The Sculptress (21 page)

‘Don’t see why not. Can’t see them sneezing at
fifty quid apiece.’ Ma held out her hand.

Dutifully, Roz took two twenty-pound notes and a
ten from her wallet and laid them on the wrinkled
palm. Then she started to gather her things together.
‘I hear Dawlington’s quite famous,’ she remarked
chattily.

‘Oh yeah?’

‘I was told Olive Martin murdered her mother and
sister about half a mile down the road.’

‘Oh, ’er,’ said Ma dismissively, standing up.
‘Strange girl. Knew ’er quite well at one time. Used
to clean for the mother when she and ’er sister were
nippers. She took a real fancy to Gary. Used to pretend
’e was ’er doll whenever I took ’im halong with me.
There was only three years between them but she was nearly twice as big as my skinny little runt. Strange
girl.’

Roz busied herself with sorting out her briefcase.
‘It must have been a shock hearing about the murders
then. If you knew the family, that is.’

‘Can’t say I gave it much thought. I was only there
six month. Never liked ’
er
. She only took me on for
a bit of snobbery, then got rid of me the minute she
found hout my old man was in the nick.’

‘What was Olive like as a child. Was she violent to
your Gary?’

Ma cackled. ‘Used to dress ’im up in ’er sister’s
frocks. God, ’e looked a sight. Like I said, she treated
’im like a doll.’

Roz snapped the locks on her briefcase and stood
up. ‘Were you surprised she became a murderess?’

‘No more surprised by that than by anything else.
There’s nowt so queer as folk.’ She escorted Roz to
the front door and stood, arms akimbo, waiting for
her to leave.

‘It might make an interesting introduction to the
programme,’ Roz mused, ‘the fact that Gary was a
doll-substitute for a notorious murderess. Does he
remember her?’

Ma cackled again. ‘Course ’e remembers ’er. Carried
messages between ’er and ’er fancy man, didn’t
’e, when she was workin’ for the Social.’

*

Roz made a beeline for the nearest telephone. Ma
O’Brien either wouldn’t or couldn’t elaborate on her
tantalizing statement and had closed the door
abruptly when pressed for information on Gary’s
whereabouts. Roz dialled Directory Enquiries and
asked for Wells-Fargo in Southampton, then used her
last fifty pence to call the number she was given. A
bored female voice on the other end gave her the
company’s address and some directions on how to
find it. ‘We close in forty minutes,’ was the woman’s
parting shot.

By dint of parking on a double yellow line and
shrugging off the prospect of a parking ticket Roz
made it to the Wells-Fargo office with ten minutes to
spare. It was a dingy place, approached through a
doorway between two shops and up a flight of uncarpeted
stairs. Two anaemic Busy Lizzies and an ancient
Pirelli calendar were the only spots of colour against
the yellowed walls. The bored female voice resolved
itself into a bored-looking middle-aged woman who
was counting the seconds to the start of her weekend.

‘We don’t often see customers,’ she remarked, filing
her nails. ‘I mean if they can bring their package here
they might just as well deliver it themselves.’ It was
an accusation, as if she felt Roz were wasting company
time. She abandoned her nails and held out a hand.
‘What is it and where’s it for?’

‘I’m not a customer,’ said Roz. ‘I’m an author
and I’m hoping you can give me some information for a book I’m writing.’ Stirrings of interest animated
the other’s face so Roz pulled forward a chair and sat
down. ‘How long have you been working here?’

‘Too long. What sort of book?’

Roz watched her closely. ‘Do you remember Olive
Martin? She murdered her mother and sister in Dawlington
six years ago.’ She saw immediate recognition
in the woman’s eyes. ‘I’m writing a book about her.’

The woman returned to her nails but didn’t say
anything.

‘Did you know her?’

‘God, no.’

‘Did you know
of
her? Before the murders, that is.
I’ve been told one of your messengers delivered letters
to her.’ It was true enough. The only trouble was that
she didn’t know if Gary was working for Wells-Fargo
when he did it.

A door to an inner office opened and a man fussed
out. He looked at Roz. ‘Did this lady want to see me,
Marnie?’ His fingers ran involuntarily up and down
his tie, playing it like a clarinet.

The nail file vanished from sight. ‘No, Mr Wheelan.
She’s an old friend of mine. Popped in to see if I’ve
time for a drink before I go home.’ She stared hard
at Roz, her eyes demanding support. There was a
curious intimacy in her expression as if she and Roz
already shared a secret.

Roz smiled amiably and glanced at her watch. ‘It’s nearly six now,’ she said. ‘Half an hour won’t delay
you too much, will it?’

The man made shooing motions with his hands.
‘You two get on then. I’ll lock up tonight.’ He paused
in the doorway, his forehead wrinkling anxiously. ‘You
didn’t forget to send someone to Hasler’s, did you?’

‘No, Mr Wheelan. Eddy went two hours ago.’

‘Good, good. Have a nice weekend. What about
Prestwick’s?’

‘All done, Mr Wheelan. There’s nothing outstanding.’
Marnie raised her eyes to heaven as he closed
the door behind him. ‘He drives me mad,’ she muttered.
‘Fuss, fuss, fuss, all the time. Come on, quick,
before he changes his mind. Friday evenings are always
the worst.’ She scurried across to the door and started
down the stairs. ‘He hates weekends, that’s his
trouble, thinks the business is going to fold because
we have two consecutive days without orders. He’s
paranoid. Had me working Saturday mornings last
year till he realized we were simply sitting around
twiddling our thumbs because none of the offices we
deal with open on a Saturday.’ She pushed through
the bottom door and stepped out on to the pavement.
‘Look, we can forget about that drink. I’d like to get
home in reasonable time for once.’ She looked at Roz,
measuring the other’s reaction.

Roz shrugged. ‘Fine. I’ll go and talk to Mr Wheelan
about Olive Martin. He doesn’t seem to be in any
hurry.’

Marnie tapped her foot impatiently. ‘You’ll get me
sacked.’

‘
You
talk to me then.’

There was a long pause while the other woman
considered her options. ‘I’ll tell you what I know, as
long as you keep it to yourself,’ she said at last. ‘Is
that a deal? It’s not going to help you one little bit,
so you won’t need to use it.’

‘Suits me,’ said Roz.

‘We’ll talk as we walk. The station’s this way. If we
hurry I might be able to catch the six thirty.’

Roz caught her arm to hold her back. ‘My car’s
over there,’ she said. ‘I’ll drive you instead.’ She took
Marnie across the road and unlocked the passenger
door. ‘OK,’ she said, getting in the other side and
starting the engine. ‘Fire away.’

‘I did know of her, or at least I knew of
an
Olive
Martin. I can’t swear it’s the same one because I never
saw her, but the description sounded right when I
read about her in the newspaper. I’ve always assumed
it was the same person.’

‘Who gave you her description?’ asked Roz, turning
into the main road.

‘There’s no point asking questions,’ snapped
Marnie. ‘It’ll just take longer. Let me tell the story
my way.’ She collected her thoughts. ‘I said back there
that we hardly ever see customers. Sometimes office
managers come in to suss out what sort of operation
we run, but normally it’s all done by telephone. Somebody wants something delivered, they phone us and
we dispatch a rider, simple as that. Well, one lunchtime,
when Wheelan was out getting his sandwiches,
this man came into the office. He had a letter that he
wanted delivered that afternoon to a Miss Olive
Martin. He was prepared to pay over the odds if the
dispatch rider would hang around outside where she
worked and give it to her quietly as she was leaving.
He was absolutely adamant that it wasn’t to be taken
inside and said he was sure I understood why.’

Roz forgot herself. ‘And did you?’

‘I assumed they were having an affair and that
neither of them wanted people asking questions.
Anyway, he gave me a twenty-quid note for the one
letter, and we’re talking six years ago, remember, plus
a very good description of Olive Martin, right down
to the clothes she was wearing that day. Well, I
thought it was a one-off and as that old bastard Wheelan
pays peanuts at the best of times, I pocketed the
cash and didn’t bother to record the transaction.
Instead, I got one of our riders who lived in Dawlington
to do it freelance, as it were, on his way home.
He got ten for doing virtually nothing and I kept the
other ten.’ She motioned with her hand. ‘You take
the next right at the traffic lights and then right at
the roundabout.’

Roz put on her indicator. ‘Was that Gary O’Brien?’

Marnie nodded. ‘I suppose the little sod’s been
talking.’

‘Something like that,’ said Roz, avoiding a direct
answer. ‘Did Gary ever meet this man?’

‘No, only Olive. It turned out he’d known her
before – she used to look after him when he was a
child or something – so he had no trouble recognizing
her and didn’t bungle the job by trying to give the
letter to the wrong woman. Which, considering what
an oaf he was, I thought he might do. Pull in here.’
She glanced at her watch as Roz drew to a halt. ‘That’s
grand. OK, well, the upshot of the whole thing going
so smoothly was that Olive’s bloke started to use us
quite regularly. All in all we must have delivered about
ten letters in the six months before the murders. I
think he realized we were doing it on the side because
he always came in at lunchtime after Wheelan had
gone out. I reckon he used to wait until he saw
the old fool leave.’ She shrugged. ‘It stopped with the
murders and I’ve never seen him since. And that’s all
I can tell you except that Gary got really nervous
after Olive was arrested and said we should keep our
mouths shut about what we knew or the police would
be down on us like a ton of bricks. Well, I wasn’t
keen to say anything anyway, not because of the police
but because of Wheelan. He’d have burst a blood
vessel if he’d found out we’d been running a bit of
private enterprise behind his back.’

‘But didn’t the police turn up anyway about a
month later to warn Wheelan against the O’Brien
brothers?’

Marnie looked surprised. ‘Who told you that?’

‘Gary’s mother.’

‘First I’ve heard of it. As far as I know they just
got bored. Gary wasn’t so bad because he loved his
motorbike but the other two were the most work-shy
creeps I’ve ever come across. In the end they were
skiving off so often that Wheelan sacked the lot. It’s
about the only decision he’s ever made that I agreed
with. God, they were unreliable.’ She checked her
watch again. ‘To tell you the truth it amazed me that
Gary delivered Olive’s letters so conscientiously. I did
wonder if he had a bit of a yen for her himself.’ She
opened the car door. ‘I’ll have to go.’

‘Hang on,’ said Roz sharply. ‘Who was this man?’

‘No idea. We dealt in cash and he never gave his
name.’

‘What did he look like?’

‘I’ll miss my train.’

Roz leant across and pulled the door to. ‘You’ve
got ten minutes and if you don’t give me a decent
description I’ll go straight back to your office and spill
the beans to Wheelan.’

Marnie shrugged petulantly. ‘He was fifty-odd, old
enough to be her father if the age they gave for her
in the paper was right. Quite good-looking in a
smarmy sort of way, very clean cut and conservative.
He had a posh accent. He smoked. He always wore a
suit and tie. He was about six foot and he had blond
hair. He never said very much, just sort of waited for me to speak, never smiled, never got excited. I
remember his eyes because they didn’t go with his
hair. They were very dark brown. And that’s it,’ she
said firmly. ‘I don’t know any more about him and I
don’t know anything at all about her.’

‘Would you recognize him from a photograph?’

‘Probably. Do you know him then?’

Roz drummed her fingers on the steering-wheel.
‘It doesn’t make any sense but it sounds exactly like
her father.’

THE OFFICER ON
the gate checked Roz’s name against
his list the following Monday, then picked up the
telephone. ‘The Governor wants to see you,’ he said,
dialling a number.

‘What for?’

‘I wouldn’t know, miss.’ He spoke into the telephone.
‘Miss Leigh’s here for Martin. There’s a note
that she’s to see the Governor first. Yes. Will do.’ He
pointed with his pencil. ‘Straight through the first set
of gates and you’ll be met the other side.’

It was horribly reminiscent of being hauled before
the headmistress at school, thought Roz, waiting nervously
in the secretary’s office. She was trying to
remember if she’d broken any rule.
Bring nothing in
and take nothing out. Don’t pass messages.
But she had
done that, of course, when she spoke to Crew about
the will. The slimy little toad must have ratted on her!

‘You can go in now,’ the secretary told her.

The Governor gestured towards a chair. ‘Sit down,
Miss Leigh.’

Roz lowered herself into the easy chair, hoping she
looked less guilty than she felt. ‘I wasn’t expecting to
see you.’

‘No.’ She studied Roz for a moment or two, then
seemed to reach a decision. ‘There’s no point beating
about the bush. Olive has had her privileges suspended
and we think you may be the indirect cause
of the suspension. According to the log-book you
didn’t come in last week, and I’m told Olive was very
upset about it. Three days later she destroyed her cell
and had to be sedated.’ She saw Roz’s surprise. ‘She’s
been very volatile ever since and, under the circumstances,
I am not happy about letting you back in. I
think it’s something I need to discuss with the Home
Office.’