‘Is that right? What?’
‘It was you I wanted,’ Slider said. ‘I have a job for you, but I don’t know how you’ll do it.’ He explained. ‘I thought of you because you’re good at getting people to talk to you.’
She nodded, her eyes far away. ‘I think I can see me way. Don’t worry, boss. It’ll be grand.’
‘And of course – as quickly as possible,’ he added.
Angela Fraser was what Swilley described to herself as ‘wired’ – tense, excited, but elated with it. She met her in Café Rouge, sufficiently far down the parade from the office to avoid being spotted if Amanda should happen to come back.
‘She’s been in a filthy mood since your blokes came in,’ Angela confided, sitting beside Swilley on a banquette, at the back of the restaurant and facing the door. It was part of her new persona as a secret agent: she reckoned she could see anyone coming in before they saw her, and nip into the ladies, which was back here, if necessary. ‘Snapping at everyone, complaining about the coffee. Can’t get anything right for her. She sent back a letter because there was the tiniest little crease in the paper. She even bitched about one of the clients, and they’re like gods to her, normally.’
‘Has she given you any idea why she’s in a bad mood?’ Swilley asked.
‘I’d have said it was grief over David dying if she was anyone else, but I don’t think that woman’s got a heart. I think she’s worried, but I don’t know what about. Unless—’ The wide open eyes searched Norma’s face. ‘You think she had something to do with it, don’t you? The murder.’
‘I don’t think anything,’ Swilley said blandly. ‘I just do as I’m told, and leave the thinking to my boss. He’s good at it.’
‘I liked him,’ Angela said, settling down. ‘He reminded me of this teacher I had at school, Mr Maltby. Maths. He was nice. I was rubbish at maths, but he always made you feel you could do stuff, you know?’
‘Yeah, I know,’ Swilley said. ‘So what have you found out?’
‘Well, there’s a lot of stuff in Amanda’s room, and she leaves it all locked up when she goes out.’ She shook her head. ‘I’ve never known an office where so much is locked away. I mean, salaries, yes, and staff files, but not anything else. What could she have to keep secret? We all know all the clients and their backgrounds. But I did get to look at the accounts. Some of it’s in books that Nora keeps, and there’s a lot more on her computer. It’s security locked, but I know her access code.’
Norma was amused. ‘How come?’
‘She’s a dipstick,’ Angela said simply. ‘She wrote it on a sticky label and stuck it on the side of her top right-hand drawer. Thinks no one’ll ever find it there, but I’ve seen her checking it before she logs on. Anyway, I found out the main things you wanted to know. The first thing is that we don’t get a government grant, which really surprised me. I’d have thought that’d be the first thing Amanda would go for, because the government’s dead keen on getting disabled people back to work.’
‘So where does the income come from?’
‘Well, the companies pay a fee. The big ones have to employ so many disabled by law, so they pay us a retainer to find the right person whenever they need one, and the smaller companies pay on a case by case basis. And then there are donations. I guess that’s what Amanda spends her time doing. It’s mostly from private individuals, and one or two companies – manufacturers of mobility equipment and disability aids mostly – but the biggest donor is the Windhover Trust.’
Swilley looked enquiring. ‘What’s that?’ she asked, to see if Fraser knew.
‘Oh, they’ve been paying us a monthly donation since the beginning,’ Angela said. ‘It’s a medical charity. I asked Nora about it once. Medical research and support, she said. I think they’re something to do with one of the drugs companies,’ she concluded vaguely.
‘What would they get out of it – making such a big donation to you, I mean?’
‘Well, I suppose it’s good for their image,’ Angela hazarded. ‘And don’t they get tax relief or something? I think Nora said companies get their tax reduced for charity donations. And maybe Amanda collects data for them, or sends them customers. I don’t know. That sort of thing would be what’s in her private files, I suppose. Anyway, the Windhover’s a big supporter – we could about survive on what they pay us alone. Oh, and I asked Nora about setting up the agency in the first place, like you asked me, and she said that was Windhover as well – gave Amanda a big lump sum to get the office building adapted and get the whole thing going.’
‘They sound like the good guys,’ Swilley said.
‘Well, I guess they are. It’s nice when you hear all the stories about these big multinational drugs companies, to know there’s one that’s doing something good, giving something back.’
‘I expect lots of them do,’ Swilley said. ‘I expect a lot of these stories are exaggerated.’
Angela looked pleased at the idea of the world being a nicer place. ‘Yeah, I bet you’re right.’
‘So that’s the income,’ Swilley prompted. ‘What about the outgoings?’
‘Oh, yeah, you wanted to know about salaries. Well, Nora gets £1650 a month – gross – which surprised me a bit because it’s not that much more than me. I get £1350.’
Around twenty thousand and sixteen thousand respectively, Norma thought after a quick calculation. ‘Is that about average?’ she asked.
‘I can’t say about Nora – I mean, she’s supposed to be an owner, isn’t she? But mine is a bit above average. When you work for a charity you don’t expect high wages.’
‘And what about Amanda?’
‘There wasn’t anything about her getting a salary, either in the books or on the system – I suppose she’d be bound to keep that private. But in the bank account I did find a regular transfer to another account of ten thousand every month.’ She screwed up her brow. ‘But that couldn’t be her salary, could it? I mean, that would be a hundred and twenty thousand a year. She wouldn’t take that much, when it was a charity, would she? Only, I can’t think what else it could be, because it’s too big to be utilities or rates or anything, and if it was office supplies or something like that it’d be paid when the invoices came in, not monthly.’
‘You’re right,’ Norma said. ‘I wonder if it could be paying off a loan of some sort?’
‘I don’t know. I never heard of any loan – and a loan for what, anyway? Apart from the office and office supplies, we don’t use anything else.’ She shrugged the problem away, being essentially uninterested in it. ‘Anyway, I made a note of the bank account number in case you wanted it. I suppose you’d be able to find out whose it was, wouldn’t you?’
‘Yes,’ said Swilley. ‘If it was important.’ She smiled encouragingly. ‘You’ve done very well.’
The last of the elation faded from Angela’s face, and she slumped. ‘Doesn’t make any difference, though, does it? It doesn’t bring David back.’ Her lip trembled and she put her hand over it and pressed for a moment. When she removed it, a certain steeliness had come with further thoughts. ‘If she did have anything to do with it, I hope you get her! It makes me sick to think of her being all pious and smug and all the time she’s done something like that.’
‘Well, we don’t know she’s done anything,’ Swilley said quickly. ‘And you mustn’t let her think you suspect her, whatever you do.’
‘Oh, I won’t,’ Angela said easily. ‘I can be as two-faced as the next person.’
SEVENTEEN
Butcher’s Dog
Porson actually came to Slider’s office rather than summoning him, proof of excitement. Because he was The Syrup, it wouldn’t be revealed any other way. Except that – wasn’t there something of a shine to the old boy’s bumpy pate, and a sparkle lurking under the overhanging eyebrows?