‘This is quite ridiculous.’
‘No. It is not. The drinks in the back of the car indicate he didn’t drive away. They were not bought locally, and they were available. I believe you realised that the time of that garage door closing, when everybody thought the car was driving away, was critical.’
She was very still for a moment, then with an angry gesture she reached up and tore the rubber band from her hair, using it as something to occupy her fingers, stretching it so fiercely that I was sure it would snap. At the same time her hair danced furiously as her shaking head rejected what I’d been saying.
‘How could I possibly have thought that?’ she demanded angrily. ‘Everybody believed—I still believe—that Uncle Edwin drove away.’ She stopped. I was smiling at her. It cost a lot, that smile.
‘But Rosemary, you knew he’d not driven away, because the drinks on the back seat of your car were not bought by him that night, they were bought by you, in Lichfield, when you went there to collect Duncan.’
Her breath was drawn in with a gasp, and she was quite white, until anger sent a rush of blood upwards from her neck.
‘That’s a lie!’
‘I don’t believe so.’
‘Then go and do your believing somewhere else. I’m not going to listen to this.’
‘You couldn’t have anticipated that Duncan would be charged with the murder. But you wanted to give him an alibi, to play safe. He had the best motive—the inheritance, for what it was worth. But the alibi you gave him was for the wrong time, as it seemed then. He was charged, but for the murder time of much later, when your uncle was believed to have returned.’
She gestured violently—her anger, her bemusement. ‘What are you trying to do, damn you?’ There were tears in her voice. ‘Why would I want to give Duncan an alibi, for heaven’s sake?’
‘Because of the hints I’ve received. Only small things, expressions, tones of voice, evasions. I think you two were much closer than you’re both pretending.’
She managed to smile. ‘And what if we were?’ It became a grimace, reverted to a smile.
‘It might alter the situation.’
‘You’re a fool, Richard. Do you know that? Yes, we were very close, but that was long before. It all broke up, oh, at least three years before Uncle Edwin died.’
‘What happened?’
‘Glenda Grace. That’s what happened.’
So we’d come to the other subject I’d wanted to discuss, and with no effort from me. We’d also moved away from the question of the alibi. I wondered whether she’d realised that I’d not been talking about her alibi for Duncan, but his for her. If so, she’d steered me away from it very neatly.
‘You knew Glenda Grace?’
‘She got her claws…’ Then she flinched, as though I’d slapped her. Or she had. She shook her head violently. The thought so agitated her that she was no longer able to stand still, and she began pacing, only a few steps one way, a few steps hack, almost as though she felt herself restricted by her own taped, white lines.
‘It sounds as though you knew her before she even met Duncan,’ I suggested.
She stopped pacing and turned to stare at me with mute appeal, her eyes bright, strongly side-lit by the lamp.
‘I knew her’, she said, ‘when she was young and happy, just a schoolgirl. When there was nothing vicious and dirty in her life. But things happen to young girls, things beyond control. Perhaps she was on drugs, even so early. She looked like an angel, Richard, so innocent —those big eyes…’
‘What are you trying to tell me?’ I asked gently.
She flung herself into one of the leather chairs. ‘She was my daughter, Richard. You can’t expect me to tell you everything, at a first meeting. We were what they now call a one-parent family, while I was struggling to get on the stage, or write…don’t for God’s sake interrupt. Don’t tell me I neglected her. We couldn’t have been closer. Two sisters, that’s how I saw us. Perhaps that was wrong.’ She put the back of her hand against her mouth, and turned her shoulder to me.
I waited. I went to look out of the uncurtained window. A spatter of rain hit it. She was speaking again
‘Whatever I did, it must’ve been terribly wrong. One day I realised she genuinely hated me, through and through. She wanted to leave home…home, that was a scruffy little flat in London…and we had a flaming row. Only then—Richard…to see that smooth, beautiful face distorted, and hear those obscenities! I couldn’t answer her, couldn’t say a word. She walked out, next to nothing in her hands, and out of my life. She was sixteen.’
This was information I’d wanted, or thought I’d needed, but I hadn’t been prepared to receive it in this way.
‘I’ll get you a drink,’ I offered.
‘No!’ she shouted. ‘Let me say it. That…that was the time I lost heart. The novel, it was useless. Uncle Edwin offered me the job here. So I came. It was like a haven. You can understand why I love this house, every brick, even this smelly old musty room, if you want to know. Oh yes, I saw you twitch your nose.’
‘He knew?’ I asked. ‘Is that why your uncle offered?’
‘It came out of the blue. I hadn’t seen him for…oh, twenty years. When I was at college. I don’t think he knew about Glenda. But he might have done. He never mentioned her. Glenda Grace! My God, that was her professional name, and you can just guess what that profession was.’
‘I’m glad, anyway, that you’ve been happy here.’
Then she smiled. The years ran away. This woman was at least fifty, and for the past few minutes had looked sixty. But her face now glowed with warmth.
‘Edwin could not have been more thoughtful and kind. And of course, there was Duncan. It was here I met him again…we hadn’t seen each other since we were children. Then it’d been when our families met—I’m his second cousin, you know. He’s three or so years younger than me, but that didn’t seem to matter. Have you noticed…Duncan’s sort of timeless? So serious and unsmiling about his music…’
She hadn’t heard his plans for a musical play.
‘…like a university professor, and at the same time he’s always been a complete innocent. When we were little I used to bully him terribly. At eleven, a seven-year-old is a natural target for everything. And dear Duncan took it all with—well, eagerness. He’s never lost that. He expected me to take him in hand and order his life, and I suppose, as best I could with him being so far away in Lichfield, I did that. There are other cathedrals, you know, other organs. But he wouldn’t move, just couldn’t work up the energy. I suppose if it’d come to it, I’d have thrown it all up here, and gone to him.’
‘And left this house?’
She considered that seriously. ‘One thing I can thank her for, I suppose.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Glenda. I met her again before I’d made up my mind. I’d gone over to Lichfield—it’s not too far out of the way, coming here from London—to see Duncan. Richard, I don’t see that this is of any interest to you.’
‘Another time, perhaps?’
She rose from the chair, even at that time gracefully, and came up to me. Her eyes searched mine. ‘You realise why I’m telling you all this?’ she asked, touching my arm.
I took that as a genuine question. ‘So that I’ll understand about Duncan, and why he could not have killed his uncle.’
She slapped my lapel. ‘Wrong again. Sometimes, you can be quite stupid, Richard.’
‘Can’t help it. What were you saying?’
She walked away from me. ‘Oh…Duncan and me. I was intending to tell him, that day, that I was going to leave here and go to live with him. You understand—wait for any move from Duncan, and I’d wait for ever.’
‘Yes. I’ve met him.’
‘But he had to take me to the Bishop’s party. Said he was committed. And there she was. Glenda. In that setting—for a few seconds I didn’t recognise her. Ridiculous, because she hadn’t changed, so beautiful and so innoce
nt, and behind that pretty little doll’s face of hers…She saw who I was with. It was enough. The fact that it was my arm through Duncan’s told her all she needed to know, and he was as good as lost. In the first minute I knew it, Richard. I don’t think he said another word to me the whole evening.’
I cleared my throat. Her eyes came round to me. Pain in them. I said: ‘Why was she there? I can’t reconcile…’
‘She’d come with Clyde Greenslade.’
‘The porn king!’
The laugh she gave was hideous. ‘You’re as innocent as Duncan, I’ll swear. That was what he did—certainly—and that was what she did. My Glenda. But the shades of intention are very slim, Richard. A change in the angle of a spotlight, a soft-focus lens, a fractionally different camera angle…and it becomes art. Art imitating life, if that’s your taste. And Clyde—you must meet him—was always an expert at promoting his own image. Charities. Anonymous donations that’re leaked to the press. Gifts to the Church. He’d presented a tapestry he’d got his dirty hands on…something about the history of Lichfield.’
She had been speaking with hollow bitterness. Only the words ‘dirty hands’ revealed her feelings fully.
‘Lord, but we did have a row,’ she said, and her lips twitched to a smile. ‘As far as anybody could have a row with Duncan. He just stood there. How could I tell him she was my daughter? And the words I used…he just did not understand. Of course, once she saw she’d ruined everything for me, dear Glenda went back to London.’
‘With an introduction to Uncle Edwin, Duncan told me.’
‘That was a laugh. She went back to Greenslade and his art movies.’
‘So your uncle never knew about it, this trouble you had with Duncan?’
‘He knew,’ she said quietly.
‘He found out she was your daughter?’
‘No. Not that. Oh Richard, I don’t like talking about this. I should never have said…’
‘I’m sorry, but I must know.’
I was faced with the problem that her uncle’s murder had left me with a large selection of suspects, and no motive for it. The death of Glenda Grace held all the emotional possibilities to provoke a motive. I had to find the link.
She was standing by the window, with the lash of rain on the panes behind her, me by the empty fireplace. The door to the dining room opened, and Drew put in his shaggy grey head.
‘Rosemary, we’re ready.’
‘For God’s sake, get out!’ she flared at him.
His face shocked, he withdrew.
‘It’s gone on long enough,’ I said, not wishing to witness her distress any more.
‘You might as well hear the lot,’ she said, not containing her disgust, arms hugging themselves across her breasts. ‘I had a sort of breakdown. Duncan, I’m sure he’d have…kind of come back, if I’d tried. But…his distress! She’d just marched out of his life, offered him some sort of vague ecstasy, then snatched it away. I couldn’t offer that. I had some sort of a breakdown. I had to explain, to Uncle Edwin. He loved me, you know, Richard, in his strange way. All he said was…’ She tried to laugh, but it was strangely pathetic. ‘He said that at least Glenda had his thanks, because I’d come back to him. A year later, she was dead.’
She said this with finality, indicating that it was the end. But it wasn’t. Gently, I prodded her on.
‘That was at another of those wretched parties. Were you there?’
‘Of course I was there!’ she cried, in contempt at my poor use of logic. ‘It was Uncle Edwin’s flat. I lived there, when he was in London. And she came. Richard, I was sick. I mean that. Literally sick.’
‘Oh?’
‘She was with Drew Pierson. Dear Drew—on his arm, and with that mocking look in her eyes. I could have killed her.’
She covered her face with her hands. I hated to take it further. ‘The impression is that somebody did,’ I murmured.
Above her fingers her eyes pleaded.
‘I know…’ I held up a hand. ‘She fell. She was drunk. Or she was on drugs. Nevertheless, there’s been a suggestion that she was…helped on her way.’
‘Somebody…’ She swallowed, and tried again. ‘Somebody,’ she whispered, ‘seemed to think she was killed.’
‘There,’ I said. ‘What did I say?’ I cocked my head. ‘You’d heard?’
She shook her head. ‘I got a note. It said: “I saw you do it. Be at…” What does it matter where I was supposed to go?’
‘And did you? Go,’ I explained.
‘As though I would!’ She was scornful. ‘Why’re you looking at me like that?’
‘And nothing happened?’
‘What? Oh, I see. Of course not.’
‘Then they didn’t see you do it.’ I spread my hands, grinning.
‘D’you know, Richard, you could’ve been a pleasant man, if it wasn’t for your training. I’ve got to get out there. We’ll never get through it tonight.’
By some miracle, she’d put on her professional face. As she put her hand on the doorknob I said: ‘You didn’t tell me…did you hear your uncle’s car drive away?’
She turned, her eyes hard. ‘Damn you, Richard.’
‘Duncan says you weren’t with him when the engine sound died away.’
‘Then it must be true,’ she snapped.
‘I’m terribly afraid he might be banking on that.’
It held her. Straight-backed, she stood facing the door. ‘He’s coming here?’ Her voice was uncertain again.
‘I wouldn’t be at all surprised.’
She opened the door, went through, closed it behind her. I heard her voice raised.
‘All right, everybody. Let’s run through the next scene. That’s you, Mildred, and…’
Her voice faded as she walked away. I was left staring at the door, miserable, uncertain, and despising myself.
11
We didn’t get away from there before midnight. Amelia was fascinated by the rehearsals, and only weariness prevented her from staying to the end. I tried to utilise the opportunity, but I could do so only in snatches, and then in a tense whisper in the shadows at the side.
Amelia didn’t ask me what had happened in the library. Perhaps she failed to realise that Rosemary had changed. It was the change that disrupted the smooth flow of the play. She was acid and critical, pouncing in every minute or two to interrupt. I was surprised that the cast didn’t seem to mind. They were worried, though, I could see that.
I found Mervyn Latimer in the farthest corner at a card table, a tiny desk lamp clamped to its edge. He was the set designer, and his name was on the guest list of Edwin’s last party. I sat opposite him. He was working grimly over a batch of designs and sketches.
He barely glanced up at me, and seemed uninterested in my place in the scheme of things. Latimer was a small man, thin and mean-looking, and his eyes pecked from side to side, scanning the designs through huge spectacles with metal rims. His only comment as I settled on to a flimsy chair was: ‘She wants another settee in. Now she tells me.’
His voice was bitter. ‘Must be murder,’ I agreed, ‘working for a woman.’
He spared me another upward glance, wolfish, his teeth showing in a fevered grin.
‘She wants it, she gets it.’
‘Worked with her before, have you?’
‘Known her for years,’ he admitted, mumbling it through a pencil stuck between his teeth. ‘Wonderful director. Goddamn it, where am I goin’ to put the bookcase?’
He was the sort of man who complains in order to emphasise the difficulties, and thus burnish the triumph when he conquers them. ‘I understand you worked for her uncle, too.’
No reply. He rescued the pencil and scribbled a note across a corner. Then he slapped it down and sat back.
‘I know who you are. They warned me.’ He produced a battered pack of cigarettes. ‘Smoke?’ I showed him my pipe. He nodded, and lit up, cupping the match. ‘The law,’ he said, nodding again. ‘Don’t you chaps ever get
tired? You got your man, so why not forget it?’
He hissed smoke through his teeth. They were brown. He hooked one arm over the back of the chair.
‘I’m not the law,’ I explained. ‘And I’m not convinced the right man was sentenced.’
‘Hmm!’ He took the cigarette out of his mouth and stared at it. ‘I wasn’t, at the time. But nobody asked my opinion.’
‘Anybody in mind?’
‘Oh mate, give over.’
‘You were here, at the party, so you knew everybody.’
‘That’s it, you see. They were all his friends, and my friends too.’
‘Friends, for a failure party? That always struck me as strange.’
‘Somebody’, he said, ‘has been giving you wrong impressions.’ He tapped ash on to the green baize, swept it away, and ingrained it deeper. ‘Edwin wasn’t beaten. He knew he’d got the material. His plays. Valuable properties, those plays. It was all a matter of finance. Why d’you think Clyde Greenslade was there? Don’t let anybody fool you they were friends. Not since that kid Glenda died, they weren’t…’
‘About her…’
But he was into his full flow, all this conducted in a low tone, so as not to disturb the action on the floor. ‘It was finance, you see. Clyde’d got money. And good old Drew Pierson, he’d got money. Edwin knew he could get his finance, if he’d only let somebody else do the directing for the next play. That was what we were all there for. To persuade Edwin. It was the jam on our bread and butter we were thinking about.’
‘I see.’
‘Which’, he said, picking a shred of tobacco from his tongue, ‘was why Edwin’s performance was so strange. Even for him. All he wanted was to succeed as a director. Mad for it. Drooling at the chops. Couldn’t he see, either way he wasn’t going to direct another play! So why…and you can explain this…why the hell wouldn’t he think about it? Why couldn’t we get him set down still for a minute, to talk?’
‘I’m sure I don’t know.’
‘Going out for more booze! We wanted to get down to business. But he’d gotta go out for more damned booze. Jesus!’
An Alibi Too Soon Page 13