The news of Helena Ahmed’s death didn’t filter through into the Village until the following day. The taskforce members had been far too engrossed in maximising steak night, followed by brandy night, to bat an eyelid over the news. In fact, it was only when Gladys and Cynthia gathered for their usual papers session and mid-morning coffee in the main hall that they caught sight of the brief report, coincidentally gasping over it at the almost exactly the same time. A text from George suggesting that they get together to consider the implications caused them to slip away to the rendezvous as usual in Cynthia’s kitchen. After her success in hosting a bevy of senior police officers Cynthia now took a devil may care attitude to a taskforce gathering. As it was past coffee time in her judgement, George found himself in his customary chair but with very little else on offer.
“Now I suppose we’ll never know,” he said.
“Never know what?” Gladys asked.
“Whether she did it or not.”
“Oh, come on George,” Gladys expostulated. “First of all you were sure she did it and then you were wavering and, as far as I recall, you never stopped wavering. It was probably your evidence that caused the jury to think again.”
“In any event,” Cynthia intervened, “the jury found her innocent.”
“Oh no, they didn’t.”
“Pardon.”
“They didn’t,” George repeated. “They found her not guilty. They failed to convict her. That doesn’t make her necessarily innocent.”
“Well, it’s academic now, isn’t it?” Gladys barked.
“I suppose so—I wonder what role the niece played.”
“You mean Shamira? We’ve been over that—she was only eleven at the time.”
“Yes—I only thought about it because she’s giving up her legal career here and going to Pakistan to carry on her aunt’s work.”
“What? I can’t believe that. When we interviewed her for the article, she was so pleased with what she’d achieved. She seemed to be settled here.”
“She did regard her aunt as a role model,” Cynthia reminded her. She turned back to George. “How do you know all this?”
“Oh, I read through the legal section of the paper online,” George responded importantly. “Her chambers has announced her departure with regret but praised her for wanting to continue her aunt’s work. That notice came out this morning. They didn’t waste much time. Neither did she in leaving. It seems a remarkable coincidence. Helena Ahmed left the country straight after Pennington’s murder and now she’s dead, her niece does the same. I thought about mentioning it to Andy.”
“Don’t you think they’re busy enough dealing with the Grouper Junior and his mates?” Gladys asked him. “What is there to mention?”
George looked surprised at the challenge. “I thought it was worth discussing—that’s all. You know that, as an ex-copper myself, I don’t like loose ends.”
“Loose ends—again?”
“Well, yes—we still don’t know who killed Richard Pennington, do we? Helena Ahmed was set free by the court, it couldn’t have been the Grouper Senior because he was in court on trial and it’s unlikely to have been the Grouper Junior, who was very young at the time and following his father’s instructions to deal with the body. Sarah Richardson has been pretty much ruled out. Despite all our efforts we still don’t know.”
“All that may be true,” said Gladys with growing impatience, “but you’re always talking to us about following the evidence. What possible evidence is there to link Shamira with doing anything wrong? I don’t care what you want to dream up about her. I’m going off to send her a text. I think what she’s done shows great courage to give up her career in support of the women’s cause.”
George watched her departing back. “That certainly put me in my place, didn’t it?”
“Not really,” Cynthia comforted him. “You know what she’s like. When she has a mission, she wants to get on with it.”
“So you agree with her about not talking to Andy?”
Cynthia thought carefully about what to say—it was eggshell time. She didn’t want to upset him. On the other hand… “What we had to tell him before was important,” she said finally. “We all knew it was.”
George considered her carefully and then smiled rather ruefully. “And this is just something out of left field. If I bother them, they might feel they have to listen to me, but I might look like an old man trying to find a role in life just as the prosecuting counsel was inferring at the trial. Every dog has his day and I had mine. Is that what you’re ever so gently trying to tell me?”
Cynthia reddened. “That’s the last thing I’d want you to think. I- I admire you greatly.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she wished she could grab them back.
His smile widened. “You’d be right though. And as for the last bit, I happen to feel the same about you.”
Cynthia felt as though her face was on fire. “Gladys is right about Shamira, you know,” she blurted out.
“Yes, yes,” George reflected. The smile hadn’t left his face. “Perhaps she is.”
**
It was a week later when Shamira had moved into Helena’s well-located but unpretentious house in Lahore with a lovely shady internal garden that she replied to Gladys. She was sitting behind her aunt’s desk with the window open, allowing the scents from the flowers below to waft up into the room. When Zakia Kaltabi came in she was in mid-text.
“Hiya,” Shamira greeted her.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Zakia answered her, “you’re busy. Perhaps I should have rung the bell. You see I have a key and when Helena was here I always used to just…”
“…come up,” Shamira finished the sentence for her. “Please continue to do exactly that. As far as possible I want everything here to continue as my aunt had it, although I did wonder about changing the curtains.”
She inclined her head towards the window and Zakia took one of the curtains in her hand. She watched as particles of dust drifted down to the floor. “They do look as if they’ve had their day,” she commented. “I could have some new ones run up for you very quickly and it wouldn’t cost much. Nothing like that costs much here.”
“Yes, please do.” Shamira’s head was still over her phone.
“Have you any preference for colour?”
“No, something nice and bright. You choose—I’m sure you’ll choose well.” She put in the final full stop and jabbed her finger on to the “send” button. “That was to the lady who wrote the magazine article about me.”
“Oh yes, I read it.” Zakia inspected a framed photograph on the wall. “Isn’t this the picture from it?”
“That’s right.”
“And there are a few more books here.” Zakia’s fingers wandered along the shelves of the bookcase before she transferred her attention to the desk. “That’s a nice picture of Helena. And…” she leaned further over, “who’s this?”
“Oh, that was my little sister who was killed by the Christmas Day Cyclist.”
“Richard Pennington, you mean?”
“I do.”
Zakia looked over towards the other corner of the desk and stopped as though she’d been transfixed. “What’s that?”
“The golden lion? Oh, that was a present from Helena.”
“It looks like the ones they showed at the trial.”
“It is.”
“So Pennington must have given it to her.” Shamira was aware that Zakia was looking very intently at her.
“Presumably so,” she answered. Her voice was very level.
“He must have liked her a lot to give it to her.”
“Yes.”
“And she wanted to decide who she liked, rather than being forced by him.”
“Yes.”
“So she decided to uphold her rights as a woman.”
“Exactly.” They were staring at each other now.
“She was a wonderful woman,” Zakia said.
“Yes, she was. That’s why the lion is there, to remind me that I’ll be trying to follow in her mighty footsteps for the rest of my days.”
Zakia smiled. “Speaking of which, I hope you don’t mind but I had a word with the minister. I said you would want to see him, you know, about the funding.”
“Did he give you a time?”
“Eleven tomorrow at his office.”
“I’ll be there.”
“I’ll fix your curtains at the same time.”
“Sounds good,” Shamira said.