Robert Goddard - Sight Unseen

'This is Edmund Questred, Mr Umber.' He had spoken very softly, almost whispering into the receiver. 'We need to speak. Don't phone me. Come to the back door of the shop at eight thirty tomorrow morning. Please don't contact Jane in the meantime.'

Umber thought about phoning Sharp, then thought better of it. He might already be asleep. If so, it was a kindness to let him sleep on.

There was to be little sleep for Umber himself. He tossed and turned, counting Junius suspects like sheep, but to no avail. He made it to twenty or so, a long way short of the total. And then he thought about Sally. He had schooled himself for so long not to think about her death and the manner of it that it almost felt as if he was doing so for the first time. It was difficult to remember how weary he had been of her inability to put the past behind her; and how relieved he had felt in the months following their separation. The guilt that had swept over him the minute he heard she was dead – that was clear in his mind, however. He pictured her, lying lifeless in the bath, as Alice had found her. He had loved her. He had abandoned her. There had been no excuse. But maybe now there could be the next best thing to reconciliation – reparation.

There was no sign of Sharp in the breakfast room when Umber left the hotel next morning. He walked up past Marlborough Library and followed the lane round to the rear of the High Street shops. There was a small delivery yard at the back of the Kennet Valley Wine Company. The double doors leading to the storeroom behind the shop were ajar. He stepped through.

Questred was waiting for him inside. He was sitting on a wine box, smoking a cigarette and staring listlessly at a newspaper, folded open at an inside page. CHILD MURDERER SLAIN IN PRISON KNIFING ran the headline above the article he appeared to be reading. He did not rise at Umber's approach, merely looked up and nodded to him.

'You got my message, then.'

'As you see.'

'Jane reckons you and Sharp will be in touch with her today.'

'Very likely.'

'She reckons you'll have taken it into your heads that something she did led to this.' Questred held up the newspaper.

'Well, it's quite some coincidence, isn't it?'

'The only person she told about your visit was Oliver. She phoned him straight after you left the cottage. But he wasn't at home. She left a message, asking him to phone back as soon as possible. She didn't say why. And he didn't call until last night, so…'

'It really was a coincidence.'

'You obviously don't think so.'

'Do you?'

'No.' Questred smiled grimly. 'Does that surprise you?'

'Yes.' Umber sat down on the nearest box. 'It does.'

'There's something I have to tell you. In confidence. I don't want it to reach Jane's ears. I'd deny saying it if it did, anyway, and she'd believe me over you every time. It's, er, about… your wife.'

'Sally?'

'Yes. I… This Radd business has shaken me, I don't mind admitting. I don't know what to make of it. I -'

'What about Sally?'

'Yes. OK. Sally. Well, the day she died…' Questred rubbed his forehead. 'That is, I realized later it was the day she died.'

'What happened?'

'She phoned here… that afternoon.'

'She phoned here ?'

'Yes. She, er, wanted to speak to Jane, but she didn't have the number for the cottage and, er, well… I wasn't about to give it to her.' Questred dropped the butt of his cigarette onto the concrete floor and ground it out with the toe of his shoe. 'Anyway, she asked me to get Jane to phone her. She didn't give a reason. I didn't ask for one. To be honest, I, er, thought she sounded… overwrought. I told her I'd pass the message on. But, er…'

'You didn't.'

'No. I didn't want her upsetting Jane. So, I said nothing about it when I got home. And I said nothing about it when we heard she was dead either. In fact, this is the first time… I've mentioned it to anyone. I, er, didn't think it mattered. Well, I persuaded myself it didn't. And maybe I was right.'

'Or maybe not.'

Questred looked cautiously at Umber. 'I didn't expect you to take this so calmly.'

'I've already done a lot of thinking about Sally's death. What you've just said only reinforces my suspicion she was murdered.'

'Oh God. Do you really believe mat's possible?'

'Yes. I really do.'

'But that would mean…' Questred shook his head. 'Christ knows what it would mean.'

'I intend to find out.'

Questred rose and moved to the door, where he stared out at the wedge of sunlight advancing slowly across the yard. 'I'm frightened, Umber. That's the truth.'

'So am I.'

'Do you have to see Jane?'

'That's up to Sharp.'

'How would it be if I arranged for Oliver to speak to you? He's got state-of-the-art security at his place in Jersey. You won't get past the gate if he doesn't want you to.'

'In return for leaving Jane alone?'

'Yes.'

'That'd be up to Sharp as well.'

'But you could put it to him.'

'Yes.' Umber stood up. 'I could.'

And he did, over the breakfast he found Sharp polishing off back at the Ivy House.

'We only have his word for it that Jane didn't speak to anyone else,' Sharp objected.

'He didn't have to tell me about Sally's call, George.'

'True.'

'And Hall could refuse to see us if he was so minded.'

'Also true.'

'So what do you think?'

'I think we'd better accept his generous offer.' Sharp eyed Umber over a jagged triangle of toast. 'Don't you?'

It was unclear exactly how long it would take Questred to set up a meeting for them with Oliver Hall. Sharp gave him a twenty-four-hour deadline to concentrate his mind, then booked Umber and himself out of the Ivy House and headed for London.

'We can stay with an old pal of mine from the Met, Bill Latter, while we wait to hear from Hall,' he announced as they drove towards the M4. 'I gave him a call from the hotel. He'll be glad of the company. Not that he'll let you know it. Besides, he won't see much of us. We'll be busy. And this time you'll be calling the shots. Who can we talk to about Sally's activities in the days and weeks before her death?'

'Alice Myers was her best friend. She owned the flat Sally died in. Still does, presumably. If anyone knows what was going on in Sally's head at the time, it's Alice.'

'We'll start with her, then.'

'But there's a problem. Alice is anti-Establishment to her fingertips. Spent a whole winter in the Eighties camped out at Greenham Common. Obstructs the police on principle. She'll clam up in front of you.'

'What are you trying to say, Umber?'

'I'll get more out of her on my own, George. It's as simple as that.'

'Huh.' Sharp said nothing more for a mile or so, then resumed, the affront to his status evidently shrugged off. 'All right. Leave me out of it. There's something else I need to do anyway.'

'What's that?'

'Alan Wisby. Does the name ring any bells?'

'I don't think so.'

'He was a private detective Oliver Hall hired when my investigation ran into the sand. You and Sally would have been in Spain by then, but if Wisby was doing a thorough job, which I -'

'Hold on. Yes. A private detective did come to see us. I can't remember his name. Insignificant sort of bloke.'

'That would be Wisby. I can't blame Hall for going down the private route when it became obvious I was getting nowhere, but he could have done better than Wisby.'

Umber was not going to argue with that. He recalled a short, thin, whisper-voiced chain-smoker, a pale streak of English winter in the Catalan spring. Sally had taken an instant dislike to the man. But he had not stayed long enough to become a nuisance. He had asked his questions, they had answered them and he had gone, with little or nothing to show for his trouble.