Blood in Grandpont (DI Susan Holden 2)

‘In that case,’ Joseph replied cheerfully, ‘I’ll find some witnesses, don’t you worry.’ As if finding witnesses was the easiest thing in the world. Like buying fags at the local corner shop.

Holden turned back towards the sofa. ‘Dr Tull, would you mind telling me where you were last night?’

‘I was at home. I got back from work just after six o’clock. Maria was still here. I had a whisky while she finished her supper. Let me think.’ He paused, and gave an impression of a man thinking. Holden too was thinking. Dr Tull had asked why they weren’t pulling in the local druggies. Why had he said that? She herself had certainly said nothing along these lines the night before, so where had that idea come from?

‘Ah yes!’ Dr Tull now gave the impression of a man suddenly remembering a vital detail. ‘I made a couple of phone calls, and then ate supper in front of the telly. I think I fell asleep for a while. After that I did a few chores. I was a bit worried because of the rain, and I went out to check the drain at the back hadn’t got blocked, but my trousers got soaked, so I went and had a bath, and then sat and read in bed, but I think I must have fallen asleep again.’

‘He did,’ Lucy said, taking up the baton. ‘I found him asleep with his glasses still on and his lights blazing when I got in.’

‘So where had you been, Lucy?’

‘The Raglan Hospital, in the Woodstock Road. I was visiting someone.’

‘We need a name.’

‘Marjorie Drabble. She’s dying of cancer.’

‘When did you leave the hospital?’

‘Hell, how should I know? You don’t worry about time when you’re visiting someone. You try to give them your full attention.’

Holden gave a slight shrug and smile. ‘I appreciate that, but we do need to know,’ she insisted. ‘Did you stay to the end of visiting hours?’

‘It’s a private hospital. They don’t throw you out on the dot, but I guess I must have left by 8.45.’

‘And then what?’

‘I went and had an ice cream in Alfredo’s in Little Clarendon Street, and then because it kept raining I had a coffee, and then when it didn’t stop I caught a taxi home. I guess I must have got in between ten-fifteen and ten-thirty.’

‘Which taxi firm?’

Lucy gave Holden a look of utter disgust, as if she couldn’t believe the nit-picking pedantry of her questioner. ‘Oxford Cabs,’ she said finally, and stood up, placing her hands truculently on to her hips. ‘You can check with them if you want to.’

‘We will,’ Holden replied, unwilling to concede any more sympathy to a young woman whom she was finding it hard to like.

‘Is that it then?’ Lucy snapped back brusquely.

Holden nodded. ‘Joseph and you are welcome to go. However, I do need a couple more minutes of your father’s time.’

‘Why?’ she demanded. DC Lawson, sitting there taking it all in and writing brief notes, decided that Lucy had already taken over the role of matriarch in the house.

But Holden was not deflected. ‘Lucy,’ she said firmly, ‘Constable Lawson will come with you. Because one practical thing we do need are some photos of your mother.’

This request had the most surprising effect. Lucy, who had briefly turned her baleful gaze upon Lawson, twisted back round towards Holden. ‘Maria Tull is not my mother,’ she snarled. ‘My mother died over twenty years ago, in a car crash. Maria is my stepmother,’ she continued, her tone now so stressed that Holden feared for what she might do next. ‘So if you want photos, Joseph is the person to ask. If it’s all right by you – or even if it isn’t – I’m going to go to my room now, as I need to make a phone call.’ With that, she stalked out of the room, and up the stairs.

‘I’ve got lots of photos,’ Joseph said triumphantly. ‘Come on, Constable, I’ll show you them all and you can choose as many as you like.’

Lawson followed Joseph out of the door, closing it carefully behind her, for she knew what Holden wanted to do next. Behind the

shut door, silence descended. Holden hadn’t quite decided how to ask what she had to ask. In her head, as Lawson had driven her to Bainton Road, she had rehearsed three different approaches, but she had failed to be satisfied by any. While Lawson was parking, she had torn up her mental notes and decided to play it by ear. In the end, she decided, how she said what she had to say probably wouldn’t matter that much. What would be important was Alan Tull’s reaction.

It was Alan Tull who broke the silence. He had been slumped back in the sofa all the time Lucy was in the room, but now he sat up, shook himself slightly, and leant forward. ‘So,’ he said, politely, as if addressing a new patient in his surgery, ‘how can I help you?’

Almost without realizing it, Holden took a deep breath in and then slowly let it out. She put her hand into the small black bag she was carrying and pulled out a mobile phone. ‘We found this in your wife’s coat pocket. Does it belong to her?’ She spoke casually, and held it up to show him, but he glanced at it only briefly, as if it had no interest to him. ‘Well, if it was in her pocket, I dare say it is. It certainly looks like hers. Why do you ask?’

Holden studied the mobile, and her fingers quickly flicked across the keypad. Then she stood up, walked over to the sofa, and held it in front of Tull. ‘Can you tell me who this is?’ she said quietly. She kept her own eyes on Tull, and she saw shock – or what she certainly believed to be shock – flash across his features.

‘God!’ was all he said.