The Breaker (27 page)

I was neither hurt nor surprised by his confession. James and I have been married a long time, and I knew perfectly well that he was having a relationship with someone else. He has never been a good liar. My only emotion was relief that he had finally decided to clear the air. I felt no animosity toward Kate Hill-Sumner for the following reasons.

It may sound insensitive, but I would not have regarded it as the worst misfortune that could have happened to me to lose the man I had lived with for thirty-three years. Indeed, in some ways I would have welcomed it as an opportunity to start a new life, free of duty and responsibility. Prior to the events of 1993-94 James was a conscientious father and husband, but his family had always taken second place to his personal ambitions and desires. When I realized that he was having an affair, I made discreet inquiries about the financial position should divorce become inevitable, and satisfied myself that a division of our property would allow me considerable freedom. I renewed my career as a teacher some ten years ago, and my salary is an adequate one. I have also made sensible pension provisions for myself. As a result, I would certainly have agreed to a divorce had James asked for one. My children are grown up, and while they would be unhappy at the thought of their parents separating, I knew that James would continue to be interested in them.

I explained all this to James in the spring of 1994, and showed him the correspondence I had had with my solicitor and my accountant. I believe it concentrated his mind on the choices open to him, and I am confident that he put aside any thought of attempting to rekindle the affair with Kate Hill-Sumner. I hope I don't flatter myself when I say it came as a shock to him to realize that he could no longer take my automatic presence in his life for granted, and that he took this possibility rather more seriously than he took his relationship with Kate Hill-Sumner. I can say honestly that I have no lingering resentment toward James or Kate because it was I who was empowered by the experience. I have a great deal more confidence in myself and my future as a result.

I was aware that William and Kate Hill-Sumner had a child sometime in autumn 1994. By simple calculation, I recognized that the child could have been my husband's. However, I did not discuss the issue with him. Nor Indeed with anyone else. I could see no point in causing further unhappiness to the parties involved, particularly the child.

I have never met Kate Hill-Sumner or her husband.

Vivienne Purdy

*19*

Inside Broxton House, Nick Ingram abandoned both women in the kitchen to put through a call to the incident room at Winfrith. He spoke to Detective Superintendent Carpenter, and gave him details of Harding's activities that morning. "He's been taken to the Poole hospital, sir. I shall be questioning him later about the assault, but meanwhile you might want to keep an eye on him. He's not likely to go anywhere in the short term because his arm needs stitching, but I'd say he's out of control now or he wouldn't have attacked Miss Jenner."

"What was he trying to do? Rape her?"

"She doesn't know. She says she shouted at him when her horse bolted, so he slapped her and knocked her to the ground."

"Mmm." Carpenter thought for a moment. "I thought you and John Galbraith decided he was interested in little boys."

"I'm ready to be proved wrong, sir."

There was a dry chuckle at the other end. "What's the first rule of policing, son?"

"Always keep an open mind, sir."

"Legwork first, lad. Conclusions second." There was another brief silence. "The DI's gone off in hot pursuit of William Sumner after reading your fax. He won't be at all pleased if Harding's our man after all."

"Sorry, sir. If you can give me a couple of hours to go back to the headland, I'll see if I can find out what he was up to. It'll be quicker than sending any of your chaps down."

But he was delayed by the wretched state of the two Jenner women. Celia was in such pain she was unable to sit down, and so she stood in the middle of the kitchen, legs splayed and leaning forward on her two sticks, looking more like an angry praying mantis than a crab. Meanwhile, Maggie's teeth chattered nonstop from delayed shock. "S-s-sorry," she kept saying, as she took a filthy, evil-smelling horse blanket from the scullery and draped it around her shoulders, "I'm j-just s-s-so c-cold."

Unceremoniously, Ingram shoved her onto a chair beside the Aga and told her to stay put while he dealt with her mother. "Right," he said to Celia, "are you going to be more comfortable lying down in bed or sitting up in a chair?"

"Lying down," she said.

"Then I'll set up a bed on the ground floor. Which room do you want it in?"

"I don't," she said mutinously. "It'll make me look like an invalid."

He crossed his arms and frowned at her. "I haven't got time to argue about this, Mrs. Jenner. There's no way you can get upstairs, so the bed has to come to you." She didn't answer. "All right," he said, heading for the hall. "I'll make the decision myself."

"The drawing room," she called after him. "And take the bed out of the room at the end of the corridor."

Her reluctance, he realized, had more to do with her unwillingness to let him go upstairs than fear of being seen as an invalid. He had had no idea how desperate their plight was until he saw the wasteland of the upper floor. The doors stood open to every room, eight in all, and there wasn't a single piece of furniture in any but Celia's. The smell of long-lying dust and damp permeating through an unsound roof stung his nostrils, and he wasn't surprised that Celia's health had begun to suffer. He was reminded of Jane Fielding's complaints about selling the family heirlooms to look after her parents-in-law, but their situation was princely compared with this.

The room at the end of the corridor was obviously Celia's own, and her bed probably the only one left in the house. It took him less than ten minutes to dismantle and reassemble it in the drawing room, where he set it up close to the French windows, overlooking the garden. The view was hardly inspiring, just another wasteland, untended and uncared for, but the drawing room at least retained some of its former glory, with all its paintings and most of its furniture still intact. He had time to reflect that few, if any, of Celia's acquaintances could have any idea that the hall and the drawing room represented the extent of her remaining worth. But what sort of madness made people live like this? he wondered. Pride? Fear of their failures being known? Embarrassment?

He returned to the kitchen. "How are we going to do this?" he asked her. "The hard way or the easy way?"

Tears of pain squeezed between her lids. "You really are the most provoking creature," she said. "You're determined to take away my dignity, aren't you?"

He grinned as he put one arm under her knees and the other behind her back, and lifted her gently. "Why not?" he murmured. "It may be my only chance to get even."
 

I don't want to talk to you," said William Sumner angrily, barring the front door to DI Galbraith. Hectic spots of color burned in his cheeks, and he kept tugging at the fingers of his left hand as he spoke, cracking the joints noisily. "I'm sick of the police treating my house like a damn thoroughfare, and I'm sick of answering questions. Why can't you just leave me alone?"

"Because your wife's been murdered, sir," said Galbraith evenly, "and we're trying to find out who killed her. I'm sorry if you're finding that difficult to cope with but I really do have no option."

"Then talk to me here. What do you want to know?"

The DI glanced toward the road, where an interested group of spectators was gathering. "We'll have the press here before you know it, William," he said dispassionately. "Do you want to discuss your alleged alibi in front of an audience of journalists?"

Sumner's jittery gaze jumped toward the crowd at his gate. "This isn't fair. Everything's so bloody public. Why can't you make them go away?"

"They'll go of their own accord if you let me in. They'll stay if you insist on keeping me on the doorstep. That's human nature, I'm afraid."

With a haunted expression, Sumner seized the policeman's arm and pulled him inside. Pressure was beginning to take its toll, thought Galbraith, and gone was the self-assured, if tired, man of Monday. It meant nothing in itself. Shock took time to absorb, and nerves invariably began to fray when successful closure to a case remained elusive. He followed Sumner into the sitting room and, as before, took a seat on the sofa.

"What do you mean,
alleged
alibi?" the man demanded, preferring to stand. "I was in Liverpool, for God's sake. How could I be in two places at once?"

The DI opened his briefcase and extracted some papers. "We've taken statements from your colleagues, hotel employees at the Regal, and librarians at the university library. None of them supports your claim that you were in Liverpool on Saturday night." He held them out. "I think you should read them."

Witness statement: Harold Marshall, MD Campbell Ltd., Lee Industrial Estate, Lichfield, Staffordshire
I remember seeing William at lunch on Saturday, 9 August 1997. We discussed a paper in last week's
Lancet
about stomach ulcers. William says he's working on a new drug that will beat the current frontrunner into a cocked hat. I was skeptical, and we had quite a debate. No, I didn't see him at the dinner that evening, but then I wouldn't expect to. He and I have been attending these conferences for years, and it'll be a red-letter day when William decides to let his hair down and join the rest of us for some lighthearted entertainment. He was certainly at lunch on Sunday, because we had another argument on the ulcer issue.

Witness statement: Paul Dimmock, Research Chemist, Wryton's, Holborae Way, Colchester, Essex
I saw William at about 2:00 p.m. Saturday afternoon. He said he was going to the university library to do some research, which is par for the course for him. He never goes to conference dinners. He's only interested in the intellectual side, hates the social side. My room was two doors down from his. I remember seeing the do not disturb notice on the door, when I went up to bed about half past midnight, but I've no idea when he got back. I had a drink with him before lunch on Sunday. No, he didn't seem at all tired. Matter of fact he was in better form than usual. Positively cheerful, in fact.

Witness statement: Anne Smith, Research Chemist, Bristol University, Bristol
I didn't see him at all on Saturday, but I had a drink with
him
and Paul Dimmock on Sunday morning. He gave a paper on Friday afternoon, and I was interested in some of the things he said. He's researching the drug treatment of stomach ulcers, and it sounds like good stuff.

Witness statement: Jane Riley, Librarian, University Library, Liverpool
(Shown a photograph of William Sumner) Quite a few of the conference members came into the library on Saturday, but I don't remember seeing this man. That doesn't mean he wasn't here. As long as they have a conference badge and know what they're looking for, they have free access.

Witness statement: Carrie Wilson, Chambermaid, Regal Hotel, Liverpool
I remember the gentleman in number two-two-three-flve. He was very tidy, unpacked his suitcase, and put everything away in the drawers. Some of them don't bother. I finished about midday on Saturday, but I made up his room when he went down to breakfast and I didn't see him afterward. Sunday morning, there was a do not disturb notice on his door so I left him to sleep. As I recall, he went down at about 11:30, and I made up his room then. Yes, his bed had certainly been slept in. There were science books scattered all over it, and I think he must have been doing some studying. I remember thinking he wasn't so tidy after all.

Witness statement: Les Allen, Librarian, University Library, Liverpool
(Shown a photograph of William Sumner) He came in on Friday morning. I spent about half an hour with him. He wanted papers on peptic and duodenal ulcers, and I showed him where to find them. He said he'd be back on Saturday, but I didn't notice him. It's a big place. I only ever notice the people who need help.

Witness statement: David Forward, Concierge, Regal Hotel, Liverpool
We have limited parking facilities, and Mr. Sumner reserved a parking space at the same time as he reserved his room. He was allocated number thirty-four, which is at the back of the hotel. As far as I'm aware, the car remained there from Thursday 7 to Monday 11. We ask guests to leave a set of keys with us, and Mr. Sumner didn't retrieve his until Monday. Yes, he could certainly have driven his car out if he had a spare set. There are no barriers across the exit.

"You see our problem?" asked Galbraith when Sumner had read them. "There's a period of twenty-one hours, from two o'clock on Saturday till eleven thirty on Sunday, when no one remembers seeing you. Yet the first three statements were made by people whom you told us would give you a cast-iron alibi."

Sumner looked at him in bewilderment. "But I was there," he insisted. "One of them must have seen me." He stabbed a finger at Paul Dimmock's statement. "I met up with Paul in the foyer. I told him I was going to the library, and he walked part of the way with me. That had to be well after two o'clock. Dammit, at two o'clock I was still arguing the toss with that bloody fool Harold Marshall."

Galbraith shook his head. "Even if it was four o'clock, it makes no difference. You proved on Monday that you can do the drive to Dorset in five hours."