Suspicious Minds

Chapter Twelve

“Now will you accept he’s a murderer?”

Not even a fuzzy telephone line could disguise Doreen Capstick’s told-you-so triumph.

“Doreen, for God’s sake! The man’s daughter is missing.”

“Exactly. And why? I’ll tell you. Because she’s met the same terrible fate as Alison.”

Harry closed his eyes and reminded himself to be patient. “So you’re not letting us have the apology we asked for?”

“You must be joking! Your letter’s in the wastepaper basket. Sue and be damned, that’s what I say to your precious Mr. Stirrup.”

“In that case, to borrow your slogan, au revoir.”

At the same time that Harry put down the receiver, Jim stuck his head round the door.

“Fancy a chicken salad at the Traders’?”

After the Ensenada, club food had no more appeal than a school dinner, but Harry was glad to escape the phone. The morning’s many interruptions had not helped him forget the unsatisfactory finale to the previous evening. He and Valerie had dined well and not been troubled by further conversation with Grealish. Harry’s hopes had been high when he’d driven them to her flat in Crosby, but she hadn’t invited him in. The turn-down had been gentle: she’d said she had a busy day ahead and wanted an early night, and he believed her. He didn’t want to push his luck, so he had kissed her once then hurried away. But the sense of so-near-yet-so-far was impossible to shake off.

Waiting for Jim in reception, Harry felt a tap on his shoulder. He could somehow tell it was a gesture of reproach.

“On your way out? I’ve come specially to see you.” Jonah Deegan’s tone implied that he was the victim of a conspiracy.

Harry uttered a silent prayer for strength. “Any news?”

“Be reasonable. It’s early days yet.” Jonah wrinkled his brow. “And a difficult case. No two ways about it.”

“Heard about Claire?”

“Read about it in the paper. That’s why I’m here. What happened?”

Jim came into reception. “Hello, Jonah. Found the Maltese Falcon yet? Busy now, Harry?”

“I’ll catch you up at the club. Mine’s a pint of best.”

“Thought the chicken salad sounded too clean living to be true. See you around, Columbo.”

As the door closed behind the big man, Harry turned back to Jonah and gave him a brief account of the events of the past couple of days. “So step-mother and step-daughter are both nowhere to be found,” he concluded. “Coincidence? Hard to believe. But not impossible. Do you have any ideas?”

Deegan scratched his nose. “I saw them both on Friday. Stirrup at his office, the girl at the house. Spoiled little madam, I thought. She didn’t want to talk. But he seemed devoted enough. To her, not his old lady.”

“Could it be Stirrup murdered Alison — and Claire did a runner for some unconnected reason?”

“Possible.” Jonah contemplated the floor. His gloom was enough to wipe the smile off a Cheshire Cat. Perhaps he was remembering all the evil deeds he had encountered during his years with the police. Or perhaps his arthritis was troubling him. “He might have disposed of them both and spirited away the corpses. But how the hell he’d do it, I don’t know. The human body isn’t easy to hide.”

“So what next?”

“I keep looking for Mrs. Stirrup. I had a quick scout round her room at the house, it gave me one or two ideas. Long shots, mind. And I still need to talk to some friends of hers. Stirrup’s not paying me to search for the kid. The police can do that better anyway.”

“Do you think Alison’s dead?”

“Maybe. Not suicide. Accident’s possible. Amnesia too, come to that. But she might just have decided to pack in her old life and start again.”

“Abandoning her mother and her claim to a slice of Stirrup’s worldly goods?”

“Hard to credit, I agree. Abandoning her mother’s easier to understand, by all I’ve been told. Matter of fact, I’m seeing the Capstick woman this afternoon.”

“Good luck.”

“I’ll need it, by the sound of things. I gather she’s a tartar. Any road, don’t let Stirrup confess to double murder till you’ve got some cash on account of my fees.”

“What happened to the poor but honest gumshoe, turning down the client’s tainted money?”

“He didn’t have Liverpool Corporation on his back, demanding a councillor’s ransom in bloody poll tax.”

After Jonah had shambled out, the rumbling of his stomach reminded Harry that he was hungry. He sprinted over to the Traders’, barely casting a glance at the bikini-clad girls sunning themselves in the Parish Church gardens. At the members’ bar, the pint of best awaited him together with Jim, who was already in conversation.

His companion was a snappily dressed young man in dark glasses, who had put his portable phone on the counter as if he expected an urgent call at any moment. The Thatcher era might have drawn to a close, but Oswald Fowler remained a yuppie to his fingertips.

“Harry, mate,” he drawled. “I’ve been meaning to give you a ring. You sent me a client. Trevor Morgan.”

“Don’t tell me, you needed air freshener to kill the booze fumes after he’d gone.”

A smile flitted across Fowler’s face. “Your client’s obviously driven mine to drink.”

“Between you and me, Jack may be willing to cough up a few quid if pushed. Without prejudice, of course.”

“I’d have to take instructions.” The tone was non-committal but Fowler could not quite hide the dollar signs in his eyes. A quick settlement was good for cash flow and he had long mastered the knack of matching the effective conduct of his clients’ litigation with his own self-interest.

“Jack always wanted to see Trevor right financially. Until now, the problem’s simply been one of pride. Neither of them wanted to make the first move. But Trevor needs the money.”

Fowler nodded. “I had to take the case on legal aid.” He made it sound like a donation to charity. “Morgan’s life is in a mess. No job, no cash, no wife.”

“Has Cathy walked out on him now?”

“Earlier this year. His dismissal was the last straw, by the sound of things. The main danger is that any compensation he gets will be eaten up in alimony if and when she starts proceedings.”

Harry kept a discreet silence. If anyone could advise Trevor on how best to keep a windfall from Stirrup Wines out of any matrimonial negotiations, it was Ossie Fowler.

“He’s at the end of his tether,” continued Fowler as he sipped the last of his G and T, his tone as indifferent as that of a Met Office man forecasting typhoons in the tropics. “Desperate. I did wonder if he might top himself. Though I imagine he’s never sober enough to knot a noose to swing in. However, we aren’t our clients’ keepers. Thank God! Anyway, I must dash. Got to arrest a ship this afternoon.”

“Hope it gives up without a struggle.”

“You recommended Morgan to see Ossie?” asked Jim as they found themselves a table. “Why exactly are we advising someone to sue our best client?”

“Trust me.”

“Last man I heard say that is serving three years in Walton for forging a security document.”

Over lunch Harry outlined the conversation he had had with Morgan in the magistrates’ court. The big man gave every appearance of concentrating on his food and, when the story was told, said simply, “Soft bugger.”

“Me or Trevor?”

“Both of you. Him for messing up his life, you for getting involved. Anyway, mine not to reason why. Question is, will Jack Stirrup settle?”

“I can persuade him. Trevor hasn’t much of a case, but it’s worth paying a few bob to avoid all the hassle. Deep down it’s what Jack wants to do.”

“Mind-reading now, are you? Take care. The thoughts of some of our clients would make Hannibal Lecter queasy. Anyway, how long will it take Trevor to drink the cash away?”

“That’s his business. But if Cathy’s left him he ought to be celebrating, not drowning his sorrows.”

“Never met her.”

“She used to give him a hard time, by all accounts. Jack couldn’t stand her and I gather the feeling was mutual.”

“Some people might say that was a point in her favour. And she’ll have had plenty to put up with.”

“Suppose you’re right. Perhaps fighting with Trevor made her feel better about his infidelities.”

Jim grunted. An undemonstrative but uxorious man, he had little patience with marriages that did not work. He called the waitress over to order desserts which undid the good of a healthy main course and turned the conversation to the forthcoming Test Match.

When they arrived back in the office only a couple of minutes after the end of the official staff lunch hour, Suzanne, cradling a telephone under her chin, waved to attract Harry’s attention. Her lips were pursed in disapproval and she glanced unsubtly at the clock on the wall opposite the switchboard.

“There you are at last. Detective Inspector Bolus from Merseyside Police is holding for you.”

“I’ll take it in my room.”

A call direct from the chief rather than an uniformed indian? Must be important. Harry broke into a run down the corridor. When he picked up the phone, Bolus’s voice sounded grim.

“Mr Devlin? I have some urgent news for you. Your client wants you here.”

“What’s the problem?”

“It’s about his daughter. She’s been found.”

Harry almost fooled himself into a reaction of relief. But a moment’s thought made him realise that good news would not be broken like this.

“Where?” he asked cautiously.

“In one of the caves at New Brighton.”

Bolus paused. Not for dramatic effect, Harry sensed, but from weariness. The weariness of a man, still young, who has seen too much violence, too much misery.

“We don’t have the post mortem results yet. But there’s no real doubt. She was raped first, then strangled.”