‘Er—premeditated, sir, definitely. Why park his car so far away from the house? Why borrow a car in the first place?’
‘But, if it was premeditated, you nit, bang goes his motive! You say he killed Cynthia Perking because she was pregnant. Well, how did he know? She’d only found out for sure herself that morning.’
‘Well ’ began MacGregor.
‘You can’t have it both ways, laddie. And if it wasn’t premeditated, bang goes all this business about him using somebody else’s car and parking it away from the house. Castles in the air, laddie, that’s what you’re building! You’ve been reading too many of these daft detective stories. Take it from me, laddie, real-life crime’s not like that.’ Dover belched comfortably.
MacGregor tried again. T think . . . ’
‘Look, laddie,’ growled Dover, his temporary good humour deserting him rapidly, ‘we’re not going to spend all night flogging a dead horse. Hcreward Topping-Wibbley is a nonstarter! Get it? Cynthia Perking was done in by her husband and tomorrow morning you can push off bright and early and get a warrant for him. Then we’ll nip over to his sister’s place and arrest the bastard. This is an open-and-shut case and I’m damned if I’m having you making a four-course meal out of it. And you’d better look up the trains back to London after lunch too, while you’re about it.’
MacGregor was appalled. For a few seconds he couldn’t think of anything to say and watched in stunned silence as Dover helped himself to another cigarette. If somebody didn’t do something, the old fool would just steamroller his way to black disaster. Mentally awarding himself the Victoria Cross MacGregor took his courage in both hands. ‘Sir, I really must protest. No, please, sir—let me have my say. If you don’t, I shall really feel obliged to put in an official complaint.’
‘You cheeky young bugger!’ gasped Dover. ‘After all I’ve done for you! Talk about biting the hand that feeds you, this takes the bleeding biscuit!’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I mean it,’ said MacGregor stoutly. ‘You simply can’t just waltz off and arrest John Perking like that— simply because you’ve got a general theory about wife murderers. Good heavens, sir, you haven’t even clapped eyes on John Perking yet, never mind questioned him. He may be able to clear himself quite easily, apart from the fact that in my considered opinion his wife was already dead long before he got back home from work.’
‘All right,’ roared Dover, his little black moustache twitching with fury, ‘I’ll just damned well prove to you here and now that Perking killed her! I was trying to spare your feelings but I can see now that such consideration on my part is like water off a dead duck’s back. Now, just pin those shell-like lug-holes of yours well back, sergeant, and listen! Call yourself a detective? You’ve about as much blasted idea of detecting as . . . ’ Once again Dover couldn’t think of a suitable simile so he abandoned the search. ‘Yesterday afternoon, from the time Cynthia Perking left her next-door neighbour’s until the time that copper off the cars confirmed that she was dead, only two people entered that house. Agreed? One was your mysterious stranger who may or may not be Hereward Topping-Wibbley and the other was the dead woman’s husband. Right?’
‘As far as we know, sir.’
‘As far as we know at the moment, but if you think a mouse could have got in without one of those nosey women spotting it you’ve got more faith in human nature than I have. Now, your chap calls and goes away again. I don’t know why he called and you don’t know why he called. It doesn’t bloody well matter. When he left Cynthia Perking was still alive.’
‘Mrs Withy combe didn’t see her, sir,’ MacGregor pointed out sulkily. ‘She said . . . ’
‘Yacking again, MacGregor? You can’t stop that mouth of yours flapping for two minutes, can you? It’s a pity you don’t talk less and use what passes for your brains a bit more. What about the bloody television set?’
‘The television set, sir?’
‘Yes,’ lisped Dover in a crude attempt at mimicking his sergeant’s more cultured tones, ‘the television set, sir! Look in your little notebook and see what the policeman who examined the body had to say about the television set.’
‘I can remember perfectly well, as it happens, sir. He said that when he entered the room where Mrs Perking was lying the television set—which she had been watching— was still on. He even remembered what the programme was and, when he checked, he found that the set was still switched on to the station Mrs Perking used to watch every afternoon.’
‘Well,’ said Dover, assuming a heavy condescending manner which made MacGregor long to kick him where it would do most good, ‘of course I don’t know how they do things in the elevated social circles in which you move, but in my humble environment we switch the telly off when guests arrive. Matter of common politeness, I should have thought. Now, just work it out for yourself, laddie. Cynthia Perking is sitting there watching the telly. At five o’clock the front-door bell rings. She goes to answer it and brings the caller back into the sitting-room. She switches off the telly and they have their little chat or what-have-you. His lordship or whoever-it-is stays until twenty-five past five. “Don’t bother coming to the front door,” he says all polite-like, “I’ll see myself out.” “O.K.,” she says with one eye on the clock, and out he goes. She makes a dive for the television set and switches it on. She’s in time to see the last ten minutes or so of her precious serial. You know what these telly addicts are like: half a programme’s better than nothing. And that, my clever young gentleman, is why the telly was on. If your mysterious visitor
