Page 25 of Murder in Shades of Fire and Ash

“Patsy was going to be at work that evening,” Charlie said. “She says Unwin knew that.”

Dylan shrugged. “I’m not saying it was her. I’ve never spoken to Patsy on the phone, just met her in person. I don’t suppose she’s the only woman Unwin knew. How is she?”

“About how you’d expect,” Charlie said.

“I’ll call her in a day or two. Once I can be sure of not breaking down. Give her my love.”

Charlie said he would. “This woman definitely rang Unwin, not the other way round?” he asked.

Dylan might not have been sure about anything else, but he remembered the phone ringing. “No, I can remember Unwin’s silly ring tone. He was always changing it, and the latest was bird noises.”

Either way, it meant that Unwin was going to meet whoever made that call. Or at least he intended to meet them, andlaterprobably meant later that day. Access to Unwin’s phone records had just become more urgent.

“Excuse me a second,” Charlie said, and reached for his own phone to send

Eddy a text:

We need Unwin’s phone records ASAP. Harass them!

A thumbs-up came back.

“We’ll find out who called,” Charlie said, “and I’ll be in touch. Take care of yourself, and ring me anytime if you remember anything else.”

Dylan nodded. Charlie wanted to stay, if for no other reason than to make sure Dylan ate something, but it wasn’t an option. He made a mental note to call, and to ask Patsy to do the same.

Detective Superintendent Mal Kentand Charlie had attended each other’s weddings, but at work, Mal wassir, the big boss, and clearly headed for further promotion. Even as a friend, Mal could be intimidating. He had the natural authority Charlie saw in Tom in his college principal mode, and today, that authority filled his office. Charlie sensed that he was in for a telling-off, and he was almost right.

“Freya has been keeping me up to date on the investigation into Unwin’s death,” Mal began. “I’m concerned that PC Hargreaves appears to have no alibi for the time of the murder, and that you seem convinced she had nothing to do with it. I admit that I find her to be a strange young woman.”

Most people did, Charlie reflected. Patsy’s direct way of talking, combined with her excellent memory for detail, could make her an uncomfortable colleague. She rarely bothered with social niceties and had no hesitation in correcting anyone who made a mistake about, say, an obscure point of law, or indeed, which side of a building to open the windows on in a heatwave. But she was a superb police officer and would be a brilliantdetective, unless he, Charlie, failed to find who killed Unwin. If he didn’t, Unwin’s death would follow her around like a shadow.

“What you see is what you get with Patsy,” he said. “She doesn’t have an alibi, but then nor do a lot of other people.”

Mal didn’t speak. He didn’t have to.

“OK, I agree that most people weren’t about to move in with Unwin, and most people weren’t in a polyamorous relationship with him,butall the evidence against her is circumstantial. There are other people we should eliminate before we accuse Patsy. The mysterious Jeff Britton for one, and I’m waiting on Unwin’s phone records.” Charlie told Mal about the call Unwin had received while at Dylan’s.

“A call that Dylan thought was from Hargreaves,” Mal said.

All Charlie could do was agree. “I’ve asked Eddy to prioritise the phone records. Once we get them, we’ll know one way or the other who the call was from.”

“I’ve had a call from Unwin’s older brother, Alex,” Mal said. “He knows someone, who knows someone, and he got through to me rather than you or Freya.” There was a pause. “The main thing — the only thing — he wanted to tell me was that he thought Hargreaves murdered his brother. He said she was jealous of Unwin’s other partners and that anything else was an act.”

19

Monday afternoon

“Charlie.”

The voice of his immediate boss came from behind him, as he walked away from Kent’s office.

“It’s time we went to find out about this fake fire officer. You can drive.”

It was unusual for Charlie to spend more than half an hour or so with DI Ravensbourne. Her usual habit was to appear, ask pertinent questions, issue carefully constructed instructions — with an inevitable sting in the tail — and depart in a cloud of cigarette smoke. Today, for reasons known only to Freya Ravensbourne herself, Charlie was driving her to a fire station just over the border into England, in search of the elusive Jeff Britton.

Charlie was instructed to take the ‘scenic route’ avoiding the main roads with their road works and holiday traffic. It meant a lot of tight bends and steep hills, and shadows stark against the bright sunshine. But many of the fields were still green, dotted with newly shorn sheep, and noisy with the sound of farmers getting their hay in before the weather inevitably changed. There were stretches of road completely shaded by trees archingoverhead, and others where the land stretched out in front of them until Charlie was certain the whole country was visible.

Ravensbourne sighed. “Who needs to go abroad when the weather is like this?” she asked, apparently not expecting an answer as she gazed out of the window. “Not that it is often like this,” she said after a moment, “and when it is, there is always trouble.”

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