Murder in the Cotswolds by Nancy Buckingham Page B

her desk briskly, and summoned Tim Boulter.
    “We’re off to DHQ,” she said, as she handed him the memo. “Here’s why.”
    He read the message. “Naughty! This should be good for a laugh.”
    She spun round with a flash of anger that took Boulter by surprise. “We’re not out to relish a man’s downfall, Sergeant, simply to establish facts.” Facts, not feelings. Shades of Jolly Joliffe.
    “Sorry, ma’am.”
    “Well, try to look sorry. Go and get the car. I’ll be out in a moment.”
    The sun was warm again, the sky was just as blue. But today the road to Marlingford had lost its charm for Kate.
    “Mind you,” said Boulter ruminatively, “Gower knowing Mrs. Latimer better than he admitted yesterday only muddies things up, doesn’t it? It might be more significant if he’d had a lunch date with the husband. Hatching the plot together, I mean.”
    “Mmmm,” said Kate abstractedly.
    “I wonder if they were having it off ... Gower and Mrs. Latimer.”
    “Oh for God’s sake,” she snapped. “Why speculate when we’ll soon find out.”
    Christ, Tim thought, she’s in a mood. As Julie had been last night, because he was so late getting home. Though his wife did have a point. Just the one evening when her mother had the kids staying over, he’d arrived home dog-tired after working seventeen hours on the trot. Bugger the bloody job, she’d yelled at him. Bugger the monthly pay-cheque too? he’d flung back. Tim stifled the guilty thought that he’d been on a high of excitement about his first murder enquiry all the time that Julie had been sitting waiting for him to come home.
     
    * * * *
    When they arrived, Kate went directly to the interview room and interrupted the proceedings. This was a calculated move, and it paid off. Richard Gower was obviously startled by her sudden appearance. She asked the DC to leave and took his place, facing Gower across the small table. Boulter stood just inside the door.
    “Mr. Gower, a point has arisen which may require a change in your statement. You told us yesterday that you knew Mrs. Belle Latimer only very slightly.”
    “That’s right. So?”
    “Sergeant,” she said.
    Boulter referred to his notebook, though he certainly wouldn’t have needed to. “Information has reached us, sir, that soon after twelve noon on Friday, the first of May, you arrived at Hambledon Grange to have lunch with Mrs. Latimer.”
    Gower stared at the sergeant. He stared at Kate. “Oh,” he said finally, “that.”
    “Yes, Mr. Gower, that.” Kate’s tone was chilly.
    “A single lunch doesn’t add up to an intimate relationship, if that’s what you’re suggesting.”
    “Maybe not. But in the circumstances it does require explaining.”
    “There’s a perfectly simple explanation.”
    “Then perhaps we may have it.”
    Gower picked up a ball-point from the table and started running it through his fingers, back and forth. “I didn’t mention this yesterday because it didn’t seem relevant. Mrs. Latimer invited me to lunch that day because she wanted a private word about how the Gazette might help her in a certain matter.”
    “Keep going.”
    “It concerned a charitable fund we were both involved with. For an extension to the Chipping Bassett Leisure Centre. She was on the organizing committee, and the Gazette was backing the project with publicity. Mrs. Latimer had reason to suspect that some of the money collected was being creamed off. Naturally she wanted that stopped. But she was afraid that if anything about it leaked out, people’s feelings would be so outraged that the flow of contributions would dry up and put paid to the entire scheme. She suggested a private meeting with me so that we could discuss ways and means of catching the culprit out without creating a public scandal.”
    It was a far-fetched story that couldn’t be either proved or disproved, just like his alibi for the time of the killing.
    “If this is true,” said Kate, “I don’t see why