‘I’m glad about that. We need your input.’ Old phrases from her Civil Service days came back to Marjorie when she was nervous. She said hastily, ‘I mean, we need to hear what you have to say, Sam. And not just about poetry, but about the other subjects we’re including in the festival.’
‘Well, I’ll be there. We can talk then.’ He could hear her breathing, but she did not speak. He made himself say, ‘I’ll stay behind after the meeting, if you like.’
‘It’s not really festival business. And it’s rather urgent.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I need to speak to you today, Sam. I’ll come to your place, if you like. Or you could come here. My husband’s out at work all day, so we won’t be disturbed.’
For a moment, he had a nightmare fantasy of the patrician Mrs Dooks luring him to her house and enticing him on to her couch of seduction. He dismissed it hastily. ‘No. I’d rather see you here, if that’s all right with you. If you don’t mind the mess.’
There was a first hint of relaxation in the tense voice as she said, ‘No, I don’t mind the mess, Sam. I’ll be there in half an hour.’
Sam looked round his bedsit desperately. It was like having a visit from your mother. No, it was much worse than that. It was like having a visit from Miss Dagnan. She had been the Senior Mistress in his secondary school, a formidable, large-bosomed dragon who had been responsible for discipline. Sam had made the same jokes about her as his fellows, but he had never lost his secret fear of her.
Surely Marjorie Dooks couldn’t be as bad as old Daggers?
‘I don’t want you here when they come.’
‘Why’s that? I can give you moral support with the fuzz.’ Kate Merrick tried to keep it light, but she felt hurt.
‘To tell you the truth, I’m not quite sure why. Perhaps it’s because I would be self-conscious. I think I’ll find it easier if you’re not there, watching my every move.’ But Ros Barker found it difficult to look her partner in the face. She couldn’t remember when that had last happened.
‘You mean I might be like a protective wife, watching your every move?’
Ros did look at her now, hearing the hurt in her voice. ‘Don’t be silly. It’s nothing like that. I just think I’ll find it easier to concentrate on what I have to tell them without you or anyone else listening to me,’
‘Is it because you don’t want them to know that we live together?’
‘Don’t be silly! I thought both of us got over that a long time ago.’
‘Homophobia in the police service. It makes sense, I suppose, especially as this John Lambert is an older bloke.’
‘It’s nothing to do with that. Honestly it isn’t.’ She went over and held Kate’s shoulders, making her look into her face. She felt the tension in the slim frame, then the relaxation as Kate grinned at her earnestness. ‘All right. But wouldn’t you rather I was there to back you up with the fuzz? They’ll know you didn’t like Peter Preston.’
‘They’ll know because I’ll tell them. I shan’t make any secret of it. You and I both know that a lot of people didn’t like Herr Preston and his assumptions of cultural superiority.’
‘You’re right there. I don’t think you should call him that, though.’
‘Now you sound like my mum! But it shows what I mean. I’ll find it much easier to talk to them if I don’t have you listening. I know you’d be supporting me, but I’d be more self-conscious and less able to concentrate with anyone there — even you.’
Kate nodded, her small, mobile features suddenly very serious. ‘All right. I need to pop round to the primary school anyway; apparently there’s a possibility of a part-time job in the office there. Go and put your face on for the fuzz and I’ll make myself scarce.’
Ros went obediently into their bedroom and noted how neatly the bed was made and how Kate’s usual clutter of make-up on the dressing table had been tidied. Ready for the policemen, who would never see it. In many respects, Kate Merrick was a more conventional young woman than she pretended to be, but when you felt tenderly about someone, you loved even their foibles.
She tidied her hair, put on a little lipstick, thought for a moment, then slipped out of her jeans and into the skirt she rarely wore nowadays. Kate wasn’t the only one who could be a little conventional; for some reason she could not fathom, Ros thought she might be more convincing to the long arm of the law in a skirt.
She watched the police Mondeo turn into the drive, then skipped quickly down the two flights of stairs to open the big blue front door in the instant that they rang the bell. She thought they looked a little surprised at her promptness as she gave them her prepared smile. ‘Do come upstairs. We have the top part of the house, but we don’t have a separate entrance.’
She said this as she led them upstairs and into her studio. She had already decided not to speak to them in the rather cramped sitting room on the floor below. The space and light made the studio seem less confining — made it seem as if that would somehow make her answers to them more convincing. She said, ‘I’m sorry the place is so untidy — we’ve been deciding which of my paintings should go to the exhibition of my work in Cheltenham.’ She stifled a smile when she noticed that Kate had removed the nude of herself to a position behind the other works they had chosen. So much for her talk about bourgeois reservations.
Lambert and Hook looked round the studio unhurriedly and with genuine interest. Neither of them could remember being in the workplace of a professional artist before. Then they threw Ros off balance by beginning not with the killing she had geared herself for but with the letter she had almost forgotten in the face of greater events.
Hook said almost accusingly, ‘I understand you received a threatening letter two days ago. Don’t you think you should have informed us about that?’
‘I didn’t take it very seriously, I’m afraid. I was still pondering what to do when Kate brought it in to you.’
‘Didn’t take it seriously? Why was that? Isn’t it a serious thing to have your life threatened?’
‘Of course it is, if you think it’s a genuine threat. But it seemed like the kind of thing that only happens in books. I suppose it was beginning to dawn on me that even if there was an outside chance of it being serious I should report it. Then I heard that Kate Merrick had taken the matter out of my hands.’
‘So your initial thought was that it was just a prank?’
How could a man who looked so easy-going be so persistent? She was rattled by his doggedness, particularly as it seemed to imply she was crass or insensitive. ‘I was getting round to the idea that it was more than a prank when I heard that Kate had been to see you about it.’
‘So initially you thought it might be no more than a joke in bad taste. Who did you think might be the comedian responsible?’
‘One of the literature festival committee, I suppose. But I’ve no real idea.’
‘Which one?’
‘That would be pure speculation. This really isn’t fair, you know.’
Hook’s lips twisted a fraction at the edges. ‘I know. Nevertheless, we’d be interested to hear who you favoured as the author of these threats.’
‘I suppose I thought it might be the kind of stupid thing Peter Preston might do. But it’s irrelevant now, because he’s been killed himself, hasn’t he?’
Lambert took over as smoothly as if the transfer had been anticipated. ‘Indeed he has, Miss Barker. But the threatening messages might not be entirely irrelevant. Did you know that Mr Preston had received a note identical to the one you received yourself?’
‘No.’ She looked suitably shocked. ‘I think DS Hook told Kate that I wasn’t the only recipient, but I didn’t know that Preston had received one. And now he’s dead?’
‘Yes.’
He let the simple monosyllable hang in the wide-windowed studio. She breathed deeply and said, ‘Do you think whoever sent him the note is the man who killed him?’
Lambert allowed himself a grim smile. ‘We don’t know yet that it was a man who sent those letters, nor a man who killed Mr Preston. But for what it’s worth, I don’t think that whoever sent those messages killed Preston. And I don’t think you are in any danger because you received one. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t have reported it. We don’t encourage foolish bravado in the public. Who do you think killed Mr Preston?’