Стивен Бут - Fall Down Dead

‘None of the walking-club members ever thought to question his façade as a wealthy property developer. Why should they? And Elsa certainly didn’t care. She had no curiosity about his business dealings as long as the money was coming in to support their lifestyle. She knew he went off to meetings and had business calls in his office at home, but she never inquired what they were about.’

‘I’m sure he would have discouraged her from inquiring if she ever showed an interest. The one thing Elsa Roth was good at — doing what Darius wanted. She would have avoided anything that might annoy him.’

‘She must have felt in a very precarious position, I suppose.’

‘But she was his wife. Even if he divorced her, she would have been in line for a handsome settlement.’

‘I think it was more than just financial self-preservation. I believe she was very afraid of him. She must have sensed something in Darius that the others didn’t.’

‘What a pity she didn’t tell us before it was too late.’

So there were only two people in that group Darius didn’t have a financial hold over. Faith Matthew and Sophie Pullen. One of them was dead. And perhaps he’d been right to trust what the other was saying.

‘Any one of them might have killed Faith to protect Darius. I wonder what story he told them in the clubhouse that night.’

‘Whatever it was, I’m sure he was very convincing.’

So Darius had bought their loyalty. He’d paid for their friendship. And with Elsa it was more than just friendship. Perhaps it was with the students too. Which one of them had been willing to go even further for him and commit murder?

What about previous members? Had they angered him in some way and had their financial support withdrawn? Or did they just have enough? They’d been forced to pander to his obsessions. Yet they were all just part of his façade, an elaborate role play that must have gone some way to satisfy his ego.

‘What about Faith, though?’ said Cooper.

‘There’s no financial connection with Darius Roth that we can see.’

Cooper considered that for a moment.

‘Carol, I need you to go to that hospital where Faith Matthew worked,’ he said.

‘Meadow Park?’

‘Yes. See if you can find out why she left. We know Darius was a patient there. I want to establish if there’s a previous connection between them. If so, it might have begun at the hospital.’

‘I’ll get straight on to it in the morning.’

‘It was all about to come to an end anyway,’ said Irvine.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Look at the figures.’

Cooper’s ability to read spreadsheets was a recently acquired skill. Some of it meant little to him, but he recognised a downward trend, knew what figures meant when they were printed in red or placed in brackets.

Irvine’s inquiries into his company showed it to be on the verge of collapse. Darius had been syphoning off the profits and selling assets until the business was on its knees. The money was about to run out. Within months he would be bankrupt. Liam Sharpe’s rent wouldn’t be paid, the Goulds’ land would be sold off, and the students’ allowances stopped.

Did Jonathan Matthew find out there was no money? Did he confront Darius Roth, furious to find himself indebted to his sister’s killer? Maybe Roth had lorded it over him, as just another beneficiary of his patronage. But if so, he’d chosen the wrong person to patronise. The life of Jonathan’s sister had meant more to him than money or music.

But someone else had used Jonathan Matthew to target Darius. Was it another member of the group who got wind of the problem? Had their funding failed? It was interesting to speculate what might have happened next time the walking group met in that clubhouse in the old chapel.

‘You see, Darius inherited control of the businesses when his brother died six years ago,’ said Irvine. ‘In October.’

‘And the date of the Kinder walk was changed to mark the anniversary of Magnus’s death.’

‘Yes.’

‘So it’s some kind of memorial to his brother,’ said Villiers. ‘Perhaps they were very close.’

‘I think there’s more to it than that,’ said Irvine. ‘It was Magnus who quickly built up the business. As the older son, he took it over when their father died. By all accounts, he made a big success of it. That was when the money really started to roll in.’

‘But when Magnus was killed—’

‘Darius inherited.’

‘Yes, but it seems Darius wasn’t as good a businessman as his brother. He’s drained the companies of profit. There’s a massive mortgage on Trespass Lodge too, which he would have been defaulting on very soon.’

Cooper nodded. That made sense. Darius had failed to live up to his brother. And he lost all the money trying. The company he inherited had declined rapidly under Darius’s leadership. He’d made bad decisions, poor investments, trusted the wrong people, all while spending extravagantly on vanity projects.

He’d ruined the business Magnus and their father had built up, wrecked the Roth empire. He must have been glad that Magnus wasn’t around to see it.

Diane Fry called that afternoon. Ben Cooper wasn’t as surprised as he might have been at any other time. She’d wanted something from him, after all.

‘They’ve called off the disciplinary hearing,’ she said without any preamble or small talk.

Cooper breathed a sigh of relief. It had been weighing on his mind ever since his visit to Ripley.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’m pleased to hear it.’

‘They must have found out something that undermined the case they thought they had against me.’

‘Yes, I’m pretty sure that’s what happened,’ said Cooper.

‘I know you did something. But maybe I shouldn’t ask what it was.’

He laughed. ‘Well, whatever it was, I’m glad it helped.’

‘You know, I think they were watching me,’ said Fry. ‘They had me under surveillance. Can you believe it?’

‘How do you know that?’

‘I’ve seen them,’ she said. ‘Sitting in a black BMW watching for me to use my InPost locker at the service station by Clifton Bridge. They must know I use that terminal regularly to receive packages.’

‘Do you think they sent something to your locker and were waiting for you to pick it up?’

‘Yes. Something incriminating, I imagine. I bet they planned to catch me opening the locker and taking delivery.’

‘But you never went to your locker?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘Angie warned me not to.’

‘I guess she was the one who saved your bacon, then.’

‘Maybe.’

‘You said you receive regular packages at the InPost terminal,’ said Cooper. ‘Were they...?’ He left the question hanging.

Then it was Fry’s turn to begin laughing.

‘I order Whole Earth organic no-caffeine coffee alternative and vegetarian tofu ragout from Holland and Barrett,’ she said. ‘And occasionally some moringa powder and cacao nibs.’

Cooper laughed too. And it wasn’t just relief. It seemed so out of character with the Diane Fry he knew.

‘Well, I just never get time to go into Nottingham to visit their store,’ she said defensively.

‘I thought you were more of a chocolate and wine woman. What’s with all the healthy foodstuffs?’

‘They give me energy. That’s better than cocaine any day, Ben.’

Cooper was trying to readjust his mental image of Diane Fry to some kind of health-food fanatic. It wasn’t really working.

‘So nothing suspicious,’ he said.

‘People can see anything as suspicious,’ said Fry. ‘It depends on your perspective. It depends what you want to believe — or what you want others to believe.’