I could use a large drink.”
Carole followed him through into the bar. She was still in shock, not from the violent confrontation she had just witnessed, but from the strength of her emotional reaction to Ted’s jeopardy.
Until the other lunchtime customers had left, Ted Crisp was particularly loud and jovial in the bar, like a national leader determined to dispel press speculation about his health. But he drank a lot-Scotch, unlike his usual bitter-to counter the shock he had undoubtedly felt. And all the time, his two companions kept looking uneasily at his chest, to check that the flow of blood had really been staunched.
When there were just the three of them left, Carole asked, “Are you really not going to tell the police, Ted?”
“What use would it do?”
“It might remove Donal from circulation.”
“And what use would that do? He’s not really a threat to anyone.”
“You say that, with a fresh stab wound only inches from your heart?”
Ted could not prevent a small shudder at the image. “Look, if I do shop him, the cops’ll just have another go at stitching him up for the Long Bamber murder-which I’m sure he didn’t do.”
“I think you’re being very altruistic.”
“Altruistic nothing, Carole. I just don’t see the point of someone being charged with a crime they didn’t commit.”
With her Home Office background, she could not help agreeing with him.
“It’s a pity, though,” mused Jude, “that we’ve lost touch with Donal. I think he does know something about what happened to Walter Fleet. He hinted as much.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Ted’s voice was heavy with mock apology. “I’m sorry that my inviting him to stab me has resulted in your losing your best source of information.”
“You know I didn’t mean that.”
He grinned weakly. The skin that showed above his unkempt beard was pale and strained. However much bravado he was showing, the fight had traumatised him.
“No, I know you didn’t. Well, I can’t imagine Donal’s gone that far. He won’t stray out of the area. Shouldn’t be too hard to find him. He’ll lay low for a few days in some unsuspecting owner’s stables, then he’ll be back round his usual haunts-the Cheshire Cheese, George Tufton’s yard, Fontwell races. You’ll track him down soon enough.”
“Mm.” Jude’s brow wrinkled as she tried to get her thoughts in order. “Donal accepted the offer of a lift to Fethering because he said it ‘just the place that I need to settle back into,’ which might suggest he’s got a bolt-hole down here.”
“Could be,” Ted agreed. “There are enough people with stables in the area.”
“Yes, but he also implied that he knew something about Sonia and Nicky Dalrymple’s marriage, which he might have overheard if he was dossing down at their stables.”
“I think that’s rather a big leap of the imagination,” said Carole in her prim wet-blanket mode.
“Possibly not.” Jude’s brown eyes sparkled as the logic came together. “And now I come to think of it, Sonia did say something about not wanting Donal around her stables again, which implies that he had been there. And the Dalrymples travel so much that the stables are empty and unused a lot of the time. Yes, they’d be the perfect bolt-hole for him.”
Jude’s enthusiasm was infectious and, though she tried to resist it, Carole found her spoilsport pose weakening. “So what are you suggesting-that we go and see Sonia Dalrymple and ask whether she has an unwelcome guest in her stables?”
“Something along those lines, yes. Except Sonia’s not there at the moment. She’s taking a few days’ break at Yeomansdyke.”
“Oh.” And Carole could not completely disguise her disappointment as she said, “Well, we’ll have to wait till she comes back.”
Jude nodded, then turned to Ted. “You’re sure you’re going to be all right?”
“Yes. Just have a kip upstairs; that’ll sort me out.”
“Sure?” asked Carole anxiously.
“You betcha.” He grinned with manufactured bravado, and lapsed into the manner of the stand-up comedian he had once been. “Take more than a little prick to put Ted Crisp out of commission-particularly when that little prick’s only Donal Geraghty!”
“All right, but, as we’ve seen, he can be dangerous,” said Jude. “You look after yourself.”
“Right you are, nurse. I’ll do as I’m told.”
“Well then, we’ll say good-bye.” And she rose to her feet.
Carole looked up in puzzlement. “Why, where are we going?”
“To the Dalrymples’ house.”
“But you’ve said they’re not there.”
“No.”
Carole’s eyes widened in fascinated horror. “Are you suggesting that we trespass-or even ‘break and enter’?”
“That’s right,” said Jude.
21
Some of the Dalrymples’ fleet of cars may have been on the premises, but they were invisible behind closed garage doors. Jude persuaded a very uncertain Carole during their walk along the tow path that their best means of approach was through the front gate. She was known to Sonia and, if seen entering, felt confident she could invent some reason for doing so. Carole wasn’t so sure, but she did have to concede that “trespass” was a lesser offence than “breaking and entering”-though she was afraid they might have to move up the scale of criminality when they reached the stables.
Carole was also paranoid about the presence of burglar alarms and CCTV cameras, but as they walked across the gravel to the house, there was no sign of either. Nor, so far as they could tell, had there been any witnesses to their arrival.
When they reached the frontage, Carole’s twitchiness increased. Walking up to the front door and ringing the bell was a legitimate act. Jude could easily have been mistaken about how long Sonia Dalrymple was staying at Yeomansdyke. But the minute they started going round the side of the house, the two women had stepped over the barrier into wrongdoing.
Jude, unaffected by any such scruples and knowing the route, marched boldly ahead. Her companion, with scuttling gait and many furtive glances behind, gave a totally convincing impersonation of an intruder.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she kept saying. “It’s illegal.”
“Not only illegal, but dangerous.”
“What do you mean, Jude?”
“If Donal is in the stables…”
She didn’t need to finish the sentence. After the recent confrontation in the Crown and Anchor neither of them needed reminding they were dealing with a violent man.
“Maybe we should go back.”
“Do you really want to?”
There was a moment while Carole weighed up the demands of fear and curiosity. Then, firmly, she shook her head.
“Thought not.”
At least, when they got to the stables, no “breaking and entering” was required. The large outer gate of the block was not locked, nor had the padlocks been put through the rings of the individual stalls. Presumably, since, as Jude had witnessed, Sonia now kept all her tack inside the house, there was nothing worth stealing. The
