Dover sniffed unpleasantly. With a sigh he leaned over the garden wall and looked at the entirely undistinguished patch of grass which lay on the other side. ‘Where was the blooming body?’
‘Er, right here, sir, tucked up under the wall. Hiding it from the road as much as they could, I suppose.’ MacGregor fished importantly in his briefcase and produced one of the official photographs.
‘Never mind!’ growled Dover. ‘I can imagine. And don’t keep waving those dratted photographs at me. They fair turn my stomach.’
‘Are we going to interview Mrs Hamilton, sir?’
‘Might as well,’ said Dover sourly. ‘At least we’ll be out of the rain.’
He pushed himself off the wall and gazed morosely round. A flicker of life came into his mean little eyes. ‘I thought that fat sponger said that there were some council offices on the other side of the road,’ he said accusingly.
MacGregor followed the direction of the Chief Inspector’s eyes. No council offices. He looked back at the house.
‘Oh, I’m sorry, sir. This is number 15. It’s number 25 we want. It’s the numbers, you see, sir, they’re practically illegible. I’m terribly sorry, sir. Number 25 must be a bit higher up.’
‘And he calls himself a blooming detective!’ murmured Dover. Not entirely displeased at having caught his subordinate out, he stumped off after MacGregor who was peering intently at the house numbers.
‘I think this is it, sir.’ MacGregor advanced halfway up the front steps and looked closely at the number on the door. It was obscured by several layers of old and blistered paint but MacGregor was satisfied that he had now found the right house.
Having surveyed one front garden Dover wasn’t going to waste his time examining another, scene of the crime or not. ‘ Ring the blooming bell,’ he ordered, ‘and let’s get on with it.’
Dutifully MacGregor rang and rang and rang. By the time Dover had lumbered up the steps precisely nothing had happened. The house remained as apparently lifeless as it had been when MacGregor’s finger first made contact with the bell push.
‘She must be out, sir.’
The rain trickled off the brim of Dover’s bowler hat. He reflected, not for the first time, that it was a dog’s life and lashed out with a malicious kick at the door. Still nothing happened. Again Dover applied boot to wood.
MacGregor’s alert young ears picked up a muffled sound from the depths of the house. ‘I think somebody’s coming, sir.’
From behind the door came a sustained rattling and clinking as bolts were withdrawn and keys turned in the locks. With a weary creak the door scraped open by at least six inches. Above a stout taut chain a shadowy face appeared.
‘Wat yer want?’
MacGregor, after a moment’s hesitation, raised his hat politely. ‘Mrs Hamilton? I wonder if we could have a few words with you. This is Detective Chief Inspector Dover. We’re from Scotland Yard.’
One suspicious eye regarded MacGregor warily.
‘Wat yer want?’
MacGregor looked at Dover as if expecting him to assume the initiative. Dover glowered back. ‘For God’s sake, get on with it!’ he hissed.
‘We would like to ask you a few questions about your husband’s, er, death, Mrs Hamilton.’
‘Oh yerse?’ said the eye.
Dover dug his elbow into MacGregor’s ribs as an encouragement to speed things up.
‘Perhaps,’ ventured MacGregor, ‘we could come inside?’
‘Why?’ demanded the eye.
MacGregor looked despairingly at his Chief Inspector. ‘ Well, you don’t want all the neighbours watching us, do you?’ he smiled persuasively.
‘Don’t bother me.’
MacGregor tried an appeal to her sympathy. ‘It is raining rather heavily,’ he pointed out. ‘We’re getting soaked.’
‘Yer’d better come back when the sun’s shining in that case.’
Dover got his boot in the narrow opening a split second after the door had started to close.
‘’Ere!’ protested the eye. ‘Wat yer think yer doing?’
‘Open this door, you old hag!’ snarled Dover, never very strong on public relations.
The eye assumed a cunning look. ‘ Yer’ll have to take yer foot out first. I can’t unfasten the chain ’cept with the door closed.’
Dover, in spite of much evidence to the contrary, wasn’t a complete fool. He had, moreover, cut his professional teeth on some pretty fly characters in the old days. ‘I’m not that daft,’ he sneered.
‘Looks like stalemate then, dunnit?’
‘You can get into serious trouble for obstructing the police in the execution of their duty,’ blustered Dover.
‘I know me rights. Yer can’t come in ’ere without I lets yer.’
‘We can get a warrant, you know,’ thundered Dover.
‘Well, you hop off and get one, mister.’
There was a pause while both sides considered the situation.
‘We just want to ask you a few simple questions,’ said Dover plaintively.
‘It’s no good arsking me. I don’t know nothing. I just went to bed that night after ’e’d gorn out and I didn’t know nothing till they told me next morning.’
‘Had your husband any enemies?’
There was a sardonic laugh from behind the door. ‘Just about every husband and father in Wallerton, I shouldn’t wonder. Not to mention a few sons.’
‘Oh, it was like that, was it?’
‘So I’ve been told. I reckon I was the only woman in the whole town he didn’t have those sort of ideas about. Dirty pig! He tried to get rid of me, you know. Wanted a divorce. Got his eye on some young bit of fluff down by the harbour end. I told him what he could do with his divorce. “ You can take yer divorce,” I told him, “and stuff it!” I haven’t put up with his goings on all these years just to let some young tart get her thieving hands on everything.’
‘Was he a wealthy man?’ asked Dover in some surprise.
‘Pretty warm. I’ll be all right, don’t chew worry. Ten thousand quid in insurance alone.’
‘Ten thousand?’ said Dover, and looked significantly at MacGregor.
‘I kept the payments up meself,’ said Mrs Hamilton proudly.
Dover regarded what little he could see of her with approval. Just like a woman! Yack, yack, yack. Putting the noose round her neck with her own tongue,
