Inside, the air was chokingly oppressive; sour and heavy. Perrot felt immediately stifled and slightly nauseous. He tucked his helmet more firmly under his arm and tried not to breathe too deeply. The man was shouting at him again.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Mr. Hollingsworth?”
The man said “Christ” again then turned and stumbled away. For a moment Constable Perrot thought he was going to crash into the sitting-room architrave. He lurched a few steps towards an armchair. From its position Perrot supposed it to be the one in which Hollingsworth had been sitting when his slippers were visible through the letter box. The cushion was widely and deeply indented as if a large animal had been curled up there for some considerable time. Hollingsworth reached the chair, turned round vaguely once or twice as if unsure which was the right way to face and fell into it.
PC Perrot hesitated, looking around him. Very little light came through the drawn velvet curtains but a lamp, shaped like a golden pineapple, with an unlined cream linen shade, had been switched on. An unpleasant odour came from a vase of half dead roses, their leaves crisp and brown. It mingled with the smell of alcohol, cigarettes, garlic and something the policeman recognised but could not have named but which was monosodium glutamate. Dirty cutlery and several used foil containers were spread all over a handsome inlaid table on which there was no cloth. Some of the containers still had bones and bits of food in. There were a lot of flies about.
Realising he would probably wait a long time to be invited, PC Perrot pulled one of the narrow backed dining chairs out and sat down, a healthy distance from the table. He placed his helmet on the floor and adjusted his radio which was digging into his slightly plump middle. Then, indicating with a polite nod the foil dishes, said, “Catering for yourself, I see, sir.”
Alan Hollingsworth did not reply. He was glancing at the clock, a giant sunburst of crystal rays and gilded face and figures. He looked dreadful. Hair matted, hanging in greasy hanks around his face. He hadn’t shaved for days and from the look—and smell—of him hadn’t washed either. Dark full moons of sweat saturated the underarms of his shirt. The rims of his eyelids and the corners of his mouth were encrusted with whitish yellow flakes.
Perrot, deciding he would give six months of his pension to have the windows open, made so bold as to suggest it. At this Hollingsworth started shouting again, the gist this time being that Perrot should say what he’d come to say and get out.
“Very well, sir,” said Constable Perrot, waving away an especially bloated bluebottle. “We’ve had one or two concerned ... um ...” About to say “rumours,” he decided the word sounded a bit gossipy. “Inquiries regarding the whereabouts of your wife. As I’m sure you appreciate, this visit in no way implies any accusation or suspicions on our part as to the lady’s wellbeing. But it is normal police procedure ...”
At this point Hollingsworth buried his head in his hands. His shoulders started to twitch, then jerk about violently. Strange, hysterical sounds came from his throat. Coarse sobs. Or they could have been guffaws. Then he threw his head back so savagely one would have thought his neck might snap. Perrot saw the face, crisscrossed with tears, but was still not sure whether the man had been laughing or crying.
“Can I get you anything, Mr. Hollingsworth? A cup of tea perhaps?”
“No.” The filthy, double cuffs of his shirt hung down loosely, covering the backs of his hands. He wiped his face and then his nose with one of them.
“You’re plainly not very well, sir.”
“I’m pissed, you stupid idiot.”
Perversely, this insult, far from annoying Constable Perrot, produced in him a quiet confidence. To his mind the resident of this splendid property, by behaving no better than some rowdy council house layabout, had rejigged both the social and psychological balance of the encounter to his own benefit. The policeman unbuttoned the flap on the chest pocket of his shirt and produced a notebook and Biro.
Hollingsworth picked up the nearest bottle, which was uncapped, poured a stream of liquid into a smeary tumbler and sloshed it down. The smell of his sweat became more pronounced and the degree of acridity increased. It occurred to Constable Perrot for the first time that Hollingsworth was not only despairing but possibly afraid.
“Am I correct in understanding that Mrs. Hollingsworth is visiting her mother?” No reply. Constable Perrot repeated the question with much the same result. He waited a few moments than said, “If you refuse to help me here, sir, I’m afraid I must ask you to present yourself—”
“I’m not going out!” Hollingsworth jumped up. He braced himself against the chair as if in readiness against a forcible removal. “I can’t leave the house!”
“Please, calm yourself, Mr. Hollingsworth. This really is just routine procedure. Nothing to get upset about.” Even Perrot, unimaginative almost to the point of stolidity, knew that this was unlikely. The procedure may well be routine but the situation, he felt certain, would prove to be most irregular. He flipped open his notebook, clicked his pen and smiled encouragingly. “Am I right in thinking that your wife is visiting her mother?”
“Yes.”
“Could I have the address, please?”
“What for?”
“Just to satisfy ourselves as to her whereabouts, Mr. Hollingsworth.”
“There’s no need, I assure you.”
Constable Perrot waited, pen poised, patience on a monument. When it became plain that the proceedings would not continue until he gave a satisfactory reply, Hollingsworth suddenly leaned closer towards the policeman who had to force himself not to lean back.
“Look, is this all confidential?”
“Certainly, sir. Even if I decide to file a report,” he hoped Hollingsworth did not realise this was inevitable, “it would remain purely a police matter. Unless of course further circumstances dictated a different policy.”
“My wife doesn’t have a mother. Actually, the vicar came round asking questions. He was quite persistent—you know what do-gooders are.”
PC Perrot, who inevitably had had rather more experience with the way do-badders were, nodded agreeably.
“I said the first thing that came into my head to get rid of him. But the truth is,” his voice cracked at this point and Perrot got the impression that he was struggling not to weep, “she’s left me.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Mr. Hollingsworth.” And he genuinely was. Colin Perrot, extremely contented with his own marital bargain—amiable, pretty wife, smashing teenage daughter and a pair of lively sons—briefly felt, by proxy, a touch of the anguish consuming the pathetic figure facing him. No wonder he was cursing and drinking and flailing around like one demented. Without realising they were doing so, the policeman’s fingers strayed to the frame of his chair seat and pressed the wood.
“And before you ask, I don’t have an address.”
“How long has Mrs. Hollingsworth been gone?”
“I’m not sure.” Noticing Perrot’s look of disbelief he added, “Days and nights just seem to have run into each other. Three days, four maybe.”
“Couldn’t you be a little more accurate, Mr. Hollingsworth?”
“God, it’s something I’m trying to forget, man! Not dwell on.”
“She hasn’t been in touch?”
“No.”
“So you have no idea of her whereabouts?”
“Well, I wouldn’t have, would I?”
“Did she leave a message?”
“On my answerphone. Wiped, before you ask.”