there?'
'Friends, mostly.'
'Awkward place to get to.'
Yep. '
'When did you last see him?'
'Week ago.'
'What did you take him?'
'Bit o' cake. Few cigs. No booze, no drugs nothin' like that. You can't
get away with much there.'
'Can you get away with anything there?'
She leaned forward again and smiled as she drew deeply on her cigarette.
'Perhaps I could have done if I'd tried.'
93
'Could he give you anything? To take out?'
'Well, nothin' he shouldn't. Just as strict about that as the other way
round. We all sat at tables, you know, and they were watchin' us all the
time all the screws. You'd be lucky to get away with anythin'.'
But Lewis knew that it was all a little too pat, this easy interchange.
Things got in, and things got out every prison was the same; and everybody
knew it. Including this woman. And for the first time Lewis sensed that
Strange was probably right: that the letter received by Thames Valley Police
had been written by Harry Repp at Bullingdon Prison, handed to one of his
visitors, and posted somewhere outside at Lower Swinstead, say.
For whatever reason.
But as yet Lewis couldn't identify such a reason.
'Did Harry ever ask you to take anything out of prison?'
'Come off it! What'd he got in there to take out?'
'Letters perhaps?' suggested Lewis quietly.
'If he'd forgotten some address. Not often, though.'
'To some of his old cronies?'
'Crooks, you mean?'
'That's what I'm asking you, I suppose.'
'Few letters, yes. He didn't want them people in there lookin' through
everythin' he wrote. Nobody would.'
'So you occasionally took one away?'
'Not difficult, was it? Just slip it in your handbag.'
'What was the last one you took out?'
'Can't remember.'
'I think you can.' Lewis was surprised with the firm tone of his own voice.
'No, I can't. Just told you, didn't I?' (Yet another cigarette. ) 'Please
don't lie to me. You see, I know you posted a letter at Lower Swinstead.
Harry'd asked you to post it there because he thought he was wrong as it
turned out that it would be postmarked from there.'
For the first time in the interview, Debbie Richardson seemed unsure of
herself, and Lewis pressed home his perceptible advantages.
'How did you get to Lower Swinstead, by the way?'
'Only three or four miles--' ' You walked? '
'No, I drove--' She stopped herself. But the words, in Homeric phrase, had
escaped the barrier of her teeth.
'Didn't you say you couldn't drive?'
'Lied to you, didn't I?'
'Why? Why lie to me?'
'I get used to it, that's why.' She leaned forward across the table.
And Lewis saw for certain what he had already suspected for semi-certain that
she wore no bra beneath her dress; probably no knickers, either.
'How often do you go to the pub there, the Maiden's Arms?'
'Often as I can.'
'Not in the car, I hope?'
'Sometimes get a lift there you know, if somebody rings.'
'When were you there last?'
'When I posted the letter.'
'Open all day, is it?'
'What's all this quizzin' about?'
'Just that my boss'll be interested, that's all.'
'You're all alike, you bloody coppers!'
It seemed a strange reply, and Lewis looked puzzled.
Pardon? '
'What you just asked me about the pub being' open all day. Exactly what the
other fellow asked.'
'What other fellow?'
'Can't remember his name. So what? Can't remember yours, come to that.'
'When was this?'
'Last night. Asked me out for a drink, didn't he? I reckon he fancied me a
little bit. But I was already--' 95
' From the police, you say? '
'That's what he said.'
'You didn't check?'
Debbie Richardson shrugged her shoulders.
'Nice he was sort o' well educated. Know what I mean?'
'You can't recall his name?'
'No, sorry. Tell you one thing though. Sergeant, er . ..'
'Lewis.'
'Had a lovely car, he did. Been nice it would ridin' round in that.
A Jag maroon-coloured Jag. '
chapter twenty-two . a mountain range of Rubbish, like an old volcano, and
its geological foundation was Dust. Coal-dust, vegetable-dust, bone-dust,
crockery-dust, rough dust, and sifted dust all manner of Dust in the
accumulated Rubbish (Dickens, Our Mutual Friend) 'not for scrap, is she? '
Stan Cox nodded towards the Jag parked in the no-parking area outside his
office window in the Redbridge Waste Disposal Centre.
'Getting on a bit,' conceded Morse, 'like all of us. You know, windscreen
wipers packing up, gear-box starting to jam, no heat. '
'Sounds a bit like the missus!'
'Pardon?'
'Joke, sir.'
'Ah, yes.' Morse's smile was even weaker than the witticism as he looked
round the cramped office, his eyes catching a girlie calendar in the corner,
from which a provocatively bare- breasted bimbo, with short blonde hair,
stared back at him.
'Nice, ain't she!'
Morse nodded.
'Past her sell-by date, though. She's the May girl.'
'Remember the of' song, sir ' From May to September'?'
'You just like having her
