A Thrust to the Vitals

by Evans, Geraldine

  Mickey had posed the question: how the hell had Nigel managed to wrangle an invitation to such a swanky do? It was a question that had already occurred to Rafferty. Its possible answer piqued his curiosity. He would make sure Nigel at least answered that one truthfully, whatever lies on other matters he might in the meantime have concocted and hope to get away with.

  The two hotel staff — Randy Rawlins, the cocktail waiter cum barman, and Samantha Harman, the blonde and buxom waitress — who had been on duty in Seward’s suite during the reception, had clearly decided that the safer option in the circumstances, was making sure they remained amongst the less suspect lower orders in Rafferty’s mind. For they had adopted servile positions behind the bar, well away from the VIP guests. Randy Rawlins even retained a hold on one of the tools of his trade, tightly clutching a shiny metal cocktail shaker as if he thought his life depended upon it.

  Rafferty had, of course, recognised Rawlins’ name. It was curious that in Rawlins, Mickey, Nigel and several others, this evening’s civic reception should have brought so many of his old, long since grown-up schoolmates together in the same room as the town’s more elite inhabitants.

  Randy Rawlins, in spite of the trendy diminutive that the manager had used when naming the staff on duty at Seward’s reception and the barman’s tight-fitting clothing, was none other than Randolph, the weedy kid that everyone – even the teachers — had picked on at school. Though, the teachers, of course, had mostly had a far better developed instinct for picking out the weak than the majority of the kids.

  After telling the guests what was next on the agenda and reminding them again that they would be questioned individually in the Boudicca Ballroom, Rafferty made his escape before any of the agitated suspects got a second wind. It was already late enough. They all wanted to get home, so he was keen to limit any further delays in the proceedings.

  The first of the guests called to the Boudicca Ballroom for questioning was Ivor Bignall. Bignall was around fifty and although clearly still both tired and emotional, he carried his drink well. From his reddened face, it was apparent he got plenty of practise in this and, as a local councillor and prominent businessman, was presumably a frequent and far from unwilling participant in these free food and booze extravaganzas.

  Still, given that the big man had been, according to Seward’s assistant Marcus Canthorpe, a business associate and partner with the late Rufus Seward in various enterprises, as well as, presumably, a personal friend, he was far more reasonable than Rafferty had expected in such fraught circumstances, especially considering he had been forced to hang around for over an hour and a half.

  By now, it was approaching two in the morning and the florid fifty-something undoubtedly wanted his bed. So did Rafferty, for that matter. But ‘I’ve a Big’un’, as Rafferty had already mentally dubbed Bignall and, given the size of the man’s feet, he might well be so endowed, was undoubtedly to reach this refuge long before Rafferty, Llewellyn or any of the rest of the police team.

  And, after Bignall outlined his experiences during the evening – his encounter in the hallway with the stranger, whom he readily described, who had enquired as to Seward’s whereabouts, and whom Rafferty had no trouble recognising as Mickey, he professed himself unable to enlighten them any further. Once he, like the two security guards, had supplied a description of this late-arriving guest, Rafferty, conscious of the by-the-book Llewellyn hovering at his elbow, had told him he’d need to come to the station the following day to work with the police artist, then he let him go.

  But this was purely a preliminary questioning. The meatier stuff would come later once further evidence had been discovered and sifted.

  Next, they spoke to Bignall’s beautiful wife, Dorothea, though with so little result they might as well have not bothered. She did, however, blurt out one interesting piece of information: that she had attended St Oswald’s, Seward’s private boarding school, and had been in the same year as the dead man.

  Dorothea Bignall, who told them she was thirty-eight to her husband’s fifty-five, was slender, and had a demeanour of such pale fragility it suggested her husband’s claim that she was ill might well be true. Though this might, of course, be down to the fact that she didn’t carry her drink as well as her much larger husband.

  Shortly after it became clear that Mrs Bignall was too tired to string a sentence together, never mind blurt out anything further that was interesting or revealing as to who might have killed the evening’s honoured guest, they allowed her and her husband to go home. Both would, of course, be questioned again when a few more facts had emerged.

  Next, Rafferty said he wanted to question the mayor, Idris Khan. The half-Welsh, half-Asian Khan seemed to have inherited the volubility of both his Celtic and Asian forebears. And although he had calmed down considerably from his earlier over-emotional state, he was clearly still highly charged.

  Khan was a well-known local entrepreneur and fixer who, like Bignall, often featured in the local paper in the course of his duties. A skilled networker, he was said to know everyone who was anyone, which explained why he was the only one amongst the guests who had claimed to recognise Superintendent Bradley during his brief appearance at the evening’s reception. He was more than happy to confirm this fact, which he had already confided to Mary Carmody.

  This lack of recognition of Bradley by the rest of the guests was surprising in itself, given the super’s fondness for getting his face on the telly and in the papers. But perhaps it was that Khan, like Llewellyn, was a teetotaller and, apart from Seward’s soberly on-duty employees, was the only one amongst the official guests who had been both clear-headed and sufficiently astute to realise there might be mileage in mentioning Bradley’s presence that evening.

  Idris Khan and Mandy, his wife, had been amongst the early departing guests. Khan, as they had learned from the security guards posted at the entrance door to Seward’s suite, had returned late in the evening, still trailing his wife, to retrieve something she had left behind.

  Rafferty couldn’t help but wonder if this ‘something’ that had been so urgently required by Mandy Khan had been the dainty tin containing cocaine that Constable Hanks had found in the suite’s main bathroom. However, he decided to reserve this information for another time. He also resisted mentioning that he knew of their late return to the reception shortly before Seward’s body was discovered. It was interesting that neither of the Khans mentioned the latter; maybe it would prove a useful bargaining tool further down the line.

  Uptight and apparently in need of another little sniff of ‘something’, Mandy Khan seemed incapable of answering their questions with any degree of coherence. In fact, she seemed so spaced out and ‘out of it’ that Rafferty quickly concluded he was wasting his time and there was no point in speaking to her further at the moment.

  Marcus Canthorpe, they had, of course, already spoken to. When formally interviewed along with the rest and asked about the late arriving visitor that was Mickey, he told them that he hadn’t seen the man himself and had only learned about him from Ivor Bignall in the furore that had ensued after he had discovered his boss’s murdered body.

  It was Bignall, along with the two security guards, who had revealed the presence of this late visitor. All three would shortly contribute to the photo fit description that would, in spite of Rafferty’s intended delaying tactics, soon be winging its way to the media.

  Questioned about the thankfully still-unidentified Mickey’s late night visit, Canthorpe became defensive, as if he felt his boss’s murder was somehow his fault.

  Fretfully, he told them, ‘According to the security guards, this man Mr Bignall described had an invitation. There was no reason not to let him in.’

  Rafferty, desperate to cover all the bases for Mickey’s sake, had earlier questioned the security guards on this very matter and asked them if they had got a good look at the man’s invitation.

  Indignantly, they had both replied that they had and that it was a
genuine invitation.

  ‘And his name?’ he had asked next, which was where their indignation slackened off and they confessed that they didn’t actually read it. It was late, they had explained by way of mitigation for this failure. But as they had pointed out, his name would be on the guest list and it would simply be ‘a process of elimination, wouldn’t it?’

  Rafferty had, of course, furtively checked for his brother’s name at the earliest opportunity, but it hadn’t been on the guest list. So how had he come to receive an invitation? He doubted the explanation his brother had proffered: that Sir Rufus Seward himself had sent it to him.

  Questioned about this, Canthorpe shrugged and admitted he had no idea. ‘I don’t know how this stray, unknown guest managed to turn up with an invitation. Ivor Bignall and I were jointly responsible for the guest list, he for the council and me for Sir Rufus. I spoke to Mr Bignall earlier and, when he mentioned this late arriving guest and that he had asked to speak to Sir Rufus mere minutes before I found my boss’s body, he told me he wasn’t one of his invitees. He certainly wasn’t one of ours, either. I don’t have any idea who he could be.’

  Rafferty thanked heaven for small mercies as Canthorpe shook his head unhappily. At first, Canthorpe said that he had no idea how the late arriving stranger could have got his hands on an invitation. But, shortly after, he decided he might have the inkling of an idea.

  ‘On Sir Rufus’s behalf, I was responsible for the invitations and the guest list,’ he reluctantly admitted. ‘But my office in Sir Rufus’s estate, which is a few miles north of Norwich, is pretty much a thoroughfare between the front door and Sir Rufus’s office. It’s possible that anyone passing through could have helped themselves to a blank invitation if they were so- inclined.’

  He gave a weary shrug. ‘Maybe we should have been more security conscious, but how could I, or any of us, have guessed that a violent maniac would conspire to get his hands on an invitation so he could kill Sir Rufus? It’s the stuff of fiction.’ He paused, then added, ‘Or it was, before tonight.’

  Somehow, Rafferty doubted that his brother would have had reason to visit Rufus Seward’s estate or that he would have been likely to gain admission if he had made such a visit. But it was becoming increasingly clear that someone had wanted Mickey’s presence at the evening’s reception. But it was a conundrum to which he, for now, had no solution, and he had no option but to put it aside. It was evident that security over these party invitations hadn’t been a big issue. Equally clearly, somehow, Mickey had been in receipt of one of them. Rafferty could only hope his brother would be able to shed some light on the matter when he finally had a chance to question him more thoroughly.

  ‘You said this late night visitor asked to speak to Sir Rufus as soon as he arrived?’

  Canthorpe nodded. ‘Though, as I said, I only learned this from Ivor Bignall later, after I found Sir Rufus’s body. Mr Bignall told me the man seemed more than a little drunk. But such late visits weren’t unusual. Sir Rufus often did private business at functions. I would barely have registered Mr Bignall’s remark, but for—’

  ‘Quite.’

  By now they were all way past the time of being able to pose much in the way of useful questions or to have much hope of receiving useful answers from those they questioned, who mostly seemed out on their feet. More for the form than the expectation that they would gain any useful information, they questioned Roy and Keith Farraday, the identical twins who had been in the same school year as Mickey, Nigel, Randy Rawlins and Seward. Rafferty reminded himself that the twins had been the school sneaks; if it was a practise they still indulged in in their maturity, Rafferty intended to find out.

  Like the rest, the Farradays proclaimed total ignorance of Seward’s violent demise and refused to be shifted from this stance. The hotel staff on duty in Seward’s suite — Randy Rawlins, the clearly now openly gay cocktail waiter and barman and Samantha Harman, the busty waitress — took a similar line. Even at this unsociable hour, the latter was apparently not too tired to flirt. But Rafferty, now too exhausted even for such a harmless diversion as flirting, sent them all off into the night. He was willing to give them the benefit of any doubt for now, but he was also willing to give them enough rope to implicate themselves if any of them had reason to nurse a guilty conscience.

  It had become apparent, during his questioning of the guests, that Seward, as well as receiving his civic honours, had also taken the opportunity to revisit his past. And gloat about his success to the failures who littered it? From what Rafferty had so far discovered, he had treated the people who had populated that past and who had failed to shine in life with the same lack of civility as he had treated them in their youth. Had one of them decided it was payback time?

  Rafferty saved the best till last. He felt he deserved a treat and had deliberately made his cousin wait till even the help had been questioned. Perhaps he was being petty, but, given their past differences, he felt that he owed Nigel little in the way of consideration. Besides, there was nothing more likely to get his cousin’s dander up and encourage him to blurt out things better left unsaid than making him wait until last to be questioned. And, anxious to prove his society credentials, Nigel might even tell him the truth about how he had got his name on the guest list.

  Getting any kind of truth out of his devious cousin inclined Rafferty to make use of every weapon in his arsenal, petty or not. And if petty swung it by angering “dear” Nigel, Rafferty wasn’t too proud to stoop to that level.

  Chapter Four

  Nigel Blythe, Rafferty’s sharp-suited estate agent cousin, strolled nonchalantly into the ballroom, gazed around at the party litter with a disinterested air that didn’t fool Rafferty for a second, and after making them wait a good ten seconds, finally condescended to saunter across the floor to the table where they had set up operations.

  Nigel had yet to open his mouth, but, never mind hoping to make his cousin’s dander unwisely rise, Rafferty could feel his own equilibrium wobble. He was also discomfited by the calm presence of Llewellyn at his side. Ready to take notes, his sergeant was studying Nigel as if he were some rare anthropological specimen that he had not previously known existed. Rafferty envied him his scientific detachment.

  When eventually he deigned to take a seat and be questioned about his presence at such a lavish, VIP function, Nigel languidly explained that he had met Sir Rufus at a house-warming party to which, as the selling agent, he had been invited by Sir Rufus’s house-purchasing friends.

  Nigel being Nigel, he would have made the most of the opportunity. Rafferty didn’t doubt that his cousin had milked this potentially lucrative house-warming for all it was worth and then some. Almost as a reflex action, he would have left piles of his arty, oh-so-tastefully-produced literature, describing his determinedly up-market estate agent business, in the various rooms to which, as a guest, he had access, as well as a few that he most definitely didn’t.

  But Nigel had never believed in waiting for business to come to him. As Rafferty had learned when his cousin was placing his first, exploratory, foot in the shark-infested waters of the estate agents’ profession and had used him as both sounding board and potential sucker, Nigel’s life-philosophy was entirely pro-active — it had had to be. ‘Dear’ Nigel would certainly have used his oily charm on the wives and partners of those present – women responded to Nigel, whereas men tended to regard his sharp suit and even sharper, calculating brain and over-active libido as a threat to them, their wallets and their wives.

  However he’d managed it, ‘dear’ Nigel had wangled the invitation to Sir Rufus Seward’s swish reception in order to mingle with rich, potential house-buyers.

  Rafferty stared across the table at his cousin. Untroubled on the surface at least, his cousin gazed back with his usual annoying confidence. Rafferty even thought he could trace the hint of a sneer in the angle of his cousin’s lips. He immediately felt the familiar desire to remove it with his fist.

  Instead
, he acerbically enquired, ‘And Sir Rufus was so charmed by your business methods that he felt his civic reception wouldn’t be complete without your presence, is that it?’

  ‘Exactly so, my dear cousin.’ Nigel smirked and directed his sharp gaze around the vast, echoing ballroom and its assorted party detritus, as if concerned that eavesdroppers might be concealed in the wainscoting and be taking notes about his business methods.

  His eye must, just then, have alighted on one of the celebratory banners at the end of the ballroom, for he froze, shuddered, and went quite pale. For a few revealing seconds, his accustomed confidence vanished to be replaced by an expression of dread.

  Rafferty barely managed to suppress the grin this response drew in return. Finally divorced after an unhappy first marriage, Nigel had resolved to play the field and never again allow himself to be tied down. It was as if, in discovering that some married pair had manacled themselves to each other for half a century, Nigel had at last found something about this interview that did intimidate him. But he covered it well once he regained his poise.

  ‘Oops,’ he said, as he put a languid, well-manicured hand to his lips and hastily averted his gaze from the life-sentence banner. ‘I suppose, in the circumstances, that should be dear “Inspector” — shouldn’t it?’ Nigel crossed one expensively tailored leg over the other, admired the sheen from his Italian loafers, and remarked, ‘How very astute of you to realize that Sir Rufus valued me and my professional skills.’

  Rafferty’s lips tightened to prevent the escape of an unwise response. He glanced briefly at Llewellyn, but his sergeant was wearing his poker face, so he couldn’t hazard a guess as to his colleague’s thoughts.

  ‘Sir Rufus was interested in backing me in some property deals I had previously spoken to him about,’ Nigel elaborated as he removed his hand from his mouth and studied his beautifully manicured fingernails. ‘Very smart businessman, Sir Rufus. He’s a sad loss. A sad loss.’ Nigel’s smoothly handsome face, beneath its equally smooth and sleekly-styled hair, fell into suitably mournful lines at this.