'It's not that. It's. just that I'm a slow reader.'
'What if you'd been a quick reader, sir? Where would you be now.9'
'Probably been a proof-reader in a newspaper office.
They could certainly do with one,' mumbled Morse as he considered 'Maclure' and 'Mc Lure' and 'Mac Clure' in the last cutting, with still no sign of the genuine article, 'former Senior Lecturer...'
Interesting, that extra little piece of the jigsaw--that 'former'...
Lewis braked gently outside Number 14 Evington Road South; then decided to continue into the drive, where the low-profile tires of the Jaguar crunched into the deep gravel.
Chapter Thirteen
Whatever crazy sorrow saith, No life that breathes with human breath Has ever truly longed for death (ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON, The Two Voices)
Mrs. Mary Rodway, a smartly dressed, slim-figured, pleas-antly featured woman in her late forties, seemed quite willing to talk about herself--at least for a start.
Four years previously (she told the detectives) her hus-band, a highly-salaried constructional engineer, had run off with his Personal Assistant. The only contact between her-self and her former marriage-partner was now effected via the agency of solicitors and banks. She lived on her own happily enough, she supposed--if anyone could ever live happily again after the death of an only child, especially a child who had died in such dubious circumstances.
She had seen Mc Clure's murder reported in The Inde pendent; and Morse wasted no time in telling her of the specific reason for his visit: the cuttings discovered among the murdered man's papers which appeared firmly to under-line his keen interest in her son, Ma Uhew, and perhaps in the reasons for his suicide.
'He was quite wrong--the Coroner. You do realise that?' Mary Rodway lit another cigarette and inhaled deeply.
'You don't believe it was suicide?'
'I didn't say that. What I do say is that the Coroner was wrong in making such a big thing about those hard drugs. That's what they call them: 'hard' as opposed to 'soft.' It's just the same with pornography, I believe, Inspector.'
Whilst Morse nodded his head innocently, Mrs. Rodway shook her own in vague exasperation. 'Life's a far more complicated thing than that--Matthew's was--and that Coroner, he made it all sound so... uncomplicated.'
'Don't be too, er, hard on him, Mrs. Rodway. A Coro-ner's main job isn't dealing with right and wrong, and making moral judgements, and all that sort of thing. He's just there to put the bits and pieces into some sort of pattern, and then to stick some verdict, as best he can, in one of the few slots he's got available to him.'
If Mrs. Rodway was at all impressed by this amalgam of metaphors, she gave no indication of it. Perhaps she hadn't even been listening, for she continued in her former vein: 'here were two things--two quite separate things--and they ought to have been considered separately. It's difficult to put it into words, Inspector, but you see there are causes of things, and symptoms of things. And in Matthew's case this drugs business was a symptom of something---it wasn't a cause. I knew Matthew I knew him better than anyone.'
'So you think...?'
'I've stopped thinking. What on earth's the good of churning things over and over again in your mind for the umpteenth fime T'
She stubbed out a half-smoked cigarette savagely, and immediately lit another.
'You don't mind me smoking?'
'No, no.'
'Can I offer you gentlemen one?' She held out a packet of King-Size Dunhill International, first to Lewis who shook his head with a smile; then to Morse who shook his head with stoical resolve, since only that same morning, when he'd woken up just before six with parched mouth and pounding head, he had decided m forgo--for ever- more--the spurious gratification not only of alcohol but of nicotine also.
Perhaps his decision could wait until tomorrow for its full implementation, though; and he relented. 'Most kind, Mrs. Rodway. Thank you... And it's very valuable, what you're sying. Please do go on.'
'There's nothing more to say.'
'But if you felt feel--so strongly, why didn't you aee to give evidence at the Inquest?'
'How could I? I couldn't even bear to switch on the TV or the radio in case there might be something about it. You couldn't bear that, could you, Inspector? If it had been your child?'
'I--1 take your point,' admitted Morse awkwardly.
'You know usually, when things like that happen, you get all the rumour and all the gossip as well. But we didn't have any of that--at the Inquest.'
Three times now Mary Rodway inhaled on her cigarette w/th such ferocity that she seemed to Lewis hell-bent on in-flicting some irreparable damage to her respiratory tract.
But Morse's mind for a few seconds was far away, a glimmer of light at last appearing at the far end of a long, black tunnel.
'So...' he picked his slow words carefully, 'you'd hoped that there might be some other evidence given at the Inquest, but you didn't want to provide any of it yourself?.'
'Perhaps it wasn't all that important anyway.'
'Please tell me.'
