‘That’s my fiance you’ve got there,’ says Charlie. ‘Did you know that? Remember, we talked about him? You wondered why I wouldn’t choose to paint him, if I had to paint somebody.’
‘I don’t care who he is. Stop where you are, or I’ll shoot him. I mean it!’
‘I love him. We’re supposed to be getting married, even though everyone we know thinks it’s a really bad idea.’
‘Shut up!’
‘It isn’t a bad idea, though, because I can’t be happy unless I’m with Simon. And after what I’ve been through, I think I deserve to be happy. You know all about what happened to me, right? You told me you did. I’m just like you, Martha. My life was in pieces, all because of a man…’
‘Don’t call me that!’
‘… but I was lucky enough to find a way out of my despair. I’ve got a chance to be happy now, and… well, the thing is, Simon and I haven’t actually been happy together yet, even though we’ve known each other for years. All we’ve done is waste time.’
Mary swings the gun round, points it at Charlie. The hammer falls from her left hand. That’s right: she broke her fingers.
‘Put the gun down, Mary,’ says Waterhouse.
‘Keep quiet!’ Her voice is shaking so much, I barely recognise the words. ‘Or I’ll shoot you so you die, like Gemma. Not like these two. I never wanted to kill them. Ruth’s my friend.’
‘You didn’t want to kill Aidan?’ Charlie says. ‘You shot him in the chest.’
‘I shot him in the shoulder. I… I meant to aim higher. I didn’t want to shoot him at all, but he wouldn’t…’
‘Wouldn’t what?’
‘He wouldn’t admit that he loves me.’
I hear a series of noises that are painful to listen to: shrill one minute, rasping the next. Can they all be coming from Mary? They don’t sound human.
‘The medics need to come in here and help Aidan and Ruth,’ says Charlie gently. ‘You’re going to let them do that, aren’t you, Martha?’
‘Martha’s dead!’
‘You said you didn’t want to kill them…’
‘If I do what you’re asking, what will happen to me?’
‘Prison. You know that. You’re not stupid. You’ll be able to paint there, though. Or write, if you want to. I’ll make sure of that. I’ll look after you, but first you’ve got to put the gun down.’
‘What about my paintings, the ones in my house? What will happen to them?’
There’s a pause. It seems to last a long time.
‘Nothing. They’ll be waiting for you when you get out. And you will get out. You’ve got to trust-’
‘How long?’
‘I don’t know exactly. With extenuating circumstances taken into account, perhaps five years.’
‘You’re lying!’ Mary waves the gun in the air as if she can’t decide who to aim for. ‘Five years for a murder and two attempted murders? That’s too little. How long? Tell me the truth.’
‘You’ll be allowed to keep some of your paintings with you on the inside,’ says Charlie. I hear fear in her voice for the first time. ‘I’ll do everything I can to make sure-’
‘I wouldn’t be able to take them all with me, would I? All my pictures?’
‘Hand the gun to me and I’ll make sure they go with you, every single one of them.’
‘You’ve seen how many there are.’ Mary’s voice shakes. ‘They won’t fit in a prison cell. I can’t not have them with me.’
‘There are prisons that have other kinds of accommodation, not only cells. Women’s prisons especially. Some prisoners have their own rooms, or they share with one other person, but the rooms are a decent size.’
‘Sounds like a Villiers dorm.’
‘It’s true, Mary,’ says Waterhouse. ‘We’ll make sure you have the space you need for your paintings.’
‘You’re lying, both of you,’ she says, sounding calmer. ‘That’s okay. I won’t hold it against you.’ She lifts the gun, holds it to the side of her own head. When she speaks again, I can hear that she’s smiling, even though her face is turned away from me. ‘Now, Martha,’ she says. ‘No mistakes this time.’
‘No!’ Charlie screams.
‘I think yes,’ says Mary, and pulls the trigger.
28
‘The CPS won’t touch it with a bargepole unless we can do better than this,’ said Proust. His ‘World’s Greatest Grandad’ mug lay on its side. He rolled it back and forth on his desk, smacking the handle against the wood every few seconds. ‘It doesn’t help that Aidan Seed’s in the habit of confessing to killings that never took place. He still hasn’t offered a satisfactory explanation for why he did that-why tell us he’d killed one woman when in fact he’d killed someone altogether different?’
‘He’s still in bad shape, sir,’ said Charlie. ‘Ruth Bussey’s explained it in Seed’s presence. I was there. I saw him confirm her explanation as best he could. Seed regretted having told Bussey he’d killed Trelease. He got cold feet about facing up to the truth after all these years, and by that time he knew Martha Wyers was calling herself Mary Trelease, so he decided to turn what he’d originally intended to be the beginning of his true confession-“I killed Mary Trelease”-into an easily disprovable false one.’ Charlie shrugged. ‘I know you don’t like it, but it does make sense, sir.’
‘If that’s your opinion, Sergeant Zailer, then you have my condolences.’
‘We’ve been through this,’ said Simon impatiently.
‘Not everyone’s mind works in exactly the same way yours does, sir.’
Proust gave Charlie the look he reserved for despicable traitors.
‘Even if we accept Bussey and Seed’s explanation and a revised confession from Seed, it’s going to be an uphill struggle if Len Smith sticks to his story,’ said Sam Kombothekra.
‘The CPS don’t do uphill struggles, sergeant. You know that as well as I do. They prefer gentle strolls down country lanes.’
Sam nodded unhappily. ‘In their eyes, Smith’s a killer, yes, but he’s not a liar.’
‘He isn’t a killer,’ said Simon. He wasn’t interested in other people’s eyes and the things they saw that weren’t there. After last week he was less interested than he’d been before. Most people were idiots, even those whose rank and years of experience might suggest otherwise. Coral Milward had been so determined to nail Stephen Elton for Gemma Crowther’s murder that she’d wasted God knows how much time trying to break down what she’d called Elton’s ‘suspiciously solid’ alibi. It was solid because he’d been telling the truth.
Elton, Simon had heard from Colin Sellers, was a habitual user of prostitutes, both male and female. (‘No droughts for him, lucky sod. World’s his oyster-both hemispheres.’) After helping to clear up at Friends House on the night Gemma was murdered, he’d paid a visit to one of his regulars, a sixteen-year-old called Sharda who shared a bedsit in Seven Sisters with three other illegal immigrant sex workers. Elton’s alibi was also his motive: Gemma Crowther had known about his habit and regularly threatened to expose it to their Quaker friends if he didn’t follow her orders to the letter. Effectively, he was her domestic slave. Elton had been foolish enough to admit to Milward that he’d frequently fantasised about killing Gemma, and only didn’t because he loved her. ‘You’ve got to admit, though, that’s a good reason,’ Sellers had remarked this morning to Simon, entirely without irony.
Mary Trelease hadn’t been interviewed at all, despite a long and elaborate description she’d given Ruth Bussey of an encounter with a detective from London. All lies. Dunning had called at 15 Megson Crescent several times and got no response. When he finally got round to entering the premises by force, Trelease and Ruth Bussey had already left for Garstead Cottage. Simon had found this out from DC Kevin Prothero, the newest member of Milward’s team, the one to whom she’d assigned the task of dealing with some of the more awkward loose ends. Two of these were Simon and Charlie.
