Murder on the Short List Read Free Page B

it?”
    â€œIt was a woman’s name, SUE, followed by a number. I couldn’t tell you which, except it was just the one.”
    â€œA single digit?” The inspector sounded pleased. “SUE, followed by a single digit. That’s really useful, sir. We can check that. And did you see the driver?”
    â€œNo, I can’t help you there.”
    â€œHear any shooting?”
    â€œWe often hear shooting in these parts. Look, I’d better find my dog.”
    â€œWe’ll need to speak to you some more, Mr . . .?”
    â€œPriddle. Bernard Priddle. You’re welcome. These days I live in one of them poky little council bungalows in the village. Second on the left.”
    The inspector watched him stride away, whistling for the dog, and said to one of the team, “A useful witness. I want you to take a statement from him.”
    Mooney was tempted to pass on the information that Bernie was a publicity-seeking pain in the arse, but he decided to let the police do their own work.
    T he body was removed from Middle Field the same evening. Some men in black suits put it into a bag with a zip and stretchered it over the well-trodden ground to a small van and drove off.
    â€œNow can I have my field back?” Mooney asked the inspector.
    â€œWhat’s the hurry?”
    â€œYou’ve destroyed a big section of my crop. What’s left will go over if I don’t harvest it at the proper time. The pods shatter and it’s too late.”
    â€œWhat do you use? A combine harvester?”
    â€œFirst it has to be swathed into rows. It all takes time.”
    â€œI’ll let you know in the morning. Cutting it could make our work easier. We want to do a bigger search.”
    â€œWhat for?”
    â€œEvidence. We now know that the woman Bernard Priddle saw – the driver of the Jeep – was the woman in the photograph I showed you, Mrs Susan White, the dead man’s wife. We’re assuming the younger woman was White’s mistress. We think Mrs White was suspicious and followed them here. She didn’t know about him buying the tied cottages. That was going to be his lovenest, just for weekends with the mistress. But he couldn’t wait for it to be built. The wife caught them at it in the field.”
    â€œOn the raincoat?”
    â€œThat’s the assumption. Our forensic people may confirm it.”
    â€œNasty shock.”
    â€œOn both sides, no doubt.”
    Mooney smiled. “You could be right about that. So that’s why he was shot. What happened to the mistress?”
    â€œShe must have escaped. Someone drove his car away and we reckon it was her.”
    â€œSo have you arrested the wife?”
    â€œNot yet. She wasn’t at home when we called.”
    Mooney grinned again. “She guessed you were coming.”
    â€œWe’ll catch up with her.”
    In a tree in the hedgerow a songthrush sounded its clear notes and was answered from across the field. A breeze was cooling the air.
    O n the insistence of the police, Mooney harvested his crop a week before it was ready. He’d cried wolf about all the bother they’d caused, and now he suffered a loss through cutting too early. To make matters worse, not one extra piece of evidence was found, for all their fingertip searches through the stubble.
    â€œIs that the end of it?” he asked the inspector when the final sweep across the field was made. The land looked black and bereft. Only the scarecrow remained standing. They’d asked him to leave it to use as a marker.
    â€œIt’s the end of my work, but you’ll be visited again. The lawyers will want to look at the site before the case comes to court.”
    â€œWhen will that be?”
    â€œI can’t say. Could be months. A year, even.”
    â€œThere won’t be anything to see.”
    â€œThey’ll look at the positions where the gun was found, and the body and the coat. They map it all