The Evil that Men Do (12 page)

‘Well, the amenities I'm concerned with right now are first, towels, and second, food.'

We lunched on smoked salmon, salad, and crusty bread. Simple and very satisfying. I virtuously topped off my meal with a handful of grapes, saving the cake for dinner. Alan helped with the dishes, no great chore.

It was still raining.

‘No walk to Sezincote today,' said Alan. We were sitting in the lounge, in seductively comfortable chairs. ‘I don't even care to walk into the town.'

I shivered, quite unnecessarily. The room was warm. ‘Nap time?'

Alan just looked at me.

‘Well, no, I'm not actually sleepy, either.'

There was a little silence. Then Alan said, ‘There's no point in trying to run away from it.'

‘Is that what we were doing?'

That look again.

I sat up a little straighter. It took some effort. ‘All right. What are we going to do?'

‘We're going to be methodical about it. Do you suppose there's anything to write on in this establishment?'

‘Have you ever known me to be without a notebook?' I am addicted to spiral notebooks, and carry one everywhere I go. I struggled out of my chair, nipped into the bedroom, and found the small one I'd brought along. ‘Now.'

Alan tented his hands in a gesture that made him look more like Alistair Cooke than ever. ‘First: what do we want to know?'

I headed a page ‘Queries' and created a subhead, ‘Paul'. ‘There's a lot we want to know about Paul. Why was he staying in Broadway – or why is he staying there? He may have come back, after all.'

‘Right. And why was he incognito?'

‘Oh, but that's an easy one. He—'

‘No, let's get the questions down first, and then see if we have any answers. There's quite a lot more about Paul. What is his real name, Paul Jones or Peter James, or maybe something else entirely?'

I got that down. ‘Why did he disappear, and where did he go?'

‘We know part of the answer to that one, but the most puzzling one is, why was he so upset when he nearly ran into you?'

‘Yes, and where did all that blood come from?' I paused. ‘Any more about Paul?'

‘Not that I can think of at the moment. Oh, yes, there's one, but we might as well make it a query about Jo Carter. Why is she, or was she, trying to find Paul?'

‘Or in general, what's she up to? What's her relationship with Sarah? Where is she, Jo, I mean, where is she now?'

Alan thought for a moment. ‘Well, as we've got to Sarah, what is it that's troubling her so badly?'

‘And to that one I haven't a clue.' I looked at my list. ‘Goodness, there's a lot we don't know.'

‘And you've forgotten the matter that really should have come first,' said Alan, looking very sober.

‘What's that?'

‘Who killed William Symonds, and why? That's where this all started, you know.'

‘Or at least where we came into it. Alan, I have the feeling we've waded into something that goes a long way back. There was a novel I read once, by Mary Stewart, I think, that talked about entering a situation in the middle of the third act, with no idea what the play was about or even who the characters were. That's the way I feel now.'

‘That's nearly always the way it was in police work, Dorothy. Or at least, no. Most of the time it was boring routine. Wife throws pot at husband, husband stabs wife. Thieves fall out. Drug deals go bad. A crowd of bored, stupid teenagers decides to go on a rampage.'

I shuddered. ‘I'm very glad you're out of all that.'

‘Not half as glad as I am. But in the odd case when the solution wasn't obvious, we always had to go back. It was almost never a matter of where John Doe was at ten thirty on the night of the fifteenth. Oh, it came to that in the end, of course, when we knew who the villain was and had to find the evidence to prove it. But in order to come to that assurance, we had to look into the relationships of everyone concerned, what someone stood to gain, or to lose. It was almost never pretty.'

‘No. Crime isn't, is it? But Alan, that's exactly the problem with the death of the farmer. There's nothing in his background that could lead to murder. And yet he's dead. I suppose the police in Broadway really did their job?'

‘Oh, yes. It's easier in a village. In a city a man can be anonymous. Not in a village. Believe me, if Bill Symonds had any secrets in his life, past or present, they would have been discovered instantly. There was
no
reason for him to be killed.'

‘Well, then, logically, he's still alive.'

‘Which he is not. Therefore the logic has a flaw. And as we have no idea what it is, perhaps we'd be more productive exploring some of our other questions. What do you suggest?'

I looked again at my list. ‘I've numbered them. How about Paul, question two: why was he incognito? I think the answer to that one is obvious.'

‘Do you? And what is your answer?'

‘He's a rock star. He didn't want to be recognized. Hence the beard and the false name.'

‘Ah, but that answer raises more questions. Why didn't he want to be recognized?'

‘His fans. He didn't want to be mobbed.'

‘You're forgetting a couple of things, love. One: Saturday night was his first appearance on television. That means the number of people who knew what he looked like is limited.'

I grinned, happy to be one-up for a change. ‘
You
are forgetting the Internet, and YouTube, and Facebook, and all the other ways teenagers trade information these days. Half the world could know what he looked like, and we old fogies would be the only ones left in the dark.'

‘All right. I'll grant you that one. Do you think that's why he came to the Holly Tree? He must be making a fortune. He could have stayed anywhere.'

‘Well  . . . it does seem an unlikely place for him. And you know, you've raised some questions in my mind, actually. Most rising young stars revel in publicity. They wallow in it. I suspect their agents insist. And here he is, just on the verge of his big television debut, choosing to hole up, incognito, in a small B-and-B in a Cotswold village. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense.'

‘Which gets us back to  . . . would it be Paul, question one, on your list? Why he was in Broadway at all?'

‘It would be, and that's been one of the big questions all along. Even before the death of the farmer.'

‘He was there for a private reason, something that had nothing to do with his career. I'll swear to that. His whole demeanour was that of a private individual. When he ran you down—'

‘Nearly. Not quite.'

‘—nearly ran you down, he was terribly shaken, but it wasn't the fear that he would be exposed, the great Peter James, as a reckless driver. He was concerned about you.'

‘And about something else. His anxiety was out of all proportion to the minor damage he'd done to me, or to himself, for that matter. Alan, that child was terrified.'

‘I agree. So let's put a few facts together. First, where was he coming from?'

I looked blank. ‘I haven't the slightest idea. I wasn't paying attention. We were leaving the pub. I don't remember the name. It wasn't very nice.'

‘The Hunting Dog. Near the bottom of the High Street. We had turned to go back to the Holly Tree, or in that direction, anyway. He came from behind us. Therefore from the west.'

‘If you say so,' said I, the geographically challenged.

‘Second, what was the time?'

‘Around lunchtime. We had stopped in the pub to get some lunch.'

‘So, say around one, or a little past. Now, do you remember when William Symonds was presumed to have died?'

I felt a distinct chill. ‘No.'

‘Latest time, around one. Earliest, about ten that morning.'

‘Alan, you're not saying Paul killed him? I thought we disposed of that long ago.'

‘I think so, too. I'm saying, as a hypothesis, that he saw him killed.'

‘But  . . .' I stopped talking and thought about that. ‘Why would he not go to the police?'

‘Because he knew the killer.'

THIRTEEN

T
hat one silenced me. ‘How do you work that out?' I said, finally.

‘I said it was only a hypothesis. I can't come within miles of producing evidence, but it fits the few facts we know.'

‘Such as?'

‘Fact: William Symonds was killed sometime between ten and one on Tuesday. Fact: Paul Jones – we'll call him that for now – was going somewhere at a hell of a clip just before one. Fact: he was coming from the west.'

‘That's an inference, not a fact,' I argued. ‘We didn't see him coming. And even if he was, how would that mean he was coming from that quarry? Isn't it more or less south of here? Of Broadway, I mean?'

He looked at me in some surprise. ‘Your geography has improved.'

‘No, it hasn't. I've been studying that miserable OS map until I'm nearly blind, and even I know that down, on a map, is south.'

‘Yes. Well. The point is, yes, you're right about the direction. But remember that Paul was on a motorbike. He couldn't have ridden that to the quarry, or back. Even the Land Rover had to stop some distance away, you remember. And if you can bear to look at the map once more, I think you'll see that he would have had to go west from the quarry to get to anything like a road.'

‘All right, but why would he have been to the quarry at all? I wouldn't have said he was the outdoor type.'

‘I have no idea, at least not yet. But you will have to admit that he was in a state of near collapse when we saw him in front of the Hunting Dog.'

‘No argument about that. But any number of things could have caused that.'

‘For instance?'

‘Well  . . . he had a fight with someone. That would explain the blood, too.'

‘With whom?'

‘
I
don't know! I know nothing about him, really. Maybe with the person he came to Broadway to see. And that would explain why he left town right away, too. He was fed up with the situation and wanted to get away.'

‘It's possible. I don't think so, though. Dorothy, you're better than I at reading people's reactions, but at the time we both thought Paul was struggling with fear, not anger.'

I cast my mind back to the boy's face, ashy white where it wasn't covered with blood and mud. I saw again his frantic haste, his reluctance to talk, his desperate effort at courtesy in spite of everything. ‘Yes, you're right,' I said slowly. ‘He was afraid. All right. Your theory is full of holes, but all right. For the sake of the argument, he saw the murder done. I repeat, why didn't he then go to the police? He seems to me to be a law-abiding sort.'

‘And I repeat, he knows the murderer. And is terrified of him, or her.'

‘Terrified of him? Or
for
him?' A new idea was trying to surface in my brain.

Alan leaned forward, or tried to. ‘Blast it, this furniture is demoralizing! Comfortable, but not conducive to escape. Dorothy, you may have something there. Afraid
for
the murderer. I like it. That seems to capture the sense we had, or at least I had, of his condition at the time. Afraid, yes, but afraid something worse was going to happen to someone he loved.'

‘Which implies that the murderer  . . .'

‘Is someone very close to him. Dorothy, have you heard anything about his family?'

‘I don't even know if he has one. No, wait! Jo said something  . . . when we first met her, remember? Something about being a friend of his family. She would know.'

‘Then the first thing we need to do is talk to Jo.'

‘We have to find her first.'

‘That shouldn't be too hard. She works in social services, presumably in Cheltenham. We'll go to Cheltenham.'

It was a short trip, even in the rain, which by now had become a downpour. We finally found a car park with a few empty spots, paid-and-displayed, and then huddled in the car trying to decide where to go.

‘It might have been simpler to call,' I said. ‘Drier, anyway.'

‘Perhaps, but bureaucracies are difficult enough to navigate in person. On the phone they can be impossible. Do you have any idea how many agencies could come under the general heading of “social services”?'

I was about to find out.

Alan has a mobile phone that does everything but dance the cancan, which he used to locate the main office of the Gloucestershire County Council. It was a long way from our car park, and our umbrellas didn't help much. A receptionist in a skimpy stretch top asked if she could help us, quite obviously hoping she couldn't.

Alan gave me his ‘Let me handle this' look and said, ‘We're looking for Ms Carter, Jo Carter. Can you tell me where we might find her office?'

‘And what agency is she with?'

‘I'm afraid I can't quite remember. Foolish of me. Can you look her up?'

The woman, already bored with us, looked at her computer screen and then shook her head. ‘Not unless you know the agency. What kind of help were you wanting?'

I drew breath. Alan stepped on my foot. Gently, but unmistakably.

‘Actually, we're simply visiting from out of town and wanted to call on her for a few minutes. Do you not have a directory by name?'

‘Can't divulge personal information. Here, this might help.' She handed us a brochure listing various agencies and turned her attention firmly back to the computer screen where, I saw as I took a deliberate look, she was playing a card game.

‘Blood pressure, darling!' whispered Alan. We retired to a quiet corner and Alan tried all the agencies' phone numbers, one after another. He spent enough time on hold, or being told by a computerized voice how important his business was and how privileged the voice was to serve him, that I wished I had a computer game to amuse me. I was sorely tempted to take over the receptionist's desk.