The Plague Maiden (34 page)

When Loveday burst into an uncontrollable bout of sobbing the nurse told them it was time to go. Wesley touched Loveday’s
shoulder gently and told her he’d be back when she was feeling better.

*

‘Rachel and I have been having a word with Loveday Wilkins. I think she knows who Adam Hunting’s natural father was but she’s
not saying,’ said Wesley as he climbed the stairs to Chief Superintendent Nutter’s office. Heffernan was lagging behind, making
heavy weather of the stairs.

‘Could we believe her even if she named him?’ Heffernan sounded sceptical. ‘She is in a mental institution.’

‘Just because she’s ill it doesn’t mean she’s not telling the truth. I believed her.’ As soon as he’d said the words, Wesley
began to doubt his own judgement. What if it was just some strange obsession of Loveday’s? That the ailing brother who received
all the love and attention, her share as well as his own, had really been a cuckoo in the nest? But Amy’s confession to William
Verlan that Adam hadn’t been her husband’s child seemed to confirm Loveday’s assumption. Although it was always possible that
this had been a fanciful piece of mischief and Aaron Hunting was Adam’s real father after all. The very thought of all the
possibilities made Wesley feel tired. It had been a hard week.

Chief Superintendent Nutter’s office had all the modern conveniences, including a television and video recorder in the corner.
They found Nutter leaning back in his soft leather executive chair with his eyes fixed on the flickering screen.

‘Come in, Gerry, come in. Come in, Inspector Peterson. They said that it was going to be on later … after the main headlines.’
He didn’t take his eyes off the television as he spoke.

They sat down on the well-upholstered visitors’ chairs and watched in silence as the lunch-time news unfolded. The threat
of war in some distant hot land; storms up in Scotland; an oil tanker in peril off the French coast; a prediction that the
house price boom was almost over. Nothing immediately relevant to the officers of Tradmouth CID.

‘Here it is,’ Nutter announced, leaning forward.

A man was emerging from the familiar Gothic façade of the Royal Courts of Justice, punching the air in triumph. Chris Hobson,
dressed in his best suit and tie, was handed a bottle of champagne by one of his supporters. He opened it, sending the cork
flying towards the crowd of press photographers, and took a long swig. After twelve years of prison tea it must have tasted
good.

Wesley glanced at Nutter, who was staring at the screen with an expression of despair. And things could only get worse.

A reporter had thrust a microphone in Hobson’s face and asked him how he felt.

‘Over the moon,’ was the reply.

But Hobson’s solicitor edged his way in before his client could say too much. ‘We’re delighted that justice has been done
at last. My client has lost twelve years of his life due to police incompetence and corruption and we hope that the compensation
he receives will be commensurate with his suffering.’ The man sounded as though he was reading a carefully prepared statement
but he was finding it hard to keep the smug smirk of triumph off his lips.

When the newsreader moved on to a report about a royal tour Heffernan turned to Nutter. ‘That’s all we need. Hobson one, police
nil.’

‘Well, he was innocent, Gerry. And Norbert did rig the evidence. But he’s well out of it and we’re left to clear up his mess.’

Wesley, who would hardly have described being dead as ‘well out of it’, sat tight and said nothing. But Nutter looked him
in the eye. ‘I hear Norbert’s son’s our most likely suspect. Are you ready to charge him yet?’

‘I’d like to make a few more enquiries first, sir,’ Wesley answered, thinking of Helen Wilmer’s alleged attempts at amateur
blackmail. If Dermot O’Donovan had been telling the truth, was it really likely that she expected to get a four-figure sum
out of a schoolboy?

Heffernan stood up, poised for a quick getaway like a runner on the starting blocks. ‘I’ve got a feeling we’re going to get
to the bottom of this case pretty soon, sir,’ he said optimistically.

Nutter stared up at him. ‘I do hope so, Gerry. What we need is a quick conviction … to restore our credibility.’

‘We’ll see what we can do,’ muttered Heffernan as he left the office with Wesley following close behind.

‘So who killed Shipborne and why?’ Wesley asked once the Chief Superintendent was well out of earshot.

‘Put your answers on a postcard and send them to Chief Superintendent Nutter, Tradmouth nick. I don’t know who killed him,
Wes, and frankly, if we carry on like this, hitting a brick wall every time we get a new lead, I’m beginning to think we’ll
never find out.’

It wasn’t like Heffernan to be so despondent. Maybe he was thinking of the days to come … of the pressure from above and the
press intrusion as they tried to come up with a result.

‘Amy Hunting’s funeral’s this afternoon. Feel like going?’

‘Not really,’ said Wesley honestly.

‘Neither do I, but I’ve a feeling we should go along and pay our respects. It’d be convenient if she turns out to be the murderer,
wouldn’t it?’

‘Not for Aaron Hunting.’

‘Think it’d affect his profits, do you? I can’t really see anyone boycotting his special offers just because his crazy wife
bumped some old vicar over the head a few years ago. It’d be a five-minute wonder.’

They’d reached Heffernan’s office and both men flopped down. After being on their best behaviour with CS Nutter they needed
to relax, loosen their ties, put their feet up and think.

It was Heffernan who spoke first. ‘So what have we got?’

Wesley helped himself to a blank sheet of paper from
Heffernan’s chaotic desk and began to write. ‘One: Philip Norbert – admits to wandering into the vicarage on the off-chance
and helping himself to Shipborne’s wallet and says he saw the body. His account fits with Hobson seeing him at the scene but
he has to be our number-one suspect, I suppose. Although if Dermot O’Donovan was telling the truth and Helen Wilmer was really
blackmailing the killer, how did she expect to get a thousand quid out of a schoolboy?’

‘Unless she didn’t know he was a schoolboy. Perhaps she’d met him and he spun her some yarn about being heir to a fortune
… he wouldn’t be the first teenage lad to let his imagination run away with him. What about suspect number two?’

‘Has to be Amy Hunting. She’d just found out that Shipborne had been in charge of an experiment that probably led to the death
of her son. She’d been to see him at the vicarage under some cock-and-bull pretext so she knew the lie of the land. She could
have staged the robbery.’

‘So how did Hobson come to have the silver?’

‘Maybe DCI Norbert took it and planted it. Although in the reports I’ve read, the housekeeper, Mrs O’Donovan, reported that
it was missing straight after the murder, and Norbert didn’t know about his son’s involvement when he was first called to
the scene, so he’d hardly have taken it to plant on someone else on the off-chance. And there was definitely an anonymous
phone call to say the silver could be found in Hobson’s flat … I’ve checked that out.’

‘Would Helen Wilmer have known Amy Hunting?’

‘It’s possible she’d seen her or she recognised her from a photograph.’

‘Who’s next?’

‘There’s always Aaron Hunting. Helen had worked at Huntings so she’d be bound to recognise him. And he claims that as far
as he knew Adam was his son so his motive would be the same as Amy’s.’

‘Any more?’

‘Verlan’s a possibility, although I can’t think why. Then there’s Helen Wilmer’s father, the captain of the bell-ringers …
he’d just had a row with Shipborne and Shipborne’s diary said he had a temper.’

‘I can’t see him strangling his own daughter.’

‘It’s been known. And under Dermot O’Donovan’s influence she’d changed from a nice Sunday school teacher into a nasty little
blackmailer.’

‘Barry Castello? He certainly knew Amy so it’s possible he was Adam’s father. Or he might have had some row with Shipborne.
He – or rather Damascus Farm – was the major beneficiary of Shipborne’s will.’

‘I wouldn’t rule him out. Then there’s Dermot himself. He was a thief, a nasty bit of work, and his alibi’s dodgy. Shipborne
may have caught him with his fingers in the poor box and Dermot hit out in panic and covered his tracks to make it look like
a robbery. He may have seen Hobson in the pub, found out where he lived and planted the silver. He may have told us that tale
about a blackmail note to throw us off the scent. He may have strangled Helen to stop her blabbing, then Verlan came along,
ran over the body and panicked like he said.’ He sighed. ‘I suppose we could come up with more names if we put our minds to
it, but I think that’s enough to be going on with.’

‘Do you think it’s relevant that Adam might not be Hunting’s son?’

Wesley didn’t answer. He began to study the notes he’d written.

‘My money’s still on Philip Norbert, you know,’ Heffernan said with a sigh.

Wesley looked up from his notes. The boss was probably right. He glanced at his watch. They just had time to grab something
for lunch before the funeral.

They left the office and drove into the centre of Tradmouth, coming to a halt outside the pasty shop under the gaze of a predatory
traffic warden. Wesley waved his warrant card at the uniformed figure before disappearing
into the shop and returning with a carrier bag containing two large traditional pasties.

With any luck that would keep them going until the funeral baked meats appeared … if they were on the guest list, which was
doubtful. But some instinct told Wesley that it might be wise to be there when Amy Hunting was laid to rest.

As soon as Wesley arrived at the cemetery he had the feeling that Amy Hunting’s funeral was going to be one of those restrained,
polite English affairs that kept the lid firmly on emotion and referred to the hope of heaven in the same dismissive way as
people touched wood for luck … a vague superstition, hardly understood. Her remains were to be dispatched below ground in
Tradmouth cemetery with the maximum of efficiency and the minimum of fuss with little religious input. But perhaps Amy had
wanted it that way.

The party was gathering around the open grave when they arrived. Aaron Hunting, the chief mourner, wore an immaculate black
suit, Armani probably, and black silk tie, showing up the funeral directors in their chain-store versions. His face betrayed
no emotion as he fixed his eyes on the sturdy oak coffin.

Wesley was surprised to see Barry Castello there, hanging back behind a group of women, hardly any of them in black. He looked
more distressed than Hunting, and a casual onlooker might have taken him for the widower. He also noticed Keith Sturgeon standing
staring ahead as though stunned. He was with a group of men wearing identical suits … an overt show of respect from Huntings’
loyal staff.

But as Wesley and Heffernan watched from a tactful distance, another familiar face caught their eye. As his mind hadn’t connected
her with Amy Hunting it took Wesley a split second to put a name to the face. But there she was, standing next to Aaron Hunting,
her face half
veiled under a large and expensive-looking hat. Wesley gave Heffernan a nudge.

‘What’s she doing here?’ Heffernan responded in a stage whisper.

Wesley didn’t answer, and the two men stepped back, hoping that she wouldn’t see them. The element of surprise might come
in useful later on.

It wasn’t until the coffin was safely underground and the mourners were walking away from the graveside that they made their
move. Their quarry was walking beside Aaron Hunting, her arm linked in his. Wesley walked fast to catch up with them and Heffernan
followed a little more slowly.

‘Mrs Powell. I didn’t expect to see you here.’

The look of horror on Janet Powell’s face was fleeting. But Wesley saw it clearly. She opened her mouth to speak but no sound
emerged.

‘Are you a friend of the family?’

Janet looked at Hunting, who was standing there, his arm still linked with hers. His face was impassive. He was giving nothing
away.

‘Er … Amy was my sister.’

Now that Wesley looked at her closely, he could see a resemblance between her and Amy Hunting. This was the Auntie Jan Loveday
had spoken of … the recipient of Amy’s secrets. She was fair where Amy had been dark, plump where Amy had been thin … but
there was something about their facial features which gave away the fact that they were sisters.

‘I saw your friend, Chris Hobson on the tele. I would have thought you’d have been there celebrating with him,’ Heffernan
tried to sound innocent.

She looked at him coldly, ‘I came straight back after I’d given evidence. Amy was my sister, you know. Now, if you’ll excuse
me, we must get back to the house.’

Aaron Hunting put a protective arm around his sister-inlaw’s shoulder. ‘Yes, gentlemen, if you’ll excuse us. It’s a very upsetting
day, as I’m sure you’ll understand.’

‘We’d like a word with you, Mrs Powell. It shouldn’t take long. Our car’s outside.’ Heffernan spoke confidently, as though
he didn’t expect a refusal.

Janet Powell hesitated, looking at her brother-in-law for support. But Hunting told her gently that she’d better go, his eyes
meeting hers.

With a last pleading glance towards Hunting, she walked silently with them to the car.

After making sure that Janet Powell was comfortable in a spare office with tea in a proper china cup and a plate of chocolate
biscuits, Gerry Heffernan led Wesley into his office.

‘I don’t know why we couldn’t have talked to her in one of the interview rooms, Gerry.’

‘Softly, softly. We’re lulling her into a false sense of security. Nice cop, nasty cop, minus the nasty cop. And besides,
she’s got friends in high places.’

Wesley smiled. ‘Then we’d better not keep the lady waiting. You seem more cheerful.’

‘We’re on to something, Wes. I can feel it in me water. Janet Powell just happens to be Amy Hunting’s sister and the Reverend
Shipborne was responsible for the experiment that killed Amy’s son. Coincidence or what?’