Page 32 of Murder in Portofino

‘It certainly does. Edgar didn’t go into any detail. What’s been happening? Has money been taken? A big sum?’

‘In excess of two million pounds, I believe.’

I saw her sit back with a shocked expression on her face – although she might just have been a good actor.

‘Two million pounds? But how? Who?’ She sounded genuinely stunned.

‘That’s what I’ve been engaged to find out. From what the others have told me, it would seem that only Jerome Van der Groot, Edgar Beaumont, Neil Vaughan, Adam Phillips and you had access to the accounts. Is that correct or have I left anybody out?’

‘No, that’s everybody. But surely you don’t think…?’ She was still doing a very good job of looking horrified.

I ignored her question. ‘You’re absolutely sure about there’s nobody else? No secretaries, trainees, interns?’

‘Absolutely not. We’re the only people with access, but…?’

This time, I did reply to her unposed question. ‘Now that Mr Van der Groot has been murdered, we’re left with just four possible perpetrators. I’m trying to identify which of you this might be.’

The expression on her face was one of horror, but she pulled herself together and looked me square in the eye. ‘Well, I can tell you right now that I had nothing to do with it.’

‘That’s good to hear but, tell me, if you had wanted to make payments to an outside bank account, could you have done so?’

She answered immediately. ‘Yes, of course I could. That’s the main part of my job. I pay people, but everything I do is vetted by Neil and Edgar and, of course, by Jerome.’

That sounded pretty conclusive. ‘I now have a more difficult question for you: assuming that you’re telling the truth, and seeing as Jerome Van der Groot is dead, that only leaves three possible perpetrators. Have you ever had any suspicions about any of them?’

She immediately shook her head but I sensed a lack of conviction. I waited some time for her to actually put her thoughts into words. ‘It’s unthinkable that any of my colleagues would have done anything so awful. I certainly can’t believe it of Adam or Neil.’

I immediately picked up on her omission. ‘What about Edgar Beaumont?’

I had to wait before she answered and she was clearly choosing her words carefully. ‘Edgar’s been having problems, money problems. He’s in the middle of an acrimonious divorce and every now and then, he moans to me about it, but I genuinely can’t imagine him resorting to theft, particularly on such a grand scale.’

‘And what about Jerome Van der Groot?’

She looked up sharply and caught my eye again. ‘Jerome? But he’s dead…’

‘Indeed, but he might have been squirrelling money away, mightn’t he?’

I had to wait even longer while she explored what appeared to be a completely new concept. Finally, she replied, but I noticed that she didn’t look me in the eye this time. ‘No, that doesn’t sound right, besides, he’s dead…’

There seemed to be little more I could get out of her about the accounts so I queried the big argument on Saturday night and her answer to this was more informative.

‘It was between Jerome and Martin.’ She shot me a quick glance. ‘You were here yesterday, weren’t you? You heard Martin – he can be a real pain. He and Jerome had a massive argument.’

‘About what?’

‘I don’t know all the ins and outs of it, but I’m pretty sure it was something to do with industrial espionage.’

Now it was my turn to look surprised. ‘You’re going to have to explain that to me.’

‘Like I say, I don’t know much about it, but I think the cause of all the trouble was that Martin’s been in talks with one of the other TV channels.’

‘With a view to leaving your company?’

‘I honestly don’t know. Maybe he was just feeding them ideas, but, whatever it was, it really got to Jerome. Any company that can dream up a fresh game-show or comedy-show format could potentially make many millions. In consequence, any ideas have to be kept strictly confidential.’ She paused for a moment before a thought must have occurred to her. ‘The best person to ask is Susie. She was sitting next to Jerome as usual and she knows everything there is to know about what goes on here at GreyratTV.’

I made a mental note of the fact that Susie Upton’s usual spot had been alongside the big boss and continued with my questions. ‘This has nothing to do with the inquiry into the accounts irregularities, so you’re under no obligation to answer, but just to satisfy my curiosity, what’s the relationship between Susie Upton and Martin Grey? One minute, I hear them insulting each other and the next, I see Grey with his hand on her thigh. What’s that all about?’

‘Martin puts his hand on everybody’s thigh – including mine! I wouldn’t read too much into that. As an outsider, I think Martin’s secretly jealous of Susie because anybody can see that she’s more popular than he is. He’s got such a massive ego, this really gets to him and he’s always sniping at her as a result. But at the same time, he absolutely drools over her. Anybody can see that.’

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