by J M Gregson
He was glad that he’d put on his best shirt and sweater and the newer of his two pairs of trousers. For a horrible moment as he sat at the table and stared around him, he thought that he had forgotten to comb his hair. He raised his right hand surreptitiously to his head and ran it awkwardly over his pate. All was well: the parting was certainly there, and the style of his short fair hair, such as it was, was in place.
The other customers on this cold Friday morning were all middle-aged and elderly women. He felt them looking at him, resenting his inappropriate presence here. But that didn’t last long. None of them was alone and they quickly resumed their conversations. Probably these now included observations on this alien youthful intrusion, but that was no doubt inevitable. He’d grown used to being an object of interest and even sometimes of bawdy female speculation in the supermarket. You lived with these things, when you worked with the public and were a man of the world. He hoped that Jane Preston would arrive before too long.
She was worth the wait. She was wearing jeans, he was happy to see, though they were very new and of a quality he had never possessed. Her green top was in no way tarty, but it accentuated her charms. Jamie found it difficult to detach his eyes from the breasts beneath it and his speculation about what support, if any, they were receiving. Jane said, ‘Oh, you’ve already ordered!’ and he realized that he had perpetrated his first social faux pas.
She handled the waitress far better than he had, receiving her attention with a smile of welcome and a briskly delivered order for a cappuccino. Jamie had just ordered ordinary coffee and was surprised when it now was delivered in a pot. He poured a small amount of milk in carefully from the jug provided and stirred his coffee thoughtfully, trying to look as if he did this all the time. Then he gave Jane a bright smile and said, ‘And how can I be of service to you, fair damsel?’
She gave him a wide smile. ‘I don’t feel very fair this morning. And I’m not quite sure what a damsel is supposed to look like in the twenty-first century. But thank you for being my knight in shining armour.’ She looked very fair indeed, to Jamie, in her bright green top and new jeans. Smart casual, they called it. He wished he felt as smart and as casual as Jane looked. He wasn’t up to being a knight in shining armour, but he was grateful for the thought. He said stoutly, ‘I can’t think that you’ve anything to fear at all from the police.’
‘Can’t you? After all the tales we hear? I didn’t think you were as naïve as that.’
He wanted to prove to her that he wasn’t naïve, without admitting exactly how much he did know about the police. He’d given that some thought this morning, but it wasn’t going to be easy. ‘The police want convictions, there’s no doubt about that. But this is a serious crime and it will get a lot of publicity. They won’t try to rig the evidence or frame anybody, with so much at stake. They could end up with egg on their faces if they tried to frame someone who was innocent.’
‘You see! You do know all sorts of things that I don’t. What you just said might seem obvious to you, but it’s all new to me. When I was a student, I heard such awful things about the police and what they do.’
Jamie smiled, feeling more confident now. ‘You shouldn’t believe everything students say. They like to dramatise things, to make out that the police are all vicious pigs and that they themselves are whiter than white. Whatever the police would like to do, they have to be careful, nowadays. You don’t even have to say anything, if you don’t choose to. They can’t even grill you with a brief beside you unless you’ve been charged with an offence. And even then, you can give them the old “no comment” if you think that’s the best line.’
‘There you are! You know all sorts of things that I don’t. If I have any trouble, I shall insist on having you at my side as they give me the third degree.’
He grinned, aware by now that she wasn’t entirely serious. ‘I don’t think that would be a very good idea. If they do come to see you, just remember that you are a private citizen with nothing to hide, who is merely fulfilling her public duty by giving whatever help she can to the police in their enquiries.’
She sipped her coffee without comment. He imagined those full, efficient lips pressed against his, exploratory perhaps at first, then moving forward into passion. Surprised, perhaps, by his adeptness and his urgency, giving herself to him, journeying onwards and upwards into other and as yet unspecified amorous adventures. Bloody hell, Jamie!
‘So you want to be a writer.’
The words seemed to come from a long way away, banishing the images which were racing like an express train across his fevered brain. ‘What? Oh sorry, yes.’ Supposed to be a writer and not even articulate. ‘Yes. I write a little. Well, quite a lot, really, but I throw most of it away. That’s part of the process. You have to be self-critical to improve. Chucking things out may be the most important part of the creative recipe, you see.’
‘Yes, I do see. It makes good sense. Did Alfred Norbury tell you that?’
That was puncturing his posturings, wasn’t it? Particularly as he’d been quoting Alfred almost word for word. ‘I suppose he did. I think I was working it out for myself, but he put it into words for me. Shortened the process. I’m grateful to him for that. He made me more optimistic, in a way. I used to simply despair of myself when I thought what I’d composed wasn’t very good, but now I see it as a necessary part of the process. The secret is to spot the worthwhile phrases and the worthwhile ideas amidst the dross. Then you keep those and polish them and add to them, if you can.’
‘You really believe in this, don’t you? And it all makes sense. I’ve tried bits of poetry, like most people, but I’ve always been so disappointed with the results that I’ve just chucked them away in disgust.’
‘You shouldn’t do that. Spot the good bits, even if it’s only a word or two, keep them, and use them to stimulate more.’
‘Perhaps we could have a go together. Show each other what we’ve written, I mean. That’s if I can bring myself to show my sorry efforts to anyone else.’
‘You should do that. Humility is one of the foundation stones of creativity.’ That was him, not Alfred and he wanted to let her know that. But was it as profound as it had sounded, or merely pretentious nonsense? ‘It would be good if we could try bits of writing and then show them to each other. It’s a very lonely business, writing. You have to develop self-critical faculties, as I said, but there are times when a second opinion would be very welcome.’
Jane gave him that smile again and her blue eyes brimmed with a friendly humour. Jamie forgot about words and thought about flesh again. She said firmly, ‘I’m making no promises – I’m not sure that I can bring myself to show my puny efforts to anyone else, even someone as obviously sympathetic as you. I expect you’re missing Alfred.’
He didn’t like the switch back to his mentor, but if he rejected it he would feel disloyal. He said slowly, ‘I think we’d gone as far as we could go.’
‘I see.’ She was looking hard at him, patently trying to assess how genuine his statement was.
‘Alfred was very generous. Both with his time and with his resources. He told me to take any books I wanted from his library, and even made suggestions. Helpful ones, in the main. And he was a good teacher, I think, one to one. He knew a lot about literature and a lot about the processes of writing. And he was a good communicator.’
‘Yes, I see.’ She took a large gulp of her coffee, drummed her fingers on the immaculate white tablecloth, paused for so long that he wondered if she was waiting for him to speak. Then she said, ‘Was there a sexual relationship between you?’
He wasn’t shocked. He hadn’t been expecting it, but when she asked the question he felt that it had been coming all along. ‘The police asked me that.’
‘And what did you tell them?’
He waited until she looked up, then gazed hard into those very blue eyes. ‘I’m strictly heterosexual, Jane. I think you might have realized that.’
His hand stole dar
ingly across the table and covered hers.
The Burgess house was certainly impressive. There was white frost on the lawn, but that only made the front garden seem even longer as they drove up and parked on the gravel before the double front door. The modern red brick of the front elevation rose above them, seeming impossibly high against the crisp blue of the winter sky beyond it. ‘You probably won’t need to display your hard bastard skills this morning,’ said DCI Peach to DS Northcott.
The maid who opened the door viewed the tall black man with interest rather than suspicion when Peach announced their identity. ‘Mrs Burgess is expecting you. You’re to come into the morning room,’ she said. They followed her through a huge hall with impeccable parquet flooring to a room on the left which looked over their car and down the front drive to the leafless flowering crabs and cherries by the gates. They had less than a minute to conduct their habitual CID assessment of the room before Sharon Burgess arrived and offered them her hand.
Peach was looking at the contents of a glass-fronted bookcase when she arrived. She said aggressively, ‘Casing the joint, are we? And what are your findings?’
Peach smiled benignly. ‘A nicely proportioned and pleasantly furnished room. Well kept, which in this context argues excellent domestic staff rather than the direct attentions of the owner. Very little used. I was wondering when a book was last removed from that bookcase.’
‘Entirely correct, Sherlock. Coffee will be along in a moment, but I can’t remember when it was last served in here. We’re only here now because my cleaner is busy in the sitting room. And I suppose because my maid thought it a suitable place to accommodate curious policemen.’
‘Nice for you to have a choice of rooms.’
Mrs Burgess said, ‘I rattle around here. I keep thinking of moving to somewhere smaller and I shall probably do so eventually. But the children and the grandchildren like it when they come to stay and I can afford it. My husband left me comfortably off and Burgess Electronics continues to prosper.’
She was sizing them up during this initial fencing, when Peach felt that it was he who should be assessing her. Wealth gives certain advantages in the one-upmanship stakes, and this woman was clearly used to exercising those advantages. He said briskly, ‘We’re heading the enquiry into the death of Alfred Norbury, at the hand of person or persons unknown. How long had you known Mr Norbury?’
‘I didn’t know him well. I suppose about a dozen years. I’d probably heard of him earlier than that. Alfred was quite a well-known local figure, as I’m sure you’re aware.’ She looked at Clyde Northcott rather speculatively on that thought, but the coffee arrived as she had promised. The DS helped himself to one of the flapjacks she offered and then held his china cup and saucer with immense care, like a child on its best behaviour. She tried not to be distracted by this strange presence in her morning room. ‘I didn’t know Mr Norbury particularly well.’
‘And yet you saw fit to invite him to be one of the founder members of your book club.’
Peach was looking at her with his bald head a little on one side and his dark eyes bright with interest, like a blackbird about to sample a particularly succulent worm. Sharon decided that she had much better give her full attention to the senior man. ‘It wasn’t me who invited Alfred. And it wasn’t my book club.’
‘Collective adjective, Mrs Burgess, that “your”. And if you didn’t invite Mr Norbury, you certainly sanctioned his presence at that meeting on Monday night. Or am I quite wrong? Did you oppose his membership? Were you overruled?’
The questions were coming at her like machine-gun fire. She hastened to answer before the fusillade could continue. ‘It was Enid Frott who invited him. And yes, I was consulted: I sanctioned Alfred as a member, I suppose. It was all very informal and tentative.’ She sighed. ‘The book club was Enid’s idea, but I welcomed it and encouraged her to set it up. The first problem was obviously to get a number of suitable people interested. We decided that we would start with six and then add to that as we went along, unless the whole thing collapsed around our ears.’
‘Which it did in spectacular fashion, with the murder of one of the founder members. One of the best-read and therefore most promising of the founder members, if what I have heard already is correct.’
It was a reminder to Sharon that they had been in touch with the other people who had been there on Monday night and with other people who had known Norbury. She needed to control everything she said here. She felt deflated as she said, ‘I expect the book club will disintegrate now. Well, it never got off the ground really, did it?’
‘Murder isn’t the best of starts for any sort of club, is it?’ Peach gave her an irritating grin, as if he found the thought amusing. ‘Do you think Mr Norbury would have been a useful member of the book club?’
This was a question she hadn’t expected. It was only later that she realized it was an invitation to tell them everything she knew about Norbury. She said carefully, ‘He had all the attributes to be a good member, if he was willing to participate. I’m sure he was quite the best-read person there on Monday night, despite the presence of Jane Preston, who is well qualified and works in the field. He is – was – articulate and stimulating. Enid and I wanted him because we knew that he would initiate lively discussions on whatever we had read.’
‘I see. That confirms what other people have told us. I think you said, “If he was willing to participate.” Did you have doubts about that?’
It showed how careful she needed to be: this man would pick up any unguarded phrase and use it against her if it suited him. ‘I had certain reservations about Alfred, yes. He could be too bright for his own good, sometimes. He liked to show off his knowledge and I felt that might inhibit others who weren’t as confident as he was.’
‘I see. Well, that makes sense. It also shows quite a knowledge of the man, in someone who didn’t know him well.’
He was throwing her own phrase back at her again, suggesting that she was concealing things she knew about Alfred. She said firmly, ‘I discussed these things with Enid Frott, who knew him better than I did. We agreed that on balance Alfred had things to offer which would outweigh his disadvantages. I watched him on Monday and I think that would be a fair summary of his conduct. He was lively and stimulating. Controversial, probably, at times. But people listened and responded. That’s what we wanted of him, I suppose. No one was going to be neutral, with Alfred around.’
‘Someone certainly wasn’t neutral. Someone killed him the next day.’
‘But not necessarily someone who’d been at the book club meeting on Monday night. Someone else entirely, in my opinion.’
‘And why do you say that?’
‘Because I saw nothing at our meeting which would suggest a murder. I’ve been reviewing it in my mind ever since I heard Alfred was dead, and I can’t think of anything said there or any action taken there which would suggest that anyone present on Monday night had murder in mind.’
She was the oldest of their suspects at sixty-seven, but the calmest and seemingly the most secure they had spoken to so far. Wealth and power brought a certain assurance, Peach supposed. This woman was used to being in control, especially here, in this huge house where she reigned supreme. ‘We are tracing Mr Norbury’s movements and contacts prior to his death on the day which followed your meeting. So far we haven’t found anyone who admits to being in contact with him on Tuesday. Was anything said on Monday which suggested that violence might follow?’
‘No. I thought I’d already answered that. I told you, I’ve been over it in my mind and haven’t come up with anything.’
‘Did Mr Norbury himself say anything which might suggest violence?’
There was a tiny pause whilst she considered her reply. ‘No. Alfred had rather tense exchanges on literature and the writer’s craft with Jane Preston and with Dick Fosdyke. But that was the sort of thing for which we’d included him and it wasn’t unpleasant. Alfred gave us a few thoughts about crime
fiction and then said he proposed to shut up whilst we chose our first book to read and discuss.’
‘And he didn’t say anything more shocking than that?’
‘No. He shut up then.’
Peach eased himself back in his chair a little and stared at her steadily. ‘I wonder why people have such selective recall about important details. You are the second person who has chosen to omit the most significant thing Mr Norbury said.’
‘I can’t think what you mean, Chief Inspector.’
But the denial came too promptly on the heels of his remark; she had begun it almost before he had completed his assertion. He said coldly, ‘I think you know exactly what I’m referring to, Mrs Burgess. Alfred Norbury told the company at large that he kept a pistol in his car at all times. Your recall of other things he said seems commendably precise. I cannot think that you have forgotten such a dramatic statement from the murder victim. I therefore now have to ask myself why you chose to withhold that information.’
His adversary – she had no doubt by now that she was that – looked at him resentfully for a few seconds, but did not lose her nerve. Sharon knew she had made a mistake, but surely not a vital one. Her greater secret was safe still. ‘All right. I probably shouldn’t have left that out, but perhaps you can understand why I did. I’d already told you that I knew Alfred from way back. I’d agreed that we should invite him to join us. I thought that if I told you that he had that weapon in his car I’d have immediately become your number-one suspect. It may have been foolish to withhold the information, but you can surely understand why I did it.’
Peach had watched her with raised eyebrows during her explanation. He glanced at Northcott, gave the slightest shrug of his shoulders, and said, ‘Mr Norbury brought a younger man with him and requested that he should be made a member of your embryonic book club.’
