The Dead Hand of History (35 page)

‘Stan
did
kill them both,' Jenny said fiercely. ‘Why won't you . . . why won't you believe me?'

‘But at least you didn't make Tom suffer,' Paniatowski said. ‘So perhaps you did care about him
a little
, after all. You poisoned him, and strangled him, and cut off his hand. And then you left the hand outside the newspaper office. But this time, you
couldn't
let Mike Traynor know by phone – if he'd heard a woman's voice, the whole structure you'd so carefully built up would have collapsed – so you sent him an anonymous note instead. Is there anything I've missed out?'

Jenny Brunskill said nothing.

‘Ah yes, the other clues. After you cleaned Tom Whittington's flat thoroughly – to make sure there was no trace of you there – you planted one of Linda's scarves for me to find. And you also took a pair of Stan's shoes, which you'd dipped into his wife's blood, and hid them at the back of his wardrobe after the first time my men searched his house. I think that's about all. Is there anything
you
'd like to say?'

‘You'll never prove any of this,' Jenny told her.

‘Of course I will. The process has already started. You had an important meeting on the morning that Linda's hand was found, and I've sent one of my men to find out if you turned up for it. And, of course, he'll discover that you didn't – even though it
was
so important – because you were too busy killing Tom and leaving his hand outside the
Chronicle
offices.'

‘I . . . I was too nervous to go to that meeting on my own, so I just walked around town.'

‘I'm having your home searched even as we speak. We'll find traces of glue there – the same kind of glue as was used to stick the words to the anonymous letter that Mike Traynor received. We may even find the magazines you used to cut out the words. And we'll find the chemist's shop where you had the picture of you and Tom developed. I could go on, but there's really no need to.'

‘No, there probably isn't,' Jenny agreed, her head slumping forward. Then she raised it again, and when she did, there was fire in her eyes. ‘I'm not ashamed of what I did, you know,' she continued. ‘I did it all for Father – and he approved.'

‘Your father's dead,' Paniatowski said.

‘But he still talks to me. And
I
still talk to
him
. Where else do you think the plan came from?'

‘The plan?'

‘Making it seem as if Linda was having an affair! Blaming the murders on Stan! Cutting off the hands! You didn't think that came from me, did you? Poor stupid me! Of course not! It was all
Father
's idea!'

EPILOGUE

I
t was the morning after Jenny Brunskill's arrest, and as Monika Paniatowski drove her red MGA past one of the old cast-iron milestones that the council had somehow never got around to replacing, she felt as if she was passing a significant milestone in her life, too.

Today would be the day she tied up the final loose ends of her first case as a chief inspector. But it would also be the day that Charlie Woodend left England on the first stage of his journey to his new life in Spain.

She was experiencing a double sense of loneliness – the loneliness that Charlie's departure was already causing her, and the loneliness that command brought with it. Well, she couldn't do anything about the former, and the latter had been her own choice, she reminded herself, so she'd better learn to live with it and – maybe – start to bloody well enjoy it.

She arrived at her destination – Brunskill's Bakery – at just after nine o'clock, and when she entered the managing director's office, she found Stan Szymborska staring thoughtfully up at the oil painting of Seth Brunskill.

‘The first time I came into this office and saw that picture, I thought Linda was as obsessed with her father as Jenny was,' she told Szymborska.

‘And so she had been,' Stan replied. ‘As I told you, even after his death, it took her some time to come out of the box, but though she died horribly, she at least died
free of him
– and that is some little consolation.'

‘If she was as free of him as you say, then why didn't she take the portrait down?'

‘She tried to, once, and her sister wouldn't have it. Even the
thought
of removing it made Jenny hysterical. She said this was the managing director's office, and he was the managing director. She often talked about him like that – as if he was still alive.'

‘When Jenny accused Tompkins of being responsible for the murders, I really did think she was doing it in a desperate attempt to save
you
,' Paniatowski said. ‘But saving you was the last thing in the world she wanted.'

‘Then why
did
she make the accusations?'

‘Partly it was designed to make me think she actually
was
the loving sister-in-law she pretended to be. Partly, I believe, she was hoping that I'd take her accusations just seriously enough to close down Tompkins' for a few damaging days, while I conducted an investigation.'

‘She would have to have been crazy to think that,' Stan said.

‘Yes, she would, wouldn't she?' Paniatowski agreed. ‘And maybe, by that point, she'd convinced herself that Tompkins really was responsible for Linda's death – because if he hadn't wanted to buy Brunskill's Bakery, none of this would have happened.'

‘Do you think she'll ever be tried for the murders?'

‘I don't know,' Paniatowski admitted. ‘It all depends on what the head-shrinkers say – on whether they think she's competent to stand trial.'

‘And do you think she is?'

‘No,' Paniatowski said. ‘To be held responsible for your actions, you have to be able to distinguish between right and wrong in their widest possible sense – and all Jenny ever really knew was what was right for
Seth Brunskill
.'

Szymborska sighed. ‘We had a plan, my Linda and I,' he said. ‘We were going to sell the bakery to Warren Tompkins and use the money to buy a boat. We'd sail around the world, and keep
on
sailing, until the money ran out. And only then would we worry about what we'd do next.'

‘It sounds wonderful,' Paniatowski said wistfully.

‘It
would have been
wonderful,' Stan Szymborska agreed. ‘But there'll be no boat now. Now, when I sell the bakery, I'm going to give most of the money away to charity.'

‘I'm afraid you can't sell the bakery
at all
,' Paniatowski told him.

‘Why not?'

‘Because, under the law as it stands, you're not allowed to profit from your own crimes.'

‘I don't understand,' Stan Szymborska said. ‘
Jenny
murdered Linda. You
know
that!'

‘Indeed I do,' Paniatowski agreed. ‘But that's not the crime that I'm talking about.'

It was a beautiful summer's day, and the English Channel was as calm as the proverbial mill pond.

Charlie and Joan Woodend stood on the upper deck of the ferry which would take them to France. Charlie was reading the
Daily Globe
, and Joan – perhaps just a
little
regretfully – was taking a last look at the White Cliffs of Dover.

‘I've just been readin' this article by Mike Traynor,' Woodend said. ‘You remember him, don't you?'

‘Isn't he a reporter on the Lancashire
Evening Chronicle
?'

‘That's the man, right enough – reporter on the
Chronicle
, an' a world-class dickhead.'

‘Language, Charlie!' Joan said.

‘Sorry,' Woodend replied. ‘Anyway, yesterday Traynor had a go at Monika, an' today he's been forced to eat his own words. An' I mean
forced
. Readin' the article, you can almost see the editor standin' over him, with a whip in his hands. Listen to this. “I was wrong about DCI Paniatowski, and I'll be the first to admit it. Her handling of the Linda Szymborska murder has been little less than brilliant.”
Little less than brilliant!
The bastard never said anythin' that complimentary about me.' He paused. ‘Sorry! Again! I promise that now I'll be spendin' more time with you, I'll try to get out of the habit of usin' bad language.'

‘You'd better do more than just
try
,' Joan warned him, though they both knew – after all the years they had been married – that she was not being serious.

The hooter on the funnel blew loudly, and the ferry began to slowly pull away from the dock.

A small, almost secretive, smile came to Joan's face. ‘She never
did
ring you, did she?' she asked.

‘Who?' Woodend asked innocently.

‘Don't start playin' that kind of game with me, Charlie Woodend,' Joan said sharply.

‘Oh, you mean Monika?' Woodend asked. ‘No, she didn't.'

‘An' how do you feel about that?' Joan wondered. ‘Are you pleased? Or are you disappointed?'

‘A bit of both,' Woodend admitted. ‘But mostly, I feel very
proud
of her.'

They faced each other across the interview table in Whitebridge Police Headquarters – two Poles who had each, in their own way, known both triumph and despair.

‘It was Len Monkton, the bakery nightwatchman, who first put the idea in my head,' Paniatowski explained. ‘Now what was it he said, exactly? Seth Brunskill was “hardly ever out of the bakery. Didn't believe in holidays. Never took a day off. And in the end, I suppose, that's what killed him.” And he was right, in a way, wasn't he?'

‘In a way, he was,' Stan Szymborska agreed.

‘Because if he
had
been able to stay away from the bakery – if he
had
been able to give his daughters a little of the freedom that any woman has the right to expect – he might still be alive today.'

‘Yes, he might.'

‘As I said, it was Len who first put the idea in my head, but it was my own desperation with the way the case was going which
really
pushed me to ask for the exhumation of Seth's body,' Paniatowski continued. ‘I was
hoping
to find evidence of foul play, so that I could use it to put pressure on Linda's murderer – who, at the time, I thought was you. But, if I'm honest with myself about it, I never really
expected
to find that evidence.'

‘But you did?'

‘Yes – or rather, the estimable Dr Shastri did. Seth died of heart failure, right enough, but it wasn't a
natural
heart attack. It was induced by a high concentration of potassium chloride. How did you get him to take it?'

‘He was destroying my Linda,' Szymborska said, ignoring the question. ‘Every day that passed, there was less of her, and I knew that if he lived much longer, she would
never
be able to find her real self.'

Paniatowski reached across to the tape recorder. ‘Interview suspended at eleven-oh-three,' she said, pressing the off-switch.

‘Why have you done that?' Stan Szymborska asked.

‘You still haven't explicitly admitted killing Seth Brunskill,' Paniatowski said.

‘I know.'

‘And without a confession, it's going to be very hard – after all this time – for us to actually
prove
you did it.'

Stan Szymborska smiled. ‘But you will
try
to prove it, won't you, Chief Inspector?' he asked.

‘Oh, I will
try
,' Paniatowski assured. ‘I'll give the investigation all I've got, because that's my job. But I'll tell you honestly, Stanislaw, I don't hold out much hope of success.'

‘Turn the machine on again, please,' Szymborska said.

Paniatowski pressed the record button. ‘Interview resumed at eleven-oh-four.'

‘Seth Brunskill died of potassium-chloride poisoning, which I administered to him, knowing exactly what its effect would be,' Szymborska said.

Paniatowski glanced at the tape recorder, and then back at Stan Szymborska.

‘
Why admit it?
' she mouthed silently. ‘
Why?
'

‘In my mind, the only possible justification for the murder was that it would give my Linda a new life,' Stan Szymborska said. ‘But now she has no life at all – and neither have I.'