The Killing in the Café

TWENTY-FIVE

In the Renault on the A3, Carole looked disapproving as she heard her neighbour blithely lying in her conversation to Becky Granger. ‘I know it’s ages ago, but I was at your fiftieth …’

‘Not that many ages ago,’ Becky Granger reproved her mildly from the other end of the phone. ‘I’m not quite ready for the scrapheap yet.’

‘Sorry. I was there with a boyfriend. You and I hadn’t met before.’

‘And I probably didn’t meet you then. There were a lot of people there I didn’t know. My then boyfriend was a member of the Fethering Yacht Club and I think he issued invitations to every other member. Extravagant bastard … one of the many reasons why we’re no longer an item.’ She sighed. ‘Oh, it all seems a long time ago. That party was such a scrum.’

‘Anyway, Becky, I got your number through Josie Achter.’

‘Oh my God, I haven’t heard that name for ages. How is the old boot? Still in Fethering? Still got the café?’

‘No, she’s sold up and moved to Hove.’

‘Has she? I haven’t heard a squeak from her for ages – probably not since that party.’

‘And it was at the Fethering Yacht Club, wasn’t it?’

‘Blimey, how much did you have to drink that night? Yes, of course it was.’

Carole’s lips were tight. To be able to hear Jude’s blatant lies and not to be able to hear the other end of the conversation was doubly frustrating for her.

‘Well, Becky, Josie and I were trying to remember the name of someone she met that night, someone she hadn’t seen for a long time …?’

‘Are we talking about the guy she spent the whole of the evening dancing with? They were all over each other. Which was so unlike Josie. Normally at parties she was all buttoned up, never wanted to draw attention to herself. But that evening … I’d have been embarrassed if I hadn’t been in such a state that I was incapable of embarrassment.’

‘It probably would be that guy she was talking about. Josie was saying she’d lost touch with him.’

‘Well, she’d certainly found touch with him at the party.’

‘So what was his name?’

‘Oh my God, you’re really testing me now. We are talking over ten years ago.’

‘Please try and remember.’

‘I am trying. Oh, it was one of those unusual man’s names. Sounding old-fashioned. Ending with “us”.’

‘Amos?’ asked Jude excitedly.

‘No, not Amos. It was …’ There was a silence. ‘Quintus! That’s right. His name was Quintus.’