Murder in Hampstead by Sabina Manea (read this if txt) 📕

‘I can’t be sure of the details, but he must be connected to someone she was very fond of.’

‘You’re far too good at this game. He’s the son of an old friend of hers, a colleague from the Mathematical Society. Martha Corcoran died prematurely – an aggressive cancer – when Adam was barely out of his teens. Adam never knew his father, so Professor Kiseleva took him in, and he’s lived with her ever since.’ The Detective Chief Inspector leaned back enigmatically into his chair.

Lucia could see he had a final trick up his sleeve. ‘What is it now?’

‘Now the Professor’s gone, there’s an awful lot left behind,’ he said cryptically.

‘You mean her will. Adam is the main beneficiary and the executor. He gets the house, and the Mathematical Society gets her money.’

Lucia had a pang of remorse at taking the wind out of Carliss’s sails yet again. They had developed an ongoing game of amicable competition which they both enjoyed, all the more as neither took offence at the other’s winning a round. They made a good partnership. Lucia liked the DCI’s straightforwardness. With him, what you saw was what you got – a safe pair of hands, not easily fazed.

‘You can do my job for me. I could go back to the station, and nobody would notice the newly promoted DCI Steer has taken over.’ There was no hint of malice or bitterness in his voice. He was simply acknowledging that she had scored another point.

They laughed, a brief but necessary antidote to the unhappiness that the Professor seemed to have cultivated around her. It had been a long and intense day, and they were both ready to stop. While they were engrossed in conversation, the pub had gradually filled up with a trickle of weary commuters, reluctant to finish their return journey to lonely bedsits or demanding family homes. Lucia and DCI Carliss willed themselves to persevere for a little while longer.

‘The Professor was very attached to that Society of hers. Adam’s been well looked after, but if I were in the housekeeper’s shoes, I’d be pretty hacked off. All those years of service and not a penny out of the estate,’ said the policeman.

Lucia corrected him. ‘If Mrs Byrne knew about the will, that is. She could have been entirely in the dark. And judging by what I saw in Bloomsbury, I’m not surprised the Professor endowed her brainchild so generously. Her work was her life.’

‘Adam must have hoped for some cold hard cash out of the old lady, if, as you say, he’s got money worries. Though I don’t get why he’s so desperate.’ Carliss scratched his head and leafed through his notes. ‘Ah, here it is. He’s an accountant. Works for a firm called Runciman Parry, just behind Leadenhall Market. He can’t be poor.’

‘Drinking is an expensive habit.’

‘Not that expensive. He wasn’t paying rent, for a start.’

‘Good point. Now the Professor is out of the way, he wants to shift Beatrice Hall as fast as he can. He told me to carry on with the decorating. With the current state of the property market, he’s going to be a multimillionaire overnight. Paying me a few thousand to tart up the place ready for viewings is small change compared to what’s about to land in his lap.’

‘So, he’s got a very strong motive. He bumps her off, and bang – he gets the house, so he can get on with solving his pressing cashflow issues.’ Carliss paused pensively. ‘He corroborated the housekeeper’s story on the argument you heard in the kitchen – said she’s forever on his back to clean himself up. On the poison, he says he didn’t know it was there. He claims he’s never looked under the kitchen sink – he would have had no reason to. He came down to the garden around three forty-five, just before the Professor, as he wanted first dibs on the champagne. Again, he says he didn’t notice anything of interest.’

Lucia turned the information over in her mind. Why did it seem all too convenient? So far, they had an impossible murder and two potential motives, mitigated by some tenable explanations. The picture was incomplete.

True to form, Carliss pre-empted her. ‘We’re not getting very far, are we? The Professor really had a knack for angering everyone around her. But that doesn’t automatically make them cold-blooded killers.’ He yawned, and Lucia agreed that they had reached a natural end for the time being. ‘Seeing how we’re not going to solve our puzzle tonight, shall we have another one? My round again. My mum’s brought me up right – I shouldn’t let a lady pay for drinks.’

‘In that case, I won’t let that good upbringing go to waste.’

The pub was emptying now that the reluctant commuters were grudgingly making their way back to their abodes. There was nothing waiting for her at home – no pet, no children, no lover. Faced with the silence of the flat and the weight of her own imagination, Lucia far preferred the current status quo and whatever else it may bring. She was enjoying the thrill of the chase.

They went their respective ways after the second drink. Lucia ambled slowly back to Beatrice Hall, where her van was still parked. She had no compunction about getting behind the wheel following the best part of a bottle of wine. She was a confident – if somewhat reckless – driver.

As the vehicle came closer and closer into sight, she noticed something was very wrong. She stood by it for a good few minutes, hypnotised by the words that had been menacingly scrawled in tall, blood-red capitals on its side: “BITCH. YOU’LL PAY”.

Chapter 13

More than anything, the defacement of her beloved van made Lucia angry. She refused to indulge in feeling sorry for herself. Instilling fear was