Blood Lines

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  ‘Go on,’ Slider said.

  Encouraged, she perched on the edge of his desk. ‘Well, guv, you saw the studio: it’s not as if it was a brightly lit open space. There’s the set in the middle, with the panellists’ table and a sort of backdrop screen behind it. A person could be standing behind the screen and not be seen by the rest of the studio. And all the lighting is focused on the set, so everywhere else is dim and shadowy. Then there’s the tiers of audience seating, set up on scaffolding – you can walk right under that. And then there’s the control box and the lighting gallery, and all sorts of little rooms off the studio floor – props and make-up and dressing-rooms. What I’m saying is that there’s any number of places someone could be in the studio without anyone seeing them. So what better excuse, if you actually weren’t there at the time? Parsons can’t prove she was there—’

  ‘But no-one can prove she wasn’t,’ Slider said.

  ‘Exactly. And she was dodging about all evening, which could have been her way of making sure everybody remembered seeing her around, but nobody knew where she was at any given moment.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  Norma made a face, which meant it was. ‘She’s tall and strong. She plays basketball for the BBC team. And she insisted on having a look at the body, even though Somers tried to discourage her. Maybe she was making sure the scene looked right for the police.’

  ‘If he was her lover, why would she want to kill him?’

  ‘Any number of reasons. Love and hate, jealousy, frustration—’

  Slider smiled at her. ‘You know you’ve got nothing, don’t you?’

  ‘All we’ve got is nothing,’ she pointed out boldly.

  ‘However, on your side, Sandal Palliser said that we had already met Greatrex’s latest female fancy, which suggests it was someone at the BBC. So it’s quite possible it was Fiona Parsons. While that doesn’t make her the murderer, it can’t do any harm to find out a bit more about it. She might have some light to throw on the situation. So you can go and talk to her—’

  Norma jumped up. ‘Thanks, guv!’

  ‘—carefully.’

  ‘I’m always careful,’ she said indignantly.

  ‘I’ve heard that.’

  When she had gone, he picked up the phone and dialled. Tufnell Arceneaux was a scientist at the Met Lab, whose specialist field was forensic haematology; a life-loving man with whom Slider had spent some memorably Byzantine nights when they were both younger and his head was harder.

  The handset roared, and Slider held it back hastily. Tufty’s voice was as large as his appetites. ‘Hello, Tufty, it’s Bill.’

  ‘Hello, old fruit! How’s it hanging?’

  ‘Symmetrically, thank you. How are you?’

  ‘Bloody awful, thanks for asking. I haven’t been to bed for two days – feel as if some bastard’s borrowed my body and been careless in it.’

  ‘What was the celebration?’

  ‘Burns night.’

  ‘I thought that was in January?’

  ‘I’m talking about that fire at the fertilizer factory in Crickle-wood,’ Tufty roared triumphantly. ‘I’ve just spent the last thirty-six hours tissue-typing the victims. Identified all but one, though – had to send that one off to the tooth fairy. However, all that aside, I’ve got some good news for you. Your culture vulture who cut himself shaving—’

  ‘You’ve managed to look at that, with all you’ve had to do? I’m touched.’

  ‘Had a sleepless moment to spare. Couldn’t let my favourite dick down – does that all by itself these days!’ Tufty chuckled massively at his own humour. ‘Anyway, I managed to get a lift off the wallet – quite a nice one – a thumb. Good enough to identify, I should have thought. I’ll send the print off to you.’

  ‘That’s terrific. Thanks, Tufty. Oh—’

  ‘No, no it’s all right, I thought of that. It isn’t the corpse’s. But I’ve got something else for you as well. I got a whole forefinger and thumb off that holy card jobbie you sent over—’

  ‘The Bible text?’

  ‘That’s the chap. There are all sorts of marks on it, but one finger and thumb – ordinary greasers, not bloody – have come out a treat. And in my humble op, the thumb’s not the same as the one on the wallet. Here’s the thing, though – it’s not the corpse’s either.’

  Slider was silent for a moment. ‘Just one finger and thumb?’

  ‘Just one identifiable.’ Slider was silent, thinking. ‘Does that help?’ Tufty howled anxiously.

  ‘Like a hernia,’ Slider said. ‘I’ve no idea what it all means.’

  ‘You mean, before you hadn’t a clue, and now you haven’t a clue?’

  ‘Nutshell.’

  ‘Life’s a bugger, isn’t it?’ Tufty sympathised. ‘Tell you what, I’m just off in ten minutes or so. Handling flame-grilled factory workers doesn’t half give you an appetite. Why not join me somewhere and we’ll have a meal and a drink or two, make a night of it. You need the oils wheeling, old horse.’

  ‘I’ve still got the hangover from the last time we did that,’ Slider said, ‘and that was two years ago.’

  ‘Time you let go again, then. You introverted types get your pipes clogged up – too much thinking and not enough drinking. What say?’

  ‘I’d love to, really, but I’ve got to go and see Irene this evening. I promised. She wants to talk about the divorce and everything.’

  ‘Christ,’ Tufty said, awed. ‘Well, best of luck, old chum. If you survive it, give me a bell, and we’ll get together some time.’

  Atherton was lucky – quite a short vigil rewarded him with the sight of Sandal Palliser leaving the house alone. He watched him walk up to the main road and turn left, and a few moments later was ringing the doorbell in hope. He had armed himself with an excuse, but it wasn’t needed. Mrs Palliser expressed no surprise or curiosity on seeing him, but simply bid him come in, and padded before him towards the kitchen.

  ‘Sandy’s away out, you just missed him,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘He’ll not be back until late. It’s his night for bridge with the Frasers – they live in Kensington Court, just a step up the road. D’you know them? She writes the society column in one o’ those glossy magazines, and he writes plays no-one can make head or tail of.’

  Atherton knew who she meant. ‘Too rich for my blood,’ he said. ‘I’m just a humble copper. Don’t you play bridge?’

  She turned to him, and her eyes crinkled with amusement. ‘I do not. There’s nothing so daft as a card game – except those who play them. But Sandy likes being with his own sort of people now and then; and I like an evening doing what I like.’

  ‘And what do you like?’ Atherton asked, obediently taking his cue.

  ‘Being left alone in the house with a handsome young man can’t be bad at my age. What’s it to be, now? Tea, coffee, or a drop of something?’

  She sounded positively roguish. Atherton plumped for safety and tea.

  ‘We’ll stay in here, if you’ve no objection,’ she said, pulling out a chair from the kitchen table. ‘It’s the only warm room. When Sandy’s out, the central heating goes off.’

  Atherton didn’t know whether she meant he turned it off, or she did, whether he was supposed to sympathise or approve of the thrift. However, the kitchen was cosy, with a four-oven Aga sitting fatly under the chimney throwing out heat, and the smell of recent baking in the air. There was an ancient bakelite wireless with an illuminated dial half-hidden in the clutter on the dresser making conversational sounds just below the level of comprehension; and an enormous black cat, which had been curled up looking like a fake-fur cushion on a high-backed wooden chair by the range, unfurled itself and hopped lightly down to come and wipe its nose politely on Atherton’s trouser, purring like a food-mixer. It was no hardship to sit in here amongst the amiable clutter. Atherton lolled at his ease at the table, the cat now heavy on his lap, and watched while Mrs Palliser made a pot of tea, and buttered a plateful of oatcakes and decorat
ed each with a slice of cheese. He had a sense of absolute comfort and safety, and he wondered if Palliser knew how lucky he was.

  Mrs Palliser brought everything to the table, sat down cattycorner to him, and put the plate between them. ‘Help yourself,’ she said. ‘I see Gordon’s taken to you. You like cats.’

  ‘I have one myself,’ he said, and told her about Oedipus as he watched her put milk into two enormous teacups and fill them with strong orange-brown tea from the fat black earthenware pot. Then she reached for the bottle of Teacher’s she had put down nearby, unscrewed the cap, and poised it over his cup. ‘You’ll take a nip,’ she said, and it was hardly a question. ‘Or do you like it separate?’

  ‘I’ll have it your way,’ he said, fascinated.

  She poured a good slug into each cup, screwed the cap back on the bottle, and drew a hearty sigh. ‘Ah,’ she said, as though he had passed some test, ‘you’re a good boy. Here’s how!’

  ‘Good health,’ he found himself replying. It didn’t taste half bad, actually, almost perfumed; and since he was ravenous, he followed her example and took an oatcake, and found the combination faultless. Soon, elbows on table, they were talking cosily. Mrs Palliser would have been happy to indulge his curiosity on any subject – ‘Chatting’s my best thing,’ she told him at one point – but it was easy to bring her to the subject of Roger Greatrex, which must have been on her mind in any case.

  ‘Of course, Sandy and Caroline were goan out together at one time, did you know that?’ she said. ‘Before she married Roger, of course. As a matter of fact, it was through Sandy that Roger met her. It’s queer to think about that now,’ she added reflectively. ‘How things happen, and you can’t see the end of them. That’s how it’s meant to be, I suppose.’

  ‘It seems that way sometimes,’ Atherton said encouragingly.

  ‘Sandy’d known the family from boyhood, you see – Caroline’s, I mean. His father was a solicitor, and he did some work for the old lord, and that’s how Sandy met the young folk. They lived nearby, and Sandy used to get invited to make up the numbers.’ She gave a wicked little smile. ‘That’s where he got his taste for the high life and the County Set. Of course, it’s different there in the lowlands.’ She poked her chin up. ‘Me, I’m from Deeside. We don’t bow the knee to anyone.’

  ‘I can’t imagine you ever needed to,’ Atherton said gallantly, and she rewarded him by pouring him more tea. ‘You must have had the world at your feet.’

  She didn’t deny it, only looked at him with a wry smile and crinkled eyes. ‘Well, Sandy was a handsome young man, and as clever as a knife,’ she resumed, ‘and he was popular with the younger ones, and the old lord quite approved of him too. Anyway, after Sandy came to London, Caroline came down too – not for his sake, you understand, but for a bit of excitement and change, to see life and so on. But of course, knowing Sandy was there, and maybe feeling a bit lonely, she got in touch, and he offered to show her the sights, and one thing led to another, and so they started to walk out. I don’t know how serious it was on her part – it was before my time of course – but I know Sandy wanted to marry her. But then he got friendly with Roger, and introduced him to Caroline, and before he knew where he was, Roger’d taken her away from him.’

  ‘How did he take it?’ Atherton asked.

  ‘Oh, well, Sandy would always put a good face on it. He’d not let Roger know he minded – that’d be letting him win. But to my mind there was always a tension between them. A rivalry, you might say. They were friends, right up to the end, but underneath they watched each other like two cats. Maybe that’s why the friendship lasted so long,’ she added with a little nod. ‘It mattered too much to the pair of them, d’you see, ever to drift apart. And Sandy was always devoted to Caroline. Devoted.’

  ‘Didn’t you mind?’ Atherton asked, intrigued by the lack of rancour in her voice as she said it.

  ‘Mind? Why should I mind? It was me he married. I’ve half an idea the old lord asked Sandy to keep an eye on her. Poor Caroline hasn’t had an easy row to hoe. Married to Roger was no picnic – and then the child being not just right in the head, and there was never another. I dare say they were afraid to risk it. No, I wouldn’t have swapped places with her for anything. But Sandy would always do her a good turn if he could. Not that she ever said anything. It wasn’t in her to complain, and I liked her better for that, I can tell you. Except just the once—’ She paused, though it may only have been to concentrate on pouring. ‘Will you have a piece of my Dundee cake?’

  Atherton accepted, since she obviously wanted him to, and watched her in silence as she pottered about the kitchen fetching the huge, nut-studded cake, the cheese, a knife and two small plates. She cut him a dark cliff of cake, laid a matching wedge of cheese against its side, and passed it over, and waited while he sampled and pronounced. It was excellent, and she smiled at his praise as though it genuinely pleased her.

  When at last she was settled again, he prompted her. ‘So what happened, that one time that Caroline complained?’

  She looked at him quickly and then away. ‘Oh, it was a long time ago. Before the baby was born. The marriage was in trouble, and for a while there Sandy thought they might be going to split up. Caroline wanted a baby, you see, her family was pressing her about it, and Roger – in defiance, maybe, I don’t know – was flaunting this young woman at her. He’d always had a roving eye, but this time it was blatant. Anyway, Caroline broke down for once in her life and ran out on him, she actually moved out, to a bedsitter in Earl’s Court. Shocking it must have been for her to do that, and her a Catholic. Sandy went and saw her, of course. He said she was in a desperate mood. I think he thought she might do something silly. But he talked to her and he talked to Roger, and finally they got back together and it was all hushed up.’ She paused, just a breath, but Atherton felt he could hear the wings of the Kindly Ones beating the air around them in the moment of silence. ‘And then she found she was pregnant.’

  She looked at Atherton, and he nodded very slightly as encouragement to go on. She sighed, as though he had given her the wrong answer, and looked down at her hands again. ‘Well, that sorted things out. Roger dropped the young woman, and it all looked set fair. Then the baby was born.’

  ‘And that was the—?’

  ‘The poor simple boy, yes. Jamie, they called him. After that, I don’t think it ever really worked between Roger and Caroline, but they always kept a good shop-front, as they had to, really, since they couldn’t divorce. I think it suited them, really, to have their separate lives. But Sandy always thought Roger treated her badly.’

  ‘Do you have any children?’

  ‘No. We’ve none. We’d have liked them but – Sandy can’t.’ The last words were almost swallowed, as if she felt she shouldn’t tell him, but wanted to too much to stop. And then she looked up suddenly into Atherton’s eyes, and he stared down into thirty years of silent disappointment. ‘But I’ve plenty nephews and nieces. And we’ve had a good marriage, Sandy and me,’ she said defiantly. ‘We understand each other. He has his little ways to put up with – but then, so have I. And he’ll never leave me. I’ve always known that.’

  And that was what she had to be grateful for, what she settled for? he wondered. He felt hugely, horribly sad. The ramshackle, cluttered house suddenly became a gigantic metaphor, a neglected opportunity, at the heart of which this shapeless woman cooked huge vats of nourishing, tasty food – for whom? He wanted to ask her but didn’t dare. He didn’t think he could bear the sadness of her answer, whatever it was.

  He met Slider in the White Horse for a quick one before going off. ‘So there you are,’ he said at last, when he had told everything.

  ‘Where am I?’

  ‘There’s our suspect. No alibi, suspicious behaviour, won’t answer questions, is obviously hiding something – and has the cast-iron motive. The Big Green One. As the Southern planter said about the bougainvillaea, it’s all over my jalousie.’

  ‘Because Gre
atrex pinched Palliser’s bird?’ Slider said discouragingly.

  Atherton was hurt. ‘Why not? A lifetime of dissembling, hiding his hurt and jealousy, pretending to be friends with this despicable nerk, just so as not to let him get the better of him. Seeing Greatrex swanning around making a bigger and better name for himself, succeeding everywhere just that bit more than Palliser can manage. They have a long debate in the newspapers about modern art, and Greatrex even wins that one—’

  ‘Does he?’

  Atherton was confused. ‘Does he what?’

  ‘Does Greatrex win the debate?’

  ‘Well of course,’ Atherton said impatiently. ‘No-one could take Palliser’s position seriously – all that guff about art being elitist, and the arts subsidies ought to be spent on welfare instead. It’s hackneyed – the wealthy liberal’s guilt-trip. No-one really believes it. He probably only took up the argument to be on the opposite side from Greatrex.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘He earns his living from it,’ Atherton pointed out. ‘And all he achieves by being contrary is to make himself look like a plonker, while Greatrex, who is still a handsome son-of-a-gun, gets the pole position, the praise and the totty. Then he comes face to face with him at the TVC, and it all becomes too much. Thirty years of resentment boils over, and he tops him.’

  ‘With a knife he’s brought with him for the purpose?’

  ‘All right, it may not have been absolutely spontaneous. But he knew he was going to be on the same panel with Greatrex.’

  ‘Did he?’

  ‘Oh yes. Anyone in the country could have known, because they announce on the programme the week before who’s going to be on next week, and it was in all the TV listings. But anyway, Palliser knows. He arrives early, hoping for a moment alone with Greatrex, and when the opportunity finally presents itself – when Greatrex leaves the room alone to go to make-up, Palliser follows him.’