by Colin Dexter
Morse looked hurt.
“You still think it’s just about possible?”
Lewis considered the question again.
“No, sir. I know you always like to think that most murders are committed by next-door neighbors or husbands or wives—”
“But what if this woman at Number 1 isn’t telling us the truth?” queried Morse. “What if she never made that phone call at all? What if she’s in it with him? What if she’s more than willing to provide him with a nice little alibi? You see, you’re probably right about the timescale of things. He probably wouldn’t have had time to get back here to Kidlington, commit the murder, and then return to the office and be sitting quietly at his desk when she rang him.”
“So?”
“So she’s lying. Just like he is! He got back here—easy!—murdered Rachel James—and stayed here, duly putting in an appearance as the very first reporter on the scene!”
“I’m sorry, sir, but she isn’t lying, not about this. I don’t know what you think the rest of us have been doing since Monday morning but we’ve done quite a bit of checking up already. And she’s not lying about the phone call to Owens’ office. One of the lads went along to BT and confirmed it. The call was monitored and it’ll be listed on the itemized telephone bill of the subscriber—Number 1 Bloxham Drive!”
“Does it give the time?”
Lewis appeared slightly uneasy. “I’m not quite sure about that.”
“And if our ace reporter Owens is privileged enough to have an answer phone in his office—which he is …”
Ye-es. Perhaps Morse was on to something after all. Because if the two of them had, for some reason, been working together … Lewis put his thoughts into words:
“You mean he needn’t have gone in to work at all? … Ye-es. You say that electronic gadget records the number on your card, and the time—but it doesn’t record the car itself, right?”
Morse nodded encouragement. And Lewis, duly encouraged, continued:
“So if somebody else had taken his card—and if he stayed on the Drive all the time …”
Morse finished it off for him: “He’s got a key to Number 1—he’s in there when she drives off—he walks along the back of the terrace—shoots Rachel James—goes back to Number 1—rings up his own office number—waits for the answer phone pips—probably doesn’t say anything—just keeps the line open for a minute or two—and Bob’s your father’s brother.”
Lewis sighed. “I’d better get on with a bit of fourth-grade clerical checking, sir—this parking business, the phone call, any of his colleagues who might have seen him—”
“Or her.”
“It’s worth checking, I can see that.”
“Tomorrow, Lewis. We’re doing nothing more today.”
“And this woman at Number 1?”
“Is she a nice-looking lass?”
“Very much so.”
“You leave that side of things to me, then.”
Morse got to his feet and went to the door. But then returned, and sat down again.
“That ‘refrigeration factor’ you mentioned, Lewis—time of death and all that. Interesting, isn’t it? So far, we’ve been assuming that the bullet went through the window and ended up in the corpse, haven’t we? But if—just if—Rachel James had been murdered a bit earlier, inside Number 17, and then someone had fired through the window at some later stage … You see what I mean? Everybody’s alibi is up the pole, isn’t it?”
“There’d be another bullet, though, wouldn’t there? We’ve got the one from Rachel’s neck; but there’d be another one somewhere in the kitchen if someone fired—”
“Not necessarily the murderer, remember!”
“But if someone fired just through the window, without aiming at anything …”
“Did the SOCOs have a good look at the ceiling, the walls—the floorboards?”
“They did, yes.”
“Somebody might have picked it up and pocketed it.”
“Who on earth—”
“I’ve not the faintest idea.”
“Talking of bullets, sir, we’ve got another little report—from ballistics. Do you want to read it?”
“Not tonight.”
“Very short, sir.”
He handed Morse the single, neatly typed paragraph:
Ballistics Report: Prelim.
17 Bloxham Drive, Kidlington, Oxon
.577 heavy-caliber revolver. One of the Howdah pistols probably—perhaps the Lancaster Patent four-barrel. An old firing piece but if reasonably well cared for could be in good working nick like as not in 1996.
Acc. to recent catalogues readily available in USA: $370 to $700. Tests progressing.
ASH
2–22–96
Morse handed the report back. “I’m not at all sure I know what ‘caliber’ means. Is it the diameter of the bullet or the diameter of the barrel?”
“Wouldn’t they be the same, sir?”
Morse got up and walked wearily to the door once more.
“Perhaps so, Lewis. Perhaps so.”
Chapter Twenty-one
A Conservative is one who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.
—AMBROSE BIERCE, The Devil’s Dictionary
Morse did not go straight home to his North Oxford flat that evening; nor, mirabile dictu, did he make for the nearest hostelry—at least not immediately. Instead, he drove to Blox-ham Drive, pulling in behind the single police car parked outside Number 17, in which a uniformed officer sat reading the Oxford Mail.
“Constable Brogan, sir,” was the reply in answer to Morse’s question.
“Happen to know if Number 1’s at home?”
“The one with the N-reg Rover, you mean?”
Morse nodded.
“No. But she keeps coming backward and forward all the time. She seems a very busy woman, that one.”
“Anything to report?”
“Not really, sir. We keep getting a few gawpers, but I just ask them to move along.”
“Gently, I trust.”
“Very gently, sir.”
“How long are you on duty for?”
“Finish at midnight.”
Morse pointed to the front window. “Why don’t you nip in and watch the telly?”
“Bit cold in there.”
“You can put the gas-fire on.”
“It’s electric, sir.”
“Please yourself!”
“Would that be official, sir?”
“Anything I say’s official, lad.”
“My lucky night, then.”
Mine, too, thought Morse as he looked over his shoulder to see an ash-blonde alighting from her car outside Number 1.
He hastened along the pavement in what could be described as an arrested jog, or perhaps more accurately as an animated walk.
“Good evening.”
She turned toward him as she inserted her latchkey.
“Yes?”
“A brief word—if it’s possible … er …”
Morse fumbled for his ID card. But she forestalled the need.
“Another police sergeant, are you?”
“Police, yes.”
“I can’t spare much time—not tonight. I’ve got a busy few hours ahead.”
“I shan’t keep you long.”
She led the way through into a tastefully furbished and furnished front room, taking off her ankle-length white mackintosh, placing it over the back of the red-leather settee, and bidding Morse sit opposite her as she smoothed the pale blue dress over her hips and crossed her elegant, nylon-clad legs.
“Do you mind?” she asked, lifting a cigarette in the air.
“No, no,” muttered Morse, wishing only that she’d offered one to him.
“What can I do for you?” She had a slightly husky, upper-class voice, and Morse guessed she’d probably attended one of the nation’s more prestigious public schools.
“
Just one or two questions.”
She smiled attractively: “Go ahead.”
“I understand that my colleague, Sergeant Lewis, has spoken to you already.”
“Nice man—in a gentle, shy sort of way.”
“Really? I’d never quite thought of him …”
“Well, you’re a bit older, aren’t you?”
“What job do you do?”
She opened her handbag and gave Morse her card.
“I’m the local agent for the Conservative party.”
“Oh dear! I am sorry,” said Morse, looking down at the small oblong card:
Adèle Beatrice Cecil
Conservative Party Agent
1 Bloxham Drive
Kidlington, Oxon, OX5 2NY
For information please ring
01865 794768
“Was that supposed to be a sick joke?” There was an edge to her voice now.
“Not really. It’s just that I’ve never had a friend who’s a Tory, that’s all.”
“You mean you didn’t vote for us today?”
“I don’t live in this ward.”
“If you give me your address, I’ll make sure you get some literature, Sergeant.”
“Chief Inspector, actually,” corrected Morse, oblivious of the redundant adverb.
She tugged her dress a centimeter down her thighs. “How can I help?”
“Do you know Mr. Owens well?”
“Well enough.”
“Well enough to hand him a newspaper scoop?”
“Yes.”
“Have you ever slept with him?”
“Not much finesse about you, is there?”
“Just a minute,” said Morse softly. “I’ve got a terrible job to do—just up the street here. And part of it’s to ask some awkward questions about what’s going on in the Close—”
“Drive.”
“To find out who knows who—whom, if you prefer it.”
“They did teach us English grammar at Roedean, yes.”
“You haven’t answered my question.”
Adèle breathed deeply, and her gray eyes stared across almost fiercely.
“Once, yes.”
“But you didn’t repeat the experience?”
“I said ‘once’—didn’t you hear me?”
“You still see him?”
“Occasionally. He’s all right: intelligent, pretty well read, quite good fun, sometimes—and he promised he’d vote Conservative today.”
“He sounds quite compatible.”
“Are you married, Inspector?”
“Chief Inspector.”
“Are you?”
“No.”
“Do you wish you were?”
Perhaps Morse didn’t hear the question.
“Did you know Rachel James fairly well?”
“We had a heart-to-heart once in a while.”
“You weren’t aware of any one particular boyfriend?”
She shook her head.
“Would you say she was attractive to men?”
“Wouldn’t you?”
“I only saw her the once.”
“I’m sorry.” She said it quietly. “Please, forgive me.”
“Do you know a man called Storrs? Julian Storrs?”
“Good gracious, yes! Julian? He’s one of our Vice Presidents. We often meet at do’s. In fact, I’m seeing him next week at a fund-raising dinner at The Randolph. Would you like a complimentary ticket?”
“No, perhaps not.”
“Shouldn’t have asked, should I? Anyway,” she got to her feet, “I’ll have to be off. They’ll be starting the count fairly soon.”
They walked to the front door.
“Er … when you rang Mr. Owens on Monday morning, just after eight o’clock you say, you did speak to him, didn’t you?”
“Of course.”
Morse nodded. “And one final thing, please. My sergeant found some French letters—”
“French letters? How old are you, Chief Inspector? Condoms, for heaven’s sake.”
“As I say, we found two packets of, er, condoms in one of her bedroom drawers.”
“Big deal!”
“You don’t know if she ever invited anyone home to sleep with her?”
“No, I don’t.”
“I thought,” said Morse hesitantly, “most women were on the pill these days?”
“A lot of them off it, too—after that thrombosis scare.”
“I suppose so, yes. I’m … I’m not really an expert in that sort of thing.”
“And don’t forget safe sex.”
“No. I’ll … I’ll try not to.”
“Did she keep them under her nighties?”
Morse nodded sadly, and bade goodnight to Adèle Beatrice Cecil.
ABC.
As he walked slowly along to the Jaguar, he felt a slight tingling behind the eyes at the thought of Rachel James, and the nightdress she’d been wearing when she was murdered; and the condoms so carefully concealed in her lingerie drawer—along with the hopes and fears she’d had, like everyone. And he thought of Auden’s immortal line on A. E. Housman:
Kept tears like dirty postcards in a drawer.
As he started the Jaguar, Morse noticed the semistroboscopic light inside the lounge; and trusted that PC Brogan had managed to activate the heating system in Number 17 Bloxham Drive.
Chapter Twenty-two
O Beer! O Hodgson, Guinness, Allsopp, Bass!
Names that should be on every infant’s tongue!
—CHARLES STUART CALVERLY
Morse headed south along the Banbury Road, turning left just after the Cutteslowe Roundabout, and through the adjoining Carlton and Wolsey Roads (why hadn’t the former been christened “Cardinal”?); then, at the bottom of the Cutteslowe Estate, down the steeply sloping entry to the Cherwell, a quietly civilized public house where the quietly civilized landlord kept an ever-watchful eye on the Brakspear and the Bass. The car phone rang as he unfastened his safety belt.
Lewis.
Speaking from HQ.
“I thought I’d told you to go home! The eggs and chips are getting cold.”
Lewis, as Morse earlier, showed himself perfectly competent at ignoring a question.
“I’ve had a session on the phone with Ox and Cow Newspapers, sir—still at work there, quite a few of them. Owens’ car park card is number 14922 and it was registered by the barrier contraption there at 7:04 on Monday morning. Seems he’s been in fairly early these last couple of months. Last week, for example, Monday to Friday, 7:37, 7:06, 7:11, 7:00, 7:18.”
“So what? Shows he can’t get up that early on Monday mornings.”
“That’s not all, though.”
“It is, Lewis! It’s still the card you’re on about—not the car! Can’t you see that?”
“Please listen to me for a change, sir. The personnel fellow who looked out the car park things for me, he just happened to be in earlyish last Monday morning himself: 7:22. There weren’t many others around then, but one of the ones who was … Guess who, sir?”
“Oh dear!” said Morse for the second time that evening.
“Yep. Owens! Ponytail ’n all.”
“Oh.”
In that quiet monosyllable Lewis caught the depth of Morse’s disappointment. Yet he felt far from dismayed himself, knowing full well as he did, after so many murder investigations with the pair of them in harness, that Morse’s mind was almost invariably at its imaginative peak when one of his ill-considered, top-of-the-head hypotheses had been razed to the ground—in this case by some lumbering bulldozer like himself. And so he understood the silence at the other end of the line: a long silence, like that at the Cenotaph in commemoration of the fallen.
Lewis seldom expected (seldom received) any thanks. And in truth such lack of recognition concerned him little, since only rarely did Morse show the slightest sign of graciousness or gratitude to anyone.
Yet he did so now.
“Thank you, my old
friend.”
At the bar Morse ordered a pint of Bass and proceeded to drink it speedily.
At the bar Morse ordered a second pint of Bass and proceeded to drink it even more speedily—before leaving and driving out once more to Bloxham Drive, where no one was abroad and where the evening’s TV programs appeared to be absorbing the majority of the households.
Including Number 17.
The Jaguar door closed behind him with its accustomed aristocratic click, and he walked slowly through the drizzle along the street. Still the same count: six for Labor; two for the Tories; and two apparently unprepared to parade their political allegiances.
Yes! YES!
Almost everything (he saw it now so clearly) had been pushing his mind toward that crucial clue—toward the break-through in the case.
It had not been Owens who had murdered Rachel James—almost certainly he couldn’t have done it, anyway.
And that late evening, as if matching his slow-paced walk, a slow and almost beatific smile had settled round the mouth of Chief Inspector Morse.
Chapter Twenty-three
Friday, February 23
Thirteen Unlucky: The Turks so dislike the number that the word is almost expunged from their vocabulary. The Italians never use it in making up the numbers of their lotteries. In Paris, no house bears that number.
—Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
As Lewis pulled onto Bloxham Drive, he was faced with an unfamiliar sight: a smiling, expansive-looking Morse was leaning against the front gate of Number 17, engaged in a relaxed, impromptu press conference with one camera crew (ITV), four reporters (two from national, two from local newspapers—but no Owens), and three photographers. Compared with previous mornings, the turnout was disappointing.
It was 9:05 A.M.
Lewis just caught the tail end of things. “So it’ll be a waste of time—staying on here much longer. You won’t expect me to go into details, of course, but I can tell you that we’ve finished our investigations in this house.”
