‘I went back into the sitting room and what happened next was very distressing. He just went to pieces. Backed off from me, flailing his arms and shouting, “Go away, go away”. I didn’t know what to do.’
‘Why not just do as he asked,’ said Troy and was swiftly frowned on for interrupting.
‘I started talking quietly. Saying how happy I’d been to hear from him, to see him again. That I meant him no harm and just wanted to explain things. Eventually he calmed down a little and slumped into one of the armchairs. I drew up a stool and sat with him. And then I told him what I’ve told you. I described my disappointments, my sad marriage, my lost child. I said if he had spent years thinking my life was nothing but success and happiness and all at his expense he could not have been more wrong.
‘And then I talked about the letters that came after
Far Away Hills
. Sent to me but written to him. I had kept a few and offered to bring them over for him to read. Above all I tried to explain that I’d stolen his story to give it to the world, not for my own advancement.’ Absorbed as he was in his narration, Jennings did not miss the sudden gleam of mockery in the chief inspector’s eyes. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘self-justification if you like, but not only that. I was trying to do something about his hurt, perhaps repair some of the damage. Give me some credit.’
Barnaby saw no reason to respond. Certainly he had no intention of demonstrating a shred of understanding, let alone approval. Jennings continued:
‘Eventually I realised I was just saying the same things over and over again. He was still in the chair. His position hadn’t changed, but he’d put his head in his hands, covered his face as though he couldn’t stand the sight of me. Then I saw moisture rolling over the inside of his wrists and down into the cuffs of his shirt in a steady stream. I was so . . . I took one of his hands in mine. It was like a stone, cold and heavy. Tears splashed everywhere. The hollow of his palm was brimming with them, like a little pool.’ He repeated himself, shaking his head as if this was still not quite within the bounds of belief.
He slipped then into a silence which seemed to have something of genuine shame about it and not a little mystification. His face was crowded with emotion. The silence continued for some time.
‘It was this single moment that turned my thinking completely round. I understood then, for the first time, what a terrible thing I had done. For I had other stories to tell - even now my head’s full of them - but
Far Away Hills
was all he had and the theft of it broke his heart.
‘We sat there ohh . . . God knows how long. I asked him if there was anything, anything at all I could do to put things right, even as I knew there couldn’t possibly be. Eventually he told me it was of no importance. His actual words were, “Who steals my life steals trash”. Then he asked me, begged me, to go away. But I couldn’t bring myself to. So, after a little while, he did. Quietly disengaged his hand and went upstairs. He looked so bloody lonely. And battered, as if he’d just climbed out of a boxing ring. Yet of the two of us he was the one with dignity. He’d had the courage to see my offer for the shoddy hypocrisy that it was and spit in its eye. I waited half an hour - by this time it had gone midnight - till it became plain that he was not going to come down, then put on my coat and left.’
‘Pulling the front door to?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re positive it was properly fastened?’
‘Positive. I made a point of slamming it loudly so Gerald would know I’d gone.’
‘Did you see anyone at all when you left the house?’
‘At that hour? In that weather?’
‘Just answer the question, Mr Jennings,’ said Troy.
‘No.’
‘Perhaps in a parked car?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘Did you go upstairs during the course of the evening?’
‘No.’
‘What about any of the other rooms?’
‘No.’
‘The kitchen?’
‘
Hell
.’ He got up and poured some water, the glass clinking, trembling against the rim of the jug, then returned to his seat. ‘What is all this? What do you want me to say? I’ve told you the truth.’
‘You have told us two totally conflicting stories, Mr Jennings.’ Barnaby leaned forwards and once more rested his elbows on the edge of the table. His thick neck and wide shoulders blotted out all else from Jennings’ field of vision. ‘Why should we believe the second any more than the first?’
‘Oh God . . .’ Fatigue had made him apathetic. He opened his arms and turned his hands upwards in resigned disbelief. He reminded Barnaby of the cauliflower man in Causton market chanting, ‘You want my blood, lady? It’s yours.’
‘Think what you like. I’m finished.’
‘There are one or two more questions—’
‘Totally wacked. You’re flogging a dead horse here, Barnaby.’
‘Did you know that Hadleigh was married?’
‘Married?’ Bafflement and incredulity combined to revive Jennings’ energies somewhat. ‘I don’t believe it.’
‘There’s a wedding photograph in his sitting room.’
‘I didn’t see that.’
‘Put away before you came.’
‘Must be a fake. A prop to flesh out the background. Where’s the lady supposed to be now?’
‘Dead of leukaemia.’
‘Very convenient.’
‘According to Mr Hadleigh, just before he moved to the village, which would be in 1982.’
‘That’s when I knew him.’
The chief inspector congratulated himself on his decision not to waste yet more man hours chasing up Hadleigh’s marriage certificate or details of Grace’s death. Jennings’ suggestion would also explain why the dead man found it easy to tell anyone and everyone about this supposedly deeply painful episode in his life.
Jennings continued, ‘I suppose that’s why the picture was concealed. Because I was in a position to give the lie to such a story.’
‘Presumably. The second point I’d like to clarify is rather more complicated. We’ve reason to believe that Hadleigh occasionally dressed as a woman. Appeared in public like this. Is that something you knew about?’
‘How extraordinary.’ But even as he spoke and gave a negative shake of the head Barnaby could see Jennings was preparing to qualify this response. ‘Although . . . I did talk to a friend once, an analyst, about Gerald - anonymously of course - and he asked me a similar question. Did I know if the respectable middle-class civil servant was the only fake persona this man had adopted? He said living a lie, to this extent and degree, imposed tremendous strain and often the people who were doing so needed desperately to escape. As returning to their true selves was psychologically dangerous they would create a third personality, usually quite different from the first two. Obviously this chap used fancier terminology, but that was about the gist of it.’
Barnaby nodded. This sounded, given that they were discussing behaviour most people would regard as completely abnormal, not an unreasonable proposition. Someone came in to remove the tea tray and ask if they needed any refills. Replying in the negative the chief inspector got up and crossed to the window, opening it a little, breathing in the cold night air. As if in response to this move Jennings rose as well, commenting on how late it was and asking for his overcoat.
‘I’m afraid there is no question of you returning home tonight, Mr Jennings.’
Jennings stared in amazement. ‘You’re keeping me here?’
‘That is the case, sir, yes.’
‘But you can’t do that. You have to charge me or let me go.’
‘Easy to see you don’t write crime stories, Mr Jennings,’ said Sergeant Troy. He grinned as he took down his black leathers. Middle-class outrage when the forces of law and order had occasion to tweak aside the velvet glove never failed to entertain. ‘We can hold you for up to thirty-six hours. And apply for an extension if necessary. This is a serious, arrestable offence we’re talking about.’
Jennings sank back on to his hard shell of a chair. He appeared numb with shock and was mumbling something that Troy did not quite get. He asked for clarification and was far from surprised when it came.
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ said Jennings. ‘I want to see my solicitor.’
Hunting in Full Steel
It was the start of a new week and the weather had changed completely. Warmer, with a mizzle of rain. A sly day, as they say in Suffolk. When Troy entered the office Barnaby was on the phone. The sergeant saw immediately what was going on. The chief’s expression was one he recognised, blank, self-controlled, constraining with some force the response he thought appropriate to the occasion.
‘I am aware of that, sir . . .
‘Yes, I shall be talking to him again this morning . . .
‘It’s hard to say at this stage . . .
‘I’m afraid not . . .
‘Naturally I will . . .
‘I have already done so . . .
‘I’m sure we all hope . . .
‘No. At least nothing I’d care to put on the table . . .
‘I am pursuing—’
Troy heard the crash as the interrogator slammed the phone down right across the room. Barnaby replaced his own receiver without any visible signs of irritation.
‘Being leaned on from the top, chief?’
‘The head lama himself.’
‘Spit in your eye don’t they? Llamas?’
Barnaby did not reply. He had picked up a pencil and was doodling on a large note pad.
‘Jennings’ solicitor, is it?’
‘Just earning his hundred fifty an hour.’
‘They got it sussed - lawyers,’ said Troy, unbuttoning a cream trench coat of martial cut embellished with epaulettes, buckles, a belt of highly polished leather and pockets so wide and deep they could well have contained reinforcements from the US cavalry.
‘Whoever loses they win. Crafty buggers.’ He shook out the coat and placed it on a hanger, smoothing the fabric out and fastening the buttons.
‘You’re wasted here, sergeant. You should have been a valet.’
‘Load of rear gunners. I suppose it’s pressing trousers all day.’
‘Well, when you’ve finished faffing about, I’m in dire need of a caffeine shot.’
‘I’m as good as gone,’ said Troy, who was indeed already opening the door. ‘Do you want anything to eat?’
‘Not right now.’
Barnaby was pleased with himself for not feeling peckish. Perhaps his stomach was adapting. Shrinking to accommodate the modest input that was now its daily portion. Of course, it could be that it was still only half an hour from breakfast time.
The kitten had, as usual, been present and making a nuisance of itself. After a polished performance of naked greed and winsome precocity it had climbed on to Barnaby’s knee, displayed its bottom, sat down and massaged his trousers with its claws. All this to the sound of excessive purring.
‘Why is it always me?’ A cross demand to the room at large.
‘He knows you don’t like him,’ replied Joyce.
‘Dim then, as well as hoggish.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t be too sure about that.’
This morning, perhaps recalling his previous manhandling over the marmalade, Kilmowski contented himself with simply looking at Barnaby’s breakfast plate, looking at Barnaby, sighing a lot, yawning and turning round and round. Eventually, waiting till his wife’s back was turned, Barnaby gave the kitten a small piece of bacon. Followed by a bit of rind for its cheek.
Joyce said: ‘Why don’t you just put him on the floor?’
The coffee arrived. Troy backed into the room with a tray holding a large Kit Kat and two cups and saucers. He put one of these on the desk before metaphorically licking a finger and holding it to the wind.
The atmosphere didn’t seem to be all that bad. Not when you took into account the recent bollocking from the chief super. These were notorious. Poisonous bloody things, likened, by one recipient, to having your head forced down a blocked-up toilet.
Yet here was the DCI, barely minutes after the affray, swigging his drink and doodling with his pencil as if it had never happened. You had to admire him.
Troy, silently doing just that, wondered what was on the note pad. Barnaby was working with close, tiny strokes as if filling something in. Probably plants. Or leaves. The chief was good at that. Nature drawing. He said it helped him concentrate.
Troy unwrapped his chocolate, ran his thumbnail down the silver paper, snapped the biscuit in half. Then, munching, he eased his way around Barnaby’s desk for a quick shufty.
He hadn’t been far out. Primroses. Beautifully done, just like in a book. Tiny flowers softly shaded with grey, leaves with all the bumps on. Even dangly roots, thready and slightly tangled.
Troy felt envious. I wish I could do something like that, he thought. Paint or play music or write a story. Admitted, he could paralyse club cronies with a well-told joke. And his karaoke ‘Delilah’ at the Christmas party had been described as shit-hot. But it wasn’t quite the same.
Seeing the chief’s cup empty he tidied it away, saying, ‘You come to any decision about Jennings yet, sir? Whether he’s still in the frame?’
‘I doubt it. We’re checking out the story he told about Hadleigh’s antecedents. If Conor Neilson had been leading the sort of life described he’d almost certainly be known to the Garda.’
‘Plus it’s an uncommon name.’
‘Not over there it isn’t. And this stuff from forensic is not encouraging.’ He indicated several glossy photographs and closely typed back-up sheets. ‘Jennings’ prints are in the sitting room, on various pieces of crockery, the ashtray and the front door. Nothing upstairs—’
‘There wouldn’t be. The murderer wore gloves.’
‘Don’t interrupt!’
‘Sorry.’
‘Then there’s the problem of his shoes. No fibres from the stair or bedroom carpet. No blood or other substances. No skin particles. They’re absolutely clean. And you know as well as I do you can’t do a job like the one we’re looking at and take nothing from the scene. They’re working on his suit at the moment but I can’t say I have high hopes.’