the right thing.’
‘Did Dennis find out that you’d spoken to him? Is that why Simon Walden had to die?’
There was a silence. No traffic outside. No birdsong. Then Dennis’s voice, affable and persuasive as always. ‘You can’t trust what Grace says, Matthew. You know that. She’s always been emotionally frail and given to strange fancies.’
‘I told Dennis,’ Grace said. ‘He was here when I came back and he wanted to know where I’d been. I can’t lie to him. He knows when I’m not telling the truth. I don’t have my own life any more. He said I’d done a wicked thing, telling him our business. The man could wreck all the great work at the Woodyard. If he died, it would be a form of sacrifice. It would serve the greater good.’
‘I didn’t kill Simon Walden.’ Dennis was still confident and easy. ‘You know that, Matthew. I was celebrating your father’s life at his funeral. In front of your mother and many of their friends. I spent all morning with your mother. I felt that she needed my support.’ A pause. ‘As you weren’t there to give it. In different circumstances, if you were a more attentive son, you might have been at the service to vouch for me.’
Matthew didn’t say that he had been there, at the chapel of rest, at least, and that he’d said goodbye to his father in his own way. ‘But you didn’t need to kill Simon Walden, did you, Dennis? You just had to let Grace know that it would be convenient if he died. As she said, you control her. Like a puppet-master. Like the king who let it be known that he wanted Thomas Becket killed in Canterbury, you set up the train of events that led to murder without getting your hands dirty yourself. Because your wife doesn’t have her own life any more. She hasn’t for years. She’s so terrified of you that she’ll do whatever you want.’ Matthew turned to the woman, his voice gentle. ‘What did you do, Grace? How did it work?’
She turned away from her husband and started speaking. ‘Simon had given me his mobile number. I called him and told him that I’d found something that would incriminate the trustees. A copy of the cheque they’d given to Rosa’s mother. We arranged to meet.’
‘Why did you choose Crow Point?’
‘I used to go there with my parents. They had a little boat that they kept at Instow. We had picnics there when I was a girl. I thought it would be a good place to die. I would like to die there, listening to the wind and the waves.’
‘How did you get there?’
‘I drove there in Dennis’s car. He’d got a lift to the funeral with a friend. I can drive, although I seldom do these days. I’m a capable woman.’ A pause. ‘I was a capable woman.’
‘What about Christine? That was the day before she was snatched so she was here with you. She wasn’t at the Woodyard that day.’
‘I left her at home, watching television.’ Grace’s voice was very calm. ‘She was happy enough and I knew it wouldn’t take long. I’d be back before Dennis was home.’
‘So, you drove to Braunton. What happened next?’
‘I didn’t drive down the toll road,’ Grace said. ‘Dennis had become friendly with a couple who lived in the cottage there and I thought they might recognize the car. I parked at the other side of the point, the seaward side, behind the dunes at Braunton Burrows, and I walked from there. Simon was waiting for me. I saw him in the distance. He was looking out.’ She lifted her head. ‘I think Dennis is right and I’m mad. I must be mad.’
Matthew pictured her, lanky and awkward, with her scarecrow straw hair and her staring eyes, walking over the sand towards the man she was going to kill.
‘I knew nothing of this.’ Dennis spoke for the first time since Matthew had begun his story. His voice was as Matthew remembered from his childhood. Deep and rich. The sound of God. ‘Of course I wasn’t pleased that Grace had gone behind my back to speak to Walden about our affairs, but I didn’t threaten her. It’s ridiculous to suggest that I asked her to kill him.’
Grace ignored him. It was as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘I’d brought a knife with me; it was in my bag. An ordinary kitchen knife. I sharpened it before I left home. I