Gently Instrumental (7 page)

‘Is Walt your man, then?’

Gently grunted and eased into the grass. Little cream moths, shiny-winged, rose irritably and settled again. ‘Would it stop the performance?’

‘What do you think? We couldn’t go on with Walt in the nick.’

‘It might get you publicity.’

‘We don’t need that sort. If you pinch Walt the show is off.

Gently plucked a stem of the grass. ‘Do
you
think he was capable of it?’ he said.

‘Walt?’ Friday paused, scowling. ‘I wouldn’t know, would I, with that sort of seacook.’

‘Then why should we think differently?’

Friday was silent; he sucked air through a cold pipe. The yacht from Thwaite had sailed clear of the haze and showed now as a yawl, its mizzen plain.

Gently chewed on his stem. ‘Walt’s the man with a motive. He was adrift for two hours after the rehearsal. He’s active enough to have dealt Virtue. And Dr Capel is keeping him under sedation.’

Friday kept sucking.

‘I talked to him this morning and he made some damaging admissions about Virtue. Inspector Leyston is with him now. I daresay he’ll be taking Walt to the police station.’

Friday sucked faster.

‘He fits the pattern, of course. Normally our first suspect is the husband or wife. In this instance Hozeley stands as the husband and Virtue as the wife playing fast and loose.’

Gently leaned back and chewed composedly, his eyes watching the yawl. Friday was sitting bold upright, pipe sagging, his scowling face hot.

‘But you can’t
do
that.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because it doesn’t make any sense.’

‘The jury will like it.’

‘To hell with the jury! I was the one who was there.’

‘You were . . . where?’

‘At that rehearsal. Trying to keep my hands off Virtue.’ He snatched the pipe away violently and jerked himself closer to Gently. ‘Now you just listen to me, mate. What I’m telling you beats guessing. When Virtue cleared off after the row Walt wasn’t in a shape to kill anyone. He was knocked up, you understand? What he needed most was a shot of brandy. When he left the hotel he was like a man who’d been hit over the head with a crowbar. And I was worried, I can tell you, in case he took a walk in the sea. But him going after Virtue is a laugh – he hadn’t enough steam left to swat a fly.’

Gently chewed. ‘He’d have had time to recover.’

‘That’s damned nonsense. He was pooped.’

‘Suppose he was shamming.’

‘Pull the other one. You can’t act going grey in the face.’

Gently turned his head to spit grass. ‘So you’re convinced of Hozeley’s innocence.’

‘That’s what I’m saying and it’s the truth. You’re never going to hang it on Old Walt.’

Gently sucked his stem. ‘Well . . . Meares is out. He and Miss Hazlewood left together. And we can pass the doctor.’ He tossed away the grass. ‘It does seem to leave only you.’

The clusters of haws hung conveniently; Gently, in his turn, reached up to pluck some. He took careful aim at the oil drum and succeeded in bouncing a haw off the top. Friday was staring at him like a man who’d just been touched with a hot poker. His mouth was agape, showing strong but nicotine-stained teeth.

‘So then . . . it is me you’re after!’

Gently shrugged. ‘The cap seems to fit.’

‘Oh no it doesn’t. I didn’t go after him – he was home and dry by the time I left!’

‘But you could have got him out again, couldn’t you?’

‘How could I have done that?’

Gently aimed a haw. ‘Oh . . . any excuse. Say that Walt was injured and was asking for him.’

Friday’s eyes were round. ‘But that’s all balls!’

‘I think it would have fetched him,’ Gently said. ‘Of course you may not have thought of the trick yourself. But it may have been put to you by someone who did.’

‘You mean – Dr Henry?’

Gently fired a haw.

‘You’re raving,’ Friday said. ‘Bloody raving. Dr Henry was all against it. It was him that stopped me from going after him.’

‘That’s your tale.’

‘But it’s true. You go to the doctor and ask him.’

Gently smiled, drew a haw and hit the oil drum dead centre.

‘Can anyone vouch for you . . . apart from your daughter?’

‘I don’t know – someone must have seen me.’

‘But someone you can name?’

‘I tell you I don’t know! I wasn’t thinking about that when I was walking home.’

‘There’s a footpath, isn’t there, across the Common, joining the road near Gorse Cottage? That would be your quickest way back – and of course, unfrequented at that time of night.’

‘I wasn’t out at Gorse Cottage!’

‘But if you had been, you’d have taken that footpath?’

‘Look – for Christ’s sake can’t you believe me?’

‘I’d find it easier with a witness.’

Friday scrubbed at the sweat that was drenching him; his scowling eyes looked dazed. Below them the yawl, a blue-painted vessel, was approaching the bend in a tight haul. Now it too had encountered the wind-shadow and its masthead jib had begun to slat.

‘This is all a try-on . . . that’s it, isn’t it?’

Reluctantly, the yawl was putting in a tack. As it came about the sun flashed blindingly from glassy paint and varnish. Then it picked up a course that would have been losing but for the friendly direction of the tide.

‘Look, if that’s the game . . . !’ Friday raked off sweat. ‘I’m not the only fish in the pond. I don’t know about Foxy’s going off with Laurel, but he was out there damn soon after Virtue.’

‘Meares . . . ?’

‘Yes – clever-boy Meares. He could have seen Laurel home and doubled back. And how was it he left his cello in the Music Room, when always before he’d taken it home with him?’

‘Did he do that?’

‘Yes he did. You’d better do your homework, mate. And here’s another thing – it was Foxy who was narking him, saying we should dump him and bring in an understudy. I’ll bet the doctor didn’t tell you that – nor that he’s such a pal of Foxy’s.’

Gently poised a haw. ‘You think the doctor might cover for him?’

‘I know he would mate, never mind about thinking. And if you really want to have a go at Foxy, you listen to what I’m telling you now.’ He leaned nearer to Gently, his eyes hard. ‘On Wednesday morning he called at the doctor’s – was in there with him for above an hour – patients with appointments queuing up and getting on to my girl for keeping them out. So what was that about, hey? And before your lot had come taking statements. And Foxy was in a state was what my girl said, and still in a state when he left. Now you tell me!’ He eased back from Gently, a leer in his close-set eyes.

‘Didn’t your daughter tell you what it was about?’

‘What could she hear – out there with the patients?’

‘It could have been a consultation.’

‘What – for an hour?’ Friday snatched his head back, shedding sweat. ‘I wouldn’t have told you, and that’s straight, if you hadn’t tried to pin it on me. But I’m not carrying the can for anybody, least of all for clever-boy Meares. I don’t owe him any money – not like some I could mention round here.’

He struck a match on the bole of the hawthorn and relit his pipe with measured puffs. The scowl still moulded his face but touched now with a shade of complacency. He puffed smoke towards the distant yawl which, clear of its tack, was drifting through the bend.

‘Still . . . it was you who advocated violence.’

Friday powered smoke. ‘Meaning what?’

‘If there was a conspiracy to get rid of Virtue, wouldn’t you have been deputed to put the boot in?’

‘But aren’t I telling you—!’

‘You haven’t told me much. Just tried to switch my interest to Meares. You aren’t out of the wood yet, Mr Friday – not if that’s the best you can do.’

Friday’s eyes were sullen. ‘So that’s it, then.’

‘If you’ve more to say, you’d better say it.’

‘I reckon I’ve said too bloody much now.’ He jumped to his feet and stood glowering down at Gently. ‘You’re a right son of a seacook, aren’t you?’

Gently tipped his hat and leaned back in the grass. The half-decker, at last, had reached the yacht club jetty and the yawl had cleared the bend and picked up a wind.

A
COLOURFUL NEW
banner had gone up in The Street: The Peacock Players present
Twelfth Night
. But now it was the hour of the lunchtime siesta when every shop door was closed. A street of silence: the only vehicles were those standing shimmering at the kerb, and no face appeared at any window as Gently tramped back to the police station. The sun had won; the town, its victim, lay depopulated and stunned.

Leyston was waiting in his shirtsleeves and divested of his tie. He had his feet up on the desk, but withdrew them discretely as Gently entered.

‘I’ve booked you a table at The White Hart, sir.’

‘You’d better come along to give it ballast.’

Leyston’s long face expressed pleasure. He rose and began rolling down his sleeves.

‘Have you had any luck, sir?’

Gently grunted. ‘Did you get anything new from Hozeley?’

‘Not exactly from Hozeley, sir, but I got something. It could be a line on those chummies from Streatham.’

‘The Parry brothers?’

‘Yes sir.’ Leyston buttoned his sleeves with conscious modesty. ‘Of course, it may have no connection. But the description sounds about right.’

Gently dropped on a chair. ‘Tell me.’

‘Well sir, it was the Crag lad. After we left he went to Hozeley and told him about a man who’d spoken to him on Monday.’

‘Monday was one of his days at the cottage?’

‘Yes sir. This happened just as he was leaving. Crag lives with his grandfather down at Town End, so he uses the footpath across the Common. There’s a gate from the garden on to the Common. This chummie was waiting just outside. He asked young Crag who lived at the cottage, and if he hadn’t got a young man called Virtue staying with him.’

Gently pouted his lips. ‘How good is the description?’

‘Crag wasn’t too strong with the details, sir. He isn’t very bright, as no doubt you noticed, and he was nervous when he talked to me.’ Leyston eased a cuff. ‘About thirty-five, sir, around six feet, with dark hair, dressed in a blue shirt and dark-coloured slacks, speaking with an accent that Crag took for Cockney.’

‘It might fit Frank Parry.’

‘Apart from the age, sir, and Parry’s being only five-ten-and-a-half.’

‘Has Crag seen the photographs?’

‘I showed him a spread, but he picked a villain who’s doing a stretch.’

Gently made a face. ‘Who spun you this tale – was it Crag on his own, or did Hozeley prompt him?’

‘It was Hozeley who mentioned it, sir. But the kid confirmed what he said.’

‘And Crag was nervous?’

‘Yes, sir.’ Leyston touched a sideboard uncertainly. ‘Do you reckon he was put up to it?’

‘That’s what I would reckon – if it wasn’t for the Parrys.

Yet even the Parrys were no guarantee if Virtue had boasted of his exploits, giving Hozeley to understand that he had enemies in town who might seek him out. And the description, conveniently vague, might well have come from the same source. Gently sighed.

‘One thing is certain – if there was a man, and the man was Frank Parry. He was here on Monday, which means he may have stayed in the town overnight.’

Leyston echoed the sigh. ‘Yes sir. I’ll put a couple of men on it.’

‘And meanwhile I need some information. What time did Leonard Meares get home?’

‘Meares, sir . . . ?’

Leyston had been about to pick up the phone. Now he hesitated, his hand poised: his tone sounding almost reproachful.

‘Yes – Meares. His statement ends with the time he left The White Hart. I assume you checked him out further than that, even though he left in impeccable company.’

Leyston coloured slightly. ‘Yes sir. I did have a word with him and his wife. Seems he got in at about nine-fifty. He had a bit of trouble after leaving the hotel.’

‘What sort of trouble?’

Leyston grew pinker. ‘Got caught short is what I mean, sir. There’s a bug going around with all this hot weather – I’ve had a dose of it myself.’

Gently stared. ‘And you accepted that?’

‘Well – yes, sir. Yes, I did. I’ve known Mr Meares for a long time, and – well, his wife was present when I questioned him.’

‘What has his wife got to do with it?’

Now Leyston was looking positively unhappy. ‘She – she’s a bit of a case, sir. I didn’t want to put him in the wrong with her.’ He ran his tongue over his lips. ‘You see, she’s jealous of Miss Hazlewood. There’s nothing in it, sir, nothing at all. But I didn’t like to query him in front of his wife.’

‘So Meares was adrift for half an hour too.’

Leyston didn’t try to contradict it.

‘Where does Meares live?’

Leyston gulped. ‘In Tunstall Road, off the top end of The Street.’

‘That’ll be less than a mile from Hozeley’s.’

Leyston nodded. ‘All the same, sir—’

‘In half an hour he could have gone after Virtue, clobbered him in the lane, and been back home.’

Leyston slumped into the desk chair. ‘Look, sir . . . Mr Meares isn’t that sort at all, ! He’s a member of the Rotary and the yacht club and runs the Birdwatchers’ Association. He’s a man you can trust, sir. I can’t see the likes of him going in for violence. I wouldn’t put it past Friday, nor even the doctor. But Mr Meares is another matter.’

‘A man of stainless reputation.’

‘Yes, sir. That’s what he is.’

‘Which would make him a perfect mark for Virtue.’

‘Sir—!’ Leyston almost choked on his tongue.

‘What’s Capel’s number?’

Leyston gave it miserably and Gently reached for the phone and dialled. After an interval he got Capel, who apparently had been fetched from his lunch.

‘Just a minute . . . I’ve got some coffee!’ There followed a sound of quick gulping. ‘Ach . . . it tastes foul in this weather! What can I do for you, Superintendent?’

‘Is Meares your patient?’

‘Leonard? He’s been on my books for years.’

‘So you can tell me the present state of his health.’

‘Well, I suppose so – if it concerns you.’

‘It concerns me.’