Faith Martin - A Fatal Affair

‘And that brings me to the purpose of this visit. I’ve had a word with the Chief Constable, and he’s agreed with my proposal.’

At this, Harry Jennings felt his heart rate began to ratchet up a notch or two, and a slow, sick feeling sidled into his stomach, making him swallow hard. ‘Sir?’ he asked warily.

‘We might turn a blind eye to things, Harry, but that doesn’t mean to say that the powers-that-be haven’t noticed that that girl of yours and our coroner have developed a habit of, well, shall we say, “supplementing” our more normal lines of inquiry?’

At this point, Harry Jennings got a really bad feeling. ‘Sir,’ he began to object, but wasn’t allowed to finish.

‘Now, I know we can’t expect WPC Loveday and Dr Ryder to help you on the actual Iris Carmody case—’

‘No sir, we definitely can’t! WPC Loveday has barely completed her probationary period and—’

‘But Dr Ryder, as city coroner, has before now done some, shall we say, follow-up inquiries on a number of his inquest cases, isn’t that so?’

‘Yes sir,’ Harry admitted miserably.

‘And with some considerable success?’

‘Yes sir,’ he was again forced to agree.

‘Very well then. As I said, the Chief Constable is with me on this, Inspector. After the inquest on my son is over – no matter what the verdict may be – you will approach Dr Ryder and ask him to make further discreet inquiries about my son and the circumstances of his death.’

‘Superintendent, sir, I don’t think that’s really wise …’

Keith Finch gave a harsh bark of laughter, and for the first time looked seriously angry. ‘It may not be wise , Inspector,’ he snapped, leaning forward in his chair, ‘but everyone’s going around saying that my boy – my boy! – murdered that girl and then killed himself.’ Suddenly he slammed the flat of his palm down on Jennings’s desk so hard and fast, that Jennings nearly went into orbit. The sharp ricochet of sound had the heads of the police officers in the outer room swivelling in their direction.

‘ And I’m not having it, Jennings . Is that clear?’ Superintendent Finch said through gritted teeth.

Harry nodded wretchedly. ‘Yes sir,’ he agreed. Clearly the Super still had some clout with the higher-ups, and he was in no mood to be thwarted.

‘Very good. So, continue your investigation into the Carmody case,’ the Superintendent said mildly now, standing up and looking as if nothing dramatic had happened. ‘Let nothing interfere with that. Continue regarding my son as a suspect if you must. But let that clever girl of yours and the old vulture sniff around my son’s case without any impediment. Understood?’

‘Yes sir,’ Harry said, standing up politely.

It was clear, all right, but that didn’t mean to say he had to like it. And, whilst he might have to tread carefully – for now, anyway – that didn’t mean he would always have to toe the line. Especially if they finally got some proper evidence as to who had murdered Iris Carmody, and why.

He watched his superior officer leave the room and then slumped back down behind his desk with a groan. Great! As if he didn’t have enough troubles already. This was infuriating – another case with his station’s annoyingly efficient and pesky lone WPC and the old vulture snooping around in police business.

Just what he needed!

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