine Tarrant, and he usually stayed much longer – forty to forty-five minutes, on average. And she swears that on Thursday he got out, locked the car and walked along the footpath towards High Gables as he always did.’

  ‘A quarter of an hour,’ said Lineham thoughtfully. ‘Not long, even for a quickie.’

  ‘Quite. And by then, Mr Tarrant was already in the house.’

  ‘And if he’s telling the truth, and went straight up to his wife’s rooms …’

  ‘… who was it he heard in the bedroom with his wife?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  The phone rang again: Tarrant, this time, also enquiring about Damon. After a brief conversation Thanet replaced the receiver and said, ‘He’s really getting worried about the boy now.’

  The two men stared at each other in silence, thinking.

  ‘If Mrs Tarrant had taken a new lover,’ said Lineham at last, ‘and Speed knew about it, it would certainly give him a motive, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘I would have thought so, yes. Though if you remember, according to PC Driver it was extraordinary what a knack she had for discarding her lovers without turning them against her.’ Thanet remembered what old Mrs Glass had said. To have Nerine’s exclusive attention was as if the sun was shining especially for you. ‘Despite her reputation it was almost as though they regarded it as a privilege to have been admitted to her bed at all, and went into the affair accepting from the beginning that it was too good to last. Though, come to think of it, I know for a fact that that certainly didn’t always apply.’ And he told Lineham about Doc Mallard’s friend.

  ‘But it’s surely unlikely that she should have been killed by a past lover. I mean, the time when that sort of violence erupts is when feelings of jealousy and rejection are still running high, not months afterwards. And Speed has been the current favourite for some time.’

  ‘I remember Beatrix Haywood saying that a few months was par for the course and any minute now he would be finding himself supplanted. It looks as though it might already have happened.’

  ‘And he suspected it!’ said Lineham. ‘He probably sensed she was going off him and got suspicious when she started trying to put him off. I expect he was desperate to find out who the new man was, and thought he’d do a bit of spying.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘So then, later on in the afternoon, he goes back to have it out with her.’

  ‘Could be … If we’re right about all this, Mike, I wonder if Tarrant knew about this new lover.’

  ‘I doubt it. If he realised the voice wasn’t Speed’s, why should he lie about it?’

  ‘I’m not so sure. It can’t be much fun admitting that your wife was having an affair and that you actually walked away from her bedroom door knowing she was with her lover. But to put her in an even worse light by informing us that, well, as a matter of fact it wasn’t the lover we knew about but yet another one… It would have made her look a bit of a whore, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Well, let’s face it, sir, that’s what she was, practically. High-class, perhaps, choosy – well, yes, to the extent that she only had one man at a time, but …’

  ‘Perhaps. But it’s one thing for her husband to have to admit that to himself, another to have to acknowledge it to the police.’

  ‘Possibly … I suppose that if Mr Tarrant realised that the voice he heard wasn’t Speed’s that could have been the straw which finally broke the camel’s back. He could have gone away, brooded over it all afternoon and finally decided he’d had enough.’

  ‘On the other hand we have to accept that he might just have assumed the man with his wife was Speed, and still genuinely believe it. Well, there’s not much point in wasting time speculating. We’ll have to see them both again, obviously. Mrs Speed, too. What was she up to, I wonder?’

  ‘Anything else of interest come in, sir?’

  ‘Yes.’ Thanet grinned. He had kept the most dramatic bit of news until last. ‘There’s a possibility that our outsider might be coming up fast on the rails.’

  ‘Buzzard?’

  ‘Yes. There’s been a sighting in the area, on the afternoon of the murder. He was driving an old green van. An alert PC who happened to be involved in Buzzard’s trial recognised him waiting at the traffic lights by those major road works on the Ashford Road just outside Sturrenden, at around five o’clock.’

  ‘Really? But that’s only a few miles away from Ribbleden!’

  ‘Exactly. I want him picked up and brought in, Mike. Who knows? We might have to look no further, and we can leave all these people in peace.’

  ‘I’ll get on to it right away, sir.’

  ‘But meanwhile we can’t sit about twiddling our thumbs. As soon as you’re ready we’ll go and see Mr Tarrant again.’

  FOURTEEN

  The lawns of High Gables had just been cut and the scent of new-mown grass hung on the air. Thanet inhaled appreciatively as he and Lineham crossed the gravel to the front door.

  Vicky Cunningham answered their knock. Today she was wearing red-and-white striped trousers, a white teeshirt decorated with red hearts and red butterfly clips in her hair. The gravity of her expression belied the gaiety of her attire. ‘He’s in the garden. He’s …’

  ‘What?’ prompted Thanet.

  She pulled a face, shrugged. ‘You’ll see for yourself.’

  ‘Where is he, exactly?’

  ‘Around the back. He said he was going to have a bonfire.’

  ‘Not exactly bonfire weather,’ said Lineham as they walked along the front of the house and turned the corner onto the terrace where Nerine Tarrant’s body had been found. ‘It must be in the seventies by now.’

  Thanet stopped. ‘I wonder …’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘I was just thinking … If we’re right, and Speed came here on Thursday not to meet Nerine, but to spy on her, he must have found himself a vantage point …’

  Thanet set off purposefully along the path they had followed the previous day. When he reached the gap in the yew hedge he turned right instead of left, walked as far as the corner, then paused. Here there was no gap; the hedge was a dense, impenetrable right-angle. Ahead, the path continued, curving past a border of tall shrubs which backed onto the third side of the hedge, and skirting a huge clump of rhododendrons.

  The rhododendrons were the answer, Thanet decided. He approached them, then turned to look back at the house. Yes, from here there was a clear view of both the front door and the gap in the yew hedge through which any clandestine visitor would have to emerge in order to get out of the garden via the gate in the back fence.

  Thanet turned to study them. At their tallest they were perhaps fifteen feet high. Here and there late flowers still bloomed, the spectacular purity of their candy-floss pink enhanced by the glossy dark greens of the dense foliage and the withered bracts of dead blossoms. Stooping, Thanet thrust his way into the heart of the bushes. It was like stepping into a low cave. Green filtered light penetrated the canopy of leaves, imparting to the thick gnarled branches a myste
rious, almost sinister air. Despite the oppressive warmth of the enclosed space, Thanet shivered.

  ‘Find anything, sir?’

  Lineham’s face, suspended like that of the Cheshire Cat, appeared in a gap in the foliage.

  ‘Just a minute. Ah …’

  Thanet took some tweezers and a plastic bag from his pocket and bent to retrieve a small object from the ground. Then he thrust his way back through the embrace of the branches onto the path and handed the bag to Lineham.

  The sergeant’s nose wrinkled in distaste. ‘Fag end. Pretty stupid if you ask me, smoking while he waited. I mean, anyone could have seen the smoke and come to investigate.’

  ‘Still, potentially useful evidence. If it’s his. It could have been thrown there by anyone. We’ll get a saliva test done.’

  ‘Talking of smoke, sir …’ Lineham nodded in the direction of the back boundary, where a murky, dun-coloured cloud was swirling up between the tops of the trees. ‘Mr Tarrant’s bonfire, presumably.’

  As they drew nearer the crackling of the fire grew louder, punctuated by the irregular thud of an axe and a sharp crack of snapped branches. At the edge of a small clearing they paused. Tarrant was burning up the remains of a dead tree, felled some time ago, judging by the weathered look of the exposed end of the trunk. Stripped to the waist, he was working like a man demented, and his body glistened with sweat. The frenetic energy with which he was attacking a recalcitrant branch, the leaping flames and billowing smoke all combined to impart to the scene a disturbing air of violence, of passion unleashed. A picture of Tarrant as he had first seen him, the suave, sophisticated man of the world, flashed across Thanet’s mind. It was difficult to reconcile the two images.

  Thanet stepped forward. ‘Mr Tarrant?’ he called.

  Tarrant gave a final wrench at the branch before glancing over his shoulder, staggering a little as it finally parted company with the trunk. Then he laid it on the ground and wiped his forehead with the back of his arm before slowly straightening up. He was breathing heavily, his sparse fair hair dark with sweat.

  Thanet advanced, holding up a hand to shield his face from the intense heat. He was conscious of sweat breaking out all over his body. ‘Could we have a word?’

  ‘Is it Damon?’

  Thanet shook his head. ‘No further news yet, I’m afraid.’

  Now that Tarrant’s impetus was broken, the energy seemed suddenly to drain out of him, and he put out a hand to steady himself against one of the few remaining branches of the dead tree. Then, body sagging with fatigue, he walked heavily to the edge of the clearing and picked up a checked shirt lying on the ground. He pulled it on.

  ‘Perhaps we could find somewhere cooler?’ suggested Thanet.

  ‘We’ll go indoors.’

  Tarrant led the way to the back door of the house and then to the study, pausing in the kitchen to ask Vicky to bring a jug of iced lemonade. He slumped into his chair behind the desk and indicated that Thanet and Lineham should sit down.

  ‘What is it now?’ he said wearily, taking a red spotted handkerchief from his pocket and mopping at his forehead again.

  What had driven Tarrant to that bout of frenetic activity? Thanet wondered. Had he been trying to blot out misery, or guilt?

  Thanet didn’t want to believe that this man had killed his wife. Tarrant, he was convinced, had loved her deeply. But he had to acknowledge that the surgeon was one of the prime candidates. Over the years Thanet had seen many a reasonable man or woman ultimately driven to violence, the trigger factor sometimes so apparently trivial that others gaped in disbelief that so minor an offence should have such disastrous consequences. If Tarrant had realised that the man in his wife’s room wasn’t Speed … Well, Nerine might well have taken one lover too many. Thanet knew that if this man were innocent he should be allowed to mourn in peace, that it would be inhuman to cause him further, unnecessary pain. But he might be guilty and the professional in Thanet knew that he had no choice. Much as he hated the idea, it was his duty to get at the truth. And if Tarrant had lied …

  ‘You remember, when we spoke to you last, you told us that when you came back to the house at lunchtime on the day your wife died, you heard a man’s voice from her bedroom?’

  Tarrant’s lips tightened. ‘Yes.’

  ‘You told us that it was Mr Speed.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘You’ll have had more time to think about it, by now. Would you care to amend that statement in any way?’

  Thanet caught the flicker of a glance from Lineham. You’re being too soft with him. Sir.

  There was a knock at the door and Vicky entered with a tray, ice-cubes chinking. She set it down on a side table and poured three tall glasses and handed them around. Thanet would have preferred not to accept the drink. In the circumstances he didn’t feel comfortable about enjoying Tarrant’s hospitality. But it would have been churlish to refuse and besides, it looked like fresh lemonade. Thanet could see the bits of lemon floating around in the cloudy liquid. His throat suddenly ached for the delicious coolness of it.

  He smiled up at Vicky. ‘Thank you.’

  Tarrant had already drained his glass and was holding it out for more. ‘God, I needed that. Delicious, Vicky.’

  ‘Good.’ Vicky refilled his glass then held up the jug, raising her eyebrows at Thanet and Lineham.

  They shook their heads.

  ‘I’ll leave it here and you can help yourselves if you change your minds.’

  Thanet waited until the door had closed behind her before saying, ‘Well?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten what the question was.’

  ‘I asked if you’d care to amend your statement in any way … That you’d heard Mr Speed’s voice in your wife’s room.’

  ‘That’s what I thought you said. I don’t know what you mean. How could I “amend” it, as you put it?’

  ‘You’re sure, that it was Mr Speed’s voice?’

  ‘I told you, yes.’ Tarrant was impatient now, and Thanet was pretty sure that he was sincere.

  ‘What are you getting at, Inspector?’

  Thanet sighed. There was no going back. ‘I’m afraid it couldn’t have been Speed.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘Mr Speed tells us that he did intend to visit your wife that lunchtime, but that he didn’t do so because he saw your car turn into the drive ahead of him. That was at twelve thirty-five. You did say you got here just after half past twelve, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes. But … Just a minute. Let me get this quite straight. You’re saying that he arrived after me?’ Tarrant paused, his eyes going blank as he focused on the next, inevitable question. ‘But in that case,’ he said slowly, ‘who …?’

  ‘Exactly, Mr Tarrant. In that case, who was with your wife?’

  Tarrant gave an uncomprehending shake of the head, then rubbed his hands over his face as if to erase his confusion. ‘I have no idea. None.’

  ‘Any conjectures?’

  ‘No!’ It was almost a shout. ‘Look here, Inspector, there must be some mistake. You must have got this wrong.’

  ‘I’m afraid not, sir. We have an independent witness who confirms that Mr Speed was definitely not in this house at twelve thirty-five that day.’

  Tarrant swivelled his chair to look out of the window, and Thanet wondered what he was thinking. If he was innocent, his thoughts must be bitter indeed. Even after her death, it seemed, Nerine’s promiscuity had the power to reach out and turn the knife in the wound which had given him so much pain all his married life. And if he was guilty … Well, thought Thanet, if Tarrant was guilty he deserved an Oscar.

  Tarrant shook his head and his voice was tight with suppressed emotion as he said, ‘I’m afraid I can’t help you, Inspector. So if you don’t mind …’

  Outside, Lineham said, ‘What d’you think, sir?’

  Thanet shrugged. ‘For what it’s worth, I’d say he was telling the truth. But I’ve been wrong before and no doubt I’ll be
wrong again. What did you think?’

  ‘Same as you. What now?’

  ‘Another word with Miss Barnes, I think. She saw Tarrant knock on his wife’s door that lunchtime, remember. And I distinctly recall feeling that she was holding something back.’

  ‘You mean, she might know who the new man was?’

  ‘Well, she’s around the house all day, isn’t she? We don’t know how long the new affair had been going on, and even if she didn’t see him on that occasion, she might have seen him on another.’

  ‘True. There is one odd thing, though …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, everyone seems to agree that Mrs Tarrant never tried to hide her affairs, so why the secrecy surrounding this one?’

  ‘Perhaps she wanted to be sure of the new lover before casting off the old? Or perhaps …’ Thanet came to an abrupt halt. Suddenly, all was clear to him. And yes, it would explain so much …

  ‘Perhaps what?’ said Lineham.

  ‘Come on. Let’s go and see Miss Barnes.’

  But finding her took a little time. Eventually a murmur of voices led them to the room next door to the sitting room in which they had interviewed old Mrs Tarrant that morning. The old lady’s bedroom? wondered Thanet as he knocked.

  ‘Just a minute.’ Marilyn’s voice. A moment or two later the door opened a few inches. ‘Yes? Oh … Sorry, you can’t come in. Lavinia’s in one of her dressing-up moods and she’s changing.’

  ‘Could you spare us just a few moments?’

  Marilyn glanced back over her shoulder. ‘If you’d wait, I’ll be as quick as I can.’

  Thanet nodded. ‘Fine.’

  The door closed. Lineham leaned against the wall beside it, gazing into space and whistling tunelessly between his teeth. Thanet strolled along the corridor to a window at the far end. Daphne and Beatrix Haywood were standing at the door of the coach house, deep in conversation. Beatrix was carrying a wicker basket over one arm and as he watched she set off purposefully down the drive. Going to the village, presumably. Shopping, perhaps? Or possibly to help prepare for the jumble sale this afternoon. He and Lineham had seen the notice outside the church hall as they had driven past, earlier. Daphne stayed watching the older woman until she was out of sight, then turned back into the house, closing the door behind her. They certainly seemed to get on well, thought Thanet. But then, their needs dovetailed beautifully. Daphne needed someone to run her home and Beatrix needed a home to run. But in addition they were linked by a powerful emotional tie: Daphne’s only lover had been Beatrix’s only son.