the crypt at Alder Hall. That probably meant nothing, but Fry still had a bad feeling about him. A gut instinct, perhaps, and no more. She shouldn’t let it influence her judgement.
‘By the way,’ said Murfin, ‘there’s a lady here who says she wants to talk to someone. A Mrs Somerville.’
‘Never heard of her. What does she want? Can’t you deal with her, Gavin?’
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‘Well, I thought you might be interested in talking to her yourself, like. She says she’s Professor Robertson’s daughter.’
Anne Jarvis lay on a sofa in the sitting room. Only her head and arms protruded from the quilt that had been used to cover her, and one hand hung limply towards the floor. The room was very warm, and somewhere a fly buzzed against a window pane.
Cooper halted in the doorway of the room, taking in his surroundings. Almost the first thing he noticed was the quilt’s pink floral pattern. It was the worst possible thing for showing up the dog hairs. The atmosphere was stuffy, and the smell reminded him of his visits to the hospital. Where Mrs Jarvis’s skin showed, it was white and almost translucent, the light from a standard lamp above the sofa shining through to the veins, as if her body was held together by tissue paper.
With an effort, she turned her head on a pillow and looked at him. ‘This is nice,’ she said. ‘Another visitor. I am honoured.’
‘I’m sorry to intrude,’ said Cooper. ‘I didn’t realize …’
‘That it was a sick room? Yes, I’m afraid so.’ Her voice was frail, but still lively. She moved her right hand, but didn’t quite complete the intended gesture. ‘Don’t be shy, whoever you are - sit down and have a cup of tea.’
‘I really can’t stop, Mrs Jarvis. I just came in to say hello.’
‘This is the policeman I told you about, Annie,’ said Jarvis, bending over her to lift her trailing hand back on to the quilt. ‘The detective.’
‘Oh, does he have a name?’
‘I’m DC Cooper, Mrs Jarvis.’
‘Cooper? I think I knew another policeman by that name once, but I forget what he did. I forget a lot of things.’
Cooper fidgeted uncertainly. He had no idea what was wrong with Mrs Jarvis, and there was no way he could come straight out and ask. It just wasn’t done to be so direct. The
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dog that had followed him into the room sidled towards the sofa and settled itself into position against the edge of the quilt. Feckless, Pointless or Aimless, he couldn’t tell. But the animal remained quite still as Mrs Jarvis’s hand slipped slowly down and came to rest on top of its broad head.
‘It’s wet outside again,’ she said.
‘Yes, it is, Annie,’ said Jarvis.
‘I’m lucky, then, to get these visitors coming out in the rain to see me.’
Cooper looked round the room. And only then did he see the other man, who was sitting very still in an armchair, partly hidden by the open door. He was about the same age as Tom Jarvis, but smaller and more worried looking, with a green cardigan bunched around his middle and a tweed hat clutched in his lap. He gave Cooper a small, apologetic smile, but said nothing.
‘This is my brother Maurice,’ said Mrs Jarvis, without turning her head fully.
The effort seemed to exhaust her energy, and she closed her eyes. Her husband hovered uncertainly, and the dog looked anxious. Cooper bit his lip. Every moment he stayed here, he was being reminded more and more of his mother and her hospital bed.
The brother stood up and touched his arm. ‘Time for us to go, I think. Annie’s tired.’
‘Yes, of course.’
Cooper felt himself coming properly alert again as they stepped out of the overheated sick room. He looked at Mrs Jarvis’s brother. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your last name, sir. Mr …?’
The man nodded. ‘Goodwin,’ he said, holding out a hand. ‘Maurice Goodwin. Pleased to meet you, I suppose.’
Lucy Somerville had the air of someone who had never been inside a police station before and was afraid of being
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contaminated if she touched anything. She sat with her knees tight together and her coat pulled close around her chest, shaking her head when she was offered tea or coffee.
‘The thing is, I’ve been worried about Dad for a while,’ she said. ‘He and Mum were very dependent on each other. When Mum was gone, he didn’t seem grounded any more. His interests started getting more bizarre. Just bit by bit - I don’t suppose it was ever any big decision on his part.’
Fry estimated Mrs Somerville’s age at about forty-five. She looked comfortable and affluent - the coat was good-quality wool, the scarf silk, though that was all that could be seen of her clothes.
‘What sort of things do you mean, Mrs Somerville?’
‘Well, until then his research had been factual. It was a specialized branch of anthropology, nothing more than that. Dad studied cultural attitudes to death, the traditions and rituals of burial, and so on. A bit morbid, I suppose, but at least it was an academic interest. Once Mum died, he started drifting into areas that were more … esoteric. The internet made it easier. He found all kinds of things that I would never have suspected existed.’
Fry nodded. She could believe anything of the internet. All the most illegal and unpleasant things in life seemed to thrive there. ‘Anything specific that you can remember?’
‘Oh, I once saw a reference on his computer to something called “Corpse of the Week”.’
‘What on earth is that?’
Mrs Somerville shuddered a little at the memory. ‘I didn’t look. The name of it was enough to trouble me.’
‘Do you think it was a website?’
‘Yes.’
