An Act of Evil (16 page)

“
I’ll make it, sir,” said one of the officers and went into the kitchen. The other picked up an envelope that was lying on the table.

“
We saw this among your post, sir,” he said. “It’s not been tampered with in any way but it does appear to be a woman’s handwriting. Can you say if it’s Miss Porter’s?”

Kenyon
took the envelope and stared bleary eyed at it, then nodded.

“
If you could open it, sir, it might be of assistance to us.”

Kenyon
sat down and blew his nose, then ripped open the flap of the envelope. The letter inside was written on one side of a single sheet of pale blue notepaper. He read it through then handed it across to the policeman without a word.

“
Dear Mark,” the note said. “I’ll be away by the time you get back but I wanted you to know as soon as possible that it’s been confirmed today that I’m pregnant. I’m very happy and very well and should be a mother by Christmas. I’ll see you when I get back. All my love, Diana.” It was dated four days after Kenyon had flown to Australia. The policeman looked inquiringly at him.

“
She wanted to have a baby,” he said in reply to the unspoken question. “But she didn’t want a marriage. It’s not altogether uncommon. I met her at a party and we liked each other very much. She was perfectly honest about it. Obviously she wanted to feel…some affection for the father but the baby would be hers. I accepted her terms.” He pressed a handkerchief to his running nose. “That’s all there is to it really. Now what the hell’s all this about her being murdered?”

“
You’ve not heard what’s happened at all?”

“
Not a thing. I’ve been somewhere in the outback of beyond most of the time.”

The
policeman told him of the events surrounding Vercaster. Kenyon listened unemotionally as he finished, then accepted the coffee brought through by the other officer.

“
I’ll probably react to all that later,” he said. “It’s a lot to take in all at once. I’m sorry I can’t play the grief-stricken lover if that’s what you expect. I was very fond of Diana but I’m not going to pretend I was madly in love with her. That wasn’t part of our arrangement. But I can’t see how I can help you.”

“
You said something earlier about her being strangled. We never said that.”

“
I knew you’d pick that up. You’ll just have to believe me that I didn’t know my own name when I got off that plane. I saw Diana about ten weeks ago and she was alive and well and that’s how I left her. Don’t try and pin a murder on me for some meaningless remark.”

“
There’s just one thing you might be able to help with. Do you know a man called Peter Sinclair?”

“
Sinclair?” Kenyon thought for a moment then it came back to him. “Oh, that prat. Depends what you mean by know him. We’ve been in the same studio. Why?”

“
Did Miss Porter ever talk about him?”

“
She talked about a lot of people. Let me think. They’d appeared in something together once she told me. What was it? No, it’s gone…but we saw him once…where was it? That’s it, it was a Variety Club Lunch for someone or other. He was sitting with…what’s her name?...Vicky Price, that black-haired cow who quit acting a while back and married some smart Harley Street doctor. They were at a table on the other side of the room. Diana said something about him being the most evil man she’d ever known.” Having pieced together the picture out of his memory, Kenyon suddenly saw the nature of it.

“
Are you saying that he did it?” he exploded. “Why haven’t you got him yet?”

“
We have no evidence, sir, and in fact Mr Sinclair may well have an alibi. Do you know why Miss Porter said he was evil?”

“
No. But I know she meant it. And Diana did not like disliking people.” Suddenly he sneezed again.

“
We’d like to take your statement now, sir.”

The
Variety Club Lunch had taken place three weeks before Kenyon went to Australia. Sinclair, who had claimed not to have seen Diana Porter for more than a year, was now known to have been twice in the same company within the previous four months and the long unfilled period of time remained in his visit.

Chapter Fourteen

MADDEN SAT ALONE in his office on Friday morning and wrestled with the problem of the continuing absence of Powell and the lack of an adequate alibi for Sinclair. All his experience and instincts still centred on Powell, whose failure to come forward was tantamount to an admission of guilt. He found it unbelievable that Powell could not know the police were looking for him. Never before had Madden faced an inquiry in which the known facts stubbornly refused to fit a recognised pattern. While Maltravers might only dream of solving crimes, Madden knew from long experience how they should be investigated and settled, but the very discipline of proper inquiries, which had never failed before, was now a fatal handicap. At his centre, William Madden had one terrible human failing — he could not admit that he might be wrong.

It
was now, he considered, only a matter of time before Powell was arrested and the lack of an alibi for Sinclair would become academic. But how long could he afford to wait before taking direct action on Sinclair? Forty-eight hours, he decided. Until then he would put these irrational misgivings down to overwork. Certainly for most of the previous fortnight no police officer in Britain had worked longer or more conscientiously in the hunt for Diana Porter and her killer.

Maltravers
now had all his waking moments — and many of his sleeping ones — haunted by dread of inescapable abominations. He was finding it almost impossible to think clearly about everything that had happened in the now forlorn hope of identifying some key piece of information that would lead to the solution, however horrible it might be. More than anyone he wanted Diana to be found — dead or alive — and was quietly furious with his own impotence to do anything.

Grim
faced, he walked again round the cathedral and the Chapter House. A note had been put on the case which had contained the Latimer Mercy explaining that it had been stolen and he gazed at it thoughtfully. It seemed an impossible length of time since he had first met David Jackson at that spot, when the only crime to be investigated was the esoteric theft of an old misprinted Bible. That was something he could have played with in his imagination, a pleasing intellectual exercise in which he might demonstrate the incisiveness of his analytical brain. Now his mind was stultified with grief, worry and anger. He paused by the organ and noticed his own face in the mirror which the organist used to watch the choirmaster; his features were chillingly like those of his father in the last dreadful weeks before he died. He sat in the Chapter House, trying to recall faces he had seen there on the night of Diana’s performance. While he was wrapped in his thoughts someone quietly sat down beside him. It was Miss Targett.

“
I’ve been here almost every day since…” She smiled at him apologetically. “I don’t know why. Whenever I sit here and think about all the dreadful things that have happened, one phrase keeps coming to mind.” She paused then quoted softly: “All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.”

Maltravers
looked slightly surprised. “T. S. Eliot,” he said. Little Gidding would not have struck him as being Miss Targett’s sort of poetry.

“
Pardon?” she said. “Oh, no. Dame Julian of Norwich. I remember Miss Porter speaking those words on television. But I’m afraid I cannot see how things can possibly be well now.”

Unlike
the last time he had seen her, Miss Targett was now composed but Maltravers still acutely sensed that the little old lady, her life previously settled and secure within a framework of innocence, had been irreversibly affected by being brought into contact with violence and wickedness. Her understated sorrow was all the more potent for her aura of dismay. He stood up and offered her his arm.

“
May I walk you home, Miss Targett?”

She
smiled gratefully. “That would be very kind.”

Miss
Targett’s cottage was the end of the terrace at the corner of the alleyway leading from opposite the north transept to the city centre. When they reached the door she invited him in but he said he had to return to Punt Yard.

“
Please give my love to Miss Davy,” she said. “Tell her that you are both in my thoughts a great deal. Oh, and how is your leg incidentally? You don’t seem to be limping.”

“
No, it’s much better, thank you.” Maltravers looked at her slightly puzzled. “But how did you know about it?”

Miss
Targett frowned to herself. “I can’t recall who told me about it. I think it was Mr Knowles after morning service on Sunday. I assumed that everyone knew about it. They really will have to do something about Talbot’s Tower I fear. Somebody could be seriously injured.” She extended her small hand. “Thank you so much for seeing me home. God bless you.”

As
he walked back to Punt Yard, Maltravers met the Dean and Webster by the Lady Chapel.

“
Still no news?” the Dean inquired. “Oh this is intolerable. Every day I fear there will be some further outrage. Oh, forgive me. Your concern can only be for Miss Porter. Is there still any hope that she…” He was unable to finish the sentence.

“
I don’t know,” said Maltravers. “All I want now is for it to be over.”

“
It may not be much longer,” said Webster. “All our prayers are with you.”

The
Vercaster
Times
was lying on the hall table when he went back into the house. Half the front page was given over to Diana’s disappearance and the police hunt but there was no mention of Hibbert offering his reward. Maltravers’ outraged offence in the market place two days earlier had given way to a pitying contempt for the vain, glory-seeking councillor and he wondered if he should have curbed his tongue. The offer of a reward would have done no harm, even though it seemed unlikely to have done any good.

There
was a reception in the Town Hall that evening to which Maltravers and Tess had agreed to accompany Michael and Melissa. It had been planned as an occasion of thanks and congratulation on the eve of the final day of the festival but instead was a gathering of unrelieved tension. The Mayor made a speech, dutifully acknowledging the work that had gone into the event and touching on some of the highlights of the previous fortnight. Everyone listened in polite silence, many staring into their wine glasses, but his words had an inevitably hollow ring.

“
Finally and most unhappily,” he concluded, “I must express on behalf of everyone in Vercaster our sense of regret and horror at the dreadful events which have cast such a terrible shadow over all our endeavours. We have with us this evening some of the friends of Miss Diana Porter, whose performance in the Chapter House so magnificently launched our festival. We extend to them our deepest sympathies over the awful mystery of her disappearance and all that has happened since. We can only hope that even now Miss Porter may be found alive and the man who has perpetrated this wicked deed arrested.”

The
gathering coagulated into separate groups, each talking in hushed and uncomfortable tones. Maltravers was approached by a man he vaguely recognised who introduced himself as the producer of the Mystery Plays.

“
I’ve seen you backstage but we haven’t spoken,” he said. “I’d just like you to know that we greatly appreciate your attending our performances. It can’t have been easy for you.”

“
I’ve been grateful for something to do,” said Maltravers. “And both Miss Davy and I have been very impressed by the standards you have achieved.” He paused momentarily, then forced himself to add, “I’m sure Diana would have shared our opinion.”

Slowly
and inevitably he was beginning to think and speak about Diana in the past. He was the last one who would fully accept the fact of her death without absolute proof. The producer made no comment but smiled sympathetically and walked away.

Across
the room Maltravers caught Hibbert’s eye. The councillor immediately turned away and began talking in an unnaturally loud voice.

“
Of course we mustn’t lose sight of the fact that it has been an absolutely marvellous festival,” he said. “Tremendous credit to Vercaster. Let’s not forget that.”

Several
people turned and stared at him in disbelief but he was impervious to their looks. He walked across the room and started talking to the Mayor about how the event should become an annual occasion.

Tess
gently squeezed Maltravers’ arm as he glared at the obscene councillor.

“
Ignore him,” she said softly. “He’s making a fool of himself.”

“
He’s getting back at me,” Maltravers replied. “He’s a very nasty little man.”

Hibbert
’s insensitive behaviour brought about the last thing he would have wished, the departure of his audience. There was a notable movement towards the exit in which a clearly embarrassed Mayor and Mayoress joined. They waited outside the door and spoke to Tess and Maltravers as they were leaving.

“
It was very kind of you to come,” said the Mayor. “I feel I should perhaps apologise for what happened in there just now. I don’t understand it at all.”

“
I think I do, your Worship,” Maltravers replied. “But it doesn’t matter.”

The
Mayoress offered her cheek to Maltravers to say good-night.

“
I shouldn’t say this,” she whispered as their faces lightly touched, “but I’ve always thought Ernie Hibbert was a little turd.” When she pulled her face away, it was that of a woman who would not know the word, let alone say it.

“
You nearly made me smile then,” Maltravers said. “That’s not easy at the moment.”

Over
her shoulder he saw Jeremy Knowles give him a brief nod of farewell before leaving with other members of the Vercaster Players.

In
the silent, late-night streets, as the four of them walked back to Punt Yard, workmen were erecting steel barriers along the route that the jousting knights and the rest of the medieval procession would follow to the fair the next day. They turned into the yard off the main road and saw a police car standing outside the house. Instinctively they quickened their steps and, as they approached, David Jackson stepped out.

“
Your babysitter told me where you were and what time you’d be back. I couldn’t see any necessity for disturbing you.”

“
Nothing dramatic then?” There was a note of disappointment in Maltravers’ voice. Now any news was better than no news.

“
Nothing dramatic. I’d just like another word about Sinclair.” He and Maltravers went into Michael’s study and Tess brought them coffee.

“
The more we test Sinclair’s story, the more suspicious we get,” Jackson said. “In fact, the problem is the big parts of it we can’t test. We’ve got nearly three and a half days he can’t or won’t account for. He knows by now the way we’re starting to think but he still can’t produce any evidence to substantiate his story. Quite simply, if it isn’t Powell then Mr Sinclair may find himself on his way back here much sooner than he expected.”

He
went over the details of Sinclair’s story and the contradictions the police had uncovered.

“
He may not be lying about not having seen Miss Porter for a year but it’s not unreasonable to think he would have at least noticed her at one of the two events we now know they both attended. You knew her as well as anyone, better than most. Can you think of
anything
at all regarding Peter Sinclair? Mr Madden wants to give more time to tracing Powell before taking action, but I’m getting the feeling that somebody from here will be on their way to Los Angeles eventually. If you can think of some piece of evidence — or someone who might supply it — then possibly Mr Madden will act sooner.”

“
I’ve thought about it as much as any other aspect of this whole thing,” Maltravers replied. “I’ve rung friends of hers that I know collect odd bits of gossip. If anything had come out I’d have told you. Do you think he’s lying about what happened while he was here?”

“
I don’t think he’s telling us the whole truth. The question is, what’s he hiding?” Jackson sat in silence for a few moments staring into his coffee cup.

“
The problem is that things have become so complex and extraordinary that we may have lost touch with some basics,” he said finally. “You start any murder investigation by considering two simple things — motive and opportunity. In Powell’s case motive is impossible to decide because God knows how his mind works. Opportunity is certainly there though. He was in Vercaster and access into the Dean’s garden through the trees at the bottom would have been simple. The same reasoning applies to Sinclair. Again an unknown motive but until we know where he was from Sunday lunchtime onwards we don’t know that he was not here. A possible motive, of course, is jealousy. Was he the type to nurse a grudge after being rejected?”

“
He’s conceited, he’s arrogant and he thinks he’s God’s gift to women,” Maltravers replied. “But if all the men who think like that were homicidal maniacs you’d be very busy indeed. The problem remains as to why he should be attacking the Dean and the Bishop. And us of course.”