Page 52 of Blow Down (The Plumber's Mate)
“I bet you were really glad you made the effort to look her up, weren’t you?”
Phil half smiled. “Ties in with it not being premeditated, though. All helps to build up the picture.”
I nodded. “Still looking a bit too pixelated for my liking, but yeah, I s’pose so.”
“And there’s another thing. You notice how the lack of any money changing hands over this replica necklace means there’ll be no record of the transaction in Fenchurch’s books?”
“So?”
“So we’ve only got his word for it she was the one who asked him to do it.”
“But if he’s lying about that, why admit to making it in the first place?”
“Staff. As in, he’s got ’em cluttering up the place during normal working hours. Maybe one of them stumbled across him doing it? Chances are he even farmed out some of the work to one or more of them—or ordering that fake stone, at least.”
“S’pose if you’ve got minions, you might as well use ’em,” I agreed. “So what, you reckon someone else got the necklace made, swapped ’em out while Amelia wasn’t looking, and then . . .” I frowned. “Someone got pissed off with her trying to pass the fake one off as real? D’you reckon she sold it? Nah, can’t be—her and Alex were rolling in it, weren’t they?”
“Alex, maybe. I haven’t been able to look into his finances yet. But her? Not a chance. Her and Frith were on the verge of bankruptcy before she married Majors. His other wedding present to her was a bailout for the business.”
“Huh. No wonder Vi didn’t take to her. She can’t have been too chuffed about the old man spending her inheritance on the new floozy.”
“Yeah. Speaking of Vi Majors, I’m going to need to speak to her again. See what she has to say about her uncle making that necklace.”
“You reckon she didn’t know?”
“If she did know, I want to know why she didn’t see fit to mention it.”
I bit my lip. “Could’ve been her, couldn’t it? If Vi did take the necklace when her stepmum thought she did—back when she called me in to find it—it could’ve been her getting the fake done.”
“Maybe. She’d have had to have reason for believing Fenchurch wouldn’t shop her to his sister, though, wouldn’t she? You’re forgetting something else too. Mrs. Fenchurch-Majors called you in to find her necklace, right? And you got interrupted before you could find it—if it was even there. But she never called you back to have another go, did she?”
“Well, she had all the fayre stuff to worry about . . .” I wasn’t even convincing myself. “Nah, if it really was worth three hundred grand or half a mill or whatever, she’d have had me turning that house upside down, wouldn’t she? Unless it just turned up?”
“Or unless it was the fake one that’d gone missing. Worst-case scenario, she’d just have to ask her brother to do her another one.”
“Yeah, but would he?” I frowned. “D’you think it cost much, making that fake? I mean, for the stones and all?”
Phil shook his head. “Cubic zirconia’s cheap as chips. I looked it up online. There’d be the gold—or gold plate—but it’d still be peanuts compared to the real thing.”
“Speaking of which—where the bloody hell is it? S’pose you’ve checked the local cash-for-gold place?”
“Among others. No, if she sold it, the big question is, what’s happened to the money?”
“Been hacking her bank account?”
Phil smirked. “I’ve got my contacts.”
We’d reached my house. “Coming in?” I asked as Phil pulled on the handbrake.
He nodded.
And before you ask, no, we didn’t spend the evening going over the case. We spent it on the sofa with a takeaway and the telly.
What?
Everyone’s entitled to a bit of slobbing around on a Friday night.
Saturday, I had a couple of quick jobs to do—one of which, in the event, turned out to be a lot less quick than I’d been expecting—so me and Phil went our separate ways after breakfast and I didn’t see him again until dinnertime. After which, I had to love him and leave him, although sadly without the love him bit, as I’d arranged to meet up with Dave for a few pints. His idea—I’d have thought the missus would have him on a short leash this close to her due date.
