Five Dead Canaries

to slip off her pinafore and join them at the table. After giving Maureen a warning glance, Diane braced herself.

‘We had another visit from Sergeant Keedy,’ she said.

Quinn glared. ‘Why is he still bothering us?’

‘He wanted to talk to Maureen alone.’

‘Well, I hope you told her that he couldn’t. I don’t care who he is, Di. He can’t come barging in here and bombarding Maureen with questions. She’s still recovering from what happened.’ He pointed his knife at Diane. ‘You should have refused outright. Did you?’

‘No — but they were only alone together for a short while.’

‘Two minutes would have been too long!’ he protested.

‘He felt that Maureen could help the investigation.’

‘I didn’t mind,’ said Maureen, coming to her mother’s aid. ‘Sergeant Keedy was very nice. He didn’t make me feel uncomfy or anything. He just wanted to know a little more about the others.’

‘The best way to do that,’ said Quinn, ‘is to talk to their families.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ said Diane. ‘They’re still struggling with the shock of what happened at that pub. Besides, they could only say what their daughters were like at home. Maureen knew them at work where they behaved differently.’

His gaze shifted to Maureen and there was menace in his tone. ‘Don’t you dare tell me that you talked to him about our family. I warned you against that.’

‘Sergeant Keedy didn’t ask about us,’ said Maureen.

‘So what did you tell him?’

‘I just told him the truth. I liked them all. They were friends. I miss them. The person that the sergeant was really interested in was Enid.’

‘Enid Jenks — she the one who plays the violin?’

‘Yes, she played the piano as well.’

‘And what did you say about her?’

Maureen hesitated, looking at her sister to indicate that Lily was perhaps too young to hear the information. Quinn became restive. He spoke through a mouthful of half-chewed potato.

‘Well — what did you say, girl?’

‘I told him that Enid was having trouble with a man at work.’

‘What sort of trouble?’

‘He wouldn’t leave her alone.’

Meals of any kind always posed a problem during an investigation. Marmion and Keedy had to eat on the hoof, grabbing whatever they could at whatever unlikely time it might be. It was mid-afternoon before they finally managed to have some lunch. Back at the police station, they munched sandwiches and sipped lukewarm tea. Keedy’s visit to the factory had given them a much more rounded picture of their chief suspect and the photograph was an added bonus. As he reached for another sandwich, Marmion studied the face of Herbert Wylie.

‘What do you see when you look at him, Joe?’ he asked.

‘I see an ugly little bugger in a decent suit.’

‘You’d never think he was off on a works outing, would you?’

‘Maybe he didn’t want to spend a day with a load of other men,’ said Keedy. ‘His idea of fun is to be alone with Enid Jenks.’

‘Alan Suggs was no oil painting but, compared to this sour-faced chap, he was dazzlingly handsome. If he wanted to impress women, why didn’t Wylie learn to smile properly?’

‘Who knows?’ He looked over Marmion’s shoulder at the photograph. ‘There’s a mean glint in his eye. You can imagine him stalking his prey.’

‘That’s only because you know what he did to Enid Jenks,’ said Marmion. ‘If you didn’t, you’d probably have said that he needed spectacles. I mean, look at this character over here,’ he went on, pointing to a plump individual in the middle of the group. ‘He’s got the face of merciless killer, if ever I saw one, yet he’s probably a devoted husband and father who’s led a spotless existence. The camera does lie sometimes.’

‘That’s a fair point,’ conceded the other. ‘I daresay that anyone looking at a photo of me would think I was a homicidal maniac. And remember how Harte reacted when he first set eyes on you? You’re a highly respected detective inspector yet he thought you looked shifty.’

‘There’s no need to bring that up,’ complained Marmion.

‘It shows you that you should never judge a sausage by its skin.’ Keedy glanced at the telephone. ‘Are you going to ring Chat for a chat?’

‘He’ll be too busy claiming credit for unmasking our new suspect.’

‘We do the digging and he gets the pat on the back.’

‘It was ever thus in the police force.’

‘You could have been superintendent, if you’d really wanted the job.’

‘I like it the way it is, Joe.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, I’m serious.’

‘But it would have meant more money, more power and regular meals.’

‘It would also have kept me caged up in Scotland Yard, missing the dubious pleasure of your company. I’m good at what I do and I’ll settle for that.’

Keedy drank some tea. ‘How did you get on with Enid Jenks’s father?’

‘It was much as I expected.’

‘Did he refuse to believe that his daughter had deceived him?’

‘Yes, he did — and I had some sympathy with him there. It rattled him,’ said Marmion, pressing on quickly before Keedy could respond to the veiled reference to Alice. ‘He thought that Enid did everything that he told her and that she’d never developed a mind of her own. He knows differently now.’

‘Didn’t he have the faintest inkling that she was being hounded?’

‘No, Joe, he’s not the most observant of men. In retrospect, of course, it was another story. When I told him that Wylie had turned up at their church on one occasion, he said that he knew when that must have been because his daughter began to behave strangely one Sunday. She not only dragged him away as soon as the service was over, she held his arm all the way home and she hadn’t done that for years. When he asked if something was wrong, Enid said she felt unwell.’

‘It must have been a torment for her, suffering in silence like that.’

‘She just didn’t feel able to confide in him. By chance,’ continued Marmion, ‘Neil Beresford was there when I called. He’s made an amazing recovery. Last time I saw him, he was almost at death’s door. He’d come to see Jenks to discuss the letter they’d both received from Mr Kennett.’

‘What was their verdict?’

‘They’re both going to accept the offer.’

‘That’s very sensible of them.’

‘So is Mr Ingles, apparently.’

‘I remember him,’ said Keedy. ‘He threw us out of the house.’

‘We touched a sensitive spot, Joe.’

‘My memory of Mr Ingles is that he was a compound of sensitive spots. You had to be careful what you said. Talking to him was like walking barefoot over broken glass. Next time you go there, Harv, you go alone. There was one thing in his favour, mind you,’ he went on, unable to hide a smirk. ‘At least he didn’t think you were shifty.’

Sadie Radcliffe was in the middle of putting wet dungarees through the mangle when the visitors called. Drying her hands, she went to the door and opened it to a smartly dressed couple whom she’d never seen before. Brian Ingles introduced himself and his wife and asked if they might speak to her. Since the living room was full of baby things, Sadie was embarrassed to take them into it but she had no alternative. After waving them to the settee, she perched on a stool beside the fireplace. She noticed the quality of June’s coat and the pearl necklace at her throat. Ingles took control. Accustomed to giving orders at work, his question sounded more like a