Corpse in Waiting by Margaret Duffy

works for me, that’s all – an employee,’ she said, none too convincingly. ‘He’s looking for a business premises for me in this area.’
    â€˜What is your business?’
    â€˜I’ve told you already. I run an agency.’
    â€˜Yes, but what kind of agency?’
    â€˜For domestic staff, nannies, home helps, that sort of thing.’ She started to rise. ‘I’m going now.’
    â€˜Sit down.’
    Slowly, she did so.
    â€˜How many of your friends are ex-cons?’ I enquired.
    The woman actually went a little pale. ‘Why, none of them, of course!’
    â€˜A first offender then, this man who mugged the child. Someone who was described as a hoodie.’
    â€˜All this has nothing to do with me !’
    â€˜Could it be that it’s the boyfriend who chucked you over who’s trying to get you into trouble?’
    Visibly, she thought through the implications of cooperating over this. Then, ‘I don’t know,’ she answered slowly.
    â€˜You’ve spoken to him then.’
    â€˜Yes, I had to. I discovered I’d got some of his stuff. I told him I’d bin it all if he didn’t collect it.’
    â€˜And you shared a few worries at the same time?’
    She shrugged. ‘Well, you do, don’t you?’
    â€˜Did you give him my mobile phone number?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜I think you’re lying. What’s this man’s name and address?’
    â€˜His name’s Alan Kilmartin. He’s an architect.’ She gave me the address, all the information now coming with an alacrity that made me think that she wanted revenge and also that he probably wasn’t the man who had made the call.
    â€˜But you did get hold of my mobile number. How?’ I asked, trying to keep calmly professional and knowing I was failing, fast.
    The lip-glossed mouth formed a little pout. ‘OK, I admit I had a little look at Patrick’s mobile when he was in the john at a café where we went for coffee. He’d left it on the table.’ She smiled in knowing fashion, gazing down at her perfectly manicured fingernails.
    â€˜I see,’ I said. ‘And last night you persuaded him into drinking alcohol even after he’d told you he was banned.’
    â€˜Banned? What’s banned?’ she muttered. ‘Who banned him? You?’
    â€˜No, his medical specialist did. He was doped by thugs during his previous case and suffered slight liver damage.’
    â€˜Well, I don’t suppose a few drinks did him any harm.’
    â€˜You don’t actually care, do you? You see something and you want it, mostly because someone else already loves it, whether it’s a house or a person. You have to have it and then, like the house, make money on it by ripping it apart and getting rid of it. But the real satisfaction is taking it away from someone else.’
    Alexandra shot to her feet and I did likewise.
    â€˜He’s a fine man too,’ she said, almost spitting out the words as though they disgusted her. ‘I like fine men. They turn out to be quite ordinary in the end when you’ve stripped them off, layer by layer. For some reason it’s something I’m really good at. But don’t worry, you’ll get him back – eventually.’
    And with that she stalked away.
    I stood and cursed myself for allowing my feelings to get the better of me.

SIX
    I f the address Alexandra had given me was correct Alan Warburton Kilmartin, Dip.Arch. RIBA, lived in Warminster. I wondered, after what she had said, if he really had thrown her over for someone else or merely run like blazes when he realized what she was doing to him. On the other hand, they might have had a fairly normal relationship and he had become fed up with her hobby of hoovering up other, desirable, men mostly on the grounds that they were married, engaged, devoted to, or going out with, someone else.
    I could not, of course,