Murder in the Cotswolds Page 6

  “Is that so?” Kate gave him a direct look. “It seems to me that you knew the lady a lot better than you’re admitting.”

  She saw him clench his fists in anger. “She was a forceful woman. Anyone could have guessed that much about her in just a few minutes’ conversation.”

  “I see. Have you anything more to tell us, Mr. Gower?”

  “Nothing,” he said shortly. Then he met Kate’s eyes and continued in a more reasonable voice, “Well, there is one thing, not to do with this. I remembered something last night that might be significant, and I’ve put it into my statement.”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s about my car. Yesterday morning, when I got in to drive to the office, the seat seemed to be in the wrong position and I had to adjust it a notch further back. Because of my stiff leg, you see, driving is uncomfortable if the seat’s not exactly right. I didn’t really think about it at the time, just made the adjustment. But ...”

  “You’re saying that this proves that someone else drove the car between the time you left it outside your home on Tuesday evening and used it again yesterday morning?”

  “Well, it’s a pointer, isn’t it?”

  “Perhaps—if you’re telling the truth. I have to inform you, though, that only one set of driver’s fingerprints was found on your car when it was examined. Since you drove it to Marlingford yesterday morning, they must be yours. Unless you wear gloves for driving?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “We’ll make a comparison, of course, with the prints you’ll be providing for us this morning, but I don’t think there can be any doubt, do you?”

  His mouth tightened. “The other person could have been wearing gloves.”

  “That’s true, Mr. Gower, if that other person exists.” Kate rose abruptly to her feet. “I’ll send the officer back so you can complete your statement. You’ll need to amend it now in the light of what you’ve told me about your relationship with Mrs. Latimer.”

  * * * *

  The interview with Gower had done nothing to improve Kate’s mood. Damn the man, why couldn’t he produce a shred of hard evidence to substantiate his story? Failing that, he’d have to remain the prime suspect. Except that there was no obvious motive. There was a possibility of his having colluded (for a financial advantage) with the victim’s husband and/or cousin, either one of whom might have been banking on a fortune coming to him as a result of her death. Or Gower could have acted alone for personal reasons. Perhaps he had been her lover after all, and they’d quarrelled. Kate angrily threw out these unwanted theories; then, reluctantly, the professional in her called them back for cool assessment.

  There was, of course, Gower’s involved story about Mrs. Larimer’s suspicions concerning the accountant, George Prescott. It might even be true, but where would that get her? Still, it was something to be checked out.

  Over a cup of coffee with her sergeant in the DHQ canteen (to which he added a sausage roll and a wedge of lemon cheesecake), Kate made it clear that she had no desire to talk—about the case or about anything else. She sat there silent and brooding; then, abruptly telling Boulter to fix an appointment for them to see Prescott soonest possible, she took herself off to the superintendent’s office.

  “Something new, Mrs. Maddox?” He waved Kate into a chair, his cheerless expression conveying plainly that he expected nothing from her.

  Kate filled him in on the latest developments. When she’d finished, there was a brief silence before he spoke.

  “That’s all you’ve got?”

  For a brief, rebellious moment Kate wondered if the bastard actually wanted her to fail, just to lend weight to the chauvinist doctrine that women have no place in the higher ranks of the police force. But she at once rejected the thought as unjust. Jolly Joliffe was a damn fine police officer with a first-class record. He wanted results, from wheresoever and whomsoever.

  “The leads we do have, sir, seem to point in different directions.”

  He scratched the side of his long nose thoughtfully. “You’ll need to watch Gower. That man’s no hick journalist. For God’s sake don’t let him catch you out in any procedural cock-ups.”

  “Thanks for the tip,” she said meekly.

  The superintendent leaned back and crossed his legs. “You’ll be off to see George Prescott now?”

  “Yes, that’s next on the agenda. Sergeant Boulter says that he’s never heard any whispers against Prescott. Is there anything you can tell me about him, sir?”

  “Hmm.” He mused. “I wouldn’t cast him as a villain. Widowed a few years ago, leads a quiet life, except ... I do happen to know he likes a flutter on the gee-gees. I saw him at Cheltenham on Gold Cup day, and he had the harrowed look of a man who’s lost a packet. But George Prescott is quite a pillar of the community in Chipping Bassett, so be careful how you handle him, my dear.”

  His dear! His bloody dear! “I’ll keep what you say well in mind, sir.”

  A wave of the hand indicated that the audience was at an end. “The ACC’s getting edgy about this case, Chief Inspector, so for God’s sake come up with something that I can feed him. Without delay, please.”

  Such as an arrest and a watertight case for the prosecution before noon? Oh yes, Mr. Superintendent sir, I’ll do that small thing for you. On her way out, Kate glanced in at her own office, waiting lone and empty for her to take up residence. How long would that be?

  * * * *

  George Prescott’s office was on the ground floor of a gloomy Victorian building standing behind the Council House in Chipping Bassett. A reception area was crowded with small desks and tall filing cabinets and two largish women. The accountant’s own room was a degree more spacious, but it had the same slightly shabby air. As did the man himself. On the short side and the plump side, he was the antithesis of smart. Kate knew that this might well be deliberately cultivated. It wasn’t always wise for a professional man to appear too prosperous; his clients got to thinking he was doing too well out of them.

  “Good morning, Chief Inspector ... Sergeant. Please sit down. I wonder ... would you excuse me for just one moment. I have this important letter to get off.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  The one moment stretched as he read the letter through carefully, then set about adding his signature. This was a process that needed squaring up to, a couple of trial runs of sketching with the pen in the air before the name was executed on paper. Then he went to the door and handed the letter out.

  “Right, that’s dealt with. Now, what can I do for you, Chief Inspector?”

  Kate made a slant-wise approach to her objective. She wanted him sitting comfortably, as unalarmed as possible by this visit from the police.

  “I’m glad to make your acquaintance, Mr. Prescott. I’ve just joined the division, you know, so I’m very much the new girl.”

  A pale smile on a pale face. His balding forehead gleamed sweatily. He was as nervous as hell, but Kate wouldn’t condemn a man for that reason alone. “I, er ... I was reading about you in the Gazette.”

  Kate had seen the piece herself that morning. Clearly lifted direct from the handout provided by the PR department at headquarters, it was blandly worded; the accompanying photograph, smudgily reproduced, over-emphasised (Kate thought) her thick dark eyebrows and square chin. Sure enough, as Richard Gower had said, it didn’t do her justice.

  “In that case, Mr. Prescott, you will also have seen the news item about Mrs. Belle Latimer’s death.”

  “Indeed, yes. A dreadful business. Most tragic.”

  Kate deliberately didn’t respond, and he babbled on, “Whoever would believe a hit-and-run accident like that could happen in this quiet neighbourhood? Quite dreadful. The poor lady will be sadly missed.”

  Accident? His choice of word was curious. The Gazette (as could be expected in the circumstances) had given the item only minimal coverage, referring to it as a hit-and-run tragedy with not so much as a hint of there being suspicious overtones. But the b
uzz all over the district was of murder. So who did George Prescott think he was kidding?

  “You knew Mrs. Latimer?” she queried.

  “Knew?” Prescott seemed dumbfounded. “I, er ... I was her accountant, so, er ... naturally I ...”

  “You were Mrs. Latimer’s accountant?” A surprise, this. “You mean, I take it, for the business of the Hambledon Estate, the farms and stables?”

  “Yes. I ... I’ve handled Mrs. Latimer’s financial affairs for a number of years.”

  “So you knew her quite well?”

  “Not, er ... we weren’t exactly on social terms. But, er ... yes, quite well.”

  “Would you say she was a person with enemies, Mr. Prescott? People who might be glad to have her out of the way?”

  There was terror in his pale eyes. “Are you really suggesting that ... ?”

  “Please, sir,” said Boulter swiftly, “just answer the chief inspector’s question.” The sergeant had immaculate timing, Kate noted with approval. Mostly self-effacing during an interview, he came in with precisely the right weight and pace when required.

  “Whoever could possibly want to ... to do anything so ... ?” Prescott was waffling.

  “You can’t think of anyone, then?”

  “No one. Certainly not. No.”

  “How well did you yourself get on with Mrs. Latimer?” Kate asked.

  “Perfectly well. Yes, perfectly well. I didn’t have what you might call a great deal of personal contact with her. My staff handle the day-to-day work.”

  “Who would they be, sir?” Boulter had his pen poised, ready to take down the names.

  “Well, only Mrs. Knight, really. She attends the estate office two mornings a week to keep the books in good order. That’s a service I offer to local farmers and small businesses.”

  Sergeant Boulter was nodding. “That would be Mrs. Alison Knight? We have her down to be interviewed, ma’am. She’s on DC Green’s list, I think.”

  “I don’t see why you should want to talk to her,” said Prescott, frowning worriedly.

  “Just routine questions, sir. And by the way, we’d better have your home address for the record.”

  “It’s a hotel, a residential hotel. I find that convenient, since my wife died. Bedford Court, I expect you know it. But I hope you won’t be going round there upsetting everyone by asking a lot of questions.”

  While that anxiety was still with him, Kate winged in with her next question. “I believe that you’re the honorary treasurer of the Chipping Bassett Leisure Centre extension fund?”

  Prescott’s head twisted back to Kate. It was plain fear that glimmered in his eyes. “I am, yes, but....”

  “Mrs. Latimer was on the organising committee?”

  “That’s right, but....”

  “What contact did you have with her in that connection, Mr. Prescott?”

  He made vague little gestures. “The occasional meeting, no more than that.”

  “And everything has been going well?”

  “Going well? How do you mean?”

  “No disagreements of any kind?”

  The accountant gaped, then pulled himself together with a visible effort and adopted an outraged tone. “Now, look here—”

  “Mr. Prescott,” Tim intervened again, “the chief inspector merely wants to get an accurate picture of recent events as they concerned Mrs. Latimer. You’d help us by giving simple, straightforward answers.”

  There was a sullen pause, and then his tone became one of patient explanation. “If you have ever had the experience of sitting on a committee, Chief Inspector, you’ll know that there are always minor disagreements. Little clashes of personality and so on.”

  “And you and Mrs. Latimer clashed?”

  “Not especially. No more than any of the others.”

  “She had no criticism of the manner in which you were handling the funds collected?”

  An appalled silence. His face drained of what little colour it had, giving him the pallid, flabby appearance of an oven-ready chicken.

  “Absolutely none! Really, Chief Inspector, I must protest most strongly at what you’re insinuating.”

  Kate chose this moment to terminate the interview. If she pressed him any harder at this stage he was going to clam up on her completely. She’d let him sweat for a while. Without doubt Prescott had something to hide, something that made him sick with fear. To what extent that something would confirm Richard Gower’s story she couldn’t be sure, though she did feel hopeful. Great oaks from little acorns grow, Kate! Oh sure, sure, but ninety-nine point nine percent of them wither and die. Even if George Prescott was up to his neck in financial chicanery, it didn’t necessarily make him a murderer. The next step would be to establish that he could have killed Belle Latimer. That he had no alibi for the vital time and that he was somehow able to use Gower’s car. A hell of a lot to hope for.

  She stood up, hitching her bag over her shoulder. “Thank you, Mr. Prescott. That will be all for the time being. Good morning to you.”

  Long after the police had left his office, George Prescott sat at his desk, staring vacantly at the opposite wall. Every now and then he was seized with a fit of trembling. Half an hour went by, and he heard the two women in the outer office leave for their lunch hour. Still he sat doing nothing. At length, he pushed himself up wearily from his chair and peered out through the communicating door, just to make quite sure that he was alone.

  He picked up his phone and dialled a familiar number. It rang for a long while—probably Joan was in the garden on such a fine day. When she finally answered, she was glad to hear his voice.

  “Georgie?” She became suddenly anxious. “I hope this doesn’t mean you won’t be coming to see me on my birthday next week. You did promise.”

  “No, that’s still on. Listen, Joan, I have a favour to ask.”

  “Then ask away, love. You know I can’t refuse my baby brother anything. What is it?”

  “I ... I can’t explain, not on the telephone. Suppose I come over to see you now?”

  “Well, of course. If it’s so urgent. You can have some lunch with me.”

  “No,” he said with a shudder. “I shan’t want any lunch.”

  Twenty minutes later, he drew up outside his sister’s thatched cottage, to which she’d moved to be near him after retiring from her job in the claims office of a large insurance company in Gloucester. The front wall of Meadow View was smothered with a giant banksia rose, a thousand tiny yellow blooms shimmering in the sunshine. Joan was standing at the door, on the lookout for him. She was a small woman, with grey hair frizzy from over-perming. Winged spectacles gave her a birdlike appearance, which was accentuated by the way she moved, daintily, with fluttery little gestures of her hands.

  “Georgie, whatever is this all about?”

  He glanced nervously at the open windows of the adjoining cottage. “Let’s go indoors, Joan.”

  “Oh very well. Though I can’t think why you need to be so secretive.”

  Inside, the sheen of polished brass dazzled from every shelf, every tabletop, almost every possible space on every wall.

  Horse brasses, candlesticks, handbells, paperknives, figurines and animals, platters and bowls and ashtrays. “I love brass,” Joan was wont to confide unnecessarily.

  George Prescott sank into a cushioned Windsor chair and passed his podgy hands across his eyes. “Joan,” he said, “you have to help me.”

  “Of course I’ll help you, Georgie, you know that. What is it you want me to do for you?”

  He gazed at her, wondering if he’d been a perfect fool to come here. How could he word his plea? What could he tell dear old Joan that she’d be able to square with her puritan conscience?

  “Joan, please listen to me and don’t ask questions. I can’t explain what this is all about, it’s too complicated. But the police have been ... well, nosing around, and....”

  “The police? Nosing around? Whatever do you mean, Georgie?”

 
“I said don’t ask questions.” He was suddenly petulant, exactly as he used to be years ago when she’d caught him out in some boyish prank. “Just accept my word that what I’m asking you to do is necessary. It’s not all that much, anyway. I want you to say, if asked, that I spent Tuesday evening here with you. The whole evening. I came about seven and I stayed till nearly eleven. Have you got that?”

  “But you weren’t here on Tuesday, Georgie. It’s over three weeks since you last came to see me.”

  “For God’s sake, woman! Will you please do as I say and don’t nag me about the whys and wherefores.”

  Joan looked at him doubtfully. He could be so difficult and unkind when he got in a paddy. She set about soothing him down, aided by years of practice.

  “Oh very well then, if it’s so important to you. But you shouldn’t tell lies, Georgie, specially to the police.” She saw temper flare in his eyes and went on hastily, “All right, I’ll say what you want me to say. Now, which evening was it?”

  “Tuesday,” he said impatiently. “Tuesday. I came at seven and stayed till nearly eleven.”

  Joan repeated his words silently, then gave her brother a bright nod. “Yes, I’ve got that.”

  “Thank heaven. You’d better say we had supper, and talked. Oh, and we played Scrabble. Right?”

  “Had supper and played Scrabble. Right, Georgie.” At least the danger of an ugly scene had been averted. Besides, the dear boy wouldn’t ask her to tell a lie for him without having a very good reason. And after all, it wasn’t much of a lie, just a little fib. A harmless little fib. Fortunately for George, Joan was too unworldly to connect the evening in question with the murder of Mrs. Belle Latimer.

  After he’d left, Joan stood lost in dithering thought. As in all her moments of crisis, she cast her mind back to the days of their childhood. It had been such fun then, with her two-years-older sister and baby brother Georgie. Such fun. Now Mary had been dead these five years, and their dear parents long ago. She sighed, reflecting sadly that her adult life somehow hadn’t lived up to its bright promise. Her Mr. Right had failed to make an appearance, which had denied her the children she’d always longed for. She hadn’t even become an auntie, since Mary hadn’t married either, and Georgie’s wife had been unable to conceive. At her office, although she’d always got along quite pleasantly with the other women clerks, she’d failed to make any close friendships. And it was the same now; though she took part in lots of village activities, she’d never properly been accepted as belonging even after four years. So it was only dear Georgie who really mattered to her, only dear Georgie in all the world who really cared whether she was alive or dead.