Cooper knew well enough of Marshall’s reputation as an inveterate womanizer. And by all accounts a highly successful one, reflected the detective, the very thought of which made him uneasy. The young woman looked to be in her early to mid-thirties, certainly a good thirty years younger than Marshall but that, Cooper reckoned, would not stop a man like him.
Gesturing for Smiley to accompany him he led the way back into the marina office. The young woman was standing just inside, by the window. Cooper had been unable to see her but he guessed that she too had watched the unmarked police car containing Richard Marshall leave the marina complex and turn onto the main drag en route for Dorchester, and then on past Honiton and Exeter to Torquay.
As Cooper and Smiley entered the office she quickly turned away, walked over to her desk and sat down, sweeping back her long bright chestnut hair with one hand. She was unusually tall, but she had quite a small tight-lipped face, Cooper observed. She also had a slightly sulky look about her, without which, the detective sergeant thought, she would have been rather pretty. The young woman contrived to stare straight ahead while ensuring that she did not look directly at either of the two police officers.
“If you’ll excuse me, miss, I think we’d better have a word,” began Cooper, in the deceptively deferential manner he was inclined to adopt at the beginning of an interview. As he spoke he pulled up the one other chair in the little room, leaving Smiley to perch against a box of what seemed to be engine parts.
Cooper at first merely checked details, like the young woman’s name and the precise nature of her job. And as he questioned her an intriguing, but not entirely unexpected, scenario began to emerge.
“My name is Jennifer Roth and I’m Ricky’s personal assistant,” she said.
Cooper resisted the temptation bluntly to ask straight away if that was all she was. Instead he stuck to the gentle approach. He was that sort of policeman. He believed that softly softly got the best results. It certainly seemed to work for him, anyway.
“And perhaps you could explain to me exactly what that entails.”
She nodded. “Ricky runs the marina and I run the office, answer the phone, do all the paperwork, send out invoices, pay the bills.”
Jennifer Roth had a very educated voice. Definitely public school, and with more than a little of the inborn sense of superiority which came with the territory, Cooper suspected, despite its having been shaken somewhat that day. He wondered fleetingly about her background.
“I see. And how long have you known Ricky and worked for him?”
“I’ve worked here for about four years now. I got the job quite soon after Ricky took over here.”
“Did you know him before that?”
Jennifer looked uncertain and said nothing.
“Did you know him before that?”
“No,” she said.
“So how did you get hired?”
“I answered a newspaper advertisement,” Jennifer replied quickly enough, but she still seemed unwilling to meet Cooper’s eye and her face was distinctly flushed.
Cooper studied her for a moment or two.
“You seem a little upset,” he said gently. Jennifer looked up, meeting his gaze at last. She looked as if she didn’t know how to respond. She opened her mouth as if she were about to say something and then closed it again, remaining sullenly silent.
“Are you upset?” he asked, a little more firmly.
She shook her head.
“I think you are,” Cooper persisted.
“Well, a bit, maybe. But wouldn’t you be if your boss had just been taken away in handcuffs?”
Cooper bowed his head slightly, acknowledging her point. He was pretty sure it was more than that. But Jennifer Roth seemed to be warming to her theme, or perhaps she just felt this was ground that she could safely explore.
“I mean, what do I do? There are checks here that need signing. It’s Friday. Half the world will descend on us tonight wanting to go out on their boats for the weekend. Ricky does all the basic maintenance work, he’s not a qualified mechanic but he’s very knowledgeable and he gets the boats ready for most of the owners. Makes sure everything’s in working order, and calls in extra help if needed. That’s his big Friday job. What am I going to say to them?”
“That’s up to you,” responded Cooper. “We are investigating a very serious matter here, you do realize that, don’t you?”
Again Jennifer Roth looked as if she didn’t know what to say. Cooper waited until she eventually spoke. He had learned over his years of questioning people that if you presented them with silences which lasted long enough, the vast majority would say something as if somehow compelled to fill the vacuum. And very often he found it a most effective technique.
“Well, I assumed so,” said Jennifer Roth. “You wouldn’t have taken him away in handcuffs if that wasn’t so, would you?”
“Absolutely right. And have you any idea what this serious matter is?”
Yet again Jennifer Roth hesitated.
“No,” she said eventually.
“Are you quite sure of that?”
“Quite sure, I’ve just told you,” Jennifer snapped the reply. She looked petulant more than anything else now. Petulant and sulky.
“We have just arrested the man you know as Ricky Maxwell on suspicion of the murder of his wife and children.”
“Oh.” Jennifer Roth closed her eyes and leaned back in her chair.
“Is that all you have to say?”
Jennifer opened her eyes. Small, vaguely blue eyes, matching the size of her features. Cooper thought he could see panic in them. He wasn’t quite sure. Hers was a very strange reaction, not easy to assess.
“I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t seem surprised.”
“Of course I’m surprised. Shocked is more the word. I’m shocked.”
Cooper studied her appraisingly again.
Her face was even more flushed. But if that was panic he had seen in those small, now veiled, eyes she gave no further sign of it. She seemed quite calm. Cooper waited to see if she would say any more, ask him any questions, even.
“Is there nothing you want to know about this?” he said after a bit. “Aren’t you curious?”
She half-shook her head, half-nodded. She was confused, you could see that clearly enough.
“No, I don’t think so.”
“You haven’t even asked when this happened, have you?”
“No. No.” She leaned back in her chair, tipping the two front legs slightly. She looked even more sulky and petulant. Certainly unwilling to cooperate. Then she sighed, in a resigned sort of way.
“OK. When did it happen?” she asked, her voice heavy with exaggerated weariness.
“Twenty-eight years ago,” Cooper replied, and he could not have explained why he was so sure that she already knew the answer. But he was sure. Quite sure, even though she responded only with a slight nod and said nothing more at all.
Abruptly he swung on to another tack.
“So how well do you know Ricky?” he asked.
“I don’t know, really. Quite well, I suppose.”
Cooper sighed. His patience was running out. He wasn’t sure whether Jennifer Roth was being deliberately obtuse, or whether, perhaps, she wasn’t the brightest young woman he had ever encountered.
He took an oblique approach.
“Could you give me your address please, Miss Roth.”
The young woman hesitated just for a moment.
“Flat 5, Heron View Court, Poole,” she said eventually.
Cooper studied her thoughtfully. This was really a result. It was not only the address of one of the luxury apartments in the marina complex, it also had another significance. Cooper had somehow already suspected it, had a gut feeling, but he knew better than to rely on gut feelings and hunches, indeed always thought that hunches were at best a policing myth and at worst a dangerous alternative to a properly conducted investigation.