David Webb 13 - One Is One and All Alone Read online

  David Webb 13 - One Is One and All Alone

  Anthea Fraser

  Endeavour Press (2014)

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  Rating: ★★★★☆

  Tags: Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, Mystery, British Detectives, Thrillers & Suspense, Crime, Murder, Traditional Detectives, Thrillers

  Mystery; Thriller & Suspensettt Mysteryttt British Detectivesttt Thrillers & Suspensettt Crimettt Murderttt Traditional Detectivesttt Thrillersttt

  When DCI Bennett remarries after the death of his wife, his family struggle to understand his new choice of partner.

  Una is a private, isolated woman, providing little in the way of companionship and preferring to live a very separate life to her husband.

  Soon after the wedding, Bennett’s old friend from the force, DCI Webb, also begins to wonder about Una.

  And as the two detectives work together on a series of violent shop raids, Bennett’s mood starts to sour.

  When two members of the Bennett family become victims of murder, and the cold-hearted Una seems to be inexplicably tangled up in the crimes,Webb is forced to investigate whether she should be a suspect.

  Very quickly, a baffling murder investigation is underway, complicated by the intricacies of family disputes and loyalties.

  And Webb faces one of the most traumatic cases of his career…

  'One is One and All Alone' is a chilling crime thriller that is perfect for fans of Elizabeth George and Nikki French.

  Praise For Anthea Fraser:

  'Another of her shrewd and sympathetic looks at contemporary life...A gripping, well-told murder mystery' - Western Morning News

  'A well-mannered, well-plotted and well-told story' - Birmingham Post

  'A well-structured book, with good balance between depiction of character

  and development of plot' - Criminologist

  'An absorbing, page-turning read' - Woman Journalist

  'Offers shrewd look at colour supplement version of country life' - Guardian

  ANTHEA FRASER has written all her life but did not begin to take it seriously until after marriage, when she found herself at home with two small daughters and embarked on a correspondence course with the London School of Journalism. She wrote short stories before turning to novels of the supernatural, and then to crime. Her novels include ‘The Seven Stars’.

  Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.

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  One is One and All Alone

  Anthea Fraser

  Copyright © Anthea Fraser 1996

  The right of Anthea Fraser to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  First published in the United Kingdom in 1996 by Collins Crime Club.

  This edition published in 2014 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  GREEN GROW THE RUSHES-O

  I’ll sing you one-O!

  (Chorus) Green grow the rushes-O!

  What is your one-O?

  One is one and all alone and evermore shall be so.

  I’ll sing you two-O!

  (Chorus) Green grow the rushes-O!

  What are your two-O?

  Two, two, the lily-white Boys, clothed all in green-O,

  (Chorus) One is one and all alone and evermore shall be so.

  I’ll sing you three-O!

  (Chorus) Green grow the rushes-O!

  What are your three-O?

  Three, three, the Rivals,

  (Chorus) Two, two, the lily-white Boys, clothed all in green-O,

  One is one and all alone and evermore shall be so.

  Four for the Gospel makers.

  Five for the Symbols at your door.

  Six for the six proud Walkers.

  Seven for the seven Stars in the sky.

  Eight for the April Rainers.

  Nine for the nine bright Shiners.

  Ten for the ten Commandments.

  Eleven for the Eleven that went up to Heaven.

  Twelve for the twelve Apostles.

  Table of Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  Extract from The Seven Stars by Anthea Fraser

  1

  It was the time DCI Webb always enjoyed: the day’s work was behind him; outside, the March winds blustered with their usual vigour, hurling the occasional handful of sleet against the windows, while here, in his little domain, all was warmth and peace — and Hannah had come for supper. Furthermore, since her flat was on the floor below, he wouldn’t even have to brave the elements to take her home.

  ‘You’re looking very pleased with yourself,’ she commented. ‘What were you thinking?’

  He grinned shamefacedly. ‘“East, West, Home’s Best”, or something equally corny.’

  ‘Well, so it is.’ She stretched out her legs to the gas fire’s blatantly fake logs. ‘Especially on an evening like this. I’ve been trying to guess what you’ve got in the oven; it smells delicious.’

  ‘Spiced pork.’ He topped up her glass. ‘I’m having quite a social day today; I met Malcolm Bennett for lunch and we went to that new grill place.’

  ‘Any good?’

  ‘Yes, well worth a visit. Decor’s a bit jazzy but the food’s excellent.’

  He frowned, staring into the dancing lights of the fire, and Hannah watched him curiously, aware that something was bothering him.

  ‘Is he the one who recently remarried?’ she prompted.

  ‘Not all that recently — must be getting on for two years. But yes, that’s Malcolm.’

  Another pause. To break it, she said, ‘And has it worked out?’

  Webb sighed. ‘I’ve been asking myself that. To be honest, I can’t think why he married her. Carol was such a pretty little thing, with a sparkle almost to the end. This one’s as stiff as a waxwork — no warmth about her at all.’

  ‘His family’s grown up, I suppose?’

  ‘Yes, a son and two daughters. Tim and Sally are married and Jane, the youngest, lives with her boyfriend.’

  ‘How did they take their father’s marriage?’

  Webb shrugged. ‘He met Una less than a year after Carol died and they married three months later. It’s my bet the kids resented her from day one. But they were all living away from home and I suppose he was lonely, poor bloke.’

  ‘You coped,’ Hannah pointed out, ‘without marrying the first woman who came along.’

  ‘It’s different after a divorce; I was glad to see the back of her!’

  An oversimplification, as Hannah well knew, but she merely said, ‘Has he hinted at problems?’

  ‘Not specifically, but I’ve known him a long time. I was best man at his wedding. The first one, that is.’

  ‘But not the second?’

  ‘They don’t have best men at register offices. It was wise not to marry in church, though; it would have brought back Carol’s funeral, for all of us.’

  ‘So what’s she like, this new wife?’

  ‘Tall, thin. Not pretty, certainly, though she has fine eyes and quite a striking face. But it’s her manner that’s off-putting — so stiff and formal.’ He shook his head. ‘Poor old Malcolm; I hope he’s not bitten off more than he can chew.’

  ‘Well,’ Hannah remarked, leaning forward and putting her glass on the table, ‘it might not be the most delicate observation in the circumstances, but he made his bed and now he must lie on it.’ />
  ‘And I don’t envy him that, either!’ Webb commented, getting to his feet and going to check on the casserole.

  *

  Across the town Una Bennett, still at her desk, sat staring at the door, which was vibrating from its resounding slam. That was totally uncalled-for! she thought angrily. She’d been quite justified in her criticism and there was no need for Pat to fly off the handle like that, let alone give in her notice. Now she’d have to go through all the rigmarole of advertising and interviews, and it couldn’t have come at a worse time, with that trilogy awaiting translation.

  Well, there was nothing she could do this evening. She glanced at her watch: seven o’clock, later than she’d — She drew in her breath, eyes widening in consternation. Damn! The upset with Pat had made her forget it was Malcolm’s birthday, and the family was coming to dinner.

  Hastily she locked her desk, shrugged on her jacket and reached for the phone.

  ‘Malcolm? Sorry, I’ve been delayed but I’m on my way now. Would you be a love and put the ducks in the oven?...What? Yes, of course both of them. I should be home in half an hour.’

  The lift seemed slower than usual, stopping on the first floor to let more people crowd inside. Reaching the ground floor at last, Una hurried along the passage to the door opening on the car park. It was raining — hard, icy drops that stung her face.

  Head down, she hurried over to the car. Before her marriage, her flat had been only five minutes away; now, she had to negotiate the centre of town, always snarled up with traffic at this time of night, then face the twenty-minute drive to Lethbridge. Not to mention, when she finally reached home, the disapproving faces of the family.

  She edged her way out on to King Street, switching her mind from office problems to the evening ahead. Barbara was coming, too, she remembered, filtering round Gloucester Circus: Carol’s unmarried sister who, Una was convinced, had hoped, after a decent interval, to marry Malcolm herself. God, what a hornet’s nest she’d married into! She’d been better off—

  Her thoughts skidded to a halt and were firmly battened down. No, she hadn’t meant that — not really. She was still fond of her husband, even if his set ways occasionally drove her to distraction.

  Her eyes on the wet road, she thought back to their meeting, on the coach trip to Scotland. Since all the other passengers were paired off, they’d been more or less thrown together, but after a day or so she’d found herself watching out for him. He was a big man — tall and broad-shouldered, his hair, still plentiful, fading barely noticeably from fair to grey. For the rest, a face that was pleasant rather than good-looking, and bushy eyebrows which were somewhat at odds with the twinkle in the eyes beneath them.

  Almost inevitably they’d sat beside each other on the coach and again at dinner each evening at the different hotels en route. Since the tour had been organized by Prime Travel of Shillingham, it was no surprise to find he lived locally, in the neighbouring town of Lethbridge. What had surprised her was his job — a detective chief inspector.

  That he was lonely was obvious, and he’d lost no time in telling her of the death of his wife and about his children and grandchildren. For her part she’d volunteered nothing, but his gentle yet persistent questioning had soon elicited the admission that she also lived alone.

  It was his undivided attention that charmed her. She was not used to the company of men, possessed, as she well knew, no feminine wiles to snare them. But this kindly policeman seemed, to her astonishment, to find her attractive, and she was more than grateful.

  Wondering anew what he’d seen in her, she glanced briefly in the rear-view mirror. Black hair in a short bob, dark eyes with strong, black brows: no obvious charms there. Nor, she noted wryly, had her brief marriage dispelled what she thought of as her ‘spinster look’ — an almost imperceptible pursing to her mouth, an air of resigned apartness.

  It came, she thought now, from thirty years of being alone, for since her mother’s death that was how she’d felt, whether or not there’d been others around. Her very name compounded it. When she was a child, her father had explained that Una meant ‘one and only’; her parents had married late, and there would be no more children. In fact, ‘One-and-Only’ became his pet name for her — ‘Come along, One-and-Only, time for bed!’ Sometimes he’d call her ‘Una-ique’, which she’d gathered meant the same thing.

  But her kind, joking father had died when she was thirteen, and her mother followed him five years later. Then it had been brought home to Una that she was indeed ‘One and Only’, with no one left who belonged to her. Without her work and her music, life would have been insupportable.

  As she turned at last into her drive, still caught up in memories, she recalled an exchange which had taken place in an office where she’d once worked. To her comment, ‘One can’t do everything oneself !’, that woman — what was her name? — had snapped irritably, ‘“One”? Who or what is “One”?’

  And Una had replied unthinkingly, ‘“One is one and all alone, and evermore shall be so.”’

  She remembered being appalled at the accuracy of the quotation, and the woman, after a startled look at her white face, had gone out of the room.

  Blocking off further reminiscences, Una turned off the ignition, gathered up handbag and briefcase, and went into the house.

  The smell of duck wafted in waves of succulence from the open kitchen door. At least dinner shouldn’t be too much delayed by her tardiness.

  She pushed open the sitting-room door, and the conversation in progress stopped abruptly.

  ‘Hello, everyone,’ she said with forced brightness, conscious of their alert, watching faces. ‘Sorry I was tied up, but I’m sure you’ve managed to entertain yourselves.’

  Malcolm moved towards her and she pressed her cold face briefly against his warm one. ‘Thanks for seeing to the ducks.’

  ‘Is there anything else I can do?’

  ‘You could lay the table, if you don’t mind. Everything else is under control. I’ll just run up and change.’

  Before going upstairs, Una checked the oven, switched on the extractor fan, took the cheese out of the fridge, and closed the kitchen door behind her.

  God, she could have done without this, tonight of all nights, she thought with exasperation as she hastily washed — no time for a shower. After a difficult day at the office, it would have been pleasant to have curled up with supper on a tray and an anodyne television programme. Instead, she had to produce a three-course meal for people who resented her very existence, and, what was more, smile while she did so.

  Would they, she wondered, not for the first time, have objected to anyone their father had married? Was it because the wedding was too soon after Carol’s death? Or was she herself the problem? She was well aware of her uncanny knack of antagonizing people, which she seemed unable to circumvent. Whatever the reason for their dislike, there was no way now to rectify it.

  Swiftly she applied make-up, brushed her hair, slipped into a green silk dress, and, with a last check in the mirror, hurried back downstairs.

  The meal, carefully chosen to include Malcolm’s favourite dishes, was progressing smoothly. Una had given some thought to seating, and, while checking her husband’s table-laying, had put neat little name-cards in each place. Barbara, she’d positioned as far from herself as possible, on Malcolm’s right, which should please her, she’d thought caustically.

  The plan seemed to be working well; as Jane’s boyfriend, Steve, had been unable to come — no loss, in Una’s view — the two sisters were seated side by side. There was not, she thought, watching them, a strong family resemblance; Sally, the elder, was a no-nonsense young woman with a firm chin, whose blonde hair was caught back in a tortoiseshell slide. Jane, at nineteen the youngest of Malcolm’s children, was more vivacious, with a bubbly personality she inherited from her mother. She also had the Bennett fair hair, but hers was frizzled all over in the prevailing fashion which, to Una’s eyes, looked as though it hadn’t bee
n combed in weeks. The two of them were engaged in animated conversation which produced an occasional burst of laughter.

  Across from them, on Una’s left, Sally’s husband Neil sat silently between Barbara and Jenny, Tim’s wife. Glancing at his closed, sullen face, Una felt the invariable twist of dislike. He was a pompous, arrogant young man, too handsome for his own good, who lost no opportunity to cause trouble.

  Beyond him, Barbara was in the middle of a long story to which Malcolm was listening, his head slightly bent towards her, and Una, continuing her analysis, turned her attention to them.

  Barbara Wood was an elegant woman, who wore her chin-length grey hair in a straight bob. As Una watched, she laughed and hooked it back behind her ear with an almost girlish gesture. She had large, deep-set grey eyes, high cheek-bones and good bone structure, and though not as pretty as her sister’s photographs, was well-groomed and attractive. Una wondered how long she’d been in love with Malcolm; possibly ever since Carol married him, which could account for her remaining single. Or possibly this was only because, like Una herself, Barbara was a career woman, teaching history at a private school in Shillingham.

  And Malcolm? Una’s eyes lingered reflectively on her husband. The last two years had not been without contretemps as two strong characters adjusted to living together. More volatile than he, there’d been times when his reasonableness infuriated her. At others, he’d reacted with an angry outburst at what he saw as her insensitivity. Perhaps all marriages were like that; she’d no way of knowing. But it did seem that those who embarked on it later in life had as a consequence more rocks to negotiate; the young tended to blunder on regardless, confident that love would see them through.

  And hard on that thought came the realization that she didn’t love Malcolm — probably never had. The suddenness of the revelation shocked her, and she was still adjusting to it when she became aware of her stepson’s assessing gaze.