Mick said, “C’mon! A little E and a little weed? That’s not drugs. That’s just relaxing.”
“Well, with Daddy paying the rent,” Gail muttered close to my ear, “and three husbands supporting her, I guess she could afford to relax.”
I said, “At college they always ask if you can make a living out of art and I usually say, ‘no’ or, ‘not for years and years.’ ”
“You agree with Mick? This is art?”
“Female self-reference has been recognized as serious art for years now.”
“Bugger self-reference,” said Gail. “There’s something really worrying about handcuffing yourself to railings on a cold, wet night and calling yourself a tart — even to publicise your own exhibition. It just doesn’t sound like Mo. She didn’t rough it even at Glastonbury. Remember her deluxe Caravette?”
“I think she felt she needed the exposure,” Mick said, and then blushed and squirmed. The rest of us stared awkwardly at our shoes.
Gail recovered first. “But you said the police had to cut her off the railing. If she cuffed herself, where was the key? That’s what I mean — she might do it to be dramatic, but she’d be damn sure to undo it if it got uncomfortable. This is Moselle we’re talking about.”
“Good point,” said Woody.
“I thought it was a grand gesture,” Mick said. “She liked grand gestures. It was another feminist statement about marriage — women going like slaves to the altar, loving their own chains, throwing away the key, just for the theatre, the spectacle, which is all that a wedding is these days.”
“Is that what she said?” I was interested.
“Did the police look for the key?” Gail was somewhat more practical.
“She said a wedding and a marriage were polar opposites.” Mick swung his arm to draw our attention back to the installation. “Princess for a day, a servant for life.”
I nodded. I have always thought the Cinderella story was back-to-front or, at least, ended the wrong way.
“I just don’t see Mo as a servant,” Gail said, “even with three husbands.” She had turned and was watching the silent footage of the short plump man almost eclipsed by Mo’s bridal crinoline. “I want to know who the last poor sucker was.”
From the doorway behind us a voice said, “I rather think you must be talking about me.” Dwarfed by his own cashmere coat, he came forward saying, “I’m Charles. I got to the crematorium too late. I’m sorry.” His eyes behind little round glasses looked weak and weepy, but his voice was plummy and vigorous. “They’re still talking about you all there. I gather there was some dispute about who was the widower.”
“Er, how do you do?” Woody made a great effort and held out his hand. “I’m Woody, one of the widowers, I suppose.” He introduced the rest of us, except for Mick, who’d gone outside for a smoke. I’d seen him fumble in his pocket for his tobacco and make for the door. He really was a pleasure to watch.
Charles said, “Mine was a proper marriage and I have the certificate to prove it.”
“Me, too,” said Woody. “And I promise there was no divorce.”
“I don’t remember speaking to anyone called Charles,” Bekki said. She assessed the quality of the cashmere coat and transferred herself to Charles’s side. Alastair looked as though ten tons had been lifted from his shoulders and Gail whispered, “Who put the cash into cashmere?”
“It was on her Web site,” Charles was explaining. “I was in Paris on business...”
“Ooh, Paris,” Bekki sighed.
“Obviously we kept in touch while she was setting up the exhibition, but she warned me things might get frantic, so I didn’t worry when she stopped answering her messages. I went to her Web site to see if there’d been any critical reaction to the installation on her interactive. But Mick had put in the death notice instead. Of course I came straight over.”
“Of course you did, dear,” Bekki said, stroking the cashmere as if it were a thoroughbred horse.
I was conscious of Gail and Alastair drawing together and away from the rest of us. I followed them.
Gail was saying, “...three husbands, none of whom knew anything about the others.”
“So they say.”
“Don’t you believe them?”
“I’ve had an absolutely bloody morning,” said Alastair, “and I don’t believe anyone.”
“Alastair thinks one of the husbands found out about the others and decided to punish Mo,” Gail told me. “He thinks the handcuffs and the TArt stuff demonstrate male anger and violence.”
“Which one?”
“Alastair thinks Joss was both the most angry and the least in control.”
“That’s fair,” I said, “but surely the whole thing was self-generated. I agree with Mick: I think it was art and publicity that lost control.”
“You would,” Gail said.
“Well, what do you think?”
“I think I want to talk to Mick again. You’d agree to that, wouldn’t you, Liza?”
But when we went outside into the cold drizzle we couldn’t find Mick.
“I’ve had it,” said Alastair. “I’m cold and hungry and I want to leave before anyone notices we’re gone.”
“Anyone?” said Gail. “What can you mean, dear?”
“I’m serious.”
“Well, you warm up the car. Liza and I want to see if Mick’s gone back to The Sun in Splendour.”
But Mick was not at the pub.
“Shame,” said Gail. “I don’t suppose you asked for his phone number, did you, Liza?”
“What d’you take me for?”
“A wimp,” said my new best friend, “a nice wimp, an arty wimp, but you don’t take life by the throat, exactly.”
“And you do?”
“I sort of have to — not being arty.”
We trailed back to the car, each in our own way disappointed.
Half an hour later at The Star of India, we ordered Chicken Tikka and Lamb Jalfrezi, Aloo Gobi, pilau, riata, and paratha, hot food to warm our frozen hearts. The beer came and we began to thaw out. Alastair grabbed a napkin, borrowed a ballpoint, and started a list. Gail and I craned our necks to see. He wrote, Woody: too nice. Charles: too fat. JOSS.
I said, “Oh, bloody hell, Alastair. You’re assuming someone wanted to hurt or humiliate Mo. We don’t know that. And lists don’t work unless you know everyone involved, which we also don’t. Besides, you’re supposed to list suspects — not non-suspects.”
“Alastair’s good at cutting out the crap,” Gail said.
“A list of non-suspects doesn’t make it non-crap.” For some reason I was quite cross and depressed. “And what about the non-husbands? Bekki, for starters. As far as I can see, she only came over to protect her husband’s money because she thought Mo was getting too much of it.”
Alastair gave me a pitying look and wrote, Bekki: too stupid.
“But she’s greedy enough,” Gail said.
I said, “And Mo herself? Isn’t it far more likely that self-promotion went horribly wrong?”
Alastair wrote, Mo: too Sybaritic.
“What about Mick?” Gail said. “I’m sorry, Liza. You’re going to hate me for saying this when you’re so obviously smitten, but I’ve got a bad feeling about Mick.”
“Mick? Why?”
“Well, he’s a liar.”
“How can you say that?” I protested.
“He said he didn’t know any of the husbands and he thought they were all actors. But Charles knew him. Without being introduced. He said, ‘Mick left a message on her interactive.’ Also Mick slunk out as soon as Charles turned up. You know he did, Liza. You were watching him.”
“Was not — well, sort of.”
“Then you know he snuck off as soon as Charles appeared. I think he didn’t want us to know he’d lied. And he didn’t want Charles to accuse him of not informing him about Mo’s death, except on the Web site.”