Free The Price of Love and Other Stories by Peter Robinson

an odd hobby, poker, isn’t it?”
    “For a woman, you mean?”
    “Well, that wasn’t what I meant, but I suppose, now you come to mention it, yes.”
    “Because you usually associate it with men in cowboy boots and six-guns on their hips?”
    “Well, not these days so much, but certainly not with a group of professional women.”
    “And why not? If we were playing bridge or gin rummy, would it make a difference?”
    “OK, I take your point.”
    Natasha smiled. “Anyway, we enjoy it, and it does no harm. It’s not as if the stakes are beyond anyone’s means.”
    “What about the online playing? The tournaments?”
    “You’ve heard about those? They’re not for everyone. Only Evangeline from our group goes in for them. But the online stuff … ” She shrugged. “It’s fun. Better than computer dating or chat rooms. Safer, too.”
    “I suppose so,” said Banks, whose online experience was limited to Amazon and the occasional rock concert clip on YouTube. “What kind of person would you say Victor Vancalm was?”
    “As I told you, I scarcely knew him.” She chewed on her lower lip, then said, “But from what I did know, I’d say he was used to getting his own way, a bit bossy perhaps.”
    “Abusive?”
    “Good God, no! No. Certainly not. As far as I ever knew, Denise was perfectly happy with him.”
    She didn’t look Banks in the eye as she said this, which immediately raised his suspicions. “So she wore the trousers, then?”
    Natasha Goldwell smiled. “Oh, Mr. Banks! What a quaint expression. I’m afraid you really are behind the times. It was an equal partnership.”
    “What were you doing at Denise Vancalm’s house the day before the murder?” he asked.
    A couple of women sat down at the table beside them, paper bags crinkling and crackling, chatting about some rude shopgirl they’d just had to deal with. “And did you see her hair?” one of them asked, aghast. “What sort of colour would you call that? And there was enough metal in her face to start a foundry.”
    The interruption gave Natasha the breathing space she seemed to need after Banks’s abrupt change of direction. When she answered his question, she was all poise again. “No reason in particular,” she said. “We often get together for a coffee. Denise happened to be working from home that day, and I had a spare hour between clients. One of the perks of running your own business is that you can play truant occasionally.” She wrinkled her nose.
    “What did you talk about?”
    “Oh, this and that. You know, girlie talk.”
    “She didn’t have any problems, any worries that she shared with you?”
    “Mr. Banks, it was her husband who was murdered, not Denise.”
    “Just trying to find a reason for what happened.”
    “I would have thought that was obvious: he interrupted a burglar.”
    Banks scratched the scar beside his right eye. “Yes, it does rather look that way, doesn’t it? Do you know if either of them had any enemies, any problems that were getting them down? Debts, for example?”
    “Debts?”
    “Well, there was the poker … and Mr. Vancalm’s trips.”
    “Victor made business trips, it’s true, and Denise plays a little online poker, but – debts? I don’t think so. Are you suggesting it was some sort of debt collector come to break his legs or something, and it got out of hand? This is Eastvale, Mr. Banks, not Las Vegas.”
    Banks shrugged. “Stranger things have happened at sea. Anything else you can tell me?”
    “About what?”
    “About what happened that night?”
    “I finished work at six-thirty. Denise met me at the office. We went to the Old Oak for a drink. Just the one. We are always careful. She drove me to Gabriella’s. We played poker all evening, then she dropped me off on her way home, sometime after eleven. That’s all there is to it.”
    She did sound a bit as if she were speaking by rote, Banks thought, remembering what Annie had said, but then she had already been asked