Juan Foot in the Grave

by Roger Keevil

  “We’re just leaving, Miss Glass,” called Constable. “We thought Captain Alfredo might be with you.”

  Philippa came to herself and got to her feet. “No. I haven’t seen him.”

  “Perhaps he left without saying anything,” suggested Copper, as Philippa led the way towards the front door. As the three reached the hall, footsteps sounded on the staircase from the first floor, and Alfredo came into view.

  “Ah, Philippa, there you are,” he said easily. “I was looking for you. I come to tell you that we are finished, and so we go. I am sorry that we disturb you, and I thank you for your help.” He flashed a broad smile. “By the way, is it not that you are working in the bar today?” Philippa started to splutter an explanation, but Alfredo turned and made his way towards the cars as Philippa closed the front door behind the police officers.

  “Alfredo,” said Constable in a lowered voice as the three stood on the drive. “If I didn’t know better, I might think that you had been carrying out a search of the rooms upstairs of that house.”

  “Not at all, Andy,” grinned Alfredo. “Just one room. The bedroom of Mr. Connor and Philippa Glass. And I think you will be interested to see what I have found hidden in the drawer of Philippa’s… cabinet of drawers, is this the word?”

  “Chest of drawers? Dressing table?”

  “Yes. Dressing table.” He held out a hand in which nestled three coloured and laminated cards the size of a credit card.

  “What are those?” asked Copper.

  “Identity cards. Spanish identity cards for foreigners. And they are good. Very good.” Alfredo’s voice was heavy with irony, causing Dave Copper to look more closely at the photographs and details on the items.

  “Well, well, guv,” he said. “Look – same trick again. These have all got the same layout, same numbers, same nationality, same… well, I assume that’s the address… same signature – but three different faces.”

  “Yes,” confirmed Alfredo. “And you see the original nationality? It is Morocco.”

  “This is beginning to develop quite nicely, Copper,” said Constable as the two climbed back into the car. “I think we’re starting to get a few interesting items to chew over.”

  “Where do you want to chew them over, guv?” asked Copper, starting the engine. “Back to the Runcorn?”

  “Not likely,” riposted Constable. “We’ll only get Eve’d again, and I’m not sure I’m ready for that yet. And I don’t fancy that other place up by the cop-shop – we’d probably run into Liza Lott or Roxanne Stone again. I’ll tell you what – let’s go for something completely out of character. Let’s just go back to our own villa and put our feet up round the pool with a beer in our hands.”

  “Brilliant idea, guv,” responded Copper. “I always think better when I’ve got a beer in my hand.”

  “Debatable,” said Constable with a note of humorous reserve. “But we’ll test the theory.”

  At the ‘Casa del Torero’, the pool was giving off sparkling reflections from the sun, an invitation which Dave Copper felt unable to resist. A swift sprint to his room, and he was back in his swim-shorts and heading for the water while his superior adopted a more leisurely approach, opening two bottles of beer and placing them at the ready as Copper plunged into the deep end. A few minutes later the younger man emerged from the pool, shook himself like a spaniel, and plonked himself down on a sun bed alongside the one already occupied by Andy Constable.

  “That feels good, guv,” he grinned. “You know, I could almost feel I’m on holiday.” He took a swig of beer. “If only we didn’t have things like dead bodies and suspicious characters and suggestive clues to take into account, I reckon we might actually be able to enjoy ourselves.”

  “Yes, well, I think we ought to pretend we are actually on holiday for a moment, and forget about everything else for just five minutes. I am going to close my eyes and think about nothing in particular. If I start to snore, nudge me.” As if on cue, the sound of the doorbell echoed through the villa. “Bloody hell! Can’t a man get any peace around here, even on a Sunday?”

  “Like I said, guv, it’s a conspiracy.”

  “Well, don’t just lie there dripping, man. Go and find out who it is, and tell them we don’t want any.”

  As Dave Copper picked his barefoot way through the arch leading to the front of the building, the murmur of conversation could be heard. Constable thought he could recognise the tone of voice, and his suspicions were confirmed as Copper reappeared leading their visitor.

  “Look guv… it’s Eve come to see you.” A bright smile lit his features, and only the momentarily upturned eyes gave him away.

  “Well, I’ve really come to see both of you,” said Eve, casting an admiring glance up and down Dave Copper. He unconsciously stood a little straighter and pulled his stomach in.

  “I know you wanted to talk, Eve,” said Constable, heaving himself from the comfort of his lounger and leading the way to a patio table and chairs in the shade of an awning. “I’m sorry we had to put you off earlier, but I’m afraid Alfredo was quite insistent. But I thought you were tied up at the restaurant.”

  “Phil turned up at last,” explained Eve. “She said something about not feeling well, but then she said you two and Alfredo had been snooping up at their villa, and he’d made some remark to her about work, so she’d decided she couldn’t get away with it, I suppose. So I thought, as she’s there, and Alfredo’s sister is in the kitchen as well helping the chef, I could actually get away and have a word. You know, away from everyone else.”

  “In that case, David,” suggested Constable, “it would probably be a good idea if you go and get your little book so that you can make some notes.” And as Copper hurried up the steps towards the first floor, “And you’d probably better put some clothes on while you’re about it.”

  “Oh, don’t worry on my account, darling,” simpered Eve, as the still-damp sergeant rolled his eyes and vanished indoors.

  “We’ll just hold on until he’s back,” said Constable, and a few moments uneasy silence ensued until Copper, now in T-shirt and fresh shorts, rejoined them, pad and pen at the ready.

  “So then, I suppose we ought to be a little more formal, Miss… sergeant, have you had a chance to make a note of Eve’s full name?”

  “Stropper, love. Eve Stropper. But everyone who comes into the bar calls me just Eve.” She sighed. “Oh, I spend so much time behind that bar – sometimes it’s a relief to escape. But that’s really why I wanted to talk to you. You wouldn’t believe some of the things I hear – well, when people have had a drop to drink, they talk, don’t they? Some of the things Philippa and I have found out, they’d make your hair curl. If I wanted to take up blackmail, I could pack that job in straight away.”

  “That’s interesting, guv,” put in Dave Copper. “That’s the second time somebody’s mentioned blackmail.”

  “Yes, well,” preened Eve, “fortunately I’m not that kind of girl.”

  “You say you have things to tell us, Eve.” Constable sat back and folded his arms. “And as we stand a fair chance of not being interrupted, now that Miss Glass has stepped into your shoes at the bar, why don’t you go ahead and do just that? Now, is this about the things that happened the other night at the party, or the people involved?”

  “Well, both really, Andy… inspector. Now I wasn’t going to say anything about Philippa, being as she’s my best mate, but I suppose it’s all out now anyway.”

  “Excuse me… exactly what is all out?”

  “About her and Juan. They’ve had this thing going for a while now, and she swore nobody knew, and she made me promise not to say a thing, but obviously somebody blabbed, the way they always do. And that’s what the argy-bargy was about.”

  “Argy-bargy? That’s the first we’ve heard of anything like that, isn’t it, guv?” said Copper. “Argy-bargy between her and…?”

  “X-Pat, of course. I don’t know who tipped
him off that there was something going on, but he had this huge row with Phil on Friday night. Well, I say huge row, but it wasn’t voices raised or anything like that, but for all that, you could see that X-Pat was getting worked up – you know, his neck going red and his eyes bulging. What happened was, it was getting a bit dark, and I think Juan had been outside seeing off the last of the Spanish boys who were going, and Phil followed Juan outside when she thought nobody was looking, but I think X-Pat must have noticed her, and not long afterwards, he went out into the garden after her. Then about five minutes later, she came back in.”

  “Did you speak to her at that point?” asked Constable.

  “I couldn’t really not,” said Eve. “She was in a terrible state, crying and everything, although of course she was trying to hold everything in so as not to make a fuss, so she was sniffing a lot and she had to borrow my handkerchief, and she told me X-Pat had said ‘If I find he’s laid a finger on you, he’s a dead man’. Horribly jealous, he is.”

  “You say he said ‘if’. So it sounds as if he was still in some doubt as to what had gone on?”

  “Yes, I still don’t think he knew for sure. I don’t know who had told him or what they’d said. It might have just been some sort of a hint for all I know. But that’s sometimes enough for him. He’s got a shocking temper on him sometimes.”

  “Did Miss Glass say anything else?”

  “No, not then, because just then Wally Torrance came up and joined in, and I thought, thank the lord, because I didn’t want to get caught up in anything, because I’m all for a quiet life, me. So then we were carrying on pretending nothing was wrong, and then about five minutes after that, Liza came up and asked Phil where Juan was, and Phil said ‘How should I know?’, as if she didn’t care a bit, and she said X-Pat might know, because he wanted Juan too. I thought to myself, ‘You’re treading on thin ice there, love’, but I didn’t want to butt in, and then Liza said ‘Oh my God! I’d better go and find him before X-Pat does’, and then she said something which I didn’t quite catch because Percy came over to top up the glasses, but it was something about ‘needing to be certified, or else none of us is safe’, and off she went into the garden, leaving me and Phil with Wally and Percy. And it’s a good job Percy had those bottles of wine, because normally he can’t keep his hands to himself when he’s had a drop or two. I don’t mind really, I suppose, because he’s a nice enough old buffer, but a girl likes to be asked, doesn’t she?” Eve favoured Dave Copper with what was obviously intended to be an inviting smile.

  Constable thought for a moment. “This is the first hint that we’ve had of any tensions involving Mr. Laborero. I think we’ll need to speak to your friend Philippa again, because she wasn’t exactly forthcoming on the subject before.”

  “You don’t just want to talk to Phil,” said Eve quickly. “I mean, she may be no saint where Juan was concerned, but she’s not the only one.” Constable’s raised eyebrows invited her to continue. “I know Roxanne was messing about with him, and that was when Ed Stone was still alive. Mind you, now I come to think of it, it might not have been that long before he died in that horrible accident at the quarry, so for all I know he may have died before he found out. I hope so. Ed was a lovely man – I liked him, and it’s dreadful when you know something about someone’s other half but you feel you daren’t say anything. I don’t go poking about in other people’s relationships. That’s probably why I’m still single.”

  “So you reckon that Roxanne Stone was involved in an affair with Juan Manuel Laborero before her husband’s death?” said Copper. “Sounds as if he had a bit of a taste for the married ladies, eh, guv?”

  “Well, sergeant, at least there’s one option we can rule out – we can be certain that the late Mr. Stone didn’t kill him.” Constable allowed an incongruous touch of black humour to creep into his response. “But going back to Mrs. Stone… ”

  “Oh, actually she was very upset by Ed’s death, by all accounts. That’s what everybody told me. Gossip in the bar again, I’m afraid – well, you can’t switch your ears off, can you? But it just goes to show, you never can tell how people are going to react to these things. Anyway, one way or another, I reckon Juan managed to console her, or take her mind off it, or whatever way you want to put it. I suppose talking things through helps, and Juan was the only one around, so he was the man to do it. At any rate, what with the business and everything, it looks as if Roxanne came to rely on Juan quite a lot, and she bought him a new car as a thank-you just afterwards.”

  “What, that blue jobbie?” asked Copper. “Nice thank-you!”

  “Yes,” agreed Eve. “I know one or two people probably put two and two together and thought Rox and Juan might have been a bit more than work partners. I think that they might have wondered what she was thanking him for. But that was then, and this is now, and you know what it’s like with relationships – sometimes they just move on. Like Juan did. And you probably don’t know, but these days, Rox seems very close to Tim, but I’ve no idea how he felt about it.”

  “So that would mean… hang on… ” Dave Copper thought it through. “No, that wouldn’t make sense. Tim Berman wouldn’t have anything against Juan if Juan’s relationship with Roxanne Stone was over.”

  “Don’t ask me, darling,” replied Eve. “I’ve long ago stopped trying to work out how men’s minds work. You’d have to ask him.”

  “Whereas X-Pat Connor… ” continued Copper thoughtfully.

  “Ooh, now that reminds me,” butted in Eve. “Rox was another of the ones who went off looking for X-Pat on Friday night. I never knew he was so popular. Not that he’s really my type. I don’t know, there’s just something about him… ”

  “Do you have any idea what time that would have been?” asked Constable, determined to stop Eve going off down a side-track of irrelevance, and taking pity on Dave Copper who was attempting to make sense of his increasingly jumbled notes.

  “About ten o’clock, I think,” said Eve. “She said there was something she needed to have out with him. Something about protecting herself. So I said the last I’d seen of X-Pat was when he’d gone outside, so off she went out into the garden, but then a few seconds later, X-Pat and Liza came in through the door from the kitchen. They must have come round through that way from the garden, so I don’t suppose Rox ever found him.”

  “So did she come back?”

  “Oh yes. A few minutes later I noticed Ewan was over the other side of the room, so I popped over and told him that Rox was going on about protection, and I thought he’d probably want to be in on it, because he’s the one who organises all the security guards for all the building sites… ”

  “Through one of his cousins.” Dave Copper couldn’t resist the remark.

  “That’s the one,” said Eve blithely. “Anyway, he went out to find her, and they came back in together at about ten past, I suppose.” Suddenly, Eve seemed to run out of steam. “That’s about all I remember.” She smiled apologetically. “You’ll think it funny, but for all that I work in the bar, I don’t actually drink all that much, so what with having had quite a long day at work, and Percy and his top-ups with his famous fizz, I just sat down in one of his great big chairs and I think I must have drifted off. I didn’t really come to until somebody nudged me because people were starting to go home. Good job I didn’t have far to go.”

  “So then,” summarised Constable, “you never saw any more of Juan Manuel.”

  “No, I didn’t,” confirmed Eve. “Oh, there was one thing I forgot. I don’t think I would have seen him much, even if I hadn’t dozed off. I bet he was going to leave early anyway, because he’d told me early on that he wanted to get away and check something, because he had something big happening on Tuesday. He said it was worth a lot to him, whether he did it or not.”

  “Did he explain?”

  “No, darling, he didn’t. He was very mysterious. I don’t have any idea what he meant.” Eve shook her head sadly. “
I don’t expect I ever will.”

  Chapter 11

  “Well, well, well,” said Dave Copper as he returned from seeing Eve off the premises.

  “And well exactly what?” returned Andy Constable, who had resumed his place on the sun lounger, lain back, and closed his eyes.

  “It’s all starting to shape up quite nicely, isn’t it, guv?” Copper threw himself down on the next-door lounger, which groaned in protest at the sudden load, and leant up on one elbow. “The first story we hear from everybody, this guy Juan is the finest thing since sliced bread and everybody’s best buddy. But talk to a few people, and all this extra stuff comes out of the woodwork. What do you make of it, now that Eve’s spilt a few beans?”

  “What I make of it, David,” replied Constable, eyes still closed, “is that Eve’s beans, as you put it, aren’t the only things which require something of a rethink. We have all manner of seeds which, if we nurture them carefully, might very well develop into fully-grown motives, given a drop of extra daylight.”

  “Nice metaphor, guv,” murmured Copper. “Not even remotely mixed.”

  “Mock not, sergeant,” growled Constable. “We higher ranks are supposed to have an intellectual advantage over you more menial oiks.” He opened one eye and laughed. “So instead of lying there cluttering the place up, why don’t you go and have a root through the fridge? There must be something in there out of which you can construct a couple of sandwiches. We will fortify ourselves with something to eat, plus perhaps a second beer if you have left any, after which we shall recharge our brains with a siesta, and then I suggest we go on a little gardening expedition and do a little more digging. Agreed?”

  “Agreed, guv. Just one question, though.”

  “Which is…?”

  “How come you can get away with the digging comments, and I can’t?”