had to keep on taking it.'
'Keep on taking it?' echoed Joe. 'Oh, shoot. You mean he'd started dipping his hand in while you were still working at Poll-Pott? I bet you helped him, right? No wonder he changed the habit of a lifetime and actually got married to you!'
'I resent that!' exclaimed Naysmith indignantly. 'I love Lucy dearly, she knows that. All that I have done has been for our future happiness and that of our family.'
He thrust his face close to Joe's as he spoke, but his expression didn't match his tone. A complicitous grin played on his lips and he gave Joe a big wink. This was a really cold piece of work, thought Joe. And it's only that coldness which is keeping me alive, and hopefully Dorrie too, while he works out how best to develop this situation.
Concentrate on the woman, he told himself. She's your best hope.
'He murdered Victor Montaigne, did you know that?' he said. 'What happened, Felix? He too sharp for you? Got wind of what you were up to, so you offed him?'
Get him to admit it, see what her reaction was.
'Certainly. He was bright, dear Victor. But not bright enough to make his accusations in public. No, he waited till we were alone in the office after the Christmas party. I thought at first he wanted to propose taking a cut which would have been fine. But no, he just wanted me to know that he knew, and rather than spoil his skiing trip having to hang around and make statements to the police, he was postponing the revelation till after the hols. So I spoilt his skiing trip for him anyway.'
'Meaning you killed him! You hear this, Mrs. Naysmith?'
'For heaven's sake,' said Naysmith irritably. 'You don't imagine you're telling Lucy anything she doesn't know? Who do you think drove my car up the Al while I drove Montaigne's with his body in the boot? Of course, when I made it look like suicide, I'd no idea how long it would take the pigs to find him. Worked out rather well.'
They'll be able to tell he's been dead a week, not just two days,' declared Joe with all the expertise of a man who'd read Venera's chapter on dating a body.
'After immersion in icy water? Hardly,' said Naysmith. 'But even if they do, so what? I never said he was the one who attacked me, did I? I'll leave recovery of that particular memory till everything's signed and sealed.'
You had to give it to him, thought Joe, admiring what he knew he most lacked, the ability to think on his feet, to change direction in midair. No simple straightforward giant this, but a man wily as Loge. Yet he'd been like Wagner's Fafner in one respect in his lust for gold he hadn't hesitated to kill his fellow giant, Fasolt.
'And Potter? Your old mate. How come you had to off him too?'
'Yes, that was hard,' said Naysmith, frowning. 'Poor Peter had stumbled on something. Maybe Victor had dropped a hint, can't see him getting there himself. Of course, the first person he confided in was me, because I was the last person he would suspect. Silly ass then spent most of Christmas in the office puzzling things out. Didn't have much else to do, I expect. Rather a lonely type since all his sporting chums had got themselves married or partnered at the least. Deep down I think the dear chap was a repressed shirt-lifter, though he would have punched your nose in if you'd dared suggest it. Red hot on insurance claims. You ever get that problem of yours sorted, by the way?'
'I'm working on it,' said Joe. 'So what happened?'
'He rang me, suggested we meet. I came. He showed me what he'd worked out. It was clear as the nose on your face really. Everything pointed one way, I was the chap with his hand in the till. Only Peter was determined not to see it. But the others wouldn't let old friendship blind them, even if they felt it! So I thought, with Victor out of the way, there was a ready-made scapegoat if things got hot. No one knew I was here, eventually they'd find out Victor had never left the country, too good an opportunity to miss, so I did it.'
Joe glanced towards Lucy. She'd wandered to the doorway and was looking anxiously up the stairs. No hope there, even if she had been listening, he guessed. While he didn't care to believe that her biological imperative would drive her to kill for herself, clearly it had taken her far beyond the point where anything her husband did for her alleged benefit bothered her.
'And Sandra lies?' he prompted.
'Sandra? When she got home after calling the police and giving her statement and all that crap, she rang the cottage to tell me what had happened. Lucy fielded the call, said I was down at the pub. Sandra gave her a blow by blow account. She really thought you'd killed poor Peter at that point. So when she mentioned some papers of Peter's she'd removed, she wasn't at all suspicious. She just thought they looked a bit confidential and didn't want some nosey cop taking them in as evidence and breaking our client confidentiality. I'd rung Lucy from a call box on my way home to say all was well. But when she told me this, I got to thinking that maybe once you got yourself off the hook, Joe, Sandra might start having silly thoughts. I didn't know what it was she'd taken, but I couldn't risk it leading to me. So I turned round and headed back into town.'
To kill her on the off chance she'd seen something? Shoot, you really get off on this stuff, don't you?'
'No, indeed,' denied Naysmith indignantly. 'All I wanted was to double check.'
He glanced at his wife who was clearly in a world of her own, then dropped his voice confidentially.
'I had a key to her flat, you see. We used to have a little thing going, you know what I mean. I let myself in and took a look around. I found the papers, quite innocent as it turned out. But alongside them I found a copy of our partnership agreement which she'd clearly just been studying. How's that for cold blooded? She finds one of her partners dead and heads off home to see how this will affect her own situation.'
He sounded genuinely indignant.
That why you killed her, to teach her a lesson in etiquette?' said Joe.
'Don't be frivolous. The silly cow woke up and found me there what else could I do?'
'Yeah, I see how it was forced on you,' said Joe.
'Funny thing is, I've been looking at my own copy of the agreement tonight. In the unlikely event Darby died before we took on anyone else, leaving me as the sole surviving partner, I would assume absolute control, wouldn't have to buy anyone's estate out or anything. It was a sort of protective device against some unforeseen disaster
