I had wondered why he had been so upset.
‘It was hay fever!’ Hawthorne explained. Once again, he addressed himself to me. ‘When we were in Brompton Cemetery, did you notice the plane trees?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I made a note. They were right next to the grave.’
‘Plane trees are the worst if you get hay fever. They’ve got a pollen grain that gets right up your nose. And shall I tell you two well-known cures for hay fever?’
‘Honey,’ I said. ‘And ginger tea.’
‘And that’s exactly what Alan was buying in Pier Pharmacy.’ He turned back to Godwin. ‘It’s also the reason why you were wearing sunglasses, even though it wasn’t sunny. You’d gone down to Deal to meet your girlfriend. But then you got an attack of hay fever so you went into the chemist to get something to help. Traverton gave you some herbal stuff and you left the place seconds before the accident took place.
‘And it was you who caused the accident. The two kids were on the promenade next to the beach. They’d been told never to run across the road and anyway they could see perfectly well that the ice-cream shop was closed. But suddenly, in front of their eyes, their dad walked out of the chemist’s shop next door and even with the cap and the sunglasses they recognised you, and because they were excited they ran towards you. That was the moment when Diana Cowper turned the corner and it happened right in front of your eyes. Both your children were hit.’
Godwin groaned and put his head in his hands. Beside him, Mary sobbed quietly.
‘Timothy was killed. Jeremy was lying there and of course he called out for his dad because he’d seen him just a moment ago. I can’t imagine what you must have been feeling right then, Alan. You’d just seen your two children knocked over by a car but you couldn’t go to them because you were supposed to be in Manchester. How were you going to explain to your wife that you were actually in Deal?’
‘I didn’t realise they were so badly hurt,’ Godwin rasped. ‘There was nothing I could have done to help …’
‘You know what? I think that’s bollocks. I think you could have run into the road and cared for your children and to hell with your little subterfuge.’ Hawthorne stubbed out his cigarette, the ash sparking red. ‘But at the very moment, you and Mary came to some sort of an agreement. Traverton told us that Mary was staring into his eyes but he was wrong about that. You were staring at Alan, who was standing right next to him. You were telling him to get the hell out. Is that right?’
‘There was nothing he could do.’ Mary echoed the words that Alan had just spoken. She had a face like death, with tears glistening on both cheeks. She was staring into the mid-distance. Later on, I would be sickened that all this had happened in my home. I would wish that they had never come here.
‘I sort of understand why you’ve stayed with the family all these years, Mary,’ Hawthorne concluded. ‘It’s because you know you were responsible for what happened. Is that right? Or is it because you’re still shagging Alan?’
‘For God’s sake!’ Godwin was furious. ‘We ended that years ago. Mary is there for Jeremy. Only for Jeremy!’
‘Yeah. And Jeremy is there because of Mary. The two of you really are made for each other.’
‘What do you want from us?’ Godwin asked. ‘Do you think we haven’t been punished enough for what happened that day?’ He closed his eyes for a moment, then continued. ‘It was just bad luck. If I hadn’t come out of the shop at that moment, if the boys hadn’t seen me …’ He was speaking very slowly, his tone almost matter-of-fact. ‘All I’ve ever cared about is that Judith should never find out,’ he said. ‘It was bad enough losing Timothy. And Jeremy. But if she knew about Mary and me …’ He stopped. ‘Are you going to tell her?’
‘I’m not going to tell her anything. It’s none of my business.’
‘Then why did you bring us here?’
‘Because I needed to know I was right about the two of you. You want my advice? I’d tell your wife about what happened. She’s already thrown you out. Your marriage is over. But this thing, this secret you’ve had between you, it’s cancer. It’s eating you up. I’d cut it out.’
Alan Godwin nodded slowly, then got to his feet. Mary O’Brien did the same. They moved towards the door but at the last moment Godwin turned back.
‘You’re a clever man, Mr Hawthorne,’ he said. ‘But you have no understanding at all about what we’ve been through. You have no feelings. We made a horrible mistake and we’ve had to live with it every day. But we’re not monsters. We’re not criminals. We were in love.’
But Hawthorne wasn’t having any of it. It seemed to me that his face was paler and his eyes more vengeful than ever. ‘You wanted sex. You were cheating on your wife. And because of that, a child died.’
Alan Godwin stared at him with something close to disgust. Mary had already passed through the door. He spun on his heel and followed her. We were left alone.
‘Did you have to be so hard on them?’ I asked, at length.
Hawthorne shrugged. ‘You feel sorry for them?’
‘I don’t know. Yes. Maybe.’ I tried to gather my thoughts. ‘Alan Godwin didn’t kill Diana Cowper.’
‘That’s right. He doesn’t blame her for the accident in Deal. He blames himself. So he had no reason to kill her. She was just the instrument of what happened, not the cause.’
‘And the driver of the car …’
‘It doesn’t matter who was driving the car. Damian, his mother, the lady next door. It’s got nothing to do with it.’
Cigarette smoke hung in the air. I would have to explain that to my wife later. I was still sitting on the piano stool. My number one theory about the murder had just crashed to the ground.
‘So if the killer wasn’t Alan Godwin, who was it?’ I asked. ‘Where do we go next?’
‘Grace Lovell,’ Hawthorne replied. ‘We’ll see her tomorrow.’
Twenty
An Actor’s Life
Grace Lovell had not returned to the flat in Brick Lane and I can’t say I blamed her. It would take a long time to wipe away all the blood that had been spilled and longer still to erase the memories of so much violence.
She and Ashleigh were staying at her parents’ home in Hounslow, close to Heathrow Airport, where her father worked as a senior commercial manager. Martin Lovell had taken the day off. He was a large, intimidating man, wearing a polo shirt that was too small for him, with shoulders straining at the fabric and butcher’s arms bursting out of the sleeves. He had shaved his head, which made it difficult to guess his age, but he must have been in his late fifties. Grace didn’t look anything like him. He was holding Ashleigh and had to be careful to concentrate on what he was doing. I could easily imagine him accidentally smothering the little girl in his bear-like embrace. As usual, she was showing no interest in what was going on, absorbed in the pages of a rag book.
The house was clean and modern, part of an estate which must have been perfectly aligned with the main runway as we were deafened every few minutes by the roar of the planes taking off. Grace and her father didn’t appear to notice the noise. Ashleigh positively enjoyed it, giggling with pleasure every time a plane went past. Grace had told us that Rosemary Lovell, her mother, was at work, teaching maths at a local secondary school. This left the five of us sitting awkwardly close to each other on sofas and armchairs that were rather too big for the room. Martin had offered us coffee, which we had refused. He sat quietly while Grace did most of the talking. From time to time I noticed him watching us with a strange, smouldering anger in his eyes.
Over the next twenty minutes, Grace described her life with Damian Cowper, how they had met, their relationship, their time in America. She was quite different from how she had been the last few times we had met her, as if Damian’s death had released her from some sort of obligation. As she talked, I realised that she had fallen out of love with him a long time ago and I remembered Hawthorne sarcastically dismissing her as ‘the grieving widow’. Well, he’d been right about that. She’d been the actress all along and this was her moment in the spotlight. I don’t mean to be unkind. I liked her. She was young and charismatic and she had allowed her life to be stolen away from her. Although she never said as much, it was clear that Damian’s death would give her a chance to start again.