Honour drew up a chair to sit beside Anna, moving away stacks of what looked like exam papers. “So, what do you need to know?”
Anna went into the Julius D’Anton scenario, asking if Honour could give her details of when she had served him in the antiques shop.
“Oh, well, when you said his name 1 wasn’t sure who he was, but now … yes, I remember him.”
“He was buying a table?”
“Yes. I work part-time, or whenever Michael needs me, and 1 happened to be in the shop when he came in. I had been warned about him, that he might try to pass off a check, and I was not on any account to accept it as payment.”
“Just take me through what happened.”
“Can I ask why?”
“Yes. He was found dead two days ago, in the Thames near Richmond.”
“Oh, that’s terrible! I’m sorry.”
“Yes, that’s the reason I’m here. He’d been in the water for a while, probably since around the rime you had seen him.”
“Really? Well, I can’t see how I can help you. He came into the shop and asked to collect the table, as he had put down a deposit. As Michael had warned me about him, I asked that he paid the purchase price in cash, as I was not allowed to accept a check.”
“How did he react?”
“Well, he sort of shrugged, you know, as if he expected that; he didn’t seem put out. He was quite chatty and friendly, and said he would come back to talk to Michael.”
“Did you see what he was driving?”
“No, but I suppose he must have had a van or something to fit the table in, as it was quite large.”
“Did he come here to the farmhouse?”
“Good heavens, no! Why would he?”
“Had you ever seen him before?” “No.”
“So you didn’t recognize him?”
“No, it was the first time I’d ever seen him at the shop.”
Anna smiled. “Well, that’s it, then. I’m sorry to have bothered you.” She glanced at Pete.
He stood up. “Could you show me to the bathroom, please?”
Honour gestured to the hallway. “Straight through, off the hall; it’s a cloakroom.”
Pete hesitated and then walked out. Anna wanted to go into the office room that Gordon had seen, but Honour remained seated, so she kept asking questions.
“Did your husband meet Julius D’Anton?”
“No, he was at work.”
“You have a kiln in one of the barns.”
“Yes, but I’m a real amateur; it’s just something I like to do.”
“I saw some of your paintings at the antique shop.”
Honour laughed. She hadn’t sold more than one small canvas.
Pete returned. “Sorry—I think the cistern is playing up. I couldn’t flush your loo.”
Honour shook her head and walked toward him. “It’s tricky—you have to yank it down hard.”
She walked out and Pete followed as Anna made a quick move to the room off the kitchen. She opened the door and looked in; there was the desk and computer, as Gordon had photographed, but there was no painting on the wall. That in itself was suspicious; they would need a search warrant to explore further.
“Thanks again,” Anna said, when they left a few minutes later. She paused and turned back to Honour. “When 1 was last here there was a young man, blond hair, in your yard?”
Honour looked puzzled and then smiled. “Oh, that’ll be one of the local farm boys. They muck out the stable and exercise Damien’s hone.”
“Thank you.”
Pete started up the engine; they reversed and drove out. Honour watching them leave.
“What did you think?” she asked.
“About what?”
“The setup here?”
“Rather pleasant, if you like this kind of thing, but its really out of the way. I wouldn’t like it.”
“What did you think of her?”
“Seemed nice; must have been a real beauty, very friendly.”
Anna nodded and then asked Pete to stop at the ivy-covered cottage. He stayed in the car as she walked up the tiny pathway to the front door. It was a long shot, but nevertheless, she wanted to make sure of something. The same elderly lady opened the front door who had given Gordon the directions to the farm. Anna introduced herself and Mrs. Doris Eatwell patted her arm rather than shake hands, as she was very arthritic. Anna told her that she was making inquiries about an antiques dealer called Julius D’Anton. Mrs. Eatwell said she had never heard of him, but knew Michael Sudmore, as he had bought a number of items from her.
Anna was invited inside, and knew she had the right place.
“Oh, this is nice,” she said as she was shown into a small sitting room with a very modern sideboard and table.
“Thank you. I’ve got a new bathroom too—1 sold off all the old things I had.”
“Did you recently sell a table to Mr. Sudmore?”
“Yes, I did. He’s a lovely man—he came by to see some china I was selling, and he saw it outside the back door.”
Anna was gone for over half an hour.
“Guess what?” she said when she returned to the car. “Michael Sudmore buys the table, does it up, and puts it into his shop, I would say asking a hell of a lot more than he paid for it. Julius D’Anton goes to the fair—as Sudmore said, he had a real eye for antiques—puts a down payment on the table, and sniffs out where it came from.”
Pete started up the Morgan and they drove on down the lane.
“So, this is what I think might have happened: Julius D’Anton drives here to see if Mrs. Eatwell has any other antiques that he can buy for peanuts. It’s not far from here to the farmhouse, right?” “Right,” Pete said, concentrating on maneuvering the car around the potholes once more.
“What if he pays a visit and was, according to Mrs. Eatwell, driving a van? She had no idea what make or color, but she said it was a van— you with me?”
“Yeah.”
Anna leaned back; it was all supposition yet again.
“Go on,” Pete said, all ears now.
“Okay, what if he ran into trouble—maybe hit one of the ditches? I don’t know, but what if he continued on from Mrs. Harwell’s to the farmhouse? Nobody answers at the front door—the bell doesn’t work, so again this is just possible—what if he walks around to the back of the farmhouse to the kitchen?”
“Yes, still with you.”
“It’s a big coincidence, but Julius D’Anton would know Alexander Fitzpatrick from his days at Oxford. What if he saw him here? What if he was hiding out here and Julius recognized him?”
“Then what?”
“Well, I don’t bloody know,” Anna snapped.
“So this guy Fitzpatrick is hiding out. and up comes someone from his past:’! say, I say, I say, I recognize you, matey’—and then what? ‘My van has broken down and do you have a vehicle I can borrow, like the Mitsubishi’?”
“Oh, shut up. It’s possible.”
“Sure, anything is—but you’ll need to match the dates this Julius was seen in the Mitsubishi to when he went belly upward in the Thames.”
“Yes, I know. Let’s just ask around any garages and repair shops in this area and see if we can find the missing van.”
Anna was doubting herself; she was certain that Pete thought she was adding two and two and coming up with Christ knows what. However, an hour and a half later, in McNaulty & Sons crash repair shop and restoration yard, they found the van.
It was an old post office van, resprayed a dark navy blue, with more dents and bangs than a stock-car racing vehicle. The entire bodywork was a mismatch of filler; it didn’t look remotely roadworthy. The backend had indeed gone. The van had been towed into their yard, but remained in the same condition, as the owner had given them a dud check to repair it. The check was signed by Julius D’Anton. Anna gave instructions to the garage that they should leave the van as it was; she would have someone tow it to London.
Pete had shaken
his head; yet another vehicle the forensic lab had to check over. It was filthy, mud-spattered, and inside were used coffee beakers and takeaway food cartons, mounds of newspapers, and a few odd pieces of bookcases and ornaments. These could possibly have been bought at the antiques fair, as there were also some of the flyers on the passenger seat, along with an old T-shirt and jeans, and a rolled-up sleeping bag. In the ashtray were also some roaches. They left everything as it was. Anna knew she would have to work out a time frame of when D’Anton was last seen alive by Michael Sudmore, with what looked like quite a wedge of cash, to when his body was discovered in the Thames. She would need to go back to talk to Sandra, his widow, about the exact dates when Julius had said he was onto something big, and the fact that his fingerprints were found in the drug squat in Chalk Farm. They knew when his van had been taken into the breaker’s yard at Mc Naulty’s: it was two weeks before the murder of Frank Brandon.
Anna and Pete found a table for dinner in a small Italian bistro in Oxford city center. They had not bothered to drive any farther a field to the famous, Michelin-starred eateries outside the city. The food was delicious and, apart from a few rowdy students, they had an enjoyable meal without mentioning the case once. Anna relaxed, helped by a very good bottle of Merlot and Pete’s equally good company. Anna told him about her student days here, and how she had rarely ever had enough money to dine out further than a McDonalds. She never brought up the times she had driven back and forth to see Langton in the rehabilitation home. In fact, it never crossed her mind, and she enjoyed telling Pete about her old bicycle that she had ridden around the city until it had been stolen. From then 011 she had walked, even though she had been certain she’d seen another student whizzing past on it.
The case finally reared its head when, as they left the restaurant, Pete had asked for some tinfoil. From his glove compartment, he took out a plastic knife, then took copious scrapings of mud from around the hubcaps, wheels, and sides of the Morgan.
“I’m impressed,” Anna said, watching him.
“Yeah, well, it looks like it may rain, so better to do it now.”
The rain started coming down about half an hour later. Pete had put the roof up, and despite a few areas where tape covered some cracks, they could hear each other. They ran into heavy traffic on the motorway, as a truck had overturned, and spent over an hour inching along. They found themselves discussing the case, all Anna’s theories and suppositions. Pete queried many of them, but became fascinated and also slightly in awe of her productive detective mind.
“I take after my father,” she said. The conversation turned to her personal life, and she found herself telling him more than she could recall telling anyone else. How her father had been such a powerful force in her life, and her delicate mother such a loving support to them both.
“You are lucky,” Pete said. He gave a few details about his own childhood. He had been brought up mainly by his grandmother, who had doted on him, until he was twelve years old. After she passed on, he went to live with his father in Devon. He was a builder and carpenter, who would spend whatever he made in the pub. His mother had been a nurse, who had left his father for a doctor, and emigrated to Australia. The broken promise of her sending for him had hurt him deeply, but thankfully his grandmother had always made him feel very loved. When he did eventually fly out to Australia to meet his mother and stepfather, she was a stranger.
“It’s odd. I went out there with every intention of forming a bond with her—you know, wanting her to be special—but she was a strange, cold woman. Maybe she regretted leaving me, but I don’t ever recall her holding me in her arms.”
“That’s awful,” Anna said, remembering how her mother would be at the gate waiting for her to come home from school: always there, always with her arms out for a hug.
“The way I was brought up made me wary of relationships. Women Were either like my granny or the type my father used to bring home
from the pub—and he had a real variety. He was never too particular: blond, brunette, fat or thin. I don’t think he liked to sleep alone, or cook or do any household things like washing up, so whenever I got back from school, there was always a strange woman hoovering and dusting.”
“Is he still alive?”
“Nope. He committed suicide eighteen years ago. Went out to his hut, where he would supposedly do his carpentry, and threw a rope over a beam.”
“Did you …”
“Yeah, I found him—not a pretty sight. But I called the police and they took care of everything. From then on, I was sort of on my own. I inherited what little he had—the cottage and a couple of outhouses and fields. I got about fifty grand. I went to university in Liverpool; no idea why I chose that one, because I could have had the pick of a number, but off I went, money in the bank, good digs, and a sort of freedom I had never really felt before. I had a terrific time—there’s nothing like the Liverpool sense of humor—and I made great friends there; we still keep in touch.”
“Did you meet your wife there?”
“No, I was back in London when we met. In fact, we only really knew each other for a few months before we moved into the house in Hampstead, and then got married a year or so later.”
Anna stared from the window as the rain lashed down.
“Have you ever been married?” Pete asked her.
“No. Not even close.”
“How come?”
“Well, I’m not that old for one thing—I’m only twenty-eight.” And yet it did sound old to her, and she was shocked.
“You ever lived with anyone?”
Anna suddenly didn’t want to talk. “Not really.”
“Oh, I see. You can pump me for my seedy background, but you don’t seem to want to go into yours.”
“Your background didn’t sound seedy to me. I told you, I had a great relationship with my parents.”
“But what? You gave everything to your career?”
“Yes.”
He laughed and gave her a sidelong look. “You must have got hurt hard.”
“No, I didn’t.” She really didn’t want to get into the Langton relationship, and was beginning to get irritated by his persistence. At last, the traffic thinned out and they could pick up some speed.
He reached over and took her hand, giving it a squeeze. “Sorry. I just want to get to know you—I suppose that’s obvious.”
She smiled and released her hand. “Well, I’ve never been very good at expositions, so let’s just say maybe I will give you the gritty details some other time.”
“Gritty?”
She sighed and then shook her head. “I was joking. There’s really nothing else to know about me.”
“You going to stay with me tonight?”
“No, I’d like to get home—but how about I cook you breakfast tomorrow at my place?”
“Okay, it’s your call.”
Anna still didn’t really understand why she was keeping Pete at a distance. She did find him attractive, and she was getting fond of him and enjoying his company.
She was still pondering it when she drove herself home after collecting her Mini from Pete’s garage. He had kissed her briefly—it had felt good, but not passionate—not like she had felt with Langton. The “gritty” truth was that she was unable to let Langton go. She hadn’t wanted to continue the relationship, and she was certain that he didn’t either, but why was she so tentative about making more of her friendship with Pete?
Undressing and getting ready for bed, she felt terribly sad. She curled up like a child in her big new bed. The few sexual relationships she had had in her past had meant nothing compared to her infatuation with Langton. In many ways, that was what it had been: never a steady or serious affair. He had never been a friend, but a demanding lover. She wondered if that was why she couldn’t move forward with Pete. He was just too damned nice! He didn’t excite her. Langton had certainly done that. In bed, at work, in every way, he had dominated her—at times, really frightened her�
��but she had thrived on his ability to make every nerve in her body tingle. She wondered if she would ever feel the same way about anyone else, even knowing what a dangerous creature Langton was. Instead of making her reject everything about him, it made her long for him to wrap her in his arms and make love to her. She didn’t think about what had gone on that day with Pete, the discovery of D’Anton s van, the possibility he had met Alexander Fitzpatrick at Honour Nolan’s farm.
All she thought about, as she cried herself to sleep, was how much she missed James Langton.
CHAPTER 12
Pete arrived at nine o’clock with croissants and fresh fruit. Anna made them both omelets and brewed up some coffee. Once again, they were totally at ease with each other. Pete helped unpack her boxes and put up the plasma TV; he was helpful and considerate, and very adept at checking plugs and carrying all the cardboard boxes down to the bins in the basement.
He worked alongside her, washing china and ripping off the bubble wrap from various pieces of furniture. He loved her new flat and, when they took a coffee break, they sat on the small balcony looking out onto the river. Anna was wearing old jeans and a stained T-shirt with sneakers. He was similarly dressed; they could have easily been mistaken for a loving couple. But he didn’t make any moves on her; in fact, apart from a kiss on her cheek when he arrived, he had not touched her.
She was surprised how disappointed she felt when he checked the time and said he should be making a move. “Do you have to go? I owe you dinner.”
“I’ll take a rain check. I’ll probably be pretty tied up next week.”
She smiled. “Okay. Thanks for helping me out this morning.”
She watched him leave, feeling at odds with herself. She was unwrapping the few items still left to put into the kitchen when she came across a painted mug. It was nothing special to look at, but what made Anna sit back, thinking, was its shape. She had seen one similar—far better painted, and with a more professional glaze—in Michael Sudmore s antiques shop.
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