The Big Five O

Fay sighed inwardly. This wasn’t going to be quick.

‘So basically, he’d been at work.’

‘I think so, yes, but yesterday–’ Charlotte paused and Fay waited again.

‘Yes?’ Fay knew she sounded sharp, but she’d told Len she’d be there by ten latest and surely Charlotte had stuff to get on with as well.

‘I phoned him around 3 p.m. and his phone was switched off. Went straight to answer phone. So I called him at work, and Libby said he was out of the office.’

‘Right.’ Fay drank a bit more coffee and resisted the urge to tell Charlotte to get to the crux.

‘And she wasn’t sure where.’ Charlotte’s tone suggested this was loaded with significance.

Fay sighed audibly now. ‘Well, perhaps he hadn’t told her. Doesn’t mean he was up to no good.’

‘Lib organises his diary. She’s the most efficient woman on the planet. There is no way Roger would be in a meeting she didn’t know about. She was covering for him!’

Fay shook her head. ‘If she was, why not just lie and say he had a meeting with the ABC company and have done with it?’

‘In case I checked I suppose.’ Charlotte looked irritated. ‘When I persisted, she was all vague about how he could be here and he’d mentioned he might pop in there. I didn’t believe a bloody word of it.’

‘Anyway,’ said Charlotte impatiently as Fay looked sceptical. ‘I was talking to a client the other day who said she’s got some sort of tracking on her two kids’ phones – so she can see where they are if they’re late home from school or the daughter goes out in the evening. Says it stops her worrying so much. And I was thinking – that maybe you’d know about it. So I can do it to Roger.’

‘What?’ Fay heard herself almost squawk. ‘You want to put a tracker on your husband’s phone?’

‘Yes.’ Charlotte looked defiant. ‘I do.’ She got up and reached for the coffee pot. ‘She said it’s a feature on an iPhone – you do family sharing or something. I pretended I wanted to keep an eye on Joe. But I’ve Googled it and I don’t know how to do it without getting into Roger’s phone – and as I told you, he’s changed the pass code. I wondered if you’d have any ideas.’

Fay frowned. ‘Why would I know how to hack into someone’s phone and why would I want to?’

‘I suppose,’ said Charlotte. ‘I could ask him to do it for me and say I’ve been worrying about him having a car crash and also about Joe cycling back from football practice and could we all track each other’s so we all know where we are all the time. I could say I was going to ask Becky too.’

Fay shook her head. ‘He’ll think you’ve gone crazy – and any self-respecting eighteen-year-old is going to tell you right where to get off. Anyway,’ she went on. ‘How would tracking him help him not to have a car crash? You could see that he was on the M20 but you wouldn’t know if he was whizzing along merrily listening to Drivetime or pulverised in a forty-car pile-up!’

‘But if he refused,’ – Charlotte was in no mood for logic – ‘it would show he didn’t want me to be able to see where he was going.’

‘If he refused,’ said Fay deliberately, ‘it would be because he didn’t want to go along with a wife who didn’t trust him or want to allow him any personal freedom! How would you feel if Roger came home and said he wanted to track you?’

‘I’M not doing anything wrong!’ said Charlotte heatedly. ‘He’d say no because then if he goes to this Marion’s house, he’d know I’d be able to see which road she lived in. I’ve got a feeling it’s in Maidstone.’

‘Why?’

‘There was a receipt for a coffee from the Wealdstone Hotel there. Look!’ Charlotte got up and rummaged in her handbag. She slapped a small piece of paper on the table between them.

Fay looked at it, unimpressed. ‘So? He could have been waiting for someone – or killing time before a meeting. It’s not even two coffees, for God’s sake.’

‘Or waiting for her husband to go out before he went round …’

Fay stood up. The conversation was making her feel sick and shaky inside. She spoke firmly. ‘This is crazy. You haven’t got a shred of evidence to support that there even is ‘this Marion’. Why don’t you simply ask him where he was yesterday afternoon at 3 p.m.?’

Charlotte scowled. ‘I did, of course,’ she said crossly. ‘He said he’d gone over to Arnold Greaves – it’s a company they’re buying. But if that were true, Lib would have known.’

‘Not if he popped in on the way somewhere else. Just to drop off some paperwork–’

Charlotte had topped up her own cup and held the pot towards Fay. She looked hard at her friend. ‘Why are you defending him?’

Fay waved the coffee away. ‘I am trying to be the voice of reason. Somebody needs to be!’

Charlotte sat back down and picked up her iPad. ‘Well, if you won’t help me do the phone, I will have to go to plan B. I’ve been looking at private detectives to get him followed. They can put some sort of tracking device on the car or follow them in person. But I can only do it on Wednesdays to start with, cos the one I spoke to wanted nine hundred quid a pop.’

Fay who had been heading for the door, spun back round, alarm flooding her. ‘OH for God’s sake! That’s ridiculous. What ARE you thinking of? I’ll follow him myself if you’re going to spend that.’

Charlotte leant forward. ‘Would you? Really?’

Fay walked back towards the table and leant both hands on it, looking straight at Charlotte. ‘If I did, it would only be because you were getting so upset – not because I think it is justified in any shape or form. And because I can’t stand by and let you waste money like that on some shyster who saw you coming.’

‘He’s been in the game for thirty years,’ said Charlotte calmly. ‘He was very nice actually. He’s called Pete and he specialises in philandering spouses. I told him everything and he said it did sound as if Roger had something going on.’

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