Murder in the Cotswolds (9 page)

He went on to explain that the pathologist’s report, as expected, was that Mrs. Belle Latimer—aged forty-four—had died from multiple injuries consistent with her having been run down by a vehicle. The timing of her death had been established as 22.01 hours. The car involved had been picked up in Marlingford—a dark blue Volvo belonging to Mr. Richard Gower, owner and editor of the
Marlingford Gazette.
The tyres matched the tracks found at the scene of the crime, and shreds of clothing and blood on the underside could be proved to have come from Mrs. Latimer’s body. Gower, however, had strenuously protested his innocence, and he had no apparent motive for killing Mrs. Latimer. He couldn’t give a satisfactory alibi, though. He claimed that he’d remained at home for the whole evening awaiting a visit from an unknown and unnamed man who had promised him some newsworthy information, but who failed to show up. Interviews with his neighbours hadn’t yielded anything helpful.

Gower’s story about his relationship with Mrs. Latimer had been less than truthful, in that initially he had claimed it was very slight. When challenged with the fact that he was known to have lunched with her alone at Hambledon Grange on May 1. Gower still claimed that he knew her only slightly and that this had been a purely business meeting. They were discussing ways of trapping the man whom Mrs. Latimer suspected of creaming off money collected for the extension to the Chipping Bassett Leisure Centre—namely, local accountant George Prescott, the fund’s honourable treasurer. When interviewed, George Prescott appeared distinctly uneasy, but would admit nothing. The other members of the fund-raising committee had all been interviewed now, but none of them had admitted to being aware of any suspicions Mrs. Latimer might have had concerning Prescott’s honesty. Nor did they themselves have any suspicions. So the matter was still to be resolved. As for the remaining two names on the suspect list, Bruce McLeod, the Hambledon estate manager, and Ted West, the senior groom, whilst there was no evidence as yet to implicate them in the killing, both men seemed to have borne their late employer a measure of ill-will.

Kate took over. “Thanks, Tim. Now, we’ve had a very concise review of the situation as it stands. Does anybody have a thought that might point us in a useful new direction? Come on, just spit it out.”

“How about little green men from Mars?” a lazy voice from the back of the room suggested. He was young and good-looking, Kate saw, and altogether too pleased with his image.

“Find yourself a scriptwriter if you hope to make it as a comic,” she advised, turning the laugh on him. “Let’s be having something intelligent.”

An older man with cropped grey hair raised a finger.

“Yes, er ... Alan, isn’t it?”

“I’m not sure whether it’s anything or nothing, ma’am. I was having a pint with Doug Rawden in the pub at Steeple Haslop last night. Doug was the village bobby there for his last couple of years before he took his pension. We got to talking about the case, and he reckoned that the worst enemy Mrs. Latimer ever had was old Sam Wilkes.”

“Sam Wilkes? Who’s he?”

“A real old nutter, seemingly. He’s always sounding off to anyone who’ll listen about what bastards that lot up at Hambledon Grange are. He gets quite graphic describing what he’d like to do to them. It could never be pinned on Sam, but pound to a penny he was the one who set fire to one of the estate’s barns a few years back. Out of spite.”

“Interesting,” said Kate. “What’s his grievance?”

“Doug didn’t know the ins and outs of it, ma’am. It happened before he moved to the village. Old Sam never makes a lot of sense when he’s been boozing, which is most of the time. It was some rigmarole about Sam being cheated out of his land by Mrs. Latimer’s father, Sir Peter Stedham.”

Yet another candidate to add to the list, as if they didn’t have enough already! But it might be a promising lead and needed following up.

“Tim, I’d like you to have a little chat with Mr. Samuel Wilkes. Thanks for the info, Alan.”

For another half hour thoughts and ideas were tossed around, Kate encouraging everyone to have his say. Finally, “actions” for the day were allocated and the troops dispersed.

* * * *

Reports on the routine interviews were avalanching in, threatening to overwhelm the Indexing Section. But so far nothing significant had emerged. Studying copies of the reports carefully that afternoon, Kate thought it might prove useful to follow up the interview with Mrs. Alison Knight, the woman who did the bookkeeping for the Hambledon estate. She’d do it herself, calling on her way home tonight.

From her several journeys to and from Marlingford, Kate had already noted the quaint little dwelling called Old Toll-House Cottage. It stood right beside the roadway with a well-tended garden adjoining it. On the wall was fixed an ancient board in peeling paintwork listing the toll dues of former days. Kate was glad to see a green Metro squeezed into the small gravelled area just inside the gate, which suggested that Mrs. Knight was at home.

Her knock was answered at once by a striking-looking woman of around her own age whose long, high-cheekboned face was framed by a mass of dark curly hair drawn back in a chiffon bow. She was wearing jeans and a sloppy-joe sweater, but wearing them with panache.

“Mrs. Alison Knight? I wonder if I might have a word. I’m Detective Chief Inspector Maddox.”

“Detective Chief Inspector?” The large brown eyes took on an alarmed look, a reaction that any police officer (and particularly a senior officer) has to get accustomed to. “What’s wrong?”

“Please don’t worry, Mrs. Knight. It’s just that as you work in the office of the Hambledon estate, I thought you might be able to help us clear up one or two points concerning Mrs. Latimer’s death.”

“It’s dreadful, isn’t it? But I only work there two mornings a week, you know.”

“I realise that, but I’d still like to talk to you.” Kate gestured with her hand. “Perhaps I could come in.”

“Yes ... yes, of course. Please do.” Alison Knight looked flustered to have been blocking the doorway and forgetting courtesy.

The front door opened directly into the living room. This was small but charming, the curved walls cream-washed between black oak beams. The furniture, too, was oak, and the curtains a Jacobean print. The only touches of modern luxury were the wall-to-wall carpeting and stacking hi-fi equipment. Kate accepted the tub-shaped chair she was offered.

“What a lovely home you have,” she kicked off pleasantly, to put the other woman at her ease. “I’m looking for somewhere to live myself, now that I’ve been transferred to the Cotswold Division. I’ll be lucky to find somewhere half as nice as this.”

Mrs. Knight looked vaguely pleased, but she was still tensed up. “It’s a listed building, you know. My mother bought it after my father died.”

Kate had already noticed a framed photograph on the mantelpiece of a couple in deck chairs on the beach. It was the woman, glancing round in surprised delight, who took one’s eye. Beside her the man looked rather colourless.

“Those are your parents, I suppose?”

“Yes. My mother’s dead, too, now.”

“She was very beautiful.” Perhaps this was a slight exaggeration, for politeness’s sake. “My husband would have loved this cottage. He was very interested in vernacular architecture.”

“He’s dead?”

“Yes, he was killed fourteen years ago.” It was thirteen years and ten and a half months.

“That’s tough. I mean, losing your husband so young.”

“And you?” queried Kate, though she knew the answer already from DC Green’s report.

“I’m divorced. It didn’t work out. I was in show business, you see, always touring from theatre to theatre, and his job was in Birmingham.” A wry face. “Not the best basis for a successful marriage.”

“I guess not. What productions were you in, Mrs. Knight?”

“Oh please, call me Alison.”

“I’m Kate.” After the strain of projecting the right image to all the antipathetic men she’d had to deal with over the past few days, it was nice to meet a woman of around her own age to whom she felt she could relate in a natural, friendly way.

“I was in the touring companies of several of the big musicals,” Alison told her. “And I did some television and radio work, too. But it’s not an easy life, especially when you get past the age for the dolly-bird parts. So when my mother died and left me this cottage, I decided to give up show biz and bury myself in the country. Luckily, I’d done secretarial training in my teens, and now I have a bookkeeping job ... well, you know about that. And I find a good outlet for my ‘artistic urge’ as a member of the Chipping Bassett Troubadours.”

Alison was talking much more freely now, forgetting, as Kate had hoped, to feel obscurely threatened by the presence of a police officer. She certainly had a lovely voice. There was a rich, velvety, dark-chocolate quality about the way she spoke which Kate envied.

“I’ve always wished that I could sing,” she said.

“Who says you can’t? You have good diction and breath control. Why don’t you give it a whirl? Actually, we need some more chorus members in the Troubadours. It’s great fun.”

Kate laughed. “I’m sure it is. But I’d never have time for rehearsals, let alone performances.”

“You’ve risen to quite a dizzy height in the police, haven’t you? Detective chief inspector, that’s really something. Do you find the men you work with resent you?”

Kate shrugged. “Most of them do, in varying degrees.”

“So how do you cope?”

“Grin and bear it. When I start getting wound up over something that’s just plain outright chauvinism, I try to look at the situation from the male viewpoint. If you’ve been brought up in a climate where men automatically ruled the roost, as if they were superior creatures, it must come hard to swallow the fact that a mere woman can be every bit as intelligent and capable as you are—even if she hasn’t the same physical strength.”

“My God, you’re a bloody sight more tolerant than I’d be in your shoes.”

Kate grinned. “Okay then, here’s the truth. I boil with rage and want to hit back. Usually I can’t, but just now and again ...”

“You get the chance, and thoroughly relish it.”

They sat smiling at each other in comfortable togetherness. It was with reluctance that Kate reverted to official business.

“As I said, Alison, the reason I’m here is to ask you about Mrs. Latimer.”

Perceptibly, there was a cooling of the atmosphere. “I really don’t see how I can help. I told that to the young detective who came to see me last night.”

“That was just a routine enquiry. We’ve been interviewing everybody who had any sort of contact with Mrs. Latimer, and all the people living anywhere near Hambledon Grange. But I was hoping, as you must have known Mrs. Latimer fairly well through your work, that you might be able to give me some background information about her which could help us get to grips with this case.”

“What sort of information?”

“Well, from a few hints I’ve picked up, she could be a bit of a dragon. Is that true?”

Now Alison looked obstinate. “I don’t think it’s right to criticise someone who’s dead and can’t defend herself.”

“I’d go along with that in normal circumstances. But when it’s a case of murder, the character of the victim can often be relevant in tracking down the killer. So we mustn’t shrink from anything that will help us see that justice is done. Don’t you agree, Alison?”

“Well, I suppose if you put it like that ...”

“I gather that Mrs. Latimer was quite generous with her money. She supported the Leisure Centre extension project in a big way, as well as serving on the fund-raising committee. I suppose you deal with all that, as part of your job?”

“Oh no, Mr. Prescott handles it personally. He’s the
honorary
secretary for the Leisure Centre fund, you see, so he wouldn’t be able to charge them for my services.”

Kate put the question as if casually. “As far as you know, was everything harmonious between Mr. Prescott and Mrs. Latimer? No disagreements of any kind?”

“Disagreements? I don’t understand.”

“We know that Mrs. Latimer could be an impetuous woman. I just wondered if ... well, if she ever made criticisms of the way Mr. Prescott handled her business affairs. Or the Leisure Centre funds.”

Alison’s brown eyes were reproachful. “Now you’re asking me to discuss my employer with you.”

“I only want to get at the truth, Alison. Even if Mrs. Latimer did make criticisms of Mr. Prescott, it could easily be that she was mistaken.”

But Alison refused to be drawn. “All I can say is that I never heard anything about them disagreeing.”

Kate allowed a pause before asking, “You’ve been keeping the Hambledon estate books for some time, haven’t you?”

“For nearly three years now, from soon after I came here to live after my mother died. I had to find a job of some kind, and I heard that Mr. Prescott was planning to start up a bookkeeping service to farmers and small businesses. It suits me just fine. I’d hate to be stuck in the same little office day after day. This way, I get to travel around and meet people.”

“Was Mr. Prescott the accountant for the Hambledon estate even before he offered the bookkeeping service?”

“Oh yes, for years, from way back before Mrs. Latimer took over.”

“So presumably everything went smoothly?”

“I wouldn’t say smoothly.” Alison gave a quick, unamused laugh. “You were right about Mrs. Belle Latimer, Kate. She could be a real bitch, always ready to find fault. Just because she had the good luck to inherit a huge estate, she seemed to think it gave her the right to queen it over lesser mortals. Mind you, I always kept my head down and let it all wash over me. But I don’t think a day passed without her ranting off at someone or other.”

“But not at Mr. Prescott, you said?”

“Well, only about trifling things. Nothing serious.”

“What about her husband? How was she with him?”

“How was she with him? Well, I can’t really say. I hardly ever saw them together.” Alison shrugged, seeming at a loss. “Mr. Latimer’s a pretty easy-going sort of man. At least, that’s how he’s always struck me. Er ... can I offer you a drink, Kate?”