‘You don’t know very much at all, really, do you?’
Tim was certain of the identity of his captor now. The plummy, rather supercilious county drawl was distinctive.
‘As you say,’ Susie Fovargue continued, ‘no one else will know what we’ve been talking about. I don’t fancy Jack’s chances of getting away with it, though, do you?’
‘Getting away with what?’ Tim asked, bewildered. Surely she wasn’t suggesting that she and Fovargue would be able to wriggle out of being sentenced for the murders, after all the evidence she’d just revealed. Was she mad enough not only to kill Tim but to imagine that he hadn’t told anyone of his whereabouts? Or that she could replace the floorboards and cover over their grisly secret?
It struck him with a massive pang of guilt that he hadn’t, actually, told anyone else that he was heading for the farm. Juliet would have been sure to guess, though, after their discussion yesterday evening. Wouldn’t she?
‘Killing that stupid girl,’ said Susie, finally ripping the scarf from her face and shaking her mane of hair free from the hood. ‘I’d gladly have done it with him: dispatching her was long overdue. But he had to do it on his own, without me. After he’d let her violate our trust in each other, too.’
Tim could see her eyes now. In the shadowy artificial light, she looked half-crazed.
‘Are you trying to tell me that your husband has killed Martha Johnson?’
‘Oh, well done, DI Yates. I knew you’d get there at last! Yes, that’s what I am telling you – not trying to tell you. He’s denying it, of course. I told him I’d get even with him over it.’
Tim was assailed by a sudden terrible thought. ‘Where are your children, Susie?’
‘What? Oh, I asked the nanny to take them to stay with her in the village. She does that sometimes. They seem to enjoy it, for some reason.’
His words seemed to disorient her, as if he’d reminded her that she inhabited two unimaginably separate worlds. Suddenly, she lost some of her energy. Tim cursed his fetters. If he could only free himself, she’d be easier to overpower now.
Susie Fovargue looked around her uncertainly, then glanced at her watch.
‘Time’s up, DI Yates,’ she said, obviously attempting to recover some of her former aplomb. ‘Would you like me to blindfold you? The others were already dead, but I believe it’s the done thing when the accused is still alive.’
‘What’s that noise?’ said Tim. He’d said it to stall her, but as he spoke he could genuinely hear something: a sharp splitting sound.
She stopped to listen. The noise came again, closely followed by another, different, sound: the distinctive din of a door being kicked in, a door closer to them, Tim would swear, and less robust than the giant armoured portal that fronted the building.
Susie Fovargue seized the billhook from the desk.
‘Watch out! She’s armed!’ Tim shouted, as two figures came rushing into the room.
Susie lashed out. The smaller of the two figures let out a yell and slumped to the floor. The other, a muscular young man, seized Susie’s wrist and twisted it viciously, forcing her to drop the billhook. He kept hold of her wrist and held her other arm against her upper back, immobilising her. She made a feeble attempt to kick his ankle, but he retaliated by kicking her own ankle much harder.
Juliet had fallen just a few feet from Tim. Slowly she got to her knees, holding one side of her face tight with both hands. Blood was coursing across her clenched fingers.
‘Juliet!’ Tim shouted.
She couldn’t answer him.
‘She needs an ambulance!’ Tim shouted. ‘Call for an ambulance now!’
‘Do you want me to let Susie go?’ said Nathan Buckland.
‘Can you cut my hand free without releasing her?’
‘What the bloody hell’s going on here? And what’s that stink?’
Josh Marriott had appeared in the office doorway. No one had heard him enter the building. He was clearly bewildered by what he saw.
‘Susie?’ he asked questioningly. ‘Nathan?’ Although he didn’t understand the situation, it became apparent that of the two, it was Nathan Buckland whom he trusted. He made no attempt to free Susie Fovargue from Nathan’s grasp.
‘Get an ambulance!’ Tim repeated. ‘Now!’
Josh took a closer look at Juliet. His face set grimly. ‘I’ll get a better signal outside.’
Fleetingly, it crossed Tim’s mind that Marriott might decide to do a bunk. But he knew from experience the signal from within the shed would be weak. Besides, his only option was to trust the man.