Learning Curve

by Catherine Aird

  Leeyes sniffed. ‘One of those safety in numbers cop-outs, I suppose.’ The superintendent reserved his severest condemnation for judges who, unable to properly apportion guilt between two defendants, sentenced neither.

  ‘In a manner of speaking,’ said Sloan warily. He wasn’t entirely sure if not disclosing the name of the driver in the fatal car crash – if it was really known, that is – could be construed as obstructing the police in the course of their enquiries or not, and therefore be chargeable. One thing he was quite sure about though was that the patently obvious alliance of the survivors of the crash might not be as cast-iron as they wanted the police to think. Not now that someone had taken a potshot so to speak at Paul Tridgell who was one of their number. He cheered up slightly himself. Accidents that weren’t accidents were the very stuff of police investigations.

  ‘I still say it’s a cop-out,’ insisted Leeyes trenchantly.

  ‘Quite so, sir. In theory, of course, the father could have had a vested interest in sheltering his son from prosecution.’ He didn’t add that now the police wanted to save Paul from something much worse. ‘But only in theory.’

  ‘So?’

  At last Sloan got back to the point he wanted to make. ‘However, whatever Derek Tridgell knew, he had obviously been prepared to live with it for quite a while before he died which is very interesting.’

  ‘Until he was too near death to keep quiet any longer,’ agreed the superintendent.

  ‘They say confession is good for the soul, sir,’ murmured Sloan. His own mother, a noted churchwoman, always insisted on this being so. ‘Myself, I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘It clears up crime quicker than anything else we can do,’ said the superintendent, a pragmatist if ever there was one.

  ‘What occurred to me as really odd, sir,’ persisted Sloan, ‘is that the killing, or whatever else it was, didn’t seem to have made all that much difference to everyone in Derek Tridgell’s circle at the time.’

  ‘Or,’ pointed out Superintendent Leeyes, immediately putting his finger on a weakness in Sloan’s argument, ‘the man had something to lose by disclosing what he knew.’

  Detective Inspector Sloan nodded. ‘That might well be the case, sir. One of the people in the building at Luston when Michael Linane fell into that vat was Tridgell’s own boss, Jonathon Sharp. I can quite understand that Tridgell might have had a vested interest in not shopping him if he had done something wrong. He’d have lost his job. Only if it was him, of course,’ he added belatedly.

  ‘Or Big Pharma might have been ready to make it worthwhile to button lips,’ said Leeyes cynically. ‘You never know with businesses of that size.’

  ‘Very true, sir,’ agreed Sloan, although he didn’t know a lot about big business. What he did know about it, though, he didn’t particularly like.

  ‘There’s a lot to be said,’ pronounced Leeyes, a man well known for toadying to the higher ranks in the force in the interests of his own career, ‘for knowing on which side your bread is buttered.’

  ‘There’s something else I’ve been thinking about, sir,’ said Sloan.

  ‘Get on with it then, man. I haven’t got all day.’

  ‘I’m not quite sure how to put it, sir,’ began Sloan. There had been something in a lecture on legal history he had heard in his training that had surfaced in his mind since he’d been caught up with what he had – perforce – called the Tridgell case. It had been a brief lecture, cantering smartly from the Bow Street Runners through to today’s forensic scientists, via Jonathan Wild and Sir Robert Peel. Some of it, though, had stuck in his memory including the fact that once upon a time murder had been deemed to be not a crime per se but more simply as a disturbance of the Queen’s peace. Until some Victorian Act of Parliament changed its designation to that of the more straightforward crime of homicide, the Queen’s peace was said to have been restored only when the culprit had been caught and justice done.

  And what was interesting, Sloan said now, was that there hadn’t been any noticeable disturbance of the Queen’s peace by any death connected with the late Derek Tridgell. It didn’t appear to have upset any pre-existing applecart either, which was equally strange. He listed the deaths for the superintendent.

  Michael Linane, one-time Head of Sales at Luston Chemicals, had been decently buried after a full inquest and quietly replaced. Only those officials concerned with health and safety at work seemed still interested in his fatal accident. Or so Crosby had reported.

  Edmund Leaton’s body was still entombed underground by falling rock but someone else was – in the poet’s words – now seeing his wife and child fed.

  And whomsoever had been at the wheel of the car on the night of the fatal road traffic accident was still going about their lawful business. That, of course, didn’t include Elizabeth Shelford who wasn’t going very far at all in her wheelchair, but who was being conspicuously well supported by three out of four of her surviving fellow passengers.

  Superintendent Leeyes started to tap the file on his desk with his pencil. ‘As scenes of crime go, Sloan, I must say they don’t amount to very much.’

  ‘No, sir, though Crosby’s still checking on two or three more vehicles that might have hit young Tridgell and his sister last night.’

  ‘Someone was warning the boy off, I suppose,’ grunted Leeyes.

  ‘We think so, sir, which is very worrying.’ He added a rider. ‘Or perhaps trying to put him out of action.’

  ‘Downright dangerous, if you ask me,’ said Leeyes unhelpfully. ‘Right, that’s all for now, Sloan, but don’t let anything else happen to him.’

  ‘No, sir,’ sighed Sloan. Like most of the superintendent’s instructions this was not going to be easy to accomplish.

  ‘And Sloan …’

  Sloan paused at the door. ‘Sir?’

  ‘Don’t forget,’ said the superintendent enigmatically, ‘that there are dangers in playing the man, not the football. Forget the deceased. He didn’t do it. It’s the football you should be after.’

  ‘I won’t forget, sir,’ promised Sloan, making his escape from the superintendent’s room without being any the wiser than he had been before he entered it. There should be a phone call coming in soon, though, which might help.

  ‘Sorry to bother you again, miss,’ began Detective Constable Crosby. He was standing on the doorstep of Laguna House, Elizabeth Shelford’s house at Larking.

  ‘It’s Constable Crosby, isn’t it?’ the owner said, peering up at him from her wheelchair.

  ‘That’s right, miss.’

  She frowned. ‘I’ve told the police everything I can remember about the accident already. You know that.’

  ‘Yes, miss, but this is different.’

  She raised a pair of finely shaped eyebrows. ‘In what way?’

  ‘It’s about last night,’ he said awkwardly.

  ‘Last night?’ She stiffened visibly, her knuckles turning white where they gripped the handles of her wheelchair. ‘What about last night? Tell me quickly. Has something else happened?’

  ‘Only in a manner of speaking, miss. We just want to know if you had visitors.’

  The young woman looked him up and down and then said, ‘You’d better come in.’ She spun the wheelchair round with practised ease and led the way to the kitchen. ‘Now sit down and tell me what this is all about.’

  ‘We need to know if you had any visitors last evening,’ he repeated, pulling up a chair to the table and studying her properly at close quarters for the first time. He hadn’t realised on his last visit quite how young and attractive Elizabeth Shelford was. She could scarcely be any older than he was and, save for having two patently useless legs, was vibrantly alive. He realised, too, how cleverly she was dressed. A cream coloured scarf spilt out over a cerise jumper which coordinated well with the pair of black velvet trousers she was wearing. Two black shoes with pom-poms on their toes peeped out from under the trousers and were just visible on the footrests of her wheelchair. Whatever had
happened to her body, the young woman’s spirit remained undiminished. He cast an involuntary glance at his own shoes and quickly looked away again.

  ‘What if I did?’ She manoeuvred her chair expertly over to a worktop and had plugged in a kettle almost before he realised she was on the move again.

  ‘We need to know,’ he said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘In the pursuit of our enquiries into a matter that has arisen,’ he said falling back, like many a policeman before him, on the rubric.

  ‘What matter?’ she said tightly. ‘Tell me, what’s happened? Please.’

  ‘We would just like know who your visitors were and when they left,’ said the detective constable patiently.

  ‘I had three,’ she said unexpectedly, her back still to him.

  ‘And their names?’

  ‘Trevor Skewis for one.’ She hesitated. ‘He’s all right, isn’t he? I mean nothing’s happened to him, has it?’

  ‘Not that we know about, miss. And the others?’

  ‘Paul Tridgell and Tim Cullen.’ She turned and looked at him. ‘So why the enquiry? Tell me.’

  Crosby countered her question with one of his own. ‘When did they leave you?’ he asked, tugging his notebook out of his pocket.

  ‘Paul Tridgell and Tim Cullen went quite early …’

  ‘And Trevor Skewis?’

  ‘Half past nine,’ she said, turning her back to him again. ‘He always goes by then.’

  Crosby watched as a deep blush climbed up her cheeks.

  ‘I mean, he never stays really late.’ She spun her wheelchair round, turning back to the worktop again and said, ‘Come over and pick up our tea.’

  Crosby obediently walked over to her, collected two brimming mugs of tea and brought them back to the table. ‘Steady hands,’ she commented.

  ‘Do you live alone?’ he asked curiously. An infant in these matters, he had only just realised that the shade of her nail polish matched the cerise of her jumper.

  ‘My mother comes down every morning,’ she said, ‘before she goes to school – she’s a teacher – and some of the boys usually turn up in the evening. My father’s away a lot – he works abroad.’

  ‘The boys?’

  ‘The others who were in the car accident with me – Paul Tridgell, Tim Cullen and Trevor Skewis. I told you about all of them before. Not Danny Saville. He isn’t really one of us. The other two left early last night because Tim Cullen had to be at work and Paul was taking his sister out for a drink.’

  ‘But Trevor Skewis stayed on?’

  ‘That’s right.’ A faint blush suffused her cheeks again. ‘He … he’s been very helpful since the accident.’

  Crosby looked round. ‘Do you get out at all yourself, miss? I see you’ve got a car in the yard.’ He’d noticed its adaptations, too, but thought it wouldn’t be tactful to mention them.

  ‘Just to the hospital,’ she said rather shortly. ‘Nowhere else.’

  ‘So what do you do all day?’ he asked curiously.

  ‘I pick oakum, Constable. In other words, I languish.’

  ‘This drink of Paul’s last night,’ said Crosby, embarrassed and swiftly getting back to business. ‘Did you all know about it?’

  ‘Oh, yes. He told us that he and Jane were going to the Lamb and Flag pub at Friar’s Flensant – it’s their local, you might say.’

  Detective Constable Crosby wrote something in his notebook.

  ‘Did it matter?’ asked Elizabeth Shelford.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Crosby and told her that someone had tried to run Paul and Jane Tridgell down on their way home from the Lamb and Flag the night before.

  She sat very still, absorbing the news. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Paul Tridgell is,’ said Crosby.

  ‘Paul is sure about a lot of things,’ she said. ‘Too sure for his own good sometimes.’

  ‘So, naturally,’ he said, getting up to go, ‘we’re checking on everything we can.’

  ‘Of course.’ Elizabeth Shelford lowered her mug to the table. ‘Go softly, Constable,’ she said enigmatically, ‘and you’ll go further.’

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  It was an unexpected crunch on the gravel outside their house that brought Amelia Thornycroft to the sitting-room window. The sound came from a small dusty truck that had drawn up outside their front door. To her surprise she saw her husband tumble out of it, wave to the driver and make for the door of the house as it drove away. The sound of the front door slamming behind him alerted her to the fact that all was not well.

  Amelia, responding both to Simon’s unusually early return and the noisy entry, hurried through into the hall. ‘Whatever’s happened, Simon?’ she asked. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine, thank you,’ he said tautly.

  ‘Where’s your car, then?’

  ‘Over in Forbes’ garage, that’s where,’ he said with tightened lips. ‘Being repaired. They brought me home. Damn fool of an earthmover driver on the site backed into me first thing this morning and hit my front wing. It’s covered in yellow paint but even so he swore he didn’t see me behind him.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Amelia, exuding wifely sympathy as he came over and delivered her a kiss on her forehead. ‘But as long as neither of you was hurt. That’s what’s important.’ She regarded him anxiously. ‘You’re not hurt, are you, Simon?’

  ‘No, my dear. I’m not hurt.’ He relaxed and gave her a little smile. ‘Just in pride and pocket, I suppose.’

  ‘Can’t do anything about the pride,’ she responded lightly, ‘but I daresay the insurance will see to the pocket.’

  ‘I’m not so sure about that,’ he grumbled. ‘Car insurance doesn’t usually cover you off-road and this was on the northern bridge site which is pretty uneven and mucky anyway.’

  ‘What about the firm?’ she said. ‘You’re working there for them.’

  ‘They’ll be a better bet. I’ll have to find out what it’s going to cost first – a bomb, I expect. These vehicle repairers see you coming and they always expect it to be an insurance job even if it isn’t. The other driver swore he didn’t see me,’ he added as an afterthought. ‘More likely he wasn’t looking.’

  ‘Couldn’t he hear you?’

  ‘He had ear defenders on,’ said Thornycroft absently. ‘This outfit that are building the bridge are pretty keen on health and safety, you know.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it,’ said his wife dryly.

  ‘Besides, our car’s supposed to have a quiet engine, remember?’ he said, not really listening to her. ‘It was quite a selling point when I bought it. No, the trouble is that these fellows will drive them too fast. They forget they’re not out on the open road.’

  ‘Where they shouldn’t drive too quickly, either,’ she said pertinently.

  ‘I expect it’s a dull old job from their point of view, and they’re usually young,’ he conceded, calming down by degrees. ‘But then, to cap it all, while I was on the phone to the garage fixing up the paint job, the police turned up.’

  She looked puzzled. ‘Whatever for?’

  ‘That’s what I wanted to know. I thought at first some nosy parker in the office had sent for them after she’d seen the earthmover back into me – there’s a sanctimonious young woman in there who takes herself altogether too seriously. She’s always looking for trouble.’

  ‘But it wasn’t?’ said Amelia.

  ‘It turned out he was making enquiries about an accident last night in Friar’s Flensant, although why they think it could be anything to do with me I can’t imagine.’

  ‘It was Paul Tridgell who was hit,’ she informed him. ‘And his sister, Jane.’

  ‘Was it? Oh dear.’ He grunted. ‘Not hurt, I hope, either of them?’

  ‘Not badly, but Paul insists they were run down on purpose,’ she said, wincing.

  ‘Ah, that explains why the police came out to see me. They know I know them both. The policeman wouldn’t say, though. How did you know?’

/>   ‘Marion told me when I went to see her today. I saw Paul and Jane, too. Both a bit shaken, I should say.’

  ‘I’m not surprised.’ Thornycroft frowned. ‘I don’t like the sound of that accident, Amelia. The Tridgell family have had quite enough to put up with as it is already.’

  ‘I expect the police are checking up on everyone who knows him,’ she said.

  ‘Can’t blame them for that,’ he said. ‘I don’t hold any brief for that young man but even so I wouldn’t want anything like that to happen to him. I showed the policeman my car and all he could say was that if it had been as damaged as all that from hitting a pedestrian he would expect the casualty to be dead. And so would I.’ Simon Thornycroft ran a hand through his hair. ‘I wouldn’t put it past Paul to have mentioned me to the police, all the same. And everyone else he knew.’

  ‘Why on earth would he have done that?’ asked Amelia.

  ‘Just to be difficult,’ said her husband trenchantly. ‘Derek always found him a bit of a handful. Bit of a disappointment, too, that boy, and never out of trouble.’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ protested Amelia. ‘He’s quite a nice lad really.’

  ‘He’s a bundle of trouble, my dear. His father was sorry he wouldn’t take up caving when he was young, although I must say that I wasn’t,’ he said. ‘Now it looks as if he’s changed his mind because Kate Booth rang me at work yesterday and asked if she could come round here at the weekend and borrow some spare kit of mine for him.’

  ‘It’ll be nice to see her again,’ said Amelia.

  ‘I don’t know how he’ll cope with abseiling,’ said Thornycroft pessimistically.

  ‘I expect he will,’ said Amelia.

  ‘And never forget,’ he went on, ‘his father couldn’t get him out of the country quickly enough after that awful road accident. The whole carload must have been drunk as skunks.’ He gave a great stretch. ‘Talking of drinks, I wouldn’t mind one now, darling, and I’m not driving, remember.’

  When Crosby got back to the police station, Detective Inspector Sloan, provincial policeman, was just coming to the end of a long telephone call with a policeman in the City of London whose remit was much wider than that of a mere division in the Calleshire County Constabulary. His beat was worldwide and related to money and one of its many illegal spin-offs, commercial fraud.