'According to her parents, she came home earlier than she'd planned after a phone call on the Friday afternoon. When she got here, she caught Leo packing his belongings, at which point he told her he was going to marry her best friend and left. The implication was that he had been here all the time.'
'No,' said the Colonel stoutly, 'and I'm damn sure he didn't put in an appearance on the Friday, either. I was in the front garden all afternoon so I'd have seen his car.'
'Are you sure about that?'
'I certainly am. We have a strict routine. Tuesdays and Fridays, the front garden; Mondays and Wednesdays, the back; Thursdays, shopping. Never varies.'
Fraser glanced towards Daphne Clancey, who nodded. 'Never varies,' she agreed. 'I blame the Army for it.' A sly smile crept around her mouth. 'I blame the Army for a lot of things.'
Fraser chewed the inside of his lip in thought. 'Why didn't you tell the Richmond police this when they interviewed you after Jinx's accident?' he said.
'Because they were only interested in why Jinx would want to kill herself,' the Colonel pointed out. 'So Daphne told 'em Leo jilted her, and before I could explain that she didn't seem too unhappy about it, Daphne starts weeping and wailing about the incident on the Sunday. False conclusions being drawn all over the place, if you ask me.'
'What's your explanation for the incident on Sunday, sir?'
'It was an accident,' he said. 'Door blew shut. Goebbels was onto it like a shot. Me, too, for that matter. Hauled her out of the garage and she was right as rain in no time.'
'The silly old fool nearly killed himself,' said Mrs. Clancey fondly.
Fraser nodded again. 'Did she give you an explanation after you got her out of the garage?'
'Just agreed it must have been an accident,' said the Colonel, 'then begged Daphne to stop fussing. 'I'm all right,' she said.'
Fraser had observed the outside of the garage when he arrived. Like the Clanceys', which was separated from it by a narrow pathway beside the four-foot wall that divided the properties, it was part of a two-story side elevation at the rear of the house with access from inside. The front doors faced each other under discreet porches halfway between the corners of the houses and their garages, leaving an enviable stretch of ground between the gates and the front elevations. Jinx's was full of shrubs and small trees, masking the ground floor of the house from the road; the Clanceys' was rather more formal, with rose beds around a small area of lawn. After all, thought Fraser, it wasn't surprising Tuesdays and Fridays were given over to its care. A view of the back garden through their sitting room window showed an area of equivalent size.
'Did Miss Kingsley drive off in her car after you rescued her?' he asked Colonel Clancey.
'Not immediately.'
'But she did go out?'
He nodded. 'She made a phone call first, then shooed us out, saying she was fine.'
'Who was she phoning?'
'No idea. Made the call from her bedroom. Presumably whoever she was going to visit, to explain why she was delayed.'
'Do you think it was wise to let her drive in the circumstances?'
'Matter of fact, no, but there wasn't much we could do to stop her.'
'Did she come back later?'
The Colonel looked at his wife. 'Couldn't say, to be honest, but I would imagine so-she wasn't one for staying out.'
Fraser tugged one of Goebbels's ears. 'So were the garage doors bolted or unbolted when you went to see why Goebbels was barking?'
'Unbolted,' said the Colonel.
'Oh, Eric!' scolded his wife. 'Where's the sense in lying? It won't help Jinx. They were bolted,' she told Fraser. 'Eric looked through the garage window, saw what was happening, and came to me for the spare key. Frankly, it's a mercy she hadn't bolted the front door as well, otherwise he'd have had a terrible job getting in.'
The old man pushed himself out of his chair and moved across gaze out over the garden. 'Known Jinx since she first moved in here with Russell,' he said shortly, 'thirteen, fourteen years, give or take a year. She's a fine woman, a little remote perhaps, too independent sometimes-thinks she can do anything a man can do, then finds she's not as strong as she thought she was. Rescued her once from under a bag of cement because it was too damn heavy for her.' He paused on a low chuckle. 'Wedged under it like a great floundering crab-haven't laughed so much in years.' He paused again. 'Saw her through that terrible business over Russell, watched her put her life back together again and make a success of her photography. And with no help from her father, I might add. She wouldn't have it. 'I'll make it on my own, Colonel, or not at all.' That's what she said.' He turned round with his beetling white brows drawn together in a ferocious frown. 'Woman like that doesn't commit suicide, or even think about doing it. And if she did, she'd do it right. She'd have run a hose pipe from the exhaust and plugged the gaps in the window where it came in. Wouldn't rely on the fumes in the garage to kill her.'
'Perhaps she wanted to be rescued,' suggested Fraser.
The Colonel snorted derisively. 'Then she'd have wept her heart out afterwards and told us how unhappy she was,' he argued. 'Seems to me, the important question is why. Before anyone knew Leo and Meg were murdered, the police latched onto Jinx's unhappiness at losing Leo as the reason. Two suicide attempts when you're depressed make some sort of sense.' His eyes narrowed. 'But what's your thinking now that you know Leo's dead? You suggesting she knew about the murders and tried to kill herself afterwards?'
Fraser thought about this for some time, his eyes searching the old man's face closely. It was a good point, he admitted to himself. There was an inherent paradox if the first suicide attempt happened before Meg and Leo were murdered, because it was a peculiarly complicated psychology that led you from suicidal despair to murderous anger and back to suicidal despair again.
