That time-schedule depended on how far they had to travel to the morgue, on which point we had no knowledge at all. The car turned and drove away, with Paul actively protesting, still.

  ‘Very soon’, I said, ‘he’ll have the lot of us there, or in his office.’

  ‘Hmm! At least it’d be something to do.’

  ‘You’d feel at home in a morgue, would you, Oliver?’ I asked.

  ‘I’ve been in morgues. Not exactly like home, Phil. Very much more cold.’

  I didn’t like to think about it. ‘One thing about it, Oliver,’ I reminded him. ‘You’ve got your black pastel paper, all ready. So you can always go and stand at the window and wait for everything to come right. The setting sun, any clouds, the street lights—you just wait. Now…won’t that be exciting, Oliver?’

  He grunted, but nevertheless we went to our room. We waited. Oliver did preliminary sketches—to get his eye in, as he put it. Eventually, dinner intervened. Afterwards, we went back to our room. Hopefully.

  But Oliver’s hopes were dashed once again. Street lights came on, the tide was a little past its highest level, and reflections were superb. Until a dirty black cloud swept in and dropped a curtain of rain on the whole scene, then raced inland to sweep down on the Manor, and Oliver cursed the weather, the location, his pastels, his trousers—the lot.

  Then, when it was clear that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with it, we sought out the only refuge—the bar.

  Paul had returned, and looked jaded. The twins were quietly drinking the evening away—and Elise was sitting in a corner with her father, and with a man I hadn’t seen before.

  Harcourt raised a hand and snapped his fingers at us. Very bad manners, I thought. ‘Here they are now,’ he said to the stranger. ‘Can we have a word, Philipa? And with you, Oliver, please.’

  ‘Certainly.’ I smiled at him. It was now obvious that the newcomer was Harcourt’s solicitor, who had not impressed Elise at all, I recalled.

  I had guessed correctly. Harcourt said, with a certain amount of pride, ‘This is my solicitor. Rupert Greatorex. These people, Rupert, seem to understand what’s going on.’ He tried for a self-deprecating laugh. ‘Which is more than I do.’

  We accepted this as a compliment, though Harcourt’s smile had been somewhat cynical. Greatorex got to his feet and shook hands.

  ‘My husband’, I said, ‘is an ex-policeman. CID. And I know quite a bit about what goes on. Do you think you can help Geoff, Mr Greatorex?’

  ‘That remains to be seen. I can try. I’m meeting Llewellyn, with the magistrate, in the morning. He’ll be asking for a remand in custody. I shall, of course, oppose that. But I’d hope to secure something better than a remand on bail. I want to destroy the case against Geoffrey Davies completely.’

  ‘I’ll get ‘em in,’ said Harcourt, trying to be useful. Apparently, nothing could be discussed in a serious manner unless we all had drinks to inspire us. So there was a short wait while he arranged that.

  At this time in the evening I would have expected the bar to be packed with the Chinese Brush painters and the German language enthusiasts. But no. No sign of any of them. There had perhaps been a communal agreement to leave us in peace for a while. Or maybe there was something gripping going on in the television room.

  ‘So,’ I said. ‘What can you do for Geoff, Mr Greatorex?’

  He smiled. He was one of those men who seem to be solid through and through, bone and muscle and personality. If he stated anything, you would be taking a great risk by questioning it.

  ‘Motive,’ he said, nodding sagely. ‘That’s going to be the central issue in my argument. As you’ll probably know, Llewellyn isn’t required by law to adduce a motive, though of course it’s always a useful lever. But I don’t think he will try it. What he’s got is very weak, and Llewellyn knows it. You know what I’m talking about, I’m sure. That Geoff Davies would kill both women because one of them might have slashed Elise’s painting. Tcha! Ridiculous!’

  ‘I don’t think you’re quite correct, there,’ I put in politely.

  ‘What?’ He frowned heavily at my interruption.

  I smiled. ‘There’s been no suggestion that Geoff could have killed both Pam Wilton and Jennie Crane. That anybody did that, in fact. The weakness in any case against Geoff is that he should have killed Jennie Crane on behalf of Elise, you might say. If so, it would be a very unusual motive for murder—killing somebody as a favour, you could describe it.’

  ‘That’, said Greatorex heavily, ‘is what I’m trying to say. That Geoffrey Davies did have a very weak motive for killing Jennie Crane. There has been no suggestion yet that Llewellyn is thinking of a charge of murder in respect of Mrs Pam Wilton. And it’s that weakness in motive that I shall challenge. And I shall make a central point out of it. Means—yes. Davies would certainly have been able to acquire a length of wood—as would anybody else. Opportunity? Of course. But Llewellyn wouldn’t be able to build a case on that, because everyone of the group had freedom of movement, so all of you had the opportunity.’

  ‘Except for Elise,’ I said. ‘She was with Oliver and me. Apart from…’ I deliberately left that hanging, to see whether he was aware of all the facts.

  Greatorex glared at me. ‘We are talking, here, about Geoffrey Davies, not about Elise Harcourt.’

  ‘But I think I’m getting to know Llewellyn,’ I assured him. ‘He’s very subtle. And I think he’ll be thinking, suggesting, and leading you towards Elise—and her opportunity.’

  ‘People don’t lead me, young lady.’ His face was now carved into sharp angles, his eyes narrowed, the knuckles white around the glass that was now, so suddenly, empty.

  ‘Of course not,’ I said soothingly. ‘You’ll introduce the subject of motive, I’ve no doubt, because Llewellyn wouldn’t wish to—not when he’s talking about Geoff, that is. Because—for Geoff—it is so terribly weak. Kill somebody in order to please Elise! As you said yourself, it’s a bit far out.’

  ‘Now you just listen to me—’

  ‘Let her say it,’ Oliver put in. So quietly, he suggested this, but there was a warning tone in his voice. I touched his arm. A thank-you.

  Greatorex glared, seemed about to burst into violent and extended protest, then abruptly he sat back, a faintly condescending smile on his lips. Then he nodded his permission. Let the woman make a fool of herself.

  ‘And once the motive of the slashed painting was introduced,’ I continued, ‘Llewellyn would take it up, and he would pick it to pieces, and he’d ask you whether you were implying that, although that motive wasn’t really valid, when applied to Geoff, it wasn’t very appropriate when applied to Elise. And he would point out that Elise herself had a perfect opportunity to kill Jennie, because she was, at the specific time, within yards of her. And I’d expect him to remind you that this opportunity was engineered by Elise. No…damn it…let me say this. It wasn’t, in fact, Jennie Crane who slashed the painting, it was Pam Wilton. And her husband, Paul Wilton, could verify that fact, and might already have done so to Llewellyn, which would—’

  ‘Now listen here…

  It was his warning, bullying tone that annoyed me. ‘No!’ I shot back at him. ‘You listen. This matters. I’ve met Llewellyn more often than you have. I know him better. I know exactly what he’s aiming at—what he’s got in mind. And that’s a set-up in which they did it together, Elise and Geoff. No, Elise, you just sit there and say nothing. I’m talking now on your behalf, and Geoff’s. And I’m convinced, Mr Greatorex, that if you tackle this in the way you’re proposing, you’ll be playing right into Llewellyn’s hands. And he’ll hold both of them, Elise and Geoff, on a conspiracy to murder charge.’

  Greatorex thumped the table. His face was flushed and his eyes were wild.

  ‘Never…never in my life…I’ll not have it! I’m not going to listen to anything you’ve got to say. People who are ignorant of the operation of law and the courts—’

  ‘Very well.’ I smiled at him. I smiled at everybody. ‘Do it as you wish. But I’m going to bed. Coming, Oliver?’

  But Oliver was already standing behind me, ready to draw back my chair. I got to my feet, smiled all around, and said, ‘Goodnight, all. See you tomorrow.’

  17

  I was sure that Oliver would have liked to continue the discussion with Greatorex, and that he had a few points to take up that I had missed. But he caught my eye, and we left him to retrieve his standing and authority with the man who paid his fees. In any event, there was just a chance that the sky would have cleared.

  But it hadn’t. For quite a while Oliver stood by that window, but, if anything, the situation became more and more impossible. So, although it was a little early for us, we retired to bed.

  When we went in to breakfast in the morning, I had a brief look round. There was just a possibility that Llewellyn had returned Geoff to us, without Greatorex’s persuasion. But there was no sign of him, and he was not breakfasting in his cottage with Elise, because there she was at a far table—and no Geoff.

  She saw us and waved, but there was no space at her table and we had to search elsewhere for two seats together, and found ourselves sitting with the twins, one each side of them.

  ‘I hear he’s coming to do it today,’ said Martin gloomily.

  I glanced at him. There seemed to be something wrong with his moustache. If he’d trimmed it that morning, he’d done a very poor job. It seemed to be a little twisted.

  ‘To do what?’ I asked.

  ‘Take all those witness statements he was talking about.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ I’d rather forgotten that. ‘It’ll be something to do.’

  But he seemed more concerned than the simple taking of statements justified.

  ‘We’d like to show you something,’ he said, sounding miserable. ‘Philip and me.’

  ‘Oh…what’s that?’

  He shook his head. ‘Better to show you.’

  I didn’t press him. There seemed no point. ‘Where?’ I asked.

  ‘In the Glasshouse.’

  Then he devoted his full attention to his breakfast.

  Oliver and I strolled on the terrace until the twins appeared, both looking rather downcast.

  ‘What is this?’ I asked, but they were stubbornly unresponsive.

  Fortunately, and as I had expected, we were the only ones to show any interest in the Glasshouse. Martin led the way, directly to the counter at the far end.

  All our individual piles of equipment were still where the police officers had left them, apart from the minor disarrangement caused by the upsurge of painting from photos, the day before. The equipment belonging to Jennie, and also that of Pam, were the only ones untouched.

  It was to Jennie’s that the twins steered us.

  Martin seemed to have been elected as spokesman for them. He stood with his back to the counter, smiled a little emptily, and said, ‘You know about the trick Jennie tried on us?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  I glanced at Oliver. We had not seriously considered the motive the twins shared for a basic dislike of Jennie. The incident had seemed so paltry, that Jennie would have sought to upset their personal relationship with that telling remark: ‘You were wonderful last night, darling.’ They had been able to deal with that quite simply, and I’d had the impression that they’d forgotten about it, or at least no longer been concerned about it. But it now seemed that they had been more seriously disturbed than I had thought.

  And now it appeared that the method used to disconcert them had been seen as an insult, one which they still deeply resented.

  ‘Well…’ Martin sighed. ‘We decided to give her a bit back. She deserved it, you’ll admit.’

  ‘Indeed she did,’ I agreed. But I was beginning to feel disturbed.

  ‘Anyway…we worked something out, ready for when we got here. Philip and me. Two things, really. One of them was related to being twins—which was what she’d tried to use against us.’

  ‘Just retribution,’ murmured Oliver. But he too sounded unhappy about what we might be about to hear.

  ‘Yes.’ Martin gave a twisted smile at his brother. ‘And I was the one who made the sacrifice.’

  I glanced at Oliver. He shrugged, pouting. Then Martin reached up, and peeled off his moustache.

  ‘Oh…no!’ I said, though whether in mourning for the discarded moustache, or in protest at the deceit, I wasn’t myself certain.

  ‘But look at these, first,’ said Philip eagerly.

  He was referring to the paintings on the counter—Jennie’s work, that fatal morning. I didn’t suppose that anybody had interfered with them since they’d been placed there, but now, spreading things out a little, I saw that Jennie had worked hard—and fast. There were eight partly finished paintings of the estuary, with the tide out, and from what she had done I was able to confirm my guess—she had used a sandy-coloured wash to replace the black of the slime. The paper used for these was even thicker than I had been using, and with a different surface. Possibly Canson 400, I thought, and there was something strange—wrong—about each one of them, I puzzled over this for a few moments. Then I saw what it was.

  On each of them, where paint had been applied as a flat wash (and with acrylics, Jennie would probably have started with basic washes) there was visible, in letters two inches high, these lighter than the washes, the word BITCH, or I AM A BITCH, or, in one instance, ROTTEN BITCH. Each painting effort was ruined in this way.

  ‘But how…Oliver, look. How…’

  He smiled. He had worked it out.

  ‘We came in here,’ said Philip. ‘Late on the first night—Sunday—and we painted the letters on all her blank sheets, with oil. It rejects the water paints, such as acrylics, you see. We experimented at home. In my house—or rather, in my workshop. Three-in-One oil was the most effective, but when it dried—or soaked in, rather—you could just detect it, which we didn’t want, because then she might have spotted the trick before she even started. In the end we settled for WD40 oil. So that’s what we used. It comes in a spray-can, but you just spray some into a saucer. A number four brush for the lettering—you get the idea?’

  I drew in a deep breath. Oliver said, ‘Very ingenious.’

  ‘And she’d see the words coming up on the paper, as she painted,’ Martin said, ‘where the oil rejected it, and she’d have no spare paper, and she’d waste the whole morning getting some fresh paper. Oh…it was beautiful.’

  ‘You watched her reactions?’ I asked. They wouldn’t have been able to resist that.

  ‘Oh yes. Of course.’ Martin nodded, and his moustache, insecure, fell off. ‘We watched from behind the yew hedge.’ He had managed to catch it.

  ‘Giggling?’

  ‘Trying not to.’

  ‘And…the moustache?’ I asked Martin.

  ‘The real one was sacrificed in the cause of art.’ He pursed his lips. ‘We thought we ought to use the fact that we’re twins against her—as she’d tried to use it against us. So I sacrificed my moustache—and Marie will bawl me out when I get back.’ He grimaced.

  ‘It’ll grow again,’ I said comfortingly.

  ‘Yes. It’ll grow.’

  ‘So…’ said Philip, sighing, ‘we went along there—’

  ‘You were there?’ I demanded.

  ‘Yes,’ said Philip seriously. ‘Martin told you that. We went along to watch her face when she got going, then we paraded round and round her, both of us with false moustaches, sometimes on, sometimes off, and laughed our heads off at her language when she tried to get going with her painting.’

  ‘Wait, wait!’ I cut in. ‘Have you told any of this to Llewellyn?’

  ‘Him? Lord…no. It was just for a laugh, and I can’t imagine him laughing.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to. You must tell him.’

  They looked at each other, eyebrows raised. ‘If you think so.’

  ‘If you don’t I’ll have to.’

  They nodded miserably.

  ‘And this was…right at the start?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Philip. ‘We gave her a quarter of an hour to get going, then we went along to see how she was getting on.’

  ‘And…’

  ‘Well…’ Philip spread his hands. ‘She was cussing away, and we had a good laugh, and did the moustache trick on her, then we went back to our own painting.’

  ‘Hmm!’ I glanced at Oliver, and he inclined his head.

  I had been idly turning over the paintings Jennie had worked on. Two were completed, and with no defects. ‘But she did manage to get some more watercolour paper.’

  ‘Yes.’ Philip nodded. ‘She came along to where we were and handed out a good cussing, so we gave her some of our paper. Only fair.’

  ‘Yes. Only fair.’ I glanced at Oliver. ‘And you didn’t go there again? To Jennie’s site, I mean.’

  ‘Well…yes. About lunch time. Wasn’t it, Martin?’

  ‘About then. A bit before.’

  ‘And everything was normal?’

  ‘Normal?’ Philip glanced at his brother. ‘I suppose so. She was working, and didn’t notice us.’

  ‘Nobody else about?’

  ‘Well…no. Did you see anybody, Martin?’

  Martin shook his head, then changed his mind and nodded. ‘Only Elise. She was coming towards us, when we were part way back. She didn’t see us. We were under the trees.’

  So Martin and Philip wouldn’t have much to tell Llewellyn. Nevertheless, I instructed them: ‘Tell everything to Llewellyn. Everything. Every detail. It’s what he’ll expect.’

  Martin grimaced. ‘Everything?’

  ‘Indeed. The lot.’

  Grumbling to each other, they wandered away. It occurred to me, from what I’d just heard, that Llewellyn might have gained quite a fair amount of information from the painting equipment spread along that counter, yet he hadn’t thought of that. I hadn’t, either. But I had now lost the opportunity, because Llewellyn arrived, along with his inspector, and a somewhat jaded Paul, and I discovered he had selected the Glasshouse as the centre for his interviews. Long, deep and searching, they would be, I expected.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24