In Vino Veritas (34 page)

The two big men stood looking at the outside of the cottage for a moment before they went to the door. There was no sign of life. But the oak door was answered quickly when they knocked. Vanda North said, ‘I'm getting quite used to seeing you two. This is the second time today. I don't know whether I should be flattered or alarmed.'

Lambert said nothing until they were sitting in the low-ceilinged lounge, with its comfortable sofas and the big television and hi-fi set in opposite corners. As always, his grey eyes fixed steadily upon his quarry. He waited until she was sitting motionless and looking at him before he said tersely, ‘New evidence has come to light, Miss North. We need to know what you can tell us about it.'

‘As ever, I am at your service, though I can't think of anything important that you haven't already had from me.' Beneath the routine politeness, the smiling confidence, she gave the impression that she relished their meetings not as exchanges of information but as intellectual contests.

‘Tell us again where you were last Wednesday night, please.'

A little sigh, just the slightest suggestion that her patience was not inexhaustible. ‘I thought we had cleared up any confusion about that. I was at Jane Beaumont's house, as I told you from the start. I know there was a little confusion on Jane's part, because Martin had her so drugged-up that she wasn't quite sure what she was doing. That had been going on for years and I shan't forgive him for it. I think everyone can see how much better she's beginning to look since he died. I'll tell you whatever you want to know about my colleagues at Abbey Vineyards, but when I see what he did to his wife, I can't regret that Martin's dead.'

She was saying too much, afraid of whatever challenge they had to offer, thought Lambert. He didn't interrupt; there was always the possibility that even such an organized woman might let something slip if she was nervous. He was aware that if she denied him, if she took the obvious course which was open to her, even the police machine might find it difficult to amass the right evidence to bring her to court. But he didn't think she would do that.

Outside, beyond the conservatory, a blackbird was singing and a green woodpecker with a bright red head was exploring the lawn. He saw these things behind her without taking his eyes from her composed, intelligent face. And still neither of the men who sat so upright on the sofa spoke. Vanda North said, ‘You said you had new evidence. Are you now going to acquaint me with it?'

‘A car was seen parked near the scene of this killing at eleven o'clock last Wednesday night.'

‘That is no more than circumstantial evidence, surely?'

Lambert smiled, recognizing the first concession in this macabre little endgame. ‘It is a popular fallacy that no one is convicted on circumstantial evidence. It happens quite often, when the circumstantial evidence is strong enough.'

‘Which hardly seems to be the case here.'

‘As you may remember, we have details of the cars driven by all of the people who are involved in this investigation. In this case there is a match.'

Vanda North nodded and made her last bold play to test their strength. ‘I'm glad to hear it. When you have arrested the gentleman concerned, we shall all be able to get on with our lives again.'

‘The car concerned is a silver-grey metallic Audi saloon. We believe it is the car owned by Mrs Jane Beaumont.'

Hook, studying her now as closely as Lambert, felt a reluctant admiration for the coolness of the woman. There was no obvious sign that she was forcing the smile she gave them as she said, ‘What you believe and what is fact may be a long way apart. Jane Beaumont was at home in her bed at the time of the murder. I have already told you that. I am prepared to testify to it in court, if necessary.'

Lambert was inexorable, sensing now that he had her in a corner, that in the crisis she was not going to let her new friend suffer for her. ‘Your testimony would not be worth very much, as you were not in the house at the time.'

‘Jane will tell you that I was. I believe she has already told you so.'

‘She was in bed and asleep at the time of her husband's death.'

‘I'm glad that you admit that. The presence of a similar car to hers at the scene of the crime has no connection with Jane Beaumont.'

‘It was Mrs Beaumont's Audi which was in Howler's Heath at the time of the killing. I said that she owned it. I did not say that she was driving it on this occasion.'

‘This gets more outlandish by the minute. Do I understand that you're now suggesting that some person unknown stole Jane's car and—'

‘No!' Lambert's denial was like a gunshot in the quiet room. ‘I'm stating, not suggesting, that, without Mrs Beaumont's knowledge, you drove out to an assignation with Martin Beaumont. That you shot him through the head with his own pistol.'

She looked him fiercely in the face for several seconds, in what had become a contest of wills. Then, with a sigh which was scarcely audible, she acknowledged that there was nowhere for her to go now. ‘He'd arranged the meeting, not me. I didn't intend to kill him when I went there.'

They could hear the beginnings of a defence plea in court here, but that was not their concern. They wanted an arrest and a conclusion to their involvement. It was DS Hook, speaking as though he were neutral in this battle of opposing wills, who said softly, ‘It's over, Miss North. You should tell us now about what happened last Wednesday night.'

She stared at him in surprise for a moment, as if she had forgotten his presence in the intensity of her duel with Lambert. Then she spoke in a steady monotone, like one under hypnosis. ‘Martin asked me to meet him in that place and at that time. I asked him why he had to be so secretive about it, but he said he didn't want the rest of his staff at Abbey Vineyards to know about the meeting. I thought he was going to make some offer to me about the withdrawal of my capital from the firm. That's why the secrecy made sense. Martin regarded any concession as a mark of weakness, so I could understand that he wouldn't want others to know about it.'

She turned her head for a moment to look at the bright sunlight and the rich green of her lawn outside the house, as if realizing for the first time that these things were going to be denied to her. Then she resumed her trance-like monologue. ‘Martin wasn't making any concessions at all. He wanted to warn me off any friendship with his wife, any attempt to rescue Jane from the prison without walls in which he held her. He said he wasn't going to buy me out of the company and he would make very sure that Jane didn't get her divorce.

‘I think I said that he couldn't do that nowadays, that the laws of the land would allow Jane to escape him. That's when he reached for the pistol. I knew from my years with him that he always kept it in the driver's door of his car, hidden under a windscreen cloth, but for a moment I couldn't move: it felt as if someone had frozen my limbs. He waved the pistol in my face. He shouted at me that he wouldn't allow anything to threaten the future of Abbey Vineyards. He'd always been irrational about the business, almost as if it were a child of his, living and breathing. I believed him. I believe he was threatening that he would kill Jane or me if we damaged the firm. That was when I panicked. I grabbed at the gun and it went off.'

Beaumont had been shot very precisely through the temple. Lambert wondered if that would have happened, in the sort of struggle she described. But that was for others to argue, months later and in the solemnity of a criminal court. Sinuous minds, well versed in the law, would explore the plea of self-defence, perhaps the reduced charge of manslaughter, over days, maybe weeks.

That was not the concern here. Hook stepped forward and announced formally that Vanda North was being arrested for the murder of Martin Beaumont. She listened to the familiar words of arrest and the caution about prejudicing her defence if she withheld information, as if they fascinated her.

They led her to the door and the waiting police car. It was not until the door was opened for her that she stopped suddenly, as if she felt the need to explain her confession, ‘I love Jane. I couldn't allow anything to happen to her, could I? We would have built a life together.'

Five minutes later, when she was sitting very upright in the back of the car with Lambert beside her, she said, as if there had been no pause, ‘Maybe we still will, in a little while. Jane has a lot of life left to live, now that Martin's gone.'