by EJ Lamprey
‘He wasn’t—was it a young Australian bloke? Very good-looking?’
His eyes met hers again in the mirror, slightly more cautious now. ‘Can’t rightly remember. Foreigner, for sure. Wearing a very nice black sheepskin, I remember that. Looked at one for myself, once. Bloody expensive that type are, pardon my French.’
Edge resisted the urge to grill him further but made a careful note of his name and number from the license card so that Kirsty could get hold of him when she passed on the information. So Simon had been at the Lawns twice that morning? What price his alibi now?
~~~
Maggie, after virtually a whole day spent in the run, refused to leave her basket when Edge picked up the lead yet again and merely eyed her reproachfully over the rim. With a sigh she tucked the tattered remnants of a squeaky toy bear into the basket, threw a blanket over the dog and let herself out the door. There was food, there was water, the dog had behaved last time she’d been left in the evening, and at some point there had to be trust. She walked briskly down to the house and through to the conservatory, where William and Vivian were sharing a bottle of red wine.
‘So what did your agent want?’ Vivian greeted her and pointed at a glass of white wine. ‘I got you the house white again. Should it be champagne? Good news?’
‘Oh no, just editing a script. Kind of thing I like least. If it comes out well the scriptwriter claims the credit, if it doesn’t it’s my fault. I told her last time I wouldn’t do another for that show so I’m a bit annoyed. I think they’ve run out of editors, though, because she offered me double the money. It’ll pay for a few weeks somewhere in the sun, but it’s awful work.’
‘Polishing a jobbie.’ William nodded understandingly.
Donald arrived at that moment, setting his martini down carefully on the table before dropping into the fourth chair.
‘Oor Wullie, master of the bon mot. Whose turds are being burnished?’
‘Edge is prostituting her art for filthy lucre so she can go on holiday.’
‘Oh aye?’ Donald glanced across at her with interest. ‘Actually, I’ve an annuity just matured with an unexpected little bonus on top, I was thinking of treating myself too before I re-invest. Where are you going?’
‘I have to earn it first.’ Edge protested, side-tracked. ‘But somewhere it doesn’t rain would be first choice. A desert, maybe, I am so sick of the rain.’
‘I got a windfall as well. I’m toying with deep sea diving off the Barrier Reef.’ remarked William, and grinned at their stupefied faces. ‘What, picturing me in a swim suit?’
‘Trying not to.’ Donald said frankly. ‘I don’t think the great whites would ever recover, and that would be a major blow for Australian tourism.’
Reminded, Edge leaned forward. ‘You will never guess what I found out in the taxi today!’ Talking over a suggestion from William which really had no place in mixed company, she reported her conversation with the taxi-driver for the second time.
‘I rang Kirsty as soon as I got back. Then she told me that Simon had actually been here two years. Came over on an ancestral visa, or whatever they’re called. She was going to bring me up to date tomorrow, when she comes to visit. She hadn’t said before, because Sylvia doesn’t know and she didn’t want her to find out from me. There’s no law against fibbing to your aunt, but it does seem he’d been dating Alison Martin a while, was probably living with her, although maybe not, as there were no traces of him in the flat when they checked on the Monday. He still wasn’t a suspect because he was with us all from the time he arrived to the time the body was found—until this came up. The time is still really tight, but it looks bad, doesn’t it?’
‘It’s not even that tight.’ Donald said thoughtfully. ‘If he knew where to find her, anyway. Trot up to the laundry, break her neck, string her up and trot back to the taxi. Huge chance to take, but I suppose he gambled we’d all be in our apartments getting ready, or already in the house. Oh, right, and she had to write the note. That does make it tricky. But why kill her anyway?’
‘Oh, come on.’ Vivian looked at him in surprise. ‘I know if I had a sudden nephew on the doorstep saying he was on a short holiday, and the first thing he’d done was look me up, I’d be pretty unimpressed to find he’d actually been here for two years, had a life and a girlfriend, and actually only bothered when he was leaving. Especially if I found out from the girlfriend! No more favourite nephew, especially if he was leaving so soon. He couldn’t possibly mend his fences in time. Sylvia would have been furious.’
‘And actually that explains the odd wording of the note.’ William topped up his wine as they looked enquiringly at him. ‘Think on, Alison’s been girning about him spending so much time with his aunt when he’s about to leave anyway, and never introducing her to said aunt? So he comes out the shower Sunday morning and there’s the note on the pillow. She’s effectively saying ‘I’m sorry, I’m going to tell her everything, it’s your own fault’. What does he do? He takes the note, gets a taxi, so he’s only a few minutes behind her. Sees her car, driving in or already parked outside the laundry, he could have seen that from the taxi from the top road, so he knows exactly where she is. Catches up with her, bundles her into the laundry, kills her—maybe deliberately, maybe by accident while he was trying to scare her. But probably deliberately. Strings her up, leaves the note, runs back to the taxi. And that jacket—he leaves it at the station, because perhaps she tore at it, maybe her hair is on it, and fifteen minutes later he arrives here as though for the first time. Alibi. Forty-eight hours later he’s back in Australia, no inconvenient girlfriend, still got a doting aunt.’
Edge took a deep breath. ‘What slays me.’ she said a bit crossly, ‘is that I’m supposed to be the scriptwriter. I’ll drop that crappy script off with you tomorrow morning, okay?’
‘I hate to say it, but it does sound plausible.’ Donald leaned forward intensely. ‘Not even that huge a chance, he only had to pass six apartments, two of them empty. He wasn’t expected until ten, so Sylvia wouldn’t have been looking out. He even borrowed Sylvia’s car that afternoon, remember, she told us? Easy to clear all traces of himself from the flat and move out before the polis ever came checking. The only quibble is that he was wearing the jacket at the picnic, so either he got it cleaned or bought himself another on Monday morning, just to be on the safe side. I guess the polis lines are humming to Australia, eh?’ He sat back and sipped his martini with evident enjoyment. ‘You know, I think we’re getting quite good at this. I’m going to ask Brian how we go about getting licensed as PI’s.’
~~~
Edge got back from the pub to a tidy apartment and a peacefully sleeping dog, and her message light blinking on her phone. The message was from Kirsty’s superior officer, DI Iain McLuskie.
‘Jessica Fletcher! I’m sorry to miss you.’ His laugh rolled down the phone. ‘I wanted to be the one to tell you. That missing jacket? Right here. Handed in to us by Linlithgow station, and was put aside with the stuff that’ll go to the auction if it isna claimed. Nothing you could see with the naked eye, but the lab boys have found teeth marks and Alison Martin’s make-up on the left sleeve.’ His voice deepened with satisfaction. ‘Och, yon cheeky scunner’s deep in it the noo!‘
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Friday—Patrick to lunch
Patrick Fitzpatrick, Edge’s accountant and sometime escort, heaved himself to his feet to greet Vivian cheerfully and looked past her appreciatively at Dallas, who was particularly beautifully dressed and looked very exotic in the cheerfully casual ambience of the dining room. Edge had noticed before that whenever Dallas met someone new she ducked her head down and barely spoke. Her strange lip-smacking twitch could be suppressed for brief intervals but returned with a vengeance when she had to spend time with strangers. Edge wasn’t in the least surprised that Vivian, who would normally have joined them, was taking Dallas off to a smaller table with a passing nod and smile, but Patrick looked slightly taken aback.
‘Have I offended Vivian somehow?’ He took his seat again. ‘And who was that? She looked faintly familiar. I’m usually very good with faces.’
‘She’s a relative of sorts.’ Edge, still sworn to secrecy, was vague. Vivian was uncomfortable introducing Dallas as Winter, knowing she was Wendell, but still hadn’t managed to raise the subject with her. Anyway, Dallas had made it clear she wasn’t keen on being sociable. She had only reluctantly met Donald and William and obviously preferred having Vivian to herself.
There was a third chair at the table Vivian had chosen but William, after the most fleeting of glances, headed straight towards Edge and Patrick, shaking hands with the latter with genuine pleasure. The two big men had only met once before, and Patrick still eyed the flamboyant William with some caution, but they crushed each other’s knuckles in a friendly trial of strength. Donald, joining them during the ritual, looked sardonic.
‘My finger was dislocated recently.’ He took the final chair at their table with a nod to Patrick. ‘Don’t expect me to play the winner.’
‘Wuss.’ William waggled his fingers experimentally and grinned at Patrick. ‘You’ve been working out.’
‘Thirty squeezes a day on a tennis ball.’ Patrick agreed, and grinned back. ‘I take my handshake very seriously, to be sure. Not that I can use it often. We must shake again before I leave today.’ He switched his attention sharply as the chafing dishes were placed carefully on the buffet and beamed. ‘Here we go!’
Bill came out in his whites while Patrick was back at the buffet getting a third helping and was immediately trapped in conversation by his enthusiastic fan. William looked across at Vivian’s table, then nudged Edge. ‘Vivian’s telling her about the Death caper.’
Edge looked across, and started to laugh as Vivian’s mobile hands galloped and chased. Dallas’s head twitched and William shook his own.
‘Call me a bad person, but I am really glad your Patrick is here today, or we’d have her at the table. That twitch of hers gives me the willies. I could cope if it was regular but I swear she waits until I finally relax, then does two in a row.’
‘You’re a bad person.’ Edge told him obediently, then sighed. ‘I’m a bad person too. I keep thinking it’s deliberate and she could stop it if she wanted. It really doesn’t seem to worry Vivian at all.’
‘Well, Vivian’s good people. Do you think it’s psychosomatic? Or mild cerebral palsy?’
‘Tourette’s syndrome,’ Donald told them, as he topped up their glasses from the water jug. ‘I looked it up. Not that you’ll find much on her, but I did read that somewhere and the symptoms do fit.’
‘I thought people with Tourette’s said rude words?’ William looked across at the back of Dallas’s head with new interest but Edge was frowning at Donald, puzzled.
‘What on earth do you mean, you looked her up? She’s hardly famous, is she?’
‘She’s extremely famous, in some circles.’ Donald looked from one to the other, surprised. ‘Dallas Wendell? Oh, she can call herself Winter but she’s a member of the Wendell family. They funded a major production of Il Quattro Stagione a few years back and she came to the opening night. Didn’t meet us plebs, right enough, but then when you see her twitching like that you can’t fault her for keeping clear. I only saw her at a distance, ticking away in the back of the Royal box, but she—and the jerk—well, pretty distinctive. Once seen, never forgotten. When Toussaint-Wendell goes public she could quite possibly become one of the richest women in the world. What I don’t understand is her connection with Vivian.’
At that moment Patrick returned, beaming, to the table. Edge frowned in fierce warning, and Donald changed the subject.
As it happened, the subject he picked, a highly suspect email he’d received the night before about a parking ticket, got Patrick so heated he almost forgot to eat his third helping. One of his clients was a recent victim of internet fraud and he lectured them sternly on security.
‘She got an email saying her bank had failed, and to fill out a report with her account details to start her claim to recover as much of her money as possible. Does she contact her accountant? She does not. And don’t get me started on the emails from banks asking you to log in and check a recent ’suspicious’ transaction. Doesn’t seem to matter how often the word goes round that your bank will never ask you to do that, they still catch people. Again and again. Another client got a call from Microsoft saying his computer was sending error messages. They offered to talk him through activating a security account. He got suspicious, luckily, and rang off. Here’s the thing, Microsoft will never phone you. You phone them.’
He paused to demolish the last of his meal, then returned to the subject. ‘Not to mention good old-fashioned identity theft. It beggars belief how easily people can set themselves up as someone else, especially when you think how many security hoops the average person has to jump through to create accounts for themselves, eh? These buggers are just persistent. Used to be you knew your banker, your creditors and your debtors by sight. You dealt with them across a desk, you got a good look at them, got to know about them as a person, weighed them up in the light of personal knowledge and experience. Not now. You can do business with someone for millions of pounds without ever meeting them. You have to assume the worst, all the time. Never let your guard down. I’m not entirely one for saying you can tell a man by his handshake,’ he shot a quick smirk at William, ‘or whether he can look me in the eye, but the fact remains if you haven’t met someone face to face, you have no idea what they’re like. When it comes down to trust, you should never trust someone you haven’t met. Now me, I don’t trust anyone until I’ve met his parents, children and neighbours and our grandparents used to do business together, and even then I wouldn’t give him my PIN.’
‘You sound like Katryn.’ William shifted restlessly. ‘She bangs on about it all the time. I think the security here is pretty good. Anything odd on the computer, check with her or one of her drones. And yes, I got caught with the bank one. This drone here towed me out. Katryn gave us a list of common scams, and a website to use to check—Snopes, is it?—and we’re to contact her if we’re not sure. Day or night. We all know that. All the post goes to Megan, and she sorts it into our post-boxes, which are right next to her desk and under her eye. No one could take someone else’s mail without her spotting them, and I can’t see Megan intercepting any herself. She’d be the first person suspected if there was an incident.’
‘There are shredders in the laundry, as well,’ Edge offered, ‘and a locked box outside each apartment for confidential waste. Joey empties those once a week and shreds them. Katryn brought in that system.’
Patrick listened closely, nodding approvingly. ‘And you all use the systems?’ he asked and William sighed.
‘Patrick, we have to. Katryn checks the blue bins for anything confidential put out with the recycling, and it’s six lashes with the cat if she finds anything. She has us scared to death.’
The subject ended in laughter and switched to travel plans for the spring and summer. As the meal was ending Megan slipped into the room and went from table to table. She stopped where Vivian was having lunch with Dallas, missed the next table and smiled at Patrick.
‘Hello, Mr Fitzpatrick, I should have known you’d be here, you never miss Osso Bucco! Donald, Edge, there’s a quick meeting in the Sunday room in about ten minutes, can you please be there? It will only take a few minutes?’
‘You forgot me.’ William looked hurt. ‘Or maybe I’ve lost so much weight I’m invisible from certain angles?’
‘I could never miss you, William, you’re one of my favourites.’ Megan patted his arm lightly. ‘But you’re not needed for the meeting, although you can of course attend if you want. Oops, must run,’ and she dashed off to where the diners at another table were preparing to take their leave.
William grimaced at the others. ‘Patronizing bint. And now I’ll have to go keep oor Miz Winter company, because if I’m no
t invited I can’t see she’ll be. I’ll tell you what, Patrick, I’ll stand you a drink in the pub while these two rudely dash off. That way you can meet her. She’s an experience.’
‘I wish I could.’ Patrick was genuinely regretful. ‘You aged pensioner types forget that a working man can’t call his time his own. I shifted a meeting by an hour to be here but I’m going to have to move pretty smartly to get there on time.’
~~~
Dallas vanished to powder her nose, or so Vivian told them as she joined them. ‘Then she’s going. She won’t wait for us to get back from this meeting, whatever it is. William, will you do the honours and escort her to her car?’
He nodded absently, thrust out his hand to shake Patrick’s and did his best to crush it in retaliation for the aged pensioner comment. Vivian rounded the table to join Donald and Edge as Patrick, wincing, took himself off.
‘Dog owners, do you think?’
‘Looks like. Probably more poison.’ Donald remarked glumly, drawing horrified glances from the other two as they crossed the big hall quickly.
Nearly half the residents were already in the room when they arrived, many taking seats and looking expectantly at Katryn standing at the front of the room. There was a general air of anxiety, Donald wasn’t the only one jumping to the conclusion it would be bad news. Katryn smiled reassuringly and glanced at her watch as a late arrival slipped through the door.
‘I think that’s everyone?’ She looked across at Megan, who nodded. ‘Ladies, gents, thanks for your time. I wanted to let you know that Clarissa was released from hospital today. Matron has her up in Frail Care for twenty four hours and then she’ll be going back to her bungalow. Most of you are probably aware that Edge has been taking care of Clarissa’s dog. The dog is now pretty good on the lead, and is wearing a muzzle with no problem. The thing is, Clarissa is going to be walking with a stick for a while yet, and she’s a little bit unsteady. She wants the dog back with her straight away—she has a dog-flap in the back door, and a bit of enclosed garden—but Maggie will need one proper walk a day. I’m hoping a few of you will volunteer for that? Clarissa will be able to go on the walks with you once she’s stronger, and eventually take over altogether. In the meantime she gets to know a lot more people, the dog gets used to walking with other dogs, everybody wins all round.’
