The Breaker (28 page)

"This is absurd!" snapped Sumner nervously. "You'll just have to talk to more people. Someone must have seen me. There was a man at the same table as me in the library. Ginger-haired fellow with glasses. He can prove I was there."

"What was his name?"

"I don't know."

Galbraith took another sheaf of papers out of his briefcase. "We've questioned thirty people in all, William. These are the rest of the statements. There's no one who's prepared to admit they saw you at any time during the ten hours prior to your wife's murder or the ten hours after. We've also checked your hotel account. You didn't use any hotel service, and that includes your telephone, between lunch on Saturday and prelunch drinks on Sunday." He dropped the papers onto the sofa. "How do you explain that? For example, where did you eat on Saturday night? You weren't at the conference dinner, and you didn't have room service."

Sumner set to cracking his finger joints again. "I didn't have anything to eat, not a proper meal anyway. I hate those blasted conference dinners, so I wasn't going to leave my room in case anyone saw me. They all get drunk and behave stupidly. I used the mini-bar," he said, "drank the beer and ate peanuts and chocolate. Isn't that on the account?"

Galbraith nodded. "Except it doesn't specify a time. You could have had them at ten o'clock on Sunday morning. It may explain why you were in such good spirits when you met your friends in the bar. Why didn't you order room service if you didn't want to go down?"

"Because I wasn't that hungry." Sumner lurched toward the armchair and slumped into it. "I knew this was going to happen," he said bitterly. "I knew you'd go for me if you couldn't find anyone else. I was in the library all afternoon, then I went back to the hotel and read books and journals till I fell asleep." He lapsed into silence, massaging his temples. "How could I have drowned her anyway?" he demanded suddenly. "I don't have a boat."

"No," Galbraith agreed. "Drowning does seem to be the one method that exonerates you."

A complex mixture of emotions-
relief? triumph? pleasure?
-showed briefly in the man's eyes. "There you are then," he said childishly.
 

"Why do you want to get even with my mother?" asked Maggie when Ingram returned to the kitchen after settling Celia and phoning the local GP. Some color had returned to her cheeks, and she had finally stopped shaking.

"Private joke," he said, filling the kettle and putting it on the Aga. "Where does she keep her mugs?"

"Cupboard by the door."

He took out two and transferred them to the sink, then opened the cupboard underneath and found some washing-up liquid, bleach, and pan scourers. "How long has her hip been bad?" he asked, rolling up his sleeves and setting to with the scourers and the bleach to render the sink hygienic before he even began to deal with the stains in the mugs. From the strong whiffs of dirty dog and damp horse blankets that seemed to haunt the kitchen like old ghosts, he had a strong suspicion that the sink was not entirely dedicated to the purpose of washing crockery.

"Six months. She's on the waiting list for a replacement operation, but I can't see it happening before the end of the year." She watched him sluice down the draining board and sink. "You think we're a couple of slobs, don't you?"

" 'Fraid so," he agreed bluntly. "I'd say it's a miracle neither of you has gone down with food poisoning, particularly your mother, when her health's not too brilliant in the first place."

"There are so many other things to do," she said dispiritedly, "and Ma's in too much pain most of the time to clean properly ... or says she is. Sometimes I think she's just making excuses to get out of it because she thinks it's beneath her to get her hands dirty. Other times..." She sighed heavily. "I keep the horses immaculate, but cleaning up after myself and Ma is always at the bottom of the list. I hate coming up here anyway. It's so"-she sought a suitable word-"depressing."

He wondered how she had the nerve to stand in judgment on her mother's lifestyle, but didn't comment on it. Stress, depression, and waspishness went together in his experience. Instead, he scrubbed the mugs, then filled them with diluted bleach and left them to stand. "Is that why you moved down to the stables?" he asked her, turning around.

"Not really. If Ma and I live in each other's pockets we argue. If we live apart we don't. Simple as that. Things are easier this way."

She looked thin and harassed, and her hair hung in limp strands about her face as if she hadn't been near a shower for weeks. It wasn't surprising in view of what she'd been through that morning, particularly as the beginnings of a bruise were ripening on the side of her face, but Ingram remembered her as she used to be, pre-Robert Healey, a gloriously vibrant woman with a mischievous sense of humor and sparkling eyes. He regretted the passing of that personality-it had been a dazzling one-but she was still the most desirable woman he knew.

He glanced idly around the kitchen. "If you think this is depressing, you should try living in a hostel for the homeless for a week."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"

"This one room could house an entire family."

"You sound like Ava, my bloody sister-in-law," she said testily. "According to her, we live in the lap of luxury despite the fact that the damn place is falling down about our ears."

"Then why don't you stop whinging about it and do something constructive to change it?" he suggested. "If you gave this room a lick of paint it would brighten it up and you'd have less to feel depressed about and more to be thankful for."

"Oh, my God," she said icily, "you'll be telling me to take up knitting next. I don't need DIY therapy, Nick."

"Then explain to me how sitting around moaning about your environment helps you. You're not helpless, are you? Or maybe it's you, and not your mother, who thinks that getting her hands dirty is demeaning."

"Paint costs money."

"Your flat over the stables costs a damn sight more," he pointed out. "You balk at forking out for some cheap emulsion, yet you'll pay two sets of gas, electricity, and telephone bills just in order to avoid having to get on with your mother. How does that make things easier, Maggie? It's hardly sound economics, is it? And what are you going to do when she falls over and breaks her hip so badly she's confined to a wheelchair? Pop in once in a while to see she hasn't died of hypothermia in the night because she hasn't been able to get into bed on her own? Or will that be so depressing you'll avoid her entirely?"

"I don't need this," she said tiredly. "It's none of your business anyway. We manage fine on our own."

He watched her for a moment, then turned back to the sink, emptying the mugs of bleach and rinsing them under the tap. He jerked his head toward the kettle. "Your mother would like a cup of tea, and I suggest you put several spoonfuls of sugar in it to bring up her energy levels. I also suggest you make one for yourself. The GP said he'd be here by eleven." He dried his hands on a tea towel and rolled down his sleeves.

"Where are you going?" she asked him.

"Up to the headland. I want to try and find out why Harding came back. Does your mother have any freezer bags?"

"No. We can't afford a freezer."

"Cling film?"

"In the drawer by the sink."

"Can I take it?" "

"I suppose so." She watched him remove the roll and tuck it under his arm. "What do you want it for?"

"Evidence," he said unhelpfully, making for the door.

She watched him in a kind of despair. "What about me and Ma?"

He turned with a frown. "What about you?"

"God, I don't know," she said crossly. "We're both pretty shaken, you know. That bloody man hit me, in case you've forgotten. Aren't the police supposed to stay around when women get attacked? Take statements or something?"

"Probably," he agreed, "but this is my day off. I turfed out to help you as a friend, not as a policeman, and I'm only following up on Harding because I'm involved in the Kate Sumner case. Don't worry," he said with a comforting smile, "you're in no danger from him, not while he's in Poole, but dial nine-nine-nine if you need someone to hold your hand."

She glared at him. "I want him prosecuted, which means I want you to take a statement now."

"Mmm, well, don't forget I'll be taking one from him, too," Ingram pointed out, "and you may not be so eager to go for his jugular if he opts to counterprosecute on the grounds that he's the one who suffered the injuries because you didn't have your dog under proper control. It's going to be your word against his," he said, making for the door, "which is one of the reasons why I'm going back up there now."

She sighed. "I suppose you're hurt because I told you to mind your own business?"

"Not in the least," he said, disappearing into the scullery. "Try angry or bored."

"Do you want me to say sorry?" she called after him. "Well, okay ... I'm tired ... I'm stressed out, and I'm not in the best of moods but"-she gritted her teeth-"I'll say 'sorry' if that's what you want."

But her words fell on stony ground, because all she heard was the sound of the back door closing behind him.
 

The detective inspector had been silent so long that William Sumner grew visibly nervous. "There you are then," he said again. "I couldn't possibly have drowned her, could I?" Anxiety had set his eyelid fluttering, and he looked absurdly comical every time his lid winked. "I don't understand why you keep hounding me. You said you were looking for someone with a boat, but you know I haven't got one. And I don't understand why you released Steven Harding when WPC Griffiths said he was seen talking to Kate outside Tesco's on Saturday morning."

WPC Griffiths should learn to keep her mouth shut, thought Galbraith in annoyance. Not that he blamed her. Sumner was bright enough to read between the lines of newspaper reports about "a young Lymington actor being taken in for questioning" and then press for answers. "Briefly," he said, "then they went their separate ways. She talked to a couple of market stallholders afterward, but Harding wasn't with her."

"Well, it wasn't me who did it." He winked. "So there must be someone else you haven't found yet."

"That's certainly one way of looking at it." Galbraith lifted a photograph of Kate off the table beside him. "The trouble is looks are so often deceptive. I mean, take Kate here. You see this?" He turned the picture toward the husband. "The first impression she gives is that butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, but the more you learn about her the more you realize that isn't true. Let me tell you what I know of her." He held up his fingers and ticked the points off as he spoke. "She wanted money and she didn't really mind how she got it. She manipulated people in order to achieve her ambitions. She could be cruel. She told lies if necessary. Her goal was to climb the social ladder and become accepted within a milieu she admired, and as long as it brought the goalposts closer, she was prepared to play-act whatever role was required of her, sex being the major weapon in her armory. The one person she couldn't manipulate successfully was your mother, so she dealt with her in the only way possible-by moving away from her influence." He dropped his hand to his lap and looked at the other man with genuine sympathy. "How long was it before you realized you'd been suckered, William?"

"I suppose you've been talking to that bloody policewoman?"

"Among other people."

"She made me angry. I said things I didn't mean."

Galbraith shook his head. "Your mother's view of your marriage wasn't so different," he pointed out. "She may not have used the terms 'landlady' or 'cheap boarding-house,' but she certainly gave the impression of an unfulfilled and unfulfilling relationship. Other people have described it as unhappy, based on sex, cool, boring. Are any of those descriptions accurate? Are they all accurate?"

Sumner pressed his finger and thumb to the bridge of his nose. "You don't kill your wife because you're bored with her," he muttered.

Galbraith wondered again at the man's naivete. Boredom was precisely why most men killed their wives. They might disguise it by claiming provocation or jealousy, but in the end, a desire for something different was usually the reason-even if the difference was simply escape. "Except I'm told it wasn't so much a question of boredom but more a question of you taking her for granted. And that interests me. You see, I wonder what a man like you would do if the woman you'd been taking for granted suddenly decided she wasn't going to play the game anymore."

Sumner stared back at him with disdain. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Or if," Galbraith went on relentlessly, "you discovered that what you'd been taking for granted wasn't true. Such as being a father, for example."
 

Ingram's assumption was that Harding had come back for his rucksack because, despite the man's claim that the rucksack found on board
Crazy Daze
was the one he'd been carrying, Ingram remained convinced that it wasn't. Paul and Danny Spender had been too insistent that it was big for Ingram to accept that a triangular one fitted the description. Also, he remained suspicious about why Harding had left it behind when he took the boys down to the boat sheds. Nevertheless, the logic of why he had descended to the beach that morning, only to climb up again empty-handed, was far from obvious. Had someone else found the rucksack and removed it? Had Harding weighted it with a rock and thrown it into the sea? Had he even left it there in the first place?