The Thursday Murder Club

by Richard Osman

  ‘That’s a story for another day. You have one more question before I leave the room. Fun though this is.’

  ‘Of course,’ replies Elizabeth. She shuts her notebook and adjusts her glasses. ‘Well, I have a statement really, but I promise it ends with a question.’

  Donna turns up her palms, inviting Elizabeth to continue.

  ‘This is what I see, and I know you’ll stop me if I misspeak. You are in your mid twenties, you give the impression of being clever and intuitive. You also give the impression of being very kind, yet very handy should a fight erupt. For reasons we will get to the bottom of, almost certainly a doomed relationship, you have left London, where I would have thought the life and the work would have suited you to a T. You find yourself here, in Fairhaven, where the crime is minor and the criminals are petty. And you are pounding the streets. Maybe a junkie steals a bicycle, Donna; maybe someone drives off from a petrol station without paying, or maybe there’s a fight, over a girl, in a pub. Goodness me, what a bore. For reasons that are not of importance, I once worked in a bar in the former Yugoslavia for three months and my brain was screaming out for excitement, for stimulation, for something extraordinary to happen. Does that sound familiar? You are single, you are living in a rented flat, you have not found it easy to make friends in the town. Most of your colleagues in the station are a bit old for you. I’m sure that young PC, Mark, has asked you out, but there’s no way he could handle a south London girl, so you had to say no. You both still find it awkward. That poor boy. Your pride won’t allow you to go back to the Met for a good while and so you’re stuck here for the time being. You’re still the new girl, so promotion is a pretty distant prospect, added to the fact you’re not all that popular because, deep down, everyone can tell you’ve made a mistake and you resent being here. You can’t even quit. Why throw away these years on the force, the tough years, just because of a wrong turn? So you strap on the uniform and you turn up, shift after shift, teeth gritted, just waiting for something extraordinary to happen. Like, perhaps, a woman who isn’t a nun, pretending her bag has been stolen.’

  Elizabeth raises an eyebrow at Donna, looking for a response. Donna is utterly impassive, utterly unimpressed. ‘I’m still waiting for the question, Elizabeth.’

  Elizabeth nods, and opens her notebook again. ‘My question is this. Wouldn’t you like to be investigating the Tony Curran murder?’

  There is silence as Donna slowly weaves her hands together and rests her chin on them. She considers Elizabeth very carefully before speaking.

  ‘There is already a team investigating the Tony Curran murder, Elizabeth. A highly qualified murder squad. I recently delivered tea to it. They don’t really have a vacancy for a PC who tuts every time she gets asked to do the photocopying. Have you ever thought it’s possible you don’t really understand how the police works?’

  Elizabeth notes this down and talks as she writes. ‘Mmm, that is possible. How complicated it all must be. But a lot of fun, I imagine?’

  ‘I imagine too,’ agrees Donna.

  ‘They say he was bludgeoned,’ says Elizabeth. ‘With a large spanner. Could you confirm that?’

  ‘No comment, Elizabeth,’ says Donna.

  Elizabeth stops writing and looks up again. ‘Wouldn’t you like to be part of it, Donna?’

  Donna starts to drum her fingers on the desk. ‘OK. Let’s just suppose I would like to be involved in the murder investigation …’

  ‘Yes, quite, let’s suppose that. Let’s start there and see where we get to.’

  ‘You do understand how CID works, Elizabeth? I can’t simply ask to be assigned to a particular investigation.’

  Elizabeth smiles. ‘Oh goodness, don’t you worry about that, Donna; we can take care of it all.’

  ‘You can take care of it?’

  ‘I should have thought so, yes.’

  ‘How?’ asks Donna.

  ‘Well, there’s always a way, isn’t there? But you would be interested? If we could make it happen?’

  Donna looks back to the heavy door, safely shut. ‘When could you make that happen, Elizabeth?’

  Elizabeth looks at her watch and gives a small shrug. ‘An hour, perhaps?’

  ‘And this conversation never leaves this room?’

  Elizabeth puts a finger to her lips.

  ‘Then I would. Yes, please.’ Donna holds up her hands, open and honest. ‘I would really, really like to chase murderers.’

  Elizabeth smiles and puts her notebook back in her pocket. ‘Well, this is smashing. I thought I had read the situation correctly.’

  ‘What’s in it for you?’ asks Donna.

  ‘Nothing, other than a favour to a new friend. And we might have the odd question here or there, about the investigation. Just to satisfy our curiosity.’

  ‘You know I couldn’t tell you anything confidential? That’s not a deal I can agree to.’

  ‘Nothing unprofessional, I promise you.’ Elizabeth crosses herself. ‘As a woman of God.’

  ‘And in an hour you say?’

  Elizabeth looks at her watch. ‘I’d say about an hour. Depending on the traffic.’

  Donna nods, as if this makes complete sense. ‘About your little speech, though, Elizabeth. I don’t know if it was designed to impress me, or to show off in front of Joyce, but it was pretty obvious stuff.’

  Elizabeth concedes the point. ‘Obvious, but right, dear.’

  ‘Almost right, but you’re not quite, Miss Marple. Is she, Joyce?’

  Joyce pipes up. ‘Oh yes, that boy Mark is gay, Elizabeth. You’d have to be fairly blind to miss that.’

  Donna smiles. ‘Lucky you have your friend with you, Sister.’ She likes that Elizabeth is attempting to hide a smile of her own.

  ‘I’ll need your mobile number, by the way, Donna,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I don’t really want to fake a crime every time I need to see you.’

  Donna slides a card over the table.

  ‘I hope that’s a personal number and not an official one,’ says Elizabeth. ‘It would be nice to have some privacy.’

  Donna looks at Elizabeth, shakes her head and sighs. She writes down another number on the card.

  ‘Lovely,’ says Elizabeth. ‘I suspect between us we can find whoever killed Tony Curran. It can’t be beyond the wit of man. Or rather woman.’

  Donna stands. ‘Should I ask how you can get me on the investigating team, Elizabeth, or don’t I want to know?’

  Elizabeth checks her watch. ‘Nothing you need to concern yourself with. Ron and Ibrahim should be taking care of it about now.’

  Joyce waits for Elizabeth to stand too, then leans into the tape recorder once again. ‘Interview terminated, 12.47 p.m.’

  19

  DCI Chris Hudson swings his Ford Focus onto the long, broad driveway leading up to Coopers Chase. The traffic hasn’t been at all bad and he is hoping this won’t take too long.

  As he checks out his surroundings, Chris wonders why this place needs quite so many llamas. There are no spaces in the visitors’ car park, so he eases the Focus onto a verge and steps out into the Kent sun.

  Chris has been to retirement communities before and this is not at all what he had been expecting. This is a whole village. He wanders past a bowls match, wine chilling in coolers at each end. One of the players is an extremely elderly woman smoking a pipe. He follows a meandering path through a perfect English garden, flanked by three storeys of flats. There are people gossiping on patios and balconies, enjoying the sunshine. Friends sit on benches, bees buzz round bushes, light breezes play tunes with ice cubes. Chris finds the whole thing deeply infuriating. He’s a wind-and-rain guy, a turn-up-the-collar-on-your-overcoat man. If Chris had his way he would hibernate for the summer. He has not worn shorts since 1987.

  Chris crosses a residents’ car park, past a red postbox looking picture-book perfect, annoying him further, and finds Wordsworth Court.

  He rings the buzzer for flat 11: Mr Ibrahim Arif.

  Af
ter being buzzed up and walking across a lushly carpeted hallway and up a lushly carpeted staircase and knocking on a solid oak door, Chris finds himself in that flat of Ibrahim Arif, sitting opposite the man himself and also opposite Ron Ritchie.

  Ron Ritchie. Well, wasn’t that quite the thing? Chris had been taken aback the moment they had been introduced. The father of a man Chris was investigating – what was that? Luck? Something more sinister? Chris decides he will just let it play out. He trusts that, if there is an angle, he will spot it.

  Strange that this is where ‘Red Ron’ ended up, though. The scourge of the bosses, the Beast of British Leyland, and British Steel, and British whatever else you’d care to mention? Amidst the honeysuckle and Audis of Coopers Chase? Chris would have barely recognized him, to be honest. Ron Ritchie is wearing mismatched pyjamas, an unzipped tracksuit top and dress shoes. He is looking around vacantly, mouth open. He is a mess and Chris feels awkward, as if he is imposing on a private scene.

  Ibrahim is explaining the situation to DCI Chris Hudson.

  ‘It can be very stressful for elderly people to talk to police officers. You mustn’t think that’s your fault. This is why I suggested you conduct the interview here.’

  Chris nods gently, because he has done the training. ‘I can assure you that Mr Ritchie is not in trouble, but if, as you say, he has information, I will need to ask him a couple of questions.’

  Ibrahim turns to Ron.

  ‘Ron, he just wants to ask you about the argument you saw. Remember, we talked about it?’ Ibrahim looks back to Chris. ‘He forgets things. He’s very old, Detective Chief Inspector. A very, very old man.’

  ‘All right, Ibrahim,’ says Ron.

  Ibrahim pats Ron’s hand and speaks to him slowly.

  ‘I think it’s quite safe, Ron. We’ve seen this gentleman’s warrant card. I rang the number on it, then I googled him. Remember?’

  ‘I just … I just don’t think I can,’ says Ron. ‘I don’t want to get into any trouble.’

  ‘There won’t be any trouble, Mr Ritchie,’ says Chris. ‘I guarantee it. It’s just that you might have important information.’ ‘Red Ron’ is a shadow of his former self and Chris is very aware that he must play this carefully. Certainly don’t mention Jason yet. The possibility of a pub lunch is also rapidly vanishing. ‘Mr Arif is right, you can tell me anything.’

  Ron looks at Chris, then back to Ibrahim for signs of reassurance. Ibrahim squeezes his friend’s arm and Ron looks at Chris again, then leans forward.

  ‘I think I’d be happier talking to the lady.’

  Chris is taking his first sip of the mint tea Ibrahim has made for him. ‘The lady?’ He looks at Ron and then at Ibrahim. Ibrahim helps him out.

  ‘Which lady, Ron?’

  ‘The lady, Ib. The one who comes and talks to us. The woman copper.’

  ‘Oh yes!’ says Ibrahim. ‘PC De Freitas! She often comes to talk to us, Detective Chief Inspector. Window locks. Do you know her?’

  ‘Of course. Yes, she is one of my team.’ Chris is trying to remember if the young PC with the non-existent shoelaces was Donna De Freitas. He was fairly sure she was. She’d come from the Met and no one knew why. ‘We work very closely together.’

  ‘So she is part of the investigation? This is excellent news.’ Ibrahim beams. ‘We love PC De Freitas here.’

  ‘Well, she’s not officially part of the investigation team, Mr Arif,’ says Chris. ‘She’s on other important duties. Catching criminals and … so on.’

  Ron and Ibrahim don’t say a word, they just look expectantly at Chris.

  ‘But it is a terrific idea. I would love her to be on the team,’ says Chris, trying to work out who he would need to speak to. Surely someone owed him a favour?

  ‘She is a fine officer,’ says Ibrahim. ‘She does you credit.’

  Ibrahim becomes serious again and turns to Ron.

  ‘So, if the handsome detective here and our friend PC De Freitas came to talk to you together? Would you be happy, Ron?’

  Ron takes his first sip of tea.

  ‘That’d be perfect, Ib. I’d like that. I’ll talk to Jason too.’

  ‘Jason?’ asks Chris, on alert.

  ‘Do you like boxing, son?’ asks Ron.

  Chris nods. ‘Very much, Mr Ritchie.’

  ‘My boy is a boxer. Jason.’

  ‘I know, sir,’ says Chris. ‘You must be very proud.’

  ‘Only, he was with me, so he should be here. He saw the row too.’

  Chris nods. Well, that was very interesting. The trip has not been wasted. ‘Well, I’m sure I can come back and talk to you both.’

  ‘And you’ll bring PC De Freitas with you? How wonderful!’ says Ibrahim.

  ‘Of course,’ says Chris. ‘Whatever gets us to the truth.’

  20

  Joyce

  So it seems we are investigating a murder. And, better still, I have been in a police interview room. This diary is bringing me luck.

  It was interesting watching Elizabeth in action. She is very impressive. Very calm. I wonder if we would have got along if we’d met thirty years ago? Probably not, we are from different worlds. But this place brings people together.

  I do hope I’ll be of some help to Elizabeth in the investigation. Help to catch Tony Curran’s killer. Perhaps I will, in my own way.

  I think that if I have a special skill, it is that I am often overlooked. Is that the word? Underestimated perhaps?

  Coopers Chase is full of the great and the good, people who have done something or other with their lives. It’s really a lot of fun. There’s someone who helped design the Channel Tunnel, someone who has a disease named after them and someone who was the ambassador to Paraguay or Uruguay. You know the type.

  And me? Joyce Meadowcroft? What do they make of me, I wonder. Harmless, certainly. Chatty? Guilty, I’m afraid. But I think they know, deep down, that I’m not one of them. A nurse, not a doctor, not that anyone would say that to my face. They know that Joanna bought my flat here. Joanna is one of them. Me, not so much.

  And yet, if there’s a row at Catering Committee, or if there’s a problem with the lake pumps, or if, as happened very recently, one resident’s dog impregnates another and all hell breaks loose, then who is there to fix it? Joyce Meadowcroft.

  I am very happy to listen to the grandstanding, watch the chests puffing out, hear the furious threats of legal action and wait for them to blow themselves out. Then I step in and suggest that maybe there’s a way through, and perhaps there is a compromise to be reached, and perhaps dogs will be dogs. Nobody here feels threatened by me, nobody sees me as a rival, I’m just Joyce, gentle, chatty Joyce, always has her nose in everything.

  So everyone calms down through me. Quiet, sensible, Joyce. There is no more shouting and the problem is fixed, more often than not in a way that advantages me. Which is something no one ever seems to notice.

  So I am very happy to be overlooked and always have been. And I do think perhaps that will be helpful in this investigation. Everyone can look at Elizabeth and I’ll just get on with being me.

  The ‘Meadowcroft’, by the way, is from my late husband, Gerry, and I have always liked it. I had many reasons to marry Gerry and his surname was another to add to a long list. A friend of mine from nursing married a Bumstead. Barbara Bumstead. I think I might have found an excuse and called it off.

  What a day! I think I’ll watch an old Prime Suspect and then bed.

  Whatever Elizabeth needs me to do next, I’ll be ready.

  21

  It is another beautiful morning.

  Bogdan Jankowski is sitting on a swing chair on Ian Ventham’s patio and is taking some time to think things through.

  Tony Curran has been murdered. Someone broke into his home and killed him. There were plenty of suspects and Bogdan is going over a few of them in his head. Thinking about reasons they might have for wanting Tony Curran dead.

  Everyone seems shocked by Tony’s death, but no
thing surprises Bogdan. People died all the time of all sorts of things. His father had fallen from a dam, near Krakow, when Bogdan was a child. Or jumped, or was pushed, it didn’t matter. It didn’t change the fact that he had died. Something will always get you in the end.

  Ian’s garden is not to Bogdan’s taste. The lawn, which stretches down to a line of trees in the far distance, is orderly and English and striped. Down towards the trees, off to the left, there is a pond. Ian Ventham calls it a lake, but Bogdan knows lakes. It has a small wooden bridge crossing its far end as it narrows. Children would love it, but Bogdan has never seen children in this garden.

  Ian had bought a family of ducks, but foxes killed the ducks and then a guy Bogdan knew from the pub had killed the foxes. Ian didn’t buy any more ducks after that, because what would be the point? There will always be foxes. Sometimes wild ducks still visited. Good luck to them, was Bogdan’s view.

  The swimming pool is directly on Bogdan’s right. You could take a few steps down from the patio and dive straight in. Bogdan had tiled the swimming pool. Bogdan had painted the little bridge duck-egg blue and Bogdan had laid the patio he was sitting on.

  Ian had come good on his offer and had asked him to oversee the building of the Woodlands development. So he was taking over from Tony, which some people might now see as bad luck, a jinx perhaps. But to Bogdan it was just something that was happening, and he would do it as well as he was able. Good money. The money doesn’t really interest Bogdan, but the challenge does. And he likes being around the village, he likes the people.

  Bogdan had seen all the plans now, studied everything. They were complicated at first but, once you’d seen the patterns, simple enough. Bogdan had enjoyed working on smaller jobs for Ian Ventham, he had liked the order of it, but he understands that things change and that he needs to step up.

  Bogdan’s mother had died when he was nineteen. She had come into some money when Bogdan’s father had died. From somewhere, it hadn’t been a time for details. The money paid for Bogdan to take up a place at the Technical University in Krakow, to study engineering. And that’s where he had been when his mother suffered a stroke and collapsed at home. If he had still been at home then he would have saved her, but he wasn’t, and so he didn’t.