Constance wasn’t in the habit of undertaking gumshoe surveillance, but Ellis intrigued her – ‘waster’, ‘bear hugger’, ‘gofer’ – and she had the time to spare. Rosie’s house wasn’t going anywhere fast. She followed him all the way to Upper Street, where he entered one boutique and then another, exiting with purchases each time. Then he treated himself to an espresso and a chocolate twist, in a café, before riding the underground to Old Street and taking the short walk to Hoxton Square. Constance watched him enter a property on the west side and take the stairs to the first floor, where he disappeared from view, only to reappear briefly at a window.

  Constance took more photographs; the square, the first-floor apartment, the view towards the east side, and revisited some she had taken earlier of Ellis perusing t-shirts in the shops. She wondered if Ben, the nephew, Rosie’s son, would appreciate his uncle’s fashion choices. But, maybe, probably, if your mother had just been murdered, you weren’t too bothered about what you wore.

  7

  ‘Hello Debbie, Constance. Thank you for coming in so promptly.’ Inspector Dawson entered the interview room at Hackney police station, late, at 6.15pm the following day, PC Thomas in tow. Constance noticed his crumpled, short-sleeved shirt, tucked into his trousers on one side only, and his tousled hair completed the picture of a man who had wrestled with sleep.

  In contrast, Debbie appeared well-groomed. Her hair was drawn back into a taut ponytail with an olive-green cat hair clip, her flowery blouse softened her features and her nails were painted today, in a subtle shade of ivory. Constance thought her dressed for a Saturday magazine ‘what to wear’ photoshoot feature, rather than an interview with the local constabulary.

  ‘Do you have any leads yet?’ Debbie said.

  Constance marvelled at Debbie’s poise in the circumstances, especially after her theatricality at their last encounter. Instead, today, she seemed composed and solid.

  Inspector Dawson took a seat at the table, placing a large, brown envelope upon it, face down. PC Thomas slid in next to him.

  ‘Certainly,’ he said, ‘and I can deal with things quite quickly, I believe. There’s been a development. Two actually…or it might even be three.’

  Debbie’s eyes narrowed. ‘Tell us, please,’ she said, resting her elbows on the table.

  ‘First of all, we’ve found the murder weapon.’

  Constance held her breath.

  ‘And what is it?’ Debbie asked.

  ‘I can show you a photo if you like.’

  Both Debbie and Constance leaned forward, as Dawson’s fingers probed the depths of the envelope and pulled out a pile of photographs. He selected one and thrust it in Debbie’s direction.

  ‘But that’s…Rosie’s,’ Debbie said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What is it Inspector, please? I can’t see,’ Constance asked.

  Dawson nudged the photograph in Constance’s direction. ‘It’s a trophy, made of some kind of resin, a bit damaged around one of the edges. It was found in a dustbin a few doors from the house. You’re confirming that this award belongs to Rosie Harper?’

  ‘Of course I am. It has her name on it.’

  ‘And where was it kept, do you know?’

  ‘I last remember it on the mantelpiece, right in the centre. Rosie had loads of trophies, but this one was always her favourite.’

  ‘Was anyone seen dumping it?’ Constance asked.

  ‘I can’t tell you that,’ Dawson said.

  ‘But you have a suspect?’ Debbie stared hard at Dawson, her mouth hanging open.

  Constance removed her jacket and draped it on the back of her chair. Then she unscrewed the cap of her bottle and sipped at her water. Debbie was asking all the right questions, Constance thought.

  Dawson nodded. ‘That’s my second piece of good news.’

  PC Thomas, silent and impassive, handed him a bag, from which he extracted a sealed transparent package. Inside it there was a large, black, padded leather glove.

  ‘Is this yours?’ he asked Debbie.

  ‘Can I pick it up?’

  ‘Be my guest,’ he said.

  Debbie lifted the package, squeezed it and held it close to her face, then turned it over. After a few seconds she said, ‘It could be.’ She passed it to Constance.

  ‘Is there any way of confirming that it’s yours?’ Dawson said.

  ‘If I had the left hand and it matched. But it’s a very ordinary glove. I have at least two pairs like this.’

  ‘It’s a make commonly bought for use on a motorbike…or moped, I understand,’ Dawson said.

  ‘A bestseller. That’s why I bought it.’

  ‘It was found at the scene, close to your wife’s body.’

  ‘You think the suspect left it behind?’

  ‘Oh come on, Debbie, drop the act. It’s fairly obvious that it’s your glove and it puts you squarely in the frame.’

  ‘Did you find the other one, of the pair?’

  ‘No. But we’ve tested this one, for DNA. We’ll have the results soon.’

  ‘How soon?’

  ‘A few days.’

  ‘Can’t you do it any quicker?’ Constance chipped in.

  ‘That’s how long it takes.’ Dawson stared pointedly at Constance and she looked away.

  ‘Is that it, then?’ Debbie sat back, and snatched a look at Constance too.

  ‘I haven’t got to development number three.’ Dawson held out his hand and PC Thomas deposited an iPad in it. Dawson fiddled with it for a few seconds, then laid it down on the table.

  ‘Your wife made a call to the emergency services back in 2017,’ he said.

  Debbie shook her head.

  ‘You don’t remember? She said you’d assaulted her.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The call is very real, I can assure you. We have a recording. Would you like to hear it?’

  ‘This is crazy. This is why you called me in?’

  ‘I’ll take that as a yes then.’ Dawson pressed play on the iPad and a woman’s voice blared out.

  ‘What service do you require caller?’

  A quiet and shaky woman’s voice responded ‘Police’.

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘At home,’ followed by a loud sob and the sound of a door being slammed and a lock being turned. Then more sobbing. Debbie closed her eyes tightly and then she stuffed her hand into her mouth.

  ‘Are you in danger?’

  ‘No, not any more, maybe…’

  ‘Did someone hurt you?’

  ‘Ah. Where to start? My husband…he…I got upset. I need the police to come. I need them to stop him.’

  ‘Is your husband there with you now?’

  ‘I think he’s gone. Oh God, I hope he’s gone.’

  ‘Tell us your address, then we can come and help you.’

  ‘I…I…no I don’t want…please…I’m fine now. I don’t need help. I don’t know…I shouldn’t have called. Just silly really.’

  ‘You said he hurt you?’

  ‘Well…he….’

  Then a boy’s voice in the background. ‘Mum, are you in the bathroom?’

  There was more rustling and the line went dead.

  Debbie wiped the back of her hand across her eyes.

  ‘Look. I never “assaulted” Rosie. I would never hurt her,’ Debbie said.

  ‘So you accept that was Rosie’s voice?’

  ‘Even if that was her, on the call, you said it was two years ago. How can it have anything to do with who killed her? This can’t be all you have?’

  ‘It’s more than enough.’ Dawson folded his arms.

  ‘What else are you doing to find the killer?’ Debbie asked again, her mouth slackening around the edges, her fingers fluttering lightly against each other.

  ‘An eye witness saw you arrive at the house at around the time your wife was killed. You’ve confirmed the murder weapon was readily available in the living room and will, I’m sure, be covered in your fingerprints, you have a history of violence towards your wife and your glove was lying in the middle of a lake of blood on the floor. It couldn’t be clearer if your name was OJ Simpson!’

  ‘You think it was me. Oh God. This is some kind of sick joke.’

  ‘I don’t see anyone laughing.’

  ‘No, you’re wrong. Is this…is this all because I ran away? I saw it made a lot of trouble for you.’ The tremors in Debbie’s fingers spread across her hands and up her forearms. Dawson passed the iPad back to PC Thomas. ‘Why would I want to kill Rosie?’ she said.

  ‘We’ll have plenty of time to work that one out between now and the trial.’

  Debbie sprang up and her chair crashed to the floor.

  ‘No!’ she cried out. ‘You’re wrong. You’re so wrong. And if you lock me up, you’ll stop looking for the real killer.’

  Constance stepped towards her and reached out to take her arm, but Debbie thrust her away and backed against the wall. Dawson ignored Debbie’s outburst and took his time packing up the photograph and the glove. Then he rose deliberately to his feet, jabbed at the same spot on his spine which he had tweaked, when he had bent down to peek through Debbie’s letter box three days earlier, and began to intone the all too familiar words.

  ‘Debbie Mallard, I am arresting you for the murder of Miss Rosie Harper. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court.’

  ‘Debbie. It’s OK. We’ll sort this out,’ Constance waved at Dawson to allow her to speak. ‘And I’ll let your kids know where you are,’ she said.

  Debbie stared through Constance.

  ‘I told you it wouldn’t take long,’ Dawson chirped. ‘Come with me then. We’ll find you somewhere comfortable to spend the rest of the afternoon. There might even be some footie on.’

  8

  Constance dawdled in front of the window of Tom Dixon in Coal Drops Yard. She smoothed her skirt, ran a finger under each eye and moistened her lips, peering close to the glass to check on the progress of her impromptu grooming session. Then she became distracted by the display; a cascade of copper torpedoes and spheres, shiny red plastic chairs stacked in piles of four and lots of shimmering glassware; vases, candleholders, ornamental dishes. The kind of shop she would love to browse, if she had the time, because of the sheer audacity of its contents.

  Three doors down, she entered the Coal Office restaurant, the scent of garlic and rosemary assaulting her nostrils as she spied Greg Winter seated at the bar, a half-empty high-ball glass in his hand.

  ‘Hi.’ Constance nudged him from his reverie. Greg leaped up and pulled back a barstool for her, his mouth lightly brushing her cheek on his body’s forward trajectory. He was wearing a navy-blue jumper and his curly hair was cut short.

  ‘Hi to you. It’s nice to see you again,’ he said, sinking back into his seat. ‘I had fully intended to wait to order drinks,’ Greg continued, ‘but then the cocktail list was just too tempting. There’s one here that has gin which changes colour in front of your eyes. I had to try it.’

  Constance scrutinised Greg for any sign that he might have known that Judith had delivered a similar message to her once before, expounding the restorative properties of ‘hydrangea’ gin. Perhaps that was what happened when you spent time with people; you gravitated towards the same products, even without prompting. Although, Judith and Greg had not been together for some months now.

  Greg was a wealthy businessman with his fingers in a number of innovative schemes. He had acted as expert witness on the first case Constance and Judith had worked on together. The reliability of some lie-detecting software had been challenged and he’d impressed them both with his honesty, in addition to his technical skills. Shortly afterwards, he and Judith had begun to see each other. Things had ended abruptly but, before that, he had taken Constance’s brother, Jermain, on in one of his pioneering garden businesses. This was the first time Constance had seen him since then.

  ‘Sounds interesting,’ she said. ‘And I am late, so I’m pleased you didn’t wait.’. She tucked her chair in close as the waiter wafted past, a basket of knotted bread balanced on the tips of his fingers. ‘It was nice of you to invite me.’

  ‘It was nice of you to accept.’

  When Greg had first called, Constance had considered declining his offer; she didn’t want to be disloyal to Judith in any way. Then, she’d reasoned that, as far as she could tell, Greg had not been at fault when they split: I’m just letting you know that Greg has gone, moved out, and I don’t want to talk about it. And it was my decision, before you say anything. That was what Judith had offered, when his absence become conspicuous. On top of that, Constance was pleased that Greg should seek her out, after all this time. She had always enjoyed his company. And, finally, the factor which had clinched things for her and forced her to accept, despite those reservations – she was curious to find out what he wanted from her, while hoping it wasn’t to tell her that Jermain had done something wrong.

  ‘Where are you living now?’ she asked.

  ‘Still based in London, although I’m often travelling. But when I’m here, I’m back in Putney, my old stomping ground. You?’

  ‘Hackney, as always, not sure I’ll ever leave.’

  ‘You don’t think some Prince Charming will come and carry you off on a white charger then, to somewhere far away, like Windsor or Kew?’

  ‘That’s very un-PC. You do know that, don’t you?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Suggesting I need either a “Prince Charming” or to be “carried off”. I might just be happy the way I am. Or maybe I’ll do the carrying.’

  Greg shrugged. ‘There we go. We haven’t even got past introductions and I’ve already offended you. You can imagine how “foot-in-mouth” I am on the modern dating scene.’

  ‘And what are you working on in leafy Putney?’ she laughed, fortified by the knowledge that she could discount any romantic overtures from Greg. That would have been too awkward for words.

  ‘The garden centre app is doing fantastically well.’

  ‘I heard from Jermain. I am so grateful you gave him the chance to show what he can do.’

  ‘Hey. I’m the one who should be grateful. He’s really performing…out-performing. I like him and, more importantly, the team likes him. I’m going to spend the rest of this year consolidating, but then we may go for a big push. There’ll be a chance for Jermain and some of the others to invest in the business, but only if they want. He might appreciate your advice then.’

  Constance laughed uproariously, as well as with considerable relief. ‘Now that tells me you don’t know my little brother quite as well as you think you do, or he’s been putting on a big act for you. Jermain doesn’t accept advice from anyone.’

  ‘He’s lucky to have you looking out for him anyway,’ he said. ‘What about you? You said you were heading into court, when I called.’

  ‘A hospital pass and a nasty one. Assault. And they were convicted.’

  ‘Do you think they did it?’

  ‘I don’t know. They said they were innocent, said it was self-defence. One of them cried.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Me too. They were three young men who had never had any breaks. Sometimes it happens like that.’

  ‘You think you could’ve done more?’

  ‘Sure, with more time and an unlimited budget and a judge who hadn’t just had to release a rapist on a technicality, but that’s often the way. I mustn’t let it get to me, must I?... Can I have what you’re drinking, do you think?’

  Greg held up his glass to the distant waiter, mouthed ‘two’ and received a reassuring nod in return.

  ‘So what now? Who’s next in line for the Lamb treatment?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ve been instructed by Debbie Mallard, Rosie Harper’s ex-husband?’

  Greg sat up straight. ‘Wow. I saw she’d been arrested. It’ll be the trial of the century, won’t it? Judith must be excited.’

  Constance turned around to see if the waiter was on his way back yet. Even though she loved working with Judith, it bothered her that Greg would assume she needed Judith’s help. ‘We haven’t had much chance to discuss it yet,’ she said.

  ‘Oh,’ Greg’s fingers rapped the marble worktop. ‘How is Judith?’

  ‘Same as ever, although she confessed you’d been giving her these podcasts to listen to, to make her more empathetic.’

  Greg nearly spat out his last mouthful of gin.

  ‘Is that what she said?’ he laughed, and Constance noticed the dimples in his cheeks for the first time. ‘I think Judith and your brother can shake hands. As if she ever listened to anything I recommended. I didn’t know that she’d said that. How hilarious. You do know that she doesn’t really mean half the things she says, that she just pretends to be hopelessly old-fashioned and bigoted. It’s an affectation.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Although, I’m sure you’re a better tonic for her than any podcast.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Oh yes. She told me she’d never worked with anyone like you before. Clever, determined, forward-thinking, totally reliable and always challenging her, never saying “yes” to everything, like the others did.’

  ‘Wow. I think my face must be the colour of that drink, if it ever arrives.’ Constance looked pointedly at the waiter, who had collected a tray from the furthest end of the bar and was finally heading in their direction. Now, she was ashamed of herself for her negativity towards Judith.