Elizabeth George - This Body of Death

She said, “And exactly what truth would that be?”

He moved away. He turned on the ignition. He said, “When I thought about it, the date on his contract didn’t mean anything.”

“What date? What contract?”

“The contract with DragonFly Tonics, Frazer Chaplin’s agreement to use his Vespa to advertise the product. The contract called for a bright colour of paint; it designated the number of transfers required. His signature makes it appear as if he went out directly and had the work done.”

“He didn’t,” she said, understanding now. “Winston’s watching those films for a lime green Vespa with transfers. The house to house is asking about a lime green Vespa with transfers.”

“Something likely to be seen and remembered.”

“When he didn’t use a lime green Vespa with transfers to get up to Stoke Newington at all.”

He nodded. “I rang the paint shop in Shepherd’s Bush after I spoke to Barbara about meeting her snout. Frazer Chaplin went there indeed to have the Vespa painted and the transfers applied. But he did it the day after Jemima died.”

BELLA MCHAGGIS WAS wrestling a new worm-composting bin from her car when Scotland Yard arrived. Her visitors comprised the two officers she’d spoken to at the Met, on the day when she’d found poor Jemima’s handbag. They parked across the street from Bella’s house in an antique motorcar, which was how she noticed them at first, because of the car itself. The appearance of such a vehicle in Oxford Road-or any road, she reckoned-was going to draw attention. It spoke of indulgence, money by the bucketful, and petrol swallowed down willy-nilly. Where was conservation? she wondered. Where was good sense? She couldn’t remember their names, but she nodded a greeting as they came across the street towards her.

The man-he politely reintroduced himself as DI Lynley and his companion as Superintendent Ardery-took over the removal of the composting bin from Bella’s car. He had manners. There was no doubt about it. Somebody had brought him up correctly, which was more than one could say about most people under the age of forty these days.

Obviously, they hadn’t come to Putney to help her with her worm composting, so Bella asked them into the house. The inspector needed to put the bin into the back garden anyway, and since the only way to get there was through the house, once they were inside Bella did the proper thing and offered them a cup of tea.

They demurred, but they did say-this was the woman, Superintendent Ardery-that they’d like a word. Bella said of course, of course, and she added stoutly that she hoped they’d come to tell her an arrest had been made in this terrible affair of Jemima’s death.

They were close, DI Lynley said.

They’d come to talk to her about Frazer Chaplin, the superintendent added.

She said it kindly, and the kindness made Bella’s antennae go up. She said, “Frazer? What’s this about Frazer? Haven’t you done anything at all about that psychic?”

“Mrs. McHaggis.” It was Lynley now. Bella didn’t half like the way he sounded, which was unaccountably regretful. Less did she like his expression because it suggested to her an element of…Was it pity? She felt her spine stiffen.

“What?” she barked. She felt like showing them the door. She wondered how many more times she was going to have to direct these stupid people where they needed directing, which was on to Yolanda the Flipping Psychic.

Lynley again. He began an explanation of sorts. It had to do with Jemima’s mobile and calls made to it on the day of her death and calls made to it after her death and pinging towers, whatever they were. Frazer had rung her within the time frame of her death, it seemed, but he had not rung her afterwards, which, apparently, was suggesting to the coppers that Frazer thus had murdered the poor girl! If there was ever anything more nonsensical than that, Bella McHaggis did not know what it was.

Then the woman copper chimed in. Her explanation had to do with Frazer’s motorbike. She banged on about its colour, the transfers he had put upon it to raise a bit of needed money, and how transporting oneself on a scooter like Frazer’s made getting round town a rather simple thing.

Bella said, “Hang on just a minute,” because she wasn’t as thick as they seemed to think and she suddenly understood where this was heading. She pointed out that if it was scooters they were interested in, had they thought about the fact that the scooter they were yammering about was an Italian scooter and Italian scooters could be hired for the day and she had an Italian living right there in her house, one who’d been thick as you know what with Jemima before Jemima had ended things between them? And didn’t that damn well suggest that they ought to be looking at Paolo di Fazio if they were so intent upon pinning this crime on someone in Bella’s house?

“Mrs. McHaggis.” Lynley again. Those soulful eyes. Brown. Why did the man have hair so blond and yet eyes so brown to go with it?

Bella didn’t want to listen and she certainly didn’t want to hear. She reminded them that nothing of what they were saying mattered because Frazer hadn’t been anywhere close to Stoke Newington on the day of Jemima Hastings’ death. He’d been exactly where he always was between his work at the ice rink and his job at Duke’s Hotel. He’d been here in this house, showering and changing. She’d told them that, she’d bloody well told them, how many more times was she going to have to-

“Has he seduced you, Mrs. McHaggis?” It was the woman who asked the question and she asked it baldly. They were all sitting at the kitchen table, and there was a set of condiment containers on it and Bella wanted to hurl them at the woman or perhaps at the wall, but she didn’t do so. She said instead, “How dare you!” which, she realised, was an antique remark that betrayed her age more than anything else she might have said. Young people-people like these two officers-talked about this sort of thing all the time. They didn’t use the word seduce either, when they talked about it among themselves, and they thought nothing of what it meant to invade someone’s privacy in such a way-

“It’s what he does, Mrs. McHaggis,” the superintendent said. “We already have confirmation on this from-”

“This house has rules,” Bella told them stiffly. “And I’m not that sort of woman. To suggest…even to think…even to begin to think…” She was sputtering, and she knew it. She expected this made her seem a perfect fool in their eyes, an old bag who’d somehow fallen victim to a smooth-talking Lothario come to remove her from her money when she had no money in the first place so why would he have even bothered with the likes of her? She gathered her wits. She gathered what dignity she had left. She said, “I know my lodgers. I make a habit of knowing my lodgers because I’m sharing a bloody house with them, and I’m not very likely to want to share my house with a murderer, am I?” She didn’t wait for them to reply to this question, which was largely rhetorical anyway. She said, “So you listen to me because I’m not going to repeat myself: Frazer Chaplin’s been here in this house from the first week I started letting rooms, and I think I’d have sorted out that he was…whatever you seem to think he is…a bloody long time before now, don’t you?”

The two cops exchanged a long look. It was the man who picked up the conversation next. He said, “You’re right. That wasn’t a particularly helpful direction. I think the superintendent merely meant that Frazer’s got something of an appeal for women.”

“What if he does?” she demanded. “It’s hardly his fault.”

“I wouldn’t disagree.” Lynley went on to ask could they just go back over what she’d told them about Frazer’s whereabouts on the day that Jemima Hastings died?