The Doll's House

Kate let the last piece of information sink in, hoping it would be enough to shift Deborah Gahan’s attitude to them. O’Connor sat down beside Kate and waited.

‘My brother wasn’t a particularly nice man,’ Deborah Gahan responded, ‘and I’m not talking about his fall from society. He was a schemer, always looking for the next scam he could pull. I’m not sure how involved he was with Adrian Hamilton’s financial collapse, but if he was part of it, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least.’ She looked from Kate to O’Connor. ‘I can’t be completely sure but I believe it was Keith Jenkins who put the money up for Adrian Hamilton’s widow.’

O’Connor asked the next question: ‘And what makes you think that, Deborah?’

‘He was a single guy and flash with his money – expensive cars, designer clothes, living it up. He was only starting to make a name for himself in television, so it wasn’t from there that he got his money but he had plenty of it all the same.’

‘So why would he help Adrian Hamilton’s widow?’ This time Kate did the asking.

For the first time since they had arrived, Deborah Gahan smiled, but it was more like a smirk than any positive change in her mood. ‘For the same stupid reason that most men do what they do, Dr Pearson.’

‘You’re saying Keith Jenkins and Lavinia Hamilton were involved with each other?’

‘It was only rumoured but, a bit like how Adrian Hamilton’s money worries surfaced once his dead body turned up in the water, everyone started asking questions. Answers soon rose to the surface. Keith Jenkins and Lavinia Hamilton might have been discreet, although it wouldn’t have mattered too much if they hadn’t. That is, of course, if Adrian Hamilton didn’t know about it.’

Kate sat forward. ‘You don’t think Adrian’s death was an accident. You think he killed himself.’

‘Dr Pearson, whether he ended up in the water intentionally or the alcohol put him there doesn’t really matter. He was losing his business, and was probably about to lose his wife. Either or both of those things might have been enough for some people to take matters into their own hands.’

Kate felt Deborah Gahan was still holding back. ‘Was there something else?’

‘It was a long time ago, Dr Pearson.’

O’Connor had no intention of letting Kate’s last question go unanswered. ‘Deborah, if you know something else, you’d better tell us.’

‘The wife – Adrian’s wife – she lost a baby the year her husband died. A girl, I understand.’

Kate asked another question, one to which she suspected she knew the answer. ‘Ms Gahan, you said Adrian’s wife, Lavinia Hamilton, lost her baby. You didn’t include Adrian Hamilton in that loss.’

‘Oh, he was part of it all right, but perhaps not in the way he wanted. I can’t be sure, no one can, but the parentage was in some doubt. Keith Jenkins’s name was floated as the possible father. I understand after the baby died Lavinia Hamilton started to unravel.’

‘Mentally, you mean?’ Kate kept eye contact with Deborah Gahan.

‘Post-natal depression, call it what you will, but either way, she became a mess and it’s thought Adrian finally put two and two together.’

‘Who told you all this?’ O’Connor was standing up again.

Deborah Gahan turned from Kate to O’Connor. ‘Jimmy, if you must know. He was very close to the family back then.’

‘What about the two children?’

‘What about them?’ She turned back to Kate.

‘How did they cope with it all?’

‘They were children. How do you think they coped? They got on with things.’ Deborah Gahan took a deep breath, then stood up to face O’Connor. ‘Now, Detective Inspector, if you don’t mind, I can’t be any more help to you.’

‘Just one more thing, Ms Gahan.’ Kate stood up too. ‘If Keith Jenkins was the father, he would have been a number of years younger than Lavinia.’

‘So?’

‘I was just wondering how they got together in the first place.’

‘Jimmy introduced Keith to the Hamiltons.’

‘And how did Jimmy and Keith meet originally?’ O’Connor, like Kate, was reluctant to let Deborah Gahan off the hook.

‘They were both at Trinity, but attended at different times.’

‘Really, Detective, it was a long time ago.’

‘Try, Deborah. It’s important.’

‘I guess in the same way Jimmy met everyone else, in some bar …’

‘Go on.’ O’Connor still not prepared to let go.

‘Keith would have been seriously underage at the time, but that wouldn’t have bothered Jimmy. Keith seemed to look up to him …’ She paused. ‘Jimmy liked the attention. Even as a teenager Keith Jenkins had charisma.’

‘Are you saying Jimmy—’

‘I’m not saying anything of the sort. My brother was a weak man, Detective Inspector. He had an ego, and liked it when others bolstered it. You asked me how they all met, and I’ve told you.’ Deborah Gahan was digging her heels in. ‘It was all a long time ago.’

‘What about lately, Deborah? Were they still friendly?’