true because it will be true. And they can't catch us out by asking about the TV programmes we didn't watch.'
'But what happened was private. It was for us alone.'
'Not any more. Murder destroys privacy. We made love. No doubt the police will use a coarser word. If they don't speak it, then they'll think it. But we made love in my bedroom, on my bed. You do remember?'
Remember. Oh yes, he remembered. His face flamed. He felt as if his whole body was burning. The tears that welled up despite his desperate will to hold them back were scalding tears. He squeezed his eyes shut so that he need not have to wipe them away. Of course, he remembered. That dull, square little back room, anonymous as a room in some cheap hotel, the mixture of excitement and terror which half paralysed him, his incompetent rumblings, the whispered endearments which had become commands. She had been patient, experienced and in the end she had taken charge. Well, he had never been naive enough to suppose that for her it was the first time. For him, but not for her. But what had happened was, he knew, irrevocable. It was she who had possessed him not he her, and that possession was more than physical. For a moment he couldn't speak. It was difficult to believe that those grotesque but controlled writhings had anything to do with the Caroline who stood now so close to him, yet so distanced. He noticed with sharpened perception the pristine cleanness of the grey and white striped shirt, cut like a man's, the sway of the long grey skirt, the black patent court shoes, the simple gold chain and the matching gold cufflinks, the corn-coloured hair sculpted back into the single thick plait. Was this what he had loved, still loved, a boy's romantic ideal, the cold remote perfection of her? And he knew with an almost audible groan that their first coupling had destroyed more than it had affirmed, that what he had yearned for, still yearned for, and had lost for ever, was an unattainable beauty. But he knew, too, that she would only have to stretch out a hand and he would follow her again to that bungalow, to that bed.
He said miserably: 'But why? Why? They won't suspect you, they can't. It's ridiculous even to think it. You got on well with Hilary. You get on well with everyone in the station. You're the last person the police will be interested in. You haven't even a motive.'
'But I have. I've always disliked her and I hated her father. He ruined Mummy, forced her to spend her last years in poverty. And I lost the chance of a decent education. I'm a secretary, essentially a shorthand-typist, and that's all I'll ever be.'
'I've always thought you could be anything you chose.'
'Not without education. All right, I know you can get a grant, but I had to leave school and earn as quickly as possible. And it's not only me, it's what Peter Robarts did to Mummy. She trusted him. She put every penny she'd got, every penny Daddy left, into his plastics company. I've hated him all my life and I hated her because of him. Once the police discover that I'll get no peace. But if I can produce an alibi, that will be the end. They'll leave us alone, both of us. We only need to say that we were together and there will be the end of it.'
'But they can't see what Hilary's father did to your mother as a motive for murder. It's unreasonable. And it was all so long ago.'
'No motive for killing another human being is ever reasonable. People kill for the strangest reasons. And I've got a thing about the police. It's irrational, I know, but I've always had it. That's why I'm so careful when I'm driving. I know I couldn't stand up to a real interrogation. I'm frightened of the police.'
And she was, he remembered, seizing on this demonstrable truth as if it made the whole request legitimate, reasonable. She was obsessive about the speed limit even when the road was clear, obsessive about wearing her seat belt, the state of her car. And he remembered that time three weeks ago, when she had had her handbag snatched while shopping in Norwich and, despite his protest, hadn't even reported it. He remembered her words. 'It's no use, they'll never get it back. We'll only waste their time at the police station. Let it go, there wasn't much in it.' And then he thought, I'm checking up on what she's telling me, verifying it. And he felt an overpowering shame mixed with pity. He heard her voice.
'All right, I'm asking too much. I know how you feel about truth, honesty, your boy scout Christianity. I'm asking you to sacrifice your good opinion of yourself. No one likes doing that. We all need our self-esteem. I suppose yours is knowing that you're morally better than the rest of us. But aren't you a bit of a hypocrite? You say you love me, but you won't lie for me. It's not an important lie. It won't hurt anyone. But you can't do it. It's against your religion. Your precious religion didn't stop you going to bed with me, did it? I thought Christians were supposed to be too pure for casual fornication.'
Casual fornication. Each word was like a blow, not a fierce stabbing pain but a continuous thud like regular deliberate blows on the same bruised flesh. He had never, even in those first marvellous days together, been able to talk to her about his faith. She had made it plain from the beginning that this was a part of his life with which she had neither sympathy nor understanding. And how could he begin to explain that he had followed her into the bedroom without guilt because his need of her was stronger than his love for God, stronger than guilt, stronger than faith, needing no rationalization, no justification other than itself. How, he had told himself, could anything be wrong which every nerve and sinew told him was natural and right, even holy.
She said: 'All right, let it go. I'm asking too much.'
Stung by the contempt in her voice, he said miserably: 'It's not that. I'm not better, I'm not. And you could never ask too much. If it's important to you, of course I'll do it.'
She looked at him sharply as if judging his sincerity, his will. He heard the relief in her voice. She said: 'Look, there's no danger. We're both innocent, we know that. And what we tell the police could so easily have been true.'
But that was a mistake, and he saw the realization of it in her eyes. He said: 'It could have been true, but it isn't.'
'And that's what's important to you, more important than my peace of mind, more important than what I thought we felt for each other.'
He wanted to ask why her peace of mind needed to be built on a lie. He wanted to ask what they did, in fact, feel for each other, what she felt for him.
She said, looking at her watch: 'And after all it will be an alibi for you too. That's even more important. After all, everyone knows how unkind she's been to you since that local radio programme. God's little nuclear crusader. You haven't forgotten that?'
The crudity of the implication, the note of impatience in her voice, all repelled him. He said: 'But suppose they don't believe us.'
'Don't let's go over all that again. Why shouldn't they believe us? And it hardly matters if they don't. They can't ever prove we're lying, that's what's important. And after all it's natural that we should have been together. It isn't as if we've just started seeing each other. Look, I've got to get back to the office now. I'll be in touch, but we'd better not see each other tonight.'
He hadn't expected to see her that night. The news of this latest murder would have been broadcast on local radio, passed from mouth to mouth. His mother would be waiting anxiously for his return from work, avid for news.
But there was something he had to tell her before she left and somehow he found the courage. He said: 'I rang you last night. While I was driving around thinking. I stopped at a phone box and telephoned. You weren't in.'
There was a small silence. He glanced nervously at her face but it was expressionless. She said: 'What time was that?'
'About twenty to ten, perhaps a bit later.' 'Why? Why did you telephone?'
'The need to talk to you. Loneliness. I suppose I half hoped that you might change your mind and ask me to come round.'
'All right. You might as well know. I was on the headland last night. I took Remus for a run. I left the car down a cart track just outside the village and walked as far as the ruined abbey. I suppose I was there just after ten.'
He said in horrified wonder: 'You were there! And all the time she must have been lying dead within a few yards of you.'
She said sharply: 'Not a few yards, more like a hundred.
There was never any chance that I'd find her, and I didn't see her killer if that's what you're thinking. And I stayed on the cliffs. I didn't go down to the beach. If I had, the police would have found my footprints, mine and Remus's.'
'But someone might have seen you. It was bright moonlight.'
The headland was empty. And if the murderer was lurking in the trees and saw me, he's hardly likely to come
