“And you didn’t see anyone or notice anything unusual about that time?”
“No suspicious men lurking about in the shrubbery, Superintendent,” said the doctor, shrugging into her coat. “We certainly would have said if we had.”
“All right, Doctor, Mr. Wilson, thank you.” Kincaid stood and joined Deveney at the door. “We’ll see ourselves out. But do please let us know if you remember anything.”
He and Deveney were only halfway down the front walk when the doctor’s car shot down the graveled drive in reverse. She nodded to them as she went by, backed into the lane, and sped off towards the village.
“No wonder she ends up in the ditch,” Deveney said, chuckling.
Although the sun had come out while they were in the house, the garden still held a thin glaze of moisture. Heavy, bronze heads of hydrangeas hung over the path, leaving damp streaks on their trouser legs.
“What do you suppose she’s playing at?” Deveney continued after a moment. “She knew Gilbert’s death would release her from any obligation of confidentiality, especially about his medical condition.”
Kincaid pushed open the garden gate, then stopped and turned to Deveney as they reached the car. “But Claire is still her patient, and I think it’s
“She could’ve just told us that he’d come about his medical condition,” mused Deveney, “and we would have gone merrily on our way.”
Kincaid opened the door and slid into the passenger seat, thinking about the slightly off-center feel of the whole interview. “I think the good doctor is entirely too honest for her own good, Nick,” he said as Deveney joined him. “She couldn’t bear to tell an outright lie.”
Next on their list of burglary victims was Madeleine Wade, owner of the village shop. They drove through the center of the village and past the garage, and after a wrong turn or two found the shop, tucked away in a cul-de-sac halfway up the hill. Fruit and vegetables were displayed in boxes outside the door: lovely perfumed Spanish tangerines, cukes, leeks, apples, and the inevitable potatoes.
Nick Deveney picked a small, earthy pippin from a box of apples and brushed it against his sleeve. A bell tinkled as they entered the shop’s postage-stamp interior, and the girl behind the counter looked up from her magazine. “Can I help you?” she asked. Her soft voice held a trace of Scots. Straight fair hair framed a fragile-looking face, and she regarded them seriously, as if her question had been more than rote. Beneath the short sleeves of her knitted top her arms looked thin and unprotected. She seemed about the same age as Lucy Penmaric and made Kincaid think of his ex-wife.
The shop smelled faintly of coffee and chocolate. For its size it was very well stocked, even to a small freezer case filled with good quality frozen dinners. While Deveney handed his apple over for weighing and dug in his pocket for change, Kincaid flipped through his notebook, and when they’d completed their transaction, he took Deveney’s place at the counter. “We’re looking for Madeleine Wade, the owner. Is she here?”
“Oh, aye,” said the girl, favoring them with a shy smile. “Madeleine’s upstairs in her studio, but I don’t think she has a client just now.”
“Client?” repeated Kincaid, wondering bemusedly if the shopkeeper led a double life as the village prostitute. He’d known stranger combinations than that.
The girl tapped on a card Cello-taped to the countertop. REFLEXOLOGY, AROMATHERAPY & MASSAGE, it read in neat calligraphy, and beneath that, BY APPOINTMENT ONLY, and a phone number.
Enlightened, he said, “Oh, I see. She’s quite the entrepreneur, isn’t she?”
The girl looked at him blankly for a moment, as if he’d exceeded her vocabulary, then directed, “Just go round the side and ring the bell.”
Kincaid leaned a little more determinedly on the counter and ventured, “You’d be about school-leaving age, I should think?”
She blushed to the roots of her fair hair and whispered, “I did my GCSE’s last year, sir.”
“Do you know Lucy Penmaric at all, then?”
Seeming to find this question less intimidating, she answered a bit louder. “I know her to speak to, of course, but we don’t hang about together, if that’s what you mean. She’s never had much to do with the village kids.”
“Stuck-up, is she?” Kincaid asked, inviting a confidence. Deveney, flipping idly through the postcards while munching his apple, gave every appearance of ignoring their conversation.
Frowning, the girl pushed her hair from her face. “No, I wouldn’t say that. Lucy’s always nice enough, she just doesn’t seem to mix with anyone.”
“That’s too bad, considering what’s happened,” said Kincaid. “I imagine she could use a friend just now.”
“Oh, aye,” she said. With the first hint of curiosity she’d shown, she added, “You’ll be from the police, then?”
“That we are, love.” Deveney joined them, holding aloft his apple core. “And you’ll be doing us a great service if you’ll toss this in the bin.” He winked at her, and she blushed again but took the apple core willingly enough.
Cocky bastard, thought Kincaid. He thanked the girl and she smiled at him gratefully. As he reached the door, he turned back to her. “What’s your name, by the way?”
She offered it to him on a whispered breath. “Sarah.”
“That one’s not likely to make a rocket scientist,” quipped Deveney as they left the shop.
“I’d say she’s shy, not stupid.” Kincaid avoided a puddle as they rounded the corner of the shop. “And I find it dangerous to underestimate people, though I dare say I’ve done it more than once.” He thought again of Vic, of the times she’d come home in a temper, threatening to darken her hair to brunette so that she wouldn’t have to prove her intelligence to everyone she met. It occurred to him now that even though he’d sympathized with her, he’d been just as guilty as the clods he’d criticized—he hadn’t taken her seriously until it had been much too late.
“Touche.” Deveney winced at the mild reproof. “I’ll try to keep a more open mind.”
