by Janet Neel
To Die For
The sixth John McLeish/Francesca Wilson Mystery
Created by the hard work and dedication of a pair of female friends, the fashionable Café de la Paix in Covent Garden begins to attract the attention of a restaurant chain determined to acquire it. A tempting financial offer is made to the shareholders but negotiations break down and deadlock seems inevitable until one of the owners, the beautiful and spoilt Selina Marsh-Hayden, is found strangled and stuffed into a disused freezer. That is only the violent hors d’oeuvres to a series of events which boil over in the Café’s kitchens. Detective Chief Superintendent John McLeish, his wife Francesca and her hugely-talented but high-maintenance brothers, all become involved and discover that financial skullduggery and sexual passions are key ingredients of a recipe for murder.
JANET NEEL is the maiden name of Baroness Cohen of Pimlico. She read Law at Newnham College Cambridge and qualified as a solicitor in 1965. She worked in the USA designing war games and in Britain as a civil servant in the Department of Trade and Industry; then moved into a career in merchant banking and also founded and financed two successful London restaurants. She was appointed to the House of Lords in 2000 and sits as a Labour peer with a particular interest in trade, industry, taxation and communications. Married with three children, Baroness Cohen lives in Cambridge and is Chairman of the Cambridge Arts Theatre. Her first crime novel as Janet Neel, Death’s Bright Angel, won the Crime Writers’ Association’s John Creasey Award in 1988 but she has also written novels as Janet Cohen.
The Ostara Crime imprint aims to collect and republish quality crime writing for new readers. The Series Editor is Mike Ripley, an award-winning crime writer who was also the crime fiction critic for the Daily Telegraph and then the Birmingham Post, reviewing almost 1,000 crime novels in 18 years. He now writes the monthly ‘Getting away With Murder’ column for Shots Magazine (www.shotsmag.co.uk), the UK’s leading website for fans of crime writing and has been the editor of Ostara’s Top Notch Thrillers imprint since its launch in 2009.
Also by Janet Neel:
Death’s Bright Angel
Death On Site
Death of a Partner
Death Among the Dons
A Timely Death
O Gentle Death
Other Ostara Crime Titles
Christine Green Deadly Errand
Christine Green Deadly Admirer
Christine Green Deadly Practice
Denise Danks The Pizza House Crash
Denise Danks Better Off Dead
Denise Danks Frame Grabber
Lesley Grant-Adamson Patterns in the Dust
Lesley Grant-Adamson Guilty Knowledge
Lesley Grant-Adamson Wild Justice
David Serafin Saturday of Glory
David Serafin The Body in Cadiz Bay
David Serafin The Angel of Torremolinos
James Melville The Wages of Zen
James Melville The Chrysanthemum Chain
James Melville A Sort of Samurai
James Mitchell Sometimes You Could Die
James Mitchell Dying Day
James Mitchell Dead Ernest
TO DIE FOR
* * *
JANET NEEL
Ostara Publishing
First published in 1998
Copyright © 1998 Janet Neel
Ostara Publishing Edition 2015
The right of Janet Neel to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN 9781909619302
CIP reference is available from the British Library
Printed and Bound in the United Kingdom
Ostara Publishing
13 King Coel Road
Lexden
Colchester CO3 9AG
www.ostarapublishing.co.uk
For Gertrud Watson
Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Epilogue
1
‘Thank you. Thank you indeed. Yes, we have you with a table for six tonight. Yes, in a booth. Look forward to seeing you.’
Judith Delves, in the neat inconspicuous black suit befitting the manager of a major West End restaurant, presented raincoats and umbrellas to the expensively dressed pair of young men just leaving the restaurant. It was a brilliant September afternoon, intermittently streaked with rain, and the Café de la Paix had been full that lunchtime. The tourists, who sustain all big London restaurants, were going home to Paris and New York, but the regulars, the Londoners working in the big office blocks in St Martin’s Lane and the Strand, were coming back from their holiday houses and big hotels in foreign countries.
The Café was a long ground-floor space running the full width of a large office building and the design challenge had been to avoid the look of an oversize village hall. A skilful mixture of heavily gilded large mirrors and huge 1930’s posters against a pale gold background and booths broke up the space without having involved enormous cost. The real money had gone into a long, curving bar, equipped with every storage device a barman could want, and a modern, beautifully equipped kitchen. The Caff, as its regulars called it, could seat 250 and, at lunchtime and after curtain-down in the surrounding theatres, mostly did. Judith Delves turned and with the restaurateur’s eagle eye saw instantly that two tables at the back had not been cleared and signalled a busboy, in the long white overall over black trousers that signalled his status.
‘Judith.’
Selina Marsh-Hayden, her partner in the restaurant, bright blonde, model slim, turning all heads in her cherry-coloured suit with its exiguous pleated skirt over long legs, pushed through the heavy glass door.
‘Hello,’ Judith said, trying not to sound accusing. Selina should have been present two hours ago to deal with the lunch reception, but this was not the moment to say so.
‘I tried to ring.’ Selina made a pretty gesture of helplessness, indicating histories of unavailable telephones and broken-down lines. ‘But then I thought, anyway, we had to talk face to face. Can someone look after the place just while we have coffee?’
‘I’m not sure there’s any point, Selina. I’m not going to change my mind.’ Angry as she was, Judith still observed that every last one of the men sitting over their coffee at the bar was watching Selina’s legs more or less overtly.
‘Yes, but darling, that’s the thing, you see. I’ve changed my mind.’
Judith stared at her and put both hands on the reception desk to steady herself. ‘You’ve what?’
‘Judith, do come over and sit down and I’ll get coffee.’
They both waited until they had before them a cup of the Café’s exquisite cappuccino, the milky foam only just not overflowing the top of the heavy earthenware cup, and grated chocolate a sharp brown on the top. ‘You were right,’ Selina said, when the waiter had gone. ‘We can do better and I’ve decided not to sell my shares in the Caff. So we’ll be able to stop a sale, won’t we, just like the lawyers said, because we’ve got thirty per cent between us.’ She beamed at her friend, fresh and beautiful, her looks enhanced if anything by the faint milky line of cappuccino on her upper lip.
‘Thirty per cent does block a sale, yes, just as we’ve always been advised,’ Judith agreed. ‘But what’s made you change your mind? I’ve asked you often enough to stand by me and told you we could do better.’
‘Oh. Various things.’ Selina pressed her hand. ‘Mostly I remembered – bit l
ate, I know – that you’re my very best friend, and have been since we were babies.’
Judith contemplated her, not unaffectionately. ‘You were quite clear you wanted out. What happened, Selina?’
‘I told you. Various things.’ She took her hand away and dug in her handbag for a cigarette and glanced around. ‘We are in the bit for the pariahs who smoke, aren’t we? Good.’ She smiled, lazily, at the young waiter who had sprung to her side with a light. She drew on her cigarette, giving her friend a considering look through the smoke. ‘Well, Richard for one. He still wants to sell, of course, because we’re absolutely bust. This morning, the laundry actually wouldn’t give me this week’s lot until I paid cash for three weeks back. I only had £20, so I had to look in all Richard’s jackets for the other £30. But the trouble is, Judith, any money we get has to go to the bank, and it’s a joint account – I mean, they’ll take mine too. So there isn’t much point in selling.’
‘Did you not realise you – or Richard – were bust?’
Selina and the Hon. Richard Marsh-Hayden had been married for several years, and Judith had been chief bridesmaid and a regular guest in their house, but had always understood that she had no idea how that marriage worked.
‘Oh, you can’t tell with Richard. He always says he’s broke but mostly he isn’t. Only this time he is – I looked at some of his letters. He owes money everywhere, not just to the bank.’ Selina drew on her cigarette, irritably. ‘You are lucky, you know, with Michael. All those chaps at Marshall Deneuve are making a fortune in bonuses, Richard says, and I bet Michael’s got it all safely tucked away.’
Judith found herself blushing furiously. ‘Selina, we’re not … I mean, we only just … I mean, I don’t really know how Michael feels about …’
‘You’ve fucked him, though.’
Judith, scarlet, nodded, as always appalled and cheered by Selina’s directness.
‘Was it OK?’
‘Oh yes. Yes.’
‘Mm. Have you seen him since? I mean, apart from here.’
‘Yes.’
‘And done it again?’
‘Yes. And we’re going away this weekend.’ She saw, incredulously, that Selina’s lip was drooping, disconsolately. ‘Selina?’
‘Oh hell. Just don’t get married, it ruins everything.’ Selina stubbed a cigarette out crossly.
‘We’re nowhere near that,’ Judith assured her, battening down the fantasies which she was determined not to allow to surface. She hesitated and crumbled a piece of sugar into her coffee. ‘I wondered, you know, whether it was because … well, if he was doing it because he wanted to persuade me to sell my shares. He wants to sell his and get on to the next thing. But he didn’t have to do that – I mean, when I was the only person holding out, I only had fifteen per cent, so I would have had to sell.’
‘Yes, but you were making his life more difficult.’
Judith stared at Selina, stricken.
‘Don’t look like that, darling, it’s just that you’ve known each other – well, at least since Richard and I got married. I know you’ve always rather fancied him, but he’s never … well, has he? Sorry, sorry, Judith, it’s just that men are such bastards, and you’ve always been sensible and kept clear of the worst. Look, anyway, it doesn’t matter, you and I aren’t going to sell, no matter what any of these bloody men say, are we? All we have to do is tell them.’
Judith took a long swallow of her coffee to steady herself. It was perfectly true that Michael Owens, director of Marshall Deneuve, four years her senior and a very personable six foot two inches hunk of man, had never reciprocated her tentatively offered admiration until the last month. But as Michael pointed out, he had never seen her very much and certainly not registered her as a person until the discussions about selling the restaurant had started. It had been Richard Marsh-Hayden, temporarily flush, who had originally agreed to put up money to enable Selina and Judith to start a restaurant together. They had found, rapidly, that on the basis of the most hopeful budgeting exercise, their own funds were inadequate, and Richard had therefore persuaded Michael Owens, an old school-friend and rising banker, to put in the rest. Michael had only started to take an interest when it became worthy of a banker’s attention, and not long after had begun to pay real attention to Judith.
She sneaked a look at her oldest friend who was looking downcast and pettish, and decided in a rush of confidence that all this was, unbelievably, jealousy. Richard Marsh-Hayden, despite his undoubted glamour, was a selfish and boorish husband and had now added insolvency to his other faults, quite unlike the well-mannered, well-off Michael Owens.
‘Brian Rubin is going to be very cross though, Selina. It’s been in the papers – that the Gemini Group are about to make an acquisition.’
‘Well, that’s just too bad, isn’t it? I’ll just go and ring Peter – my solicitor, darling, you know – and get him to ring up Mr Rubin, so he can get sworn at.’
‘The cow. The bloody cow.’
‘Excuse me.’
‘I’m sorry, Richard, I know it’s your wife I’m talking about. But fuck it.’ Brian Rubin was shaking with temper, the olive skin flushed unbecomingly up to the dark, thick, curly hair.
‘I’m just as pissed off with her as you are.’ The Hon. Richard Marsh-Hayden, an elegant blond thirty-eight-year-old graduate of Eton, Balliol and the Welsh Guards, habitually spoke as if reared on one of the rougher North London council estates, all the consonants slurred or missing altogether.
‘She agreed to sell.’ Brian Rubin threw himself into a chair. ‘I’ve been trying to do this deal for six months and I can’t tell you what it’s costing in fees. Ah, Judith.’
He rose awkwardly to his feet as Judith Delves, a little flushed, the heavy jaw in the square face set, came in. Richard Marsh- Hayden rose too.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, breathless, ‘but we were finishing the service. Chef is just behind me.’
Tony Gallagher, a heavy-set blond Irishman, his dirty white tunic unbuttoned at the neck, walked in looking hot. He glanced round the group and said, unapologetically, that the laundry was late, so he had to go on in this jacket, then threw himself into a chair and lit up a cigarette. He made to put his feet up on another chair, but a look from Judith stopped him.
‘So where is Selina?’ Brian Rubin asked, rudely.
‘She’ll be back soon.’
Judith sat behind her own large desk which took up a good quarter of the available floor space in the cramped office. A PC sat to her right, and that part of the desk was covered with piles of bills held together with rubber bands. Three heavy board-covered day books lay to her left near a small office switchboard. There were two more desks in the room, both smaller, one as tidy as Judith’s, the other wildly disorderly, with flowers, papers and two Harvey Nichols bags jumbled together on the top.
Richard went over to look at his wife’s cluttered desk, and burrowed through papers and bags until he found her diary. ‘Nothing at all for today except Hair. And she’d had that done. Where is she?’
‘She doesn’t put everything in that diary, Richard.’ Judith spoke without looking up.
‘I bet she doesn’t.’ It was explosive and angry and Tony Gallagher applied himself to be soothing.
‘She’ll be back. She knows this is important. Where did she go, Judith?’
‘To pick up her shoes from that place up the road.’
‘When?’
‘Well, about ten minutes ago, but she did say she had other things to get.’
Richard Marsh-Hayden made an impatient noise and Judith shook her head slightly at Tony. It was after all Richard’s wife whose conduct they were seeking to excuse.
‘Michael is on his way,’ she said, feeling herself going pink.
‘Oh good. We’ll have one major shareholder who is making sense.’
Tony Gallagher stubbed out a cigarette savagely and reached for another, catching Richard’s attention.
‘Sorry, Tony, but your five
per cent is about as much use as a fart in a thunderstorm.’ He swung round to look out of the window. ‘What’s the silly bitch doing?’
Judith began to sort the pile of bills on her desk, treating the question as rhetorical.
‘Look, for God’s sake, Judith, go and find her, we need to sort it out right now.’ Brian Rubin was rattled and didn’t mind showing it.
Richard Marsh-Hayden swung round from his furious contemplation of the street below. ‘Or you’ll do what?’
‘Or I’ll go and buy some other place where the owners can make up their minds to sell.’
‘Get off. You need this deal, you’ll run out of cash if you don’t get a rights issue off.’
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’ The response was immediate but defensive, and everyone in the room heard that.
‘Yeh, I do. Talked to a man in a brokers this morning.’ Richard Marsh-Hayden jabbed a pencil in the air by way of emphasis. ‘Look, bugger it anyway, most of us want to sell, there’s no disagreement about that. Just don’t be too ready to tell us how you could go and buy something else tomorrow. You couldn’t, you’re fucked if you can’t buy us, so let’s start from there, OK?’
Brian Rubin opened his mouth to protest but Richard Marsh- Hayden had swung back to look out of the window again, both hands flat against the glass, frustration in every line of his body. Tony Gallagher’s mouth had dropped open and Judith felt as if hers had too.
‘You mean that after all this Mr Rubin here can’t afford to pay us for the restaurants?’
Richard turned to her, slowly, in an elaborate display of weary patience. ‘Thought we’d gone through all of this months ago. Brian is going to raise the money by issuing new shares in his company to the punters on the stock market, yeh? Only you can’t do that unless you’ve got something to buy. He’s got a lot of restaurants but no cash. Now, we’ve got two restaurants. OK, and not a lot of cash either, but put the two together and you get a group in which he can sell shares, so he can get cash to keep going and buy some more. But he has to do a deal, or he runs out of cash. Soon.’
