divorced from your husband.’
‘You should ask him that!’ The words flew out in temper before she could control them, and her hand flashed instinctively to her mouth. ‘I’m sorry. I wish you could ask him, though. He might give you a more cogent explanation than I can.’
Lambert looked through the long windows of the elegant room to the garden which dropped gently away to a large pond with a fountain playing in the centre. A modern house with at least six bedrooms and a well-tended garden of around an acre. Any divorce settlement would surely have left Ted Giles a rich man. Was it the wife who had resisted it, knowing what it would cost, knowing that she might even have to move out of this opulent place? He said, ‘Are you saying there was a dispute between you over the terms of the divorce?’
Sue Giles smiled bitterly. Not over the terms, Superintendent. Over the very idea. Ted said he didn’t believe in divorce. “To have and to hold” and all that stuff.’
If it was true, the dead man had been depriving himself of a fortune, by the look of this place. But he couldn’t have resisted for ever against the modern divorce laws. Perhaps he had been increasing his bargaining power by holding out, refusing to make things easy until the price was right. He said, ‘But you say you had been separated for five years. Even if you thought at first that you might get back together, that is ample time to have instituted divorce proceedings.’
‘Yes. I suppose I thought that Ted would see reason, in the end. And although I knew our marriage was finished and would have liked to see it formally terminated, it was not a matter of great importance to me until quite recently.’
She looked quite calm again as she said this, as if she had always known in her heart that she would be saying it. Even the words had a prepared ring to them. Lambert offered the question they invited. ‘But your own circumstances have changed?’
‘Indeed they have.’ She could not keep a little elation out of her voice, even in this strange context. ‘I have developed a serious attachment over the last few months. In due course, I should like to be free to marry again.’
‘I see. In ordinary circumstances, that would be entirely your own affair. In the present ones, you must see that we need to know the name of this man.’
She smiled at them, looking very attractive now, her strong features softened by love, her tension gone with the release of its declaration. She studied the serious, attentive faces of the two men opposite her for a moment. ‘You really don’t know yet, do you? I thought you might have picked it up when you went into Ted’s school. My man is the Head of Social Sciences there, Graham Reynolds.’
***
DI Chris Rushton and George Taylor, manager of the Oldford branch of the National Westminster Bank, enjoyed the preliminaries to the release of information about the late Edward Giles’s account. They were both men who were used to observing the formalities their work required, both men who knew the rules and were happy to play life by them.
Taylor made his little speech about the confidentiality of the details of personal finance; Rushton responded with his speech about serious crime and the way it overrode the normal boundaries. Taylor said the crime would need to be very serious indeed to cause him to reveal the details of a client’s account; Rushton said that this was as serious as it could be, as the police were now certain that Edward Giles was a homicide victim. It was like a minuet in words, with the parties advancing and retreating with the set steps they had known for years. Without any word as brutal as murder being used, the formalities were completed and Taylor graciously revealed the details of the late teacher’s account.
Giles’s salary from the Gloucestershire Local Education Authority came in regularly at the end of the month. There were unexceptional direct debits for payment of mortgage,
‘You should ask him that!’ The words flew out in temper before she could control them, and her hand flashed instinctively to her mouth. ‘I’m sorry. I wish you could ask him, though. He might give you a more cogent explanation than I can.’
Lambert looked through the long windows of the elegant room to the garden which dropped gently away to a large pond with a fountain playing in the centre. A modern house with at least six bedrooms and a well-tended garden of around an acre. Any divorce settlement would surely have left Ted Giles a rich man. Was it the wife who had resisted it, knowing what it would cost, knowing that she might even have to move out of this opulent place? He said, ‘Are you saying there was a dispute between you over the terms of the divorce?’
Sue Giles smiled bitterly. Not over the terms, Superintendent. Over the very idea. Ted said he didn’t believe in divorce. “To have and to hold” and all that stuff.’
If it was true, the dead man had been depriving himself of a fortune, by the look of this place. But he couldn’t have resisted for ever against the modern divorce laws. Perhaps he had been increasing his bargaining power by holding out, refusing to make things easy until the price was right. He said, ‘But you say you had been separated for five years. Even if you thought at first that you might get back together, that is ample time to have instituted divorce proceedings.’
‘Yes. I suppose I thought that Ted would see reason, in the end. And although I knew our marriage was finished and would have liked to see it formally terminated, it was not a matter of great importance to me until quite recently.’
She looked quite calm again as she said this, as if she had always known in her heart that she would be saying it. Even the words had a prepared ring to them. Lambert offered the question they invited. ‘But your own circumstances have changed?’
‘Indeed they have.’ She could not keep a little elation out of her voice, even in this strange context. ‘I have developed a serious attachment over the last few months. In due course, I should like to be free to marry again.’
‘I see. In ordinary circumstances, that would be entirely your own affair. In the present ones, you must see that we need to know the name of this man.’
She smiled at them, looking very attractive now, her strong features softened by love, her tension gone with the release of its declaration. She studied the serious, attentive faces of the two men opposite her for a moment. ‘You really don’t know yet, do you? I thought you might have picked it up when you went into Ted’s school. My man is the Head of Social Sciences there, Graham Reynolds.’
***
DI Chris Rushton and George Taylor, manager of the Oldford branch of the National Westminster Bank, enjoyed the preliminaries to the release of information about the late Edward Giles’s account. They were both men who were used to observing the formalities their work required, both men who knew the rules and were happy to play life by them.
Taylor made his little speech about the confidentiality of the details of personal finance; Rushton responded with his speech about serious crime and the way it overrode the normal boundaries. Taylor said the crime would need to be very serious indeed to cause him to reveal the details of a client’s account; Rushton said that this was as serious as it could be, as the police were now certain that Edward Giles was a homicide victim. It was like a minuet in words, with the parties advancing and retreating with the set steps they had known for years. Without any word as brutal as murder being used, the formalities were completed and Taylor graciously revealed the details of the late teacher’s account.
Giles’s salary from the Gloucestershire Local Education Authority came in regularly at the end of the month. There were unexceptional direct debits for payment of mortgage,
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