Devices and Desires (28 page)

He said miserably: “But why? Why? They won’t suspect you, they can’t. It’s ridiculous even to think of it. You got on well with Hilary. You get on well with everyone in the station. You’re the last person the police will be interested in. You haven’t even a motive.”

“But I have. I’ve always disliked her and I hated her father. He ruined Mummy, forced her to spend her last years in poverty. And I lost the chance of a decent education. I’m a secretary, essentially a shorthand-typist, and that’s all I’ll ever be.”

“I’ve always thought you could be anything you chose.”

“Not without education. All right, I know you can get a grant, but I had to leave school and earn as quickly as possible. And it’s not only me, it’s what Peter Robarts did to Mummy. She trusted him. She put every penny she’d got, every penny Daddy left, into his plastics company. I’ve hated him all my life, and I hated her because of him. Once the police discover that, I’ll get no peace. But if I can produce an alibi, that will be the end. They’ll leave us alone, both of us. We only need to say that we were together and there will be the end of it.”

“But they can’t see what Hilary’s father did to your mother as a motive for murder. It’s unreasonable. And it was all so long ago.”

“No motive for killing another human being is ever reasonable. People kill for the strangest reasons. And I’ve got a thing about the police. It’s irrational, I know, but I’ve always had it. That’s why I’m so careful when I’m driving. I know I couldn’t stand up to a real interrogation. I’m frightened of the police.”

And she was, he remembered, seizing on this demonstrable truth as if it made the whole request legitimate, reasonable. She was obsessive about the speed limit even when the road was clear, obsessive about wearing her seat belt, the state of her car. And he remembered that time three weeks ago, when she had had her handbag snatched while shopping in Norwich, and despite his protest, hadn’t even reported it. He remembered her words. “It’s no use, they’ll never get it back. We’ll only waste their time at the police station. Let it go, there wasn’t much in it.” And then he thought, “I’m checking up on what she’s telling me, verifying it.” And he felt an overpowering shame mixed with pity. He heard her voice.

“All right, I’m asking too much. I know how you feel about truth, honesty, your Boy Scout Christianity. I’m asking you to sacrifice your good opinion of yourself. No one likes doing that. We all need our self-esteem. I suppose yours is knowing that you’re morally better than the rest of us. But aren’t you a bit of a hypocrite? You say you love me, but you won’t lie for me. It’s not an important lie. It won’t hurt anyone. But you can’t do it. It’s against your religion. Your precious religion didn’t stop you going to bed with me, did it? I thought Christians were supposed to be too pure for casual fornication.”

“Casual fornication.” Each word was like a blow, not a fierce, stabbing pain but a continuous thud like regular deliberate
blows on the same bruised flesh. He had never, even in those first marvellous days together, been able to talk to her about his faith. She had made it plain from the beginning that this was a part of his life with which she had neither sympathy nor understanding. And how could he begin to explain that he had followed her into the bedroom without guilt because his need of her was stronger than his love for God, stronger than guilt, stronger than faith, needing no rationalization, no justification other than itself. How, he had told himself, could anything be wrong which every nerve and sinew told him was natural and right, even holy.

She said: “All right, let it go. I’m asking too much.”

Stung by the contempt in her voice, he said miserably: “It’s not that. I’m not better, I’m not. And you could never ask too much. If it’s important to you, of course I’ll do it.”

She looked at him sharply, as if judging his sincerity, his will. He heard the relief in her voice as she said: “Look, there’s no danger. We’re both innocent, we know that. And what we tell the police could so easily have been true.”

But that was a mistake, and he saw the realization of it in her eyes. He said: “It could have been true, but it isn’t.”

“And that’s what’s important to you, more important than my peace of mind, more important than what I thought we felt for each other.”

He wanted to ask why her peace of mind needed to be built on a lie. He wanted to ask what they did, in fact, feel for each other, what she felt for him.

She said, looking at her watch: “And after all it will be an alibi for you too. That’s even more important. After all, everyone knows how unkind she’s been to you since that local radio programme. God’s little nuclear crusader. You haven’t forgotten that?”

The crudity of the implication, the note of impatience in her voice, all repelled him. He said: “But suppose they don’t believe us.”

“Don’t let’s go over all that again. Why shouldn’t they believe us? And it hardly matters if they don’t. They can’t ever prove we’re lying, that’s what’s important. And after all it’s natural that we should have been together. It isn’t as if we’ve just started seeing each other. Look, I’ve got to get back to the office now. I’ll be in touch, but we’d better not see each other tonight.”

He hadn’t expected to see her that night. The news of this latest murder would have been broadcast on local radio, passed from mouth to mouth. His mother would be waiting anxiously for his return from work, avid for news.

But there was something he had to tell her before she left, and somehow he found the courage. He said: “I rang you last night. While I was driving around thinking. I stopped at a phone box and telephoned. You weren’t in.”

There was a small silence. He glanced nervously at her face, but it was expressionless. She said: “What time was that?”

“About twenty to ten, perhaps a bit later.”

“Why? Why did you telephone?”

“The need to talk to you. Loneliness. I suppose I half-hoped that you might change your mind and ask me to come round.”

“All right. You might as well know. I was on the headland last night. I took Remus for a run. I left the car down a cart track just outside the village and walked as far as the ruined abbey. I suppose I was there just after ten.”

He said in horrified wonder: “You were there! And all the time she must have been lying dead within a few yards of you.”

She said sharply: “Not a few yards, more like a hundred. There was never any chance that I’d find her, and I didn’t see her killer, if that’s what you’re thinking. And I stayed on the
cliffs. I didn’t go down to the beach. If I had, the police would have found my footprints, mine and Remus’s.”

“But someone might have seen you. It was bright moonlight.”

“The headland was empty. And if the murderer was lurking in the trees and saw me, he’s hardly likely to come forward. But it’s not the happiest position to be in. That’s why I need an alibi. I wasn’t going to tell you, but now you know. I didn’t kill her. But I was there and I’ve got a motive. That’s why I’m asking you to help.”

For the first time Jonathan detected in her voice a note of tenderness, almost of pleading. She moved as if to touch him and then drew back, and the tentative gesture, the withdrawal, was as endearing as if she had laid her hand against his face. The hurt and misery of the last ten minutes were swept away in a rush of tenderness. His lips seemed to have thickened so that speech was difficult, but he found the words. He said: “Of course, I’ll help. I love you. I won’t let you down. You can depend on me.”

Rickards had arranged with Alex Mair to be at the power station by 9.00 that morning but had planned to call first at Scudder’s Cottage to see Ryan Blaney. The visit was one of some delicacy. He knew that Blaney had children, and it would be necessary to question at least the eldest. But this couldn’t be done until he had with him a woman police constable, and there had been some delay in arranging this. It was one of those comparatively minor irritations which he found difficult to accept, but he knew that it would be unwise to pay more than a brief visit to the Blaneys without a WPC. Whether or not the man proved to be a serious suspect, he couldn’t risk a later allegation that information had been extracted from a juvenile without the observance of proper procedures. At the same time Blaney had a right to know what had happened to his picture, and if the police didn’t tell him someone else speedily would. And it was important that he was there to see the man’s face when he heard the news, both of the slashed portrait and of Hilary Robarts’s murder.

He thought that he had seldom seen a more depressing
place than Scudder’s Cottage. A thin drizzle was falling, and he saw the cottage and the neglected garden through a shimmering mist which seemed to absorb shapes and colours so that the whole scene was one damp amorphous grey. Leaving DC Gary Price in the car, Rickards and Oliphant made their way up the weed-infested path to the porch. There was no bell, and when Oliphant thudded on the iron knocker the door almost immediately opened. Ryan Blaney stood before them, six foot tall, lank, bleary-eyed, and gave them a long, unwelcoming stare. The colour seemed to have drained even from his ruddy hair, and Rickards thought he had never seen a man look so exhausted and yet still be on his feet. Blaney didn’t invite them in, and Rickards didn’t suggest it. That intrusion had better wait until he was accompanied by a WPC. And Blaney could wait. He was anxious now to get to Larksoken Power Station. He gave the news that the portrait of Hilary Robarts had been slashed and found at Thyme Cottage, but offered no other details. There was no response. He said: “Did you hear me, Mr. Blaney?”

“Yes, I heard you. I knew that the portrait was missing.”

“When?”

“Last night, at about nine-forty-five. Miss Mair called for it. She was going to take it to Norwich with her this morning. She’ll tell you. Where is it now?”

“We have it, what remains of it. We shall need it for forensic examination. We’ll give you a receipt, naturally.”

“What good will that do? You can keep it, the picture and your receipt. Slashed to pieces, did you say?”

“Not to pieces, in two clean slashes. Perhaps it can be repaired. We’ll bring it with us when we come, so that you can identify it.”

“I don’t want to see it again. You can keep it.”

“We’ll need the identification, Mr. Blaney. But we’ll talk about it when we see you later today. When, incidentally, did you last see the portrait?”

“Thursday evening, when I wrapped it and left it in the painting shed. I haven’t been in the shed since. And what’s the good of talking? It was the best thing I’ve ever done and that bitch destroyed it. Get Alice Mair or Adam Dalgliesh to identify it. They’ve both seen it.”

“Are you saying you know who’s responsible?”

Again there was a silence. Rickards broke it by saying: “We’ll be with you late this afternoon, probably between four and five, if that’s convenient. And we shall have to talk to the children. We’ll have a WPC with us. They’re at school, I suppose, the children?”

“The twins are at playgroup, Theresa is here. She isn’t well. Look, you’re not going to all this trouble about a slashed portrait. Since when have the police cared about pictures?”

“We care about criminal damage. But there is something more. I have to tell you that Hilary Robarts was murdered last night.”

He stared intently at Blaney’s face as he spoke. This was the moment of revelation, perhaps the moment of truth. It was surely impossible for Blaney to hear the news without betraying some emotion: shock, fear, surprise, real or simulated. Instead he said calmly: “You don’t have to tell me that either. I knew. George Jago phoned early this morning from the Local Hero.”

Did he indeed, thought Rickards, and mentally added George Jago to his list of people to be questioned as soon as possible. He asked: “Will Theresa be in and well enough to speak to us this afternoon?”

“She’ll be here and she’ll be well enough.”

And then the door was closed firmly in their faces.

Oliphant said: “God knows why Robarts wanted to buy that slum in the first place. And she’s been trying to force him and the kids out for months. There’s been a great deal of feeling about it in Lydsett, as well as on the headland.”

“So you told me on the way here. But if Blaney killed her, he’d hardly draw attention to himself by hurling that portrait through the window of Thyme Cottage. And two unrelated criminal acts, murder and malicious damage on the same night, is too great a coincidence to swallow.”

It had been a bad start to the day. The drizzle, seeping coldly under the collar of his coat, added to his mild dejection. He hadn’t noticed that it was raining on the rest of the headland and could almost believe that Scudder’s Lane and that picturesque but sour little hovel generated their own depressing climate. He had a lot to get through before he returned for a more rigorous confrontation with Ryan Blaney, and he wasn’t looking forward to any of it. Forcing the gate shut over a clump of weeds on the path, he took a last look at the cottage. There was no smoke from the chimney, and the windows, hazed with salt, were tightly closed. It was difficult to believe that a family lived here, that the cottage hadn’t long been abandoned to damp and decay. And then, at the top right-hand window, he glimpsed a pale face framed with red-gold hair. Theresa Blaney was looking down at them.

Twenty minutes later the three police officers were at Larksoken Power Station. A place had been reserved for them in the car-park outside the perimeter fence close to the guard house. As soon as they approached the gate, it was unlocked and one of the security police came out and removed the cones. The preliminaries took only a little time. They were received with almost impassive civility by the uniformed security guard on duty, signed the book and were issued with their lapel badges. The guard telephoned the news of their arrival, reported that the Director’s PA, Miss Amphlett, would be with them very shortly and then appeared to lose interest in them. His companion, who had opened the gates and removed the cones, stood casually chatting to a stocky man dressed as a diver and carrying his helmet under his arm, who had apparently been working on one of the water towers. Neither of them seemed particularly interested in the arrival of the police. If Dr. Mair had instructed that they were to be received with courtesy but the minimum of fuss, his staff couldn’t have done it better.