A Fatal Affair

by Faith Martin

  Luckily he burst into speech before she could do so.

  ‘Yes, getting that ladder tested was a stroke of genius!’ Keith Finch said, giving her another grateful look.

  The ladder!

  Trudy, who hadn’t realised how tense she’d actually been, felt her shoulders all but slump in relief as comprehension finally came. So the test results must have come back in on the woodworm and the state of the rungs. And it didn’t take a genius to work out that the experts’ verdict had been that the wood had been in no fit state to take a man’s weight.

  ‘Of course, Jennings pointed out that David knew the barn well, and might have known the ladder was a bit rickety from playing there as a kid. But I told him – in no uncertain terms, you can be sure – that was all but irrelevant. Nobody who was in the act of killing themselves, especially when befuddled already by a sleeping drug, was going to have the presence of mind to avoid stepping on ladder rungs that they might have guessed were unable to take their weight, would they?’ Superintendent Finch looked from one to the other. ‘I mean, it’s just not feasible, is it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have said so, no,’ Clement said, sensing that Trudy’s nerves were probably a little fraught right then. ‘I take it that DI Jennings …’ He broke off diplomatically.

  ‘Is now having to rethink the whole thing?’ the Superintendent finished happily. ‘Yes he is. Well, I suppose it would be more accurate to say that he’s not quite so sure that the case is as cut-and-dried as it first appeared. Which as far as I’m concerned, is a major step forward. So …’ He leaned forward eagerly in the chair. ‘Now that things are moving at last, what’s your next move?’

  He looked at Trudy expectantly.

  Chapter 25

  Under her superior officer’s unwavering gaze, Trudy gulped. Their next move? For a hideous second her mind went a total blank and she groped for the first thing she could think of.

  ‘Well, we’ve spoken to someone called Mortimer Crowley. I don’t know if DI Jennings mentioned him?’ she heard herself say. Luckily (and astonishingly,) she heard herself say it in a calm and even confident manner.

  Beside her, Clement leaned forward slightly in his chair, and as if sensing she might need for a moment or two to pull herself together, took over smoothly, ‘I take it he’s been living in the village a few years. Have you met him, Superintendent?’

  Keith Finch’s lips twisted grimly. ‘Yes, to both questions. DI Jennings mentioned that he was a person of interest in Iris’s murder not long ago. Apparently, he holds a lot of wild parties with friends of his that come down from London. The Inspector is not sure if the rumours of drugs and debauchery that surround his set are accurate or not, but the village on the whole tends to regard him as a bad lot. And Iris was known to be friendly with him.’

  ‘Something he denies,’ Clement grunted.

  ‘Yes, well, that’s hardly surprising is it?’ Keith Finch responded laconically. ‘And yes, naturally, I’ve seen him out and about in the village and we exchange the odd pleasantry, but I can’t say that I know the man. Or want to. But since I learned he was on the radar for Iris’s killing I’ve put out a few feelers amongst my friends both here and further afield and from what I can tell he’s – legally at least – above board. He inherited a lot of money from his late wife, and has invested most of it in real estate and art galleries.’ The Superintendent paused and put the tips of his fingers together in what was obviously a subconscious habit, before smiling wryly. ‘Now as I’m sure you’re aware, there can be a lot of hanky-panky going on in the art world – I had a word with a chap who specialises in art forgery and whatnot, and the things he told me made my hair stand on end! I can tell you, I’ll never go into another museum and look at the pictures in the same light again. But having said that, our friend Crowley’s name hasn’t been mentioned in connection with anything remotely shady. He tends to steer clear of fake Corot’s and what-have-you, and specialises instead, in a quiet sort of way, with promoting and selling new painters. There’s a growing market for them apparently.’

  He shrugged. ‘Not that a clean sheet in his business-practices means anything. If Iris did fall foul of him in some way, it won’t have had anything to do with his work, but with his social life.’

  ‘Yes I tend to agree,’ Clement mused. ‘Correct me if I’m wrong, but the thinking is that she met someone a bit wild at one of the parties and things got out of hand, yes?’

  The other man nodded but frowned. ‘Yes, but I’m not sure how seriously DI Jennings is pursuing that line of inquiry. It presupposes that Iris met some man who really lost his head over her and strangled her in a fit of … well, who can say?’ He shot a quick look at Trudy, who was looking rather young and innocent, and had to remind himself that she was a very able police officer. He cleared his throat and carried on gamely. ‘But if Iris did meet someone who was off his head on drugs or mentally unstable, or a bit of a sexual sadist, it seems odd that they’ve been able to find no trace of him. This is a small village, after all, not a big city. Anyone out of place would have been clocked and observed almost at once.’

  Clement nodded glumly.

  But Superintendent Finch wasn’t quite finished. ‘However, I’m not inclined to let Crowley off the hook quite yet. When I was asking around about him, a friend of mine from the golf club told me in confidence that he knows a chap called Rhys Owen, who apparently is well in with Mortimer Crowley and his arty friends. He told me this Rhys fellah is often as drunk as a skunk and in a bragging mood, and liked to hint about his daring peccadilloes with the opposite sex. And had boasted that he’d attended one or two parties locally that had proved very interesting indeed. I wanted to talk to him and narrow that down a bit, but unfortunately he’s a slippery bastard, and I couldn’t manage to get hold of him. I don’t know whether he was so anxious to avoid me because I’m with the police, or because I’m David’s father. But you might have more luck?’

  He turned to Trudy as he finished speaking.

  ‘Yes sir,’ Trudy said, taking that as an order. ‘We’ll make that a priority.’ Then she took a deep breath and glanced at Clement. ‘There is one more thing we’ve come up with that might prove very helpful. Do you know if David kept a journal or a diary, sir?’

  The Superintendent looked at her quickly, his eyes flickering rapidly in thought. ‘I’m not sure,’ he finally said. ‘What makes you think that he might have done?’

  ‘Somebody mentioned him writing something down in a notebook or pocket diary-type thing,’ Trudy said vaguely, aware that she was being evasive, but not wanting to give the grieving father false hope. ‘Of course, it may have been something he had taken up recently – after Iris died.’

  Keith nodded. ‘That sounds like something David might do. He was very methodical, you know. Painstaking. I suppose it had to do with his love of engineering …’ He broke off and cleared his throat again. ‘My son didn’t kill that girl, Constable, I’m sure of it.’ He stiffened his shoulders briskly. ‘But you’re right. If he did keep some sort of a record, it’s vital that we find it.’

  ‘You haven’t come across it in his things then, sir?’ she prompted gently. ‘Here in the house, I mean?’

  ‘No. But his mother might have some idea …’ He clicked his fingers angrily as something obviously occurred to him. ‘I’ll go and search his student digs myself. We haven’t got around to collecting his things from there yet. What with one thing and another, neither of us have felt like facing it. I could kick myself for not doing it sooner. I’m sure DI Jennings would have sent someone already, but they might have missed it. David was a dab hand at finding hiding places.’

  Trudy opened her mouth to protest – sure that DI Jennings would not be very happy about this – then abruptly closed her mouth again, her objections unspoken. The last thing she wanted to do was get in the middle of a power-struggle between her superior officers.

  ‘Yes sir,’ she said meekly instead.

  ‘Well, we’d best let yo
u get on with things,’ Clement said, rising to his feet. It was only when she too rose and looked across at him that Trudy realised that he was looking rather grim-faced.

  It was so unexpected it made her heart skip a beat. What had made him look so displeased? She tried to cast her mind back through the interview they’d just conducted and couldn’t think of anything that might have caused the coroner’s jaw to set in quite so firm a line. But their host was also rising and walking with them to the door, and she had to concentrate on saying her farewells.

  Once they were outside and walking to the car however, she cast Clement another quick look, but his expression hadn’t changed.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ she asked, her nervousness making her sound more defiant than she really felt.

  They were standing in the street, face to face, talking quietly. Trudy, not about to make the mistake she’d made before, had already checked that their surroundings were deserted and free of eavesdroppers.

  Clement grunted and shook his head. He wasn’t looking forward to the next few minutes but he knew what had to be done. Once he was sure they were out of sight of the house, he turned and looked her square in the face. ‘I don’t like the idea of the Superintendent searching for David’s diary,’ he said flatly. ‘And much as I hate to say it – and this is something I never thought I’d ever find myself saying – you should find a phone box and report back to DI Jennings immediately and tell him everything we’ve found out. Not only about the possibility of the diary’s existence, but tell him that he needs to send someone to David’s university again to thoroughly search his lodgings.’

  ‘But why? I doubt it would be there anyway,’ Trudy said, surprised by the hard tone of her friend’s voice. ‘If he was keeping a record of Iris’s movements or trying to find out who killed her, wouldn’t he have it with him?’

  ‘Very likely,’ Clement conceded. ‘Then again, there might just be two books – a regular journal that he could have been keeping and left behind at his university lodgings, and a more recent notebook that he had on him in the village,’ Clement said doggedly. ‘Don’t forget, originally he would have thought he’d be leaving college only for the May Day celebrations, and would have been expecting to go back the next day. He might not have brought his journal with him for such a short trip.’

  ‘In that case, there’s not likely to be anything relevant in it then, surely?’ Trudy said stubbornly, still feeling unsettled because she still couldn’t see what her mentor was driving at, nor why he was so unhappy with her – because he clearly was.

  ‘Only his thoughts on Iris!’ Clement all but barked. ‘And who knows what he might have written down in it? His suspicions of other men that she might have been friendly with, casual remarks about dates when he’d been stood up – and she could have been meeting someone else – and who knows what other clues. It’s vital that the team investigating Iris’s murder get their hands on it,’ Clement said, before adding significantly, ‘and that Superintendent Finch doesn’t.’

  He was looking at her almost coldly now, standing rigidly, aware of the tension creeping over him. He knew what he had to say next wasn’t going to go down well, and he hated the thought of them having their first proper argument, but he could sense it was coming.

  Trudy blinked. ‘What do you mean? Why would you want to stop the Superintendent finding his son’s journal?’ she demanded. ‘It might have something in it that proves his innocence. You said that yourself.’

  ‘Yes,’ Clement gritted. ‘But use your head, girl,’ he admonished, beginning to feel angry himself now, because it was falling on him to teach her some hard facts of life, and he didn’t particularly feel like doing it. ‘For all we know, the boy’s journal might prove the exact opposite!’

  For a second Trudy floundered – and then, with a rush of indignation, she understood.

  ‘You think David did kill Iris after all – and wrote about it in his journal?’ she accused, feeling, for some strange reason, oddly betrayed.

  Clement bit back a swear word. ‘I don’t know, and nor do you,’ he pointed out coolly. ‘And that’s precisely the point. In fact, I think it very unlikely that if David did kill her that he would then be so stupid as to admit as much in writing! But he might have killed her nevertheless, and not admitted it in his diary. In which case, his previous entries might well provide clues as to how he was feeling – his growing disenchantment with Iris for example. He might have written down entries when he was angry, giving away his true emotional state. All of which would add to the case against him. And if his father finds it …’ Clement took a deep breath. ‘What’s to stop him from destroying it?’

  Trudy was so stunned by the accusation, that she actually took a step back. She stared at Clement’s stern, challenging face for a moment, and then took a second step back.

  ‘You can’t … you can’t just say something like that about someone like Superintendent Finch,’ she said weakly. ‘He wouldn’t do something like that!’

  ‘No? Why not? He’s a grieving father after all, and desperate to save his son’s reputation. And maybe his own career as well. It’s not likely he can advance any further if it’s an unacknowledged fact that his own son is believed to be a murderer, is it?’

  Trudy’s eyes flared. ‘You can’t say that!’ she repeated. But even as she felt the indignation and anger building inside her, now that the shock of the accusation was receding a little, in her head she was beginning to concede that her friend might have a point. What was to stop him destroying the diary if he thought it implicated his son? The man was only human after all. But … still she found it unthinkable. She knew that the Superintendent’s reputation as a police officer was totally unsullied. And having met the man, she just couldn’t see him betraying everything he’d worked for, and stood for … and yet …

  Clement watched her go pale, then red, then pale again. He waited patiently for her to sort it all out in her mind, but he knew that she must be in turmoil. Everything loyal in her, and everything she’d been taught, would be telling her that superior officers were honourable and trustworthy and incorruptible.

  But she wasn’t the totally green and innocent young girl he’d first met any longer. In the past two years she’d seen five murderers caught, and had to deal with the tragic aftermath of their crimes. She was learning, and learning fast, that the world didn’t operate in monochrome shades of pure black and bright white, but in an almost infinite number of shades of grey.

  And now she was faced with a choice. Did she ‘do the right thing’, inform DI Jennings, as he’d told her she must, and ‘betray’ Superintendent Finch? Or did she keep a diplomatic silence?

  Clement felt his left leg begin to tremble and cursed inwardly. No doubt the stress of the moment was bringing on an episode. Surreptitiously he leaned back against the garden fence behind him and carefully shifted more weight onto his right leg. At least Trudy was too distracted by her own woes to notice his, he thought gratefully.

  He took slow, deep breaths and watched her struggle with her dilemma – and grimly acknowledged that there was nothing at all he could do to help her.

  Chapter 26

  Angela Baines was beginning to get worried. It wasn’t like Janet to be so late in getting home. Already she’d had to put their dinners to keep in the oven on a low heat. It simply wasn’t possible for her to eat on her own, not knowing why Janet wasn’t home. She’d always been a considerate girl and she knew when the evening meal was served.

  She paced nervously up and down the front window, pausing every now and then to stare at the garden gate, hoping to see her daughter’s form push it open and walk through. But only a lone chaffinch, searching for mayflies to feed its growing brood, darted around the garden, providing movement.

  She glanced at the wooden sunburst clock on the wall again. It was a recently purchased and rather fashionable item that would normally give her pleasure to look at, but today she barely noticed this symbol of her determined moderni
ty. It simply kept telling her the same thing – time was ticking away and her daughter was not home.

  Angela tried to stem her growing sense of panic. Janet was a sensible girl, after all, and a thoughtful one. She was sure to be home soon with a very good excuse. Maybe she’d been into town, and the bus had broken down? It was sure to be something like that and nothing serious at all. Unlike some girls, who could cause their parents no end of trouble, Janet had always been a good girl.

  Not like that little madam Iris.

  Angela was glad that Iris was gone and felt no guilt whatsoever for feeling this way. The little so-and-so had been nothing but trouble ever since she could start to walk and talk, but more recently she and her radical ideas about running away to London had become downright dangerous.

  How many nights had Angela lain awake, worrying that the atrocious girl might succeed in luring Janet to go away with her? And who knows what might have happened to Janet then if she had? You heard such awful stories about young girls going to London and simply vanishing.

  At least that particular nightmare no longer bothered her, she thought with intense satisfaction. A mother had a sacred duty to protect her children, didn’t she?

  She paused at the window again, and glared at the still stubbornly shut garden gate, and felt her stomach once more start to churn with anxiety.

  What on earth could be keeping her? Angela took another look at the placidly ticking clock and felt like dragging it from the wall and breaking off the silly wooden sunbeams that radiated out. She wanted to smash it to pieces and then throw the whole thing in the dustbin.

  What on earth had made her buy the wretched thing?

  She forced her trembling hands down to her side and took deep calming breaths. It was no use getting into ‘one of her awful tizzies’ as her mother had always called them.

  Of course, they had only been childish tantrums, and she hadn’t had a spell like that for some time. Not since her husband died, in fact. Not that she could remember anyway. But there were times, in the middle of a particular dark or long night, when she could lie awake for hours, worrying. Whenever she’d had a particularly stressful day, she’d wonder if she might have had ‘one of her tizzies’ and then gone off into a daydream and forgotten about it.