by J F Straker
‘Would they each have a copy of this?’ he asked, watching Whisky and Soda, who were sniffing earnestly at his trouser legs.
‘Yes.’
‘So they at least would know who would be doing the round on any particular day.’
‘Yes. So would their families, I suppose. Friends too, possibly, in some cases.’ Frances could contain her curiosity no longer. ‘Forgive my asking, Mr Hasted, but why your interest in Meals on Wheels? Has it to do with Mrs Doyle’s murder?’
‘It could have.’
‘But you’ve got the men who did it, haven’t you? It was on the news.’
‘They admit to stealing the car,’ Hasted said. ‘But they deny all knowledge of the murder. And there’s evidence to suggest they may be telling the truth.’
‘So what happens to them?’
‘They’re being brought before a magistrate this morning on the minor charge, and he’ll almost certainly remand them in custody for a week. That will give us time to make further enquiries.’
‘You’re sure they didn’t do it?’
‘No, we’re not. But it’s a possibility we can’t ignore.’
‘And you think the alternative is someone on that list?’ Frances prodded Whisky gently with a slippered foot. The dog ignored the protest and continued sniffing. ‘Or someone who had access to it?’
‘Well, it has to be someone who knew her movements that day, doesn’t it? And these people certainly did.’
‘Including me?’
Hasted smiled. ‘Including you, Mrs Holden. Although I doubt whether we’ll be checking on you very closely. We’re more interested in anyone known to have had a grudge against her—real or otherwise.’
‘Well, she wasn’t wildly popular, was she?’ Frances said sadly. ‘Somehow or other, poor thing, she managed to upset quite a few of the locals.’
‘Like Sam Bates, eh?’ he said, seizing the opening. ‘And I see his wife’s on the list.’
‘Oh, that old thing! You know about that, do you?’
‘I’ve heard rumours,’ he said. ‘I don’t know the details.’
‘You know he owns that piece of rough ground behind the church?’
‘Does he? No, I didn’t know.’
‘He bought it around six years ago, on an understanding with the council that he would be granted planning permission to develop it as a small private housing estate provided he built an access road. The only existing access was the footpath alongside the cemetery.’
‘It’s still the only access, isn’t it?’ Hasted said.
‘Yes. And that’s the snag. For Sam Bates, I mean. Colonel Phillips owned the Manor then, and he agreed to let Sam build a road through his paddock.’ Frances smiled. ‘For more than adequate compensation, I’m told. The colonel had a good head for business. Whisky! Soda! Stop it!’
‘It’s all right,’ Hasted said. ‘They don’t bother me. What went wrong, Mrs Holden?’
‘The colonel died. He collapsed while reading the lesson in church. They rushed him to hospital, but he was dead on arrival. And he hadn’t actually signed the contract. Elizabeth Doyle bought the Manor and refused to complete the deal, and Sam Bates was left with a white elephant.’
Hasted considered the list Frances had given him. Only four names were unknown to him, and with the exception of Arthur Shawby, who had been in hospital on the Friday, all would have to be checked. This was routine stuff, most of which could be left to subordinates. Two, or possibly three, he preferred to handle himself.
Mr Doyle was out, Mrs Trotter told him when he called at the Manor, but Andrew was in. How have they been since the tragedy? he asked. Much the same as before, she said, it’s never been what I’d call a happy house. Precious little laughter and no real show of affection. Well, they say money doesn’t bring happiness. You want Andrew, do you? He’s upstairs with his guitar.
Yes, Hasted said, he wanted Andrew.
‘Dad’s at the Vicarage,’ Andrew said when he came down. ‘About the funeral. Is it important?’
‘It can wait,’ Hasted said. ‘When did your father plan to have the funeral?’
‘Friday.’
Hasted nodded. ‘That should be OK. You know the inquest is this afternoon?’
‘Yes. Will it take long?’
‘It shouldn’t. Just evidence of identity, et cetera. Then he’ll adjourn. But it will enable your father to get a burial order.’
‘Oh! I don’t think my father knew he’d need one. Would you like a coffee, Mr Hasted?’
Hasted said he would. While Andrew was absent in the kitchen he went out across the terrace to the formal garden, arranged in rectangles separated by broad walks with squat box and lavender hedges, and turned to admire the house. Built of red brick, with numerous gables and latticed windows, the walls adorned with clematis and climbing roses, it seemed to glow in the sunshine. He returned to the terrace and peered in at the long dining room, admiring the oak-panelled walls and the stucco work on the ceiling. The furniture, although obviously expensive, did not impress him. Elizabeth Doyle, he decided, had had no eye for period.
He was back in the sitting room when Andrew returned with the coffee. Pouring, Andrew said, ‘Those two men you arrested, Mr Hasted. Have they confessed? To the murder, I mean.’
Once more Hasted explained the situation. ‘So we have to widen our enquiry,’ he said. ‘And that means questioning a lot of people. It’s routine stuff that is time-consuming and involves considerable leg work, and most of it is unprofitable. But it has to be done.’
‘Is that why you’re here now?’
‘Partly,’ Hasted said. ‘So let’s get it over, shall we? Where were you that Friday lunchtime?’
‘In the Falcon at the Rye. Derek Mollison drove me over.’
‘Did he bring you back?’
‘No. He left early. Said he was meeting someone.’ Andrew gave the vestige of a grin. ‘They say he’s got a girlfriend.’
Hasted nodded. He knew Derek’s reputation, but it was a reputation he found difficult to accept. True, Alice Mollison would never win a beauty competition. She was also highly strung and had a sharp tongue. But she was Alfred Plummer’s daughter and the apple of his eye, and it was Plummer who owned the garage and employed Derek to manage it. It was said that, because of Derek’s reputation, Plummer had been averse to the marriage. If he were to discover that his son-in-law was having an extra-marital affair it was odds on that Derek would be out on his ear. And Derek loved the job. Would he be fool enough to jeopardize it?
‘So how did you get back?’
‘I walked. Through the woods.’
‘Through the woods? In all that rain! Really?’
Andrew’s pale face flushed slightly at the hint of disbelief in the inspector’s tone. Embarrassed, he said, ‘I’d had rather a lot to drink.’
‘You mean you were pickled?’
‘More or less, yes.’
‘What difference did that make?’
‘The rain just didn’t seem to matter.’
Hasted nodded. He could understand that. ‘Did you go anywhere near the Philipson cottage?’ he asked.
‘No. There’s a ride that comes out near the garage. You know?’
Hasted shook his head. Rye Woods were largely foreign territory to him. He did not own a dog and was not a keen walker, and until that week he had had no occasion to visit them.
‘I’m afraid not,’ he said.
‘Oh! Well, it starts near the Falcon and joins the Compton Morris road just west of the garage. I kept to that.’
‘Did you meet anyone?’
‘Not as I remember. But it’s all a bit hazy. Getting back, I mean. Although I remember being sick.’
‘Where was that?’
‘Somewhere along the ride.’
‘What time did you leave the Falcon? Do you know?’
Andrew shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not. Sometime after one, I imagine. But that’s just a guess.’
‘Well, what time did
you get back here?’
‘I don’t know that either. I’m sorry, Mr Hasted, but I don’t. I was wearing an anorak, but it was a light summer one, more or less useless in that sort of weather, and I was absolutely soaked. So as soon as I got in I went straight upstairs and stripped off. Then I lay down on the bed and went to sleep.’
‘Was Mrs Trotter here?’
‘No. She leaves at twelve-thirty.’
‘Were you still in bed when Mrs Holden rang?’
‘Yes. That’s what woke me. But I was pretty muzzy—it must have been ages before I got around to answering it. She probably thought I was tight. Which I still was, I suppose. A bit, anyway.’ The deep-set eyes narrowed. He said earnestly, ‘My father doesn’t know I was drunk. You don’t have to tell him, do you?’
Hasted smiled. ‘I shouldn’t think so.’
‘I don’t know how he’d take it, you see.’
‘Well, don’t worry.’ Hasted sipped coffee. It was cold, but talking had made him thirsty. ‘Mrs Holden has been telling me of your stepmother’s refusal to let Sam Bates build a road through your paddock. You know about that?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘I wondered if your father might be more sympathetic to the project.’
‘I don’t know about sympathetic,’ Andrew said. ‘I doubt if he’d care one way or the other. My father isn’t really the rural type, Mr Hasted. I wouldn’t be surprised if he decided to sell the Manor and move to London.’
‘Chacun à son goût,’ Hasted said. ‘Me, I prefer West Deering. London’s fine for a night out, but living there would drive me up the wall.’ He stood up to leave. ‘One more thing, Andrew. Did you or your father have occasion to use the Morris while it was here?’
‘I don’t think my father did. But I did. On Thursday. I collected some timber from Mr Bates.’
‘So your fingerprints would be all over the boot?’
‘I suppose so, yes.’
‘Well, later today we’ll be setting up a mobile incident room on the Green. I’d like you to call in and have your fingerprints taken.’ He smiled at the look of concern on Andrew’s face. ‘Not to worry. It’s solely for elimination purposes. OK?’ Andrew nodded. ‘And ask your father to do the same, will you? Even if he didn’t drive the car he may have fingered it.’
Sam Bates’s yard was situated close to the Deering Arms. Hasted picked his way between the racks of timber, the stacks of bricks and other building materials and larger piles of what appeared to be junk, to the office in a room on the ground floor of the house. The office was closed, and he walked round to the front, where Ivy Bates opened the door to him. Sam was out, she said. Rory? Was he not up in the yard? No, Hasted said, he was not. ‘He’ll be in the pub then,’ Ivy said. ‘You’ll catch him there. Good about Saturday, wasn’t it?’
‘Saturday?’ he queried.
‘The match.’ Like her menfolk, Ivy was a cricket fan and a keen supporter of the village team.
‘Oh! We won, did we? Good.’
‘We didn’t just win, George, we walloped them. And Rory got sixty-three and took three wickets.’
‘Good for Rory,’ Hasted said. ‘Sorry I missed it. I was busy Saturday.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘Those men. Still, you must be pleased you got them so quick.’ From the kitchen came the hissing sound of water boiling over on a hot stove. ‘Tell Rory not to be late,’ she said as she bustled away.
The Deering Arms was a modernised seventeenth-century alehouse, a happy mixture of the old and the new. Rory Bates was in the small bar, chatting up the landlord’s wife. He was a broad and muscular young man, with a trim little moustache that looked slightly incongruous on his weather-beaten face.
‘A pint of best for the Force, please, Aileen,’ he said when he saw Hasted.
‘Make it a half,’ Hasted said. ‘I’ve a busy afternoon ahead of me and beer makes me sleepy. Especially in this heat. I hear you did yourself proud on Saturday, Rory.’
‘First time I’ve ever topped fifty,’ Rory said. ‘Mind you, I was dropped twice.’
‘It’s all in the game.’ Hasted lifted his glass. ‘Cheers!’
‘Cheers!’ They both drank. ‘You’ve done yourself a bit of good too, haven’t you, George? Picking up those two killers so soon—Big Brother should be pleased with you. I know we are.’ Rory grinned. ‘The old man drank your health. In cocoa, of course.’
‘Of course,’ Hasted said. Sam Bates was a teetotaller. ‘But why?’
‘You know about the feud between him and Mrs Doyle over the Manor paddock?’
‘Vaguely. What about it?’
One or two people, Rory said, had hinted—some broadly, some subtly—that he or his father might have been responsible for Elizabeth Doyle’s death. ‘It was meant as a joke, of course, and I don’t think anyone really believed it. Too way out. All the same, it was in pretty poor taste.’ Rory smiled. ‘The old man was hopping mad.’
‘I can imagine,’ Hasted said. ‘How about you?’
‘Oh, I wasn’t bothered. If it had been serious I’d have quashed it, of course. As it was...’ Rory shrugged. ‘Well, I just ignored it.’
‘Quashed it how?’
‘As it happened, we both had a cast-iron alibi. Dad was in Limpsted—he draws the wages Friday—and didn’t get home till close on two. And Billy Young and I spent the day over at Yellham, repairing the Follicks’ roof.’
Were the alibis cast-iron? Hasted wondered. Rory’s, yes—if Billy Young substantiated it. But why had Sam been late for lunch that day? And why the assumption that his arrival home at two o’clock absolved him from suspicion? Sam Bates might be an unlikely killer, but his alibi needed to be checked.
‘I’ve been talking to Andrew Doyle,’ he said. ‘Do you remember him collecting some timber from your place on Thursday?’
Rory’s weather-beaten face wrinkled in thought. ‘Was it Thursday? I’m not sure. Could have been Wednesday. Want me to look it up?’
‘No. It’s the incident that’s important, not the day.’
‘Oh! Well, in that case—yes, he did. Half a dozen seven-foot lengths of two-by-two. In oak. Why?’
‘Did you help put them in the car?’
‘No. I would have done, only—yes, you’re right, George. It was Thursday. I remember now. I was showing him where the posts were stacked when Ma called me to the phone. By the time I got back Andrew had taken the posts and gone.’
‘So your fingerprints wouldn’t be on the Morris? That’s the car he was using.’
‘No.’ With the glass en route to his lips, Rory paused, ‘Here! What’s this all about, George? You’ve got the men that did it, haven’t you? So why the interest in my fingerprints? I don’t get it.’
Hasted explained yet again that there was now some doubt whether the two men they had arrested were guilty of the murder. ‘They deny it,’ he said. ‘And there’s evidence to suggest they may be telling the truth.’
‘Good Lord! You mean the body was already in the boot when they nicked the car? Someone else had put it there?’
‘It’s possible. Which is why we need to check on fingerprints. There are plenty beside theirs on the car. Was your father in the yard on Thursday?’
‘No.’ Rory finished his beer. ‘It was him that phoned me. From the Morris.’
‘Eh?’ Hasted exclaimed. Then he smiled. ‘Oh, I see. Compton Morris.’
‘Yes. He’d been delayed. Wanted me to let the Vicar know he could be late. He didn’t say what for.’
‘Why didn’t he ring the vicar himself?’
‘I’ve no idea. I never thought to ask.’
Now for the awkward bit, Hasted thought. But it could not be avoided, and in as casual a tone as he could muster he said, ‘Well, anyway, we’ll be setting up a mobile incident room on the Green this afternoon or this evening. You know—to gather and sift information. Call in sometime and have your fingerprints taken, will you? We want to eliminate as many as we can.’
‘Will do.�
��
‘And ask your father to do the same.’
‘Sure. Though he won’t like it. He—’ The smile on Rory’s face vanished. ‘Here, wait a minute! I told you: neither of us touched the damned car. Not Thursday, not any time. So it’s not elimination you’re after, is it? You think one of us might have killed her and that our fingerprints could be on the car to prove it.’ He looked grim. ‘You bloody hypocrite, George!’
‘Oh, don’t be an idiot, Rory,’ Hasted said. ‘I don’t think anything of the sort, and you know it. It’s just normal police procedure. Anyway, what the hell are you beefing about? Just now you were complaining that some of your friends were insinuating—’
‘I didn’t say friends.’
‘Acquaintances, then. Well, here’s where you confound them. And not just by quoting alibis. If your prints aren’t on the Morris you’re in the clear.’ Not entirely true, Hasted thought, but near enough. ‘Isn’t that what you want? Not just to be innocent but to be seen to be innocent?’ Rory shrugged. ‘You see? Like I said, it’s a matter of elimination. Now, how about the other half?’
‘No thanks.’
‘You’re sure? Well, perhaps you’re right.’ Hasted spoke with forced cheerfulness. It worried him that his job should alienate him from his friends. He was a man who valued friendship. ‘Your mother said not to be late for lunch.’
At the garage Derek was checking the oil level in his father-in-law’s car. Hasted exchanged a few words with Plummer, a retired marine engineer whose upright bearing belied his seventy-one years, and explained to Derek about the incident room and the need to have his fingerprints taken. ‘We should be through with the Morris by tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Certainly by Friday.’
‘Good. I feel naked without a spare.’ Derek wiped the top of the engine and closed the bonnet. ‘How’s the new arrival, George?’
‘Fine, thanks. So is Sybil.’
‘Alice said, any help you want, to let her know.’
‘That’s kind of her,’ Hasted said. ‘Thank her for me, will you? But Eileen’s coping magnificently, and Sybil should be home by the weekend.’
‘Another son, eh, Inspector?’ Plummer said. ‘Derek was telling me. Congratulations!’
