“It’ll settle down,” Elise said.
And it had. Well, Caro had.
* * *
—
“Actually, sod it,” Caro suddenly said now. “My old man can take her for once—Baz, you’re on tutu duty! I’m on my way.”
When she arrived at Elise’s, she was starving and Elise had nothing she wanted.
“Halloumi? Avocado? Seeds? Bloody hell. I’m not a vegetarian budgie. Let’s go and get a ham sandwich over the road while we talk it through. And see what the locals are saying.”
Doll Harman was behind the bar and nodded a greeting as Elise pulled up a stool and let Caro do the honors.
“Two Cokes and can we see the menu?” Caro asked.
“We’re not doing food,” Doll said. “Kitchen’s closed—I’m giving it a deep clean.”
“Shame,” Caro chirped. “I’ll have two bags of crisps instead. Meat flavor, please.”
“We don’t see you in here much,” Doll said to Elise as she poured the drinks and deliberately blanked Caro.
“No, I’ve not been well.”
“I heard—I’m sorry about that.” And she smiled in sympathy. “How are you doing now?”
Doll leaned her bosom on the bar and winced in commiseration as they passed ten minutes discussing women they knew who’d had breast cancer, implants, bra fittings, and other hilarious moments in changing cubicles.
“When are you back at work?” Doll asked, idly sweeping crisp crumbs off the bar.
“I went back this week,” Elise said. “Hard to sit at home when there’s been a death on my own patch.”
“Ah, Charlie,” Doll said quietly. “To be honest, I thought the booze would kill him. Brandies at lunchtime! Madness. Dave had to ban him when he started to get nasty.”
“Goodness! He was always so lovely when I spoke to him.”
“That’s what we all thought but we saw a very different side of him. He turned on Dave. Effing and blinding like a laborer. And he was very rude about me.”
“No!”
“Said I was a ball-breaker because I wouldn’t let Dave invest his pension in some scheme. Well, it was a bloody stupid idea. I put my foot down straightaway. ‘That’s our old age,’ I told Dave. We’re planning to buy a house in Spain when the time comes, put up a couple of deck chairs, and pickle ourselves in G and Ts. That’s the plan, anyway.”
“Sounds perfect.”
“It is. I think we had a lucky escape. I bet others haven’t.”
Bingo!
“I bet. Look, we’d better get off,” Elise said, sliding off the stool. “It’s been lovely to chat.”
“Same.” Doll smiled. “Come back anytime.”
* * *
—
“Up to his old tricks! Wonder if that was Charlie’s first try in Ebbing,” Elise said when they got outside. “God, Mrs. Dave really hates you!”
“Ha! She’ll hate me even more when I rearrest her son,” Caro said. “But Dave didn’t give Charlie his money, did he? Who else in Ebbing has got money to be conned out of?”
“Pete Diamond? And the local business owners? What about the Lobster Shack man? Toby something? His website’s quite flash. We can go and see him after we’ve been to the Eastwoods’。”
“It’ll have to be quick. Baz will kill me if I’m not home for feeding time at the zoo. I said I’d be gone for only a couple of hours.”
They were climbing into Caro’s car when Ronnie suddenly shot out of her door and flagged them down.
“Elise, have you heard? The police were at the weekender’s cottage next door to yours earlier. Suspected drowning. It’s the husband. Val’s heard that the coast guard got a call early this morning about a swimmer who’d disappeared from sight, and a pile of clothes was found.”
“Seriously?” Caro said, scrolling through her phone. “Yep. At seven this morning. Who goes swimming at that hour? Is this him?”
She showed Elise and Ronnie a photo on her phone of a good-looking man in ridiculous swimming trunks.
“Yes. That’s Kevin Scott-Pennington,” Elise said. “He and his family come down most weekends.”
“Perhaps he didn’t know about the riptide,” Ronnie said.
Fifty-seven
SATURDAY, AUGUST 31, 2019
Dee
Elise and DS Brennan have come to see Liam. I can see it’s a bit awkward for Elise but I do it every day—acting as though I don’t know people when I see them in different circumstances.