Rebecca didn’t speak. From the warmth she knew she was colouring. ‘There was nothing to find out about Gerald and me.’
‘It’s difficult to hide anything in a place like this,’ reminded Bentley.
There was no proof. The bastards down below might have guessed but they didn’t know – she and Gerald had been far more discreet than he had been with Jennifer – so they didn’t know and no-one could prove anything. ‘I had no relationship with Gerald Lomax.’ Rebecca was pleased at the steadiness in her voice.
‘It’s a nice flat, isn’t it?’
‘What?’
‘Gerald’s, here in London. A nice flat?’
‘I’ve only been there once. At a party for Emily. But yes, it is a nice flat.’ She shouldn’t have qualified the visit.
‘When would that have been?’
‘It must be more than a year ago.’ What was he getting at? They’d always been discreet there, too.
‘Not weeks ago? Or just days?’
‘No.’
‘The security would have influenced Lomax’s choice, I suppose,’ said Bentley, conversationally. He loved questioning people who despised him: thought they were cleverer. ‘Very American.’
Rebecca felt emptied by uncertainty. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘You’re on the CCTV recording, Ms Nicholls. We’ve got you several times. It’s a long loop but it doesn’t go back years.’
Rebecca Nicholls sat motionless, without expression, for several moments, before she began to sob. There were no tears.
Bentley and Rodgers afterwards agreed that it was always the same: once the dam broke you got washed away in the confessional flood water until in the end you had to say something positive to get them to stop telling you the sexual fetishes of their grandmother’s pet hamster.
Rebecca Nicholls admitted the affair had begun a month before Emily had been born and gave dates and hotels where she and Gerald Lomax had travelled together on overseas business trips, in addition to her accompanying him on the three-times-a-year updating and assessment returns to New York.
‘But Jennifer never knew.’
‘You want me to pull down those screens and tell me that again?’ demanded Bentley. He had what he wanted. He didn’t have to go around in circles any more. This was the part when she learned he wasn’t the dickhead she’d thought him to be but the hardest bastard she’d ever met and that he’d been playing with her – enjoying himself – all the time.
‘Are you going to charge me with anything?’
‘Fucking a married man isn’t a crime. Not in this country at least.’
‘What then?’ She showed no outrage at the dismissive obscenity. He’d won. She supposed it was a spoil of victory to humiliate her.
‘Bring a proper prosecution against Jennifer Lomax.’
‘She didn’t kill Gerry because of me.’
‘Sure.’ It was going to be a good case after all. Fuckable woman, eternal triangle, jealousy, revenge, all the ingredients. Plus a bloody clever – convincing almost – load of bollocks about hearing voices telling Jennifer what to do. Bentley was conscious of Rodgers looking at his watch beside him. He gave an imperceptible nod in return.
‘Gerry was going to tell her. Get a divorce.’
‘Did he?’ pounced Rodgers, sharing the questioning now.
‘No! He said he’d tell me before he did. But he didn’t say anything. So he hadn’t told her.’
It was wrong, reflected Bentley, to believe it was only men who had their brains between their legs. ‘So you tell me, Ms Nicholls, why you think Jennifer Lomax came in here yesterday and tried to turn her husband into hamburger?’ The Americanism for an American had come to him after he’d begun speaking and he was proud of it.
‘I wasn’t responsible for his death.’ Real tears began, at last.
‘If it hadn’t been you it would have been someone else,’ said Rodgers. It was well past conclusion time.
‘We loved each other. We were going to get married.’
‘And live happily ever after?’ said Bentley.
‘Yes! Jennifer was a mistake. Like Jane had been a mistake.’
Jesus, thought Bentley. ‘It’s a bastard, the search for eternal happiness. Maybe he’s found it now.’
‘What’s going to happen to me?’
‘You’ll be called, as a witness.’
‘I won’t testify.’
‘Don’t tell me what you are or are not going to do, Ms Nicholls,’ warned Bentley, savouring the attitude Rebecca had attempted towards him at the beginning. ‘If you try to be stupid you’ll be subpoenaed. And if you refuse in court you’ll be jailed for contempt, among all those tongue-licking dykes. And if you try to leave the country I’ll apply for an international arrest warrant, which won’t achieve much but it’ll guarantee your name and photograph all over every newspaper you can think of and everyone can make up their own mind whether you were responsible or not.’
‘Bastard!’
‘Believe it.’
‘I’ll lose my job.’
‘You probably will,’ agreed Rodgers. It had just gone past the floodgates time.
Bentley thought the same. ‘Thank you for your help.’
‘I don’t want to go back downstairs. Not this afternoon.’
‘Go home then,’ said Bentley.
‘Isn’t there any other way?’ pleaded the woman, tentatively.
Not even on your back with your legs splayed, thought Bentley. ‘A man has been murdered, horribly. My only interest is in seeing that justice is done.’
‘She has to know? Jennifer, I mean?’
‘She already does, doesn’t she?’ Bentley pointed out.
‘I suppose so. Gerald should have told me.’
‘Gerald should have done a lot of things he didn’t.’
‘And not done a lot of the things that he did,’ picked up Rodgers, as the door closed behind the girl. He stood, looking down critically at the other man. ‘What the hell were you trying to do to me, about seeing that justice is done!’
They both laughed.
Bentley said, ‘Lomax must have had a dick like a donkey.’
‘And used it like one,’ agreed Rodgers. ‘You took a hell of a chance about a security camera. We don’t even know if there is one.’
‘She wouldn’t have known either. She was too arrogant.’ He grinned. ‘Just like one of those television films, wasn’t it?’
‘Lucky,’ insisted Rodgers.
‘But I was right about another woman, wasn’t I!’
‘You took longer than an hour to prove it,’ argued Rodgers.
Ceremoniously Bentley took a five-pound note from his wallet and handed it to the other man.
‘You could have done it under the hour,’ said Rodgers, accepting the bet.
‘I can’t stand superior cows like that: I enjoyed myself, bringing her down. That was worth five pounds. Can you imagine those legs locked around your neck?’
Rodgers offered the money back. ‘You were right, about the case itself.’
Bentley took his money back. ‘Wrapped and parcelled. We’ve got the classic woman-scorned scenario.’
‘What’s the voice in her head going to tell her now?’
‘That she tried but lost,’ said Bentley. ‘It’s a fucking nuisance we’ve got to go through things properly.’
‘That was part of it, wasn’t it?’ realized Rodgers. ‘Refusing any statement until she had a solicitor.’
‘Jennifer Lomax is a very cunning killer,’ judged Bentley. ‘We’ve got ourselves another good one here, Malcolm. It’ll run.’
For the second night in succession, Bert Feltham got a call at home from Humphrey Perry.
‘Things look very different,’ announced Perry. ‘There was another woman. It looks as if Jennifer Lomax found out.’
‘She’s faking the voice in her head?’ It still inevitably had to be a guilty plea but it could turn out better. No-one liked insanity.
‘Bentley wants to interview her tomorrow at the hospital. Your man’s got to be there with me, obviously.’
‘What time?’
‘Ten.’
‘There could be more mileage in this than we thought.’
‘Isn’t that why I have your home number?’
Perry was being wise after the event but Feltham didn’t challenge him.
Chapter Eight