Last Act of All Page 14

  *

  Henry Stanton was right. The judge, sympathetic initially, was clearly suspicious of her failure to give her version of events.

  She had been well warned; she had gone through all the motions of intellectual acceptance, but it was only now she understood her true mental attitude over these months.

  At heart, she had classified this as something too bad to happen, and was still, psychologically, no better prepared than she had been on the day of Neville’s death. She had not looked ahead, and now she dare not. The present moment was as much as she could bear, and she went below, under escort, with a white, blind look on her face.

  She did not see the policewoman with hazel eyes watching her leave the dock with bewilderment and not a little concern.

  PART THREE

  Chapter Nine

  Frances Howarth had always hated to apologize. A certain stubborn arrogance made it difficult to surmount the molehill of saying, ‘I was wrong’; now, when the result of error was the imprisonment of a vicar’s daughter, almost certainly innocent of the crime which Frances, virtually single-handed, had pinned on her, that difficulty assumed mountainous proportions.

  Why, then, against the dictates of common sense as well as self-preservation, had she got herself into this hideous situation? Duty, she supposed grimly. It wasn’t a jazzy virtue, and ever since Wordsworth it had received a bad press, but on the quiet days when the tempests of events didn’t roar too loudly, she could still hear that stern voice, even if the early idealism that had taken her into the police force in the first place had become tempered by pragmatism.

  Helena’s telephone response to her letter had at least been prompt. Now, that same afternoon, Frances found herself sitting opposite a woman outwardly calm but bearing all the stigmata of the ordeal to which she had been, as Frances now believed, so unjustly subjected.

  There is only the finest dividing line between explanation and excuse, as Frances was uneasily aware. She was seeking expiation, yes, though her motivation was not merely to set her own moral record straight.

  But talking was not the least of her skills. As she explained her reasoning, she saw the woman’s wariness give way to reluctant attention and felt almost ashamed, as if some sort of chicanery were involved. Yet now she was coming to the hardest part of all. She could still see the woman in the dock, her head bowed. It was an image she had lived with ever since.

  ‘When you refused to give evidence, that — that threw me. I had seen you lying, remember, and you did it consummately. I could not understand why you should object to turning in a performance in the dock which might have let you walk out, a free woman.

  ‘So you must have balked at taking the oath. And it seemed quaint, to say the least, that a woman who had involved her teenage daughter in a false alibi should turn scrupulous over a little thing like perjury.

  ‘I even discussed it with my boss, but he laughed at me.’ (‘Evidence?’ Coppins had demanded, then, when she tried to explain, ‘Woman’s intuition,’ he had mocked. ‘Don’t come to me with woman’s bloody intuition.’) ‘He said you were probably afraid they’d dig up a lover or a scandalous past. But we hadn’t found anything like that, and believe me, we had your life under a microscope.

  ‘Then I turned it on its head. If I accepted that you lied initially to protect your child, and otherwise told the truth, a different picture began to emerge.

  ‘There was plenty of time, between Sharon taking away the coffee tray, and your arrival, for someone else to have been in. The list of people with a motive was extensive, but after your arrest enquiries stopped. A few sketchy statements had been taken, two or three alibis checked out, that was all: a nice, straightforward case, with no further need to squander manpower.

  ‘I’ve tried to get the case re-opened, but they think I’m mad, and my boss would be furious if he knew I was here. So…’

  She came to a halt, her throat dry from so much talking. There was a long, long silence. Then Helena gave a deep, shivering sigh and spoke.

  ‘Oh, I didn’t kill him. But I’ve known that all along, so it doesn’t make any difference, does it?’ A little shakily, she got to her feet and spoke with awful politeness. ‘I hope you feel better for having told me. And now, perhaps, you might be kind enough to leave.’

  Frances stared at her blankly. ‘But I want to fight for you — clear your name—’

  Helena’s smile was bitter. ‘Clear my name? Rake everything up again, for the press to have another Roman holiday, do you mean?’ Her tone was one of detached contempt. ‘Don’t be a fool. I’ve served my time, I’ve survived, more or less. Debt to society paid, case closed. Let’s leave it that way.’

  ‘Mrs Radley, if you didn’t do it, someone else did.’

  The huge, haunted blue-grey eyes turned on her, almost showing the animation of impatience. ‘Well, of course they did. I’m not stupid. But then, Neville deserved it. I didn’t kill him, but I can’t condemn whoever did. He probably tortured them into it.

  ‘You seem to think you’re offering me something worth having. Can you remove my grey hairs, and the lines on my face? Can you give me back my daughter’s love?’ Her voice cracked, but she carried on fiercely, ‘I mustn’t think about it. I’ve closed that door, and Edward says I need never talk about it again.’

  She was a remarkably disciplined woman, Frances thought, a remarkably tough woman. But she still hadn’t understood.

  ‘You know you didn’t do it. Everyone else thinks you did, with one exception. There is one person who knows you didn’t, and who knows that you know.’

  ‘Well, obviously.’ Her reply was almost snappish.

  ‘It doesn’t occur to you that it’s a very dangerous thing to be the only person who knows for certain that there is an unconvicted murderer at large?’

  It was clear that it had not. The realization shattered her artificial composure like a brick thrown through a plate-glass window, and she put both hands up to her cheeks. ‘Oh my god!’ she whispered, and began to cry.

  *

  After that, Helena talked and talked. She fetched some brandy, which she drank and Frances sipped at; she spoke of Neville, and of Harry’s influence, and of Neville’s sense of destiny at the Radnesfield crossroads. She looked, eventually, as if her soul had once more made connection with her body, and though the pain might be sharp, it seemed to have lanced that festering repression.

  About Radnesfield, she was virulent, and Frances said at last, ‘Are you really saying that someone in the village was responsible for Neville’s death?’

  Helena paused, frowning. ‘I can’t say that. But I believe that if Radnesfield had been different, none of this would have happened.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Frances digested this. Was it merely dislike of being an outcast — natural enough, but unhelpful — or was there somewhere hard, if unrecognized evidence?

  ‘Could you give me a concrete example of what you mean?’

  Helena retreated. ‘Oh, I’m probably being silly. Neville and Edward both thought I was unbalanced on the subject. But I’ll tell you who you should talk to — Mr Tiggywinkle.’

  ‘Mr Tiggywinkle?’

  ‘Neville’s name for him.’ Helena bit her lip. ‘He was good fun, Neville, good company, and very acute. If you remember Mr Tilson you’ll understand. He’s old and harmless-looking, but he has penetrating eyes that see through you and out the other side. He’s not local, but he’s made a hobby of this village, studying it, almost. You know, the way some small boys keep a colony of slugs in a jam jar.’

  Frances laughed. ‘You’re feeling better.’

  Her companion stared at her. ‘You know, I am,’ she said, wonderingly. ‘Nothing’s changed — in fact you’ve given me something new to worry about — but you’ve believed I’m innocent. And I knew that, yet suddenly I don’t feel guilty any more. Perhaps it’s the brandy.’

  She was laughing, almost naturally, when she heard the front door opening. ‘Half-past four — it’s probably Edw
ard. Hello!’ she called. ‘In here!’

  Stephanie, in the hall, heard the voices with relief. At least she wouldn’t be alone with her mother. She opened the door and hesitated on the threshold.

  Her mother must have had her hair done. It wasn’t the way it used to be, but it was elegant, not weird like it was yesterday. And she was smiling, and when she spoke it wasn’t in that funny artificial voice. It was a bit high-pitched, perhaps, but it sounded warm and natural again.

  ‘Oh, it’s you, Stephanie. Darling, do you remember Detective-Sergeant Howarth? She’s realized I was innocent all along, and she’s going to do what she can to convince everyone else.’

  For a moment Stephanie could not take it in; the miracle she hadn’t even dared to pray for.

  ‘Oh Mum,’ she said, and as her mother held out her arms, she hurled herself into that safe haven, sobbing her relief.

  Feeling an intruder, Frances rose quietly. Over her daughter’s head, Helena met her eyes. ‘Thank you.’

  Frances paused. ‘It won’t all be this easy,’ she cautioned, but Helena smiled, though the corners of her mouth were quivering.

  ‘Worth it for this alone,’ she said, and Frances’s last glimpse, as she left a card with her phone number on a table, was of the two heads, the blonde and the dark, pressed together in the big armchair.

  *

  She was closing the gate as Edward Radley’s car drew up. Seeing her, he leaped out, advancing on her with bristling courtesy.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘Mr Radley — you may remember me. I’m Frances Howarth.’

  She saw an expression she recognized appear on his face. It was a look compounded of uneasiness, suspicion and distaste, and she knew it from a thousand other encounters with those who had reason to be wary of the law.

  ‘What do you want?’ he demanded roughly.

  ‘I’ve just been to see your wife—’

  A less controlled man, she thought, would have struck her. ‘Dear god!’ he said. ‘Haven’t you done enough to her already? You’ve seen her — isn’t she broken enough for you?’

  ‘I appreciate your feelings. But I felt I must come to tell your wife that I now believe her to be innocent and want to do what I can to put the record straight.’

  He did not unbend. ‘It would certainly have been welcome if you had experienced this Pauline conversion at the time. Now, when my wife is trying to put it all behind her, I cannot see that disinterring the past will serve any useful purpose.’

  She looked at him thoughtfully. ‘Mr Radley, do you believe your wife is innocent?’

  He squared his shoulders. ‘My wife told me that at the time when you, Sergeant Howarth, so unfortunately refused to accept her word.’

  She was not in the habit of quoting Shakespeare on investigations, but now she heard herself saying, ‘“When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her, though I know she lies.”’

  His face flamed. ‘How dare you!’ he snarled, and turned on his heel.

  Not clever. She turned, and wearily crossed the square to Tyler’s Barn and Mr Tilson.

  She had time to regret her decision as she waited on the doorstep. She could claim no official standing; she was arriving, unannounced, with little purpose other than to persuade him to gossip about his neighbours. She could have been on her way home to Limber by now; she wished she had spent more time on reflection before she had rung the bell.

  But to her surprise, Maxwell Tilson recognized her, and was refreshingly pleased to see her. ‘Miss Howarth — or should I call you Sergeant? What an agreeable surprise!’ He twinkled sharp brown eyes at her, and reminded of his nickname, Frances almost expected to see his nose twitch interrogatively as he ushered her in.

  ‘How clever of you to remember me. Frances will do — this is a very unofficial visit.’

  ‘How exciting.’ The room into which he led her was lit by lamps and untidy with papers and books. The chairs were huge, shabby and comfortable, and on the table beside his leather wing-chair sat what appeared to be a fairly ambitious Scotch.

  Mindful of her drive home, Frances requested a tonic, and, reassured as to his willingness to help, went on to explain her mission.

  He heard her out in attentive silence, and did not speak for a few moments after she had finished.

  ‘Yes,’ he said at last. ‘The more I think about it, the more I think your reasoning is probably correct. Though it didn’t surprise me much at the time, I have to admit.’

  Frances was taken aback. ‘Didn’t surprise you? Helena Radley’s arrest? Oh, you mean Fielding’s murder.’

  ‘No, I don’t in fact. That did surprise me, because in my experience of life it is, don’t you find, never the things one would say were totally predictable that actually happen?’

  She was surprised into laughter, and, satisfied, he went on.

  ‘There was enormous tension building up, with Fielding at its centre. He was provoking it, of course, but others were colluding, or it could never have happened. He was staging real-life melodrama, using this place as a setting for the grand illusion which became tragic reality.’

  ‘Helena felt that. She talked of his becoming Harry – his television character – when they moved down here.’

  ‘Precisely. I even took to watching the programme, you know, and it was quite obvious. But then, she was in the illusion business too. That’s a powerful force; act it out, become it... Aristotle knew all about it, as he did about so many things.’

  She refused the sidetrack. ‘Are you saying she helped set up the situation? According to her, she hated it—’

  ‘Oh no, by no means. Grand Guignol would never be to her taste. Her creation was completely different, and ultimately came into conflict with his when he landed a role that suited him better than being cast as enfant terrible. When he found he could actually manipulate real people...infinitely more satisfying.’

  ‘I accept what you say about his scenario. Several people spoke in precisely those terms at the time of his death — Dyer, the producer, for one. But I’m intrigued — why do you say Helena was trying to create a fantasy?’

  His look expressed pity at her poverty of observation. “That girl lives a fantasy. She’s probably done it all her life — I would guess at an unhappy childhood, wouldn’t you? She’s afraid of being less than perfect in case no one loves her any more, and she has created this elegant carapace of the perfect wife and mother. Virtuous, long-suffering, beautiful, talented but self-sacrificing; the modern Patient Griselda. Nobody is that good, my dear, nobody, and if you force yourself to tolerate your husband’s infidelities, brutalities and total lack of consideration without complaint or even acknowledgement, something has to give. I thought she murdered him; perhaps she simply murdered her selfhood.’

  Frances remained sceptical. ‘It’s a pretty theory. But she did divorce him, after all.’

  ‘Ah yes! But that fascinated me almost more than anything else. She found a replacement, virtually overnight, who let her carry on the illusion.

  ‘Edward, you see, is an incurable idealist; the role of perfect wife, once more, was just waiting for her. I often wondered if there was more to their relationship, if they ever came off stage, as it were — and, recently, how it would survive the revelation that she was imperfect enough to take a poker to someone’s head.’

  ‘I think he has simply blotted out what he doesn’t want to see.’

  ‘That would be typical, I surmise, though I have never got to know him well. But as for her — well, deep and troubled waters lie beneath the serenity.

  ‘But as I said, you’ve made out a good case. And there have been one or two things — oh, no more than straws in the wind…’

  She had been listening, fascinated, to this fluent and persuasive analysis, but at these words her professional ears pricked up.

  ‘Straws in the wind?’

  He hesitated, weighing his words. ‘I must be at some pains not to overstate this. But — the vil
lage is unsettled. They know something, I think, or at least believe they do. They’re uneasy.’

  ‘Well, a murder in a village — they would be, wouldn’t they?’

  ‘Not if they felt it had nothing to do with them, no. Perhaps not even if they felt it met the standards of natural justice. And Neville, don’t forget, brought his play-acting headlong into conflict with their precious world-in-amber. George Wagstaff was going to lose his farm, the village was about to be overrun by foreigners, and don’t think it wasn’t resented quite as much as Dyer resented the loss of his golden egg-laying goose.’

  ‘You’re not suggesting they would deliberately connive at murder?’

  The reply shot back. ‘Yes, without a doubt.’

  At her shocked expression, he paused. ‘Now I’ve horrified you. It’s not quite as bald as that. If they had seen someone bringing the poker down on Fielding’s head, they wouldn’t lie to the police about it — oh, unless it were a brother, a son, a lover, something like that, but that obtains the world over.

  ‘It’s probably merely that they think they know something that might shed a light on whatever took place. They wouldn’t feel it their business to report what may be only opinion or gossip. Particularly in a situation where, in a most satisfactorily primitive sense, someone got their just deserts.’

  Frances still found it hard to accept. ‘Even if it resulted in the wrong person being convicted?’

  ‘Ah. Now, you see, this is where my observation begins to tie in with your theory. As I said, they are uneasy. Something is wrong, and perhaps if your policemen had gone and talked to them at the time, they’d have let something slip, more or less deliberately. Especially if you found one with local connections.’

  ‘Mmmm.’ Frances considered that one uncomfortably. ‘So you think, if I went and chatted to them now, told them what I think…’

  He looked at her under his heavy brows. ‘You do have a need to put it right, don’t you? Now, is that an abstract passion for justice, or merely sinful personal pride?’