“I’m in a catch twenty-two. The police don’t believe me. They think I’m guilty, but trying to use doubt or cunning to wriggle out of the prosecution. Even Geof Wyatt, who was my partner and who knows me better than anyone, claims to have had the runs since he saw the Inspector’s photographs. They all ate there regularly, partly because I gave them discounts and partly out of a genuine desire to see an ex-copper succeed.” He wiped a weary hand across his mouth.
“Now, I’m persona non grata and I can’t really blame them. They feel they’ve been conned.”
“Why would you need to con them?”
“The recession.” He sighed.
“Businesses are going down like ninepins. There’s no reason mine should have been immune. What’s the first thing a restauranteur’s likely to do when he’s running out of money? Hang on to dodgy food and serve it up in a curry.”
There was a twisted logic to it.
“Won’t your staff speak up for you?”
He smiled grimly.
“The two waitresses have agreed to, but the only one whose word might carry weight is my assistant chef, and he was last heard of heading for France.” He stretched his arms towards the ceiling, and winced as pain seared round his ribs.
“It wouldn’t do me any good anyway. He must have been bought. Someone had to let whoever framed me into the kitchen and he had the only other key.” His eyes hardened.
“I should have throttled him when I had the chance but I was so damn shell-shocked I didn’t put two and two together fast enough. By the time I had, he’d gone.”
Roz chewed her thumb in thought.
“Didn’t that man tell you anything after I left? I assumed you were going to use my hat ping on him.”
Her candour brought a smile to his bleak face.
“I did, but he didn’t make much sense.
“You’re costing money on the foreclosures.” That’s all he said.” He arched an eyebrow.
“Can you make anything of it?”
“Not unless the bank’s about to pull the rug from underneath your feet.”
He shook his head.
“I borrowed the absolute minimum.
There’s no immediate pressure.” He drummed his fingers on the floor.
“Logically, he should have been referring to the businesses on either side of me. They’ve both gone bankrupt and in each case the lenders have foreclosed.”
“Well, that’s it then,” said Roz excitedly.
“Someone wants all three properties. Didn’t you ask him who it was and why?”
He rubbed the back of his head in tender recollection.
“I was clobbered before I had the chance. There was obviously a fifth man who went upstairs during the brawl to release Tweedledum and Tweedledee from the window bars. For all I know, it was that hammering we heard. Anyway, by the time I came to, a chip pan was in flames on the stove, the police had arrived in force, and my nextdoor neighbour was rabbi ting on about how he’d had to call an ambulance because I’d tried to boil a customer in fish stock.” He grinned sheepishiy.
“It was a blasted nightmare.
So I hit the nearest copper and legged it through the restaurant. It was the only thing I could think of.” He looked at her.
“In any case the idea that someone was trying to get hold of the Poacher was the first thing I thought of. I checked out both the adjoining properties five weeks ago and there’s no common factor between them. One was bought privately by a small retail chain and the other was sold at auction to an investment company.”
“They could be fronts. Did you go to Companies’ House?”
“What do you think I’ve been doing for the last three days?” He gritted his teeth angrily.
“I’ve checked every damn register I can think of and I’ve got sweet FA to show for it. I don’t know what the hell’s going on except that the court case will be the last nail in the Poacher’s coffin and presumably, at that point, someone will make me an offer to buy the place. Rather like you kept doing the other day.”
She let his anger slide past her. She understood it now.
“By which time it will be too late.”
“Precisely.”
They sat in silence for several minutes.
“Why were you beaten up the first time I saw you?” Roz asked at last.
“That must have followed on the Inspector’s visit.”
He nodded.
“It was three or four days after I reopened. They grabbed me off the doorstep when I unlocked the door. Same MO as you witnessed men in ski-masks with baseball bats but that time they shoved me in the back of a fish lorry, drove me ten miles into the New Forest, slapped me about a bit, then dumped me by the side of the road with no money and no cards. It took me all afternoon to walk home, because nobody fancied giving me a lift, and at the end of it’ he flicked her a sideways glance “I found Botticelli’s Venus loitering palely among my tables. I really thought my luck had changed until Venus opened her mouth and turned into a Fury.” He ducked to avoid her hand.
“God, woman’ he grinned “I was out on my feet and you tore more strips off me than the bastards in the fish lorry. Rape, for Christ’s sake!
I could hardly put one foot in front of the other.”
“It’s your own fault for having bars on your windows. Why do you, as a matter of interest?”
“They were there when I bought it. The chap before me had a wife who sleep walked I’ve been glad of them these last few weeks.”
She reverted to her former question.
“But it doesn’t explain why, you know. I mean if the idea of the Inspector’s visit was to get you to jack it in quickly, then they should have clobbered you the day you’reopened, not four days later.
And if they were happy to wait until the court case, then why clobber you at all?”
“I know,” he admitted.
“It made me very suspicious of you. I kept thinking you must be connected with it somehow but I had you checked and you seemed genuine enough.”
“Thanks,” she said duly.
“You’d have done the same.” A frown carved a deep furrow between his brows.
“You must admit it’s damned odd the way everything blew up around the time you appeared.”
In all fairness, Roz could see it was.
“But you got stitched up,” she pointed out, ‘before you or I had ever heard of each other. It must be coincidence.” She topped up his glass.
“And, anyway, the only common factor between you and me five weeks ago was Olive and you’re not suggesting she’s behind it.
She’s hardly confident enough to run a bath on her own, let alone mastermind a conspiracy to defraud you of the Poacher.”
He shrugged impatiently.
“I know. I’ve been over it a thousand times. None of it makes sense.
The only thing I’m sure of is that it’s about the neatest operation I’ve ever come across. I’ve had the ground cut from under me. I’m the fall guy and I can’t even begin to get a fix on who’s done it.” He scratched his stubble with weary resignation.
“So, Miss Leigh, how do you feel now about a failed restauranteur with convictions for health violation, GBH, arson, and resisting arrest?
Because, barring miracles, that’s what I’ll be in three weeks.”
Her eyes gleamed above her wine glass.
“Horny.”
He gave an involuntary chuckle. It was the same gleam in the pictured eyes of Alice.
“You look just like your daughter.” He stirred the photographs again.
“You should have them all around the room to remind yourself of how beautiful she was.
I would if she’d been mine.” He heard Roz’s indrawn breath and glanced at her.
“Sorry. That was insensitive.”
“Don’t be an oaf,” she said.
“I’ve just remembered where I’ve seen that man before. I knew I knew him. It’s one of Mr. Hayes’s sons. You know, the old man who lived next door to the Martins.
He had photographs of the family on his sideboard.” She clapped her hands.