‘Yes, I think so. Stewart and my daughter have separated for the time being.’
Maria didn’t look up and she didn’t smile, exactly. But her shoulders – which had been rather tense – relaxed.
Yes, thought Ellie, Maria is definitely interested in Stewart as a man. I really don’t know how I feel about that. Poor baby Frank. Oh dear, poor Diana. Does Diana know that Stewart has caught this woman’s eye? But then, he is a fine-looking man and why shouldn’t he look elsewhere if Diana dumps him?
Ellie suddenly realized what the time was. The police would be on the lookout for her very soon. ‘I must go. Thank you for giving me so much of your time.’
‘Not at all. I hope I was able to help.’ She looked up an address, and scribbled it down on a piece of paper. ‘Mo Tucker’s address. Perhaps we’ll meet again.’
They shook hands briefly, with surface smiles.
Ellie went down the stairs with a great deal to think about as she sped home.
*** The police car waited outside while Ellie went in to change her clothes, collect her mobile – most important – and make some phone calls about the wedding reception. She made and ate a sandwich and drank a cup of coffee on the run. Rose was in the kitchen, busily putting together the ingredients to make some little chocolate cakes, while listening to the radio. Rose wondered if Ellie could manage to drop by the shops for this and that in the food line. Midge was waiting under the table for titbits from Rose’s cooking. Aunt Drusilla was so intent on the computer screen that she barely acknowledged Ellie’s flying visit.
There was no sign of Jimbo, and no messages on the answerphone. Sandy Hair was sitting in the driving seat of the police car, with DC Baptiste beside him.
‘May I sit in the front?’ Ellie asked DC Baptiste, when she was ready to
depart.
‘No!’ said Sandy Hair.
Ellie meekly got in the back of the car and tried not to feel seasick
when he rounded corners on two wheels. Arriving in one piece at the
station, Ellie straightened her jacket and said, ‘Really, young man, I
would recommend you take some driving lessons soon, or you’ll lose
your licence.’
Sandy made a sound like steam escaping from a kettle. Ellie smiled,
allowing herself to be ushered into the police station, and guided down
a corridor to an interview room.
She was left there for some time. She wondered if this was to show her
who was boss in this situation but as it happened, she’d got plenty to
think about. In addition, because she’d thought it might be a good idea to
take her mind off her grinding anxiety about Diana, she’d had the
forethought to bring some paperwork with her and was soon engrossed
in that. Concentration was definitely required.
All these legal terms … it was all very well setting up a charitable trust
to administer some of the funds her husband had left her, but it was all so complicated. She rather thought that she now understood the first four pages, but … she shook her head and sighed. Bill would have to explain
the rest to her.
‘Hah!’ It was DS Willis, looking almost as angry as the “dearie”
policeman.
‘Oh, hello again,’ said Ellie, casually. ‘Are you ready to ask me your
questions now, or shall I go on with this for a while?’
DS Willis sat opposite Ellie and DC Baptiste came in to sit with her.
Ellie carefully checked over her papers, put them in order, placed them
inside her bag and smiled at DS Willis. ‘Now suppose you tell me what
this is all about?’
DS Willis switched on a tape and recorded that she and a colleague
were present, at 1430 hours …
‘Goodness,’ said Ellie. ‘Is that really the time? I feel quite hollow. Might
I have a cup of tea? A little milk, no sugar. And a biscuit, if you have one.’ DS Willis took no notice. ‘Mrs Quicke, you have been accused of
obstructing the police in the course of their duty.’
Ellie sighed. ‘I suppose I can always get my solicitor down here to
defend me, but really, why waste time for both of us? You know perfectly
well – because I give you credit for listening to both the men you sent to
Stewart’s flat – that one of your constables made a complete fool of
himself and then tried to take it out on me. I think your dragging me down
here for no real reason could be called harassment. I’ll have to ask my
solicitor about that, won’t I?’
The muscles along DS Willis’s jawline shifted as she ground her teeth.
‘They were acting on information received when they went to ask your
son-in-law Stewart a few questions.’
‘Really? What information? What’s he supposed to have done?’ ‘You were deliberately obstructive.’
‘They asked me if I knew where he was and I said I didn’t. Which was
the truth. They wanted me to turn a blind eye while they searched for
bank statements, and I refused to let them because they hadn’t a warrant.
Is that being obstructive? I don’t think so.’
DS Willis appeared to be on the point of losing her temper. Ellie watched
her with some interest. She considered telling the woman that if the
policemen had asked her nicely if she had any suggestions as to where
Stewart might be found, she might have told them. Or perhaps she
wouldn’t.
‘Well, if that’s all …?’ said Ellie, drawing her bag towards her. ‘No, it certainly isn’t.’ DS Willis was going to make the most of her
opportunity to grill Ellie. ‘Let’s start from the beginning.’
Eight
D
S Willis leaned forward slightly. ‘For the record, what is your name and what relation are you to Miss Drusilla Quicke?’ ‘I am Mrs Ellie Quicke. I was married to her nephew Frank, who died last year.’
‘You stand to inherit the most under her will?’
‘So she says. I’ll believe it when I see the will.’
‘She informed you that was the case?’
‘Yes, but she may well change her mind and leave it all to her son, Roy. And even leave some to her great-niece, my daughter Diana, if it so pleases her.’
‘Surely it bothers you that she may change her will?’
‘No. My husband left me very well provided for.’
‘No one ever has enough.’
‘So they say. Personally, I’ve found a big inheritance brings its own problems. That’s why we’re setting up a charitable trust to get rid of some of the money.’ Ellie showed DS Willis some of the paperwork from her bag. ‘You see?’
‘You could be getting rid of some of the money because you know you have a lot more to come.’
‘Believe me, dealing with Aunt Drusilla’s estate would be no picnic. I know she owns a lot of property in the immediate vicinity, most of it flats to let. There may well be more that I don’t know about. Looking after property to let is not my idea of fun.’
‘There’s that big house, too. That should fetch a bomb if the site were redeveloped.’
‘It’s the Quicke family house. It belonged not to Miss Quicke, but to my husband Frank – who left it to me. Miss Quicke now has it on a repairing lease. What about that cup of tea?’
DS Willis snarled at her colleague, who left the room. A fact which was then recorded on the tape. With the tape switched off, Ellie said, ‘Has that fool of a constable ever tried to call you “dearie”?’
DS Willis fought to hold back a smile. She won. Just. Ellie went through her handbag looking for a handkerchief. The air was perhaps a trifle on the dry side in this interview room. A pity she hadn’t thought to put in some sucky sweets. But the
re, you can’t think of everything.
A cup of tea arrived, and the tape was switched back on again.
DS Willis said, ‘We have established that you have the best motive for killing your aunt, so …’
‘No motive at all,’ said Ellie. ‘In fact, I’m rather fond of her and I think she is of me, too.’
‘—so I’d like you to tell me when you were last at her house.’
‘Apart from this morning when your WPC let me in, and saw me out again?’
Ellie tried to think why it should matter when she was last at Aunt Drusilla’s house. Then she got it.
‘Ah. For fingerprints purposes? The day before it happened, I suppose. I’ve been there almost every day … no, make that every day … for the last week or so because of the renovations and the wedding on Saturday. Although I can’t think when I last went up into her bedroom.’
‘Try.’
Ellie sat back and thought about it. ‘I’m really not at all sure. I was up there quite a bit when she had that bad fall some time ago, because she had a spell in bed. Then Rose moved in to look after her temporarily, and I don’t think I had any reason to go up there after that. Maybe to fetch something for her …?’ Her voice trailed off. She shook her head. ‘Maybe Rose might remember or Aunt Drusilla, but I honestly don’t think I went up there after Rose moved in.
‘I was in and out downstairs, of course. There were a lot of workmen around. My Aunt found them intrusive but refused to consider moving out of the house till they’d finished. I acted as mediator between my aunt and the workmen on occasion. I was pretty successful at keeping the peace until my aunt found the plumbers were proposing to use the wrong gauge of pipe, and sacked them on the spot. She was, of course, quite right to do so. That’s when I suggested my own plumber, Jimbo Johnson. But you know all about that.
‘The builders seemed efficient enough. She didn’t have any quarrel with them, apart from turning down their proposal to redevelop the garage and the back of the house into self-contained units. I believe she did have an argument with them about that but I wasn’t there and only heard about it after it was over.
‘It was the electricians who caused me the most grief. They were slow. I had to keep popping in to see that they were providing enough power for the caterers who were doing the wedding on Saturday. The caterers need to bring in a great deal of electrical equipment and there simply aren’t enough power points in the kitchen. That’s why I was pressing the electricians – who were rewiring the unoccupied back part of the house first – to finish before the weekend, which they promised to do.’
‘Let’s get back to the wiring. The old wiring. It had been condemned?’
‘No. No one had come along and slapped a notice on, saying, “You must not touch.” Nothing like that. I agree that the wiring in what used to be the servants’ quarters was quite appalling, but then, nobody had lived there for years. That was where the electricians started, putting in a new ring main for that part of the house, which included the old servants’ sitting room and bedrooms, the larders and the scullery. You can check with them about that.
‘The wiring in the rest of the house was in need of replacement but it was still serviceable. I know, because when we were married about thirty years ago, my dear husband put in a new ring main for the part of the house which Aunt Drusilla used. That is, the kitchen, downstairs living rooms, bedrooms and bathrooms above. It cost a pretty penny and we had to scrimp and save to pay for it. Before you point out that Aunt Drusilla is as rich as Croesus, in those days we thought she was as poor as a church mouse and couldn’t afford to do it herself.’
‘So the wiring you put in has developed faults.’
‘Not as far as I know, but it was certainly in need of attention and that’s what was happening. The electricians have been working there on and off for, oh, ten days or so. On the day of the accident I’m told they were due to start on the kitchen, but to do that they had to turn off the power there and to the rest of the house. Do I make myself clear?
‘Miss Quicke had promised Mrs McNally’s daughter that she could hold her wedding reception there this Saturday. The electricians couldn’t guarantee the rewiring would be done in time, so Miss Quicke told them to leave it till after the weekend. You can ask my aunt about this, surely? I can only tell you what she told me.’
‘Go on.’
‘Well, at that point my aunt realized she would have to look for somewhere else to stay until the workmen had finished. Exit Miss Quicke. End of story.’
‘You seem to know a lot about electricity. How handy are you with a screwdriver yourself?’
‘Hopeless. Ask my husband. Oh. You can’t, of course.’
‘Do you mean to tell me –’ with an air of menace – ‘that you have never in your life changed a plug?’
‘Of course I have,’ said Ellie cheerfully. ‘I had to put a plug on an electric toaster before I was married – do you remember that in those days they used to supply electrical equipment without plugs? I hadn’t a clue how to do it, so I undid the plug on my radio to see how the wires went, and copied them. I was so pleased when the toaster worked, but Frank – we’d just got engaged at the time – he thought I’d be bound to have got it wrong, took it all apart and did it up again. Of course, he did everything like that about the house himself after we got married.’
DS Willis looked stunned, but recovered. ‘You could have got someone else to interfere with the wiring in your aunt’s bedroom.’
‘That’s a good point,’ said Ellie, drawing her chair nearer to the table. ‘I was wondering if you’d thought about a contract killer – is that what they call them? Contract killers? Forget about the wiring being old. Jimbo says that the cleaner was using the hoover all right in the bedroom, that she coiled up the flex, indicating she’d finished the job. Then she turned the television on, which of course she shouldn’t have done on her employer’s time. The point is that the wiring does seem to have been working perfectly normally up till then, don’t you agree?’
‘It is possible, yes.’
‘Well, what I think is that someone who knew what they were doing tampered with that television set. It couldn’t have been done by accident, could it? Perhaps it was done by one of the electricians who was in and out all week? Or one of the plumbers? Was it very hard to do, this rewiring job?’
‘I’m asking the questions, if you please.’
Ellie shrugged. ‘I just wanted to help. But if that’s all … it’s getting quite late, isn’t it, and I have so much still to do today.’ She looked at her watch, and stood up. ‘I really must go. Shopping to do, phone calls to make. And tell that young man that if he calls me “dearie” again, I’ll have him for libel … or is it slander?’
‘Slander,’ said Ms Willis, absent-mindedly.
Ellie began to button up her jacket when there came an interruption. Sandy Hair poked his head round the door and signalled to Ms Willis, who turned off the recorder and left the room.
Ellie picked up her bag and looked around to see if she’d left anything else in the room, which she hadn’t. Before she got to the door it opened again, and in marched Ms Willis carrying a file and wearing her most forbidding expression. Ellie sighed. Really, if the woman would only pluck her eyebrows, she’d be far easier on the eye and would probably have an easier ride in life.
‘Don’t go,’ said Ms Willis, sitting down and switching on the tape again.
Ellie hovered. ‘Is it really important? Because I do have a lot on.’
‘It’s important. We’ve just got the result of the autopsy in. Your cleaner, Mrs Tucker, had a heart condition. We have also had the voltage that was going through the television aerial checked. It was not sufficient to kill anyone.’
Ellie gaped. ‘You mean that Mrs Tucker wouldn’t have died if her heart had been all right? That a mild shock from the aerial triggered off a heart attack?’
‘Yes.’
‘You mean someone tried to frighten Aunt Drusilla, b
ut not to kill her?’
‘That’s what it looks like, yes.’
Ellie thought about that. If the voltage had not been sufficient to kill, then it opened up all sorts of possibilities. A lot of people – not just Diana
– might have liked the idea of giving Aunt Drusilla a nasty shock, while not wanting to kill her.
Ms Willis said, ‘So let’s go through your story yet again, shall we? You were irritated with your aunt for various reasons and decided to give her a fright, not intending to kill her.’
‘Dear me,’ said Ellie, ‘you do have a one-track mind, don’t you?’ She didn’t sit down again, but looked for her mobile phone in her handbag. She was more than a little surprised by how well she was standing up to this intimidating woman. What would her dear Frank have said, if he could have seen her now? Six months ago she would probably have sat down with a meek expression and obeyed Ms Willis. Now, oh no! She’d had it up to here with the woman.
‘I can see you’ve got to start all over again but I’ve told you all I know. For the record, I did not try to give my aunt an electric shock – and in any case, her heart’s as strong as an ox – and I don’t see any point in going over and over the same ground. So I’ll call a cab and be on my way. I’m not risking life and limb in a police car with Sandy Hair again.’
‘Wait a minute. You can’t go yet.’
‘Can’t I? I don’t see why not. Oh, I almost forgot. What did you want to speak to Stewart for?’
‘To eliminate him from our enquiries.’
Ellie started to punch in the number for the minicab firm that she always used. ‘What enquiries? He’s a law-abiding soul, never even got a speeding ticket as far as I know, so that means you wanted to talk to him about the accident. Well, he hasn’t anything to do with it, I can tell you that. He didn’t even know someone had died till I told him. He’s actually rather fond of Miss Quicke, you know.’
‘That’s just your opinion. Sit down again, please, Mrs Quicke.’
Ellie spoke into the phone. ‘Yes, Mrs Quicke here. Can you send a cab to the police station for me, as soon as possible? I’ll need to do some shopping in the Avenue, then drop it back at my house and then go on to my solicitor’s … it’s a big house down by the river. Five minutes? Thank you.’ Norm helped old Mr Tucker back into his chair and tucked him in. The room looked dingier than ever, partly because Mo hadn’t been there to tidy up, and partly because for some reason the television was not on.
Murder By Accident Page 11
