Strictly Murder

by Lynda Wilcox

  The more excited she got the more her aitches disappeared, I noticed, but at least she was talking.

  “I suppose the police did a thorough search of the area?”

  “Oh yes. And of the house,” she pointed across the road to number 17. “They even dug up the garden.”

  “Did they find anything?”

  “Nah. Nothing. There’s some around here that reckoned she’d gone off with a feller, but she were a nice girl, Charlotte. I’d known her since she were two years old. Watched her grow up, I did.”

  She nodded in satisfaction as if watching a child grow up gave you a deep insight into their character. Perhaps it did but not if the watching had only been from across the road.

  “Not like modern teenagers then? Covered in make-up and wearing clothes that reveal far too much.”

  “Oh, I know, shockin’ it is nowadays but Charlotte weren’t like that.” She paused. “I did see her wearing make-up a time or two, though.”

  “Did her mother approve?”

  “Carol? I wouldn’t ‘ave thought so. She were quite strict and so were Charlotte’s dad. She always had to be home by a certain time. Not like today with kids roamin’ the streets at all hours.”

  I was about to ask her who lived in the house now but remembered just in time that I was supposed to be from the estate agents who might be expected to know that. Instead I asked,

  “When did the Neals move out?”

  She thought for a moment.

  “Oh, about a year after, I’d say. Carol reckoned there were too many memories. They were going down south somewhere to make a fresh start, she said. It’s been sold about five times since then. None of ‘em ‘ave looked after it nor cared for it much. As you can tell.”

  I nodded. It was time I wrapped this up. I’d got about as much out of her as I was going to get, though she had given me one possible pointer.

  “Well, I must get on. Nice talking to you.”

  “And to you. Good morning.” She turned and shuffled back down the path while I strode off towards Conway Drive and the patch of woodland near the shops.

  I had the place pretty much to myself when I got there. There were no dog walkers about and the children were in school so I wandered at will, stopping now and again to take a few photos. I found the ‘bomb hole’ easily enough and stood on the rim for a few minutes while I thought about the missing girl. If the police had scoured the area and found nothing then there was probably nothing to find. Surely Blackie and his mates would have unearthed anything hidden here in the twenty years since Charlotte’s disappearance, so this was probably a wild goose chase on my part. Still, KD might find it useful as she weaved the few meagre facts I had been able to gather into a plausible story.

  I looked at my watch. Half past twelve, time to return to Crofterton and get some lunch at the ABC.

  On a whim, I called in at Knight’s Estate Agents on the way to Valentino’s. I still needed a place to live and I might as well kill two birds with one stone. Mr Oily was in the outer office and came across as soon as I’d shut the door.

  “Good morning. How may we help?”

  No sign that he remembered me, I noticed. Good. It avoided any potentially difficult comments or questions.

  “I’d like your lettings department, please.”

  He accompanied me through to the boxed in space behind the screen.

  “Client for you, Mr Powell.”

  The smile Tom directed upwards died on his face as soon as he recognised me.

  “Hello, Tom,” I said taking the chair at the end of his desk. “Can you let me have some more details, please. I’ve decided against the last property you showed me.”

  I smiled in what I hoped was a friendly way but Tom merely threw me a black look as he got up and slid open the top drawer in his filing cabinet.

  “Any particular property in mind?”

  “Not this time, no.”

  He rifled through the contents for a moment before sitting back down clutching a handful of papers which he thrust towards me.

  “Have the police been giving you a hard time too?” I asked, hoping to inspire a feeling of solidarity. It seemed to work for he relaxed and turned towards me, almost eagerly.

  “I’ll say,” he replied, voice barely above a whisper. Fortunately there was a lot of noise coming from the main office. I thought it unlikely we’d be overheard.

  “Anyone would think I killed her.”

  I widened my eyes in mock horror and incredulity that they could think such a thing and tried to look sympathetic.

  “Then, yesterday, they came in and confiscated the appointments diary.” He indicated a blank space on the desk.

  “Really? I suppose they wanted to know who’d viewed the place last? Before me, I mean.”

  “Yes.”

  “And?” I prompted, I didn’t want Tom going all monosyllabic on me. He stayed silent, so I applied a little flattery.

  “Naturally, they’d come to you. You’d be the best person to tell them. After all, you must be a good judge of character by now. Meeting so many people, showing them round. You could probably recognise a dodgy character a mile off.”

  Was it my imagination or did young Mr Powell sit up a little straighter and taller in his chair as he considered this?

  “Well, there is that, of course.”

  “They’d rely on that,” I assured him. “Your assessment would be important to them.”

  “There was only an old lady, Mrs Smith, about a fortnight ago,” Tom finally admitted.

  Mrs Smith? Oh great! It was going to be fun trying to find her, then. For a moment I indulged in the malicious pleasure of imagining the attempts of Inspector Farish and his team in doing so before re-focusing my attention on the lad in front of me.

  “An old lady? I can’t see her killing JayJay, can you?”

  “Hardly. She wouldn’t have had the strength. All grey hair and wrinkles, she was.”

  Thus, in Tom’s view, obviously incapable of doing anything more strenuous than sitting in a rocking chair and knitting.

  “Oh well, the police will find her, no doubt, and give her the same third degree treatment as us. I suppose they’ve asked you about the keys, too?”

  He drew back a fraction. Fearing I’d lost him and he might clam up, I went on in a confidential tone,

  “They seemed to think I’d had them but I told them they were never out of your pocket.”

  Strictly speaking they’d merely asked me if I recalled Tom having trouble opening the door but he wasn’t to know that. Fortunately, this blatant lie bore fruit.

  “Me too.” He was eager to talk again. “And where they were kept, who had access to them, if I’d ever lost them or given them to anybody.”

  “Ridiculous,” I agreed as he enumerated these points on stubby fingers.

  “Or whether I’d put them down where someone could get at them.”

  “Well, of course you hadn’t.”

  He had. He’d left them on the kitchen worktop - for a short while at least. Still, I wasn’t going to point that out. I smiled encouragement.

  “Well, no.”

  A shifty look appeared in his eyes for a moment. Was it merely the memory of putting the keys down that worried him or something else, I wondered.

  “And I suppose they’ve taken the keys as well?”

  “Oh, yes,” he nodded. “Took them off me before they let me go on Monday.”

  I heard the faint, muffled noise of a phone ringing.

  “Excuse me a moment.”

  He opened a desk drawer and lifted out a mobile. While he took the call I dropped my gaze to the pile of particulars he’d given me, pretending to read them but, in reality, my brain was working furiously. If taking calls on his mobile was a regular occurrence - he’d certainly done so that Monday - and he’d left the keys lying about, then it was possible the key to Willow Drive had been switched whilst he was thus distracted. Everything would have to fall just right though, for me to feel
totally happy with this idea.

  “Sorry, about that. My next appointment.”

  Leaving the phone on the top of the desk he stepped to the filing cabinet and pulled out a folder and a set of keys which he set down next to the mobile. In a flash I picked up the keys.

  “If you don’t mind,” he sounded cross as he shut the drawer and held out his hand.

  “I was just looking at the fob, “I lied dropping the bundle into his open palm. “Clever idea that. The logo, I mean.”

  It was. The words ‘Knight’s Estate Agents’ were engraved on one side of a heavy, metal fob that had been fashioned in the shape of a knight on horseback. However, the ring itself held far greater interest. It wasn’t, as I’d expected, a thin double circle of wire but a single ring with a depressible clip. Much easier and quicker to use than twiddling key and wire round and round in circles, pinching your fingers and breaking your nails. Very interesting.

  “Anyway Tom, thanks for these.” I got up, waving the sheaf of particulars in my hand. “I’ll be in touch.”

  He nodded. “OK. Goodbye.”

  Well, I thought, once I was back on the High Street, he may not know it but Tom Powell has definitely given me plenty to think about.

  The ABC lunchtime crowd had hardly thinned out at all; it seemed particularly heavy even for a Friday. The wine bar was growing increasingly popular with local businessmen and it pleased me to see the place so busy. When I arrived most off the tables were still occupied but, fortunately, my usual bar stool was vacant and I hurried across to claim it. While I waited for my croque monsieur I read through the estate agent’s particulars, turning the pages over in a listless fashion. I didn’t enjoy house hunting, I decided. It was fast becoming a ceaseless trawl around one drab, poorly maintained and overpriced property after another. I could paper my current flat with the fistfuls of A4 sheets I’d collected from all the letting agents I’d visited. (Despite Knight’s claim to be ‘the’ estate agent, there existed half a dozen more in Crofterton alone and two others in the nearby town of Bellhurst. - I know, I had trudged into every single one over the past couple of months.) I sipped at my white wine spritzer dejectedly. Of the four sets of details Tom Powell had given me, I dismissed two out of hand. The first was way over my budget - £1600 a month! That was more than I earned working for KD in that time and twice what I paid in Sutton Harcourt — and the second too far from the centre. I nibbled at my hot sandwich while considering the remaining pair. I liked the sound of ‘a modern town house in a pleasant thoroughfare close to city centre and all amenities’, so that was a possibility. The other I wasn’t quite so keen on but, what the hell! Both were probably worth a look. I folded the sheets and stuffed them in my bag.

  “How is the house hunt, Verity? Ca va?”

  I wiped melted cheese from my mouth and chin before replying.

  “It goes, Val, but not very far and not very fast.”

  “My poor Verity.” His sensuous mouth twisted in a sympathetic grimace. “You know, Verity, there is a flat above here that you are most welcome to have.”

  I did know. It wasn’t the first time the offer had been made. I just didn’t fancy living over the wine bar. It would only encourage me to spend more time in the place — I treated it as a second home as it was — and I wanted to put a greater distance between me and my bed than a stagger up a flight of stairs every night. Besides, I might be tempted to drag him up the stairs with me.

  “Thanks, Val. I might take you up on that if I get any more grief from my landlord.”

  “C’est bon.”

  He gave a Gallic shrug, his handsome face creasing in a smile. Once, I’d considered taking him as a lover, an idea he had actively encouraged but sleeping with a man is a sure fire way to ruin a good friendship, I’ve found, and so far I’d always managed to resist.

  As if reading my thoughts his eyes twinkled. I changed the subject hastily.

  “Business is good?” I indicated the groups of diners with a wave of my hand.

  “Oh, yes, very good. And you? You are working hard for your writer of novels?”

  “Certainly am,” I sounded confident enough but in truth felt rather less sanguine about my prospects of working for KD for too much longer. Her comment about not needing me while she worked on the new book did not bode well for the future. My future, anyway. Not that I was going to confess my concerns to Val, bless him, he’d only offer me a job. He moved away to serve coffee to his customers, leaving me to continue fretting over KD’s words. I thought of the agents’ particulars in my bag. I wouldn’t be able to move out of my flat if I lost my job. With a sigh I slid off my stool and moved across to one of the now empty tables. Taking my notebook from my bag, I proceeded to write down all the reasons I could think of to persuade my employer that we should carry on the way we were. Val brought me a cappuccino but said nothing and left me to it. When I’d done I sat back and looked at my meagre list. The problem was, I could think of any number of reasons for KD to write new, original material but hardly any for her to pay a PA cum researcher. I heaved a frustrated sigh and threw my pad and pen back in my bag.

  “You are not going back to work, Verity?”

  I glanced at my watch - nearly half past two already. I got up and walked towards the bar.

  “No, I’ve got the afternoon off. I’m going to go home and spend it working on my report.”

  “Your report?”

  “Yes. KD and I are working on a twenty year old case. It’s one involving a schoolgirl called Charlotte Neal.”

  “Ah bon.” Val leaned towards me over the counter just as the phone began to ring.

  “Now I must fly. Thanks Val.”

  We touched cheeks and I made for the door as he turned away and picked up the phone.

  I strode back down the crowded pavement towards the car park. This continued spell of warm weather certainly brought out the shoppers, I reflected, as I skirted the dawdlers and dodged the kids on skateboards. At the junction where the High Street met All Saints, I joined the queue waiting at the pedestrian lights. With all the various filter lanes this crossing nearly always involved a long wait. I stood patiently, deep in thought, shifting forward from time to time as people moved around and about me. Suddenly the whole world was spinning towards me, my arms flapped wildly like some demented flat-footed booby desperately trying to get airborne. I struggled to stay upright. Something big and red filled my vision and there was a scream followed by a gasp, though that might have been me. An arm shot out like a safety barrier in front of me, hands clutched at my sleeves and pulled me back. Back from pitching head first into the roaring traffic and under the thundering wheels of a number 29 bus.

  “Are you all right, love,” asked an elderly gentleman to my left. “I thought we’d lost you there.”

  “Yes, yes I’m OK, thank you,” I replied, my heart racing.

  I looked round wildly but didn’t recognise anyone I knew in the sea of faces gathered at the kerbside. The lights changed and we surged across. When we reached the far side I turned and looked back, scanning the pavements opposite. No one was running off or lurking inconspicuously in a shop doorway. Everything seemed placid and normal but I was as sure as eggs is eggs that some bastard had deliberately pushed me in the back, fully intending me to fall to my death beneath the rush of oncoming traffic.

  Chapter 7

  I hate housework. It’s in my genes, a trait inherited from my mother who claimed that a tidy house was the sign of an empty life. She led a full existence did my mother. She was also replete with a maxim for every occasion so I would often be admonished with ‘never a borrower nor a lender be’ or ‘a place for everything and everything in its place.’ Which explained why I grew up in a house piled high with books, knick-knacks and mementos of every description. She didn’t have a place for any of them.

  I finished vacuuming and dusting and gave the living room a quick blast from a can of furniture spray - it works just as well as elbow grease when you are in a hu
rry. All right, it doesn’t polish the wood but it does make the room smell nice. Then I tackled the kitchen sink.

  At half past eleven, exhausted after my morning’s efforts, I flopped on the settee with a mug of coffee and the intention of going through my notes from Jaynee Johnson’s diary. Then the phone rang.

  “Good morning, Verity, it’s KD.”

  “Morning, boss. What can I do for you?” I asked, my heart in my mouth, my fingers crossed as I prayed fervently she was going to ask me to do some new research or anything that would save my job.

  “Are you doing anything this afternoon?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Why?”

  “Oh, good.” Her voice sounded relieved and I wondered what my admission of an empty Saturday afternoon had let me in for. “I meant to ask you on Thursday if you would come with me this afternoon.”

  This sounded ominous.

  “Come with you? To what, exactly?”

  “I’m presenting the prizes at the Crofterton dog show.”

  “You’re what?”

  I failed to keep the incredulity out of my voice and KD sounded faintly hurt when she replied.

  “It’s all part of the job, dear.”

  “Part of being a writer or a dog lover?”

  “Don’t be so dense, Verity. It’s all part of being a local celebrity.”

  “Oh! That job!”

  KD looked on being a famous face as a necessary evil but it remained the one aspect of her work she liked least.

  “Anyway, please say you’ll come.”

  “Well, I am out this evening, I murmured.”

  “Ooh. A hot date, eh?”

  I’d hardly describe dinner with Inspector Farish in that fashion so I ignored the comment.

  “Go on. Where is it and what’s the dress code?”

  “Crofterton racecourse and posh frocks.”

  “OK. Where and when do you want me to meet you?”