by Jill McGown
He broke down, and Lloyd waited for a moment before getting out of the car, and beckoning to two sergeants who were leaving the station.
‘Mr Drake is under arrest,’ he said, and went to report back to Allison, who would be less than pleased with his methods. A short wait, and a long, long interview. Partly on the carpet, partly being told he’d done a good job. A lot of stuff about the image of the force, a lot of mutual sympathy and regret.
At last, it was all over, and he could go home. His eye ached, and he felt weary and stiff, but he refused the offer of a car, and drove himself.
Judy met him at the door, examining his eye, making him sit down. She handed him a very large whisky.
‘I’ve got steak,’ she said.
‘I don’t think it does any good.’ He sipped the whisky.
‘It does if it’s rare, and served with onion, chips and peas,’ she said. ‘My speciality.’
He smiled.
‘Lloyd, why didn’t you tell me?’
He shook his head. ‘I couldn’t, I couldn’t tell anyone. I kept hoping I was wrong, though I knew I wasn’t. But I couldn’t accuse him of something like that, not even to you. I thought if we went out to Tasker’s, if he really thought someone else was going to get the blame, he might …’ He shrugged. ‘But he didn’t. Wishful thinking.’
‘When did you realise?’
‘Almost straight away.’ He took a much larger gulp of the whisky. ‘But it was just last night that I knew for certain.’ He smiled at her, a little sadly. ‘That’s why I was in a bad mood,’ he said. ‘He called her Lennie. Pauline Pearce called her Lennie – that was the first time I’d heard anyone call her that. But Drake wasn’t there, and he had never heard anyone call her that. He’d only ever spoken to Austin, and he always called her Leonora.’
Judy nodded. ‘ I always wondered why,’ she said. ‘Lennie hated it. But then Lennie’s a boy’s name – maybe he …’ She smiled. ‘ I’m getting as bad as you,’ she said.
‘I used your method. I looked at the facts we already knew in a different light. I stopped wishing the next-door neighbour had seen something, and realised what she hadn’t seen.’
‘Lennie took risks,’ Judy said, after a moment. ‘ She liked people who weren’t all that safe.’ She looked at him. ‘ I’m glad, in a way, that it was that risk that killed her. Not just because she happened to pick up a telephone.’
He knew what she meant.
Two hours later, they had finished their leisurely meal; Judy’s speciality had done the trick, as she had said it would, and Lloyd felt much better, as he tipped the last of the brandy into Judy’s glass.
‘I’ve lost my temporary promotion,’ she said.
‘I thought we didn’t discuss that at home?’
She smiled.
‘Still, it was a good way to lose it, from the career point of view,’ he said. ‘I owe you an apology. I really thought you’d lost your way.’
‘I owe you one. I really thought you were going to buy one of those flats.’
‘It was you, was it, speeding? I nearly took your number, but you were moving too fast.’ He took her hand. ‘I suggest we leave the washing up and go to bed.’
‘What a good idea.’ She got up from the table. ‘You can talk to me in French,’ she said.
‘No I can’t.’
‘Your mother was half French, and you don’t speak the language?’
‘My father’s wholly Welsh, and I don’t speak that either. I speak the most wonderful language in the world. English.’
Judy laughed. ‘Isn’t that treason, or something?’
‘Oh, yes. They’d probably blow me up. But English doesn’t need an Academy to make people remember to speak it, like French does. As for Welsh roadsigns – if you have to plug a language into a life support system, forget it.’
He put his arm round her as they walked into the bedroom.
‘A language should live,’ he said, kissing her ear. ‘It should breathe …’
‘Why did you never tell me?’ she said.
‘It should be pliant and responsive.’ He pushed her down on to the bed, his lips touching her temple, her eyes. ‘But complex, and not too easy to master.’
‘You talk about everything. All the time. Nineteen to the dozen. And you never told me you had French blood in your veins.’
‘You should want to explore it.’ He kissed her hair. ‘The deeper you delve into its mystery …’
‘You, the romantic, keep quiet about being one-quarter French, as though it was something to be ashamed—’ She broke off, and stared at him.
‘What?’ he said, sitting back. ‘You look so like a gun-dog that I want to give you a biscuit. What?’
‘It’s French.’
‘Forget it,’ he said, I told you there would be no supplementary information given. You produce names, and I will tell you if you are right, promise. But no—’
‘How did you know I was talking about your name?’ she asked, interrupting him in full flow.
He couldn’t believe he had fallen into so simple a trap. It was the blow on the head that had done it.
‘It’s French,’ she said smugly, then frowned. ‘But I’d have thought you would have liked a romantic French name. Michel, Jean-Claude, Pierre … so, it must be a dreadful French name.’
He started to undress.
‘But how would we know what sort of name qualifies as dreadful in France?’ she said. ‘It must be a name that means something in English. Or a name that we use in a quite different context from—’
‘I do the talking,’ he said, turning to her, kissing her before she could get any further with her exploration of language. It occurred to him, later on, that he had never made love to a chief constable either.
Perhaps he had that to look forward to.
Copyright
First published in 1991 by Macmillan
This edition published 2014 by Bello
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Copyright © Jill McGown, 1991
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