She was really animated now. It was important to her to convince them about the merits of this man they had never seen and might never see. Hook brought her gently back to the matter in hand. ‘And Peter Preston thought he could damage his prospects?’
‘Oh, he was quite certain that he could. He said when he’d released the details of an extra-marital affair to the country’s tabloid press, Ron wouldn’t even be nominated as a candidate to contest the election. I had no doubt that he was right. There are always plenty of candidates on offer and appointing committees tend to play safe. They hate any whiff of scandal.’
‘Did you believe this?’
‘I did. He had dates and times. He said the right papers would run it over several days and make a big thing of it. When I told Peter he surely wouldn’t be so cruel, he laughed in my face. He said I should consider how cruel I’d been to him. I think he really believed that. He couldn’t accept that we’d had an honest difference of opinion. He equated his discomfort in losing an argument to the real suffering he proposed to cause to an able and innocent man.’
‘So did you agree to his demands?’
‘No. I could never have done that. Peter was in the wrong.’ Then, as if she saw that as stubbornly didactic as it sounded, she added much more quietly, ‘I don’t really know what would have happened. I played for time. I pointed out that even if I acceded to his desire to direct the literary festival, people would want to know the reason why I’d resigned. I’d need time to devise some convincing reason for withdrawing from work I believed in and enjoyed.’
‘And did you set about doing that?’
She looked at Hook’s caring, enquiring face and at Lambert’s grimmer one beside it. ‘No. I suppose it was no more than a delaying tactic, to give me time to think.’ For the first time since Lambert had told her about the contents of Preston’s filing cabinet, a small smile flitted briefly across her strong features. ‘It’s an old Civil Service strategy. When something is sprung upon you unexpectedly, you go away, gather all the information you didn’t have earlier, and come back with better arguments to a meeting a couple of weeks later.’
‘And what arguments were you able to muster?’ This was Lambert, acerbic and sceptical, resuming the questioning.
‘None. I don’t think there was a solution. If a man is warped, unreasonable and unscrupulous, he doesn’t listen to arguments.’ She produced the adjectives with a surprising relish; they sensed that she had rehearsed them many times for her own benefit but never expected to produce them for others.
‘And five days later, Mr Preston was dead.’
‘Yes. I don’t think the world has lost much with his demise. Rather the reverse, in fact.’
‘Did you kill him, Mrs Dooks?’
‘No. I don’t approve of murder, even though on this occasion I shall not be sorry if your investigation is unsuccessful.’
‘You have just given us a vivid account of the desperate situation in which you found yourself. You are a woman who prefers decisive action to indirect resistance. Didn’t you see murder as a logical step?’
She stared at him steadily for a moment before she replied. ‘Mr Lambert, you’re beginning to sound like a lawyer in court. I’ve told you I didn’t kill Peter Preston. Any discussion of the logic of such a course is irrelevant.’
‘Where were you last Tuesday evening?’
‘I think I told you this on Thursday. I was at home throughout the evening. I understood that my husband had confirmed that.’
Lambert nodded to Hook, who flicked to a different page of his notebook and studied a note he knew perfectly well, allowing the tension to stretch even tighter in the silent room. ‘Your husband confirmed that you were in the house together at the beginning of the evening. He said that he retired to his own quarters to do some work and that you were at the other end of the house. He says he did not see you between seven forty-five and ten thirty. He pointed out that the television was on in your section of the house throughout the evening, but we have to be aware, of course, that you could easily have left it on when you vacated the house for a time. Do you dispute any of this?’
Damn James and his petty vindictiveness! Typical of him to call that small study ‘his own quarters’. Marjorie could see him now, pretending priggishly that he had to be honest, allowing them to persuade the information in driblets from his reluctant lips. She and he had existed in an atmosphere that had varied between carefully distanced and unspoken hostility for months now. For the first time, she wondered how much James knew about her and Ron. She said, as if the words had been wrung from her, ‘No. This is a big house, as you imply. And as you might deduce from what you’ve heard from me today, our marriage is no longer close. It’s probably almost over, to be honest. We often choose to spend our evenings apart.’
‘So it would have been perfectly possible for you to leave the house without his being aware of it.’
‘I suppose it would. As James has no doubt already told you — very reluctantly, of course.’
The bitter sarcasm of the last phrase made them wonder about the depth of her feeling for the unexpected new man in her life. She’d left them in no doubt that she would be capable of extreme measures to prevent the disclosure of Ronald Forshaw’s affair with her to the public at large. Hook said quietly, as if confronting a sad truth, ‘This house is less than three miles from the spot where Preston was killed. You could have been there and back within twenty minutes, with Preston removed from your life for ever.’
Marjorie managed a smile. ‘You’re very persuasive. You make it sound an attractive option. And indeed it would have been — if it hadn’t involved murder. I don’t think in those terms, DS Hook. I never left the house.’
Lambert stood up, made as if to leave, then paused on what might have been an afterthought. ‘Do you or your husband possess a pistol, Mrs Dooks?’
‘No. I wouldn’t willingly have one in the house and James has never had any interest in such things.’ She seemed for a moment as if she was about to say more, then glanced up into his face and decided against it.
Lambert said, ‘I believe you supervised the collection of arms during your final Civil Service years.’
A small smile flitted briefly across the strong features, as if in brief recognition of a point scored by an opponent. ‘Yes. I had overall responsibility for the collection of IRA and Ulster Volunteer arms surrendered after the resolution of the Irish conflict. I suppose it might have been possible for me to acquire a pistol then, had I been so inclined. I did not in fact do so. I directed the staff involved, but I had no direct contact with the collection and disposal of the weapons involved.’
He studied her for a final moment, then said abruptly, ‘If you have anything further to tell us about yourself or others, please ring Oldford CID immediately.’
She watched their car turn slowly out of her drive and out of vision, standing at the window until the last sound of it was gone. Then she moved back through the silent house and turned her thoughts to what she was going to say to James when he returned from golf.
The unprepossessing figure who had accosted Chris Rushton as he left the football ground in Hereford waited until Sunday morning to present himself at the police station in Oldford. He reckoned correctly that the CID people he needed to speak with would not be in the station on Saturday night.
This man knew his way round police stations and police procedures. It was a bright May morning and spring was advancing rapidly, so he took the major sartorial step of relinquishing the long gabardine overcoat he regarded as his winter uniform. For the first time in the year, he wore the shabby blue anorak, which was his normal summer garb. He shrugged aside the efforts of the station sergeant to make him reveal the subject of his visit. ‘It’s CID stuff, this.’ When the stolid face remained doubtful, he added solemnly, ‘It has to do with the murder your CID people are investigating. I need to speak to the chief superintendent in charge of the Preston case.’