The Punishment She Deserves

by Elizabeth George

  “Of course.” Ardery sounded not the least bothered by these revelations. “But what was not made public was the contents of the man’s diary. The name Lomax was in it. Sergeant?”

  Havers said, with a glance at an earlier page in her notebook, “Twenty-eighth of January through fifteenth of March. Seven times.”

  Rabiah didn’t reply at once. She tried to consider every ramification of speaking. Then she made her decision. “That would have been about a family matter. I didn’t think of him as a clergyman because it wasn’t as a clergyman that I met with him.”

  “May I ask why you met with him?” Ardery asked.

  “If you can explain the importance,” Aeschylus said politely.

  “The sergeant and I are here to follow up on two investigations into Mr. Druitt’s death.”

  Rabiah liked the sound of this even less than she’d liked the sound of the police claiming to have seen Lomax seven times in the dead man’s diary. She said, “To be frank, my two adult sons are substance abusers. One is in recovery and one is not. The one in recovery has been having a very bad time of it. His middle daughter died some eighteen months ago after a long illness. My son isn’t coping well at all and I wanted—I needed, actually—to talk to someone about it. Mr. Druitt was recommended to me.”

  “Who did the recommending?” the DCS asked.

  Rabiah was silent. This was exactly what happened when one talked to the coppers and said anything beyond either yes or no. She needed to keep her replies as simple as possible.

  Outside the house a cat howled suddenly, one of those disconcerting preludes to a fight. Another cat responded. What followed was a mercifully brief spat of combined shrieking as the animals went after each other. Rabiah grimaced. She wondered if anyone would mind should she dart outside and shoo the felines off. But no one besides herself seemed to have noticed the noise.

  “Ms. Lomax?” the DCS said.

  “I’m trying to recall. One of my square-dancing group, I think. Or it could have been one of the people I train with.”

  “Train with?”

  “I’m a runner.”

  “But you don’t actually remember who it was?”

  “Why don’t you recall?”

  They’d spoken at once, the detectives. Aeschylus stepped in. “My client’s memory is germane to very little and certainly not to your purpose in coming to speak with her today. She has indicated why her surname appeared in Mr. Druitt’s diary and I can attest to the death of her granddaughter, although that, too, has nothing to do with any question about who suggested Mr. Druitt as a sympathetic ear.”

  “Fair enough,” Ardery said in reply, and then to Rabiah, “Where did you two meet when you had your conversations?”

  Rabiah saw that Aeschylus was about to intervene again, but she also saw that they could go round and round forever, so she said, “That’s easy enough to answer, Aeschylus,” and then turned to the DCS and said, “It rather depended upon our schedules. Sometimes here, but more often in one café or another.”

  “I’m not sure what you mean. The day and the time are always the same.”

  “What she means,” Aeschylus interjected, “is that while the day and the time are always the same, the place would alter due to whatever else she or Mr. Druitt had on that day.”

  “Busy, are you?” Havers was the one to ask the question.

  “Quite,” Rabiah said.

  “Doing what?”

  Aeschylus stood. He said, “Now we have gone entirely off topic. My client has explained why she met with Mr. Druitt, and if there is nothing more on that subject, I shall have to draw this meeting to a close. Do you mind if I do that, Rabiah?”

  Rabiah did not.

  Ardery locked eyeballs with Aeschylus. It was one of those moments when one person wants the other person to know who’s really in charge. Then she said to Rabiah, “I believe you’ve explained things sufficiently.” And to her colleague, “Sergeant Havers, have you a card with you?”

  A few moments of strained silence passed while the sergeant excavated in her lumpy bag. She found a holder for her business cards and handed one of them over to her superior, who then handed it with some ceremony to Aeschylus Kong. She said, “If your client remembers anything pertinent from her sessions with Mr. Druitt, please ring my sergeant.”

  “What could possibly be pertinent?” Rabiah asked before she could stop herself, although she did take the card from Aeschylus.

  “I’ll let you decide that,” the DCS said.

  ST. JULIAN’S WELL

  LUDLOW

  SHROPSHIRE

  The photo begged for an explanation. Barbara reckoned that the DCS would bring the matter up the nanosecond that Rabiah Lomax closed her front door upon them. There was more going on here than met the eye, and Ardery had to know it. Barbara gave her a quick look as they walked to the car. When they reached it and still Ardery hadn’t said word one, Barbara took the plunge.

  “What kind of a coincidence do we want to call the glider bit?”

  Ardery clicked the vehicle’s locking system and they got inside. “The photograph? I don’t see calling it a coincidence at all.”

  Barbara chewed on this, saying nothing more till they were retracing their route to the centre of Ludlow. Then, “But it’s too dead odd.”

  “We’re not in London, Sergeant. The population’s small. The fact that Nancy Scannell and Rabiah Lomax are both in a photograph with a glider has no real significance. Or do you wish to make it significant?”

  “It seems like something we need to take on board as they both knew the dead bloke. I mean Rabiah Lomax and Nancy Scannell.”

  “Nancy Scannell did not know ‘the dead bloke.’ Nancy Scannell cut ‘the dead bloke’ open. If there’s an important element I’m missing here, I’m intrigued to hear it because otherwise it seems to me that you’re suggesting collusion on the part of Nancy Scannell—altering the facts as she saw them on the corpse—and Rabiah Lomax, based on Rabiah Lomax’s appointments with Druitt.”

  “The IPCC report doesn’t say a word about Lomax,” Barbara said. “They missed the connection. So did DI Pajer. Her report doesn’t mention it anywhere.”

  “Why would either report mention Lomax? They didn’t have the diary. And even if they’d got their hands on it, there is no connection to be mentioned.” Ardery’s voice sounded edgy. The tone was a warning not to press this any further. “Everyone was investigating a suicide while in custody, sergeant. Full stop. Are you trying to build a case that Rabiah Lomax—for reasons unknown—got into the police station along with—let us assume—Nancy Scannell? The two of them then subdued Ian Druitt—also for reasons unknown—then strung him up by means of a doorknob and left him to die? Apart from there being no apparent motive and absolutely no evidence, how would they have accomplished this? Perhaps they’re the ones who planned the burglaries that kept the patrol officers occupied? Perhaps one of them disguised her voice, made the phone call about paedophilia, contacted the others when Druitt was brought in, fed the PCSO a convenient sleeping draught obtained from the local crone practising witchcraft, and the rest is what happened after the PCSO downed it and passed out, allowing them to commit murder.”

  “He wouldn’t’ve wanted anyone to know. There’s that,” Barbara said. “Ruddock could’ve let someone in that night and that person could’ve done the deed while he was conveniently out of the room making his pub phone calls.”

  “So now it’s collusion on the part of Rabiah Lomax, Nancy Scannell, and the town’s PCSO? All of this coming from a random photograph of a group of people grinning round a glider?”

  Barbara heard the DCS’s frustration, and she wanted to explain herself. She wanted to tell her that she and Lynley had always operated on the basis of anything being possible. Nothing was ever too outrageous to consider because the outrageous was always within reason when
it came to murder. So was the unlikely. So was the unthinkable. So was the putatively inexplicable. Lynley was the fine cop he was because nothing was ever off the table. He had never been the kind of bloke whose priority was making an arrest so that he could go home to supper. It was looking more and more, though, as if Isabelle Ardery might be. Only . . . it wasn’t going home to supper that she had on her mind. It was going home to something else. Barbara had already seen that. She could, even now, practically breathe it in with the air.

  “And, by the way,” Ardery continued, “are you now eschewing your previous theory about the PCSO, the woman he’s bonking, and someone sneaking into the police station while said bonking is going on?”

  “Guv,” Havers said, “it’s just that—”

  “Really, Sergeant. This can’t go on. I’m willing to speak with this Finnegan Freeman—whoever the hell he is—but that’s it. I’ve gone along with the issues you’ve raised, but this is as far as I’m going to go.”

  Barbara said, “It’s only that when you showed me that photo, I thought—”

  “May I remind you that it was your thinking that put you where you are today?” Ardery snapped.

  Barbara knew where that remark was going to lead. She liked to believe that she also knew when it was time either to change direction or to reverse course altogether. So she said, “I s’pose I might be looking at things wrong way round,” although she didn’t believe this for a moment.

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Ardery said.

  “There’s still that anonymous call, though.”

  Ardery gave her a glare. “Your point being?”

  “If we want to make sure this bloke—Clive Druitt—is satisfied that we’ve looked at every possible angle, it’s prob’ly time to look at the CCTV footage on the phone call night.” And before Ardery could respond, Barbara added, “I could do that while you talk to Finnegan Freeman, guv. How long would that take? Less than an hour, you ask me. And then we would’ve touched on every possible item that might send Clive Druitt running to his solicitors.”

  Ardery squeezed her temples. She had a look of a woman whose internal resources were being quickly depleted. She said, “Point taken. The CCTV film from the phone call night. Full stop. And I hope you take my meaning, Sergeant.”

  Barbara assured her that she did.

  LUDLOW

  SHROPSHIRE

  When she rang the PCSO’s mobile about the CCTV footage in question, Barbara found that Gary Ruddock had not yet begun his official day. Old Rob had taken a fall, he told her, and he was just returning to Ludlow from Accident and Emergency. He reckoned he could meet her at the police station in forty-five minutes. That was perfect as far as Barbara was concerned. There was a small detail she’d not mentioned to Ardery that she wished to check out.

  To her way of thinking—which, admittedly, meant overlooking the DCS’s way of thinking—if someone had given Ian Druitt the heave-ho into eternity, then that person was either the PCSO for reasons yet unknown, or it was a person—also yet unknown—who gained access to the station while the PCSO was engaged in something else. In this scenario, Barbara believed that the something else involved a car and a female, and she also believed that there had to be a way to prove this. So she set off for the station.

  She went with the idea of someone—be it Ruddock’s lady friend showing up for a bit of clothing removal in the back of a car or a killer with strangulation on his mind—gaining access to the police station via the route she’d pointed out to Ardery earlier. When she reached the station, she walked past it and along the street a short distance into Weeping Cross Lane. There, she paced slowly along, looking for the kinds of CCTV cameras that were ubiquitous in London. This was a commercial area of town, with businesses serving many interests: from van hire firms to equestrian needs. At least eight of them had CCTV cameras, Barbara found, which piqued her interest until she got close enough to see that not a single camera was pointed towards the street. That meant there was no joy to be had. But it also meant that anyone could come up from the river to the police station without being photographed along the way.

  She proceeded to the end of Weeping Cross Lane and found herself in Temeside. Since the to-be-questioned Finnegan Freeman lived in one of the houses here, Barbara thought it might serve her purposes to sort out which one it was. She checked the address in her notes and headed in the direction of the Ludford Bridge. As she did so, she caught sight of Ardery’s car pulling up onto the pavement in front of a house at the end of a terrace called Clifton Villas.

  Barbara hesitated. She knew that Ardery didn’t expect to see her in Temeside, so she gave thought to doing a rapid about-face and scurrying back into Weeping Cross Lane, where she could find a wheelie bin to hide behind, if necessary. But she needn’t have worried. The DCS didn’t get out of her car at once. Although she was facing Barbara from where she’d parked, she rested her head on the steering wheel for about a minute before she finally shoved the car door open. She ran her hand over her hair, looked at her wristwatch, and proceeded to the front door of the house. She was out of Barbara’s sight at that point, as the house appeared to have a shallow porch. For her part, Barbara made tracks back to the police station, where she sat on the back step and wondered about all that she was witnessing in the DCS that she would have vastly preferred not to witness at all.

  There had been something not right with Ardery earlier. It wasn’t just that Barbara had waylaid her before she’d had a chance to eat her breakfast. She had a feeling from her colourless complexion that Ardery wouldn’t have been able to hold down food anyway. Nor was it the fact that the DCS had not been able to have her morning coffee prior to their conversation. Instead it was what her right hand did when she took the map Barbara handed to her. It was how she dropped that right hand to her side when she couldn’t stop its trembling. Barbara had concluded that the DCS was in a condition that might prevent her from noting a detail that needed noting. But she—Barbara Havers—wasn’t in a position to point this out to anyone.

  Some ten minutes after Barbara’s return to the station, the PCSO drove into the car park. He gave her a friendly wave and strode to unlock the back door. She joined him, telling him about the movability of the camera in the front of the station as she followed him inside. She ended with, “So what I’m hoping is that it was in a different position the night the 999 phone call was made.” This was only partially true. She had more on her mind than the 999 call. She led them in this direction by saying, “How’s old Rob doing?”

  “He was talking about having a fry-up when I left him. He only gets ’em once a week and his fall this morning prevented that. He was thinking I might do the honours, but there he got it wrong, poor bloke.”

  Ruddock led her along the corridor towards the front of the station, the overhead lights shedding their usual unappealing glare upon the lino and—she reckoned—upon her unwashed hair. She said, “Sounds like you’re quite fond of him.”

  “Can’t help liking a bloke his age who’s still got so much life in him,” Ruddock said.

  “On the other hand,” she pointed out, “living with a pensioner must get in the way sometimes.”

  “How d’you mean?” He shoved open the door to the reception cubicle where once someone had sat to greet both visitors and individuals wanting police help. It was a small area, barely large enough to contain both of them. A desk to one side of it held on its top an out-of-date computer terminal. Ruddock switched it on and waited while it groaned into action.

  Barbara said, “Your love life and all that.”

  “Eh?” He turned back to her.

  “Just thinking that it must make things rough—living with an old bloke like you do—if you want private time with someone.”

  He laughed, saying, “If I had a love life. With my wages, it’s better not to. I s’pose I could offer a lady a lager and a pizza on payday, but that’s about it. Th
at being the case, I keep them more or less at arm’s length. The ladies, I mean.”

  Barbara listed this under the heading interesting factoid in her mind. She wasn’t sure what to make of it.

  Behind him, the monitor came to life and within a few keystrokes, there was a split screen to view. One half of it was black—“Looks like that CCTV camera in the back isn’t working, just like I thought,” he said—and the other showed a slice of the street in front of the station, the steps leading up from the pavement, and a portion of the path leading to the door. Ruddock went at the keyboard and images flashed on the screen. What they took in remained the same with respect to the camera’s position, although they documented a partial view of activities on the street as they flashed by: cars passing, mums pushing prams and pushchairs, joggers, and two different individuals coming up the steps towards the path and—one assumed—discovering that the station was unmanned. Then he stopped the images and they were at the night in question, for it turned out that the call had been made at night—hardly a surprise when one considered that it was anonymous—and there was nothing recorded save the night itself and the time, which was shortly after midnight. The image was what it had been from the start: a slice of street, the pavement, the steps, and part of the path to the door.

  Barbara hadn’t actually expected to see someone wearing a Hannibal Lecter mask as he—or she—gazed up at the camera before swivelling it away from a position taking in the front door. There was something else she’d come to check. She asked Ruddock to continue going back through time, which he did. Finally, the image altered, and the camera showed the area immediately round the front door. When she asked him to advance the image forward slowly through time, in the direction of the night Druitt died, she was able to capture a moment when the screen went to black. When it brightened to picture again, the camera documented what it had shown ever since the call had been made, which was not the front door but rather the route to get to it. Prior to the black screen, however, no matter how far back they went in the film, the focus of the camera remained on the door, which meant it also remained on the intercom.