suggestion of it was the presence of Kincaid; and that alone brought a frown to the Chief Constable’s brow. The man was looking bumptious, quite different to when he was brought there. And if he was being properly guarded the fact was very little in evidence.
‘And you first saw Fleece when?’
‘I think it was twenty-eighth September.’
This was another perplexing point; it was Mrs Askham who was answering the questions. She’d also been crying, the Chief Constable was sure of it, her make-up was in a ghastly mess; and her tone, though clear, was low, so that he needed to lean forward to catch the responses. What had this London fellow been doing to her, the wealthiest woman in North Wales…?
‘What was his purpose in visiting you?’
‘Reg.’
‘A question of money?’
‘No. Me.’
‘He made a proposal?’
‘If you can call it that.’
‘And your son knew?’
‘Yes. He was there.’
‘What steps did you take as a result of the visit?’
‘I consulted Clarence. He knew who I was.’
‘What suggestion did Mr Stanley make?’
‘None. There was nothing we could do.’
‘So you agreed to the proposal?’
‘I daren’t not agree.’
‘Did you know your son went looking for Kincaid?’
‘Yes.’
‘And what for?’
‘Yes. A bribe. We were desperate.’
Presumably Gently was adding it together, and Evans too, from his intelligent attitude; but a freshly arrived Chief Constable was finding it difficult to pick up a cue. At last he drew out an amber cigar-holder, lit a cigar, and sat nursing his knee. The thing to do now was to think up an apology, something to smooth down the ruffled La Askham…
‘And now we’ll have your son’s statement.’
Good lord, was there more of it? The Chief Constable touched his watch and looked meaningly at Evans. But no, there were no dissentients, this extension seemed understood. La Askham left the seat and her son took his place. And young Henry, he too was looking under the weather. He wasn’t nearly as fierce as the C.C. remembered him. Altogether his appearance was decidedly hangdog, though with his driving habits he was no novice at these parties…
‘Put in your own words what happened on Monday.’
‘I… for certain reasons I wanted to meet Mr Kincaid. I’d heard from our housekeeper that he was staying in Caernarvon, so I went there to find him, and afterwards to Llanberis…’
Then, for the Chief Constable, the world abruptly ceased to turn. This was no simple statement: it was a full-dress confession. In horror he sat listening, with his cigar going cold on him; heard the damning words uttered in Henry Askham’s halting voice.
‘So I decided to wait there… in case I should see him…’
‘Say where it was you waited, please.’
‘On the cairn at the summit. I sat down because I felt dizzy…’
‘What made you feel dizzy?’
‘I’ve got a bad head for heights…’
And then the worst, or what was so near it that the worst must be inferred: a transparent evasion of a guilt that screamed aloud. A damned-good grilling must get the rest of it, of that there was no question. The case was made. Henry Askham was the self-confessed murderer of Fleece.
But the strangest part of it was the lack of emotion that accompanied this frightful revelation. Nobody appeared very much concerned, not even the droop-figured culprit. Gently was looking mildly bored; Evans had a distant, meditative expression; Mrs Askham was scarcely listening; and Kincaid was gawping at Mrs Askham. Did nobody care any longer about self-confessed murderers, even when millionaire-apparents, sons, and voiders of capital charges? It seemed they didn’t. In fact, the atmosphere was wholly unaccountable. The C.C. felt like pinching himself to be assured that he didn’t dream…
Now Mrs Askham had stirred herself.
‘Then may I take it there will be no charge?’
That was the question. The C.C. found himself staring with open mouth at Gently. There had to be a charge, and yet… before Gently could speak, he knew it. It was part of the craziness he had stumbled into, the prevailing pattern of derangement.
‘I don’t think a charge will be necessary. But there is something I have to say to you.’
It was too much. He was reading them a lecture on the heinousness of false witness. Like two naughty children, they listened, the proud La Askham and her fiery son, the one with submissive and downcast eyes, the other with a look that was near admiration. After this, the C.C. gave up. There could be no more attempt at intelligent appraisal. It mattered little that the Yard man was about to release his cherished prisoner; that was purely a formality. Open the cells. Let them all go.
And Kincaid:
‘I feel greatly in your debt, Superintendent. Not only for clearing me of the charge. It goes much deeper than that.’
They were shaking hands; they all shook hands. It might have been an old chum’s reunion. Then Kincaid offered his arm to Mrs Askham, and Mrs Askham laid her gloved hand on it…
When Gently returned to the office he found the C.C. seated behind the desk; with a perceptible stiffness in his bearing and a resolute gleam in his eye. He pointed to the seat of interrogation, sniffed and angled his moustache.
‘Now,’ he said. ‘Perhaps a man can be told what’s going on in his own division?’
Gently sat, feeling for his pipe.
‘It’s a long story,’ he replied.
But it was simple too, for all stories were basically simple; the story of a rich man’s enticement of a poor man’s wife. Of the corrupting power of large possessions, of the cropping of dragon’s teeth, and the ultimate destruction of a guilty one when no man pursued him. Simple and moral, if morals still lingered in a well-explained world. Simple anyway, like truth. A dramatic testimony for five players.
‘Mrs Askham was very generous in filling in the minor detail.’
She had been; though wouldn’t ‘confessed’ have been the word that best described it? Deliberately, never glancing at Kincaid, in her low, steady voice, she had rehearsed without excusing every incident of that long-ago. A confession, yes, and more: a revelation of herself. A picture of the woman as she was, pitilessly drawn for Kincaid to see. His blind devotion had made her honest, she’d felt compelled to render account. At least she would tender a rigid integrity to his unconditioning acceptance.
‘She married Kincaid in the first place because she thought herself pregnant by Askham. They had had a brief affaire, very much a boss-employee relation. But after the marriage a change took place. Askham had taken a second look at her. He saw that her husband was deeply in love with her and it suggested that he’d thrown something away. He began to fall in love with her himself. Soon it was no longer enough for her to be his mistress. He grew jealous and possessive and wanted Paula entirely, he saw in Kincaid an interloper, a mere gesture to the proprieties.
‘Towards the end of nineteen-thirty-six the situation became more critical, since Paula was really pregnant this time and there were reasons why Kincaid could not have been the father. A divorce was out of the question; it would have had business repercussions for Askham; and he wouldn’t hear of an abortion even if that had been
