Circles of Fate (15 page)

“I rather wish it was. It would mean you weren't still hankering after you know who. But go on.”

“He's a representative for an insurance company and he asked me all sorts of questions about that day. I suppose Rock Bennett put in a claim form for his plane. You can't expect them to hand out that sort of money without making extensive enquiries. Funny thing was –”

“Yes?”

“He seemed more interested in establishing that Felipe was alone with Monica Perryman than anything else.”

“Oh dear,” said Cathy helplessly.

“You know something I don't?”

“Don't ask,” begged Cathy. “Why rake up the past?”

“I haven't. It's come seeking me of its own accord.”

“All right, love. Anything to prime the pump with?”

“Gin.”

“Lovely ... m'm, thanks. Now, where to begin.”

“With Felipe.”

Cathy's hand touched Anita's, her eyes were tender. “Does everything still begin and end with him?”

“Yes it does, Cathy.”

“Then this is going to hurt. When I left Leyenda he was under suspicion of theft.”

“Theft? But that's ridiculous! What's he supposed to have stolen?”

“Monica Perryman's jewellery. Claude Perryman put in an insurance claim and that's what the man was investigating. The pouch she carried it in wasn't found on her body and, I'm sorry to have to say it, but Felipe did have both access and opportunity.”

“A fact I have just confirmed to the insurance man,” said Anita bitterly. “Oh, I'm a great help. But,” hopefully, “a person can't be convicted because they had the opportunity, because they might have taken something. Has the jewellery, or any piece of it, been traced?”

“Not yet.”

Anita was just relaxing on a hefty sigh, it all seemed so flimsy, when she caught sight of Cathy's face. “There's something else?”

“Well,” began Cathy on a cautious note, “there's the lump of money he can't properly account for.”

“What money?”

“The money he handed over for your house.”

“Me again. I do seem to be putting his head in the noose. But I don't understand. Felipe's not poor.”

“No, he's a rich man. But a shrewd rich man. He knows that one day he'll have to retire from the bull-ring and every peseta he earns is wisely invested.”

“His money is so tied up he can't touch it?”

“Yes, of course he can, he can always ask for one or other of his resources to be released. This, of course, would take time, but no problem there because if he wanted a sizable sum in a hurry the bank would oblige with a loan. But he hasn't taken any of these steps. He claims that Pilar bought the house with her own money.”

“Where would Pilar get that much money from?”

“Precisely.”

“Just a minute,” said Anita. “This is senseless speculation because Monica Perryman didn't have her jewellery with her.”

“No?”

“No. She was leaving Claude. She told me so that day at the airport, and she said something strange that I didn't piece together until later. What it amounted to was, she considered that she had paid for the expensive trinkets he'd given her, she called them perks, and I believe she'd put them somewhere safe so that later she could sell them and have a decent standard of living.”

Out of the blue, Cathy said: “You love Felipe very much, don't you?”

“You don't stop loving a person because they're not suitable for you. But I don't see what that has got to do with this.”

“Don't you?” Cathy leaned forward and placed a comforting hand on Anita's. “Be reasonable, pet, you can't change facts to fit the situation. Claude and Monica Perryman were a devoted couple. Monica couldn't wait to be reunited with Claude. She was as excited as a child at the prospect.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you told me. You also told Edward and Claude and Claude's housekeeper. That night at Claude's house, remember?”

“I told a lie.”

“Oh, Anita” – sorrowfully.

“I did. That was the lie, not this. Monica Perryman did tell me she was leaving Claude.”

“But she loved him,” put in Cathy softly.

“Yes, she loved him, but not his way of life. I've never thought about it before, but my life and Felipe's could have run a parallel course to theirs. Except that Felipe has got more feeling than Claude.”

Cathy received this criticism of her former employer with a frown, but said amicably enough: “All right, you lied that night. Why?”

“Isn't that obvious. You saw Claude Perryman. Could you have told him, or any other newly bereaved man for that matter, that his wife was leaving him? That she was returning only because she thought she owed him a face-to-face explanation, that it was less harsh than reading it in a letter?”

“Put like that, no, I couldn't. But did you have to lie quite so excessively?”

“Claude has a way with him. He draws you. I looked at him and I had to say all those things. He was a little boy begging sugar and I couldn't deny him. But you know how it is.”

“I know,” said Cathy, looking bleak.

“Afterwards I regretted it.”

“Afterwards? You mean now?”

“No, then. He went greedy and mean. Yes, I'm remembering it all quite clearly now. He asked me about the jewellery. Then he started making up to me.”

“Making up to you?”

“Yes, under cover of that tragic widower act, he was making a pass. He told me that I fascinated him and hinted that we might, very discreetly, get together.”

Cathy had been quietly sipping her gin and orange. She replaced her glass on the low coffee table with such force that the contents slopped over the sides and the glass sat in its own damp ring. Her face was very white.

“That's too much. I've known Claude Perryman for some time and he's treated me, and every other woman within striking distance, with nothing but respect. The joke is, you almost had me believing your twisted little tale until you called Claude a womaniser.”

“It's not a twisted tale,” insisted Anita stubbornly. “It's the truth.”

“Then prove it,” said Cathy on a jarring note.

“How can I?” – helplessly. “But wait a minute, perhaps I can. She did tell someone else.”

Cathy's: “Oh, yes?” was both sceptical and derisive, and although the colour was beginning to creep back in her cheeks her eyes blazed with enough anger to make Anita feel uncomfortable.

“She told her sister. I distinctly remember Monica telling me that it was her sister who persuaded her to come back and face Claude and not take the coward's way out. Oh, Cathy.” She stopped treading warily and her tone was one of extreme supplication. “I don't ask you to believe me, but help me if you can. Do you by any chance know where Monica's sister lives?”

“Monica once told me, but I don't remember. I'm not one to clutter my mind with unimportant details.” Catching sight of Anita's eyes, and lowering her own before their humble entreaty, she amended that to: “Well, it seemed unimportant at the time.”

“Think ... Cathy,
think.”

“Up North, definitely. She could have got an earlier flight, landing at Luton. But she said ... I think I've got it ... Chanley or Chamley was less than half an hour's drive from Manchester airport.”

“Cathy, I love you,” claimed Anita ecstatically. “Dear, kind, sweet, disbelieving Cathy, come with me to Chanley or Chamley or wherever it is.”

“You must be crazy.”

“Yes, I must be,” she wheedled. “Surely your conscience wouldn't allow me to go alone.”

As though it was settled, Anita unearthed a map and began to study the area round Manchester. She couldn't find a Chanley or a Chamley, but she found a Chedley.

“Could be,” said Cathy, then resignedly: “All right, when do you want to go?”

“I want to go tomorrow, but Miss Standish, she's the Head, would strongly disapprove. Better make it Saturday and keep my job. Can you drive?”

“Yes. Do you have a car?”

“No.” A pause. “Edward has.”

“Look, you've enlisted my help in this wild goose chase, but Edward has far too much common sense.”

“Not Edward. Just his car. You could talk nicely to him, Cathy.”

It was much later before she realized she had told the secret she had pledged never to tell. She was sad about this, but had she really had a choice?

Saturday came. As they drove along, Anita said: “It was nice of Edward to lend us his car.”

The sun had popped out at about eight o'clock, and had gone back in at half past. Now it was raining and had been for the past hour. The countryside looked uninspiring under its blanket of grey drizzle, and the steady flick of the windscreen wipers was beginning to give Anita a headache.

“Have you thought what we should do when we get there?” asked Cathy.

“Nope.”

“Considering that we don't even know the sister's name,” she pressed, “what we're hoping to achieve is pretty optimistic.”

“I'm hoping Chedley turns out to be a village with a gossipy post-mistress who knows everyone's business. There can't be many people who've had a sister visit them from overseas, who has since died and whose husband is an exporter.”

“All right, so we find her. What are we – correction – what are
you
going to say? I know Monica Perryman left her jewellery with you?”

“M'm. Tricky, isn't it?”

Fifteen minutes later Cathy said: “We're here.”

Anita, who had been dozing off, sat up and took notice.

“It is a village, or near enough.” Relief coloured her voice.

As Anita had anticipated, Monica's sister wasn't difficult to locate. The post-office was closed for lunch, but they found a greengrocer's shop open further down the road and made enquiries of the apple-cheeked assistant, who was happy to oblige. Monica's sister was called Freda Thompson and she lived in the third cottage along the track leading to the river.

“Better park your car and walk,” they were advised. “The man from the insurance firm got his car bogged down and Jim Myers, from the farm, had to bring his tractor to get him out.”

Cathy and Anita exchanged glances, but said nothing. And yet, thought Anita, they couldn't have hoped to be first. It shook her resolution, but only temporarily. Her thoughts had only to swing to Felipe to get a stiff injection.

The approach road to the cottage was appalling. As Anita picked her way over the ruts, her opinion of Keith Gifford took a dive. He must have been crazy to attempt this road in his car.

Then she concentrated her thoughts on Monica's sister, Freda Thompson. The fishing tackle propped against the wall reminded her that there was also a Mr Thompson.

She knocked three times before the door was opened. She expected to be greeted by an older, slightly more worn edition of Monica Perryman. It was not so. Pale grey eyes stared at her above prominent cheekbones. The heavy mouth was cautious and unfriendly. In that respect she was like Monica. Her manner had been just as crushing as her sister's at first. Controlling the impatience in her voice, she said:

“I'm Anita Hurst and this is my friend, Cathy Gray. We knew your sister.”

“You'd better come in,” said Freda Thompson, widening the door grudgingly. “I'd be obliged if you'd keep your voices down, my husband is sick.”

“I'm sorry,” they both murmured in unison.

“That's all right. He's always sick. If it isn't one thing it's another. Delicate constitution, you know.”

The room was big and comfortless. Anita remembered Monica telling her that her sister's husband had fought ill-health all his life and had not been able to provide much in the way of material advantages.

“It can't have been easy for you,” she said. It sounded lame, not the sort of thing you said to a stranger. It built up aggression. Freda Thompson had stated a fact, she had not been soliciting sympathy.

“You'd like to sit down, perhaps?”

They sat, accepting the invitation that wasn't, and was only put because her years of countrywoman's hospitality reared higher than her new-found hostility. This wasn't the sister that Monica had spoken of so lovingly, not this intense, trapped creature.

“You'd like some tea?” she asked, but again her tone lacked enthusiasm and both girls declined.

There followed a tense silence, during which Anita toyed with various methods of approach. Brave and direct, she thought.

“Did your sister and Claude Perryman have a happy marriage?”

A wary look crept into the pale grey eyes. Anita had the funny impression that it wasn't the last question she expected to be pitched at her.

“Why shouldn't they have been happy? With his money.”

“Money doesn't buy happiness, Mrs Thompson.” There was an unintended admonishment in Anita's voice. She was going wrong somewhere, missing her cues, tangling her lines.

“They were happy,” announced Freda Thompson defiantly.

“That's all I wanted to know,” said Anita, rising to her feet.

She wondered how the woman's curiosity could let her go without asking why she had wanted to know that. Her fear of trespassing beyond a certain point must be stronger than her curiosity, she decided.

They didn't speak until they were back in the car and then Cathy said :

“So you've drawn a blank.”

Anita couldn't stop her eyes going incredulous. “Do you think so?”

For reply Cathy said: “You'd better tell me what you made of her.”

“It's not what I've made of her,” answered Anita delicately, because short of saying the woman was a liar and a thief, how could she put it? “But circumstances.”

“Yes, poor woman,” sympathized Cathy, on the wrong track altogether, “we can't have seen her at her best. Death at close quarters is frightening. And her sister's death was more tragic than most. One second Monica had a healthy expectancy of life and the next – Wham! On top of that the poor soul has to contend with a sick husband.”