The Inspector Walter Darriteau Murder Mysteries - Books 1-4, David Carter [diy ebook reader .txt] 📗

‘If they were sitting down having dinner how do you know he was six foot tall?’ asked Walter.

‘Because when they had finished the meal they got up and walked out. She linked his arm and he seemed happy enough with that too, not awkward at all. He was a six footer all right, maybe slightly more, I’m not pulling your plonker, if that’s what you think.’

‘We don’t think that,’ assured Walter.

‘Anything else?’ asked Karen.

‘Like what?’

‘Do you know where he worked? Do you know where he lived?’ asked Walter.

‘Nope and nope. Though I think he worked here in Chester, though I don’t know why I think that, just do.’

‘And she never said his name? In all your chats?’

Janice shook her head, but then smiled broadly.

‘Mirror! That’s what she said his name was, only the once, I remember now. She said his name was Mirror, and she could see her own fate in it, the mirror like, I’d forgotten all about that, strange really.’

‘Mirror?’ queried Karen, spelling it out. ‘M-I-R-R-O-R?’

Janice nodded firmly. ‘That’s what she said, deffo.’

‘How often did she see him?’ asked Walter.

‘No idea, but a lot, and he paid her well too, I told you that, so she said, but he didn’t like her seeing other men, I know that much, but she could never stop doing that.’

‘Was there anyone else specific besides this Mirror character?’ asked Walter.

‘Loads of others, lots of weirdo’s too, I mean dozens, but not another one who sticks out. Not like him.’

‘You’ve been very helpful,’ said Walter.

‘I hope I have.’

‘If you think of anything else, no matter how tiny or insubstantial it might seem to you, will you give me another call?’

‘Course I will. Can I call you Walter?’

‘Course you can,’ said Walter, and he smiled his best friendly uncle smile and hoped that it didn’t come out too creepy.

Chantelle came back into the room and grinned.

Pound to a penny she’d been listening at the door.

‘Your sister’s been very helpful,’ said Walter.

‘That’s good,’ she said, nodding and sitting down.

Walter asked, ‘Did Ellie ever mention a girl called Tracey Day?’

‘Not a name I know of. Why?’

‘No reason, just another name that’s cropped up in our inquiry.’

‘You didn’t ever meet any of these guys, did you?’ asked Karen.

‘Course not! What do you take me for? Got more sense than to get mixed up in all that!’

‘Sure, course you have,’ said Walter.

‘You collect glass paperweights?’ said Karen, nodding at a display case full of round glass paperweights, turquoise, green and blue, that was pushed in against the far wall.

‘Yeah,’ said Chantelle, chuffed that the coppers had noticed her prized collection. ‘Always loved them, and do you know what they are really good for?’

‘What?’ said Karen and Walter, as one.

‘Hurling at burglars! Stop ’em stone dead, they would,’ and both the sisters laughed together.

Walter and Karen grinned and stood up, and the girls stood too, and the toddler started crying, and Chantelle let slip the F word.

‘Will you call me? If there’s any news?’ asked Janice.

‘Sure,’ said Walter. ‘And you’ll call me if anything else turns up here.’

Janice grinned and nodded and went to the radio and turned it back on.

Dee-Bee-Cee! The Continuing Sound of Free Radio.

It was time to go, Janice opened the front door, and a second later the coppers were through it and out of there and gone.

Fifteen 

Everyone was back in the office by half past three, as the update briefing got under way. Mrs West kicked things off by saying, ‘Are we making any progress here, or are we wasting our time?’ Which seemed an odd thing to say to most of her captive audience, though no doubt she was under pressure again on costing and time management issues, and the like.

‘We have a new lead, ma’am,’ said Walter.

‘Go on.’

‘Ellie Wright’s best friend, maybe her only friend, is a girl called Janice Jefferson. Janice told us that Ellie was real frightened of one particular client. He’s reported to be some kind of foreign banker, or a banker with a foreign accent, and we have a good description because Janice saw the man. He’s six footish, IC1, clean cut, dark hair and eyes, and speaks good English with a foreign, possibly eastern European, maybe Bulgarian, Romanian accent, that sort of thing.’

‘Do we have a name for this guy?’

‘Janice said his name was Mirror.’

‘Mirror, as in looking glass?’

‘That’s what Janice said.’

‘Odd name.’

‘It is, ma’am, and it’s not a name listed in any names directory. Jenny, I want you to ring round all the local banking institutions and ask if they have anyone of that name.’

Jenny nodded and said, ‘Sure, Guv. Is that a Christian name or surname?’

‘Could be either.’

‘What about getting this Janice girl in to compile a photofit?’ suggested Mrs West.

‘If you think it’s worthwhile,’ said Walter.

‘While we are spending so much time on this we might as well have something to show for it.’

Walter nodded and said he’d organise it.

‘What happened to the names Hector threw in the ring?’ asked Mrs West, sniffling into a neat hankie.

‘We went to see Crocker,’ said Gibbons. ‘Heck and me. Crocker has an alibi for Friday night, his huge mother, she said he was in the house all night, but I’d say that’s about as reliable as rice paper in a storm. He denied ever knowing Ellie, denied ever visiting any girl in a caravan down by the river. We took a sample of mud from the tyres of his mother’s car, he doesn’t have his own wheels, so he said, and that’s gone to the lab to see if it matches with the stuff at the foot of Marigold Lane.’

‘Good. What was your gut feeling?’ asked Walter.

‘I’d say he’s capable of it, there’s a temper on him, for sure, and violence in him too, we know that, but unless the mud comes back positive we have nothing to connect him with Ellie Wright at all.’

‘You agree, Hector?’

‘Yes, Guv, I didn’t like the guy one bit, but he didn’t give