Dead Woman's Shoes: 1 (Lexy Lomax Mysteries) (14 page)

Lexy gave a mirthless smile, remembering Hope and Edward’s comments about the Todds’ renovations.

“It’s not as if we were short of money,” went on Mr Todd. “In fact, I couldn’t understand why Avril was sending these horrible letters, and she didn’t seem able to explain it herself. I thought perhaps it was some event in her childhood.”

That would have been a nice irony, thought Lexy.

“You should have got her some help, Mr Todd,” she said, pointedly.

“I know, you don’t have to tell me – but after last time…we had such a huge showdown. She promised me sincerely that she would never do it again.”

Lexy tried to imagine the well-nourished Avril Todd tearfully making this pact with her small, insignificant husband.

“Anyway,” he sighed, “over the last year, I gradually realised that she was… at it again. I asked her outright, once or twice, but she denied it. She covered her tracks very carefully. I looked everywhere for some sort of evidence, you know, envelopes, magazines with letters cut out, but she never seemed to leave anything around. The only real thing I had to go on was her mysterious weekly nights out, the ones that she told me she spent attending am-dram committee meetings. When I found out that wasn’t the case, I suspected she might be using the time to distribute her… letters. You know, under cover of darkness. I felt I needed some evidence to confront her with, which is when I decided to call your number. I thought if I got a photograph of her leaving letters, I would be able to have it out with her.” He paused. “But surely she wouldn’t have gone to meet one of her victims in person?”

“Do you have any idea who she might have been sending the letters to?” Lexy asked urgently. Other than Hope Ellenger.

“Oh, it would almost certainly have been the members of the Clopwolde Amateur Dramatics Society,” he said, promptly. “If she’s running true to type. It was an am-dram group in Maida Vale, too. And in Reigate.”

Reigate? He hadn’t mentioned Reigate.

“They were the group of people with whom she was most involved in the village.” He paused. “She didn’t really socialise with anyone else. Oh, my poor, stupid Avril.”

Lexy was stunned by Mr Todd’s news. But she had to steel herself for a bit longer, because having broken it to him that his beloved wife had been killed, now was the time for the really tricky part.

“Mr Todd?”

“Yes?”

“Obviously the police don’t know we’re having this conversation.”

His voice was cautious. “No?”

“No. They will probably be waiting to break this news to you when you return home, as they don’t know where you are at present.”

“Right.” He drew the word out.

Lexy squeezed her crossed fingers. “You see, when I gave my witness statement I didn’t actually mention that I was on a surveillance job, following your wife. I said I was just driving around, and I’d got lost. I said I saw her car parked up a lane, so I just stopped to ask her the way.”

Roderick Todd cottoned on quickly.

“So what you’re saying is the police don’t know I hired a private eye to follow my wife?”

“No,” said Lexy, gently.

“And they don’t know that Avril was involved in sending out these letters?”

“Not from me,” said Lexy. “I didn’t realise that myself until you told me.”

He became very calm. “So all I need to tell them is that I had no idea what Avril was doing or who she was meeting last night?”

“That’s about the long and short of it.”

There was a brief pause.

“And if it is proven that she was… murdered because she was trying to blackmail someone, I can say I had no idea what she was up to? So that it doesn’t look as if Avril had been doing this with my knowledge?”

“Yup,” confirmed Lexy. Everyone had a price – that’s what she was relying on.

“And it will help you out too?”

“More than you know.”

“Then I agree.”

Lexy sank weakly to her knees, still holding the phone. That had been a close one.

“You’ll have to act as if Avril’s death is a terrible shock to you when you see the police this afternoon,” she reminded him, respectfully.

“I won’t need to act.”

“No… of course not.”

“In spite of this arrangement between us, I still consider it imperative her murderer is found, of course,” Mr Todd continued. “I won’t be able to rest. I can rely on you in this respect, can’t I?”

“Sorry?”

“To find Avril’s killer, I mean. You’re in a unique position to do so.”

No, no, no. Definitely no. Lexy gave a forced laugh. “Listen, Mr Todd, when the killer made his getaway in your wife’s car, he would have left his DNA and prints all over it,” she told him. “As soon as the forensic evidence comes back from the police lab, they can nail him. They won’t need this evidence we’re… keeping private.”

“Well – if you’re sure?”

As eggs is eggs. Lexy replaced the receiver and walked slowly back into the bathroom to put on her jeans.

Avril Todd a writer of poison pen letters. A blackmailer. And all the time Lexy had thought she was some kind of man-eater. She thought back to the morning two days ago when she had met Roderick Todd.

It’s not who she’s meeting so much as what’s she’s doing.

Lexy gave a grim smile. When she did the next surveillance job, she’d make damned sure that she and the client were both playing in the same rock and roll band.

When she did the next surveillance job? Lexy punched the rim of the bath. What was she thinking? There would be no more surveillance jobs, or anything else that even smacked of the words
private
and
investigations
in the same sentence.

And as for her existing work – well, Hope Ellenger’s blackmail letter problem had just solved itself, to put it brutally. She certainly wouldn’t be getting any more. And as for Guy Ellenger – well, he could
cherchez la chatte grotesque
himself. She would tell him that this afternoon, when she went round there.

Lexy nursed her hand. She could feel Kinky’s eyes on her from where he stood in the bathroom doorway.

A sudden, sharp rap at the front door made them both jump.

Lexy struggled to do up her jeans as she went to answer.

Hopefully it would be Edward. It would be good to see a friendly face.

She pulled open the door.

A man and a woman stood expressionless on the veranda.

Oh, crap.

“Alexandra Lomax?”

She nodded silently.

They held up warrant cards, and the man stepped forward.

“I’m DI Tony Malik and this is DS Maggie Caine. It’s about the murder of Mrs Avril Todd last night. Is it convenient if we come in?”

Lexy ushered them through, relaxing slightly. They hadn’t arrested her on the spot. That was promising. And DI Milo must have kept shtum over her assumed name, which was big of him. She ought to feel grateful. But she guessed there would be plenty of time for that over dinner on Sunday night.

She extracted that thought from her mind with some difficulty.

“Have you arrested anyone?”

“It’s a bit early yet,” said DI Malik. Lexy saw perspiration running down his neck. “The forensics team is on to it, but these things take time.”

How long did it take to scrape a bit of DNA off a car seat and analyse it? In the meantime a murderer was running around free. Lexy pursed her lips. With what she knew, she probably
could
suss out who it was quicker than the police. After all, she’d met most of the suspects, if Roderick Todd was right in assuming that Avril’s blackmail victims were confined to members of the Clopwolde am-dram. She grappled with her conscience. If she and Mr Todd had decided, for reasons of their own, to withhold certain information from the police, the least she could do would be to follow some of the leads herself and point the boys in blue in the right direction. She liked Avril Todd even less now she knew how low the woman had sunk, but it wasn’t right that her killer should stay free. Especially if he’d happened to spot Lexy in his rear view mirror as he drove away from the scene.

The policewoman’s eyes flickered with practised ease around the living room.

“We’d like to go through your statement again with you, Ms Lomax.”

Lexy tried to look relaxed. “Sure. Can’t offer you tea or coffee or anything, I’m afraid, I’m a bit disorganised here. Only just moved in, actually. I can’t believe I got caught up in all this.”

Now that was a true statement if she’d ever made one.

“Was there any particular reason that you chose to drive towards Nudging last night?” asked DI Malik.

“None whatsoever,” replied Lexy, airily. “It was a nice evening, and I was just following the country roads, taking in the scenery, trying to get familiar with the area.”

“OK.” The questioning went on. The three of them sat perspiring for twenty minutes. Lexy resolutely stuck to her story, secure now in the knowledge that Roderick Todd wasn’t going to blow her cover. She was almost starting to believe it herself.

“Right,” said DS Caine, eventually. “I think that covers everything. We shouldn’t have to bother you too much again.”

“Good,” said Lexy. “I mean…”

But the officers smiled understandingly. They all stood up.

“Oh, yes – one more thing… have the press been on to you at all?” asked the policewoman.

“No.” Lexy stared at her, alarmed. “DI Milo said he’d keep my name out of the press statement.”

“Oh – OK.” She gave Lexy a quizzical look. “We haven’t released anything officially yet, because we haven’t been able to trace any of the relatives, but sometimes these things get leaked out. So, let us know if you see anyone hanging around. And because we haven’t released anything yet it’s imperative you don’t tell
anyone
about what happened last night, for obvious reasons.”

“Course not.” As if she’d do that.

“We’re trying to track down the husband at the moment,” the policewoman went on. “We believe he was away overnight.”

“Poor bloke.” Lexy gave her a bland smile.

The detective inspector’s phone burst into life. He answered it briskly, then turned to his colleague.

“Maggie – we have to go.”

“Thank you for your time,” she said to Lexy. Call us on this number if you think of anything else that could help us.” She handed her a card, and they left.

Lexy closed the front door with exaggerated care.

“And to think we came here to get away from it all,” she said to Kinky.

12

The more Lexy thought about the notion of trying to identify Avril’s killer herself, the more she liked it. It would be an atonement, a way of getting rid of her guilt. Because she did feel guilty. She could make a start by carrying out some low-key enquiries in the village about where the various members of the Clopwolde am-dram society had spent the previous evening.

She went through to the kitchen, reheated the porridge she’d left from the night before and made herself a cup of black tea. She found herself still dwelling on the thought of having dinner with DI Milo the following evening, not so much now because the idea offended her moral sensibilities, more that she was looking forward to eating a meal that tasted of something.

After breakfast Lexy collected up her remaining money. It consisted of five pence left from the two pounds that Hope Ellenger had given her on Thursday, ten pence that she’d found down the back of the sofa, and a handful of coppers. She might just about be able to get a can of the cheapest dog food going. She didn’t tell Kinky.

Her thoughts strayed to the fifty-pound notes crammed into the battered suitcase. It was so tempting just to borrow one of them. Get some proper provisions in. See herself and the dog through until she got a job. If she’d done that in the first place she wouldn’t be involved in any of this sorry farrago now.

But then she reminded herself how Gerard had got the money. Lexy was well aware that her husband wasn’t exactly an angel when it came to valuations, or anything else, for that matter. But you had to know where to draw the line. The Gillespie affair went beyond it. Way beyond. She felt a familiar stab of fury.

Kinky gave a small whine, and Lexy put out a hand to him. “We’re not going to touch a single note of that money,” she vowed. “A single note. We’ll get by.”

She locked the cabin door and was shortly negotiating the wooden steps set into the cliff face, Kinky hopping neatly down after her.

Lexy had decided to walk into Clopwolde along the beach, and keep an eye out on the way for small change that might have dropped where people had been sitting. And perhaps a discarded sandwich or two. That reheated porridge and water mixture hadn’t really hit the spot.

The tide was out, leaving a broad strip of shingle. A scattering of people were sunbathing, strolling, or just gazing out to sea.

They set out in the direction of Clopwolde, to the hypnotic soundtrack of waves on shingle.

After just a few minutes Lexy was damp with perspiration and her nose was burning. She started to wish she had worn her baseball cap – it was somewhere in the jumble of underclothes back at the cabin. And no one appeared to have left a single penny.

A party of gulls shrieked and wheeled noisily at the water’s edge.

“It’s all right for them,” Lexy said morosely to Kinky, as she scanned the ground. “They’re not coping with life’s grisly realities. All they have to do is cruise up and down the beach, planning their next bit of fun.”

“I’ll drink to that.” The amused voice behind her made Lexy twist around sharply.

“It’s all right – only me.” It was Edward de Glenville, wearing a loose white shirt, long khaki shorts, leather sandals and a disarming smile.

Kinky wagged his tail, and Edward squatted down and stroked him.

“You look exhausted, sweetheart,” he observed, giving Lexy a sidelong glance.

“Yeah, I feel it. I had rather a… hectic time after you left yesterday.”

“You too, huh?” Edward sat down heavily, wincing as the pebbles shifted under him.

He gave a theatrical sigh. Lexy sat next to him. “Care to tell me about it?” She could see he was dying to.