‘She rang me again on Sunday.’
‘What time was that?’
‘About two-thirty. She wanted to go and see Martin. talk to him. I persuaded her not to. Well, I thought I had. She was going to write instead, send the letter to me to deliver.’
‘Have you received it?’
‘No.’
‘I think she went after him,’ I said, ‘where she was found, the M63, it’s not far from Cheadle. You should check out the house. She could have been killed there, then moved. Was she killed where they found her?’
Miller didn’t acknowledge questions.
‘I’d be careful about making wild accusations like that,’ he said. ‘After all, as I understand it you don’t know that Martin Hobbs lived there.’
‘No. but…’
‘Or who else lived there.’
‘I know, but you must at least…’
‘I’m aware of how to conduct a murder enquiry, Miss Kilkenny.’ He spoke sharply. ‘You have a note of the street name, Sergeant?’
‘Old Hall Lane, Sir, Aston Martin, red.’
‘Where were you on Sunday night?’
‘Me?’ My face burned with indignation. ‘I was here.’
‘All evening?’
‘Yes.’ I sounded defensive, Guilty for no good cause. ‘There are children in the house.’
‘And you had no further contact with Janice Brookes after that phone call?’
‘No.’
‘Well, I think that will do for now. We’ll get in touch if we need to talk to you again.’
‘Did anyone else know her as Mrs Hobbs? Was she leading a double life?’
‘I can’t say, Miss. We do know she had a history of mental instability.’
I wondered what you had to do to qualify for that label. Go to a therapist, as I had? Take tranquillisers? Be hospitalised? I could think of precious few people who didn’t have some history of mental instability. Sergeant Boyston closed his notebook.
‘I’d like to speak to her family,’ I said.
‘I think they’ve got quite enough on their plate at the moment.’
‘But they might know why she was pretending to be…’
‘Frankly, that’s no longer any of your concern. Your client is dead. I’ve a murder to solve and I don’t want any interference. In fact, I’d regard any further activity by you as obstruction. Is that clear?’
I sent laser death rays with my glare. The two of them got to their feet.
‘There’s something else,’ I said. ‘About JB, I mean, Philip Hargreaves.’ Miller waited for me to continue. ‘Someone was seen leaving his place the day he was killed.’
‘Philip Hargreaves died of a self-induced drug over dose.’ He was impatient, spoke with contempt.
‘Well, that’s what everyone thought. But this man, he’s a known criminal, he was seen leaving on the Thursday afternoon. The person who saw him found JB’s body. He was already dead then. Twenty-four hours before I got there. But they were too scared to say anything.’
