‘Only a cleaning lady. Annie - Annie Dobbs. Lives in the village. Last house on the left as you drive through St Botolphe,’ Guy replied. ‘My wife's here by herself most of the time so it doesn't get really messy.’
‘What about when you hold your party nights?’ he asked.
‘Certainly, it gets pretty messy then.’ Guy laughed. ‘You wouldn't think educated professionals would be such slobs. But they put wet glasses down on polished surfaces, slop red wine on the fabrics and cause no end of work.’
‘Mrs Dobbs constantly complains about it,’ Caroline put in from her seat by the fire. ‘I sometimes think she loves this house more than Guy does.’
‘Did Mrs Dobbs work here the day of the party as well as the day after?’
Caroline nodded. ‘She works six days a week, Sundays too, when we've held a party on the Saturday. When that happens she takes the Monday off. I like to be sure the house is always ready for entertaining. My members are used to the best, Inspector. They would soon complain if they felt our standards slipped.’
Guy Cranston said nothing. But a little frown line had appeared between his eyes as if something had annoyed him.
Rafferty followed his line of vision and saw a glass lying under the hall table. It had contained red wine and the dregs had dripped out onto the carpet. It looked as if some tiny creature had crawled away to die.
After Guy saw them out, they walked round to the murder scene. The police tape had been removed. There was nothing to see but the industrial-size dustbins and the Cranstons’ cars and nothing but the gruesome pictures in Rafferty's head to indicate that this had been a scene of terrible violence.
They returned to the front of the building and climbed into their car, still parked where they'd reprehensively left it, in front of the façade that, in Rafferty's opinion, wasn't nearly as impressive as Guy Cranston thought. Strange how people could so easily delude themselves, Rafferty mused as they headed for the gates. ‘We might as well see this cleaning woman while we're out this way,’ he said.
Llewellyn nodded. ‘It's possible she may give us an insider's view on these agency parties.’
They already had that, though Llewellyn, of course, was unaware of it. He hoped this Annie Dobbs saw or heard something which might give them a lead. They had precious few so far. And for all the good it had done for Rafferty to put himself through the risk of being recognized, he had learned little more than when he had sat back in the office devouring the reports as they came in.
Still, it was possible Mrs Dobbs might have picked up on whether Estelle, at least, had been involved with any of the other members. Jenny had told him she had been as new a member as Rafferty himself. Of course, it was always possible she had lied, like Estelle, though the computer entry made that unlikely. But there had been a mix-up over her payment so it was possible there had been another mix-up also. Maybe this part-timer, Emma Hartley, who struck Rafferty as almost as inefficient as Isobel Goddard, might have concealed a backlog of new members for days before she got around to entering them on the computer.
Guy must have been listening for their car to start up because as they approached the gates they did an open sesame routine and Llewellyn nosed the car out onto the road and pointed it left.
Fortunately Mrs Dobbs was at home. She led them through to her kitchen and invited them to sit down. On the kitchen table was an array of brass ornaments that she had been in the middle of polishing. She picked up her rag and continued with her work. ‘I wondered when you'd get around to seeing me.’
Here was yet another quibble. Rafferty sighed faintly and asked, ‘Do you ever work late at New Hall, Mrs Dobbs?’
Annie Dobbs nodded, but didn't stop her energetic polishing. ‘Pretty often. Usually before and after they have their agency parties.’ For a brief moment, Annie Dobbs stopped polishing. She raised her head and her brown eyes settled worriedly on Rafferty. ‘For all that I love the house, I'm not sure I want to continue working there now. It's not as if I was happy with some of the goings-on. And now, with these murders...’
‘Goings-on?’ Rafferty repeated. ‘What sort of goings-on?’ How many kinds were there? Rafferty asked himself. The only goings-on he could imagine Mrs Dobbs referring to would be those of a sexual nature. And so it proved.
‘Most of their party guests tend to get a bit merry, but some of their more long-standing members take downright liberties. Give Caroline her due, she does try to put a stop to any promiscuity going on in the house, but she couldn't keep her eye on all of them all the time.’
‘And which members would they be? Do you know their names?’
Mrs Dobbs was old-fashioned and it took a while to extract the details. Ralph Dryden, the property developer was one. Another was Rory Gifford, the TV producer. Rafferty was surprised to learn that Dr Lancelot Bliss was yet another of those Mrs Dobbs named as ‘taking liberties’. All had been guilty on different occasions of making for the bedrooms with several tipsy young women in tow.
‘Mind you,’ she added, ‘They were only taking their cue from the host.’
‘Guy Cranston? You mean he used to do the same?’
‘Not when Caroline was there; he was the soul of discretion then. But when her back was turned... God knows what he gets up to on his foreign trips. Caroline turns a blind eye. I remember she said to me once that Mr Cranston was a very physical man – said he needed an outlet.’ Mrs Dobbs snorted and rubbed the current brass ornament with even more vigour. ‘If my Bert carried on like Mr Cranston and them others, I'd find him an outlet all right – I'd hand him a spade and tell him to double-dig the vegetable plot. Be fit for nothing after that.’
Mrs Dobbs’ revelations tied in with what Lance Bliss had said about the Cranstons having a semi-detached marriage and that Caroline gave Guy a long leash. Had he somehow managed to wrap this leash around his own neck?
The inquisitive Isobel could scarcely have been ignorant of such goings on when they happened under her nose, especially as it seemed likely she formed part of them. If news of them had got out, Dr Lancelot Bliss, for one, might have been dangerously compromised. He might even have lost the lucrative TV job he clearly relished so much.
And then there was Caroline – Caroline with her romantically themed office and seemingly unromantic marriage. What did she think of its semi-detached nature? She was a Catholic, so Llewellyn had discovered. Rafferty thought back to some of the Catholic wives he had known in his childhood; stoics all, each had gained strength from their faith, strength enough to cope with their frequently wayward husbands. Did Caroline share that strength? According to the all-knowing, gossipy, Lance Bliss, she cut the ‘physical’ Guy plenty of slack.
Lancelot Bliss had been more than generous in the gossipy information he had supplied about Isobel, Simon Farnell and Caroline and Guy Cranston. But he had become surprisingly reticent when asked about himself. Bliss appeared perfectly willing to gossip with a stranger about the agency partners and staff. What was it he'd said about Simon Farnell later on the evening of the first party?
‘Simon, as I imagine you noticed, is a rather predatory homosexual. I sometimes think he only put up the money to make partner in the agency because he believed he'd find lots of ‘closet’ type males would come within his orbit. I don't think he's been disappointed. But my, what a down he's got on little Isobel. I often wonder what she can have done to so incur his dislike. Caro, too, though that's more easily understood. Simon's got this yen to start a homosexual side to the dating agency. He's convinced it would be a big payer. Guy would be happy enough to give him the go-ahead as long as it didn't cost too much to get off the drawing board. It's Caro who's the stumbling block. She's a dyed-in-the-wool Catholic of course and takes the line that homosexuals are the Devil's spawn.’
Rafferty recalled he had asked the by then, well-oiled Bliss, ‘So how on earth did Farnell manage to persuade her to allow him to become a partner?’
Bliss had sniggered. ‘By hiding his homosexual light under a bushel, of course. Our Simon can be quite the devious little queen when he sets his mind to it. He dressed and acted like a really hetero male. Flattered her, flirted with her, the usual stuff. Caroline's not the most adept at telling flattery from the real thing and Simon can be a determined flatterer when it suits him. Caroline adores Guy, but he saves his most outrageous flattery for the women he's trying to bed.’
‘How on earth did those two ever get together?’ Rafferty had asked. He found himself quoting Nigel, ‘They don't seem much of a mirror-image.’
‘Guy being so good-looking and Caro so plain, you mean?’
‘Something like that.’
‘His first wife died eight years ago. She was driving when the brakes apparently failed. There were the usual rumours, but nothing was ever proved.’
‘Rumours? What do you mean?’
Bliss's shoulders shrugged in their beautifully cut jacket. ‘His first wife had inherited this house and a pile of money a few months before her death. Guy came in for the lot. I never believed the rumours myself. Guy really loved his first wife. He was devastated when she died so suddenly. I often wonder whether he married Caroline on the rebound as he had barely known her a matter of months. But she was a great support when he needed a shoulder to lean on and they've made a go of it, though I suspect that's more down to Caroline than Guy. She loves him, so puts up with his straying. Though I rather think she drew the line at Isobel. Bit much when the straying includes one's staff, I suppose, even if the staff has blue blood running through its veins.’
His remembered conversation with Bliss reminded him of Isobel. Again, he wondered why Guy had told Lancelot Bliss about the dire financial position of Isobel and her parents. He must have known the gossipy Bliss would spread it around. It was an unkind thing to do, particularly after he had bedded the girl. Neither was it altogether ethical for a partner in the business – even a ‘sleeping’ partner as Guy was, in more ways than one – to thrust a gold-digger into the midst of the agency's unsuspecting clientele, though Rafferty, remembering the mostly self-confident, occasionally arrogant profiles of his brother members, judged they would fend for themselves well enough.
It would be interesting to see if Isobel was finally given the sack; if not, it would be an indication that she did indeed know more about Guy and the rest than they would like. Knowledge was power, especially when you were as desperate as Isobel was said to be. And Cranston only had his wife's alibi to back him up for each murder.
There was another question mark against Guy Cranston. It seemed that he and Rafferty shared similar tastes in women. They had both fancied the same two girls and both girls had wound up dead. Coincidence? Or what?
As Llewellyn had remarked, Rafferty had never believed in coincidence, so it must be – or what. But which? what, that was the question?
On his arrival at the first party, Guy and Jenny had been chatting perfectly amicably. But later, when he had returned with second drinks for himself and Jenny the atmosphere between the two had seemed tense. She had been short with Guy, dismissive. Why? What could possibly have happened between them during the brief interval between Rafferty going for the drinks and his return? Had Guy taken the opportunity to make an approach to Jenny? Surely the man wouldn't be so indiscreet, especially when his wife had just arrived?
He would have liked to debate the point – that and many others – with Llewellyn. But he daren't. Rafferty knew himself well enough to be aware that in his eagerness to score over the logical Welshman, restraint usually went out the window. So, instead, after a detour to The Elmhurst to look at the scene of Estelle's murder, they headed for Ralph Dryden's office and the final interview of the day.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Dryden's office
looked as if he had been squatting in it; a sleeping bag had been rolled up and stashed behind a cushion on the settee, but it was still clearly visible. The small filing room just off his office held what, behind its concealing curtain, looked like a rack of clothes. Were Dryden's finances in an even worse state than they'd thought for him to be reduced to camping out in his office?
As Rafferty studied Dryden, he thought they might be. The well-groomed property developer no longer looked quite so glossy and well-cared-for. He had a scab from a healed shaving cut on one of his chins and the professional manicure of his fingernails had a ragged, just-chewed look.
Although he was intelligent enough to give them a polite welcome there was a tight-wound air to him. It was clear Dryden was a man on the edge; his business empire tottering, his shaky finances made shakier by the possible depredations of a blackmailing Isobel.
Now he was also a suspect in a double murder enquiry. Any one of these things could be enough to send a man over that edge, but the three together might make a person dangerously unpredictable, especially if they had already killed and killed again. If she was blackmailing this man, it wasn't surprising Isobel had taken fright and returned to her parents’ home in Suffolk. The wonder was that she had dared to return.
Rafferty glanced questioningly at Llewellyn, but all he received in return was a tiny shrug. Llewellyn had obviously not suspected how far advanced was Dryden's plight. Clearly, this was a very recent down-turn.