'It's on the tip of my tongue,' Bob said. 'How did Blacker come by a script like that?'
'He worked in publishing, didn't he? I suppose he found it in a file and took it home. If I remember right, it was unpublished.'
'And Tudor insured it?'
'Yes, after we'd had it authenticated by two experts. Inside a year it was stolen from Blacker's house.'
'Did your lot pay in full?'
'We had to.'
'Sounds like a scam to me.'
'Hard to prove. The manuscript hasn't been heard of since. Probably in New York or Tokyo by now. Blacker banked the cheque and started his publishing business.'
'Do you think Tudor was in on this?' Bob asked.
'Hard to say. If the bosses thought so, he'd have been sacked, so I guess he's innocent.'
The buzzer on her intercom went. She opened the door of her boss's office and presently returned with the package Bob was to take.
'Be seeing you, then,' he said when the paperwork was done.
'What made you ask about Blacker?' she said.
'Just interest.'
'Funny.'
'What's funny?'
'Just that I had someone else in here this morning. Said she was from the solicitors dealing with Mr Blacker's estate. She'd heard about the claim and wanted some more details, for probate reasons, she said. I told her what I've told you. That's why it's so fresh in my mind.'
'What was she like, this solicitor?'
'Scary, actually. Right in your face. Jet black hair and piercing eyes.'
Maurice McDade was released at four that afternoon and met by Thomasine and Dagmar, who drove him back to Lavant. His wife Fran was waiting at the open door and invited them in for a celebration drink.
'You two want to be alone,' Dagmar said.'I think we'll leave you to it.'
'Just the one, then,' Thomasine said, and got a look from Dagmar.
Fran had baked a banana cake that Maurice said was his favourite, and they drank champagne in front of the Swiss mountains in the time-locked living room.
'This has all been so unfair,' Dagmar said.
'Yes, but I don't want to dwell on it,' Maurice said. 'I appreciate Fran and my home even more now.'
'We missed you,' Dagmar said. 'We tried to have a circle meeting and it wasn't the same. No disrespect, Thomasine. You did your best'
'We'll soon get back to normal,' he said. 'It's important that we do.'
'We've been invited to a meeting tomorrow evening,' Thomasine said, 'but that's not a proper meeting, just a chance for that new Inspector Mallin to quiz us all.'
'It's thanks to her that I'm out,' Maurice said. 'I hope she clears up this mystery soon. I had plenty of time to think when I was inside. Until this experience I never fully appreciated what pain an unsolved crime can bring. I've written about all those cases as if there was some kind of glamour to them, the ongoing mystery of who did it. Now I know how important it is to get closure.'
'Closure with the right person arrested,' Thomasine said. 'There's another book to be written about all the poor sods who've been locked away for crimes they didn't commit.'
'True, but I've got faith in Chief Inspector Mallin.'
'You're very trusting.
'And I don't think you should have another glass,' Dagmar said to Thomasine.
18
People who write fiction, if they had not taken it up, might have become very successful liars.
In the dark-blue minibus carrying members of the circle from the New Park Centre to the police station, Anton was saying, 'I'm so grateful my old colleagues in the civil service can't see me now.'
'You want to try riding in a prison van,' Zach said.
'No thank you.' After a moment's further thought Anton spoke again. 'When were you in prison?'
'I wasn't. I was conditionally discharged.'
'What was the offence?'
'Disorderly behaviour.'
'Where?'
'In Storrington.'
'Storrington? That's no place to misbehave.'
'I didn't. I was protesting. The hunt came through there.'
'Ha — a saboteur. I should have guessed.'
Jessie Warmington-Smith said, 'Well, I'm dying of shame. I've never broken the law.'
Zach said, 'It's only a people-carrier, for fuck's sake.'
Jessie made a sharp sound, sucking in air through her teeth.
Anton said in a low voice to Dagmar, who was sitting beside him, 'You might think Zach is the only calm one among us, but take a look at his hands. He's got the shakes, poor fellow. I wonder what causes that.'
Tudor said, 'Keep your head down, Jessie. Isn't that the bishop looking over that wall?'
'Tudor. Enough!' Thomasine said in the voice she used to subdue the third years.
They were driven around Basin Road and into the forecourt of the police station where the CID officers were waiting, among them Hen Mallin, who had gone ahead in her own car. She'd met everyone at the New Park Centre and explained how the interviews would be organised. She'd made a powerful impact, courteous, but firm. No one had complained until she'd gone and they were all in the minibus.
Good shepherd that he was to his fellow writers, Maurice McDade had turned up and was there to help the older ones step down from the minibus. This thoughtfulness was typical of the man. The police hadn't asked him to come. There was no intention to interview him again.
In Interview Room One, Anton seemed to have decided to treat this as a civil service interview, presenting a confident posture, back straight, chin up and legs crossed at the ankles, hands (after checking his bow tie) clasped lightly one over the other, resting on his left thigh.
He needed to be alert. He was facing Hen Mallin, the senior investigating officer.
'Mr Gulliver, you joined the writers' circle soon after its formation, I understand,' she said with the gentle opener he expected.
'That's correct.'
'Yet by all accounts you don't contribute much in the way of writing. What do you get out of it?'
'The cut and thrust of the meetings. I'm well to the fore in the discussions.'
'Wouldn't a debating society be a better club for you?'
'Excellent suggestion,' he said, flattering his interviewer, a classic technique. 'Unfortunately I don't know of one this side of Portsmouth.'
'So you're content to be an observer rather than an active member.'
'In which sense?'
'If you don't write anything. .'
'Oh, that doesn't matter a jot. Most of what is written isn't fit to be read out. I contribute by offering suggestions and praise where it's due, which it seldom is.' He gave a knowing smile to the silent constable seated next to Hen.
