“What’s happened to Rod Cotton?”
“Ah,
“What happened to him was that he couldn’t cope with failure. I think. He never failed…or so I heard. He passed exams, he got jobs, he was offered other jobs, he made money…He didn’t fail…”
The rambling petered out. Mrs Pargeter filled the silence. “So, when he lost his job, he didn’t know how to set about looking for another one…?”
“He knew how…” The tramp halted. “He knew how, but he couldn’t…”
“You mean mentally he couldn’t? He couldn’t adjust his mind to the idea?”
The wild head nodded slowly. “He waited. He had a little money, the redundancy money…He thought something would happen. He couldn’t go out and tell people. He couldn’t admit…”
“He couldn’t admit that he’d failed?” She got no reaction to that. “Which was why he invented the new job, the job up North?”
There was no direct reaction to this question, either, but the tramp suddenly started out on another monologue, as if broaching a new subject.
“He stayed around at home for a while, waiting for it all to be all right, waiting for the phone to ring with the new offer, new job…He passed the time with drink, with drugs…the phone didn’t ring. He went away, just to get away. Went to hotels, nice hotels…flash the Gold Card, pay for the hotels…Then the hotels don’t take the Gold Card. Redundancy money running out. Smaller hotels…nastier hotels…Bed and breakfast…But,” he said suddenly, as if quoting something he found very funny, “you don’t need bed, you don’t need breakfast. To find yourself, you have to get away from material things…”
“Is that what Theresa said?” asked Mrs Pargeter gently.
He didn’t confirm this, but let out a grunt of laughter. “Somebody said it, certainly. What they didn’t say, though, was that to
Again he reached towards her for the second bottle. Mrs Pargeter shook her head firmly.
He hunched his shoulders and sank back into his greatcoat. “It doesn’t take long,” he mumbled. “Doesn’t take long to get back to a state of…” He fumbled for the word. “…a state of nature? A state of nothing, a state of not being. It’s all just a sort of shell. Money…Gold Card…job…jacuzzi…take it away and there’s nothing in the middle… Oh yes, you build up a network of money, of greed, but when you slip through the network…you go into free fall… free fall…”
The mental effort of this long speech seemed to have exhausted him. Or maybe it was the half-bottle of scotch. He mumbled incomprehensibly. Then the mumbling triggered a deep, deep cough, which shook his fragile frame.
After the spasm he looked vaguely at Mrs Pargeter, as if seeing her for the first time. “What do you want?” he asked blankly.
“It’s more a matter of what you want,” she answered, drawing the second half-bottle of whisky out of her raincoat pocket.
His eyes registered the familiar shape and he reached for it. Mrs Pargeter put it back out of sight. “I want to talk about Theresa…”
The name triggered no reaction at all.
“When did you last see Theresa?”
He shrugged, uncomprehending. The semi-lucid phase had passed; he was now drifting, outside time and reality.
“Do you know how long it is since you left Smithy’s Loam?”
“Left where?” The shaggy head shook slowly. “Left…? I don’t know…”
“Your home. Where you had a wife,” Mrs Pargeter prompted.
“Had a wife…” This sparked some recollection for him. “Had a wife, yes. Married.” He nodded. “Married a long time ago…”
“How long?”
This question was too hard. “Years…?” he hazarded blearily. “Five…ten years…?”
It sounded genuine. Mrs Pargeter could not believe that this human wreck was capable of acting its bewilderment. Nor, come to that, could she believe that it had been capable of executing the carefully planned murder of Theresa Cotton.
But she had to check, had to get something more positive. “Two and a half weeks ago, the Monday of the week before last,” she began firmly, “where were you?”
He looked at her as if she had suddenly started speaking in a foreign language. “Huh?”
“Did you go to Smithy’s Loam two and a half weeks ago?”
He turned his head in slow confusion. “I don’t know. I was here…I think. I’m always here. Always round here…always round about…When I’m not in prison…Or hospital…” He tapped his grubby plaster. “Hospital…”
“When did you break your arm?” Mrs Pargeter asked.
“Broke it. Broken…my arm. Then…I don’t know…Fell down…” His eyes focused for a split-second. “Where’s the bottle?”
“In a moment.” Mrs Pargeter signalled to Truffler Mason, who was seated on a bench a few yards away, maintaining his surveillance over the top of a newspaper. He nodded, taking in the instruction. Casually, he reached into his pocket for a Polaroid camera, rose to his feet and ambled past the two on the opposite bench. As he came level, he took a close-up photograph of the tramp beside Mrs Pargeter. Rod Cotton gave no sign of having noticed what had happened. He seemed to have sunk into a kind of coma.
“When have you got to go back to the hospital?” Mrs Pargeter asked.
He looked at her blankly.
“For your arm…?”
He did not appear to understand this, either. Mrs Pargeter tried more questions, but all of them were met by the same vacant incomprehension. His eyelids were heavy. He looked as if he were about to doze off.
Mrs Pargeter knew she wouldn’t get much more out of him. She beckoned Truffler Mason across. “Did you get a decent shot?”
He showed her the picture, and she nodded. “Better go now, I think.”
She hesitated for a moment, and then withdrew the second whisky bottle from her pocket. She looked down at the comatose wreck of humanity beside her. “Do you think I should give it to him? I said I would.”
Truffler shrugged. “Don’t think it’ll make much difference. He doesn’t look long for this world, anyway.”
“No…” Still she hesitated.
“It’d give him a happy hour or two,” said Truffler.
She nodded and, still uncertain, held the bottle out.
The engrimed hands instantly reached across and snatched it away. The metal top was unscrewed in one movement and a heavy slug of whisky poured through the discoloured lips. Then the bottle was closed and tucked safely into the greatcoat.
Rod Cotton’s shadowed eyes looked up at her pitifully. “Have you got any money?”
“If I gave you money, you’d only spend it on more drink.”
He shook his head. “Not drink,” he said childishly. “Not drink.”
“Food…?”
“Not drink,” he asserted once again.
Mrs Pargeter looked for advice to Truffler Mason, but all she got was another shrug. She’d have to make up her own mind.
And she wasn’t the sort of women to resist the pathetic appeal in Rod Cotton’s eyes. Impulsively, she unclasped her handbag, reached into her purse and pulled out a fifty-pound note. Then she added another and held them out to the sad figure on the bench.
Truffler Mason looked away as the money was secreted in the filthy recesses of the greatcoat. Rod Cotton
