Death Of A Hollow Man (25 page)

“Don’t worry—you have only just woken up, after all. But I expect you would like a bath?” Joyce had done no more previously than sponge Deidre’s face and hands while the girl had stood in front of the basin swaying like a zombie.

“Please. … I feel disgusting.”

“I’ve put out some clothes for you. And some warm tights. I’m afraid my shoes’ll be too small. But you could probably squeeze into my wellies.” Joyce got up. “I’ll go and run your bath.”

“Thank you. Oh, Joyce—did they find out after I’d gone—the police, I mean—who had … ?” Joyce shook her head. “I still can’t believe it.” Deidre’s face quivered. “What a terrible night. I’ll never forget it as long as I live.”

“I don’t think any of us will,” replied Joyce. “You might like to ring the hospital while you’re waiting for your bath. I’ve left the number by the phone.”

After Joyce had gone, Deidre found her glasses, put them on, and sat on the edge of the bed staring into the dressing-table mirror. Cully’s gown billowed around her like a scarlet parachute. It was the red of wounds and freshly killed meat. Hearing the water start to gush reminded Deidre of the reservoir. She gripped the edge of the bed. In her mind the two images juxtaposed: Esslyn’s throat gaped anew. Blood came—a trickle, a stream, a torrent, pouring into the reservoir, turning the water crimson. Her father fell again from his boat, disappeared, and surfaced, his face shining, incarnadined. He did this over and over, like a mechanical doll. Oh, God, thought Deidre, I’m going to see those two things for the rest of my life. Every time I stop being busy. Every time I close my eyes. Every time I try to sleep. For the rest of my life. Futilely she covered her eyes with her hands.

“Hi.” Deidre jumped up. Cully stood in the doorway, pencil-slim, an eel in blue jeans. She also wore a T-shirt inscribed
“Merde! J’ai oublie d’iteindre le gaz!”
“You look much nicer than I ever did in that thing, Deidre. Do keep it.”

That’s a dig at my size if ever I heard one, Deidre observed to herself. She replied primly, “No, thank you. I have several pairs of pajamas at home. ” Then she thought, what if Cully was simply trying to be kind? How brusque and ungrateful I must sound.

“Okay.” Cully smiled, unoffended. She had perfect teeth, even and brilliantly white like a film star’s. Deidre had read once that very white teeth were chalky and crumbled easily. It seemed a small price to pay. “I just came to say that I got some super bath oil for my birthday from France. Celandine and Marshmallow—and it’s on the bathroom windowsill. Use lots—it really makes you feel nice.” Cully turned to go, turned back, and hesitated.

“Terrible business, last night. I’m so sorry. About your father, I mean.”

“He’ll be all right,” said Deidre quickly.

“I’m sure he will. I just wanted to say.”

“Thank you.”

“Not sorry about Esslyn, though. He was an outbreak of rabies and no mistake. If I were queen, I’d order dancing in the streets.”

When Cully had gone, Deidre rang the hospital and was told that her father was resting, that he was being seen that afternoon by a specialist and they would prefer her not to visit until the following day. On receiving the assurance that he would be told she had rung and given her love, Deidre made her way to the bathroom rather guiltily relieved that she had a whole day to rest and recover before the stress of a visit.

She measured out a careful thimbleful of
Essence de Guimauve et Chelidoine,
tipped it in, then stepped into the faintly scented water. Then, as she lay back letting go, floating away, sliding away, vanishing, her mind emptied itself of ghastly memories, and a new idea gradually, timidly drifted to the surface. It was an idea too appalling really to be given credence, yet Deidre, tensing a little with not unpleasurable alarm, braced herself to consider it.

Cully’s intemperate phrases when referring to the previous night’s disaster had shocked Deidre deeply. She had been brought up to believe that you never spoke ill of the dead. As a child, she had assumed that this was because, given half a chance, the dead would come back and savage you. Later she modified this apprehension to include the understanding that a) if you only said nice things about them, they might put in a good word for you when your turn came, and b) it just wasn’t honorable to attack people who couldn’t answer back.

Now, hesitant and half-fearful, she prepared to examine—even acknowledge—an emotion she had always prayed would be forever absent from her heart. She recalled Esslyn’s behavior to his fellow actors. His condescension and spite, his indifference to their feelings, his impregnable self-esteem and swaggering coxcombry. His laughter and sneers about her father. Holding her breath, lying rigidly, fists clenched in the perfumed bath, Deidre faced, more or less boldly, a terrible new perception about herself. She had
hated
Esslyn. Yes. Hated him. And, even worse,
she was glad that he was dead.

White-faced, she opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling. Waiting for a sign of God’s displeasure. For the thunderbolt. When told as a child that every time she told a lie He got one out and it was only His all-forgiving love that stopped Him firing it off with all deliberate speed, she had tried to picture this celestial weapon of retribution, but all her young mind could come up with was the bolt on the kitchen door magnified a thousand times and painted shining bronze. Nothing even remotely similar crashed punitively through the Barnabys’ bathroom ceiling.

At the recognition that it never would and that she could be glad that Esslyn was no longer in a position to cause anyone pain or distress without fear of divine retribution, a tremendous wave of something far too powerful to be called relief broke over Deidre. She lay dazed, still faintly incredulous at this new truth. She felt as if someone had removed a great yoke from her shoulders or heavy chains from her legs and feet. Any minute now, she might drift up to the unriven ceiling. She felt weak but far from helpless. She felt weak in the way the strong must sometimes do. Not endemically, but accepting the need of occasional rest and refreshment. She wished now she had eaten her toast.

After a few somnolent minutes more, she turned on the hot tap and reached for the Celandine and Marshmallow elixir. If a thimbleful had this effect, reasoned Deidre, what could half a cupful do?

Barnaby, having perused his scenes-of-crime reports and witnesses’ statements, sat gazing at his office wall, lips pursed, gaze, vacant, to a casual observer miles away. Troy, having seen all this before, was not deceived. The sergeant sat on one of the visitor’s chairs (chrome tubes and tweed cushions) and stared out of the window at the dark rain bouncing off the panes.

He was dying for a cigarette but did not need the restraint of the no-smoking sign on the back of the door to stop him lighting up. He was used to being closeted all day with a clean-air freak. What really bugged him was that the chief had been a fifty-a-day high-tar merchant in his time. Reformed smokers (like reformed sinners) were the worst. Not content, thought Troy, with the shining perfection of their own lives, they were determined to sort out the unregenerate. And with no thought at all as to the possible side effects of their actions. When Troy thought of all that fresh cold air rushing into poor little lungs denied their protective coating of nicotine, he positively trembled. Pneumonia at the very least must be waiting around the corner. He insured himself against this eventuality by lighting up in the outer office, in the toilet, and anywhere at all the second Barnaby was off the premises. As a sop to all the haranguing, he had changed from unfiltered to filtered, flirting with Gitanes Caporal along the way. He admired the idea of a French cigarette more than the things themselves, and when Maureen had told him they stank like a polecat on the razzle he had not been sorry to give them up.

Troy had read through the statements but not the scenes-of-crimes reports. He had also been present an hour ago when the Smys were interviewed. David had arrived first and stated, in an even and unflurried manner, that he had not removed the tape from the razor or seen anyone else do so. His father had said the same, but much less calmly. He had blushed and blustered and stared all over the place. This did not mean that he was culpable. Troy was aware that many innocent people, finding themselves being formally questioned in a police station, become overwhelmed by feelings of quite unfounded guilt. Still, Smy senior had been in a state. Troy became aware that Barnaby was making a vague rumbling sound. He gathered his wits about him.

“That last word, Sergeant.”

“Sir.”

‘Bungled’… . Odd, wouldn’t you say?”

“Yes. I’ve been thinking about that.” Troy waited politely for a nod of encouragement, then continued, “Was someone supposed to do something, and they bungled? And was the throat-cutting the result? Or was it Carmichael who bungled? I mean, I assume he was doing what he should have been doing? What he did when they all … practiced?”

“Rehearsed. Yes. Everyone seems to agree the last scene ran as usual.”

“So what could the bungle have been? I did wonder actually if he took the tape off himself.”

“No. He was the last person to commit suicide.”

“What I meant is, if he took it off for some cock-eyed reason of his own. Maybe to get someone into trouble. Then, in the heat of the moment—acting away with all that music and everything—just forgot. Maybe he was trying to say, ‘I’ve bungled.’ ”

“A bit unlikely.” Troy looked so crestfallen that Barnaby added, “I haven’t come up with anything, either. But he struggled to tell us something with his dying breath. It must have a point. And a very important one, I’d say. We’ll just have to poke away at it. This”—he slapped his scenes-of-crimes report sheets, ‘‘has one or two surprises. For a start, the razor, supposedly checked by Deidre and further handled by Sweeney-whoever-it-was, only has one set of prints. We’ll check it out, of course, but they must be those of the murdered man. We all saw him pick it up and use it. Now as Deidre would have no reason for wiping her own off— ”

“Unless, sir, she could see we’d think that. And wiped them for that reason?”

“I doubt it.” Barnaby shook his head. “That argues a degree of cunning that I just don’t think Deidre has. And I’ve known her for ten years. Apart from anything else, she has very strict ideas of right and wrong. Quite old-fashioned for someone her age.”

“Well—that still leaves us plenty to play with.”

Barnaby was not so sure. In spite of the large amount of people milling around both on and off the set, he believed the razor renovator would be found within the handful of people intimately known to the dead man. He thought it highly unlikely, for instance, that an evil prankster would be discovered among the youthful ASMs, although he had their statements on file should he wish to follow up the idea. Nor did he feel he was in with much of a chance with the small-part actors, three of whom had no previous knowledge of the dead man, having only joined the company for
Amadeus.
Although keeping an open mind on both these available options, Barnaby actually chose to cleave tightly to his core of hard-line suspects. Chief of whom, he surmised aloud, must be the widow.

“An armful of spontaneous combustion there, sir.”

“So they say.”

“And I wouldn’t be surprised if the current bun might not be the husband’s. Women are a faithless lot.” Troy spoke with some bitterness. He had been laying none too subtle siege to Policewoman Brierley for about two years, only to see her fall the previous week to a new recruit, hardly out of his rompers before he was into hers. “And as for these actors—well … you just don’t know where you stand.”

“Can you expand that a bit?”

“The thing is,” Troy continued, “when you usually talk to suspects, they either tell you the truth or, if they’ve got something to hide, they tell you lies. And on the whole you know what you’re dealing with. But this lot… they’re all exaggerating and swanking and displaying themselves. I mean, look at that woman he used to be married to. Getting her to answer questions was like watching Joan of Arc going to the stake. Almost impossible to know what she really felt.”

“You think she wasn’t genuinely distressed?”

“I just couldn’t decide. I’m damn glad you knew them all beforehand.”

“Just because someone displays an emotion in the most effective or even stylish manner of which they’re capable doesn’t mean it isn’t genuine. Remember that.”

“Right, chief.”

“And in any case, with the exception of Joyce and Nicholas, you should be able to see through them. They’re all dreadful actors.”

“Oh.” Troy kept his counsel. Actually he had thought the show was rather good. His disappointment had been in looking at the scenery close up. All old stuff cobbled together, painted over, and held up by what looked like old clothes props. Marvelous what a bit of illumination could do. Which reminded him. “I take it Doris and Daphne are definitely out, sir? Airy and fairy in the lighting box?”

‘‘I’m inclined to think so. Apart from the fact there’s no discernible motive, they were in the wings and dressing rooms so briefly—as these statements from the actors confirm”—he tapped the pile of forms with his hand— ‘‘and also so near to the first curtain that there would simply have been no time for tinkering. The same goes for Harold. I happened to arrive at the theater when he and his wife did. He hung up his coat and started swanning around in the foyer doing his Ziegfeld number. He was there when Cully and I went to wish the cast good luck—” “Beautiful girl that, chief. Fantastic.”

“—and came down himself a minute or two later. And we all left virtually at the same time to take our seats.”

“He didn’t slip into the bog?” Barnaby shook his head.

“What about the intermission?”

“Same problem with time, really. He was up in the clubroom for a bit, then went backstage to give them hell for lack of verismo, so my wife says. Then went back to his seat with the rest of the audience. And anyway, not only did Harold have no discernible motive for wanting Esslyn out of the way, he had very positive reasons for wanting him to stay alive. He was the only person in the group who could tackle leading roles in a moderately competent manner. He was doing
Uncle Vanya
next.”