‘What others?’

  Brown shrugged. ‘I don’t know, but she used to drop hints that Ashton wasn’t her only victim. You know she inherited the business from her father?’ Radcliffe nodded. ‘By all accounts, the old man was a bit of a philanthropist. Into prison reform, supported organisations for the rehabilitation of ex-cons, that sort of thing. She didn’t have a shred of respect for him, used to make wisecracks about how he’d be turning in his grave if he knew what was happening to his “poor little lame ducks” as she called them.’

  ‘Any idea what she meant by that?’

  ‘I can’t be sure, but my guess is that there are maybe one or two people in the company who’ve done time and been given a fresh start by old Maxford. If she found out when she took over, she could have used the information to keep them under control. You know, threatened to sack them and leak their records so they’d find it difficult to get other jobs. That sort of power would have been meat and drink to her.’

  ‘Not a nice woman,’ Radcliffe commented.

  ‘You can say that again,’ Brown agreed. ‘One of the best lays I ever had, though,’ he added with a hint of regret.

  ‘Any idea where she might have kept the information? We didn’t find anything among her papers to give us a lead.’

  ‘She had a private computer in her office. If you can find someone to hack into that, you might get lucky. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m expecting a client in a few minutes. Another wealthy lady,’ he added with a leer. ‘Haven’t scored yet, but I’m working on it!’

  Before setting out for Dearley, Sukey put in a call to the estate office. Without giving her name, simply introducing herself as a Scene of Crime Officer, she asked permission to photograph the logo on a suit of recently purchased protective clothing, explaining that it would help the police with their inquiries into a recent burglary. She was almost certain that the woman who took her call was Leonie Filbury, although there was nothing in the way the girl responded to her request to suggest that she recognised her voice. She briefly left the phone to confer with someone else – presumably Ezra Hampton or his deputy – and returned to say that there was ‘no problem’.

  The estate office was housed in the complex of buildings that Sukey had noticed when driving Emily Willow home on the day of Myrna Maxford’s murder. The memory triggered a frisson in the pit of her stomach at the thought of what had happened to the old woman only a few hours later. So far as she knew, no evidence had so far emerged to link the two murders, yet she suddenly experienced an uneasy feeling – almost a premonition – that not only was there a link, but that the horror was not yet over. Then she gave herself a mental shake and told herself not to give way to idiotic fancies.

  Turning into the farmyard, she parked her van alongside a green pick-up bearing the words, ‘Dearley Manor Estates’ in white lettering. There seemed to be no one about; she glanced across at the neighbouring house, which was separated from the farmyard by wooden fencing, half expecting to see Ezra’s Land Rover, but it was not there. An air of tranquillity hung about the place; everything lay still and quiet, bathed in the afternoon sunlight. The mellow Cotswold stone barns, the farmhouse with its backdrop of trees and its well-tended garden bright with multicoloured dahlias, the black-and-white cat washing itself by the open barn door, all combined to present a classic image of English rural life. It suddenly struck Sukey how misleading appearances could be. In the late Grant Maxford’s day, such an ideal picture might have been closer to reality. What little she knew about him suggested that he had managed his lands and his business with a blend of firmness and benevolence that earned him the respect and loyalty of his employees and tenants. The same could hardly be said of his daughter. How, Sukey wondered, could such an otherwise shrewd old man have been so blind to her true character? While the picture presented to the world – of a well-run estate and a prosperous manufacturing enterprise – had not changed since his death, from the very heart of his little empire her malevolent influence had reached out in all directions, spreading its insidious poison and arousing a bitterness and hatred that had exploded at last into an act of indescribable savagery.

  Following a sign painted with the single word ‘Office’ and a pointing finger, Sukey made her way round the back of the barns to a renovated single-storey building that might once have housed livestock. A notice on a green-painted door invited her to ring and enter; she did so and found herself in a minute reception area separated from a long narrow office by a wooden counter. At the far end was a computer terminal beside which a printer was churning out paper. Leonie Filbury was standing with her back to the counter; when the machine stopped, she carefully removed the last sheet of paper and put the print-out on an adjacent desk before turning to see who was waiting. Her jaw dropped as she turned and recognised Sukey.

  ‘What do you want?’ she demanded. She looked far from well; her face had an unhealthy pallor and there were dark smudges under her eyes.

  ‘I’ve come to take photographs of some protective overalls Mr Hampton bought recently from Brockworth Agricultural Supplies. I phoned about half an hour ago.’ Sukey held up her ID, but Leonie barely glanced at it.

  ‘You’re the police? You never said.’

  ‘I’m not, I’m a civilian. I just work for them.’

  ‘You’re Paul Reynolds’ ex-wife aren’t you?’

  ‘You know I am. Does it matter?’

  Leonie shrugged. ‘I suppose not. I’ll go and fetch one of the overalls for you.’ She disappeared through a door at the far end of the office and was gone for several minutes before reappearing with a voluminous garment made of a milky-coloured material with a hood, mask, gloves and lightweight boots attached. ‘The farm workers wear them for crop spraying or sheep dipping,’ she informed Sukey, becoming unexpectedly communicative. ‘They’re supposed to give complete protection against harmful chemicals and be virtually indestructible. Mr Hampton bought three, but he took one back because it had a split in it.’

  ‘That wasn’t much of an advertisement, was it?’ Sukey chuckled, and a faint smile flitted across the woebegone features.

  ‘Looks like a costume for a pantomime ghost, doesn’t it?’ Leonie remarked as she laid the garment full-length on the counter. ‘It’s the logo you want to photograph, isn’t it?’ She folded the sleeves across the middle and smoothed out the dull green emblem embossed on the chest. The semi-transparent fabric, through which every scratch and stain on the wood was clearly visible, gave the thing a bizarre, wraith-like appearance, as if the effigy of some medieval knight, with white plastic gauntlets and boots, a masked hood for a helmet and a curious design like a random ink blot for a coat of arms, had wandered away from its tombstone and chosen this place to take a rest. For some inexplicable reason, as she focused her camera, Sukey felt a momentary tingle of gooseflesh.

  ‘That’s fine, thank you very much,’ she said after taking a succession of shots. ‘Is there a manufacturer’s label anywhere?’

  ‘There might be. I’ll have a look… yes, here we are, inside the neckband.’ From being taciturn, almost hostile, Leonie now appeared eager to be helpful. She waited while Sukey took some further shots and jotted down the details in her notebook before saying hesitantly, ‘I wonder if I could ask your opinion?’

  ‘What about?’

  Although the office was empty, Leonie gave a furtive glance round. ‘I – I told a… a sort of lie – to the police,’ she said. Her voice had thickened with embarrassment.

  Sukey stared at her. ‘A sort of lie? What does that mean?’

  ‘It was the day Myrna—’ For a moment, Leonie’s voice failed altogether, then the words began flowing out like water running downhill. ‘I was frantic when I heard the news, I hardly knew what I was doing, I was so sure Paul had killed her that I went for him. Maybe you heard?’ Sukey nodded. ‘They arrested me and I told the policewoman who questioned me that I knew it was him because I’d heard him say to Myrna, “One of these days, I’ll take you by your beautiful neck and throttle the life out of you.”’

  ‘Are you saying you made that up?’

  ‘Oh no, he said it all right. But then the woman asked if he’d said anything else, and I said no, that was all.’

  ‘But there was something else?’ Sukey prompted, as Leonie hung her head, apparently having difficulty in going on. ‘Something important that you forgot to mention?’

  ‘I didn’t forget, I decided not to tell.’ The girl was still staring at the floor. ‘He ended by saying, “unless someone else beats me to it”,’ she mumbled. She raised her head and looked at Sukey with troubled eyes that were full of tears. ‘I know I should have said, but I was so sure he’d killed her. I didn’t know then that she’d been stabbed, not strangled like he’d threatened… and you see, I never questioned what she told me about him. I know now it was all lies, but she made me hate him so much, I didn’t believe – I didn’t want to believe it could be anyone else.’ Her voice had sunk to a pathetic whisper, the tears overflowed and slithered down her cheeks. ‘It was wicked of me –and I feel the police should be told that there might have been other people besides Paul who wanted to kill her.’

  ‘I’m sure they’ve taken that possibility into account,’ Sukey said drily, ‘but there’s nothing to stop you calling in at the police station and telling them you want to add to your statement, if it’ll make you feel better.’ Realising that she had just heard something significant, she added, ‘By the way, did you say—?’

  Before she could finish her question, Leonie began speaking again. ‘There’s something else. It could be much more important.’ She wiped away her tears and blew her nose. As if getting the lie off her chest had given her renewed confidence, her voice became stronger. ‘After you left me at the Manor yesterday, I went back and—’ She jumped and broke off at the sound of an approaching vehicle. Outside, a car door slammed; moments later Ezra Hampton entered.

  He gave Sukey a friendly nod. ‘Got your pictures, then?’

  ‘Yes, thank you.’ She gestured at the overall, which still lay on the counter. ‘About twenty of those were stolen early this morning. If by chance anybody offers you one at a knock-down price, will you let us know immediately? And warn anyone else you think might be approached?’

  ‘Sure, always ready to help the police,’ said Ezra. ‘I don’t suppose there’s any more news about the barn fire?’ he added with a rueful grin.

  ‘Not so far as I know, I’m afraid.’

  He shrugged, lifted the flap of the counter and went into the office. He took off his waxed jacket, hung it on a peg and picked up the print-out that Leonie had left lying on a desk. ‘These the milking returns?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Hampton. I haven’t checked them yet.’

  Ezra grunted, sat down and picked up the phone. As soon as he began speaking Leonie leaned towards Sukey and said in an urgent whisper, ‘I need to talk to someone, I need advice. Would you come to my cottage later on?’

  ‘Yes, if you like, but why can’t you—?’

  Leonie shook her head and put a finger to her lips. ‘I can’t tell you any more now.’ She scribbled something on a pad lying on the counter, tore off a sheet and gave it to Sukey. ‘That’s my address. It’s a cul-de-sac off the village street, just past the church. Promise you’ll come.’

  ‘I promise,’ Sukey assured her. Her curiosity had been thoroughly aroused and she was itching to ask more questions, but Ezra had finished his phone call and was approaching with a sheaf of papers in his hand. ‘I must be going, thanks for your help,’ she said, and left.

  Back at the station, she bumped into PC Fox, one of the officers who had attended the incident at Brockworth Agricultural Supplies. ‘Any joy with the overalls?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, no problem.’

  ‘What’s so special about them? You’d have thought they were Vivienne Westwood originals the way that old misery carried on.’

  ‘They look like a cross between a space suit and a shroud, and one had been returned to the supplier because it was faulty.’

  Fox grinned. ‘Top-quality stuff, eh? You’ll let me have the pictures as soon as they’re processed?’

  ‘Sure, but – hang on a minute!’ The word ‘shroud’ had triggered a signal in Sukey’s brain. Convinced that it was the key to something vital, she put both hands to her temples and closed her eyes in a frantic effort to pin it down.

  ‘What is it?’ Fox sounded anxious. ‘Are you feeling ill?’

  ‘No, I’m just trying to think—’ Something clicked into place and she opened her eyes. ‘Mark, would you have a word with our friend at Brockworth Agricultural? I’d rather not speak to him myself, he made a pass at me after you’d left,’ she added, anticipating his question.

  Mark grinned. ‘Cheeky old so-and-so. What do you want to know?’

  Sukey explained and he whistled. He agreed that if her hunch was right, it could shed a whole new light on Myrna Maxford’s murder.

  He returned a few minutes later to say that he had called the firm’s number but got no reply. ‘They must pack up early on a Friday,’ he said. ‘I could try again on Monday, if you like.’

  Sukey frowned. ‘D’you think maybe DCI Lord should know about this?’

  ‘It wouldn’t do any harm, but I believe he’s out at the moment. Have a word with DS Radcliffe.’

  ‘Good idea, I will.’

  Twenty

  Bradley Ashton arrived home that evening in a vicious temper, which was not improved by the sight that greeted him as he burst into the kitchen through the personal door from the garage. It was as if a whirlwind had passed, wrenching open cupboards and drawers, flinging their contents into the air and dropping them in haphazard, untidy heaps. Apparently oblivious to the surrounding chaos, his wife was at the stove stirring something in a saucepan, a set expression on her face, a wooden spoon in one hand and a half-finished drink in the other.

  ‘What the hell’s been going on?’ Spotting the vodka bottle on the table, Bradley gave a snarl of anger, snatched the glass away from her and poured what was left of the contents down the sink. ‘You’re supposed to be cutting that out!’

  ‘I’m allowed just one little snort before dinner,’ she protested, her voice a resentful whine.

  ‘Don’t give me that crap about “one little snort”! That bottle was nearly full last night and now look at it. And look at the state of this kitchen,’ he added furiously, glaring round at the disorder. ‘It looks as if a bomb’s hit it… and you’re as pissed as a fucking newt!’

  ‘Don’t blame me, blame the police,’ she snapped, unhappily aware that he was right; the last drink had been one too many. The floor had begun rocking slightly and she grabbed at the bar on the front of the stove to steady herself.

  ‘The police? What have they got to do with it?’

  Even in her befuddled state, June detected the note of alarm in her husband’s voice. ‘You tell me,’ she muttered. ‘Banged on the door about four o’clock, didn’t they? Said they had a warrant… turned the place inside out… even went through the dustbin. Enough to make anyone need a drink.’

  ‘What were they looking for? Did they take anything away?’

  ‘Knives… they took some knives, Mummy’s lovely old kitchen knives—’ A wave of sentiment swept over her; tears splashed from her eyes and landed in the sauce. ‘I treasured those knives,’ she wailed. ‘Mummy gave them to me when we were first married—’

  ‘Stop grizzling and look at me!’ He grabbed her by the arm and spun her round. The edge of the spoon caught against the side of the pan and tipped it over. The contents spread hissing and bubbling over the hob.

  ‘You clumsy oaf!’ she screamed. ‘The dinner’ll be ruined and it’s all your fault!’ She lashed out at him with the spoon, sending gobs of sauce spattering over his sleeve.

  Furiously, he wrenched it out of her hand and flung it into the sink. ‘Sod the dinner. Look what you’ve done to my jacket!’ He grabbed the dishcloth and began scrubbing the stains. ‘Listen, you drunken bitch, remember what I told you the other evening? About all of us telling the same story if ever we were questioned about our relationship with Myrna?’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘The police know about Eric and Sam. They’ve been at the office, asking questions. For all I know, they’ve been searching their houses too. What we want to know is, how did they find out? Someone must have been talking – was it you?’

  ‘No, it wasn’t – why pick on me? I don’t even know about Eric and Sam, except that Myrna had something on them. What is it, anyway? Have they got tarts on the side as well?’ June gave a tipsy cackle while making ineffective attempts to retrieve the remains of her sauce.

  ‘Never you mind what it is, it’s enough that you knew there was something they didn’t want made public. Have you mentioned it to anyone? Irene and Nicola wouldn’t say anything, they’ve got too much sense.’

  ‘Thank… you… very… much!’ she retorted with exaggerated sarcasm. She abandoned the sauce and began peering into the other pans, making a great show of checking their contents. Anxiety was having a sobering effect; despite her denial, she had an uneasy feeling that she had said a little too much to Sukey yesterday about her real feelings towards the murder victim. But Sukey wasn’t the police, was she? She was an old college friend, someone she’d known from way back when they were both young and happy and pretty… at the memory of those far-off, carefree days more tears, this time of self-pity, began running down her cheeks.

  ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake don’t start snivelling again!’ Bradley’s voice was harsh and brutal. At the sight of his face she backed away. There was anger in his expression, but there was something else as well – fear. He was afraid, they were all afraid, he and Eric and Sam, because one of them had killed Myrna… or maybe they were all in it together… and now the police were on to them and if they ended up in prison it would be her fault.

 

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