“Or what?” she asked, genuinely interested from a personal perspective as well as regarding the case.
“You… accept one another for who they are and… what they need or you go your separate ways.” Jane spoke the last with an air of resignation. “Perhaps, in a marriage you live with the hope that one day those paths will converge again.”
“You accept your husband’s infidelity?” The level of candour on display was such that she felt comfortable to respond in kind. Jane fixed her with a stare. They were two very different women but she had to admit, Jane held a view that many could probably relate to. Several of her mother’s friends would be in wholehearted agreement. This was no framework that she could ever foresee herself agreeing to live by, though. Then again, she wasn’t married yet.
“Marriages take a great deal of work,” Jane said in a way that came across as condescending. Her eyes lowered to Tamara’s hand, presently tapping index and forefinger on the table in front of her. “One day you might find that out.” Jane must have observed the engagement ring on her finger. There was an air of superiority in the woman’s manner as well as her tone. Despite what most would consider to be a humiliating conversation, what with her husband’s admission, Jane Francis held herself upright, shoulders back, commanding. Defiant.
“If neither of you told anyone. How did Colin Bettany find out?” Janssen asked. It was such an obvious question, she was irritated she hadn’t thought of it herself. Both Ken and Jane looked to each other but neither had an answer. “What about this fire? Presumably you had the wiring signed off?” Ken nodded. “Buildings don’t tend to spontaneously combust. Old properties where the wiring is shot, perhaps, but fires like yours are rare. Any idea how it started?”
Again, neither of them offered an explanation. She indicated for Janssen to join her and they headed outside. The sense of relief at their departure was palpable within the room.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Rather like the day following a November celebration the smell of burnt wood and smoke hung in the air. The fire was out and as they crossed the yard, the destruction within the studio became apparent. The damage was immense but largely contained to the confines of the stone structure having not spread to the attached buildings. That will be cold comfort for Ken, Janssen thought as he drew the attention of the station officer, notable by his white helmet. He indicated for them to wait a moment and they held their ground.
Janssen was perturbed by Ken’s admission to a relationship with Holly, professing his misguided love for her and describing it as something of a mid-life crisis. That was tantamount to a dismissal of the affair as a passing moment, normalising what was a far darker reality in his opinion. Holly was seventeen and therefore a consenting adult in the eyes of the law, so Ken Francis was right not to feel shame or guilt regarding their relationship. The moral question beyond that was, however, far more nuanced. A man twice her age and married, albeit within a rather odd open marriage with some agreed sexual boundaries or lack thereof, having a physical and emotional relationship with a girl left him questioning the man’s moral framework. Holly was a girl, not in the eyes of the law, but certainly in his own. Unsure of exactly when Ken would have met her, she could barely have been seventeen at the time and although in the sixth form of the school now, she was still too young. Had they become associated with one another a year before then they may well have been considering it a case of grooming and exploitation. These were how thin the margins were.
There was also the issue of consent that bothered him. Until they could find someone else to corroborate his assertion of them being in some agreed relationship, they only had Ken’s word to go by. His track record of allegedly having wandering hands threw that under a different light. Could he be trusted? When asked the question, his response to Holly’s pregnancy appeared genuine but, then again, it was also a motive for murder if Holly was ready to break cover and reveal him as the father. The motive extended to his wife as well.
The family’s move to Norfolk could be viewed as a fresh start after living under the threat of prosecution or just as equally, an escape from the spectre of suspicion. He caught Tamara watching him intently. For how long she had been doing so, he didn’t know.
“Penny for them,” she said. He smiled.
“They are an odd couple.” He looked back towards the house. Ken was standing at the window watching them or perhaps the smouldering wreck of his studio, it was unclear which. “I’m trying to make sense of them.”
“You don’t like them.”
The statement confused him. He didn’t realise he was so readable. Up until that point, he hadn’t given them much thought in that sense. Personal views were best kept away from investigations as the threat of those feelings clouding judgement could be detrimental to an investigation. Was he making that mistake here? She was right, however. Neither of them were people he would ever choose to spend his time with, certainly not the more he got to know them. Did that make either of them a killer? No. Both were certainly capable. Ken with his controlled, secretive behaviour and his wife, angry and neurotic. People killed for lesser reasons than these two could potentially have. The scorned wife and the younger woman. The illegitimate child threatening their status, their marriage. They were also not telling the truth. Not entirely. That thought came from instinct and he trusted it.
The station officer arrived, sparing Janssen from having to provide an answer to the question and beckoning them over to the studio.
“I figured you would want to
