Wednesday
It was not part of the wedded-bliss package to have to take
a phone-call from anyone before breakfast. The twins had already needed a feed
at 5 and Gary had remarked then that the nights were getting perilously short
since he usually gave PeggySue her breakfast at 7. Phone-calls before 8 a.m.
were at the very least inconsiderate.
***
“Were you in bed when it happened?” Cleo asked.
“No. I was elsewhere, visiting,” said Rita. “I came to open
early because I have a regular customer at eight, and the flames were burning
the net curtains and coming out of the window,” she said.
“Did you leave a window open?” said Cleo. “Isn’t that
dangerous on the ground floor?”
“I forgot to check. I was in a hurry last night.”
“It might be the way the house was set on fire,” said Cleo.
“You mean someone did it deliberately. But why?”
“You may have an enemy, or a rival.”
“Do you mean that new hairdresser’s that’s now open at the
Wellness Centre?”
“That’s been there for ages.”
“But not open to non-members until last week. I will lose most
of my customers now.”
Cleo thought that might happen because Rita either imposed a
pot cut or a perm on her customers, had given up on Cleo’s mass of curls, and
did not cater for male clients, in contrast to the Wellness Hair Centre that
had nicely manicured male barbers and was not sexist.
“Your insurance won’t be too pleased about the fire if you
left a window open,” said Cleo.
“That’s another problem, Cleo. I’m not insured as a business.”
“That was very foolish. What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. Frank has gone to London so he can’t help me.
He took all his things with him, so I don’t think he’s coming back,” said Rita.
Cleo did not want to comment on that. Frank Wetherby was a
lone wolf and it was a wonder that he had even moved in with Rita.
“Have the fire fighters finished?”
“Nearly.”
“Have they said anything about what caused the fire?” Cleo
asked.
“No, but someone will
find out, they said.”
“Have the police arrived?” was Cleo’s next query.
“A patrol car came. I think they are going to send someone from
Middlethumpton to investigate.”
“Investigate what, Rita?”
“Arson, I suppose. I think the police always have to go to
fires.”
“You could be right, Rita.”
“Gary was listening in. At this point he drew his fingers through
his hair, making it stand on edge.
“I’d come to support you, but I have no one for the children.
I’ll send my husband before he goes to work.”
Gary winced, but Cleo had already made the offer and smiled
sweetly.
“I’ll come along when my mother-in-law arrives. My husband
is getting up soon.”
“Thank you. Weren’t you already up?” said Rita and rang off.
***
“Rita says thank you,” said Cleo.
“I heard all that. Why the hell should I go there?”
“I thought you might want to,” said Cleo. “At least she wasn’t
in bed when it happened.”
“But I was fast asleep. A torch thrown through an open
window is quite a trusted way of dealing with a rival,” said Gary. “And there’s
always the almost infallible Molotov cocktail that comes in handy for such
actions.”
“Frank left her to go to London.”
“I’m not surprised that he fled that nest. Where was she
last night? In someone else’s bed?”
“She did not say that. She got to the shop early from
somewhere else and the drapes were burning brightly. She might have been
visiting her parents, Gary.”
“No corpses handy?”
“Not so as you’d notice. I suppose she would have told me if
there had been. I got the impression that Frank Wetherby has left her for good.
I know he wanted to go to London. He told me that much before he left the agency.”
“Don’t you think he’ll come back?”
“He took everything with him.”
“That says it all. I’d advise you to close the agency altogether
if it wasn’t so damned useful,” said Gary.
“It’s summer. Business is slack. I’ll give it this year,
Gary.”
“Having you at HQ even part-time and in an advisory capacity
means that I can’t always consult the agency as I used to. The auditors would
ask why I was paying you twice.”
“Which do you prefer, Gary? The agency with all its trials,
tribulations and good ideas or me doing good deeds at your institution?”
“That’s a difficult question. I suppose that combining the
two will get tougher but is better for both of us,” said Gary, who had been
wondering how long it would take before they had this discussion and had, to be
honest, been avoiding it. “You won’t have time for the agency next year.”
“We still have Grit,” said Cleo.
“For how long? She is going to marry my boss. I can feel it
in my bones.”
“She’s free to do what she wants, but the kids need her and
she knows it. And that is not just because I work. She needs the family.”
“She didn’t used to,” said Gary.
“Well she does now. Why don’t you get some clothes on and
take a look at Rita’s bonfire?”
“I wanted to ask Roger about his intentions when he brought
my mother back from that jazz club.”
“You’re not her guardian, Gary.”
“I feel responsible.”
“Then be thankful it’s Roger she likes, not some down and out
like Kelly.”
“Talking of down and outs, I’ll have to talk to Robert
without delay. I’ll get to the shop and ask him when.”
“Robert is not down and out.”
“He might be soon.”
“You don’t need to make an appointment with a suspect,” said
Cleo. “Do you really think he shot Kelly?”
“I’ve no idea. It would make both your ex-husbands killers,
wouldn’t it?”
“Let’s hope you aren’t part of the pattern then.”
“I hope you are joking.”
“I don’t think it could happen, however.”
“Thanks for that.”
“I’d trust you with my life, so I’d trust you not to take
the law into your own hands,” said Cleo, and Gary had to be satisfied with that
explanation.
“Anyway, Jay Salerno didn’t kill anyone,” said Cleo.
“He killed your unborn child, Cleo.”
“He got away with that, thanks to Gloria swearing that I’d
fallen down some stairs.”
“No wonder she felt guilty later,” said Gary.
“But I don’t believe that Robert is a killer,” said Cleo,
“though I’ve just remembered that butchers who go in and out of slaughterhouses
probably have a different attitude to life and death. You’d better stay clear
of Robert’s hatchet in case the guy still thinks he owns me. I’m not ready to
be a widow, even in a good cause.”
“So you think that good and kindly man you were once
foolishly married to could have killed Kelly, don’t you?”
“Ask him!”
***
Gary had been treated for burnout caused by the stress of a
difficult job and the distress of not being able to persuade Cleo to ditch Robert.
In the end he walked out on her, which was truly fortuitous. Gary hoped it would
not come to the ‘I told you so’ formula when he gave Robert any leeway at all.
It was not a good idea to believe in the innocence of friends and family since
prisons and police records were full of them. He did not want Robert to have
killed Kelly, but he had to take that possibility into account. Of course, Robert’s
attachment to Cleo was now past history, he hoped, but Robert was still furious
that he had not realized what had been going on under his nose.
***
Robert, the placid Welsh guy who sang well, ran a butcher’s
shop and according to Cleo would not hurt a fly, was for the moment the only
suspect in the Kelly case. Gary could not find a way of getting round that
other than by getting definite proof that the guy had been somewhere else at
the critical time. However, his first port of call had to be Rita’s charred salon.
***
Rita met him on the forecourt of the house, which had now
been given the all clear. The fire had not done any structural damage,
fortunately, but the saloon was a mess, caused not least by the copious amounts
of foam the firemen had sprayed everywhere to contain the blaze. Gary wondered
if Chris and the forensic team would find any evidence of a break-in or arson.
“What about the back room, Rita?” said Gary.
“It’s locked from the inside, Mr Hurley. You can open it
from the salon side but need a key to get out again.”
“Surely you could get out of a window.”
“No. As you see, there are wrought iron grilles in front of
the side windows and you can’t even open them from the inside. It used be my father’s
house and he was fanatical about safety.”
Rita explained that she kept the key to get out of the
store-room on her key-ring because all the valuable hair-care products were
stored there and it was open when she was working, but when Gary opened the
door, he was fortunately not looking for the haircare products since to get to
them he would have had to step over the prostrate body lying face down on the
linoleum.
Rita gasped. Gary sighed. He was almost resigned to finding
a victim.
“Frank!” Rita cried. “What
are you doing here?”
It was Frank Wetherby and he was not dead. He had only
passed out. Gary thought he might have been overcome by carbon monoxide fumes
under the door, but what was he doing in the room? How did he get into the salon
and why?
Gary told Rita to open the windows and phone for an
ambulance. He turned the unconscious man on his side before phoning Cleo to
tell her who he had found. Frank Wetherby had a bleeding wound on the back of
his head. That must have knocked him out. There was no sign of an assailant.
“Grit has just arrived,” said Cleo. “I’ll be with you as
soon as I’ve taken PeggySue to the nursery.”
“Don’t take too long,” said Gary.
***
“I don’t suppose you know why Frank came back, do you?” Gary
asked Rita.
The colour was returning slowly to Frank Wetherby’s cheeks as
he regained consciousness. Gary hoped that he could ask him a few questions.
“No,” said Rita. “How did he get in?”
“He must have a key of the main door.”
Frank was actually clutching a key that Rita identified as
being the salon key. His visit had been clandestine. Had he been looking for
something? There must have been an urgent reason for coming if he had travelled
all the way from London.
The paramedics arrived soon with the local GP, Dr Mitchell.
Cleo arrived as they were going into the salon.
“Your husband told me who they had found, Miss Hartley,”
said Dr Mitchell. “He used to work for you, didn’t he?”
“He left. We thought he was in London.”
“Well, at least he’s
still alive,” said Dr Mitchell as he bent down to examine Frank.
“Someone knocked him out from behind,” he diagnosed.
“How many keys are there of the salon, Rita?” said Cleo.
“I don’t know,” said Rita.
“It’s pointless asking anyway. Copies are easily made. Isn’t
the key Wetherby used to get into the salon a copy?” said Gary.
Rite compared it with own original and said it was. Anyway,
he had given the original back.”
“I’ve heard of that happening before,” said Gary. “You will have to change the lock and not hand
out any more keys, Miss Bailey.”
“That is closing the stable door,” said Cleo. “What in
heavens’ name did the guy want here? He left you to go to London, didn’t he,
Rita?”
“I thought he had,” said Rita.
“We may be making a mountain out of a molehill,” said Gary.
“Do you know what is stored here, Miss Bailey? Only hairdressing stuff?”
“The usual supply of shampoos, perms, dyes and so on. Frank
kept a box of stuff on a shelf in the kitchen. That’s where the washing machine
is and there piles of freshly washed towels on that shelf. I don’t know what is
in the box, but Frank said it would be out of the way down here.”
“Is the box still here, Rita?” Cleo asked.
“It’s probably still on the shelf,” Rita said. “I’ll look,
shall I?”
Moments later Rita came back carrying a banana box.
“This is it,” she said, putting it down on a table under the
window.”
“The assailant can’t have been looking for it if it’s still
here,” said Cleo. “It wasn’t hidden, was it?”
Frank was now conscious. He was nevertheless put on a stretcher ready to wheel
to the ambulance when he noticed his box.
“What are you doing with my things?” he said, looking quite
nervous. “Don’t touch them.”
“What’s in the box, Frank?” said Cleo.
“What are you doing here, Cleo?” Frank asked.
“That’s the question we should be asking you,” said Gary.
Mr Mitchell intervened.
“No more questions, if you don’t mind. You can see that the
patient needs medical attention.”
The paramedics bandaged the wound temporarily and wheeled
the stretcher out to the ambulance. Frank seemed to have gone back into unconsciousness.
Gary thought he might be play-acting so that he did not have to answer any more
questions. Falling into a coma was a lucky break for Gary even if it was only a
ploy. Frank’s banana box was still on the table.
“Frank may not even know what’s inside that box,” Gary said.
“He was possessive about it and then left it to its fate.
That is really peculiar,” said Cleo.
“We’ll have to open it,” said Gary.
“It’s private,” said Rita. “You can’t do that.”
“Either we open it here or I confiscate it and take it to
HQ,” said Gary. “We’ll have to look inside, Rita.”
“All right, but I don’t think you should.”
As Cleo and Gary had suspected, the box contained plastic
bags containing the white powdery substance that in other cases had proved to
be heroin of various purity.
“If that’s the genuine stuff, it’s worth a fortune,” said
Cleo.
“It’s the old story,” said Gary. “Take your choice: Frank
was on a case and was offered a deal, or he was a dealer himself and bothering
other drug dealers around here. Judging from the blow on his head I would think
he had broken some gangster rule or other and was to be obliterated.”
“I can’t believe it,” said Cleo. “We’ll have to talk about
Frank’s cases when I have called up my data from his investigations. I wonder
if the assassin actually looked for the box.”
“Let’s assume the fire was started by a third party chasing
the second,” said Gary. “The door to the storeroom was fortunately still open.
The assassin slammed that door and got out through the front door. He will have
made a run for it and left Frank to his fate.
“That sounds logical,” said Cleo. ”It’s probably what I
would have done.”
“I think we can safely assume that Frank was knocked down by
whoever was involved in some sort of deal and presumably it concerned drugs. We
need to find out if Frank had arranged to meet someone there. One thing is
clear. The fire was not aimed at you, Rita.”
“I don’t know what to believe.”
“Why would Frank go to London and leave a fortune in drugs
here?” said Cleo.
“He may have received the drugs for further distribution, Cleo.
The box looks pretty full. Do you have proof that he went to London?”
“No. Do you, Rita?”
Rita shook her head.
“I’ve been very naïve,” Rita. “I thought he was nice, but he
just wanted a place to live for a while. Perhaps he was hiding out. Do you
think he was being threatened, Mr Hurley?”
“I don’t know any answers yet, Miss Bailey, but I’ll find
out. I’d advise you to go back to where you slept last night. It might be
dangerous for you to stay here.”
Rita looked horrified.
“Just one more question, Rita,” said Gary. “Did Frank
receive phone calls on your house phone while he was here?”
“I don’t think so.”
“We’ll have to check. Can you give me the phone number?”
Rita produced a business card showing all the phone numbers
of the shop, home and her cell phone.
“I’ll be in touch, Miss Bailey,” he said. “Don’t hang around
here. You should lock this storeroom since the salon is open at the front. I’ll
get a squad car to take Frank’s box to HQ.”
The squad car came almost immediately. The officers were
armed. They explained that they had escorted a bank delivery van to several
branches, but that mission was finished for the morning. The cash was in the
bank safes and the van was now empty and standing at HQ while the driver and
his mate had lunch in the HQ canteen. The squad car would accompany the van
back to Oxford at 2 p.m. which is why the guns had not been handed in. Gary commented
that it was not a bad idea to be armed. There was a lot of heroin in that box.
“No problem,” said one of the officers. “We’ll look out for
anyone following us and we’ll take it to the lab for analysis.”
“Thanks.”
***
“I’ll run you home,” said Gary to Cleo, who had walked from
the nursery to Station Street.
“Thanks. I’m really shocked about Frank. I knew he was a bit
of a dark horse, but I did not expect him to be criminal.”
“Another case of it not being possible to tell if someone is
criminally minded by just looking at them,” said Gary.
“I didn’t know him at all. He was even secretive about where
he was living, Gary.”
“He presumably had reason to be. At least you were not drawn
by default into his dark deeds.”
“No, but he left quite suddenly, as if he had not planned
to, but suddenly found this desire to go to London. Not having enough to do was
just an excuse.”
“Do you know who his contact is in London?” Gary asked, “Always
assuming there is one.”
“No. He never mentioned anyone. How did he get himself into
such a mess?”
“We’ll have work on that, Cleo. Let’s have a coffee before I
go to HQ. I’ll try to get more information on your ex-private eye. Someone may
know something, even Brass. I’m starting to feel a sneaking sympathy for that
Sergeant in Frint-on-Sea. Maybe he smelt a rat, or even knew about one.”
“You could ask him, Gary. I expect he’d like to be rehabilitated.”
“It’s a thought, isn’t it?”
“I think Brass would have said something to me, even warned
me if he knew anything.”
“Are you sure? He wants to protect himself too, Cleo.
Spilling the beans about drug barons is dangerous even if you are only a cop.”
“Like the ancient Egyptians. The messenger delivers his
message and is then beheaded.”
“Aida. Act one,” said Gary.
***
If Dorothy had started her investigating by walking through
the village she might have seen what was going on in Station Street, but she
did not know about the fire at Number 5 because she decided to tramp across
country to Lower Grumpsfield. That route bypassed the village, took her down Lavender
Drive and along a public pathway that ran behind the Kelly farm to the main
road.
Dorothy was not sure how and where to best start asking
questions. The local pub at the far end of Lower Grumpsfield had a bad
reputation for rough and ready service to rough and ready customers and
probably did not open until midday. Her only other possibility was the coffee bar,
which now belonged to a chain and was doing surprisingly good trade. Dorothy
decided to try there. It was open for breakfasts that normally consisted of a
latté plus a stodgy bun, so she joined the queue and ordered some before
sitting at one of the window tables.
***
Nothing had really changed since Mrs Grisham had run the
coffee bar. The red and white gingham table-clothes were still on the tables, a
pert assistant wore a matching apron and fiddled around with the complicated
espresso machinery while flirting nonstop with the customers, most of whom were
young males on their way to the polytechnic, which was the only higher
education establishment located in the district. Dorothy did not think those
teenagers could know anything, but a man looking like a rustic was sitting at
the next window table. He must be about the age Kelly had been. She would ask
him if he was a friend of the dead farmer.
Dorothy did not have to wait long before the man actually
changed tables and sat down at hers. Normally she would have been indignant,
but that would have been foolish since she wanted to talk to the man anyway.
I’m Tailor,” the man said.
“I’m Price,” Dorothy replied. “Do you have a reason for
joining me, Mr Tailor?”
“I thought you had asked me to,” said Tailor. “You nodded
and I decided that you wanted to talk to me.”
“Oh,” said Dorothy. “Well I do, actually, but I was not
conscious of inviting you to join me.”
“I’ll leave you then. Sorry,” said the man.
“No, stay!” said Dorothy. “You look like a farmer.”
“I am a farmer in a small way,” Tailor replied. “I wanted to
buy some grazing land off Kelly. We used to have breakfast here, so I came here
for old times’ sake. My farmland backs onto Kelly’s, you see, but my farm is
not in Lower Grumpsfield. It’s actually in Upper Grumpsfield. For some reason
the planners splitting Grumpsfield put my property in Upper Grumpsfield so that
each village had a farm that could be bought up later for building.”
“I did not know that authorities could do that,” said
Dorothy.
“You’d be surprised at what they can do.”
“So I came across your land to get here, Mr Tailor, if the
public pathway runs through it.”
“That’s right. I can put a stop to that if I buy the
adjoining land and put livestock on it. The pathway will have to be moved since
you can’t have people strolling through fields with bulls in them.”
“No, you certainly can’t,” said Dorothy, wanting to move on
to more relevant chit-chat.
“So did you get to buy the land, Mr Tailor?”
“No. Mr Kelly said he would think about how much he wanted
for it, but now he’s dead. I expect you already know that.”
“Yes,” said Dorothy.
“On the other hand, now the whole farm will be up for grabs
and I’ll grab it,” said Tailor.
“But Mr Kelly probably has relatives who will inherit,” Mr
Tailor.”
“As far as I know, he has no family. That’s what he told
me.”
“Then the estate will revert to the country,” said Dorothy.
“Surely not if I produce the document stating that I have
made a definite offer for some of the land. I don’t think anyone else could do
much with that bit of land since it has no infrastructure for building and is
not suitable for crops.”
“You are very optimistic, Mr Tailor. When did you make your
agreement with Mr Kelly?”
“Why do you need to know?”
“Just interested, Mr Tailor,” said Dorothy. “I know a young
lawyer who might take on your case – and win.”
“Now I’m interested, Miss Price. We made an arrangement on
Sunday afternoon. Then I had to get back to the milking. Cows are as regular as
clockwork. I prefer bullocks. Less work. I never saw him again and I have
nothing in writing.”
“So you didn’t arrange to meet him on Monday afternoon, I
suppose.”
“I did, but when I got there he was not there,” said Mr
Tailor.
“Where is there?” Dorothy asked.
“On the Common. That’s where everyone meets when the pubs
are shut,” said Mr Tailor.
“Everyone?”
“Of course, I may have got it wrong,” said Tailor. “I stood
on the Upper side of the pond. I thought he would see me and wave. The Lower side
is easier to reach from Kelly’s farm, but he did not turn up,” he explained.
“Or he was dead and lying so flat that you could not see
him,” said Dorothy.
***
The pond on the Common was almost a little lake, so walking
around it would take some time. The water flowed into it from the River Grump when
there had been enough rain, and out again through the River Huddle. It was a splendid venue for dogs, since they
could have a paddle, chase the incumbent ducks and get really mucky. There had
been a fierce discussion as to who would get the Common when Grumpsfield was
cut up into halves. No one had won, so
depending on which side you were on it was Upper or Lower Grumpsfield Common,
and half the pond belonged to the respective village. Huddlecourt Minor had had
no claim on the Common. It had its own common in the form of a stretch of grass
used for football and other sports at the far end of that village, where the
ground was fairly flat, but Huddlecourt Minor was a few feet more above sea-level
than the Grumpsfields.
“Wasn’t the Common a strange place to meet when you could
have met in Lower Grumpsfield – here, for instance?”
“Mr Kelly wanted it that way. We would be on neutral ground,
he said.”
“But he did not come, you said.”
“I didn’t see him.”
***
“Did you ever meet any of Mr Kelly’s friends, Mr Tailor?”
“Why all these question,” said Tailor, realizing that his
brain was being picked.
Dorothy fell back on her local history excuse. Tailor seemed
to believe it.
“Friends, did you say? I didn’t know he had any. He was a
ladies man’. I think he preferred carrying on with women to socializing.”
“I thought Mr Kelly was rather scruffy,” said Dorothy.
“Some women find that a challenge, Miss Price.”
“Do you know any of them?” said Dorothy, wondering if Mr
Tailor would think she was impertinent to ask.
“I knew Magda ages ago,” he said. “That’s the woman he was
married to, but she was carrying on with others and I had my moments with her.
Unfortunately, she wanted to be paid, and I don’t pay for my fun and games,
Miss Price.”
“Understandable. But Kelly was surely not earning money from
the woman last seen there, was he, Mr Tailor?”
Dorothy was surprised at how chatty the man was. Did he have
something on his chest, she thought. Everyone had something they would rather
forget, she conjectured, but he was talking.
“You mean that vicar’s widow, I suppose,” said Tailor. “She
doesn’t look like a sex bomb, but Kelly said she was different once she got her
clothes off.”
Dorothy thought that fitted in with what she had heard about
Edith in her depraved state of mind, but she did not say that to Tailor..
“I expect he encouraged her, Mr Tailor.”
“She didn’t need any encouragement, Miss Price. I went there
once for some eggs and they were, well…”
“At it?” said Dorothy, now familiar with the euphemism preferred
in that district. She thought that Mr Tailor was trying to shock her.
“She had my clothes off before I realized,” said Tailor. “Then
she played games with both of us. I’d never done a threesome before. It was
enlightening.”
Dorothy was appalled.
“Why are you telling me all this?” she said.
“Because the woman is a vampire, Miss Price, and I’d like to
know if she is the reason Kelly is dead.”
“So would I, Mr Tailor. What do you think?”
“I’m going to ask her. She’s coming to my place tonight.”
“Isn’t that taking rather a risk?” said Dorothy.
“Not if I’m as forceful as she is, if you understand me.”
“Oh. She’s visiting you for sex, is she?” said Dorothy.
Dorothy could not think of a way she could report what she
was now hearing without being crude. She would have to report that information
in a factual way that might be helpful in the search for Kelly’s killer, but without
passing judgement. Dorothy could not help wondering how many men Edith had offered
herself to. How many times would she have to listen to the primitive
description Tailor had just given her of Edith’s behaviour?
“If I tell you that I am a private detective working at the
Hartley Agency, will you tell me what Edith Parsnip tells you?”
“I thought I recognised you earlier on,” said Tailor. ”Why
would I want to inform on her?”
“To save a nice man from being accused of Kelly’s murder, Mr
Tailor.”
“You mean Robert Jones, I suppose. He had a motive, didn’t
he, although she treated him badly?”
Dorothy was surprised that Tailor knew so much.
“It’s all right, Miss Price. My farm does not keep me, but
my crime writing does. It pays me to be up-to-date on what goes on around here.”
“I didn’t know we had an author in our midst,” said Dorothy.
“I don’t write under my own name.”
“Do you think I have read any of your books, Mr Tailor?”
“If you read thrillers you may have come across R.D. Day,
Miss Price.”
“I expect the books are full of action and sex,” said Dorothy.
“I don’t read that kind of book.”
“Not really, but Edith’s behaviour will certainly find its
way into my next novel. I thought I wrote imaginative gangster stories, Miss
Price, but there are countless people who act in a way that is almost beyond even
a novelist’s imagination. Edith would make an ideal gangster’s moll with her
inimitable talent for getting around men.”
“I’ll leave you with an agency card, Mr Tailor,” said
Dorothy, rising from her seat. “I need information about Kelly’s activities.
You may be able to help me more than I can help myself.”
“I’ll certainly try,” said Tailor. “Real life murder is
definitely more scintillating than fiction.”
“Can we meet here for breakfast on Friday? I’d like you to
meet Cleo Hartley.”
“That’s the clever coloured woman, isn’t it?”
“Yes, and she was married to Robert Jones for a while and
cannot believe that he killed Mr Kelly.”
“I’ll talk to her,” said Tailor. “Some of what I tell her
might change her mind.”
***
Dorothy did not know if she had really achieved anything
that morning, apart from getting to know Tailor alias R.D. Day and finding out
more about Edith. She was no nearer finding a way of getting Robert off the
hook, but Cleo might have get Tailor to tell them something that could be
relevant. It was worth a try.
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