plausible at the station less than two hours ago now, even to him, smacked of that John Le Carre novel. But he wasn't beaten yet.
'What happened to the nurse?' he asked tersely.
'I have no idea.'
Another lie? 'Did Sir Christopher ever talk about her?'
'No.'
'What was her name? And don't tell me you don't remember because I won't believe you.'
Nelson sighed wearily. 'It was all a long time ago and I can't see that it has any bearing on your case.'
'Maybe not, but you told me to look for a more logical explanation for these deaths and if I discard the Carlssons' car accident as being murder but not Arina's then I'm back to the question you asked me earlier.' Horton drew some satisfaction at Nelson's surprise. Was that because he had remembered what Nelson had said or because Nelson hadn't expected him to reason it out? A little smugly, Horton added, 'You asked if Sir Christopher Sutton had left anything in his will to an individual. You were thinking of an illegitimate son or daughter.'
Nelson eyed him with interest. After a moment he said, 'Her name was Elizabeth. She was a tall, slim woman with fair hair. I can't remember her surname.'
'Try,' Horton said harshly.
'No, it's slipped my mind,' Nelson smiled politely. 'But I'm sure it will come back to me, eventually.'
'Then I'll just have to wait until it does.' Horton glanced at the clock on the big oak mantelpiece. 'What time did you say your wife would be home?'
'I didn't,' Nelson said slowly. 'Now I come to think of it, Inspector, maybe I have an old photograph that might jog my memory. She might just be in one of them. If you've got a moment, I'll dig them out.'
Horton had several moments, though he would have preferred not to spend them in the sitting room listening to that grandfather clock in the hall soberly ticking away the minutes while Nelson went through his old photos and extracted any he didn't want him to see. What's the betting he'd find none of this nurse? But Horton was wrong. In less than three minutes Nelson was back with a triumphant look on his face and with two photographs in his hand.
'Here's two of a group of us outside the hospital.' He handed them to Horton. 'There's Christopher.' Nelson pointed to a tall, good-looking, dark-haired man with an aristocratic face. 'And here's me.' But Horton wasn't interested in either of them. Instead he was staring at the tall, slender woman whom Sir Christopher had his arm draped around and who was laughing into camera. With a shock he realized he'd seen that face before. He didn't need Nelson to tell him her surname now. He already knew it. And although the passing years had obliterated most of the likeness there was no mistaking the shape of the face, the wide, slightly protruding eyes, because less than six hours ago this woman had smiled down at him from a mantelpiece underneath a painting of what looked like Manderley.
Nelson eyed him keenly. 'Her name was Elizabeth Elms. I told you I'd remember. But I can see you already knew that.'
'Not until you showed me this.'
'She's alive? You know her?'
'No, but I know her son.' And he also now knew the reason why Sir Christopher had been so shocked and upset when Gordon Elms had turned up at Scanaford House to research the ghost. Poor old Sutton had just seen one. His illegitimate son.
TWENTY-TWO
'I was just going out,' Elms said, clearly not pleased to receive another visit from the police, and so soon after the first. 'I've got a meeting with my paranormal group.'
The mind boggled, thought Horton, envisaging spooks, ghouls and ghosties sitting (or should that be floating) in a semi-circle, bemoaning the state of the nation and deciding where best to haunt.
'This won't take a moment, sir,' he said with a tight smile, stepping into the red and gold room. If Elms was a triple murderer, then he could kiss goodbye to his meeting tonight, and for the next twenty-five years, a good judge and a fair wind willing. But Elms hadn't inherited his late father's fortune, so what other motive could he have for killing Arina Sutton? Revenge on the family that had deserted him and his mother? Yes, that was possible.
Horton hadn't mentioned Gordon Elms to Uckfield on his way back to the Isle of Wight from Lymington because Cantelli had told him that Uckfield had got an emergency appointment with a chiropractor. His back had got so bad that he could only just about hobble and Cantelli had added, 'You can imagine the temper he's in.'
Horton could. Best to stay clear. He'd asked Cantelli to meet him outside Elms' house and before knocking had quickly briefed him.
Elms stood, trying to glare at them, but it just made him look as though his truss had slipped. Clearly he was not going to offer them a seat. Glancing at his watch, Elms said, 'I can only give you a few minutes.'
You'll give me a lot more than that, sunshine, if I think you're guilty of murder, thought Horton, but arranging his features into a suitably civil expression he said, politely, 'Do you own a car, Mr Elms?'
'Yes. Why?'
'What kind, sir?' asked Cantelli.
Elms looked surprised and baffled at the question. 'A Ford. It's taxed and insured and has a current MOT if that's what you're after.'
'It's colour?'
'Blue. But what's that got to-?'
'Where were you on the third of January?' Horton said briskly. Now let's see what the little gnome comes up with as an alibi for the night Arina had been killed.
'I can't remember.'
'It was the Saturday after New Year's Day, if that helps,' Horton said.
Elms bristled at Horton's sarcasm. He looked set to make some smart remark but Cantelli quickly intervened.
'Perhaps consulting your diary will help, sir?'
Elms considered this for a moment, then replied stiffly, 'I'll fetch it.'
'I'll come with you.'
'There's no need, Sergeant.'
But Cantelli ignored him.
As soon as they had left the room, Horton crossed to the mantelpiece and studied the photographs of Elizabeth Elms. Elms had said that his mother had died in 1981. How old had she been then, he wondered, picking up the gold-effect frame and peering more closely at her. She looked to be about forty when this picture was taken with Gordon, and if she had been in her twenties when working as a nurse at the military hospital in Tripoli then she had died young. Certainly before she had reached fifty.
He could still see traces of the attractive young woman in the photograph that Dr Nelson had shown him, but whether life, betrayal, desertion, disappointment, or all four had made her mouth tighter and her eyes harder he couldn't say and would never know. And neither would he know whether his own mother might look the same if she were still alive, which he doubted. Or maybe he wanted to believe she was dead because that was easier to cope with than acknowledging the fact that he'd been deliberately ignored for years. The only photograph he'd had of her had been burnt when his beloved boat Nutmeg had been torched by a mad killer. That reminded him that soon he'd have to give up living on the boat borrowed from Sergeant Elkins' friend and find a new home for himself. It was something he had been putting off in the hope of a reconciliation with Catherine, which was now completely out of the question. New Year, new decisions, he thought, pulling himself up. Get somewhere to live, sort out your life.
He turned his mind to Elms. Had Elizabeth Elms told her son who his father was? Did Gordon Elms know what his father had been doing during that missing year? Trueman had confirmed that Sutton had bought Scanaford House in 1976 and that his wife had died in 1980. It was possible that Elizabeth Elms had returned to nursing in London where Gordon Elms had told him they had lived. Maybe she had kept her eye on Christopher Sutton's career
