Game Over

Wednesday, the twenty-third. We both have busy lives, so we don’t – didn’t – get to see each other as often as we’d like.’

‘And how did he seem on that occasion?’

‘Just as usual.’

‘Was he worried about anything? Preoccupied?’

‘No, why should he be?’

‘What did you talk about?’

There was a hint of impatience in the reply. ‘Goodness, I can’t remember. Nothing in particular. Just what we always talked about. Why on earth are you asking me these questions? What relevance can our dinner conversation a week ago have to his being attacked by a burglar?’

‘It’s just routine,’ Swilley said soothingly. ‘We have to cover all possible angles. Someone might have overheard you saying something that helped them decide on the break-in.’

‘Well, we didn’t talk about his flat being full of valuables,’ she said with grim humour. ‘I think he talked about his daughter – he was looking forward to her visiting sometime soon – but otherwise I can’t think of anything specific.’

Swilley nodded and changed tack. ‘You say you both had busy lives. Do you know what Mr Stonax was doing that kept him so busy? As far as we know he didn’t have a job.’

Scott-Chatton would have frowned if she were a frowner. The eyes glittered frostily. ‘He was involved with several charities, and he always took an interest in our campaigns and wrote letters and went to see people. I can tell you he never sat around idly feeling sorry for himself. Ed wasn’t that kind of man. He’s a great, great loss, to the country, as well as to me personally. It’s awful to think of him being cut down in his prime for nothing more than the contents of his wallet. I hope you put every effort into catching this young thug, and putting him away for a long, long time.’

‘We will,’ Swilley said. ‘We are. Do you have a key to his flat?’

She threw the question in out of the blue and was gratified to see the faintest hesitation before Scott-Chatton replied, ‘I used to have one, but in fact I gave it back to Ed. We didn’t meet at his flat any more. Why do you ask?’

‘It’s just a routine question,’ Swilley said, her eyes unmovingly on Scott-Chatton’s alabaster face. ‘Something we have to ask people.’ There seemed to be no more forthcoming and Swilley stood up. ‘Well, thank you for your time. If there’s anything else we need to know I’m sure you won’t mind if I contact you again.’

‘No, not at all,’ Scott-Chatton said, seeming – to Swilley’s quiet pleasure – a little put out. She rose too and they walked towards the door.

‘I’m afraid the press will be hounding you soon, if they aren’t already,’ Swilley said with a sympathetic smile.

‘No, they haven’t troubled me yet,’ Scott-Chatton said absently. Then her gaze sharpened. ‘I hope nothing the police say or do will expose me to unwelcome press attention.’

‘We don’t talk to the press unless we absolutely have to,’ Swilley said, ‘and then we make a point of not telling them anything they don’t already know. Goodbye, and thank you again.’

In the outer room the secretary had flung Swilley a fleeting but searing look before going back to her typing, so she made a business of putting her notebook away and fiddling in her handbag until Candida Scott-Chatton had closed the door to her own room behind her. Swilley turned to Shawna Weedon, but before she could speak the girl flung a silencing finger against her lips, shoved a folded piece of paper across the table, and continued with her typing, having missed only a beat or two.

Swilley took the paper, winked, said aloud, ‘Well, goodbye, then,’ and took her departure.

At a safe distance from the building she opened the note. ‘Ciggie break, 10 min, down mews.’

An assignation, Swilley thought, amused. Now what could young Shawna have to say that her tartar of a boss would object to?

Four

Widow of Opportunity

‘So tell me – if you don’t mind talking about it – about your father’s bit of trouble last year,’ said Slider.

Emily Stonax was sitting beside him in the car, hands between her knees for comfort. The low afternoon light striking her face through the windscreen emphasised how tired she was. She looked grey.

She sighed, as if talking was an effort, but she answered freely enough. ‘It was very strange. I mean, that sort of thing just isn’t like Dad. He’s the straightest person I know. And as for sharing anything with Sid Andrew – he’d as soon lick the pavements. He had a very low opinion of him.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Oh, he told me more than once that Sid was a waste of space, a complete liability in the department. He’s the sort of man Dad always despised – a time-serving career politician, who got on by being lobby fodder and a cabinet lickspittle. He was punching well above his weight at the DTI – the Permanent Secretary practically had to guide his hand when he signed things. But then, look what happened when the scandal broke: Sid Andrew does a couple of months in purdah and then he’s Lord Andrew of Leuchars. Now he’s sitting pretty – directorships, quangos, committees, you name it.’

‘So what do you think really happened?’ Slider asked.

‘I don’t know,’ she said in frustration. ‘Dad would never talk about it. I was out of the country at the time, of course, but I read all the British papers and I watch the BBC so of course I saw everything that was in the news. It was taken up by one or two of the American papers, because Dad had been Washington correspondent for a while, but they didn’t run with it past one issue. We have our own sex scandals over there, much fruitier ones, and no-one had ever heard of Sid Andrew so it wasn’t interesting enough. But I phoned Dad straight away, of course, and asked what was going on. I said I know it isn’t true, and all he said is, “It’s pointless for me to deny it. You’ve seen the photos.” I said to him, “Dad, I know you wouldn’t do something like that.” And he said, “The evidence is irrefutable.” And then he changed the subject and wouldn’t talk about it any more. And when I next came over, it was a forbidden subject between us.’

‘So what’s your theory?’ Slider asked. She looked at him, and he gave a faint smile. ‘I’m sure you must have a theory, a thinking woman like you.’

She shrugged off the compliment. ‘I suppose he must have been tricked into it somehow. But I can’t think how. What was he doing with that girl in the first place, when he and Candida were so close? Maybe he was drunk,’ she added, as though anticipating that he would say it, ‘but being drunk doesn’t excuse bad behaviour.’

‘Was it so very bad? I mean, these days, don’t men have these little flings now and then?’

She looked disappointed in him. ‘Other people, maybe, but not Dad. And not like that. Anyway, the government thought it was serious enough to sack him and Andrew.’

‘Why do you think your father wouldn’t talk about it to you?’

She looked down at her hands. ‘Maybe because he was ashamed,’ she said quietly. ‘That’s what I’m afraid of. I could bear it if he did it and was defiant and said, “Mind your own business,” to everyone. But I couldn’t stand it if he did something he was ashamed of. Not Dad.’

It was quite a pedestal, Slider thought. Was Stonax really that virtuous? They were silent until they turned into Riverene Road, and then she said, ‘You don’t think that old stuff has anything to do with . . . with this?’

‘I don’t know,’ Slider said. ‘Probably not, but I like to know everything I can in cases like this. And I was born curious.’

‘I thought you said it was just a robbery?’

‘It looks that way,’ Slider said. ‘I’m just being thorough.’

‘Well, I suppose I should be glad about that,’ she said bleakly.

Swilley walked down Queen’s Gate a little way and came back into the mews from the other end, and then stationed herself in the shadow of a fire escape to wait. Soon enough Shawna Weedon came scuttling across the road from the office. Swilley made herself visible and the girl almost flung herself into the hiding place as if the Feds