She creased her brow. “No, I don’t think so; he hadn’t been mentioned at that stage.”
“Then what did she say about him?”
“Only that his giving her a lift was her husband’s fault, because he wouldn’t take her himself.”
So Stewart and Carol Dexter had had a row two days before her death, which made the question of his meal in Swindon even more crucial. Webb had dispatched a couple of DCs to drive from Woodstock to Swindon and from Swindon to Beckworth along the route taken by Dexter. They’d reported that, as Dexter himself had said, the journey time would vary depending on the traffic, since there were few opportunities for overtaking. It had taken them fifty minutes to Swindon and another thirty to Beckworth. But suppose Dexter hadn’t stopped in Swindon at all? The Buttery had been unable to say if he was there or not, and according to the DCs it hadn’t seemed the kind of place which would welcome leisurely diners.
His mind circling round new possibilities, Webb signalled to Jackson and they took their leave of the Parrishes.
“Don’t tell me, Guv,” Jackson said resignedly as he closed the gate. “We’re off to London tomorrow, right?”
“Right, Ken. Friend Dexter has some more explaining to do.”
***
It was a pleasant, leafy suburb in which they found them-selves the next morning, with church bells ringing over the sunlit peace. The woman who opened the door was pale and red-eyed, and she bit her lip on seeing Webb’s warrant card.
“Mr. Dexter’s waiting for you,” she said quietly, stepping aside for them to enter.
“Mrs. Kingdom?”
“That’s right.”
“I understand you’re old friends of the Dexters?”
“Yes. They lived just down the road until a few months ago.”
“Had you been in touch with Mrs. Dexter recently?”
“She phoned last week.”
“And how did she seem?”
“Nervous, edgy, unhappy.”
“Why, did she say?”
“The place was getting her down. No one ever spoke to her and she was bored out of her mind.”
“You said she was nervous. Of what?”
“She didn’t expect to be murdered, if that’s what you mean.” The woman’s voice broke. “Sorry,” she murmured after a moment. “She mentioned the village boys, that they’d been scribbling on her door and making comments when she passed them. ‘Creepy’ was the word she used.”
Stewart Dexter appeared in an open doorway and, murmuring an excuse, Mrs. Kingdom left them with him.
“Have you caught him?” he greeted them, an edge to his voice.
“Not yet, sir. We’ve a few more questions, though.”
“Come in, then.”
“I believe,” Webb said, when they’d seated themselves, “that you and your wife had words last weekend?”
Dexter stared at him. “Where the hell did you dig that up?”
“You were overheard, sir.”
“I can’t think how.”
“You quarrelled about Mr. Carey giving her a lift?”
“Not specifically, though that came into it.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “As it turned out, it was all a misunderstanding anyway. I’d mislaid my watch which needed repairing. I was sure I’d left it on the tallboy, but I found it later in the glove compartment of the car.”
“You thought your wife had moved it?”
“Not exactly.” He flushed. “I’m ashamed to say I suspected our milkman of taking it.”
“Your milkman?”
“He does some gardening for us occasionally. It seems a plug in the bedroom fused while Carol was hoovering, and since he was there, she asked him to change it for her. He was alone in the room for several minutes, and I—well, I thought he might have nicked it.”
She should have known no one here could be trusted. “Your wife said she was glad of someone to talk to. Who was she referring to?”
“Joe, I suppose.”
“And you blamed her for leaving him alone up there?” Dexter nodded. “That’s why I didn’t try to persuade her to come with us to Woodstock.”
“And you still maintain that you stopped at the Buttery, even though if you’d kept going you’d have been home in half an hour?”
Dexter held his eyes defiantly. “I do.”
“When we last met, sir, I asked what your wife was frightened of and you said the village boys.”
“That’s right.”
“But you didn’t mention the graffiti on your door.”
“Didn’t I? Well, it was part and parcel of the same thing.”
“But that did specifically upset her?”
“Yes, it seemed to.”
“Did she give you the impression she knew who’d done it?”
“We both assumed it was the Bruisers. It was the fact that they’d actually crept up our path that disturbed her.”
“When did you discover it?”
“Wednesday last week.”
No hesitation there, at least. Webb thought for a moment. “Could you describe the drawing, sir? Better still, could you draw it for us?” He nodded to Jackson, who extracted a piece of paper from his briefcase and handed it over with his pen. After a moment’s thought, Dexter drew a crude circular face and embellished it with tight coils of hair, squinting eyes and a protruding tongue. Then he handed it back. Webb studied it in silence. It was exactly as described by both Mrs. Cummings and Neil Carey, yet neither of them had been alarmed by it.
“There were no initials, or anything that might be construed as a personal threat?”
“No, just the face.”
“Very well, Mr. Dexter, that’s all for the moment.” He rose to his feet. “How are your children adapting to their mother’s death?”
“They’re all right. I was up there yesterday. It’s good for them to have their cousins around; helps to take their mind off things.”
***
They were back in Broadshire by mid-afternoon, and drove directly to Beckworth. Perhaps since Mrs. Dexter had been “glad of someone to talk to,” she’d confided her fears to Joe Barlow, who helped in her garden and mended her fuses. At least it was worth a try.
Beckworth House was open again, and they caught a glimpse of Bert Barlow at his kiosk as they turned into Tinker’s Lane. The car-park was full and blue uniforms moved systematically between the vehicles. It was unlikely that today’s drivers would be any more help than yesterday’s, but there was always an outside chance.
It was Barlow himself who opened the door to them. “Good afternoon, sir. Recovered from your upset?”
“I’m a bit better, yes.”
“Then if we could have another word—?”
He led the way to the cluttered kitchen.
“Mr. Barlow, you told us you helped Mrs. Dexter in her garden, so presumably you spoke to her from time to time.”
“Only chit-chat.”
“Did she ever touch on anything personal—about how she was finding village life, for example?”
He shook his head. “Not that I recall.”
“She told her husband she was glad of you to talk to.” Barlow looked surprised. “Did she? Well,” he went on after a moment, “she talked, certainly, but only about the house and the improvements they’d made.”
“She didn’t hint that she was sorry they’d come?”
“Far from it.”
“Then she was putting on a brave front,” Webb said, “because in fact she was very unhappy.” He saw the man’s disbelief and continued, “She’d been uprooted from family and friends, she was alone all day with not much to do, and she wouldn’t even have her children at home for the holidays. Added to which the local lads were giving her a hard time and had got her thoroughly nervy. I reckon by the day she died she must have been in a pretty bad way.”
“But that can’t be right!” Joe protested forcefully. “When I went inside to change a fuse for her she took me all over, showing me where t
hey’d knocked down walls, put in windows, Lord knows what. And she was as pleased as Punch with everything. Now you tell me she was un-happy—it just doesn’t add up.”
“Perhaps she was trying to convince herself they’d done the right thing.” Webb paused. “You say you changed a fuse for her. When was that?”
“Tuesday of last week.”
Which, as luck would have it, was before the face appeared on her door, so no chance of an angle on her reactions.
“What makes you think she was unhappy?” Barlow demanded, still not accepting it.
“Her husband told us. So did her best friend in London, and so did Mr. Carey.”
He shook his head in bewilderment. “I’d never have believed it, never.”
Webb shrugged. “We all erect barriers for ourselves, and our tragedy is that no one bothers to look behind them.”
Catching Jackson’s raised eyebrow, Webb cleared his throat and stood up. Barlow accompanied them to the door in silence.
“He didn’t like to think she’d been unhappy, did he?” Jackson commented in the car.
“Hence my attempt at philosophy. He’s probably wishing he’d responded more to her chatter. When it’s too late, we all blame ourselves for not doing more.”
“There you go again! I reckon a cup of tea would do you a power of good, Guv, and me too, come to that.”
Webb grinned tiredly. “You could be right, Ken. We’ll look in at the mobile canteen.”
***
Half an hour later, fortified by their tea, they crossed the road to Beckworth House and rang the bell at the gate. They waited for several minutes without result, and were about to turn away when they saw Mrs. Carey coming down the drive in jacket and jodhpurs, a riding hat in her hand. Catching sight of them, she quickened her steps and came to open the gate.
“I’m sorry, Chief Inspector. Have you been waiting long?”
“Only a minute or two.”
“I’ve been exercising the Duke’s horses,” she explained as they followed her up the path. “One of the perks of my job.”
“Your husband’s not at home?”
“No, he and Pippa have gone to the Garden Centre.” They had entered the minute hall and she pushed open the door of the living-room. “How can I help you this time?”
“About that graffiti, Mrs. Carey; I don’t want to alarm you, but I think you should be on your guard.”
“How do you mean?”
“We’ve now discovered that five houses in the village were daubed. You know about the Dexters, and of the others two have since been burgled.”
“You mean it was a kind of—statement of intent?”
“I very much hope not, but it’s a possibility we can’t overlook.”
“But why warn us, put us on our guard?”
“I’ve not the slightest idea.”
“I thought it was just something the village boys had been up to.”
“It may still be, though none of them have admitted it. It might have no connection whatever with what happened afterwards, but until we know for certain we mean to take no chances. So we’re checking to see if any of you noticed anything else in the last week or two that struck you as strange or unusual.” He saw her brows pucker uncertainly. “However unimportant it might seem,” he added encouragingly.
“Well, I can’t really see that it’s relevant, but there was a car parked fairly late at night.”
“Parked where, Mrs. Carey?”
“In the estate car-park, which is beneath my bedroom window. I saw it twice this last week. I thought it might have been one of yours?” Her voice ended on an almost pleading note, but Webb shook his head.
“None of ours was parked there. You hadn’t seen it before?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean anything. I only noticed it because another car’s headlights lit it up.”
“What make was it?”
She shrugged helplessly. “I’ve no idea. I could only see the roof and a distorted view of the bonnet. I can’t even tell you the colour, because on both occasions it had gone by the morning.”
“Do you remember which nights it was there?”
“Wednesday and Thursday.”
“Not Monday?” When Carol Dexter had met her death.
“I didn’t see it then.”
“And not since Thursday?”
“No, I made a point of looking. I think I heard it drive away on Thursday, just as I was falling asleep, but I couldn’t be bothered to get up and look.”
“You don’t know what time it arrived?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t take much notice till the second time, and it hasn’t been back since. I’m more or less certain of that, because I’ve kept looking at odd times over the last three days.”
Webb said curiously, “Why did you attach significance to it? A car parked in a car-park isn’t exactly unusual.”
“But that particular car-park’s part of the estate and used only by visitors to the House. No one from the village would think of parking there. And it was tucked right into the corner, as though it didn’t want to be seen.” She gave an uncertain laugh. “I’m probably just being fanciful.”
“I hope you are, Mrs. Carey,” Webb said heavily, “I very much hope you are.”
CHAPTER 10
Webb said, “The first thing I want to do is have a word with the Barlow lad.” He looked up at Jackson, who was gazing out of the window. “Ken?”
Jackson gave a start and turned. “Sorry, Guv. What was that?”
Webb leaned back in his chair and surveyed him. “Something on your mind, Ken? I don’t think you’ve heard a word I’ve said this morning.”
“Sorry. We had a bad night with young Paul again.”
“What’s the matter with him?”
“Could be a grumbling appendix, the doctor said.”
“Good Lord! Can’t anything be done?”
“They seem to think it will pass off. Anyway, the kids are still on holiday, so Millie’ll be able to keep an eye on him.” He straightened, putting personal worries behind him. “What were you saying, Guv?”
“That we ought to see young Barlow at the Whistle Stop and get some low-down on the so-called ‘Beckworth Bruisers’. He was home over Easter, too. Might have seen something.”
Jackson nodded. “That’s the pub the Drug Squad are interested in, isn’t it?”
“Yep; I wonder if the Barlows know that. We might as well go straight along, they’ve opted to be Open All Hours.”
As a reminder that it was after all only the first week in April, the mild weather they’d enjoyed over Easter had given way to a heavy overnight frost and this morning, though the sun still shone, there was an icy wind.
The further you drove along Station Road, Jackson thought, pulling down the sun shield, the tattier the surroundings became. The cheap chain stores, betting shops and pawn-brokers, and the crowded little terrace houses that led off it could have been a million miles rather than a few hundred yards from the prosperity of Gloucester Circus and the smart shops in Carlton Road and East Parade.
The Whistle Stop was an old-fashioned building on the corner of the station approach. Its faded sign bore a picture of a railway porter in peaked cap holding a whistle to his mouth. Jackson turned into the station forecourt and, ignoring the belligerent stares of a group of taxi-drivers, propped his log-book against the windscreen. Then, turning up their coat collars, the two men walked back to the pub, heads bent into the wind.
The door to the public bar had flaking blue paint and a dirty yellow glass panel. Webb pushed it open and went in, Jackson at his heels. Their arrival could not have had more effect if they’d been in uniform. Three men seated at one of the tables hurriedly gathered their belongings together and, avoiding eye contact with the newcomers, made their way quickly and silently outside. Webb let them go. Their activities were not his concern and no doubt they would be followed. He glanced round the small, smoke-hazed room. An elderly man in a corner shifted u
neasily, took a draught from his glass, and returned to the betting page of his newspaper. Two younger men on barstools, though clearly on edge, held their ground with defiant bravado.
Webb turned to the barman, a greasy-looking individual in a filthy apron. “A man called Barlow works here. Is he about?”
The man relaxed slightly, grateful that on this occasion at least he was not the object of their interest.
“He’s on the late shift today, mate.”
“So where will he be?”
The man jerked his head towards an open door behind the bar. “Upstairs having a kip, if I know Darren.” He grinned ingratiatingly.
“Would you ask him to come down, please?” Webb produced his warrant card, aware that his general identity was already known. The barman hesitated, eyeing the till, and Webb added pointedly, “I’ll keep an eye on things till you get back.”
He turned, leaning back against the bar and letting his eyes move over the unsavoury surroundings: scuffed unpolished woodwork, tables stained with rings from countless glasses, dusty red curtains at grimy windows. Hardly an inviting place to relax in.
A clatter of returning footsteps made him turn as the barman reappeared. “He’ll be right down,” he reported, and, moving further along the bar, made a low-voiced comment to the two seated there which produced an appreciative snigger in reply.
Darren Barlow, bleary-eyed and hair uncombed, came sullenly into the bar.
“Gentlemen here want a word with you,” the barman called officiously.
Aware of listening ears, Webb said shortly, “We’ll go to the station café,” and thankfully pushed his way out into the cold but blessedly fresh air. Darren Barlow, shoulders hunched and fists dug into the pockets of his denim jacket, walked beside him. He might have tried drugs, Webb reflected, but he didn’t seem to be on them now, which was something. All the same, he had a police record and was unlikely to be cooperative.
The station café was almost deserted at this hour on a Monday morning. The urns hissed in the background, and the hard white strip-light did nothing to enhance the plastic-looking sandwiches. Even Jackson, nearly always hungry, averted his eyes and ordered only coffee, carrying it to the table where Webb and Barlow awaited him near the comforting ridges of a radiator.
David Webb 8 - Symbols at Your Door Page 12
