Fair Game

by Sheila Radley

  Joanna herself had withdrawn to a window seat. Set-faced, she gulped gin and tonic while she flipped without interest through a pile of back numbers of Horse and Hound.

  Dorothy Wilson-Brown and the Treadgolds were all at the table, with a bottle of Islay malt conveniently to hand. Dorothy was absently breaking up scones and feeding them to her dogs. Her brothers, slightly ashamed to be doing so but not knowing how else to pass the time, were playing poker dice.

  Unable to settle anywhere, Lewis Glaven was roaming grey-faced between the gun room and the estate office, just across the kitchen corridor. He spoke to no one, but every now and then he gave an anguished mutter:

  ‘Never forgive myself …’ ‘First time there’s ever been a serious accident at a Chalcot shoot …’ ‘Never forgive myself …’

  Martin Tait, uneasy in his conscience, and aware of being an outsider in a distressed gathering of old friends, was patrolling the lower end of the corridor. As soon as he’d brought Alison back to the house he had rung Douglas Quantrill, who had made it his priority to collect his daughter and have her ankle attended to. Tait was now waiting for Quantrill to return, in his capacity as head of Breckham Market CID rather than as Alison’s father.

  Tait had already explained to Lewis Glaven that Detective Chief Inspector Quantrill would be coming back to begin the enquiry into the shooting. He’d been half-apologetic about the intrusion, but Lewis was evidently expecting it.

  ‘Yes, of course there must be a police investigation. Essential after a serious accident. Do we have to wait for your colleague, though? You’re a senior man, aren’t you?’

  Tait had no intention of admitting that he didn’t yet out-rank Doug Quantrill, and that until his promotion took effect he had no authority here in the Breckham Market division. But even if he were already a superintendent, he still couldn’t take charge of the investigation.

  ‘I’m also one of the witnesses, as a member of the shooting party,’ he’d explained. ‘I shall have to be interviewed just like everyone else.’

  Lewis Glaven gave him a sharp blue-eyed stare. ‘Did you see how it happened?’ he demanded. ‘Damned if I did … Nor any of the others.’

  ‘Nor I,’ said Martin, with complete truth but rather too much haste.

  His last shot, though arguably unsporting, had been nowhere near low enough to hit Hope directly. But he remembered how apprehensive he’d felt when he was searching for young Laura, and found that spent pellets were zinging down all round him with twig-shredding force. That could well have been how Hope was hit. He didn’t want to believe that the pellets were from his gun, but it was a worrying possibility.

  Fortunately, his host suspected nothing. ‘Chief Inspector Quantrill …’ Lewis Glaven was muttering. ‘Know of him, of course. Met him once or twice. Recognised him as soon as he came to pick up his daughter. A good sound countryman, I thought. Does he shoot?’

  ‘Never has done, to my knowledge.’

  Lewis shook his head. ‘Pity … A man who doesn’t shoot can’t possibly understand the concentration that’s required. Or the emphasis we place on safety. But at least you know that now, eh? No doubt you’ll make it clear to him.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Martin, with a sick feeling of culpability.

  ‘It’s these interviews I’m concerned about, d’you see?’ Lewis confided in a lower voice. ‘Concerned for my guests, I mean. God knows how this terrible accident happened, but trying to apportion blame will serve no useful purpose. My friends are distressed enough already. I don’t want them upset by a police grilling.’

  ‘There’s no question of a “grilling”,’ Tait had protested, quick to defend the reputation of the Suffolk constabulary.

  ‘You know what I mean. Ask your colleague to make it as much of a formality as possible, eh?’

  Lewis Glaven had clapped him on the shoulder and returned to the estate office without waiting for a reply. Tait paced up and down the corridor, pulled two ways. As a senior police officer, he deplored his host’s request for a token investigation. But a thorough investigation might well show that he had fired the near-fatal shot.

  If the responsibility were his, there would be no way of ducking it. Quantrill would have photographs taken of Hope Meynell’s injuries, showing the spread of the pellets. These photographs would enable the forensic lab to calculate the angle and distance of the shot. Together with photographs of the scene, with measurements from each peg, they would reveal exactly which of the Guns had fired it.

  It was an accident, of course. Everyone knew that. If the shot had been his, no one would openly blame him.

  But how could he live at ease with himself, with that careless shot on his conscience? How could he look the Glavens and their friends in the eye, when the victim was Will’s girlfriend? And how would Alison react?

  She was already furious with him for shooting wildlife in pursuit of his social ambition. So how was she going to feel about him if he’d shot a human being – particularly a girl she’d liked and was trying to take care of? Would she ever forgive him? Would she still be prepared to marry him?

  Martin was sweating out possible scenarios when the telephone rang in the estate office. Lewis Glaven answered it instantly. Anxious for news, Dorothy Wilson-Brown appeared in the gun-room doorway, looking old and drained. Martin moved away down the corridor, every bit as anxious but not wanting to seem to be listening.

  When Lewis emerged from the room he was visibly shaken. His normally straight shoulders sagged and even his trim moustache seemed downcast. Mrs Wilson-Brown hurried to put a sympathetic hand on his arm.

  ‘My dear …?’

  He patted her hand absently. ‘That was Hope’s father. I’d left a message on his answering machine to call me urgently. I’ve just broken the news to him.’

  ‘Poor Lewis …’

  ‘Poor Meynell …’ He gave a heavy sigh: ‘How d’you tell a man that the daughter he’d entrusted to your care for a weekend has been shot? Frankly, I couldn’t. Told him there’d been a bad accident, that’s all. He’s going straight to the hospital tonight, and he’ll hear the details from Will. I’m meeting him there in the morning.’

  ‘That was the best thing to say, for his sake as well as yours.’

  ‘Was it? I don’t know … I feel so guilty, Doffy.’

  ‘It was an accident, my dear. We all know that accidents happen at shoots.’

  ‘Country people know it. Suburban dentists can’t be expected to. Besides, it was my fault she was at the shoot. She hated the idea of watching pheasants being killed. Will would have let her off, but I insisted on her going.’

  ‘For the best of reasons. And I agreed with you, so don’t reproach yourself.’

  ‘You’re a great support to me, Doffy. Be a dear and come with me to the hospital tomorrow? Don’t think I can face Meynell on my own.’

  As the old friends disappeared into the gun room, Martin heard a vehicle crunching to a stop on the gravel outside. He pulled on the Barbour he’d left in the lobby, and his cap, and splashed across the illuminated yard to meet Douglas Quantrill.

  ‘Thought you might like a quick briefing before you go indoors,’ he said, sliding into the passenger seat of Quantrill’s car. ‘How’s Alison?’

  ‘She’ll be fine. The casualty department’s having a precautionary X-ray taken, but they don’t think any bones are broken. Her mother’s with her, and Peter’s going to drive them home when the ankle’s been dealt with.’

  ‘Good. You didn’t tell her how seriously Hope Meynell was injured?’

  ‘No. As you said, Alison’s concerned for the girl and there’s no point in upsetting her tonight. But as for you …’

  Quantrill’s voice had hardened. He turned in his seat and stared at Martin across the half-dark interior of the car. The hostility that came from him was almost palpable.

  ‘It’s just as well for you that their injuries weren’t the other way round. If it were Alison who’d been shot, I’d have broken your blo
ody gun over your head. You’ve been totally irresponsible.’

  ‘That’s not true!’ said Tait.

  After all, it wasn’t necessarily his shot that had caused Hope’s injuries. He didn’t intend to be caught out by forensic evidence, so he planned to cover himself when he gave Quantrill his formal statement. He would say quite frankly that he’d turned round to fire at a pheasant that had flown over him, and that he’d missed. But at the moment he was admitting nothing.

  ‘I didn’t want Alison to come and watch the shoot,’ he went on. ‘I advised her not to. Lewis Glaven insists on safe shooting, but even so I told her it was a dangerous place to be. I begged her to stay away, right up to the last minute. But she takes after her father – she’s every bit as obstinate as you are.’

  Deprived of his righteous anger, Quantrill was reduced to a peeved retort: ‘D’you think I don’t know it? The times I’ve told her she must be out of her mind to partner you …’

  ‘Our relationship is no one’s business but our own,’ said Tait loftily. Then, remembering with pleasure that he would shortly become Douglas Quantrill’s boss, he decided to be magnanimous: ‘Now, do you want any help from me in this investigation?’

  Quantrill accepted with a bad grace. ‘I suppose it’ll save time. You already know the names and addresses of the shooting party, I take it?’

  ‘Of course. And I imagine you’ll want me to show you where the shoot took place?’

  ‘Tomorrow morning, if you can make it. I don’t intend to do the interviews tonight – shooting talk won’t mean anything to me until I’ve had a look round. If you’ll just give me a general idea, now, of what happened, I’ll have a word with Lewis Glaven and then call it a day.’

  Quantrill paused: ‘Unless of course you already know, or suspect, who fired the shot?’

  Martin was slightly ruffled. ‘No idea.’

  ‘No one’s admitting responsibility?’

  ‘No.’

  Quantrill nodded thoughtfully. ‘But then,’ he said, ‘considering it’s their host’s son’s girlfriend who’s been critically wounded, who’d be prepared to admit it?’

  Douglas Quantrill took it very kindly that Lewis Glaven’s first words to him were an enquiry about his daughter’s injury.

  ‘Thank you, but it’s probably just a sprained ankle,’ he said. ‘Painful, but nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Good. Charming girl. We were delighted to have her with us at lunch.’

  Lewis Glaven led the way into the estate office. Like the gun room it was panelled, but it contained modern, functional equipment more appropriate to Glaven’s role as a company chairman than as a gentleman farmer; as well as filing cabinets there was a computer, a fax machine and a shredder. But the walls were dominated by two large-scale maps of the Chalcot estate, a yellowed one from the nineteenth century, and a modern one with a write-on wipe-off overlay. A number of silver cups and trophies stood proudly on a shelf, and the panelling was hung with framed photographs of individual pale-coloured beef cattle, each frame decorated with prizewinner’s rosettes.

  The men sat down on opposite sides of the large desk. Quantrill had remembered Lewis Glaven, from previous brief encounters, for his healthily pink complexion and his decisive manner; but now his face was as grey as his hair, and his hands fiddled restlessly with a fountain pen.

  ‘I’m sorry to intrude at such a time,’ said Quantrill. ‘It’s a distressing situation for all of you. My daughter’s upset too – she particularly liked Miss Meynell. What’s the news from the hospital?’

  ‘They give her less than a fifty-fifty chance of surviving.’

  Lewis Glaven stood up abruptly, went to a corner cupboard and fetched two glasses and a bottle of Laphroaig malt. He began to pour for both of them.

  ‘Not for me, thanks,’ said Quantrill. ‘I’ve never acquired the taste, and it’d be a pity to waste it.’

  ‘Please,’ insisted Lewis Glaven. ‘I need one, and I don’t want to start drinking alone.’

  Quantrill took a reluctant sip, identifying tar and seaweed. It confirmed his unashamedly philistine opinion that, for all its expense, malt whisky tastes medicinal. Certainly it cleared his sinuses, but if he needed to do that he could suck a Fisherman’s Friend lozenge.

  ‘You’ve got a lot on your mind this evening – I’ll leave my questions until tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Except that I need to know whether you yourself have any idea how Miss Meynell came to be hit?’

  ‘None at all, I’m afraid. Fact is, when a drive’s in progress we’re all too busy concentrating on what we’re doing to be aware of other people. We’re looking and firing high, d’you see? We’re safety-conscious, mind. Always follow the sportsman’s rules.’

  ‘So Martin Tait tells me. But when you’re pumping out shotgun pellets, there’s always the possibility that some unfortunate person will get in the way. It happens somewhere every shooting season.’

  ‘But not at Chalcot. Nothing as serious as this, in a hundred and fifty years.’ Anguished, Lewis Glaven stood up and paced about his office. ‘That it should happen to a watching guest, to my son’s girlfriend … Never forgive myself, never.’

  He came to an abrupt halt in front of Quantrill and resumed his decisive tone.

  ‘Well, Chief Inspector. You must do what you can to establish how it happened. But it was clearly an accident and I must ask you, please, not to apportion any blame.’

  Quantrill, already on his feet, raised a heavy eyebrow. ‘Why do you say that, sir?’

  ‘Because it would be damned unfair, don’t you see? With birds coming over thick and fast, no Gun can be sure where his shot is going to land.’

  ‘I realise that. But the facts will speak for themselves – we can’t consider collective responsibility.’

  ‘Nor do I suggest it!’ The colour had returned to Lewis Glaven’s cheeks. He straightened his shoulders, a country gentleman bristling with honour.

  ‘I am the host of this tragic shooting party,’ he said. ‘Miss Meynell is my guest, and I hold myself responsible for what happened to her. Solely responsible, you understand?’

  Chapter Sixteen

  Martin Tait had made his farewells to the other members of the shooting party. It hadn’t taken long. Barclay Dodd and all the dogs had snored at him, Joanna had ignored him, Tweedledum and Tweedledee had merely nodded at him over their dice.

  Dorothy Wilson-Brown, though, had treated him almost as a friend. She was evidently glad to talk, discussing her anxiety over Hope Meynell’s condition and the shattering effect the accident would have on Will and Lewis. But this made Martin even more uneasily aware of his possible involvement, and he escaped as soon as he decently could.

  As he went down the corridor, he caught sight of Lewis Glaven’s housekeeper through the half-open kitchen door. Like the rest of them, she was hanging about waiting for news.

  And that reminded him: before Hope was wounded, before Alison was injured, and before the episode with the saboteurs, he had been concerned for young Laura’s safety at the shoot.

  He raised his voice. ‘Is your daughter all right, Mrs Harbord?’

  ‘Laura? Oh yes, thank you, sir.’ Eager to talk, Ann Harbord darted out into the corridor, her gypsy ear-rings swinging. Smartly groomed as always, she hadn’t a hair out of place; but she seemed almost excited by the drama of the day. Her cheeks didn’t need their artificial colour and her eyes were hard and bright.

  ‘Any news of Miss Meynell?’ Her voice, respectfully low, emerged almost as a hiss. ‘Is she going to make it? Will she live?’

  ‘We can only hope so,’ said Martin formally.

  ‘Yes – yes of course, for everyone’s sake. Poor Major Will, just as they were going to get engaged … Not that she was right for Chalcot, Mr Glaven said so himself. But who’d have thought she would meet with such a terrible accident, poor girl –’

  Martin didn’t intend to discuss it. ‘I was asking about Laura,’ he reminded her. ‘She watched the shoot this after
noon, and I wanted to be sure she’d got home safely. Is she here now?’

  Ann Harbord was instantly evasive. ‘Ah, well, she’s not actually at home. The little madam has been in one of her moods lately, and she went off after lunch taking some clothes with her. She’ll be staying with a friend.’

  ‘You mean you haven’t seen her since lunch time?’ Remembering the shotgun pellets that had been zinging down when Laura disappeared into the bushes, Martin was chilled with concern. ‘Has she telephoned? Do you know where she’s staying?’

  ‘No, but I see no need to fuss. We had a few words last night, and the silly child’s staying away to punish me. That’s all.’

  That’s all?

  Martin’s mind reeled with anxiety. God, what had happened to the girl? Suppose she’d been lying out there at Belmont all this time, wounded?

  He should never have left the ride without checking that she was safe. Was this going to be another tragedy for which he’d feel forever responsible?

  But he was too experienced a police officer to panic. There was nothing he could do tonight to ease his conscience over Hope Meynell, but at least he could take immediate action to find Laura Harbord.

  ‘We have to know where she is. Telephone all her friends,’ he ordered the startled housekeeper, ‘and don’t give up until you’ve spoken to Laura herself. I’m going back to where I last saw her.’

  He’d intended to commandeer the first available four-wheel-drive vehicle, but fortunately there was no need for an after-dark expedition. The gamekeeper had just driven up to the back door in the Landrover, and was about to unload it in the illuminated rain.

  ‘Just the man I wanted to see!’ said Tait.

  Taken by surprise, Len Alger creaked upright. ‘Why? What for?’ he asked suspiciously.