Untimely Graves (18 page)
Authors: Marjorie Eccles
‘Yes, I do see. Bang in the middle – and she’s not inclined to let you buy it?’
‘If Charles had handled her better in the first place, yes, perhaps. But she adamantly refuses to – now aided and abetted by her nephew, Sam Leadbetter, I might say.’
‘I’ve already made his acquaintance.’
‘No doubt. He’s doing a good job at providing a consoling shoulder for Mrs Wetherby to cry on.’ The acid comment escaped him without him seeming aware of it. His lips thinned. The rider that his should have been the shoulder was left unsaid. But it was there, hanging almost visibly in the air. Riach might, Mayo thought, be a very good hater.
He watched him carefully begin to roll up the plan, then change his mind, hesitating for a moment before speaking. ‘Miss Lockett’s refusal might not be so important, not now. Originally, some time ago, the idea was that the new entrance to the school, albeit a less pretentious one, should be sited here, below the hospital,’ he said, pointing to the school boundary along Vanson Hill, ‘rather than demolish the Kelsey Road houses which could well be used as dormitory overspill. Wetherby was adamantly against the idea, he was wedded to the notion of a grand entrance. I’m afraid he could never brook the slightest opposition, and it was his baby, as they say. He managed to sway the
vote – just – in his favour. But now … well, it’s not too late to go back to the original plan.’
vote – just – in his favour. But now … well, it’s not too late to go back to the original plan.’
‘Which one were you in favour of?’
‘Oh, it’s no secret that I voted for Vanson Hill, and that I think it’s vandalism to pull this side of the quad down rather than spruce up the interiors, which it shouldn’t be beyond the wit of man to do.’ He waved his hand at the dingy walls and outdated furniture. Mayo, reminded of his own outrage at the idea of the old buildings being pulled down, had some sympathy with Riach’s feelings, though he couldn’t feel any warmer towards him. ‘The science blocks could always go up on the Kelsey Road side,’ he was saying. ‘But my opinion isn’t likely to count one way or the other. Charles was very … persuasive.’
Mayo had met ‘persuasive’ people like that. Not a few of them in his own organisation. And also people like Riach himself, who beavered away secretly behind the scenes. He thought Riach was now deliberately playing himself down, and made a mental note not to overlook the fact that the disagreement over the entrance might conceivably have blown up into a major row.
He steered Riach back towards Wetherby’s personal life, and it gradually emerged (though not by accident – Mayo was already aware that Riach was not a man to let anything slip) that Wetherby had been a womaniser. Well, three women, when it came down to it, but that had evidently been three too many for Riach to stomach. And quite enough for Mayo, to be going on with.
‘We’ll need to talk to them,’ Mayo said. ‘Can you give me details?’
‘I can’t tell you anything about Marie Holden, except that she was a peripatetic music teacher who worked here for a while, but no doubt the Secretary’s office will know how to get in touch. Angela Hunnicliffe’s an American whose husband has been working here at the school for about twelve months, but he left and they both returned to the States a week or two back. Beverley Harriman actually works here in the office – that’s her with the long black hair all over the place and the long skirt.’
She seemed an odd type for Wetherby to have taken up, but when he suggested this to Riach, he was met with a shrug. ‘He liked adoration.’
‘And she was working here on the day Mr Wetherby was killed.’
‘Yes, but I wouldn’t lay too much store by that. She’s not the violent type. Unless she accidentally killed him with a cup of her herbal tea.’
It took Mayo a moment to realise Riach was making a joke. Riach himself looked surprised, and rather embarrassed. His arrow, high-cheekboned face flushed slightly. He took off his rimless specs and polished them with a silk handkerchief he took from his top pocket.
‘And that’s about it,’ he said, refolding and replacing the handkerchief with the deft precision that characterised all his movements.
‘Yes, that’ll do for now,’ Mayo said, standing up and looking out over the quadrangle where several boys were passing through, dressed for rugby. ‘Sports feature largely in the curriculum, I gather,’ he remarked. ‘What about after-school activities – music, chess … boxing, army cadet corps?’
‘Music and chess, yes,’ Riach answered, knowing exactly what Mayo was getting at. ‘Practising for blood sports is not encouraged.’
‘And you don’t possess any firearms yourself?’
He smiled faintly. ‘Guns are objects of violence, and I’m not a violent man.’
It wasn’t an answer, but Mayo had decided to let it ride for the moment.
The interview with Marie Holden had revealed nothing that might throw light on Wetherby’s murder. She knew very little of his personal circumstances, she told Jenny Platt, her affair with him had been brief, and she was terrified it might come to her husband’s ears. The day Wetherby had been murdered, she and her husband had been on the Isle of Wight, visiting Osborne House with their children, looking at the grizzly sight of Prince Albert’s photograph on the pillow next to Queen Victoria’s, where it had slept next to his widow every night after he died
Angela Hunnicliffe was similarly out of the picture, having left the country before Wetherby was shot. Which left only Beverley Harriman – for the moment. Those three were the ones Riach had known about – but if three, so quickly, one after the other, or possibly even running simultaneously, it was eminently possible there might be more.
That was what Abigail had concluded, after having spoken to Beverley, a gullible girl dazzled by the attentions of an older, attractive man, a girl who, in Abigail’s sharp and sometimes censorious opinion, was not very bright. She’d had the opportunity to kill Wetherby: after going down to the market with Trish to visit the stall which sold designer knitwear at discount prices, they’d parted and she said she’d then cycled to the Green Man over at Lattimer where she’d agreed to meet Wetherby for a pub lunch, something she’d failed to admit when she’d first been questioned. He had never turned up. She’d returned to the office tear-stained and twenty minutes late to find the place in an uproar and Wetherby dead. Nevertheless, there was only her own word to say where she’d been after she left Trish: she said she’d waited for Wetherby in the car-park of the Green Man but no one remembered seeing her there. There had been ample time after leaving Trish for her to have slipped back to Lavenstock College. She had the motive: it wasn’t the first time Wetherby had stood her up, said Trish shortly.
‘But you surely don’t imagine she came back here and shot him?’ she then demanded scornfully. ‘She was a fool over him, and he was a louse, but she
was
in love with him – or imagined she was. Besides which, she’s not the type to do anything like that, our Bev. Otherwise, she’d have given him the push long since, like I told her to.’
was
in love with him – or imagined she was. Besides which, she’s not the type to do anything like that, our Bev. Otherwise, she’d have given him the push long since, like I told her to.’
Trish was a very different proposition from Beverley, in her early twenties but already hard-faced, fashionably dressed and made up like a china doll. But despite the scorn, there was an element of exasperated kindness when she spoke of Beverley; she seemed fond of her, in a patronising way, though Abigail guessed it was only the close proximity of working together that had made them friends.
‘I think Trish is right, though,’ she had said to Mayo. ‘Beverley wouldn’t have done it. Apart from having nothing to gain by killing him, I can’t see her as the sort to take revenge with a pistol. She’s one of those who’d forgive him and let him do it again. A tree-hugger, I shouldn’t wonder.’
‘Funny, that’s more or less what Riach said.’
When the phone rang into the silence which followed the revelations about Tone, Cleo jumped a mile. She hadn’t yet got used to it being reconnected by British Telecom. Muriel, by dint of suddenly acquired efficiency and who knew what powers of persuasion, had miraculously managed to persuade them to act immediately.
‘Hello?’
‘At last! Is that you, angel?’ asked a male voice.
‘This is 54278,’ Cleo said, rather stiffly, cross at being interrupted at such a crucial point by some love-lorn caller who’d obviously got the wrong number.
‘Then I’d like to speak with Angel, Angela, please,’ the man said, with what she now discerned as a transatlantic accent.
‘Mrs Hunnicliffe doesn’t live here any more. She’s gone back to America.’
‘What’s that you’re saying? Who is this? To whom am I speaking?’ the caller demanded, with admirable American correctness.
‘Cleo Atkins.’
‘Atkins? Daphne, is that you?’
‘No, it’s
Cleo,
’ she said, feeling this conversation was rapidly sliding out of control. ‘Daphne’s my mother and I’m living here now. She’s here if you want to speak to her.’
Cleo,
’ she said, feeling this conversation was rapidly sliding out of control. ‘Daphne’s my mother and I’m living here now. She’s here if you want to speak to her.’
‘No, no. Where’s Angel, then?’
‘I’ve told you, she’s with her husband, in America.’
‘No, she isn’t.
I’m
her husband. Brad Hunnicliffe here,’ he introduced himself belatedly.
I’m
her husband. Brad Hunnicliffe here,’ he introduced himself belatedly.
There followed a measurable pause, which Hunnicliffe broke by saying, ‘I apologise for disturbing you, it must be late over there, but I’m very worried about her. She was supposed to fly back here to the States, couple of weeks after I did, and stay with her sister in Boston for a few days. My father hasn’t been too good and I’ve been staying with him in Connecticut since I got here. Angel and I were due to meet up at Logan airport today to take the flight for San Francisco. She never turned up and I’ve found she never arrived at her sister’s, either. What’s going on?’
‘I’ve no idea, but I think you’d better speak to my father. He’s here, too. He was the one who dealt with Mrs Hunnicliffe.’
‘I’d surely appreciate that.’
Yes, said George, Mrs Hunnicliffe had certainly left Lavenstock as arranged. Everything was paid up and she’d left the house all in order (apart from a Clarice Cliff candlestick, thought Cleo, suddenly remembering she’d never spoken to her mother about it) and returned the keys by the date she said she would. He took out his notebook and began making notes. Yes, if Mr Hunnicliffe wished, he’d certainly start making enquiries immediately …
Keys! thought Cleo.
By the time the conversation had finished, she had the bunch of keys in her hand, back door key, front one and a smaller one which was probably the one to the locked cupboard upstairs, which she’d never had cause to open.
‘Go on, Dad, open it,’ she said in a choked voice a minute later, suddenly feeling extremely glad of Daphne’s hand on her shoulder as all three of them stared at the blank cupboard doors.
George turned the key. It was empty but for five pieces of matching blue luggage, locked, strapped and labelled with Angela Hunnicliffe’s name, destination Boston, and flight number. Sitting ready on top of one of them was an airline folder containing the flight documents and her ticket, dated Friday 3rd March, with her passport also tucked inside.
Cleo slowly let out her breath, let her heart resume its normal beat. Too much imagination, that was her trouble! She and her father looked at each other, the same unspoken thought in both their minds.
‘I think,’ said George, ‘Brad Hunnicliffe had better get himself back on the first flight over here.’
The spring sunshine, signalling the beginning of the end of winter, had overtaken the best efforts of the central heating programme at Milford Road, and Mayo’s office was several degrees too hot for comfort, despite the open windows. He ran a finger round the inside of his collar and wondered how the man sitting opposite could bear it.
Bradshaw K. Hunnicliffe Jr, drawn and jet-lagged, an American equipped for English weather in a long, heavy raincoat of British origin, had thrown it open as his only admission of the heat but refused to be parted from it. He sat staring at a cup of cold, untasted coffee. His face was blank with stunned incomprehension, refusing to believe that anyone could have wanted to harm
his
wife, his lovely wife, much less kill her.
his
wife, his lovely wife, much less kill her.
‘She can’t be dead, not Angel!’ He had seen her body, positively identified her, yet he had said this three times in the last fifteen minutes.
Mayo sympathised. Hunnicliffe was understandably shocked and under strain, he had just suffered the terrible ordeal of looking into his dead wife’s face, but however much Mayo felt for the man, there it was, he had run out of platitudes with which to console him. They were getting nowhere like this. ‘I know how painful it must be for you, Mr Hunnicliffe, and I’m very sorry to press the point, but I’m afraid there’s more. Your wife’s death isn’t the only murder we’re investigating. Charles Wetherby was also shot last week.’ He paused to let that sink in, but when the other man barely responded, except with a nod, as if the fact were quite irrelevant, he added a rider that he hoped would prod him. ‘Most likely with the same gun, I’m afraid.’
‘Wetherby? The Bursar?’ Hunnicliffe still hadn’t made the connection, which should by now have been evident to anyone. Either that, or he was refusing to face the inescapable conclusion. In denial, as current jargon would no doubt have it. But Mayo was having none of that claptrap, he preferred his own interpretation. He saw Hunnicliffe as a typical academic, with a mind
raised above the mundane, or the practical. Bright intelligent eyes behind wire-framed spectacles, hair receding at the temples, dark-complexioned. A thin man with a habit of clasping his hands over a small, incongruous pot-belly, like a swami in contemplation. He was said to be brilliant at his subject, he had written several textbooks dealing with such wonders as particle physics, he was reputedly a good teacher, but he was not proving good at coping with or understanding the crises of life, large or small.
raised above the mundane, or the practical. Bright intelligent eyes behind wire-framed spectacles, hair receding at the temples, dark-complexioned. A thin man with a habit of clasping his hands over a small, incongruous pot-belly, like a swami in contemplation. He was said to be brilliant at his subject, he had written several textbooks dealing with such wonders as particle physics, he was reputedly a good teacher, but he was not proving good at coping with or understanding the crises of life, large or small.
Mayo clicked his pen several times. ‘I see I must make it plainer, Mr Hunnicliffe. We have reason to believe your wife and Mr Wetherby had at one time been having an affair. And directly or indirectly, it has led to their murders.’
First, a refusal to believe. Now – outrage. The bright eyes suddenly shot sparks from behind the glasses. ‘You bring me across the Atlantic and tell me my wife has been murdered – then you tell me she was having an affair under my nose! Mr Mayo, my wife was not that kind of woman – not ever!’
‘When she was found she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.’
‘She never wore one. She regarded it as a badge of subservience, or some such feminist bullshit.’ Impatience flashed briefly across his face, then he recovered himself. ‘Nevertheless, we had a wonderful, meaningful marriage.’ He sounded as though he believed every word of it. But in the end he was the first to look away.
Delia had that morning brought in a big bunch of tight green daffodil buds and stuck them in a vase on top of the bookcase near the window. They had unfolded their petals almost immediately in the warmth and flickering sunshine now caught their bright gold, sent coins of light dancing on the ceiling. Hunnicliffe stared fixedly at the flowers, refusing to meet Mayo’s eyes, but in the face of his silence was forced at last to speak. A huge sigh escaped him, seeming to be fetched up from the bottom of his heart. ‘Oh, my God,’ he said tiredly, ‘if the first is true, then why not the other? If it’s true she’s dead, then … They’re both equally unbelievable.’
‘I’m very sorry, Mr Hunnicliffe.’
‘I guess.’
‘Are you willing to answer a few questions? We need to know the answers if we’re going to nail whoever did this.’
‘Go ahead. If you must.’
While Mayo was talking to Hunnicliffe, Abigail was told that a Mr Bysouth was at the front desk, wanting to speak to her. She went downstairs without much enthusiasm for a second encounter, and found a stranger waiting. It took a second or two, before he introduced himself, to register that this was Reuben Bysouth’s brother, Jared. They had clearly come from the same mould, but Jared was an older, fitter, altogether more acceptable version than Reuben. A big, outdoors man with close-cropped hair, a stern, weatherbeaten face, a firm handclasp and a steady look, his movements were slow and unhurried. ‘Can I speak to you in private?’
She took him into an interview room. He politely declined tea or coffee and came straight to the point. ‘I’ve come here on behalf of my sister-in-law, Vera. She told me you’d spoken to her.’
‘She’s all right?’ Abigail asked quickly.
‘She is now,’ the farmer replied grimly. He clasped the edge of the table with both big hands and leaned back, his arms stretched out in an attitude usually considered confrontational. As soon as he began to speak, however, she realised the body language was simply that of a man who meant to drive home his points without any misunderstanding. ‘I’ve sent that brother of mine packing,’ he announced bluntly.
‘Packing? What happened?’
‘What happened? He thought I was away, not expected back, that’s what happened. I was just in time to stop him knocking the hell out of Vera. I think you know what I’m on about.’ He met Abigail’s gaze squarely. ‘I blame myself, I should have realised what’s been going on. To tell you the truth, I
did
suspect it, but not the half of it, he was always careful to hit her where it didn’t show. Once or twice I tried to get her to talk to me, but she never would. Not until now.’
did
suspect it, but not the half of it, he was always careful to hit her where it didn’t show. Once or twice I tried to get her to talk to me, but she never would. Not until now.’
‘That’s the difficulty, Mr Bysouth. Women like Vera, they blame themselves, come to think they must have deserved it, somehow.’
Slowly, he nodded. ‘Trouble is, I suppose, she still has some feeling for him, though how she can have … And how he can do that to her, after what we saw our father do, as kids, beats cockfighting …
That
sanctimonious, hypocritical bastard used to lambast our mother till she was black and blue, until one day, when I was fourteen and as big as he was, I hit
him
. He never did it again.’
That
sanctimonious, hypocritical bastard used to lambast our mother till she was black and blue, until one day, when I was fourteen and as big as he was, I hit
him
. He never did it again.’
Good for Jared. He’d not easily be roused, a man like him, but watch out when he was.
‘It wasn’t an act of charity on my part to take them in, you know. I needed an extra pair of hands on the farm, and after Joyce – my wife – died, the house and the cooking were all to blazes. I knew Vera would get stuck in there, sort things out, and so she has.’
‘So Reuben’s gone? Gone where?’
‘Ireland, he says, but I don’t much care where. He reckons he has a mate there been begging him to join him for months. I’ve been fair with him, given him some money and told him if he ever shows his face again, I’ll break his legs. He knows I mean it, he’ll not come back. I won’t have history repeating itself, not in my house. Life shouldn’t be like that.’
‘And Vera?’
‘Vera can stay with me. She’ll be able to settle down, once she gets used to the idea he isn’t coming back. She’s a good wench, and I’ll take care of her.’ A tinge of colour crept into his cheeks. ‘She’s safe with me.’
She believed him. Vera had found a saviour. Her Rock of Gibraltar.
‘There’s something on her mind and she wants to talk to you,’ he said. ‘Would you come and see her? She’s still mortal shamed of going out. She somehow got between us when I went for him, see, tried to stop me getting hurt, she said, and she’s not a pretty sight just now.’
‘I was coming to see her anyway.’
Brad Hunnicliffe, now that he’d accepted the unbelievable, had loosened up. He spoke freely, revealing himself as a man who rarely used one word where six would do. He even slipped off
his Burberry as he prepared himself for Mayo’s questions, and noisily slurped the fresh coffee which had been sent for.
his Burberry as he prepared himself for Mayo’s questions, and noisily slurped the fresh coffee which had been sent for.
‘Let’s start with why your wife stayed behind after you left?’
‘My move back home came up somewhat unexpectedly.’ He droned on for some time, explaining every detail of the circumstances. ‘And since I wanted to visit with my father before taking up my new appointment, I left her to wind up all the business over here. Sorting out the lease of the house, getting rid of the car and so on, plus all the necessary bureaucracy, pardon me, we transatlantic visitors have inflicted on us when we visit Europe. Shipping all the English bits and pieces she’d collected … she was, [’m afraid, a real sucker for your country house sales and all that – you would not believe the amount of rubbish she’d picked up!’
Mayo sought rapidly for something less controversial to fix on, in case he might be tempted to say what he thought of this unexpected attack on his patriotism. ‘Your car … what sort of vehicle did you run?’
‘It was a used Mondeo Verona I bought from Automart on the Coventry Road when we came over here. Used in that it had only a few thousand miles on the clock, you understand. The agreement was that they would buy it back from me at a reasonable price when I had to return to the States, and they were happy to do this. I told Angela to leave it with them the night before she left and take a taxi to the airport next morning, which I assumed she had arranged to do.’
‘What colour was it?’
‘The car? Green. Metallic green. Have you found it?’ The prospect of having lost the car, and therefore the money it represented, as well as his wife, appeared to increase his consternation and his annoyance considerably. ‘I have to say,’ he added austerely, ‘I would have thought identification before now would not have been too much to expect from you people.’
A metallic green Mondeo, thought Mayo, holding on by ignoring this last. Then why had Angela – for he was sure, now, that it had been Angela who had been parked in the lane – been using a blue Fiat? Unless she’d already sold the Mondeo and had hired the Fiat, a fact easy enough to establish.
‘No, we haven’t found it yet,’ he said. Mildly, he felt, in the circumstances. ‘Do you recall the registration number?’
‘I have it written down somewhere.’ Hunnicliffe fumbled in various pockets and eventually came up with a pocket diary from which, after some searching, he produced the information.
‘There’s a possibility she had already turned it in, of course. We’ll get on to Automart, see what they have to say.’
Hunnicliffe put down his cup, clasped his hands across his belly, a gesture Mayo was beginning to find increased his own irritation. He looked as if he expected Mayo to ring Automart immediately, but Mayo had no intention of breaking into the thread of the interview. That could come later.
He said, ‘We’ve made enquiries from Mr George Atkins, the owner of the house you’d been renting, and it appears everything else was left ready for her departure on 3rd March. From the evidence we have so far, we think it likely she met her death on Thursday, and it looks as though she was all set to leave the following morning, Friday. All her things cleared out and packed. There was no food left apart from some milk in the fridge.’
‘She never ate breakfast,’ Hunnicliffe said absently, then went again into attack mode. ‘I have to ask you, Mr Mayo – didn’t anyone think it strange when she didn’t turn the car in, wasn’t there for the taxi, didn’t claim her seat on the airplane? Why were no questions asked? And what about the house keys?’ He slurped more coffee and set his cup down with a distinct bang on the saucer.
‘The keys were pushed through the door of Mr Atkins’s office, with a letter. People do fail to turn up for flights they’ve booked, you know, or forget they’ve booked a cab. And she may have decided to keep the car for a little longer, for all the garage knew. Taken together, all these things might have been suspicious, but since they were separate happenings, none of them gave out warning signals. Mrs Atkins did say she was surprised to find a pair of pyjamas and a few toilet things still in the house, but she thought they’d been forgotten.’ (What Daphne had actually said was that since Angela hadn’t even bothered to strip the bed, she could write for them if she wanted them forwarding. Something she was rather shamefaced at having even thought, now.) ‘The
rest of her luggage, with her passport, if you remember, was locked up.’
rest of her luggage, with her passport, if you remember, was locked up.’
‘I have to say that was one thing in her favour, she could be relied upon for that, she was always the sort of person to be careful about her possessions. What’s happened to her purse, by the way?’
It took Mayo a second or two to realise he meant her handbag. ‘I’m afraid that’s something we haven’t recovered yet.’
Hunnicliffe raised his eyebrows at this further evidence of incompetence. Having decided half an hour ago he didn’t like the man, Mayo hadn’t seen any reason since to change his opinion. Maybe Angela could be forgiven for playing away from home – although it did seem as though she might have exchanged one pompous prat for another in choosing Wetherby as a substitute.
When he had gone, half an hour later, Mayo was left with the unsettling question: could Hunnicliffe have been quite so unaware of what was going on under his nose? Without a hint, however much his academic head was in the clouds, that his marriage was not as perfect as he’d believed it? It wasn’t uncommon, after all, for people not to have an inkling in such circumstances – or to profess they hadn’t – even people much more percipient than this American appeared to be.
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