A Maze of Murders (16 page)

‘You have to understand how ridiculous the suggestion is and I'll find it a little easier to explain if he's not here. When we were young, my sister was always belle of the ball. Do you understand that?'

‘I think so.'

‘Because of her looks and vivacity, the handsome men always made a beeline for her at parties. She married Tancred and her life was what she'd always demanded, big house, big parties, endless trips abroad. But after a few years, he disappeared with another woman and it turned out that his wealth was largely illusory. My sister wasn't left penniless, but compared to how things had been, she was not well off. A little later, my husband, whom she'd always considered very dull, died and left me a fortune. I'm afraid that that made her very jealous. So when I married Larry, who was so successful, her feelings reached the stage where she said things that were really unforgivable. But she is my sister so I tried to stay friendly and for my sake Larry never told her what he thought of her behaviour; thankfully, over the last couple of years she's almost learned to come to terms with the way things are and we've grown closer together. But although Larry has been wonderful in hiding his true feelings, he's never forgotten or forgiven. So you see, she really is the very last person in the world with whom he'd have an affair.'

‘Thank you for telling me, señora.'

Clough returned. He filled a flute with champagne, handed this to his wife, then a glass to Alvarez. He sat.

‘I've explained how things are with Fenella,' she said.

Clough faced Alvarez. ‘Then you're satisfied I stayed firmly in my own bed and the maid has rather too energetic an imagination?'

‘Yes, señor.'

‘So you're left with the question, why did we lie about Neil?… Will everything we say now be in confidence?'

‘Unless that should become necessary, it will not be repeated.'

‘Fair enough … Before Tancred married Fenella, he'd fathered a child. The mother was from a wealthy county family who were sufficiently reactionary not to be in favour of one-parent families and as soon as the baby was born, he was adopted. As you'll have guessed, the adopting parents' name was Lewis.

‘We don't know anything about life at home, but obviously something, somewhere was wrong. Neil started mixing with the wrong crowd and ended up in trouble. He claimed his conviction so shocked him…'

Vera cut in. ‘Why are you so grudging?'

‘Because I look at things far more realistically than you do, my sweet. Still, whichever way you look at them, he decided to trace his true parents – a task that now is, I believe, easier than it used to be. He managed to identify both his father and mother. She flatly denied he was her child and refused to have anything to do with him. No one knew where his father was, but through the marriage he traced Fenella. By lucky chance – from his point of view – he arrived at her house on a day when my wife was there. Neil – arrogant and blaming everyone but himself for his problems – immediately put Fenella's back up, but my wife…'

She interrupted him a second time. ‘He was gritty, but it was obvious that he'd had a rough life and one had to feel sorry for him.'

‘You'd summon up sympathy for Jack the Ripper.'

‘That's stupid … I felt certain that a little help might save him, so I offered him some money.'

‘Having been warned by Fenella not to.'

‘It can't be wrong to try and help someone.'

‘Sadly, a recipe for disaster.' He spoke to Alvarez once more. ‘Events were predictable. In May, he turned up again with a further hard-luck story and a plea for more money. My wife had recovered and was just about to fly out to Barcelona, so she told him to get in touch when she returned and she'd talk to me and see what best to do.

‘Neil could be certain what my advice would be so he decided to try and circumvent my objections. He turned up in Pellapuig, unfortunately after I'd left, pleading that if he wasn't helped financially, he'd be forced to return to crime. Fenella told him that that was his problem; my wife gave him more money. Naturally, Fenella went on and on telling my wife how silly she'd been; probably becoming so heated because she reckoned she should have had first grab and had her holiday for free.'

‘Which just shows how wrong you are when you're so quick to think the worst of people,' Vera said. ‘Her holiday didn't cost her anything.'

‘Because you paid for it?'

‘Yes.'

‘I should have guessed. Your generosity is only exceeded by your vulnerability.'

‘You know how I hate it when you say things like that.'

‘When I see you being taken for a ride because of your good nature … Enough of the family bickering, which is almost as boring for third parties as family jokes … The next time Neil surfaced was when he arrived here one morning. Lacking imagination, his story hadn't changed – bad luck had robbed him, he was once more penniless and desperately trying to escape the clutches of crime, give him some money and he'd find a job and become a decent citizen.'

‘Why did you believe him this time?'

‘I haven't said I did.'

‘Surely the story about giving your wife's dressmaker the million pesetas was a lie?'

‘Of course. But I'd never expected to be challenged on that point and had to think up an explanation on the spot. No, I didn't believe him any more than I had previously.'

‘Then why give him the money?'

For the first time, Clough showed some hesitation. ‘The gods call on us to know ourselves. It's easy for them since, being gods, whatever they find in themselves must be virtuous. It's different for us mortals. Knowing ourselves can make us … A rambling way of trying to avoid the humiliating admission that I place far more value on social standing than is reasonable. In mitigation, I can only plead that when I was young, there was never enough money in the house. Poverty – even when relative – leaves a lasting mark. But since most things are double-sided, it can also breed a fierce determination to succeed. It's boasting, but I've succeeded in life.

‘Arriving on this island, it didn't take long to understand that although the expatriate community doesn't have many social levels, it is very far from a classless society. I gather that some years ago, the traditional birth and breeding were the entrée into the top rank, but, as in most other places, standards have declined and money has become the prime requisite. Live in a large house, drive an expensive car, preferably of German manufacture, and one is virtually received anywhere, however boorish one's character. We were received without question – though I hope not despite a tendency to boorishness.

‘When a society measures social values by perceived wealth, its members are never at ease because money, unlike breeding, has no inbuilt permanency; in the old days, the aristocrat could shrug off any number of scandals; the modern parvenu – unless in the entertainment world – dreads even the whiff of one. I was convinced that if people learned that our nephew – which, of course, Neil was not, but gossip prefers fiction to fact – was a convicted criminal, they would tend to ostracize us, at the same time rejoicing in the fact that they did not have criminal nephews. To avoid this, I gave Neil the money on condition he moved out of our lives.'

‘But you have said that each time he made a promise, you disbelieved him.'

‘Because my judgement was not clouded by personal considerations. When it was, I denied all logic and somehow found it possible to hope.'

‘Did you see Señor Lewis again after you gave him the money?'

‘No. I hoped he'd left the island right up to the time you told us he was missing.'

‘That was, perhaps, not unwelcome news?'

Clough smiled bitterly. ‘A barbed question! Do I accept your assessment and incur your even sharper regard, or deny it and risk being branded a hypocrite?'

Alvarez was silent for a moment, then said: ‘Thank you for being so frank.' He stood.

‘I hope you can now appreciate why we both lied to you?'

Vera said: ‘The fact is, Inspector, you never did believe me, did you?'

‘Señora, I never disbelieve a lady until I am forced to do so.'

‘Gallant, but hardly an answer.'

Alvarez said goodbye to Vera and followed Clough through the hall and outside. As he crossed to his car, Phoebe appeared around the side of the house. ‘Are you arresting Larry?' she asked gaily.

‘No, señorita.'

‘What a pity!'

Clough said wryly: ‘Do you have to be quite so disappointed?'

‘But it would have given me something to write to Wendy about.'

‘Arrange your own arrest to ensure a more vivid prose.'

‘Why should the inspector arrest me?'

‘Use your imagination.'

‘And?'

‘Why not try importuning?'

She faced Alvarez. ‘Would you arrest me for that?'

‘I am sorry, I do not know what it means.'

She laughed.

Feeling stupid, he climbed into the car and drove off.

CHAPTER 19

‘Enrique,' Dolores said, ‘you are looking sad.'

Alvarez ate the last spoonful of sopa torrada, checked the earthenware bowl and saw it had been emptied of the chicken and bread soup. If anything, he looked a little sadder.

‘Is something the matter?' Her family was her life and the slightest hint of trouble to any member caused her concern.

‘On Monday, I am going to have to phone the superior chief.'

‘Monday's three days away,' Jaime said. ‘Forget it until then.'

‘How can I forget that in three days' time he is going to go on and on about how incompetent I am?'

‘If he talks like that,' Dolores snapped, ‘he has the wits of a cockroach. Why is such a man your superior chief?'

‘Because the director-general appointed him.'

‘Then the director-general is a bigger fool.'

‘That's possible; they say he's more politician than policeman.'

‘Why should the superior chief say you're incompetent?'

‘I've recently cost the department a lot of wasted money.'

‘They're government. What does the government ever do but waste money?'

‘It wouldn't matter so much if it weren't now clear that the whole investigation has been a waste of time as well.'

‘And is that your fault?'

‘Not really.'

‘Then you do not need to concern yourself.'

‘The superior chief will make certain I am concerned.' Alvarez drained his glass. ‘Anyway, perhaps the truth is that I am incompetent.'

‘Stop speaking such nonsense!'

‘A man with all his wits does not count the flock until certain all the sheep are his.'

‘A man can only do what he thinks is right.' She stood, collected up the dirty plates and carried them through to the kitchen.

‘I don't understand,' said Jaime, as he refilled his glass. He pushed the bottle of wine across the table. ‘Who's lost the sheep?'

‘What sheep?' Alvarez asked, his mind not on the question.

‘The ones that have been stolen and you can't find.'

‘I was just using sheep as a figure of speech. What I meant was, I should have made certain of all the facts before I propounded a theory to explain them.'

‘I still don't understand.'

‘I'm not certain I do either. There's no discernible motive for Lewis's murder, so what probably happened was that he went to the stern of the boat for a pee, fell overboard, and was too tight to save himself. Yet if that was the case, why was he drugged?'

‘If he was stoned hollow, where's the problem?'

‘Not that kind of drug. A Mickey Finn.'

‘Never heard of it.'

‘It's used to dope a potential victim's drink to make it easy to rob him. Lewis was definitely drugged, which virtually confirms that the others were as well.'

‘What others?'

‘His friend and two women.'

Jaime drank deeply and thought. ‘You call yourself a detective?' he finally said, with heavy sarcasm. ‘He meant to make it easy for him and his mate to have fun with the girls, but forgot what he'd put the dope into and drank it along with them. Never thought of that, I suppose?'

‘Can't say I have. But if that's the way things were, how come there was no trace of dope in the remaining whisky and glasses?'

‘How would I know? You think I'm going to do all your work for you?'

*   *   *

Always put off until tomorrow what does not have to be done today. Yet sometimes it had to be done. On Monday morning, Alvarez accepted he would have to ring the superior chief and therefore it would be only sensible to seek the comfort of a couple of brandies with his coffee at the Club Llueso before he did so. Sadly, they did not comfort him sufficiently to make his task any more welcome.

‘The superior chief,' said the superior secretary, ‘is not at work today.' Her tone became solemn. ‘He is ill in bed.'

‘Seriously ill?'

‘You will be grateful to learn that although there is very considerable discomfort, there is no great danger. He strained his back playing golf.'

‘Very unfortunate.'

‘Indeed … Do you wish to speak to Comisario Borne who is temporarily in command?'

‘I don't think so, thank you.'

He said goodbye and rang off. He opened the bottom right-hand drawer of the desk and brought out the bottle and a glass. He poured himself his third brandy of the morning and drank to the game of golf.

*   *   *

He was walking along the lower part of the old square when a voice behind him said: ‘Hullo again.' He turned to face Phoebe. ‘Good afternoon, señorita.'

‘Good evening, señor,' she replied, her tone mocking. ‘Tell me, are you always so formal, or only to someone of whom you disapprove?'