“Putting Lucinda on one side,” said Carole, “who else might be in the frame?”
“Ah.” Donal squinted at her. “I didn’t have you down as a racing woman, Carole.”
“What do you mean? I’ve never been to the races in my life. I’m certainly not a racing woman.”
“No, but you use racing talk.”
“I’m sorry?”
“‘In the frame.’ Now isn’t that a reference to horses in a photo finish?”
“I don’t know. Is it?”
“Well, what else could it be?”
“I thought it had something to do with pictures, or photographs, that kind of frame.”
“No, no, I’ve done my research. The phrase definitely comes from the racing world.”
“It’s funny, Donal,” said Jude. “I wouldn’t have had you down as an expert on semantics.”
“Which just shows how wrong you can be. Never judge a book by its cover.”
“No. Well, you are a dark horse.”
“Ah, you see now, Jude. You’re a racing woman too.”
Jude chuckled. “I have been racing, and I love it, but I wouldn’t say I was a racing woman.”
“Well, I think you both are racing women.” Donal looked down at his empty glass. “Mind you, you don’t seem to be very fast-drinking women.”
Jude’s eyes flashed a quick message to Carole, who stood up and said, “Let me get this one. You still all right, Jude?”
“Nearly ready for another.” Her glass was half full, but she reckoned drinking with Donal might make him more relaxed and communicative.
With Carole at the bar, Jude plunged straight back into interrogation mode. “We did hear something about the circumstances of your being banned from this pub, actually.”
“Oh yes?”
“Your having a fight with Walter Fleet…”
“Uh-huh.” He didn’t seem upset by her line of questioning, just waiting to see where she was really heading.
“Presumably the police knew about that?”
“Of course. Another reason for them to make me their first suspect.”
“We did also hear about something you said when you were arguing with Walter…”
“Well, you have been doing your research, haven’t you?” he commented sardonically.
“Apparently you said, ‘You’re not worthy of her! She’s beautiful and you don’t deserve her!’”
“What if I did?”
“To the casual listener, that could make it sound as if your argument with Walter was about a woman.”
“I suppose it could.”
“So was it about a woman?”
“You’re a nosey cow, aren’t you, Jude?” But it was said without malice; he was still feeling the benefits of two large Jameson’s and a third in prospect.
“Yes, I am a nosey cow, which is why I would quite like an answer.”
“And why should I give you one?”
“Why not?”
She had taken the right approach; he appeared tickled by her response. “So you’re reckoning maybe I was having a bit of the old illicit sex with Lucinda. Is that where you’re coming from?”
“It’d fit the known facts.”
“But it might fail rather badly to tie in with the unknown facts, mightn’t it?” He smiled teasingly, as if weighing up what kind of answer to give her-and indeed whether to give her an answer at all. Eventually he said, “Suppose I was talking about a horse.”
“The ‘she’ who Walter was ‘not worthy of ’?”
“Why not? It could have been a horse.”
“I think the odds are against it.”
Donal Geraghty chuckled. “You’re doing it again. You are a racing woman, you know.”
“Maybe,” Jude conceded with a smile. “But is the horse answer the best I’m going to get?”
“It is so,” he replied, affecting an even heavier brogue. “That’s the best you’ll have from me. And, as it happens, it’s God’s honest truth. The owner of the stables and the mad Irish tinker had words about a horse-that’s all there was to it.”
“But surely-”
“Here are the drinks,” said Carole.
Donal smiled at Jude, as if he’d engineered the end of their previous conversation. “And that’s all I’m going to tell you,” he said, reaching for his glass, without any thanks, and taking a long swallow.
“All you’re going to tell me about that,” Jude countered. “Maybe you’ll tell me more about something else?”
Carole, recognising that Jude might be getting somewhere, sat down quietly with her drink.
“And what might that something else be?” asked Donal.
“Ooh…” Jude teased. “What about blackmail?”
He chuckled. “I don’t think there’s anything I could be blackmailed about by anyone in the world. You see, the one qualification you have to have for being blackmailed is to have something to lose, and”-he shrugged-“that counts me out.”
“I wasn’t meaning you being blackmailed. I was meaning you blackmailing someone else.”
“Oh yes?” He knew exactly what she was referring to, but played deliberately dumb.
“When we were at Long Bamber you spoke of your knowing something about a couple’s marriage, and their being prepared to pay you money to keep you quiet.”
“Did I now?”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to tell you who I was talking about?”
“Yes.”
“Well, aren’t you just the nosey one, Jude? I don’t suppose you were thinking of offering me money for the information, were you?”
“No.”
“So let me get it straight what you’re asking me. I have some information that is worth money to me. You want me to give you that information for free. It doesn’t sound like much of a deal.”
“I’ll buy you another drink.”
“Well, that’s exceedingly generous, and yes, I’ll take you up on that deal.” He emptied what was left in his glass, and smiled impudently at Carole. “Maybe you’d like to get me topped up, dear?”
Biting her lip to hold back an interesting variety of responses, she returned to the bar, where she had to take her place behind a queue of anoraked ramblers who had just entered the pub.
“But you could buy me a whole bottle of Jameson’s, Jude,” Donal went on, “-a crate of the stuff-and I still don’t see why I should tell you the secret that will hopefully provide me with a nice little meal ticket for the next few months-my only prospect of a meal ticket, as it happens. Why should I?”
Jude’s charm had been known on occasions to work wonders. Oh, well, it was worth a try. “Because I’m asking you to.”
Donal Geraghty shook his head. “You know it’s a long time since I’ve done something stupid for the sake of a pretty face. I think I could be said to have learnt my lesson there.”
She tried another approach. “Then let me try a bit of guessing.”
“Guess away. It won’t get you anywhere.”
“If you have a secret about a married couple, then it’s probably not something they told you deliberately. It’s more likely to be something you overheard.” He offered no encouragement, but Jude persevered. “So the couple didn’t know you were there, and, given the kind of places where you spend most of your life, it was probably round some stables or other that you heard whatever it was-possibly some stables that you were at the time using as your ‘no fixed abode.’ Not Long Bamber, because Lucinda wouldn’t let you stay there, but somewhere else…round
