‘Where does this leave us, then?’
Beatrice rubbed her forehead with the tip of her finger. ‘You tell me. Lucy Mahoney had temazepam on prescription for an operation, but Hopkins…’ She looked up at him. ‘So far no one can work out how she got her hands on those tablets.’
Caffery peered at the cut on Hopkins ’s wrist. He could see past the skin right down into the mechanics of the arm: the duncoloured tendons, the slippery fascia of muscle. ‘I don’t know. Feels a little like you’re stretching it a bit.’
Beatrice pushed a stray strand of grey hair off her forehead and gave an exasperated sigh. ‘You know, I didn’t expect you to propose marriage to me over this, but I have to say I’d hoped for a different reaction, Jack. I’d kind of hoped for some sort of appreciation. Even just a nod. A smile that I bothered to call you, maybe.’
Caffery glanced across at the DI, who hadn’t looked up and was still muttering into the phone, one finger in his ear to block out the roar of the air-conditioning unit. ‘It’s just that if you’re right,’ he muttered, leaning into her, ‘then all I can say is, God help me.’
‘And all I can say is, I hear the clink and clank of God ponying up right now – because I am right. You just haven’t heard everything yet.’
Caffery turned his eyes sideways and held hers.
‘Yes,’ she murmured, her eyebrows raised. ‘Oh, yes.’
She gestured to Fester and Lurch. Like Mahoney, Hopkins had been a big girl – it took two of them to roll her over. And when they did Caffery stopped chewing the gum. He stood quite still, his hands in his pockets.
‘See what I mean?’ Beatrice said. ‘Do you see why I don’t think she killed herself?’
On the backs of Hopkins ’s heels an area of skin had been sloughed away. Little pinpoints of black showed gravel embedded in the grazes.
‘She was dragged? You’re telling me she was dragged into the garage?’
Beatrice gave a low, humourless laugh. ‘At last,’ she murmured. ‘At last we’re reading from the same hymn sheet.’
41
Flea parked in the shaded trees, just out of sight of the road, and walked up the path to Ruth Lindermilk’s bungalow. The heat of the day was just leaving the air. The hamlet was quiet, the only sound a dog barking furiously inside one of the cottages. Flea didn’t go up the path to the door. She opened the gate and went around the side of the building to where the land dropped away sharply towards the road.
Ruth was about ten feet away, her back turned. Hatless, dressed in a short white skirt and a denim jacket, she was busy dropping birdseed into one of the feeders.
‘Hello.’
Ruth looked round, saw Flea, put the seed on the ground and began walking towards the house.
‘Ruth – please.’
‘Eff off. I’m going to get my gun.’
‘You haven’t got a gun. The police took it.’
‘Got another one. Going to get it.’
‘Christ, Ruth, this isn’t The Beverly shagging Hillbillies.’
She stopped in her tracks and turned slowly to Flea. Without the cap she seemed older. Her badly dyed hair was cut short and greying at the back. Her makeup was caked in the corners of her eyes. She was sweating, breathing hard. ‘You’ve got some fuckin’ neck, showing your face round here.’
‘I’m sorry about last time, but the neighbours didn’t send me. You should at least believe that.’
Ruth shook her head. ‘Then who are you? With your combats and your hat. Hasn’t no one never told you those are boys’ clothes? You look a right wanker.’
‘I’m a private investigator.’
‘A private…? How comes you told me you were from the Highways Agency?’
‘It was the first thing that came to mind.’
‘I should’ve known you weren’t from the council straight away. Council’d never come out to see me. Now, if I was on the social it’d be different – if I was on the soash they’d have been straight round…’ She trailed off. ‘A private investigator? What do you want out of me?’
‘Can we talk? Inside? Don’t want to give your neighbours a show, do we?’
Ruth’s mouth twitched. Her foxy little brain was working on the situation. She glanced at the road – at the other houses in the hamlet. Behind the puffy skin her eyes were grey and hard. Uncompromising. ‘You’ve got five minutes. Then I’m calling the police.’
They went into the living room. It seemed bigger with the french windows wide open, and it smelt of cleaning fluid and burnt toast. Flea pushed some cats away and sat down on the sofa. ‘I’ll be absolutely honest.’
‘It’s not in your nature.’
‘I’ll be absolutely honest. Even though I shouldn’t, I’m telling you the truth. I’m in trouble.’
‘So what? Don’t confuse me with someone who gives a shit.’
‘This case is my last hope. If I don’t get it right I’m basically going to lose my job. That’s why I lied to you. I was desperate.’
‘Desperate?’ Ruth licked her lips. ‘How terrible for you. What? Down to your last million, are you?’
‘It’s a difficult case. My client’s husband’s been having an affair. He came home drunk last week. He’d had an accident. The front grille of their car was dented. He told my client he was parked in Bristol at a work do and that someone had driven into it in the car park.’
‘And?’
‘My client didn’t believe him. She thought he’d been seeing his girlfriend over at Tellisford. If he’d been in Tellisford he’d’ve had to drive along this road to get home. I think whatever happened to his car happened down there on the road. There are skidmarks. When I was looking at them yesterday I saw your telescope from the road. That’s why I came up.’
She held Ruth’s eyes steadily. ‘My client’s accident was last Monday. Some time before midnight. Do you know anything about it?’
‘Course I do. He hit a deer.’
‘How do you know it was a deer?’
‘I could tell from the noise of the collision.’
‘You didn’t see it, then?’
‘I heard it. That was enough. The deer must have limped off because when I went down there later with the camera there was nothing. It probably died in one of the fields, the poor-’ She broke off, eyeing Flea suspiciously. And then she grinned. A gap-toothed beery smile. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘There you go again – taking me for an idiot.’
Flea looked at her stonily. ‘Are you going to talk to me or not?’
‘Depends.’
‘Depends on what?’
‘On what you can give me in return.’
‘I don’t know what I have to give you in return. What were you thinking?’
‘What do you think I was thinking?’
‘Money, I suppose. But you won’t get far with that. It’s against the ethics to pay for information.’
‘Ethics? Whose ethics?’
‘Mine. My company’s. My client’s.’
‘Oh, I’m sure you could find something. Ten K. That’s all I want. It’s not a lot. Not to someone like you.’
‘You’d be surprised what’s a lot to people like me.’
‘That’s fine.’ Ruth went to the bar and picked up a cracked glass with a drink in it. She raised it to Flea. ‘If it’s interesting enough for you, then it’ll be interesting enough for someone else.’
Flea got to her feet.
‘Where’re you going?’
‘There’s no money. I’m going home.’
Ruth shrugged. She put down the glass and went to the computer table. Pulled a cellophane envelope from the top drawer and slid out a black-and-white print. ‘My evidence.’ She came across the room and held it out. ‘I never got all his registration, only the last three letters. Otherwise I’d have called the police on him.’