This thought prompted her to look at her watch, but before she could say it was time to be off, Mrs Pargeter asked, “Where does Kirsten get the money to buy all these clothes? I didn’t think au pairs were paid that much…”
“No, they’re not. Must have rich parents, I suppose.” Then she looked again at her watch. “Sorry, I must be off now. I’ve got to be in the office this afternoon, and I haven’t sorted out anything for the kids’ supper yet.”
“Doesn’t Kirsten even do that?”
This was greeted with another ‘Huh’. Sue went on, “I don’t know why people go on having au pairs. All I hear from my friends is a long history of disasters. Anorexia, pregnancies, drugs, boyfriends – ugh! I don’t think I’ve heard of anyone who’s had a happy experience with an au pair.”
“I have heard,” said Mrs Pargeter mischievously, “of one or two husbands who have.”
Sue Curle grinned wryly. “Yes. Right. That just about says it all, doesn’t it? Another triumph for the tassel.” She picked up her handbag. “Look, I must be off. Thanks very much for the coffee. It was a really nice break.”
“I should be going, too,” Vivvi Sprake agreed, perhaps too quickly, after Sue had disappeared up the front path. She didn’t seem to want to be left alone with her hostess.
“Oh, I’m sure you don’t have to rush, Vivvi. I did just want to ask you about something…”
“Oh. What?”
For a moment Mrs Pargeter was thrown. Then she remembered her good old stand-by excuse. “About gardeners…”
Yes, about gardeners first. And then about Rod Cotton…
“Oh. All right.” Vivvi put her handbag down. She didn’t look very happy about it, but she knew she couldn’t rush off without actual rudeness.
“Yes, Vivvi. What I wanted to ask was –”
But then the telephone rang. Just at the wrong moment. It let Vivvi Sprake off the hook. As Mrs Pargeter went to answer it, her guest said hastily, “Look, sorry, I really must dash. Didn’t realise it was so late. We’ll talk about gardeners another time – OK?”
And she was out of the front door before Mrs Pargeter had picked up the receiver.
How infuriating!
“Hello?” said Mrs Pargeter into the phone.
“Mrs Pargeter? It’s Keyhole.” His voice was tense and subdued.
“Oh?”
“I did it last night. Like you asked.”
“Oh yes?”
“And I’m afraid you was right.”
“Oh dear,” said Mrs Pargeter, reaching for a chair to support herself. “Oh dear, oh dear.”
∨ Mrs, Presumed Dead ∧
Twenty-Three
“Tell me what happened, Keyhole,” she said.
“Job went easy. No problem. Sorted things out in the nick…”
“Wasn’t that difficult?”
“No. Like I said, done it before. You know, wedding anniversaries, that kind of special occasion…”
“Yes.”
“Mind you, of course, any celebrations have to be on the, sort of, domestic side. Can’t really take the missus out for a nice meal, or up West for a show, you know, bit risky, that.”
“I’m sure. But, last night…”
“Oh yeah. Right. Last night. Well, as I say, no problem getting out of the nick. In many ways it’s easier, really, doing it after we’ve all been locked in. Screws aren’t looking out for trouble. They, like, relax their vigilance. I mean, during the day they –”
“Yes.”
The tension in Mrs Pargeter’s voice got through to him, and Keyhole Crabbe speeded up his narrative. “Anyway, outside the prison, met up with my mate all right. He’d got the car and organised the gear, skeleton keys and that, and off we go to Worcester. No problem finding the place. We done our homework and knew exactly where to go. Blooming great warehouse, it was.”
“What was the security like?”
“Nothing to worry about.”
“You mean there wasn’t any?”
“Oh no. They got a couple of blokes with dogs come round, you know, patrol every hour or so. And they got these alarms on the doors and windows. But my mate’s sussed it all out beforehand, so we don’t have no difficulty.”
“And no problem getting into the depository?”
“No. Three locks, all dead easy. Could’ve done them with a piece of soggy macaroni.”
“And inside?”
“Bloody big, I’ll say that – pardon my French. All these blooming great containers. That could’ve been a problem…you know, so many of them…not knowing where to look, that sort of number. Could’ve spent a long time going through everything in a big place like that. Heavy gear to move, and all.”
“But you managed?” Mrs Pargeter urged him on.
“Yes. Like I say, my mate’s good. He’d done his research on the inside of the place, too. Took me straight to the right container.”
“So you started to unpack it?”
“Yeah. Glad there was two of us. Half weigh a lot, wardrobes and that.”
“Yes?” Mrs Pargeter was finding the tension unbearable. “So where was it? What did you find?”
“You was right. It was in the freezer.”
“Oh.”
“That was locked, and all. No problem there, though…” He seemed to be slowing down again, unwilling to continue with his story.
“Come on, Keyhole. Tell me what you found.”
His voice was thick and low as he continued. “We open the freezer. There’s this something wrapped in polythene…Heavy. We pull it out. We unwrap it. And yes, it’s a body.”
“I’m sorry,” Mrs Pargeter murmured. “I’m very sorry to have put you through that.”
“Don’t worry. You had warned me, tipped me the wink, like. Not as if it was a complete surprise.” He swallowed noisily down the line. “Nasty, though.”
“Yes. And I suppose, having been in there more than a week…”
“Wasn’t too bad from that point of view, Mrs Pargeter, actually. Tightly wrapped in the polythene, good seal on the freezer lid, wasn’t in too bad a state.”
“Good.” Mrs Pargeter hesitated, unwilling to have her next, inevitable question answered. No way round it, though – had to be asked. “And who was it, Keyhole…?”
“A woman. About forty. Fully clothed. Red hair.”
Poor Theresa Cotton. Now the anxieties and uncomfortable speculations of the last few days had been proved real, Mrs Pargeter felt weak and drained. Tears, she knew, were not far away. Tears for a woman she had only met a couple of times, but whose murder seemed to dispossess her more than the deaths of friends who had been much closer.
“Tell me, Keyhole,” she murmured. “Was there anything else in the polythene? Or in the freezer?”
“All we found was a tie. Man’s tie. Some school’s Old Boys…cricket club…something like that, anyway. That was what did it.”
“She was strangled?”
“Yes.”
“Any other wounds on her?”
“Not that we could see. No blood on her clothes, nothing like that.”
“No.” That at least suggested that the attack had been a surprise. A quick death. Mrs Pargeter tried to comfort herself with the thought.
“So what did you do, Keyhole?”
“Like you said, Mrs Pargeter. Wrapped the body up, just as it had been. Back in the freezer. Freezer back in the container. All the rest of the furniture put exactly where we’d moved it from. No one’ll know we been in there.”
“And there’s no danger that any fingerprints or…?”