Faith Martin - A Fatal Flaw

He opened his front door with a peremptory sweep, and then blinked in surprise as he saw the young, tall, brunette woman standing anxiously on his step.

Trudy Loveday had never called at the coroner’s home before. On the previous two occasions that they’d worked murder cases, she’d always gone to his office to make her reports or to meet up with him.

She’d found his name and address in the phone book and hadn’t been at all surprised to have to find her way to the prestigious area near South Parks Road, where he lived in a terrace of large, Victorian houses, in a leafy street not far from Keble College.

‘Hello, Dr Ryder,’ she said now, launching nervously into speech. ‘I hope you don’t mind me calling on you like this… If you’ve got company, I can always come back…’ She half-turned, almost wishing he’d say that he had, so that she could go away again.

For now that she was here, she was feeling distinctly uneasy. It was one thing to be assigned as this important man’s police liaison by her boss, but that was a whole world away from coming to his private residence, out of uniform, and begging for a favour. It smacked of presumptuousness, and as such, was enough to send her face flooding with colour.

Which was why she’d come over barely ten minutes after Grace Farley had left, as she’d felt that the sooner she got it over with, the less fraught her nerves would become.

‘No, no, I’m alone,’ he reassured her pleasantly. ‘Come on in, Constable Loveday,’ Clement said, using her title rather than her name, since he’d instantly picked up on her anxiety.

Trudy forced a smile and stepped inside a small but – to her eyes at least – still rather grand hall, with black and white tiles on the floor, and a large oval ornately-framed mirror set over a narrow console table. She noted the private telephone that rested on it and was once again reminded of the differences in their status.

If the Lovedays ever needed to make a telephone call, they used the phone box at the end of their street, like everyone else.

‘Come on through to the study,’ he said, indicating the door that stood open to their left. ‘I was just about to make some cocoa,’ he lied. ‘Would you like some?’

‘Oh, no thank you,’ Trudy said instantly. ‘I won’t stay long, and I don’t want to take up your time,’ she insisted. But even as she spoke, she wondered if it was true that the coroner had been about to drink so innocent a beverage.

Once or twice in the past, she’d wondered if he drank too much. Occasionally she’d noticed one or two signs that might indicate intoxication. But she watched him now as he led her into a pleasant, book-lined room with large sash windows overlooking the tree-lined street beyond, and he seemed to be alert and sober.

‘Take a seat,’ he offered, indicating one of the green leather button-back chairs that sat in front of a walnut desk. He took his own seat behind it as Trudy, still feeling very much the supplicant, lowered herself into the chair.

‘The reason I’ve come,’ she began, launching into her story before she could give herself time to chicken out, ‘is that I’ve just had a visit from an old friend of mine. And what she had to say… I thought you should know about it.’

‘Oh?’ Clement asked, clearly puzzled but also intrigued. Which was, Trudy hoped, a good sign.

‘Yes. It’s about the girl who died recently from ingesting poison – the yew berry case, and she—’

Clement Ryder quickly held up his hand. ‘Before you go any further, let me stop you just a moment. That’s one of my cases – I’m holding the inquest the day after tomorrow.’

‘Oh. I rather hoped it might be one of yours,’ Trudy admitted. ‘It makes things so much easier.’

Clement smiled wryly at her. He’d come to know Trudy Loveday quite well during the past year, and had come to respect her ambition and intelligence, but she could still be heart-breakingly young and naive sometimes.

‘It might, or it might not,’ he said firmly. ‘But it’s not really the done thing to discuss details of an inquest before it’s even started. And if you’re here to ask questions about the case, I’m afraid I simply can’t discuss it with you. Even if you’ve been assigned the case in your official police capacity…?’ He paused delicately, one eyebrow raised, and Trudy quickly shook her head.

‘Oh no, I’m not,’ she confirmed. And didn’t need to say any more. Both of them knew that her boss wouldn’t have assigned her to work on such an important case since DI Jennings preferred her to do office work, make the tea, and hold the hands of female victims of handbag-snatchings or lost cats.

Letting her work on a case that involved actual police work wasn’t something that would have occurred to him!

‘No,’ Clement agreed, a shade heavily and with an ironic glint in his eye. ‘But even if you had been working the case—’

This time it was Trudy’s turn to interrupt him, which she did, aware that she was blushing slightly.

‘It’s all right, Dr Ryder, I haven’t come here to try and find things out. I’d never presume on our…’ She found herself wanting to say the word ‘friendship’ and managed to alter her tongue just in time. ‘Acquaintance. Actually, it’s just the opposite. I’ve come here to tell you something that you might find relevant. Or not. I’m not really sure,’ she said, suddenly feeling confused and not at all as confident as she had been that that this important man would be interested in Grace’s opinion at all.

Suddenly, sitting here in this posh house and in this rather imposing room, Trudy began to wonder what she could have been thinking.

Had she been horribly stupid? When she’d set out, she’d been sure that, because he liked her and they’d got on well in the past, he would be glad to see her and interested in what she had to say. Now, she felt far less sanguine.

‘Well, I won’t know until I hear it, Trudy,’ Clement said casually, amused by her sudden lack of coherence, and determined to put her at ease. She reminded him a little of a cat set down in an unfamiliar environment, and he was glad when she began to relax. ‘So, tell me what it’s all about then,’ he advised her amiably.

Thus encouraged, it didn’t take her long to recount the substance of Grace Farley’s visit, and when she’d finished, she waited expectantly to see what he had to say.

Clement took only a few moments to process the information, and briefly consulted his memory – which, mercifully, was still functioning perfectly. ‘The files on the case are all back at my office, of course, but I’m pretty sure Grace Farly isn’t one of the witnesses on my list,’ he finally admitted.

‘Does that mean you can’t call her as a character witness then?’ Trudy asked, disappointed, and making Clement laugh softly.

‘It’s not a criminal trial you know,’ he reminded her gently. ‘I’ll be calling the person who found her – which was her mother, I believe – along with medical experts and such like. And her best friend, I believe, who, presumably, will be saying much the same as your visitor?’

Trudy shrugged. ‘I don’t know if she will or if she won’t. But Grace was really adamant that Abigail wasn’t suicidal. I just thought you should know. And I promised Grace I would tell you, so…’ She shrugged graphically.

Clement nodded. ‘So now the ball’s in my court, as they say. Both literally and figuratively speaking.’

She grinned, then looked wistful. ‘I wish I could attend the inquest. I’m sort of interested now. But I don’t think the Sergeant will let me have the time off! Not even if I make the case that it’s all good experience for me.’