The Poisoning in the Pub (8 page)

The table at which she sat was surrounded by eight chairs, suggesting that at least sometimes the residents ate communally. She waited nearly five minutes before Ray appeared in the doorway.

He was slight and very short, not much more than five foot. He couldn’t have been much use at the Crown and Anchor when it came to heavy lifting, but then Jude had
already decided that Ted Crisp’s support for the man was pure – if embarrassed – philanthropy. It was difficult to estimate Ray’s age. There was a boyishness about his
reddish hair, but the pale skin of his face was etched with a tracery of deep lines. And his eyes looked older than the rest of his body. Older and slightly disengaged. It was from the eyes that
one might deduce that he had mental problems.

He wore grubby black jeans and a thin green cotton blouson, over a T-shirt for a tour of some female singer Jude didn’t recognize. His expression was cautious, but not unwelcoming.

‘Hello, I’m Jude.’

‘That’s what Kelly-Marie said you was.’ He lingered in the doorway, not yet certain about entering the kitchen. ‘She also said,’ he went on, ‘that you was my
girlfriend. But I know that’s not true. Because if I had a girlfriend, I’d have seen her before, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before.’

He spoke this long speech cautiously, as though he were speaking in a language that was unfamiliar to him.

‘You might have seen me in the street,’ Jude suggested. ‘I do live in Fethering.’

Ray considered this proposition for a moment, then advanced a little way into the room. ‘Kelly-Marie didn’t really think you was my girlfriend. She was joking. She makes lots of
jokes at me.’ But he spoke without rancour. And a broad smile spread across his face, completely transforming his appearance. Smiling seemed to come naturally to him. It was expressing other
moods that he found difficult.

He seemed by now to have made the decision that Jude did not represent a threat, so he moved right into the room and put his hand on the back of the chair next to hers. ‘Would you like tea
or coffee? I can make tea or coffee,’ he added with a vestige of pride in his voice. He moved towards the fridge he shared with Viggo.

‘Are you having some?’

Her question prompted another moment of deliberation before Ray decided that he wasn’t.

‘Then I won’t bother. Do please sit down.’

He did as he was told, seeming almost relieved that someone was making a decision for him. He sat quietly, not looking at Jude, just straight ahead, the smile still playing around the corners of
his lips. The silence, the lack of explanation for Jude’s appearance, did not seem to worry him.

She wondered whether his response would be equally calm when she mentioned the poisoning at the Crown and Anchor. Still, that was why she had come to see him. No point in beating around the
bush. ‘Ray,’ she began, ‘I’m a friend of Ted Crisp’s.’

‘He’s a nice man.’ Ray nodded vigorously to emphasize the point. ‘A nice man.’ His smile grew broader.

‘Yes. And I gather you sometimes help him at the pub . . .’

Another enthusiastic nod. ‘He lets me. People think I can’t do things. Ted Crisp thinks I can.’

‘And you were helping at the Crown and Anchor on Monday?’

Only after he had keenly agreed to this did a slight caution come into his vague eyes. ‘Yes, on Monday,’ he agreed with a little less confidence.

‘But you haven’t been back there since?’

‘No.’

‘Are you going to go back?’

‘Well, I don’t know . . .’ Then, unexpectedly, the wide smile returned. ‘I’ll have to be there on Sunday.’

‘Why?’

‘They’ve got this man from the telly there on Sunday.’

‘Dan Poke.’

‘Yes, I’ll have to see him. I’ve only seen two people from off the telly before. One was Lyra Mackenzie.’

He spoke the name with such reverence that Jude tried to avoid showing it meant nothing to her. But she must have failed, because Ray felt he had to explain. He pulled back the sides of his
blouson to reveal the picture on his T-shirt. Jude still didn’t recognize the singer. ‘You know, from
The X Factor
.’

‘Ah. Right.’ She knew her pretence at familiarity was pretty unconvincing, but Ray didn’t seem to notice. ‘She did a concert at the Pavilion Theatre in Worthing. I waited
round the back afterwards to get her autograph.’

‘And did you get it?’

‘Yes. She signed my programme.’ Enthusiastically he rose from his seat. ‘It’s up in my room. Would you like to see it?’

Jude managed to assure him that, impressed though she was by his trophy, she didn’t actually need visual proof of its existence. He sank back into his chair, only momentarily disconsolate.
‘I must get Dan Poke’s autograph on Sunday. He’ll be the third person I’ve seen off the telly.’ The thought reassured him.

‘So who was the second one?’ asked Jude. ‘You know, after Lyra . . . um . . . ?’ She couldn’t remember the surname.

‘He was a footballer.’ His voice dropped to a level of suitable awe. ‘I once saw Gary Lineker at Brighton Station. I didn’t say anything to him. He didn’t see me.
But it was him. From off the telly.’ He looked at his watch.

‘Are you worried about your football this afternoon?’ asked Jude.

‘Yes, I like to see everything from twelve o’clock. Soccer Saturday starts on Sky at twelve o’clock.’

‘Don’t worry. You’ve got plenty of time. I’ll be gone long before then.’

‘Yes.’ He seemed reassured, but perhaps a little less relaxed than he had been. The smile was not quite as broad.

Jude pressed on. ‘But you haven’t been back to the Crown and Anchor since Monday?’ He shook his head. ‘Why?’

Ray seemed at a loss to explain this fact, but then a thought came to him. ‘My mother. I’ve been to see my mum.’

‘How is she?’ asked Jude gently.

‘She’s old, very old.’ He seemed to find the idea funny. ‘She can hardly move now. She’s very old.’ He smiled again.

‘Do you see her often?’

Ray shrugged. ‘Sometimes.’

‘Do you see her when you’re happy or when you’re unhappy?’

Jude’s voice was now very soft, soft and warm, the voice of a therapist. And it worked, soothing the troubled man into security.

‘I see my mum when I’m unhappy.’

‘And she makes you feel better?’

The question seemed genuinely to puzzle him. ‘I don’t know. When I see her there aren’t other people there. Just me and her. Not other people wanting things.’

‘What kind of things?’

‘Wanting me to say things. Asking me things. Telling me off for things.’

‘Does Ted Crisp ever tell you off for things?’

‘He did on Monday.’

‘What did he tell you off about?’

‘He was in a bad mood.’

‘Was this in the morning or the afternoon?’

‘In the afternoon.’

‘Ray, you know what happened at lunchtime on Monday, don’t you?’

‘People were sick,’ he said quietly.

‘Yes. And it was after that that Ted was cross with you?’ He nodded. ‘Can you remember what he said?’ The nod turned to a shake of the head. ‘He just
shouted.’ The memory was painful.

‘Did he shout at you? Or at everyone?’

‘At everyone. But then he shouted at me.’

‘And you really can’t remember what he said?’

This time the headshake was very firm. ‘When people shout at me, often I get confused. I don’t want to hear what they’re saying. I want to shut my ears. I just want them to go
away!’

He was reliving the kind of painful experience he described. His hands had risen involuntarily to cover his ears. Jude knew he was near to panic, the kind of panic which sent him back to his
mother’s. She would need all of her therapeutic skill to keep him in the kitchen with her.

Very gently, she asked, ‘Has Ted Crisp ever shouted at you before?’

The headshake was small, but definite. Into Jude’s mind came the thought that perhaps Ted’s action had been deliberate. In the aftermath of Monday’s poisoning, the landlord
would undoubtedly have been furious, but given the way he had nurtured and helped Ray, he would have been unlikely to vent his anger on him. So perhaps Ted had shouted because he knew such
behaviour would send Ray scurrying off to his mother. And keep him off the scene for any ensuing Health and Safety inspection. Ted Crisp’s uncharacteristic shouting could have been an act of
protection. Which, if it were the case, could well mean that he suspected Ray did have some involvement in the sabotage at the Crown and Anchor.

Now Jude had to be doubly careful. ‘You know it was the scallops that caused the food poisoning last Monday, don’t you?’

‘Yes. It couldn’t be prevented.’

This seemed a very odd response to her question. ‘What exactly do you mean, Ray?’

‘Well, scallops are seafood . . .’

‘Yes.’

‘. . . and seafood shouldn’t be left out in the hot weather.’ He sounded as though he were parroting something he had been told.

‘No, I agree. It can go off very quickly.’

‘Which the scallops must have done. They must have gone off. Got poisoned by flies landing on them or . . .’ he ran out of steam ‘. . . something like that.’

‘Except,’ Jude reasoned, ‘that the scallops last Monday had only been delivered that morning. Ed Pollack took the delivery and signed for them.’

‘But they were the bad ones.’

‘They can’t have been. They’d come directly from the supplier. In a refrigerated delivery van.’

‘They were the bad ones,’ Ray insisted.

‘I don’t understand what you’re saying.’

For the first time in their conversation Ray became furtive. He looked uneasily through the kitchen door towards the hall, as though he expected someone might be eavesdropping. Then, lowering
his voice, he said, ‘Someone was trying to poison the people in the Crown and Anchor.’

‘Yes, that’s rather what I was thinking.’

‘But I should have stopped that happening.’

‘
You
should have stopped that happening?’

‘Yes. By taking away the bad scallops and putting the good ones in the fridge.’

Jude didn’t let the excitement she was feeling show in her voice, as she asked, ‘Are you saying that you took out the tray of scallops that Ed had put in the fridge and replaced them
with another tray?’

‘Yes.’ The bewilderment grew in Ray’s face, as he mumbled, ‘It shouldn’t have happened. What I did should have stopped the poisoning. But it didn’t.’ He
looked almost tearful. ‘And Ted shouted at me.’

‘Ray . . .’ said Jude very softly, ‘who told you to change the trays of scallops around?’

Alarmed, he looked directly into her eyes for the first time. ‘It wasn’t Ted!’ His voice was suddenly loud.

‘I never thought it was Ted.’

‘No. Ted didn’t know about the people going to be poisoned.’

‘But someone else did?’

He nodded. ‘And they told me I could stop it happening by changing the trays round. I could save Ted from getting into trouble.’

‘Who told you that, Ray?’

He opened his mouth to speak, but was distracted by the sound of another door opening in the hall. He turned, and Jude looked up to see the kitchen doorway filled by the frame of a large man in
jeans and a Black Sabbath T-shirt. In spite of the heat he also wore a black leather jacket, rubbed grey at the seams. He had a dark beard and hair combed greasily back; in his nose there was a
silver stud. His eyes were as black as two olives.

‘Football’s on, Ray,’ he announced. The words sounded too big for his mouth.

Ray had risen to his feet the moment he saw the man. His expression showed respect with a strong undercurrent of fear.

‘But the football doesn’t start till twelve,’ said Jude desperately.

‘There’s other stuff on earlier.’

The man made no pretence to be addressing her, and Ray responded to his cue. ‘Yes, Viggo.’ And without a word or a look back to Jude, he scuttled across the hall to the open door of
the television room.

Viggo didn’t say anything more. Ignoring Jude’s questions and entreaties, he watched her rise from the table and cross to the front door. Immediately she had passed through, he
slammed it shut behind her, and followed his friend to watch the football build-up.

Jude’s excitement at getting so close to the truth was replaced by total frustration. And also, from her short encounter with Viggo, a sense of menace.

On the Saturday night the Crown and Anchor again did good business. Though again it probably wasn’t the kind of business Ted Crisp was looking for. Carole and Jude
didn’t go to the pub, but from their bedrooms they both heard the late-night roaring procession of bikes up Fethering High Street. Greville Tilbrook’s task of signature-gathering must
have been getting easier by the minute.

And still the Sabbath-breaking Dan Poke evening lay ahead.

The event was billed to start at eight o’clock, but when Carole and Jude arrived just before seven-thirty, the Crown and Anchor already seemed full to the gunwales. A
large heavy-drinking crowd had spilled out into the garden area and car park. If all of them were planning to watch the show, the pub threatened to burst at the seams.

Judging from the people standing outside, the presence of Dan Poke had certainly brought out a mixed clientele. A few aged pub regulars had been drawn by curiosity to witness their local’s
new venture. There were also a surprising number of couples in their forties, whom Carole and Jude recognized from the streets of Fethering, but whom they’d never seen before in the Crown and
Anchor. A lot of really young people were there too, talking loudly and swigging from beer bottles. They were dressed as for a night’s clubbing, the girls revealing acres of firm brown flesh,
the boys in voluminous shorts and sleeveless T-shirts.

The bikers, who had shattered the evening calm of Fethering for the last two nights, were also present in numbers. In spite of their chain-bedecked leather uniforms, close to they looked pretty
harmless, but still incongruous in a place like the Crown and Anchor.

There was one surprise component in the Sunday evening crowd. At the entrance to the car park, some distance from the rest, stood Greville Tilbrook and three of his lady acolytes. In spite of
the warmth of the evening they were all wearing suits, rather old-fashioned Sunday best. What was more, they carried banners. KEEP THE LORD’S DAY FOR THE LORD, NO FILTH IN FETHERING, BATTLE
AGAINST BLASPHEMY and, rather incongruously, KEEP OUR STREETS CLEAN.