Chapter 40
Lara felt tension and fear flood the room. She was in no doubt that at least two people were holding themselves rigidly in check. She smiled a little grimly, maybe she was developing a knack for this sort of thing.
Her eyes flicked to Kate who on cue said, ‘That’s all very well, Lara, but you can’t just say something like that without explaining it.’
This had the effect of damming what was clearly going to be an outburst from the rest of the room. Although was Joe rushing into speech? To Lara’s eye he seemed more interested in the sausage rolls and cheese straws. Could he really be that detached?
Sarah looked at Kate. ‘I think Kate’s right.’ Then, as planned, she said, ‘You need to explain more, Lara.’
Lara’s pulse was racing, but she drew in a huge breath and reminded herself that she wasn’t just the town florist, she was a McGregor with a strong family history and her Kindred Spirit had her back.
‘Most people in this room had a reason to want Lady Porter dead.’
Kate held up her hand as others started to speak. ‘Go on, Lara.’
‘Dr Patil… Mo,’ Lara said, trying to soften the blow, ‘you have admitted that you failed to spot a diagnosis, and there have been questions asked about you in the past—’
‘Oh, please save me from rumours about Mr Hussey!’ Dr Patil cried.
‘The man smoked sixty a day, ate a diet of chips and fried food and didn’t want “no foreign doctor telling him he had to eat curry.” He died of cancer.
It is a miracle he lasted as long as he did!
Do you seriously think I wouldn’t have saved Elizabeth Porter if I could have done?
I have loved that woman most of my life. ’
Richard Porter gawped at him.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Richard, you barely knew your mother. I’m not ashamed of it. And there is absolutely no suggestion anything was going on. She was my friend, and I learnt to be content with that.’
‘So you know nothing of the room hidden in the attic of this house?’ Lara persisted. Both Lara (and Abby) saw Richard Porter flinch.
Dr Patil said clearly and firmly, ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’ It had the undeniable ring of truth. ‘I did not kill Elizabeth Porter,’ Dr Patil persisted.
Lara studied him before saying, ‘I know you didn’t, Mo.’ She felt an urge to apologise to the man who now sank back in his chair, but she knew she needed to carry on. ‘This murder has always had its roots in the family.’
Lara ignored Abby’s aside, ‘So very often the case. I sometimes wonder why no one in my family murdered my aunt Augusta. I believe there would have been quite a large list of suspects.’
Lara continued, ‘So this is not about a misdiagnosis or the matter of a small inheritance.’ Her gaze took in Dr Patil and Mrs M.
She was suddenly conscious that everyone in the room was now listening to her.
Abby had told her that this is how it would be, had reassured her that people would be too interested in hearing what she had to say to query her right to say it.
It seemed, yet again, Abby knew what she was talking about when it came to murder.
Her next question cut through the unnatural hush. ‘Joe, how much was Lady Porter planning on leaving you in her will?’
Joe stopped midway towards reaching for a cheese straw. ‘Really?!’
She nodded.
‘You really want me to go there?’ he repeated.
‘Please, Joe.’ Lara had worried about this bit. Would Joe readily admit to what Lady Porter had been planning?
Joe shrugged. ‘About half a million,’ and he bit into a cheese straw.
There was a small gasp. Lara did not know from whom, but it confirmed what Abby and she already suspected, most people here already knew this.
‘Many people would say that was quite a motive,’ Lara observed and she saw that Richard and Julian were nodding vigorously. It struck her that Richard Porter really was a very stupid man. Could he not see where this was heading?
‘But she didn’t leave me the money,’ Joe pointed out.
‘But you thought she was going to, didn’t you?’
Joe shifted in his seat and put the cheese straw down half eaten.
‘Why was she going to leave you so much?’
Joe shrugged. ‘I didn’t ask for it, Lara. She and I just liked talking about gardens. The old girl and I got on.’
Lara felt rather than saw Abby flinch.
‘What did she call you?’
‘Well… Joe,’ he sounded puzzled.
‘Did she sometimes call you Reggie?’
Lara knew she had finally rattled Joe. He looked like if he hadn’t been wedged in by a table and Mrs M he would have bolted. He wasn’t helped when Pinky broke in with, ‘I heard her. I heard her call him Reggie. I thought maybe she was drunk, but she definitely called you Reggie.’
Lara asked him outright, ‘Were you related to Lady Porter in any way, and I mean any way?’
‘Of course not!’ Joe exclaimed. ‘My family has farmed around here for years, you ask anyone. I never met the old girl until she moved down here. We just hit it off, that’s all.’
‘He’s right you know,’ Kate commented. ‘Everyone knows Joe’s family.’
Unexpectedly, Pinky looked up and said, ‘It’s true. I’ve painted most of their dogs.’
‘That still doesn’t mean he didn’t do it,’ Richard shot at them, bristling. ‘We only have his word he wasn’t worming his way in with Mother.’
Lara cut him short. ‘Ah, the thing is Richard we do have a very good witness. Somebody who has nothing to gain from this,’ she almost said, ‘unlike yourself.’ ‘He overheard Joe trying to persuade Lady Porter not to leave him her money.’
‘You say that—’ Richard blustered.
‘No. Thomas says that.’
‘Who the hell is this Thomas bloke?’ Richard demanded, banging the table in his frustration.
‘He is an honest man who has absolutely nothing whatsoever to gain by lying.’ Lara grinned as Abby added for her benefit, ‘It is perhaps just as well that they never meet our friend Thomas.’
‘Could we get him here?’ Dr Patil enquired eagerly. Now he was off the hook, it appeared he was taking more of an interest in who had killed the woman he had loved for so many years.
‘No, that’s not possible,’ Lara said with what she hoped was finality.
Joe and Richard started speaking at once. Joe demanding, ‘Was that it then? Do you believe me?’ And Richard talking about not being satisfied unless he saw a sworn affidavit.
Lara dealt with Joe first. ‘I don’t believe you were after her money, Joe. And I’m sure you didn’t kill her.’
He sat back in his chair and stared at the plate of cheese straws, but he seemed to have lost his appetite.
Dr Patil leant towards him and said kindly, ‘It would have been her illness, the confusion, you know. And if she thought you were in any way like Reggie, it meant she held you in high regard.’
Meanwhile, Lara turned her attention to the Honourable Richard Porter. She had been looking forward to this and needed no prompting from Abby. ‘So you would be happy with a sworn affidavit?’
‘At the very least.’
‘But why would you trust a document when you know only too well they can be forged?’
‘You can’t prove it!’
At this point, Pinky Porter put her head in her hands.
‘What?! What?!’ Richard demanded, glaring around at all the people staring at him.
‘The “what”,’ Lara continued with relish, ‘is that you knew your mother was planning on making a new will. You knew this because your firm drew it up for her despite everything you said to dissuade her. Then, when on the 30th of July you brought the new will for her to sign, pretending that you had accepted the terms, you swapped the final signature page so that Lady Porter was in fact giving you power of attorney over her affairs. You then fraudulently marked each of the document’s pages with your mother’s initials, EP. ’
‘You can’t prove it,’ Richard Porter repeated, but this time it was in a hoarse whisper. All the bluster appeared to have been sucked out of him, even his hair seemed flat. He was a pathetic figure and Lara saw Joe and Sarah look away as if they could not bear to watch.
Pinky reached out her hand, but did not touch her husband. ‘I think it was always going to come out. Too many people knew.’ Her eyes flicked towards Julian who was watching her with a look of calculated concentration on his face.
Richard looked at her in something like horror.
‘Yes, I think you’re right,’ Lara said to Pinky. ‘You can’t keep much quiet in this town.’ This time her eyes involuntarily swept towards Julian. She concentrated back on Pinky. ‘It seems a lot of people round here knew you had money problems.’
Richard looked towards Lara with a ludicrous expression of surprise on his face.
He really was a monumentally stupid man.
Lara thought Pinky was right, he was always going to get caught.
‘Richard, you can’t not pay your bills without people talking about it.
People don’t like being owed money for work they’ve done. ’
‘It really pisses them off,’ Sarah blurted and Lara wondered how much the Porters owed The Red Pepper Deli.
‘People were also aware that Lady Porter had told you on more than one occasion not to expect any more handouts.’
‘So you killed her,’ Julian Armstrong cut in with a certain grim satisfaction. He had moved to sit beside Pinky and his arm was snaking its way along the back of her chair.
Abby whispered in Lara’s ear, ‘Ah, I see our Mr Armstrong is now hedging his bets and is going to offer comfort to Pinky. He is wondering, with Richard out the way, whether Pinky will be a fabulously wealthy woman. At the very least, he suspects she may have a house to sell.’
Richard met Julian’s statement in silence, his attention focused on the arm that was edging closer to his wife’s back.
He had a look on his face that was close to despair.
He really does love her, Lara realised with a sense of shock.
So maybe he had bought her paintings as a loyal husband, not just as someone saving face within the town.
It was with a certain relish that Lara turned to Julian Armstrong. ‘Let’s take you, Julian. You had a very strong reason for wanting Lady Porter dead.’
‘Barely knew the woman,’ he said dismissively.
‘But you know her daughter-in-law very well, don’t you?’
Julian flushed with anger. ‘Don’t think you can lay this at my door. And don’t think I don’t know where this is coming from, Lara. Look, you were a fling, get over it. It wasn’t the real thing,’ here he smirked at Pinky with a twist of a leery smile and Lara thought she might be sick.
Lara continued, ‘In fact you had every reason to want her dead. You knew about the planned will from Pinky and that didn’t suit you at all.
Pinky Porter with her debts wasn’t a particularly attractive prospect…
’ Lara saw that Pinky was studying her with fascinated horror.
‘…but Pinky Porter divorced from Richard, after he had inherited his mother’s wealth.
Now, that was a different matter altogether.
Far more appropriate for an Exclusive Rural Property Consultant. ’
There was a snort from Kate.
‘Pinky showed you the original will, didn’t she? You were surprised to find just how wealthy Lady Porter was, weren’t you?’
Julian Armstrong swore loudly and extensively. ‘Total rubbish!’ he concluded.
But Pinky dropped her head and would not meet Lara’s gaze.
Richard Porter watched his wife with a look that Lara could not read, but in her ear she heard Abby encourage her gently, ‘Keep going…’
The rest of the room just heard Julian’s fierce whisper, ‘Don’t say anything, Pinky, they’ve got nothing.’
‘Were you and Pinky in on it together, using the pills she had ready to hand?’ Lara continued remorselessly.
Pinky still sat with her head down. But Julian stood up and for a moment looked like he was going to launch himself at Lara.
He turned to the room. ‘She’s bloody mad.
You’ve got nothing on me. I wasn’t even here when the old hag died, I was at an executive conference in Edinburgh.
It’s all just make-believe in this stupid woman’s head.
And Pinky and me,’ he shrugged, now keen to distance himself from any motive, ‘it was just a bit of fun.’
This did make Pinky look up. She contemplated Julian, open eyed, as if she was seeing him properly for the first time.
‘It’s true you were at a conference with other estate agents…
’ Lara stressed the words, ‘…when Lady Porter died. And in a way you’re right.
The person who killed Lady Porter had to be on hand to ensure she drank the concoction of drugs they had prepared for her.
’ For a moment Lara’s voice became choked, her words suspended by tears.
Abby whispered, ‘You can do this, Lara.’
After a pause, Lara continued, ‘The coroner’s report was very detailed about the comings and goings on the day Lady Porter died.
So while we have a lot of people with motives – which did confuse me at times,’ Lara admitted, ‘there was only ever one person who could have killed Lady Porter.’ She gazed around at those watching her.
‘It was the person who went round to see her when she was alone in the house that day. Her son, Richard Porter.’