Denton had put his head back. He wasn’t listening to them. He looked at the ceiling and tried to remember what had happened. The shooting was a gap, but the rest was there: Mrs Castle, his returning home, the parting from Heseltine at Waterloo. Before that, the night crossing, the journey down from Caen. The farm. The barn. The hay. He said, ‘Heseltine and I go to France. We come back. Jarrold is waiting for me in London. He shoots me.’ He sat up. ‘How soon after I was shot did Heseltine die?’
Munro groaned. ‘Oh, Judas-’
Markson got the notebook out again, wet his finger, went through the pages. ‘Um — hmm.’ He went to another part of the notebook, licked a finger. ‘Mmm. Looks like the Heseltine suicide was the next morning.’
Denton pushed himself up and leaned his weight on his right arm. He pushed his face out as close to Munro’s as he could get it. ‘Two men travel together and come home and within twenty-four hours one’s shot and one’s dead! What does that tell you, Munro?’
‘Aw, God, Denton-Don’t do this to me, man.’
‘It’s just coincidence?’
‘Look-Give us some credit for brains, will you? Heseltine was in a bad way. He went away with you because you’d befriended him; isn’t that the way it was? His dad said something like that. He comes back to London, the next morning he reads in the paper you’ve been shot and are near death. It’s the last straw. Don’t you get it?’
Denton did get it. He wavered: he hadn’t seen it that way. It could have happened like that. Maybe Heseltine’s cheerfulness had been the rise before an inevitable drop, the shooting the immediate cause. And yet-‘Why did Jarrold shoot me that day?’
‘Because it’s the day he slipped his nurses and headed for London. D’you think we didn’t interview them? His mother had two male nurses watching him, or so she said; well, what they were was two local ploughboys that could have been diddled by a ten-year-old. Turns out they let Sonny roam the grounds while they had their tea in the kitchen every day and played peeky-boo with the housemaids. He could have slipped them any time he wanted.’
‘Then why that day?’
Munro pounded the arm of the chair. ‘Because he’s a bleeding loony!’
Denton lay back again. He felt exhausted, jangled; his blood seemed to be pounding in his head. ‘Why did we go to France?’
‘How the hell should I know?’
‘Then why didn’t you ask me?’
‘Because you were unconscious! Because you wouldn’t see us! Because it doesn’t matter! I suppose you went to give Heseltine a change of air. You’d taken him under your wing, hadn’t you? Who the hell cares?’
Denton closed his eyes. He was almost panting. ‘There’s a barn in Normandy. I think there’s a body buried in it.’
‘Oh, Jesus-!’ Munro clapped his hat on his head and stood up. ‘Let’s get out of here.’ He turned on Denton. ‘Look, I’m sorry you’re feeling poorly, but I’ve got a long ton of work to do. This is all old stuff, closed, finished. You get yourself better, that’s your job. Don’t complicate mine, will you?’
Denton kept his eyes closed. ‘Why would two men who found where they think a body is buried in France be dead or near-dead as soon as they get back?’
Munro started to say something. He looked at Markson. ‘You’re blowing bubbles. Denton, think about it — Jarrold tried to shoot you. The dick wrapped him up and put him on the ground and that was the end of him — he went right to the station and the lock-up, and he hasn’t seen the light of day since. Yes, Jarrold tried to kill you on the day you got back from France. But there’s no way he could have had a hand in this other fella’s suicide the next day — and no reason! Now get yourself better, and we’ll have a brew-up together and chew it over someplace friendly, all right?’ He jerked his head at Markson.
When the two detectives reached the door, Denton said, eyes still closed, ‘Munro? What’s happened to Guillam?’
‘He was busted down to detective and sent to East Ham — the whole way across London from where he lives. Satisfied?’
‘Wasn’t Guillam partly responsible for attempted murder?’
Munro sighed. ‘Georgie’s got friends, Denton.’ He and Markson went out, and the door closed.
Gallichan came that afternoon and made himself comfortable so that he could explore more of Denton’s dreams. Denton was tired of it. He said, ‘I read once about a doctor who found a man who’d been shot in the stomach. The man healed with a hole the doctor could look through. He learned all sorts of things about the stomach. It made him famous. I think you’re using these dreams as a hole to look into my mind.’
‘I resent the very idea that I’m doing this for some egoistical purpose of my own.’
‘It’s my mind. I don’t like you looking into it. And dreams aren’t much of a window.’
‘Well, they’re not meaningless, either. The German, what’s-his-name, says that’s the point — dreams aren’t some sort of accident caused by eating too much toasted cheese. They have profound meaning. It is our task to find that out.’
Denton was still smarting from Munro’s visit. To a degree, he had found Gallichan’s interest flattering, the exploration itself interesting, but it had run its course and his mood was bad. ‘Get out of my stomach,’ he said.
‘But we’re making progress! We have identified feeling — fear, guilt — and persons: your dead wife, the laughing child, the man with the shotgun.’
‘I never said I felt guilt, doctor. Sorrow, yes — the two aren’t the same thing. And I didn’t say the person with the shotgun was a man.’
‘Well, it wasn’t a woman, surely. Forgive me, but I think you are deliberately avoiding the obvious conclusion — that the man with the shotgun is yourself.’ He seemed very pleased with that.
Denton simply looked at him. Then he burst out laughing — real laughter. When he was done, he said, ‘I think you need to read another book. My dreams aren’t well-made plays, doctor. They’re a mess. I don’t know about your dreams, but mine are a train wreck — bodies on the track, wreckage everywhere, people staggering around with blood running down their faces. If mine have meaning, it’s for the feelings I have, not some neat tale that’s like King Lear reduced to a bedtime story.’ Before Gallichan could object, Denton raised a hand and said, ‘Enough. Get me out of here.’
The portly doctor shook his head. ‘Even your imagery is full of violence. You are a violent man, Mr Denton.’
‘I don’t need you to tell me that.’
Gallichan stood, not entirely willingly. ‘We could go so much deeper,’ he said.
‘Let’s not.’
The doctor shrugged. ‘What a pity.’
‘I want to go home.’
Next day, Munro came back. He was apologetic. Between the two men was a mostly unacknowledged respect, even friendship; if it was made difficult by Denton’s putting his oversized nose into police business, Munro still didn’t want the relationship to end. He said he was sorry about yesterday; he said he had been to some extent carrying on for Markson’s benefit. ‘I don’t like for a youngster to think we let the public make up our minds for us.’
‘Are you going to do anything about France?’
Munro sighed. ‘I’ve been thinking about it.’ He lowered his bulk into the metal chair and put his bowler on the bed. It was raining out, and water dripped from it on the sheet. ‘Tell it to me — all of it.’
Denton tried. Munro groaned when he went all the way back to Mary Thomason, but there was no other way to tell it — the Wesselons, the note to Denton, the remarques on the drawing, the Mayflower Baths. The only thing Denton skimmed over was the trunk, because of Janet; Munro saw the omission, frowned, said, ‘About this drawing-’