Ruth Rendell - The Best Man To Die

‘Yes, but what? A big piece of metal or a wooden box? He’d have sailed right over cardboard. Anyway, they didn’t find anything in the road afterwards.’

‘A dog?’

‘Fanshawe wouldn’t have crashed for the sake of a dog. And he didn’t hit one because there was no body.’

‘Then he saw the girl herself,’ said Burden carefully, ‘stepping out of the centre section to wave him down.’

‘But we’re assuming the girl was in the car. Don’t you agree with me now that she can’t have been?’

Burden walked a little way away from him and stopped by the black birch stump. ‘If the girl stepped off here,’ he said, taking a couple of paces towards the fast lane, ‘and Fanshawe thought he was going to hit her, why didn’t he swerve to the left, into the middle lane, instead of to the right? The road must have been clear as there were no witnesses to the accident. He swerved inwards, to the right, mounted this centre strip and hit the tree.’

Wexford shrugged. A car in the fast lane leapt past them at seventy. ‘Feel like experimenting, Mike?’ he said with a grin. ‘Just pop out into the road now, wave your arms and see what happens.’

‘You can, if you’re so keen,’ said Burden, involuntarily retreating from the edge. ‘I want to stay alive.’

‘Funny that girl didn’t. Mike, it couldn’t have been straight suicide, could it?’

Burden said thoughtfully, ‘I suppose it could have at that. Assume she has no connection with Fanshawe, assume she went to the South Coast with another boy friend who ditched her so that she had to hitch a lift as far as here. The driver that brought her to this point might then have dropped her at her own request. She crosses the centre section, waits until a fast car comes and steps out suddenly in front of it. Of course, that doesn’t explain why Fanshawe pulled to the right instead of to the left.’

‘And it doesn’t explain why everything that might have identified her was removed from her handbag. If she was a suicide, there’s, no possible reason why she should have removed it herself. Anyway, you seem to have forgotten our main reason for coming here. The crash occurred at ten to ten and Hatton passed on the other highway, going in the other direction, at approximately twenty to. Impoverished Hatton, desperate to replenish the empty coffers. Suppose he passed a little later than that and saw the girl step out? Now, if Fanshawe were still alive, if, say, he’d killed the girl without damage to his car, and had simply driven on, Hatton might have blackmailed him. But Fanshawe is dead, Mike.’

Now it was Burden’s turn to shrug and look baffled. He eyed the other highway, the southbound section, the hedge that bounded it, the meadows behind that hedge. The road came to a crest some fifty yards to the north of where they stood and above this ridge nothing but the pale milky sky was visible.

‘If there was some sort of foul play,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘if, for instance, the girl was pushed into the road… Oh, I know it’s fantastic, but haven’t you got something of the sort in mind yourself? If she was pushed and Hatton, approaching over the brow of the hill, was a witness, why didn’t whoever it was doing the pushing, see him first? His lorry was an outsize very high van and anyone standing here would see the top of it appearing over the crest seconds before its driver could see him. Look, here comes a lorry now.’

Wexford turned his eyes towards the brow of the hill. The lorry’s roof loomed above it and it seemed that some seconds passed before the cab came into view.

‘It was dark,’ he said.

‘Anyone standing where we are could see its headlights at precisely the same time as its driver saw him.’

The same thought striking each man simultaneously, they walked towards the crest. Beneath them half Sussex lay spread, broad meadows, green and gold, the dense bluish shadows of woodland and in the folds between, farmhouses and the occasional pointing spire of a church. Through this pastoral landscape the road wound its twin white ribbon, hummocking here, dipping there, and sometimes entirely concealed by the green swelling land.

Not more than twenty yards beyond the crest, the south bound section widened into an arc and in this lay-by the occupants of two cars sat picnicking.

‘Perhaps he parked here for a bit,’ Burden said. ‘Walked up this way for – well, a natural purpose or just because he needed air. He hadn’t been well, after all.’

But Wexford looked at the view and said presently, ‘Where every prospect pleases, and only man is vile.’

The huge American car with its splayed fins dwarfed every other vehicle in the Olive’s car park. Crossing the forecourt with Burden, Wexford saw on closer scrutiny that it was neither new nor well cared for. One of its headlamps was broken and the rust on its chrome rim showed that it had been broken a long time. Scratches marred the bluish-green finish on its wings. Here in this tiny car park in a small country town it was an unwieldy mass of metal that doubt less gave a poor return for the petrol it devoured. It took up an immense amount of space but its seating capacity was small.

‘Reminds me of one of those prehistoric monsters,’ said Wexford, ‘all brawn and no brain.’

‘Must have been grand once, though.’

‘That’s what they said about the dinosaurs.’

They sat in the saloon bar. In the far corner Nora Fanshawe sat on a leather settle beside a huge fair man with a small head. His expression was vapid, his shoulders of Mister Universe proportions. Another dinosaur, Wexford thought, and suddenly he was sure this was the owner of the car.

‘We keep running into each other, Miss Fanshawe.’

‘You keep running into me,’ said the girl dryly. She wore another of her finely tailored, neatly stitched suits, navy blue this time and as slick and business-like as a uniform. ‘This is Michael Jameson. You may remember, I mentioned him to you.’

The hand that took Wexford’s had a damp palm. ‘Nice little place this, if a bit off the map.’

‘Depends where you make your maps.’

‘Come again? Oh, I see. Ha ha!’

‘We were just going,’ said Nora Fanshawe. Then her strong masculine voice quavered a little as she said, ‘Ready, Michael?’ Suddenly she was vulnerable. Wexford knew that wistful pleading look. He had seen it before in the eyes of plain women, the pathetic terror of rejection that, because it deprives them of confidence, makes them plainer.

Jameson got up sluggishly, reluctantly; he winked at Wexford and that wink was as eloquent as words.

‘Off to see your mother, Miss Fanshawe?’

The girl nodded and Jameson said, ‘The old girl keeps her on her toes.’

‘Let’s go, Michael.’ She linked her arm in his and held it tight. Wexford watched them go, telling himself he was a fool to let the scene upset him. She was gruff, rude, unfeminine. She was also peculiarly honest and she lacked the talent of self-deception. Not for a moment did Wexford doubt that she knew this man was quite unworthy of her, in intelligence, in probity, in character. But he was good looking and she had money.

‘A bit of an oaf,’ said Burden.

Wexford lifted the curtain and between the fuchsias he saw Jameson get into the huge car and start the engine. Nora Fanshawe was not the kind of woman who looks on courtesy from men as her right. The car was already in motion before she got herself into the passenger seat. Jameson had not even opened the door for her from the inside.

‘I want you all to concentrate,’ Wexford said. ‘Don’t tell me it was a long time ago and you can’t remember. It was only about seven weeks ago. You’ll be surprised what you can remember if you try.’