Authors: Minette Walters
Frank pointed to the concrete stanchion which reared up like a single broken tooth some yards from where they were standing. ‘We’ll start there,’ he said.
‘Presumably, that’s what she drove at. How wide would you say it was?’
‘Nine feet square,’ guessed Maddocks.
‘Interesting, don’t you think?’ murmured Frank.
‘Why?’
‘I thought it was much narrower. You’ve seen the photographs. The car appeared to be wrapped around it like a metal fist.’ He cocked his head from side to side,
studying different angles. ‘It must have impacted on one of the corners and the arc lights threw everything else into shadow.’ He moved forward to prowl around the structure.
‘What difference does its size make?’ asked Maddocks, following him.
The Superintendent squatted down to examine an area of gouged and heavily scarred concrete on both faces of one corner. ‘If you were driving at a nine-foot-wide wall with the
intention of smashing into it, wouldn’t you head straight for the middle? Why aim for one end?’
There was shattered glass from the windscreen still littering the ground, and intermittent tyre traces to a point fifty metres back where the car had obviously been sitting until, at
maximum revs, she had released the brake to hurl it and herself at the concrete structure. Frank spent ten minutes walking back and forth across a broad expanse of area around the stanchion, then
he returned to stand and gaze at the burnt rubber marks where the tyres had spun before biting into the Tarmac. He crouched down and followed the line the car had taken. ‘She was absolutely
square to the middle of that wall when she set off,’ he said, ‘so how come she ended up wrapped around the right-hand corner?’
‘Hit a pot-hole and lost control?’ suggested Maddocks.
‘Except there isn’t anything big enough, not on this stretch. That’s what I was checking for. She could have driven at any of the three sides that face on to the
Tarmac but she chose the one with the best approach. If she was intent on killing herself, then there was nothing to stop her driving in a dead straight line.’
‘She changed her mind at the last minute,’ said Maddocks. ‘Didn’t fancy it so much when she saw the wall rushing towards her and tried to pull out of
it.’
‘Yes, that’s a possibility.’ He turned with his back to the wall and surveyed the area that would have been behind the car. ‘Why didn’t she start
further off and use the greater distance to build up her speed? Why sit here and rev up the engine?’
‘Because it was dark and she needed to see the wall.’
‘It was ten o’clock on one of the longest days in the year. She could have seen that thing two, three hundred yards away.’
‘All right, then, she parked herself here, sat staring at the wall while she drank herself stupid, then suddenly made up her mind to do it. Look, sir, I know what you’re
getting at. You’re saying that attempted murder isn’t out of the question. Someone got her drunk – though I have to say that’s a mystery in itself – picked the best
piece of ground for the car to stay in a straight line, made it near enough to the stanchion to preclude too much divergence from the track, stuck her unconscious in the driving seat, put the car
into
Drive
, wedged the accelerator flat down with one of the empty bottles, and released the brake. At which point, brave Miss Kingsley comes out of her drunken stupor, sees what’s
happening, tries to steer clear, realizes she can’t make it so throws herself out of the open door.’ He gave a sour smile. ‘Apart from the fact that you’d do yourself a hell
of a lot of damage, leaning in to release the handbrake of a car on full throttle, why on earth didn’t he finish her off when she threw herself out?’
‘You wouldn’t use the handbrake,’ said Frank, ‘you’d use the foot brake with some sort of brace – a piece of two by four, maybe – a
sledgehammer, even’ – he lifted a teasing eyebrow – ‘between the metal frame of the seat and the pedal, with a rope attached. Then you’d wedge your throttle and use
the rope to yank the brace away. The other alternative would be to chock the tyres and not use the brakes at all.’ He gestured towards the ground. ‘But I think it’d be obvious if
chocks had been used.’
‘And the fact that he didn’t bother to finish her off?’ muttered Maddocks sarcastically.
‘Perhaps he thought he had,’ said the Superintendent mildly, ‘or perhaps he didn’t have time to check.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘Would you
care to explain to me why this little exercise is making you so angry?’
‘Because she’s guilty as hell, sir. The whole thing was a set-up to get her old man’s sympathy. I can’t see it makes a blind bit of difference which approach
she chose, how far away she was when she started, whether chocks were used, or when she was found. She was in control of the car from the moment she set off.’
Frank scuffed his foot over the broken surface of the Tarmac. ‘She could have torn the skin off her face throwing herself out of a speeding car on to this. Why not choose
something less painful?’
‘Because she likes drama,’ said Maddocks dismissively. ‘Anyway, she didn’t tear the skin off her face. She’s not going to be permanently disfigured once
her hair grows and the bruises fade. All things considered, she came off very lightly. Too lightly for attempted murder or genuine suicide, wouldn’t you say?’
Canning Road Police Station, Salisbury – 4.45 p.m.
‘Look,’ said Miles angrily to the two police officers sitting opposite him, ‘how many times do I have to tell you? I’ve never been to a prostitute in my
life. Why would I need to? Jesus, I had my first lay when I was fifteen.’ He banged his fist on the table. ‘I don’t know any Flossie Hale and I don’t know any Samantha
Garrison, and if I wanted to shaft a forty-six-year-old – which I bloody well don’t – I could shaft Dad’s housekeeper for free. She’d probably pay me if I asked her.
She’s had the hots for me for years.’
‘You have a very high opinion of yourself, Miles,’ said the Sergeant.
‘Why shouldn’t I?’
‘No reason, except that men who talk big tend to be better in theory than they are in practice.’
‘What do you expect me to do? Burst into tears and say I’m so fucking inadequate I need to pay some old slag to give me a good time? Do me a favour.’
‘Is that what you’d do if you felt you were inadequate?’ asked Blake.
Miles shrugged and lit a cigarette.
She turned to the tape-recorder on the table. ‘Mr Kingsley’s response was a shrug.’
‘Like hell it was,’ said Miles furiously. ‘Mr Kingsley’s response is, I’m not fucking inadequate so I wouldn’t fucking well know what I’d
fucking do if I was.’ He yelled into the microphone. ‘Have you fucking well got that?’
‘Calm down, Miles,’ said the Sergeant wearily. ‘You’ll break the machine if you keep shouting at it. Why don’t you just tell us where you were and what
you were doing on the night of the twenty-second?’
‘You’ve asked me that same sodding question a hundred times and I’ve given the same sodding answer a hundred times. I was at home till eight-thirty, when I left to
visit Jinx.’
‘And we don’t believe you. Tell me, will the randy housekeeper lie for you, the way you claim your mother and brother will?’
‘I never said they’d be lying.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Oh God! Look, I’ve got to get out of here. Are you going to charge me or not? Because if
you’re not, then I want out.’
‘Why? What’s happening at five o’clock that’s so important?’
‘I owe money, you moron,’ said Miles through gritted teeth, ‘and I need to buy a bit more time. That’s what’s happening at five o’clock. Why the
hell do you think I went to see Jinxy? OK, so we shout at each other a bit but she’s always come through in the past.’
There was a tap on the door and a second WPC looked in. ‘I’ve got a Mr Kennedy out here, Sarge. He says Mr Kingsley’s his client.’
‘Show him in. Tape stopped at four fifty-one p.m.’
Kennedy looked at Miles with dislike, refused the chair that was offered him and, instead, placed two photographs on the table. The first showed Miles entering a hotel foyer, the
second showed him getting into his Porsche. ‘My client’s sister informs me that you are enquiring into an assault on a prostitute in Lansing Road, Salisbury, at around eight
o’clock on Wednesday, June the twenty-second. Is that correct?’
‘Yes,’ agreed Blake.
Kennedy tapped the photographs, indicating the printed times and date in the bottom right-hand corners. ‘My client, Miles Kingsley, entered the Regal Hotel, Salisbury, at
five-thirty p.m. on Wednesday, June the twenty-second. He returned to his car at eight forty-five p.m. that same evening and drove to the Nightingale Clinic to visit his sister. While at the Regal
he spent three and a quarter hours in room number four-three-one, leaving it only once to meet a man in the lobby.’ He placed another photograph on the table, of Miles, head down, talking to
someone whose back was to the camera. ‘That was at seven o’clock. He remained with this man for three minutes before visiting the gentlemen’s lavatory in the lobby. He returned to
room four-three-one at seven-fifteen. He was followed, photographed and watched from midday until midnight on June the twenty-second by one Paul Deacon, who can be contacted on this number and at
this address.’ He placed a card beside the photographs. ‘I trust this clears my client of any suspicion in connection with the assault in Lansing Road.’
Blake looked from the photographs to Miles’s drained, white face. ‘It would certainly seem to,’ she agreed.
Kennedy smiled coldly at his client. ‘Your father’s outside, Miles. I suggest we don’t make him wait any longer than we need to.’
Miles shrank into his seat. ‘I’m not going,’ he said. ‘He’ll kill me.’
‘Your mother and Fergus are with him. I’m sure they’ll both be very pleased to see you.’ He gestured towards the door. ‘Your father’s most
aggrieved by all of this, Miles, and he gets very angry when he’s aggrieved, as you know. You wouldn’t want your mother and brother to bear the brunt of his anger, would you?’
Miles looked terrified. ‘No,’ he said, lurching to his feet. ‘It was my idea. Mum and Fergus were just trying to help. I thought, if we put the shares up as
collateral, we could get out from under once and for all. So it’s me he should blame, not them.’
Blake watched the young man pull the remnants of his courage together and thought he was braver than she’d given him credit for. But what the hell sort of man was Adam Kingsley
to inspire such fear in his twenty-six-year-old son?
Chapter Twenty-one
Wednesday, 29 June, Nightingale Clinic, Salisbury – 5.00 p.m.
DR PROTHEROE STOOD
in Jinx’s open doorway, watching her. She was speaking on the telephone, body rigid with tension, fingers clenching the receiver, shoulders
unnaturally stiff. Her father, he guessed, for he doubted anyone else could elicit so much nervous energy. He remembered another woman standing in just this way, listening to a voice at the other
end of the line. His wife, hearing her own death sentence.
I’m so sorry, Mrs Protheroe. How long? It’s difficult to say. How long? Twelve months – eighteen, if we’re
lucky.
Jinx watched him while she spoke. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked as she replaced the receiver.
He shook his head. ‘Nothing. I was thinking of something else. Bad news?’
‘No, good,’ she said dispiritedly. ‘They’ve let Miles go.’
‘With or without charges?’
‘Without.’ She climbed on to her bed and sat cross-legged in the middle of it. ‘Kennedy was able to prove he was somewhere else.’
‘You don’t seem very happy about it.’
‘Adam was on his mobile. I could hear Betty crying in the background. I think the sword has finally snapped its thread.’
‘Are we talking about the sword of Damocles?’
She nodded. ‘Adam’s had it hanging over their heads for years. The trouble is . . .’ She lapsed into one of her silences.
‘They were too stupid to realize it,’ he suggested.
She didn’t say anything.
‘So what was Miles really doing that night?’
She pressed her hands flat on the counterpane, then released them, apparently intrigued by the depressions they’d made. ‘Cocaine,’ she said suddenly. ‘In
between gambling his non-existent fortune away. He and Fergus are in hock up to their eyeballs.’ She was silent for a moment, stroking and pummelling the bed. ‘Adam paid off fifty
thousand pounds on their gambling debts in March, and he said if they ever gambled again he’d throw them out and disinherit them. He’s had them watched for the last four
weeks.’
Alan took up her favourite position against the dressing table. ‘Why?’
‘Because Betty sold the last of her shares halfway through May and he guessed it was to cover their losses.’
‘So why didn’t he make good his threat then?’
She smiled rather grimly. ‘I imagine he wanted to know who he’d be dealing with when the boys failed to pay up.’
‘They’re over twenty-one,’ said Alan dispassionately. ‘He’s not responsible for their debts.’
‘You’re back in your ivory tower again,’ she said, two spots of angry colour flaring in her cheeks. ‘Do you honestly believe anyone would bother to take Adam
Kingsley’s sons to the cleaners if they didn’t think they’d get their money? You’ve seen what Miles is like. Now imagine what he and Fergus will have said about Adam and
Franchise Holdings while high on cocaine. There’ll be a video somewhere full of damaging allegations.’
Alan folded his arms. ‘He can’t have a worse press than he’s had in the last couple of days, so what does it matter what your brothers might have said?’
‘It would have mattered four weeks ago,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘Four weeks ago he was planning a society wedding and he couldn’t afford any scandal,
not if his precious Jinx was to have her day. Miles was right. It
is
my fault. If I’d had the sense to tell them I didn’t want to go through with the bloody thing, well . .
.’ She fell silent again.
He watched her for a moment. ‘As a matter of interest, why didn’t he kick them out at twenty-one and tell them to fend for themselves?’
She didn’t answer immediately. ‘Because they’d have done this, anyway,’ she said at last. ‘If he’d turned them loose, he’d still be expected
to pay their debts. I think he hoped that by keeping them close he could check their worst excesses.’ She bent her head so that he couldn’t see her expression. ‘They’ve
always wanted to throw his money in his face the way I do, but get-rich-quick schemes were all they could think of.’