‘If he didn’t go to Duffield,’ said Conway, ‘where did he go?’
‘It must have been somewhere farther up the line. On the other hand,’ said Leeming, ‘he might simply have got off at the next station and caught the first train back to Spondon. I still think he must’ve spotted me. Hockaday is cunning.’
‘He’s cunning and dangerous, Sergeant.’
‘I just wish I knew where he went earlier on. Anyway, I came back here and was amazed to find Stanley Quayle keen to help us.’
‘And so he should. His father was the murder victim, after all.’
‘He was dressed from head to foot in black but he didn’t really seem to be in mourning. Most people who are bereaved are quiet and withdrawn. He talked down to me as if I was one of his miners.’
‘I’ve heard that he likes to crack the whip.’
‘This is only my opinion, mind you,’ said Leeming, thoughtfully, ‘but he was less interested in his father’s actual death than he was in the fact that it’s made him head of the family. Stanley Quayle loves power.’
‘Like father, like son.’
‘He thinks the killer is a choice between Mr Haygarth and Gerard Burns. At least, that was until I put another name into his head.’
‘And who was that?’
‘Superintendent Wigg.’
‘Oh, yes,’ recalled Conway, ‘the inspector asked me about him. I explained why he was no friend of Vivian Quayle. You must know the story.’
‘I do. What else can you tell me about the superintendent?’
‘He keeps the streets of Derby fairly safe. I have to admit that.’
‘What about his private life?’
Conway became defensive. ‘I don’t know much about that,’ he said. ‘He’s a married man but I’ve no idea what his interests are or, indeed, if he has any. Running the police force is a full-time job. He doesn’t have time for anything else.’
‘I can sympathise with him there,’ said Leeming, soulfully. ‘You’re never really off duty in the police.’
There was a long pause. He couldn’t understand why the reporter was being so reticent. On any other subject, Conway was a mine of information. Reading the question in Leeming’s eyes, the other man explained.
‘The superintendent is very close to my editor,’ he said. ‘They dine together sometimes. It means that the Mercury gets the first whiff of any crime but it also means that none of us is allowed to look too closely at Elijah Wigg. In a town like this, he’s untouchable.’
‘If he’s involved in the murder,’ said Leeming, ‘we’ll certainly touch him.’
‘But you’ll have a job finding any evidence.’
‘We like a challenge.’
‘Wigg is a freak,’ said Conway. ‘He loves to be seen abroad in Derby but he remains invisible somehow. Nobody has really got the measure of him, not even my editor. Isn’t that strange?’
‘There must be something you can tell me.’
Conway needed a meditative sip of his drink before he recalled something.
‘Superintendent Wigg has a brother in Belper.’
‘So?’
‘He’s a pharmacist.’
Madeleine Colbeck hated having to lie to her father but there was no alternative. Having ushered her visitor to another room, she returned to Andrews and told him that the caller had come to the wrong address. She then made a supreme effort to look relaxed and to signal that he could stay as long as he wished. In the event, her father soon began to yawn and decided that it was time to wend his way home. Madeleine saw him off at the door with a kiss then went straight to Colbeck’s study. Standing in front of the fireplace, Lydia Quayle was admiring the painting of Puffing Billy.
‘This has your name on it,’ she said in wonderment.
‘I always sign my work.’
‘So you really did paint this?’
‘Yes,’ said Madeleine. ‘My husband was kind enough to take me all the way up to Wylam Colliery in Northumberland so that I could make sketches of it.’ She indicated the painting. ‘This is the result.’
‘It’s magnificent,’ said Lydia. ‘I had no idea you were so talented. But why paint a funny old steam engine. It’s so …’
‘It’s so unwomanly?’ suggested Madeleine.
‘Well, yes, I suppose that’s what I mean.’
‘Let me take you somewhere more comfortable and I’ll explain why I’d rather paint a locomotive than anything else in the world.’
Madeleine conducted her into the drawing room and told her how her passion for the railways made her want to paint and how Colbeck had encouraged her to develop her talent. Lydia was duly impressed. Madeleine’s long recitation had the advantage of taking some of the stress out of her visitor.
It was Lydia’s turn to speak now and she did so haltingly.
‘You told me that I could come here, if I felt the need to,’ she began.
‘I was pleased to see you, Miss Quayle. I’m just sorry that you called when my father happened to be here. I hope you didn’t mind being locked in my husband’s study for so long.’
‘No, I loved it. There were even more books than we have. It’s a wonderful place to sit and read.’
‘Unfortunately, he has very little time to do that.’
‘Beatrice and I read all the time.’
Her face clouded as she realised that she should have spoken in the past tense. The long hours of reading were behind her and the library she’d shared so pleasurably was now out of her reach. Lydia manufactured a smile of apology.
‘I’m so sorry for troubling you like this, Mrs Colbeck.’
‘You’re most welcome, I do assure you.’
‘I wish I could say that I’ve remembered something that might be of help to your husband, but it’s not so. I came here for another reason.’
‘Whatever it was,’ said Madeleine, ‘you are still welcome.’
She could see the change in Lydia Quayle. When they’d met before, it had been in a house where Lydia had seemed to belong and to enjoy a cosy, cultured, leisurely way of life with a close friend. That sense of a settled existence had now faded. Lydia had somehow been cut adrift. It was not Madeleine’s place to ask why. She simply wished to offer what help she could to her visitor.
‘You’ve awakened something in me, Mrs Colbeck,’ said Lydia. ‘It’s a feeling of guilt, I suppose. You reminded me that I had a family.’
‘Did you need reminding? News of your father’s murder was in all the newspapers. You were well aware of it when we called on you.’
‘I was aware of it but determined not to respond to it. You’ll probably find that rather heartless of me.’
‘I make no judgement, Miss Quayle. I fully understand why there was a rift between you and your father. My situation is different,’ said Madeleine. ‘If I learnt that my father had cut himself shaving, I’d rush off to be with him.’
‘What if he’d stopped you marrying the man you loved?’ asked Lydia. ‘My guess is that you’d never forgive him.’
‘You’re probably right.’
‘It’s my mother who worries me, you see. You stirred up my guilt about her. This will probably kill Mother. Before that happens, I’d like to make my peace with her.’ There was a pleading note. ‘Do you think I should?’
‘I can’t make that decision for you, Miss Quayle.’
‘What would you do?’
‘If it was at all possible,’ said Madeleine, ‘I’d try to heal any wounds.’
‘That’s what I needed you to say.’
‘Why come to me? Miss Myler would have given the same advice, surely.’ Lydia’s head drooped. ‘Oh, I see. We obviously caused problems, coming to your house as we did.’
‘It’s not my house, Mrs Colbeck.’
‘But you were so at home there.’
‘Yes,’ said Lydia with a pale smile. ‘I was, wasn’t I?’ She looked around the room. ‘Do you have children, Mrs Colbeck?’
‘No, we don’t — not as yet.’
‘This would be a nice house in which to raise a family and that’s what will probably happen one day. I made the decision not to have children and, in many ways, it was a momentous one.’
‘I agree.’
‘If they couldn’t be fathered by Gerard … by the man I told you about, then I had no interest in motherhood. That may sound odd to you. Being a spinster must seem a dull, arid, unfilled sort of life but it’s not. There are rewards that I never dreamt of and I’ve never regretted my decision to remain single.’