Dead End

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  As they went through their preliminary chatting, Slider could see that he had considerable charm, and could understand why Fay Coleraine had wanted him. Probably a great many women would want him, he thought – that combination of boyishness and power could be intoxicating. But as Coleraine talked, Slider detected a harshness about the shapes the mouth and eyes made; charm and dynamism overlaid a brittleness, as if he had spent his life defending a vulnerable place by keeping it hidden. There was an edge to the voice, too, which Slider found almost unpleasant. But he knew Coleraine didn’t like music: perhaps it was simply that he was tone deaf.

  Eventually they got on to the subject of Radek. ‘What did you think of your father-in-law?’ Slider asked. He was seated in an antiqued leather chair, buttoned to within an inch of its life, on one side of the vast reproduction Georgian desk. Coleraine, on the other side, sat well back in an executive swivel that pivoted through so many planes it could have done service as a flight simulator. Slider had accepted the offer of whisky, and was nursing a dangerously large measure of Glenmorangie in a vast cut-glass tumbler so heavy it was going to take both hands to get it up to his mouth. Everything in the office seemed to have been chosen to declare that if money was no object, good taste certainly wasn’t either.

  ‘I don’t really care for that kind of music,’ Coleraine answered, ‘so I don’t know whether he was a genius or only fabulously successful. He was certainly the latter. But the cognoscenti seem to think he was one of the world’s all-time greats, too, so who am I to argue?’

  ‘I meant, what did you think of him as a person,’ Slider said patiently, aware that Coleraine knew perfectly well what he had meant. Was this just another game of bait-the-policeman – a favoured pastime amongst some members of the middle classes, who cherished the Father-Christmas belief that all coppers were thick – or was he putting off an evil moment?

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Coleraine seemed to consider for a moment. ‘Well, he wasn’t an easy person to like,’ he said at last. ‘Not that he cared whether he was or not. He liked to play power games with people, as long as the odds were stacked for him to win – and let’s face it, when a man is as rich and important as Stefan, they usually are.’ He had put rich first, Slider noted. Was that accidental or a significant psychological marker – what they called in more technical police language, a bit of a dead give-away? Coleraine went on, ‘It was sad, really: being who he was, he could have done so much good; but he was arrogant and selfish and mean. It seemed such a waste.’

  ‘I suppose he was a very wealthy man?’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t mean “mean” in that sense,’ Coleraine said hastily – too hastily to avoid the clumsiness of the sentence. ‘Fay and I have plenty of our own. We both have successful businesses which we built up entirely ourselves, without any help from Stefan.’

  ‘You think he ought to have helped you?’

  Coleraine looked confused, as Slider meant him to be, by the near-sequitur, and hesitated over the possible paths out of the apparent misunderstanding. ‘Look, I wasn’t interested in my father-in-law’s money. I want you to realise that. I’ve done all right for myself,’ he said, with a vague wave of the glass at his surroundings. ‘It was the way he treated Fay that I didn’t like,’ he went on with an air of being absolutely fair. ‘I mean, when we were first married. That’s all in the past now, of course.’

  ‘How did he treat your wife?’

  Coleraine frowned at the question. ‘I don’t want you thinking this is some festering sore. It’s ancient history now. And in fact, I got on pretty well with the old boy at the end. He wasn’t half so bad if you stood up to him and let him know you didn’t give a damn what he thought of you.’

  ‘You were on friendly terms with him, then?’

  ‘Yes, he wasn’t such an ogre really.’

  ‘You visited him quite a lot, I suppose?’

  ‘No, not a great deal. Just now and then. From time to time,’ he said with diminishing eagerness. ‘He wasn’t the sort of man you’d drop in on out of pleasure.’ Slider was interested that Coleraine seemed to think it mattered what he thought of his relationship with Radek. He was trying to create an impression, or perhaps trying not to create another impression. Now why was that?

  ‘So what did you drop in on him out of?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ Coleraine said impatiently, lifting one hand towards his brow in an uncompleted gesture. ‘I wasn’t in the habit of dropping in on him. All I’m trying to say is that I got on all right with the old boy, but we weren’t great chums, all right?’

  Slider smiled enigmatically. ‘How did he treat your wife when you were first married?’ he reverted. Coleraine didn’t answer for a moment, looking annoyed, or perhaps rattled, and Slider went on, ‘I understand he didn’t approve of the marriage? Or didn’t approve of you?’

  ‘Who told you that? Oh, never mind. The fact is Stefan wouldn’t have approved of Fay marrying anyone. He wanted to keep her to himself.’

  ‘But he’d sent her away to school, hadn’t he, to be rid of her?’

  ‘He could hardly keep her at home once his wife died,’ Coleraine objected. ‘With no-one to look after her, he had to send her to school. But that didn’t mean he didn’t want her. She was one of his possessions, and he liked to keep hold of them. And he certainly didn’t want anyone else to have her, particularly a nobody like me. So he forbade the marriage, and when Fay went ahead and defied him, he told her she could stew in her own juice from then on, and cut her off without a penny. He was rolling in money, but he enjoyed watching us struggle. And it was a struggle at first, I can tell you. But we made it. I think it riled him that we showed him we didn’t need him. I think that’s why he offered to pay Marcus’s school fees later on. But Marcus got a scholarship, so that wiped the old devil’s eye for him.’ He paused, perhaps listening to himself critically, for he went on, ‘I felt almost sorry for him in the end. It must be sad to have to keep proving to yourself that people need you, and then finding out they don’t.’

  ‘Your son is how old now?’

  ‘Twenty-one.’

  ‘And what does he do?’

  Coleraine frowned. ‘What has all this got to do with Stefan’s murder? Why are you asking about me and my family?’

  ‘I’m just trying to get a picture of Sir Stefan’s life,’ Slider said innocently. ‘You see, no-one seems to know of anyone who might want to kill him. So I have to collect every scrap of information I can, to put the whole jigsaw puzzle together. You never know which piece might prove crucial.’

  ‘It all sounds a bit unscientific,’ Coleraine said patronisingly. ‘We aren’t living in the nineteenth century, you know.’

  ‘Oh, we’ve got people out doing all the high-tech things as well,’ Slider said kindly. ‘I have my own area of expertise.’

  Coleraine, to do him justice, recognised fifteen-all when he saw it. ‘Well, I don’t know that I can tell you anything,’ he said more helpfully. ‘I can’t think who might want to kill Stefan either.’

  ‘When did you last see him?’ Slider asked.

  A slight hesitation. ‘Actually, it was on Tuesday – Tuesday morning.’ His voice had changed. He was trying to slip it out as lightly and unimportantly as possible, and his eyes were watchful. Presumably he thought it was a damaging admission, and that might mean something or nothing: people had the oddest ideas of what was damaging, and often lied about something of no importance at all. It was one of the major frustrations of police work.

  ‘Where did you see him?’ Slider asked.

  ‘Oh, at home. At his home, I mean. I – just popped in.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘No reason in particular. I was just passing, saw his place, wondered how he was.’ He shrugged and smiled. ‘Passing fancy, you might say.’ Something visibly occurred to him. ‘I think he’d been having a flaming row with Buster. They were glaring daggers at each other, so it was a good job I did turn up. Poor old Buster looked fit to burst into tea
rs.’

  Odd how everyone referred to Keaton as ‘poor old Buster’, Slider reflected. He seemed to have been very comfortably placed and quite content in his lot. ‘What were they quarrelling about?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. They stopped when I arrived of course. But I don’t suppose it was important. They often had barnies. It didn’t mean anything.’

  Slider smiled. ‘Like a married couple.’

  Coleraine shook his head. ‘It wasn’t like that, if that’s what you were thinking. And for God’s sake, don’t suggest anything of the sort to Fay. It makes her mad as hell. She hates the way people always assume that every friendship has to be that way.’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking that. I was only suggesting that people quarrelling doesn’t mean they don’t love each other or aren’t happy together.’

  ‘Yes, well, I’ll pass over your use of the word love,’ Coleraine said with a tight smile. ‘Basically you’re right.’

  Slider switch-hit. ‘Do you know how your father-in-law’s estate was left?’

  Coleraine opened his eyes wide and frank, to show this was not a problem question. ‘The bulk of it goes to Fay. I think Buster was to have the house for his lifetime, which is only fair, considering the years he’s put in with the old boy; but it did belong to Fay’s grandfather, after all, so it’s right it should go to her when Buster dies. He hasn’t any family to worry about it anyway. But everything else goes to Fay.’

  ‘It’s a considerable fortune, I understand,’ Slider said.

  ‘Is it?’ he said with enormous indifference. ‘I don’t know exactly how much. But Fay and I have all we need anyway.’

  ‘Oh, a little extra money never comes amiss,’ Slider said genially. ‘Perhaps you could put it in trust for your son.’

  That touched a nerve. Coleraine offered only a terse and forbidding, ‘Perhaps.’

  Slider changed direction again. ‘Where were you on Wednesday afternoon?’

  Something quickened in Coleraine’s face. He was suddenly alert and wary. ‘Why are you asking me that? Surely I’m not a suspect?’

  Slider smiled. ‘Telling me where you were doesn’t make you a suspect.’

  ‘Why else would you ask that?’

  ‘I can think of lots of reasons. Supposing someone who was a suspect was naming you as their alibi? I’d need to check it out, wouldn’t I?’

  He had spoken more or less at random, but he seemed to have struck something. Coleraine’s face was taut, his mouth ugly with tension. ‘Has someone done that?’

  ‘Have you some reason not to tell me where you were on Wednesday afternoon?’ Slider countered smoothly.

  ‘No. Not at all. I – er – I was at home,’ Coleraine said with some reluctance. ‘I was supposed to be lunching with a client that day, but I didn’t feel well, so I cancelled it and went home. Mrs Goodwin, my secretary, will confirm that.’

  ‘What time did you get home?’

  ‘About a quarter to two, I suppose. I didn’t go out again.’

  ‘Were you alone?’

  ‘Of course I was alone. What sort of question is that?’

  ‘I meant, is there anyone who can confirm that you were there?’

  He shook his head. ‘Fay was at work. She came home about seven.’

  ‘And your son?’

  ‘He doesn’t live with us. He has his own flat in Bayswater.’ He tried a smile. ‘I’m afraid it’s not much of an alibi, is it?’

  ‘Well,’ Slider said innocently, ‘as long as you don’t need one, it doesn’t matter, does it?’

  ‘No, of course not,’ Coleraine said, looking at Slider thoughtfully. ‘You wouldn’t, by any chance, be taking the piss, would you?’

  ‘Not by any chance,’ Slider said, returning the look. ‘A man is dead, Mr Coleraine. What’s dead can’t come to life, I think.’

  ‘Browning,’ he said rather blankly. ‘Not a very popular poet.’

  ‘But then mine is not a very popular job. Except with the victims. We’re the only ones who actually have to see the victims. The lawyers, the judges, the juries, the social workers, the journalists – they only see the accused, looking very small and put-upon in the dock, or being hustled into a police car.’ He drained his whisky and stood up. ‘I’m very grateful to you for your time. If I have any more questions, I’ll be in touch, and I hope you’ll be patient with me. We will find out who killed your father-in-law,’ he promised.

  ‘Yes,’ said Coleraine, as if that was the only safe word he could think of for the moment.

  * * *

  In the outer office the secretary was rattling away on a word-processor. She looked up and smiled hesitantly at Slider, and he paused by her desk.

  ‘Mrs Goodwin, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Helena.’ She was a striking-looking woman in her mid-thirties, with large brown eyes and high cheekbones, dark, fine hair escaping from an Edwardian cottage-loaf, the legal secretary’s uniform garb of blue-and-white striped shirt and navy skirt. She looked as though she hadn’t been getting much sleep lately: she was pale and there were dark shadows under her eyes, and the smile on her rather lovely mouth was troubled.

  ‘You’ve been with Mr Coleraine for some time now, haven’t you?’

  ‘Four years, and two with Mr Antrobus before that. I don’t know if you’d call that a long time.’

  Slider nodded encouragingly. ‘It’s an upsetting business, this.’ She watched him carefully, committing herself to nothing. ‘A murder in the family,’ he expanded, ‘even if the victim wasn’t particularly popular.’

  ‘I didn’t really know Sir Stefan,’ she said. ‘Only as an ordinary member of the public. He never came to this office.’

  ‘Do you like classical music?’

  ‘Some,’ she said circumspectly.

  ‘You’ve been to concerts when he’s been conducting, I suppose?’

  For some reason the question bothered her. A faint pinkness appeared. ‘One or two. I – I don’t really go out much. I have a little boy. Babysitters aren’t always easy to find.’

  ‘What does your husband do?’

  ‘I’m divorced,’ she said abruptly, the pink deepening. She stood up. ‘May I show you out? I have rather a lot of work to catch up on.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t want to put you behind,’ he said with his most engaging smile, and she softened a little.

  ‘No, it’s all right, really,’ she said, coming round the desk and crossing to the door. He waited until her hand was on the doorknob.

  ‘Can you tell me what time Mr Coleraine left on Wednesday?’

  The hand remained steady, but she said, ‘I should have thought you could have asked him that.’

  ‘What an evasive answer,’ he said lightly. ‘Is there something I ought to know about Wednesday?’

  She turned and looked at him steadily. ‘No, nothing at all. He left at twelve-thirty.’ He waited in silence, looking pleasantly expectant, until she felt obliged to add more. ‘He had a luncheon appointment for twelve forty-five, but he came out of his office at half past and said that he wasn’t feeling well and was going home, and asked me to cancel it for him.’

  ‘That was rather short notice, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, but it wasn’t a client, it was a colleague, Peter Gethers. His office is only round the corner in King Street, and they were going to a local restaurant, so I was able to catch him before he left. Mr Coleraine looked very unwell. I wasn’t surprised he had to go home.’

  She was defending him. Loyalty – or something to cover up?

  ‘Did anything happen that morning to upset him? Anything out of the ordinary?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Did he have any visitors?’

  ‘Not that morning.’

  ‘Phone calls.’

  ‘Of course. Lots of them.’

  ‘What was the last one you put through? Do you remember?’

  ‘It was Marcus, his son,’ she said with faint reluctance. ‘He telep
honed at about a quarter to twelve. Then Mr Coleraine buzzed me and asked me to hold all calls for half an hour. And at half past twelve he came out from his office and said he was going home.’

  ‘Do you think those things had anything to do with each other?’ Slider asked pleasantly, as though it were a matter of no importance.

  She was not wooed. ‘I don’t know. How could I know that? You must ask Mr Coleraine.’

  ‘Of course. I just thought he might have said something to you about it.’

  ‘Well he didn’t. Is there anything else now? Because I really do have a lot of work to catch up.’

  ‘Nothing else at present. Thank you very much, Mrs Goodwin. You’ve been a great help.’

  She opened the door for him, looking faintly puzzled about what she could have said that was so helpful. There was never any harm in leaving people slightly off balance.

  Slider walked in to his office and found Atherton lounging like a tame Viking against the cold radiator talking to WDC Kathleen Swilley – always called Norma for her sins which, since she led a social life of well-guarded privacy, had to be largely imagined by her colleagues, and were. She was blonde and bronzed and mighty like the heroine of a Halls of Valhalla SF mag, and she exuded a degree of sexual vitality you could light a campfire with if you only had a magnifying glass handy – the sort of woman who her colleagues told each other, with varying degrees of wistfulness, must be a lesbian.