Page 39 of Blow Down (The Plumber's Mate)
“Does Alex know you and Amelia were a thing?” I blurted out. Then I shoved a load of risotto in my mouth in a classic case of shutting the stable door after Shergar’s already made the one-way trip to the knackers’ yard.
Lance paused, a restrained forkful of fish halfway to his mouth. There were two peas balanced on top. I was mesmerised, waiting for them to fall. “It was hardly a secret.”
“No?” Phil put in. “I had to dig pretty hard to find out, myself. She never changed her name or went by Mrs. Did she wear a ring?”
A shrug. Still the bloody peas didn’t fall. Had he glued them on with tartar sauce? “Occasionally. I didn’t keep track. And why should she change her name? A rather medieval attitude, don’t you think? Women are no longer property.” The food made it to his mouth, intact, and I could breathe again.
I had another forkful of risotto. It was pretty good, but the rice was just a tiny bit undercooked. It’s easy to do with risotto. Comes of being too worried it’ll end up gluey.
“Some people like to change their name as a sign of love and commitment,” Phil suggested.
“And some don’t.” Lance sounded a bit snippy. Defensive? “I don’t even know why we’re talking about something that was all over years ago.” He put down his fork and took a large swallow of wine, which seemed like a good idea to me, so I picked up my glass to follow suit.
Phil waited until Lance had set his glass down again. “‘Years’? That’s interesting. According to my information, your divorce wasn’t finalised until January this year. Only three weeks before she remarried, in fact.”
I just about managed not to choke on my mouthful of wine. This was turning into an episode of EastEnders. Well, not exactly, seeing as no one had called anyone else a slag yet, but hey, we were only on the first course here. Plenty of time yet.
Lance gave Phil a frosty stare and fingered his pendulum. “That was merely a formality.” He leaned over the table. Phil’s turn to get a face full of Frith. “Tell me, have you ever been married?”
Yeah, no. Bringing up Phil’s cheating bastard of an ex was well out of order. I put my fork down with a clatter. “I don’t see what that’s got to do with anything.”
Lance turned my way, an eyebrow raised. “Interesting. No, my point is merely that anyone who’s been married would know that a legal document has no effect at all on the feelings of those supposedly bound by it.” He smiled, the git. “Amelia and I simply had better things to do than to place a high priority on the formal dissolution of something we already knew was over.”
I glanced over at Phil. He looked away, his jaw tight. Christ knew what that was about.
“Obviously,” Lance went on, “once Amelia became involved with Alexander, I was only too happy to expedite matters for her.” He delicately lifted the skeleton from his fish and placed it to one side on his plate.
“Can you think of anyone who’d want to murder Mrs. Fenchurch-Majors?” Phil asked, a bit brutally, I thought.
Lance looked up from his plate, his eyes behind those daft sunglasses looking a bit moist, from what I could tell. “Of course not. Everybody loved Amelia.”
This time, I did choke on my wine. “Sorry,” I muttered when they both turned to glare at me. I pushed the glass over to the side of the table and decided to stick to water from now on.
“Disappointed suitor, then?” Phil suggested.
“I can’t imagine who that might have been,” Lance said dismissively. “Amelia had eyes only for Alexander. No, I don’t suppose they’ll ever find out who did such a terrible thing. It must have been someone who was mentally ill. She was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
That was interesting. It sounded like he didn’t know about the necklace, then. Or maybe he just wanted us to think that? Okay, this was officially doing my head in.
Phil must have been thinking along the same lines. About the necklace, I mean. Not about it doing his head in. “Did Mrs. Fenchurch-Majors ever mention a diamond necklace to you?”
Lance frowned and fingered that bloody pendulum again. “Not that I recall. If you want to talk about jewellery, it’s Arlo Fenchurch you need to see.”
Phil nodded, like that wasn’t news to him. “How did Mrs. Fenchurch-Majors get on with her stepdaughter?”
I was expecting another bland Oh, she loved her, of course, so was surprised when Lance gave a wry little smile. “I’m afraid she found her rather juvenile. So sad, a young woman of her age still acting like a spoiled child. A wasted life, by all accounts.”
“I dunno,” I found myself saying. “She seems to enjoy herself.”
“But she contributes nothing to society. Amelia, now, she was a giver.” Lance gave a sad little sigh and put his knife and fork together on his plate. “Tell me, was it very terrible, when you found her?”
Jesus, what did he expect me to say?
Not the truth. God, never the truth, when I’m asked this question by someone who loved the victim.
Course, it was equally possible he’d hated her.
I cleared my throat. “She was, well, I don’t think she could have suffered much. I mean, it must have been quick.” Sod it. I was having more wine.
