Score!

59

Outraged to learn that Sergeant Fanshawe had made a breakthrough on his patch — bonking on lady’s bedstraw indeed! — Gablecross set off for Penscombe, determined to succeed where Fanshawe had failed by nailing Tabitha. Not wanting anyone censoring his questions, however, he and Karen lurked over excellent fish pie in the Dog and Trumpet until the dark blue helicopter had carried Rupert, Lysander and Xavier off to Newmarket.

All round the pub walls were photographs of generations of Campbell-Blacks triumphing at horsy events. Noticing the ferocious intensity on Tabitha’s face as she rode a much older and larger boy off the ball in some Pony Club polo finals, Gablecross thought she would have had little difficulty in strangling Rannaldini. One of the specialities chalked on the blackboard was ‘Campbell-Black Chowder’.

‘What’s that made from? Shark and piranha?’ asked Gablecross, as he paid the bill.

‘No way,’ laughed the landlady. ‘That’s Taggie’s recipe. She’s the best thing that ever happened to that family. Got her hands full at the moment. Tab’s still in shock and won’t eat. Floods one moment, shouting the next. Rupert’s a continually erupting volcano. Just seen Taggie, dark glasses hiding her poor red eyes, driving off to Cotchester with Bianca.’

Better and better, thought Gablecross. With Taggie out, they must lose no time.

‘Shit,’ muttered Karen, as she drove up to the gates. ‘There’s even more paparazzi here than at Valhalla.’

Rupert’s beautiful house, pale gold as a drowsy lioness in the burning afternoon sunshine, made Gablecross’s Hungerford home seem even pokier. Fucking nobs.

As Ann-Marie, the au pair, knocked nervously on the study door, a shrill voice shouted, ‘I don’t care what Daddy or Tag say, I’m not having any lunch.’

Having admired Tab’s amazing beauty in the silver frames in Helen’s sitting room, and without clothes between the pages of Rannaldini’s memoirs, Gablecross was appalled by the reality.

Her normally flawless skin was grey and blotchy, the bruise on her cheekbone parsnip yellow, her eyes reddened and staring. The drastic weight loss had given her the prematurely aged look of a terminal anorexic. Her very loose signet and wedding rings clashed as she ran a hand covered with more yellow bruises through her lank hair.

Despite the heatwave, she wore grey cords and an inside-out dark green cashmere cardigan. On a nearby table were a billowing ashtray and a three-quarters-drunk vodka and tonic. All over the floor, open at the murder hunt, were today’s papers, which Tab had pinched from the kitchen, despite Taggie trying to hide them. Newmarket was on Channel Four with the sound turned down.

Slumped on a blue and white striped sofa, Tab was flipping through a photograph album. When Gablecross and Karen flashed their ID cards, she said would they please go away. To make up for her mistress’s rudeness, Sharon jumped off the sofa, grabbed a lemon-yellow silk cushion and carried it over to Gablecross singing with delight.

‘Lovely dog.’ Gablecross patted her.

‘Lovely flowers,’ said Karen enviously. ‘You are popular.’

‘It’s like a funeral parlour. Can you get me another vodka and tonic,’ Tab shouted, in a slurred voice, to Ann-Marie.

Mixing tranks and booze, thought Karen, as she clocked a Stubbs of two chestnut mares and a Turner of Cotchester Cathedral against a rain-dark sky on the walls.

‘D’you want a cup of tea before you go?’ asked Tab.

‘We’ve just had lunch, thanks.’ Gablecross nearly shattered his coccyx as he sat down heavily on an ancient beef bone. Removing it from the bowels of the armchair, he placed it on the floor.

Tab went back to her album, patting the sofa for Sharon to sit beside her, exhorting her to admire the pictures of Gertrude. ‘There she is at Daddy and Taggie’s wedding, and there she is disapproving of Daddy’s helicopter. God, she was sweet,’ then, in case Sharon was hurt, ‘but so are you.’

Having glanced at Gablecross, who tapped his head and mouthed ‘plastered’, Karen took out her notebook.

At first Tab denied everything, discounting the people who’d seen her racing towards the watch-tower and later weeping bloodstained on the edge of Hangman’s Wood. Her fingerprints were all over the telephone box, and on a glass found in the wood, persisted Karen. Her lipstick was on the glass, and her powder and traces of Quercus were all over Rannaldini’s dressing-gown.

‘Really,’ drawled Tab disdainfully, but her hand trembled as she pointed to a picture of Gertrude wearing a green paper crown at Christmas.

‘Why did you doll up and put on a new dress on Sunday night?’

‘It was an old dress, a present. I hadn’t worn it before, because I didn’t like it. I’d been riding all afternoon. It was baking, I was expecting Isa, I hadn’t seen him for ages, so I tried to look nice. We’ve only been married six months. Then I heard Gertrude was missing and forgot everything.’

‘So you rang Rannaldini?’

‘No, Wolfie,’ snapped Tab, ‘but I dialled the house instead of his mobile by mistake, and it was switched through to Rannaldini, who said he had Gertrude.’

‘What a coincidence,’ said Gablecross sarcastically. ‘So you dolled yourself up to go and see him.’

‘No.’ For a second Tab closed her eyes, clenching her fists against the memory of a hurtling weight knocking her to the floor. ‘But I wanted to get to Gertrude.’ She paused for a second, feeling her way. ‘She’d cut her paw. Rannaldini didn’t want me to take her. He’s bats about Taggie and probably wanted to return her personally. So I grabbed her and ran off, but I tripped over a bramble cable. Gertrude hit her head on a stump as I fell — that’s why she bled so much. Then I realized she was dead.’ There was a rattle of ice as Tab grabbed her vodka and tonic. ‘Her grave’s behind the tennis court.’

‘Why did you leave that message on Wolfie’s machine that you’d been raped?’

Tab’s eyes flickered in terror, her tongue ran over her gnawed, reddened lips. ‘No-one raped me,’ she whispered.

‘You’re lying. Rannaldini had a nasty dog bite, dog hairs and dog’s blood on his dressing-gown. I’m afraid’, Gablecross gave a sigh, ‘the only way to find out the truth is to dig up Gertrude and do a post-mortem.’

Tab caved in completely.

‘No, no, please not,’ she gasped. ‘It’d destroy Taggie. All right, Rannaldini did rape me.’

She was shaking so violently, Karen put down her notebook.

‘You’re being too rough on her,’ she hissed. ‘Let me talk to her.’

Pushing Sharon off the sofa, she sat down and put her arm round Tab’s shoulders.

‘I can’t take away the pain,’ she said gently, ‘but it’ll go, I promise. I’m sure you have secrets you never told your mum about, going too far with boys, smoking dope at school. Rannaldini was stunningly attractive.’ Karen picked up the Telegraph arts page, which had a big picture of him conducting. ‘Look at his beautiful hands. Your husband’s been away a long time, probably neglecting you.’

Tab’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Yes, he has.’

‘Rannaldini didn’t neglect you. He’d given you a wonderful horse, paid for you to go to America, paid for your wedding, given you a cottage and a wonderful job working on Don Carlos.’

‘I know,’ sobbed Tab, ‘but — he screwed up my mother, and Tristan’s film and I’m sure he screwed up Tristan and me.’

‘Only because he wanted you so badly, and you found him attractive. No, let me finish,’ Karen was holding Tab’s hand and stroking it. ‘It was a hot summer evening, you weren’t getting it from Isa, you have a bath and wash your hair, you ring Rannaldini, and he suggests you go over, so you put on a pretty dress and make-up for the first time in weeks, and wafting perfume you arrive all hot and excited and Rannaldini greets you wearing nothing but a dressing-gown, but knowing his reputation, you still go in.’

‘I wanted to see Gertrude, for Christ’s sake.’

‘The last telephone call Rannaldini made in his life was to you.’

‘That was me,’ protested Tab furiously, ‘ringing Isa, telling him I’d found Gertrude and was taking her straight back to Penscombe.’

‘Thereby giving yourself a pink ticket for as long as you liked with Rannaldini,’ interrupted Gablecross brutally. ‘Meanwhile, you accepted a drink from him.’

‘He thrust a vodka and tonic into my hand.’

‘What did you talk about?’

‘I said how excited I was to have a chance to go home and make it up with Daddy. Gertrude was in my arms doing a lot of wagging. I couldn’t bear to waste any more time, so I put her down, and was just pecking Rannaldini goodbye, when he swung his head so his mouth landed on mine. Then he pushed me to the floor—’

‘Why didn’t you scream for help?’

‘Rannaldini had his hand over my mouth, I saw the black hairs like bristles on crackling.’ Tab started to shudder again, her face beaded with sweat.

‘You’re quite safe,’ soothed Karen. ‘Sergeant Gablecross and I are here. Ann-Marie’s in the kitchen, look, the nice old gardener’s outside.’

To Tab, Mr Bodkin seemed miles away, merging into the heat-haze shimmering on the gravel and the smoky-blue trees beyond.

‘I tried to bite him, my teeth clashed on his wedding-ring — the wedding-ring my mother gave him, for God’s sake.’

‘Tell me what he did to you.’ Karen was stroking Tab’s hair. ‘It’s quite OK to be frightened.’

Tab described the rape quite dispassionately, breaking down only when she came to Gertrude. ‘He hit her with a bust, then threw her against the carved chest. Bastard!’ Her voice rose to a scream.

‘It’s OK to be angry.’

‘I pushed him against a table and snatched up Gertrude, who was pouring blood, and stumbled down the stairs into the wood.’

‘What happened to your glass?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘It was found by his body.’ Gablecross was on the warpath again. ‘Sure you didn’t kill him because you were so angry?’

‘No.’

‘Or lie in wait once you found Gertrude was dead, and kill him when he came out looking for you?’

‘No.’

‘Why didn’t you run back to the tennis court where all your friends were?’

‘I lost my bearings. I was so terrified he’d come after me, I just wanted to get away.’

‘How’d you get home?’

‘I was waiting by the telephone box. I heard someone singing and footsteps. I thought it was Rannaldini. I ran into the road and a big car coming from Paradise screeched to a halt. I begged the driver to give me a lift. He wanted to take me to Casualty in Rutminster, I asked him to drop me on the road to Cotchester but he swung his car round and took me the whole way home.’

Tab didn’t remember anything about the car or the man except that he was kind.

‘He wrapped a rug round me and Gertrude — she was bleeding all over the car. He turned the heating up so high he was pouring with sweat by the time we got home.’

‘How old was he?’

‘Old, at least forty.’

Karen suppressed a smile as Gablecross winced.

‘No-one you recognized?’

‘No, and he wouldn’t come in. I thanked him for saving me, and he said, in this funny accent, “I’ve got to thank you for saving me from something much bigger,” and drove off.’

‘Did you notice this picture in the watch-tower?’ Gablecross held out a photograph of The Snake Charmer.

‘Yuk,’ said Tab. ‘It was on the wall in the sitting room.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Quite. Rannaldini pointed it out, saying wasn’t he handsome in those days. I told him he looked better now. I wasn’t leading him on. It was true. He looked like an Italian waiter when he was young.’

Tab took a slug of her now tepid vodka. Maybe the worst was over. Karen got up and prowled round the room. Gablecross renewed the attack.

‘Why did you really kiss Rannaldini?’ he asked. ‘Did you lure him on to rape you so you had an excuse to strangle him in self-defence?’

‘For the hundredth time, I kissed him because I was so grateful he’d found Gertrude. What crucifies me is the thought of her terrible last hours, kidnapped, totally confused and terrified because she was deaf and blind, and then murdered.’

‘All very touching,’ said Gablecross sarcastically. ‘I think you fancied your stepdad something rotten and if, as you allege, this was the first time, how the hell d’you explain these?’ Like a straight flush, he triumphantly splayed the photographs in front of her.

For a minute, Tab was speechless as the colour swept her face, merging with the blotches until it was all the same ugly red, as she gazed down at her own lascivious beauty, the half-closed eyes, the curling tongue, the thrust-forward breasts, the pink lips glistening between the long slender white thighs.

‘The full split beaver,’ said Gablecross roughly.

‘My father had a dog called Beaver,’ said Tab slowly. Then she flipped. ‘How absolutely gross.’

She struggled to her feet to grab the photographs then, finding her legs wouldn’t support her, collapsed back on the sofa.

‘It’s a trick, my head on someone else’s body.’

‘But in your own bedrooms at Valhalla and at Magpie Cottage,’ said Gablecross. ‘We checked out the background. You have been a busy girl.’

‘I have not!’ Tab’s scream was so raw that Sharon, who’d been trembling and swallowing throughout the interview, crept under the sofa. Her bone was black with buzzing flies now. Gablecross chucked it out of the window.

‘I never took off my clothes for Rannaldini,’ whispered Tab. ‘God, how revolting.’ A horrible thought struck her. Perhaps Isa had taken them and given them to Rannaldini, perhaps Rannaldini had hidden in the cupboard, perhaps Clive…? ‘Oh, Christ, I swear I never knew they were being taken. Where did you find them?’

‘Taking pride of place in Rannaldini’s memoirs. Are you sure you didn’t catch a glimpse of them on Sunday night and burn down the watch-tower?’

‘No, this is the first time.’ God in heaven, why couldn’t this sweating, red-faced thug leave her alone?

Karen was flipping through the little cards that had come with the flowers. ‘Did you ring anyone else after the rape?’

‘No, only Wolfie and Daddy.’

‘Not Tristan de Montigny to tell him what had happened?’

‘Why ever should I? He was in France.’

‘Tristan threatened to kill Rannaldini on Friday. He was seen in Valhalla at the time of the murder.’

Tab started in horror, the colour deserting her face, leaving a grey wasteland.

‘If you’d tipped Tristan off Rannaldini had raped you,’ accused Gablecross, ‘you could have pushed him over the edge. Perhaps he heard your message on Wolfie’s machine.’

‘No.’ Clapping her hands over her ears, Tab frantically shook her head. ‘No, no, no!’

‘Wolfgang threatened to kill his dad after he heard that tape,’ taunted Gablecross. ‘Hope you weren’t telling porkies. Might ’ave encouraged that young man, even your father, to kill Rannaldini, or did you tell your husband?’

‘I didn’t.’

‘Hello, I’m back. Lovely basket of fruit arrived for you, Tab, darling.’

As a slender, very tall girl walked in, Gablecross leapt guiltily to his feet. This must be Rupert’s wife, Taggie. She looked hardly older than her stepdaughter. Unfortunately he was too late to stop Sharon wriggling out from under her chair. Frantically searching around for a present, she snatched Tabitha’s photographs off the table, and proudly bore them over to Taggie.

‘Drop, Sharon, for God’s sake!’ Tab stumbled forward, snatching the photographs, then crumpling to the floor, sobbing hysterically. ‘They think I killed Rannaldini, that I led him on to rape me. Please don’t look at those pictures.’

Seldom had Karen witnessed such fury; a tigress protecting her cub.

‘How dare you b-b-bully her after all she’s been through, you horrible, horrible beast!’ yelled Taggie.

Even Gablecross stepped back.

‘You’re right, he is a beast,’ agreed Karen. Together she and Taggie lifted a weeping Tab to her feet. For a second, she froze, rigid with revulsion, then collapsed weeping in Taggie’s arms.

‘I didn’t want anyone to know about the rape. I wouldn’t have blurted it out to Dad or Wolfie. I was just so devastated about Gertrude.’

‘I know, darling.’

‘I feel so awful about Mummy. She’s had such a terrible time with the press over the years. Imagine the f-f-field day Beattie Johnson’s going to have when she finds out Rannaldini raped me, particularly if the police say I led him on, and what will the Lovells say? Jake hates me, and Isa’s never forgiven me because of Peppy Koala. Oh, Taggie, I’ve made such a mess of my life.’

‘You haven’t.’ Taggie tugged the red scarf from her dark hair, holding it for Tab to blow her nose on, as if she’d been Bianca.

‘You’re good, brave and beautiful.’

‘Like a beautiful car that doesn’t work,’ wailed Tab. ‘I loved Lysander, Isa and Tristan so much. Why didn’t any of them love me? Because I’m bad luck, that’s why, and I don’t want to bring any more to Mummy. I love her so much too, but she’s never rung to see if I’m OK. I expect the police have already told her I pulled her husband. What’s she going to think when she sees those pictures?’

What would you think if you knew your sainted mother had grassed about your beloved father’s gun? wondered Gablecross bitterly.

‘What will she say when it all comes out?’ mumbled Tab.

‘Perhaps it can be hushed up?’ Taggie turned beseechingly to Karen.

‘Tabitha’s been very co-operative,’ said Karen, who was feeling thoroughly ashamed of herself.

Taggie turned back to Tab. ‘Look, why don’t we ask Mummy to stay for a bit?’ Her far too kind heart was already sinking as she made the offer.

But a tiny spark had ignited Tab’s face.

‘Could we? Oh, Taggie, you are kind. I hate her rattling about in that creepy house, stalked by Rannaldini’s ghost.’

‘And you must open your lovely basket of fruit,’ said Karen. ‘Mangoes and persimmons. Someone wants you to start eating again.’ She handed Tab the tiny envelope.

They were from Wolfie.

‘Perhaps he might drop Mummy off,’ sniffed Tab. ‘I’d love to see Wolfie again.’