Dying to Know (19 page)

‘I thought you ought to know—'

‘What?'

He drawled, but then all Australians do, and this just dragged the wait out to an interminable degree, an agony of expectation, fear and worry. ‘Your father's . . .'

But what, exactly, was my father? Did this man have a PhD in sadism?

‘Showing signs of regaining consciousness.'

TWENTY-SIX

W
hen we got to the hospital, it wasn't quite a case of Dad sitting up in bed, sipping tea and pinching the nurse's bottom; in fact he looked little different to yesterday, save for some more colour in his cheeks and, when you got close, movement of his eyes behind his eyelids. There was definite improvement, though.

The Australian, who was now wearing a white coat on which the name badge proclaimed his name to be Ed Keeping, was writing in his notes. He looked up, his face bearing a look of quiet triumph, although I think that there was a touch of relief underlying it. ‘His blood pressure's come down, as has his heart rate. He's responding to pain and has begun to verbalize.'

‘What's he said?'

‘Oh, nothing intelligible. Just the odd moan.'

Max had sat down and was stroking his hand, peering at him closely. ‘So he'll be all right now?'

‘He's not out of the woods yet, but it's certainly a hopeful sign.'

In the corner sat a statuesque uniformed woman police officer. She had her notebook out and her pencil poised but I had seen the paper and it was blank. Quite what she had thought my father might mutter in his coma intrigued me; perhaps she imagined that he would say distinctly, ‘I did it. I rearranged Doris Lightoller's skull bones with a hammer, and I turned her husband into a shish kebab.'

In the car, I said, ‘Half the time, I think that things are becoming clearer, but half the time, they just get even foggier. I thought it was all so obvious. A case of blackmailers receiving their just deserts.'

‘Perhaps it is. The problem is, where does Tom Lightoller fit in?' she remarked.

‘Whoever came in when we were there, had a key and knew the combination, remember? Who else but their loving son? Not only that but I think I recognized the man as he got away: I'm fairly sure that it was one of Lightoller's employees.'

She considered what I had told her. As we were driving through Mitcham, the rather scrub side of the common stretching away on either side of us, she said, ‘I think I can guess.'

‘What?'

‘I think that Tom Lightoller's carrying on the family business.'

‘Antiques or blackmail?'

‘Blackmail, silly. He sent his man to get the material that his parents were using to blackmail people.'

‘But we got that, didn't we?'

‘Yes . . .Well . . .' She thought about this. ‘Perhaps they were blackmailing other people.'

‘But why keep some of the stuff in the safe and some of it at the back of a cupboard? Why not keep it all in the safe?'

If there is one thing that Max is, it's game. After some more thought, she said, ‘Perhaps they kept the important stuff in the safe and the less important stuff where you found it. Perhaps the stuff in the safe incriminates someone famous, or someone rich and powerful.'

But she didn't sound too convinced by this herself and I didn't have to say what I thought of it. To change the subject I murmured, ‘In any case, I'm fairly confident that when Masson gets into that safe he's going to find it empty.'

‘So what do we do now?'

We had reached the large Lombard Bank roundabout and I was going round it to take the last exit, the one that led back to the Pond. ‘We're going to buy some bread, I think.'

‘And maybe some groceries?'

I smiled. ‘Why not?'

Hocking's was a nice bakery, no doubt about it. Of course, bakeries have a head start, what with that smell of freshly baked bread, but this was enhanced by the look of the bread, the buns, the cakes, the pasties, the sausage rolls, the sandwiches and the baps. It was further enhanced by the pleasant woman behind the counter who smiled at us when we entered the shop. She was quite tall and greying with a thin face, but she had kind eyes and gave me the impression that she was delighted to see us, that this was more than just a job for her. I soon discovered, though, that there was a reason for her delight.

‘Dr Elliot!' she said.

It was a situation I was used to. I was regularly accosted by people who knew me because at some point I had treated them – usually when it was two thirty in the morning and I was on call and wishing that I had chosen a life as a quantity surveyor – but who had completely failed to remain inside my head. Please do not blame me, for when I am on call I am caring for ten thousand people. I went into automatic mode.

‘Hello. How are you?'

‘I've been fine of late, thank you. I never thanked you for what you did.'

I smiled broadly. ‘There's no need for that. It's my job.'

She turned to Max. ‘Your dad was so good to me. I came over all poorly with terrible chest pains and I do believe that if it hadn't been for him, I'd have given up the goat.'

I had the feeling that she did not quite mean what she said but this was overshadowed by the embarrassment that her misreading of our relationship caused. The frown on Max's face told me that she was about to put her right but for a whole host of reasons – not least the fact that we needed this lady (who ever she was, because her name still eluded me) to be on side – I jumped in and said with suitable modesty, ‘It's all in a day's work.'

She shook her head. ‘Well, all I can say is that I'm glad that you're the one who's doing it. Now, what can I get for you?'

At which point, I realized that I didn't know how I was going to go about establishing Mr Hocking's alibi. I opened my mouth, took in some breath while thinking that I was really only playing for time, then not so much ground – more slammed – to a halt. A moment of silence that seemed like a minute and I was reduced to asking for a couple of custard tarts.

‘Good choice,' she said.

Max gave me a pitying look and, as the confections were being put in a white paper bag, said, ‘Wasn't it terrible about the murder?'

Our informant froze with the first custard tart midway between the counter and gaping maw of the bag. ‘Oh, I know! Terrible. Absolutely terrible.'

‘Were you here, in the shop?'

‘Yes!' She nodded vehemently. ‘Yes, I was!'

Exclamations rained down upon us, threatening bodily injury, but my ‘daughter' battled on. ‘Did you hear anything?' Max managed just the right tone, one that suggested excited nosiness and feminine concern; she had judged her quarry perfectly because at once a conspiracy was entered into.

‘That's what the police wanted to know! I mean I was here the whole time, serving customers and suchlike, and I never heard anything. He couldn't have cried out or anything, because I'd have heard. It gives me the creeps to think what was going on all that time. I said to my husband that night, I said, “Supposing the killer had come into the bakery instead of going into Mr Lightoller's?” Supposing he'd fancied a pasty?'

It was one of those philosophical questions on which even the finest of human minds can become stalled. Max almost gave herself away because she had trouble smothering a smirk as she asked, ‘Did Mr Hocking hear anything?'

‘No. Nothing at all. Mind you, he was upstairs in his flat having his afternoon nap when it happened. He was probably dead to the world.' An unfortunate turn of phrase, I thought. She continued, ‘That's where he is now. He has a snooze every day at this time.'

For which I was glad, since I didn't particularly want to meet him just at that moment.

Max asked, ‘Has he been shocked by what's happened too?'

Her reward was a nod. ‘Terrible. He's a very gentle and sensitive man, you know. Terribly shy.'

I tried to avoid Max's eye as I thought about the photographs.

During all this, the custard tart had made its slow, unregarded way to journey's end in the paper bag where it waited patiently for company as the events of that afternoon were dissected. I asked, ‘Did you know Mr Lightoller well?'

‘Not really. We said, “Hello”, and things like that, but nothing more.'

‘What about Mr Hocking? Presumably he knew him a bit better.'

I had hit the right button. Her face went through an almost theatrical change of expressions that had started at polite interest but ended fairly quickly at conspiratorial exhilaration as she leaned over the chocolate eclairs and said, ‘Not really.' Then suddenly she said, ‘Mind you, there was that time . . .'

But then the shop bell rang simultaneously with the rattle of the door as a very tall but very stooped old man dressed in a black suit with a waistcoat, white shirt and green tie came slowly into the shop. His lower eyelids drooped to expose reddened membranes and his eyes were watering painfully, but despite this he had a bright smile that broadened to expose an irregular array of surviving teeth clinging desperately to his gums. ‘Afternoon, Lil,' he said, then stopped to cough; it was a cough that came from deep within him and, from the sound of it, that moved awesome amounts of mucus around his insides.

‘Afternoon, Mr Lockyer.' The woman now revealed to be Lil replied in a voice that was considerably louder than usual speech. Despite this, I had the impression that he didn't really hear. He said, ‘I've come for my usual.'

‘You'll have to wait, Mr Lockyer. I'm just serving these people.'

I said, ‘No, serve Mr Lockyer first. We can wait.'

Except that Max then said, ‘I can't.'

I turned to her as she was already walking towards the door. ‘Where are you going?'

‘I've forgotten something. I'll be back in a moment.'

With which she was gone; Mr Lockyer looked at her from under his eyebrows, a large grin on his face, although I am not sure he knew what was going on, and Lil sighed and said in sympathy for me, ‘My daughter's just like that. I blame television.'

I opened my mouth, was on the point of correcting her despite my previous intentions, when Mr Lockyer said loudly, ‘She's a right cracker, she is.'

‘Mr Lockyer!' Lil was horrified and yet perversely delighted, but the old man had already been punished by the gods that be because, once again, he was dredging his own personal phlegm pool. Tutting, Lil was already getting his ‘usual', which turned out to be two jumbo sausage rolls. After he had paid his money – which he had ready in a scuffed navy-blue leather purse fastened with a clasp – he left, still coughing and still laughing, although by now it was completely to himself.

‘Now,' said Lil. ‘Where were we?'

‘One custard tart down and you were just on the point of telling me about Mr Hocking and Mr Lightoller.'

‘Oh, yes . . .' She picked up the paper bag again and went after another custard tart; I was rather perturbed to note that she used the same tongs for the custard tarts as she had for the sausage rolls. ‘Up until recently, they seemed to get on quite well. I mean, they weren't exactly
close
, if you get what I mean, but they passed the time of day, that kind of thing. Used to moan about the rates and about the litter problem and suchlike.'

‘And that changed recently?'

She nodded. ‘I don't know if they had a row or something, but I saw Mr Hocking cut Mr Lightoller dead last week. Gave him such a look, he did.'

‘Really?'

‘Yes. If looks could kill . . .' She tailed off, realizing what she had just said. ‘Not that . . .'

I hastened to reassure her. ‘Oh, no.'

This
faux pas
had forced her to pause but thankfully not before two custard tarts had become conjoined in blessed union inside the paper bag. I changed the subject. ‘What about the Parrishes? Did Mr Lightoller get on with them?'

But she was becoming cagey. ‘Yes, I suppose.'

‘And Mr Hocking?'

I am sure that I asked this in a perfectly innocent voice, but her attitude had changed. ‘Yes, of course. Why not?'

And that was all I could get from her. I paid for the custard tarts – now doubtless improved by a hint of sausage roll – and left the shop wondering a lot of things, like what she knew about Mr Hocking's relationship with Mrs Parrish, and how significant it was that Lightoller and Mr Hocking had recently fallen out, and where my daughter had disappeared to.

TWENTY-SEVEN

T
he last of these questions was answered almost immediately because Max was standing on the pavement a little way up the road, beyond Mr Parrish's grocery shop. She was beckoning frantically to me so I exercised my legendary powers of deduction and joined her.

‘What is it, daughter dear?'

She flushed. ‘Don't you start. How dare she? I'm not that young.'

‘I'm not that old, you mean.'

At which, like every female young and old that I've ever known, she came over all deaf and ignored me. ‘I've been checking out the lie of the land.'

‘What does that mean?'

She looked at me with something that the charitable might describe as ‘pitying', the realistic might describe as ‘scathing'. ‘You're not very good at this, are you?'

‘Help me through it, then.'

She led me further up the road past a wool shop, a strangely empty-looking record shop and a motor factor's until we came to an alleyway. At the end of this, after dodging some dustbins, a rusting bicycle and a dead cat, we came to an intersecting alley that led along the backs of the shops. The fence that ran down either side of the alley was in varying stages of disrepair and decrepitude; opposite Lightoller's shop it had almost completely collapsed.