“What do you mean?”
“She phoned me at the office and said she was ill. Couldn’t make our meeting in her flat on the Friday.”
“Did she say what was wrong with her?”
“No. Quite honestly, I didn’t care. Just breathed a big sigh of relief. Then the next week all Fedborough was talking about the fact that Virginia’d upped sticks and walked out on Roddy. So I was off the hook.”
“Very convenient,” said Francis Carlton.
“Yes,” Alan Burnethorpe agreed, without intonation.
There was a bit of steak-and-kidney-chomping before he went on, “You still haven’t explained what you meant by ‘not giving Debbie the satisfaction’ of you buying a First Class ticket.”
“Ah, no. Well, I told you I only came over because the police were making some nasty insinuations on the phone…”
“What kind of insinuations…assuming at that stage they didn’t know the body was Virginia’s?”
“Just asking how often I went down to the cellar in Pelling House, that kind of thing. It wasn’t actually what they were asking that got me worried; it was the tone inwhich they were asking it. I decided the only way to kind of clear my name was to come and talk to them face to face. And when I got here, I discovered why they were so suspicious of me.”
“Had they had an anonymous tip-off or something?”
“Exactly that. A letter, saying if they wanted to know how the torso got into the cellar at Pelling House, they should ask Francis Carlton.”
There was a silence. Jude held her breath. She noticed with annoyance that the barmaid had disappeared into the pub kitchen. Oh dear, she didn’t want this moment ruined by the arrival of a Tuna Bake.
“Did you see the actual letter?”
“No. But obviously it came from Debbie.”
“What makes you say that? Debbie’s not vicious. I think she’s got a rather forgiving nature.”
“Oh, come on, Alan. You’ve been divorced. You know divorce isn’t a great recipe for sympathy between a man and a woman. Debbie may appear to you to be ‘forgiving’, but she hates me. She hates the fact that I’ve got Jonelle. She hates the fact that I’m happy. She’d do anything to shaft me. And making me have to shell out the cost of an airline ticket from Miami – ”
“Even just an economy one.”
Francis ignored the interruption. “That’d give her a great charge. Pathetic, but it’s the only way she could think of to get at me, and take me away from Jonelle, even just for a few days. I bet Debbie had the idea the minute she heard about the discovery of the torso.”
“Did she sound gleeful when she heard you were going to come over?”
“She’s too subtle to do that. Besides, if she had started crowing, I might have smelt a rat. No, it was very simple. Debbie just wanted to cause me maximum inconvenience – and do something that’d upset Jonelle too. Petty revenge, that’s all.” He coloured at the recollection. “God, I bawled her out when the police told me about the anonymous letter.”
“Did she admit she’d sent it?”
“No, of course she didn’t! She denied it. But then she would, wouldn’t she?” Francis Carlton realized his anger was taking him over and paused to regain control. When he spoke next, his voice was quieter, but very tense. “I can’t wait to get on that plane tonight. I tell you one thing, Alan, whatever else I do in the rest of my life, I’m never coming back to bloody Fedborough.”
Having voiced the thought, he seemed anxious to depart as soon as possible. Alan Burnethorpe made a halfhearted offer to pick up the tab, which Francis accepted with alacrity. In spite of his denials, he really was very mean. Even with Jonelle’s money, he would remain mean. Jude wondered whether his new wife had yet found out about this little characteristic of her husband. To Jude’s mind, it was the worst flaw a man could have.
With hurried insistence that he must go and get his bags from Debbie’s and perfunctory thanks for the lunch, Francis Carlton was suddenly gone. The barmaid at that moment appeared with the Tuna Bake, so Alan Burnethorpe had to wait at the bar before he could settle up.
He looked across to where the girl was, and Jude shrank into her booth. But she wasn’t quick enough. Alan Burnethorpe didn’t make any acknowledgment, but there was no doubt that he’d seen her.
And no doubt he’d deduced that Jude had overheard his conversation with Francis Carlton.
Twenty-Five
“You know Debbie. Do you think it’s in her nature to send anonymous letters?”
“I don’t know her that well, Jude. And, anyway, divorce tends to change people’s natures,” said Carole with feeling. “When a relationship comes to an end, perfectly rational adults start behaving like playground bullies. I’m always amazed at the levels of petty vindictiveness that divorce can bring on.”
Jude nodded. She had witnessed the same. May even have witnessed the same in her own life, Carole thought suddenly. Again, she felt frustrated by how little she knew of her friend’s past. Now the subject had come up, maybe it would be a good moment to fill in some of the gaps.
But, as ever, the opportunity passed, as Jude said, “And, from what you say Debbie and Francis respectively got out of the settlement, I’d imagine she was pretty bitter.”
“She tried to sound grown-up and philosophical, but clearly she was very hurt. Her with her little flat in Fedborough, and him with his rich wife and two homes. And that was before she found out about the baby.”
“Yes.”
“That really hit her hard. I told you.”
“Mm…”
The pensive silence that ensued offered another opportunity to elicit a bit of information. Carole snatched it. “Do you regret not having children, Jude?”
Her friend looked up, smiling mischievously. “Who says I haven’t had any?” And, once again, before the supplementary question could be put, Jude had moved on. “I can see the satisfaction in it, from Debbie’s point of view. She hasn’t got much she can do in the way of revenge. Dragging Francis all the way back from Florida, putting him through a few nasty grillings with the police…not bad, is it?”
“I suppose not,” said Carole grumpily, still resentful of the way Jude had evaded the personal question. Unambiguously that time, as well; Jude had definitely been playing with her curiosity.
“Mind you,” her neighbour went on quickly, “if Debbie was responsible for the anonymous letter, then that probably rules out Francis Carlton as a suspect.”
“It was only her desire for revenge that made him look like a suspect in the first place?”
“Exactly. So that might rule him out, in spite of the fact that we now know that he had an affair with the dead woman.”
“Strange, isn’t it,” said Carole, “that, whenever murder’s discussed, anyone who’s had an affair with the victim becomes an immediate suspect…”
“Why’s that strange? Seems pretty logical to me.”
“I suppose I meant strange in the way it comments on human relationships. If you love someone, that means you want to kill them.”
“‘Yet each man kills the thing he loves…’”
Carole hadn’t expected Jude to quote Oscar Wilde. She kept encountering inconsistent details in her friend’s character. Carole Seddon liked to categorize people; then she knew what she was up against. But Jude made that process very difficult.
“Anyway,” Jude went on, “Francis Carlton wasn’t the only one to have had an affair with the lovely Virginia Hargreaves.”