Episde 30 -Ends and Beginnings

Gary had got a lift back to Dorothy’s in a patrol car and spent most of the night smarting about the meeting. Dorothy went to bed and slept soundly.

Gary left for HQ very early without a hot breakfast, which he refused saying that Dorothy had done enough for him already.

Cleo phoned Dorothy to thank her again for her presence of mind and arrange the time to drive to HQ. She was worried about Gary, but Dorothy snapped that he had had it coming for not being upright.

To give him credit, Gary was pleased to see them and hugged them both warmly when they arrived to make their statements just before ten. Well maybe he hugged Cleo very warmly indeed. Nigel was to deal with the statements since Gary would also have to give one. It was a strange situation.

Eventually all their statements were signed and sealed. Nigel had been amused by Dorothy’s initiative and disgusted that Gary had not really understood what was going on. Bad enough, that he had taken days off. Worse still that he now seemed to doubt Roger Stone, too. Gary’s judgment of women was abysmal, Nigel decided.

“Dorothy, we should have a special little talk," Gary was now saying in an officious tone of voice.

"Should we?"

"Yes. That revolver of yours. I'm not sure you should be carrying it around."

"It's all above board, Gary. I've brought the license for you to see in case you didn’t believe me when I told you," she said, handing him a document. “This morning I've left the revolver at home – under the lining of the washing basket, where it usually lives."

"You know we don't go around armed here," he told her.

“Then it’s a damn good job I am not a cop,” she spat. “You should be thanking me again, not ranting on about gun licenses.”

“That’s true, Gary. Dorothy is not bound by unreasonable rules. If Dorothy had not been armed – and there was no law against you bringing a gun to a shady meeting at a bistro - where would we all be now? Queuing up at the pearly gates?"

Nigel was astonished that Cleo could launch such a furious attack on someone she loved.

“Just get a life, Gary. You know Dorothy was out investigating last night."

"Trespassing," Gary corrected.

"Visiting," said Dorothy.

"With a loaded gun?"

"In my rucksack! The extra bullets were separate. Better safe than sorry."

"You weren't safe, Dorothy. You couldn't get at it," Cleo pointed out.

"I wouldn't have shot anyone," retorted Dorothy.

"Well, don't do it again," said Gary.

"I've never shot anyone, Gary, though I did have a go at some pigeons once. And clay pigeon shooting is great fun."

“Stick to pigeons in future, Dorothy,” said Gary.

“Only if nobody is pointing a gun at me, Gary,” Dorothy retorted. “Don't you even want to know what Mr Kelly said?"

Cleo and Gary exchanged glances. Dorothy hadn't told Cleo anything either. Nigel looked on in amazement. Dorothy seemed to be in charge.

***

"Go ahead," said Gary meekly.

"Roger Stone went to Magda Kelly."

"Did he now?"

"And Hatherton was a regular."

"Well, well."

"And the man in a coma was also a regular client of Magda's."

"A client?"

"He’s actually just someone looking for human kindness."

"Aren't we all!" Cleo could not resist commenting.

Nigel had gone to his corner table and was now taking notes as if he were witnessing a criminal questioning. The situation seemed to warrant it.

“There’s more,” said Dorothy. “Mr Kelly swore he didn't kill Magda, and I believe him. I've given it a lot of thought since then."

"I'm surprised you had time to, Dorothy," said Gary.

Dorothy ignored the sarcasm

“I was cooking the breakfast you did not eat, Gary.”

“Go on, Dorothy,” said Cleo.

"If Mrs Stone killed Shirley because she was jealous, she might have killed Burton, too, but did she?"

"I don’t quite get the argument," said Gary.

"I mean, if Mrs Stone was being blackmailed by Burton about meeting Hatherton, that would be a strong motive, wouldn't it?"

"But that wouldn't be jealousy, Dorothy," said Cleo.

"Something just as deadly."

"So you are sure that Mrs Stone's activities before Burton's murder should be looked into, aren’t you?" said Cleo.

“Unless she has already confessed,” said Dorothy. “Has she confessed, Gary? If she hasn’t, I expect her pistol will tell all.”

***

Not waiting for Gary’s answer, Dorothy argued that Mrs Temple would then only have committed two murders, not three. Was that the case?

"Even one homicide is one too many, Ladies," said Gary.

Dorothy Price was starting to get on his nerves.

"Assuming Stone was a client of Magda's, Mrs Stone's motive for killing Magda would be jealousy, wouldn't it?"

"So you think Mrs Stone could be responsible for all three killings?"

"It's possible."

"But she wasn't," said Gary. “Magda really was killed in that car accident.”

***

“But you have not told us everything, have you, Gary?" said Dorothy. "After all, Mrs Stone could have added another half a dozen to the total last night."

***

Gary winced at that rebuke from Dorothy. He decided to go on the offensive. Nigel could hardly believe the dialogue he was recording.

***

"OK. I’ve told you and will tell you again: The brakes were manipulated on Kelly's car and we've caught the gang who did it."

“Really? When, Gary? Is that one of the ways you keep a step ahead of the Hartley Agency?” said Cleo, and Gary looked shattered.

"So the rowdies are guilty. That doesn't take into account that Mrs Stone could have hired them," said Dorothy.

“For that she would have to have known where the car was parked, Dorothy.” said Gary. 

“Maybe she did, if she knew they were at HQ and she also knew the car's number plate.”

Gary was as annoyed with Dorothy as she was with him. Why was she such a clever clogs, he mused.

"Why would she know that, Dorothy?” he said. “You can't make up a crime to fit in with the spurious information Mrs Stone probably didn't have."

"If she knew about Magda, she would have known which was the Kellys' car," argued Dorothy, who was not going to give in lightly.

"Remember, Gary that last night Mrs Stone could have added another half a dozen to the total of murders she had committed., and we don’t know what she was doing at the bistro in the first place.”

“That’s brilliant, Dorothy. How did she know?”

Let's move on, Dorothy," said Gary.  “Delilah can probably tell us that Elinor was meeting someone. Or she had been to the Wellness Centre and dropped in for a drink.”

“They have enough drink at the Wellness bar, Gary,” said Cleo.

"What about Patrick Kelly. Dorothy?  You seem to know the man intimately. How many motives does he have?" said Gary.

Gary was egging Dorothy on. Cleo wondered if she should intervene.

 “I am not an intimate friend of Kelly,” said Dorothy. “He would not be my type even if I were half a century younger. Maybe you need to make a list of everyone's motives.”

"Give me a week or two," he said, wishing they would go away and leave him wallow in his failure to take the necessary steps that might at least have saved Shirley's life.

He told Cleo and Dorothy that he would do nothing until he had all the forensic reports.

***

Cleo decided that an affair with Gary was more than she could take at the moment. He was really intransigent. It was time to end the mess of having a deceitful lover and a disobliging colleague.

***

A week or so later and at Gary's request he and Colin were to meet Cleo at her office. Cleo had been wondering how long it would take for Gary to materialize. She had no intention of phoning him. She phoned Dorothy and asked her to be at the meeting.

"I think he has burnout, Cleo," Dorothy had told Cleo. "I've been reading about it on the internet. He has all the symptoms."

"Why Dorothy, is that another hunch, or are you serious?"

"I'm, serious.”

“He might just have been waiting for the forensic evidence, of course. He hasn’t been in touch all week.”

“I thought he loved you, Cleo,” said Dorothy.

“I wonder,” said Cleo. “Some affairs are only physical.” 

“I see it this way, Cleo. Think it was good while it lasted.”

“I didn’t know you knew, Dorothy.”

“It was easy to guess, Cleo, but I can understand that that scene at the bistro had a negative effect on any kind of relationship you had entered into. He’s been a rotten colleague, Cleo.”

***

"Why here, Gary?" Cleo asked. "Your office is more convenient for you."

"I've quit my job at Headquarters," Gary told her.

"You've done what?"

"Quit my job. Stress. Failure. Cowardice. Those are the three words that come to mind."

"But isn't that the wrong way to deal with negative feelings?”

"No, Cleo. I am a failed cop, that’s the full truth."

“Don't be ridiculous," said Dorothy. Where have you been sleeping, Gary? Your stuff is still at my cottage.”

“In a hotel, Dorothy. I have stuff in the cellar my flat and I bought anything else I needed.”

“OK, but I would not have bitten your head off, Gary. We still love you, even if you did not play the game with us,” said Dorothy.

"It was an intolerable situation, Ladies. I came under pressure from Stone to instigate a cover-up and I refused. He told me my job was at stake if I didn't and I told him where to put it. Then he softened and told me to come back in 6 months and see how I felt."

"That was a fair offer, considering what he must be going through,” said Cleo. “But wasn’t resigning a bit too drastic? I mean, the ends in the Burton case haven't really been tied up yet."

"Time's up for me, whatever happens, Cleo." "And I was not even going to tell you. I thought I would keep that little triumph up my sleeve."

"Throwing in the sponge is not a triumph," said Dorothy.

“The Burton case is solved more or less how Dorothy thought it would be,” said Gary. “I was desperate to show I could deliver the goods to Stone ,and I didn't.”

“The Hartley Agency only helped you, Gary. We did not take over your job,” said Cleo.

“For the record, Magda's death really was an accident. The lads who fixed her car and several others admitted their guilt. There’s plenty of forensic evidence to confirm that. We arrested them a second time when they were fiddling with someone’s car. They were doing it for kicks, they said, but that was not quite the truth, we discovered."

“But you let them go after the first arrest, Gary,” said Cleo. “That should have been a warning.”

“I had to. Pressure from the top and the evidence was scanty. No one had seen them and they did not admit anything.”

“So that pressure was Stone and he knew that Mrs Stone had hired them. Stone should be resigning, not you.”

“There's still no proof that Mrs Stone hired them. Those lads are not talking,” said Gary.

“So that could mean that Stone knew about it and did nothing to stop it." said Cleo. "I can't believe he would want Magda dead."

Dorothy had not said a word, but now she had to.

"Perhaps his marriage has conditions tied to it," said Dorothy. "Financial, for instance if Mrs Stone is rich?”

"Is she rich, Gary?" Cleo asked.

"As a matter of fact, she is. I never thought of that. Perhaps they both wanted me out of the way, too."

“As a cover for what Mrs Stone had done?” said Cleo. “Do you have a persecution complex, Gary?”

"Probably."

"Let's just assume you are imagining things," said Cleo. “It’s irrelevant to the case if Mrs Stone committed those murders without Roger Stone’s knowledge or with.”

“Not stopping a crime happening is also a crime,” said Gary. "If Roger knew what was going on and ignored it, he's for the high-jump. But what the hell? I'm out of it now."

"So what's your next move?"

"I'm going it alone from now on, but I'll patch things up with Roger. He's a decent guy at heart."

"If you go solo, you'll be in competition with my agency," protested Cleo.

"No. I'll be a partner. I don't want to encroach on your pad, Cleo, but you have to admit that you need a heavy hand and better contacts for some tasks."

"That's true, but I have Colin for all that."

"Not much longer. He's decided to become a cop."

"Talk of the devil," exclaimed Cleo, as Colin came into the office. "Are you really going to train to be a cop?"

"Yes, Cleo. I want to get on the inside of police work. I came here to tell you that, but Gary has already done so."

"Aren't you too old?"

"No. I just about qualify."

"And what about Julie?"

Silence fell. Cleo thought of the few meetings between Gary and Julie and how they had seemed a little too familiar with one another.

"I realised at the pub that evening that it was time to move on," said Colin. "And I have a private rival," said Colin, looking pointedly at Gary. "I'm leaving at the weekend. I'm joining the Metropolitan Police in London."

"Does Julie know?"

"Yes."

"And Robert?"

"I think Julie's telling him now."

“I’m moving on, too,” said Gary.

***

Cleo had to ask herself what it might mean to Gary to go back on all they had promised to one another. But she had also been thinking along those lines. What a mess. Cleo wondered why she had disregarded the signs of a romance between Julie and Gary, and why she was now upset at the idea. When they were getting fresh coffee in the utility room, Cleo asked Gary about Julie.

"My marriage was over ages ago. It just needs the full-stop behind it, and you won’t help me, Cleo. Every other woman is a substitute.”

“Don’t talk like that, Gary.”

“Will you marry me, Cleo?”

“I’m engaged to Robert and that’s the way it’s staying, Gary.”

“I'll wait my turn,” he said.

"Is that why you took that weekend off?"

"I needed to think."

"You could have talked to me," said Cleo. "Talking helps."

“I can’t talk to you, Cleo, except about work, and I’m even reticent about that. My feelings for you get in the way and I'm hanged if I'm going to expose myself to any more rejections.”

Cleo and Gary carried the coffee back into the office. Dorothy raised an eyebrow. Cleo shook her head. Gary looked out of the window onto the yard below.

***

"Let's just get up to date about Burton and Shirley," said Colin. "All this personal stuff is irrelevant right now, and the coffee pot is empty again now I've poured myself a second pot."

Colin went into utility room to replenish the supply.

Gary followed him. It was clear that he did not want to show weakness to Colin. What Gary really wanted was for them all go away and leave him wallow in his failure to take the necessary steps that might have saved Shirley's life.

Colin brought in a new jug of coffee and Gary followed him back.

"What about all that foreign Office stuff, Gary?" said Cleo. "We haven't discussed that at all"

"There's nothing to discuss. All that cloak and dagger stuff is top secret.”

"Would Stone or Hatherton admit anything?"

"I doubt it. One of the rules of spying is that no one knows about it," said Gary.

"So all that talk about working for the Home Office was not necessarily only speculation, Gary."

"That's about the size of it."

"What about Burton?"

"Mrs Stone confessed to shooting him when Greg challenged her about the ballistic evidence. It was Roger Stone's private gun. Greg think she was planning to frame him for Burton's killing.”

"Has Greg taken over your job?” Cleo asked.

“He will,” said Gary.

“So why does he think Elinor wanted to frame Roger?”

“Her affair with Hatherton, for which Burton was blackmailing her, just as Dorothy suggested."

“But didn’t Stone notice his gun was missing?”

“I don't think he can have. He had left for a conference starting early next morning in Edinburgh. We checked his hotel. He propped up the bar for about 3 hours before staggering to bed. He was woken by the call service at half past seven."

"So Dorothy Price's theory was spot on," said Cleo. "It was blackmail. Burton had seen her not just with Hatherton, but with various men and threatened to go public.” 

"The only thing Dorothy did not think of was that Mrs Stone had also had sex with Burton. She could not have coped with front page headlines. She was anxious to stay respectable. And Burton might have had a photo or some other evidence of their affair. I expect she disposed of such evidence."

"When would she have done that?"

"She would have searched his corpse and found it. She did have an assignation with him on the common. It was not a coincidence that she went there."

"So she killed both Burton and Shirley."

"It was all right for her to have men on the side, but when Roger Stone started an affair with Shirley, she had to put a stop to it. Shirley was too young, too beautiful and too ambitious for respectable, corrupt and middle-aged Mrs Stone. Shirley had arranged a meeting with Roger for a while earlier and that was coded in the daily calendar next to the phone. Mrs Stone went there and saw them together. When Roger Stone had left, Mrs Stone emerged from hiding and shot her in the back."

“Simple when you know how,” said Dorothy.

"There is another version that seems even more likely," said Gary. "Shirley was to meet Mr Stone on the common when he was supposedly out of town. To achieve that, Mrs Stone had sent her an e-mail from Roger Stone's PC. Shirley had thought Stone would still be in Scotland, so she did not even bother to check the hotel there."

"So it was all quite simple, wasn't it, whichever story you believe," said Cleo. "Anything else the Hartley Agency should know, Gary?"

***

“Is that all then Gary?” Nigel asked.

“Talk to Greg. It’s his pad now,” said Gary. “I’m leaving.”

“What about the Hartley Agency?” said Dorothy.

“Ask Cleo. That’s her pad,” said Gary, and left.

***

The meeting ended and Cleo sat for the rest of the day waiting for Gary to return, or at least phone her. But he didn’t.

Robert asked her what had happened later that evening.

“My great lover has quit,” she told him.

“I knew he would,” said Robert. “What a good job you have me – and the agency of course.”

“Will you marry me, Robert?” she said.

“I didn’t think you would want to. After all ….”

“I got divorce papers to sign today, Robert. Jay wants a divorce.”

“That’s rich, coming from him,” said Robert.

“It’s his way of apologizing for the misery I went through thanks to him.”

“That makes him preferable to your pet cop, Cleo.”

“Oh, him,” said Cleo, and almost meant it.