A Fatal Flaw: A gripping, twisty murder mystery perfect for all crime fiction fans

‘Good day, Inspector,’ Clement said pleasantly from the doorway, before walking through the outer office and nodding every now and then to the polite greetings from the few officers who were working at their desks.

Back in his own office, it took the wily old coroner only two minutes to decide which of his friends he needed to call. There were several men who owed him a favour – and now he thought of one in particular. Back in the old days, he’d saved one of his colleagues from making a potentially disastrous mistake when he’d misdiagnosed a patient with a rare condition. It had been a mistake almost any doctor would have made, but Clement had been lucky enough to have had a similar case early in his own career, and thus he’d recognised the very subtle signs.

His friend was now a VIP on a large scale, with thumbs in many pies, and had been itching to get out of Clement’s debt for years. So it would make his day to hear that he could finally do Clement a good turn in exchange and feel that they were now even.

Ten minutes later, a fuming DI Jennings received a phone call from above ordering him to offer the coroner the police liaison services of WPC Trudy Loveday for the Abigail Trent investigation.

* * *

At that moment, Trudy was in the cells going through the handbags of several prostitutes while they watched, calling her names and offering her suggestions that would have made her mother’s ears burn.

She gamely tried to pretend her own weren’t burning at some of the more raucous jeering coming from the confined women, but in truth she was rather glad when she was relieved by another officer who told her that she was wanted in the DI’s office.

Naturally, this set off a whole barrage of innuendo from her tormentors, and she could only hope that her cheeks weren’t still burning when she knocked on the DI’s door a few minutes later and was bade, crisply, to enter.

Right from the start, she could tell by her superior officer’s sarcastic tone and short, sharp sentences, that he was in a right royal tizzy. But she hardly cared, when he told her the good news that she was going to be working with the coroner again.

And the fact that she was going to be working with the coroner again on Abigail Trent’s case was the icing on the cake. Grace Farley would be so pleased!

At least now, Trudy thought with some satisfaction as she collected a bicycle and pedalled off towards Floyd’s Row, where the coroner’s office was situated, she might be able to give her friend some peace of mind.

Chapter 5 (#ulink_0124491f-717c-57a5-85c8-bc96bbc83aaf)

‘So where do we start?’ Trudy asked, beaming a thank-you smile at Dr Ryder’s secretary as she delivered a tray containing a large pot of tea, three cups and a tin of Huntley and Palmer biscuits, and then left with her usual silent discretion.

By now, Trudy was beginning to think of Dr Ryder’s office as a home-away-from home, and as she took a sip of tea, she looked across his big, but neatly ordered desk-top with an expectant look on her face.

‘Well, I thought we might start with your friend Grace,’ Clement said. ‘I’ve taken the liberty of telephoning her at work, and she’s agreed to come down here in her lunch hour’ – he checked his watch – ‘which should be in about ten minutes’ time.’

Trudy nodded happily. ‘So, what are your thoughts so far?’ she demanded eagerly.

Clement smiled. ‘I have none, in particular,’ he said, amused, as ever, by her eagerness. He reached for a biscuit and put it on the side of his saucer and with no trace of tremor in his hand today, lifted the full cup of tea with confidence.

In due time, he knew his speech would become slurred, and he’d begin to shuffle. But with luck he could still eke out a few more years before anyone would guess he had serious health issues, and he might even get another year or more after that before anyone dared challenge him on it.

In the meanwhile, he was determined to make the most of these last precious, golden years of his life before enforced retirement and illness finally got the better of him. Besides, as he listened to the young girl in the chair opposite him, he was very much aware that acting as Trudy Loveday’s mentor and champion was going to give him an investment in life for the foreseeable future.

‘But surely you got a picture of what we’re dealing with from the inquest? I only wish I’d been able to attend,’ she added, a shade forlornly.

Clement contemplated lighting his pipe, then decided he couldn’t be bothered to try and get it going, and leaned back in his chair with a sigh instead. ‘The only things to be gained from inquests are basic information and a general “feel” for the case,’ he pointed out patiently. ‘It’s not as if new evidence is ever revealed. It’s a question of making official the facts that are already known to the police and the medical authorities.’

‘All right,’ Trudy said, trying to quash down a feeling of impatience. ‘So what’s your “feeling” for this one? Do you think she committed suicide?’ she demanded. Now that her friend Dr Clement Ryder had become involved and the investigation was officially ‘above board’ with her superiors, she was eager to move the case forward.

‘Your friend was adamant that Abigail wasn’t suicidal, wasn’t she?’ he mused quietly.

‘Yes. Why? Did the other friends you called as witnesses say otherwise?’ Trudy asked sharply, and for some reason was rather surprised when the coroner shook his head.

‘No. Her parents were adamant she wasn’t depressed, of course, and her friends seemed to feel the same way. Nobody said that she seemed the “type” to take her own life. Not that there is such a thing, of course.’

‘Oh. So all the gossip about her being moody and whatnot was just that? Idle gossip and speculation, and people being spiteful? Or…’ Trudy’s eyes widened slightly as a sudden thought hit her. ‘Could it be that someone was deliberately spreading such rumours around to try and make people believe it was suicide, when it wasn’t?’

‘Maybe,’ Clement said, a twinkle appearing in his rather watery blue eyes at her evident excitement. ‘But it sounds a little far-fetched to me.’

Trudy sighed and reluctantly nodded.

‘Then again,’ the coroner swept on, ‘she might have been moody and occasionally depressed without wanting to kill herself. Most of us are down from time to time, but we don’t all go throwing ourselves off the top of tall buildings. No, the impression I got of her, reading between the lines, was of a pretty and ambitious girl, who was perhaps a shade on the selfish and self-obsessed side, and was determined to get on in life.’

‘So not suicide then,’ Trudy said with some satisfaction. ‘When Grace gets here, she’ll be pleased about that, at least. So – not suicide, and I take it we can strike out murder?’ she offered, a bit more tentatively. She nibbled on a biscuit, her face thoughtful.

Clement verbally ran through the evidence – or rather lack thereof – for the case for murder. No break-in, no medical evidence of an attack or struggle, or that the poison had been forced into her system. Nor had the victim complained of being afraid of anyone, or of anyone menacing her prior to her death.

‘Of course, none of that means that someone couldn’t have sneaked the poison into her juice somehow,’ he pointed out reasonably in summation.

‘Which would put the people in the house with her in the spotlight,’ Trudy mused, sitting a little forward on her chair now. ‘Namely, her family.’ Then she slumped back again. ‘Can you really see her mum or dad or one of her siblings poisoning her?’ she asked sceptically.

Clement had never met Trudy’s parents, but he had been able to tell from the way she spoke about them, that she enjoyed a very close and loving relationship with them – as she did with her brother. So it wasn’t surprising that she couldn’t really believe in murder within a family.

However, he’d presided over too many cases (and read too many depressing news articles) to be unaware that one’s supposedly nearest and dearest often did want to poison one another. And sometimes did just that!

‘Her parents and the sister who found her seemed genuinely grief-stricken,’ he temporised. ‘Sometime soon I’m going to have to talk to them privately and in more detail. But I think you should concentrate on what your friend Grace has to say about this beauty pageant thing, and the strange goings-on there. Just in case there’s a connection.’

Trudy nodded, then, picking up something in the coroner’s tone, she shot the older man a look. ‘You sounded rather disapproving of the beauty contest, Dr Ryder. Don’t you follow the Miss World competition?’ she asked, a shade tongue-in-cheek. Most men, she knew, liked looking at pretty girls.

‘No, I don’t,’ Clement said, half-amused and half-appalled by the idea. ‘I’d rather watch the cricket!’

Trudy shrugged. ‘I suppose I can see why most of the girls doing them think it’s fun. And the money prizes can be staggering – I did a little research on it after Grace came to me,’ she admitted, seeing the doctor’s thick eyebrows rise in surprise. ‘But I think the Miss Oxford Honey only gives out prize money to the actual winner, and prizes for the runner up and winners of each round. Grace said the shop owners who are helping sponsor it are donating the prizes. You know, stockings from the clothes shops, and cosmetics from the chemists, and stuff like that. I think they’re being rewarded for their generosity by getting to sit on the judging panel, along with Mr Dunbar and the owner of the theatre.’

‘I’ll bet they are,’ Clement grunted, secretly thinking that most of them would be only too glad of the excuse to participate in a little glamorous showbiz under the auspices of a business banner.

‘So, you think it’s unlikely to be murder?’ Trudy got the conversation back on track, trying not to sound disappointed. ‘I suppose that leaves us with accidental death then? I mean, that the dead girl thought she was drinking something herbal and good for her that she’d made herself, and was in fact drinking poison instead. That’s so sad. To think, she thought that what she was doing was going to help her reach her goals in life, when in fact, she was putting an end to her future once and for all.’

Clement blinked at this rather torturous statement and then shrugged. ‘Or perhaps she didn’t make the poisonous concoction herself, but was given it by someone else?’

‘So you do think it’s murder?’ Trudy said, grinning with excitement.

‘Or it’s possible that the person who made the concoction made a genuine mistake, and is now too scared to own up to it?’

‘Her best friend Vicky, perhaps?’ Trudy proffered absently, reading the coroner’s inquest notes in between chatting and sipping her tea.

‘No, I don’t think so. She didn’t strike me as the adventurous kind. Not the sort of girl to try making up ointments and such,’ Clement disagreed. ‘She didn’t seem that bright, for one thing. No, I got the distinct feeling she was more the follower, and Abby the leader.’

‘Oh. One of her other friends then?’

‘Or a rival in the competition, perhaps?’ Clement mused. Although he considered it part of his remit to try and rein Trudy in on some of her more fanciful theories, he had to admit that it could be fun to let the imagination run riot now and then. ‘Perhaps this prankster your friend told you about has struck again, but this time went too far? Possibly without meaning to?’

‘Would that be murder then?’ Trudy mused.

‘Manslaughter, probably,’ Clement said. ‘But I’m not a QC, and besides, this is all idle speculation, remember.’