Deadly Reunion Read online

  Rafferty was silent for a few moments. Then he said, ‘You mentioned money. Do I take it that Mr Ainsley wasn’t earning as much as he thought he should?’

  ‘Yes. His income had dropped drastically from his playing days. He wasn’t suited to the cult of celebrity. Oh, he liked the limelight, all right, but he had little to say once the spotlight was on him. It was a case of ‘I’m Adam Ainsley, the rugby star’ and that was it. He could never even pretend an interest in the person he was speaking to.’

  Rafferty asked Gottlieb about the unexplained thousand pounds a month that was being paid into Ainsley’s bank account, but the agent knew nothing of it.

  ‘Perhaps he’d applied to one of the sporting charities for a pension?’

  Rafferty shook his head. ‘No. It’s not a BACs transfer or a cheque. It’s in cash and the money is just paid in over the counter, according to the bank manager.’

  ‘Mmm, you’re right. That’s not the way a sporting charity, or any other charity, would behave. Perhaps it’s one of his wealthier admirers.’

  ‘Is that likely?’

  ‘Oh yes. Some people can be quite fanatical about their sport, quite obsessive about their favourite players. Sometimes you have them donating cash gifts to an ex-player down on his luck.’

  Rafferty wished they did the same for coppers. ‘And you think that’s what might have happened in this case?’

  ‘It’s only an idea. Adam could be arrogant with fans, not always willing to sign autographs and so on. He thought it should be enough that his fans see him without expecting him to put himself to any trouble, so a generous fan is less likely in his case.’

  ‘I see. And you can’t think of anyone else who might pay a grand a month into his bank account?’

  Gottlieb shook his head. ‘No. Sorry, Inspector.’

  Rafferty had had high hopes of Ainsley’s agent, but it had proved a false hope. He stood up and handed Gottlieb one of his cards. ‘In case you should think of something. Thanks for your help.’

  Next on the agenda were Sophie Diaz’s girlfriends. Rafferty had high hopes of these, too, but, after his failure to gain any useful information from Ainsley’s agent, his hopes faded a bit.

  Rather than see each one individually, Rafferty had asked that they meet them all together and they had elected to meet in a Notting Hill pub. Rafferty was nothing loath.

  Sophie Diaz’s girlfriends turned out to be a disparate bunch, to Rafferty’s surprise. He had expected ‘ladies who lunch’, but Kate Carrow, Sue Daniels and Amanda Shaw were all suited and stilettoed suitable for high-flying careers, which, as it turned out, was what they had. Kate Carrow was a barrister, Sue Daniels worked for an investment bank and Amanda Shaw was a General Practitioner.

  ‘How did you meet?’ Rafferty asked, once the introductions and career checks were over. ‘Were you all at Griffin School?’

  ‘God, no,’ Kate told him. ‘I was a grammar school girl, one of the few that successive governments have left alone. Sue was the same, though Amanda was at Griffin with Sophie.’

  ‘You didn’t attend the reunion?’ Rafferty asked, curious why not.

  ‘No. I try to avoid such functions. As a GP, I find people have a tendency to buttonhole me about their ailments.’ Amanda smiled and said, ‘My mechanic told me he has the same problem, but with cars. In social situations, he’s apparently always having people trying to describe the funny noises coming from their engines, expecting him to diagnose it for free. I get the funny pains. Both are equally tedious, I’m sure. But you wanted to know how we met Sophie. You already know about me. As for Sue and Kate, they’re both on the boards of the same charity of which Sophie was also a member. I hadn’t seen Sophie since school, but as a doctor, I tend to get involved with several local charities, which is how we met up again. We each found we liked the grown-up version of the other and we both knew Kate and Sue. We all got on and gradually we got around to having the occasional lunch or dinner. Apart from Sophie, we are all busy people, so they didn’t happen too often, but they were often enough to keep us apprised of each other’s doings.’

  ‘And what was Sophie doing? Did she mention whether she was doing anything likely to get her killed?’

  Amanda, who seemed to be the women’s spokesperson, said, ‘She rang me while she was at the Griffin reunion. Updated me on everyone I could remember and said she had something she wanted to talk to me about.’

  ‘Really?’ Rafferty sat forward. ‘And what was it?’

  Amanda shrugged. ‘I don’t know. She wouldn’t go into it over the phone. She said she needed to meet me for a girly lunch. I couldn’t make it that week, so we arranged it for this Friday.’

  And Sophie Diaz had died before she could confide in her friend. Rafferty chewed his lip in frustration, then asked Amanda, ‘Did she ever speak of Adam Ainsley? The boy she had an affair with during that last summer term at Griffin?’

  She shook her head and said, ‘She would always clam up when I tried to get her to speak about first loves. Even after all these years, that Adam Ainsley had dumped her was still a painful subject for her. She had always said that he was the love of her life, but beyond that, she would say nothing at all. I learned to leave it alone after a while.’

  Stymied on that front, he tried from another angle. ‘What was Mrs Diaz like?’

  ‘Sophie was a people person,’ Kate told him.

  ‘What do you mean by that, exactly?’

  ‘Just that she liked people and was interested in what made them tick.’ She grinned. ‘In other words, she was incredibly nosy.’

  ‘God, yes,’ Sue Daniels interrupted. ‘If she sniffed out a bit of gossip, she wasn’t happy until she had got to the bottom of it.’

  ‘And did she sniff out any hot gossip while she attended the reunion?’ he asked Amanda.

  ‘No. Nothing worth killing her for, anyway. Or nothing that she told me about.’

  ‘Did she do anything with all this gossip?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ they all agreed. ‘She wasn’t spiteful or malicious. She just liked to know things. And the who and the what and the why.’

  Rafferty was thoughtful after he and Llewellyn had said goodbye to Sophie’s friends. ‘Sounds more and more like she knew someone’s secret. More and more like she knew Ainsley’s killer.’

  For once, Llewellyn didn’t disagree with his theory. But he did say, ‘I wonder why, if so, she never spoke privately to us and confided this dangerous knowledge.’

  ‘You heard her friends. Sophie Diaz not only liked to know the who and the what. She also liked to know the why. It seems likely that her curiosity overcame her good sense and she asked the killer why they had done it before she could confide in us. Foolish. Very foolish.’

  By now it was after one and the sun blazed down ever more unbearably from an azure sky. Rafferty, between the failure of his ‘Cool Man’ and his sweaty hair that clung to his neck and forehead, felt as messy as a melted ice cream. ‘Lunch!’ he said in tones that brooked no argument. Even though the sticky heat had taken away his appetite, he knew he had to keep his strength up, if only to have the stamina for Superintendent Bradley and Cyrus.

  ‘Yes, but where? Any pub with a garden will be bursting at the seams.’

  Rafferty was amused to discover that if he’d trained his teetotal sergeant up in nothing else, at least he’d managed to get him to see pubs as natural lunch venues. But today pubs weren’t on the cards; as Llewellyn had said, they’d be over-flowing with perspiring customers. But he had learned a trick from Cyrus and had decided to follow his example. ‘I thought we’d buy a couple of cans, some sandwiches and retire to Kensington Gardens. Find a shady tree to sit under and watch the world go by.’

  ‘A picnic?’ Llewellyn’s face was a study. ‘In the middle of a murder investigation?’

  ‘And what better time to have one? A bit of fresh air will blow the cobwebs away.’

  Llewellyn still looked affronted. ‘You want me to sit on the grass? In this sui
t?’

  ‘Well stand up, then. It’s all the same to me.’ Llewellyn’s Beau Brummell instincts notwithstanding, the idea of a picnic was becoming more appealing by the second. Rafferty spotted a handy wine merchant’s with a sandwich bar two doors down and set off in pursuit of refreshment. Llewellyn trailed reluctantly after him.

  Refreshments purchased, Rafferty headed up Notting Hill Gate towards Bayswater and the park and his appointment with some shade.

  Lolling under a sturdy oak tree, Rafferty finished the last of his ham rolls and pulled the tag on his second can of bitter. He gave a contented sigh. Bradley, Cyrus, the murders, all seemed a million miles away. All around them tourists were sitting, taking their ease and enjoying the occasional tiny breeze. Some energetic Australians were playing football and Rafferty found himself watching them desultorily until the ball headed in his direction and he had to duck. ‘Colonials,’ he muttered before pouring the rest of his beer down his throat. ‘Time we weren’t here,’ he said.

  Llewellyn – who had deigned to sit on the grass after all – got up and made a big show of dusting himself down.

  Rafferty ignored him and headed for the nearest exit.

  From Sophie Diaz’s friends they had learned that Sophie had been quite a nosy woman who liked to know things. They didn’t intimate that she liked to make use of whatever knowledge she came by, just that she liked to have it. Even so, such a habit was a nasty one and could be dangerous, as it seemed likely to have been in this case, especially if, short of funds for the first time in her life, she had decided to turn knowledge to profit.

  Rafferty, with some of the steam taken out of his temper and his body by their shady sojourn under the oak tree, relented and let Llewellyn take the wheel for the drive to Norwich, which slowed things down somewhat. But Rafferty was happy to stay out of the office for the rest of the day and out of Bradley’s hair, so he just sat back and let Llewellyn concentrate on the road ahead.

  Even with Llewellyn at the wheel, they made reasonable time and were parked up and knocking on the first neighbour’s door by three twenty.

  A woman of about thirty, carrying a grizzling child, answered the door.

  Rafferty explained their business and she invited them in. She led them to the kitchen and asked them to sit down at the pine table. Rafferty tried to question her, his questions punctuated by more and ever louder grizzles, which turned to full-blown wails.

  ‘He’s tired. He doesn’t like this heat. Let me put him down for an hour. I won’t be a minute.’ She disappeared. The grizzles retreated till they were barely audible.

  ‘Thank God for that,’ he said. ‘Do you think she’ll make us some tea? I’m parched.’

  The woman, whose name was Mrs O’Neill, came back, said, ‘He won’t settle,’ and immediately put the kettle on. Rafferty brightened.

  She turned back to them while she was waiting for the kettle to boil. ‘You said you wanted to ask me questions about Alice next door?’

  ‘That’s right. You know there was a murder – two murders now – while she was attending a reunion at her old school?’

  ‘Yes. She mentioned it. It shocked me.’

  ‘Did she happen to mention anything that happened during the reunion?’

  ‘Like what?’

  Rafferty didn’t know. He was going through a straw-clutching exercise. ‘Anything. Anything at all. Was there anything about her daughter?’

  ‘Joanna?’ She shook her head. ‘No. I don’t think so. I can’t think of anything, though Joanna did talk about the birthday party she’s having next spring and that she expected her father to be there. Poor girl didn’t know him. It’s very sad.’

  Rafferty hadn’t liked to break the news to Joanna that she wouldn’t be meeting her father in April or any other time. He had decided to leave that to Alice Douglas. Maybe, seeing as she wasn’t after all to meet her father, Alice might relent early and let the girl know his identity now. She was entitled to know where she came from. Rafferty believed that was a basic right that was denied to too many people in these permissive days.

  Foiled from gathering any worthwhile information, Rafferty sat back and gazed hopefully at the now boiling kettle. After the stifling journey from London, he was as dry as a desert gulch and would welcome some hot, sweet tea.

  Mrs O’Neill picked up the kettle, but she didn’t reach for the mugs that were hanging on hooks under the top cupboard, but for a Pyrex basin that was sitting on the side. She half-filled this with boiling water, took a milk-filled baby’s bottle from the fridge and plonked it in the basin. The grizzler’s lunch. ‘A bit old-fashioned,’ she commented, seeing Rafferty watching her. ‘But I don’t like using the microwave to heat my baby’s milk. Just in case.’

  Rafferty just stopped himself exclaiming in disappointment. He was about to ask for tea outright, when Llewellyn forestalled him, said, ‘thank you for your help, Mrs O’Neill,’ and stood up, leaving Rafferty with no option but to do likewise.

  ‘She’d have made us tea,’ Rafferty grumped when they were outside. ‘If you’d only have waited. I was just about to ask.’

  ‘I know. Why do you think I called a halt to the interview when I did? You shouldn’t importune gratis drinks from the public. It’s unprofessional.’

  ‘Unprofessional my arse! I only wanted a cup of tea, not the favour of her boudoir.’

  ‘Even so.’

  Rafferty scowled. Sometimes he wondered just which of them was the senior officer. Llewellyn could take things on himself at times. It was a trait he would be wise to squash, although he had a sneaking feeling that he had left such squashing too late. After thirteen completed murder investigations together, he suspected they were both now set in their ways.

  But Llewellyn had his good points, as he was reminded, when the Welshman said, ‘I noticed a workman’s café on the corner. Perhaps we could stop there?’

  ‘Why not?’ Better still, such a café was likely to serve a decent mug of tea: big and strong and sweet as a nut. ‘Lead me to this oasis, McDaff.’

  It was while Rafferty was sipping his tea that something occurred to him. He was mulling over the day’s events when he sat up straight and said, ‘Dafyd.’ He waited till he had got the Welshman’s attention and then said, “I’ve got it! It was something Alice Douglas’s daughter said. The neighbour reminded me. She said that she hoped to meet her father at her eighteenth birthday party. Maybe I was wrong to dismiss it. What if Alice invited Adam to their daughter’s birthday party, sure he’d be interested in a grown up daughter when he hadn’t been in a foetus? Why wouldn’t she think that? I thought the same. But what if he’d rejected his child all over again? It could have brought a resurgence of the hate that Alice had felt for him when she was young and had just found out she was pregnant and that as a father he was not only unwilling but deadly.’

  ‘You could be on to something, sir.’

  Rafferty grinned. ‘I could, couldn’t I?’

  ‘Or, rather, you could, if it wasn’t for the means of death. The use of hemlock indicates premeditation, not the sudden upsurge of a hate originally felt nearly two decades ago.’

  Rafferty, hot in pursuit of his latest theory, ignored him. ‘Joanna told me that she intended to obtain her birth certificate when she came of age. I imagine, in one of her teenage strops, she told her mother the same thing. We both know she would have found no information about her father there. Do you reckon she would have continued to try to find out her father’s identity? Maybe she’d succeed? Joanna struck me as the tenacious sort. Maybe she would have turned her attention then to Griffin School and her mother’s old schoolmates. Admittedly Paxton wouldn’t have given her any information about them, but he might well have agreed to pass a letter on to each of them. Alice would know her own daughter, would know she wouldn’t give up. Must have worried that one of her old school mates would remember something that would give the girl a lead. Maybe she and Adam weren’t quite as discreet in their little romance as she’d tho
ught.’ He was on a roll now and said, ‘what if Sophie Diaz not only saw her slip the hemlock into Ainsley’s lunch, but also knew about Alice’s affair with him?’

  Rafferty finished the rest of his tea in a hurry and said, ‘Come on. We’ll speak to the rest of Alice’s neighbours while we wait.’

  ‘While we wait for what?’ Llewellyn asked as he finished his own tea.

  ‘While we wait for Alice to return home from work, of course.’

  ‘And do you think she’s likely to admit that Mr Ainsley refused her eighteenth birthday party invitation? She’s already told you the opposite once.’

  ‘I don’t know, do I? But it can’t hurt to ask. Even if it’s just to see her reaction.’

  They drove back to Alice Douglas’s street and interviewed her other neighbours to no avail. By the time they’d spoken to the last one, it was gone five, so they elected to wait in the car for Alice to come home.

  ‘My daughter wouldn’t find out the name of her father because none of my classmates know it.’ Alice Douglas stared hard at him, as if daring him to refute her statement.

  ‘Are you sure about that?’ Rafferty asked. ‘I wonder if Sophie Diaz guessed. Adam had just dumped her. Maybe she spied on him, looking for a way to get even? Maybe she even tackled you about it.’

  He could see that he had hit a nerve and he pushed it – hard. ‘Is that why she had to die, too? Was she someone else who knew your secret? Someone else who knew your shame that you’d allowed yourself to be used by Adam? Did she see you put the hemlock in Adam’s lunch and tell you that she’d seen you do it?’

  Alice Douglas had gone deathly pale, but she spoke up spiritedly enough. ‘You’re talking nonsense, Inspector. Sophie didn’t see me doing anything murderous because I didn’t kill Adam. And, for the record, Sophie didn’t know that Adam was the father of my baby. Nobody knew.’

  ‘Except Adam himself?’

  His accusation of murder had made her incautious. Now she said, ‘What makes you think he’d admit to paternity to our daughter even if someone put her on the right track? The thought of what he might lose if Joanna pursued him would be enough to have him running scared. He’d have admitted nothing and left Joanna to chase him through the courts if she had the money, which a few discreet checks would soon tell him she didn’t have.’