Kitabı oku: «A Fatal Mistake», sayfa 2
The next witness up was the lad who’d been responsible for the third, ‘random’ (as Clement had come to think of it) punt. He’d been indignant and hotly insistent that the blame for the dunking hadn’t lain with his boating prowess. He claimed the two ‘Lord Littlejohn’ punts had been meeting end to end across the water when he’d rounded the bend in the river, and that he’d had no chance to avoid a collision.
Since both he and the passengers on his punt were among the most sober of the witnesses questioned – according to the police constable – the coroner could see the jury was inclined to believe him.
He was also quite adamant that the drowned boy had not been a member of his party. As well as having the regulation number of passengers only (and not being vastly overloaded, as everyone freely admitted the other two punts had been), this punt had comprised exclusively engineering students, who were all known to one another.
Clearly, then, Derek Chadworth must have been on one of Lord Jeremy Littlejohn’s punts. On the face of it, this seemed by far the most likely explanation, as several witnesses had testified that ‘we all poured onto the punts by Magdalen Bridge until there wasn’t an inch of space left.’ And ‘none of us wanted to be left behind, as Lord Jerry gives such great bashes, so we all crammed in.’
However, as the afternoon wore on, it became clear to Dr Ryder that something untoward was afoot. What was more, he wasn’t certain the jury had noticed it.
It began simply enough, with one sheepish student after another taking the stand and admitting to being present on a punt, but to having very little real memory of what had happened. ‘Had a bit too much champers, I’m afraid’ was a familiar litany. As was ‘when we all ended up in the drink, I just splashed to the bank as best as I could’. And ‘I didn’t notice anyone else having any trouble or I’d have helped the poor blighter out’. But not one of them mentioned seeing or talking to Derek Chadworth before the accident.
The jury seemed less than impressed with these examples of drunken high jinks, but most of them looked ready to dismiss it as ‘one of those things’. The rich upper classes would play. And these things happened.
But Clement wasn’t so sure.
Eventually, he decided to take a more active role in order to get some answers, and he chose his victims carefully.
He waited until a theology student by the name of Lionel Gulliver had taken the stand, and – working on the somewhat precarious premise that someone who was training for the church would be less likely to lie under oath – began to question him in earnest.
‘So, Mr Gulliver. I take it that, as a potential man of the cloth, you were perhaps… er… a little less the worse for drink than some of your fellow students when you got on the punt at Magdalen Bridge?’ he asked, fixing the nervous youth with a flat stare.
Lionel Gulliver, a rather small, neat-looking young man with a quiff of sandy hair and big blue eyes, went a trifle pale. ‘Well, I’d had one glass of Lord Littlejohn’s Buck’s Fizz. To show willing and all that,’ he admitted with a gulp.
‘But only one?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘So you were more aware of your fellow students and surroundings than most of your party?’
‘Oh, well, I don’t suppose I was quite as… er…’ The theology student plucked his collar nervously. ‘But, as the good Lord said, let him who is without sin cast the first stone and all that.’
Dr Ryder smiled grimly. ‘Yes. I fully understand you not wanting to come across as morally superior, Mr Gulliver,’ he said sardonically. ‘But this is a court of law, and you’ve taken an oath on the Bible to tell the truth, and these good men and women of the jury need facts if they’re to deliver a fair verdict.’
At these steely words, the young man paled even further and visibly stiffened in the witness box.
‘Oh, of course.’
‘Splendid,’ Clement said dryly. ‘So, can you tell us… did you know Derek Chadworth by sight?’
‘Oh, er… yes, I’d seen him around once or twice.’ He went rather red, and then cast a quick, nervous glance towards the public gallery. He then hastily looked away again, his lips firming tightly together.
‘And so,’ the coroner swept on, ‘was Mr Chadworth one of those on the same punt as yourself?’
Again, the young man plucked at his collar and glanced nervously across the courtroom, as if seeking inspiration. But he didn’t seem to find any, because he turned a rather miserable-looking face to the coroner and took a deep breath.
‘You know, sir, I don’t believe he was,’ he said reluctantly. Far too reluctantly, in the circumstances, the coroner thought. After all, it should have been a simple enough question to answer – not one that gave the theology student cause for so much angst.
Clement felt a touch of excitement lance up his spine. Yes, he knew it. There was definitely something about this case that wasn’t quite as cut and dried as it seemed. But what exactly? And why did he have the feeling that all the young men and women who had just testified in his court had been at pains not to speak out of turn about something?
‘We understand that both punts were rather overcrowded, Mr Gulliver. Are you quite certain that Derek Chadworth couldn’t have got on without your seeing him?’ Clement began to probe delicately.
‘Well, he might have,’ the young man said, seizing so gratefully on this olive branch that he positively beamed his relief at the older man. ‘Oh, yes, that might have happened, I’m sure.’
Dr Ryder smiled rather grimly to himself. Not so fast, my slippery young fish, he thought, almost fondly. As a doctor, he’d been used to his young interns trying to slip things past him. Not that they’d ever succeeded; if they’d failed to read the notes he’d set them, or had neglected to do the experiments proscribed, he’d always found out about it.
Now he regarded the sweating theology student with a shark-like smile. ‘Well, let’s see if we can’t get to the bottom of this, then,’ he said, ignoring his clerk, who was beginning to shift about restlessly. ‘Where exactly were you sitting on the punt, Mr Gulliver?’
‘Er, right at the back, sir,’ the suddenly unhappy student admitted quietly. ‘I was going to take over the punting from Bright-Allsopp if he needed relieving, as a matter of fact.’
‘So you had all the occupants of the punt in front of you?’
‘Er… yes, sir.’
‘And did you see Derek Chadworth among them?’
Defeated, the young man was forced to admit he hadn’t. With a quick glance at the jury, just to make sure they were paying attention, the coroner dismissed him.
He was then forced to bide his time until he found the next suitable candidate. Of necessity, he now needed a witness from punt number two. Barring a theology student, he finally decided that, of all the witnesses called, one Miss Maria DeMarco, an Italian student of fine art, was his best bet.
As she was called to the stand, he approved her sober and respectful dark-grey skirt and jacket, and her neat little black felt hat. She was not beautiful but had a certain elan. And as he’d expected from someone who looked the epitome of a good Catholic girl, she took her oath in a quiet, serious voice, and looked composed but very uneasy.
He was gentle but firm with her.
‘Miss DeMarco, I understand you were on what I shall refer to as the second punt – that is, the punt on which Lord Littlejohn himself was present?’
‘That is so, yes.’
‘And Lord Littlejohn was the main instigator of the party?’
‘Yes, that is so.’
‘He invited you?’
‘Oh, no. A friend of his did. It wasn’t what you would call a very formal affair. Most of those present were good friends of Lord Littlejohn, but his friends had invited some people, and they in turn had brought some people of their own. You see how it was?’
‘Yes. This might account for His Lordship having seemingly misjudged just how many punts he would need to convey everyone safely to the picnic site,’ Clement said dryly. ‘Did you know the deceased?’
Clement had his court officer show her a photograph, provided by the boy’s parents, of Derek Chadworth.
‘Oh, no,’ she said firmly. ‘I don’t know this man.’
‘Would you study his likeness, please, Signorina DeMarco? Fine. Now, tell us. Did you see this man among the party on your punt?’
The Italian girl shrugged graphically. ‘I’m not sure. It’s hard to say. It was very crowded. Everyone was squished in… like, how you say… sardines in a tin, yes?’
Dr Ryder nodded. ‘Yes. But a punt isn’t exactly an ocean liner, Miss DeMarco. And the journey from Magdalen Bridge to Port Meadow must have taken you at least twenty minutes.’
‘Oh, yes, but most of the time I was talking to my friends – Lucy Cartwright-Jones and Bunny Fleet. I pay no attention to the men. They were rather… er… loud from the beer and wine.’
‘I see. When the accident happened, and your punt overturned in the water, you must have been frightened?’ He tried another tack craftily.
‘Oh, no, I swim like the fishes,’ the Italian girl said with magnificent insouciance. ‘I was more annoyed to get my lovely clothes wet.’
‘I see. Did you notice any of your fellow students struggling to swim to the shore?’ he said.
‘Oh, no! I would have helped, of course, if I had. But the river was not wide, or deep.’
‘No, I see. Well, thank you, Miss DeMarco.’
As he watched the young woman depart, rather impressed by her ability not to let herself be nailed down to a single straight answer, he mentally shook his head.
Why were they all so evasive when it came to talking about the dead boy? To the point that nobody seemed even willing to say whether or not they’d seen him at the party?
‘I think we’d better hear now from Lord Jeremy Littlejohn,’ Dr Ryder said flatly.
Chapter 3
Probationary WPC Trudy Loveday stifled a yawn and got up from the uncomfortable chair she’d been sitting on for the past four hours. Her posterior felt rather numb, and she was glad to stretch her legs, but as she did so she glanced automatically at the poor man lying in the hospital bed in front of her. He didn’t stir. And from what she’d overheard of the doctors’ low-voiced consultations with one another earlier that morning, she rather feared he never would.
A car had mounted the pavement and hit Mr Michael Emerson in Little Clarendon Street late last night. The driver had failed to stop, and witnesses hadn’t been able to provide a decent description of the vehicle that had knocked him over, breaking his arm and fracturing his skull.
When she’d reported for duty at the station that morning, her superior officer, DI Harry Jennings, had assigned her to sit by his bedside in the event that he regained consciousness and began to speak.
But she hadn’t been at the Radcliffe Hospital (ironically, barely a stone’s throw from where the poor man had been run down) more than half an hour before she’d begun to suspect the futility of her task. Clearly none of the medical staff believed he would survive, and Trudy felt desperately sorry for the man’s wife, who was right now sleeping in the chair on the other side of his bed.
Careful not to wake her, Trudy put down her notebook and pen on the bedside table and walked stiffly to the window to look outside.
The hospital was a large and beautiful pale-stone building, rather Palladian in style, surrounding a central courtyard on three sides, with Cadwallader College on the right-hand side of it, and a stand of old cedars to the left. As she glanced out at the soot-blackened pub on the opposite side of Woodstock Road, she blinked a little in the bright sunlight.
It was another hot summer’s day and very warm in the ward, and underneath her black-and-white uniform she was uncomfortably aware that she was perspiring a little. At least she didn’t have to wear her policewoman’s hat indoors, but her long, curly, dark-brown hair was twisted into a neat, tight knot on top of her head, and her scalp felt distinctly damp and itchy.
The window was open, though, allowing a scant breeze to come in, and she supposed she should be glad it wasn’t winter, when the air would be thick with smoke from all the chimneys. But even as she watched, an old Foden lorry trundled past, adding its bit of pollution to the grime that seemed to coat the beautiful city of dreaming spires and left everything looking and feeling slightly grubby.
She was just contemplating returning to her uncomfortable chair when she heard the soft slap-slap of the flat shoes all the nurses wore. She turned around, expecting to see a nursing sister taking her patient’s vital signs.
Instead, a young nurse she hadn’t seen before was beckoning her over. ‘There’s a telephone call for you. You can take it at the desk,’ she informed her quietly.
‘Oh, thank you,’ Trudy said.
She smiled an apology at Mrs Emerson, who had awoken at the sound of voices, but the poor woman barely noticed as she once again fixed her gaze intently on her husband. She’d learned from a hurried conversation with the matron that the couple had been married for nearly twenty-five years and had three grown-up children, and Trudy simply couldn’t imagine how she must be feeling.
Feeling depressed, she followed the briskly trotting nurse to the desk in the centre of the ward, where a tight-faced sister handed her the receiver before bustling away. Clearly, she was of the opinion that she had better things to do with her time than act as secretary to a lowly policewoman, and Trudy didn’t really blame her.
‘Hello, WPC Loveday,’ she said smartly.
‘Constable. Get back to the station sharpish, please. I have another assignment for you.’ She recognised DI Jennings’s voice at once, and automatically stiffened to attention.
‘Yes, sir,’ she said. But already she could hear the dialling tone in her ear.
She trotted back to Mr Emerson’s bedside and stowed her accoutrements neatly away in her police-issue satchel, only stopping at the nurses’ desk on her way past to ask someone to send word to the local police station should their patient say anything.
Then she jogged outside, where she collected her bicycle, mounted it and began to pedal fast towards St Aldate’s. Luckily it wasn’t far and wouldn’t take her long. She knew how DI Jennings felt about being kept waiting.
As she pedalled, careful to dodge the many other cyclists thronging St Giles, she wondered why she’d been called off her duty at the hospital so soon.
At nearly twenty years of age, she was an intelligent young woman, and had quickly realised DI Jennings wasn’t at all happy at having one of only a few women PCs assigned to his station. Trudy had quickly become resigned to being given the dregs of police work, keeping her clear of his eyeline and out from under his feet. Thus, she had gloomily been expecting to stay at the hospital for days, hugging her notebook and pen in case of the odd mumbled word, and fighting off boredom and pity in equal measure.
So what on earth could the sudden summons back to the station be all about? She hoped, glumly, that she hadn’t done something wrong that she was about to be hauled over the coals for. Any minor misdemeanour of hers was always noted and sarcastically commented on, whereas if PC Rodney Broadstairs, the station house’s blue-eyed boy, made the same errors, nobody said a word.
When she got to the station, there was nobody about to give her any clue as to what was in the wind, although Walter Swinburne, the oldest PC at the station, gave her an encouraging smile as she passed his desk.
But the moment she tapped on her DI’s door, waiting for his summons before entering the office, her gloom lifted like magic. For there, sitting in the chair in front of DI Jennings’s desk and scowling ferociously at him, was Dr Clement Ryder.
And probationary WPC Trudy Loveday was probably the only copper in the city who was ever glad to see him!
DI Jennings watched her come in, noting her flushed cheeks and damp hair – no doubt the girl was feeling the heat and the bike ride had winded her. He bit back a sigh of impatience and the retort that rose to his lips that a man would have been able to take such physical exertion in his stride. And if the picture of some rather overweight male constables flashed through his mind to give lie to this thought, he firmly suppressed them.
Instead, he sighed heavily and indicated the chair next to his unwanted visitor. ‘Take a seat, Constable Loveday,’ he said flatly.
‘Thank you, sir,’ Trudy said smartly, and sat upright on the edge of the chair indicated.
‘Hello, Constable Loveday,’ Clement Ryder said, turning to her and thinking how charming she looked today. A little dishevelled, perhaps, but her dark-brown eyes were dancing with curiosity and interest. Just as he remembered them.
‘Dr Ryder,’ she said calmly, displaying none of her happiness to see him. This took some effort on her part because she’d already guessed that he’d come into her life to rescue her from the humdrum routine of her usual working days. Just like the last time she’d seen him, when he’d asked for her help on another case. A case, she was very happy to remember, that they’d solved between them.
Harry Jennings sat up a bit straighter in his chair. ‘Dr Ryder was just telling me all about the Chadworth case, Constable. Are you familiar with it?’
‘No, sir,’ Trudy admitted, and promptly wondered if she would be in the doghouse for not knowing. Was it something she should have been studying?
Harry Jennings shrugged his shoulders. ‘No reason why you should be, I suppose,’ he admitted, a shade reluctantly. ‘You weren’t called out to take a part in it, as I recall. Perhaps Dr Ryder can give you a brief summary,’ he added, thin lips twitching slightly. He’d already had his ear bent for the past quarter of an hour on the subject and didn’t feel inclined to repeat it.
‘Derek Chadworth, a law student, found dead in the river last week,’ Clement obliged him succinctly.
‘Oh, yes. I know the case,’ Trudy said at once, and with some relief. She hated looking ignorant in front of the coroner. As her DI had said, it wasn’t her case, but she had overheard some of her colleagues talking about it in the outer office. ‘He was one of the drunken students on the punts that overturned, wasn’t he? Death by accidental drowning?’
‘That’s what we all thought the verdict would be.’ DI Jennings couldn’t help but interrupt, his voice sardonic in the extreme now. ‘However, it seems the… jury—’ and here he laid a rather pointed emphasis on the last word ‘—in their undoubted wisdom, chose to bring back an open verdict instead.’
The coroner’s lips twitched slightly. Trudy caught the tension in the room and forced back a smile. If it came to a battle of wills or wits between these two men, she knew who the winner would be.
‘And as I was just telling the Inspector here,’ Clement Ryder slipped in smoothly, with an expression as innocent as a newborn babe’s, ‘an open verdict requires a little more investigation.’
DI Jennings sighed heavily. ‘And as I was telling him,’ he said through teeth that, if not exactly gritted, seemed inclined to stick firmly together, ‘it’s a verdict that will have caused upset to many families.’
‘The dead boy’s, you mean, sir?’ Trudy said, a little puzzled. Only to swallow hard as the DI shot her a furious look.
‘Not just the deceased parents, Loveday,’ he snapped. ‘Although, naturally, they can’t have been very happy with such a—’ and here he shot the bland-faced coroner a telling look ‘—meaningless verdict. I was also thinking of the parents of all the other students present on that tragic day.’
‘Most of whom are ladies and gentlemen of distinction and means, naturally,’ Clement put in, shooting Trudy a twinkle-eyed look.
‘Be that as it may,’ Jennings snarled, ‘you can see their point of view! Nobody wants their son or daughter to have to deal with such a tragic turn of events on what should have been a day of celebration. Having a friend die young can be a very traumatic event in any circumstances. But to have that tragedy drawn out even further by a coroner’s jury leaving matters so up in the air… and with nobody quite knowing what to make of it… well!’
He threw his hands out in a gesture of annoyance. ‘Naturally, people want answers and to be able to decently draw a line under things. And a verdict of accidental death, or even death by misadventure, would have allowed them to do just that.’ He took a deep, steadying breath. ‘The Chief Superintendent is of the opinion that the case should be allowed to quietly settle down, allowing the boy’s parents to bury him and grieve in peace. And for all the other young men and women involved to get on with their lives.’
Dr Ryder slowly swung one leg over his knee and regarded his ankle socks thoughtfully. He had, of course, as DI Jennings had surmised only too accurately, influenced – some might even have said instigated – the verdict that had been handed down.
It had been quite easy for a man like Clement Ryder to arrange, naturally. He’d merely had to fix the foreman of the jury with a gimlet eye as he took them through a summary of the evidence, and stress certain facts. For instance, when telling them that ‘if, on consideration, you feel that some questions remain unanswered to your satisfaction, then it is only right and proper that you return an open verdict’. And, ‘if you feel that you are not sure exactly how Mr Chadworth came to drown on that day last week, then you mustn’t allow yourself to guess, or be swayed by any one theory’. This last had been directed at the WI matrons, who’d taken the hint all right.
Oh, no. He hadn’t wanted a cut and dried verdict, but one that would give him time to get to the bottom of what had really been happening in his court, and an open verdict was the only one that would allow him to do so.
Now he smiled benignly at the irate Inspector and spread his hands in a gesture of appeasement. ‘Of course, it’s an intolerable situation for everyone,’ he surprised Jennings by admitting. ‘Which is why the case needs investigating a little further,’ he reiterated.
‘As if we don’t have enough on our plates as it is,’ the Inspector grumbled. ‘We had a hit and run last night, and we’ve still got that Sussinghurst case dragging on…’
‘I’m sure you’re very busy, Inspector,’ Clement interrupted smoothly. ‘Which is why I’ve asked you to spare just a solitary and humble PC to help me do a little more digging.’
As he spoke, he saw Trudy Loveday’s face begin to glow with pleasure as she realised that her hopes about the reason for this call to the DI’s office were well-founded. For, once before, the coroner had come to the station to ask for a police officer to help him with a case, and the DI had assigned him Trudy.
And that time, between them, they’d managed to catch a murderer!
Of course, there was little likelihood of that happening again, Trudy knew, but even so! It beat sitting about in a stuffy hospital for hours on end, either waiting for her patient to say something meaningful, or for the poor man to pass away.
Jennings, suddenly tired of being the old so-and-so’s cat’s paw, shook his head and, like Pontius Pilate, seemingly washed his hands of the whole affair.
‘Haven’t I said you can have WPC Loveday for a few days?’ he said testily. ‘And may I remind you, only for a few days! I can’t spare her for long, haring about on some open-and-shut case, just because you’ve a bee in your bonnet about some students being less than candid!’
‘Thank you, Inspector. I’ll be sure to thank the Chief Constable for your forbearance when next I see him at the club,’ Clement said, smiling affably as he rose from his chair.
At this parting shot, Jennings flushed mightily. He rather suspected that ‘the club’ the coroner was referring to had something to do with the Masons – an institution he was determined to join just as soon as it could be arranged.
Any ambitious officer needed to be a member of that club all right, and this timely reminder that it didn’t do to get on the influential Dr Ryder’s bad side had him backing off rapidly, albeit with little grace.
‘Yes, well, thank you, Dr Ryder,’ Jennings muttered. Then, as the medical man began to make for the door, Jennings, too, rose from his seat. ‘I’ll just have a few words with my officer, sir, before you go,’ he added quietly.
‘Righty-oh,’ Clement said cheerfully, opening the door and passing through it without shutting it behind him. Trudy, seeing the look on the Inspector’s face, hastily rectified that and then returned to stand meekly before his desk.
But her heart was racing. She was going to work with Dr Ryder again! She was actually going to watch and listen and be taught things, instead of being given paperwork and ignored. She could have sung with happiness.
‘Right then, Constable,’ Jennings said heavily. ‘You know the drill – same as last time. Just keep the old man happy, and report back to me every day. I want to know everything that man is up to. Understood?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Trudy said. She knew Dr Ryder was too clever a man not to know she would be forced to do this, so didn’t feel at all treacherous in agreeing to the orders.
‘Try and rein him back from any real excesses. And watch you don’t go about upsetting any VIPs,’ he added, all but wagging a finger at her. ‘Most of the parents of the young people at that picnic party are members of the aristocracy, or the new money set. And if you go about upsetting them, they’ll get on to the top brass, and the top brass will have me roasted. And I won’t stand for that! Understood?’
At this, Trudy gulped. She wasn’t quite sure just how she was supposed to go about stopping Dr Ryder when he wanted something, and when he could be, well, perhaps a little straightforward in his speech and manner.
Seeing her hesitation, and guessing the reason for it, DI Jennings sighed heavily. Even he had to concede that it was hardly fair to ask a young girl of nineteen to handle someone like Ryder. Someone who could blister the paintwork with just a look or an acid phrase, and had been known to best the sharpest of QCs and any number of other dignitaries. ‘Oh, just do your best, Constable,’ he finished wearily.
‘Yes, sir,’ Trudy said, and, with a feeling of infinite relief, quickly left the Inspector’s office.
Once outside the station, it was just a short walk to Dr Ryder’s office in the coroner’s court and mortuary complex in Floyds Row. His secretary, recognising her from their first case six months before, smiled at her as Clement strode in, ordering ‘tea and cake, and plenty of it’ as he swept past her.
The older woman shook her head and sighed at his cavalier manner. But Trudy noticed she was smiling.
A few minutes later, Clement Ryder was eating a slice of angel cake and watching his young protégé thoughtfully as she read through the court documents on the seemingly unremarkable case of the drowned law student. He was curious to see what she made of them.
On their last case he’d come to acquire a great deal of respect for this young woman’s intelligence and backbone. She was still very green, of course, but she had plenty of potential, if steered right. Which was why, of course, he’d made damned sure Jennings assigned her to him again. Of course it helped that the buffoon of an inspector totally underestimated the girl’s qualities. Given the proper mentoring by her older and more experienced colleagues, she could really shine. Not that that was likely to happen, he thought, a shade gloomily.
Still, he’d do all he could to help her hone some skills while she was helping him get to the bottom of his latest project.
It took her half an hour to read every scrap of paper in the file, and when she’d finished she leaned back in the chair, a slight frown pulling her fine, dark brows together over her dark, pansy-brown eyes.
‘Well?’ he asked sharply.
‘On the face of it, sir, it looks rather straightforward, doesn’t it? There was a large party of drunken students, and two very overcrowded punts. There was a collision with a third punt and, as a result, a lot of people were pitched into the river. It’s quite possible Derek either couldn’t get to the surface quickly enough, or perhaps got trampled underneath someone else’s feet, expelling all the air from his lungs before he knew what was happening.’
‘Oh, yes. All of that is possible.’ The coroner surprised her slightly by agreeing at once. ‘Mind you, I still think it rather odd that nobody saw him getting into difficulties. There were at least twenty or more students in the water.’
‘Who would have been looking to save themselves, most likely,’ Trudy put in.
‘Oh, almost certainly.’
‘Perhaps he couldn’t get to the surface because of the sheer weight of numbers? Who knows, maybe somebody flailing about actually stood on him?’
‘Again, perhaps. But supposing any of that happened, with so many eyes actually in the water, and so many eyes on the bank watching it all happen, is it very likely that nobody saw the body rise to the surface at some point and float away?’
‘Perhaps it didn’t rise to the surface?’ She played devil’s advocate automatically.
‘Most bodies do,’ the coroner said, then shrugged. ‘Then again, who’s to say? Perhaps they did see a body float away but agreed among themselves to keep quiet about it.’
‘That’s rather far-fetched, isn’t it?’ Trudy said doubtfully. ‘Why would they do that?’
The coroner shrugged. ‘Who’s to say? The thing is, the reason you have an inquest in the first place is to tackle issues like the hows and whys.’
‘So you’re not convinced the court did get to the bottom of what really happened?’ she asked slowly. She’d learned a lot from her last encounter with this sometimes difficult, but always brilliant, man. And if he thought something was ‘off’, she wasn’t going to gainsay him out of hand.
