Dear Fellow Committee Member,
Now that the body of Mrs Dexter has been formally identified, I have notified the authorities of her involvement in our annual conference. It is possible that some of you may be contacted by the police in furtherance of their enquiries. Should this occur, I would appreciate your keeping me informed. In the meantime, may I remind you that any enquiries from the press should be directed to me. It is most important that the society speaks with one voice at a time like this and avoids any negative publicity.
Hugh Allonby,
Chairman
The letter was waiting for Fran on Wednesday, when she arrived home after spending the day at Kendal market. Absolutely no expression of regret, she noted. Nothing about sympathy for Linda Dexter’s family. She did not care for the tone of the letter at all and wondered whether or not to phone Tom Dod. She decided against and called Mo instead.
‘So, my dear, what’s up with you?’
‘To tell you the truth, I’ve had a bit of a shock. Are you busy?’
‘You know I’m never too busy for you. Actually, I’m lying with my feet up on the sofa, drinking whiskey and lemonade.’
‘Why? Have you caught a chill?’
‘Of course not, I’ve just run out of gin. What’s happened to you?’
‘Nothing’s happened to me; it’s someone else. Have you heard about the woman who’s been found dead on a railway line in Lancashire, close to a burned-out motorcar?’
‘Can’t say that I have. You’re not going to tell me … don’t say it’s that woman who disappeared at your conference?’
‘It is. It’s Linda Dexter.’
‘Good heavens! How on earth did she get there?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Come on, Fran. You must have a theory. It’s got to be murder or suicide. You don’t end up on a railway line by accident.’
‘I don’t know. It’s very peculiar.’
‘Was she depressed? The type to kill herself?’
‘Is there a type? I don’t know what to think. Maybe she did kill herself …’
‘But you don’t really think so.’
‘I don’t know. I mean, I don’t even know her all that well. It’s a funny time to choose, don’t you think? We all spent the evening chatting together in the hotel bar and she seemed happy enough. I got the impression that she was really looking forward to giving her talk the next day. And if you’re about to top yourself, why on earth set your car on fire first?’
‘What sort of place is it?’
‘What do you mean, Mo?’
‘Where she was found. Is it busy? Easy to get to?’
‘Neither. After I read about it in the paper, I checked on the map, and basically it’s at the back of beyond. She would have had to set fire to her car, then climb up the railway embankment by the bridge, and then walk a few yards along the line. It’s not even a proper railway line – just this funny old single track railway which serves a quarry.’
‘People don’t go to railway lines to commit suicide, unless they want to throw themselves under a train,’ observed Mo. ‘Did she actually throw herself under a train?’
‘I suppose so. The paper doesn’t really say how she died, but that’s the obvious assumption.’
‘Well, I agree that it all sounds jolly off-key. Why climb up an embankment in the dark? Had she got a torch with her – and what sort of shoes was she wearing? If you wanted to chuck yourself in front of a train, wouldn’t you do better to drive to a mainline station, leave your car in the station yard and wait on the platform? I told you so, didn’t I? I said she’d been kidnapped and murdered, right from the start. What does your Tom chap think?’
‘He’s not my Tom chap. I don’t know – I haven’t asked him.’
‘Well, call him. Perfect excuse.’
‘Honestly, Mo!’
‘Seems reasonable enough to me. The whole Robert Barnaby Society is going to be agog with it. Only natural to get in touch, I’d say.’
Fran was still contemplating this advice when the question was resolved by Tom ringing her. ‘You’ve seen Allonby’s note?’ he asked. Having received her affirmation, he went on, ‘I know this probably seems like a strange question, but do you happen to know what Linda Dexter was planning to say at the conference?’
‘Not really. The lecture title was The Magic Chair: Fact or Fiction, and she was going to speak about some research that she had just finished.’
‘Did she tell you anything about this research?’
‘Just that it was something completely new – information which had never been published before. She said the members would find it very interesting – as if, well, I don’t know – she thought it might create a bit of a stir.’ Fran hesitated, because she knew it sounded crazy, but then she said it anyway. ‘Do you think that perhaps someone wanted to stop her from making that speech?’
Tom gave a half-hearted laugh. ‘Sounds pretty melodramatic, doesn’t it?’
‘I don’t know what to think,’ Fran said slowly. ‘I do find it hard to believe that Linda Dexter killed herself. Surely you don’t go from being jolly in the bar to chucking yourself under a train in the space of a couple of hours?’
‘Funny time to choose to kill yourself.’
‘Funny way to go about it as well. I was talking to a friend earlier and she said she couldn’t imagine why anyone would set fire to their car, then struggle up a railway embankment, when you could far more easily drive to a mainline station and simply walk out on to the platform. My friend thinks that she must have been abducted from the hotel and murdered.’
‘I would say that there’s a lot of sense in that,’ Tom said.
‘But you can’t just walk into the Furnival Towers Hotel and attack someone. The doors are locked at night and surely Marcus Dryden would have said something if there had been any sign of a break-in.’
‘So the chances are that no one broke in.’
‘Do you really think that someone killed her? A member of the society?’
‘Do you think I’m absolutely barking to suggest it?’
‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t. Do you think it might be something to do with Linda’s research?’
‘It doesn’t seem very likely, does it? I mean, what could possibly be that important about the Robert Barnaby Society?’
‘Would the police take it seriously?’
‘I’m not planning to suggest it to them,’ said Tom. ‘In a sense, I’m with old Allonby inasmuch that we do have a responsibility to protect the society from wild rumours, and I do appreciate that it won’t do the public image of Robert Barnaby any good to be at the centre of a police investigation. Besides which, the idea sounds so farfetched that the person who put it forward would look like a prize idiot, particularly when it turned out to be a load of tosh. I mean, it can’t be much better than a million-to-one shot.’
‘But what if your million-to-one shot is right?’
‘If we could somehow get hold of a copy of Linda Dexter’s lecture, or better still, see her research notes, the two of us know enough about Robert Barnaby to see whether or not the idea is a runner. If it turns out that there is something in it, well, that would be the time to involve the police. Though quite honestly I can’t imagine what anyone could possibly discover about a dead author which would be worth committing a murder to keep it quiet.’
Fran thought for a moment before she said, ‘Linda’s family might be willing to give a copy of her research papers to the Robert Barnaby Society.’
‘They might, but an official approach from the committee wouldn’t be the best way to go about this.’
‘Why not?’
‘Think about it,’ said Tom.
‘Because if your million-to-one shot comes in, the person who killed Linda is probably someone who is at the heart of the society.’
‘Precisely.’