Stalked By Shadows (30 page)

‘Has Lucy told you this?’ Jarrett wanted to know. ‘Because she’s been imagining all kinds of things lately. I don’t think she’s well right now.’

‘That’s true,’ said Mariner. ‘She isn’t. But it’s her doctor who told us. It’s a fact, Mr Jarrett. Lucy is being poisoned.’

‘Jesus. Where is she?’

‘One of our officers has collected her and taken her to Queen Elizabeth Hospital.’

‘But I need to see her.’ Whether out of concern for his wife, or what she might say, Jarrett was suddenly animated.

‘All in good time,’ said Mariner. ‘We need to have a little chat first.’

‘You think I’m doing this, don’t you?’ he said, with disbelief. ‘You really think I would poison my own wife? I love her.’

‘We’ll talk at the station,’ said Mariner simply.

By the time Jarrett had been processed at Granville Lane, Millie had returned from the hospital.

‘How is she?’ Mariner asked.

‘Scared,’ said Millie. ‘But her mum got there just before I left, so she’s being taken care of.’

‘You ready for this?’

‘Oh, yes, sir.’

Mariner and Millie were ready and already waiting in the interview room when Jarrett was shown in. Although sitting beside her, Mariner was allowing Millie to take the lead, and she felt almost as nervous as Jarrett himself must have been.

‘I should be with my wife,’ he said, reluctantly taking a seat opposite them.

‘You will be, very soon,’ Millie reassured him. ‘But we just need to ask you some questions. You haven’t known Lucy very long, have you?’

Jarrett’s eyes narrowed. ‘By some standards I guess not, but we were attracted to each other straight away.’

‘What was it that attracted you to her?’

‘She’s smart and she’s thoughtful, and she’s pretty; she doesn’t look her best right now.’

That was the understatement of the year, Millie thought. ‘She’s also wealthy,’ she said. ‘How soon did you find that out?’

Jarrett had no problem returning her gaze. ‘She took me back to her place after our first date. I guess I could tell then that she was pretty loaded. She told me that her dad had left her some money.’

‘So was that part of the appeal?’ Millie asked.

‘No, it wasn’t,’ he replied evenly. ‘I had already fallen for her by then.’

‘So the new van, all the other gifts, they didn’t influence your feelings for Lucy.’

‘You take a pretty shallow view,’ Jarrett said. ‘Relationships aren’t about material stuff. Sure, they were nice, but I didn’t ask for any of those things. They were more important to Lucy than to me. She wanted to give them. Have you asked her about that?’

Millie flushed slightly, realising that she hadn’t. ‘What’s your relationship with Tess Maguire?’ she asked.

‘You know about my relationship with Tess,’ Jarrett reminded her. ‘She sings with the band.’

‘Is that all?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Are you lovers, too?’ Millie asked.

Jarrett glared at Mariner. ‘Jesus Christ, what is this?’

‘You seemed pretty close when we came to watch you,’ Millie said.

‘It’s professional. You think it would be a better performance if we stepped around each other on stage? That stuff, it goes with the music. Lucy knows that.’

‘How do you explain her telling you to “
Kiss me, baby
”? Is that professional too?’

‘What are you talking about?’ Jarrett seemed genuinely baffled.

‘Lucy overheard Tess Maguire say that to you, in a bar after the show, so that clearly wasn’t just for the audience.’

For a moment Jarrett seemed floored, then he broke into a wry grin. ‘It’s the line from a song. We were playing that game where someone says a line from a song and the next person has to come up with the line that follows. We were all playing it in the bar that night. “
Kiss me baby, hold me, baby
. . .”’ he recited. ‘Jesus.’ He gave a derisory snort. ‘That’s what you have on me, the line from a song? Tess wasn’t even talking to me. You can ask the other guys.’

‘We will,’ Millie said. This wasn’t going well. She needed to move things along. ‘Tell me about the evening of April the fifth. Last Tuesday,’ she said.

Jarrett didn’t even have to think about it. ‘I was home,’ he said. ‘I got back in the afternoon, Lucy came in from work and we watched TV -’ he smirked ‘- among other things.’

‘And later?’

‘We argued.’ He was remarkably candid.

‘Why?’

‘Lucy had sent for some stuff in the post; at least I thought she had,’ Jarrett said. ‘I was upset.’

‘What was it that upset you?’ Millie asked.

‘I found a pregnancy test.’

‘Why would that be upsetting?’ Millie acted confused. ‘You’d just got married. Most people would say it’s the next logical step.’

Jarrett shifted in his seat, this was less comfortable ground. ‘Lucy and I had agreed that we wouldn’t try for kids.’

‘Why was that?’

There was a new tension in his voice. ‘I don’t want kids. I never have. We discussed it at length before we married. It was important to me and I needed to be clear that Lucy felt the same way, or at least understood and was happy to go along with it.’

‘How did Lucy feel about that?’ asked Millie.

‘She said it didn’t matter. I think maybe at one time she wanted a family, but it was more important that we were together.’

‘That’s a huge sacrifice,’ Millie observed.

Jarrett glared at her. ‘Yeah, you think I don’t know that?’

‘Why is it so important to you to not have children, Will? Not part of your long-term plan?’

‘What long-term plan?’ His tone was defensive now.

‘The one in which you leave Lucy, taking half her possessions, and go off with Tess.’

‘What? Are you nuts?’ he reacted angrily. ‘Is that what you’ve been saying to her? No wonder she doesn’t trust me any more.’

‘Or is it that you already have kids?’ Millie speculated, even though she had no evidence for it yet.

Will Jarrett was speechless, and for a couple of seconds Millie thought they had him. When he eventually spoke, they could hardly hear him. ‘If you must know, the reason I don’t want kids is because I don’t want them dying a slow and painful death, before their time. I saw what my parents went through with my younger brother. I can’t put Lucy through that.’ He looked straight into Millie’s eyes. ‘I carry a hereditary disease.’

In the silence that followed, Millie suddenly pieced together the information Max had given her and it all made terrible sense. ‘Huntingdon’s disease,’ she said.

Jarrett sniffed. ‘How d’you know?’

‘You’d used your computer to search for support groups,’ Millie said. ‘I thought it was about the place, but it was about the disease.’

Jarrett rubbed his unshaven chin. ‘I was looking for something for Lucy. I thought that once she knew she may need some help.’

‘Shouldn’t you have told her before you married her?’

‘I guess I should, but it all happened so fast, and it never seemed like the right time. I thought as long as she was OK with not having kids that I could tell her the rest when the time was right. In the past, women I’ve dated have gotten freaked by it, and I didn’t want to scare her away.’ So that was what Will Jarrett was guilty of - protecting his wife. The tension in the room had evaporated, leaving Millie unsure of which way to go now.

‘How well do you know Martin Bonnington?’ Mariner intervened.

‘Who?’

‘Martin Bonnington, your neighbour.’

‘The guy across the road? Hardly at all,’ Jarrett said. ‘I’ve said hi to him. I think Lucy went out with him a couple of times and he got the wrong idea, but that was finished a long time ago. Has he been saying something? Was it him reported us?’

‘How about Nina Silvero?’ Mariner asked. ‘Do you know her?’

Jarrett shook his head. ‘Who is she?’ It was said quite naturally.

‘Where were you on the evening of Sunday, April the third?’

There followed a pause while Will Jarrett mentally reviewed his schedule. ‘I’m pretty sure we were in Reading that night, and I have plenty of witnesses.’ He consulted his watch. ‘Are we done here? I’d really like to go and see my wife.’

Millie glanced across at Mariner who nodded almost imperceptibly.

‘For the moment, Mr Jarrett; we’ll get someone to take you to the hospital. But we may need to speak to you again.’

Jarrett levelled a gaze at him. ‘I’ll cancel my gigs. I’m not going anywhere.’

‘Shit,’ said Millie, when Jarrett had gone. ‘That didn’t exactly go to plan.’

‘It rarely does,’ Mariner consoled her. ‘You did fine. Don’t beat yourself up about it. What do you think about him now?’

‘I don’t know.’ Millie sighed. ‘He seems - plausible, doesn’t he?’

‘He does,’ Mariner agreed.

‘And it certainly makes sense of why he’s not in a hurry to be a father. Made me feel pretty stupid - and insensitive.’

‘Don’t,’ Mariner said. ‘You took a perfectly valid line of inquiry. It was his secrecy that created the suspicion.’

‘And he’s still the one with the best opportunity,’ Millie said.

‘As far as we know,’ said Mariner. ‘Let’s wait and see what’s been killing Lucy Jarrett.’

They were soon to find out. Emerging from the interview suite, Mariner learned that he had a message from Dr Gail Hudson, head of toxicology within the forensic science unit. She was brusque and professional on the phone and got straight to the point. ‘Lucy Jarrett has been poisoned with thallium,’ she said.

‘Which is what exactly?’ Mariner’s ignorance of chemistry was pretty far-reaching.

‘It’s a metallic element, a bit like lead or mercury, but actually more poisonous than both and relatively easy to use. The salts are soluble in water and virtually tasteless, so it can easily be added to drinks like tea and coffee. In that respect you might say that thallium’s pretty much the ideal poison.’

‘So it has to be someone close to Lucy who’s doing this?’ Mariner’s thoughts instantly returned to Will Jarrett.

‘It’s the most likely scenario,’ Hudson said.

‘How would someone get hold of thallium?’

‘It’s hard to say,’ said Hudson. ‘It used to be found in some pesticides, rat poisons and ant killers, but because the salts are so poisonous they were banned in Europe and the US years ago. They might be still used in some developing countries, so I guess anyone visiting there might be able to get hold of it. Some pharmacies here might still stock thallium salts, but anyone buying them would be required to sign the poison book. It would be a risk, but you could ask around to see if anyone’s done that. The other context for use is in some manufacturing processes; dyes, paints, glass, that kind of thing.’

Paints again. ‘How much thallium would Lucy have needed to ingest to do the damage?’ he asked. ‘Would it have to be every day?’

‘No, it’s a cumulative thing, so if the dose is right it could be taken intermittently and still have the same effect. ‘We’ve traced at least one of the sources; it’s in the milk we found in Lucy’s fridge.’

‘Christ.’ Mariner immediately thought of the ubiquitous plastic bottles stacked at the supermarket. ‘This is milk that she’s been buying off the shelf?’ Mariner felt queasy. If a major supermarket chain was involved with this, then it wouldn’t just be Lucy Jarrett, and suddenly they’d have a massive food scare on their hands.

‘Don’t panic,’ Hudson reassured him. ‘The milk was in bottles, so she must have been taking doorstep deliveries from a dairy. Unfortunately there was no milk at Nina Silvero’s house that we could take for comparison.’

‘That’s unusual, isn’t it?’ Mariner said. ‘Most people drink milk in some form or another.’

‘It must have been removed. Didn’t you say that she’s got a daughter? Perhaps she cleared it out after her mother died. I guess milk is the first thing to go off.’

Except that the house had been preserved as a crime scene. If Nina was being poisoned, then the poisoner was also her murderer, and would have got rid of the milk on the night she died.

‘There is another way to establish whether Silvero was being similarly poisoned,’ Hudson was saying. ‘Thallium’s like arsenic, it’s retained in the body cells, especially the hair and we would still be able to detect it, even after cremation. It depends if the family is prepared to part with a sample from her ashes.’

‘It’s a formality, I’m sure, but I’ll see if we can arrange that,’ Mariner said.

‘I’ll keep in touch,’ Hudson said, and concluded the call.

When she’d rung off, Mariner called Rachel Hordern. ‘Have you scattered your stepmother’s ashes yet?’ he asked.

‘No, why?’

‘We need to test a sample from them, if you wouldn’t mind.’

Rachel’s tone was immediately suspicious. ‘What for?’

‘You told us that she had been suffering with her health in the months before she died,’ Mariner recalled. ‘We now have reason to think she was being poisoned.’

‘What? How do you know that?’

‘We don’t, for certain, that’s why we need the sample.’

‘But my mother lived alone. Who could do that?’

‘We’re keeping an open mind,’ said Mariner diplomatically. No reason to tell her that she was a suspect, at least not until after they had secured her cooperation. ‘It’s possible that the poison was added to the milk. How did your mother buy her milk?’

‘She had a milkman, the same one she’d had for years. Why on earth would he want to poison my stepmother?’

‘I’ll send over an officer to collect the sample,’ Mariner said. ‘Thank you for your help, Mrs Hordern.’ And he rang off.

After calling in Millie and Knox, Mariner brought them up to date with what Hudson had told him.

‘It has to be Will,’ Millie said straight away. ‘No one else would have access to the fridge.’

‘He’d have to be careful not to drink it himself,’ Knox pointed out.

But Millie had the answer. ‘He’s lactose intolerant,’ she said. ‘Lucy told me. The organisers had to accommodate that when they planned the wedding breakfast.’

‘Well, that certainly makes a perfect fit,’ Mariner agreed.

‘And it must take Bonnington out of the equation,’ added Knox. ‘He wouldn’t be in a position to do it.’