Guilty Pleasures (19 page)

I printed Morris's details on the back of one of my cards. ‘It really could be quite important, Harvey. You know how we prioritize your repairs: maybe you could return the favour,' I said, my face stern and unsmiling.

‘Yes, ma'am.' He gave a mock salute.

Griff picked up the sudden tension. ‘I hate to use the cliché, Harvey, but it really could be a matter of life and death.'

NINETEEN

A
fter a long tussle with the M25 and a snazzy bit of parking on my part when we unhitched the caravan in the field a friendly farmer lets us use, we arrived home in Bredeham. I'd rather hoped to find Morris's Saab waiting for us. What I didn't expect was an ordinary car, with two uniformed women sitting in it. They looked very serious as they got out.

‘Ms Townsend? We'd like a word, please.'

‘Of course,' I said, smiling up at them from the driver's seat in what I hoped was a nice cooperative way. ‘Can I just put the van in the yard? And then I'll let you in?'

‘The old man can do that, can't he?'

I froze. My vibes were twanging alarmingly. Thoughts bombarded the inside of my skull like balls in a machine. If they'd come in logical order it would have helped, but they didn't. How dared they be so rude to Griff? Why were there two of them? Did it matter that they'd got my name wrong? Unmarked car? What about IDs? Why was one going round to Griff's side? So much make-up on duty?

The van was in reverse, and we were hurtling back up the village street before I knew what I was going to do. I pointed to the dashboard-mounted mobile. ‘Speed-dial Freya Webb. I may be done for resisting arrest – I want to get my word in first.'

‘My dear one!'

‘Just in case. Tell her I'm coming straight over to Maidstone and she can arrest me there if necessary.'

‘It's Sunday!'

‘It's her personal mobile – she'll tell me what to do. For God's sake, Griff, do it.'

So why didn't the two women give chase? At least knowing they weren't on my tail I could dodge and dive through lanes only locals would know. But I could only do it slowly – you never knew when you might come nose to nose with a farm vehicle six times your size, not to mention the fact I still had a load of china aboard, and though it was well-packed, bubble wrap could only absorb so much shock.

I was concentrating so hard on not getting us squashed or even running into a road block they'd had time to set up that I didn't hear much of what Griff was saying. But I could hear that his voice was serious, and suddenly running didn't seem to have been the sensible option.

Maidstone seemed a most unattractive destination, even with Griff beside me. And it wasn't to Police HQ that Griff directed me, but to the police station. At least Freya was waiting for me, in what was clearly her gardening outfit.

‘What the hell are you doing, giving my officers the slip, Lina? I thought you were a law-abiding type.'

‘You know I am. But when two people turn up without giving names and without showing their ID, I'm bound to be suspicious. And – like Griff's assailant – they were wearing a lot of slap. I thought – who knows exactly what I thought? But here I am, as Griff told you I would be.'

‘Good. Because I may just get you off the charge of resisting arrest. But you have to be questioned about something else, and it's serious. Do you have a solicitor?'

‘Why ever should she need one?' Griff demanded. ‘Leave it to me, angel heart – I shall get the best money can buy.'

I gripped his hand. ‘Maybe that's a mistake. Maybe it'll antagonize people having some hotshot poking his expensive nose in.' But I held his glance and added quietly, ‘But you know whom I'd like you to call.'

‘I told you, it's serious,' Freya said. ‘Everyone's entitled to legal support.'

‘Am I under arrest?'

‘Only by the fell sergeant, death, and we all hope he'll hang around a bit.' She paused to smile at Griff, who presumably appreciated her allusion. I didn't. ‘As far as I can see, you came voluntarily. So I don't see why you should be under arrest at the moment. All the same, you'll be seen in an interview room – well, I'm sure you've watched enough TV to know the procedure.'

I looked her straight in the eye. ‘I've never pretended that I don't know the procedure first-hand. I saw the inside of enough cop shops when I was a kid.' She handed me over to the women I'd escaped from.

I didn't even recognize them. Amazing! That must be what they mean by blind panic. They introduced themselves as Constables Smedley and Long. They were blonde, and from their scraped back hair to their bitten fingernails they were identical.

All the same, I gave my apology. Profusely. They seemed a bit bemused, but accepted it, raising identically plucked eyebrows when I explained why I'd been so afraid. In fact, Long seemed very interested in what she called the backstory. It was she who asked all the questions; Smedley might have been suffering from a severe attack of that itis thing that makes you lose your voice.

‘So you didn't want to escape from the police, but from people you thought were criminals,' Long summed up.

I think she sounded more long-suffering than disbelieving, but I wouldn't have placed bets on it. I tried a smile. ‘Exactly. So I'm sorry I nearly ran you over and – anyway, here I am, and I'll cooperate in any way I can.'

She changed the subject with a huge wrench. ‘Tell us about St Jude's Church. That's in Kenninge.'

‘I know where it is. I helped out at the fête there. Which is how all the drama of break-ins and the rest of it started.'

‘Tell me about the church itself.'

‘You'd need an architect to do that, wouldn't you? All I know is that it's very old, with a sagging roof and a slightly bulging wall. The porch is rotting. It needs a lot of money spending on it. More than a week of church fêtes would ever make.'

‘Did you have any ideas how this money could be made?'

‘I may have suggested to Robin Levitt, the vicar, that they should sell some of the family silver. The church plate, that is. But I don't know what they've got, and even if I saw it lined up in front of me I wouldn't be able to do more than date it. It's not my area at all. That's why I needed help with the silver snuffbox featured on TV the other day. Why I handed it over the Met for safe keeping.'

‘We know about that, and very public spirited it was of you. But did you decide to recoup your losses, as it were?'

‘I don't think . . . Recoup?' My dratted memory. ‘You mean, get my money back? I only paid a few quid for it. You could say it was a charitable donation.'

‘You could. But when you realized just how valuable it might be, weren't you tempted to claim some of the money?'

‘I actually went with Robin to try to talk the donor into having it back! Look, if I've done something wrong, or someone says I have, could you spell it out? The A303's horrible, especially when you're towing a caravan, there are roadworks on the M3, and someone has sprinkled something highly flammable on the M25. I've been on the road some seven hours and I'm not at my brightest. Even apart from needing a pee.'

‘Did you steal something else from the church to make up for the thousands of pounds you gave up when you surrendered the snuffbox?'

I tried not to laugh. ‘A postcard? A guide book? What should I steal? I'm not sure where God is in my life, but I wouldn't push my luck nicking from His House, believe me. Especially when one of my best friends is the priest in charge.'

‘Something more valuable than that, believe me,' Smedley said, making me jump.

‘Look, I've not played games with you. Please, return the favour and just tell me what you think I've stolen.'

Smedley leaned forward menacingly. ‘We believe you broke into the safe and removed an item of communion plate with the approximate value of twenty-five thousand pounds.'

I gasped. ‘Even if I knew where the safe was, I wouldn't know where to find the key or even if what was in there was worth stealing.'

‘We think you did. Nothing else was nearly so valuable.'

‘So there was other stuff?'

‘Was it your own idea to rob the safe? Or was it anyone else's? The vicar's, perhaps?'

Maybe I shouldn't have turned down the idea of a nifty solicitor. ‘Robin is the best, most decent man I know.'

‘But he's been under a lot of strain. You might both have seen stealing the plate as a way of easing his financial problems.'

‘Stealing would make a priest feel better? Getting a friend to steal? From a church, of all places? Have I just stepped through the Looking Glass?'

Smedley took a deep breath, but Long continued. ‘The thing is, Lina, as you know, your prints are on file. OK, it's been a long time since we took them, but they don't go off, you know. Which means we could identify the prints which we found all round the area of the safe.'

I pounced. And was really irritated when my brain chose that precise minute to remind me that in the period of the bloody snuffbox they used to call little boxes pouncet boxes. ‘But not in or on the safe?' I managed at last.

‘You'd wear gloves, no doubt,' Smedley sneered. There was a distinct suggestion of
even you
about her comment.

‘But not in the area of the safe, wherever that might be. Where is it, incidentally? I wouldn't have thought leaving valuables in full view of a less reverent Joe Public than me was necessarily the best idea. I don't happen to have a JCB to hand, but I'm sure some people do. The people who drive them into rural post offices, for instance.'

They exchanged a quick glance. I had an idea I'd put my finger on something, but I'd no idea what.

‘As a matter of interest, what were my dabs on?' I thought hard and had a sudden vision of myself crawling round. ‘Hey, you didn't find any of my beads, did you?'

Got them! ‘Why should we find beads?'

‘Because I broke a string while I was in the choir. I was looking at those lovely misericords . . . Hey, Fi, the church warden would vouch for me! She found me in there on all fours! So you'll have knee prints as well as fingerprints. Are they admissible as evidence? I may even have left traces of blood. Hey, you wouldn't need a gob-swab to get hold of my DNA!'

There was a long silence. In a TV programme, someone would have knocked on the door at this point and brought in more evidence to scupper my whole story. They didn't now.

‘Look, I really am desperate for the loo.'

‘So you admit being in the area of the safe but nothing else?'

‘If I knew where the safe was . . . Please? The loo?'

When I was brought back, the whole chara . . . charaba . . . the whole silly play got going all over again. Smedley fired a question about Robin and his mental state, but I told her that was his business, not mine. I just repeated that he was one of the best people I'd ever met. I was this close to asking Freya to give him a character reference but thought that that might do more harm than good. And then, this time, just like on TV, there was a knock on the door.

In my fantasy, in popped Morris, riding heroically to the rescue: ‘She's my informant, my expert witness, my lover.' Any of those would have been nice. In reality it was another woman officer, clutching a DVD case. She inserted the disk into a player and left.

‘We are now going to show you exhibit blah-blah-blah, Lina, and we would like you to look at it carefully before you say anything.'

The grainy, jerky footage showed the back of a young woman, who was arguing with a middle-aged man in a street somewhere that looked vaguely familiar. Neither meant anything to me, since they were well out of the camera's favoured range. The date and time ticked along underneath. Suspecting that these might be important, I tried till my brain squeaked to work out what I'd been doing and where I was when the footage was shot. It was only when the camera angle changed abruptly that I realized I did know one of them – the man was none other than Cashmere Roll-Neck, though on this occasion he sported an open shirt. Foolishly, I gave myself away by nodding. At least I suppose that must have been what I did: something made Smedley jot a hurried note. Then the camera cut again, managing to get a reasonable shot of the young woman.

It was like looking at myself from the other side of a mirror losing its silvering. Me, and yet not me. She was taller for a start, by about four inches, I'd judge. Griff wouldn't have passed the clothes as suitable to venture out in. And her face looked over made-up, even in the poor footage.

‘What were you arguing about, Lina?'

Although I'd seen an attack coming, this particular line disconcerted me, probably because I was too busy wondering how to get in touch with this almost double of mine. I never did have much in the way of concentration, after all, except when it came to restoring china.

‘I beg your pardon?' Then I remembered, with a blush, precisely what I'd been doing at the time and date shown on the screen – I'd been with Morris. In bed.

‘I asked you what you'd been arguing about.'

From nowhere came the right response, even if Griff might not have approved of the grammar. Perhaps it was the thought of Morris, who was never lost for words, especially nice meaty ones. ‘Telling you that would presuppose that one of the disputants was me.' Not so much as a stutter. I added firmly, ‘I do recognize the man, but I don't know his name. I've met him precisely twice.' I gave them details. ‘I've even got the Marks and Spencer till receipt, so you should be able to check – to verify what I've said,' I added helpfully.