A Dead Liberty Read Online Free

little job like that? I’ve got class, I have.”
    â€œLucy Durmast didn’t say anything when she was charged,” said Detective Inspector Sloan. “That is to say,” he added with painstaking accuracy, “nothing that Trevor Porritt could catch. He made a note that she started to speak and then stopped in mid-breath.”
    â€œNot a lot of help,” said Leeyes heavily.
    â€œNo.” As far as Sloan was concerned nothing had been a lot of help in the case so far.
    â€œAnd she hasn’t said anything since?”
    â€œNot a word.”
    â€œNot even to her solicitor?”
    â€œShe won’t have one,” replied Sloan succinctly.
    â€œYou can’t altogether blame her for that, now can you, Sloan?” said Leeyes with unaccustomed jocularity.
    â€œI understand, sir, quite informally, of course …”
    â€œOf course …”
    â€œThat at the urgest request of Ronald Bolsover he’s the deputy chairman of her father’s firm—the senior partner of the family’s solicitors—er—made himself available for consultation after she had been charged.”
    â€œShe wouldn’t talk to him?”
    â€œShe wouldn’t even see him. Quite miffed about it, I’m told he was. She even sent him a message saying he wasn’t to take any action whatsoever in any circumstances.”
    â€œShe needn’t have worried too much about that,” said the superintendent. “Solicitors don’t ever take action. All they do is suggest that you take it.”
    â€œThere must have been something she didn’t want him to do,” said Sloan logically, “or she wouldn’t have said so.” It had been the only positive statement of any sort to be issued by Lucy Durmast and as such had been wrung dry of implications.
    Leeyes grunted. “Bail? Did she ask for bail?”
    â€œShe didn’t speak,” Sloan reminded him.
    â€œHow did that affect bail?” asked Leeyes.
    â€œHenry Simmonds had to ask his Clerk that,” said Sloan.
    â€œHa! And what did he say?” pounced Leeyes. “He’s supposed to know all the answers, isn’t he?”
    â€œThe Clerk said that as no application had been made there was no way in which bail could be granted.”
    â€œTypical of the way the legal mind works,” said Leeyes. “What about the police?”
    â€œHad it been asked for,” said Sloan slowly, “we would have opposed it …”
    â€œAh …”
    â€œShe was living alone, for one thing.”
    â€œAlone because she’d killed the chap she was living with?” suggested Leeyes. He, too, knew all about male murderers being mostly widowers.
    â€œNo, no,” said Sloan hastily. “Nothing like that. She lives with her father … her mother’s dead.”
    â€œBut you said …”
    â€œHer father’s overseas at the moment. He’s designing a new town in Africa.”
    â€œHaven’t they got enough problems there already?”
    â€œA town, not a township,” responded Sloan absently. “She was living alone,” he added, coming back to Lucy Durmast, “in a detached house in the village of Braffle Episcopi.”
    â€œThat isn’t exactly central either,” grunted the superintendent. “Is it?”
    â€œAbout as remote as you can get in East Calleshire,” agreed Sloan feelingly. “Nearer to Calleford, of course, than to Berebury. The victim was taken to Calleford Hospital.”
    â€œWhich is how Trevor Porritt came into the case, I suppose.”
    â€œHis patch,” agreed Detective Inspector Sloan, “not mine.” He coughed. “The distance hasn’t helped.”
    â€œNever does,” said Leeyes bracingly. The superintendent himself seldom stepped out of his office at Berebury Police Station but was all in favour of everyone else’s doing so.
    â€œIt isn’t