“You weren’t. But it doesn’t take a genius to know what happens if you shoot a rifle at a kerosene lamp.”
Cade turned away before Carson could think of a reply.
“This inferno’s going to be visible for miles around,” he said to Ritter. “We’ve got to move the trucks and put the guns back. There’s no time to lose.”
They began jogging down the drive.
“You too, Corporal,” Cade shouted back over his shoulder at Carson, who had hung back, watching the flames spread upward into the higher storeys of the house.
And that was how it had ended. They’d waited for the troops to arrive, and then shown them what the Nazi bastards had done. It was a pity that they hadn’t got there in time to save the people in the house, Cade had told them, but that was what happened in wartime. It was just bad luck.
The bells of St. Paul’s rang out the hour of two, and Ritter stretched, rousing himself from his reverie. He could have told the silent jury and the journalists with their itching inky fingers all about Marjean and Jimmy Carson. He had stories to tell that would make their hair stand on end, but instead he had lied. And he had lied well. He wasn’t going to be some sideshow that Stevie’s devious lawyer could use to shift the blame. Cade’s death had nothing to do with Marjean. It was simple greed that had driven Stevie to kill his father, and Ritter hated him for it. He hated the son as much as he had once loved the father, and he wanted him dead. Hanging on the end of a rope.
Ritter walked quickly back toward the court. He didn’t want to miss even one minute of his wife’s evidence. He had coached her well, and he expected her to be a credit to him.
THIRTEEN
Adam Clayton was worried. No, it was worse than that. He was scared. He’d felt awkward ever since he’d got to the courthouse at ten o’clock on the dot that morning, following the directions that he’d written down so carefully on a piece of paper back at the police station in Oxford. He felt secure there, but here he couldn’t rid himself of a sense that he didn’t belong. He’d worked hard to become a detective, but now he wished himself back in uniform again and out of the black pinstripe suit that had felt fine yesterday but now seemed too tight all over. Even before Bert Blake had sat down opposite him in the cafeteria, Clayton had had a feeling that something was going to go wrong, and now it had. In spades. This was Clayton’s first big trial, but he knew enough about the criminal law to be sure that policemen weren’t supposed to go round talking about sensitive exhibits in front of important prosecution witnesses, and that was exactly what he’d just done.
He’d turned around in time to see the look of anguish on Mrs. Ritter’s face as she got up and hurried out, leaving her fat husband licking the coffee from his black moustache. The photographs had been of one of the other women in the house, Cade’s assistant, Sasha, and Clayton couldn’t understand why his conversation with Blake should have had such an effect on Mrs. Ritter. Perhaps it hadn’t. Perhaps he was just being paranoid, and her husband had said something to upset her. Clayton had never liked the look of the man, even though he was the prosecution’s most important witness, the one who’d caught the defendant red-handed. But Clayton was sure that his gut instinct was right. It was his conversation with Blake that had sent Mrs. Ritter running from the room. He remembered how the people at the other tables had gone silent as he and Blake had raised their voices. God, he was an idiot. Clayton smacked the side of his head in irritation. It was his own fault for talking to Blake. The photographer had worked him out for just what he was: green behind the ears and a bit of a prude, and it had taken Blake less than five minutes to get a rise out of him. It was rotten luck that the Ritters had been sitting at a table right behind his back, but he should have known better.
Clayton looked at his watch and realised he’d been walking the halls for over an hour. Now he stopped outside the entrance to Court number 1. From this vantage point, he could see virtually nothing of what was going on inside, and so he leant on one of the high swing doors slightly to get a better view. It didn’t help, but the muffled voices inside suddenly became clearer, and Clayton could hear Ritter giving his evidence. It’d be his turn soon, once Ritter and his wife had finished, and perhaps he’d find himself answering questions about his error of judgement in the cafeteria. Clayton turned away with a shudder, and Trave had to stop suddenly to avoid colliding with his junior officer as he came out of the court.
“What the hell are you doing, Clayton?” he asked angrily. “You’re not allowed to listen to the evidence until after you’ve given your own. You shouldn’t need me to tell you that.”
“I don’t, Bill. I was…”
“Not Bill. Inspector Trave.”
“Sorry, Inspector. I was looking for you. That’s why I’m here.” Clayton stammered over his words, shaken by Trave’s insistence on being addressed by his rank. They’d been on first-name terms before, back on the day of Cade’s postmortem, when Trave had kept him on his feet and bought him a whisky.
“There’s something that’s happened, that I need to tell you about,” he went on after a moment, and then stopped, at a loss for words.
Trave looked at Clayton for a moment, and his expression softened.
“All right,” he said. “Let’s find somewhere to talk. This isn’t the best place. They’ll all be coming out in a minute.”
They went outside, turned left and left again, and Clayton suddenly found himself trying to keep up with Trave as he turned this way and that, seemingly at random, through a succession of tiny side streets under the shadow of St. Paul’s, until the inspector stopped under a freshly painted pub sign and disappeared into the dark interior of The Lamb and Flag Public House.
“You certainly seem to know your way around here,” said Clayton, admiringly, as they sat down at a table near the bar.
“An old friend of mine took me here for lunch, when I was starting out just like you, and he was an old inspector who’d seen better days. He’s been dead awhile, and I doubt anyone really remembers him now.”
“Except you,” said Clayton, picking up on a note of sadness, or was it bitterness? in the inspector’s voice.
“Except me,” said Trave, smiling. “I remember him just like it was yesterday, sitting where you are now, and saying, ‘Best bread and cheese in London, son,’ as if it was an article of faith. And he was right too. It still is the best.”
Adam Clayton began to feel better. He did not know whether it was just getting out of the courthouse or Trave’s company or the pub food, which did turn out to be really good, but his conversation with Bert Blake didn’t seem to be so terrible after all, even if Mrs. Ritter had got herself upset about it. And Trave agreed with him.
“I wouldn’t worry about it if I was you, Adam,” he said. “It isn’t as if they were photographs of the Ritter woman herself, and her evidence isn’t exactly controversial, you know. I remember taking her statement the day after it happened. It was funny. She was very specific about what she remembered, but she didn’t remember anything of any real significance. They’re like that sometimes.” Trave laughed, remembering the look of rapt concentration on Jeanne Ritter’s face as she told her story.
“I don’t think she has a very good time,” said Clayton.
“Her husband, you mean. Yes, he’s the one that I’ve got a problem with,” said Trave musingly. “He’s not telling the truth about that place in France. Silas had no reason to lie about what he and his brother overheard. Something terrible happened there. I feel sure of it. And I don’t know if it’s got any bearing on this case. Perhaps it doesn’t. Perhaps it was this man, Carson, who shot Cade when he went back there and wrote him that letter afterward. I don’t know. I just think I should have gone over to France and asked some questions. Poked around a bit. If it hadn’t been for that blinkered barrister in there, I probably would have done.”
“Why don’t you? There’s still time,” said Clayton, feeling slightly surprised by the inspector’s obvious antipathy toward the prosecutor. He’d not been aware of it before now.
“No, it won’t work,” said Trave hurriedly. He felt surprised at himself for having said so much. It was what came from keeping so much bottled up inside. He liked Adam Clayton, but he knew he shouldn’t be talking to him like this. Clayton was too junior, and besides he hadn’t yet given his evidence.
“Why won’t it work?” asked Clayton. The inspector’s anxieties about the case had begun to trouble him
