She smiled bitterly at this and then, with an effort, forced herself to look directly at them – firstly at Clement, and then at Trudy. ‘My husband told me that I wasn’t to be fooled by your youth, my dear,’ she said, making Trudy’s eyes widen in surprise. ‘He says that you and Dr Ryder have an uncanny way of getting at the truth, and that’s why he insisted you investigate everything discreetly. And I trust my husband’s judgement,’ she added. ‘Besides, I think DI Jennings and his team are under pressure to close Iris’s case as quickly as possible, which given the media attention is understandable. And the temptation for them to simply blame David and close the case must be enormous. So I’ll do anything I can to help you. What do you want to know?’
Trudy swallowed hard and felt a momentary sense of panic. Until now, the problem had felt, not academic exactly, but not altogether quite ‘real’ either. But now, facing this grieving mother who was placing so much trust in her, brought it home to her just how much responsibility there was resting on her shoulders. Especially when she wasn’t sure herself whether or not David Finch had first committed murder and then suicide.
‘Well, there are one or two things we’d like to ask you about,’ she said, knowing that she had to start somewhere, or she might start to feel paralysed by her own sudden lack of confidence. ‘Before she died, Iris was seen wearing an expensive necklace. Do you know if David bought it for her?’
‘Oh no, I’m sure he didn’t,’ Betty said at once. ‘He was a student, with a part-time job during the holidays. He had no spare money. And his father and I only gave him a small allowance – enough to cover the basic necessities. He didn’t have the wherewithal to buy Iris all the things that she was always wanting and angling for.’
The last sentence was said bitterly, and Trudy followed up on it quickly. ‘Yes, we’re picking up things about Iris. I take it she was the sort who liked the good things in life?’ she said mildly.
‘Oh my, yes, that was Iris,’ Betty Finch said coldly, but then her face suddenly crumpled. ‘Oh no, I shouldn’t have said that. I keep forgetting that the poor girl’s dead. And the way they did it! How could anyone do that to her? Make a mockery of her like that, tying her to the maypole with those ribbons? It was like someone really hated her. Her poor parents.’
Clement reached forward and put a hand over her own. ‘Easy, Mrs Finch. We won’t keep you much longer,’ he said quietly.
Betty nodded, gulped, took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders again. ‘Sorry. I’m all right now, really I am. What else can I tell you?’
‘Do you know anything about an argument that David might have had with Ronnie Dewberry, Mrs Finch? We’ve been hearing rumours that they had a falling out?’ Trudy tried next.
‘Really? Well, I know that David hadn’t been very happy with Ronnie for some time, but I don’t know that it meant much – nothing serious, anyway. They’d been friends for so long, and they always made up any differences they might have had. David never said anything to me about it.’
‘Why hadn’t he been happy with Ronnie?’ Clement slipped in his first question, and Betty waved a hand vaguely in the air.
‘Oh, I think that was because Ronnie was always warning him against Iris. For some reason, Ronnie never thought much of Iris, and wasn’t afraid of saying as much to David. Of course, they’ve been best friends for simply ages, ever since they were knee-high to grasshoppers, and so I suppose Ronnie expected David to listen to him and follow his advice to jilt her. But of course …’ Here, the dead boy’s mother shrugged. ‘When a boy’s smitten, properly smitten I mean, especially for the first time … well, even long-time friendship doesn’t count for much, does it?’
Betty smiled sadly again and looked from one to the other questioningly.
‘So David carried on seeing her. Hmmm, I’m surprised Ronnie was set against Iris,’ Clement mused. ‘She really was a stunningly lovely girl, wasn’t she?’
‘Oh yes, you had to give her that,’ Betty said promptly. ‘But I’m afraid it went to her head a bit. She had all sorts of fancy ideas – becoming a model, or a film star, or something, so they say. Silly really. She was so desperate to get out of the village and make this grand life for herself …’
She abruptly clamped her lips together as she evidently realised she was in danger of speaking ill of the dead yet again. Instead, she sighed and shrugged. ‘It was all so pointless! I knew David was just a passing fancy for her, you see. It was obvious. Oh, he was a good-looking lad, my David, and our family is well respected in the village. So …’ She trailed off, clearly struggling to find a way of saying that they were a step above the girl’s working-class roots without sounding snobbish.
‘The Carmodys would have thought of your son as a good catch,’ Trudy helped her out with a gentle smile.
‘Exactly,’ Betty said gratefully. ‘Not that Iris saw things the same way. To her, I think David was, well, just a bit of a plaything, really. Or worse – camouflage.’
‘Could you expand a bit on that for us, Mrs Finch?’ Trudy asked gently. ‘I know it’s hard, not wanting
