Free Murder Begets Murder by Roderic Jeffries

on. But she only had to see me to make a beeline over to wherever I was. It got so I became chary of sitting in the square for a drink.’
    ‘Do you think she had become very attracted to you?’
    ‘I knew she wasn’t. Or to put it a bit more accurately, I was convinced she wasn’t.’
    ‘Then why should she have so insisted on meeting you?’
    ‘God knows!In the end I came to the conclusion that all she really wanted was someone to talk to. She didn’t get on well with most of the other residents and I suppose I gave the impression of listening sympathetically. To tell the truth, I began to feel rather guilty because if I saw her before she saw me I’d duck out of the way.’
    ‘What would she talk about?’
    Waynton shrugged his shoulders. ‘Nothing much — just to add to the confusion. I’d ask her how Bill was, what the doctor had said . . .And she’d sometimes hardly bother to answer. There’d be long, unpregnant silences.’
    ‘Did she not speak about other residents who live here?’
    ‘I suppose so.’
    ‘Can you remember who she mentioned?’
    Waynton, reluctant to recall memories of a woman who had died so distressingly, finally said: ‘I really can only remember the last time. I was in the square, waiting for Diana who was late, and Betty came to the table. She started asking who I imagined Diana was out with. She suggested two names and these were quite ridiculous because Diana couldn’t stand the sight of either man/
    ‘Would you be kind enough to give me their names?’
    ‘But as Diana disliked them both . . .’
    ‘Please, señor, their names?’
    ‘Alex Dunton and Gordon Elliott.’
    ‘And can you tell me where they live?’
    Waynton gave their addresses.
    Alvarez finished writing on the back of a crumpled envelope and looked up. ‘One more question, señor. Would you believe that Señorita Stevenage was a woman whose emotions would become very involved with another person other than Señor Heron?’
    ‘I didn’t know her well enough to answer you.’ Alvarez nodded, then stood. ‘Thank you very much for all your help,’ he said, with formal courtesy.
     

 
CHAPTER XII
    Alvarez parked his car in front of a squarish bungalow set among the maquis scrub. It was an unimaginative, grace­ less bungalow, made no more attractive, since it was so obviously fake, by the steepled well in front of the patio.
    Alex Dunton was tall and thin and he had a creased, lean face which held a raffish air that was reinforced by a golf-club secretary’s moustache. He had the kind of laugh most frequently heard in the saloon bar at a favourite local and he dressed with great attention to detail and impeccable bad taste, often in country checks. Diana’s nickname for him, Provincial Percy, was cruel but not inaccurate.
    ‘Señor,’ said Alvarez, as he sat down in an uncomfortable chair on the patio, ‘I have to ask some questions concerned with Señorita Stevenage’s death.’
    ‘So it’s true she didn’t die naturally? Well, it’s not much good coming here. I hardly knew the woman.’
    ‘But I understand that you were friendly with her?’
    Dunton laughed contemptuously. ‘De mortuis nil nisi bonus, and all that, but give me a bit of credit for taste.’
    ‘Was she not rather beautiful, then?’
    ‘Depends how you like ‘em, doesn’t it?’
    ‘And how do you like them, señor?’
    ‘That’s a good question! With a bit more je ne sais quoi than she’d got, that’s for starters.’
    ‘Did you see her very often?’
    ‘You’ve got things all wrong. I didn’t see her at all unless I couldn’t get out of the way quickly enough.’
    ‘When you did see her, where would this be?’
    ‘Where? What a damned funny question. Where d’you think? In the street, at the post office collecting the mail on the odd occasion I found the place open . . .’ He shrugged his shoulders.
    ‘Tell me, did you ever visit the señorita at Ca’n Ibore ?’
    ‘Now you’re joking! Don’t you