“Ring Sister Bridget,” she urged.
“I know she’ll vouch for me.”
“Oh, I suppose it’s all right. But only for half an hour. I have to collect the children at three thirty.” She opened the door wide and pulled the dog away from it.
“Come in. The sitting room’s on the left. I’ll have to shut Boomer in the kitchen or he won’t leave us alone.”
Roz walked through into the sitting room, a pleasant, sunny space with wide patio doors opening out on to a small terrace. Beyond, a neat garden, carefully tended, merged effortlessly into a green field with distant cows.
“It’s a lovely view,” she said as Mrs. Wright joined her.
“We were lucky to get it,” said the other woman with some pride.
“The house was rather out of our price range, but the previous owner took a bridging loan on another property just before the interest rates went through the roof. He was so keen to be shot of this one we got it for twenty-five thousand less than he was asking. We’re very happy here.”
“I’m not surprised,” said Roz warmly.
“It’s a beautiful part of the world.”
“Let’s sit down.” She lowered herself gracefully into an armchair.
“I’m not ashamed of my friendship with Olive,” she excused herself.
“I just don’t like talking about it. People are SO persistent. They simply won’t accept that I knew nothing about the murders.” She examined her painted fingernails.
“I hadn’t seen her, you know, for at least three years before it happened and I certainly haven’t seen her since. I really can’t think what I can tell you that will be of any use.”
Roz made no attempt to record the conversation. She was afraid of scaring the woman.
“Tell me what she was like at school,” she said, taking out a pencil and notepad.
“Were you in the same form?”
“Yes, we both stayed on to do A-levels.”
“Did you like her?”
“Not much.” Geraldine sighed.
“That does sound unkind, doesn’t it? Look, you really won’t use my name, will you? I mean, if there’s a chance you will, I just won’t say any more. I should hate Olive to know how I really felt about her. It would be so hurtful.”
Of course it would, thought Roz, but why would you care?
She took some headed notepaper from her briefcase, wrote two sentences on it and signed it. “I, Rosalind Leigh, of the above address, agree to treat all information given to me by Mrs. Geraldine Wright of Oaktrees, Wooing, Hants, as confidential. I shall not reveal her as the source of any information, either verbally or in writing, now or at any time in the future.” There.
Will that do?” She forced a smile.
“You can sue me for a fortune if I break my word.”
“Oh dear, she’ll guess it’s me. I’m the only one she talked to.
At school, anyway.” She took the piece of paper.
“I don’t know.”
God, what a ditherer! It occurred to Roz then that Olive may well have found the friendship as unrewarding as Geraldine appeared to have done.
“Let me give you an idea of how I’ll use what you tell me, then you’ll see there’s nothing to worry about.
You’ve just said you didn’t like her much. That will end up in the book as something like: “Olive was never popular at school.” Can you go along with that?”
The woman brightened.
“Oh, yes. That’s absolutely true anyway.”
“OK. Why wasn’t she popular?”
“She never really fitted in, I suppose.”
“Why not?”
“Oh dear.” Geraldine shrugged irritatingly.
“Because she was fat, perhaps.”
This was going to be like drawing teeth, slow and extremely painful.
“Did she try to make friends or didn’t she bother?”
“She didn’t really bother. She hardly ever said anything, you know, just used to sit and stare at everyone else while they talked. People didn’t like that very much. To tell you the truth, I think we were all rather frightened of her. She was very much taller than the rest of us.”
