Chapter 1 - The Crime

 

"Nigel, how good of you to come," Andrew said as he opened the door to his guest.

Nigel smiled back at Andrew and held his hand out. "It was good of you to invite me after the recent, erm, unpleasantness," Nigel replied.

"That's all in the past now, surely. Caroline, darling, lovely to see you," Andrew said, greeting Nigel's wife.

"How could we possibly refuse the invitation? What was it you said on the invite, something about burying the hatchet?" Caroline asked.

"Indeed, yes, I have decided to retire, so old enemies should be the first to know and be conciliatory," Andrew said.

Nigel and Caroline entered. They said their hellos to Andrew's wife who was stood just behind him taking their coats and handing them to the servant to put away.

"Introductions are not necessary for Brian and Colin. Allow me to introduce Susan and Wendy, their wives respectively. What can I get you to drink?" Andrew asked.

"G and T, please," they both seemed to say in unison.

"Two G and T's coming up. Find a seat," Andrew said, indicating the arm chairs.

The waiter served Nigel and Caroline with their drinks and then they began to converse with the other guests, avoiding the past troubles when the men all vied for the control of the company, or to get their plans passed by the company. Arguments had been heated and they had left scars which would take time to heal.

These boardroom debates were usually just that, debates, but these men were far more aggressive and at times it felt more like a war zone than a boardroom.

At one point Nigel and Andrew had actually come to blows; there was no love lost between any of the men and their women folk stood by their man. This made the initial meeting strained, but the position of Managing Director, the COE of the company was about to be put up for grabs, which meant that it was in their interests to be there and pretend to be friends, and convivial.

At seven thirty on the dot, the waiter entered and announced that dinner was ready; Andrew led the way into the dining room and indicated the seating arrangement. Andrew sat at the head of the table with Caroline to his left, then Nigel. Wendy sat next to Nigel and then Brian, Susan came next, then Colin and Sophie on Nigel's right.

This arrangement put Colin as a good contender for the post, being sat on Nigel's right, indicating his right hand man, but at the other end of the table sat Brian. Was this an indication that he was a good contender, or that he was at the opposite end? He sat opposite Nigel, but then again at the bottom of the table, indicating that he was the least probable candidate.

These men all played the psychological game of position and drew their own conclusions of the positioning of the guests.

With the first course there was a very nice light white wine, the butler offered it to Andrew, who smiled and told him to allow his wife to taste it.

The waiter went to Sophie who smiled, accepting the offer graciously. She had been studying wines as a hobby and was now used to tasting the wine for dinner. The waiter poured a small amount in her glass and she sniffed it, swilled it around and then took a sip, rolled it around her tongue and swallowed it.

"Very nice, dear, an excellent choice, slightly nutty, but full flavoured and an excellent nose," she said and took another drink, draining the glass ready for a refill.

The waiter left her and poured wine for the guests, going around the table, leaving Andrew till last. The waiter was just about to pour the wine into Nigel's glass when Sophie collapsed onto the under plate in front of her. Sophie's eyes were wide open and her mouth agape.

Andrew jumped up and rushed to his wife, feeling for a pulse, but there was none.

"Someone ring for an ambulance and the police, Sophie is dead," he said, shocked and alarmed. He bent down, tears in his eyes as he caressed the lifeless form of his wife.

 

Chapter 2 - Assigned

 

The shrill tone of her phone brought Julie back from her relaxed state as she watched, rather dozed, an old episode of 'The Sweeny.'

"I don't know why you insist on watching it, you usually fall asleep half way through," Julie's latest male friend commented.

"Obviously, my dear, that is the reason," she replied and laughed with him. "Detective Chief Inspector Ashton," Julie said into the mouth piece, it had a nice ring to it.

"Ma'am, the Super asked me to ring you. We have a high profile death in suspicious circumstances. Sorry to spoil your evening, Ma'am," her sergeant said.

"OK, give me the address, I will be on my way in ten minutes," Julie said, picking up the pen by the phone to make a note of the address.

She went to the toilet and splashed water on her face to help wake her up. She took her dressing gown off, put her dress and her shoes on and she left the house within the ten minutes, after kissing her visitor and smiling at him.

"The joys of being a police person, get used to it, or don't come back," Julie said, being her pragmatic self, adding, "You will probably have left by the time I get home." She gave him a kiss and left the house.

Julie arrived at the address and began to look around the outside; it was her way of getting the feel, as she put it, of the scene.

"Sorry, Ma'am, this is a crime scene. You are not allowed inside. Can I ask you what you are doing here?" a police constable on the door asked Julie.

"Quite right, officer, do not allow anyone to enter, apart from police officers, I am Detective Chief Inspector Ashton," Julie told him, showing him her warrant card.

"Sorry, Ma'am, I-I didn't know," he apologised.

"Seeing as I have just arrived, I didn't expect you to and you were right to challenge me," Julie said.

She made her way up the steps to the front door and acknowledged the officer on the door, then entered. She again stopped and looked around before making her way up the entrance hall of this mansion, in the direction of all the activity. Julie would nod to the officers, showing them her warrant card as they acknowledged her.

Upon entering the room she saw a Detective standing by the table with the figure of the dead woman still slumped on her plate, with the doctor in attendance.

"What do we have? I am Detective Chief Inspector Ashton and you are?" she asked, showing him her warrant card and having made her own mind up already on the circumstances.

"Detective Sergeant Collins, Ma'am, The deceased is Lady Sophie Mac Adams; the wife of Sir Andrew Mac Adams, the chairman of Mac Adams Construction. There was a rumour that he was in line for a peerage in the Queen's birthday honours. There were eight diners, including the Mac Adams. The dinner was for him to announce his retirement tonight and he was going to announce his successor after the dinner. There were two candidates for the post and they were both here.

"The doctor has pronounced and we have the time of death at nineteen forty pm, the doctor's initial findings indicate that she was poisoned; Ma'am, but he will know more after the post-mortem.

The Mac Adams had brought in a chef and waiting on staff for the dinner and they were all catering students from the local technical college. They had pre-dinner drinks in the lounge and then at seven thirty, sorry nineteen hundred and thirty hours, they came in here for dinner. Sir Andrew Mac Adams asked the waiter to pour the wine for the first course, after asking his wife to taste it.

"Apparently she was studying wines as a hobby and when they were having dinner she tasted the wine, not him, unless they were out and then he tasted it, being the host. She took a sip then another and then collapsed dead, Ma'am," Sergeant Collins said.

"Hum, so we have how many suspects?" Julie asked.

"There is Sir Andrew, then six guests and six students, unless we include the victim as a suspect," Sergeant Collins asked her.

"Your wit does not suit the occasion," Julie said formally.

"No, sorry, Ma'am, but it is usual for the host to taste the wine, Ma'am and I wondered if it was meant for him, which would mean that his wife would have to be a suspect and this is poetic justice. Sir Andrew and Lady Sophie Mac Adams; were in the middle of an upset, Ma'am, which may have resulted, in divorce. I learned this from one of the diners, things were not as rosy as they appeared, Ma'am," Collins told her.

"Interesting. She tried to poison her husband, but when he offered her the offer to taste, she had two options; she gave herself up and showed her hand, as it were, or drank the poisoned wine and committed suicide, rather than admit to trying to poison her husband. Is this a distrust common among the wealthy?" Julie asked him quietly.

"They are the ones who do the honourable thing, Ma'am, or is that, just on the films?" Collins asked, smiling at her.

"That is the question, but it usually applies to the upper classes, not the ones who have dragged themselves up by their boot laces as it were. For now we will begin looking at the case as if she was the intended victim, but I will bear in mind what you said.

"The other option is the opposite, was it him trying to kill his wife and succeeding? Who had the most to gain? The other question is, how many people were the intended victims? I assume they were to all, be given a glass of that wine, even Sir Andrew? So who was the intended victim?" Julie asked Collins as a rhetorical question and walked out of the dining room into the lounge, where all the people had been gathered.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am Detective Chief Inspector Ashton and we do thank you for your co-operation by waiting for us. We will now need to interview you all and we will be as quick as possible so that you can go home as soon as possible," Julie informed them.

"Inspector, can't this wait? It has been a very distressing night for us all, especially our wives. I mean we were all supposed to drink from the same bottle, had she not dropped dead in front of us so quickly, you may have been investigating a mass murder," a guest asked.

"Sorry, no, we need the events to be fresh in your minds, we may need to ask you some more questions at a later date, as the investigation continues, but we need to speak to you now. Sir Andrew, is there another room we can use to speak to you all individually?" Julie asked.

"Yes, yes you, you can use the study, erm, and the library, I presume there will be more than one doing the interviews?" he asked.

"Yes. Sergeant, will you go with a DC in the study and I will take a PC with me into the library," Julie suggested.

Collins took a female Detective with him into the study, taking one of the female guests with them, and Julie took Sir Andrew with her and a police constable into the library.

"Sir Andrew, may I first of all express my sympathy for your loss. We will try and be as quick as possible; do you have a friend you can stay with, for tonight, Sir?" Julie asked him.

"Inspector," he said in a belittling tone.

"Chief Inspector, sir," Julie said, correcting him.

"Chief Inspector, sorry, it was common knowledge that I was estranged from my wife. We have not shared a bedroom in six months, so although I regret her death it is not as traumatic as if we were still in love. I will be fine sleeping here tonight. To get to where I am in business, you make enemies and if it was one of them trying to get at me, then they failed.

"My wife changed over the years, as we all do, she was not the same woman I married. Her good taste had become her greed, she was no longer happy with good clothes, she wanted top of the range, designer dresses, shoes and even her underwear had to be designer. It had become an obsession with her that she had the very best of everything.

"I am rich, but not that rich, we were going to Spain next month for a week's holiday to see if we could resurrect the marriage and she wanted to hire a private jet to take us there. We had a row about it. I am sure someone will tell you, so I won't hide it.

"She wanted to live the life of a billionaire, I am just a millionaire. I will want for nothing, a new car whenever I want, holidays whenever I want and for as long as I want, but there is a limit, a butler, servants, private jets are as much a dream to me as they are to you. I will not fret over the fact that I don't have them; I will have a very good life from now on with my investments. Six months in the Bahamas, maybe even have a house there, I can afford it, but butlers and servants live in? No. A daily to keep the place clean and tidy is all, I will need," he told them.

"I presume that your wife got on with all your guests, they were friends?" John asked.

"You couldn't be more wrong, Chief Inspector. The guests were enemies; they would fight like cat and dog. The difference in pay from their earnings now to being made CEO, is about twenty five thousand a year plus bonuses of a million a year perhaps. The person will go from being wealthy to being rich.

"Last year, my bonus was two million, this year I am expecting three million as my bonus. By retiring now I will also get a golden hand shake of about five million, but the construction industry is heading for a down turn. So what should I do, wait and watch as my income drops or go now at the height of the trend, with millions, in an off shore account? Or wait and watch as all my hard work is destroyed by a down turn in construction? Leave waving a merry good bye to the workers, secure in their jobs, or appear down hearted, as I make half of them redundant to save the firm, knowing the effect the downturn will have on my finances?

"No, Chief Inspector, the time to go is now and allow my successor to struggle, not me; to allow them to make the hard decisions and necessary redundancies" he told them.

"Who stood to gain from your wife's death, excepting the loss you suffered, so who stood to gain or who wanted to hurt you?" Julie asked him.

"My wife had no enemies, she helped out at the local hospice and served on the committee, organising functions to raise money. She was a very caring person and everyone liked her. As for me, well I am successful and inevitably there are people who feel aggrieved, but I would hate to say that I had the kind of enemies, people who would want me dead.

"My wife and I have had a very happy time together and settling a million on her in a divorce would not be unfair, or hinder my future life, erm, living standards. It would be a damn sight cheaper than staying married, but kill her rather than divorce? Never, I still loved her very much," he told them.

"You said a million; I presume you have a prenuptial agreement?" Julie asked.

"No, we married before I had attained the position of CEO. My wife was a secretary, and I was an up and coming business man with a degree in business studies. Landing the job with Mac Andrews construction, and the potential it offered, was pure luck. I took a small, localised building firm and turned it into a national company with a turnover in billions and excellent profits. But the tide has turned and the building industry is set for a poor period, during which lots of firms will go under, not only the small or medium sized firms. We are set for a recession and it may not be a small one. I doubt it being as bad as the Wall Street crash of the twenties, but tighten your belts now, it will be bad," he told Julie.

"Thank you for the warning. So you cannot think of any reason for someone to kill your wife. Does this mean that you think you were the target, or someone else at the dinner?" Julie asked.

"Like me, my dinner guests have enemies, but not nasty enough to want them dead. There is one other thing, it is usual for the host to taste the wine, not their wife and definitely not a guest. Had it not been for my wife's interest in wine, I would be the one tasting the wine. I therefore must assume the target, was me," Sir Andrew said factually.

"We cannot ignore that possibility, so I will leave an officer here for the night, although I doubt anyone trying again tonight, having just failed, if, you are the intended target," Julie said with compassion.

"I agree, so it will not be necessary to leave an officer here for the night. Their time may be better spent finding the bastard that murdered my wife," Sir Andrew said.

"Thank you for your help. Please don't leave the area, we may have to ask you some further questions," Julie said, and nodded to the officer who escorted Sir Andrew out of the room.

"You don't suspect me, do you?" he asked.

"I suspect everyone to some degree, so my first job is to eliminate several suspects. Once we find out how the poison was administered, I will have a better idea as to who I can eliminate. Once again I am sorry for your loss and thank you for your help," Julie said, ending the interview.

Julie had another guest brought in and again the story was the same; his wife was a pillar of the community and well liked. He had inevitable enemies, but none they thought would stoop to murder. He was a fair man but strict and ran a tight ship, as the saying goes.

Julie left the house and headed for the hotel she had booked into, after telling Sergeant Collins to join her there.

"Sergeant, what are first impressions?" Julie asked as they sat in the bar of the pub/ hotel with a beer in front of them.

"She was well liked, he had enemies, but none of the guests I interviewed could point a finger at anyone who would murder him," Collins told her.

"That is what I understand, but it seemed too pat, a beautiful wife loved by everyone, a handsome husband who still loves his wife but wants a divorce because she spends too much, does seem a bit odd," Julie said thoughtfully.

"Yes Ma'am and a big business man who has ruffled feathers, but hurt no-one; that also seems odd to me," Collins said.

"I think we need to get back to basics, Motive, Means and Method. The Method is right in front of us, she was poisoned by the wine. What the actual poison was we have yet to find out. Means, again obvious the wine, but how did the poison get in the wine, so the means is mysterious and finally Motive, there isn't one. So question, was Lady Sophie the intended victim?

"Tomorrow I want you to go to the firm and get a profile of how Sir Andrew was viewed and his wife. Try and probe for skeletons in their cupboards, no-one is without them," Julie told him.

"Ma'am, I was told to get a senior person on board at the start, because of it being a Sir and Lady involved, I know you have as yet not handed the paper work in, but I had already been issued with your mobile number, so I felt it important enough to call you. I hope you don't mind," Collins said meekly.

"Well let me put it like this, I like to hit the ground running and I most certainly have here. I have yet to register at the pub. I was just pulling into the car park when you rang me, so I may have to wear the same clothes tomorrow as today," Julie lied and smiled at him.

"Sorry, Ma'am, I'll go now and let you get some rest," he said and stood up, about to leave, then turned to face her again. "Ma'am, can I ask you if it is true that you took out four assailants single handed?" Collins asked.

"Shall we get one thing straight? It serves no purpose to ask if you can ask and then ask, anyway? If you have a question, just ask it. In answer to the question, my Sergeant at my last station was being attacked by six assailants, what would you do; stand by and let him be beaten to death or help?" Julie asked him.

"Call for back-up and get stuck in," he replied.

"That is exactly what I did and, to save further questions, yes, I put four of them in hospital, because I could not hold onto them, so I took them out and got a reprimand for being overzealous, police brutality. It earned me a promotion, but in a quiet corner of England, supposedly, so that I can cool my heels, helping aged people across the empty streets," Julie said, part joking and smiling.

"Ma'am, they made a big mistake. This area is more like Dodge City, where accidents happen in retribution and where we meet a wall of silence. Last year a local farmer employed a local lad to plough his field, the tractor over turned and the lad was killed, The farmer's barn caught fire when it was full of straw and no-one saw anything. The farmer had just gone in for a coffee, otherwise he would have been caught in the fire," Collins told her.

"Really, and what happened? Did you investigate either accident?" Julie asked.

"Can I say the old Chief Inspector has retired, under mysterious circumstances? Personally, if I can, between you and me, I believe he was warned off and rather than ignore it, he retired," Collins told her.

"I appreciate your comments and it is logged and noted. Does this have any bearing on our current case, even remotely?" Julie asked.

"I never thought about that. The farmer is a tenant farmer on the Lord's land, so perhaps, remotely. Sir Mac Adams is reportedly to be made a lord, Ma'am," Collins said.

"Noted, now go home. I have had a hard day and expect to have another one tomorrow, so I am going to bed, after registering and unpacking and ... well, I am sure there are more things I need to do before sleep, good night," Julie said and gave Collins a smile, thanking him.

Julie had registered and didn't want to tell him that she had just slept with an old friend. She looked around the room and stripped off, took a shower, made a coffee after putting her dressing gown on and sat by the window, gazing out over the tree tops as the sun slowly sank.

 

Julie didn't see the amber glow or red sky, her mind was on recent conversations. She didn't notice the scurrying clouds that drifted by, or the slowly sinking sun casting rays of light between the tree tops. She saw nothing, yet saw everything as she turned over and over in her mind what Collins had said and what the witnesses to the crime had told her.

By the time the sun had fully set and the moon had taken over lighting the area, her eyes had closed as she sat in the comfortable arm chair and she had drifted off to sleep.