The Poisoning in the Pub

Forty

There was no mistaking Will Maples’s BMW, conspicuously outgleaming the other shabby vehicles parked on the Downside Road. Its presence at least meant that he hadn’t abducted Kelly-Marie. But that small bonus was wiped out by the deduction that he was still inside the building with her.

The main door to Copsedown Hall was on the latch, which, while convenient for Carole and Jude, was also potentially worrying. Maybe Will Maples had left it like that for reinforcements to arrive. He had a habit of delegating his dirty work. Was Derren Hart about to arrive? Or was the ex-squaddie thug already in the building?

Carole and Jude sped up the stairs. There were voices coming from Kelly-Marie’s flat. Jude flung the door open.

The scene revealed looked surprisingly unthreat-ening. Kelly-Marie was sitting in her usual chair. On the sofa sat Will Maples, still dressed in the suit they had seen that morning. Beside him, to the women’s surprise, was Dan Poke. Though none of the three actually had drinks, Carole and Jude got the incongruous feeling that they had interrupted a polite tea party.

Will Maples made no attempt to pretend that he was pleased to see them. “My God, you two busy-bodies get everywhere, don’t you?”

But Kelly-Marie beamed welcome. “It’s good that you’ve come, Jude. These gentlemen want Viggo’s mobile. And you’ve got it, haven’t you?”

“Not any more. I’ve handed it over to the police.”

Will Maples let out a dry laugh. “Yes, I’m sure you have. Jude, I suggest you just give it to me. Then this whole affair can be ended without anyone getting hurt.”

“Without anyone else getting hurt, you mean,” said Carole combatively.

“Oh, more allegations do we have here?” asked Will Maples sardonically. “I thought you’d exhausted all of those this morning. I also thought you had taken on board what Melissa Keats told you. If you persist in this kind of slanderous behaviour, you could both be looking at a very long custodial sentence.”

“Not as long as the one you could be looking at,” snapped Carole.

He spread his hands wide in an insufferable gesture of calming. “As we established this morning, you have not a shred of evidence against me, no proof of my involvement in any wrongdoing.”

“I would say the fact that you’re here,” asserted Jude, “the fact that you’re trying to get Viggo’s mobile, is proof of your involvement.”

“And we also,” said Carole, “now know about Melissa Keats’s involvement. Very altruistic of her, wasn’t it, to offer to help poor Sylvia Crisp with her divorce?”

That prompted a reaction. The two men on the sofa exchanged looks, and Dan Poke murmured, “I always said that was going too far. We – ”

“Shut it!” hissed Will Maples. For the first time he did look discomfited by what was being said. But as he turned back to the two women, his expression became threatening. “Look, I’ve had it up to here with you two. And if I were capable of even a quarter of the crimes you accuse me of, I’d have thought you would realize how very stupid you’re being by constantly hounding me. If I was actually responsible for the death of Ray Witchett, or this character called Viggo, do you think I would have any compunction about adding a couple of middle-aged snoopers to my list of killings?”

A thin smile played about Carole’s lips, as she said, “You’re getting into a rather dubious area of logic here, Will. For your threats to have any validity, we must believe that you did have something to do with the two deaths. If, as you insist, you’re innocent, then we have no cause to be frightened, do we?”

There was a silence. Kelly-Marie looked around her rather full flat in bewilderment. “I’m not sure what’s happening. Would anyone like some tea?”

But her instinct as a hostess was ignored. Will Maples dropped his threatening manner and came in on another tack. He sounded very reasonable as he said, “Look, I can to some extent see where you’re coming from. The recent sequence of events at the Crown and Anchor could look suspicious, as though there actually were a campaign to get Ted Crisp out. The food poisoning, the bad newspaper headlines, the bikers, the fight…yes, it does look a bit too organized to be coincidental. But if you imagine that a company of the public profile of Home Hostelries would get involved in dirty tricks of that kind, you have very little knowledge of the business world. On the other hand, it is possible that someone inside the company might have acted off their own bat, might have hoped to advance his career by helping to acquire new properties for Home Hostelries…”

“Who’re you talking about?” asked Carole.

Will Maples looked pityingly at the man next to him on the sofa. “I always said it was a bad idea, Dan.”

“What?” The comedian’s eyebrows shot up in amazement.

“But you insisted. You said you could do it undercover, and nobody would ever find out what you were up to.” The Acquisitions manager turned to the two women. “Yes, I’m afraid you were right about some of the dirty tricks – and there you see the man responsible for them.”

“You mean he’s ‘K’?” asked Jude coolly.

That did stop Will Maples in his tracks. “What?”

“The ‘K’ who gave instructions to Viggo to set up Ray – and to kill him.”

He tried to recapture his former insouciance, but the shot had hit home. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

“She is talking about the fact,” said Carole, “that she found Viggo’s mobile, which still had K’s texted instructions on it. Instructions sent by ‘K’.”

“If you’re looking for ‘K’, then there he is!” Will Maples swung round and pointed at the comedian.

“You bastard! I had nothing to do with it!” Dan Poke’s words came out like a hiss of steam. Suddenly his hands were around his colleague’s throat. The two of them struggled awkwardly to their feet. Then there was a quick movement from Will Maples’s hand, and Dan Poke recoiled, clutching at his face. Blood spurted through his fingers from a slashed cheekbone.

“You bastard!” he repeated. “I told you you were going too far. Yes, Home Hostelries has always been in a competitive market, but we didn’t have to go to the lengths you took us to. We didn’t have to get involved in murder.”

“I was never involved in murder. Viggo may have been. Derren Hart may have been. None of it can ever be traced back to me.”

Blood was pouring down the comedian’s hand, soaking into the fabric of his shirt and suit sleeve, but he wasn’t about to back off. “No? I think if I stand up in court and give evidence, something might be traced back to you. And if Derren Hart does the same, your position could look decidedly precarious.”

“And,” said Carole, “since the police have Viggo’s mobile in their possession, I shouldn’t think it’d be long before they come looking for you.”

“Shut it!” shouted Will Maples. Carole and Jude had been watching Dan Poke, so it was only then that they noticed the Stanley knife in the other man’s hand. They also saw him move swiftly across the room, lift Kelly-Marie out of her chair and hold the bloody blade against her neck.

He had given up on denials. He’d made a quick assessment of his position, and, with the police having been alerted, decided his only option was escape. He edged the girl towards the door. Kelly-Marie, not quite sure what was happening, smiled hopefully, but with an edge of anxiety.

“You three stand by the window,” ordered Will Maples. “If I can’t see you there when I get into the car, I’ll kill the girl.”

They moved to the window. He’d devised as good a method as any other of giving himself time to make his getaway.

He backed towards the door, Kelly-Marie still held in front of him. There was a trickle of blood on her throat, but that was Dan Poke’s, dripping off the Stanley knife. It wasn’t hers. Yet.

She still looked confused rather than upset. And Jude felt deeply wretched. It was her reckless stupidity that had caused this. If she hadn’t succumbed to the temptation to reply to K’s text…

What happened next was very sudden. The open door behind Will Maples was slammed into his back. He swirled in surprise to find himself facing Detective Inspector Wilson, who quickly disarmed him. Another detective appeared from the landing and the two overpowered the Home Hostelries Acquisitions manager and snapped the cuffs on him.

It wasn’t the moment for long explanations, but Carole and Jude did gather that Detective Inspector Wilson and his colleague, aware of the potential danger to Kelly-Marie, had hidden themselves in the adjacent room that used to belong to Viggo. They had used listening devices in there and monitored all the conversation from inside Kelly-Marie’s flat.

The Detective Inspector said he’d be in touch, and the two policemen left with their prisoner and his potential chief accuser. They were going to take Dan Poke to hospital to get the gash in his cheek stitched up. Then there would be a lot of questioning for both men at the Hollingbury Major Crime Unit.

Once again, Kelly-Marie seemed remarkably unfazed by an incidence of violence. After they had watched the departing police car through the window, she turned back to her visitors with a huge beam on her face. “Now,” she said, “would anyone like a cup of tea?”