Detective Inspector Scott Drayton walked into the interview room and put a powder-blue folder on the table. He sat down and looked at Shilpa. She smiled and examined her hands. Her fingerprints and a DNA swab had been taken from her as she was checked in at the station. It was voluntary, they said, but seeing as she had nothing to hide, she complied. She had assumed they would make her press her fingers into black ink to take her prints, but she had been mistaken. Things had moved on from her days of watching reruns of The Bill. It had all been done electronically and there was no black residue on her fingers to remind her of her ordeal.
‘I have your statement here,’ DI Drayton said, pulling a sheet of paper from the folder. He was tall and skinny, with icy blue eyes and a kink in his nose. She wondered if someone had punched him in the face in the line of duty or if that was just the shape of his nose. She tilted her head and looked at him as he glanced over her statement. Maybe a jilted lover had caused the misshapenness, she decided.
He passed the paper over to her. ‘Read it, make sure you’re happy with what it says, then sign and date it,’ he instructed.
No small talk then. She nodded. She had hoped for a jovial detective. One she could joke with about how naïve she had been in picking up the knife and then not mentioning it. Drayton, with his dark-grey suit and frosty gaze, just made her feel like an ignorant child. He didn’t have a sense of humour, so she could hardly tell him that her first thought when she had seen the knife was that it had been used to cut a bloody bit of beef. A sign from her gods, no doubt prayed for by her mother, that she should not be indulging in the flesh of a sacred animal. Beef, and in particular steak, was one of her favourite meals, and she had enjoyed a steak dinner the night before the party.
Shilpa read through her statement. It was devoid of emotion. She would have peppered it with a few more adjectives. She looked up at Drayton and decided not to share her useless comment with him.
‘It’s fine,’ she said. ‘It gives you all the facts.’
‘If this gets to court, we may rely on this statement, and you may need to testify to it.’
She nodded. ‘So, what happens now?’
Drayton looked towards the door. ‘You’re free to go. But stick around, yeah.’
She stood up, her chair scraping the floor as she pushed it back. The noise setting her teeth on edge. No ‘thank you’ then. She wondered why she had bothered. Oh yes, because her fingerprints were all over the murder weapon. Well, that was if the knife was the murder weapon. Drayton wouldn’t give anything away in that regard. As she stepped out of the station, the fresh air hit her. In any event, she had done the right thing, and it felt good.
‘Shilpa.’ She heard her name and turned.
‘Thought it was you,’ said a man with a familiar face. ‘It’s Danny.’
She quickly tried to place him but failed.
‘Sheffield,’ he said.
She looked at him blankly.
‘University.’
‘Daniel Richards?’ she said, staring at him. He looked so different. Her housemate Lena had had a crush on him. She had struggled to see what her friend saw in him, but now she could see an attraction. He was a good foot shorter than she was, but he still had that thick brown hair. It wasn’t long anymore but cropped, and it suited him much better.
‘I didn’t make a lasting impression on you then?’ he said.
Shilpa laughed. ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, looking at the station behind him.
‘I work here,’ he said. He didn’t ask what she was doing at the station. She recalled that Danny had been thoughtful like that. She put her own lack of consideration down to inheriting her mother’s genes. Danny had been doing a degree in geography or something like that when they were in university together. He lived in the flat above hers, and they used to meet in the pub at the end of their road for boozy Friday nights and hungover roasts on a Sunday. That was nearly fifteen years ago now; she had forgotten about Lena and Danny – and most of her university friends for that matter. It wasn’t by design. They had just drifted apart, and when they met up, they found they had little in common.
‘So, you live here?’ she asked, suddenly missing a good night out.
‘Been here ten years now.’
Shilpa looked at his left hand. No ring. ‘Maybe we could catch up over drinks,’ she said. ‘I’ve just moved to Otter’s Reach. It would be good to get some local insight.’
‘Sure thing. I know Otter’s Reach,’ he said. He looked at his watch. ‘Look, I’ve got to be somewhere.’ He pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket, swiped the screen and passed it to her. ‘Give us your number. I’ll message you and we can get together.’
Shilpa did as he asked and then waved as he headed towards his car. It would be good to catch up with an old friend. She looked at the station and recalled the detective inspector’s parting words. It would be handy to have a friend in the police force too.
Shilpa put on a pair of shorts and made herself a glass of iced tea before walking down the lichen-stained steps from her balcony to the garden. She stopped to smell the lavender and then walked along the slipway. One day she would have a boat for still summer days like today when she needed to unwind. There was nothing like being on the water to still the soul, she thought, remembering a carefree winter holiday in Barbados after a stressful fortnight at work. Devon wasn’t Barbados, but it had its charm. It was why she was still here three months later. This southern English seaside town was slowly beginning to feel like home. She could see why her uncle was so drawn to this place.
The tide was going out slowly, and there was a gentle breeze blowing. At this time of year, the estuary was busy with tourists on chartered RIBs going between Salcombe and Otter’s Reach. But whenever the tide was out, apart from a tourist or two who didn’t understand the estuary, it was once again still. She sat cross-legged on the old concrete slipway and waved to John and Graham on their catamaran, which was tied to her mooring. She hoped they didn’t take her presence as a sign to come over and talk to her. She wasn’t in the mood for talking. She needed some quiet time to think about what had happened today, because something was niggling at her, and she wasn’t quite sure what it was.
Detective Drayton hadn’t exactly given much away at their interview. He took her statement without so much as confirming whether anyone had been murdered. But it was clear from that morning’s news report that a body had been found, and she had seen with her own eyes that Mason Connolly had been missing at his own engagement party. Nor could she deny the distress on Mrs Drew’s face when she had visited the house with her condolence cakes.
After she had gained access to the Drew house earlier, she had been ushered into the drawing room by another policeman, where she was made to wait while he fetched the detective. She was told not to leave the room, and she had obeyed, taking it as an opportunity to have a good look around. She couldn’t help it. Another trait inherited from her mother. The room was opulent, with a high moulded ceiling and a gold-and-crystal chandelier hanging in the middle. Heavy navy box-pleated curtains adorned the tall windows. One wall was covered in photos – mainly of the Drews, their happy family. It appeared that Harriet was their only child. A spoiled child. Each Christmas and birthday photo showed a mountain of presents next to her as a child and then teenager. A large picture of Harriet and Mason hung at the end of the wall. It was slightly skewed, and Shilpa touched it to straighten it. It was then that she noticed that the wallpaper surrounding the picture was slightly darker than the rest of the wall. The picture had recently replaced another one which had been in a slightly bigger frame; she could tell because the sun hadn’t bleached the paper. She looked carefully at the other pictures, but none of the others seemed to have been replaced.
After half an hour of waiting, she looked at her watch, but there was no sign of anyone coming to retrieve her. She had hoped to see the family, express her deepest sympathy and of course, tell the police about the knife. Now she wondered if they had forgotten her.
She was about to leave when she heard a voice. She looked up and noticed there was an air vent in the wall above where the pictures hung.
‘I never go into this office. It’s not my domain. I certainly couldn’t tell you what he keeps in there.’ It was Mrs Drew. ‘It’s his space,’ she said. She sounded tearful.
‘So, you didn’t enter the study that day?’ another voice said. Another police officer, Shilpa guessed.
‘I was busy with the party. Making sure our guests had drinks and that the canapés were being served. You know what these waitresses can be like. Too busy standing round gossiping about what they got up to the evening before. You have to be on at them all the time to make sure you get good service. You’d think that after all the parties I’ve thrown the caterers would only send their best staff, but no. It’s a constant string of students looking to make some easy money. I was very busy,’ she said. Another sob. ‘I saw the cake lady come in; ask her. At around midday I popped into the kitchen to see her. Check everything was all right.’
‘We will,’ said another deep voice. On reflection, that voice belonged to Drayton. There was a clattering, and after that Shilpa could no longer hear the voices. She assumed they had gone to investigate what the noise was. Her palms began to sweat, and she felt the knot in her stomach tighten. Mrs Drew had retrieved the spatula from her husband’s office the day of the party in a matter of seconds. A spatula she used to open the bureau drawer. It was a throwaway comment that Shilpa would not have retained had a body not been discovered at the house later that day. Maybe Mrs Drew had forgotten about the spatula altogether. Nevertheless, it was clear that Margery knew her husband’s study quite well, so why was she lying?