Brief Cases Box Set
Page 19
‘He wasn’t bisexual!’ she yelled. ‘He was homosexual, and he only married me for the sake of respectability. When he told me he was going to leave me I was devastated, but that was nothing to what I felt when he said he was leaving me for another man. How could he do that to me and the children?
‘Then he was diagnosed, the very same day, with cancer, and I said I’d nurse him at home, if only he wouldn’t leave me. He didn’t have much time. It was cancer of the liver, and had spread throughout his body. So he stayed, and I’ve kept it quiet all these years, and then I saw that miserable little queen actually working in Market Darley – I’d found other photographs, when Robert was ill – which I of course destroyed – so I knew what he looked like.
‘I had no idea what I was going to do about it, but I wasn’t going to have the lid blown off this whole sordid thing, after so much time had gone by. I recognised him in the road, and my temper just snapped. How dare he turn up where I lived and just get on with his life as if nothing had happened? I made a split-second decision to get rid of him once and for all. Why should I have my reputation ruined after all this time?
‘I’d already lost my husband twice. Once, when he told me he was leaving me, and the second time when he died. Why should this predatory old ‘scrote’ be allowed to live his life as if nothing had ever happened?’
Carmichael winced at her terminology, while Falconer realised that it was time he took charge of the situation, and got the woman cautioned, arrested, and delivered to the station where he could question her at greater length, and on tape. There was no way out of it now. He had incontrovertible proof that she had run down Jimmy Carling with malice aforethought, and she had finally admitted it.
When they had done all that they could for that day, the two detectives returned to the office to collect their coats, for it was bitingly cold out. ‘Crikey!’ exclaimed Carmichael. ‘She was one scary lady. I nearly shat myself at her house, if you’ll pardon my French, sir.’
‘You’re not the only one,’ agreed Falconer. ‘It’s the first time since we started working together that I’ve been really worried about wearing beige trousers,’ he added, diplomatically not mentioning that he had seen Carmichael sucking his thumb. ‘You should’ve got her to have a word with that chap that’s always worrying Kerry.’
‘You should’ve suggested that before we locked her up, sir. But what bad luck, Carling turning up like that, after all those years.’
‘Fatally bad luck for him, and catastrophic for her, too. I suppose if he had recognised her, it would probably have been all round the hotel like wildfire soon enough, and then done the rounds of the whole town.’
‘She must have nearly choked on her pudding when she recognised him in the restaurant. And then the opportunity to get rid of him just presented itself to her when she was on her way home.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Falconer. ‘You could almost say she was driven to it,’ and he chuckled quietly to himself at his own wit, as Carmichael stared at him in bemusement.
THE END
Published by Accent Press Ltd 2015
ISBN 9781783759828
Copyright © Andrea Frazer 2015
The right of Andrea Frazer to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The story contained within this book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publishers: Accent Press Ltd, Ty Cynon House, Navigation Park, Abercynon, CF45 4SN