The Dead Hand of History (34 page)

‘Do something, Mr Cutler,' Tompkins gasped.

Cutler rose to his feet, his hands already bunched up into fists.

‘If I was you, I wouldn't even think about it, Mr Cutler,' Paniatowski advised him.

An unpleasant smirk spread across Cutler's face. ‘Wouldn't you?' he asked. ‘Why not?'

‘Two reasons,' Paniatowski said. ‘The first is that any man should think twice before assaulting a police officer.'

‘I could say you completely lost your rag, and I was only defending Mr Tompkins from your attack,' Cutler said. He paused, thoughtfully. ‘What was your second reason?' he wondered.

‘Oh, that!' Paniatowski replied. ‘Well, you look to me like the kind of man who might be very dangerous if you've got a weapon in your hands or the element of surprise on your side – but neither of those apply here.'

‘So what?'

‘So I'm a fifth dan in judo – and in any
fair
contest, I'll spatter you all over the walls.'

Cutler's fixed smile stayed firmly in place, but his eyes were busy assessing the situation.

‘Do you know something,' he said finally, ‘I think you might be right about that.'

‘You'd better believe it,' Paniatowski told him.

‘And if that's the case, then I think the best thing for me to do would be to just sit down again.'

‘Good plan,' Paniatowski agreed.

She turned her attention back to Tompkins. The bakery owner seemed to be frozen to his chair, and with his mouth he was doing a more than competent impression of a landed fish.

‘For the second time of asking, would you please stand up, Mr Tompkins?' she said.

‘Did you . . . did you say this photograph was taken a week last Wednesday?' Tompkins asked.

‘Yes?'

‘And you're sure of that?'

‘I am.'

‘But . . . but that was when the Leeds Catering Convention was on. I know that for a fact, because I was there myself.'

‘That's no alibi,' Paniatowski pointed out. ‘Whether or not you actually took the photograph
yourself
is irrelevant.'

‘No, no, you don't understand,' Tompkins said, almost babbling now.

‘
What
don't I understand?'

‘I wasn't the
only
one at the convention. Linda was there, as well.'

‘She was certainly
supposed
to be there,' Paniatowski agreed.

‘And she
was
! She definitely was.'

‘You're lying,' Paniatowski said.

‘No!'

‘Then you're merely mistaken. Possibly you caught a glimpse of a woman across a crowded room, and just
assumed
it was Linda.'

‘She was there,' Tompkins insisted. ‘We had
dinner
together – in a crowded restaurant where dozens of people will have seen us. And after that, we went to the bar, where we spent
another
two hours talking about our deal.'

TWENTY-NINE

J
enny Brunskill seemed in much better shape than she had the previous day, Paniatowski thought, examining her from across the desk. She looked tidier, her hands were still and – most significantly of all – the half-crazed look had completely disappeared from her eyes.

‘Before we go any further, Chief Inspector, I want to apologize for the way I behaved the last time we met,' Jenny said. ‘I know it's no excuse, but I'd been under a lot of strain and . . .'

‘Forget it,' Paniatowski said. ‘The important thing is that you're all right now. You are all right, aren't you?'

Jenny nodded. ‘Yes, I am.'

Paniatowski gave her a gentle smile, full of understanding and sympathy. ‘So you no longer believe that it was Warren Tompkins who was behind your sister's murder?'

‘Of course not. The man would do almost anything to ruin us, but even he has his limits.'

‘And you accept that Stan killed both Linda and Tom Whittington in a fit of jealous rage?'

‘I still don't want to – but I think I must.'

‘Which means you now also accept that Tom and Linda were having an affair?'

‘In some ways, that's the hardest thing of all to come to terms with,' Jenny said. ‘You didn't know Linda, but if you had,
you'd
have found it very hard to believe, too.' She sighed. ‘But if you say you have proof . . .'

‘I do,' Paniatowski said, placing a copy of the works outing photograph on the desk. ‘Look at the four of you, standing on the front row – you next to Stan, Stan next to Linda and Linda next to Tom.'

Jenny Brunskill sniffed. ‘It was a different world,' she said. ‘A much happier world. And now it's gone for ever.'

‘It was this picture which led us to find out about the affair in the first place,' Paniatowski explained. ‘One of my smart young detective constables showed it to the receptionist at the Old Oak Tree Inn, and she picked out Linda and Tom Whittington immediately.'

‘How could they have been so careless about it?' Jenny wondered. ‘If only they'd been more discreet, they might both still be alive today.'

‘Do you know, I don't think it's anything like as simple as that,' Paniatowski said.

‘What do you mean?'

‘Anyway,' Paniatowski continued, ignoring the question, ‘since the detective constable
was
so young – and the young, in their enthusiasm,
can
make mistakes – I thought I'd better make sure he'd got it right, so I went to the Oak Tree myself. In fact, I've just got back.'

‘Oh?' Jenny said, noncommittally.

‘I showed the receptionist the photograph, and again, she picked out Linda immediately. I asked her if she was sure – I was being thorough, you see – and she said yes, she was.'

‘So it looks as if there's no doubt at all.'

‘And then I did this,' Paniatowski said, picking up a pen, and quickly sketching in long wavy hair on the Jenny in the photograph. ‘And
after
I'd done that, she wasn't sure at all.'

‘Linda was my sister,' Jenny said. ‘It's only natural that some people will confuse us.'

‘Linda wasn't at the Oak Tree Inn at all that day,' Paniatowski said. ‘She was in Leeds – just as she was supposed to be – and I can produce a dozen witnesses to confirm it.'

Jenny started to cry.

‘I should have told you that it was me, not Linda, who was having an affair with Tom,' she said. ‘But then I thought of what Father would have said, and I was so ashamed that I just couldn't.'

‘So
you
were the one at the Oak Tree Inn?'

‘Yes, isn't that obvious?'

‘But you were driving Linda's Jag?'

‘She was going to Leeds by train, so she said I could borrow it if I wanted to. And I said I'd like that. I've always been the mousy one, you see, but I felt so glamorous that day, driving a Jag and having an affair. If only I'd known then what it would lead to.'

‘What it would lead to?' Paniatowski repeated, sounding puzzled. ‘What it would lead to? Oh, I think I see what you mean! You must be partly blaming yourself for Linda's death.'

‘I am,' Jenny agreed. ‘Because if
I
hadn't had an affair with Tom, Stan would have had no grounds at all for suspecting that
Linda
had.'

‘But you did have the affair, and then Stan saw the photograph,' Paniatowski said.

‘What photograph?'

‘The one of you and Tom, kissing in front of the Oak Tree Inn. Who took it, by the way?'

‘I don't know.'

‘And who sent it to Stan?'

‘I don't know that, either.'

‘What a lot of things you seem not to know,' Paniatowski said reflectively. ‘Well, let me ask you something you
do
know the answer to. Why were you wearing a wig?'

‘I don't . . .'

‘You
must
know that!'

‘I do – inside me – but I can't really explain it in words.'

‘Try!' Paniatowski said.

‘I suppose it just felt
right
. Perhaps, subconsciously, I felt the need for a disguise.'

‘A disguise?'

‘That's right. I knew that what I was doing was wrong, you see, and perhaps I thought that by wearing a disguise, it would be as if it wasn't really
me
who was doing it at all.'

‘Yes, that makes sense,' Paniatowski agreed. ‘If I'd been brought up in the kind of home you were brought up in, I might have felt the need to do that, too.' She paused for a second. ‘But what I still don't understand is why you chose a wig which was an exact copy of your sister's
real
hair.'

‘I . . .'

‘And that kiss is another thing that's got me puzzled. So passionate! And in such a public place! What made you do it? Tom was clearly uncomfortable with the whole idea. You can tell that by the way he's standing.'

‘I couldn't help myself. I was in love with him.'

Paniatowski shook her head. ‘No, you weren't. And that wasn't why you did it.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘You
do
look a lot like your sister, but even with the wig on, you wouldn't fool anyone who knew you really well – not unless you were partially hiding your face.'

‘I never wanted to pretend—'

‘Of course you did,' Paniatowski interrupted. ‘When did you first learn that Stan and Linda were planning to sell the bakery?'

‘I never learned it, because that's a
lie
!'

Paniatowski shrugged. ‘Have it your own way. Let's say it was three months ago. You must have hated the fact that they were going to abandon Daddy's little kingdom . . .'

‘Don't you dare call him that!' Jenny hissed angrily. ‘He wasn't Daddy at all – he was Father.'

‘All right, that they were going to abandon your
father
's little kingdom. But they held two-thirds of the voting shares between them, and so there was nothing you could do to stop them. Unless, of course, they died.'

‘What a horrible thing to say!'

‘I imagine you thought of killing both of them at first, but since you would have been the main beneficiary of their deaths, suspicion would be bound to fall on you. And there was no point in killing just one of them, was there, because the other would simply inherit the shares. But say it could be made to seem as if Stan killed Linda. He couldn't inherit her shares, because you can't profit from a criminal act, so they would have gone to you.'

‘It's not true,' Jenny said, sobbing. ‘None of it's true.'

‘I have to give you full marks for both planning and foresight,' Paniatowski said, unmoved. ‘When you sent the photograph to Stan, you knew exactly what would happen, didn't you? You knew that Stan and Jenny would have a blazing row, and that Jenny – distraught at being falsely accused of having an affair – would run straight to her beloved sister for comfort. Because that's exactly what she did, isn't it – drove straight from her house to yours?'

‘I never saw her that night,' Jenny said stubbornly.

‘I'm guessing that when she arrived at your door, the first thing you did was to pour her a drink with a knock-out drop in it,' Paniatowski continued. ‘Then, once she was unconscious, you bundled her into her own car and drove to the old bakery. I'm also guessing that she was still unconscious when you tied her to the baking table. But she wasn't unconscious when you cut her hand off, was she?'

‘I didn't do that. It was
Stan
!
He
cut off her hand, just like he'd cut off someone's hand before.'

‘Now how did you know about that?' Paniatowski wondered.

‘I . . .'

‘Stan told Linda that story – and possibly she was the only one he
ever
told it to – because he loved and trusted her. And she told you, because you were her sister, and sisters share things. And you used that knowledge to help build up the case against Stan.'

‘I couldn't have cut off her hand. I
loved
her,' Jenny protested.

‘You might have done once,' Paniatowski said, ‘but when she tried to destroy your father's monument, that love quickly turned to hatred.'

‘That's not true!'

‘Of course it is. You've proved that by what you did to her. You could have cut off the hand once you'd killed her, but you hated her
so much
that you did it while she was still alive.'

‘You're wrong!' Jenny said.

‘I'm right,' Paniatowski replied firmly. ‘And then there was Tom. Poor hopeless lonely Tom. A man without friends. A man who didn't even know how to
make
friends. It must have been so easy for you to seduce him. And for only the second time in his entire life, he was really happy. The
first
time he was happy, he stole a car in order to hold on to that happiness. And what did he do to hold on to it the
second
time? Did you force him to help you kill Linda?'

‘I'm not playing your mad game,' Jenny said.

‘No, on reflection, I don't think you did,' Paniatowski said. ‘That was a pleasure you wouldn't have wanted to share with anybody. But you did get him to dump Linda's hand down on the river bank. And you did get him to ring up the press to announce the fact. And it
had to be
a man who made those calls, didn't it? Because, in the careful plot you'd spun, the murderer
was
a man. But that was the
last
thing poor Tom did for you. After that, he was of no more use. In fact, it would have been dangerous to let him live, because he was the weak link in the chain. And besides, how much more convincing it would make the case against Stan look if he appeared to have killed not only his wife, but also her lover.'