Pretty Maids All In A Row (26 page)

'It's my fault, what's happened,' Davis said in a choked voice. 'She—he—oh God—watched me clean the gun. I propped it against the wall and locked the door as I always do, but she saw me put the key in the churn. If it hadn't been for that—'

'He'd have found another, perhaps more painful, way,' Webb said. 'He was a confessed murderer, Mr Davis.' That much, Sally'd repeated over the phone. 'He'd have spent the next twenty years in jail, and he couldn't face it. When he knew it was up, he made his choice.'

Davis shook his head as the other aspect of the shock took precedence. 'I can't take it in.
Delia!
God, it's foul!'

Webb couldn't contradict him. The old couple, the farmer and his wife, sat at the table with glazed eyes. 'Cruel, that's what it is!' Mrs Davis said, and Webb noted for the first time her expertly waved hair. 'Cruel and filthy, leading our boy on like that.'

'No, Ma, she—he didn't. I never had any encouragement.'

The woman snorted, looked up at Webb. 'Does Carrie know he's dead?' 'Not yet.'

'Poor girl. And her expecting, too.'

Webb motioned Jackson into a corner. 'I'll stay here and wait for the team, Ken. Go back to Hinckley's, collect Mrs Selby and take her wherever she wants to go. She can't spend the night in that cottage. Preferably leave her with friends. Then take Sally with you and find Mrs Speight. Tell her the barest details and leave Sally with her. If I'm tied up too late here, I'll see her in the morning.'

And now it was the morning, and church bells ringing through the village proclaimed it Sunday. Two weeks exactly since the body of Freda Cowley had been found in the ditch.

With a heavy heart, Webb seated himself in the Speights' neat little house.

'I've made coffee,' Carrie said. She was unnaturally calm. Face white as paper, eyes black-circled from lack of sleep, but composed and dignified.

Webb said gently, 'Tell me what happened, Mrs Speight. From the beginning.'

She folded her hands in her lap like an obedient child. 'I've known Johnnie all my life. He always loved dressing up. I used to think he'd be an actor, he was so good at it. He was only a year older than me, and when we were about fifteen we used to go to the pictures as two girls. We thought it was a joke. But we were always sweethearts. There was nothing—funny—about him.'

'Go on.'

'We married when I was twenty and him twenty-one. He'd finished his training and got a job in Ashmartin, so we went to live there. He still dressed in my clothes about the house, but I was used to it by then.'

'You spoke so convincingly of him as your sister.'

She gave a sad little smile. 'When he dressed like that, he became another person. I even
thought
of him as Delia.'

Webb nodded slowly. He'
d heard wives of other transves
tites say that.

'But after a bit I noticed something. Every now and then he'd get restless, like, and go out by himself. He wouldn't take me with him—said he was meeting friends from the salon. After one of these times, there was a report of a rape in the paper. I didn't think anything, but later, I found he'd cut the piece out and hidden it in his drawer.'

She looked up pleadingly. 'He couldn't help it, Mr Webb. It was an illness, to do with the moon. At full moon, he needed to—well. For a long time I daren't tell him I knew, and when I did he went wild. But then he was nearly caught, and we both panicked. We decided to move, and that was when he changed round. He became Delia outside and Johnnie at home. And we—we came here.'

'You seemed so established, I thought you'd been here all your lives.' A major oversight, that. He should have checked.

She nodded. 'We had services to offer, Johnnie with his hairdressing and me with my cleaning, so we were accepted quicker than most. Anyway, I got some Valium and made him take them every month for the four days the moon was full. I told people Delia had migraines at that time of the month. And it worked. When Mrs Daly was attacked, I was sure it wasn't Johnnie. But he'd stopped taking the pills. Killing Mrs Cowley had got him all worked up again and he needed the excitement. Like a drug, he said.' She paused. 'I think I knew, then, it was only a matter of time. We couldn't have gone on much longer.'

'What will you do now?' Webb asked quietly.

'Stay here. It's the only home I have, and my ladies have been very kind.'

'You'll be all right?'

She nodded. 'I've got the baby to think of now.' Would she, Jackson wondered, be able to sing it nursery rhymes? 'So if that's all, Chief Inspector?'

'For the moment, yes. Miss Pierce will stay, if you'd like.'

'No, thank you. I'd rather be alone.'

So they left her in the neat little house, alone with her memories. Though how they could be any comfort to her, Webb couldn't imagine.

From the Markhams' guest-room window, Jessica watched the police car leave the village, and some of her tension eased. It was over, then.

The events of the previous night, ceaselessly replayed in her mind during a sleepless night, now had about them the distance and unreality of a dream. The sick horror of Speight's revelation, the dawning recognition that she was indeed to be his victim, all now were mercifully blanketed by disbelief. And although when Matthew arrived she'd have to go through it again, it would have no personal relevance.

Yet she knew this respite was temporary. The incidents that had taken place in this village would haunt her for months to come. It would be a long time before she'd remember them with composure, even longer before they were sufficiently absorbed to be incorporated harmlessly in her dramatic repertoire. Only then would the healing be complete.

The sound of an approaching car punctured her abstraction and she rose awkwardly, gripping the sill, in time to see Matthew turn into the drive. Closing her eyes briefly, Jessica drew a breath of pure thankfulness. Then, with a sense of balance restored, she opened the bedroom door.