The Maggie Murders (24 page)

Jane, whose own books overflowed
in haphazard stacks dotted around her already overcrowded new house, went to
investigate the impressive looking hardback volumes on the shelves. Complete
sets of the canonical authors filled the shelves on the left side of the room:
Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Pope, The Romantics, Scott, Austen, Dickens, The
Brontës, Collins, The Brownings, Tennyson, Trollope, Eliot, Hardy, and Kipling.
To her disappointment they weren’t first editions, but exquisitely bound
facsimiles. Unlike her well-thumbed, broken backed and heavily annotated
Penguins and Oxford Classics they didn’t appear to have been read – perused at
best. Some of the books, like the ones in Gatsby’s library were also embarrassingly
uncut. These literary heavyweights were literally that. They were augmented by
their historical, philosophical and scientific equivalents. Jane wondered how
many people had actually read ‘Gray’s Anatomy’? She knew it was one of the
great unread books at home, probably propping up the copy of ‘Ulysses’ she’d
also been meaning to finish for the last 20 years.

The bookcase filling the opposite
wall was more interesting to her, as it seemed to reflect the more personal
tastes of the Mallowans. One side was dominated by books to do with naval
history. These included a complete set of Jane’s ‘Fighting Ships’ and lots of
hardbacks which seemed to incorporate everything from triremes to Trident.
These were complemented by a range of novels which she would have categorised
as ‘Boy’s Own’ fiction. This time there were first editions, many with slight
tears, or creases on their dust jackets. The whole ‘Hornblower’ series seemed
to be there and there was also a first edition of Fleming’s ‘Dr No’ inscribed
by the author, alongside a signed copy of ‘The Cruel Sea’.

On the other side were whole
series of novels by the likes of Daphne Du Maurier, Mary Renault and R.F.
Delderfield. There was also a very impressive collection of Detective Fiction.
This included what must have been every volume by the Queen of Crime, Agatha
Christie, as one long shelf was filled with volumes containing the
investigations of Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot and the less celebrated pairing
of Tommy and Tuppence. The other English greats were also there: Conan-Doyle,
Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Margaret Allingham and Josephine Tey. The heirs
apparent were also there in volumes by both P.D. James and Ruth Rendell. The
more masculine world of hard boiled American Crime seemed to be in short supply,
although one volume by Dashiell Hammett had somehow managed to gate-crash the
party.

She was interrupted in her
browsing by Mrs Mallowan’s entrance.

For a woman who had just lost her
husband, the grieving widow was remarkably composed.

‘Many of them are rare first
editions and there’s a signed copy of ‘Rebecca’ somewhere. I’ve asked the maid
to bring us a pot of tea, won’t you be seated?’

She took the armchair opposite
Osborne.

A good looking man in his
twenties had followed her into the room; in one well-manicured hand he carried
a cane chair that he gallantly offered to Jane.

‘This is Jeremy Carberry. He’s my
lover, but then you were going to discover that very easily as he is also my
alibi.’

‘Forgive Margaret, she’s upset…’
the man hastily interrupted, although he did nothing to dissuade Jane of the
veracity of her statement, by standing beside the widow’s chair and caressing
her bare shoulders.

Jane tried to build a picture of
the poised and graceful woman in front of her. Margaret Mallowan benefited from
a slim, but not too tall figure, a finely drawn face and shoulder length ash
blonde hair. Her black dress emphasised her fine legs and graceful décolletage.
Although you could have speared seal cubs with the heels she was wearing; Jane
herself would never have considered wearing them, not that she’d have had enough
money in a month of Sundays to fritter away on such a pair. And her clothes
were so expensive that they didn’t shout money. A jade bracelet set off the
well-toned skin of her arm and her fingers were long and elegantly manicured –
not the type of hand which Jane could easily imagine pouring petrol through a
letterbox. She knew from her notes that Mrs Mallowan was only just past forty,
yet at an identity parade she would have guessed that most people would have
placed her as no more than thirty.

The Filipino maid diverted Jane’s
attention by bringing in an elegant silver tea service and fine bone china
cups. Mrs Mallowan immediately began a performance of sorting out who wanted
what and how they liked it. Jane was impressed by her coolness.

‘Don’t listen to Jez, he’s just
trying to protect me, it’s one of the things I find so appealing in young men.‘

‘And the other being what, Mrs
Mallowan?’

‘Please call me Maggie and I’m
sure a good detective like yourself must know what we women find so appealing
in young men, sergeant?’ she said casting a mischievous look at the clearly
discomfited Osborne.

Jane was struggling to maintain
her equanimity. When had British women become so direct? Had she missed some
cultural watershed about it now being the time to be unashamed about your sex
life? First it had been Connie Baker and now it was Maggie Mallowan guiltlessly
boasting about their lovers. She must have missed the fax about the British no
longer repressing their feelings.

 ‘You’ve seen my library,
Inspector. I’ve read too many whodunits to think it would be any use hiding
anything from the police. Why play the grieving widow one moment and then look
like the prime suspect the next when you ask me for my alibi?’

Osborne seemed so enchanted by
her that he hadn’t bothered to correct her demotion of him, though perhaps he
was just naturally laissez-faire over things like that? Jane certainly hadn’t
expected a man as erudite and sophisticated as Simon to be taken in by a woman
like this.

‘It’s the truth, Maggie and I
spent last night together,’ offered the tanned man standing behind her.

Jane placed Jez Carberry as
around 24 or 25. In his chinos, polo shirt and moccasins he looked very much
like the dissolute heir to a family fortune – mind you his sugar mummy may well
have paid for the clobber; it certainly wasn’t High Street fashion.  Tall and
athletic he had the build of a surfer, or oarsman. His grey eyes, high cheek
bones and soft brown hair were certainly making her own pulse run a little bit
more quickly.

‘Was this here?’

‘I’m not a complete bitch, Sergeant.
Jez has one of the new apartments down by the canal. It’s also where he runs
his business from; he’s not just a pretty face.’

‘And where did your husband think
you were last night?’ Osborne had recovered enough of his equanimity to join in
the interview.

‘After nearly 10 years of
marriage, we’d stopped asking questions. I assumed if I was out for the night
he might take advantage of my absence and enjoy a night with Lin.’

‘Lin?’

‘Our maid, she showed you in. I
caught the two of them at it last year.’

‘You didn’t think of a divorce?’

‘A little over the top, don’t you
think? It’s not as if he was screwing my best friend! We have separate bedrooms
anyway – always the secret to a successful marriage to my mind and so if he
needed to occasionally get his rocks off with that oriental slut I wasn’t going
to go through all the kerfuffle of washing our dirty laundry in the divorce
courts.’

‘You could have fired her?’

‘Have you tried finding a good
servant today, Inspector? Lin’s been our third maid in five years. If I thought
it had been anything more than an old man having a quick fumble, then I might
have done, instead I took comfort in Jez.’

‘You don’t seem very put out by
your husband’s murder, ‘observed Osborne.

‘I’m not in the habit of crying
in front of strangers, but I’m also not going to pretend our marriage was
anything other than it was. We had some good years together, but it wasn’t a
love affair.’

‘You became his beautiful young
wife and he…?’ asked Jane.

‘Gave me some security for the
business I was running.’

‘Scandalabra?’

‘He helped me set it up and get
it running.’

‘And that was worth marrying him
for? You could have gone to a bank!’

The DCS was clearly finding Mrs
Mallowan’s disarming honesty as difficult to take as Spilsbury had found Connie
Baker’s answers in their last investigation thought Jane.

‘Let’s just say we were like
Charles and Diana, we made a good beginning together.’

‘Do you know of any enemies that
he may have had?’

‘He must have pissed a few people
off; he was a property developer after all. Yet I was under the impression you
were trying to find some sort of maniac? The press have been phoning up all day
trying to get a quote. Aren’t you supposed to be catching this ‘Rub-a-dub’
killer?’

‘It’s one of the leads we’re
looking at.’

‘If there’s one thing I do feel
bad about, it’s having cast him as the candlestick-maker in these absurd
killings. If it hadn’t been for my shops he wouldn’t have been…’

For the first time Maggie
Mallowan appeared upset. Jane watched Osborne watching Carberry console his
lover. She wondered what the DCS was making of this performance.  Sitting there
in his tailored blue suit he seemed more collected than before, perhaps this
was because Mrs Mallowan was now conforming to how he expected women to react
to tragic news?  And yet however charming she found the Super, she still felt
he was a little unworldly when it came to women. She blamed the minor public
school he’d been sent to. Osborne picked up on Jane’s gaze and waved an elegant
hand towards the library door, finding it easy to adjust to his wave-length she
left discreetly to ask the maid a few searching questions.

****

Back in the incident room, DC
Sandy Clark was frantically trying to contact Jane, when DCI Jordan demanded to
know what was going on. Given Jordan was nominally the SIO on the Mallowan
murder, Sandy felt unable to prevaricate, although she would have preferred to
give Jane first dibs on the information she had turned up. The fact that Jordan
was already rifling through the reports on her desk, ensured she had little
option but to spill the beans.

‘Connie Baker was in England on
the night of the murder, sir.’

The DCI replaced the folder on
Sandy’s desk and tried to process this revelation.

‘But we were led to believe she’s
living abroad, Spain wasn’t it?’

‘She has a house in Majorca,
sir.’

‘Then what on earth was she doing
back here?’

‘Her father died suddenly; his
funeral was in Hampshire a couple of days before the Mallowan murder. She flew
back to Palma on the Friday night.’

‘Good work Cindy!’

Before Sandy had time to correct
her boss, Jordan was off in search of Dent with the news. It might be the
fillip both of them needed. For Jordan it would show that it was actually his
team and not Osborne’s which was in charge of the case, whilst the Chief
Constable would be more than delighted with any news which helped support his
previous decision to prosecute Connie.

Having been door stopped by
Debbie after the press conference, Jane felt the very least she could do for
this kindred spirit was to meet up for a drink.  And so over a bottle of Rioja
in one of the fashionable wine bars which had sprung up all over central
Exeter, they resumed a working friendship last picked over in Exmouth six years
before and only supported by an irregular Christmas card or postcard since. The
Christmas cards were mostly from Jane (though usually organised by Tim who
tended to be better about making sure she stayed in touch with people from
outside the force), whilst the postcards had been mainly from Debbie: pictures
of Jerusalem, Vancouver, Rio and Delhi had all been pinned to their kitchen cupboards
- a host of exotic destinations Jane could only dream of visiting. Although
they had managed a fortnight in Spain before Max’s arrival and a brochure on
Tuscany had been tickling her fancy over the weekend.

Debbie Rowe had matured into a
beautiful, young woman. The biker jacket and jeans were still there, but there
was a poise and elegance which made her seem more sophisticated than on their
last meeting. Her red hair had now become a fashionable blonde bob and the
discreet application of make-up emphasised the fine lines of her face and her
sea blue eyes.

‘Well, fuck me! You’ve grown even
more gorgeous!’ Jane smiled as Debbie made her belated entrance into
Hanrahan’s.

Heads were certainly turning as
the free-lance journalist turned a very shapely bottom in their direction,
before sliding her long, legs under the table.

‘I would if I was that way
inclined,’ Debbie smiled, kissing Jane’s cheek.

‘So London hasn’t corrupted you?’

‘The Armenian man running my
local bistro has been given first dibs if ever I find myself getting too lonely
up there.’

‘No City boy’s swept you off your
feet with his massive mobile and large Rolex, then?’

‘A few had their chance, but I
threw them back in the sea after having my fun with them.’

Jane didn’t know if it was
jealousy, or admiration she felt at Debbie’s breezy confidence. She had no real
reason to be discontent with her life, and yet a chance to rediscover the
careless years of her youth sometimes made her nostalgic for a freedom from
responsibility she had too rarely enjoyed. Seizing the bottle she filled
Debbie’s glass and topped up her own.

‘And how are Tim and the kids?’
Debbie enquired; and felt glad she could use the plural, as the name and gender
of Jane’s youngest always eluded her.

‘Tim’s Tim – as ever. Jen’s
wondering whether to go travelling, or go to uni. Leo’s now decided he wants to
be a landscape gardener and Max is now at the toddling stage – though I suspect
it’s the Maggie Murders you’re more interested in, than catching up with family
matters?’

Debbie was too good a journalist,
as well as having too good a heart to let that remark pass unchallenged. She
immediately demanded that Jane showed her all the latest photos of the Hawkins
clan, and then made all the right noises about how lovely mini Max looked –
even though she could never honestly get that worked up over pictures of other
people’s kids (sometimes she feared the maternal gene had been overlooked when
she was born).  She also remembered the crucial point of complimenting Jane on
how quickly she had shed her baby weight. The last part was not even flattery,
as Jane looked remarkably well for a career mum with three kids.

Set at ease by Debbie’s banter
and enjoying a rare evening out, Jane sipped her wine contentedly, as   the bar
was bathed in the warm, convivial glow of people escaping the colder days
outside and using the excuse of the ever earlier nightfall for a pre-Christmas
drink.

‘And what about Shaft?’

Jane looked bemused for a moment,
before she realised it was Debbie’s ironic allusion to her own former naivety
when asking for an interview with Sobers back in the days of the Kellow Case.

‘He’s up in your part of the
world now, left us country bumpkins for the smoke…’

‘I’ll have to look him up
sometime.’

‘You’ll never guess what he’s up
to?’ Jane sallied.

‘Vicar?’

Jane was baffled – how on earth
had Debbie come up with it? She’d been surprised when Derek had told her his
intention to enter the Church, but how had Debbie discovered it?

‘You bumped into him in London?’
she ventured.

Debbie smiled.

‘Nah… It’s too big a place for
that! He told me once, off the record, that was what he would have done, if he
hadn’t joined the police. Glad to find out he did –how’s he enjoying it?’

‘I’ll let you know – I’m meeting
him for lunch on Friday; I’ll give him your regards.’

‘Personal or professional?’
probed Debbie.

Jane didn’t feel ready to discuss
her reasons for wanting to see Derek and so decided to take the initiative instead
-

‘So what does a bright young
journalist want to know about the Maggie Murders?’

 ‘The Butcher, The Baker and the
Candlestick-maker will be the headline the tabloids will be running with
tomorrow.’

‘Rub-a-dub-dub three men in a
pub, ‘smiled Jane finishing her glass, ‘and yes I know it’s tub in the
original!’

‘Well one version is actually
“Hey! Rub-a-dub-dub three maids in a tub and who do you think was there? The
butcher, the baker the candlestick-maker, and all of them gone to the fair!”’

‘The one I was taught was
“Rub-a-dub-dub, Three men in a tub, and who do you think they be? The butcher,
the baker, the candlestick-maker, turn them out, knaves all three.’

 Debbie topped their glasses up.

‘Well, it’s quite common for
nursery rhymes to have more than one version.‘

‘They all include a butcher, a
baker and a candlestick-maker,’ noted Jane ‘though it’s the final trade which
seems so dated today.’

‘I don’t know, so many local
butchers and bakers seem to have been replaced by supermarkets nowadays, perhaps
they’ll be just as anachronistic as candlestick-makers by the Millennium.’

‘Gerald Mallowan wasn’t exactly a
candlestick-maker though, more of a property developer.‘

‘But he was the finance behind
Scandalabra. A colleague of mine ran a piece on his wife a few years back. She
was in line for one of those Local Business Woman of the Year type awards. He
dug up the financial records of the company and found out Mallowan Developments
was where her capital came from. They got married in 1980 and she opened her
first shop in Exeter in ’82. You could argue his money and support helped kick
start the business.’

 ‘Some of their stuff was
supposed to be a little bit saucy too, wasn’t it?’

‘Not if you’ve seen any of the
shops in Soho,’ laughed Debbie ‘I think they tried to drum up a bit of a
marketing buzz by selling a few risqué prints and some glossy coffee table
books with  a few tastefully photographed black and white nudes, but nothing to
seriously outrage the good burghers of Exeter.’

‘Nursery rhymes always seem to
have bits in them about knaves and maids,‘ mused Jane sipping on her wine.

‘The version I know of the rhyme
might have been about a satire on sexual mores in the Middle Ages...’

‘A nursery rhyme about medieval
sex?’ Jane spluttered, nearly snorting wine down her nose.

‘Well the butcher, the baker and
the candlestick-maker would have represented respectable tradesmen in times
past. The type of businesses every village would have once had. Good middle
class capitalists propping up the so called decent society.’

‘In the days when we still had a
society…‘

‘Well Thatcher might think
there’s no such thing as society, but in the past businesses like her father’s
grocer shop would have been one of the key focal points of most local
communities.’

‘Okay, so you’ve convinced me
it’s about successful businessmen in the days of Robin Hood and Friar Tuck, but
where does the sex come into it and don’t even start me on what Maid Marion
might have been doing with those merry men!’ giggled Jane.

 ‘Well, if those three respectable
citizens were going to the fair to see three virgins taking a bath…’

‘Then we’d have quite a scandal,’
finished Jane.

‘Rub-a-dub-dub three maids in a
tub…’

‘So it really might be about a
sex scandal?’ speculated Jane as she signalled to the waitress for another
bottle, ‘although I suppose in those days men did marry much younger girls whom
they expected to be virgins and so perhaps we’re just reading too much into
it…’

‘What if the ‘maids’ meant
underage girls to our killer?’ queried Debbie.

‘Well that would stir up a
hornets’ nest! But George Kellow was gay and Calum Baker was disabled.’

‘Now don’t be prejudiced!‘ mocked
Debbie ‘The physically challenged also have their vices.’

Jane smiled at the light-hearted rebuke;
the boot was on the other foot now.

‘What about if the men were
knaves, or corrupt in some other way?’

‘Well there’s a men’s magazine
called Knave, it’s one of those top-shelf titles popular with the Dirty Mac
brigade.‘

‘I know; I used to write for one
of them!’

Jane snorted her wine up her nose
a second time. By the time she had recovered she could see Debbie laughing.

‘Girl’s got to make a living
somehow!’

‘What on earth did you write?’

‘All those letters supposedly
detailing how ordinary men just happened to have ridiculously fantastic sexual
encounters with strange, but conveniently stunning and up for it women. You
know the type: “I was repairing a washing machine for a bored housewife, when
she suddenly smiled at me and asked if I’d prefer to do the screwing in the
kitchen or in the bedroom…”

‘They’re made up!’

‘Course they’re bloody made up!’

Jane smiled as she noticed a man
in a Santa Claus hat at the bar was giving them a disapproving look. Clearly
women were still expected to be seen and not heard in this bar.

‘Maybe it was disapproval of
their sex lives? Kellow served time for public indecency back in the Fifties
and Baker liked the idea of his wife playing away…’suggested Jane.

Debbie raised an enquiring look.

‘And off the record the
Mallowan’s marriage quite firmly puts the scandal in Scandalabra. Though if you
want to try getting that from the scarcely grieving widow, well rather you than
me.’

‘So that gives me something to
play with. A gay man and a cuckold… Now what if I find out Gerald Mallowan was
into underage girls?’

‘You’ve got my number!’

****

Far from discovering that Gerald
Mallowan had a dark side, DCI Jordan was finding out that the deceased was in
fact a pillar of the community. The only deviant thing about him in the present
climate was that he went to church every Sunday. Another pertinent fact was
that he also belonged to the same club as the Chief Constable and was on first
name terms with him.

Lin Ng, the maid, had been very
embarrassed when he tried to verify if she’d ever had a sexual relationship
with her employer. Hawkins had reported that there was nothing in it, but
Jordan liked to be thorough and brought her down to the station for a more
formal interview. He’d also insisted on a police interpreter being present,
despite Ng not requesting one. Hawkins might have been convinced by her polite
smile and broken English, but he wanted to be sure; even if it had meant a
three hour wait to find someone who was qualified to interpret.

 He wasn’t usually so bloody
minded, but he put it down to his annoyance at Osborne’s decision to allow
Hawkins far more leg room in this current case than he thought she deserved.
He’d thought of making a complaint to Dent about it; however his reading of the
latest station gossip had convinced him it might be a better idea keeping on
the right side of Osborne for the moment.  Still very much on the right side of
forty, Jordan had made his fairly rapid rise through the ranks by knowing which
horse to back and which to drop.

The only thing a three way
conversation with the maid had brought to light was her illegal status in the
UK and propensity for bursting into tears every time he asked another question.
The victim’s worst crime seemed to be paying his staff cash in hand and
avoiding the payment of tax and national insurance. Well at least he’d help
improve the quotas for clearing up crimes, the Chief Constable would be pleased
by that and Dent was still in charge for now.

As for the information he’d dug
up on Connie Baker, it hadn’t been the smoking gun he thought it was at the
time. Dent was less than exhilarated at his news, as it meant they would still
be unable to prosecute Connie a second time for the murder of her husband, even
if they got her bang to rights for the other killings. The Chief Constable had
seemed especially wary about starting a potential witch hunt against Mrs Baker
and kept worrying away about how bringing Connie in for further questioning
would play with the media…

Jordan was further discomfited by
the unexpected arrival of Osborne and his revelation that Connie Baker had an
even more watertight alibi for the night in question than their previous
assumption that she’d been in another country. It transpired she’d been caught
speeding in a hire car at two in the morning by the Sussex police on the night
in question; given that a conservative estimate for the start of the blaze was
shortly after midnight, she would have needed to have been Stirling Moss to
have set the fire and got back to the vicinity of her airport hotel in that
time.

The fact that Osborne credited
Hawkins for the discovery of this alibi had made the revelation doubly
distasteful for Jordan.

****

I is for Irish

Well the luck of the Irish;
not that they’ve had much luck since she’s been in power! Conversely, I’ve
always enjoyed the rub of the green since her election.