He was practically behind me and through the door when his right hand grabbed something off the top of the filing cabinet there.
A multicolored glass paperweight about the size of a cricket ball but twice as heavy.
An arc of light at the edge of my vision. The thing in his hand streaking towards my head.
The crunch.
Nothing.
TWENTY-ONE
A ringing sound. Shrill, insistent, and painful. I opened my eyes and saw daylight seeping into the space above the curtains. Fingered the swelling at the back of my skull. Groaned.
The ringing wasn’t all in my head.
At some stage of the night I’d emerged from unconsciousness sufficiently to drag myself as far as the sofa and collapse there. Now I was cold, my clothes were clammy, and I needed about a dozen aspirins.
I groped for my stick. It wasn’t there, of course. I made the effort to roll off the sofa and crawl to the phone.
Picked it up and listened.
“Ah, so all life is not extinct in Pangbourne. Is this the ear of Dr. Theodore Sinclair?” A man’s voice, resonant, bombastic, pleased with itself. The voice that could spell
“Who else?”
“This is Watmore, Digby Watmore. I suppose I got you out of bed.”
“No. What time is it?”
“Eight-twenty or thereabouts. Wednesday. Two or three days without, you said.”
“Two or three days without what?”
“Miss Ashenfelter on your back, to quote you verbatim.
Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten. We made an agreement.”
I recalled it faintly, as if from another incarnation. “When was this, Digby?”
“Sunday evening. The last two days have been no picnic for me, I can assure you. I say, are you sure I haven’t disturbed your sleep?”
“What happened to Miss Ashenfelter?”
He gave what sounded like an exasperated snort. “She’s been my constant companion for the past forty-eight hours.”
“Day and night, Digby?”
“I put my studio couch at her disposal, but she prefers to pass the night having interminable conversations about the Donovan case.”
I yawned sympathetically. “Was it instructive?”
“That’s beside the point now,” said Digby testily. “Events have overtaken us, haven’t they?”
“Quite a lot has happened, yes.”
“That’s precisely why I’m on the line. A fine shock I had this morning, picking up the
“The paper? No.”
“Did you know about the fire? The Ashenfelters’ place gutted. Mrs. Ashenfelter dead.”
“Er.·.yes. I was in Bath.”
There was a moment’s offended silence.
“Well, thanks for sweet F.A., Sinclair.”
“What?”
“Couldn’t you have given me a buzz? You promised me an exclusive. Hang it all, I’m a newsman, first and last.”
“Last, in this case,” I said, smiled to myself, and felt a little better. Possibly I hadn’t suffered permanent brain damage.
“You think you’re bloody amusing, don’t you?” said Digby in a burst of fury I wasn’t prepared for. “Listen to this, Sinclair. I know bloody well why you didn’t call me. You’re as guilty as hell. I’ve got my sources. You saw Sally Ashenfelter yesterday and made damn sure she couldn’t speak to anyone else. You murdered her.”
“Get lost.”
He ranted on. “I’ve written the story. It’s the lead on Sunday. So you can stuff your exclusive. When I put this down, I’m going to call the police and, by Jesus, I hope they rough you up.”
I slammed down the phone and went to look for the aspirin bottle. Then I moved fast.
A shower, a shave, a change of clothes. Black coffee. More black coffee.
I was using a blackthorn stick to help me around the house. Now I devoted more precious minutes to recovering my regular ebony cane, cursing Harry as I hobbled about the wet garden, hampered by the morning mist that afflicts us near the river. My shoes and trouser ends were saturated before I located the stick on the paved area in front of the summerhouse. The leather handle was soggy to the touch. I still preferred it to the blackthorn.
Back to the house. One more item to collect.
Earlier, while shaving, I’d tried to fathom Harry’s behavior. Couldn’t think why he’d chosen to attack me when he was already clear and on his way. I was no longer a threat. We were all but shaking hands when he’d left.
Now I understood. He’d taken the gun.
I crawled about on the living room carpet for a minute or two, feeling under furniture in case I’d kicked the thing out of sight when I staggered across the room in the night. I was wasting my time.
My brain was still functioning at ninety percent or less, but I forced it to make some deductions. Harry knew that the Colt was the murder weapon. He’d found me in possession of it. Nothing I’d said had shaken his conviction that I’d shot Morton all those years ago and was desperately covering my traces, leaving Sally to die in the burning house. The gun was his evidence. Where else could he have taken it, except to the police?
And if Harry hadn’t turned me in, Digby certainly had. The squad car could be in the lane by now.
I went to the door.
The first time I tried to start the MG, it failed. What a day to let me down, the most reliable car I’d ever owned. Tried again, three or four times. Nothing. This way I’d rapidly exhaust the battery.
Harry must have done something to immobilize the engine, blast him.
I clambered out and lifted the bonnet.
No disconnected leads that I could see. Plug covers all secure. Distributor cap in place. Everything as it should be. Not sabotage: simply the legacy of leaving the car out all night instead of garaging it. Misty weather is worse than rain for depositing a film of moisture on everything.
I collected a cloth, heated it on the kitchen boiler, and systematically dried the ignition system. Switched on again, got action first time-and overchoked. When anyone wants to make a fast getaway in the movies, they get in their cars and go. I swore, tried again, and achieved a stuttering response that persevered into a regular engine note. I was finally ready to leave.
No police car met me as I rattled up the lane. I was soon on the A4, heading west. The mist that I’d assumed was local persisted right through Marlborough, slowing my speed but making it less likely that I’d be spotted if a call had been radioed to patrol cars. It lifted for a stretch in the approach to Devizes on the A36l, and as quickly returned when I was through the town.
Swiftly into Somerset. Frome, wedged steeply between two hills, where I’d disembarked from the train with my fellow evacuees in 1943. The prison town of Shepton Mallet, the stark, unhappy place where they’d based the GIs. Finally, spectrally pale in the mist, Christian Gifford.
I stopped a few hundred yards short of the farm, drove the car up a track into a wooded section where it wouldn’t be seen from the lane, and walked the rest. Hard work for me, but I preferred to make my cumbersome exit from the car unobserved and out of shotgun range.
