‘Oh, no.’ Prue threw herself down in the armchair, and groaned. ‘So you discuss murder and mayhem together?
That must be so romantic/
Even Jill had to smile at that.
‘Seriously, love,’ Prue went on, ‘all these murders in Kelton Bridge ‘
‘Two,’ Jill pointed out quietly.
‘That’s about two per cent of the population.’
It wasn’t, there were over four thousand people in Kelton Bridge now, but she did take Prue’s point.
‘And when you’re not living in a place where people are getting murdered on a daily basis, you’re working in a job where people would be out of work if all the killers were locked up.’ She sighed her frustration. ‘It’s unhealthy!’
‘I’m happy enough.’
Prue gave her that all-seeing gaze of hers. ‘Are you?’
Jill rarely thought about it. People might complain about being depressed or fed up, but it was rare that someone decided they were happy. Thinking about it, though, she thought she was as happy as could be expected, considering the man she’d once loved had betrayed her and
considering that some crank, possibly a serial killer, was making use of her letterbox …
‘Yes, I am,’ she said firmly. “I enjoy my work, I love my cottage, I love this village and the people in it, I love the cats - yes, I am happy.’
‘You’re not getting any younger, Jill ‘
‘Oh, God.’ Laughing, Jill got to her feet. ‘I’d better bring the bottle in. You’re right, Prue,’ she called from the kitchen, ‘I’m not getting any younger, but the British Museum isn’t interested in me just yet.’
“I was thinking of children,’ Prue said when she returned.
“I know what you were thinking. We’ve had this conversation before. Perhaps I don’t want children.’
‘Of course you do,’ Prue scoffed.
She was right; Jill did want children. The trouble was, whenever she imagined those children, they were all miniatures of Max.
A sudden thought struck her. ‘Why is Steve’s mum having the kids? How did she beat off Mum?’
The expression on her sister’s face had Jill’s stomach churning. ‘Prue?’
‘It’s probably nothing,’ Prue began.
‘Oh, my God! What is it?’
‘She hasn’t been feeling well,’ Prue explained, eyes firmly fixed on the rim of her wine glass as if she were having to concentrate on a well-rehearsed speech. ‘You know she can’t shake off that cough? Well, now she’s got a pain in her shoulder.’
‘Oh, no. Those bloody fags of hers!’
‘It might be nothing,’ Prue insisted.
‘And it might be -‘ But she couldn’t say the c-word.
Couldn’t even think it. Certainly couldn’t think of life without their mum.
‘It might be a muscular thing,’ Prue said firmly.
Jill guessed that, like her, Prue was too frightened to think otherwise.
‘She went to the doctor’s yesterday,’ Prue told her.
‘Lord, she must be ill.’
‘He’s sending her for an X-ray. I was impressed. She’s having that on Monday’
Jill wasn’t impressed; she was terrified. To move so quickly, the doctor obviously thought it important.
“I keep meaning to visit,’ Jill murmured.
‘She knows how busy you are.’
‘I’m not that busy’ How could she be too busy for her own mother? The thought disgusted her.
‘Let’s talk about something else,’ Prue said firmly. ‘Zoe’s got a boyfriend, did I tell you? He’s four years old and he gave her a birthday kiss.’
They talked about the children, even managed to laugh, but Jill knew they were both thinking of X-rays and the overflowing ashtrays that had been a part of their childhood.
The phone rang and Jill got up to answer it.
‘Hi, it’s Bob. Bob Murphy. Just wondered if you’d backed Nemesis?’
Jill laughed. “I didn’t.’
‘Phew. That’s OK then. I still stand a chance of getting paid.’
‘You do,’ she told him easily. “I backed Brixnmortar.’
‘Never! The outsider? 25-1, wasn’t it?’
‘Yep. I just wish I’d put a couple of grand on it.’
“I wish I’d put my business on it,’ Bob said, ‘but as it was, I backed - let me see - Blue Mountain ‘
‘Oh, dear.’
‘Flame Thrower ‘
‘Oh, dear, oh, dear.’ She spluttered with laughter.
‘And a couple of others who should reach the finishing post before midnight.’
‘I’d better be careful then or you’ll be upping your estimate.’
“I might at that,’ he said with amusement. ‘Perhaps I’ll have better luck next week. I’ll be in touch anyway. Night.’
‘Night, Bob.’
She was still smiling as she replaced the receiver.
‘Bob? Who was that then?’ Prue asked curiously.
‘Bob Murphy - the builder who’ll be doing this place.’
Before she could go into detail, someone rang her doorbell and then hammered on her door.
On her way to answer it, Jill wondered if Prue had noticed the way she’d jumped in shock at the sound.
Probably. Prue didn’t miss much.
‘Oh, hi, Andy.’ Had her sister’s willpower brought him to the cottage?
“I thought I’d drop by with the brochure you wanted,’ he explained.
Jill had forgotten all about it. A nearby farm was being sold and the farm’s contents were being auctioned separately.
According to Ella, there were some lovely pieces going under the hammer. ‘The Wrights are giving up farming and retiring to Spain,’ Ella had told her, ‘and most of their furniture is being sold. They’ve some lovely knickknacks …’
‘Thanks, Andy’
She would have to ask him in, yet he looked exceptionally handsome this evening in a dark suit, pale blue shirt and silk tie. Prue would probably eat him.
‘Come in. My sister’s here - we were having a natter over a glass of wine.’
She’d hoped he would refuse the invitation, but he didn’t. On the other hand, it would at least show Prue that there were a few decent men in Kelton Bridge. Well, one at any rate, and even Prue wouldn’t think of counting Andy’s toes.
‘This is Andy,’ she introduced him. ‘He’s the wonderful chap who found this lovely cottage for me.’
Prue, she could see, was mentally calculating the cost of his suit and shoes and eyeing up his broad shoulders. He passed the test quickly, and Prue soon had him sitting on the sofa next to her, a glass of wine in his hands. She then proceeded to fire questions at him.
“I couldn’t live anywhere else,’ Andy said in answer to one of them. ‘It’s a great place. Everyone’s very neighbourly, people look out for each other.’
‘If someone had looked out for the vicar and his wife,’
Prue pointed out quietly, ‘Kelton Bridge wouldn’t be mentioned on every news report.’
“I can’t argue with that,’ Andy replied. ‘A terribly sad business all round. In all the years I’ve lived here ‘
‘How many is that?’ Prue wanted to know.
“I lived here for a year when I was a kid - my mother liked to move around a bit - and I came back here when I was twenty-five. So that’s eleven years in total. In all that time, we’ve never had so much as a Mars bar stolen.’
‘What did your mother do, apart from move around a lot?’
Heavens, Prue was nosy.
‘Oh, this and that. Any job that took her fancy really.’
‘Lovely,’ Prue said. ‘A friend of ours was like that. You remember Diane, don’t you, Jill? She picked grapes in France, waited on tables in Spain, and became a lifeguard in Australia. So romantic’
Smiling, Andy nodded.
‘You’re not married then?’ Prue pushed on, knowing full well he wasn’t.
‘Take no notice of her, Andy,’ Jill told him. ‘Before you arrived, I was on the receiving end of the high time you settled down and had kids lecture. Personally, I think she’s just jealous of our freedom.’
They chatted for another hour or more. Andy was driving so he stuck to one glass of wine, but Jill and Prue made up for it.
Eventually, Andy glanced at his watch. ‘It’s time I was off. Lovely to meet you, Prue, and I hope we meet again.
I’ll look forward to seeing you at the auction, Jill, and thanks for the wine.’
As soon as he’d gone, Prue threw her arms wide in a dramatic, and slightly tipsy, gesture. “I have died and gone to heaven. He is drop dead gorgeous, Jill. Dear God, girl, get a doctor to check you out. You must be dead from the neck down. He’s ‘
She broke off as Jill’s mobile phone rang.
Jill welcomed the distraction until she saw who was calling.
‘It’s me,’ Max said. “I think we’ve found Anne Levington.’
‘Alive?’ But she knew the answer to that from Max’s voice.
‘No.’
‘Where?’
‘An old ruin of a farmhouse on the Burnley to Todmorden road. Cornwall’s out there, but it’s on my patch so I’m on my way there now.’
On Monday morning, Jill was at work in the small, windowless office. The traffic noise was constant, and welcome. At least it hinted at signs of life outside.
Cornwall strode in. ‘Well?’
He always greeted her with that ‘Well?’ Never ‘Good morning’ or ‘How are you?’, always ‘Well?’
‘I’m writing up a brief report,’ she told him. ‘According to my reckoning, our man lives on this side of Lancashire, either Todmorden, Rochdale or Rossendale.’ He might even live in Kelton Bridge, she thought, and the knowledge brought an involuntary shudder. ‘The most likely area, according to this, is Rossendale. I also reckon he’ll live out in the wilds. He won’t live on an estate, but on the edge of a village or a town. He’ll be close to open countryside.’
‘Or he could live in a tower block in Manchester,’ he scoffed.
Jill leaned back in her chair. ‘Does being this grouchy come naturally or do you have to work at it?’
He looked up, surprised, and then, amazingly, gave her a small smile. It was the first time she’d seen him smile.
‘Sorry Bad weekend.’
‘Oh?’
‘My car wouldn’t start so I had to call out the AA, the wind blew a ridge tile off the roof that missed the car by inches, the washing machine flooded the kitchen, and my lottery numbers came up and I’ve lost the damn ticket.’
Jill gasped at the latter.
‘Only a tenner,’ he said, ‘but it’s not the point.’
‘Could have been a lot worse then,’ Jill said, grinning. ‘The ridge tile might have missed your car and hit you instead, and your numbers might have come up for the jackpot.’
‘True.’ He didn’t look cheered. ‘Let me see your report asap. By the way, we found a piece of chewing gum at the scene.’
‘What? From Valentine?’
‘Who knows? I’ll keep you posted,’ he said, closing the door after him.
No, you won’t, she thought grimly.
Jill didn’t get too excited. Valentine wouldn’t leave chewing gum around. He was far too careful. She concentrated on the changing areas of Lancashire that were
coming up on her display. Valentine could live in Kelton Bridge.
That begged another question, one she hardly dared ask herself. Was he responsible for the deaths of Alice and Jonathan Trueman?
Valentine was a killer - fact. He killed working prostitutes.
As he’d killed Anne Levington, they had to assume he was responsible for the lock of Anne’s hair that was delivered to Jill’s cottage.
Anne’s father had formally identified her body. She’d been left in a crumbling old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere that hadn’t been occupied for many years. True to form, she’d been left naked with only a couple of strangulation marks on her neck and the usual hearts, twelve in all, cut away from her young, pale skin.
As yet, no clues had been found at the scene - other than that piece of chewing gum. Officers were still carrying out a fingertip search, but no one was hopeful. It was uncanny how Valentine left no clues.
So - Alice and Jonathan Trueman. The killings weren’t Valentine’s style. The first had involved a knife, and although Valentine was skilled with a scalpel, he liked to strangle his victims first. Alice had been naked, but she 165
wasn’t a prostitute. For Jonathan’s murder, the killer had chosen a gun and that certainly wasn’t Valentine’s style. It was too messy, and too risky. Valentine didn’t prolong death; it was always over quickly.
Had Alice ever been a prostitute? Surely not. She had been a dancer and - what had Tony called her? - a real little raver? What if she’d used the casting couch method to gain a place in the dance group? They needed to delve very deeply into Alice’s past.
But perhaps the killings weren’t linked.
Jill stood up to stretch her legs, then decided to get herself a coffee.
It was good to get out of that cramped, airless room and see people rushing along corridors. Stuck in her office, the world could end without Jill being any the wiser. Here, there was constant noise - people running, shouting and talking, and phones ringing.
She was at the machine, waiting for it to pour some sludge into a white plastic cup, when Max came striding along.
‘Any news?’ he asked her.
‘How would I know? Cornwall doesn’t confide in me.
Although he did say something about finding chewing gum out there.’
Max’s eyes lit for a brief second but then he shook his head. ‘Valentine’s not that daft.’
‘That’s what I thought. I know it’s nothing to do with you, Max, and Cornwall would have me flogged at dawn if he knew I was discussing it with you, but I think Valentine’s most probable dwelling is in Rossendale.’
His eyebrows rose at that.
‘It could even be Kelton,’ she said, suppressing a shudder.
‘Now, do you think he’s responsible for Alice and Jonathan Trueman’s deaths?’
‘No!’
‘But if ‘
‘Never in a million years, Jill. There’s nothing whatsoever to connect them. They’re totally different.’
‘Yes,’ Jill agreed, knowing all too well that Max wouldn’t want the crimes connected, ‘but they just might be linked.
I was thinking about Alice. She was a dancer, and I heard her described as a real little raver in her youth. Who’s to say she didn’t sleep with the odd director to get on TV?’
‘That was years ago.’
“I know.’ At least she had his attention. ‘But it’s possible.’
‘No. Jonathan Trueman killed his wife, I’m sure of it.
Whoever killed him was out for revenge.’ He put some coins in the machine and gave it a thump. ‘Let me see this report you’re doing on Valentine, will you?’