The Vital Chain

by Sally Spencer

  ‘And it was the aircraftmen who pulled us out?’

  Harper nodded. ‘They were bloody marvellous. If they hadn’t been there, we’d both have been dead.’ He stood up again. ‘I have to go. My train—’

  ‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Thank you for coming to see me. I know it can’t have been easy, living through it all again.’

  I watched him walk to the door, and listened to his muffled footsteps as the echoed down the hallway. Then, alone once more, I felt my mind drift back to the first time I met him.

  ****

  It was at one of those garden parties that my brother’s wife, Lydia, held regularly during the summer months. Fairy lights were strung between the trees, I remembered, and a four-piece band was playing the sort of unchallenging music that four piece bands always play at parties like this. Groups of guests bunched together in various parts of the garden, and three hired waiters wended their way skillfully in and out of these clusters, offering the guests drinks or some of the hors d’oeuvres which Lydia had had specially delivered by an expensive catering firm based in Manchester.

  I didn’t know most of the people who’d been invited to the party – now Cormorant Publishing was taking up so much of my time, I rarely got back to the village – but I could tell from the way they dressed and the way they moved that they considered themselves to be part of the local “smart” set.

  My brother John appeared by my side.

  ‘Are you enjoying yourself?’ he asked, with just the tiniest hint of anxiety in his voice.

  ‘In my own quiet way, yes.’

  ‘I expect that, in your line of work, you must go to tons of parties like this.’

  ‘Not if I can possibly avoid them,’ I told him, and the second the words were out of my mouth I wished I could have bitten out my tongue. ‘I’m not really a party animal,’ I added apologetically. ‘When I do go to parties, it’s usually for business reasons, so they’re no more fun than being in the office.’ My brother was obviously waiting for more, and I felt obliged to provide it. ‘But I must say that this is one of the best organised parties I’ve been to in a long time,’ I finished.

  John smiled grateful. ‘Lydia put a lot of work into it,’ he said. ‘Her parties are very important to her. She says that given our position in the village, it’s almost our duty to have parties.’

  If I hadn’t been talking to my own brother, I might have laughed at the notion. As it was, I confined myself to saying, ‘Well, perhaps she has a point.’

  ‘Yes, she’s very strong on duty,’ John said. ‘She’s on all the local committees, you know.’

  ‘No, I didn’t know,’ I admitted.

  ‘Oh yes,’ John said enthusiastically. ‘You name it, she’s on it – and more often than not she’s the chair. The Church Ladies’ Committee, the Council to Preserve Rural England, the Parochial Council … Frankly, I don’t see where she gets all her energy from.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re happy,’ I said.

  ‘What about you?’ John asked. ‘Is there anyone special in your life?’

  I thought about Marie O’Hara, the Irish gumshoe. We had seen each other two or three times since our meal in the Italian restaurant, and I enjoyed being with her, but so far it didn’t seem to be leading anywhere.

  ‘Well?’ my brother asked. ‘Have you got anyone special?’

  ‘Not really,’ I said, and then, to change the subject, I asked, ‘Is Cousin Philip coming tonight?’

  John frowned. ‘He’s certainly been invited.’

  ‘And what exactly do you mean by that?’

  ‘I … err … I think he’s in a bit of a huff because we brought the outside caterers in.’

  I began to see what he meant. Grandfather had finally given Philip his own business, a couple of years after he had bought John his vehicle maintenance company, and long, long after he had acquired Cormorant Publishing for me. Philip was now head of a firm of contract caterers – caterers who, naturally enough, immediately signed an agreement to run the canteens at both Conroy Hauliers and Conroy Furnishings.

  Grandfather’s web again!

  ‘The thing is, Lydia didn’t really think that Philip’s people could handle the job,’ John said apologetically. ‘I mean, they’re fine for providing cheap, nourishing lunches – their steak and kidney pie is one of the best I’ve tasted – but really they’re not quite …’ He trailed off.

  ‘Sophisticated enough to cater for the kind of guest you have here?’ I supplied.

  ‘Exactly,’ John agreed. ‘I’ll have a quiet word with him in the morning, and explain that no insult was intended. I’m sure he’ll see my point of view.’

  How like my brother to assume that everyone else was as reasonable as he was himself, I thought. How like him to believe he could always paper over the cracks.

  A new man entered the garden, and seeing John there, made an obvious direct beeline for him.

  ‘Thank you for inviting me to your party, Mr Conroy,’ he said, pumping John’s hand vigorously. ‘Don’t want to talk business now – neither the time nor the place for it – but if you ring me in the morning, I think we’ve got a bit of extra work we could put your way.’

  He looked at me as if he expected to be introduced, and John obliged.

  ‘This is Rob, my brother. This is Bill Harper, Uncle Tony’s new executive assistant.’

  Ah yes! Grandfather had noticed that my father was looking tired, and had given him an executive assistant, so now Uncle Tony had to have one whether he needed it or not.

  I stepped back a little to get a better look at my uncle’s latest status symbol. Harper was probably only 5ft 5ins or 5ft 6ins, but he had the square body of a man who has always taken a lot of hearty exercise. He had a broad brow over a pair of darting eyes and a pointed nose. His mouth, I decided, had a ruthless twist to it. In short, though I rarely go on first appearances, I found myself disliking the man.

  ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr Conroy,’ Harper said, vigorously shaking my hand. ‘I’ve heard you’re quite a powerhouse in the publishing world.’

  I found it hard to tolerate such obvious flattery, but it was my brother’s party and I was determined to be pleasant.

  ‘You’re not from round here, are you, Mr Harper?’ I asked.

  He shook his head. ‘You’ve got a good ear for accents, Mr Conroy. No, as a matter of fact I was brought up in Stoke-on-Trent. But I’ve taken to Cheshire like a duck to water.’

  John chuckled. ‘Bill’s a great swimmer,’ he said.

  ‘That’s right,’ Harper agreed. ‘I’ve taken to swimming across the mere – there and back – every evening.’

  ‘That’s a fair distance,’ I said.

  And so it was. The mere lay just beyond the base of the hill on which the village perched. It was large enough to host a sailing club, and swimming across it and then back again was no mean feat.

  ‘Do you do it even in winter?’ I asked.

  Harper laughed, as though I’d been incredibly witty.

  ‘I haven’t been here long enough to see what the water’s like in winter,’ he admitted, ‘but no, I don’t expect I shall be swimming once the weather turns cold. Still, it’s wonderful while it lasts.’

  Some more guests were arriving through the garden gate. One of them was Uncle Tony with, inevitably, his latest blonde on his arm.

  Bill Harper saw him too. ‘If you’ll excuse me,’ he said, then turned on his heel and headed towards my uncle.

  ‘Like a trained lap dog,’ I said.

  ‘What was that?’ my brother asked.

  ‘He’s running to Uncle Tony like a trained lap dog.’

  John laughed, slightly uneasily. ‘I do think you’re rather hard on him. I’ve heard he’s very good at his job. He’s supposed to be going places.’

  ****

  And perhaps I had been rather hard on him, I thought, lying in my hospital bed. The Bill Harper I had just seen was not the same man I had met at that party. He had displayed neithe
r of the famous Harper fawning nor his equally obnoxious arrogance.

  It had been a kind, considerate, and perhaps even a courageous act to come and tell me about the crash. Was it possible that it had taken a tragedy to bring out his better nature? I suspected that it was.

  And in that – as in so many other things – I was to turn out to be hopelessly, stupidly wrong.

  Chapter Five

  Dusk was almost falling when my solitary musings about both the past and the future were shattered by the harsh sound of a phone ringing.

  When I picked up the phone, the first thing I heard was a slurping sound which could only have been made by a man sucking a boiled sweet.

  ‘Owen?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, it’s me,’ Owen confirmed. ‘I’m just ringing to tell you that I’ll be travelling up to Cheshire in the morning.’

  ‘You almost sound as if you’re asking my permission,’ I replied, though from his tone of voice I already had my suspicions that this conversation wasn’t going to be about Cheshire at all.

  ‘There’s a few things I’d like to find out about before I get there,’ Owen said, ignoring my implied question, ‘but first, I’ve got some advice I’d like you to listen to.’

  ‘All right,’ I agreed.

  ‘Once you’re discharged from hospital, you need to be very careful. Don’t use your own car – take public transport and taxis. Try to avoid being alone. Never accept any invitations from people you don’t have absolute trust in – and even then, it would be best to be on your guard.’

  Weighed down as I was by feelings of guilt, grief and disappointment, I had barely thought about the motive behind the murders, but suddenly – like that big RAF truck on that narrow country lane – it loomed up in front of me and could no longer be avoided. Yet even now, the idea that I could be the intended victim seemed insane.

  ‘I’m just a boring old publisher, for God’s sake!’ I protested. ‘Apart from my authors and a few other people in the trade, I hardly see anyone. I’ve done nothing at all to merit somebody wanting to kill me.’

  ‘And had your brother done anything to merit it?’ Owen asked quietly. ‘Or your father, for that matter?’

  Of course they hadn’t! It was ludicrous to suggest that anybody would want to kill any of us.

  Yet someone clearly had.

  I realised that though I would have to confront the issue at some point, I simply wasn’t strong enough then.

  ‘You wanted to ask me some questions,’ I said, seeking a diversion.

  ‘Yes, I did,’ Owen agreed. ‘And listen, Rob, this won’t be two old friends talking – it will be a policeman questioning a man who’s somehow got himself involved in a murder case. Do you think you can handle that?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, though I’m not sure I convinced either of us.

  ‘I’ll be meeting your family tomorrow, sir, and it would be of great value to me if you could fill me in a little on everybody’s background,’ Owen said.

  ‘I’ll do my best, Chief Inspector,’ I promised.

  And in the next 20 minutes or so, I told him of Grandfather’s rise from near poverty to a modest fortune, of the theatrical Aunt Jane, of Philip, of John’s marriage, and other bits of family gossip which came into my head. I was quite open on many points, but I kept in mind the distinction Owen himself had made between old friend and policeman, and – especially in John’s case – there were things I held back.

  ****

  Later, lying alone in the darkness, I wondered what Owen Flint – a man brought up in a harsh, soulless institution at the head of a Welsh valley – would make of the village in which I’d spent much of my childhood.

  Would he perhaps find it just a little too pretty – just a little too much like the cosy pictures they used to put on the tops of boxes of expensive chocolates?

  I couldn’t really blame him if that was his first impression. The village is almost absurdly picturesque. The High Street, which climbs a moderately steep hill, is lined with neat Georgian cottages, each with its own perfectly kept garden in front of it. Midway between the edge of the village and the church is the post office/general store, which has managed to survive in the face of supermarket competition and is as much a repository for gossip now as it ever was. At the top of the hill stands the church – a proud Norman fortress with a tower which glares imposingly down on all that surrounds it. There are stocks by the lychgate – a reminder of simpler times, when crime was more easily defined, and punishment far less complex. And across the square from the church is the George and Dragon, a fine old pub which was serving good traditional beer long before that became the general fashion.

  Apart from a certain degree of gentrification, the village must have changed very little since the day my grandparents moved there. The house Grandfather bought was down a lane which led off the High Street, and from its windows he had a view of the west side of the church. It was a large building with a heavy slate roof and ivy growing up the walls. There were stables – though he kept no horses. There were servants’ quarters – a reminder of the days when village girls considered themselves lucky if they had a “place” which permitted them to “live in”.

  It was then – and still is now – a magnificent house, and easily the largest in the village. But more importantly, it made a statement: it said that, after years of just getting by, my grandfather had finally arrived.

  Neither my father nor my uncle Tony lived in the house with my grandparents for long. They were already in their 20s when they moved in, both involved in the family business, and when they got married it was natural they should want establishments of their own.

  My father settled for an ample, though modest, cottage near the village school. My uncle chose a house at the other end of the village, with a marvellous view over the sloping green fields down to the mere and the sailing club.

  I sometimes wonder if the two sons ever saw the symbolism in this physical separation. Did they ever really appreciate the fact that they were a pair of satellites, and that the only thing which connected them was Grandfather – that irresistible force in the very centre of the village?

  Perhaps they did. Perhaps their choice of homes was a deliberate declaration of their differences.

  We will never know now.

  Chapter Six

  When Owen Flint arrived in Northwich, he was assigned a local man called Inspector Hawkins to shepherd him around.

  Hawkins, as I would discover later, was a solid, middle-aged bobby, not given to imaginative leaps of intuition, so it was not surprising that it was the detective from South Wales, not the one from Cheshire, who suggested that they should attend my grandfather’s funeral.

  It was an impressive turnout, I’m told. Grandfather had been a firm but popular employer, and as well as friends and local dignitaries, each of his tangled web of business holdings sent a number of representatives, so the church was full to bursting.

  I am trying to imagine what impression the surviving members of my family made on Owen. He would have seen my grandmother, small and frail, suddenly cast out onto a sea of loneliness after well over half a century of Grandfather’s protection. He would have noticed my cousin Philip, thin and blond, with eyes which suggested more sensitivity than his hard soul could ever muster. And he would have seen Lydia, my sister-in-law, with her pageboy haircut covered by a large dark hat, and her pale green eyes hidden behind dark glasses.

  Perhaps he asked the unimaginative Inspector Hawkins a few questions.

  ‘Where’s Rob Conroy’s mother?’

  ‘She died a couple of years ago. Cancer, I think it was. By all accounts, she’d never been very strong.’

  ‘What about Philip Conroy’s wife?’

  ‘He doesn’t have one. He likes to play the field, just like his father, Tony, did.’

  ‘And Tony’s wife – Philip’s mother?’

  ‘Oh, she ran away from home years ago, when Philip was no more than a kid.’

  This conversation,
as I say, is only guesswork on my part. But one thing I do know for sure. As they were laying my grandfather’s coffin in the ground, Flint caught sight of a shock of red hair which he had last seen driving away in a Golf GTI in Bristol.

  Flint waited by the church gate until most of the mourners had left. One of the last to go was the woman with the red hair, and when she saw Flint standing by the lychgate, she looked straight through him.

  The Chief Inspector bided his time until she had drawn level with him, then said, ‘Might I have a word, Miss?’

  She turned. ‘Are you talking to me?’

  ‘Yes. Does that surprise you?’

  The woman opened her handbag, took out a packet of cigarettes, and lit one up.

  ‘Does it surprise me?’ she said. ‘No, I suppose it doesn’t. But if we’re going to talk, I’d rather do it with a glass of something in my hand. Going to funerals always makes me feel thirsty.’

  ‘There’s a pub over there,’ Flint said, pointing towards the George and Dragon.

  ‘So there is,’ the woman agreed.

  They walked across the road and entered the pub by the side door. As he would have expected in a village like this one, the bar was all horse brasses and bare oak beams.

  ‘What would you like to drink?’ Flint asked.

  Marie glanced at the shelves behind the counter. ‘A Bush Mills whiskey with water,’ she said. ‘Better make it a double – and go easy on the water.’

  ‘So you’re not intending to drive any more today?’ Flint said.

  Marie grimaced. ‘I forgot, for a moment, that you were the Filth,’ she said. ‘Better make it an orange juice.’

  Flint ordered a pint of bitter for himself, and took the two drinks over to the table where Marie was already lighting a fresh cigarette from the stub of her first.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I know, then you can tell me what I want to know,’ he said. ‘Your name’s Marie O’Hara, you’re a private investigator, and you live in Oxford. Correct?’