Seeming to grow more nervous by the second, she showed them into the lounge and offered them seats.
The room was warm and very comfortable. Much of the furniture looked to be almost new, even the carpet showed no signs of wear, but, from a quick glance, Jill noticed signs of recent neglect. No dusting had been done for a while, the windows needed cleaning and an outing with the Hoover wouldn’t have gone amiss.
‘Is everything all right?’ Jill asked her. ‘I expected you to be at your shop.’
‘Oh, no, everything’s fine. I’ve started closing on Thursdays and opening Sunday mornings. People amble around on Sundays and are grateful to see a shop open.’ She perched on the very edge of an armchair, poised for flight. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘We believe you knew Bradley Johnson well,’ Max began.
‘Who said that?’ Her skin turned an even deeper shade of red. ‘I wouldn’t say I knew him well.’
‘So how would you describe your relationship with him?’ Max asked.
‘We met socially a couple of times, that’s all. With his wife and my husband,’ she added quickly.
‘We heard you were a little closer than that,’ Jill said. ‘We’re sorry to have to pry, Joan, but we do need you to tell us everything.’
Joan looked from one to the other of them, conflicting emotions flashing across her face.
‘Mrs Murphy, did you have an affair with Bradley Johnson?’ Max asked at last. ‘Yes or no?’
‘Oh, God.’ Joan promptly burst into tears.
She was on her feet, dashing from the room, and returning seconds later with a handful of crumpled tissues.
‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ Jill assured her, mentally crossing her fingers. ‘None of this will go beyond these four walls.’
‘Oh, God,’ Joan said again. She took several deep breaths, then whispered, ‘Yes.’
‘It’s OK,’ Jill said. ‘Can you tell us about it?’
Joan was still mopping tears from her face, but she nodded.
‘I should have told you, I suppose, but I didn’t think it would come out. And, even if it did—’ She broke off. ‘I was too scared to say anything in case the police thought it was me who killed him.’ She fixed large, frightened eyes on Max. ‘It wasn’t. I swear to God that I know nothing about that.’
‘Just tell us what happened,’ he said patiently.
Another deep, shuddering breath.
‘I’d been in the churchyard tidying up Dad’s grave. I’m always upset when I do that. But I thought I was OK so I went into the post office,’ she said. ‘It was so embarrassing. One minute I was queuing up at the counter, the next I was in floods of tears because I missed my dad so much. I rushed out of the shop and bumped straight into Bradley. He saw how distressed I was, and he invited me to sit in his car while I pulled myself together.’
Jill nodded encouragingly.
‘I was in such a state that I blurted it all out. How I’d been up to tidy Dad’s grave, how I still missed him even though it had been two years since he died, how we’d all been planning to go to Australia together to visit my brother and his family, how I’d thought Dad would be around for ever, how I never made it to Australia but instead had to sell his house. Brad was—understanding,’ she finished. ‘Kind, patient and understanding.’
‘What happened next?’ Jill asked.
‘He drove me home,’ Joan said. ‘A couple of days later, he called to see me, to make sure I was all right. Steve was away that week and—’ She bit her lip. ‘Brad was flirting with me, and I was flattered. You’d think I’d know better, wouldn’t you? But I didn’t. I fell in love with his charm, his good looks, his ways.’
‘And that’s how the affair began?’
‘Yes. It lasted about a month.’
‘Who ended it?’ Jill asked. ‘You or Bradley?’
‘He did.’ She dried her face on a couple of tissues and then pushed them up the sleeve of her cardigan. ‘I’d better explain,’ she said shakily.
‘That might be best,’ Max agreed, and Jill could sense his impatience.
‘As I said, our affair lasted a month. Then he went quiet. We’d agreed to meet but he didn’t turn up. I couldn’t believe it was over—especially without him telling me. I kept trying to contact him, but it was difficult. He didn’t answer his phone and I didn’t like to call the house. I did once, but his wife told me he was away in London. Eventually, after about three weeks, he finally called me.’
She gave a rueful, embarrassed shrug.
‘We arranged to meet,’ she explained, ‘and, although I was relieved to hear from him, I was terrified of what he might say to me. I thought I knew what that was, of course. I assumed he wanted to tell me that things were over between us, and that he was going to be faithful to his wife. You know the sort of thing.’
‘And is that what he said?’ Jill asked curiously.
‘Oh, no.’ She was growing more confident now that she’d started her story. The distress was lessening and she was becoming harder and colder. ‘I’d been a fool. Such a stupid fool. He’d never been interested in me. That first time we met? Outside the post office? I’d mentioned selling my father’s house and, from that, he assumed I had money. I did have a bit put by, of course, because the proceeds of the sale were split between my brother and me, but nowhere near as much as he imagined.’
Were they talking blackmail?
‘What did he want?’ Jill asked.
‘Five thousand pounds. Cash,’ she said bitterly. ‘If I didn’t hand over the money, he said he’d tell Steve about us.’
‘So you handed over the cash?’ Max asked.
‘Yes.’ That word came as little more than a whisper.
‘And he came back for more?’ Max guessed.
‘Three times.’ She dabbed at her eyes with the tissues. ‘I gave him fifteen thousand pounds in all. I gave him the last five thousand just a week before he was killed.’ Eyes, filled with fear once more, turned on Max. ‘But I had nothing to do with his murder,’ she said urgently. ‘I can’t say I’m sorry about it because he was a lying, cheating …’ The sentence was left to hang in the air.
‘It’s OK,’ Max said.
‘I wish I hadn’t paid him,’ Joan said bitterly. ‘That first five thousand—I was so shocked when I realized what he was up to, I just handed it over. The thing was,’ she went on, colouring, ‘I’d told him things about Steve, personal things, and I didn’t want Steve knowing. I trusted Brad, you see.’ She shook her head at her own stupidity. ‘You must think me very naive and foolish.’
‘Not at all,’ Jill told her.
Foolish or not, Joan had given them their first real lead. If Bradley Johnson was blackmailing Joan, it was likely that he’d been blackmailing others.
‘When things were going well between the two of you,’ Max said, ‘did he mention past affairs? Did he mention any other women?’
She thought for a moment and shook her head. ‘That was just it, you see. He made me feel as if I was the only woman in the world. God, how pathetic does that sound? At my age, too.’
‘We believe,’ Jill said, ‘that he’d had several affairs in the past.’
‘Quite probably,’ Joan said. ‘He was an attractive man and he knew how to turn on the charm. I don’t think,’ she added vehemently, ‘that I have ever hated anyone like I hated him.’
Jill nodded sympathetically.
‘The irony is,’ Joan added shakily, ‘that Steve left me anyway. All the time I’d been seeing Brad, before that even, he’d been with someone else. He’s left me for her.’
‘Steve’s left you?’ Jill asked in astonishment.
‘Last night,’ she said. ‘He’ll be here for his stuff at the weekend.’
‘Oh, Joan, I’m so sorry.’
‘Thanks,’ she murmured, before she took a deep, shuddering breath and broke into uncontrollable tears.
Jill tried to comfort and calm her, but she was inconsolable.
‘How will I cope without Steve?’ she asked repeatedly. ‘How will I cope?’
‘Things will work out,’ Jill told her. ‘You’ll see.’
Jill held her close and continued to offer platitudes, but she despaired. Did any married couple have a good relationship? A relationship based on trust and respect? It seemed that, everywhere she turned, it was to see rocky marriages and infidelity.
Max left Jill at her cottage, jumped in his car and drove down the lane. A hint of blackmail changed the direction of the whole investigation and Max needed to get back to headquarters and update the team.
They knew Johnson was a ladies’ man. What did he do? Seek out wealthy women, work his charm on them until they were smitten, and blackmail them? That’s exactly what he’d done with Joan Murphy. Perhaps she wasn’t wealthy in the accepted sense, but Johnson had known she had money from the sale of her late father’s house.
‘Would all his victims have been vulnerable women?’ he’d asked Jill.
‘Oh, no,’ she’d replied confidently. ‘He would have grown increasingly ambitious. He would have sniffed out the dirt on anyone. Everyone has skeletons. No one would have been safe from him.’
Thomas McQueen must have more skeletons than most. Had those secrets earned him an invitation to Kelton Manor? It would take a very rash and foolish person to blackmail McQueen. They’d be lucky if their fate was no worse than being bludgeoned to death in a wood.
On his way out of the village, Max drove past Jack Taylor’s house. Then, on an impulse, he stopped the car.
He didn’t really have time, but the old man intrigued him. Perhaps a mention of blackmail would jog his memory about his whereabouts on the afternoon in question.
Surprisingly, Max’s knock on the door was answered almost immediately. It was clear, however, that Jack Taylor had been expecting someone else.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said grimly.
‘Fraid so,’ Max said. ‘I’d like another chat. May I come in?’
Just as he thought Jack was going to refuse, the old man shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’
Max followed him into the cottage and into a small kitchen where another man, one Max didn’t recognize, was sitting at the table. With the three of them, plus the dog, there was no room to move.
It was a clean room, but, owing to the small windows, quite dark. At least it was warm, though.
‘DCI Trentham, Harrington CID,’ Max introduced himself to the stranger.
‘He’s in disguise,’ Jack Taylor muttered to his friend. ‘Must have left the deerstalker and pipe at home.’
‘Ah,’ the other chap said, eyeing Max up and down.
‘No doubt Dr Watson will be along in a minute.’
Max bent to stroke the dog while the two men enjoyed their little joke.
‘Do you live in Kelton Bridge?’ Max asked the stranger.
‘I do, yes.’ He looked about the same age as Jack Taylor, just as tall but—less healthy. He was pale, and his breath came in short rasps as if he’d got bronchitis.
‘And you are Mr …?’
‘Archie Weston.’
The name meant nothing to Max but, as he lived in the village, one of the many uniformed officers doing the house-to-house inquiries would have questioned him about the day Bradley Johnson was murdered.
‘I’m sure you’ve both been asked about—’
‘We have,’ Jack Taylor cut him off. ‘Bloody hell, you lot are hopeless. I thought you had all sorts of clever ways of tracking down killers these days. What about DNA and stuff like that? You want to watch more telly, my lad.’
My lad? Max might be half their age, but even so, they made him feel like a raw recruit.
‘We do,’ he said, ‘and that’s why we’re particularly interested in people who own dogs.’ He turned to Mr Weston. ‘I don’t suppose you own a dog, do you?’
‘As a matter of fact I do,’ he said. ‘The sister of this one.’ He nodded at Jack Taylor’s collie. ‘She’s in Rawtenstall being bathed today.’
Max made a mental note not to mention blasted dogs again. Everyone in Kelton Bridge had one.
‘Is Jess a suspect?’ the man asked with a chuckle. ‘If I’ve told her once, I’ve told her fifty times that she can’t go round bashing people over the head.’
Max chose to ignore that.
‘There’s a possibility that Bradley Johnson may have been blackmailing someone,’ he said.
‘What the bloody hell does that have to do with us?’ Jack Taylor demanded.
The simplest of statements had his blood pressure raised. Max was convinced he knew something.
‘Word gets around these villages,’ Max explained. ‘Someone will have heard something.’
‘Not us,’ Taylor assured him.
‘What about you, Mr Weston?’
‘Nope. I can’t say as I’ve heard anything.’ A sudden coughing fit had him gasping and it was several moments before he was able to continue. ‘You get newcomers to the village,’ he said when he could draw breath again, ‘and you get trouble. That’s a fact.’
Jack’s collie began licking Max’s hand and, as he looked down at her, her tailed wagged joyously.
‘I suppose your dog needs a lot of exercise, too, Mr Weston,’ Max murmured.
‘Jess? She does weightlifting,’ he answered with amusement. ‘It comes in handy when she wants to bash people over the head.’
‘The afternoon Bradley Johnson was murdered,’ Max said, tired of playing games with them. ‘Where were you both?’
‘I’ve told you countless times,’ Jack exploded.
‘No, you haven’t. You’ve told me you can’t remember. This is a murder investigation, and can’t remember isn’t good enough.’ He let that sink in. ‘What about you, Mr Weston? Where were you?’
‘Ah, well, I had a very nice young policewoman asking me that same thing. A young blonde girl from Gloucestershire. Needed fattening up a bit, but a nice lass.’
‘PC Williams,’ Max guessed, recognizing the description of one of the newest recruits.
‘Yes, that’s her. As I told her, I can’t rightly remember.’
‘At the hospital probably,’ Jack suggested.
‘Ah, yes, I might have been there.’ He rubbed at his chin. ‘So perhaps I have an alibi, after all. Alibi, that’s what you call it, don’t you?’
‘It is,’ Max said, his patience wearing thin.
‘I might have been there,’ Archie Weston said. ‘You can see my appointment letters if you like.’
‘Thank you. I’ll do that.’
‘You’ll what?’ Jack demanded. ‘What the bloody hell do you want to do that for? If Archie says he were at the hospital, that’s where he were. Good God, I remember a time when a man’s word were worth something.’
‘If only we could return to those times,’ Max agreed pleasantly. ‘However, as things stand, I need to eliminate as many people as possible. And Mr Weston hasn’t said he was there. He’s merely offered it as a possibility.’