Power Games (6 page)

He had the grace to look sheepish.

‘And, if you like, I could offer you a dry crust, while I sit and stuff amaretti biscuits? Or there's a treacle tart?'

She made tea for herself, coffee for him, plonking milk still in its carton in front of him. Yes, she'd produce plates, too – no point in getting crumbs everywhere. And then she sat, knife poised over the treacle tart, looking at him ironically.

‘I suppose if I asked for sugar,' he said, grinning, ‘you could offer me white or golden granulated sugar lumps, or demerara, or muscavado—'

She laughed. ‘No, this is the only stuff to help the medicine go down.' She passed the sugar basin, full of ordinary Silver Spoon. She slapped a hand to the side of her head. ‘D'you know, I do have some sweeteners, too.'

Straight-faced, he declared, ‘I never accept sweeteners.'

 

‘So I truly don't know what to make of him,' she told Midge, as they took their places in the National Indoor Arena.

Midge – and her colleague Lorraine – were the officers who'd promised to improve Kate's social life. Apart from encouraging her to play tennis, they'd now brought her to watch it.

‘My life seems full of moody men at the moment,' Kate continued.

‘Don't give him a thought. Just think about mean men instead. Golly, doesn't Henman look young!' Midge exclaimed, as the entire auditorium rose to its feet to cheer him and the rest of the Davis Cup players on to court. ‘Except that you haven't had much luck with men recently, have you? I mean, we hoped you'd hit it off with Cary Grant, and then there was Pat the Path – weren't you two an item for a bit?'

‘It just – sort of fizzled out,' Kate said. There was no way she would reveal even to friends exactly how. ‘God, look at those quadriceps …' What wouldn't her bad knee give for them?

‘And then,' Lorraine put in, ‘there was a very strong rumour that Someone Senior was after you.'

Kate hoped her face was entirely blank. It was inevitable that she and Graham should have become objects of gossip, but she thought she'd scotched any rumours months ago. ‘Not that I ever noticed. Who – come on, you can't leave me hanging in mid-air like that!'

‘Why, young Rodney, of course. Superintendent Smarm. Ah! Go on, Tim! Go on!'

And they were only knocking up, so far. What sort of volume would the crowd produce when Henman actually won points?

So it wasn't Graham who'd got the job: it was Rodney Neville. So how would Graham feel about that?

But now the match was starting in good earnest – with Courier looking in ominously good form – she would postpone thinking about it. And concentrate on willing Henman through.

If only …

 

Bank Holiday Monday morning was living up to its reputation, weatherwise at least. There was a bitter wind confronting a rainy sky. The bonus was that the traffic was light. She'd worked steadily through the piles of paperwork avalanching over her desk when the phone rang. Another person working over the holiday: Patrick Duncan. He was in strictly professional mode – no one could have guessed he was a fizzled-out ex.

‘You're still on that warehouse fire case?' he asked, with no preamble.

‘“Still”? Is there any reason why I shouldn't be?'

‘Come on, Kate, you know what rumours are like in this business … Anyway, if you are, I thought you'd like to know your stiff was a woman.'

‘Jesus Christ.' That the blackened flesh – once a woman like her.

‘Are you still there? … It's the pelvis that gave it away, of course.'

She must pull herself together. ‘Of course. Anything else about – about her?'

‘I'd say not young. And the teeth were in pretty poor nick. Fits in with the Fire Service view that she was a dosser. Bag-woman. Meths drinker. Whatever. Kate – are you OK?'

She tried for a laugh. ‘It's just that even in this job you get an attack of “but for the grace of God”.'

‘You mean your drinking? Kate, you're over that now,' he said forcefully. ‘You can even drink socially.'

‘I know. It's just that—' She pulled herself together. No point in saying she'd really seen herself simply as a woman, like the corpse. She and Patrick weren't yet back on those terms. ‘Well, at least we've something more to go on, now. Colin won't just be asking vague questions about missing men of the road – he can be much more specific.'

‘Is he getting any co-operation?'

‘Not a lot. If you give up society I suppose the last person you want to talk to is a copper.'

‘Find someone who doesn't look like a copper, then.'

‘Funny you should say that, Patrick – I might just have someone in mind.'

Sue Rowley was working at her desk when Kate popped in to see her. She looked up, interested, like a bird, brown head on one side, ready to dart at any crumb of the arson case that Kate might have missed. ‘What do you think about fraud as a motive?'

She flicked a glance at her watch as she spoke. Like Kate, Sue'd opted to work on the Bank Holiday, and seemed, like Kate, to be regretting it.

Kate couldn't very well match the gesture, but knew it must be some time after six. ‘Claiming for contents they don't have? None of the firms I've spoken to had their goods over-insured. Not according to the assessors, anyway. And we've got different insurers for each of the firms that have been torched. All of them tell me that the claim seems entirely reasonable given the nature of the business. Businesses, that is – they're all in different lines of country. No individual assessor smells any sort of rat.'

Sue made a note. ‘What about the premises? Were they over-insured?'

‘On the contrary. One firm, in fact – the one involved in the most recent blaze – is likely to lose a lot of money. They can't afford to pull down the wreckage and rebuild on the same site. They'd have to go somewhere cheaper, if they can find anywhere, that is.'

‘Oh, there are plenty of vacant warehouses around. More's the pity,' Rowley reflected.

‘The Selly Oak firm – now they admit they were paying an extraordinarily low rent – old, rather tatty premises, they were. I want to get on to the Health and Safety people about them – just in case they'd been warned to make expensive improvements and had chickened out. But that wouldn't apply to the other premises. The trouble is, Gaffer, there's nothing consistent in any of the premises – except the modus operandi. This silly business of someone scrambling on a possibly fragile and treacherous roof, pouring petrol through a skylight and scarpering, just in time.'

‘You're sure it's always been just in time? I'd check out the A. and E. departments. There aren't many hospitals these days doing that sort of stuff – it shouldn't take you long.'

Kate nodded. ‘It's already down as Fatima's first job when she comes in tomorrow, Gaffer.'

Sue snorted with laughter. ‘Trump me, will you? OK, that's what you're paid to do, and that's why they've fast-tracked you. Any more thoughts about that yet, Kate?'

She shook her head. ‘Been a bit busy, what with one thing and another.'

‘So I should hope! After all, Kate, we are into a murder inquiry, now. And I'd like to get as much done as we can before an MIT swoops in.'

‘Ah, the Fifth Cavalry! And they'll no doubt spot there's one thing we haven't checked out yet – who owned the land on which those premises were built. I'll get Colin on to that first thing tomorrow.'

‘Good thinking. Now, are you off home or are you and the lads going for a quick jar?'

‘Not a lot of lads around.'

‘Ah, of course. Bank Holiday. You know,' Rowley continued as she cleared a neat spot in the middle of her desk, ‘the culture's changed so much. When I was your age it was assumed we'd be off, boozing and bonding – not that we even knew the word, mind – till we were half-pissed and nowhere fit to drive. Especially us women, if we wanted to get on. Now, they know we've got homes, families, even.' She touched a framed photo on her desk. ‘What about you?'

‘I've got this great aunt,' she said. ‘But she doesn't worry if I have half a snifter after work. So long as I have a peppermint afterwards and she can't smell the beer on my breath.'

 

Aunt Cassie was so full of news she might not even have complained if Kate had rolled up drunk, provided she'd sat and listened without interrupting. In fact, she could scarcely wait for her first glass of gin to impart it all.

‘Mrs Nelmes tells me that son-in-law of hers is in the soup,' she said gleefully. ‘You know, young Eyore. Oh, he's not as bad as that, but he always looks fed up. Graham, that's it. The fair Flavia's husband.' The Harveys, man and wife.

Kate sipped her tonic and sat down to wait. Acquiescence was usually the best policy where Cassie was concerned. Moreover, if she tried to stop a flow of gossip, the old lady, balked, would turn to other prey. Kate herself, most likely. And in particular her unmarried state. And maybe Cassie would connect Kate's unmarried state with Graham's married one. No. Let Cassie have her head.

‘Apparently he was very late home the other night. Very late. They nearly missed some special do at that church of theirs. And though he was supposed to have been on the bus – and it's a fair walk, according to Mrs Nelmes, for the bus – he was scarcely damp, despite the downpour. Well, that's what Mrs Nelmes said. So what do you make of that?'

‘Why was he on the bus?' Kate asked, straight-faced.

‘Oh, there was something the matter with the car.'

‘I wonder why Mrs Harvey didn't pick him up. She's got a car of her own, hasn't she?'

‘Doesn't like town traffic or some such. Especially in the rain. So what d'you reckon?'

Kate wouldn't bite. It was bad enough listening, wasn't it? ‘What do
you
reckon?' She asked at last, taking the old woman's glass and refilling it.

‘I reckon the obvious thing. That someone gave him a lift. Or he might just have taken a taxi. But apparently he didn't want to talk about it. Told her he was back in time for that do and that was that. Told? Well, he shouted, according to Mrs Nelmes.'

Good for him! But Kate said nothing.

But Cassie needed no encouragement. ‘Of course, I don't see what the problem is, and so I told Mrs Nelmes. A man does a long day's work, gets a lift from a friend, gets to this God-bothering in time – no wonder he gets cross when his wife starts cross-questioning him. After a day like that, he should get a nice warm welcome, no questions asked. That's what my Arthur expected. And got,' she added with satisfaction, swigging the gin in one.

Kate reflected silently on the difference between a wife and a mistress.

‘So I told her,' Cassie continued, ‘I wasn't surprised the worm had turned. Only it seems that Flavia is the only one entitled to call the poor lad a worm, so Mrs Nelmes is no longer speaking to yours truly. So there you are. So I think I'll have another – just a finger – to celebrate. What about you?'

‘Why not?' She helped herself to another tonic. So what was Cassie celebrating? Her spat with Mrs Nelmes or a marriage with a problem?

‘You don't call that a drink?'

‘I do at this time of night when I've got to be up at six tomorrow.'

Cassie cackled. ‘Oh, aye. Got yourself a breakfast date, have you? Oh, not with the worm?'

‘No. With a very attractive young man called Jason. My tennis coach. And we start hitting little yellow balls at seven prompt.'

 

‘Start low, that's it, and end high. Let me see the side of that racquet. That's it. What a shot! Now – just to show it wasn't a fluke – another backhand.' Jason sent down another ball. She might be hot enough to have shed her tracksuit and to have started to swig from her water bottle, but he – all six foot one of him – was still cool, not a drop of sweat glistening in his curly black hair.

They were in the tennis centre. The centre – which held eight courts – was divided in two by a high-level walkway, designed to stop people straying on to others' courts while they were in use. Heavy canvas curtains at the end of each court reduced the echo and deadened the flight of the balls. The other side of the walkway was completely unoccupied and in darkness. Only their court and the next one had lights on. Not that anyone was on the next court. No, as far as Kate knew, she and Jason were the only people in the whole complex, apart from the receptionist, still bug-eyed with sleep, and a cleaner, the only evidence of whose existence was a trolley half-way out of a door marked PLANT.

They'd spent ten minutes or so knocking up, to get the eye in and the joints moving, and had then collected up the tennis balls. Jason somehow transformed the ball basket into a ball-gatherer. Kate simply gathered as many as her racquet would carry.

‘You'd think in a place like this people would dispose of their litter more thoughtfully,' Jason said, slinging a couple of plastic ball-tubes and a bottle into the bin beside the net. ‘Ugh.' The bottle was obviously sticky.

Kate was fossicking behind a curtain: five or six balls were lurking behind it. And a couple of empty bottles. She kicked them free. As soon as she'd deposited the balls in Jason's basket, she went back, and slung the bottles with unnecessary force into the bin.

‘It's as bad as the bloody High Street,' she said. ‘Some days you see whole families coming out of McDonald's and dropping litter. Why can't they use bins?'

‘Because they don't want to draw attention to themselves by being different,' Jason suggested, finding a chocolate wrapper and binning it. ‘Right. Ready to work on your forehand?'

She nodded, heading for the far end of the court.

‘Ready position. Knees bent, remember, take the racquet head down really low – that's it! How's that knee?'