Free Murder Begets Murder by Roderic Jeffries Page A

understand, I couldn’t stand the woman. Look, all this is a load of cod’s, so let’s have an end to it, right?’
    ‘As this is a police matter, señor, regretfully you must continue to answer my questions.’
    Dunton looked scornfully at Alvarez, wanting to show his contempt for the muddling stupidity of foreigners, but as always he could not prevent himself feeling uneasy in the face of authority.
    ‘I wonder,’ said Alvarez with quiet curiosity, almost as if he were really putting the question to himself, ‘whether it is not the truth that you knew the señorita a little better than you wish to say?’
    ‘For Pete’s sake! I hardly knew her, I didn’t like her, and I’m sorry she’s dead but I’m not going to start wearing black because of it.’
    ‘Then if all that is true, why should she have been so interested in what you were doing?’
    ‘This is becoming even more bloody daft. She wouldn’t have given a damn if I’d been living it up with a mermaid.’
    ‘It seems that she did worry, señor. For instance, there was the day when she was very keen to know if you were seeing Señora Carrington.’
    ‘Like hell.’
    ‘I assure you, it was so. She became quite excited.’
    ‘Who have you been listening to? Some of the people out here have got bloody twisted senses of humour.’
    ‘In this case I think the person was quite serious. Do you know Señora Carrington ?’
    ‘What if I do?’
    ‘Perhaps you are friendly with her?’
    ‘What are you getting at now?’
    ‘I wish only to discover the truth.’
    ‘Well, the truth about her doesn’t take much discovering. She’s one highly stuck-up bitch. Thinks herself no end of a creme de la creme, but I’m telling you she’s no smarter than the next bit of bint and she’s twice as scratchy.’
    ‘Señor, are you married?’
    ‘What’s that to do with anybody else if I am?’
    ‘And the señora lives here, with you?’
    ‘Where the hell d’you think my wife’s going to live?’ He stood up. ‘Señor, as you are English that is a question impossible to answer.’
    Gordon Elliott lived on the north side of Llueso, in a modernized finca on a hill: from the garden, one could see both Llueso and Playa Neuva bays. He was tall and too thin for his height, so that he looked bean-poley. He might have been considered good-looking but for the signs of weakness in his face, which made him appear perpetually apologetic. By contrast his wife, who was large if not exactly fat, looked as if she hadn’t ever apologized in the whole of her life.
    Alvarez, as he stood in the entrance room which was also the sitting-room, explained the reason for his visit.
    ‘A very nasty business,’ said Avis, in her deep, masculine voice. ‘Of course we can see why you have to check up. So ask away. And do sit down — there’s no extra charge for using the chairs.’
    He sat. ‘Señora, I regret, but the questions are for your husband.’
    ‘I realize that.’
    ‘Then I think it would be best if I spoke to him on his own.’
    Her manner became frosty.
    ‘Avis, don’t you think it might be best if you left,’ said Elliott nervously.
    ‘There’s nothing,’ she snapped, ‘which you can possibly say which cannot be said in front of me.’ She stood in the centre of the room, hands on hips. Alvarez smiled patiently.
    ‘Very well! It’s the kind of thing one expects from this country. I’ll go into the village and do the shopping.’ She left, trailing her sharp annoyance behind her.
    Elliott waited until they heard a car door slam before saying: ‘I’m afraid my wife gets a little impatient at times.’
    ‘It is a woman’s prerogative, señor. . . Now, if we may discuss Señorita Stevenage. She was a friend of yours?’
    ‘Oh no, not a friend. That is, if you mean someone we knew well and liked to see a lot of.’
    ‘But you did know her?’
    They heard the car drive off. Elliott took a coloured handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his forehead.
    ‘We