Thirty-Eight

The train was just pulling into the station when Rex and Alistair arrived. Fortunately for them, it had been delayed. However, their plan to intercept Annie before she returned to St. Dunstan’s Terrace depended on her not having been warned of her son’s arrest and taking off somewhere else.

Alistair left the car illegally parked close to the station entrance and they went to meet the incoming trickle of passengers from the platform. Annie was not among them. And then, just as Rex was about to turn away, he spied her at the back, wearing a headscarf and tweed coat and pulling a small suitcase on wheels. She looked surprised but not panicked to see him.

“Can we give you a lift home?” he asked. “This is my friend and colleague, Alistair Frazer. He has his car right outside.”

He took her suitcase before she could object, and Alistair escorted her to the Jaguar and opened the front passenger door. She seemed amazed to be riding in such splendour and unaware of events unfolding back in Brightlingsea. Apparently, no one had contacted her.

Rex got in the back, well pleased to have Annie McBride in his grasp. He wished to have a few words with her before he turned her over to Kent Police, who worked closely with the Essex force. He asked after her daughter and grandchildren as they drove the short distance to Phoebe’s house.

“Grand,” she said, and added that she had enjoyed a nice quiet weekend with them.

Alistair said he was an old acquaintance of Mrs. Wells’ and explained that he and Rex were staying overnight on a brief business trip.

“It’s nice she has a bit o’ company,” Annie commented.

They pulled up in front of the house and Alistair hastened around the bonnet to open the car door for her while Rex retrieved her suitcase. While Annie let herself into the house, Alistair gave Rex a conspiratorial wink. They followed her into the hall as Phoebe was descending the staircase.

“Ah, I see you have all returned safely,” she declared with a natural smile.

“These gentlemen gave me a lift from the station,” Annie said, as though edified by the experience and not at all puzzled by the fact they had just happened to be there.

Rex offered to take her suitcase downstairs and did so without waiting for a response. “I don’t know aboot you, Annie, but I fancy a cup of tea.” He filled the kettle at the sink.

“Och, let me make it,” Annie said, removing her coat.

He let her prepare the tea and then invited her to sit down at the kitchen table, saying he had a few questions and requesting her cooperation. She did so submissively, her face betraying no anxiety, nor even much curiosity.

“The questions relate to your son.”

She glanced up from her mug of tea, her face finally registering shock. She had never mentioned her son to Phoebe and now clearly wondered what was afoot.

Rex set his phone to record and placed it between them. “I came here to informally assist Mrs. Wells in a case involving some missing items and other suspicious circumstances surrounding her father’s death. My inquiry led me to Dan.”

“Danny never killed the old man,” Annie insisted without prevarication. “He had a heart attack when he saw him. The judge sent him down for ten years. Ten long years! It broke him.”

“And where were you at the time of the judge’s death, Annie?”

“At the cinema wi’ a friend,” she replied, sounding rehearsed.

“I know that’s not true,” Rex gambled. The waddle under her chin trembled. “You were waiting by the gate on New Street, were you not?”

“Aye.”

“To make sure no one saw your son enter the house by the window.”

She nodded, her throat wobbling in earnest.

“Please answer for the recording.”

She glanced nervously at Rex’s phone. “Aye, I did.”

The answers were coming more easily than Rex could have hoped. She made no effort to defend herself, perhaps because she was accustomed to succumbing to someone else’s control.

“And you must have left the upstairs window unlatched before you left for the evening, ostensibly to go to the cinema. A random housebreaker would not have known the window would be unlocked.”

Annie gazed at him with the frightened, vacant stare of a rabbit.

“You planted the hair clasp and glove fragment in Judge Murgatroyd’s room to throw me off the scent. You used your employer’s nail varnish to further mislead me and perhaps even to implicate Mrs. Wells and make it look like she had made everything up.”

No response from the housekeeper, but no denial either.

“Your son is in serious trouble, Annie, maybe more than you know. I just came from Brightlingsea.”

“He never meant to hurt the lass. I have nothing more to say. He’s my son and he’s all I have left.”

“I’m sorry, Annie, truly I am, but he’s broken numerous laws and I doubt he’ll ever leave prison again.”

Annie continued to look at him blankly, but her knotty hands shook and she placed them below the table.

“I fail to understand how you could assist your son in his intention to murder an old man and how you could condone his kidnapping of a schoolgirl and holding her prisoner. Her parents have been going out of their minds these past weeks. Did you not once give them a thought?”

“Danny took good care of the girl. He never meant her any harm.”

Rex grit his teeth. “So you keep saying. You betrayed Mrs. Wells’ trust, helped precipitate the judge’s death, and aided and abetted in the false imprisonment of a minor. I believe you also warned your son that I would be visiting Richard Pruitt at his flat, and that’s how he came to be there. You had seen correspondence from Pruitt to Judge Murgatroyd. Pruitt’s is a name your son would know very well, since he was charged in Dan’s stead for April Showers’ murder. Your son attempted to kill him to keep him quiet. Were you aware of that? And he attacked me and my friend Alistair!”

Rex stopped himself before he lost control of his temper. He pushed his tea away. “Ann McBride, I’m placing you under citizen’s arrest.”

Her expression remained impassive and she did not move a muscle in her chair. Rex made sure the door to the back garden was locked and he put the key in his pocket. He further ensured that the elderly woman could not escape by any other exit.

“Unlikely you’ll be spending another night under this roof,” he told her as he was leaving the kitchen to go back upstairs. “I suggest you pack up your things promptly.”

How long she had known her son was guilty of April Showers’ murder was something the police could ascertain. Thanks to Lindsay’s testimony, however, Dan Sutter could now be legitimately linked to that case.

“You’ll have to manage without Annie from now on,” he announced to Phoebe upon entering the living room.

“Did you get a confession?” Alistair asked from where he sat in an armchair, a tumbler of whisky in hand.

“She admitted to watching her son break into the house. I suggest we give young Constable Bryant’s career a boost. Phoebe, can you see if he’s on duty and have him come over? He can take Annie in as an accomplice in the housebreaking and in Lindsay’s imprisonment.”

While Phoebe telephoned the station, Rex helped himself to two thimblefuls of Glenlivet.

“PC Bryant is on his way,” she reported minutes later, sitting back down and folding her hands in her lap in an attitude of anticipation. “What else did Annie say?”

Rex stepped into the hall and listened out for any sounds from the basement. Satisfied Annie had not stirred from her quarters he returned to the living room.

“Not only did she stand guard by the gate, but she had taken care to unlock your father’s window before leaving for her night off. She says her son did not actually murder him. Seeing Dan Sutter by his bedside might have been enough to cause a heart attack.”

“Is that all she told you?”

“Aye, but we know she was with Lindsay Poulson while her son was in Edinburgh, and that he took your father’s watch and album, which Lindsay described. The stamp collection held nothing of real value, as originally supposed. It was just lying on your father’s desk, and he presumably took it as a memento, perhaps hoping it might fetch something.”

“Annie took an active part.” Phoebe sank back into the sofa cushions and shook her head in disbelief. Then she scowled. “That woman knew everything and played me along from the start!”

“From the moment she applied for the position of housekeeper, it seems, and inserted herself unobtrusively into your household. It can’t be a coincidence she ended up here. She and Sutter must have plotted revenge while he was still in prison.”

“But I go by Mrs. Wells. How would she have known I was Gordon Murgatroyd’s daughter or that he was living with me? Oh, wait a minute.” Phoebe made a grimace. “I said in the advertisement that the position would entail helping take care of a retired judge. I thought it would reassure applicants that they would be working in a respectable household.”

“Perhaps she saw the word ‘judge’ and made some enquiries.”

“She was at my father’s funeral! The hypocrisy of the woman!”

“She denies her son’s direct culpability in your father’s death, of course, but it’s highly probable he’s responsible for mugging your elderly neighbour in a case of mistaken identity.” Rex paced methodically between Phoebe and Alistair as he spoke.

“Annie told her son of my impending visit to Richard Pruitt’s flat. Remember our discussing that while she was serving us dinner, Phoebe? Sutter cut his throat before he could voice his suspicions to me regarding Sutter’s involvement in the April Showers murder. Then, after Annie heard from our telephone conversation that Richard was still alive, she planted a few red herrings in your father’s room to make it look like a woman had broken in.”

Phoebe’s face remained stony. “To think she was spying on me the whole time!”

“And frustrating your attempts to get to the bottom of your father’s death,” Alistair added.

“Indeed. What about Dad’s wig?” Phoebe asked Rex.

“We found one similar in Richard’s attic. Now that we know Sutter stole the stamp album and watch from here, it’s apparent he took the wig as well, and left it in the spot where Richard kept a shoebox containing information on him as a warning not to meddle. I’m just not sure when he put it there, since the police have not got back to me yet regarding what was on the CCTV tapes. Alistair said Sutter wasn’t carrying a box when he left the flat after his attack on Richard.”

“That’s right,” Alistair confirmed. “Possibly he came back to continue his search when Richard was in hospital and left the wig for you before taking off. A ‘pursue this investigation and you’ll be dead, too’ sort of thing.”

“Can we prove he was instrumental in my father’s death?”

“Perhaps a second opinion can be sought as to whether your father died of a heart attack or else was asphyxiated,” Rex said. “If such can be proved.” Though he sincerely hoped Phoebe would not have the judge’s grave disturbed.

“Scared to death or smothered by a pillow; either way, Sutter is responsible,” Phoebe declared. “At least now we can prove he was here.”

“Just think,” Alistair addressed Phoebe. “If you hadn’t opened up the investigation, Lindsay Poulson may never have been found. So your father’s death was by no means in vain.”

Phoebe looked thoughtful for a moment. “That’s very true,” she acknowledged.

Dan Sutter had a lot to answer for, Rex reflected with anger. The Showers had lost their own daughter forever. Adding to their misery, Stu had caught his hand in a machine at work while still reeling from his grief, and as a result had lost his job. The benefits he received were poor compensation for limited use of a hand. Rex hoped he would derive some peace in knowing the truth at last.

“After a good deal of thought, I’ve decided to put the house on the market,” Phoebe announced, interrupting his thoughts. “It’s not the same without Doug or Dad, and it’s time to downsize. I want to move back to Edinburgh and reconnect with old friends. And both of you, of course,” she said with a smile.

“I’ll host a welcome home party for you,” Alistair offered, raising his tumbler.

The doorbell rang at that moment.

“That’ll be Constable Bryant,” Phoebe said, getting up from the sofa.

“It’s turning into a very long night,” Rex said to Alistair, suppressing a yawn. “We won’t get much sleep.”

“I cleared it with Smiley while you were downstairs talking to the felonious housekeeper,” Alistair informed him. “We don’t have to get back to the grindstone until Tuesday.”

“So Smiley’s not going to lecture us aboot taking the law into our own hands?”

“Well, he might have to smooth some ruffled feathers on our behalf, but he’s still giving us the day off.”

In that case, Rex thought happily, they could stop over in Derby on the way back to Edinburgh the following day and see Helen. He had something important to tell her.