Gerry felt her pulse quicken. ‘When was that?’
‘Before 13 April, that much I know. February? March?’
‘What was she doing?’
‘She wanted to see Mrs. Westlake.’
‘Can you remember what it was about? It might be important.’
‘No. But Mrs. Westlake interviewed people for jobs and wrote cheques or made some payments in cash. Sometimes people dropped by to pick up their payment. Not everyone likes electronic bank transfers.’
‘And this girl came for cash or a cheque?’
‘I’m just saying that she might have done. Or maybe she was after a job. She didn’t tell me. I mean, there was nothing unusual about her. I do remember she was very pretty. Quite tall, long-legged, short reddish hair, maybe hennaed.’ Tamara dabbed at a latte moustache. ‘Mrs. Westlake put the personnel together for the events Mr. Blaydon held, including the serving and kitchen staff and people to coordinate them on site. She didn’t trust most outside caterers. Not just for the parties, but business events, too, gala dinners, retirement parties, employee of the month awards and so on. She liked to use her own core team. I don’t know for certain why this girl came to the office, but that would be my first guess. For a job.’
‘So there would be records in Blaydon’s business files? Bank details, name, address?’
‘There should be. It was all above board. But accounts handled all that.’
‘Are you sure she came to the office to see Mrs. Westlake?’
‘Yes. That’s why I remember her. She came up to my desk and asked if Mrs. Westlake was in, and if she could see her. Said she had an appointment but she was a bit early. She waited in the reception area for a while, glancing at a magazine. I do remember she seemed nervous. You know, not really concentrating on what she was reading, just flipping the pages, looking at the pictures. Putting it down and picking up another. Then when the time came I showed her into the office myself.’
Gerry thought it odd that Tamara had recognised the girl from the photo when Charlotte Westlake, who must have had far more dealings with her, hadn’t. Was Charlotte lying? They would have to re-interview her. ‘I don’t suppose you remember her name, do you?’ she asked.
Tamara thought for a moment and said, ‘Do you know, as a matter of fact I do. I asked her, you know, so I could tell Mrs. Westlake who was here to see her. Announce her, like.’
‘And?’
‘Her name was Marnie. I’m afraid I can’t remember her second name, but I remember her first name struck me as odd. It’s not often you come across someone called Marnie.’
‘No,’ said Gerry, scribbling away in her notebook. ‘No, it isn’t.’
‘It’s from an old film, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Gerry, who had seen just about every ‘old’ film there was with her parents when she was growing up, and had a surprisingly good recollection of most of them. ‘Alfred Hitchcock. Tippi Hedren and Sean Connery. It’s about sexual violence. And Marnie was a sexually repressed kleptomaniac.’
DC Dev Bharati was a keen young detective from County HQ, handsome, slim, and casually dressed, and he was clearly excited to be involved in such a high-profile case. He was a bit too deferential for Banks’s liking, but that probably wouldn’t last. Still, it made a change from the easy familiarity of Annie, Gerry, and Winsome, with whom he was more used to working.
‘I thought you’d want to know right away, sir,’ Bharati said as he drove Banks into Lyndgarth. ‘DS Flyte is still with him.’
They pulled up outside the Black Bull in the high street. Bharati had to duck as he walked through the doors. The beams inside were also low, and he had to watch where he walked. DS Samuel Flyte was sitting at a rickety table with the pub’s landlord Mick Slater, a grizzled old denizen of the public house trade. Banks had met him before on a number of occasions and found him gruff but sound enough.
Flyte was a few years older than Bharati, fat but not obese. He reminded Banks of his old oppo, DS Jim Hatchley, now long retired and by all accounts practically taking up residence at Eastvale Golf Club. Hatchley had resembled a rugby prop forward gone to seed, but Banks guessed there was more muscle than fat in Flyte’s bulk. He was also bald, with a shiny head, a small moustache, a red face, and a slow, countryman’s manner of moving, along with the habit of appearing to think for a moment before answering any questions. He stood up when Banks entered and shook hands. He was wearing a tight-fitting navy suit, already a little shiny around the elbows.
There were plenty of people in the pub, and Banks had no doubt most of them were talking about what had happened on the edge of the village. He recognised a couple of reporters from the local papers, but the London press hadn’t turned up yet. As soon as they got wind of what had happened, they’d be up the M1 quickly enough, and Zelda’s dirty laundry would be spread all over the front pages of the national media. Another good reason for hanging on to the notebook.
Banks sat down with Mick Slater, Flyte, and Bharati. Slater offered drinks, but they all refused. The two detectives did so because Banks was present, he assumed, and Banks declined because he didn’t want any alcohol and rarely drank tea or coffee in the afternoon.
‘Let’s get straight to it,’ he said. ‘I know you’ve probably told DS Flyte already, but I’d like you to tell me exactly what happened. Start with when.’
‘It was three or four days ago,’ said Slater. ‘Just before the weekend.’
‘What time of day?’
‘About now.’
Banks saw DC Bharati make a note of the time. ‘And what were the man’s actual words?’
‘He asked if I knew of a young woman living in these parts. Said he was an old friend and he hadn’t seen her for some years, but he’d heard she was living in Lyndgarth. A place called Windlee Farm. He didn’t have a full address and his satnav was going wonky. Well, they do that a lot around these parts. Then he described her. Her appearance, the slight accent. It sounded to me as if he was talking about Mrs. Cabbot.’
It sounded the same way to Banks, though it was strange hearing Zelda described as Mrs. Cabbot, especially as she and Ray weren’t even married. ‘So you got the impression that he didn’t know exactly where she lived?’
‘Right. It’s easy enough if you have a street address in a small village like this, but Windlee Farm isn’t exactly in the village, as you know. It’s over half a mile away from any other houses here. I don’t even know what the address is, myself, or even if there is one. I think it’s on Lyndsdale Road, but that could be wrong. The road changes its name every hundred yards, it seems. And I don’t think there’s a number. Must be a postal code, of course, but I’d be hard pushed to tell you that, either. It’s just known as the Old Farm around these parts. Anyone who wants it knows that. And knows where it is.’
‘It’s like my place,’ said Banks. ‘Newhope Cottage. In Gratly. No street address. No street. What did he look like?’
‘Medium height, stocky, fortyish maybe, cropped black hair, five o’clock shadow — the kind you get with those special razors — thick lips, fleshy nose, and beady eyes. Moved like the sort of bloke who probably thinks he’s God’s gift to women, if you catch my drift. Flash clothes, too, just a bit too gaudy, if you ask me, and jewellery. You know, gold chain, big rings, that sort of bling. He looked like a bit of a thug, to be honest. And he had an accent.’
‘What sort of accent?’
‘European. Not French or Italian. Maybe Bulgarian or Polish or something like that. Could’ve been Russian. Who knows? Bit of a harsh edge to it. Guttural. Just the sort we voted to get rid of.’
‘What did you tell him?’
‘Nothing. Like I said, I didn’t like the look of him, and I don’t like to give out that kind of information about my customers on spec. You never know who you’re telling, do you? Could be planning on burgling the place. Or raping her or something. I don’t know Ray and his missus very well, but they come in here for a drink or two now and then, and they always seemed nice enough to me. This bloke looked like trouble, and Mrs. Cabbot, well, she’s an attractive woman, out there on her own sometimes... you know. Like I said, you never know what someone has in mind.’
‘That was good thinking,’ said Banks. ‘You did the right thing.’
‘Seems as if he found her, anyway, doesn’t it? Maybe I should have reported it straight away. At least told Ray and Zelda, given them a chance.’
‘Not your fault.’ He must have asked someone else, Banks thought, or driven around until he saw the name on the front of the cottage. Then when he’d found it, he staked out the place from the hollow over the weekend before making his move, probably after seeing Ray leave in the late afternoon. There would be an accomplice somewhere, too. Maybe someone had seen him out on the moorland? You tended to get quite a few ramblers out there on weekends.
‘Did you see his car?’
‘No.’
‘I did,’ came a voice from the left.
Banks turned. ‘And you are?’
‘Kit. Kit Riley.’
‘Kit’s a regular,’ Mick Slater said.
Banks looked more closely. Kit was an elderly man, a bit dishevelled in a grubby, striped rugby shirt, baggy brown cord trousers, and a leather gilet, despite the weather. His white hair stuck out at all angles, and he clearly hadn’t shaved in a week. He had the weather-beaten complexion of a lifelong farmer.
‘You saw the car?’ Banks said.
‘Aye. I were just leaving, like, and he pushed past me, rude as can be. Foreigners. Sooner we’re shut of ’em, the better.’
‘But you did see his car?’
‘Oh, aye.’ Kit paused and glanced down at his glass, which was almost empty.
Banks sighed. Everyone had watched too much television these days, it seemed, and expected something in return for whatever information they gave the police.
Banks nodded to Mick Slater. ‘Give him what he wants.’
‘Ooh, ta very much. I’ll have a whisky, please, Micky, my boy. A double.’
Slater poured the drink. When Banks reached for his wallet, the landlord shook his head, as if to indicate he’d bear the expense. ‘No, it’s only fair,’ said Banks, passing some money over. Slater shrugged and got the change from the till.
‘Right then, Kit,’ said Banks, after Riley had taken his first sip and smacked his lips. ‘What kind of car was it?’
Riley sipped some more whisky theatrically before saying, ‘It were a Ford Fiesta.’
‘You’re sure?’ Banks asked, heart sinking.
‘I know my cars,’ said Riley. ‘I tell you, it were a Ford Fiesta.’
Only the most popular car in the country, with about 100,000 registrations last year alone. ‘What colour was it?’
‘Dark green. Or blue. Hard to tell.’
‘You didn’t get the number, by any chance?’
‘Stopped writing down car numbers when I was twelve,’ Riley replied.
Banks felt a memory rise up from deep in his mind. Sitting on the secondary modern school wall by the main road junction with his best friends, Steve and Paul, writing down the makes and numbers of cars that went by. He must have been about ten or eleven. Why on earth had he thought to do something as pointless as that? Probably because his friends did. But it wasn’t even as serious a pastime as trainspotting, standing at the end of a windy platform in the rain jotting down train names and numbers, then going home and neatly crossing them off in your book with pencil and ruler. There was no book of car numbers, as far as he knew, only pictures and descriptions of models in the Observer’s Book of Automobiles.
It was a pity that Kit Riley had given up the practice so early. Inquiries about a dark Ford Fiesta wouldn’t get very far. It was clear that whoever was looking for Zelda had made no effort to hide the fact. He had gone into the pub on the village high street, obviously rather exotic in his bling, and described Zelda to the landlord. So he clearly wasn’t worried about his description being circulated. Why? Did he think the police were too stupid to trace him? Was he so confident and arrogant that he could afford to do what he wanted right under their noses? Banks had known plenty of criminals who were, who would think nothing of walking into their local, shooting someone they had a grudge against and walking out again. And how did the man know what Zelda looked like unless he knew her? He must have seen her somewhere, or at least seen a photograph of her.
‘Is that all?’ he asked Kit.
‘Aye. Oh, there’s one more thing.’ Kit glanced down at his empty glass.
Banks ignored the gesture. ‘Go on. Tell,’ he said.
Riley seemed disappointed, but he knew when he’d gone too far. ‘There were another bloke with him. Waiting in the car, like. I didn’t get a good look at him, but it wasn’t someone I’d care to meet in a dark ginnel, I can tell you that much.’