Dead End (33 page)

‘So, no quarrels, scandals, feuds at the school?’

‘No, sir. But there was another death.’

Slider almost rubbed his hands. ‘At the school?’

‘One of the masters, Simon Phelps. During the previous summer hols. Fell to his death down a chalk quarry.’

‘Accident?’

‘Apparently. Just lost his balance and fell. The interesting thing from our point of view was that Harris said he was a close friend of the Keatons, went around with them, ate out with them, visited their quarters at all hours. And he was a bachelor.’

‘Ah. And this accident?’

‘He and the Keatons were out on a picnic together when it happened.’

Atherton tapped and entered. He looked at Norma’s legs, but only just, and only out of aesthetic appreciation. He might have answered that morning, if asked, that Sue had grey-blue eyes and a wide, beautiful mouth, but he had no idea what her legs looked like.

‘Do you want my report now, guv?’

‘Yes, come in. No, stay, Norma,’ Slider said. ‘He’s been looking into Radek’s wife’s death.’

‘There’s not much to say about it. She was found dead in the morning by Doreen Keaton – Radek and his wife had separate bedrooms. The bottle of pills was open on the bedside table and half full, and they calculated by the number left that she must have taken a double dose. She’d been taking the sleeping pills for about six months – prescribed by the doctor, nothing funny about it. Doreen said that she had been nervous and irritable, but not particularly depressed, though she’d been drinking heavily that night after a quarrel with her husband. The path report was unchallenged: she died of an overdose of narcotic. They brought it in accidental largely because there was no note and the dose, though lethal, was quite small. The thinking was if she’d meant to kill herself she’d have swallowed the whole bottle. As it was, they decided she’d been confused with drink and didn’t know what she was doing.’

‘And was there speculation?’

‘Not in the press. It was very respectful – talked about Radek’s genius and his war record, and what a terrible tragedy this was, and how it was to be hoped it wouldn’t affect his work. Keaton was interviewed and gave them out a devoted couple, and Doreen said again that Lady Susan hadn’t been depressed. The nearest thing to a hint was in a gossip column which said it was tragic when quarrels, which all married couples have, got out of hand, wondered why Lady Susan had been drinking so much, and mentioned apropos of nothing that Radek had
recently conferred his patronage on a promising young female pianist who was as talented as she was beautiful.’

‘So that makes three,’ Norma said, looking at Slider.

‘Three what?’ Atherton asked.

‘Bodies in Keaton’s wake,’ Norma said.

‘Four,’ Slider corrected. ‘Don’t forget Doreen, who died of gastroenteritis.’

‘People do,’ Atherton pointed out. ‘And food poisoning. Hundreds every year.’

‘Phelps fell down a quarry,’ Norma said.

‘Who’s Phelps?’ Atherton asked, and she told him. ‘Staggered and fell?’ he said when she’d finished. ‘So you think he was poisoned at the picnic, do you?’

‘I don’t think anything,’ Norma said. ‘I leave that to my superiors. I’m just a humble footsoldier.’

Atherton, who had taken the other chair, leaned back in it, crossed his own long, lovely legs, and used his fingers to tick points off. ‘So we have Buster wanting to marry Doreen and bumping off her fiancé to get him out of the way; then bumping off a master who – what was his crime? Hanging around Doreen? Was she that gorgeous?’

‘Why not?’ Slider asked. ‘She looked pretty enough in the photo I saw, and in a closed community like that she wouldn’t have too much competition.’

‘In any case,’ Norma said, ‘a man can be jealous without having anything to be jealous of.’

‘Or a woman. Quite: it’s an intransitive sin,’ Atherton acknowledged. ‘So, why Lady Susan? And Doreen?’

‘I don’t know.’ Slider sat for a moment longer, staring at nothing. Then he pushed himself to his feet. ‘I think I’ll go and ask him.’

‘Ask Buster?’

‘He’s the only one who knows,’ Slider said.

‘Then I’d better come with you.’ Atherton said, with a sideways glance at Norma.

‘Sir,’ she said, ‘if Mr Barrington comes in, what shall I say?’

‘If he asks, tell him where I am,’ said Slider. ‘Don’t tell him about my speculations if you can help it. I’ll explain everything to him personally when I get back.’

* * *

They waited a long time at the door, and Atherton had given up and was ready to go, but Slider stood as though planted. Atherton had seen him in this mood before. In the grip of an idea, he became dogged but also oddly confident. It was a comforting trait in one’s superior, especially when he seemed to be sprouting a wild hair.

At last there was a movement behind the door, and it opened slowly, to reveal Keaton blinking like an owl. His chin was unshaven, his eyes baggy and bloodshot, his trousers liberally creased across the lap as though he’d been sitting in them for days, which he probably had: they looked to Atherton’s searching eye like the pair they’d interviewed him in on Thursday.

Keaton looked at Slider, not even sparing Atherton a glance. ‘I thought you’d be back,’ he said wearily.

‘There’s something I wanted to ask you,’ Slider said, not like a policeman but like someone familiar, an old acquaintance or long-term neighbour. ‘Can I come in?’ Even a paranoiac would have had trouble finding him threatening. It was beautifully done, Atherton thought. Buster had stepped back almost before thinking, and by the time suspicion caught up with him Slider was over the doorstep and wiping his feet carefully and absently on the doormat.

‘Can’t you leave me alone? I’ve already told you everything I know,’ Buster said, turning a look of dull resentment on Atherton.

‘Oh, I know,’ Slider said vaguely. ‘I just wanted a chat about something.’ He was ahead of Keaton now, and moving towards the stairs. ‘The drawing-room, is it? Shall I go up?’

Keaton hesitated, looking doubtfully at Atherton, but Slider had started up the stairs. ‘After you,’ Atherton said, smiling; and thus bracketed, Keaton could only go up. It was plainly an effort for him, and Atherton felt guilty for a moment at putting the old man through the mill again.

In the drawing-room Slider went and sat down on the chaise longue and gestured to Keaton to take the armchair nearest him. Keaton sat nervously, placing his arms along the arm-rests and his hands over the ends as though he were about to be strapped in and acquainted with the National Grid. Atherton sat to his other side so that Keaton couldn’t look at them both at once; but his attention was still fixed on Slider. Whatever his
apprehensions, they were focused on Slider: Atherton barely existed for him.

‘You see,’ Slider said, as though merely continuing a conversation, ‘I think I understand most of it. There are just one or two details I haven’t worked out.’

‘Details? Details of what?’

‘Peter Hepplewhite – that’s obvious, of course. And Simon Phelps – a little nudge and over he went. But Lady Susan, that’s the puzzle. Not so much how you got her to swallow the pills, but
why?
I know it doesn’t matter in the long run, but do I like to understand. It nags at my mind otherwise.’

Atherton had thought Keaton looked bad before, but during this speech his face seemed to grey, and he thought Keaton would either pass out or throw up.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he whispered at last.

‘I think you do,’ Slider said unemphatically. ‘Your wife Doreen – she’d begun to suspect, hadn’t she? Or perhaps she’d suspected all along but you’d begun to be afraid she’d talk. Easiest thing in the world to get rid of her, I do see that. Opportunity is everything, isn’t it? And then you had Stefan all to yourself – once you’d got rid of little Fay.’

‘I never hurt her,’ Keaton said faintly. ‘I would never have hurt Fay.’

‘No, but you got her sent away to school,’ Slider agreed. ‘Was Stefan hard to persuade?’

‘It was him that wanted her to go. He said she couldn’t stay at home with no-one to look after her.’ His voice grew a little stronger. He seemed not to have noticed that he had not denied any of the other premises. ‘Well, that was true, wasn’t it? We didn’t tour so much in those days, but there were still all the evenings we wouldn’t be at home. Who’d have stayed with her then? But
I
didn’t want her to go. It was Stefan’s idea. She wanted to go, anyway. She hated her father.’

‘Did she like you?’

‘Of course she did. She knew I loved her. She still does. Who do you think persuaded him to do the concert at the church? I did that, for her.’

‘And was it for her that you killed him?’

Keaton stared, his jaw loose. It trembled, but no sound came out.

‘You killed him so that she could have his money, is that it? You knew Alec was in financial trouble, and you didn’t want her to suffer, so you killed Stefan so that she’d inherit his estate.’

‘No!’ He found his voice at last. ‘No! You’ve got it all wrong!’

‘All right,’ Slider said placidly, ‘then you tell me. Why did you kill him?’

‘I didn’t! You’re mad! You know I didn’t! Lev shot him. Everyone saw!’

‘Oh yes, Lev shot him,’ Slider agreed, ‘but that wasn’t what killed him. You and I know what killed him, don’t we?’

Still Buster stared, as though unable to remove his gaze. Atherton was afraid he might have a stroke. The shock of all this, at his age – and the horror of being accused, if he hadn’t done it – and Atherton still had doubts about the guv’s whole theory—

‘You know?’ Buster said faintly.

‘Of course,’ Slider said comfortably. ‘But if it wasn’t for the money, then why?’

Atherton actually saw the blood return to Keaton’s face. His voice rose with indignation.

‘For the money? What do you take me for? A common, vulgar criminal? I wouldn’t kill anyone for money.’

Slider caught Atherton’s eye and silenced him with the minutest flicker of his own. ‘Tell me then. It was something to do with Lev, wasn’t it? Why didn’t you tell me that Lev had visited the house on Tuesday?’

Keaton turned his head away, his mouth puckering as though over a bad taste. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘About Lev and Stefan? You didn’t like that little arrangement at all, did you?’

Goaded, Keaton showed a flash of heat. ‘You have to have it all out, don’t you? You can’t keep things decently hidden, any of you! It was bad enough with the women – sluts every one of them – but
boys?
And it was all so blatant! Even Marcus knew all about it. The next thing it was going to be in the press, and then where would we be? I told him it had to stop – the boy was the worst sort, loose morals, loose mind, loose tongue! He told me he’d get rid of him, and I thought he had. I thought it was
all over. And then Marcus came round and tried to blackmail him with it.’

‘That was his visit on the Tuesday?’

‘We were just about to go out. I told Stefan not to see him, but he was always contrary. Well, it was his own fault if he didn’t like what he heard. Marcus said he’d take the story to the press if Stefan didn’t give him money.’

‘You heard it all, did you?’

‘There’s an intercom in there, to the kitchen, so that he can call me when he’s working, if he wants something. I fixed it years ago so that I can turn it on to listen when I want,’ Buster said casually. ‘I had to be able to look after him. He never knew about it, of course.’

‘And what did he say to Marcus, when Marcus threatened him?’ Slider asked.

‘He told him to go to the devil. You couldn’t bully him – no-one could. Stefan may have been many things, but he was no coward.’

‘And then Lev turned up.’

‘He insisted on seeing him. I could have told him how it would be.’ Buster’s mouth turned down. ‘The filth that flowed out of that creature’s mouth! I wouldn’t soil myself with repeating it. Afterwards, when he’d gone, I told Stefan he’d been too soft with the boy, that he should have threatened him with the law if he didn’t go away and stay away. It was obviously a put-up job between him and Marcus, that’s what I thought. And then Stefan said he’d changed his mind, he was going to take the boy back.’ He paused, contemplating something black and yawning in his memory. ‘I thought he was saying it just to upset me, but the next morning he said it again. He said Lev was talented and ought to be helped and that he was thinking – thinking of bringing him to live with him. In our house.’ He stopped. He had reached the heart of the horror as far as he was concerned.

‘What did you say to that?’ Slider prompted him gently.

‘I said I wouldn’t have it. He said it was none of my business. We quarrelled – the worst quarrel of our lives. I told him I wouldn’t stay under the same roof as that creature, and he said in that case I could pack my bags and get out.’

‘Surely he didn’t mean it? He must have said that sort of thing to you before, but he didn’t mean it.’

‘He meant it all right,’ Buster mourned. ‘He said he was fed up with me trying to run his life. He said I’d turned into a nagging old woman, and he wanted young people around him. He said he’d give me a month’s wages and I could leave at the end of the week. But where could I go?’ He raised his eyes to Slider’s. ‘I’ve no family. I’ve never had any other home. I’ve a little bit saved, but not enough to keep me. And besides – I’ve been with him for forty years. He’s my life.’