Lessingham said: 'I had an appointment with my dentist in Norwich at five o'clock and then briefly visited a friend in the Close. So I drove here from Norwich, not from my cottage. I'd just turned right off the B1150 at Fairstead when I nearly crashed into the back of this unlit car skewed across the road. I thought it was a damn silly place to park if someone wanted to take a leak in the bushes. Then it crossed my mind that there could have been an accident. And the right-hand door was open, that seemed a bit odd. So I drew into the side and went to take a look. There was no one about. I'm not sure why I walked into the trees. A kind of instinct I suppose. It was too dark to see anything and I wondered whether to call out. Then I felt a fool and decided to leave it and mind my own business. And it was then that I almost tripped over her.'
He took another gulp of the wine. 'I still couldn't see anything, of course, but I knelt down and groped about with my hands. And it was then that I touched flesh. I think I touched her thigh, I can't be sure. But flesh, even dead flesh, is unmistakable. So I went back to the car and got my torch. I shone it on her feet and then slowly up her body to her face. And then, of course, I saw. I knew it was the Whistler.'
Meg Dennison asked gently: 'Was it very terrible?'
He must have heard in her voice what she obviously felt, not prurience but sympathy, an understanding that he needed to talk. He looked at her for a moment as if seeing her for the first time then paused, giving the question serious thought.
'More shocking than terrible. Looking back my emotions were complicated, a mixture of horror, disbelief and, well, shame. I felt like a voyeur. The dead, after all, are at such a disadvantage. She looked grotesque, a little ridiculous, with thin clumps of hair sticking out of her mouth as if she was munching. Horrible, of course, but silly at the same time. I had an almost irresistible impulse to giggle. I know it was only a reaction to shock but it was hardly admirable. And the whole scene was so, well, banal. If you had asked me to describe one of the Whistler's victims that's exactly how I should have seen her. You expect reality to be different from imaginings.'
Alice Mair said: 'Perhaps because the imaginings are usually worse.'
Meg Dennison said gently: 'You must have been terrified. I know I should have been. Alone and in darkness with such horror.'
He shifted his body towards her and spoke as if it were important that she, of all those present, should understand.
'No, not terrified, that was the surprising part. I was frightened, of course, but only for a second or two. After all, I didn't imagine he'd wait around. He'd had his kicks. He isn't interested in men anyway. I found myself thinking the ordinary, commonplace thoughts. I mustn't touch anything. I mustn't destroy the evidence. I've got to get the police. Then, walking back to the car, I started rehearsing what I'd say to them, almost as if I were concocting my story. I tried to explain why it was that I went into the bushes, tried to make it sound reasonable.'
Alex Mair said: 'What was there to justify? You did what you did. It sounds reasonable enough to me. The car was a danger slewed across the road. It would have been irresponsible just to drive on.'
'It seemed to need a lot of explaining, then and later. Perhaps because all the subsequent police sentences began with "why". You get morbidly sensitive to your own motives. It's almost as if you have to convince yourself that you didn't do it.'
Hilary Robarts said impatiently: 'But the body, when you first went back for the torch and saw her, you were certain she was dead?'
'Oh yes, I knew she was dead.'
'How could you have known? It could have been very recent. Why didn't you at least try to resuscitate her, give her the kiss of life? It would have been worth overcoming your natural repugnance.'
Dalgliesh heard Meg Dennison make a small sound between a gasp and a groan. Lessingham looked at Hilary and said coolly: 'It would have been if there had been the slightest point in it. I knew she was dead, let's leave it at that. But don't worry, if I ever find you in extremis I'll endeavour to overcome my natural repugnance.'
Hilary relaxed and gave a little self-satisfied smile, as if gratified to have stung him into a cheap retort. Her voice was more natural as she said: 'I'm surprised you weren't treated as a suspect. After all, you were the first on the scene, and this is the second time you've been, well almost, in at the death. It's becoming a habit.' ^
The last words were spoken almost under her breath but her eyes were fixed on Lessingham's face. He met her glance and said, with equal quietness: 'But there's a difference, isn't there? I had to watch Toby die, remember? And this time no one will even try to pretend that it isn't murder.'
The fire gave a sudden crackle and the top log rolled over and fell into the hearth. Mair, his face flushed, kicked it viciously back.
Hilary Robarts, perfectly calm, turned to Dalgliesh. 'But I'm right, aren't I? Don't the police usually suspect the person who finds the body?'
He said quietly: 'Not necessarily.'
Lessingham had placed the bottle of claret on the hearth. Now he leaned down and carefully refilled his glass. He said: 'They might have suspected me, I suppose, but for a number of lucky circumstances. I was obviously out on my lawful occasions. I have an alibi for at least two of the previous killings. From their point of view I was depress-ingly free of blood. I suppose they could see I was in a mild state of shock. And there was no sign of the ligature which strangled her, nor of the knife.'
Hilary said sharply: 'What knife? The Whistler's a strangler. Everyone knows that's how he kills.'
'Oh, I didn't mention that, did I? She was strangled all right, or I suppose she was. I didn't keep the torchlight on her face longer than was necessary. But he marks his victims, apart from stuffing their mouths with hair. Pubic hair, incidentally. I saw that all right. There was the letter L cut into her forehead. Quite unmistakable. A detective-constable who was talking to me later told me that it's one of the Whistler's trademarks. He thought that the L could stand for Larksoken and that the Whistler might be making some kind of statement about nuclear power, a protest perhaps.'
Alex Mair said sharply: 'That's nonsense.' Then added more calmly: 'There's been nothing on television or in the papers about any cut on the victims' foreheads.'
'The police are keeping it quiet, or trying to. It's the kind of detail they can use to sort out the false confessions. There have been half a dozen of those already apparently. There's been nothing in the media about the hair either, but that piece of unpleasantness seems to be generally known. After all, I'm not the only one to have found a body. People do talk.'
Hilary Robarts said: 'Nothing has been written or said, as far as I know, about it being pubic hair.'
'No, the police are keeping that quiet too, and it's hardly the sort of detail you print in a family newspaper. Not that it's so very surprising. He isn't a rapist but there was bound to be some sexual element.'
It was one of the details which Rickards had told Dalgliesh the previous evening but one, he felt, which Lessingham could well have kept to himself, particularly at a mixed dinner party. He was a little surprised at his sudden sensitivity. Perhaps it was his glance at Meg Dennison's ravaged face. And then his ears caught a faint sound. He looked across to the open door of the dining room and glimpsed the slim figure of Theresa Blaney standing in the shadows. He wondered how much of Lessingham's account she had heard. However little, it would have been too much. He said, hardly aware of the severity in his voice: 'Didn't Chief Inspector Rickards ask you to keep this information confidential?'
There was an embarrassed silence. He thought, They had forgotten for a moment that I'm a policeman.