Death in the Sunshine (Retired Detectives Club, #1)(78)

The blue box file is sitting at the back of his wardrobe, surrounded by pairs of shoes. With her heart pounding in her chest, Lizzie reaches into the wardrobe and lifts it out. There’s a lock on the front clasp, but it isn’t locked. Her fingers shake as she undoes the clasp and lifts the lid. There’s one file inside – an A4 buff folder that’s stuffed about two inches thick.

Lizzie opens the file and starts to read.





43


MOIRA


She parks on the street and double-checks the address against Peggy Leggerhorne’s message – 233 Stingray Drive. She hasn’t told Peggy she’s coming – didn’t want to give Peggy the chance to tell her not to – so she feels a bit bad, but she’ll get over it. She’s on the trail of something important, she’s sure of it, and she just needs to get clear on the sequence of events.

Climbing out of the car, Moira walks up the neat path that borders the driveway and then cuts across the front of the white weatherboard-clad house to the porch. The steps up to the porch are lined with pots of flowers in full bloom – pinks, reds and a dotting of cream. There’s a double-seated swing bench on the porch with a blue gingham seat pad and pretty embroidered cushions in different shades of blue arranged neatly along the back. The front door is pale grey. Moira raises her hand and knocks firmly.

The door opens almost immediately. It stops at about six inches open, a brass door chain visible across the gap. A silver-haired lady who looks to be in her mid to late eighties peers through the crack between the door and the frame. ‘Hello?’

Moira suspects she’s been watched from the moment she pulled up outside. ‘I’m Moira, we’ve been talking on Messenger.’

Peggy stares at her for a long moment without speaking. ‘I didn’t think you’d come here. I thought you asked for my address to know the location of the burglary. I don’t—’

‘I’m really sorry to turn up unannounced, but I’m working with Philip and Rick from the community watch – we’re doing our own investigation into the murder at Manatee Park.’

Peggy frowns. ‘The one that the management are trying to hush up?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is that how you got those injuries?’ asks Peggy, gesturing towards Moira’s face.

‘I disturbed an intruder at the CCTV office yesterday. He’d attacked Hank, the guy who works there, and hurt him. I tried to stop him getting away, but, well, he did this and knocked me unconscious.’

‘Sounds like you were very brave.’ Peggy moves closer to the door, but she’s still looking worried. ‘Thing is, we don’t like people coming inside, not after what happened.’

‘I understand,’ says Moira, giving Peggy what she hopes is a reassuring smile. ‘We can talk right here if you like.’

Peggy looks unsure. She leans away from the door, her hand on the chain.

I’m losing her, thinks Moira. She tries again. Last chance. ‘I appreciate this might be difficult but can you tell me about the burglary and how it happened?’

‘I try my best not to think about it.’

‘It could help solve the burglaries and the murder at Manatee Park.’

Peggy bites her lip. She glances back into the house and uses sign language to say something to her husband, then steps out on to the porch and pulls the door closed behind her. ‘What do you need to know?’

‘Everything you can tell me. Why don’t you start from the beginning?’

Peggy nods. ‘It woke me up, the noise of them breaking in, but it didn’t wake Arnold, my husband.’ She leans closer, her voice hushed. ‘He’s deaf; they said eighty-eight per cent of his hearing had gone when they last tested him. He sleeps like a log, unlike me.’

‘Do you know what time it was?’

‘I do, because when I opened my eyes the alarm clock display was right in front of me. It was 1.03 a.m. on the nineteenth. I remember thinking I’d had even less sleep than usual before waking. Then I heard the breaking of glass and knew there was someone who shouldn’t be inside our home.’

Moira feels the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end – the Leggerhornes were burgled the night of the nineteenth, and Hank said he’d seen the murder victim walking along Stingray Drive around 1 a.m. on the nineteenth. ‘What happened next?’

Peggy shakes her head. ‘Nothing on my part, I’m ashamed to say. You always think that if someone breaks into your property you’ll act to protect what’s yours, you know, fight back.’ She exhales loudly. ‘I didn’t do that. I wasn’t brave like you were yesterday with that intruder you found. I stayed in bed. Hugged my husband, who was still sleeping. And prayed that the intruder wouldn’t come upstairs and hurt us.’

‘And did they?’

‘No. I could hear them moving about downstairs, and I think they thought about coming up but when they stepped on the first couple of stairs they creaked really loudly. The intruder left soon afterwards.’ She shakes her head. ‘I guess they’d got enough and didn’t want to risk us finding them in the house.’

‘Did they take much?’

Peggy closes her eyes for a moment. When she opens them her eyes are watery. ‘They took the silver my mother left me when she passed, a gold mantle clock that had been in my family for five generations, and Arnold’s service medals. We kept our emergency fund in the kitchen drawer – around five hundred dollars in twenties and tens – they took that too.’