A Match Made for Murder by Iona Whishaw (top 10 best books of all time txt) 📗

“Tantalizing gossip, my dear, holds the key to every case. Well, it’s out of our hands. Now, Ames.”

“Yes. Apparently O’Brien made a rare venture up the stairs to Ames’s office to say the lads are troubled by Terrell. He wasn’t quite sure whether O’Brien was trying to say they are unhappy to have to work with a coloured police officer, or they aren’t sure how to handle the public’s misgivings, or if they think he is standoffish.”

“How interesting. I’m sure he never expected to have to handle that sort of problem. What did he do?”

“The right thing, as it turns out. He told O’Brien to remind the men that they are part of a unit and need to stand by their own. He also suggested someone take him for a beer. I suggested he get the ball rolling on that one.”

“I knew Ames was made of the right stuff.”

“Yes. Your regard for each other is legendary. I suspect he’s worried some of the men might genuinely be prejudiced and it could interfere with the police work.”

Lane nodded. “There’s really nothing he can do about that, though, is there? One hopes that Terrell is good at his job and the men will come to rely on him and lose those sorts of prejudices. As it happens, Ames had a little problem to share with me as well.”

Darling waited, and when nothing was forthcoming, said, “Yes?”

“I’m just not sure I can say anything.”

“Oh, blimey. Not his love life, is it? I’d stay as far away from that as possible. I know I do.”

“Yes, I suppose it is that, though not entirely. His strange case is involved as well.” Lane went on to tell Darling about Tina lying and Ames feeling betrayed by it. “He came up with the idea that perhaps he was too cross at her to interview her properly. I suspect he might ask Terrell to do it.”

“Perhaps I could hire you as the department psychologist,” he said. “Now, the murder underfoot here looks like it’s well in hand, so no one will need you, and we have a week left on this supposedly relaxing honeymoon. We must make plans. There is a pool to lie by, an as yet unscheduled horse expedition, and your tennis lesson. One or two other things we could do.” He leaned over and kissed her softly. “I don’t want us to get back and feel regret.”

“I’m already inoculated against regret by just being in this lovely place with a lovely person and being able to lie around in a bathing suit in November.” Lane looked at her watch. “Right. I’m off to my lesson. Why don’t you arrange for something with horses for tomorrow? See if we can get a picnic lunch to take along.”

Chela was sitting outside on a chair in the tiny alcove attached to the cleaning cupboard, having a cigarette, looking over the fence onto the street and farther north at the Catalina Mountains in the distance. The fragrant shade of an oleander provided soothing respite from the noon sun. She loved this moment of quiet. Of course, Raúl would be annoyed to know she was smoking, a thought that filled her with a good-natured rebellion.

She turned at the sound of the door opening and stood up automatically as Mrs. Holden came through. She was wearing a light-blue summer coat and a matching blue hat. Meg stopped when she saw Chela and then smiled broadly.

“Oh, I didn’t know anyone was here. This must be your lunchtime. I am so sorry. I know, I know, I shouldn’t be using the back door, but my husband, Mr. Holden, is in the lounge, and I’m sneaking off to pick up his birthday present. There’ll be a cab here soon.”

With that she flipped the latch on the gate and stepped out to wait on the street. Chela watched Mrs. Holden’s back. The woman snapped open her handbag and took out a handkerchief, then put it back, and looked nervously both up and down the street. Why, Chela wondered, would the woman offer such an unnecessary and lengthy explanation of her movements to a hotel maid? Curious now, she sat back down on her chair and waited. Either the young man would come or the older one. She bet anything that Mr. Holden was not sitting in the lounge. Her patience was rewarded. The same car that had been driven by the older man pulled up and the passenger door was impatiently pushed open. The man was leaning across the seat saying something to the woman, who still lingered on the sidewalk. This time Chela saw his face and frowned. She’d seen it before, and not just the last time he’d driven up. Somewhere else.

The parents of Ada Finch’s friend Rafaela, who lived two streets above the Finches, would not allow her to be questioned without their being present, and so Ames and Terrell now sat on kitchen chairs with them, feeling the awkwardness of the questions they would have to ask.

“Did Ada say anything to you at any time about a man she might be seeing or any plans she might have?”

Rafaela, a tall girl with dark hair held back with a ribbon, glanced at her parents and looked down.

“Please answer the sergeant,” her father said. He stubbed a cigarette he’d lit only moments before into a glass ashtray and looked expressionlessly at his daughter.

If I were Rafaela, Ames thought, I’d be scared to death right now.

“She . . . she was seeing a man. She used to go away with him sometimes at night, and she’d tell her parents she was staying here at my house.”

Rafaela’s father looked thunderous and leaned across at her. “She bloody what?”

Her mother looked down and then put her hand on her husband’s arm. “Language, darling.”

“Don’t ‘language’ me! Our daughter has been letting that good-for-nothing Finch girl use us as an excuse for her filthy behaviour.” He reached over