A Fatal Affair by Faith Martin (top e book reader TXT) 📕

it sooner. I’m sure DI Jennings would have sent someone already, but they might have missed it. David was a dab hand at finding hiding places.’

Trudy opened her mouth to protest – sure that DI Jennings would not be very happy about this – then abruptly closed her mouth again, her objections unspoken. The last thing she wanted to do was get in the middle of a power-struggle between her superior officers.

‘Yes sir,’ she said meekly instead.

‘Well, we’d best let you get on with things,’ Clement said, rising to his feet. It was only when she too rose and looked across at him that Trudy realised that he was looking rather grim-faced.

It was so unexpected it made her heart skip a beat. What had made him look so displeased? She tried to cast her mind back through the interview they’d just conducted and couldn’t think of anything that might have caused the coroner’s jaw to set in quite so firm a line. But their host was also rising and walking with them to the door, and she had to concentrate on saying her farewells.

Once they were outside and walking to the car however, she cast Clement another quick look, but his expression hadn’t changed.

‘Is something wrong?’ she asked, her nervousness making her sound more defiant than she really felt.

They were standing in the street, face to face, talking quietly. Trudy, not about to make the mistake she’d made before, had already checked that their surroundings were deserted and free of eavesdroppers.

Clement grunted and shook his head. He wasn’t looking forward to the next few minutes but he knew what had to be done. Once he was sure they were out of sight of the house, he turned and looked her square in the face. ‘I don’t like the idea of the Superintendent searching for David’s diary,’ he said flatly. ‘And much as I hate to say it – and this is something I never thought I’d ever find myself saying – you should find a phone box and report back to DI Jennings immediately and tell him everything we’ve found out. Not only about the possibility of the diary’s existence, but tell him that he needs to send someone to David’s university again to thoroughly search his lodgings.’

‘But why? I doubt it would be there anyway,’ Trudy said, surprised by the hard tone of her friend’s voice. ‘If he was keeping a record of Iris’s movements or trying to find out who killed her, wouldn’t he have it with him?’

‘Very likely,’ Clement conceded. ‘Then again, there might just be two books – a regular journal that he could have been keeping and left behind at his university lodgings, and a more recent notebook that he had on him in the village,’ Clement said doggedly. ‘Don’t forget, originally he would have thought he’d be leaving college only for the May Day celebrations, and would have been expecting to go back the next day. He might not have brought his journal with him for such a short trip.’

‘In that case, there’s not likely to be anything relevant in it then, surely?’ Trudy said stubbornly, still feeling unsettled because she still couldn’t see what her mentor was driving at, nor why he was so unhappy with her – because he clearly was.

‘Only his thoughts on Iris!’ Clement all but barked. ‘And who knows what he might have written down in it? His suspicions of other men that she might have been friendly with, casual remarks about dates when he’d been stood up – and she could have been meeting someone else – and who knows what other clues. It’s vital that the team investigating Iris’s murder get their hands on it,’ Clement said, before adding significantly, ‘and that Superintendent Finch doesn’t.’

He was looking at her almost coldly now, standing rigidly, aware of the tension creeping over him. He knew what he had to say next wasn’t going to go down well, and he hated the thought of them having their first proper argument, but he could sense it was coming.

Trudy blinked. ‘What do you mean? Why would you want to stop the Superintendent finding his son’s journal?’ she demanded. ‘It might have something in it that proves his innocence. You said that yourself.’

‘Yes,’ Clement gritted. ‘But use your head, girl,’ he admonished, beginning to feel angry himself now, because it was falling on him to teach her some hard facts of life, and he didn’t particularly feel like doing it. ‘For all we know, the boy’s journal might prove the exact opposite!’

For a second Trudy floundered – and then, with a rush of indignation, she understood.

‘You think David did kill Iris after all – and wrote about it in his journal?’ she accused, feeling, for some strange reason, oddly betrayed.

Clement bit back a swear word. ‘I don’t know, and nor do you,’ he pointed out coolly. ‘And that’s precisely the point. In fact, I think it very unlikely that if David did kill her that he would then be so stupid as to admit as much in writing! But he might have killed her nevertheless, and not admitted it in his diary. In which case, his previous entries might well provide clues as to how he was feeling – his growing disenchantment with Iris for example. He might have written down entries when he was angry, giving away his true emotional state. All of which would add to the case against him. And if his father finds it …’ Clement took a deep breath. ‘What’s to stop him from destroying it?’

Trudy was so stunned by the accusation, that she actually took a step back. She stared at Clement’s stern, challenging face for a moment, and then took a second step back.

‘You can’t … you can’t just say something like that about someone like Superintendent Finch,’ she said weakly. ‘He wouldn’t do something like that!’

‘No? Why not? He’s a grieving father after all, and desperate to save his son’s reputation. And maybe his own