door.
‘Yes?’
‘Look, I’m sorry to break into your rehearsal, but I wonder if you could give me a hand to carry something.’ And So Much Comic… was shelved again.
Outside the Office stood Willy Mariello’s forlorn guitar in its black case, leaning against a large amplifier. It had been brought up from the Masonic Hall after Tuesday’s drama. By the door was a thin girl with long brown hair and those peculiarly Scottish cheeks that really do look like apples. Tension showed in the tightness of her mouth and the hollows under her eyes. ‘Charles, this is Jean Mariello. Mrs Mariello, Charles Paris.’
She nodded functionally. ‘I’ve come to collect Willy’s things.’
‘Yes. Charles, I wonder if you could give me a hand with this amplifier. If we just get it out on to the street, I’ve phoned for a taxi.’
‘O.K.’ Brian was patently embarrassed and wanted to get rid of Jean Mariello. His administrative ability did not run to dealing with recent widows.
They placed the heavy amplifier on the pavement. Willy’s wife followed with the guitar. Brian straightened up. ‘I’d better go. I’ve got some Letrasetting to get on with.’
‘What am I going to do the other end?’
Brian paused, disconcerted by her question. Charles stepped in. ‘It’s all right. I’ll go with you. I wanted to go over that way. Off Lauriston Place, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh… Oh well, that’s fine. I’ll go and get on with the… er… Letrasetting.’ Brian scuttled indoors.
Charles felt he should say something fitting. ‘I’m sorry.’
Jean Mariello shrugged. ‘Thank you.’
The taxi arrived and they travelled for a while in silence. Charles felt the need for some other inadequate condolence. ‘It must be terrible for you. We were all very shaken.’
‘Yes, it’s been a shock. But please don’t feel you have to say anything. Willy and I weren’t love’s young dream, you know.’ The accent was Scots and she spoke quietly, but there was a hard note in her voice.
‘Did you live together?’
‘Up to a point. Though one or other of us always seemed to be touring or something.’
‘You’re a musician too?’
‘Yes. I sing in folk clubs. Not Willy’s sort of music. We grew apart musically as well as everything else.’ She leant forward and tapped the glass partition. ‘If you drop us just here…’
Meadow Lane was lined with grey houses, considerably smaller than those of Coates Gardens. They had the dusty shabbiness of the Old Town. Most of the windows were shrouded with grey net. But on the house they stopped by the windows were clean and unveiled.
Charles let Jean pay the driver. She turned to him. ‘Can you manage that on your own? It’s heavy.’
It certainly was. Also an awkward size. His hands could not quite clasp round it. But he was determined to manage.
As she opened the front door, he noticed a worn stone slab over it which dated the house: 1797. Inside, however, the place had been extensively modernised. There was no sign of a fireplace in the front room, but there were new-looking central heating radiators. Everything gleamed with fresh white paint. There was even a smell of it. The room was empty of furniture, but a ladder and a pile of rubble in the corner indicated decorating in progress.
He lowered the amplifier gratefully on to the uncarpeted floor. ‘Would you mind putting it against the wall there where people can’t see it? The catch has gone on the window and I don’t want to encourage burglars.’
Another effort moved the amplifier to the required position. He stood up. Jean Mariello had left the front door open and stood with her arms folded. He was expected to go.
And he was never likely to get such a good opportunity for finding out more about Willy. No point in beating about the bush. ‘Mrs Mariello, do you think your husband was murdered?’
She was not shocked or angry, she seemed to expect the question. ‘No, I don’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘No one wanted to kill him. Listen, Willy wasn’t a particularly nice person. He was mean and lazy. But those aren’t reasons for anyone to murder someone.’
‘No. But you can’t think of anything he might have done to antagonise anyone in that Derby lot?’
‘I’ve hardly met any of that Derby lot, so I wouldn’t know. Listen, Mr Paris, I can understand your curiosity, but the police have asked me all these questions and so has everyone I’ve met for the past two days. I’m getting rather bored with it, and I’d be grateful if you would stop.’
‘I’m sorry, Mrs Mariello, but I do have a reason for asking.’ And he told her of his encounter with Willy in the Truth Game. At the end he paused dramatically.
She did not seem over-impressed. ‘You say he seemed troubled?’
‘Yes.’
‘Probably some horse he’d backed had been beaten.’
‘No, it was more than that. I’m sure it was. Something that really went deep.’
‘Nothing went very deep with Willy. That Truth Game could have meant anything. What makes you so sure it was something serious?’
He could only supply a lame ‘Instinct’.
To give her her due, Jean Mariello did not actually laugh out loud. ‘Well, instinct tells me, from knowing him pretty well, that the only thing that upset Willy was not getting his own way. He was spoilt. He’d had a lot of success and it went to his head. Used to be just a builder’s labourer, playing guitar in his spare time. Then the group took off and suddenly he was famous. Everyone gave him everything he wanted and he started getting bad- tempered if anything didn’t fail into his lap. If he was upset, it must have been that some girl had slapped his face.’
‘There were a lot of girls?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you know if he’d been particularly involved with anyone recently?’
‘We didn’t discuss it. We went our own ways. Listen, Willy was a slob. All right, I’m sorry he died, but he was no great loss.’
Charles was shocked by her honesty and his face must have betrayed it. Jean laughed. ‘Yes, you’re wondering why I married him. Well, I was only seventeen, I wanted to be a musician and I wanted to get away from my parents. And Willy was different then-it was before he became successful. He was less sure of himself and, as a result, less selfish. We both changed. He became a bastard and I got a lot tougher. In self-defence.’
There was a slight tremor on the last words, the first sign of human feeling that she had shown. The callous attitude to her husband’s death was a protective shell, distancing her from reality. It was true that she had not loved him, but the killing had affected her. Charles changed his approach slightly. ‘When did you last see him?’
‘Last Friday. I went down to Carlisle to start a tour of folk clubs. Then this happened. I’ll be joining the tour again as soon as I’ve got things sorted out.’
‘And Willy didn’t seem upset when you left?’
‘He was exactly as usual.’
‘And you’ve no idea what he was doing over the weekend?’
‘Screwing some bird probably. Decorating here maybe. Rehearsing his bloody show. I don’t know.’
The edge was creeping back into her voice. She wanted Charles to leave. She wanted to be on her own. Maybe so that she could break down and cry her heart out. There was not time for many more questions. ‘Why did he get involved in the show in the first place?’
‘Puce split up. Willy had delusions of grandeur-wanted to get it together as an all-round entertainer. Another Tommy Steele. No big impresario offered him a contract, but Derby University offered him a part in their tatty show. I suppose he saw it as a rung on the ladder to stardom.’ She put an infinity of scorn into that word.
‘Sounds unlikely.’
‘Maybe there was some other reason. Look, Mr Paris-’
‘I’m sorry. I’ll go. Can I just ask you again-was there anyone you can think of, however unlikely, who might have profited by your husband’s death?’
