Mrs, Presumed Dead (19 page)

There was such a thing, Mrs Pargeter reflected after her guest had left, as protesting too much. She might have suspected some of that was going on from the way Sue badmouthed her boss, even if she hadn't seen them together looking so intimate in that pub but as it was . . .

So Sue was trying to throw people off the scent about her relationship with Geoff. Might not that suggest that her 'working late at the office' was as much of a euphemism as the expression traditionally is . . . ?

And might not knowledge of her affair be just the sort of ammunition her lawyer husband would seize on in his battle to gain custody of their children . . . ? Even to the extent of playing on the undoubted colour prejudice there was around . . . ?

Suppose Theresa Cotton had known about the affair and 'cleared her mind of grudges and resentments' by telling Sue that she knew . . .

And suppose Sue had translated Theresa's words into a threat to tell all to her husband . . .

Given the ferocity with which she was determined to hang on to her children, it looked as if Sue Curle was another Smithy's Loam resident with a possible motive for murder.

CHAPTER 34

Of course, there was someone else in Smithy's Loam who might be capable of a totally irrational act like murder. Jane Watson gave every appearance of being completely mad, and, in her paranoid delusions, the permanent removal of someone who represented a threat to her might seem completely logical.

But Mrs Pargeter didn't like that conclusion. For a start, she had a strong prejudice against murders committed by people who were mad. She had always disliked them in crime fiction and didn't care for them much in real life. Madness was so vague, so woolly. Any motivation and logic could be ascribed to someone who was mad. At the end of a crime book in which a madman dunnit, Mrs Pargeter always felt cheated and annoyed.

Apart from anything else, the murder of Theresa Cotton did not look like the work of someone unhinged. It had not been an irrational act; rather the reverse, it had been a supremely rational act. Putting on one side for a moment the theory that the taking of human life is an act of madness under any circumstances, the strangling had been well thought out and executed.

No, it was simplistic to say: Jane Watson appears to be mad, therefore Jane Watson must have killed Theresa Cotton.

Anyway, even madness has its logic. There are reasons behind most irrational behaviour, even though those reasons often only make sense to the perpetrator of that behaviour. What Jane Watson had said to Mrs Pargeter had contained an internal logic for her, if not for anyone else.

And the more Mrs Pargeter thought about their encounter inside 'Hibiscus', the more she seemed to see a logic running through Jane Watson's behaviour. Jane had not randomly identified Mrs Pargeter as an enemy; something in her visitor's actions or behaviour had triggered that response.

Mrs Pargeter concentrated hard, and thought through everything that had happened that morning, and everything that had happened on every other occasion when her path had crossed with that of Jane Watson.

It took about ten minutes of thinking back, recreating the scenes, remembering the minutiae, and then suddenly all became clear.

The important encounter had been the one a few weeks before when Mrs Pargeter had gone across to see Fiona Burchfield-Brown and check on the identity of Theresa Cotton's first bearded visitor. As she came out of 'High Bushes' she had almost bumped into Jane Watson. And Jane Watson had looked at her and run away as if scared out of her wits.

What Mrs Pargeter had forgotten until that moment was what she had been carrying on that occasion. Held against her chest had been the booklets of the Church of Utter Simplicity.

She began to see daylight. If one identified the 'them' of Jane Watson's paranoid ramblings with the members of the Church, a kind of logic emerged.

The police informer agreed that it was not his usual line of work. But, still, he worked a lot on the telephone and yes, of course he'd do it. Anything that the widow of the late Mr Pargeter required, whatever it was, no problem, he'd be happy to oblige.

'Say you're a television researcher,' said Mrs Pargeter. 'OK.'

'And say you're researching a programme into dubious religious sects. And say that your aim is to expose some of the things they do . . . like brainwashing, or putting obstacles in the way of people who want to leave.'

'Right you are.'

'Do assure her that your aim is to have these abuses put right. And assure her that anything she says will be treated in absolute confidence, that nobody will ever know she told you . . .'

'OK'

'Say I gave you her name . . .'

'You, Mrs Pargeter?'

'That's right. Say that I am determined to have the practices of this kind of place stopped at all costs . . .'

'Anything else?'

'That'll do for the time being. Ring me back and tell me how she takes it.'

'OK'

He rang half an hour later. 'Sorry I couldn't get back to you before. She talked.'

'Had a lot to say?'

'You could put it like that, Mrs Pargeter, yes. Very difficult to stop her once she got started. Pretty highly strung lady, I'd say.'

Yes, highly strung, thought Mrs Pargeter, but not mad.

'Anyway, I got it all. That Church does sound a pretty dodgy set-up, I must say.'

'They wouldn't let her leave?'

'That seemed to be her main problem, yes. Apparently even now, five years after she got out, she still lives in fear that they're sending off people to fetch her back in.'

Yes, it all fitted. Mrs Pargeter thanked her unseen assistant profusely, and once again received assurances that, after all the late Mrs Pargeter had done for him, nothing was too much trouble.

'No, I can fully understand,' said Mrs Pargeter, trying to stem Jane Watson's flow.

'I'm sorry, but once I finally did get out of that place, I cracked up completely. You know, a really major breakdown. Lasted eighteen months or so. But I had help and drugs and things and gradually I began to come out of it. And then I met Roger and we got married and moved here, and I really thought things'd be all right. I mean, I was still in a strange state . . . you know, afraid of people, terrified of making contact. I'd just lost all my confidence about dealing with things. But Roger's wonderfully supportive, I'm so lucky. And I really thought I was getting better.'

'Until Theresa mentioned that she was going to join the Church, too.'

Jane Watson became suddenly devious. 'I didn't say she said that.'

'No, but—'

'No, actually, the thing that sparked it all off again was seeing someone from . . . someone from . . .' She couldn't bring herself to say the words. '. . . someone from that place, here, in Smithy's Loam.'

'Brother Brian?'

Jane Watson nodded. 'I saw him going up Theresa's front path. I thought he was coming for me and had gone to the wrong house. I'm afraid I just went. Instantly I was right back like at the beginning of the breakdown. I hid. I locked myself in the lavatory.'

'But Brother Brian didn't come to your door, did he?'

'No, but I was convinced they were on to me. I was convinced that they'd tracked me down. And I thought they'd take me away from my house and from Roger and—'

'They haven't got the power to do that, Jane.'

'Oh, they have. They're very powerful, Mrs Pargeter, very persuasive.'

'Yes, but you've got free of them, you really have. You've broken away and made your own life, outside the Church of Utter Simplicity.'

'I know,' said Jane. 'I know I have.' She didn't sound very convinced by her assertion. 'But when I see them again, I just feel utterly powerless.'

'You'll be all right,' Mrs Pargeter soothed. 'Even if they did know where you are, they'd have given you up as a bad job by now. Anyway, they got all your money when you joined, didn't they?'

The woman nodded.

'That's all they're really interested in.'

'Yes, but now I'm well-off again. I mean, Roger's got a good job and . . .'

'Jane, that is your husband's money. He's not going to give it to some loony sect, is he?'

'No, no, I suppose not. I'm sorry, I do just panic when I see anything to do with them. I'm not rational.'

'Which is why you rushed away when you saw me carrying their leaflets?'

'Exactly. I thought you were another one. I just get so confused, I'm not really responsible for what I do.'

'Listen . . .' Mrs Pargeter took the woman's trembling hand. 'It's all right. You're quite safe here. There's no one out to get you.'

'No?'

'No.'

'Oh, I know you're right. I still just panic when I meet people.'

'Well, you needn't. Come on, you must get to know your neighbours. They don't mean you any harm. They can even help you.'

Jane didn't look convinced by this assertion. Mrs Pargeter wondered how much she was convinced by it herself. One at least of the other Smithy's Loam residents had proved unhelpful to the point of murdering someone.

Unless, of course, it had been Jane herself.

'Tell me,' Mrs Pargeter began in a tranquillising tone, 'what happened that day Theresa left?'

'Mm?' Jane looked at her blankly, as if she had just dragged back from another plane of being.

'The day you saw Brother Brian . . . ?'

'I don't know. As I say, I just panicked. I took a lot of these pills the doctor had given me.'

'Tranquillisers?'

'That kind of thing, yes. They make me all woozy. I don't really know what I'm doing when I have a lot of them. Just walk around in a dream.'

'Hm. And did Theresa come and see you?'

'When?'

'That evening. The evening after you'd seen Brother Brian. She went round and said goodbye to everyone else in the close.'

'Oh.'

'Did she come and see you?'

'Yes. I can't remember. Maybe she did. I think so.'

'Came just to say goodbye.'

'That's right.' said Jane Watson, nodding her head slowly in confirmation. 'Just to say goodbye.'

No, Jane Watson couldn't be ruled out, either. True, the heavily tranquillised state she was in on the night of the murder did not fit in well with the meticulousness of the crime.

But then there was no guarantee that she was telling the truth about what had happened.

And, given Jane Watson's terror of being taken back there, Theresa Cotton might only have needed to mention the Church of Utter Simplicity to sign her own death warrant.

CHAPTER 35

Which really just left Fiona Burchfield-Brown.

Mrs Pargeter wondered whether there could be anything that Theresa Cotton had challenged Fiona Burchfield-Brown with when she visited her on the night before her death. Fiona seemed so aristocratically bumbling, so earnestly incompetent, so transparent, that it was hard to imagine her as the possessor of a guilty secret. But Mrs Pargeter was far too canny an old bird to be deceived by appearances.

She settled down that evening over a large vodka Campari to think about what might worry Fiona Burchfield-Brown.

It didn't take long for her to decide to ring Truffler Mason. He had after all investigated the residents of Smithy's Loam in his search for Rod. Was it possible that his Welsh 'market researcher' had come up with something that might be relevant?

His voice sounded as mournful as ever, but it contained no trace of resentment. He was still quite happy to give Mrs Pargeter any assistance she might require.

'I'll ask and get back to you,' she said. Then, with a note of concern in his voice, he continued. 'Does this mean, Mrs Pargeter, that you're still on the case . . . ?'

'Well . . .'

'I thought the husband-kills-wife scenario was a bit obvious myself.'

'I think it's just worth my asking around a bit.' Mrs Pargeter conceded cautiously. 'You know, see if I get any leads.'

'Hmm. All right. But you be careful.'

'What do you mean, Truffler? I'm not in any danger.'

'Don't you believe it. You're up against someone completely ruthless.'

'Yes, but I'll keep a low profile and—'

'Look, the murderer has already killed two people to keep whatever secret it is quiet.'

'Two?'

'Well, I'd have said quite possibly two, yes, Mrs Pargeter. Do you really think Rod Cotton fell in the Thames by mistake?'

'I had assumed that, yes. Or it might have been suicide. I mean, he was in such a hopeless state, he had no idea what he was doing. He'd already fallen and had one accident. He could hardly stand up straight.'

'Make him all the easier to push in, wouldn't it?'

'I hadn't thought of that.'

'Look, Mrs Pargeter, you've established that the murderer knew about what had happened to Rod Cotton . . .'

'I think so, yes.'

'Must be right. Only someone who knew the state he was in would have dared to dispose of the body that way. The murderer was counting on the fact that either the police wouldn't be able to find Rod Cotton or that, if they did, they wouldn't be able to get any sense out of him . . .'

'Yes, I suppose you're right.'

'So if Rod had made contact with the murderer recently, the murderer might have reckoned he knew too much for safety.'

'But why would Rod make contact?'

'I don't know. Maybe because of something you said when you talked to him . . .'

'Oh, good heavens, I never thought of that.'

'I may be wrong. All I'm saying, Mrs Pargeter, is that you're up against someone who won't hesitate to use violence again. So, if you are planning any heroics— '

'I don't think heroics are my style at all,' said Mrs Pargeter coyly.

'From what I've seen of you, I think they just might be. Anyway, if you are planning any kind of confrontation, make sure that I'm around.'

'Very well.' She spoke contritely, like an obedient little girl. It was rather comforting, though, the thought that she had a protector on hand when she needed one. Comfortingly familiar – it was, after all, a feeling she got used to while the late Mr Pargeter had been alive.