would almost be prepared to swear that the fluctuations were genuine. And, as one grew used to his eccentricities, Kincaid appeared less abnormal. A personality emerged from behind them, unusual perhaps, but firmly intact.
‘I’d like to have a statement about your search for your wife.’
‘Take a note. I went to our house in Putney…’
Only of course it wasn’t there, nor the houses of their neighbours, nor anything the way he’d seen it or known it. A bombed site here, a block of flats there, new people, new names, not a soul who remembered Kincaid.
‘I saw an announcement and I went to that Everest Club meeting. I don’t care about those people, they’re nothing to me at all…’
But surely some of them must know what had happened to Mrs Kincaid, and it was to question them that he had gone to the Asterbury that night. And there again he was frustrated. He couldn’t convince them of his identity. All he’d got from it was a slander suit and a waggon-load of publicity.
‘Still, I thought that when my name was published… and it was then I began advertising.’
But never a word reached him from Paula Kincaid.
‘Can I have a statement on your reactions?’
‘Take a note. I’m sure she’s alive. I’ve known that all along, really… up there in Shigatse, and Lhasa. The Tibetans have discovered a system and they can tell about people. I knew a priest in Shigatse, and he gave me lessons.’
‘A statement about Wales.’
‘Continue note. I got the feeling that she was there… can you understand that? Like a Tibetan smells his village when he’s lost in strange country. We spent our honeymoon there… I taught her to love the mountains. We returned several times, Llanberis, Capel, Caernarvon. So I went. I went to those places. I tried to find where we’d stayed. I even went to the Devil’s Kitchen, which was her favourite climb. And all the time I felt she was there, her presence was strong among the mountains… but I could find her nowhere, and there was nobody to tell me. Then the feeling went dead and I came back to London.’
Kincaid’s voice trembled slightly as he made this recital and his blazing eyes looked brighter, more glittering still. He spoke with a compulsive note of conviction, setting even Evans’s mouth agape, while the cynical station inspector gazed pop-eyed at the speaker. Yet Gently had heard that same ring in the stories of accomplished liars. And Kincaid had told stories that would have shamed Baron Munchausen…
‘A statement about the club members who knew your wife.’
‘Take a note. Dick Overton, Ray Heslington, and Arthur Fleece.’
‘Fleece? Fleece knew your wife?’
Kincaid sneered. ‘I don’t answer questions.’
‘A statement about Fleece.’
‘No, thank you. See my lawyer.’
It was infuriating, and there was nothing that Gently could do about it. If only he’d had Kincaid for just one hour before he was charged! The concatenation of those three names dangled seductively in front of his nose, but there was no way for him immediately to sink his teeth into them. Overton — Heslington — and Arthur Fleece. They had all known Paula Kincaid, and one of them had died…
‘Heslington believed you were Kincaid. Give me a statement on that.’
‘Take a note.’ Kincaid’s sneer had deepened during Gently’s silence. ‘Heslington’s an idiot, but he’s a well- meaning idiot. I never had a scar. That’s a wrinkle on my forehead.’
‘Continue the statement.’
‘About Heslington and my wife? He only met her twice, and he could tell me nothing about her. He lives in Wimbledon, you know, though the line passes Putney. Don’t ask me what I mean, because I won’t be able to tell you.’
‘Continue the statement.’
‘Of course. There’s Dick Overton. Now he knew her rather better; in fact, he was quite a friend. But he didn’t believe I was Kincaid — Dick’s intelligence isn’t his strong point — so of course he told me nothing.’ Kincaid paused. ‘But you could try him.’
‘Continue the statement.’
‘End of note. I’ve no more to tell you about my wife.’
‘Hmn.’
Gently studied him, trying to reach some conclusion. In his wide experience of human enigmas, Kincaid bid fair to take the cake. For if he were not Kincaid, what second process could have evolved him? From what strange school of life had such a character graduated?
‘Give me a statement about your career.’
‘Take a note.’
Kincaid grinned horribly. He too had been doing a little studying, his head tilted back, his expression superior.
‘Well?’
‘I didn’t have a career. It was over by the time I was twenty-five. I lived at Salisbury with my guardian and was educated there at the local grammar school. Afterwards I took a post in the town, and then came up here, to Metropolitan Electric. I married Paula in thirty-five as part of the Jubilee celebrations. And I climbed Everest in thirty-seven. After that, see the Sunday Echo.’
‘That’s the sort of stuff you could have dug up somewhere.’
‘I didn’t promise you anything else. I’ve been dead above twenty years.’
‘You’ll have to do better than that. If you want us to prove your identity.’
‘No comment. And I’d like to be getting back to my cell.’
‘Just one thing more.’ Gently produced the cigarette-case, the one which Evans had found on the cairn. ‘You’ve seen this before, but I’m showing it to you again. Perhaps you’ve remembered something about it which you didn’t tell Inspector Evans.’
Kincaid took the case, a frown appearing as he examined it; he turned it over and over and stared long at the snapshot.
‘The initials… those are mine. I might have had a case like this. But it’s gone… I can’t place it. I can’t place the picture.’
‘I think you know the case is yours.’
‘No, you’re wrong. I’d say if I did.’
‘It’s the one you took to India.’
‘Why should I have done a thing like that? I was smoking a pipe when I went there. I smoked nothing else while I was in Tibet…’
‘But you’re smoking cigarettes now.’
‘Oh yes, I began again when I got back to Delhi. But we all smoked pipes on the expedition — it was the thing, you know. We were serious young men.’
‘Surely that case is the sort of present your wife might have given you.’
Kincaid stiffened. There was a twitching in the muscles about his eyes. He burst out agitatedly:
‘No — I’d remember! I wouldn’t forget a thing like that. I’ve never seen it before, I tell you. Take me back to my cell!’
Gently shrugged and motioned to Evans, who went to the door to fetch the constable. Kincaid got jerkily to his feet and began to shamble out. Then at the door he turned suddenly, and tears were streaming down his face.
‘I want her back!’ he exclaimed brokenly. ‘I want my wife… I want Paula back again…’
‘ Back from whom? ’ Gently fired at him, but Kincaid didn’t seem to hear. Weeping like a child, he permitted the constable to lead him away down the corridors.
Evans sucked in air and slammed the door shut after them. The station inspector shook his head; he put a finger to his temple.
‘The skinny bastard. I could kick him from here to Llanfairfechan!’
Evans was furious; he could hardly persuade himself to sit down.
‘Take a note. Take a note. Like he was running a bloody press conference! I ask you, would you have thought
