‘Linda is downstairs in her room and that is where she is going to stay.’
‘But I want to see her.’
‘So I have gathered. Unfortunately, I cannot permit it.’ Dover goggled and gulped down the last of the toast. ‘Why the hell not?’
‘My daughter may have the appearance of a mature woman but she has the mind of a child. You would not, I imagine, cross-examine a five-year-old girl about a murder.’
‘Kids have been questioned before,’ objected Dover. ‘Of course, it needs handling with tact and delicacy by an expert but.. .’
‘What has happened in other cases is of no concern to me. I have my daughter’s interests to consider and I have no intention of standing idly by while you revive memories whose horrors are now mercifully beginning to fade into the background.’
‘ ’Strewth,’ Dover grumbled, ‘I’m not going to eat the girl!’ Wing Commander Pile remained perfectly calm. ‘You are not going to interview her, either. I don’t know how far your powers extend, chief inspector, but I am fully prepared to make an issue of this. I have already been in touch with Linda’s medical advisers and they all, without exception, agree that she should not be subjected to any form of police interrogation.’
Dover sighed. This joker spelt trouble. He looked the sort of bastard who not only knew all his own rights but everybody else’s as well. Of course, in normal circumstances, Dover would have flattened him quicker than that but, what with his stomach and this cold . . . A somewhat tatty olive branch was offered. ‘I’d have no objection to you being present.’
Wing Commander Pile contented himself with a curt shake of his head.
‘It is a murder case,’ Dover pointed out dejectedly.
‘My daughter could tell you nothing which would help you in your enquiries. She was well away from the scene when Mr Chantry was killed.’
‘Oh?’ said Dover, rallying a bit. ‘And how do you know when Chantry was killed?’
‘I don’t – but it was certainly after Mrs Lickes had escorted Linda back to this hotel.’ Wing Commander Pile expertly and effortlessly swung a chair into precisely the right position and seated himself upon it with a crisp economy of movement. ‘When you are ready, I will make my statement.’
‘I’m ready now,’ said Dover.
Wing Commander Pile’s eyebrows rose. ‘Aren’t you going to take notes?’
‘Notes?’ Dover sank back with a suppressed groan of fury. What did this snooty beggar think he was – a bloody shorthand-typist? ‘I have a sergeant to take notes!’ he growled.
‘But your sergeant isn’t here.’
‘He never bloody well is when he’s wanted,’ snarled Dover. ‘Still, it makes no odds. I’ve got a photographic memory.’
Wing Commander Pile’s eyebrows went higher.
‘It’s true!’ insisted Dover, over-elaborating his lies as usual. ‘You ask anybody up at the Yard. I’m famous for it. They call me What’s-his-name of the Metropolitan Police.’
‘I can well believe it.’
‘So you don’t have to worry.’ Dover laughed with touching modesty and tapped himself on the forehead. ‘Anything you say’ll be stored up here. Word for word. Like one of those computer things. Now, you just go right ahead and tell me what happened. Start from the earthquake.’
‘Well,’ – Wing Commander Pile frowned as he marshalled his thoughts before recording them for ever in the self-proclaimed human memory bank – ‘we were in bed, of course. Asleep. I suppose the first tremors partially woke me up but, before I could realize what was happening, my bed, the bedroom, the whole house appeared to slide and then tip over towards the rear. Then I heard this ominous cracking sound over my head and somehow I knew that the roof was collapsing. One does have these peculiar flashes of comprehension in moments of crisis – I’ve noticed it before. Well, I remember calling out – a warning to Linda, I suppose – and the next minute the entire ceiling just fell down on top of me. I lost consciousness. Something hit me on the head, I think. A tile? A beam? I don’t know. I don’t think I was knocked out for more than a minute or two. When I came back to my senses I found myself buried under all this debris and rubbish. I was just beginning to try and free myself when I heard somebody shouting my name.’ The wing commander paused to let the suspense build up. ‘It was Walter Chantry.’
Dover, who was desperate to get his own back, didn’t even open his eyes.
‘Walter Chantry!’ repeated Wing Commander Pile. ‘He saved my life. It is thanks to him, and to him alone, that I am sitting here today.’
Dover refrained from comment.
‘I am making it my business,’ Wing Commander Pile went on grandly, ‘to get a posthumous George Medal for him. I feel it’s the least I can do.’
‘He ought to get something,’ agreed Dover. ‘Well, what happened next?’
‘I called out to Chantry not to bother about me but to help Linda. He shouted back that he had already got her out and that she was all right.’ Wing Commander Pile broke off his narrative to stare suspicously at Dover. ‘You are taking all this in, I hope?’
The chief inspector, suddenly envisaging letters of complaint winging their way straight to the Assistant Commissioner (Crime), opened his eyes and assumed an expression of alert intelligence. ‘Every word,’ he assured Wing Commander Pile earnestly.
‘Good,’ came the stem reply, ‘because I can promise you I have no intention of repeating it. Well, I then heard Mr Chantry scrambling in through the window – most of the glass had already fallen out – and he started trying to extricate me. Eventually, he succeeded. I cannot emphasize Mr Chantry’s bravery too much. The back part of the house had already gone and the part I was trapped in could have collapsed at any moment. It is not every man who, in that terrifying darkness, would have risked his own life to save that of
