Evil Angels Among Them (21 page)

‘Yes, of course,' said David. ‘We'll go right now.'

Becca found Gill calm and Lou in a state verging on frenzy. ‘I sorted the little shit out,' Lou told Becca. ‘I told him to piss off, in no uncertain terms.' She gave a demonstration, hands on hips and a ferocious look on her face. ‘“Bugger off,” I said, “and don't come back! Mrs English and her solicitor will come to you when they're good and ready.”'

The thought of Lou, tiny and fierce, seeing off a large policeman was so funny that Becca had consciously to keep from smiling.

‘It was a sight to behold,' Gill said dryly. ‘She was more than a match for him, I can tell you. But I thought I'd better let David know.'

Lucy and David, having found Becca's note, arrived shortly after she did, and had the story repeated to them. ‘And he'd better not come back,' Lou finished, scowling. ‘I'm not afraid of him, with his tight trousers and his big truncheon. He obviously thinks with his truncheon, that one.'

David laughed. ‘Well put.'

Gill, mindful of Bryony, gave them a warning look. ‘Would you like some coffee?' she asked quickly.

While Gill went to put the kettle on, David drew Becca to one side. ‘You haven't had a chance to talk to her, have you?'

‘Not yet,' Becca admitted. ‘But I was thinking – have you talked to her on her own? Maybe there's something she doesn't want to say in front of Lou.'

He recognised the truth in that as soon as she'd said it. ‘You're brilliant!' he whispered. ‘If I can only get her alone . . .'

Becca thought for a minute. ‘I could take Lou to the Rectory,' she offered. ‘Would that help?'

‘Perfect. If you can see to that, I can take care of the rest.'

They followed the others into the kitchen. ‘I was just about to offer everyone some sandwiches for lunch,' Gill was saying. ‘But I've suddenly realised that in all the excitement this week, I haven't been to the shops and I'm just about out of bread.'

Becca seized the opportunity. ‘You can all come to the Rectory for lunch,' she offered.

‘Me, too?' asked Bryony.

‘Of course.'

The little girl beamed. ‘Yes, please.'

‘It's very kind of you,' said Gill.

But as they prepared to go, David put a detaining hand on Gill's arm. ‘We'll be along in a few minutes,' he said. ‘I need to have a private word with my client.'

In a short while the others had gone; Gill carried on making coffee as though nothing had happened. ‘Milk? Sugar?' she offered.

‘Just black, thanks.' David waited while she poured out the coffee and sat down across from him, cupping her large, capable hands round her mug and looking at him questioningly. ‘Now, then,' he said. ‘I think you know what this is about, Gill. I think you're keeping something from me, and I reckon that it's because of Lou.'

‘What do you mean?' she asked calmly.

‘I think that there's something you don't want her to know, or that you're trying to protect her from. Am I right?'

Gill sighed and sipped her coffee. ‘You're right,' she said. ‘At least partly.'

‘I'm waiting.'

‘It's just that – well, in spite of what I said before, I had what some people might construe as a good motive, or at least some sort of a motive, for killing Flora.'

‘What people?' David asked sharply. ‘The police, for instance?'

‘Possibly,' she acknowledged.

He leaned back in his chair, fighting the impulse to rush her. ‘Start at the beginning,' he ordered.

Gill related the whole story, rationally and composedly. She had a good memory for such things and was able to recall the substance of her conversation with Flora in some detail. ‘I don't suppose you can imagine me in a towering rage,' she concluded with a small smile. ‘But I can assure you that I was in one. It was almost as if I were outside myself, watching myself screaming at her. But she was threatening my child, threatening the security of our family. I think I
could
have killed her at that moment. But I didn't. I just let her die instead, and I've got to live with that.'

David wasn't going to let her forget her subsequent sins. ‘And you lied to the police, and lied to me.'

‘Well.' She ran her finger round the rim of her coffee mug, considering. ‘I prefer to think of it as not telling the whole truth.'

‘Same thing.' David leaned forward to emphasise his words. ‘You've got to come clean now, you know. You've got to make a statement to the police telling the whole truth, and you've got to tell Lou.'

‘Oh, no!' For a moment she seemed startled out of her self-possession. ‘I can't tell Lou! She would – well, you heard what she did to that policeman this morning. Can you imagine what she'd do to Enid Bletsoe if she knew?'

‘You can't protect her from the truth,' he said insistently. ‘Surely you can see that? For one thing, these allegations of Enid's: they involve Lou as well. She needs to know about them. And it can't be a good thing for your relationship to keep secrets like that. In the end it will only come between you.'

‘Yes, I see.' Gill sighed. ‘I'll have to tell her, then.'

‘Today, soon. And then we'll draft a statement for the police.'

She was silent for a moment, thinking. ‘Will you come with me when I tell her? I think it would be better if we weren't alone. Bryony mustn't know, of course, but – I think I'd like to tell Lucy and Becca as well. They'll have to know eventually, and it would be better if I told them all.'

David nodded. ‘The sooner the better. Why don't we go to the Rectory right now and get it over with?'

Things didn't go strictly to plan, though. As they were leaving Foxglove Cottage, David spotted a police car in the drive of The Pines and a moment later Sergeant John Spring emerged, a bemused grin on his face.

‘Why don't you go on ahead to the Rectory and I'll catch up with you in a few minutes?' David suggested to Gill in a hurried whisper. ‘I'd like to have a word with the sergeant.'

Gill complied, and David crossed the road.

‘Dave!' John Spring greeted him. ‘Just the bloke I wanted to see, and here you are!'

‘Have you got a few minutes for a chat?' suggested David.

‘You bet, mate. Fancy a drink at the Queen's Head?'

‘All right,' David agreed. ‘I'm buying.'

It was an unseasonably warm day, so they were able to carry their pints to a table in the garden of the Queen's Head where they were unlikely to be overheard. David knew that some report of the previous night's conquest was inevitable, and it wasn't long in coming.

‘Not that I wouldn't rather go back to the Crown and Mitre,' Spring mused. ‘Jolly good pub, that, and a smashing clientele.' He shook his head reminiscently. ‘What a corker, that Cynth. Knows how to give a bloke a good time, I don't have to tell you. The things that girl doesn't know about pleasing a man just aren't worth knowing. The windows of my car are still steamed up,' he added with a grin.

‘A very nice-looking girl,' David said neutrally.

‘Nice-looking! Dave, that's not the word. Didn't you get a look at her knockers? Weren't they the most smashing pair you've ever seen?' Fortunately no reply was required; Spring went on, ‘Trouble with you, Dave, is you're too strait-laced. You need to break out a bit, have a bit of fun. Now I could see that Cynth's friend Lisa really fancied you. Quiet little thing, seemed prim and proper, but she had a kid, didn't she? So she wasn't as pure as she'd like to let on. You could have had it off with her, Dave, and your Lucy none the wiser for it. Stick around with me a bit, mate. I'll see to it that you have a bit of fun now and again.'

David moved his glass around on the weathered pine table, leaving damp stains on the wood. ‘I'm not really in Walston to have fun,' he reminded Spring with a wry smile to take the sting out of his words. ‘I'm here on business, and it's serious business.'

‘Ah, yes. That client of yours.' Spring lowered his voice and looked round. ‘That's what I wanted to talk to you about. She's in a hell of a lot of trouble, Dave.'

‘How so?'

‘Well, you know that she told me she didn't have any motive for poisoning the old bag? Turns out she had a hell of a motive.'

‘Oh, yes?' David raised his eyebrows, inviting him to go on.

‘I suppose you heard how I went there this morning and that little gal sent me packing?' He laughed, amused by the situation. ‘A real little spitfire she is – I wouldn't want to cross her. I was afraid she'd scratch my eyes out, or kick me in the family jewels. So I cut my losses and went to see the doc, like I told you I was going to. He didn't want to tell me, but I finally got it out of him. It was the old bag across the street, Enid Bletsoe, that gave him the tip-off, told him that Flora Newall had been poisoned. So I dropped in to see her, and you won't believe what she told me.'

‘Try me,' David invited.

‘She told me that she knew all along that your client had poisoned her, and why. Flora Newall was a social worker and she was threatening to take Mrs English's kiddie into care. Because the old bag Mrs Bletsoe had filed a complaint to say that the kiddie was being abused. That's it in a nutshell, Dave.' He grinned with relish.

David, profoundly glad that he wasn't as surprised by this information as Spring had hoped, decided not to reveal how much he knew. ‘That's very interesting,' he said cautiously.

‘And besides that, she said, your client grows poisonous plants – just look at the name of her cottage.'

‘That doesn't prove anything,' David pointed out. ‘From what I understand, she inherited the name of the cottage when she bought it.'

‘And,' Spring went on, undeterred, ‘apparently some other bloke in the village had a heart attack not long ago. Mrs Bletsoe reckons he was poisoned too, only he didn't die.'

‘That,' said David, beginning to get angry, ‘is a malicious and unsupported lie. Mrs Bletsoe ought to be ashamed of herself for spreading such rubbish.'

‘Hold on to your hair, Dave,' Spring grinned. ‘I'm just telling you what she said. I didn't say that I believed her. But any way you cut it, mate, your client is in trouble.' He spread his hands on the table for emphasis. ‘I'll put it to you straight, Dave. There's no one else in the picture. Everything points to your Mrs English and no one else. The timing – Miss Newall had to have been poisoned during the time she was at Foxglove Cottage, according to the toxicologist. And we know it was no accident. All those jars of leaves have been tested and there was no trace of foxglove in them.'

‘I could have told you that.' David tried not to sound scornful. ‘Don't forget that Mrs English drank some of the tea herself and didn't seem to have suffered any ill effects.'

‘The first lot, yes,' Spring pointed out with unusual perspicacity. ‘But she says she made up a special brew to settle Miss Newall's upset stomach. They've tested that jar as well, and it was perfectly okay. No foxglove. That means no accident. And now that we've got a motive, your Mrs English is well and truly stitched up, Dave.'

David digested the information for a moment. ‘But you have no proof,' he said at last. ‘Nothing but circumstantial evidence. You haven't got enough to charge her.'

‘Don't worry, mate. We'll get it. It's only a matter of time.'

‘Why are you telling me this?' David asked shrewdly. ‘It's not just because we're friends, is it?'

‘Dave!' Spring put on a hurt expression. ‘How can you doubt me?' When David continued to regard him with a sceptical smile, he lowered his voice. ‘Okay, Dave, I'll put it to you straight. I want you to get her to confess.'

‘Confess?' David echoed, unbelieving.

‘Don't you see, it's the best way? She's obviously guilty as hell, and we'll get her in the end. But if she confesses now, we can do a deal. Go easy on her. Manslaughter, and she'd be out in a few years.'

David shook his head. ‘She's not guilty, John.'

‘Come on, Dave! It's as plain as the nose on your face that she did it – the old bag was going to take her kiddie away, so she poisoned her. Just get her to confess and we'll all be better off. And do it soon or it will be too late.'

‘What's in it for you?' David wanted to know. ‘I can't believe that you're that interested in my client's welfare.'

Spring sighed and drained his glass. ‘If you want to know the truth, Dave, I'd like to get it all sorted while I'm still on this case,' he admitted. ‘It'll look good for me if I can get a confession – help me to get promotion. Now that this has developed into a full murder enquiry, one of the chief inspectors will be taking over soon and it will be out of my hands.' He gave David a sly look over the rim of the empty glass. ‘And I won't be able to help
you
any longer, mate, if I'm not on the case. No more information.'

David understood exactly the position in which Spring found himself. ‘I'll see,' he said noncommittally, standing up and offering his hand. ‘Thanks for being honest with me. And I'll be in touch, John.'

‘Just a minute, Dave.' Spring scrabbled in his pockets for a scrap of paper and a stub of a pencil, then wrote down a number and handed it to David. ‘My home number,' he said. ‘Ring me any time, day or night. But you'd better make sure you do it soon.'

By the time David got to the Rectory, Gill had managed to impart the crucial information to Lou in the presence of Lucy, Becca and Stephen, while Bryony played in the garden. Lou was, of course, upset, but the public nature of the confession made it difficult for her to react as she would have done in private, and Gill was cheered by everyone's warm support.