Just before lunch the PM report arrived. Barnaby had the sheets out of the folder before Audrey had left the room. He scanned them quickly. Troy said, ‘Any surprises?’ and received a glance that seemed to him slightly sympathetic.
‘Craigie didn’t smoke although he used to. Didn’t drink. Last ate about nine hours before he died. Cause of death a non-angled knife-thrust puncturing the right ventricle which does away with the idea of Gamelin striking from behind.’
Barnaby waited and Troy made shift to conceal his irritation. The old man was inclined to indulge in the theatrical pause whenever an especially meaty revelation was in the offing. It ran in the family. You had to make allowances. What bugged Troy was that when he tried to do it, he was told to get a bloody move on. Dutifully he produced the feed-line.
‘That it then, sir?’
‘Not quite.’ Barnaby laid down the report. ‘He was also suffering from bone cancer.’
‘Cancer!’ Whatever Troy had expected it was not this. Barnaby could not have wished for a more satisfactory response. Troy sat down in the visitor’s chair. ‘What - bad?’
‘Bad as it gets. They say he had a few months at the most. That explains the wig of course.’
‘Sorry?’
‘If he was having chemotherapy he’d probably lost his hair.’
‘But would he go in for that sort of thing? You know what they’re like up there. Wouldn’t he be exposing himself to some wonky universal ray or stuffing herbs up his nose?’
‘If you remember, he was at the Hillingdon on the day Riley was found. Gibbs said Craigie was a regular hospital visitor. It’s my guess that all of them were told this to account for his frequent attendance.’
‘You mean he didn’t want to upset them till he had to.’
‘Precisely.’
‘Saint Arthur after all then.’ Troy’s mouth turned down clownishly in disappointment. Even his bright quills of hair drooped.
‘We’ll check with the hospital of course, but I think it’d be wise to abandon your idea of the wig as part of an actor’s performance.’
Troy put on his shrewd look. He shrugged, pursed his mouth, nodded. Judicious, not convinced. ‘How do you see this affecting the murder, Chief?’
‘Don’t know. If Craigie really succeeded in concealing it, probably not at all.’
‘The murderer couldn’t have known. Who’s going to risk years in the slammer if all you’ve got to do to see your victim off is hang about for a few weeks.’
‘If time wasn’t a problem, no one.’
‘Right. On the other hand ... wo hay ... what about this? Knowing his days are numbered, wishing to spare all and sundry unnecessary aggro, our hero tops himself.’
‘Psychologically, I’d say that’s quite sound. But he would never have done it like this, causing the maximum pain and confusion. I see him as the sort to put his affairs in order and take an overdose, leaving a note on his bedroom door. You know the sort of thing - don’t come in. Call an ambulance.’
‘OK. Say ... um ... someone knows, yes? He’s had to tell them to get the future straightened out and he - or she - can’t hack it. Can’t bear the thought of poor old Obi’s increasing deterioration, so they do a spot of mercy killing. A quick thrust and it’s one halo less down here, one more on the pearly hatstand.’
‘Same argument. They wouldn’t choose that way.’ Barnaby tapped the report. ‘Unnecessarily dangerous and messy. They’d slip something into his muesli.’
‘’Spose so.’ Blocked at every turn, Troy gazed rather shirtily at the VDU. It would serve some people right if they were stuck with a teak head who got one idea a year, and that out of a cracker at the Christmas thrash.
‘Sorry, Gavin.’
‘What?’ Troy feigned bewilderment. ‘Oh - that’s OK. Just thinking aloud, you know - like you do. Right,’ he got up, ‘I think I’ll grab an early lunch. Usually fish, end of the week. I’d better try some. Supposed to be good for the brains.’
‘The ancient Chinese had got it taped. They gave their suspect a mouthful of rice. If he spat it out it meant his salivary glands hadn’t dried up. Ergo - he was telling the truth.’
‘What if he just didn’t like rice?’
‘Half an hour, maximum. And bring me back some sandwiches.’
When Chris and Suhami returned to the kitchen, they brought a fairly well-filled bright green bag and tipped the post on to the kitchen table. Two small parcels and around a dozen letters.
Janet’s quick eager fingers picked them over. There was nothing for her. Flinching from a glimmer of pitying concern in Heather’s eyes she got up and started to clear away the coffee cups.
‘Heavens,’ said Arno, tearing open an envelope, ‘there’s a booking here already for our hydro/massage weekend.’
Shake Hands With Aphrodite had been well publicised in Causton and Uxbridge and discreetly small-aded in one or two magazines. Several bubble-effect motors had been purchased to gussy up the community’s staid, claw-footed baths. Alternatively, if dry, the workshop would take place in the lake.
‘Here’s one for you,’ said Chris. ‘And May.’ He held out a long narrow envelope of heavy cream parchment, immaculately inscribed in heavy type and franked.
‘For both of us?’ Arno took the letter, pleased but puzzled. May, as bursar, got a great deal of mail but himself hardly any. He could not imagine, he said, why someone should be writing to them jointly.
‘Can’t you?’ said Chris, looking excited and exasperated at the same time. ‘It’s from a solicitor.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘Of course. They always look like that.’
‘I think Chris may be right,’ murmured Heather timidly.
‘We must find May at once.’
‘Open it,’ said Suhami. ‘It’s addressed to you as well.’
‘Nevertheless I prefer to wait till she is present.’
‘May was with Mrs Gamelin earlier,’ said Heather. ‘Shall I fetch her?’
‘I’ll go,’ said Suhami.
Felicity was lying back on her pillow, eyes closed, a little fringe of milk on her top lip. May was seated by the bed. Suhami came in quietly and closed the door.
She crossed to the bed and stood looking down. She had not seen her mother for years without what Felicity called her ‘war paint’ and realised that had they passed in the street, she wouldn’t have recognised her.
Felicity’s hair was tied smoothly back and she was lying on the pony tail, so there was nothing to soften the fastidious sharp lines of jaw and cheek. Even in deep repose she looked desperately unhappy. All of the Gamelins, thought Suhami. All of us ... With an unexpected movement of the heart, she noticed that her mother’s unpainted brows were flecked with grey.
‘Is she going to be all right, May?’
‘That rather depends on whether she wants to be. At the moment all we can offer is quiet and rest. I suspect that her mind and body have been greatly abused.’
‘Yes.’ Suhami turned away. After all there was nothing she could do. Too much time had passed. There was not even the memory of affection. ‘There’s a letter for you.’ She moved off, not looking back. ‘The general opinion seems to be that it’s from a solicitor.’
Having decamped to the office, Arno was now sitting behind the old Gestetner and, with Chris’s help, was sorting things into piles. As he had anticipated, most were inquiring about future events. One or two were bills, some sought healing appointments. He rose as May entered, holding out the parchment envelope. She tore it open at once.
‘It’s from a Mr Pousty of Pousty and Dingle. They want to see us.’