Chapter 58
Elizabeth is back in Willows, sitting in her low chair in Penny’s room. She is filling in Penny on the drama.
“Simply everyone was there, Penny. You would have been in your element, swinging your truncheon and arresting everyone in sight, no doubt.”
Elizabeth looks over at John, in the chair where he spends most of his days. “I’m guessing you filled Penny in on the details, John?”
He nods. “I may have overstated my own bravery a little, but other than that, it was chapter and verse.”
Elizabeth, satisfied, pulls a notepad and ballpoint from her handbag. She taps a page of the notepad with her pen, like a conductor giving notice to her orchestra, and begins.
“So where are we, Penny? Tony Curran is bludgeoned to death, by person or persons unknown. As a side note, I will never tire of saying ‘bludgeoned.’ I bet you used to say that a lot in the police, you lucky thing. Now, Ian Ventham, meanwhile, dies within seconds of being injected with a huge dose of fentanyl. You know fentanyl, John?”
“Of course,” says John. “Used it all the time. Anesthetic, mainly.”
John the vet. Elizabeth remembers the fox that John nursed back to health with Ron. Once healthy, it had gone on to murder Elaine McCausland’s chickens. Not proven, but there were no other suspects. Ron had taken a lot of grief for it at the time, which had pleased him enormously.
“How easy would it be to get hold of it?” asks Elizabeth.
“For someone here?” John starts. “Well, not easy, but not impossible. Pharmacies would have it. You could break in here, I suppose, but you’d have to be very determined, or very lucky. And you can get it on the internet.”
“Goodness,” says Elizabeth. “Can you?”
“The dark web. I read about it in The Lancet. You can get all sorts. A rocket launcher, if you really wanted one.”
Elizabeth nods. “And how would one go about getting on the dark web?”
John shrugs. “Well, I’m guessing, but if it were me, the first thing I would do would be to buy a computer. Perhaps go from there?”
“Mmm,” says Elizabeth. “Might be worth checking who has a computer.”
“You never know,” agrees John. “It would certainly narrow it down.”
Elizabeth turns back to Penny. How unfair to see her lying there.
“One man bludgeoned, Penny; the other poisoned. But by whom? If Ventham was killed straightaway, then somebody out there this morning killed him. Me or John. Or Ron or Ibrahim? Or . . . who knows? Ibrahim has a list of thirty names on a spreadsheet, to start us off.”
She looks at her friend again. She wants to walk out the door with Penny right now, arm in arm. Share a bottle of white, listen to her swear like a docker about some imagined slight, and sway home happy and tipsy. But that will never happen again.
“I always find it peculiar that Ibrahim doesn’t come and visit you, Penny.”
“Oh, he does,” says John.
“Ibrahim visits? He’s never said.”
“Like clockwork, Elizabeth. Four p.m. He brings a magazine and solves bridge puzzles with her. He talks them through. They solve a puzzle, he kisses her hand, and off he pops half an hour later.”
“And Ron?” asks Elizabeth. “Does he visit?”
“Never,” says John. “I suppose it’s not for everyone, Elizabeth.”
She nods. She supposes so too. Back to business.
“So, Penny, who wants to kill Ian Ventham? And why at the very moment digging was about to start? I suspect your question might be who loses what if the development goes ahead? Wouldn’t you think?
I want to talk to you about Bernard Cottle at some point.
Do you remember him? With the Daily Express and the nice wife?
I feel like there is a motive there, waiting to be winkled out. ”
Elizabeth stands, ready to leave.
“Who loses what, Penny? That’s the question, isn’t it?