Conferences are Murder (15 page)

“But there was no love lost between you, was there?” Charlie asked.

“No, but that didn't mean I was glad to see him dead. Sure, we'd had our disagreements in the past, but not the sort you'd
even swing a punch about, never mind push someone out of a tenth-floor window. If I went around killing everyone I thought was sexist or racist, that hall in there would be littered with corpses.”

Charlie scribbled furiously on the back of one of the Conference Chronicles he was carrying. With a shock, Lindsay realized it was a different edition from the morning one she'd seen in the conference office earlier.

“By the way,” he said, “rumor has it that the forensic lads have found traces of blood in one of the shower cubicles on the tenth floor.”

“Really? Do we know whose blood?” Lindsay asked eagerly.

“No idea. But it sounds serious. The
Daily Mail
guy was saying that they'd found a couple of splashes on the shower curtains, traces between the tiles on the wall and some in the drains. So maybe they'll have to get into DNA testing and take blood samples from all of us.” Charlie sounded like he couldn't wait to get in the queue for the needle.

“What do you think, Sophie?” Lindsay asked, adding, for Charlie's benefit, “She's a medic.”

Sophie shrugged. “Depends how much blood they found. I suppose if Jack cut himself on a major artery as he went through the window it might have sprayed his killer with blood. More likely, though, whoever pushed him cut himself or herself on a shard of glass. Frankly, I can't see them running DNA tests on anyone other than a prime suspect, though. The test costs far too much to run a screen through the whole conference. Besides,” she continued, “it could have nothing to do with the killing. Maybe someone who was having a heavy period had just used the shower.”

Both women tried not to grin at Charlie's look of shocked squeamishness.

“Yeah, well, thanks,” he said unenthusiastically. “I don't suppose you saw any blood-stained killers heading for the showers?”

“No, I didn't. Besides, everyone was either asleep or so pissed that a naked murderer covered in blood could probably have
run from one end of the campus to the other without anyone noticing,” Lindsay said.

“And you didn't see anyone else who might have had anything to do with it?”

Again, that niggling feeling of having noticed something she couldn't quite get hold of came back to Lindsay. Not for the first time, she wished she'd stuck to her new habit of sobriety. “No,” she said hesitantly. “At least . . . as I came out of the lift, I had the impression of someone turning the corner, but nothing I could positively identify.”

Charlie looked like a dog with two bones. “That's tremendous,” he enthused. “That gives me a great line for Sunday—‘Prime Suspect Spots Mystery Figure.' ”

“Gee, thanks, Charlie. Couldn't you really stitch me up instead?” Lindsay asked ironically.

He had the grace to look sheepish. “Sorry. Just got a bit carried away. I'll tone it down a bit, promise. Now, was it a man or a woman you saw? Think,” he urged.

“No idea, really. It was something I caught out of the corner of my eye, that's all. Is that a new Chronicle, by the way?”

“Yup,” he confirmed. “A bundle of them just appeared in the bar. I grabbed a handful for my delegation, since they'll vanish like snowflakes in a sauna soon as the word gets round. D'you want one?” He thrust a copy at her. “Wild, isn't it? I wish I could get to whoever was doing it.”

Lindsay ignored him, absorbed in the front page of the Conference Chronicle Ehening Supplement.

Before she could finish reading, Sophie's voice insinuated itself into her consciousness with its best bedside manner.

“Lindsay, the man's asking you a question. You're wasting his five minutes.”

“Sorry. What was that, Charlie?”

“Will you be going to his funeral?”

Lindsay mentally shook her head in disbelief. Now she was out of it, it was hard to fathom how she'd done a job like Charlie's for so many years.

“I shouldn't imagine so for one minute,” she said. “I never chose his company when he was alive, so I don't see any point in hypocrisy now he's dead. Now, Charlie. Time for me to ask a question.”

“Fire away.”

“Who's the clever money on now? I mean, leaving me out of the equation, of course.”

He ran a hand through brown hair that was already beginning
to thin, though his unlined face looked no more than early twenties. “You've got me there, Lindsay. I mean, there's a million crazy rumors in the naked city tonight, but nobody
seriously
thinks he was bumped off because someone wasn't happy with the merger, or because Andy Spence wants the job, or because Dick McAndrew wanted to get even for Union Jack closing down
Socialism Today
, or because he hadn't delivered one of his thousands of broken pre-election promises,” Charlie rattled off, enumerating the suggestions on his fingers. “I don't know, maybe he had a mistress he'd given the elbow to. You know his reputation with women.”

Lindsay nodded. “If it moves, it's there to be screwed. Unless it's a member of the Equality Committee, in which case, it's there to be put down.”

“Charming,” Sophie muttered. “I know hospitals where he'd have walked into a consultant's job.”

“Word is,” Charlie added confidentially, “it might be
cherchez la femme
. Only nobody knows who the
femme
in question might be. Before the merger, the clever money said he was conducting very close negotiations with Maureen Sloane, the former deputy general secretary of the broadcasting union, but that was over months ago. And she moved in with one of the floor managers from
Newsnight
just after Christmas, so she can't have been carrying that much of a torch. And there's been no recent goss about Tom. So your guess is as good as mine.”

“Oh well, thanks anyway, Charlie. And hey—don't make me look a complete bitch, there's a pal,” Lindsay said.

He grinned and waved his copies of Conference Chronicle. “No way. Compared to this, I'm an amateur! See you.” He grinned and shot off back down the corridor to distribute the latest scandal among the other members of his delegation.

“Nice to know I'm not the only victim of the bad-mouth brigade, isn't it?” Lindsay said.

“Don't get too sanctimonious, Ms. Gordon,” Sophie responded. “Let's not forget how many years you spent earning a living doing exactly what young Charlie and his fellow vultures do.”

“Okay, okay. I'll leave the moral high ground to you people who've never lived in glasshouses.”

“What next?” Sophie asked. “Do you still want to get hold of that guy who set the place by the ears just now?”

“Of course I do. He's got to have a hidden agenda behind that outburst. Even I wouldn't have had the bottle to stand up on that platform and say out loud what so many of us are thinking.”

“Bottle or stupidity,” Sophie observed. “By the way, what was all that about shadowy figures disappearing round corners? You never said anything to me about that.”

Lindsay shrugged. “It was the vaguest of impressions. Just a flicker in the peripheral vision. But there's something niggling at the back of my mind about it. I just can't get a hold of it.”

“Do you really want to get a hold of it?”

“Of course I do. That's a daft question,” Lindsay complained. “If I could get a handle on something definite, something factual, I'd be as happy as a pig.”

“It's not a daft question, smartarse. The point I'd like to make is, if you suddenly remember something you saw or heard that you didn't tell the police earlier, they're going to be deeply suspicious on two counts. One, are you deliberately trying to draw suspicion away from yourself and towards someone else? And two, did you deliberately suppress the information earlier for some twisted reason of your own?”

“You mean, blackmail?”

“Or just to pass it on to one of your old journo cronies. For a fee, of course.”

“That's evil,” Lindsay said. “I've lived with you for three years, and I never suspected you of possessing such a devious mind. Mind you,” she added, “I never was much good at spotting devious women.”

“Water under the bridge, babe,” Sophie said, giving her a quick hug. “There's nothing wrong with your judgement. So, are you sure you really want to dig up whatever it is you think you might have buried away in your few remaining brain cells?”

“Yes, I'm sure. After all, I don't have to tell the police right
away, do I? I could just poke around till I found some more convincing evidence, couldn't I?”

Sophie groaned. “That wasn't quite what I had in mind. God, Lindsay, you're incorrigible.”

“I know. Good, innit?” Lindsay said with a wink. “So what did you have in mind?”

“Well, hypno, of course!”

“Oh
no
, you must be out of your California-crazed
mind
,” Lindsay groaned.

Sophie pressed on regardless. “I use hypno all the time! I can get women to deliver their babies without drugs by using hypnosis, so I'm sure I can help you retrieve data that's only filed away in the drawer marked ‘alcoholic oblivion.' What do you think?”

Lindsay closed her eyes. “My eyelids are growing heavy,” she intoned, then slumped backwards against the wall.

“Quit clowning,” Sophie said. “You know it works.”

Lindsay straightened up and pulled a face. “I know. I just don't like that whole thing of handing over control. You could tell me to do anything you wanted.”

“I've told you a thousand times, you
don't
lose control. Your subconscious is in charge, not me. I can't get you to do anything that goes against your basic personality or principles. If you'd let me practice on you when I was training, it would be second nature by now.”

“Oh, all right,” Lindsay said grudgingly. “Only don't blame me if it doesn't work.”

Sophie smiled. “I won't.”

“And don't
tell
anyone, okay?” Lindsay scowled.

Sophie struggled to straighten her face. “Your reputation is safe with me. You won't regret it, I promise you.”

Lindsay looked doubtful. “Huh,” she said. “But if I catch myself doing your ironing, there'll be trouble, I'm warning you.”

8

As they walked towards the conference office, Lindsay finished reading the Chronicle's latest contribution to the troubles of the Amalgamated Media Workers' Union. She let out a soft whistle and said, “Hey, Sophie. Listen to this.

“Bloody hell! Someone's really got their knife into Andy.”

“No more than they did into you in this morning's edition. Now you seem to be in the clear, I suppose they've got to find someone else to sling their mud at. And who better than the one man who stands to gain most,” Sophie said.

“Well, he does and he doesn't,” Lindsay said. “He'll only take over the top job on a temporary basis, till they can organize an election for a new general secretary. And there's no guarantee he'll win. Union Jack beat him last time, but even if he does do a good job as caretaker, there will be a lot of people who see him as being tarred with the brush of Tom Jack's appalling administration. I'll obviously need to talk to him, though. Maybe I can collar him this evening in the bar.”