Hard Going (12 page)

‘Whatever you want.’

‘And we’d better keep an eye on Mrs Kroll, both in case she bolts, and in case she leads us to him. Or he might go to his other son, Stefan. I suppose we ought to have the daughter’s house in Birmingham watched as well, in case he goes there.’

Porson nodded. He was thinking. ‘This makes him a bit tastier, doesn’t it? Desperate for money, knows his wife’s boss is well off.’

‘And that he’s a philanthropist,’ Slider added.

Porson shrugged. ‘I wasn’t thinking that so much. I mean, can you ask a philanthropist to fund your gambling debts?’

‘If he’s fond enough of your wife and it’ll help you turn over a new leaf, maybe,’ Slider said.

‘Hmph. Maybe. What I was thinking is, wifie’s got the key, and she lets him know when the boss is going to be out so they can rifle the place and nick – well, whatever’s nickable.’ He forestalled Slider’s objection. ‘We don’t know that he didn’t keep a bundle of readies somewhere. Old-fashioned bloke who doesn’t like modern technology is just the kind to pay for everything in cash. Then the boss comes back unexpectedly and there’s nothing for it but to whack him.’

‘But in that case why did the boss obligingly sit down with his back to Kroll? And why was he writing a cheque?’

‘Oh, all right!’ Porson said grumpily. ‘Have it your way. The visit was while Bygod was at home, the Krolls appealed to his better nature and he agreed to help.’

‘But then why kill him?’

Porson’s eyes gleamed with triumph. ‘Because the help he was offering wasn’t enough, and there was a bigger prize somewhere in the house. There was no sign of disturbance because Mrs Kroll knew exactly what it was and where it was. She could put her hand straight on it.’

Slider sighed. ‘It’s a possible scenario, but how the hell would we prove it?’

‘Catch Kroll first. Once you’ve got him, reel ’em both in and one or other will crack.’

‘What we have to do,’ Slider said, ‘is establish exactly when Mrs Kroll arrived and left, and whether Mr Kroll was there on that day. We know from the fingermark he was there some time, but it could have been an earlier occasion. If we can fix his van in the area on the Tuesday … Put McLaren on it.’

‘Right, guv,’ said Hollis, adding another note to those about who was going to be watching what and whom.

‘But we can’t just hang around waiting for Kroll to turn up,’ Atherton objected.

‘Is that your guilt speaking?’ said Slider. ‘I agree. I think we should have a good look at the Crondaces, particularly the father. He’s the only person we actually
know
issued threats against Bygod. Get on and trace them – father, mother and Debbie – and we can have a chat with them, see what they’ve been up to. Carry on with the other things we were doing. And meanwhile—’

‘Meanwhile?’ Atherton urged. ‘That was an interesting pause.’

‘Meanwhile –’ Slider came back from his thoughts – ‘I don’t see any harm in paying a little visit to the ex-wife, see if she has any light to shed on our mystery man. See if you can track her down, will you?’

It turned out not to be too difficult to find Mrs Bygod, who was still using his name, at least professionally: she had a dog-grooming business. She was living on the edge of Chipping Barnet, a leafy spot to the north of Finchley where golf courses roam free as God intended, and breed and flourish in the verdant Hertfordshire pastureland. Slider claimed the privilege of rank to get out of the office for a while and breathe the fresh air.

According to the land registry, the house was owned by one Philip Buckland, presumably her new husband. It was called Field End, which sounded leafy, but it was actually a large, modern bungalow, disappointingly right on the Barnet Road, the A411, which was busy and noisy. Still, Slider supposed, it was better for business not to be tucked away where passing trade could not take note of your existence. It did at least back on to open countryside – or in this case, open golf course, which in Hertfordshire amounted to much the same thing.

The bungalow was showing its age: the original wood-framed windows were in dire need of painting, the chimney needed repointing, and there were several slipped tiles among those on the roof. The wide front garden of the bungalow had been surfaced to make parking space, but it was cracking round the edges, and weeds were beginning to establish bridgeheads on it.

A sturdy signpost against the front wall announced
JUNE BYGOD PET GROOMING CLIPPING DYING SHOW SERVICES
, and a phone number. It, too, could do with repainting, Slider noted. A minivan, with the same words painted on its sides under a depiction of a show-cut poodle with its hair dyed pink and a pink bow on its head, was parked on the tarmac to one side, and on the other was a large black Range Rover with sheep bars on the front – a real Chelsea Tractor. Slider pulled up alongside it.

A dog started barking when he rang the doorbell, and since the door was glazed with reeded glass, he could see it prance into view from somewhere in the back of the house. When the door was opened it flung itself on him – a grey standard poodle with a suspiciously blue tinge to the grey of its coat, wearing a blue collar stuck with large imitation sapphires. It was as tall as a man when it stood on its hind legs, as it was only too happy to prove. It put its front feet joyously on Slider’s shoulders, bent on proving its Gallic credentials by French-kissing him.

‘It’s all right, he won’t hurt you,’ a voice trilled. ‘He’s only being friendly.’

Slider liked dogs, but he had no need of a saliva sample at this stage of the investigation. He pushed the poodle down firmly with a hand on its chest, projecting mastery, and it sat, gazing up at him adoringly. Atherton had the same sort of effect on women, he remembered, a trifle wistfully.

‘Down, Buffy, down,’ its owner commanded redundantly. ‘There, you see? He likes you.’

June Bygod was small and well-corseted, firm curves embraced by a two-piece Jersey suit in beige with blue trim. She had a tight, smoothly pink face, professionally made up, expensively styled wavy hair, light brown with blonde highlights, and a good deal of gold costume jewellery. She was smiling a professional smile, with a hint of teeth that were either capped or amazingly regular for her age, which he knew from the marriage certificate to be sixty. Under the make-up, he thought her face missed being attractive by some distance, but in day-to-day business transactions you would never realize it. Probably she had never been pretty, and had learned to make the best of things.

He got out his warrant card. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Slider of the Shepherd’s Bush CID,’ he said.

The Shepherd’s Bush bit did not seem to mean anything to her. ‘Oh yes?’ she said brightly. ‘Is it about a dog?’

‘I’m afraid I have some bad news, madam,’ Slider said. ‘May I come in?’

She blinked, and her mouth sagged into disappointed lines that seemed more natural than the smile. ‘Oh,’ she said, slightly crossly. ‘I thought you were a customer. Oh well, come in, then.’ She stepped back to let him in and shut the door. ‘Come through.’ The poodle pranced ahead of them, and she led the way through a narrow, parqueted hall to a sitting room at the back, with sliding French windows the whole width giving a view on to a very dull garden – lawn in the middle and shrubs round the edge – with a chicken-wired dog run and kennels at the end, and beyond them the verdant pastoral idyll of the ninth hole, 180 yards, dog leg right, par three.

The wallpaper was ambitiously patterned, as was the carpet: together they gave the same effect as when you rub your eyes too hard with the heels of your hands. The overstuffed three-piece suite and fake fireplace, glittery chandeliers and onyx-topped coffee-table reminded him of his ex-wife’s new home with her second husband, Ernie Newman, except that Irene’s stuff was all brand new, and this was old and somewhat worn. There was a strong smell of dog and a fainter one of cigarettes. The former was explained by the presence of an elderly dachshund and a greasy-looking Yorkshire terrier, curled up together on a rug on the sofa, the latter baring its teeth and emitting a low, rattling snarl. The cigarettes – since Mrs B did not herself smell of them – suggested Mr Buckland smoked.

‘So what’s all this about?’ she asked. ‘Please sit down.’ She waved him to an armchair facing the window. He sat, and the poodle immediately plonked itself in front of him, offering utter devotion if he felt inclined that way. ‘He seems to have taking a liking to you. Does he bother you?’

‘No, I like dogs,’ he said. Buffy, who evidently spoke human, responded by putting one paw on his knee. He removed it, gently but firmly. This relationship was going no further.

June Bygod, or Buckland, whatever she was now, sat on the sofa facing him, and thought from the direction of his eyes that he was looking out of the window over her shoulder. ‘Lovely view, isn’t it? We get the occasional golf ball coming in – one broke the bathroom window last year – but it’s a small price to pay for a vista like that on to open country.’ She said this without irony. She spoke with exaggerated refinement, like an early Mrs Thatcher, as if she were disguising a country accent with too much RP. Cruelty to vowel sounds, Slider thought. ‘So, how can I help you? Shepherd’s Bush, did you say? I don’t know anyone from Shepherd’s Bush.’ A little laugh. ‘Oh, except my ex-husband Lionel, but he’s Hammersmith, really. Anyway, I’m sure he hasn’t broken any laws. He’s not the type.’

She hadn’t heard, then? Well, thanks to the cottaging MP’s frailty, it hadn’t made the national dailies. ‘I’m very sorry to have to tell you that he’s dead,’ Slider said.

She looked at him alertly, head a little tilted, questioning frown. ‘Dead? When?’

‘He died on Tuesday. I’m afraid I have to inform you that he was murdered.’

You got a lot of reactions in the Job, but he wasn’t really expecting this one. She smiled. The smile was quickly removed, and she said, ‘Oh dear, I don’t mean to – of course, murder’s no smiling matter. But if you knew Lionel, you’d know how ridiculous that sounds. You must have got the wrong name somehow. Really, you’ve made a mistake. I mean, who on earth would ever want to murder Lionel?’

‘It’s no mistake. As to who would want to murder him – I was hoping you might be able to help me with that.’

‘What on earth do you mean?’ She seemed slightly affronted.

He responded to the urgent poodle eyes by gently scratching the curly poll as he answered. ‘Do you know of anyone who might have wanted to do him harm?’

‘No, of course not,’ she said, at once and firmly.

‘When did you last see him?’

‘Oh, I really can’t remember. Ages ago. I haven’t had anything to do with Lionel for years, not since we split up. We exchange Christmas cards, and that’s about it. I don’t know anything about his life now. We went our separate ways and that was that.’

‘That was because of the court case, wasn’t it? The Roxwell case.’

She frowned. ‘Oh, you know about that, do you? Well, it wasn’t so much the case as all the unpleasantness afterwards. The newspapers, and the reporters hanging around outside all the time. The terrible things they said.’ The strained RP was slipping, and she sounded more like a middle-class midlander now. ‘It wasn’t possible to have a normal life any more. That dreadful man, Derek Crondace—’ She paused. ‘You don’t think it was him who killed Lionel, do you? He threatened him most dreadfully at the time. It was one of the reasons I left. I saw no reason why I should be put in the firing line when I had nothing to do with any of it.’

‘It’s one of the possibilities we’re looking into,’ Slider said in the mildest possible way. He didn’t want her getting off on that. ‘You say you haven’t had any contact with him, other than Christmas cards? Did you part on bad terms, then?’

‘Oh,’ she said with a throwaway gesture, ‘not that, so much. I don’t think it was possible to be on bad terms with Lionel. He was the world’s mildest man – everyone took advantage of him. No, it wasn’t a bitter parting, I don’t mean that, but it was all over between us and there was no sense in pretending otherwise. I felt he’d ruined my life through his ridiculous crusade, and I wanted out. I wasn’t prepared to suffer alongside him while he rode out on his white horse, in his shining armour, especially when I didn’t agree with it.’

‘By crusade, you mean—?’

‘Defending undefendable criminals. Like that dreadful Roxwell man. He was so obviously guilty, he ought to have gone to prison for what he did, but Lionel got him off – and
used his own money to do it
! And let us in for all that dreadful – unpleasantness.’ She seemed dissatisfied with the word. ‘I can’t describe to you what it was like,’ she went on in a low voice. ‘All those horrible accusations. And then of course one started to wonder – well, whether there was anything in it.’

‘And was there?’

She hesitated, looking in his direction, but through him. ‘I don’t know,’ she said at last. ‘I’d never suspected anything like that before. He seemed normal enough to me. A bit milk-and-water, maybe. A bit over-polite, if you know what I mean. Sometimes a woman likes a little bit of, you know, the cave man to come out in her husband.’ She gave a coyly roguish smile that made Slider blench inwardly. ‘But of course I didn’t know where he was every hour of the day. And his practice meant he mixed with some pretty strange people. And why did he take up for Roxwell if he didn’t have some special sympathy for him? You had to ask. It did make me wonder whether he was just
too much
of a gentleman, if you get my drift. Well, once you start having doubts …’ She shrugged. ‘You can’t just dismiss them.’ She paused a moment. ‘Has he been getting up to anything like that in Shepherd’s Bush?’

‘We have no information to suggest he has.’ He changed direction. ‘How did you first meet him?’

‘My father was a solicitor, in Stamford, and Lionel did his training there. We met and fell in love – he was very handsome, tall, distinguished-looking. His father was a barrister, you know, and I always thought Lionel was wasted as a solicitor. He should have gone to the bar instead. He’d have looked so wonderful in the robes, in court. But he always said he was happier as a back-room boy. No ambition, that was his problem.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, we married, and Daddy made him a partner, and when Daddy retired he bought the practice. But he wanted to do more criminal work, so he sold it, we moved to London, and he set up there.’