Walters opened his mouth to say something, but Morse continued. 'How long have you been in the Force?'
'Eighteen months altogether, but only three-'
'You've got a lot to learn.'
'I'm learning all the time, sir.'
Morse grinned at the young man. 'Well, you've got something else to learn; and that's exactly what your duty has got to be now. And in case you don't know, I'll tell you. It's your duty to report everything that's happened tonight to Chief Inspector Bell, agreed?'
Walters nodded. The point had been worrying him sorely, and he felt glad that Morse had made things so easy for him. Again he was about to say something, but again he was interrupted.
'But not just yet, understand? I'll see the Assistant Chief Constable first and explain the whole position. You see, Walters, there's something a bit odd about this business; something that needs an older and a wiser head than yours.'
He poured another liberal dose of whisky into Walters' glass, another into his own, and spent the next half-hour asking Walters about his training, his prospects and his ambition; and Walters responded fully and eagerly to such sympathetic interest. At half past midnight he felt the profound wish that he could work with this man; and at a quarter to one, when about to leave, he was only too happy to leave with Morse the items he had originally set out to deposit in the house on Canal Reach.
'How did you get in there, sir?' he asked on the doorstep. 'Did you have a key or-'
'When you've been around as long as I have, Constable, you'll find you don't need a key to get through most doors. You see, the lock on the back door there is a Yale, and with a Yale the bevel's always facing you when you're on the outside. So if you take a credit card and slip it in, you'll find it's just strong enough and just flexible enough to-'
'I know, sir. I've seen it done on the telly.'
'Oh.'
'And er the lock on the back door there isn't a Yale, is it? Goodnight, sir. And thanks for the whisky.'
Morse spent the next hour or so looking through the two Letts' diaries now in his possession, the one (for the current year) just handed to him by Walters, the other (for the previous year) taken a few hours earlier from Canal Reach. If Walters could be trusted, no letters of even minimal significance had been found in the drawers of the desk; and so the diaries were probably as near as anyone could ever come to unlocking the secret life of the late Anne Scott. Not that the entries seemed to Morse particularly promising. Times, mostly: times of trains; times of social events; times of pupils' lessons-yes, that was doubtless the meaning of those scores of initials scattered throughout the pages, several of them recurring at regular (often weekly) intervals over months, and in a few cases over a year or more. The 'E.M.' entry on the Wednesday she'd died held his attention for a while as he knew it must have held the attention of Walters and of Bell. But, like them, he could only think of one person with those same initials: himself. And he had never quite forgiven his parents for christening their only offspring as they had.
Morse slept soundly, and woke late next morning, his brain clear and keen. The images and impressions of all he had learned had flashed across his mind but once, yet already the hooks and eyes of his memories were beginning to combine in strange and varied patterns.
Almost all of them wrong.
Chapter Fourteen
Chaos preceded Cosmos, and it is into Chaos without form and void that we have plunged.
– John Livingston Lowes, The Road to Xanadu
Mrs. Gwendola Briggs was very soon aware of the different nature of the beast when, on the following Monday, Morse, after a rather skimped day's work at the Thames Valley HQ, finally found time to pursue his unofficial and part-time course of enquiries. This man (it seemed to Gwendola) was quite unnecessarily objectionable and bullying in the series of questions he bombarded her with. Who was there that night? Where had they sat? What were the topics of conversation? Had anyone cancelled? Had anyone turned up at the last minute? Were the bridge-pads still there? Exactly what time had they finished? Where were the cars parked? How many cars? It was all quite flustering for her, and quite unlike the vague and pleasant questions that the big and gentle constable had asked her. This man irritated her, making her feel almost guilty about not quite being able to remember things. Yet it was surprising (as she later confessed to herself) how much he'd compelled her to remember; and as Morse prepared to take his leave, holding the list of the names and addresses of those who had attended the bridge evening, he felt adequately satisfied. With the losing pair of each rubber (as he had learned) staying at the same table, and the winning pair moving along, it seemed more than likely that Anne had spoken with everyone there, at least for some intermittent minutes.
'Oh, yes. There was something else a little unusual about that night, Inspector. You see, it was our first anniversary, and we had a break about eleven to celebrate. You know, a couple of glasses of sherry to mark the occasion-drink to our future success and-' Gwendola suddenly broke off, conscious of her tactlessness. But Morse refused to rescue her.
'I’m sorry. I didn't mean to- Oh dear! What a tragedy it all is!'
'Did you meet last week, Mrs. Briggs?'
'Yes, we did. We meet every-'
'You didn't feel that because of the er tragedy that-'
'Life must go on, mustn't it, Inspector?'
Morse's sour expression seemed to suggest that there was probably little justification for such continuance in the case of this mean-minded little woman, doubtless ever dreaming of over-tricks and gleefully doubling the dubious contracts of the recently initiated. But he made no answer as his eyes skimmed down the list she had given him. 'Mrs. Murdoch'! Was that the same one? The same Mrs. Murdoch who had invited him to the party when he and Anne…? Surely it was! His thoughts floated back to that first-no, that only-evening when he and Anne had met; the evening when but for the cussedness of human affairs he- Augh! Forget it! Should he forget it, though? Had there been something he had learned that evening that he should, and must, remember? Already he had tried to dredge up what he could, but the simple truth was that he'd drunk too much on that occasion. Come to think of it, though, there was that bit of research he'd heard of only the previous week. Some team of educational psychologists in Oxford was suggesting that if you'd revised whilst you were drunk, and turned up sober for the next day's examinations, you'd be lucky to remember anything at all. Likewise, if you'd revised in a comparatively sober state of mind and then turned up drunk, you'd hardly stand much chance of self-distinction. But (and this was the point) if you'd revised whilst drunk, and maintained a similar degree of inebriation during the examination itself, then all was likely to be well. Interesting. Yes. Morse felt sure there was something he'd heard from Anne that night. Something. Almost he had it as he stood there on the doorstep; but it slipped away and left him frustrated and irritated. The sooner he got drunk, the better!
As he finally took his leave, he realised how less than gracious he'd been to the chairman of the Summertown Bridge Club.
When the door opened, Morse recognised one of the Murdoch boys he'd seen at the party, and his memory struggled for the name.
'Michael, is it?'
'No. I'm Ted.'
'Oh, yes. Is your mother in, Ted?'
'No. She's gone down to the hospital. It's Michael.'
'Road accident?' What made Morse suggest such a possible cause of hospitalisation, he could not have said; but he noticed the boy's quite inexplicable unease.