Ann Cleeves - Killjoy

‘Who paid?’ he asked.

‘We took it in turns,’ she said resentfully, ‘if it’s any business of yours.’

‘Did you ever give her money?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’ She obviously saw it as an admission of weakness. ‘I know it was all her own fault storming out of the house like that, but it didn’t seem right that she should live off a stranger. Not completely. I wanted her to have some cash of her own.’

‘How much did you give her?’

‘Ten pounds, twenty pounds, whatever I could afford.’

That would be a lot, Ramsay thought, for Ellen Paston. Probably a day’s pay. But it didn’t explain the eight hundred pounds in the building society.

‘Did you ever give her more than that?’ he asked. ‘Perhaps for her to start a savings account?’

Ellen shook her head. ‘Where would I get more than that?’ she demanded. ‘There’s only Mam’s pension and what I get from the Grace Darling.’

‘Yes, of course,’ he said, surprised by her aggression. ‘ Is that why Gabby came to meet you?’ he asked, suddenly brutal. ‘For the money?’

Ellen’s mood changed quickly, like a child’s. She forgot her anger and smiled.

‘Nah,’ she said. ‘She’d have got that anyway. She knew I’d not see her go short. I told you. She wanted to keep in touch.’

‘What did you talk about?’

‘Everything,’ she said. ‘Bit of news from the estate. She’d lost contact with most of her friends there. What was going on in the Grace Darling. Gossip, I suppose you’d call it. A bit of a crack.’

Ramsay saw that it was quite plausible. Gabby Paston had lived on the Starling Farm for sixteen years. Despite Prue’s kindness it must have been a strain to be uprooted into a middle-class household. The rules of engagement would be different. The talk would be of books, the theatre, politics. He remembered his own introduction to the Bennetts. It had been an exhilarating experience but he had been frightened always of betraying his ignorance and it had been a relief at times to escape home, to soap operas on the TV and his mother’s chat. So Gabby had sneaked away every couple of weeks to eat cream cakes with her aunt. With Ellen she could relax for an hour and use the dialect words and expressions which the Bennetts would hardly understand. And she could listen to gossip, to the trivial, salacious, and amusing bits of news which would be despised in her new life, but which would make her feel part of the estate again. Then why had she left in the first place, he wondered, if it was such a wrench? He did not put the question immediately to Ellen Paston. He thought she would refuse to answer it and he had other things to ask while she was being co-operative.

‘Did you talk about Amelia Wood?’ he asked. ‘She was a trustee at the Grace Darling and there must have been stories to tell about a woman like that.’

‘Maybe,’ she conceded, ‘but we didn’t see enough of her at the Centre to find out.’

‘Had you heard that she’d been murdered?’ he asked quietly.

She shook her head and for a brief moment he thought he saw her mouth turn up in a strange lopsided grin. Was it shock? Embarrassment? Or the pleasure in having information which he needed and which she was not prepared to share?

‘She was strangled,’ he said more sharply. ‘Like Gabriella.’

‘When?’ The question surprised him. He had expected some expression of regret.

‘Yesterday evening,’ he said. ‘At some time after six.’ He paused then asked deliberately. ‘What were you doing then?’

She seemed pleased to have gained accurate information from him and answered almost absentmindedly.

‘I was at home with Mam. There was no work. The Centre was closed for the day.’

‘You didn’t leave the house all evening?’

She shook her head and looked up at him, a challenge. ‘Ask Mam,’ she said. ‘She’ll tell you.’

Oh, yes, he thought. I bet she will.

‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘Why did Gabriella leave home?’

She looked straight at him, not caring whether or not he believed her.

‘I’ve told you,’ she said. ‘ It was her age. She just got fed up with us.’

‘She fell out with your mother,’ he said.

‘Aye. It was something like that.’

‘What was the row about?’

She smiled maliciously. ‘ You’ll have to ask Mam,’ she said. ‘ Won’t you?’

Ramsay did not answer. They both knew that Alma Paston would give little away.

‘Look,’ Ellen said. ‘ I should get back. I’ve work to do.’

‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘ I’ll clear it with Mr Lynch. And I’ll take you back myself. There’s just one more question…’ He looked directly at the hunched, ungainly figure sitting on the chair on the other side of the desk. ‘Gabriella had eight hundred pounds in a building society account. Do you know where she got the money?’

Ellen gave a hard laugh and he could have sworn that her astonishment was genuine.

‘The mean little madam,’ she said. ‘And she still took money off me!’

The resentment was directed not at the fact that Gabriella had money, but that Ellen had known nothing about the account.

Joe Fenwick heard the news of Amelia Wood’s death on the transistor radio he kept behind the reception desk to liven up the duller moments of the day. The afternoon was always quiet. There were a few old ladies in the small lounge for a reminiscence session, sharing stories of their childhood in the twenties, but Joe thought that most of them were so deaf that they would not be disturbed by the strains of Radio Newcastle coming from the lobby. There was an extended report of the murder during the two o’clock news and Joe thought the information was too interesting to keep to himself.

He found Prue Bennett and Gus Lynch in the theatre. They were arguing in an irritable, petulant way about the following week’s rehearsal of Abigail Keene. Prue thought the whole production should be cancelled or at least postponed. How could they go on with the rehearsals, she said, pretending that nothing had happened? The information, given by Joe, that Amelia Wood had died only strengthened her argument. They must cancel now, she said. They couldn’t go ahead when both a member of the Youth Theatre and a trustee had been killed. Besides the question of taste it was a practical matter. They couldn’t encourage young girls to come out after dark. Not at a time like this. The parents wouldn’t stand for it.

‘If the parents don’t like it,’ Gus Lynch said crossly, ‘they can arrange to bring the kids to the square and pick them up after the rehearsal. It’s not beyond the wit of man to organize some sort of rota.’

His reaction to Amelia Wood’s death surprised Prue. She was shocked and frightened- it seemed to her that everyone connected with the Grace Darling was a potential target-but Gus seemed overtaken by a terrible excitement. He talked about the murders all the time and became feverish and restless, insisting even more strongly that the production should go ahead. ‘The publicity won’t do us any harm,’ he said. ‘It’ll ensure a full house at least. And the press will certainly be there.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s terrible. We don’t want that sort of publicity.’

‘There are lots of parallels with the play when you come to look at it. Sam Smollett was accused of murder. He just never got caught.’

‘But who’ll play Abigail?’ Prue cried, hoping that a discussion of the practical details would make him calmer, give her a chance to make him see sense.

‘Anna, of course,’ he said, as if Prue were a fool. ‘She’ll make a perfectly adequate understudy.’

‘Look,’ Prue said. ‘I’m not sure she’s up to it. Not after all this strain.’