Page 139 of Marble Hall Murders

‘I don’t care who killed Eliot! And no. I didn’t see anything – but if I had, I wouldn’t say. I heard a screech of tyres as I came out of the party, but I didn’t see the car. Eliot was already dead. That was when I knew providence was on my side and that I could pay you back the way you so dearly deserved. I took a scrap of his clothing and his watch and some dust from the road and after that it was all so easy. You can tell the police anything you like, my dear, but they’re not going to believe you. You can put a knife in yourself or you can wait for someone to do it to you in prison. Either way, you’re finished. You’re dead.’

She got to her feet and that was when I did something so stupid, looking back on it now, I honestly believe I deserved everything that followed. It had gone so well, but right then the cold-bloodedness of what she had done, the madness ofit all, got through to me. She had said she’d wanted to be my friend and I’d believed her. More than that, by reporting Charles to the police, I felt I’d done her harm and therefore in some way I owed her. What a fool I’d been! For a brief moment, I was furious with both myself and her.

‘It’s not going to work, Elaine,’ I called out to her.

‘Go to hell, Susan.’

I pulled my mobile phone out of the tissue box, where it had been all along, and held it up for her to see. ‘I’ve recorded every word of this conversation, Elaine. You talk about traps, but the moment you came through the door, you walked into mine. All I wanted was to hear it from your own lips – and you’ve spelled it out very nicely. I think you’re the one who’s going to need a lawyer. Now get out of here.’

She didn’t move.

‘Give me that,’ she said.

‘No. I’m giving it to the police.’

‘You tricked me.’

‘That’s right. Just like you tricked me!’

‘Give it to me!’ She moved incredibly quickly. She had been standing near the counter and even as she spoke, her hand had whipped out and grabbed one of the Japanese knives. Suddenly I was looking at ten inches of razor-sharp steel.

‘Don’t be stupid, Elaine,’ I said, doing my best to keep my voice steady, glancing around the room for anything I could use to defend myself. ‘People will have seen you arrive. Your car is parked outside. If you hurt me, you’re going to be the one who ends up in prison.’

‘Give it to me!’

There had been a second transformation. It was only now that I realised Elaine wasn’t just vengeful, she was seriously out of her mind. What was left was this crazed woman in Dior and Estée Lauder brandishing a hideous carving knife in a way that was both improbable and terrifying.

‘Think of your daughters, Elaine. Think of your grandchildren. Don’t you want to see them again? Go home. We can forget about this …’

I was lying. Elaine had perverted the course of justice, obstructed the police and God knows what else. Nobody was going to give her a free pass and perhaps somewhere inside that broken mind of hers she knew it. She let loose a stream of swear words, screaming them as she moved towards me, and I was so paralysed by what she had become that I didn’t realise what she was going to do until it was almost too late. I saw the knife above her head. I saw her bring it down in a vicious, scything motion. But it was only when the blade sliced through my upper arm and chest, cutting open my dress and the flesh beneath, that I understood I was in mortal danger and unless I reacted very quickly, I was going to die.

‘Give me the phone!’ she screamed, her voice like nothing I had heard before.

I backed away, aware of blood coursing down my arm and seeping through my clothes. There was no pain yet. That would come later. I tried to stop her. ‘You don’t know what you’re doing, Elaine. Stop this! This is crazy!’

Somehow, I’d had the presence of mind to pick up a chair and I held it with the legs pointing towards her, using it to keep her away from me. She was slashing with the knife, left and right, left and right, eyes staring. I saw it sweep inches awayfrom my face, just out of reach. My blood was splattering the white Carrara marble floor. And still she was screaming, a hysterical, meaningless cacophony. By this stage, all she wanted to do was kill me and to hell with the consequences. There was nothing I could say to her. The rising flood of grief and rage had finally burst its banks.

She lowered the knife and charged towards me. I chose the moment to thrust forward, pinning her between the four legs of the chair and propelling her backwards into a larder cupboard, which happened to be open. There was a crash of breaking wood. Spice bottles and storage jars cascaded onto the floor and exploded all around her. She lashed out with her left hand and I lost hold of the chair. It was sent hurtling to one side and now there was nothing between Elaine and me. She saw her opportunity, rushing towards me with the knife. I backed away, almost slipping on my own blood. I couldn’t stop her. It was over for me.

I heard an explosion of wood and glass and saw the window on one side of the room disintegrate as a metal cylinder – which I would only later recognise as a dustbin – smashed into the room. It came within an inch of hitting me and for a terrible moment I thought someone else had joined in the attack, that somehow Charles had got out of Belmarsh and had arrived in time to help his wife. But it had been used as a battering ram, not a weapon, and a second later, Detective Inspector Ian Blakeney climbed through the hole that had been made and imposed himself between me and Elaine, his face flecked with blood from the fragments of broken glass.

‘Drop the knife, Mrs Clover. I’m a police officer.’

Elaine stared at him.

‘Put the knife down. Now!’

The madness had already left her. As she realised what she had done, she burst into tears, howling like an animal. Her hand fell and she dropped the knife, which broke on the marble floor. Blakeney was unarmed. It was only his personality that was keeping her at bay.

‘I want you to kneel down and put your hands behind your head, Mrs Clover. I don’t want to hurt you.’

Slowly, dazed, still sobbing, she did what he had said.

He looked at me. ‘Susan, do you have a phone? I want you to call 999 and then hand it to me. Can you do that?’

I no longer had the phone! I must have dropped it when I picked up the kitchen chair. For a terrible moment, I wondered if Elaine had managed to destroy it after all. Not that it would really matter. Not after what Blakeney had witnessed. He was standing over her, his eyes fixed on her. I felt something pulling at my dress and remembered that it had a pocket. The phone was inside. I must have slipped it in there without realising what I was doing. I did as he asked. I dialled the number and when it was answered, I handed it to him.

That’s all I remember. After that, like a character in a Victorian novel, I think I must have passed out.

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