Rose ignored the martini placed before her and slid the cigarette case back into her bag. She snapped the bag shut and reached for the pashmina shawl that she’d draped across the back of her chair. “This is getting boring, you know that? I don’t know why I’ve got to spend the evening talking about Stacy Storm.”
“You don’t have to. But it’s either here or later at the station.”
Her eyes hardened. “This wasn’t a date at all, was it, not a proper date? This was just to get something out of me, find out things.” She pulled the black shawl around her and leaned toward him. “Next you’ll be saying I had something to do with her murder, won’t you?”
“No. You were in London. Don’t worry; we checked out your alibi.”
She looked so stunningly self-satisfied at that, Jury wanted to laugh.
“You mean you don’t think I ran over to Chesham in my Manolo Blahniks and shot her? Well, good for you. Ta very much for the drinks.” She slid from the stool and walked across a room that was growing ever more crowded.
But Jury hardly registered her departure.
Manolo Blahniks?
While he was walking toward the Green Park tube station, his mobile ding-ding-dinged and he considered throwing it down in front of the Mayfair Hotel and stomping it to death.
How childish. “Jury.”
“It’s me,” said Wiggins. “I did find somebody connected with Roedean. Taught there twenty years ago and remembers ‘her girls,’ as she called them. Specifically, Kate Banks. Name’s Shirley Husselby. You want the Brighton address?”
“Yes.”
Wiggins gave it to him. “You going there, then?”
“First thing tomorrow. Thanks, Wiggins.”
Jury didn’t stomp the mobile to death. Reprieve.
57
How did these places seem never to change? It was pleasant, he thought, looking across this shingle beach toward the sea. Time seemed to have stopped here and, without meaning to, stayed.
He turned and walked along King’s Road, facing the sea. Years ago he had been here on a case, one of the saddest cases of his career. But they were all sad, weren’t they?
Walking on, Jury had no trouble finding the house. It was on a narrow street just off Madeira Drive with a long view of the sea. It was one of a line of terraced houses, the numbers uniform and easy to see on the white posts to which they were attached. He used the dolphin door knocker, wondering what it was about dolphins that made them so popular as door knockers. He heard an approach and then what seemed to be a mild argument on the other side of the door until finally it opened with a yank.
The woman who yanked it was elderly and fragile-looking and, he assumed, must be Shirley Husselby. She was the one Wiggins had found. He took out his ID, saying, “I’m Superintendent Richard Jury. My sergeant called?” He didn’t know why he made a question of it, unless it was to give this small woman the opportunity to say, “I don’t think so.”
“Oh, yes. I’m sorry for the delay opening the door. This door will be troublesome.” She gave it a little kick. “You don’t look like a superintendent. I expected someone short, stout, gray, and squinting.”
Jury thought of Racer and smiled.
“Do come in.” She threw out her arm, ushering him in. Then she explained further. “It’s the ‘superintendent’ part. That’s a very high rank of policeman for one so young.”
“Me? I’m not young at all, I’m-”
Her finger to her lips, she stopped him. “Superintendent, don’t tell people your age. It’s none of their business. I never do. Anyway, you look young and quite handsome. Please”-she held out her arm again, toward the front room-“just go on through, but watch that runner! The fringe wants to catch at your heel and send you sprawling.”
Jury thanked her for the warning. The fringe said nothing.
In the living room, he was warned not to sit on the armchair to the left of the fireplace unless he wanted a good pinching. “The springs in that chair are so temperamental I never know what they’ll do. Just sit beside me on the sofa; I think it’s on its good behavior.”
Jury looked around at this quite ordinary, very comfortable-looking room: a crisp fire burning, old but good chairs and tables, pretty cream linen, and tulip-patterned slipcovers-all of them looking welcoming but apparently full of traps for the unwary.
“Now, I’ve just made fresh coffee.” The silver tray and coffee service sat on a coffee table before the sofa, steam rising from the spout. There were cream, sugar, and small biscuits. All of it looked quite nonthreatening.
“Be careful of the coffee. It’s hotter than you might think. Cream? Sugar?”
Jury declined cream and sugar but took the china cup and saucer carefully. “Thank you.” The coffee was no hotter than coffee ought to be. He thought she had a watchful air, as if she were prepared to call Emergency if the first sip had him on his back on the floor. Then he said, “I expect you’ve heard about this series of murders in London?”
“Yes. You want to talk to me about Kate Banks, is that right?” He thought her cup rattled against the saucer as she set it down. “She was one of the best students I ever had. I felt absolutely terrible when I read about her. I just couldn’t believe it. Why, of all people…” She shook her head. Her mouth shut tightly, as if holding back emotions that threatened to overflow.
“You think it so unlikely something such as that would happen to her?”
“Of course. She was universally liked at school. Roedean, that is. Really, she was a remarkable person.” Miss Husselby rose and went to the fireplace, saying, “Oh, this fire is unbelievably lazy, and then sometimes it will just shoot out!” She poked at the recalcitrant logs, burning by whim. Nothing in Miss Husselby’s world cooperated.
When she’d reseated herself, Jury said, “Please go on about Kate.”
“She was very smart, intelligent, and just a very good person, liked, as I said, by everyone. She was the sort who could settle disputes-you know, who could act as go-between. The girls trusted her, and deservedly so.” Miss Husselby sipped her coffee, then sat back. “It was too bad her mother was so flighty. Undependable. The very opposite of her daughter. Kate was simply a rock. One could lean on Kate, young as she was.”
Jury said, “There was another girl, I believe a friend of hers. Crystal North.”
“Oh, Crystal.” The tone changed, suggesting that Crystal North was an entirely different kettle of fish. “I don’t know that I’d call her a ‘friend’ of Kate’s, though she certainly wanted to be. She wanted to be best friends-in fact, I think she wanted to be Kate, if you know what I mean. Kate didn’t like her very much. But Crystal generally got what she wanted; unfortunately she had no tolerance for frustration. And she would play with other people’s lives.”
“How?”
“I remember once she cheated on a test; she copied answers from the paper of a girl beside her. The girl came to me about it. It came down to one of them, one of them had to have copied, but which one? The tutor favored Crystal; Crystal was a great manipulator, see. The tutor gave them an ultimatum: if one of them didn’t admit to cheating, he’d have to fail both of them. And Crystal let that happen. She was going to fail in any event, so telling the truth gained her nothing. It’s one thing to act stupidly when the only victim is you yourself; it’s quite another thing to make someone else, some innocent person, pay.”
Jury thought of the zebra crossing. The hand stretched out to stop traffic. The car unable to stop. The miscarriage.