Element of Doubt
Page 29
‘But she didn’t come back?’
‘Not to my knowledge. Mr Lomax left about a quarter or twenty past ten, and I went to bed soon after.’
‘So you didn’t hear either Mr or Mrs Salden come in, or Miss Trimble leave?’
‘No. But she stayed rill eleven, I believe.’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘There’s a note for Mr Salden, on the table in the hall. I was dusting,’ she added defensively, ‘and couldn’t help seeing it.’
Lineham was looking at Thanet. Anything else you want to ask?
Thanet gave an imperceptible shake of the head and stood up. ‘This note, Mrs Pantry. Is it still on the table in the hall?’
‘I think so, yes.’
‘Let’s go and see, shall we?’
He waited while she reluctantly dragged herself to her feet.
THREE
Mrs Pantry led them to a long oak table set against the wall at the far side of the hall and picked up a piece of paper. ‘Here it is.’ She handed it to Thanet.
10.35. Marcia
Bernard rang. Is staying on at Holly Cottage. Don’t wait up.
Josie.
P.S.
Waited until 11 p.m. then gave up. See you tomorrow, after work. J.
Edith Phipps had been hovering near the stairs and now she approached them. ‘Excuse me, Inspector. I thought you’d like to know. Mr Salden’s home.’
Thanet turned. ‘Oh, thank you. Where is he?’
‘In the drawing-room. Through there.’ She pointed.
A knock at the door, then a second, brought no response. Thanet waited a moment longer, then lifted the latch and went in.
The room was long and low, ceiling and walls striped with ancient, honey-coloured oak beams infilled with white-painted plaster. Thanet didn’t think much of Marcia Salden’s taste; instead of the old rugs, mellow colours and antique furniture which the room demanded, it was furnished with a heavily patterned fitted carpet, modern dralon three-piece suite and – most incongruous of all – in the far corner, a cocktail bar. Salden was slumped in an armchair beside the inglenook fireplace. As they came in he raised his head in a dazed fashion and then put his hands on the arms of the chair preparatory to levering himself up, as if his legs alone were incapable of taking the strain.
‘Please,’ said Thanet, trying not to stare too obviously at an enlarged photograph hanging on the wall near by. Surely that was Princess Anne shaking hands with Salden? ‘Don’t get up.’
He introduced himself and he and Lineham sat down.
‘I understand that you have identified your wife?’
Salden nodded.
‘I’m sorry.’
Salden said nothing. He was considerably older than his wife, in his late fifties, Thanet guessed. Short and overweight, with round face, thinning hair and an aura of soft living, he would have passed unnoticed in any group of middle-aged businessmen, his conventional dark suit, sober tie and well-polished shoes almost the uniform of his class and status. Only the dazed look of someone in shock would have singled him out.
‘I don’t understand,’ he said. For the first time his eyes focussed on Thanet’s face. ‘What happened?’
Thanet shook his head. ‘That’s what we’re trying to find out. Do you feel you can answer a few questions?’
A nod.
‘When did you last see your wife, Mr Salden?’
Salden’s forehead wrinkled, as if this were an impossibly difficult question. ‘I … Oh God, I can’t seem to think straight. I’m sorry.’ He rubbed his hand across his eyes. ‘It must have been, oh, between a quarter and half-past seven last night.’
‘When you left to go down to the village, to visit your mother-in-law?’
‘Yes.’
‘But you spoke to Mrs Salden after that, I understand.’
Salden stared at Thanet. ‘Did I? Oh, yes, you’re right, I did. On the phone. I rang to tell her not to hold dinner for me. We had guests, you see.’
‘You were sufficiently worried about your mother-in-law not to want to leave her?’
‘Well, it was partly that. But she’d been asking for me, and when I got to the cottage she was asleep. I thought I’d better wait until she woke up. Over these last few months there’s been little enough we could do for her except be there, when she wanted us.’
‘Yes, I see. But you spoke to your wife again later, I believe?’
‘Did I?’ repeated Salden. He frowned, shook his head. ‘No I didn’t. I’m sure I didn’t.’
‘Didn’t she ring the cottage herself, soon after half-past nine?’
‘Ah, I see what you mean. Yes, Mrs Pantry told me … No, she must have spoken to Nurse Lint. I’d gone out, by then.’
‘But I understood you stayed with your mother-in-law until she died, in the early hours of this morning.’
‘Yes, I did. But I went out for a walk, earlier. Just for some fresh air …’
‘So you didn’t see your wife, when she went down to the cottage, after dinner?’
‘No. Nurse Lint told me she’d left shortly before I got back.’
‘And then you decided to stay on at the cottage.’
‘That’s right. It seemed to me that my mother-in-law had taken a turn for the worse, so I rang home to tell Marcia – my wife – not to wait up for me. But she hadn’t arrived back, so I left a message with Josie – Josie Trimble, one of our guests.’
‘You wouldn’t have expected her to want to come back down to the cottage herself, to be with her mother?’
‘No. It was my turn, you see. Win – my mother-in-law – had cancer, the lingering sort, and over the last few months we’ve both spent many nights at the cottage, thinking that she wouldn’t last until morning. In the end we arranged that we’d take it in turns to sit with her. I assure you that my wife did everything possible to make her mother’s life as comfortable as she could. She even got her a full-time nurse, to live in …’
‘Please, Mr Salden … I wasn’t criticising your wife, merely trying to understand what happened last night. So you’re saying that she left your mother-in-law’s house at – what time?’
‘I’m not sure. Nurse Lint would be able to tell you, I expect. Before I got back from my walk at about half-past ten, anyway.’
‘And how would she have got there?’
Salden frowned. ‘Well, normally she would have gone by car. But there must be something wrong with it. It’s still in the garage. It was the first thing I checked this morning, when we found she was missing, and I tried it. It wouldn’t start.’
‘These keys were in her pocket.’
Salden leaned forward to look at them. ‘Yes, those are hers. So she must have decided to walk. It only takes a few minutes to get to the village, cutting across by the footpath. And I noticed the torch was missing from her car.’
A footpath … ‘Does it run near the river, at any point?’
‘Yes. It emerges into the village just beside the bridge.’
Salden’s gaze suddenly became blank, fixed. His mouth quivered. Then slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, the contours of his face began to blur and slacken. His eyes glistened, then tears began to spill out and trickle down his cheeks.
‘Mr Salden …’
Salden gave no sign of having heard. The silent tears continued to run unchecked down the plump, quivering cheeks and then, abruptly, his face contorting into a gargoyle mask of grief, he dropped his head into his hands and began to sob, a harsh, broken, ugly sound.
Any further questioning of Salden would have to wait for the moment. Thanet glanced at Lineham then rose and crossed to lay a consoling hand on the man’s shoulder. After all these years in the force he still found the sight of naked grief hard to bear.
In the hall Mrs Pantry was just answering the front door. ‘Oh, Mr Fothergill. Do come in.’
‘Thank you.’ The small, wiry figure of a man in his late twenties stepped briskly into the hall. He was wearing corduroys, a tweed spo
rts jacket and a clerical collar. ‘Is this true, what Jack Kimberley tells me? That Mrs Salden has been drowned?’
The vicar had presumably run into PC Kimberley outside.
The housekeeper nodded.
Thanet came forward. ‘I’m afraid so. I’m Detective Inspector Thanet of Sturrenden CID, and this is Sergeant Lineham.’
Mrs Pantry quietly withdrew.
‘Richard Fothergill. Vicar of Telford Green.’ He extended a hand and Thanet shook it.
‘I’d just come to offer my condolences to Mrs Salden, on her mother’s death. But this … This is terrible. Terrible.’ The thin mobile face was clouded with genuine distress. ‘First Mrs Hammer, then Mrs Carter, now Mrs Salden. Three deaths in one week …’
‘Mrs Hammer?’
‘An old lady who lived in the village. She’d been failing for some time, like Mrs Carter, Mrs Salden’s mother. But Mrs Salden … This is terrible,’ he repeated. ‘What happened?’
‘She was pulled out of the river at Donnington Weir this morning. The police surgeon thinks she must have gone in some time last night. More than that we don’t know, as yet.’
‘And Bernard … Mr Salden? How is he? How is he taking it?’
‘Badly, by the look of it. He seems very distressed. I’m glad you’ve come, perhaps you’ll be able to help him.’
‘Of course. I’ll call the doctor, if necessary. And between us Edith Phipps and I will be able to manage the administration to do with his mother-in-law’s death, arrange for the undertakers to come and remove her body and so on. Where is he?’
‘In the drawing-room …’
Thanet watched the vicar knock softly on the door and go in, then turned to Lineham. ‘Did you notice where Miss Phipps disappeared to, Mike?’
‘In there.’ The Sergeant nodded at a door on the opposite side of the hall.
‘Right. Look, give these keys to Kimberley and ask him to see if he can get Mrs Salden’s car started. Tell him I want to talk to him after I’ve seen Miss Phipps. Then join me.’
‘Right, sir.’
Thanet crossed the hall and knocked at the door Lineham had indicated.
‘Come in.’
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About the Author
Dorothy Simpson was born and brought up in South Wales, and went to Bristol University, where she read modern languages before moving to Kent, the background of the Thanet novels. After spending several years bringing up three children, she trained as a marriage guidance counsellor and subsequently worked as one for thirteen years, before writing her first novel. She says, “You may think that marriage guidance counsellor to crime writer is rather a peculiar career move, but although I didn’t realise it at the time, of course, the training I received was the best possible preparation for writing detective novels. Murder mysteries are all about relationships which go disastrously wrong and the insights I gained into what makes people tick, into their interaction and motivations, have been absolutely invaluable to DI Thanet, my series character, as have the interviewing skills I acquired during my years of counselling.”
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1987 by Dorothy Simpson
Cover design by Michel Vrana
ISBN 978-1-5040-4556-8
This edition published in 2017 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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