‘Oh, you poor things,’ said Mrs Cooper. ‘My, how dreadful. You mean to say you all don’t have servants in England? I wouldn’t have believed it after seeing all those films with butlers and castles and all.’ She turned to Auntie Joan. ‘I guess you were lucky having the daddy you had, Joanie. A Lord who stayed with the Queen at Sandrin…that house you told me about where they go duck hunting. Why he’d just be bound to have a butler open the door for him and all. What was the name of the butler, you know the one who was so fat and drank port wine you told us about at the country club that time Sandra and Al had their silver anniversary?’
A strange, choking sound from Auntie Joan suggested that her condition had worsened. The afternoon was not a success. That evening Eva tried to put her fourth call through to Wilt. There was no answer. Eva went to bed that night and hardly slept. She knew now she should never have come. Wally and Auntie Joan knew that too.
‘We’d better go up to the lake tomorrow,’ he said helping himself to four fingers of bourbon. ‘Get them out of the way.’
But as the quads were going to bed Josephine found what Sol Campito had pushed among the things in her hand luggage. It was a small sealed gelatine cylinder and she didn’t like the look of it. The other girls didn’t like the look of it either and swore they hadn’t put it there.
‘It could be something dangerous,’ said Penelope.
‘Like what?’ asked Emmeline.
‘Like a bomb.’
‘It’s too small for a bomb. And it’s too soft. When you squeeze it–’
‘Then don’t. It might burst and we don’t know what is in it.’
‘Whatever it is I don’t want it,’ said Josephine.
Nobody wanted it. In the end they threw it out the window where it landed in the swimming-pool.
‘Now if it’s a bomb it won’t do any harm,’ said Emmeline.
‘Unless Uncle Wally’s taking his early-morning dip. He could be blown up.’
‘Serve him right. He’s a big mouth,’ said Samantha.
Chapter 12
By the time Ruth Rottecombe got to bed it was after 7 a.m. Her night had been an exceedingly unpleasant one. The police station at Oston was not a new one and while it might have held some quaint charm for old lags, it had held none whatsoever for Mrs Rottecombe. For one thing it smelt and the smells were all horrible and revoltingly unhygienic. Tobacco smoke mingled with the various foul by-products of far too many beers and too much fear and sweat. Even the Superintendent’s attitude had changed once they were inside. His nose hadn’t stopped bleeding and the police surgeon summoned from his bed to take blood from a man who had failed the breathalyser test was of the opinion that it might well have been broken. The Superintendent greeted this piece of information by ignoring Mrs Rottecombe’s presence and giving vent to his feelings about ‘that drunken bastard, Battleby’ in several words of four letters. He also expressed his belief that the drunken swine had in all likelihood burnt his own house down for the insurance money.
‘Doubt?’ he had said with a muffled snarl through the bloodstained handkerchief. ‘Doubt? Ask Robson, the Fire Chief. He’ll tell you. A plastic dustbin in the middle of the kitchen catches fire of its own accord and all the doors locked? It’s as plain as the nose…ouch. Wait till I’ve had him for forty-eight hours.’
At this point Mrs Rottecombe had asked faintly if she could sit down and the Superintendent regained some slight composure. It wasn’t much. She might be the wife of the local MP but she was also the regular associate of a suspected arsonist and paedophile and the bastard who had broken his nose. One thing was certain, she wasn’t above the Law. He’d show her that.
‘You can go in there,’ he said gruffly, indicating the office next door. Mrs Rottecombe then made the mistake of asking if she could use the toilet.
‘Feel free,’ he said and pointed down a passage. Five utterly horrifying minutes later, she emerged ashen. She had vomited twice and it was only by holding her nose with one hand while supporting herself against a wall smeared with excreta that she was able to avoid sitting down. Not that there was a seat but even if there had been she wouldn’t have dreamt of sitting on it. In any case the water-closet didn’t live up to its name.
‘Are those the best toilet facilities you can provide?’ she asked when she came back and instantly regretted it. The Superintendent raised his head. He had stuffed his nostrils with cotton wool and they were already a horrid red. His eyes weren’t much pleasanter.
‘I don’t provide any facilities,’ he said, sounding like a bad case of adenoids in a foul temper. ‘The Local Authority does. Ask your husband. Now then, about your movements this evening. I understand from the other suspect that you habitually meet at the Country Club every Thursday night and…Well, would you care to explain your relationship with him?’
In the face of that ‘the other suspect’ Mrs Rottecombe drew on her reserves of arrogance. ‘What’s that got to do with you? I find the question highly irregular,’ she said haughtily.
The Superintendent’s nostrils flared. ‘And I find your relationship irregular too, Mrs Rottecombe, not to say peculiar.’
Mrs Rottecombe stood up. ‘How dare you address me in that manner?’ she squawked. ‘Do you know who I am?’
The Superintendent took a deep breath through his mouth and let it out with a snort through his nose. Two red blobs fell on to the blotter in front of him. He reached for some fresh cotton wool and took his time replacing them.
‘Trying to pull social rank, are we? Coming the old high horse. It won’t wash, not here and not with me. Now sit down or stand, just as you like, but you’re going to answer some questions. First of all, did you know that ‘Bobby Beat Me’…Ah, I see you did know the locals’ name for him. Well, your little friend is very interesting about Thursday nights. Calls it ‘Slap and Tickle Night’ and would you be interested to know what he calls you? Ruthless mean anything to you, Ruth the Ruthless? Now, I wonder why he calls you that. Fits in with those filthy mags he’s fond of. What do you say to that?’
What Mrs Rottecombe would have liked to say was unspeakable. ‘I shall issue a writ for slander.’
The Superintendent smiled. There was blood on his teeth now. ‘Very sensible of you. Nail the bastard. And after all they do say there’s no such thing as bad publicity.’ He paused and looked at his notes. ‘Now, the fire, the actual fire that is known to have started just after midnight. Are you prepared to swear that at midnight you were in the company of the accused at the Club?’
‘I was at the Club, yes, and Mr Battleby was there too. The Club Secretary can testify to that. I would not say I was in his company, as you put it.’
‘In that case I suppose he drove himself there.’
Mrs Rottecombe tried to be patronising. ‘My dear Superintendent, I assure you I had absolutely nothing to do with the fire. The first I knew about it was when the Secretary called me to the phone.’
That hadn’t worked either. It had merely infuriated the Superintendent. As soon as she left he got the Sergeant to call the _News on Sunday_ and the _Daily Rag_ and give them the word that there was a story involving a Shadow Minister’s wife to be had at Meldrum Slocum. A juicy story involving arson and sex. Having done that he went home. His nose had stopped bleeding.