two of them, so that most people seemed destined to make their purchases sideways.
An equally dead hand was in charge of the supermarket’s stock. Shelves were either overloaded with the things nobody ever wanted, or empty of the products everyone required. Carole Seddon used Allinstore infrequently. Her major shopping was done in one weekly foray to Sainsbury’s. She only resorted to the local supermarket when she had run out of something. And, given the strict way in which she organised her life, she very rarely did run out of anything. Jude, amongst whose priorities housekeeping took a much lower rank, was a more regular visitor to Allinstore.
Still, there are certain rules of domestic life. You can never have too many tins of chopped tomatoes on your shelves. And an extra pack of kitchen rolls never goes amiss. More important, these were both products that could be little harmed by the supermarket’s erratic buying policy.
Carole put a four-pack of each into her basket and then, in a fit of wild spontaneity, added a bottle of fizzy spring water. It wasn’t a brand she had heard of, but it was commensurately cheap.
Identifying Hilary Potton was not too challenging a task. Only two of the tills were manned, and there was no way the spotty teenager with variegated hair and a nose stud had given birth to Imogen. So, even though the girl’s queue was shorter, Carole deliberately took her basket to the other one. Once there, the polite middle-class tones she heard as totals were announced left her in no doubt that she was on the right track.
Hilary Potton was strong-featured with thick, carefully shaped eyebrows and black hair cut fashionably short, the kind of woman to whom the words “striking” and “handsome” rather than “beautiful” would be applied. The blue Allinstore tabard didn’t do her any favours, but in a suit or well-cut leisurewear she would have looked very good.
There was only one customer in front of her before Carole, angling herself awkwardly around a pillar, had a little moment of panic. What was she going to say to this woman? What possible advance in her tenuous murder investigation did she hope she was going to achieve? Jude should have come; she’d be much better at creating a conversational bond. Why on earth had Carole decided to come to Allinstore in the first place?
Of course it didn’t matter. If she made her purchases without a word being exchanged, nobody would think anything odd. That was why people went into supermarkets. On the other hand, she wouldn’t have any trophy of information to take back in triumph to Jude. And Carole’s hypersensitive nature was beginning to think that Jude was already having the lion’s share of this investigation.
The other customer had left. Carole placed her basket in the bay designed for it and said fatuously, “Just essentials.”
“Ah, but those are the very things that are essential,” Hilary Potton responded.
This was promising. Not only a response, but one with an element of levity in it. Must build on this start.
“Mind you, I can never find all the essentials I need in here.”
The words came out stilted, and Carole regretted them as soon as they were spoken. Criticising the supermarket was probably not the best way of engaging in conversation with one of its employees.
Serendipitously, however, she had managed to say exactly the right thing. “Tell me about it,” said Hilary Potton, raising her eyes to heaven as she scanned Carole’s purchases. “I’m afraid I hardly ever shop here-can never find the stuff I want.”
“No, I’d got the impression Allinstore wasn’t the greatest supermarket on the planet.”
“That is an understatement.”
“And what are they like as employers?”
A shrug. “Probably no worse than most. Anyway, beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Oh?”
But the prompt was not needed. “Hard to find part-time work round here. You know, that’ll fit in with the demands of a teenage daughter.”
“Yes, I’m sure it must be.”
“Still, if your husband walks out on you, what choice do you have?”
There was an impatient shuffling sound from someone lurking behind the pillar. Further extension of the conversation was impossible. Carole was told the total for her purchases and paid in exact change.
But she didn’t think the exercise had been wasted. If nothing else, it had confirmed Jude’s conjecture about Hilary Potton setting herself up as a public martyr. The readiness with which she had started denigrating her husband had been striking. And Carole felt sure there was a lot more where that came from.
When she relayed the information she had obtained to Jude back in Woodside Cottage, it did seem pretty meagre. Basically what it came down to was that Hilary and Alec Potton were going through a very sticky divorce, and there was no love lost between them. Which everyone in Fethering already knew.
But Jude was characteristically positive about the contribution to their investigation. “Though whether we should dignify what we’re doing with the name of ‘investigation’ is a moot point.”
“Well, there’s been a murder-no question about that.”
“No. And we were the first people on the scene, so we definitely do have an involvement. But we have no information of real relevance. We haven’t even got any suspects.”
“Jude, are you suggesting we should give up our nonexistent investigation?”
“Of course I’m not, you idiot.”
The thought, before she’d met Jude, of anyone calling Carole Seddon an “idiot” without losing her goodwill forever, was an unlikely one. Now she found the use of the word rather comforting. Yes, it was possible for a personality even as frozen as Carole’s to thaw.
“No, we’ll press on, in the face of total ignorance, until we find out who killed Walter Fleet.”
“Unless, of course, the police get there first.”
“Phooey. No chance. It would take away the fun if they did, though, wouldn’t it?” Before Carole had time to respond, Jude went on. “Now look, I was about to knock up a prawn salad. You will stay and have some, won’t you?”
“Well…” Carole’s first instinct was to say no. When she came to think of it, her first instinct in response to any invitation was to say no. But Jude had lit a fire whose light flickered pleasingly onto the chaos of her sitting room, and the second glass of Chilean chardonnay was slipping down a treat. The offer was certainly more appealing than the remains of a fish pie sitting in the fridge at High Tor. And Carole had already done Gulliver’s evening routine of feeding and a trip out to the rough ground behind the house to do his business. Besides, sitting at home, she’d knew she’d worry about the fact that Stephen hadn’t rung her back, or feel that she should ring her ex-husband David to find out if he knew anything about the state of their son’s marriage.
“If it’s no trouble, Jude.”
“Of course not. I’m going to do it for myself, so…Help yourself to more wine. I won’t be long.”
After her friend had disappeared to the kitchen, Carole looked around the room, and tried to work out how there could be comfort in such confusion. Jude’s approach to interior design reflected her wardrobe. Everywhere firm outlines were softened by swathes of drapery. What logic dictated must be sofas and armchairs became vague shapes under accumulations of throws, rugs and cushions. Even the horizontal lines of mantelpiece, tables and shelves were rendered irregular by the bizarre collection of objects that were placed on, or suspended from them.
Such untidiness went against Carole’s every instinct, but she couldn’t deny the room was a relaxing environment to inhabit. Whatever she was sitting on seemed to cosset and blur the angularities of her body. From the kitchen, the reassuring mumble of Radio 4 could be half heard. Carole leant forward to the bottle on the table in front of her, and topped up her glass.
“We spoke too soon.”
Jude was standing in the kitchen doorway.
“What?”
“We were guilty of underestimating the police.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Just heard it on the news. The police have taken a forty-seven-year-old man in for questioning in connection with the murder of Walter Fleet.”
