‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ said Inspector Fletcher. ‘What seems to be the trouble?’
‘It’s my back, sir. I seem to have twisted something. I think I need a massage.’
14
Inspector Grime of the Norfolk Constabulary hated London. He had hated it ever since his father took him there as a treat when he was seven years old. Master Grime had been accidentally separated from his father in a huge shop in Oxford Street and it had taken four very frightening hours before they were reunited. He disliked the noise, the clamour of streets too full of cars and carriages and carts and humans. He disliked the crowds rushing around on missions he did not understand. He disliked Londoners. He thought they were slick, superficial, devious and would rob you of your last farthing if they had a chance.
Now, stuck in a cab at eleven o’clock in the morning between Liverpool Street Station and Noel Road in Islington, home of William Lewis, son of the merry widow in Fakenham, he cursed the traffic that was making him late for his interview, arranged by telephone the afternoon before. Damn London, said the Inspector. At least I’ll be out of here this evening after I’ve seen the other Lewis up in Highgate.
William Lewis ushered him into an upstairs drawing room that looked out on to a garden and the Regent’s Park Canal. ‘You’ve come a long way to see me, Inspector, it must be important. Would you like some coffee?’
‘Thank you, but no,’ said the Inspector. ‘I’m sorry to have to ask you personal questions, but this is a murder inquiry. I wonder if you could tell me about how your mother coped after your father died. In a general way, if you see what I mean.’
‘Have you met my mother, Inspector?’
‘I’m afraid I haven’t had that pleasure yet, Mr Lewis. My sergeant went to talk to her and reported back.’
‘Pity, that,’ said William Lewis. ‘Things might have been easier if you had. Let me try to answer your question, Inspector. My mother is a creature of fancy. My father once referred to her as being blessed with an iron whim. She gets ideas into her head. And unlike a lot of women who are content to leave the idea where it is, she acts on them. Not all the time, just most of the time. My brother and I — he’s the elder, by the way — tried to persuade her to stay where she was after our father passed away. The house was more than adequate for her needs. I’m not saying she had a lot of friends, but she knew a lot of people round there. But no, that wouldn’t do. Sell the house, move to Fakenham — why Fakenham, for God’s sake? She was going slightly mad.’
‘When you refer to her going slightly mad, sir, what do you mean? Was she behaving out of character?’
‘I think you could say she was behaving entirely in character, that was the trouble. Who in their right mind would want to get involved with an ageing bounty hunter who stalked his victims over the flower rotas and the Harvest Festival at the local church?’
‘I hope you won’t mind my asking, sir, but did you meet Mr Gill the bursar? What did you think of him?’
William Lewis snorted. ‘He was awful. Creepy, sucking up to my mother all the time, calling her darling and my love and all that sort of stuff. You could tell a mile off that he was only interested in the money.’
‘So what did you and your brother do about it?’
‘We tried, Inspector, we tried. God knows we tried to talk some sense into her. What did she think she was doing, marrying this useless specimen of humanity? And if she did have to marry him, why did she have to leave him all her money? What would Father have thought of it?’
Inspector Grime had a sudden vision of Horace Lewis, obsessed with the sale of his undergarments, supposedly up a ladder in the stockroom with a very pretty girl beside him.
‘We can get the exact figures from the solicitors, Mr Lewis, but I wonder if you could tell us exactly how much money we’re talking about here. In the shares and the property?’
William Lewis looked out of the window. A barge was making slow passage towards the long tunnel at the top end of Noel Road. ‘You may find this hard to believe, Inspector, but I don’t know. Truly I don’t. I could never keep up with the numbers at school. My brother Montague looks after all that. I know I have enough to live comfortably off the shares.’
‘Could I ask you to tell me how you felt about Mr Gill, sir? Did you dislike him? Did you hate him?’
William Lewis wasn’t going to own up to hatred. ‘Dislike would do it, Inspector,’ he said. ‘Extreme dislike, maybe.’
‘Did you kill Roderick Gill, Mr Lewis?’
‘I did not.’
‘Could you tell me where you were on the afternoon and evening of January twenty-second?’
‘Of course. In the afternoon I went for a walk, as I usually do, Inspector. I spent the evening with my brother. We played chess.’
‘Who won?’
‘I did, Inspector. It was quite a long game. In the end I captured his queen with a fork and that was the end of my brother. On the chessboard, I mean.’
Forty minutes later Inspector Grime was in the small library at 14 North Road, Highgate, home of the mathematically minded Montague Lewis, elder son of Mrs Maud Lewis of Fakenham. The conversation followed remarkably similar lines to the earlier interview in Noel Road. Montague Lewis, like his brother, thought his mother had gone slightly mad. He could see no reason why she wanted to marry this wretched bounty hunter. The Inspector noted that they used exactly the same word to describe Roderick Gill. It could have been collusion before he arrived, or it could have been the way they had talked about him for months.
‘How would you describe your feelings towards Roderick Gill, sir? Dislike? Loathing? Hatred?’
‘I don’t think I’d go as far as that, Inspector,’ said Montague Lewis. ‘I despised him, that’s the best way to put it, I think. I despised him for creeping round my mother the way he did, I despised him for insisting they get married as soon as possible.’
‘Did you kill him?’
‘I did not.’
‘Could you tell me your whereabouts on the afternoon and evening of January the twenty-second?’
‘Of course, Inspector. I spent the afternoon at the London Library. The staff there will confirm that. I spent the evening at my brother’s house.’
‘And what were you doing at your brother’s house, sir?’
‘Sorry, we were playing chess, Inspector.’
‘Who won?’
Montague Lewis looked cross all of a sudden.
‘I did,’ he said. ‘I usually beat William at chess.’
Inspector Grime didn’t know what to make of it. For now he said his farewells. He wondered how much collusion there had been between the brothers, all wasted by a silly mistake, not agreeing a common line on the chess match. Both of them must have been lying, he thought. Heaven knew what they had been doing that evening but one lie was not enough to convict anybody of murder.
As he made his way towards his train, Inspector Grime cursed London with greater fury than ever. Somewhere on his travels around the capital, probably in this very station where he now stood, swearing loudly, his pocket had been picked. The Artful Dodger had his wallet and the train ticket to take him home to Fakenham.
The old men of the Jesus Hospital were in rebellious mood in the days after they talked about their lives and their jobs to Inspector Fletcher and his sergeant. Even a new dress for the barmaid in the Rose and Crown had been unable to staunch their anger. The fit among them agreed to hold a meeting in the pub at seven o’clock in the evening. Three of their number were confined to bed on doctor’s orders. Two could see little point in wasting their money in the pub. Another two were teetotal and had never tasted a drop of alcohol in their lives. Their companions never tired of pointing out that this appeared to have done little to improve their health. On the contrary, these two were considered by the experts as the most likely to join the late Abel Meredith in the Jesus Hospital section of the graveyard. The rest made their way at varying speeds to the Rose and Crown where they were welcomed by the barmaid, pulling pints as fast as she could go.
They discussed various means of registering their protest. Hunger strikes were considered until those still in
