On Deadly Tides Page 13

  “How is she?” Victoria asked as she dropped into the chair opposite Penny’s.

  “She’s resting now. Bethan delivered Jessica’s suitcase, and that really seemed to knock the stuffing out of her.”

  “I’m sure it must have been so distressing,” Victoria said, “seeing her daughter’s belongings.”

  “She didn’t actually open the suitcase when I was there. I’d say she’s holding up pretty well, considering, but it’s painful to see someone wrapped up in so much grief. I’ll never forget that whimpering sound she made on the beach where her daughter’s body was found. My heart is just breaking for her. And as if her grief weren’t enough, she has a lot of questions about how Jessica died. The police version doesn’t make any sense to her, and I agree with her. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, either. There are just so many gaps and unanswered questions.”

  “Well, I hope you’re not encouraging her, Penny. That wouldn’t be doing her any favours. The police investigated; they probably took measurements and checked tide tables or whatever it is they do, and their version of what happened is more than likely what did happen.”

  “But she’s got all these doubts about what the police are telling her. She knows her daughter better than anyone, and what she’s been told doesn’t sound like something Jessica would do. People tend to behave in a certain way. They’re predictable.”

  She blew out a long exhale. “And then there’s the backpack.”

  “What backpack?”

  “Jessica’s.”

  “What about it?”

  “What happened to it, that is the question.”

  “Does it really matter?”

  “Of course it matters! Unless we find out what happened to the backpack, despite what the police think, I’m convinced that someone will get away with murder.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Oh God,” said Penny before Victoria could reply. “That’s all we need.”

  “What? What is it?”

  “Brace yourself. He’s seen us and he’s coming over.”

  Victoria turned around slowly to see Bill Ward, plaid shirt, fisherman’s vest, green trousers and all, lumbering toward them.

  “That’s him? Mr. Let’s Have Lunch and See Where It Leads?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “‘Oh God’ is right.” The corners of her mouth started to twitch, and Penny glared at her. “Don’t. If you start, I’ll …” But it was too late, and a loud burst of laughter erupted from both of them.

  Penny managed to get her laughter under control just as Bill reached them, but the moment of merriment had left her face creased with a broad smile.

  Interpreting that as delight at seeing him again, Ward returned the smile. “Hello, Penny. Back again, are you? Nice to see you.”

  “And you.” She introduced him to Victoria, who met his eyes when she said hello, but avoided looking at Penny.

  “And how is the art world treating you, Penny?” Ward asked.

  “Oh, not too badly. Haven’t had any time for painting since your weekend retreat, but I’m looking forward to putting what I learned into my next painting. I’ve got a few ideas for what I’d like to do next.”

  “She’s been offered a spot to exhibit her paintings in a Christmas art show,” Victoria chimed in.

  “Oh, how exciting. Which gallery?”

  “Oh, just a small gallery near us,” said Penny before Victoria could reply. “Not a big one at all. Hardly even worth mentioning.” Victoria shot her a questioning look, and when her lips parted as if she were about to say something, Penny frowned and gave a slight shake of her head.

  Ward’s eyes narrowed as he watched the exchange.

  Finally, after a few minutes of stilted conversation, Ward checked his pretentiously large wristwatch, designed for tracking the kind of vigorous outdoor sporting activities he rarely, if ever, engaged in. “I was just thinking about lunch. If you two ladies don’t have plans, I’d be happy if you would join me. My treat, of course.”

  “Oh, that would have been so nice, but unfortunately we were just saying it’s time we left for home,” said Penny, just a little too quickly.

  “Yes, we have errands to do on the way, so …” added Victoria.

  “Well, another time, perhaps,” said Ward.

  Victoria barked out a robust burst of laughter as soon as they were outside. “I can see why Bill Ward gives you the creeps. I almost lost it when he invited the two of us to lunch. I’m sure he was thinking, ‘And let’s see where this leads.’”

  “What a thought.”

  “But what was all that about, when you didn’t want him knowing about your paintings in the Christmas exhibit?” Victoria asked as they reached the car park.

  “It’s the gallery I didn’t want him knowing about. I didn’t have a chance to tell you, but his ex-wife, Cilla McKee, is the manager there, and I just thought it would be better if the gallery’s name didn’t come up. She’s really bitter toward him, and God knows what he thinks of her.”

  “Oh, I see. Or at least, I think I do. It would have been awkward.”

  “Yes, and for some reason, I didn’t want him to know that I know about his ex-wife,” said Penny.

  “Well, I don’t know that it really matters.” Victoria unlocked the car, and they opened their doors and climbed in.

  “But your mentioning the art show reminds me I need to pick up the paintings from the framer,” Penny said. “I can’t wait to see what they look like. Good frames always make such a difference.” As they pulled onto the main road that led to the bridge to the mainland, she added, as if to reassure herself, “I hope Louise is going to be all right. I’m worried about her, but she has my number if she needs me.”

  * * *

  A ringing or vibrating phone in the middle of the night is rarely a good thing. Penny groped for the mobile on her bedside table, not knowing what, or who, to expect. A vague thought flashed through her mind that it could be Colin ringing from Canada, where it was five or six hours behind the U.K., depending on what time zone he was in, but the number that glowed in the dark wasn’t his. Her phone didn’t recognize the number, and neither did she.

  She was about to ignore the call, when her instinct told her to answer it.

  “Hello?” After a pause came a torrent of slurred words.

  Oh, someone’s had too much to drink and dialed the wrong number, she thought, preparing to end the call. But just as she was about to take the phone away from her ear, she made out the word “help.” Or she thought that’s what she heard. She pressed the phone closer to her ear. “Hello?” she said again. “Do you need help? Who is this?”

  “Laaweeese.” The word was thick as if the speaker’s tongue were swollen and heavy.

  “Louise?” Penny, now wide awake, sat bolt upright. “Louise, is that you? What’s wrong?”

  When there was no response, Penny ended the call, called 999 and asked them to send police and ambulance to the Beaumaris Arms Hotel. She then called the hotel’s night number and let the night porter know that an ambulance was on the way and to please take the first responders immediately to the room of Louise Graham and be prepared to unlock the door. And then, with nothing more she could do, she settled down to wait.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Penny knew she’d have a difficult time getting back to sleep, and she did. But as the opening notes of the birds’ dawn chorus filtered through her open window, she fell into an uneasy sleep and dreamt she was being chased through the corridors of a hotel, and when she reached the safety of her room, it was filled with the people who had been chasing her. She woke with a start, and remembering the middle of the night phone call, got up, dressed, and went downstairs. It was 6 A.M.

  She put the kettle on, and just as she was about to pour the hot water into the cafetière, her phone rang. It was Bethan, who apologized for ringing so early but thought Penny might be up, and since she was, Bethan needed to speak to her in person. Penny added another sc
oop of coffee to the press, set out a second mug, and a few minutes later Bethan was in her sitting room, her hands wrapped around a welcome mug of coffee after a long night.

  “How is Louise?” Penny asked. “Is she in hospital?”

  Bethan nodded. “She’s receiving the best possible care, and the doctor I spoke to expects her to make a full recovery.”

  Penny let out a sigh of relief. “Oh, that’s good. I was so worried. As you can imagine, I had a sleepless night after that phone call. I could barely make out what she was saying. I thought it was a drunk with a wrong number. What on earth happened to her?”

  “It appears she took an overdose of sleeping tablets.”

  “Oh no. And then she changed her mind and called me to ask for help?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Wait a minute. You said ‘it appears.’ Either she did or she didn’t. Did she?”

  “Well, we found an empty bottle of sleeping tablets in the nightstand in her hotel room, and we checked with the prescribing physician in New Zealand. He said she asked for them just before her trip to the U.K., and he prescribed them. Said he could understand, what with the jet lag and the difficult circumstances surrounding her journey here, that she might need them. But he assured us he never would have given them to her if he thought there was the slightest chance she would use them to self-harm.” She took a sip of coffee. “Only …”

  “Only what?”

  “She insists she didn’t take one last night, let alone all of them. She said she was feeling so anxious and wound up the night she stayed with you that she took one then, and that was the only one she took.”

  “You hear sometimes of people taking a tablet, then when it doesn’t work they take another, and they end up with an accidental overdose. Could it have been something like that? I’m sure with the terrible stress she’s been under and the heightened grief of being so close to where her daughter died, and your giving her Jessica’s suitcase filled with personal belongings, that it’s understandable she could be a bit forgetful and anxious. But accidently taking a whole bottle doesn’t seem possible.”

  “There weren’t that many. This was just a short-term solution, and they were to be taken on an as-needed basis, to help her get through a difficult time. The doctor gave her only eight tablets, and she insisted the only one she took was the one on the night she stopped with you.”

  “So that would have left seven tablets.”

  “The doctor isn’t sure that would be enough to kill her, but it could have. If she’d gone to sleep, that amount could have been enough to depress her breathing function. Fortunately, she hadn’t had anything to drink, but if she had, the alcohol could have compounded the effect of the medication. So all in all, it’s a good thing she was able to ring you and that you responded so quickly and appropriately.”

  Penny examined the contents of the mug resting on her knee while she considered her response.

  “It looks to me as if someone’s afraid that Jessica’s mother is asking too many questions,” she said. “And they panicked.” She took a sip of coffee. “And what’s more, I think if Louise Graham hadn’t turned up, someone very likely would have got away with the murder of her daughter.”

  “I can’t think of a plausible reason why someone would want to hurt her, or silence her,” said Bethan. “But she wasn’t in a fit state to be formally interviewed when I looked in on her earlier. Anyway, she’s asking for you. You’re the only person she knows in this country, and if you’re available today, it would be good for her to have you there.”

  “Are you going back to Bangor to try to talk to her?”

  “No. I’d give you a ride if I were, but I’ve been up most of the night on another case as well as this one, and I’m going home to get a couple of hours sleep.”

  * * *

  Three hours later, Penny pulled back the privacy curtain that had been drawn around Louise Graham’s hospital bed. She was sitting up, eyes closed, the sheet drawn up to her chest, and her hands resting lightly by her side.

  “Louise, it’s me. Penny.” The patient’s eyes fluttered open, and her head turned toward Penny.

  “Oh, thank goodness it’s you.” She stretched out her hand, and Penny grasped it as she lowered herself into the visitor’s chair.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Still a bit woozy, if I’m honest.”

  “Are you up to talking? I was very concerned by the state of you on the phone call. I barely knew it was you.”

  “Thank God you did. Who knows what might have happened if you hadn’t?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know, Louise. Do you feel up to talking about it? Can you tell me what happened last evening?”

  “I’m not sure I know what happened, but I’ll try.” She closed her eyes as she gathered her thoughts. “Let’s see. Well, I didn’t feel like having dinner in the hotel restaurant. Too fancy, and besides, I wasn’t hungry. But I knew I should eat something, so I asked at the reception desk, and the receptionist said go out the front door, and there’s a small supermarket that does sandwiches and the like, so I went there. Walked around for a bit, then back to the hotel.”

  “Did you eat your sandwich in your room?”

  “No. I was going to, but there was an open place, like a square, with some benches across from the castle, so I ate it there and thought about Jessica.”

  Penny nodded, recognizing the description of the place where she and Colin had enjoyed their lunch of fish and chips. “And when you got back to your hotel room, did anything look disturbed?”

  “No, everything was exactly the way I’d left it.”

  “Okay, so then what did you do?”

  “I had a shower and watched a bit of the television. Then there was a knock at the door. For some reason, I thought maybe it might be you, so I opened it, but it was someone from the hotel with a tray. Hot chocolate and toast. I said I didn’t order that, and he said it was compliments of the manager. So I thanked him and realized that hot chocolate was exactly what I wanted. And the toast was good, too.”

  “Comfort food.”

  “Exactly. The toast was covered with one of those round silver things with a hole in the middle that you lift off. He set the tray down on the desk and told me to leave everything in the hallway when I was finished with it, so that’s what I did.”

  “And your sleeping tablets. Where did you keep them?”

  “In my sponge bag with my toiletries. The bag was in the bathroom.”

  “And were the sleeping tablets in your sponge bag when you had your shower?”

  Louise let out a small sigh. “Now that I can’t say. Unless you’re specifically looking for something, you don’t really take any notice, do you?”

  “The police say they found the empty sleeping tablets bottle in your bedside table.”

  “Well, I didn’t put it there.”

  “And you’re quite sure you didn’t take a sleeping tablet last night?”

  “I’m positive. The only time I took one was the night I stopped at yours. I told all this to the police.” She closed her eyes and her breathing slowed.

  “Are you all right, Louise?” Penny asked. “Should I leave you to rest now?”

  Her eyes fluttered open. “Yes, I’m all right. The police were here earlier, but they didn’t ask too many questions because I wasn’t alert enough to talk. They might have said they’d be back later. I told them I didn’t take the sleeping tablets, though.”

  “And when you were at the hotel, did you speak to anyone about Jessica? Did you ask questions about what she did or where she went?”

  “Of course I did. That was the whole point of being there. I spoke to the fellow in the bar, and he told me he’d seen her talking to you on the Friday evening, which I already knew about. He seemed a fine young man. Polite. In fact, now that I think of it, he was the one who brought the hot chocolate to my room.”

  “The young man from the bar brought up your hot chocolate? That seems odd.
You’d think someone from the coffee shop or kitchen would have done that. Oh, wait, was it after eight o’clock?”

  “Just after, I think.”

  “Oh well, the coffee shop closes at eight, so it’s possible they made your drink just before, and then, while the coffee shop person took care of closing up for the day, the bartender was asked to run it upstairs. It’s a small hotel, and the staff probably just pitch in and do what’s asked of them.” Penny remembered that on the Friday night of the painting weekend, Sarah Spencer, the assistant manager, had worked at the bar on what was supposed to be her night off.

  “And did you speak to anyone else about Jessica?”

  “The woman at reception who checked me in said she’d been instructed to notify the duty manager when I arrived, and then asked me to wait for a minute, and then the duty manager came along and told me how sorry she was about Jessica.”

  “That would be Sarah Spencer.”

  “Yes, I think that was her name. She seemed a nice woman. Well spoken. And I asked her if she’d met Jessica, and she said, no she hadn’t.”

  “Hmm. I suppose someone could have entered your room while you were out getting your sandwich, taken the sleeping pills, and then left the container in the drawer of the nightstand, to be discovered later, so it would look as if you’d taken them.” She thought for a moment. “It was probably a safe bet that you wouldn’t look in the drawer, but the police certainly would. Anyway, I’m glad to see you’re feeling better. Did they give you any indication how long they expect to keep you in?”

  “They said I might be able to go … I almost said ‘I might be able to go home,’ but that’s not really the case. They said that I could be discharged later today or tomorrow morning.”

  Penny leaned forward. “Unless there’s some reason why you want to go back to the hotel, it’s probably best if you don’t. Here’s what I think we should do. I’ll go to the hotel now, pack up everything in your hotel room, and let the front desk know you won’t be returning. I’ll take your suitcase home with me, and when you’re discharged, you come straight to me in Llanelen. Unfortunately, if it’s tomorrow, I can’t come and pick you up because I’ve got to work, but the bus is easy, and I can tell you how to do that, or we can make other arrangements. And you can stay with me until you’re ready to return home to New Zealand, or for as long as you like or need to.”