“Of course not. We’re a happy family. Aren’t we, Alison?”
Alison looked at Banks. “Yes, Mother,” she said.
Banks turned back to Mrs. Rothwell. “Had your husband been behaving at all unusually recently?” he asked. “Had you noticed any changes in him?”
She frowned. “He had been a bit edgy, tense, a bit more preoccupied and secretive than usual. I mean, he was always quiet, but he’d been even more so.”
“For how long?”
She shrugged. “Two or three weeks.”
“But he never told you what was wrong?”
“No.”
“Did you ask?”
“My husband didn’t appreciate people prying into his private business affairs, Chief Inspector.”
“Not even his wife?”
“I assumed that if and when he wanted to tell me, he would do so.”
“What did you talk about over dinner yesterday?”
She shrugged. “Just the usual things. The children, the house extension we wanted to have done… I don’t know, really. What do you talk about when you’re out for dinner with your wife?”
Good question, Banks thought. It had been so long since he and Sandra had gone out to dinner together that he couldn’t remember what they talked about. “Did you have any idea what he might have been worried about?” he asked.
“No. I suppose it was one of the usual business problems. Keith really cared about his clients.”
“What business problems? I thought he didn’t talk to you about business.”
“He didn’t, Chief Inspector. Please don’t twist what I say. He just made the occasional offhand comment. You know, maybe he’d read something in the Financial Times or something and make a comment. I never understood what he meant. Anyway, I think one of the companies he was trying to help was sinking fast. Things like that always upset him.”
“Do you know which company?”
“No. It’ll be on his computer. He put everything on that computer.” Suddenly, Mrs. Rothwell put the back of one ringed hand to her forehead in what seemed to Banks a gesture from a nineteenth-century melodrama. Her forehead looked clammy. “I’m afraid I can’t talk anymore,” she whispered. “I feel a bit faint and dizzy. I… Alison.”
Alison helped her up and they left the room. Banks glanced over at WPC Smithies. “Have you picked up anything at all from them?” he asked.
“Sorry, sir,” she said. “Nothing. I’ll tell you one thing, though, they’re a weird pair. It’s an odd family. I think they’re both retreating from reality, in their own ways, trying to deny what happened, or how it happened. But you can see that for yourself.”
“Yes.”
Banks listened to a clock tick on the mantelpiece. It was one of those timepieces with all its brass and silver innards showing inside a glass dome.
A couple of minutes later, Alison came back. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Mummy’s still weak and in shock. The doctor gave her some pills.”
“That’s understandable, Alison,” said Banks. “I’d almost finished, anyway. Just one last question. Do you know where your brother is? We’ll have to get in touch with him.”
Alison picked up a postcard from the top of the piano, gave it to Banks and sat down again.
The card showed the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge, which looked orange to Banks. He flipped it over. Postmarked two weeks ago, it read,
Dear Ali,
Love California, and San Francisco is a great city, but it’s time to move on. I’m even getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road! This sight-seeing’s a tiring business so I’m off to Florida for a couple of weeks just lying in the sun. Ah, what bliss! Also to check out the motion picture conservatory in Sarasota. I’m driving down the coast highway and flying to Tampa from LA on Sunday. More news when I get there. Love to Mum,
Tom
“How long has he been gone?”
“Six weeks. Just over. He left on March 31st.”
“What does he do? What was that about a motion picture conservatory?”
Alison gave a brief smile. “He wants to work in films. He worked in a video shop and saved up. He’s hoping to go to film college in America and learn how to become a director.”
“How old is he?”
“Twenty-one.”
Banks stood up. “All right, Alison,” he said. “Thanks very much for all your help. WPC Smithies will be staying here for a while, so if you need anyone… And I’ll ask the doctor to pay your mother another visit.”
“Thank you. Please don’t worry about us.”
Banks looked in on Richmond, who sat bathed in the bluish glow of Rothwell’s monitor, oblivious to the world, then went out to his car and lit a cigarette. He rolled the window down and listened to the birds as he smoked. Birds aside, it was bloody quiet up here. How, he wondered, could a teenager like Alison stand the isolation? As WPC Smithies had said, the Rothwells were an odd family.
As he drove along the bumpy track to the Relton road, he slipped in a tape of Dr. John playing solo New Orleans piano music. He had developed a craving for piano music – any kind of piano music – recently. He was even thinking of taking piano lessons; he wanted to learn how to play everything – classical, jazz, blues. The only thing that held him back was that he felt too old to embark on such a venture. His forty-first birthday was coming up in a couple of weeks.
In Relton, a couple of old ladies holding shopping baskets stood chatting outside the butcher’s shop, probably about the murder.
Banks thought again about Alison Rothwell and her mother as he pulled up outside the Black Sheep. What were they holding back? And what was it that bothered him? No matter what Mrs. Rothwell and Alison had said, there was something wrong in that family, and he had a hunch that Tom Rothwell might know what it was. The sooner they contacted him the better.
3
Laurence Pratt delved deep in his bottom drawer and pulled out a bottle of Courvoisier VSOP and two snifters.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized to DC Susan Gay, who sat opposite him at the broad teak desk. “It’s not that I’m a secret tippler. I keep it for emergencies, and I’m afraid what you’ve just told me most definitely constitutes one. You’ll join me?”