‘The Godfreys seem unlikely, surely?’
‘Ye-es except that I thought that Vince – Mr Godfrey – was trying to convey something to me when he said how determined his wife was, that she had to have what she wanted. He was telling me something, Martha.’
She was silent, unable to think of anything helpful to contribute.
‘Anyway. Enough of that. Tell me about your weekend. How did dinner with the vamp go?’
‘OK,’ she said. ‘She isn’t really a vamp. Just seems very young. She was much as I’d expected but no worse. Truth is I don’t think she’s a bad kid. Just not for Simon. That’s all. She’s wrong for him.’
‘Because she’s not like Evie?’
‘Give me some credit, Alex. No, not just because of that. It’s because she’s the wrong age, the wrong outlook, the wrong intellect. Even the wrong class. Everything’s wrong.’
‘You think she is a gold-digger?’
‘Not in the usual sense. I’m sure she doesn’t think of it like that. It’s more that she might love him now but when he’s older, more vulnerable, he won’t be the same man. Anyway, that wasn’t what I had to tell you. Alex. I know about the Message to Martha.’
‘What? You’ve solved it on your own?’
‘Not really. My stalker wanted me to know who he was and why.’
‘I am intrigued.’
‘Thought you would be.’
‘Go on then.’
She related Finton Cley’s story, finishing: ‘Quite simply he blames me.’
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘We-ell. His point is that I put the family through a lot of unnecessary pain. He thinks I should have suppressed the letter and put in a verdict of misadventure. Then there would have been an insurance payout; he could have stayed at public school.’ She recalled Finton’s face.
She carried on with the story. ‘His mother wouldn’t have been flung into penury and presumably his sister, in spite of her father’s suicide, would not have descended into depression and alcoholism.’
‘Very neat,’ Alex said, ‘but if there was a note and you had suppressed it you could, presumably, have been accused of insurance fraud.’
‘That’s right. I had no choice. I pointed this out to Finton but he was fairly unforgiving. His mother has since died and his sister has alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver. It’s a sad story.’
Alex touched her hand. ‘You’re not responsible, Martha.’
‘I keep telling myself that but a little voice inside me listens to Finton’s arguments and I do feel responsible.’
‘You are not responsible,’ he repeated, louder this time.
‘No, I know that. I don’t really see how I could have acted any differently but it is one of the difficult and sore points of the job.’
‘Is he going to leave you alone from now on?’
She nodded. ‘I think so.’
‘It’s a grim business. Talk about something else.’
Afterwards she could have bitten her tongue off but she’d said it by then anyway. ‘Did your wife mind you going away for the weekend?’
His face seemed to freeze and she knew she’d said something gauche. He said nothing but the look of anguish that passed across his face was grey and chilly. He opened his mouth and still said nothing. Then he looked away from her.
‘I would dearly like to confide in you one day, Martha,’ he said softly, ‘but now is not the time. My wife is not a well woman.’ He met her eyes very briefly and she nodded and smiled.
‘When you’re ready to talk, Alex,’ she said, ‘I will be ready to listen.’
He met her eyes, then: ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘I shan’t forget.’
She changed the subject. ‘Mark Sullivan seems better.’
A tinge of humour touched Alex’s face. ‘A little bird told me that Dr Sullivan has somehow managed to curb his drinking.’
‘That was the conclusion I came to and I’m so glad. So very glad. He’s clever and talented and it was a rotten waste.’
‘He’s also left his wife, so the same little bird told me, and is living alone in a small rented bungalow.’
‘Another one with a much younger girlfriend?’
‘I don’t think so, at least, not that the little bird has told me. I think it were
‘Keep me informed,’ she said. ‘What’s your next move?’
‘Get someone to talk to the estate agents who sold number 41 to the Godfreys, see if I can interview the relatives of the old lady, just in case they have anything to add – maybe about carers or something, take some sniffer dogs over to the house the Sedgewicks lived in before they moved just in case they did bring the body with them to number 41.’
‘But,’ Martha protested, ‘there are still the questions about Mrs Sedgewick’s very odd behaviour, the shrine of the children’s room, the name Poppy. There’s something funny about Alice Sedgewick and from what you’ve told me the family form a wall around her. They are abnormally protective of her. Why?’
ELEVEN
Holmes and Watson were a pair of springer spaniels trained as sniffer dogs and their relish for detection was about as great as that of the great Sherlock himself. Their trainer was a police sergeant named Shotton and he too did his work with great gusto and loved the dogs almost more than his wife (though he wouldn’t have dared tell her so). The three of them worked as a beautiful team.
Holmes and Watson’s particular speciality was the sniffing out of decayed corpses. In their time they had unearthed quite a few and as Shotton put them in the back of his van and looked at their eager faces, tongues hanging out, already panting in anticipation, he wondered if today’s mission would bring more success.
He had his orders: first of all to take the dogs to 41 The Mount and see if they found any sign of a second body. If the site proved negative he was to move on to Bayston Hill, to the house the Sedgewicks had previously occupied and do the same there.
Anticipating opposition he had telephoned the Sedgewick’s house to forewarn them. Aaron Sedgewick was absolutely livid.
‘I don’t know what you think you’re doing in this police state,’ he said.
Yeah, yeah, Shotton thought. Police state when they don’t like what we do, but powerless and ineffectual when it is they who want us.
‘Merely trying to find out the truth, sir. I’ll be round with the dogs in half an hour.’
Sedgewick was no more friendly when Shotton arrived at number 41, the dogs straining at their leashes.
Aaron Sedgewick stood, stony-faced, in the middle of the lounge, as the dogs, noses burying in the carpets, began their frantic search handled by Shotton who took absolutely no notice at all of the furious man.
Holmes and Watson covered every single corner of the house, even managing to scamper up the ladder into the loft. Apart from interest in the area around the water tank they found nothing.
When Shotton had loaded up the dogs back into the van he returned to the house.
‘Thank you, sir,’ he said. ‘Your cooperation was much appreciated.’
Sedgewick snorted and gave him a look of pure loathing.
Of his wife there was no sign.
He had a very different reception when it came to the house in Bayston Hill. Occupied by a lively and elderly
