Chapter Two

 

Conversation with Coverdale

 

Everything seemed to be happening at once, and everybody treated him with a totally agreeable care and delicacy. When the police car arrived he was still on the sofa, with Melissa holding a damp towel to his jaw and Elsom full of apologies for not knowing his own strength. Then into the car – it was the first time he had ever been in a police car, and he said so to the detectives – and in a flash they were back at The Laurels. He was still feeling shaky, and entered the house holding the arm of one of the detectives.

In the hall Mr Slattery gave him his customary look, but otherwise everything was changed. As always happens when the police enter a house where a violent event has occurred, the whole place seemed to have been taken over by them. There were cars outside the house, men dashed in and out carrying bits of equipment, and they talked to each other briskly. ‘Got all you want?… Is Jerry at the station… Finished the downstairs and the hall, trying upstairs.’ Feet clattered in and out, up and down. He tried to look in the living-room, but was not allowed to do so. A man appeared, nodded, said ‘Mr Brownjohn, come along.’ Where were they going? It proved to be the kitchen. Clare wouldn’t like this, he thought as they sat in chairs on opposite sides of the kitchen table, she wouldn’t like it at all.

‘My name’s Coverdale.’ He was a big man with a lumpy, knobbly face and a bulky body that seemed to be straining out of his shiny blue suit. ‘Sergeant Amies.’ Startled, Arthur looked round and saw another man beside the door. ‘Cigarette?’

‘Thank you, I don’t smoke.’

Coverdale lighted one himself, staring across the table all the while. Was it the prelude to a fierce interrogation? Instead he said, ‘Put the kettle on, Bill. Mr Brownjohn could do with a cuppa. You’ve had a shock.’

‘Yes.’

‘Stands to reason it was a shock.’

‘I was a little hysterical. A friend had to hit me.’

‘He made a job of it. You’re going to have a nice little lump.’

‘I don’t really know what’s happened.’

‘Stupid. Course you don’t.’ Was he guileful, or as straightforward as he appeared? ‘Somebody broke in, that’s the way it looks at the moment, burglar perhaps. Your wife surprised him.’

‘She – she is dead?’

‘I’m afraid so. I told you on the telephone.’

‘Yes. Somehow it’s hard to believe.’ This was true. Clare’s presence seemed to him to hang like a gas cloud over the whole house.

‘You need that cup of tea.’

‘Tea coming up.’ The Sergeant poured it into mugs instead of the cups Clare would have used. The tea itself was strong and sweet, and he did feel better after drinking it.

‘Amateur,’ the Inspector said.

‘What?’

‘If it was done that way, somebody breaking and entering and then your wife surprising him, it was an amateur. Pros don’t carry guns.’

‘She was shot?’

‘Didn’t I say?’ It was the first hint that guile might lurk behind the blue marble eyes. ‘Emptied the revolver in a panic, fired all over the place. Amateur sure enough.’

What was the best question to ask? ‘When did it happen?’

‘Round about three-thirty.’

‘I don’t think that’s right.’ Surprise showed on Coverdale’s lumpy face. ‘I mean Clare has – had – rather fixed habits, for being in and for being out. She was almost always in on Friday afternoons. So it’s not likely she would have come back and surprised a burglar. I mean, she would have been here.’

‘Interesting.’ Coverdale drained his cup. ‘Eh, Amies?’

‘Interesting.’ The Sergeant whisked away the cups, began to wash them up.

‘You think it was personal, some enemy?’

‘Oh, I didn’t say that.’

‘You got any enemies, your wife got any?’

‘No. Nobody who would do this.’

‘Happily married? No quarrels?’

‘Certainly not.’ He was genuinely shocked by the suggestion. ‘We were quite happy. My work takes me away from home rather a lot. Clare had developed interests of her own. I was pleased about that, but I suppose in a way they tended to separate us.’

‘Tried to ring you this afternoon.’ Coverdale’s voice was casual. ‘Your office. No reply.’

‘It’s a small office, just an address. I don’t have a secretary.’

Silence. Amies turned from the sink. ‘Going to ask him, sir?’

‘May as well.’ He could feel his legs trembling. ‘Any idea where you were this afternoon around three-thirty?’

‘I went up to Birmingham this morning to see a client. I caught the two-fifteen back. I was in the train from Birmingham to London.’

‘Mind telling us the client’s name?’ That was Amies again.

‘Steel Alloys Limited. I saw Mr Gibson, left him soon after twelve, had lunch –’

‘Mind telling us where?’

‘A pub called the Dog and Duck, just off the Bull Ring. I got in to Euston – oh, I can’t remember, but not before half past three.’

‘They’re not that quick yet, are they?’ Coverdale laughed heartily.

‘I don’t understand why you’re asking me these questions.’

‘Shouldn’t have done perhaps. Don’t want to upset you. Leave it until tomorrow if you like.’ Coverdale got up. ‘Like us to fix a hotel for you? Don’t suppose you’ll want to stay here, wouldn’t advise it anyway.’ Amies had washed up the cups. The two men moved to the door. He felt a passionate reluctance to let them go.

‘There was a question I wanted to ask you.’

‘Yes?’

A man put his head round the kitchen door, muttered something to Amies, who went out. Coverdale looked inquiring.

‘How do you know it was half past three when it happened?’

‘Your next door neighbour, name’s Lillicrapp. Heard some glass breaking, saw a man run out of your house and down the road. Went round the back to have a look. The glass was your French window, broken by one of the shots. He looked through the window, saw your wife on the floor, rang us straight away. That’s the sort of co-operation we like to get from the public.’

‘This man he saw. You’ve got a description?’

Coverdale nodded. The door opened again, Amies said, ‘Spare a minute, sir?’

He was left alone in the kitchen. His existence with Clare surrounded him. The plates had their own place on the dresser shelves and she had been especially pleased by the mats beside them, a series called ‘Cries of Old London’ which she had bought only a few months ago. Attached to the gas cooker was an automatic lighter which he had bought for her. He sat at the kitchen table and put his head in his hands. His jaw ached.

‘Mr Brownjohn.’ Coverdale was looking at him with what might have been pity. Beside him, Sergeant Amies was holding the Easonby Mellon letters. ‘No more questions for tonight.’