“Has Barney heard this?”
“Not yet. And there’s no reason why he needs to. As long as we can agree how to handle the… ramifications.”
“What exactly do you mean?”
“I believe Hayley’s plan was to frame Barney for Carol’s murder, leaving the tape to be found by the police when they responded to the anonymous 112 emergency call she obviously intended to make after killing Carol. She’d arranged for him to have no alibi that would bear examination, whereas I assume she had one standing by for herself. The tape would have supplied the perfect motive. It could plausibly have been obtained from your phone by some private detective, employed by Barney to check up on Carol. It was a good plan. We can only be grateful she couldn’t bring herself to go through with it. Barney’s denials wouldn’t have counted for much. I don’t know how I could have got him off. The beauty of it, from Hayley’s point of view, was that Barney would have understood very clearly who’d framed him and why, without being able to do a damn thing about it, except tell the truth and have it universally disbelieved. Sweet revenge, in Hayley’s mind. Better than murdering Barney, she’d have murdered his beloved wife and ensured he’d spend the rest of his life in prison contemplating that fact.”
“Barney might have understood. But I don’t. What would Hayley have been avenging?”
“Her sister’s murder-as she sees it.”
“What?”
“Her name isn’t Winter, Tim. It’s Foxton. She’s Kerry Foxton’s twin sister.”
TWENTY-ONE
I wasn’t with the company back in the summer of 1999,” said Whybrow His soft, susurrant voice was the only sound that reached Harding through the dark blanket of the night. “If I had been, things might have been very different.” They were parked in a lay-by just round the headland from Nice, no more than a couple of kilometres from Villefranche. “I think I’d have questioned Kerry Foxton’s credentials-and her motives-sooner and more searchingly than I gather Ray Trathen did. But that wouldn’t necessarily have made any difference. There’s no legislating for accidents. And an accident is what happened to her on that diving expedition.
“I made enquiries about the Foxton family at the time of the inquest. It seemed prudent to establish whether there were any surprises in store for Barney. That’s when I first heard about Hayley Barney really should have told me sooner. He’d heard from Carol, of course. Kerry had confided in her that she had a twin who’d suffered from depression since her mid-teens. Her parents were embarrassed by the contrast between the two girls and never mentioned Hayley. After a spell in hospital and a sequence of recoveries and relapses, Hayley cut herself off, living alone in Birmingham, where she held down various temporary jobs when she was well enough to work. Kerry kept spasmodically in touch with her, but the accident put a stop to that. Her parents told Hayley nothing about it, apparently for fear the news would only make her illness worse. She didn’t hear about their deaths until long after the event.
“She’d become content to have no contact with her family. Self-imposed isolation is quite common in such cases, I’m told. She must have supposed Kerry and her parents had abandoned her. Then, at some stage, almost certainly after the inquest, she found out what had really happened to them. I don’t know how and it doesn’t much matter now. The point is that she did find out.
“You’d think learning a thing like that might be the last straw for someone with a history of mental trouble. Not so in Hayley’s case, though. At the time of my original enquiries, I arranged to have a confidential word with a psychiatrist who’d treated her while she was still living in London. It transpired he’d had doubts about the diagnosis of depression all along and had come to believe the real problem was rooted in feelings of inferiority to her twin-something he never mentioned to the family. When I asked him what effect her twin’s death might have had on her, he answered in one rather surprising word: liberating.
“You never suspected Hayley was mentally ill, did you? Why not? Because Kerry’s death means she’s no longer crushed by her inability to match her sister’s achievements. More than that, it’s given her a way to surpass those achievements, by becoming her twin’s avenger.
“Who can say what she hoped to gain by latching onto Barney’s uncle Gabriel? Barney’s convinced she tried to persuade the old man to leave her Heartsease and all his money. It’s possible. That would have been a kind of revenge. If so, the plan failed. Gabriel was far from a soft touch. But the family feud over the ring came to light as a result of his death and she began to plot a direct move against Barney, having been encouraged by the likes of Ray Trathen-and maybe even Gabriel too-to believe he’d murdered Kerry. Whoever stole your phone must have been put up to it by Hayley. She was presumably looking for anything she could use against Barney. And, boy did she strike lucky.
“Don’t feel you have to admit or deny anything, but it’s occurred to me you may have got closer to Hayley than was good for you. The tape proves you and Carol are lovers. I’ve known that for quite a while, by the way, though happily Barney doesn’t have a clue she’s been unfaithful to him. Valuable information for Hayley. But was it also unwelcome information? Was jealousy part of the mix? You tell me. If you want to. Or not, if you don’t.
“I’ve advised Barney not to call in the police. Hayley’s arrest and prosecution would only tempt the media, especially Fleet Street, to reopen the Kerry Foxton story. Then they might start digging into Starburst International, which we don’t need at any time, but especially not at the moment, with a particularly juicy deal about to be finalized involving the sort of people who’d run a mile if the press started sniffing around.
“What we really need to do is to find Hayley and persuade her to submit herself to professional care so this kind of thing can’t happen again. We’ll see she has the best treatment available. Barney will pay. The fact she didn’t go through with her plan suggests to me she knows she needs help. We’re willing to supply it. I think she may be willing to accept it, especially if it’s offered by the right person. I see you as that person.
“I imagine you must have found out enough about Hayley at least to know where to start looking for her. We’ll cover your expenses. Do whatever is necessary to find her. Quickly. I doubt Carol will sleep soundly in her bed until you do. She doesn’t know about the tape, incidentally. She was still locked in the bathroom when I came across it. So, that’s between you and me. Which is how it can stay as far as I’m concerned. I don’t want to sully Barney’s rosy vision of his marriage.
“I can’t predict how he’d react if he learnt the truth about your afternoons with Carol. His volatile temper and the stake he has in Jardiniera suggest to me it would work out badly for you. And for Carol. So, for all our sakes, let’s avoid that, shall we?”
Harding did not immediately respond. He sat still, staring straight ahead through the windscreen towards the faint, twinkling lights of Villefranche. But there was no stillness in his mind, where more grim realizations and queasy suspicions than he could keep track of jostled and collided.
He was being blackmailed. That was clear, however subtly Whybrow had phrased his proposition. Harding did not need to be told how disastrous it would be if Barney heard the tape of Carol’s message. He had no choice but to do what was asked of him. Or at least to try.
Finding Hayley, if she did not wish to be found, would be far from easy. She would surely not return to Penzance. Ann Gashry could well know where she was. It was certainly apparent that Ann had lied about Hayley in virtually every particular. Nathan had not been her brutal Svengali. Nathan, indeed, might not even exist. Some explanation for Hayley’s likeness to Kerry had been needed to distract Harding while the plot against Barney Tozer was set in motion. Feeding him titbits about Francis Gashry and sending him to see Herbert Shelkin had served the same purpose. And then there was the night he had spent with Hayley. Had that just been another way of blinding him to the truth?
He wondered if Ann had tracked Hayley d
own in Birmingham and told her her parents and twin sister were dead. If so, it implied they had been co-conspirators ever since. He wondered also if Whybrow could be right about Hayley’s mixed motives for attacking Carol. Either way, Hayley knew about his affair with Carol and had done even before they slept together. Darren Spargo had not been stalking her. Rather he had been acting a part, scripted and paid for by Hayley.
There was one consolation worth clinging to. She had not taken her plot against Barney to its logical, murderous conclusion. Carol was traumatized but unscathed. Barney was outraged but at liberty. The situation was not beyond redemption. Maybe Whybrow’s solution to the problem was the best all round.
And maybe it was too good to be true. The reasons he had given for avoiding police involvement were not entirely convincing. Harding knew what Ray Trathen for one would say was the real explanation. Barney did not want Hayley’s belief that he had murdered Kerry to be examined in court-not to mention the newspapers-because she was right: he had murdered Kerry.
If that was true, Barney’s reluctance to see Hayley prosecuted was reinforced by guilt. He did not know how she had planned to frame him for Carol’s murder, of course. As far as he was concerned, she had only intended to do to him what he had done to her: take the life of a loved one. Maybe he saw the justice in that and had no wish to punish her for it-an interpretation that only rendered Whybrow’s calculation more impenetrable.
In the final analysis, it did not really matter. A peace offering was on the table. And Harding was to be its broker. Willingly or not.
“I’m asking a lot of you, I know,” said Whybrow, breaking the long, heavy silence. “But I wouldn’t if I thought you weren’t equal to the task.”
“Is that so?”
“You’ll do it?”
“I don’t appear to have much option.”
“I’m sorry you see it like that. Truth is, this is in everyone’s interests.”
Oddly, Harding felt that probably was the truth. He sighed. “There are leads… I could follow.”
“Good.”
“When would you want me to start?”
“As soon as possible.” Whybrow ejected the tape from the dashboard player and handed it to him. It was a cynical, mocking little gesture. There would be another copy. There would always be another copy. “There’s no time to be lost.”
TWENTY-TWO
Harding barely slept that night. In the small hours, just as he was finally slipping into unconsciousness, he was jolted fully awake by a realization that had long lain dormant in his mind. It was Whybrow’s account of Hayley Foxton’s life story as opposed to Hayley Winter’s, that had set his memory searching once more. Suddenly, sickeningly he knew where he had seen her before. He knew for a virtual certainty, though he could not render the certainty absolute without returning to England-and reopening a door he would have preferred to leave closed.
It was one more parcel of unwelcome knowledge for his overburdened mind. Mentally and physically weary, he set out on the drive to Monaco next morning hardly knowing what to expect from his encounter with Barney and Carol. So much had happened since their last meetings. So much that he had been unaware of had intruded into his life.
He assumed both of them would be waiting for him. Whybrow had said they would be expecting him at 10:30. As it was, Barney was alone when he arrived, prowling the terrace like a wounded bear, downcast and unshaven, his trousers and shirt so crumpled he might have slept in them.
“Carol’s still out for the count,” he explained, leading Harding into the lounge. “She took some pills to help her sleep. They packed a punch.”
“How’s she coping with… what happened?”
“Pretty well. She has a lot of inner strength. More than me, I sometimes think.” He gave an all-purpose shrug. “What can I tell you, Tim? Wednesday night isn’t an experience I’d want to repeat in a hurry.”
“It must have been awful.”
“Yeah. But more awful for Carol than me. When something like that happens, without warning, it… knocks you sideways.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you any warning. I never had the slightest inkling Hayley was planning anything of the kind.”
“Why would you? You didn’t know whose sister she was, did you?”
“No. I didn’t.”
“Want a coffee? I just made some.” Tozer picked up his mug from the glass-topped table and took a slurp. “Help yourself. You know where it is.”
The expedition to the kitchen gave Harding a minute or so to ponder the question of whether Carol’s no-show was down to sleeping pills or some evasion tactic she had devised. The question was still open when he returned to the lounge, coffee in hand. Tozer had lit a cigarette now and was slumped in one of the soft leather armchairs that faced the wide-windowed view of the office towers and apartment blocks of Monte Carlo, with a broad blue chunk of the Mediterranean shimmering beyond. Harding sat down next to him.
“I blame Humph as much as anyone,” Tozer growled. “He should have told me Uncle Gabriel had a housekeeper who was the spitting image of Kerry Foxton. Of course, he never actually met Kerry. But he must have seen her picture in the paper. Then again, he didn’t know she had a twin sister. Not an identical twin, but one close enough in looks… Well, maybe no one’s to blame. Except Hayley Foxton, that is. She put the fear of God into Carol.”
“But, in the end, she didn’t harm her.”
“No, thank Christ. But she planned to. Oh yes. She very much planned to. Even when Tony told me a couple of days ago who the housekeeper was, I never saw anything like this coming.”
“It’s a pity you didn’t tell me.”
“I would have done if I’d had the chance. But you dropped out of touch, remember? Even though, as it happened, I actually only had to call you up on your not-so-lost phone if I’d wanted to talk to you.” A suspicious glint had appeared in Tozer’s eye. “What was with all that?”
“It was lost. Stolen, I assumed. But it got handed back in at the Turk’s Head. A customer took it by mistake, apparently.”
“OK. But then you left Penzance, without letting me know where you were going.”
“Sorry. I got… sidetracked.”
“Sidetracked?”
“Hayley sent me off on a wild-goose chase to London, looking for the ring. She must have been playing for time at that stage. And she had an accomplice to help her do it. Ever heard of Ann Gashry?”
“Don’t think so.”
“Or Nathan Gashry?”
“No. Who are they?”
“Neighbours of the Foxtons in Dulwich. Well, Ann was, certainly. Nathan… I’m not so sure about.”
“But this woman… led you up the garden path at Hayley’s say-so?”
“Yes. Elaborately-and convincingly.”
“Then she might know where Hayley is. Hell, Hayley might have gone to ground with her.”
“It’s the first thing I’ll check.”
“Starting when?”
“Tonight. Tony’s booking me on the seven o’clock flight back to London. I’m turning into quite a commuter.”
“And all on my behalf.” Tozer groaned and sat forward in his chair, massaging his forehead. “Thanks for doing this, Tim. You’d be justified in telling me to get stuffed after I let you find out about Kerry Foxton the hard way.”
“It certainly might have been better if you’d filled me in on the background before I went to Penzance.”
“Don’t think I don’t know it. Bloody stupid of me to think all that stuff wouldn’t crop up. Truth is, I was just trying to get Humph off my back the easiest way I could. As to whether the ring rightfully belonged to Dad or Uncle Gabriel… I couldn’t give a toss. Anyway…” Tozer took a deep pull on his cigarette. “I don’t want to see Hayley banged up. I didn’t murder Kerry. Christ, why should I have? But…” Another pull. “I should’ve checked our gear more thoroughly. There’s no dodging that. I didn’t know Kerry was planning to enter the wreck, but even so�
� I wasn’t meticulous enough. Which makes me partly responsible for everything that happened. Then and after. Including this latest…” He shook his head. “Bloody hell. I don’t know what I’d do without Carol. Meeting her was the best stroke of luck I’ve ever had. Just a pity it coincided with the worst, hey? Funny thing, life. And death.”
“Funnier than you know.” Harding winced at the unpredictability of Tozer’s reaction to what he was about to say. “I was in Penzance a few days after the accident, Barney. With Polly. We went down to see the eclipse.”
“You did?” Tozer frowned. “Why didn’t you mention that when I asked you to go over?”
“Not sure. I guess I didn’t want you to change your mind. I saw the trip as a chance to gauge how well I could cope with returning to places she and I had been together. Especially towards the end.”
“And how did you cope?”
“Fine. But, then, there was plenty to keep me occupied, wasn’t there?”
Tozer gave a rubbery grin. “Thanks to me, yeah.” He slapped his knee. “Looks like we’ve both been holding out on each other, Tim. We’ll have to put a stop to that. So, any gen on Hayley, you let me know pronto. Deal?”
“Sure. Though…”
“What?”
“Tony seems to think he’s in charge of the operation.”
“He’d like to be in charge of everything. But I’m top dog and that isn’t about to change. Anyhow, it doesn’t matter which one of us hears from you first. We’re eye to eye on this. If Hayley gives the ring back and signs up for some proper treatment, I’ll pay her shrink’s bills and pretend Wednesday night’s… escapade… never happened.”
“That’s big of you.” Harding and Tozer swivelled round simultaneously at the sound of Carol’s voice. She was standing in the doorway that led towards the bedrooms, dressed in a grey tracksuit and fluffy pink mules. There were shadows under her eyes, her hair was flat and matted and there was something abnormal in her breathing. “Really big of you. Considering it was my throat she nearly cut.”
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