Evil Intent (23 page)

She tried to put it out of her mind, and succeeded fairly well by the time Brian suggested they go their separate ways for an early lunch and meet up again in an hour.

If she grabbed a sandwich, there ought to be time for a quick walk, she told herself as she turned eagerly for home. Then she was seduced by a butcher’s shop window, displaying an inviting array of prime cuts of meat.

A bone, she thought. She should get a bone for Bella.

‘A knuckle bone, my love. That’s what you want,’ the butcher advised her. ‘A nice knuckle bone. They don’t splinter like other bones. Won’t get stuck in your doggie’s throat.’

‘Thanks. How much will that be?’

‘No charge, my love.’ He wrapped the bone in greaseproof paper. ‘Anything else, my love? I have some lovely steaks today. Scottish beef. Sirloin, fillet.’

It seemed mean to take his bone without buying anything. On impulse, Callie pointed to the steaks. ‘I’ll have two of those. The fillet, I think.’

‘Oh, very nice, too.’ The butcher chose the two best and winked at her. ‘I hope he’s worth it, my love.’

Was
he worth it? Callie pondered the question, handing over the money – a shocking amount for just two pieces of meat. Enough to feed an African village for a week, most likely.

It had been another lovely evening, filled with laughter and warmth. He’d provided the takeaway, a massive amount of Chinese food. They’d eaten, they’d talked, they’d played with Bella. He’d been in no rush to leave. And when he’d finally gone, it had been with the promise of
returning
on the following night. ‘To keep an eye on Bella and see how she’s
settling
in,’ he’d said. ‘I feel responsible for her.’

She still couldn’t quite figure out what he wanted from her.

Did it matter? She enjoyed his company; he made her feel like an
interesting
person. So what if he didn’t reciprocate her growing sense of
attraction?

If he just wanted to be friends, then friends they would be, she decided.

Better, thought Callie wryly, a good friend than a bad lover.

She was almost home. Her footsteps quickened and she bounded up the steps, Marco forgotten – almost.

Bella was waiting for her at the door, her feathery tail wagging her whole body with ecstasy. Unconditional love on both sides, totally
reciprocated.
Callie swooped her up in her arms joyously.

It was only later, during her lunchtime walk with Bella, that Callie realised she hadn’t told Brian about her Thursday visit to the Harringtons. The visit had happened after their staff meeting; Friday had been her day off, Saturday had been Brian’s, and Sunday had been so busy with Harvest Festival that the matter had slipped her mind.

As soon as they met after lunch, Callie told him. She didn’t expect him to be very happy about it, and she was right.

‘Why on earth didn’t you tell me?’ Brian demanded.

‘There just wasn’t a chance,’ she explained lamely, detailing everything that had happened since then.

‘You should have rung me straightaway. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me something as important as this.’ He frowned at her. ‘I’m the parish priest, Callie. I have the cure of souls of this parish. That means it all comes down to me. My parishioners are
my
responsibility, not yours.’

‘Sorry, Brian.’

‘As a matter of fact, you were out of line going to see them without me, let alone without telling me. They were trying to reach
me
, and you went instead.’

Callie bit her lip. ‘It was an emergency. They were distressed, and
needed
to talk to someone …’

‘It could have waited until I’d finished lunch.’ His eyes were narrowed, and the line of his mouth indicated his displeasure.

‘Sorry,’ she repeated, feeling miserable. Just over a week on the job, and already she’d badly blotted her copybook. She had disappointed – even angered – Brian, and had jeopardised their working relationship. Maybe she was in the wrong line of work after all.

After the police left, Frances sat for a long time at the kitchen table,
staring
into her now cold coffee, numb with shock.

She was already late for work, and she knew that she ought to talk to Graham and tell him what DS Cowley had suggested about her relationship with Leo. But ridiculous as the allegation was, she couldn’t bear to face
Graham just now. Nor could she face Leo.

With a chill feeling in the pit of her stomach, though, she realised that she had to tell Leo. The police would probably ask him about it as well, hoping to catch him out, hoping that he would betray something to
confirm
their suspicions. She had to warn him.

It wasn’t something that should be done over the phone. With sudden resolution, Frances dumped the cold coffee down the sink, grabbed her handbag and went through to the front door, calling out to Graham as she passed his study. ‘I’m off to work now.’

‘But what about—’ he called after her.

She shut her mind to the concern in his voice and hurried towards the nearest bus stop. Seeing a number 94 disgorging passengers, she broke into a run and caught it just before it pulled away from the stop. She squeezed into an empty seat at the back, breathing heavily, her chest constricted with pain, unnoticed tears on her cheeks.

The other passengers were locked into their own private worlds,
staring
straight ahead, looking out of the window, or reading a newspaper; no one paid her any attention. Only the conductor, a grizzled and wiry black man with liquid brown eyes that reminded her of Leo’s, gave her a
kindly
look. ‘You okay, ma’am?’ he asked as she flashed her season ticket at him.

Her response was brusque, mechanical. ‘Yes. Fine.’ He shook his head and moved on.

When the bus reached Lancaster Gate, she barely waited for it to stop before swinging herself off the back platform and turning towards St John’s Rectory.

A smile split Leo’s face at the sight of her on the door step. ‘Frannie, love!’ he boomed. ‘You must have read my mind. I was just thinking about ringing you. Come in, pet. Come in.’

He led her upstairs to his private sitting room. It was a comfortable room with a superb view, looking out over Hyde Park. Frances ignored the view and collapsed onto a squishy leather sofa. ‘Oh, Leo,’ she gulped, tears very close to the surface.

‘Frannie, love – what on earth is wrong?’ He sat beside her and put his
arm round her shoulders. ‘Talk to Leo, pet.’

She didn’t want to tell him, but knew that she must. It was painful, it was embarrassing. ‘I have to warn you,’ she said. ‘The police – they’ll
probably
be back to talk to you.’

‘Oh, them.’ He gave a dismissive shrug. ‘I can handle the police. You don’t have to worry about me.’

‘They’ve just been to see me.’ She took a deep breath and plunged on, not looking at him. ‘They made some crazy accusations. They thought – they think – we’re…having an affair. You and I.’

Leo’s laugh rang out, loud and incongruous. ‘What did you tell them?’

‘I told them it wasn’t true. That it was unthinkable.’

‘Oh, pet! Don’t you fancy me just a little bit, then?’

‘Leo!’ She turned horrified eyes on him, swimming with tears. ‘It’s not a joke, Leo.’

‘Sorry, pet.’ He gave her a contrite squeeze.

‘Don’t you see? I didn’t understand, at first, what they were getting at, or why they thought it was important. But then I figured it out. They think we’re in it together.’

‘In
what
together?’ He frowned, baffled.

‘The murder. Jonah. They think we killed him, one or both of us, then gave each other alibis.’

‘But why would we do that?’

‘I’m not sure what they think. Maybe because he insulted me,’ she guessed. ‘And he insulted you. I suppose they think that’s reason enough.’

‘The way I look at it,’ Cowley said as Neville drove back towards the
station,
‘they did it for one of two reasons.’

Neville was bemused at the way Cowley had got the bit between his teeth on this one. He’d seemed to be going through the motions on this case until now, very much taking a back seat and doing what he was told, but the interview with Frances Cherry had empowered him in some way. ‘Tell me,’ he invited.

Cowley paused to light a fresh fag, then chucked the match out of the window. ‘It could have been the woman priest thing,’ he said. ‘Like we
thought before. The row, and all that. Adimola must have really pissed them off, and they could have come back a little bit later, while he was still in the church, and offed him together.’

‘Or?’

He took a long, contemplative drag. ‘Or he could have been
blackmailing
them.’

‘Blackmail?’ Neville sat up a bit straighter.

‘Say Adimola found out that they were having it off. Maybe he saw them together somewhere, and put two and two together. Who knows how he found out. But say he did?’

‘It’s a thought,’ said Neville slowly. ‘It’s a thought.’

‘And there was something Vincent Underwood said,’ Cowley went on. ‘He said that he and Adimola left the church together, remember? And that Adimola said he’d forgotten something, and went back.’

It was a detail which had puzzled Neville at the time, and had nagged in the back of his mind ever since. Why would Jonah Adimola say that? What was his real motivation for going back into the church? ‘So you think he’d arranged to meet them there?’ he said with rising excitement.

‘It’s possible.’

‘It would explain a lot,’ Neville reasoned.

‘Say the row was a total red herring,’ Cowley continued. ‘Say they’d already set up a meeting.’

Neville took it a step further. ‘The row might even have been staged.’

‘To give Adimola a reason to be in the vestry. But then Underwood got involved, and he had to get rid of him before the other two came back to meet him.’

‘And they came back as arranged,’ Neville concluded, ‘and killed him. To shut his mouth and protect their guilty secret.’

‘That’s it,’ Sid Cowley declared triumphantly. ‘That’s it, Guv.’

Neville put on his indicator and turned at the next corner. ‘I think we need to talk to Leo Jackson right now, don’t you?’

Leo finally managed to calm Frances down. ‘We had nothing to do with it,’ he reminded her. ‘That’s our best defence, pet. They can’t pin something
on us that we didn’t do.’

‘But they can try,’ she warned.

‘They can try, but they won’t get anywhere. We’re innocent.’

Frances twisted her wedding ring and drew a ragged breath. ‘Yes, I
suppose
you’re right.’

‘Trust me, pet.’ He scrutinised her closely. ‘Would you like some tea? You look like you could use it.’

‘I really ought to go to work. I’m late already.’ She sounded half-
hearted
at best.

‘On second thought,’ pronounced Leo, ‘you need something a bit more bracing than that.’ Waving away her unspoken protest, he went to a
cupboard
and produced a bottle of whisky, then sloshed a healthy portion into a glass. ‘Drink this,’ he ordered.

Frances didn’t argue. She took a tentative sip, shuddered, and downed most of it in one gulp. ‘Thanks, Leo. I did need that.’

As he poured a glass for himself, Frances remembered what he’d said when she arrived. ‘You said you were just about to ring me,’ Frances recalled. ‘I don’t suppose it was ESP. What was that about, then?’

‘Oh, that.’ Leo sat down across from her and turned the glass in his massive hands. ‘I wanted to tell you something, Frannie love. I didn’t want you to read it in the papers first – I wanted to tell you myself.’

The worst-case scenario emerged full-blown in her mind and she gasped in horror. ‘Oh, Leo, no! They haven’t …’

‘No, no, no.’ He laughed and put up a reassuring hand. ‘Nothing like that, pet. It’s
good
news. Or I suppose it’s good.’ Leo paused and announced, ‘They’re going to make me a bishop.’

‘But that’s wonderful news!’ Impulsively she went to him and gave him a hug.

‘Mind the glass, pet,’ he chuckled.

She returned to the sofa. ‘Tell me about it. All the details.’

‘Bishop of Brixton. It will be announced tomorrow. That’s pretty much all I know at this point,’ he said. ‘I’ve had a chat with the Appointments Secretary. And I’m due to see the Diocesan Bishop at the end of the week.’

‘You deserve it, Leo. No one deserves it more than you.’

‘Unless it’s you, Frannie love,’ he said quietly. ‘You’re one reason why I’m taking it. I want to be able to make a difference when the battle for women bishops starts in earnest. As a bishop myself, I’ll have a voice that will be heard. On that issue, and so many others. A voice for the excluded and the marginalised.’

‘Your voice will always be heard.’ She smiled at him fondly. ‘No matter where you are.’ Then a disturbing thought struck her. ‘But what about …’

‘Oliver?’ he finished for her. ‘It’s okay, pet. I’ve talked to him about it, and it will be all right. He’ll manage. I’ll manage.’

‘You’re giving him up?’ Inwardly she sighed in relief. ‘I know that must be really difficult, Leo, but it’s the only way.’

He straightened and stared at her. ‘Give him up? I’ll never do that.’

‘Then what …’

‘He’s the love of my life,’ Leo stated simply. ‘The Church may not be ready to accept that yet, and we both have to be prepared to wait things out a bit.’

Frances felt once again that dread which had possessed her when she’d first met Oliver. ‘You
will
be careful, won’t you, Leo?’ she pleaded with him. ‘Oh, you must be so careful.’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’ll be careful.’

The doorbell rang; they looked at each other.

Marigold Underwood lunched with two of her friends at a favourite
restaurant
in Knightsbridge, chattering to them as though nothing in her world had changed. Their children, their lovers, their husbands were – as always – the main topics of conversation. Since she had nothing to add on the first two topics, Marigold contributed a few amusing anecdotes about her cat Jezebel, and facilitated a gossip session about another friend who had been seen in the company of an unknown man.

‘I heard he was gorgeous,’ sighed Beatrice enviously.

‘And young,’ added Georgina with equal envy.

Then suddenly, that topic of conversation exhausted, they turned on Marigold.

‘My cleaning lady showed me this morning’s
Globe
,’ Georgina said. ‘Did you know? There’s an interview with Vincent in it. All about that murder.’

‘Oh, really?’ Marigold managed to sound surprised.

‘I saw it, as well,’ Beatrice admitted. ‘There’s even a photo.’

‘Is it any good?’ Marigold asked brightly.

‘Oh, quite.’

Beatrice had always been a good liar, Marigold reflected. That was why she was so successful in carrying out her affairs.

The photo, as she knew herself, was not at all flattering, though it was quite accurate. It seemed to capture the essence of Vincent in all his
pomposity. 
His round face wore a bland, self-satisfied smile and his plump hands were folded on his stomach in a most characteristic pose. There was something about it that made her want to tear it from the paper and rip it to shreds, to destroy that smug smile.

The article had hinted, discreetly but unmistakably, at the accusation which Vincent had made from the beginning, to her and anyone else who would listen: Frances Cherry had killed Jonah.

Marigold wondered now, as she had from the first, whether Vincent really believed that.

Lilith was in a panic. With the wilful lack of co-operation from Leo Jackson and DI Stewart, she really had reached the end of the road. She sat at her desk and went laboriously through her notes. There was nothing there from which she could cobble a story. Nothing.

Her editor had been delighted with the Underwood interview, heaping effusive praise upon her. ‘Well done, Lilith,’ he’d said. ‘Just the sort of work I like to see in the
Globe.
You leave the reader wanting more. And I know you’ll give it to them tomorrow.’

But what was there left to give?

Just one thing, and that was her ace in the hole.

Frances Cherry’s stole.

She’d threatened DI Stewart with it, in the heat of the moment, not seriously intending to follow through with her threat. Or at least not yet.