‘No. Not to speak of. But I didn’t think much of them.’
‘Oh?’
She pulled harder at the handkerchief on her lap, and it began to tear along one edge. ‘I always thought they were a pair of right toffee-nosed gits, but I never said nowt. Stephen thinks he’s God’s gift to women, and that Nicholas is a bit doolally, if you ask me.’
‘In what way?’
‘Have you met him?’
‘Yes.’
‘He’s like a little kid, gets all overexcited. Especially when he’s had a drink or two. Practically slavers all over a person, he does. Especially women. He even tried it on with me once, but I sent him away with his tail between his legs.’ She shuddered. ‘I don’t know how they put up with him at that there school, unless they’re all a bit that way.’
‘What about Stephen?’
Esther shrugged. ‘Seems a pleasant enough gent on the outside. Bit of a smoothie, really. Got a lot more class than his brother. Bit two-faced, though.’
‘In what way?’
‘You know. All friendly one minute, then cuts you dead next time he sees you. But they can afford to do that, can’t they?’
‘Who can?’
‘Rich folks. Don’t have to live like ordinary people, like you and me, do they?’
‘I don’t imagine they have the same priorities, no,’ Banks said, unsure whether he approved of being called an ordinary person. ‘Did he try it on too?’
‘Mr Stephen? No. Oh, he liked the girls, all right, but he was too much of a gentleman, for all his faults.’
Mrs Haines seemed to have forgotten her grief for a few moments, so absorbed had she been in the past, but as soon as silence fell, her tears began to flow again and her husband put his arm around her. In the kitchen, something smashed, and the child ran wailing into the room and buried his jammy face in Esther Haines’s lap.
Banks stood up. ‘You’ve been very helpful,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry to have been the bearer of such bad news.’
Esther nodded, handkerchief pressed to her mouth, and Mr Haines showed him to the door. ‘What are we to do about… you know…’
‘The remains?’
‘Aye.’
‘We’ll be in touch soon,’ Banks said. ‘Don’t worry.’
Upstairs, a baby started crying.
The first thing Banks did was look for a phone box to call Sandra and tell her when he’d be back. That didn’t prove as easy as it sounded. The first three he came across had been vandalized, and he had to drive almost two miles before he found one that worked.
It was a pleasant drive back to Eastvale through Harrogate and Ripon. In a quiet mood, he slipped in Delius’s North Country Sketches instead of the 1960s pop he’d been listening to. As he drove, he tried to piece together all the information he’d got that day. Whichever way he looked at it, the trail led back to Swainshead, the Greenocks, the Colliers and John Fletcher.
5
Only the cry of a distant curlew and the sound of water gurgling over rocks in the stream at the back broke the silence.
Then Sam Greenock echoed the news: ‘Bernie? Dead? I can’t believe it.’
‘I’m afraid so,’ Banks said. It was the second time in two days that he had been the bearer of bad news, but this time it was easier. The investigation proper had begun, and he had more on his mind than Sam Greenock’s disbelief, real or feigned.
They sat in the living room at the back of the house: the Greenocks, Banks, and Sergeant Hatchley taking notes. Katie gazed out of the window, or sometimes she stared at the huge ugly wooden cross on the mantelpiece. She had said nothing, given no reaction at all.
‘It’s true he was staying with you then, is it?’ Banks asked.
Sam nodded.
‘Why didn’t his name show up on the register? We went to a lot of trouble checking every place in Swainsdale.’
‘It’s not my fault,’ Sam said. ‘He was staying with us as a friend. Besides, you know as well as I do that those guest books aren’t legal requirements; they’re only for people to write comments in if they want, show they’ve been here.’
‘When our man called and asked if you’d had any Canadians staying recently, why didn’t you mention Bernard Allen?’
‘He didn’t ask me anything. He just looked at the register. Besides, I never thought of Bernie as a Canadian. Oh, I know he lived there, but that’s not everything, is it? I’ve known people who lived in Saudi Arabia for a year working on the oil fields but I don’t think of them as Saudis.’
‘Come off it, Sam. Bernard Allen had been in Canada for eight years, and you hadn’t seen him for four. This was only his third trip back,’ said Banks.
‘Still…’
‘Did you have any reason to lie about Bernie being here?’
‘No. I told you—’
‘Because if you did, we can charge you with concealing information. That’s serious, Sam. You could get two years.’
Sam leaned forward. ‘Look, I never thought. That policeman who came, he didn’t tell us what he was looking for.’
‘We can check, you know.’
‘Bloody check then. It’s true.’
Sam couldn’t remember the officer’s name, so Banks asked Hatchley to make a note of the time and date. It would be easy enough to find out who had made the visit and what approach he had taken. He still wasn’t sure about Sam Greenock, though.
Banks sighed. ‘All right. We’ll leave that for now. Which room did he stay in?’
Sam looked at Katie. She was staring out on the fell side, so he had to nudge her and repeat the question.
‘Five,’ she said, as if speaking from a great distance. ‘Room five.’
‘We’ll need to have a look,’ Banks told her.
‘It was two weeks ago,’ Sam said. ‘There’s been other people in since then. That’s where we took Fellowes after he’d found the body.’
‘We’ll still need to look.’
‘Do you think he’s hidden some secret message there, Inspector? Taped it to the bottom of the dresser drawer, maybe?’
‘You’ve been reading too many espionage novels. And if I were you, I’d cut the bloody sarcasm. You might start me thinking that there’s some reason you don’t want me to look in Bernie Allen’s room. And while we’re at it, he’s not the first person to get killed after leaving this guest house, is he, Sam?’
‘Now wait a minute,’ said Sam. ‘If you’re trying to imply—’
Banks held his hand up. ‘I’m not trying to imply anything. What was it the man said: once is happenstance, twice is coincidence? Let’s just hope there’s not a third time.’
Sam put his head in his hands and rubbed his eyes. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Really, I am. It’s the shock. And now all these questions.’
‘Look at it from my point of view, Sam. Bernard Allen was killed after he left your guest house. That’s given his killer about two whole weeks to cover his tracks, leave the country, arrange for an alibi, whatever. I need everything I can get, and I need it quickly. And the last thing I need is some clever bugger who just might have been withholding information to start playing the comic.’
‘Look, I’ve said I’m sorry. What more do you want?’
‘First of all, you can tell us when he left.’
‘About two weeks ago.’
‘Can you be more specific?’
‘Katie?’
Again, with great difficulty, Katie turned her attention to the people in the room. Banks repeated his question.
‘It was a Friday,’ she said.
Hatchley checked the dates against his diary. That’d be the seventeenth, sir,’ he said. ‘Friday. May the seventeenth.’
‘What time?’
‘Just after breakfast. About nine thirty. He said he wanted to get an early start,’ Sam said.