Bitter End Part 4

'Ambulances?' Buchanan said, just checking. 'More than one?'

'Well, they took something away in an ambulance not long after they got here. Something in a body bag.' She shook her head in pretended distaste that didn't quite mask the enthusiasm in her voice. 'It was dark, of course, except for the flames, so we couldn't see properly till they got their floodlights going but I imagine it must have been what was left of Mrs Gra.s.sick or Jamie Ford. And then, later on, there was another ambulance to take Poppy, Jamie's wife, to hospital. Badly cut with broken gla.s.s she was, poor little thing, when the windows came in on her.'

'Is she still in hospital?' Buchanan asked, his mind exploring the possibility of having a word with her. If anyone could explain why her husband had been with Vanessa Gra.s.sick at two-twenty-five on a Sat.u.r.day morning it would be she. 23. Mrs Pringle folded her arms under her substantial bust, hitching it up a little, and, for a long moment, appeared to be admiring the countryside. Buchanan was starting to wonder whether she had heard the question when he realised that she was deep in thought. Apparently she was in some doubt whether to confide in him or not. Finally, she drew an audible breath and said, That's a thing that's been worrying me.' She withdrew her gaze from the middle distance and looked firmly at Buchanan as though she expected him to argue with her about that. 'On Tuesday we went to visit Poppy in hospital. Elizabeth Armstrong and myself.' She indicated the Armstrong household with a nod: a modernised version of her own which had had its beautiful sandstone walls coated with an ugly pebble-dash. 'Such a sweet little thing she was, Poppy Ford. No bigger than you, dear. Quiet as a little mouse, but we all liked her. We went in Elizabeth's car and took some fruit and magazines with us but, when we got there, we were told that Poppy had been discharged two days before, on the Sunday.'

Fizz stuck her head forward like a pointer. 'She didn't come back here?'

'n.o.body knows where she is,' Mrs Pringle growled deeply, hugging her bosom. 'It's so unlike her to just take off like that without even phoning to let us know she was all right. We notified the police on the way home, naturally, but we've heard nothing from them or from Poppy all week. I'd have thought she'd have been worried about Jet, but no. Not a word.'

'Jet being . . .?' Fizz inquired in a gentle voice, designed to avoid interfering too much with her discursive flow.

'Jet. . . her cat. He's dead, of course, but Poppy wouldn't know that, would she? So you'd have expected her to have phoned to ask Elizabeth or me, or even the police for that matter, to look out for him. But no. n.o.body has heard a word from her since she left the hospital. It's uncanny.' 24. Buchanan felt Fizz's eyes on his face but didn't want to receive the message she was sending. He could see for himself that there was no way he could honourably turn his back on this investigation. He didn't need to be told he was in a cleft stick. He could feel it tightening inexorably around his throat. 25.

Chapter Three.

If Buchanan was overjoyed to discover that the 'nice little

pub' of Fizz's recollection was, in fact, the Chirnside Hall

Hotel, he managed to hide it well. He accepted without

comment her plea that it must be under new management,

but was probably swayed more by the thought of a decent

lunch instead of a pie and a pint. The service, as befitted a five star establishment, was suitably relaxed which gave Fizz time to dispose of a large gin and tonic before eating -thus getting the full benefit of the alcohol content. She was in a particularly good mood, not just because of the gin, but because the flimsy hint of mystery surrounding Vanessa Gra.s.sick's death was suddenly showing signs of becoming something she could get her teeth into. Meanwhile Buchanan, for much the same reason, was looking as grim as something chiselled out of Mount Rushmore.

'Oh, cheer up, for pity's sake,' Fizz told him with her usual compa.s.sion for a fellow traveller on Life's stony road. 'Even if Vanessa was murdered by her business partner -or any other beneficiary, for that matter -they

can't defrock you for paying out her estate. You're covered by the police inquiry and the coroner's verdict. It's not up to you to query it.'

He stopped grinding his teeth to take a spoonful of chowder. 'I have to query it, Fizz, you know that. The least I ought to do, if only for my own peace of mind and the reputation of the firm, is to find out what the police think 27. about Mrs Ford's disappearance. But even that's not going to please Lawrence Gra.s.sick, is it? It's obvious he doesn't want any adverse publicity like a murder investigation and -if that should happen -he won't easily forget that I was the one to set it in motion just when the case had been closed.'

It wasn't easy to deny this reading of the situation. Fizz had to admit. There couldn't be a worse person to cross in the entire Scottish legal system than the man who had been dubbed Ghengis Gra.s.sick since his student days.

There were plenty of stories about his vituperative attacks on junior counsel, and any witnesses bold enough to try lying to him in court were liable to be on Prozac for the rest of their lives. There were three ways to avoid dentures, so the saying went: brush after meals, visit your dentist regularly, and don't cross Ghengis Gra.s.sick.

It said much for the man's professional capability, however, that he was unarguably top dog in Scottish law, and Fizz herself would have killed to get a job in his chambers in any capacity whatsoever. There was no chance of that not unless she got first cla.s.s honours in her finals plus all manner of distinctions, a personal recommendation from the prof, and character references from the Prime Minister, the President of the Bank of England, and G.o.d. Yes, and had a s.e.x change operation into the bargain, since Gra.s.sick was a known misogynist as well as a despot.

'Don't do it, Buchanan,' she said earnestly. 'It's not worth it -really, really not worth it. The grief that man could cause you for the rest of your working life doesn't bear thinking about. h.e.l.l, if he doesn't care who gets his wife's money, why should you? For G.o.d's sake, let's just drop the whole thing and go home.'

Buchanan raised his eyes from his plate and blinked at her for a minute as though he couldn't believe she would willingly turn her back on an interesting inquiry at this stage in the game. Fizz could barely believe it herself. The only motive she could find for suggesting such a course 28. was to avoid witnessing a colleague -OK, a friend commit professional suicide.

Buchanan finished his soup in a morbid silence before he folded his arms on the table and shook his head. 'It wouldn't work for me.'

Fizz started to argue but he wouldn't budge.

'I hear what you're saying, Fizz, and a lot of it's perfectly true, but you know what I'm like. I'm a lawyer because I like being a lawyer. Not because my dad was a lawyer. Not because I was forced into the business. But because I believe in truth. If I did what you want me to do, if I did what I know to be wrong to save my career, it would be on my conscience for the rest of my life.' He toyed with his cutlery and grinned a bit sheepishly. 'A long time ago I heard a psychiatrist say that most cases of mental illness had their roots in a guilty conscience. I've no idea whether there's a grain of truth in that but I reckon I'm one of those people who have a genetic weakness in that area and I believe in prevention rather than cure. I need my self-respect.'

It was so unlike Buchanan to bare his soul like this that Fizz was left unable to respond. She hadn't entirely realised just how seriously he was taking this thing but it was now beginning to worry her, too. After all, her own future, if her plans came to fruition, was likely to be tied up with Buchanan's. She had invested a lot of time, ever since she first enrolled for a law degree, in making sure she had a job with Buchanan and Stewart when she graduated.

There was horrendous compet.i.tion for trainees.h.i.+ps in Edinburgh, and the Buchanan and Stewart partners.h.i.+p was one of the choice berths. As yet, n.o.body had promised her anything even semi-permanent, and the arrival last year of Dennis, the new junior partner, had brought the personnel up to fighting strength, but she still had hopes of carving herself a niche by the time she needed one. What a laugh it would be if the fortunes of Buchanan and Stewart were to take a dive in the meantime. Not. 29. Neither of them said much for the rest of their meal.

Fizz's ebullient mood had now plummeted. It was standing out a mile that, in her own interests, she should be continuing to nag Buchanan to keep his doubts to himself, but it was equally clear to her that he wasn't exaggerating when he claimed he'd suffer for it if he did. She'd known about his love affair with the truth for a long time and, in spite of herself, she was finding it hard to leave that factor out of the equation.

Worrying about other people's peace of mind was not something Fizz did. She'd grown up the hard way, virtually on her own from the age of fourteen, and she'd had problems enough just keeping body and soul together without losing sleep over things that were not of immediate concern. When it came to a choice between her own needs and those of someone else, she could seldom afford the luxury of being generous. But there was something about Buchanan that made her feel sorry for him -not

often and not a lot -just the sort of twinge of uneasiness you'd feel seeing a dog trying to cross a busy road. He simply didn't have the same sort of carapace over his emotions as Fizz had grown during the hard years. He believed in people, he trusted them, he strove for them, and half the time they just took what he had to give and scarpered. Too late to change him now: what he needed was a thoughtful friend to slap him about the ears from time to time.

'Well, what about a compromise?' she suggested after a while. 'We can do a little digging around . . . talk to a few people. Try to ascertain whether there's really any need to take the matter further. We ... you could be worrying for nothing.'

'Yeah.' He tried for a grin but it didn't come off and he didn't persist in the effort to look hopeful. 'Well, no, actually. That idea doesn't grab me at all. For one thing, I'd hate Gra.s.sick to catch me being underhand about it. If I decide to make my own inquiry I'll tell him I'm going to 30. do it. And for another thing, we already know there's more to this business than meets the eye. We already know I've cause to be concerned. Better to get it cleared up and have done with it. The chances are it won't turn out to be anything too embarra.s.sing for Gra.s.sick. I hope not anyway.'

There didn't look to Fizz to be too many options. It wasn't the sort of thing Buchanan was likely to change his mind about after a good night's sleep, and there was as much chance of Gra.s.sick giving his blessing to a review of his wife's demise as of his donning a tutu and performing an entrechat in the forum of the High Court.

She excused herself to go to the loo and, on the way back, made a detour to speak to the two waiters who were hovering attentively by the doorway. It didn't take much to get them chatting about the burned-out house down the road, a news item which rated, locally, as something on a par with the shooting of JFK.

'It must have been some blaze,' Fizz suggested, wide-eyed with interest. 'Was anyone killed?'

'Aye. Two people blown to bits,' said the waiter who had attended her table, and added, as an aside to his partner, 'Lenny told me they were picking up pieces for two days.'

'Who's Lenny?' Fizz asked him, seeing that Lenny must have had a ringside seat.

'Lenny Napier. He's the postman. He hears all the news when he's delivering the mail. He says an old couple who lived across the road were near thrown out their bed by the bang. Two-thirty in the morning! They thought it was world war three starting. They're not over it yet, the pair of them.'

Fizz looked deeply sympathetic. 'Were there only two people living in the house?'

'No, no miss. Just the one of them belonged to the house,' the other guy put in, smiling at her. He was middle-aged and heavy with it but he still bore the signs of being a heart-throb in his youth. 'The woman was Vanessa 31. Gra.s.sick -her husband's a famous lawyer -you'll maybe have heard of him. They came in here for dinner all the time. But the man that was killed with Mrs Gra.s.sick wasn't her husband. He was one of the neighbours.'

Fizz, out of the corner of her eye, caught sight of Buchanan crossing the room towards them, and knew he meant to stop her from asking questions before he had okayed it with Gra.s.sick. Quickly, she raised her eyebrows at the two men. 'At two-thirty a.m.?'

Both of them chuckled, exchanging glances.

'Aye, miss, you may well ask,' the older one admitted, 'and I'll not deny there's been more than you putting two and two together, and maybe making five. But I'll not believe there was anything between them. Mrs Gra.s.sick was too much of a toff to take up with Jamie Ford, decent enough lad though he was.'

'You knew them both?' Fizz asked, but the other waiter was ready for a turn at putting in his ten pence worth and he didn't go along with his pal's opinion.

'She was much younger than her husband, you see.

Thirty-three, it said in the paper, and he's grey-haired.

Must be near enough fifty. Yon place wasn't a weekend cottage, if you ask me, it was a love nest.'

'Och no, Andrew,' his pal insisted, shaking an emphatic head. 'A terrible thing like yon happens and right away folk are seeing bogles, asking if it was really an accident, getting suspicious about d.a.m.n all, making up things so it's more exciting. It's just foolishness, that's what it is, aye and speaking ill of the dead.'

Buchanan loomed up at Fizz's shoulder and cleared his throat to draw attention to the fact that he was waiting with his wallet in his hand. 'Sorry, Fizz, but we really have to rush,' he said pointedly and nodded to their waiter.

'That was a nice meal. Can I pay for it, please?'

Andrew, the younger guy, started apologising and das.h.i.+ng around with the check etc giving Fizz the chance to isolate his colleague. 'Why are people saying it wasn't an accident?' 32. He looked sideways at Buchanan and tried to wriggle out of it by saying, 'Och, it's just gossip like 1 was saying. Just some daft old folk making mountains out of molehills. We don't get a lot of excitement round these parts so we have to make the most of it, know what 1 mean?'

'But who--?'

'Come on, Fizz, we really must go now.'