The Jewel That Was Ours

'Er, I'll just, er. ' Lewis had seen the phone in the entrance-hall and with Mrs. Kemp's permission he now quickly left the room and rang HQ for a WPC. He felt profoundly uneasy, for he'd known the same sort of thing on several previous occasions: surviving relatives rabbiting on, as if so fearful of hearing the dreaded information.

'She'll be along soon, madam,' reported Lewis, seating himself again. 'Very dangerous that stretch by the Botley turn. '

'Not for the driver, Sergeant! Not on this occasion. One broken collar-bone, and a cut on the back of his shoulder — and even that refused to bleed for more than a couple of minutes.' The bitterness in her voice had become so intense that Lewis couldn't think of anything, even anything inadequate, to say. 'It would have been better if he'd killed me, and had done with the whole thing! I'm sure he thinks that. You see, he can't get rid of me — not the way he could get rid of any normal wife. He has to keep coming back all the time to look after my needs when. when he'd much rather be out having his needs looked after. You do know what I'm talking about, don't you, Sergeant?'

Lewis knew, yes; but he waited a little, nodding his sympathy to a woman who, for the moment, had said her immediate say.

'What time did your husband leave this morning?' he asked quietly, noting a pair of nervous eyes suddenly flash across at him.

'Seven-twenty. A taxi called. My husband was banned for three years after he'd killed me.'

Lewis shook his head helplessly: 'He didn't kill you, madam—'

'Yes he did! He killed the woman in the other car — and he killed me, too!'

Lewis it was who broke the long silence between them, and took out his note-book: 'You knew where he was going?'

'His publishers. He's just finished a book and now he's doing some chapters for the new Cambridge History of Early Britain.'

'And he actually—went, did he?'

'Don't be silly! Of course he went. He rang me up from London. The post hadn't come when he left, and he wanted to know if some proofs had arrived.'

'What time did you expect him back?'

'I wasn't sure. There'd been some trouble at The Randolph. You know all about that?'

Lewis nodded — ever dreading that inexorable moment when she, too, would have to know all about something else.

'They'd changed the programme — I forget exactly what he said. But he'd have been home by half-past ten. He's never later than that. '

The slim, dark-haired, rather plain woman in the wheelchair was beginning to betray the symptoms of panic. Talk on, Lewis! Write something in that little book of yours. Do anything!

'You've no idea where he might have gone to when he came back from London?'

'No, no, no, Sergeant! How could I? He'd hardly even have the time to see his precious Sheila bloody Williams, would he? That over-sexed, pathetic, alcoholic. '

Talk on, Lewis!

'He must have been pretty upset about the Wolvercote Jewel.'

'He'd been waiting long enough to see it.'

'Why didn't he go over to America to see it?'

'I wouldn't let him.'

Lewis looked down at the uncarpeted floor-boards and put his note-book away.

'Oh no! I wasn't going to be left here on my own. Not after what he did to me!'

'Mrs. Kemp, I'm afraid I've got—'

But Marion was staring down into some bleak abyss. Her voice, so savagely vindictive just a moment since, was suddenly tremulous and fearful — almost as if she already knew. 'I wasn't very nice to him about if, was I?'

Blessedly the front-door bell rang, and Lewis rose to his feet. 'That'll be the policewoman, Mrs. Kemp. I'll — if it's OK — I'll go and. Look, there's something we've got to tell you. I'll just go and let her in.'

'He's dead. He's dead, Sergeant, isn't he?'

'Yes, Mrs. Kemp. He's dead.'

She made no sound but the tips of her taut and bloodless fingers dug into her temples as if seeking to sever the nerves that carried the message from ears to brain.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice

(Mark Twain, Following the Equator)

'SIT DOWN, INSPECTOR! Can I get you a drink?'

Sheila Williams, fairly sober and fully respectable, was drinking a cup of black coffee.

'What — coffee?'