‘There’s Tabitha Coombs over by the archway through to the other room, the tallish one who looks like Cher on a bad day,’ he added.
At a guess, the woman was somewhere in her mid-thirties, her waist-length cocoa-brown hair worn loose, with a fringe that framed her face and touched straight, black brows. She had high cheekbones, a narrow, aquiline nose, pale complexion and a generous mouth.
‘She’s quite striking, in a slightly witchy kind of way,’ I said.
I was certain that the gallery was too crowded and noisy for her to have heard me, but something made her glance our way at that moment, her gaze direct from eyes of a surprisingly light, almost lilac, grey.
‘Her friend Kate, my informant, is the cute blonde with pink streaks in her hair, standing next to her.’
‘Hardly a friend, now she’s blabbed to you?’ I suggested.
‘Tabitha Coombs thinks she is, that’s why she confided in her. But Kate says she and her husband were friends with Tabitha’s fiancé, Jeremy, for years before they got engaged and though they didn’t much like her they just had to put up with her.’
‘Generous of them,’ I commented drily.
‘She said Tabitha was probably cheating on her fiancé with the owner of Champers&Chocs, as well as being involved in the scam, so maybe she’s got some kind of axe to grind. But I don’t really care what’s driving her, so long as she’s willing to introduce us. Then the rest is up to me.’
Before Kate had contacted him, Charlie had already had a tip-off from a disgruntled Champers&Chocs customer about cheap fizzy wine being sold for vintage champagne, so she had given him an easy way into his investigation.
‘Never look a gift-snitch in the mouth,’ I said.
The two women parted company and Kate slowly drifted across in our direction in a casual sort of way, talking to one or two people en route.
When she reached us, Charlie introduced us.
‘This is my friend Randal Hesketh – his family home is nearby, so I invited him along just for the ride. Randal, this is Kate.’
‘Pleased to meet you,’ Kate said, all flirty smiles and big, pale blue eyes with fluttering eyelashes. I supposed she was pretty enough, but since she wasn’t in the least my type her flirting didn’t have any effect on me. This seemed to disconcert her.
‘Are you ready to introduce us to your friend?’ Charlie asked.
She made a moue that looked so cutesy she’d probably practised it in the mirror a million times. ‘As I’ve already said, she’s not a friend, it was just that Luke and I had to tolerate her after she and Jeremy got engaged. But I always felt there was something wrong about her – and my instincts are usually right.’
‘Then let’s get on and find out the truth,’ he said. ‘Do you remember your story, about how we got talking and you found out I was a journalist for Lively Lancashire magazine, though I’d walked into the gallery by chance?’
Kate nodded. ‘So I told you a bit about the artist and her day job as a packer in a warehouse, and then offered to introduce you. Got it,’ she said.
She gave me another of those flirty glances. ‘Are you coming, too, Randal?’
‘No, I’ll stay here; it’s none of my business,’ I said, feeling a distaste for the whole Judas situation. I may be in a similar line of work, going undercover to get film footage for the independent TV programme I work for, Hellish Holidays, but it’s more impersonal.
‘See you later,’ I added to Charlie.
I took a glass of water from a passing tray, since fizz wasn’t my thing, whatever it was labelled as, and surveyed the gallery. It was still crowded and buzzing, so the exhibition seemed to be a success. I noticed red ‘Sold’ stickers had been affixed to several picture frames too and, on impulse, bought one myself that had taken my fancy as we entered. It was of a helmeted woman in a chariot-like wheelchair, entombed in a Sleeping Beauty tangle of flowering briars. A figure was hacking his way in, but he looked more like the Grim Reaper than a handsome prince.
I’d just paid and arranged to have it delivered to my family home in the nearby hamlet of Godsend after the exhibition had ended, when Charlie came back looking pleased with himself.
‘Got what you wanted?’
He nodded. ‘She’s agreed to ask her boss if I can have a tour of Champers&Chocs and do a short interview, so I can include it in an article on local entrepreneurs. He won’t be able to resist the publicity, but I could see she wasn’t keen on the idea. Then the fiancé – that bloke she’s talking to now – showed up and monopolised the conversation, so I left it at that. Bit of a know-it-all tosser, I’d say, too fond of his own voice.’
The man was thin and not much taller than Tabitha, with an arty lock of marmalade-coloured hair falling over his eyes in a very doomed-poet kind of way. He seemed to be lecturing her about something.
‘If that’s the fiancé, then your Kate was all over him like treacle when he arrived a few minutes ago,’ I said. ‘I assumed he was her husband. So, maybe he’s the axe she’s grinding?’
Charlie grinned. ‘You could be right. She told me her husband couldn’t make it tonight, but that didn’t stop her flirting with you earlier, too, I noticed.’
‘Do you think she’s telling the truth about Tabitha’s involvement?’
‘No idea. The scam’s certainly going on, because we’ve had champagne samples analysed, but I’ve taken what she said with a pinch of salt,’ he said. ‘Innocent until proven guilty. Tabby – everyone calls her that, apparently – was certainly uneasy as soon as Champers&Chocs was mentioned and suspiciously unenthusiastic about the company being featured in a magazine.’
‘That’s all right: it’s not going to be,’ I said drily. ‘Though of course she may be even less keen on it appearing all over a TV programme exposing what’s been going on.’
I looked over my shoulder at Tabitha Coombs as we left. The crowd had begun to thin a little and she was staring after Charlie with those startlingly light grey eyes under brows drawn together into a formidable Frida Kahlo frown. Then the fiancé said something and put a proprietorial arm around her and she looked up at him with such a loving smile that her face was quite transformed.
I felt a sudden pang: she looked like a woman in love and I found it hard to believe that she was having an affair with another man.
But, whether she was or not, if she was involved in the label-swapping scam, then she was risking her happiness for some easy money and her house of cards was about to come tumbling down.
Chapter 3: Bang to Rights
‘So Harry, my boss at Champers&Chocs, told me to show the reporter the packing room and give him some information about the business, because it would be good publicity,’ I told Emma, my best and, as it turned out, only friend. It was only my second phone call out since I’d been sent to prison and it was good to unburden myself of the whole sorry story.
I’d have rung her and told her everything the moment I was first arrested, had her husband, Des, not been back from his latest foreign contract. He’d turned into such a possessive control freak he even resented sharing Emma with her female friends.
‘And I suppose the reporter snooped?’ she said.
‘Yes, when I had to leave him for a few minutes to go to the office to answer an urgent phone call. The line was dead when I got there and I was so naïve, it never occurred to me that this Charlie Clancy had set up the call to distract me. As soon as I was out of sight, he somehow got into the back room, even though it was usually locked when Harry wasn’t there, and photographed the crates of fake champagne.’
‘I do wish you’d told me about the fraud when you first found out about it, Tabby.’
‘You had enough on your plate as it was,’ I said. ‘And I’d handed in my notice when I realised Harry hadn’t stopped the fraud, so another couple of weeks and I’d have been out of there.’
‘It was a huge shock when I saw his secret film exposing the scam on that Dodgy Dealings programme, and there you were! And what
was worse, Des was with me and he saw it, too.’
I shuddered. ‘I looked so shifty when the reporter asked me what went on in the back room and I replied that it was just an office … It was clear I knew what was happening.’
‘Maybe, but that doesn’t mean you were implicated in it. I feel guilty for letting Des persuade me to go on a family break with him and Marco to St Lucia before the end of the trial, even though I was sure you would be found not guilty.’
‘I thought so too, at first: I was just an employee, after all. But Harry tried to lay the blame for thinking up the scam on me and said we’d been having an affair, then Kate stood up in court and backed his story up.’
‘What a cow!’ Emma said.
I could still hear Kate’s voice as she stood there in the witness stand, all big, innocent baby-blue eyes, saying sadly, ‘Oh, yes, Tabitha told me in confidence that she’d thought up a way for Champers&Chocs to make some easy money, replacing the bottles of vintage champagne with cheap fakes. I told her it was illegal, but she just laughed and said no one would ever find out.’
‘But none of that was true,’ Emma said stoutly.
‘No, but I could see the jury didn’t believe me – and I suppose it did look bad that I hadn’t told the police, or handed in my notice as soon as I found out. Only, Harry had been kind to me in the past, letting me work hours that fitted in with caring for Mum and then offering me a per-manent job later.’
‘I know,’ she said sympathetically. ‘And things suddenly seemed to be going right for you, what with getting engaged to Jeremy and then your first solo exhibition.’
‘Jeremy didn’t believe I was innocent, even before Kate stood up there and lied through her teeth – we’d already had a big argument and I’d moved back into the flat,’ I said. ‘I was found guilty of involvement in the fraud and the judge said he was going to make an example of me and send me to prison, and though my solicitor had warned me the day before to pack a small bag just in case, it was still a huge shock when I got an eight-month custodial sentence.’
‘I couldn’t believe it when I got back from the holiday and found out you were in a prison in Cheshire! I wanted to visit you, but Des was still home and … well, he’s worse than ever. Wants to know what I’m doing every minute of every day. But at least I managed to write to you and tell you when he’d gone off again. Was the prison horrendous?’
‘It passed in a bit of a blur, to be honest. I was totally stunned when I heard the sentence, though someone said to me, “You’ll be out by the spring,” as I was led down to the cells below the court, which I think was meant to cheer me up. Prison – especially over Christmas – was like a strange nightmare I kept thinking I’d wake up from. I was so scared that I retreated right into myself, but then in the New Year I got moved here, to the open prison.’
‘Is it much better?’
‘Yes, it’s in a lovely old building in the countryside, and though of course we’re still prisoners, with strict rules and regulations to obey, it’s more relaxed. I’ve got a library job and help clear after dinner, too, so I keep myself occupied.’
‘Perhaps you’ll be able to do your papercuts and collages again?’ she suggested.
‘I haven’t got any art materials with me and I’m not sure even open prisons would be that keen on my having sharp craft knives,’ I said. ‘I’m only hoping the greetings card firms I’ve sold designs to in the past didn’t see that TV programme and realise it was me, so I can carry on working with them when I get out.’
‘Probably not,’ Emma said optimistically. ‘And even if they saw it, people aren’t that quick at putting two and two together.’
‘That’s true,’ I said, feeling a slight flicker of hope.
‘I’m afraid it’s too far away for me to come and visit,’ she said apologetically, though I hadn’t expected her to, since her little boy, Marco, was only six and in addition to being a mum she was doing some supply teaching in the reception class at his infants’ school.
‘It’s lovely just to talk to someone,’ I said. ‘The only other person I’ve rung is Jeremy, because I was desperate to know how Pye is. Even though the engagement was off, I’d begged him to look after Pye if I got sent to prison and he said he would, though I’m sure he didn’t believe that would happen any more than I did.’
‘So, how is Pye? You were so inseparable, you must be missing each other terribly.’
‘I am, and I’m so worried about him, Emma!’ I told her. ‘The minute Jeremy heard my voice he put the phone down, and when I wrote he didn’t answer, so I don’t know what’s happening.’
‘Look, don’t worry, I’ll drive over there tomorrow after school with Marco and see how Pye is,’ she promised. ‘I can’t take him home with me, because Des would have a hissy fit when he gets back, but I’ll make sure he’s OK.’
‘If you would,’ I said gratefully. Emma had only met Jeremy a couple of times, but she was less than twenty minutes’ drive away. Thank God Des was working abroad again and she was, for the moment, a relatively free agent.
‘Do you need anything?’ she asked. ‘I could send it in a parcel if so?’
‘That would be wonderful, because I seem to have packed all the wrong things. I need more clothes and maybe my sketchbooks …’
I told her what I needed and where they would be found.
‘What about money?’ she asked.
‘I’m actually all right for cash, because when the solicitor warned me the night before the verdict that I might get a custodial sentence, I drew out a month’s rent for the flat to give to Jeremy and then forgot and wrote him a cheque, so I’ve got quite a bit of credit for my phone calls and anything I need. On release, they deduct it from the money you brought in with you.’
‘He was so mean, making you carry on paying rent for the flat after you got engaged!’
‘He is a bit tight, but I spent quite a lot of time there working on my pictures. I was going to keep it on as my studio when we finally got married …’
If we’d ever got married, because Jeremy had proved really reluctant to name a year, let alone a date!
I was on tenterhooks, wondering how Pye was and hoping for good news, but Emma sounded troubled when we spoke again.
‘Jeremy wasn’t pleased to see me at all, and didn’t even invite me and Marco into the house. And I’m afraid Pye wasn’t there, Tabby – Jeremy said that he couldn’t cope with the constant yowling after you’d gone, so he’d found him a good home, but he wouldn’t tell me where, or who with.’
Cold dread seized my heart, for not only did I adore Pye, but he was the last living link to my mother, who had also loved him.
‘You don’t think he’s just saying that and he’s had him put to sleep?’
‘No, I’m sure he hasn’t,’ she reassured me. ‘When I told him he shouldn’t have rehomed Pye without your permission, he said you’d abandoned him by committing a crime, so it was your own fault, but I was to assure you the cat was perfectly all right.’
‘I hope so … and thank you for trying to find where he was,’ I said, but inwardly I was thinking of Pye – my awkward, demanding, adorable Pye – out there somewhere living with strangers … Was he happy and safe? A slow tear slid coldly down my face.
‘The other thing is, Tabby, that your belongings weren’t in the flat any more, but in boxes piled at the back of the garage. Jeremy said since obviously you and he didn’t have any kind of future together and your rent had run out, he was going to let the flat again. I can’t believe how mean and horrible he’s turned out to be!’
I didn’t feel that surprised after our final argument … and anyway, it paled into insignificance compared with his arbitrary rehoming of Pye.
‘He let me go and rummage through the boxes and I found most of the things you wanted. He says he’d be grateful if you’d have them removed at the first opportunity,’ she added.
‘He’ll have to wait then, because I can’t do anything till I get out – and ev
en then I’ll have nowhere to live, no job and a criminal record.’
‘Jeremy’s such a pompous, self-satisfied prig, though I couldn’t say so when you were in love with him. And I should know, because I married one myself,’ she said wearily.
‘Is Des being just as difficult?’ I asked sympathetically.
‘He gets worse every time he gets back from a contract and wants every second of my time accounted for. And the least thing that isn’t quite the way he likes it, or the way his mother used to do it, and he flies right off the handle. Even when Marco was a toddler, he didn’t have tantrums like that!’
‘He isn’t violent, is he?’
‘No, it’s all verbal bullying. I’d be straight out of there if he tried anything else. And I know I should stand up to him more, but I don’t want Marco to hear us arguing all the time. I could do with your sharp tongue to cut him down to size occasionally.’
‘My sarcastic tongue frequently gets me into trouble,’ I said ruefully. ‘I don’t think one or two of my smart answers to stupid questions went down well in court.’
Emma was still following her own thoughts. ‘Sometimes he’s really sweet, just like he was when we were first going out. It’s since he started working away on longer contracts that he’s really changed.’ She sighed. ‘It seems to me we’re both in prison, in a way.’
‘I’ll get out in a couple of months, if I don’t blot my copybook.’
‘And Des is going to be back for only a couple of days and then he’s off for six weeks to Dubai,’ Emma said, then added, to my puzzlement, ‘And thank you for not saying it.’
‘What?’
‘“I told you so.” Remember when Des and I decided to get married only a couple of months after we met and you suggested I didn’t rush into it? I told you he was wonderful and I knew it was the right thing for me and Marco. But you were quite right.’
I’d worried that it was too soon after she’d been widowed, even though I could understand her longing to be loved again and to give Marco a father. I hadn’t been sure that Desmond was the right man for her, either.
A Christmas Cracker Page 2
