The Sleeping Partner (20 page)

Without looking at me he said: ‘Why do you tell
me
this?'

‘I'm out of my depth. I thought if anyone could advise me on the motions of self-preservation it would be you.'

‘Is self-preservation all you want?'

‘Not all.'

His face was tight-drawn, the brilliant brown eyes concentrated as if in a bright light. ‘You realise you've taken a vital step in telling me all this?'

‘Yes.'

‘And a risk?'

‘The risk of being disbelieved. I know.'

‘Oh, I believe you.'

‘That's a risk you take.'

He shook his head. ‘You're not a murderer. You've too much imagination. And tolerance. Though I think you might have put them both to better uses.'

‘… Unfortunately the police deal only in proof.'

‘No, the risk you've taken in telling me this is that you've so to speak, passed the baby on to me. Whether you do as I advise or not, I have to tell the police or get in a tricky position myself.'

I went to the window and sat in the window-seat. ‘And what do you advise?'

‘Tell me first about yourself and your wife. Tell me about things on the periphery of the story. I want to see more of the picture.'

I tried to tell him about all the people distantly or closely involved, Simon Heppelwhite and Ray French and Frank Dawson and our life together before she disappeared. ‘The trouble is,' I said, ‘that the whole equation isn't laid on. Bits of it are probably floating around Lynn's London flat and the men who visited her there.'

Footsteps were coming upstairs. John waited but they went past. He said: ‘An equation can have unknown quantities. The real difficulty lies in setting the thing up.'

‘It's in trying to set it up – or break it down – that I've landed myself in a worse mess than before.'

‘This man Simon Heppelwhite. He's your best friend and hers. If he's not involved he could have a clearer view of your marriage than anyone. Have you seen him recently?'

‘Not since this thing blew its top off.'

‘He would be worth seeing. There must be a reason why he appeared to turn against Lynn, as you say he did. And why has your wife been meeting this man from your works, Dawson? I—'

‘The answer looks fairly obvious to me.'

He tried to take a deep breath and failed. ‘ This man French tells you that your wife was a nymphomaniac. What do you say? You should know.'

I said bitterly: ‘Perhaps I don't.'

‘But what would you have said?'

‘I should have called her highly sexed. I'd no reason to suppose more.'

‘Perhaps a nymphomaniac doesn't need to appear more than that to any one man. Why should she? Especially to her husband, whom it's more necessary to deceive than anyone else. And yet I wonder …'

Silence fell between us.

He said: ‘ How exactly did the body look? Can you describe it in more detail?'

I described it in more detail. He said: ‘Yes … Of course we're supposing that the police will be able to fix the date of her death accurately. That may not be. When a body is left exposed to the air, an estimate's much easier because the calliphora which normally breed on the body go through definite life cycles, and you can calculate accurately by their evolution. But anthracite, I should think— This upsets you?'

‘Go on.'

‘Anthracite would have some of the semi-preservative properties of ordinary soil. Was she completely covered?'

‘I think she must have been. The dog … She isn't now.'

‘She isn't now. So from now on things will move more quickly. Well, if she has been completely covered I doubt if the pathologists will be able to specify the date of her death to within four or five days … But are you sure?'

‘I think she died the night she disappeared.'

‘Then who came back the following night and what did they come for?'

‘I think the person who killed her had left something behind and wanted to get it … The scent came from the bottle he'd upset. And I think the earring had been lying there since the night before.'

‘But your wife must have intended to divorce you. She must have sworn the affidavit when she was still alive.'

‘Yes, and I think she must have meant to leave me that night. The letter she wrote to me was so typical, and her handwriting is particularly hard to copy.'

‘But you believe she didn't pack her own bag?'

‘I'm certain she didn't complete it anyway. She wouldn't under
any
circumstances pack my toothpaste. She always hated the flavour. She'd be as likely to pack my shoes by mistake.'

‘The point I think we have to ask ourselves, since it's the first question the police will ask themselves, is who stands in any way to benefit from your wife's death. What was the motive: profit, concealment, reputation, sex, anger, jealousy? And how was the murder done?'

‘Her – present condition shouldn't prevent them from discovering that.'

‘No …'

‘And what do you advise me to do?' I said again.

Outside on the weedy lawn a long black cat was stalking a thrush. In the branch of a distorted elm another thrush was making an excited twittering sound.

‘Go and see a good criminal lawyer first thing in the morning. It's the only way, Mike. Don't go within a mile of your house again. Go and see him and tell him everything and do whatever he advises.'

‘Which will be to see the police at once.'

‘Yes, but in his presence. You'll be in a far stronger position after you've consulted him.'

‘Another lawyer …'

‘As a matter of fact I think I know the man who would do – I was at school with him – Digby Hamilton. At the moment he's right at the top.'

The black cat had got very near the bird now. His hind quarters quivered with the intent to kill. The thrush had taken no heed of his friend's warning. Then almost as the cat launched himself, the thrush saw the danger and flung open his wings. A quick flutter put him just out of reach of the flying claws, and then he gathered height and soared into the tree.

‘If I don't take your advice?'

‘That's to be decided.'

‘Doing what you say wouldn't keep Stella out of the picture.'

‘Perhaps nothing will.'

‘Yes, but if I was arrested and charged they might think she had some knowledge of it – if we're supposed to be lovers. She might be dragged in as an accessory after the fact.'

‘The danger's there, but it will be there now whatever you do. Actually, even if you were the murderer and they convicted you, they couldn't find enough evidence to move against her.'

‘Only to poison the rest of her life with ugly rumours.'

‘The surest way of avoiding that is to clear yourself, and the surest way of clearing yourself is to see someone like Digby Hamilton.'

I got up and walked across the room. Now that it came to the point I shied away from the sort of thing I'd been going to do three hours earlier. Detective Sergeant Baker's arrival on the scene had made everything infinitely more difficult.

‘Oh, of course, I know you're right; it's the logical, sensible thing to do. But telling you about it – even though you've believed me – has made me realise what a lame-duck story it really sounds. I wish I could make one more positive step of some sort before giving away my freedom of action. For instance, I feel I ought to follow up this note from Frank Dawson.'

‘He's in Wales at present?'

‘Yes, I had promised to go down myself tomorrow. This survey job is in its last stages.'

‘The police will find out all that Dawson has to tell.'

‘Where does Hamilton live?' I asked, partly to gain time.

‘We should find him at his flat in the Temple. He might even see you tonight. I did him a favour a couple of years ago and I don't think he'd refuse.'

I picked up the book he had put down when I came in, stared at it, trying to decide. ‘Do you read Greek for pleasure?'

‘I've never had time since I left school. And I was pretty bad at it there.'

‘So you're making up time now.'

‘Something like that.'

I shook my head. ‘I'm sorry but it doesn't make sense.'

‘To improve my Greek? Why, because I'm dying? We all are. Mine is only an accelerated rate.'

‘I hope not too accelerated.'

A thrush was still chattering in the garden.

‘There are days when I feel much better,' he said. ‘Have you decided, Mike?'

‘Give me until after supper.'

Footsteps again, and Stella put her head in. ‘Sorry to be an age.

Things are nearly done. If Mike will give me a hand upstairs with them …'

‘No,' said John. ‘Have it downstairs. I'd rather come down.'

‘But only a few hours ago the doctor said—'

‘I'll take the risk. I have a phone call to make this evening.'

While she was fixing things below I helped him to get up, to put on an old fisherman's jersey, a pair of trousers and a coat.

He was a queer sight, taller than I was, athletic of build but his vigour in ruins. He was more like someone in the prime of life, injured and having lost blood in a car crash.

When he was dressed he sat on the bed and got his breath back before having a shot at the stairs.

He said rather carefully: ‘ You know in all this there's one symbol that puzzles me more than it should, because it's the one I'm most familiar with. It's the letter S – which shouldn't be an unknown quantity to me at all.'

I reached for his slippers under the bed, found one, and then took more time than I needed to find the other.

Hoping my voice sounded right, I said: ‘We've agreed she's not really in it at all.'

‘Oh, she is in one sense, whether we like it or not.'

‘Are these slippers the right way round? – there doesn't seem any difference.'

‘There isn't … Are you in love with Stella, Mike?'

I would have given a year then to have been still in search of the slipper. But I wasn't. He only had to put his foot into it, and there was nothing I could do but straighten up.

I straightened up. I looked at him. He had his finger inside the heel of the slipper, fixing it.

‘Yes, John. I think I am.' There wasn't any lie I could tell him at all. Not any.

‘Only think you are?'

‘No … I'm sure.'

‘And does Stella love you?' As he spoke he lifted his own head, his face a little less colourless from bending, his eyes full of a sort of incredulous inquiry.

‘You ought to know she doesn't.'

Slowly he buttoned his coat, the strong fingers fumbling but not only from weakness.

He said: ‘ One isn't responsible for one's emotions, only for one's actions … Perhaps I should feel gratified that we have an admiration in common—'

‘I've only known it for the last four or five days. Believe me, I'd no idea …'

‘One doesn't necessarily have, until the last minute.'

‘I thought I felt the same as ever about Lynn. It must strike you as queer, phoney—'

‘Not as much as it might. Because something rather like it happened to me.'

There was a whistle from downstairs. He mastered his own lips and whistled back.

‘When I met Stella my first wife had only been dead two months. I'd been married to her for sixteen years, and marriages aren't much better than ours had been. When she died I thought everything was finished for ever. If I hadn't by accident met Stella it might have been. But you would have thought chance would have given me a year or so to grieve decently. When I found myself in love with Stella – and deeply and truly in love: not merely wanting her and finding marriage the only way of getting her – when I found myself in love, the feeling for a long time came up against a sense of outraged decency; it seemed to put in question my own sincerity towards both women and my honesty with myself … Did you feel anything like that?'

‘Very much … Only I hadn't reasoned it right out. But in my case there's – an extra difficulty.'

‘You mean that Stella isn't free,' he said gently. ‘ But S becomes part of the equation.'

‘I still don't see it. Except that anything I may feel for her – any wish to keep her from getting her feet muddied – may have a bearing on what I do, she still isn't anywhere but on the extreme outside edge of this mess; and that I hope is where she's going to stay.'

He said: ‘Consider the significance of a point which travels round the circumference of an ellipse at a uniform rate …' He got up and steadied himself against the bed. ‘ I wonder if in this problem there is no centripetal force … Shall we go down?'

John Curtis rang his lawyer friend while Stella was upstairs making his bed. For some reason I couldn't explain to myself, I didn't want to be the one to tell Stella about Lynn – I felt I couldn't get the words out which would break that bit of news. It was like confession to a crime, merely to admit what I had to admit, and that as a result she had been in the same house with Lynn that afternoon. If John told her in his own time, at least there would be no risk of my having to see the look in her eyes when she knew.

Digby Hamilton was in Paris, his wife said, but she was expecting him back in the morning. John covered the phone and asked me if he should ring someone else, but I said, no, I'd rather see the man he knew; so it was agreed I should ring him at ten in the morning from the hotel. John said he would ring also, to be sure that Hamilton got the right impression as to the urgency of the thing.

I stayed at the cottage until ten. Stella walked to the gate with me when I left. She said: ‘It's been a queer evening Mike. Everyone – walled up, on their best behaviour, safe subjects only. Have we all got secrets from each other?'