Apportionment of Blame (29 page)

“OK. I think that her brother, this stupid Doug character, is a much more likely candidate, and certainly Gemma appears to be hiding something, which is suspicious.”

“So we are back with wondering what to do next. How do I find out which one it is, and how do I get the truth out of them?”

“Isn't your best way to Doug through Ilse?”

“Yes, but I don't think she's sure. She suspects he might have done something, but once she closed the door when Helen had left, that was it as far as her knowledge of what happened is concerned. He may have told me he tries to protect her, but I sense Ilse's a little scared of his temper. To ask her to challenge him would not be fair to her, and it may do no good anyway, as she wants to believe he is innocent, so he could tell her anything and she'd believe him.”

“That leaves Gemma.”

“Yes.”

“Does she live on her own?”

“No, with her parents. She said she has a flat over the garage.”

“How many houses down Barn Lane have a flat over the garage?”

I looked at her, impressed and feeling stupid that I hadn't thought of that.

“Not many, I'm thinking,” she said.

“I sense a search coming on. Get your coat.”

We leapt to our feet, the possibility of a lead providing a resurgence of energy.

As we came downstairs, Joyce called to her parents.

“I'm going out with Greg.”

We both got into my car, that was a first, and I gunned the engine and crunched across the gravel to the road and away. I had the sudden feeling that we were homing in on something important and I began to feel like a detective again.

The lanes between Dedham and Monks Colne are not wide and I had to control my urge to drive quickly. As it was I took the bends quite hard, and Joyce made a comment about me wanting to be Nigel Mansell.

We entered the lane from the end nearest to our local railway station, and I became aware that Helen must have driven down this way on that fatal night. I hoped Joyce was not thinking the same thing.

I crawled along. There were high hedges on both sides of the road and some of the houses were well hidden. However, most were old cottages, with no entrance other than a small garden gate like Ilse's, certainly no entrance for a car and therefore no garage.

We considered every house, but there were no possibilities at all until we reached the entrance of the lane to the railway line. There was the house where the dog had leapt at me in the doorway. I stopped the car.

“Look at that. Lots of outbuildings with space for garages and flats all over the place. I came here twice asking questions. Surely this can't be the place.”

“I think we should go on. This may not be the only house with a garage.”

So I inched the car forward and we continued our slow progress to the other end of the lane.

The only other candidate was a relatively new barn conversion with a garage set back to the right in a landscaped garden. Above the garage there was a high, steeply pitched roof with windows set into it.

“There is enough room for a flat there,” Joyce said. “I'll go and ask.”

And before I could reply she'd left the car and was pushing open the gate.

At the front door I saw her talking to a middle aged women dressed in jeans and a brightly coloured smock. The woman was shaking her head and soon Joyce returned to the car.

“Gemma doesn't live there,” she said.

“What did you say?”

“I asked her if Gemma lived there. Told her I was a friend who was expected, but I had lost the precise directions to the house.”

“You could be good at this game.”

“So it must be the other place. Do you want to try the same thing there?”

“If you like. But watch out for the dog if you go to the door.”

She smiled.

“I will.”

We drove back and I parked in the entrance to the lane, much where Helen must have parked, I thought.

Joyce went to the door again, and I waited in the car.

“Any trouble with the dog?” I asked when she returned.

“No. I didn't see a dog. Gemma's at work.”

“So she does live here. Right at the entrance to the lane and right across the road from Ilse. How extraordinary.”

“What do you want to do now?”

“Could you bear it if we walked down to the railway line?”

She looked away and through the windscreen.

“I think I'd rather stay here, if you don't mind.”

“I don't mind at all. I shall only be a few minutes.”

The lane was poorly surfaced, but dry. I pulled my scarf more tightly round my neck and set off for the accident site, if that is what it was.

Along and to my right ran the boundary of Gemma's parents' garden. I kept my eye on it, and as I rounded the bend which brought the railway into view, I noticed a small garden gate, overgrown with brambles and looking as if it was rarely used.

My thoughts went back to reading The Secret Garden. I'd always had a fascination for garden gates set in brick walls. This one was set in a thick whitethorn hedge, but it still looked intriguing.

I looked from the railway to the gate, and walked on to the crossing. An idea began to form in my mind, but once again I came up against the need for proof and I had no idea how to find any.

Chapter 16

I
am
a firm believer in not spending time trying to think of something just beyond my reach. It never works and just generates frustration.

If I can't think of a name, or which movie someone was in, I consciously try to think of something else. The more we push our conscious minds to retrieve something, the more it won't.

Someone once wrote that the best way to think of something is to stop thinking about it, to say three nursery rhymes one after the other, and then see what happens. Remarkably, very often this method works.

Based on this sound principle, having tried and failed with the nursery rhymes while walking back to the car, I took Joyce home and drove into Colchester with my car radio playing loud. I heard it on the Grapevine, Marvin Gaye was singing and I wished I could hear something useful on mine.

The lyrics of songs can be relevant so often to what is going on in life, or is that just my wishful thinking?

In town I parked my car and went to raid the shopping centre for a new shirt, trying hard not to think of the one thing which kept annoying me and demanding my attention.

Then on to the music store to look at CDs. Finally, in desperation, I bought a newspaper, then a take away meal, took them home and settled down to eat and then to read the paper from cover to cover before doing the crossword.

The net result of this was sleep in a very uncomfortable position on the sofa, with an empty wine bottle on the carpet beside me, and the same old furry taste in my mouth.

At that point I gave up, cleared everything away, had a very hot shower and turned on the television. There I stayed till it was time for proper sleep.

The next morning, still determined to distract my brain into action, I took my usual train, my usual tube, and bought my usual coffee on my way to the office. It occurred to me that if I was not careful I would soon fall into the same rut generated by my city work.

During my last visit I'd left correspondence distributed in some sort of order on the desk. The notes from Doug were also still there. I picked them up, read them again and put them in my pocket. If he was the culprit, and the police made an arrest, I would not need to show the notes to anyone else.

There was one new letter to open and I added its contents to the collection in front of me, then perused the cases I had pending.

A teenage boy who had gone missing and was thought to be in London; an elderly woman trying to find her sister; a man suspecting his wife of having an affair. I picked up two messages relating to that one and recalled one of my first cases, which was similar.

Some city high flier claimed his wife was having an affair, and when I looked into it I discovered she was coming up to London to do some temping work each day as her husband never gave her any money for herself.

I read through the cases I had, wondering which to follow up first, trying to keep thoughts of Joyce and Helen out of my head, but failing.

Eventually I opened up my laptop and began work on tracing the missing sister, using all the family search sites I knew. My pad became covered in possibilities as I traced, checked and cross checked and the time passed quite quickly.

At just after midday I closed up my computer, locked the office door and made my way down to an Indian restaurant in the street for one of my favourite buffet lunches. Coming out of the doorway I bumped into Ilse.

“Hello,” I said with a mixture of confusion and surprise.

It was odd to see her so suddenly, and out of context. She looked smartly turned out and more like the woman I had taken to lunch than the dowdy hermit I had first encountered.

“What a surprise.”

She was clearly embarrassed and rather at a loss.

“I was just coming to see you.”

“Oh?”

“Can I talk to you?”

“Would you rather do it upstairs in my office?”

“Yes, please.”

“Come on then,” and I held my arm out into the open doorway and let her climb the stairs ahead of me.

Back in the office I was aware again of how bare it looked as I took her coat and proffered a chair.

“Not very impressive, I'm afraid. I haven't been here long.”

I sat facing her and waited for her to speak. She smiled her embarrassment before plunging in.

“I've been to see the solicitor who did my mother's will.”

I felt a slight tremor of potential excitement, and immediately squashed it for fear of disappointment.

“I told him I didn't want the inheritance.”

She clearly still found it easier speaking one sentence at a time.

“And what did he say?”

“He said the inheritance is mine to do with as I wish.”

“Quite right.”

“But that he would be prepared to help me if there was anything particular I wanted to do.”

“Yes he would, for a considerable cost, no doubt.”

Always the cynic, and it was me who had suggested she see him in the first place. Not helpful, Greg, I chided myself.

She looked at me, and frowned as if she hadn't thought of costs.

“Well, if you use his professional services, he will expect you to pay for them. He won't exactly do things as a favour.”

“I see.”

I tried to ignore my rumbling stomach and thoughts of the buffet curry which awaited me downstairs.

“He told me there are ways of using the money to save on Inheritance Tax and gave me some suggestions. But that's all.”

“And?” I let it hang.

“I have decided what I want to do.”

She paused again. The words blood and stone came to mind.

“And I would like you to help me.”

“I will help in any way I can. Just tell me what I can do. And I will not be charging you for my services.”

I don't know why I said that. I suppose I felt sorry for her. There was certainly reason to.

“Thank you. Only I wouldn't know how to go about things.”

“I understand.”

I gave into my stomach's demands.

“Look, have you had any lunch? Do you like curry? I was just on my way to eat.”

“I don't mind curry if it's not too hot. But you mustn't pay for me again.”

“OK. Let's go downstairs for lunch and you can pay this time. You can probably afford it,” I added with a tentative smile.

“Yes. I suppose I can.”

I took her back down to the street, along to my favoured eating place and showed her how the buffet system worked, walking round with her and telling her what was what. We sat opposite each other after a few minutes, and she began to make cautious inroads into the variety on her plate.

She ate without speaking and this only fuelled my curiosity as I was fairly sure what she was going to say.

“Do you like the curry?”

“Yes. I wasn't sure, but yes, I do.”

“So what have you decided?” I could wait no longer.

“I want the young lady's family to have it.”

“Wow! All of it?”

“Yes. I just don't want it. It wouldn't be fair.”

I looked at her over my fork of Lamb Pasanda.

“Do you not think your mother would like you to keep some of the money?”