Name To a Face

FORTY

I’ve thought about you a lot these past few days,” said Clive Isbister as they settled with their drinks at an empty table in the buffet car. “I was shocked when I heard Barney had been killed and that Hayley Winter-Foxton, I suppose I should say-was the prime suspect. Then I saw it reported that you were there when it took place. Now… what? You’re going back to Penzance?”

“Carol asked me to pay Humph a visit and tell him exactly how it happened,” Harding replied. It was a passable cover story. “She was too busy sorting everything out to come herself.”

“I can imagine. Well, that’s good of you. But what a coincidence, hey? I’ve been up at an ISVA dinner-Incorporated Society of Valuers and Auctioneers.” Isbister’s flushed complexion and general loquaciousness suggested he had not stinted himself. “So, tell me, how did it happen?”

There was clearly no avoiding an explanation, so Harding embarked on one, omitting any mention of his new-found doubts about Hayley’s responsibility for Tozer’s death-and of Nathan Gashry’s supposed suicide. He was in no mood to bare his soul and felt certain there was nothing to be gained by taking Isbister into his confidence.

“Appalling,” said Isbister when he had finished. “Just appalling.” Which was not, Harding reflected, such a bad summary. “And there’s no question it was Hayley?”

“There wasn’t much room for doubt.” Which was not, of course, the same as saying there was no room at all.

“But shooting him like that, in cold blood. I’d never have thought her capable of such a thing.”

“Neither would I.”

“But you saw it with your own eyes, so there it is.” Isbister stared thoughtfully into his plastic beaker of whisky and soda. “It’s strange. Ironic, you could say. There’s a reunion every decade of my year at Humphry Davy Grammar. Our year, I mean. Barney’s, mine, Ray Trathen’s…”

“And John Metherell’s?”

“Yes, of course. John’s too. You know him?”

“We’ve met.”

This minor revelation induced a puzzled pause on Isbister’s part. Then he pressed on. “Well, the last was in… 1998. Function room at the Queen’s Hotel. I remember standing there, chatting with Barney, and… yes, actually, I think it was John Metherell, now you mention him. Anyway, the do was winding down and Barney said jocularly ‘See you in another ten years, then.’ And John said, ‘God willing.’ To which Barney responded, ‘Don’t worry. I’m indestructible.’ And, you know, in a funny sort of way, I believed him. There was something… granite-like… about him. Good at rugby, you know? Loose-head prop. Get tackled by him and you remembered it. My God, you did.” He winced in tribute to a long-ago collision. “Yes. Indestructible. But he wasn’t, of course. And he won’t be sharing a joke with anyone at the 2008 gathering.”

“Have the police asked you any questions?” Harding enquired, hoping Isbister could be lured away from maudlin reminiscences of his schooldays.

“Not as such. They came to me for the keys to Heartsease, that’s all. Wanted to search the basement flat on the off chance of turning up some clue to Hayley’s whereabouts. Is she still on the run?”

“As far as I know.”

“Well, they obviously didn’t find anything, then. Where do you think she’s gone?”

“No idea.”

“There’s no mistake, is there? She’s Kerry Foxton’s sister? I mean, I know there’s a resemblance, but-”

“She’s definitely her sister.”

“Right.” Isbister nodded. “I bumped into Ray Trathen in Market Jew Street yesterday, you know.” He glanced at his watch. “Day before yesterday, I should say. He was full of it, as you can imagine. ‘Told you Barney was up to no good,’ he crowed. ‘Now he’s got his just deserts.’ He was drunk, of course. Well, not sober, anyway. But I didn’t like the pleasure he took from Barney’s death. Or the conclusions he drew. The fact that Hayley evidently believes Barney murdered Kerry doesn’t prove he did.”

“No. It doesn’t, does it?”

“Barney sailed close to the wind, no question about it. Always did. He was running scams even at school. Started selling Kit-Kats of dubious origin and graduated to reefers. I daresay Ray’s right about Starburst International being a dodgy outfit. But the one thing Barney never had was a vicious streak. He wasn’t a bully. He was actually a very generous man. He basically wanted everyone to have a good time, preferably in a way that turned him a useful profit. A wheeler-dealer. A barrow boy. A rogue. But a murderer? Especially of an attractive girl like Kerry? Never. It just… wasn’t in his character.”

“Did you know Kerry?” Isbister’s second reference to Kerry’s looks had finally caught up with Harding.

“Not really. I met her a couple of times. Once in the Abbey Hotel restaurant. She was dining there with Barney the night my wife and I were celebrating our anniversary. They… joined us for drinks beforehand. We… chatted… about this and that. I remember Janet-my wife-complaining over dinner that I’d been ogling Kerry. Perhaps it was true. Kerry was very attractive, of course. But she had this… extra something as well. Glamour. Charisma. I don’t know what you’d call it. The wow factor, I suppose. Yes. That’s what she had. In spades.”

“What was the other time you met?”

“Oh, much duller. She called round at the office. It can’t have been long after we’d met at the Abbey.” Isbister frowned with the effort of recollection. “Yes. No more than a few days. She wanted my… professional opinion on something.”

“What was that?”

“She had a… document… she wanted me to date.”

“Really?” Harding was now having to exert himself not to push too hard for details.

“Eighteenth-century she thought. Could we confirm it? I had Julian Mann-our expert on that kind of thing-cast his eye over it. He pronounced it genuine, I seem to remember. It was a single page of handwriting. But clearly part of something longer.”

“Did you read it?”

“Glanced at it. Oh yes.” A jolt of memory animated Isbister’s expression. “I spotted the name Borlase. They were big cheeses in Penzance back in the eighteenth century. So, that was a promising sign in itself. Then Julian gave it the thumbs-up. Right sort of paper, ink, lettering style. That kind of thing. I assumed Kerry had all of… whatever it was, so I… asked if she wanted us to sell it for her. Antiquarian stuff always attracts a lot of interest. And it looked like there was a local connection too, which was obviously a bonus.”

“But she turned you down?”

“Yes. Just wanted confirmation of the date. Mid-eighteenth-century.”

“Didn’t you think it odd, her having this… document, but not being willing to show you the whole thing?”

“A little, yes, but…” Isbister stared at the night-blanked window for a moment, then snapped his fingers. “You know, I’d forgotten that.”

“What?”

“Well, she asked me to say nothing to Barney about her visit. Said it was all part of a little… surprise she was planning for his birthday. Late August. He was the youngest boy in our year.” Isbister’s gaze became distant and unfocused. “I didn’t socialize with Barney. I hardly ever saw him. So, saying nothing wasn’t difficult. In fact, I… forgot all about it. And Barney never got his present, did he? By late August, Kerry was in hospital… on life support.”

“I wonder what happened to the document.”

“So do I.”

“We’ll probably never know.”

“Probably not, no.”

In truth, though, Harding thought he did know. What it was and what had become of it. A complete version of Francis Gashry’s report on the Shillingstone affair, stolen by Kerry from a descendant of Gashry’s executor, helpfully authenticated by Isbister’s antiquarian expert and then concealed beneath the floorboards at Kerry’s childhood home in Dulwich, safe from whatever risks she feared she was running in Cornwall. As an additional precaution, she had hidden a note of precisely where the report was secreted in a place where only her sister was likely to discover it, just in case she met with an accident-as indeed she did.

“Kerry’s family might have it, I suppose,” Isbister mused. “But they’re all dead, aren’t they? Except Hayley, of course. Perhaps she has it. I wonder…”

“What?”

“If it’s connected in any way… with the theft of the ring from Heartsease.”

“I don’t see how.”

“No. Neither do I. Except that… everything seems to be connected with everything else.” Isbister was beginning to sound positively philosophical. He lowered his voice. “I had lunch earlier this week with Gordon Meek.”

“Who?”

“Gabriel Tozer’s solicitor. He instructed us to auction the contents of Heartsease in accordance with Gabriel’s will. Now the house is to be sold-also by auction. Only then will the estate be wound up. I’d been assuming the proceeds would go to some charity or other. Gabriel obviously didn’t want to benefit his nephews, Barney and Humphrey. Otherwise he’d have just left everything to them. Well, that part’s true enough. But the rest’s a bit more complicated. Gordon was still in a state of shock at the news of Barney’s murder. He said to me-in strictest confidence, you understand-that he couldn’t help wondering if Hayley might have acted differently if she’d known she was going to become a relatively wealthy young woman. I asked him what he meant and, frankly, I was astonished by his answer. Gabriel Tozer specified in a recent alteration to his will that the proceeds of both sales, contents and house, along with his savings, which apparently were considerable, were to go not to various charities, as he let his nephews suppose, but to Hayley Winter, as Gabriel of course believed her to be called, although she wasn’t to be told until after the sales were completed.”

“You’re sure about this?”

“Gordon Meek doesn’t get things like that wrong, Mr. Harding. He shouldn’t really have told me. And he’d be horrified to know I’d told you, so I’d appreciate it if you’d keep it under your hat. But, yes, Hayley was Gabriel Tozer’s heir. She just didn’t know it. And it makes no difference now, anyway, does it? She’s never going to get the chance to spend the money.”