Murder on the Lake (20 page)

‘I’m
sure they’re very good.’

She looks
back at Skelgill and smiles sweetly, perhaps she edges nearer; indeed it seems
she gently pounces upon his throwaway compliment and magnifies its
import.  She lays her hands one on top of the other on her thigh, her
slender fingers pointing towards him.  She bows her head a little so that
tresses of hair fall to frame her eyes, and emphasise her coquettish demeanour
as she gazes up at him.

‘So,
Inspector – is it a
murder
investigation yet?’

Skelgill
is clearly unprepared for this question; too fast to conceal, a flicker of
alarm creases his features.

‘No,
no – it’s just routine – it’s a requirement for the Coroner –
it’s –’

However,
Sarah Redmond interrupts.

‘But shouldn’t
you be asking me about Rich Buckley and Bella Mandrake – what was their state
of health and mind – since there is no suspicion of foul play?’

Now
Skelgill looks a little sheepish.

‘These
are on my list of questions.’  He points to his temples with the index
finger of each hand – as if to indicate, in the absence of a notebook,
the location of his substitute paperwork.  ‘I just like to rotate the order
– it gets monotonous asking the same thing over and again.’  Now he
holds up both palms in a confessional gesture.  ‘And what with you being a
– detective writer.’

Sarah
Redmond leans back against the settee; her body language easing the pressure of
her subtle interrogation.  She smiles again, now demurely.

‘Oh, you
have me bang to rights, Inspector.’  She shakes her head, and takes hold
of a lock of hair, and begins weaving it between her fingers.  ‘But a girl
can’t help wondering – such a delicious set-up – and, hey presto,
two deaths occur.’

‘It
was just a coincidence.’

Skelgill’s
hasty negation carries little ring of conviction, and she continues unchecked.

‘Wouldn’t
it be neat, Inspector – if Bella somehow bumped off Rich and then took
her own life once the gravity of her offence had sunk in?’

Skelgill
seems ready to object – but then perhaps his instincts overrun the
defences erected by his training – and he abandons his post and signs up
to her cause.

‘Why
would it be neat?’

‘Neat
for the
real
murderer, Inspector.’

As
Skelgill stares at her, she springs up to her feet.

‘A
glass of wine, Inspector – or are you driving?’

He
takes a second to answer, as if his mind is still wrestling with the writhing
hypothesis she has just thrown at him.

‘I’m
driving, later – but you go ahead.’

‘Just
one moment, please.’

Sarah
Redmond glides lightly across the blood oranges and vibrant purples of the geometrically
patterned carpet, watched by Skelgill from his half-turned position on the
settee.  She is slightly above average height for a woman, long-legged; she
throws her feet gracefully, the curves of her calves, thighs and buttocks accentuated
by the clinging hipsters.  Her mane of hair is elegantly shaped, and its
longest tresses reach down to the small of her back, brushing the curve of
exposed pale flesh at the base of her spine.  As she leaves the room
Skelgill rises and removes his jacket.  He folds it into quarters –
and then sniffs it suspiciously a couple of times – before crossing to
the windows and placing it upon the seat of a Shaker rocking chair.  
He tries to check his appearance in the pane, brushing his fingers through his
hair, but there cannot be sufficient reflection – in any event he hears
the clink of glassware as Sarah Redmond re-enters the drawing room, and he
moves his hand into a salute, as though he is shading his eyes while observing the
street below.

Sarah
Redmond glances at him and smiles; she carries two goblets casually in one
hand, inverted with their stems between her fingers, and in the other a bottle
of chilled white wine that is already attracting condensation.  Its foil
and cork have been removed and it does not appear entirely full, as though a
glassful has already been consumed.  Skelgill follows her and they resume
their former positions on the settee.  She pours a generous measure for
herself and about half the amount for Skelgill.

‘I
don’t normally drink before lunch, Inspector – unless I’m seeking
inspiration, that is.’

She
smiles again, more coyly this time and raises the goblet.  Skelgill stares
at his glass – he has a curious expression on his face, perhaps he is reflecting
that this could become a pleasant habit – and after a moment’s hesitation
he reaches for it and reciprocates her gesture.  He appears careful,
however, to sip rather than to gulp.

‘You
are left-handed, Inspector.’

Skelgill
appears a little surprised by her remark; he glances rather stupidly at the
glass in his left hand, and then at how she holds hers in the same
fashion.  She nods as if to confirm his assumption.

‘I
noticed at dinner – how you switched over your cutlery.’

‘Aye,
well – I’ve never got the hang of it – feels like driving on the
right.’  He lifts his glass and takes another small sip.  ‘Bit of a
handicap, really.’

She
shakes her head, quite vehemently.

‘Oh,
no Inspector – we are the lucky ten per cent.  Although in the creative
professions the statistic is less skewed.  Witness at Grisholm Hall: as
well as you and me, there were Linda and Lucy – and Rich.  What are
the odds of that – five out of ten?’

‘Life’s
full of coincidences.’

‘And
clichés, Inspector.’

Skelgill
hesitates.

‘So
what does it mean?’

‘I
understand we can call upon a part of our brain that is off limits to mere mortals,
Inspector – a skill to be celebrated.’

Skelgill
grins sardonically.

‘I’ll
try that one with my boss.’

Sarah
Redmond, with studied care, kicks off her plimsolls to reveal manicured
toenails coloured to match her hair, and – exhibiting an enviable flexibility
of the joints – tucks one bare foot beneath the opposite thigh, enabling
her to sit side-on in a kind of half-lotus position, facing Skelgill directly.

‘Where
were we, Inspector?’

Skelgill
appears to edge slightly away from her, although this movement enables him to
swing a casual arm over the back of the settee, and to rest the opposite elbow
on the furniture’s arm behind him.  Now he, too, is largely facing her.

‘You
were solving my crime – not, I stress, that there is any evidence of a
crime having been committed.’

Sarah
Redmond takes a slow drink of wine, scrutinising him over the rim of her glass.

‘Nonetheless,
Inspector, it is fascinating to speculate – there must have been previous
occasions when things were not all that they seemed.’

Skelgill
produces a non-committal shrug of the shoulders.

‘I’d
say that’s par for the course – criminals don’t generally leave us a note
of their MO.’

‘Unlike
in the whodunit, Inspector.’

Now
Skelgill frowns.

‘I’m no
expert on crime fiction – but I thought these stories were all about red
herrings.’

His
remark is more of a statement, but Sarah Redmond shakes her head.  Locks
of hair fall across her eyes, and she blinks rather alluringly through the Titian
veil.

‘I should
say, Inspector, that the ideal whodunit allows for each of the possible
suspects to have a motive – even if it is not explicitly outlined by the narrator
– call them red herrings, but I believe they are more sophisticated than
that.’

If Skelgill
is harbouring doubts about this line of discussion he does not show it. 
Yet it must strike him that the woman is intent upon some course of her
own.  And there is the police protocol of not discussing an investigation
with a member of the public – one who, after all, is a possible suspect (if
there are such persons in this case).  But, perhaps swayed by the
comfortable privacy of their surroundings, and the first reckless flush of the
alcohol, he is willing to be led by her subtle manoeuvres.  His fluctuating
attitude is perhaps reflected in his use, for the first time, of her name.

‘So
what would
your
motive be, Sarah?’

Sarah
Redmond appears delighted by his question.  She smiles contentedly and
takes another languorous drink of her wine, and then swirls the contents of her
glass and considers the glistening maelstrom, as if for inspiration.

‘To
kill Rich Buckley – I think... revenge.’  She throws Skelgill an
experimental glance.  ‘To kill Bella Mandrake – to silence her.’

Skelgill
looks distinctly shocked.

‘And
why is that?’  This is all the reply he seems able to muster.

‘I
don’t need to approach the problem from your perspective, Inspector.  You
have incomplete knowledge.  There is much about me you don’t know.  Rich
Buckley took me as a lover – then spurned me just as I was emerging as a
novice author – he destroyed my confidence and set back my career –
it took me years to recover.  Bella Mandrake ran a local drama group
– she took me under her wing – she helped me rebuild my self-assurance
– and my reputation as a writer – we had a torrid lesbian affair –
I ended it against her wishes – and so she threatened to expose both relationships
– unless I complied with her demands.’

Skelgill
sits in silence, slightly open-mouthed, a little wide-eyed, and breathing audibly.

Sarah
Redmond is deadpan; then suddenly she bursts into a peal of laughter and
reaches forward to press a hand on Skelgill’s thigh.

‘I’m
joking
,
Inspector!’

‘Aye
– well – aye, I presumed you were.’  Skelgill is blushing and
looking stiffly down at her hand.  ‘Clever story though – I can see
why you’re good at your job.’

Sarah
Redmond smiles with satisfaction.  Slowly she withdraws and helps herself
to more wine.  Skelgill takes a rather large gulp from his own glass, and
does not object when she offers him a top up.

‘So
you see, Inspector – it would be convenient for me – the murderess
– if you were to believe that Bella disposed of Rich and then killed herself.’

Skelgill
produces what is clearly a somewhat forced and uncomfortable grin.  But he
opts to hear more.

‘So,
the others – what would be their motives?’

She
drinks and then eases herself into the corner of the sofa, leaning back and stretching
out her legs, so that her bare toes make the lightest of contact with
Skelgill’s thigh. As he glances down, she closes her eyes meditatively.

‘Dickie
Lampray, Angela Cutting – well they both go back some years with Rich
Buckley – I have seen them in their coven, late at night, conspiring
– perhaps they acted together – some old rivalry?’

‘Wouldn’t
money be a more likely motive, given their business connections?’

She
opens first one eye and then the other, and concedes with a toss of her head.

‘Perhaps
Rich double-crossed them – and they decided an alternative fate would be
most suitable.’

‘Alternative
to what?’

‘Dickie’s
connections run very deep – compared to him Rich was just a new kid on
the block – I imagine Dickie could call in a few favours if he wanted to
damage Rich.’

‘And
what about Angela?’

‘As
the saying goes, the pen is mightier than the sword.  We all tread
carefully in the presence of a renowned critic.’

Skelgill
ponders for a moment, perhaps reflecting upon his own experiences to date.

‘And
Bella – why would they kill her?’

‘I
think – I think – that Bella was the architect of her own
destruction.’

‘In
what way?’

‘You
saw how she was, Inspector.  She sought the limelight, in her own peculiar
way.  When you arrived she redoubled her efforts – she made the killer
– or killers if it were Dickie
and
Angela – think that she
knew something of what they had done.  So she had to be eliminated.’

Skelgill
frowns; he does not appear convinced.

‘But
she was going on about ghosts and whatnot.’

‘Forces
of evil, as I recall, Inspector – sufficiently ambiguous to suggest she
meant in human rather than supernatural form.’

Skelgill
nods in acceptance, though he might recall that Sarah Redmond had played her
part in rather mercilessly winding up an already disturbed Bella Mandrake.

‘Okay
– if it weren’t them – what about the writers?’

She furrows
her brow and turns out her bottom lip in a petulant manner.

‘I
should have to drink and think a little more – to explore what might be
their motives.’  She does indeed drink.  ‘To kill Rich Buckley would
appear to be a spontaneous act, since these are unknown and as-yet unpublished
authors.  Would he have provoked some anger that prompted such a drastic response? 
Knowing what little I did of him – certainly he was capable of causing
offence, without remorse – but could something so damaging have occurred
in those few days?’