Deep Waters (26 page)

Neville had a quick conversation with DCS Evans’ secretary, the admirable Ursula, who told him that the great man was tied up with urgent matters—an important phone call, evidently—but promised to let him know when Evans was available. ‘There are a few things I need to discuss with him,’ Neville told her.

When his phone rang, though, it was Andrew Linton. Everything was in readiness: the property details were completed in draft and the agency agreement contracts had been drawn up to authorise Andrew to show and sell the flats. All he needed now was for Neville to pop in, check the details, and sign the contracts. ‘I have a viewing scheduled for this afternoon,’ Andrew told him proudly. ‘One definite viewing, and two tentative. And I’ve pulled out a few property details for you to take a look at. Terraced houses that fit your criteria.’

Neville looked at his watch. ‘Yes, all right. I’ll come right now,’ he decided. Andrew’s office was no more than a
ten-minute
walk; he could get there and be back before Evans was off the phone.

But he’d barely made it out of the building and across the street when his mobile rang. ‘He’s finished his phone call,’ Ursula reported. ‘How quickly can you get up here?’

‘Change of plans,’ Neville said. ‘Half an hour, maybe? I’ll ring you before I come to see if he’s still free.’

‘No,’ said Ursula. ‘You don’t understand. He wants to see
you
. Right now.’

‘Oh, God. I’m on my way.’ Neville changed direction, nearly causing an accident on the pavement, and headed back across
the street to the station. He took the lift straight up to Evans’ floor; it wasn’t a good idea to keep Evans waiting, he’d learned a long time ago.

‘Any idea what it’s about?’ he asked Ursula.

She shrugged. ‘He’s been talking to Hereward Rice. That’s all I can tell you.’ She buzzed through. ‘DI Stewart is here, Sir.’

‘Send him in.’

Neville opened the door into the inner sanctum and found Evans behind his desk. He meant business, then: no
preliminaries
, no small talk. Neville’s heart sank. What on earth could this be about?

‘Sit down, man,’ said Evans, gesturing to a hard wooden chair.

He sat; he waited.

‘Joe di Stefano,’ said Evans. ‘I understand you’ve been making enquiries?’

This wasn’t at all what Neville had expected, it caught him off guard. ‘Yes, Sir. He’s…he was…Mark Lombardi’s
brother-in
-law.’

‘So I gather.’ Evans frowned, lowering his caterpillar
eyebrows
.

Wrong-footed, Neville stumbled on. ‘He died of a heart attack. Mark asked me to find out why a post-mortem had been ordered.’ Had Hereward Rice rung Evans to complain? He couldn’t understand why: he’d only been asking for information, not trying to interfere in any way.

‘Well, the post-mortem has taken place,’ Evans informed him, the sing-song Welsh rhythm of his voice more pronounced than usual. ‘And though Joe di Stefano did die of a heart attack, it was only in the most technical sense.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Heart attack was the cause of death. But it wasn’t a natural heart attack.’ Evans put his elbows on his desk and glared
impatiently
at Neville.

‘Sir?’

‘Do I have to spell it out for you, man?’ With a gusty sigh, Evans delivered the punch line. ‘Joe di Stefano didn’t die
naturally
at all. He was murdered.’

A new bag. Callie focussed her thoughts on that.

Fortunately, her cheque book hadn’t been in the stolen bag: she seldom used it these days, as a debit card was much more convenient. Quite a few shops no longer even accepted cheques, she’d noticed, and you couldn’t use a cheque to get money from a cash machine.

But you could use it to get money out of a bank in the
traditional
way. There was, Callie knew, a branch of her bank close to Paddington Station, so she headed there when she’d left the police station. Though she’d already reported the theft to the bank by phone, at the teller window she checked her current account balance to make sure that no one had been using her debit card, then cashed a cheque, stuffing the money into her pocket.

Callie recalled seeing a bag shop in Paddington Station,
targeted
at travellers and tourists. These days the station resembled an airport terminal, with all the shopping and eating options provided for people in transit: no longer just a newsagent and a place to grab a bar of chocolate, but full-fledged boutiques and restaurants.

She found the bag shop and discovered that it was targeted at
wealthy
travellers; the price tags were as hefty as her old bag when it was fully loaded. Still, she told herself, a good bag was an investment, not a throw-away fashion statement. She’d had the old black one for five or six years at least, and would have kept it even longer if it hadn’t been forcibly removed from her life. If you pro-rated the cost out over the amount of use…

A quick survey of the shop revealed a bag quite similar to the old one, and Callie had just about steeled herself to its price tag when she spotted a red leather bag that was the stuff of dreams: soft as butter, impossibly expensive. Its colour was not a blatant pillar-box red or an orangey tomato red, but the red of sweet,
ripe cherries. After checking the price tag with a grimace of pain, Callie reached out an involuntary finger to stroke it.

Her sigh of longing was audible; a middle-aged woman who was browsing nearby caught her eye. ‘I think you should buy it,’ she said in an American accent. ‘It’s beautiful.’

‘Yes, it’s beautiful. But I should probably get the black one. It’s more practical. Safer, if you know what I mean.’ Her hand went to her clerical collar.

‘Safer, yes.’ The woman gave a rich laugh. ‘I don’t know about you, my dear, but sometimes I think “safe” is over-rated. Quite frankly, I don’t always want to play it safe. Life is too short.’

Callie looked into the woman’s warm brown eyes and saw a lifetime of wisdom there. ‘You’re right,’ she said, and reached—with reckless resolve—for her chequebook.

Neville stared at the Detective Chief Superintendent. ‘Murdered?’

‘Unless he committed suicide in a particularly bizarre way. And that doesn’t seem very likely to me.’

‘But…how?’

Evans pulled a notepad towards him and consulted it. ‘Ethylene glycol poisoning,’ he read out, adding, ‘That’s
anti-freeze
, to you and me.’

Neville still couldn’t take it in. How on earth did that square with a heart attack?

‘According to Dr Rice, di Stefano ingested a quantity of anti-freeze, which brought on coronary failure—cardiovascular collapse, he said. It doesn’t take much, apparently,’ Evans went on. ‘An ounce or two of the stuff can be fatal.’

‘How can they tell that’s what he had?’

‘Easily, it would seem. If they’re looking for it.’ Again Evans checked his notepad. ‘Some sort of crystals in the kidneys. A dead give-away, so to speak.’ He allowed himself an ironic smile.

‘So…someone gave Joe di Stefano anti-freeze to drink?’

‘Now you’re getting it. Rice says there’s no doubt about it. Murder. He’ll be opening an inquest as soon as it can be arranged.’

Neville was still processing the ‘m’ word. ‘But who?’

Evans put the palms of his hands on his desk and hunched forward slightly, fixing Neville with a purposeful stare. ‘That, DI Stewart, is what you’re going to find out.’

‘Me? But there’s the Betts baby case,’ he protested. ‘I’m SIO. I came back from my honeymoon to do it.’ Neville knew it was feeble: that very morning he’d just been about to suggest to Evans that his time could be better spent.

‘On hold,’ Evans said crisply. ‘You’ve done what you can with that one, and nothing else will happen until the inquest resumes. No, the thing that concerns me more is Mark Lombardi. You’re friends, I understand?’

‘Well, yes. Yes, we are,’ Neville said, seeing a possible escape. That must be why he was so reluctant, he realised: Mark was a good mate.

‘But you’re a professional. That won’t stand in the way of your dealing with this case properly. Will it?’ Evans raised his eyebrows and waited for an answer.

Neville sighed. ‘No, Sir.’

‘You’ll need to talk to Lombardi first, of course. Where is he?’

‘I have no idea,’ Neville admitted. ‘He might be with the Betts family.’

Evans glowered, his brows lowering ‘
Might
be? I thought you were SIO on that case. Or so you’ve just reminded me.’

‘Well, yes, Sir.’

‘Find Lombardi, wherever he is,’ Evans ordered him. ‘Pull him off. You can talk to him, of course, and find out everything you can about di Stefano, but as of right now, DS Lombardi is on leave. I don’t want him involved in our enquiries in any way.’

He nodded. ‘The Betts family. Will they need a new FLO?’

Evans shook his head. ‘I shouldn’t think so. This di Stefano business should be cleared up before the Betts inquest resumes.’
It had better be
, his gaze said.

Resigned, Neville stood up. ‘Well, I suppose I’d best be
getting
on with it, then.’

‘Talk to Dr Rice yourself, if you want to,’ Evans suggested, genial now. ‘He’ll give you the technical low-down, maybe tell you where you should start looking.’

‘Yes, Sir.’

‘You’ll want to use DS Cowley, of course.’

Sid Cowley, his sergeant. He’d been avoiding Sid—with
surprising
success—since his precipitate return from honeymoon. Before Neville’s wedding, Sid, the perpetual and enthusiastic bachelor, had been scathing about the institution of matrimony in general and Neville’s embrace of it in particular. He’d warned Neville, over and over, that he was making a big mistake. Now he would be unbearably full of himself. Crowing.
I told you so
. He might not say it in so many words, but it would be written all over his smug face.

Neville wished he had the nerve to ask Evans if he could have a different sergeant. But he couldn’t avoid Sid Cowley forever. He would have to face him sooner or later; it may as well be today. ‘Yes, Sir,’ he said. ‘I’ll find him.’

‘Keep me informed,’ Evans instructed. ‘I’ll be looking for results quite quickly on this one, Stewart.’

‘Yes, Sir.’

Neville didn’t look back as he left the office; to Ursula’s
quizzical
glance he responded with a shrug and a shake of his head.

Frances was doing a routine round of the wards when her pager went off, with the message that she should go to her office.

She was surprised to see Callie waiting for her there. ‘I hope I haven’t interrupted anything important,’ Callie said, as Frances gave her a hug. ‘I was nearby, and thought I’d drop in to see you.’

‘I’m overdue for a break, as a matter of fact,’ Frances assured her.

Callie looked a bit peaky, she observed. In need, perhaps, of sustenance. ‘Do you have time for some lunch?’ Frances
suggested
, glancing at her watch.

‘Definitely.’

‘Nice bag,’ said Frances. ‘Is it new?’

‘Brand new. I’ll tell you about it over lunch.’

‘I love the colour. You can get away with it.’ Frances tried not to sound envious; with her red hair, she would never dare.