The Blood Pit (13 page)

Rachel had hovered outside the shop for a while, looking in the window, coveting a saggy handbag made of leather soft as silk.
But she had never spent a three figure sum on a handbag in her life and her thrifty upbringing on the farm ensured that she
didn’t consider the option seriously now. Besides, the rent on the cottage she shared with Trish was due … and the electricity
bill.

She tore her eyes away from the temptations of the window as Trish opened the shop door. A bell jangled somewhere in the back
and a woman appeared. She was stick thin and her leathery skin suggested that she’d spent too much time on sunbeds over the
years. Her coarse, dead straight, blonde hair was a couple of shades lighter than Rachel’s own. But then Rachel didn’t have
to resort to the bottle. It was hard to
guess her age, but there was no doubt that she was older than she’d like to be.

She looked at the two policewomen enquiringly with a smile that bordered on the obsequious. But the smile disappeared when
they introduced themselves, asked her if she was Betina Betis and said they’d be grateful for a word in private.

Betina whispered a few words to her assistant – a girl in her own image but with twenty years advantage – before leading Rachel
through to the back of the shop, past racks of colourful designer dresses to a neat little kitchen. There was a small melamine
table and Rachel and Trish were invited to sit. The woman’s manners were stiff but impeccable. Rachel wondered what she was
hiding.

When it was clear that tea or coffee wasn’t going to be offered, Rachel came straight to the point. ‘You’ll know that Annette
Marrick’s husband was found murdered on Wednesday?’

‘You can’t really avoid it, can you? It’s been on every news bulletin. It must be awful for poor Annette.’

‘You’ve spoken to her since it happened?’

Betina shook her head. ‘You don’t know what to say, do you? I sent her a sympathy card.’

Betina Betis wasn’t a good liar. Somehow Rachel knew that she wasn’t telling the truth when she said she’d had no contact
with Annette.

‘Tell me about Charles Marrick,’ she said, tilting her head to one side. ‘What kind of man was he?’

Betina gave the question some consideration. Then she said, ‘I must admit, I didn’t like him very much.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘We mustn’t speak ill of the dead, must we? Bad manners and all that … or bad luck … can’t remember which. And to be truthful,
I hardly knew him. Only met him a couple of times.’ She gave Rachel a small, apologetic smile which
suggested that she’d said all that she was going to say on the matter.

‘In a murder enquiry, we do need people to be honest with us,’ said Trish, speaking for the first time. ‘If we get to know
the victim, it can help us find out who killed him and why.’

This didn’t seem to go down well with Betina. She shook her blonde head and kept her mouth tight shut. She either couldn’t
or wouldn’t dish the dirt on Charlie Marrick. And all Rachel’s instincts told her that there was a lot of dirt to dish.

‘Where were you on Wednesday afternoon?’

Betina was prepared for this question. She answered it with all the confidence of a child reciting a poem she’d learned by
heart. ‘Annette and I met for lunch then we went to Celia’s yacht. We shared a bottle of Chardonnay – or two – and discussed
a charity dinner we’re organising.’ Her eyes darted from one woman to the other, anxious to be believed.

‘What time did Annette leave?’

‘I can’t really remember. We had a lot to discuss. It must have been just before I did … around four thirty … five. Something
like that. Sorry I can’t remember exactly.’

Rachel forced herself to smile, hiding her irritation. ‘Perhaps Ms Dawn will remember.’

There was a flash of something that Rachel suspected was alarm in Betina’s eyes, there for a split second then gone. ‘I don’t
think she’ll be able to tell you any more than I can. Really I don’t.’

Rachel knew she had to speak to Celia Dawn. But doing it before Betina had a chance to contact her to get their story straight
might be a tall order.

They left the shop and made straight for Burton’s Butties. They’d grab some lunch and make straight for Celia Dawn’s place.

*

‘I feel like a regular customer,’ Gerry Heffernan said with satisfaction as Wesley parked the car outside Le Petit Poisson.

‘But hardly a valued one,’ Wesley replied, looking at his watch. It was almost eleven o’clock. ‘Maybe we should have come here
before we went to see Pinney,’ he sighed. ‘They’ll be getting ready for lunch.’

Heffernan gave a wicked grin. ‘Flustered … that’s just how I want him.’

Wesley smiled and shook his head. There were many ways of catching suspects off their guard … and Gerry Heffernan knew all
of them.

‘You ready for your jaunt tonight? What is it? Romantic meal for two and a night in the honeymoon suite?’ He gave Wesley a
nudge and winked theatrically.

‘Something like that. Pity I’ve got to turn in for work tomorrow.’

‘Aye. It was inconsiderate of Marrick getting murdered like that. Take your time tomorrow, eh Wes. I’m sure we can cope for
an hour or two,’ Heffernan said with a benign grin.

When they finally arrived at Le Petit Poisson, they were told that Chef wasn’t there but he’d be back that evening for the
Saturday night rush. Wesley felt a little annoyed with himself for not considering this possibility. As a young child he’d
gone through a phase of believing that his teachers actually lived at the school and, in the same way, he’d assumed that the
great chef spent all his waking hours in his kitchen. Perhaps the fact that his home life and family were never mentioned
on his TV programme had helped this assumption. But now they’d been given his home address they turned the car round and drove
back through Tradmouth then out to the small village of Ashworthy – a tiny settlement that in times gone by had been considered
too small to deserve a church or a pub.

The Colbert residence was a converted farmhouse acquired by the chef when the resident farmer, traumatised by the
foot and mouth outbreak, cashed in his remaining assets and retired to the seaside. Modernised to a high specification, the
rambling old house set in the rolling Devon fields with its huge modern kitchen, gleaming paintwork and gravel forecourt where
the farmyard had once been, had shed its slurry pits, oily tractors, smelly livestock and acres of land to become the sanitised
version of the farmhouse, fit for city folk to live in. There were so many houses like this now in the south-west – snapped
up by downsizing Londoners or the simply rich who had no roots in the rich Devon soil. Rachel Tracey, Wesley knew, resented
the newcomers. And if Wesley had come from a family like hers, he might just have felt the same.

The door was answered by a slim woman with glossy black hair and a slightly oriental appearance. She wore tight-fitting jeans
and a white T-shirt and she was beautiful enough to render Gerry Heffernan speechless. When Wesley asked if they could have
a word with Monsieur Colbert, she led the way into a cavernous kitchen with an Aga against one wall and a monumental steel
fridge against the other. The cupboards were hand painted and expensive and Fabrice Colbert was sitting at a breakfast bar
in the centre of the room, sipping a cappuccino and reading a tabloid newspaper. When he saw the two policemen enter, he slid
off his tall stool and asked them if they wanted a coffee. Marie would get them one. No problem.

The chef seemed more relaxed than he had done in his restaurant. Perhaps he didn’t know that what he thought of as his cast-iron
alibi had, like all cast iron, a tendency to develop cracks.

Wesley and Heffernan accepted the coffee. They both felt they needed a rush of caffeine to stimulate the brain. Marie wasn’t
introduced to them so they were a little unsure of her status – whether she was wife, partner, friend, mistress or up-market
domestic help. Wesley wondered whether to
ask but, before he had a chance, his boss began to speak and the moment was lost.

Heffernan came straight to the point. ‘We’ve checked out your alibi for Charles Marrick’s murder. Not very satisfactory is
it?’

Colbert, still relaxed, gave a classic Gallic shrug. ‘You tell me. If I’d known I was going to need an alibi I would have
been careful to get a good one. But as I am innocent and I did not know Charlie was dead until the next day …’

Heffernan asked him to go over his story again, looking for discrepancies. There were none which meant either he had a very
good memory for what he’d told the police before or he was telling the truth.

It was Wesley who asked the next question. ‘Have you ever heard of a man called Darren Collins?’

Wesley watched the man carefully and saw a flash of something that looked like panic flicker in his eyes, swiftly suppressed.

‘No,’ Colbert replied. He made a great show of thinking for a few moments. ‘Did he work in my kitchen? Some of the staff do
not stay for long and I cannot be expected to remember their names. And we have washers-up and …’

‘So the name means nothing to you?’

The chef shook his head. ‘As I said, someone of that name might well have worked in my kitchen for a short time but … No, the
name means nothing to me.’

Wesley felt he had to fill the time, to justify their visit, so he asked him again about his relationship with Charles Marrick,
going over old ground, listening for any slip that digressed from the authorised version. But Fabrice Colbert was word perfect.
And calm. There was no tempestuous kitchen devil here – he had been left behind at Le Petit Poisson. Wesley had suspected
from the beginning that the whole thing was an elaborate act. The punters expected a temperamental French chef and that’s
exactly what they got.

Their coffee cups were empty and there was no sign of Marie to provide a refill. Wesley stood up. ‘I think that’s all for
now, sir. Thanks for your co-operation.’ He glanced at Heffernan who was smiling benignly as he admired the view from the
kitchen window. ‘Er … I know this is a bit of a cheek but you know that recipe for crème brulée you did on your last TV show
… ?’

Colbert nodded. ‘What about it?’

‘Well my wife took it down and now she can’t find it. I just wondered if you’d be good enough to write it out for her. I’m
sorry to trouble you but …’ He took a chubby pen wrapped in a sheet of folded paper from his inside pocket and passed them
to Colbert.

Wesley made suitably grateful noises as Colbert scribbled down the recipe. Then, as he rolled the recipe up carefully around
the pen, he thanked him again. With an ego such as Colbert’s a bit of humility never came amiss. The man would end up thinking
he had the local police in his pocket. And that’s exactly what Wesley wanted him to believe.

By the time they took their leave, Fabrice Colbert was all smiles. And Wesley had the recipe – together with the pen Colbert
had used to write it – safe in his pocket.

As they drove off, Fabrice Colbert watched as their car disappeared down the drive before picking up the telephone receiver
and dialling a number he knew off by heart.

While his father was consorting with prominent chefs, Sam Heffernan sat in the passenger seat of the Land Rover. He glanced
at the man beside him in the driver’s seat. At thirty-one, Simon was the youngest partner in the practice. He was dressed
for the countryside as usual in an ageing Barbour and brown corduroy trousers and Sam knew his overalls and wellingtons were
in the back of the car, along with Sam’s own. Fashion went by the board when you were standing in some manure-ridden barn with
your arm up a cow’s backside.

Simon turned the vehicle on to a dark lane lined with a wall of tall, impenetrable hedges, relieved only by the occasional
passing place and the odd farm gate that gave a glimpse across the rolling green fields. Being used to the terrain, he drove
with confidence along these narrow, snaking thoroughfares that frightened the life out of the tourists.

‘So where are we off to now?’ Sam asked.

‘Tradington – mare’s been in labour for a while and it doesn’t seem to be going well. All good experience for you.’ Simon was
taking his responsibility for training up the new boy seriously. Not that Sam was objecting – he was willing to learn. And
besides, Simon was an amiable companion … when he got off the subject of house hunting.

‘So how do you like large animal work?’

‘Great,’ Sam replied. ‘It’s what I’ve always wanted to do.’ He tried to sound suitably enthusiastic.

‘You’re living back at home, aren’t you?’

‘Yeah. With my dad. He’s a widower so I reckon he’s glad of the company and buying my own place is out of the question for
a while – houses are so expensive round here.’ As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he knew he’d said the wrong thing.
Any mention of the property market would set Simon off on the subject of his recent TV appearance on
House Hunters
. Sam decided a quick change of subject was called for.

‘I don’t suppose the police have got anyone for that break-in at the surgery?’

‘Not yet. Maybe you could have a word with your dad … chivvy them along a bit.’

‘I’ve not seen much of my dad for a few days. He’s busy with this case – the murder in Rhode. Have you heard about it?’

He glanced at Simon and saw that he had turned quite pale. For a while he fell uncharacteristically silent but by the time
they reached the farm he seemed to be back to his old, cheerful self.

Sam couldn’t help wondering what was bothering him – the break-in at the surgery … or the murder in Rhode. But new boys can’t
really ask questions.

Rachel Tracey found herself a free bench on the esplanade and ate the smoked salmon and cream cheese sandwich she’d just bought
from Burton’s Butties. She gazed out over the river, watching the yachts glide by and the passenger ferry chug to and fro
over the water, and when she closed her eyes for a few moments Wesley Peterson popped unbidden into her mind. But she was
strict with herself and banished him from her thoughts. She’d been down that road before and it had led nowhere. Not only
was Wesley married but he was probably the faithful type, brought up by strict Christian parents from Trinidad – his only
sister had even married a vicar. She should find someone who was available. The trouble was, decent available men were in
short supply and even when she’d thought she’d hit the jackpot with a man called Tim from Scientific Support, he’d turned
out to be married. Perhaps she would follow her mother’s advice and start attending Young Farmers’ socials again. She’d done
so up till a couple of years ago and she considered it a backwards step. But beggars can’t be choosers, she told herself.