The Circle (24 page)

25

You shan't evade

These rhymes I've made.

Catullus (87-54BC)
Fragments,
trans. Sir William Marris

J
ust to recap, you were at home all night?'

'All night,' Bob said.

;But you were up early?'

'My job. I was on the Bristol run.'

'Which meant leaving home at . . . ?'

'Five thirty.'

'So you got out of bed at what time?'

'Quarter to five. "Early to rise and early to bed makes a man healthy, wealthy and dead."'

Stella Gregson smiled. 'One of yours?'

'Wish it was.'

'You're sure about the time?'

'I leave it to the last possible second to pull back the duvet. Quick shower and shave, sling on some clothes, slice of toast and a cup of coffee, in that order if my head is working. Then off.'

'A quarter to five this morning? No earlier?'

'I told you. I like my bed.'

'And of course there's no way to prove you were there all night?'

'How could I? Ah - you mean like someone sharing my bed? You reckon?'

'Fair enough,' Stella said. She'd enjoyed interviewing him.

'You said that wasn't one of your verses just now?'

'James Thurber.'

'But you do write poetry. You read me a sample when we last met'

'Doggerel is a better word.'

'I thought it was all right.'

'It's meant to raise a laugh here and there. Things that happen to me, people I meet. Nothing deep.'

'Is any of it published?'

'God, no. I'm a beginner.'

'I noticed you write it down in a pocket book.'

'An old diary. When I first came to the circle one of them told me to keep everything. Most of it's crap.'

Stella leaned forward like a conspirator. 'Anything on the other members? I'd love to read some more.'

He hesitated. 'Well, some of it's a bit... you know, below the belt. I wouldn't want them to read it.'

'But I'm not in the circle,' Stella said. 'And there aren't many laughs in this job.'

'All right.' He put his hand into his hip pocket and took out the small black diary. 'Don't expect Tennyson, will you?'

'I wouldn't want him, thanks. He's dead, isn't he? May I keep it overnight? I'll take care of it.' She slipped it into a drawer, and for a moment Bob Naylor looked as if he'd been duped and didn't understand how.

'We're done.' Stella parted the slats of the blinds. 'She's waiting for you downstairs.'

'Who is?'

'Your friend from the circle. That's Dagmar's little car, isn't it?'

He looked out. 'Doesn't mean a thing.'

But when he emerged from the police station it was Thomasine who stood outside the car waving. Dagmar was at the wheel. 'We thought you might be hungry if you came here straight from work,' Thomasine said. 'I got you a bite to eat from the pasty shop. It's still warm, I think.'

'Kind of you.'

'Some of the circle are in the bar at the New Park. We would have had a meeting, but it doesn't seem right somehow. We thought we'd join them.'

'Okay with me.'

It was good to see Maurice there, restored as the father figure of the circle, his big hand clasped round a pint glass. Less good to see Tudor, flushed with the drama of another death and ready to badmouth anyone who couldn't be there. Of the ladies, only Thomasine and Dagmar had come.

'Why on earth should this happen to Jessie?' Dagmar said.

'Obvious,' Tudor said. 'She got up someone's nose.'

'You don't murder people just because they upset you.'

'Oh, but you do. Well, plenty of murderers do. Let's face it, she put herself on a pedestal. Holier than thou, forever reminding us she was once married to an archbishop.'

'Archdeacon.'

'What's the difference? You wouldn't think there was any, the way she went on. You'd never find her drinking in this bar, for instance.'

Thomasine said, 'She obviously got up
your nose,
Tudor.'

'You know yourself, there were times when she would have made a nun feel guilty. As for us, we were the children of darkness.'

Maurice said, 'Let's try and be more charitable, shall we? There was nothing in Jessie's attitude that remotely justified anyone killing her.'

Dagmar said, 'Thank you, Maurice. I can't abide people who speak ill of the dead.'

Tudor said, 'So you're carrying the torch now, are you?'

'What torch?'

'Our moral conscience. Someone has to do it, I suppose. Well, you want me to be more charitable. Here's a more charitable theory for you. She was killed because of that book she was writing.'

'"Tips for the Twenty-First Century"?' Thomasine said in disbelief. 'What's the problem with that?'

A knowing smile spread across Tudor's face. 'No problem any more. It's all gone up in flames, hasn't it, like "The Snows of Yesteryear", another apparently inoffensive book. Has anyone yet considered the theory that it wasn't the people the killer wanted to destroy, it was the books?'

'That's bullshit,' she said.

'So were the books. This is literary criticism taken to the ultimate. Kill off bad books before they get published.'

'Tudor.'

'Yes?'

'Does your mother know you're out?'

Bob saw this descending into a slanging match. 'Hold on, hold on. We're all on edge,' he said. 'Let's keep it friendly, huh?'

Maurice backed him. 'The circle has always been about support for each other. Together, we ought to be able to make some sense of what's happening. In some ways we're better placed than the police to get to the truth of it. We have a fair idea what we're all about.'

'We're creative people, or we wouldn't have joined the circle,' Dagmar said, extending the idea. 'How can any of us be a murderer? Killing is destruction, the very opposite of what we are.'

'Unless one of us joined for the wrong reason,' Thomasine said with her peculiar talent for speaking up at the wrong time.

'What do you mean?'

'That they had an agenda of their own and are using the circle as a cover for their killing.'

Tudor rose to this at once. 'A cover? You've got something there. We know who the
bona fide
members are. They're the people who write stuff and read it out week after week.' The direction of his thoughts was clear as he eyed the others seated around the table. 'Maurice finished his book and delivered it. Dagmar has done about twenty.'

'Twelve,' Dagmar said.

'That's enough to prove you're genuine. Thomasine has a great folio of erotic verse.'

'Poetry,' Dagmar said.

'And far from great,' Thomasine added.

'Sorry. Poetry. Great in number, by any standard. We all admire your body - of work.' He paused to have his wit appreciated. 'And I've completed over a hundred thousand words of autobiography.'

While this was going on, Bob felt the spotlight moving inexorably his way. 'That makes me the killer,' he said, to cut short the process. 'Nothing to read out. No form at all as a writer.'

Thomasine was quick to defend him. 'You're not the only one, Bob. Anton never reads his work in our manuscript sessions.'

'Neither does Sharon,' Dagmar said.

'Right,' Thomasine said. 'She just doodles through the meetings.'

'Yeah, but they're the ones with the alibis,' Bob said. 'On the night Miss Snow was killed, Anton was using his computer and can prove it and Sharon was up in Harrogate.'

'And Zach was up in Sharon,' Tudor added.

'Tudor, why do you have to lower the tone at every opportunity?' Thomasine said.

'Like I said, it comes back to me,' Bob said. 'No alibi. Bugger all to show as a writer.'

Concern was etched deeply in Thomasine's face. 'What about your rhymes? It's no good being coy about them.' She hesitated, but not for long. 'He's a wiz at making up funny rhymes.'

There was a silence. Then Maurice said, 'Could we hear one?'

Bob's leg jerked under the table. 'This isn't the moment, is it? I'd rather be the number one suspect.'

'Go on,' Thomasine said.

Dagmar said, 'Do it, Bob.'

He took a deep breath. 'I guess there's the "Writers' Prayer".'

'What's that?' Maurice said. 'Let's hear it.'

'A bit of nonsense really. Don't know if I can do it from memory:

Lead me not into temptation,

Overusing punctuation.

Kindly show me where to drop

Comma, colon and full stop.

But if I falter, grab me, please,

And cut out my apostrophes.'

There was a silence that threatened to go on for ever. Tudor's eyes had opened wider and Dagmar's had closed, it seemed, in embarrassment.

Maurice was the first to speak. 'You wrote that?'

'Like I said, this isn't the time.'

'It's good.'

Maurice's approval always carried weight in the circle. There were murmurs of agreement.

'When did you compose it?' he asked.

'I wouldn't say "composed". "Made it up" is more like it. Today, while I was out on the road.'

'You see?' Thomasine said to them all with undisguised pride. 'He's one of us.'

Tudor gave a hollow laugh. 'I bet that pleases him no end.'

Hen Mallin worked until after midnight, repeatedly reviewing the videotapes of Blacker's visit to the circle and the witness interviews the team had carried out. Somewhere in that lot was the arsonist, unless it was Fran, the one person she hadn't got on tape. She wasn't excluding Fran. But it was hard to visualise any of them with the level of cruelty required. Even Naomi, the most obsessive one, seemed focused on writing a book, not taking a life.

She was late getting in next morning and there wasn't much to encourage her in the latest report from the forensic lab. Samples had been taken of the lead content of petrol owned by certain suspects. The residues of the leaded petrol used by the arsonist gave at least a reasonable chance of making a comparison. Basil had a couple of cans in store for his motor mower. Checks on the old cars owned by Dagmar and Fran had confirmed that they ran on leaded. Zach ran his motorbike on leaded. None of the samples matched.

She showed the report to Stella. Trying to be helpful, Stella said it was one more factor in the case, something to add to their database.

Hen was not so upbeat. 'It doesn't help us at all, Stell.

All this proves is that we haven't found the killer's supply. Any of those people could have used a can we didn't trace.'

Stell nodded. 'Are we checking the local petrol stations?'

'Done. They have no idea. A can can be bought in the shop or filled at the pump.'

'And you can bet this killer isn't going to use a local garage.'

'I did have one thought,' Hen said. 'Bob Naylor.'

'What about him?'

'He's a Parcel Force driver. Presumably they have their own depot where they fill up.'

'They'd be using diesel, guv.'

'Yes, but it's a garage set-up. The odd can stored there for private use. Have someone check it, Stell.'

Stella's eyebrows rose. 'You rate Bob Naylor as the arsonist?'

'He's the newcomer, isn't he? You interviewed him. What's your opinion?'

'I rather liked him, tell you the truth.'

'But did he tell
you
the truth?'

Later, towards midday, DC Shilling found Hen in the incident room.

'Guv.'

'Mm?'

'I've got something for you. Remember you asked me to track down the second man in the Blacker photo?'

'Innocents
magazine.'

'Right. It turns out he was the owner of Lanarkshire Press, the publisher of all those men's magazines. Mark Kiddlewick.'

'Have you found him?'

'Sort of.'

'He's not dead?'

'No.'

'Banged up?'

Shilling shook his head.

'So what do you mean by "sort of"?'

'He changed his name by deed poll in nineteen eighty-seven. He was Marcus Chalybeate after that.'

'Bit posh.'

'It was meant to be. He sold his publishing interests and wanted to forget them. He went into the health club business just when it was really taking off, got in with a couple of hotel chains and started equipping hotels up and down the country with all the latest treadmills, rowing machines, weightlifting gear and the rest of it. The turnover was huge. He started buffing up his image, making donations to charity and the Labour Party, rubbing shoulders with the great and the good. Five years ago he was given a life peerage. He's Lord Chalybeate of Boxgrove now.'

'I think I've heard of him,' Hen said. 'Not that I've ever stepped inside a health club. Where can we see him?'

'Problem there,' Shilling said. 'He's unavailable.'

'What do you mean - "unavailable"?'

'I made enquiries. He has a secretary and she says his diary is full for the next week. The government are trying to get some bill through the House of Lords and every vote is crucial.'

'I'll see him in London, then.'

'You won't get past that secretary, guv.'

'Watch me.' She handed him the phone. 'Get me the number.'

Without another word, Shilling pressed the buttons and handed it across.

'Is that Lord Chalybeate's secretary?' Hen said. 'Good. May I speak to him? . . . Detective Chief Inspector Mallin of West Sussex Police . . . Isn't he? Oh, but I think he'll make an exception for me. Tell him it's about an old colleague of his at Lanarkshire Publishing, Edgar Blacker. Yes, Blacker ...' In a short while she winked at Shilling. 'Lord Chalybeate? Good of you to come to the phone. DCI Mallin here. Bit of a blast from the past, this. I need to see you urgently about your connections with the late Edgar Blacker. You probably heard he was murdered . . . This afternoon, please . . . That will do nicely. Three thirty? . . .' She put down the phone and said to Shilling, 'Do you own a suit and tie? Get home and togged up. We're meeting him at the Garrick Club.'

They didn't step far into the Garrick. Just enough to announce themselves to the porter. Lord Chalybeate was waiting at the top of the steps and came down when he heard his name. He was silver-haired now and wore designer glasses and a pinstripe suit. He was just recognisable as the man in the photo.