Kate was contemplating what Aunt Cassie would no doubt have condemned at the ultimate dereliction of housekeeping duty – a breakfast McMuffin on the way into work – when the phone rang: Dave Allen was calling a breakfast meeting of the squad.
She was greeted by wonderful smells: Dave had organised two piles of sandwiches, bacon and sausage. ‘Staff morale,’ he muttered as an aside.
He reported to the group what he and Kate had managed to extract from Cornfield; then others reported on their progress so far. Zain Khan’s was the most interesting: he’d managed, as he modestly said, to decipher some of Mrs Duncton’s file. Apart from her varicose veins and her irritable bowels, what had caused her some concern was the state of her husband’s health.
‘Time and again we get her saying he’s moody – there’s even a hint or two he may have knocked her about. Still no path report. Bastards are busy. Kate, you and Jane to my office, please, soon as you’ve fed your faces.’
Which was quite an urgent order from Dave.
The flipchart was already in position, with Rod writing something on the bottom of the Ken Barr sheet. What he was adding was a large £ sign, followed by a couple of others and three question marks.
‘That’s what it comes down to, isn’t it? The budget’s already overstretched (when will the public learn we can’t afford for them to go on killing each other?); we’re pushing everything we can out from the centre; more bobbies on the beat; better clear-up figures. And now what may or not have been a murder a generation ago. Dave, what are your feelings?’
‘I’d rather hear what the two wenches who’ve talked to the brother have to say. Jane?’
More brownie points for him.
‘He’s bloody rich. Loaded. I’ve never seen a house like his without having to pay a fiver to get in. But that doesn’t mean as how he had to kill his old man to get it. Kate was saying he had this legacy provided he changed his name.’
‘But then he said he’d changed it after some medical scandal, didn’t he?’
‘And he had his bag packed to take him abroad. Now, if he was a medic, wouldn’t he have access to drugs? He could slip his dad a few, make it look like natural causes.’ Her face fell. ‘Except he was in Nottingham at the time.’
‘No reason why he shouldn’t have given them to his sister and got her to do the dirty,’ Kate said. ‘And then Max Cornfield was there to get her out of the country. However,’ she added, more soberly, ‘we haven’t checked his medical records, assuming they still exist, or the evidence presented to the inquest.’
‘Which may indicate that Barr had a long-standing condition and was simply a heart attack waiting to happen,’ Dave concluded for them. ‘Tell you what, Gaffer, why don’t we get Jane here to sort out the historical stuff, as it were, while Kate goes back to Fraud and sorts out the will business.’
Even as she nodded her agreement, Kate’s stomach sank. Back to Fraud meant back to Lizzie. Back to the dubious commission rogatoire. And back to the constant bad temper and barrage of innuendo.
‘Come on, our kid,’ Jane said, putting a hand on Kate’s shoulder, ‘you look as if you’ve lost half a crown and found a rusty button.’
‘I never did like paperwork,’ Kate said, managing a pale smile.
‘But you’ve nearly finished, and the more you’ve done, the glummer you’ve got. You come down the canteen: you could do with a breather, by the looks of things.’
Kate’s smile was more positive. ‘That’d be great. My shout.’
Jane dug in her purse. ‘It may have to be an’ all – I’m clean out till I’ve been to the hole in the wall. Funny,’ she continued, as they fell into step, ‘the ways this job changes your life. Like forgetting to buy milk or pick up the dry-cleaning or whatever. Makes a difference if you’ve got a good boss, of course. I mean, Dave works the socks off us when we’ve got a panic on, but he does understand about breathing time – like those trips to the pub you were so sniffy about.’
‘I was wrong there. Freely admit it. I wish I could stay in this squad, to be honest.’
‘But you’re a high-flyer!’
‘It’s all very well flying high, but you never know what you’re going to land in, do you? Sometimes it’s a nice spot like this, others it’s a shit-heap.’
‘You reckon Fraud’s a shit-heap, do you?’ Jane asked, pushing open the canteen door.
‘I didn’t say that at all,’ Kate laughed. Hell! Why did Jane have to raise her voice at that point? Talk about walls and bloody ears! ‘Tea or coffee?’
‘Well, why do you want to stay with us, then? Coffee, please.’
‘Less paperwork,’ she said. ‘And trials that don’t go on for years, and evidence the jury can understand, and a proper sentence for the scrote at the end of it all. For God’s sake, we see people who’ve ruined more lives than a serial killer ending up with just a couple of years in the library of an open prison. Nick a car radio in Handsworth, you get six months. Nick millions of pounds no one can actually see, and you may even get off scot-free if the jury can’t follow the rows of figures.’
Jane snorted. ‘Careful how you get down.’
‘Get—? Oh, off my soap-box, you mean. Sorry. How about sitting over there, away from the TV?’ She paid for the drinks and headed towards an isolated table.
‘Thing is,’ Jane said, sitting down, ‘they say that that Dl’s a bugger to work with. King, whatever her name is,’ she added, in another stage whisper. Damn Dudley and its carrying voices.
‘Come on, Jane, being a woman in the service is tough enough without other women bitching about you. We’re all in the same spot – bikes or dykes, whatever. Now, what are you up to this weekend?’ This loyalty was getting to be a strain.
‘Looking at houses, that’s me and my boyfriend. Party tomorrow night. If this weather holds, we’re off to Wales on Sunday. What about yourself?’
Kate could have kicked herself: this was going to be a worse topic of conversation than the last. ‘If a phone call I’ve got to make back in Fraud comes up with the answer I’m expecting, I may have to fly out to Portugal. Or Germany. Otherwise there’s something at the NEC I might go to.’ And suddenly her heart lifted. No, she wasn’t going to have a weekend entirely on her own, after all. But it sank again. Rod would be the last person Graham would want her to spend time with. A terrible though struck her: she might not tell him.
‘It’s all right,’ Derek greeted her, ‘you can breathe freely. ‘Lizzie’s not in. Some meeting somewhere. So we’re not sure whether she’ll be back or not.’
Kate slung her bag on to her desk. On impulse she phoned the hospital for news about Mrs Hamilton. She was conscious and might be moved from Intensive Care the following day. But family visitors were all that would be allowed for a few more days.
‘Her neighbour’s very keen to see her,’ Kate said neutrally. ‘The one who brought her in and who’s looking after her dog.’
‘We’ll have to see,’ said the voice. ‘As I told him when he phoned.’
One phone call seemed to lead to another. She found herself dialling Leon Horowitz.
‘I need to talk to you in more detail about the will you witnessed,’ she said. ‘Will you be at home early next week?’
‘What sort of detail?’
‘Just the order in which things happened,’ she said. ‘I’ll be accompanied by a colleague from the Portuguese police, of course, so your statement will have legal validity. So you will be there next week?’
‘It’s hard to say,’ he began.
‘Oh, Mr Horowitz, the sooner this is done the better. After all, Mr Cornfield won’t be able to claim his legacy till all formalities are complete.’ She gave him her number. ‘I’ll be flying out specially,’ she added, ‘so if you do have any last minute changes of plan, I’d be very grateful if you let me know.’
Then a similar call to Mr Steiner. And another to the travel agency the police used. Yes, it looked as if she’d be jetting round Europe. Suddenly she was tired of not knowing – she wanted to pounce.